|
[
HOME
]
[ writings
]
[
biography
]
[
gay ferret
]
[
gay daily news ]
[
DREAMWalker Group ]
[
my great store ]
[
Promisetown Tales ]
[
Links
]
[
email
me ]
Site designed by
DREAMWalker
Group |
|
Henry and Sarah (Cindy)
- an exercise in point of view |
|
Tuesday, 7 December
1999, at 2:46 p.m. |
Sarah
(Cindy) - First person
I’m lying here on a bed with my eyes halfway shut
and all I can hear is the muffled sound of people walking eighty feet below me.
The paint smells really dry, as if the room hasn’t been painted for thirty
years. It’s a small room, with a double bed and a bathroom off to the side.
Somewhere over the noise of the people, I hear a neon sign buzzing like a
furious knat.
I’ve been here about three times – to
this hotel, I mean.
There was that guy from Passaic, New
Jersey, the one with the slight limp and bad breath – he confessed to
me that he thought of seducing his daughter. Made me feel all sorts of
butterflies in my stomach.
And there was Jimmy – who was from …
ummm … some city out west. He’d wanted me to agree to having another
woman present, but I’d said no. I can’t remember the third time, the
third guy, but I do remember walking past that creepy guy in the lobby
three separate times.
It really shook me up; a few minutes
ago, when this guy called me by his wife’s name– which is the same as
my own real name, Sarah. Of course, Henry – that’s his name -- didn’t
know he’d done it, but I sure knew. And it felt really weird, like
suddenly - out of nowhere - he went from being a stranger to somebody
who somehow KNEW me. But that was impossible.
It pulled me to attention, that’s for
sure, and almost made me mess up my act. I mean, I was able to go with
the flow, keep up the motions, but he had to have known. I could feel
my eyes change; like they were suddenly hard and afraid. His calling
me by name – he did it about three times -- it was even worse than the
weird clicking sound his teeth kept making when he kissed me. Or the
way his hair felt sort of course and hard.
I sure am feeling tired now, more so
than I usually feel after a trick. When I close my eyes really tight,
I can see my own apartment. But I feel almost too tired to get up. And
my muscles all ache and I feel like crying.
He – Henry – got out of bed a few
minutes ago and I could hear him rummagging through his pockets.
Getting my money. I’m pretty sure he’s good for a nice tip, but you
just never know. People always think that tricking is the hardest
part, being with a stranger. But it’s not. For me, it that split
second when I’m standing by the elevator or in a dark stairwell,
counting my pay. Will it be exactly two hundred dollars or a walloping
two-twenty-five or two-fifty. You just never know. And if it’s only
two hundred, you think, "What did I do wrong?"
Being with another guy’s wife isn’t too
bad. But did she have to have my name? It reminds me of how daddy was
always calling me mommy’s name by mistake. And what was really
mortifying was when he did it in front of my friends.
Well, water under the bridge and time
to get up. I’ll force myself into a reclining position, then into
standing. I can see it all now – since I’ve done it over a hundred
times this year (hell, seven times last week alone!). I’ll get
dressed, slide across the floor toward the door, and I’ll snatch up my
pay. If he’s there, I know I’ll smile sheepishly like a little girl
who got caught with her hand in the cookie jar. If he’s in the shower
(God, I hope he’s still in the shower!) I’ll hurry out the door and
not turn back.
On the way home, Ill get some tender
vittles for Snuffy. And tomorrow? Tomorrow ’ll call mom and wish her a
happy birthday.
---
Henry (Third Person)
Henry couldn’t stop thinking about his
wife during their time together. Even lying there after it was over,
watching the diminishing beams of light coming through the yellow
window, he found himself wondering what Sarah might be doing just
then.
He patted his hair with one hand while
he pulled the sheet up over his bare chest with the other one. As
Cindy lay there next to him, her head resting in the crook of his arm,
Henry could almost see his wife puttering around the kitchen, her
apron smeared with remnants of the dinner she had no doubt just
finished preparing for Joshua.
New York City was such a dirty town, he
thought, too dirty for the likes of the girl he had been with. He knew
she was really nothing more than a glorified tramp, but she was still
awfully nice. He’d met her about two weeks ago on the Internet, the
virtual equivalent he supposed, of the corner of 46th and 8th Avenue.
Still, the picture in her ad had shown a girl with some innocence --
something most of the girls he met never had. Lying there, he could
smell a light perfume on her neck, sweet and spicy, maybe a little
tangy too.
Henry knew it was time to get up and
leave, head back over to Grand Central Station where he would take the
train back to Connecticut. He rose and slowly began the process of
finding his clothes and putting them on. Cindy was silent on the bed
and he wondered if she was depressed or whether she was just tired
from being with too many clients.
Outside, the wind whipped around the
side of the building and Henry dreaded the thought of having to leave
the room. On his way to the bathroom, he fished $250 from his pocket
and dropped it on a wobbly card table near the door.
-- 30 --Back to
writings contents
Copyright © 1999 by Michael Walker
Michael Walker is a freelance writer in Washington, DC. He is also the founder
and proprietor of
DREAMWalker Group..
|