Chapter 66
Big Gook Meets The Cowboy
Anna Magenta gave good head: it was thoughtful, reflective. She let her mouth tell a story, a story of emptiness inside and the power of pleasure to make it numb. The girl let feel flow, sensation dictate: a loving stroke was followed by a pause- the notes she didn’t play- and Tom found himself smiling in spite of it all, unable to create a scenario for escape, too tired to deny the bliss. Anna’s cheek was swollen with pride.
She squeezed his knees, the four of them in this private lounge, Gentleman’s West on the boulevard, Tom looking down at Anna enterprising, enjoying her career choice. She winked her eye and puckered, storming the shaft as Atari saw God. Beside Tom sat the Cowboy, the blowjob on his dime, his way of you’re welcome. Tom caught an eyeful of the Cowboy’s member: august & ebony- noble- choking a Puerto Rican preteen. As Atari climaxed he took a moment to ponder, to wonder to himself aloud in silence: ‘Is that all there is to the circus?’
After the girls had eaten the Cowboy rolled a smoke, happy as a Saturday but clearly affected by little Coco’s performance: his hands made shake with the tobacco in the rolling paper and the subsequent cigarette hung from his fat lips skinny. With his ten-gallon hat restored to its home atop his nappy hair he was back in the saddle, the Cowboy once more, gleaming bright in his blue suit, living a lie.
Antony “Tony” Dare- the Cowboy- grandson of a slave, sipping on a Cantarito: so black he was purple. He was the only beneficiary to his grandmother’s fortune, she the widow of white oilman and pariah Frederick Dare. Freddy had fallen in love with his black cook Abigail and married her just before striking oil in Lousiana. When he died his money had gone to Abigail, and when she died the greazy money oozed its way into the hands of her favorite grandson Tony.
Idle, rich, the Cowboy had ambled out to Sick City several years on to piss his fortune away, reinventing himself as a Western hombre, ignoring his skin tone and speaking with a Texas accent, strange for a black boy from Louisiana. He tried his hand at producing independent features only to learn that Hollywood doesn’t like coloreds- even when they talk like John Wayne. After one incomplete Western he surrendered, his lust helping him settle on a career financing pornographic films, his days spent gambling the profits away and drinking in the sunshine.
Also tequila. Lots of tequila.
“The filthier the Mexican on the bottle,” Tony Dare inhaled, “the angrier the tequiza.” Neither he or Tom spoke, and then Tony, hearing his own words, began to laugh, and eventually Tom with him. General Marder- the bearded bastard on the bottle of booze- looked at the men with low-key disgust, just waiting for the opportunity to slit their throats. Anna was at another table with Coco, both of them mentally counting the bills.
“Some little white kid came up to me on the street... he wanted to know if I’d come to his birthday party...”
Tom laughed.
“On my horse. Do you believe these people?”
The music from the main stage leaking in through the paper walls... circular jazz so the girls could grind.
“Your girl Heather Jasmine... she was never gonna be in the movies...”
Atari looked over, suddenly sobered, certainly confused.
“That was just used as a bait. Just to get her out the house. Away from the folks.”
Tom’s almost asked: ‘How do you know?’ but he thought better, knowing Tony Dare the Cowboy never had to lie.
Atari wondered: ‘One of a hundred?’ and Tony, as if reading his mind, said aloud, “One of a thousand.”
The Cowboy downed a shot of tequila. “Guy I played in a poker game? He told me so.”
Atari could feel General Marder running wild in his bloodstream, recruiting revolutionaries, raping women and children.
“He was a big man. Nobody tell me who he was until afterwards.”
Atari, unable to speak, didn’t.
“They said, ‘Tony, that Mr. Lerner? That’s Isaac Lerner, head of MCM studios.’ You can bet I look him up after that.”
“Isaac Lerner? The head of MCM Studios?”
“That’s the man. They recruit the girls and then...”
Tom- shot glass in hand- forced himself to swallow. “And then...?”
Tony nodded. “Half make the pictures, the other half Project Geronimo.”
“He said that? He said ‘Project Geronimo’?”
“His words.” The Cowboy poured another ounce of poison. “What the fuck does it mean, anyway?”
Tom sat up, the sight of Big Gook turning his blood green. The Cowboy, stoned, could barely swivel his head.
Big Gook, a bucket of chow mein in a brown paper bag, yellow skin, front teeth to fuck the Easter bunny, head like a hot-air balloon. His real name was Ming Hung and the fact that he couldn’t speak English didn’t stop him from trying. He would have been a load of laughs if he didn’t work for Ed Goffrey as a collector.
As an enforcer.
“Good afternoon, gennerman.”
He had brought his friend with him, a short slope with cross eyes, a Fu Manchu, and his hand in his pocket.
“Oh no,” Tom Atari, reaching for his gun.
Anna and Coco- one of them surely having made the call- removed themselves from the room.
Big Gook laughed, showing off the blue of his teeth, Fu Manchu steady.
“Hello, Atari,” Big Gook, “don’t worry- today is not yo day today.” He smiled, a serpent unfurling, “We here for the Negro.”
Tom’s finger, rounding the trigger... Fu Manchu watching, ready to pull his piece.
Tony Dare turned to Tom, “You believe this shit? This is about gambling debts.” As if Tom didn’t know.
“You owe SO much money,” Big Gook turned over his shoulder to Fu Manchu, who found the subtle humor in the line without moving his eyes.
Big Gook gave good chuckle.
The Cowboy licked his massive lips: “Chris Lee gave me to the end of the month.”
The smile was gone from the Gook’s face, faster than cars drive through Montana.
“Chris Lee...? I don’t see him nowhere.” He stared at the Cowboy.
Tony Dare, sloshed, stood, and in a bolt of lightning Fu Manchu’s gun was pointed directly at his heart. Tom had let his guard down, fatal, would have been dead before the orgasm.
“Christ!” The Cowboy.
“Sit down.” Big Gook as traffic cop, turning to Fu Manchu, “No no.”
The gun must have had a mind of its own: Fu Manchu nodded in understanding but the Smith & Wesson didn’t move a muscle.
“We friends here. All buddies." Turning to Tom, "Right, buddy?”
Atari nodded, knowing when to fold. He put his gun on the table and sat back for what was next.
“Right, buddy?”
The Cowboy- hands in the air- lowered them slow, and then, tense, “Right.”
Big Gook pulled up a chair and sat across from the Cowboy. “Only in movies they shoot everybody with pistols. You no good to Mr. Goffrey if you dead. Don’t be a silly!”
It was the way he said ‘silly’ that made Tony laugh, kicking up his boots as his body shook, and then Tom was laughing too, exhaling, taking a much needed shot of General Marder’s righteous nectar. Tony lit a smoke.
Even Big Gook smiled as he pulled out the bowie knife: “But I do have to take you testicles.”
