Kissing the Beehive

Joe O'Brien had brought a six-pack of beer. Fra

Salvato was the first one up, the little ass kisser. Then my supposed best friend Joe O'Brien, Levao . . . they all rose and undid their zippers. I stayed seated and stared at McCabe. I hated him, hated what he was about to do for no reason in the world except boredom and pure mea

"Don't do it, Fra

He had both hands in front of his jeans. He looked at me over his shoulder and his expression changed – something new had come to him. "Okay! Hold your fire, boys! I'll tell you what, Sam. If you piss on them, we won't. How's that? Fair?" Delighted, the other guys looked back and forth between us. No matter how this one turned out, they were off the hook. Now they could relish Fra

"You want me to piss on my own dog? You're a fucking pervert, McCabe!" If I'd had an inch of courage, I would have punched him in the face. But this was Fra

"Rather be a pervert than a pussy, Bayer. So I guess it's time to give your doggy a golden bath, Sammy." Staring straight at me, he reached down and pulled out his dick. I quickly looked away. Next came the metallic hiss of the others unzipping accompanied by their embarrassed giggling.

Then pssssss . . .

I jumped up and ran back the way we had come. As I reached the other end of the hall, I heard Joh

Because I had avoided looking at the house, I hadn't seen that the ground all around was torn up and everywhere there were signs of construction.

"What're they doing here?"

Fra

From a distance, the building looked as ratty as it had years before. But as we got closer, I saw a great deal of renovation had already been done. There were new doors and windows with the labels still on the glass. Sections of the porch had been completely restored. There were highly polished brass ornaments on the banister and front door.

We climbed the steps and looked in the windows. Inside, the wooden floors glowed, their lush dark color contrasting perfectly with the fresh white on all the walls.

"Man! It's a little different from the last time I was here. Looks like a monastery."

"You wa

"How'd you get a key?"

"Sam, you keep forgetting I'm a cop."

"Were a cop. Aren't you on a leave of absence?" I followed him into the house and was immediately assailed with the acrid chemical smells of wood sealant and new paint.

"I'm going back to work next month. That was part of my deal with Magda."

"Good! Know what I was thinking about as we drove up here? The day you guys pissed on Joh

He shook his head. "Don't be so sure. She might piss on 'em with me. That's what I like about her. Come on, I want to show you something." He walked across the entrance hall, his leather heels clicking loudly on the shiny wooden floors.

It was such a contrast to the last time I'd been chez Tyndall. That day, the house was roasting and smelled like old ashes mixed with wet wool. Strewn everywhere were filthy, stained, broken objects you didn't want to touch. Today the rooms were white as a cloud, clean and empty. The smell was completely different but just as strong. It marched proudly into your nose and proclaimed that everything here was brand-new, sanded fine, freshly painted, ready to go. New life was about to begin.

"Remember my cousin Leslie DeMichael? He's foreman on this job. Knows I'm interested in the Ostrova case, so a couple of weeks ago he called and told me to come over. They'd found something when they were about to paint this room. Said I had to come see. It's right over here. I asked them to leave it like it was for a while. That's why they haven't finished." He pointed to one of the few unpainted walls. Crudely carved there was a cock and balls, looking like something a ten-year-old doofus would hastily draw on the wall of a public bathroom. Beneath it were carved the words, "Beehive and Bone – forever." I ran a finger into the deeply gouged letters of the words.

"I wonder who did this?"

"Pauline, dummy! That's why I wanted you to see it. Magda told me. You know Eddie called her Beehive. Bone was her nickname for him. Very few people knew that. He was supposed to have had a dick like a sequoia tree."

"How do you know about Durant's penis, Fra

"Jitka. Pauline told her. She used to come up here all the time to have sex. Something about a haunted house that made her horny."

"Pauline used to fuck in this house? Get out of here!"

"It's true. And not just Edward Durant either. Before him there were others. Remember, though, back in those days you didn't have so many places to go. You either did it on the backseat of a car, out in the woods, or . . . the Tyndall house. At least here you had a roof over your head."

I shuddered in disgust. "Phooey! You remember what this place was like! What it smelled like. How could anyone be turned-on by that?"

"Oh excuse me, Mr. Bestseller, but weren't you recently together with a woman who made porno films and was in the Malda Vale? No offense but, uh, some people would find that a little weird."

"True. But why are we here, Fran? Not just to see this."

"No, but guess who told me first about Pauline coming up here? Veronica Lake! Last time she was here; knew all about it. Jitka only filled in the details. Your ex-girlfriend may be unstable, but she knows how to find out things. If she were normal, she would make a good cop.

"Anyway, we're here today because I see this house like our relationship, Sam. We had a history before, but now the whole thing's changed. New paint, walls, everything.

"The other day Magda asked me who my real friends were. I said you." His eyes narrowed and his mouth tightened, as if he was afraid of what my reaction would be. "You and two other guys. That's it – three people on earth. I don't know if that's great or pathetic, but that's how it is. What do you think?" He did a nervous little two-step, like a boxer standing in his corner waiting for the bell to ring.

"I'm very touched. And I agree – I think of you as a good friend, Fra

"Good! That's a relief. But if we're going to be real friends, then there are things you gotta know. The main one being I'm a junkie. I've been one on and off for years. It started when I got bored in Vietnam. Nobody knew it but Magda and now this psychiatrist I go to, Dr. Dudzinska. Magda made me go. Said she wasn't going to live the rest of her life with a fuckin' junkie and she's absolutely right.

"The guy who shot me was a dealer. I owed him a thousand dollars and didn't feel like paying. So he comes up to me that day and says real friendly, 'Fran, what about my thousand?' I say, 'Hey, Loopy, I don't have it right now.' So darling Loop shoots me in the stomach. Simple and to the point. No hard feelings – just business.