Leaving Las Vegas (16 page)

Eventually returning to his bed, this time naked, Sera finds that her indifference has grown, her diffidence flagged, her acceptance become all-consuming, like a well-matured cancer.
She takes him into her as if he were a trick; perhaps the biggest, baddest, god-trick of all time, but still a trick. He rocks on her, wrapped tightly in his own thoughts. She is a hollow doll, a million billion miles away from an orgasm. Al’s a vigorous lover, and she knows that this will go on for a long time; in fact, this all could go on forever.

She anticipated some pain, but now she finds that she can barely feel him. His penis, though quite large, is causing merely an imprecise pressure inside of her, like the willful abuse of a post-Novocain dentist’s drill. It’s new to her, this numbness. In all these years she’s always
felt
it, and she vaguely pines for the pain that summarized her dignity. He can’t hurt her now. He can—and will—do whatever he wants to her, but he can’t hurt her. Anyone can do anything to her; she couldn’t care less.

And now, the sun. Just the top of an orange disk visible through his open window, it always moves with unexpected swiftness at rise and set. Al has been waiting, watching for hours in the darkness of his room, and the Strip is remarkably silent and still.

He told Sera to leave at some time during the night—he can’t remember when—and came to this window, sat down and crossed his legs. His erection is still with him, looking out of place as men’s erections do and causing him great distress, throbbing and aching relentlessly. At first he was quite proud, pounding into her with no end in sight; he imagined her to be frightened, delighted, impressed. Then an hour passed, and he still was not delivered. In pain himself, he dare not even think of how she was holding up, and it was pure determination and fear of humiliation that drove him well into the next hour, when finally he rolled off of her and sent her away. He feels no excitement, no concupiscence, yet still
his penis burns hard, threatening to split his skin. Afraid even to touch it, he tries to concentrate on the sun as a way to distract his misery.

Years ago Gamal Fathi, a boy in Oman when that country was all but sealed off from the twentieth century by Sultan Said ibn Taimur, had a sister named Manal who fell ill with a mysterious sickness that drove her to her mattress with fever and shivers. After four days his father, a man of some limited wealth, went in search of medicine to the home of an aging European who was rumored to have such things. The quest, dangerous, very expensive, and of dubious legality, was successful to the degree that he returned with a clay pot of prescribed liquid before it was too late. Everyone had considered the journey to be impossible and rejoiced at the miraculous accomplishment, convinced that the will of Allah had been revealed to them. And because of this, their grief was that much more unbearable when, after drinking the medicine, Manal convulsed and died within the hour. Gamal felt tricked, his young mind unable to follow the logic of the purpose. His father set off to kill the man who sold him the medicine, and he never returned.

Al’s erection has at last died. A knock at his door startles him—odd for this hour of the morning. Pulling his pants on, he goes to answer it.

“Who is there?” he says, his hand on the knob, instinctively prepared to pull or push in an instant.

A young voice from the other side answers, “Service, Mr. Frisk. I have your breakfast. Shall I use my key?”

Disappointed by the apparent lack of intrigue, Al throws open the door with the intention of berating the boy for his mistake: “Why do you bother me!…,” but is stopped by the sight of the face, wide-eyed and whitened with fear, purely American, and as such, both bland and limitless. “You have the wrong room,” says
Al, in a much subdued tone, a virtual whisper.

The boy extracts a green piece of paper from his uniform pocket and looks at it. Unsteadily, he says, “Sorry, sir. I’m sorry.” He looks at the number on the door. “Oh… oh no. I’m on the wrong floor. I’m so sorry to wake you, sir. I got off on the wrong floor.” An attempted smile and a clumsy half-bow, and he is off on his way, the sound of a squeaky wheel on his cart Dopplering away to the hungry Mr. Frisk.

“I wasn’t sleeping,” says Al in an impossibly low voice. He knows the boy couldn’t have heard him.

He goes into the bathroom, and after shutting tightly the door, lies down on the floor. He feels the cold hard tile against his ribs, porcelain at his back and colder still. It is not as it used to be. Something is wrong with Sera. She is soft; he is too easy, perhaps out of practice. Everyone stares at him, yet no one knows him—he knows no one. Las Vegas stinks. It is loud and hot. He hates this city, his little room.

This will undoubtedly go on for the next few days, thinks Ben as he stares at his naked wrist, expecting to see but failing to find his
once prized Rolex. The watch has been swapped as planned for a few dollars at one of Las Vegas’ always cheerful pawn shops. Now, instead of a thirty-five hundred dollar Swiss watch, Ben has two hundred and fifty dollars and a vacant wrist—a bargain to go along with his basement. Rather than blend this money in with his working capital, he decides to keep it apart and use it deliberately for one single thing. After all, he didn’t pawn the watch for money. He pawned it to reaffirm his commitment to himself, to serve as an evidential footnote in his final chapter. So it is appropriate that
any incidental money received from the transaction be used to complete the composition, to create a symmetry of action. More than appropriate, it is important. It is important because he needs to have something be important.

Maybe an overpriced hooker would be a good choice, someone to accept his last blast of semen, his final genetic statement. Too well paid to douche in his hotel room, the girl would leave with soggy underpants and shower at home. Hours later, the last of his DNA—possibly surviving him—would be wiped off the back seat of a cab with a paper towel.

His room is actually more of a motel room than a hotel room, probably because it is part of a motel, not a hotel. He had planned to stay in one of the many colorful towers that decorate the Strip, but was unable to come to terms with the corporate mentality regarding a reasonable extended stay rate. There were other problems too. Slightly suspicious of his motives and doubtful about his condition, the big hotels he tried were reluctant to suspend maid service on a daily basis, and Ben didn’t want a good bedridden binge interrupted by Mrs. Clean; he also didn’t want anyone fucking with his liquor. He was ultimately able to negotiate acceptable terms with the manager/owner of the Whole Year Inn—read the Hole You’re In—one of the smaller motels that stand on what could easily be imagined as vacant lots, up and down the Strip. For one hundred and fifty dollars Ben gets a room for a week, self-service at the maid’s cornucopian cart, and unlimited use of the ice machine and pool—No Life Guard on Duty. If there’s a problem he can always move to a hotel, though he is charged in advance for each week here. In any case, he’ll try to time it so that he gets a good view for his last days on the Strip, and week in or week out, Bank of America will write
their
whole loss off.
Moving may take a few trips. Whenever he returns to his room he brings with him a bottle or two of something or other, and after less than a week here he already has quite a little stockpile of booze, a trick that he could never or would never manage in LA. Always have access to a drink. The little room holds several inventories. There are bottles under the bed, in the drawers of the particleboard dresser, on the toilet tank, one in the toilet tank, in his suitcase, small ones in the pockets of dirty clothes, chilled ones in a styrofoam cooler that he bought, and a few more under the bed—in case of an emergency. As he watches television and sucks vodka he can feel the presence of all his liquor, surrounding and always beckoning, comforting but not reassuring.

After pawning the watch this morning he spent some time at poolside, watching a fat family from the midwest splash around in the dirty water. They are staying at the motel for two days as part of their vacation and seem to be satisfied with the accommodations. Talking with them, Ben felt a great sense of admiration for their general contentment, but he knows that this wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny; their life could no more work for him than his for them, nor would he want it to. He was also impressed with the friendliness that this cholesterol-ridden, white-skinned little family exuded, a virtue that tends to run rampant in the midwest. Now, after his swim, he takes it easy on his bed, in front of the television, putting the final touches on his argument to himself in favor of buying a girl tonight, and selling his car tomorrow.

The trip from Los Angeles, the last time that he has driven, was indeed difficult for him. At this late date it has become nearly impossible to strike the balance of maintenance in his blood alcohol level. The line between too much and too little has long since become far too fine for his blurred vision to discern. So he is loath to get behind the wheel and jeopardize his best laid plans,
not to mention the well being of the population of Las Vegas. There are cabs available anywhere, anytime in this city should he feel the urge to go someplace far. Las Vegas has also helped to rejuvenate his penchant for walking. Though he is physically no longer capable of the long, brisk walks that he used to take around Venice, he is perfectly happy to stumble up and down the Strip at night, swerving and tripping, a menace only to himself. Vegas has always had this attraction for him, the world’s most amusing walking grounds, sober or drunk. So really his car has become something of a liability, a loose end. He can imagine it now: he’s lying on the bed, sighing with relief as he realizes that he is gasping for his last breath, only to be interrupted—saved—by the manager/owner of the Whole Year Inn, who has come by to complain about the abandoned car in his parking lot. More realistically, owning a car is not exactly conducive to the anonymity that he is seeking here. The car must go. Tomorrow he will take it to one of the resale lots on Fremont and no doubt strike as good of a bargain for it as he did for the Rolex this morning.

As far as a hooker goes, concerning the skirt, pussy to be bought and paid for, perhaps even actually indulged in, his feeling is: of course. He wants to talk to a girl, a girl, girl, girl, girl. If his dick still works maybe he will even fuck her. His money is holding out just fine and can be easily concealed. He no longer has anything else to lose. At this point in his life—very nearly the period—the only thing that he could possibly crave, the only nonalcoholic thing, is a warm body. Up close evidence that life does go on. This will be his secret bargain, his revenge many times over for the watch and the car. He’ll pilfer this little piece of ecstasy from a girl who thinks that he is paying for mere sex. She’ll come to him, wielding her savvy and thrusting forth her hard earned survival, and he, unbeknownst to her, will suck off an extra hour for his own life. He will feel her heart beat and sit in joyous
wonder of her, someone who takes the trouble to work so hard just to live so hard: a neat trick.

Sera, looking rather glum and spectral, yet more intact than she has recently, stands on the sidewalk with her hands on her hips. The bruises that adorned her face have run away during the night, much the same way that they appeared, leaving only the cut on her cheek to suckle nutrition as it matures into Al’s indelible signature. Moving headlights catch and play with her features, little shadows dance lightly over her impassive eyes. Pursuant to Al’s request, she is working the Strip tonight. But something is missing, and she can’t imagine how she once took such satisfaction in standing on this little patch of sidewalk… This little patch of sidewalk… Not unlike a confused cat on a dark road, she is experiencing one of those dormant moments of self-hypnosis and is somewhat mesmerized by the traffic. The slam of a car door stirs her, and she turns toward the sound.

Ben is standing on the driver’s side of his car. “Hello,” he says.