The Book of Skulls

In the middle of the night I felt a certain pressure of the bladder and went searching for a john in that maze of hallways and doorways. I opened a few wrong doors. Heaps of humanity everywhere. Out of one room, sounds of passion, the regular, rhythmic bouncing of bedsprings. No need to peek: that had to be Oliver the Bull, giving his Judy her sixth or seventh ride of the night. She’d walk bowlegged for a week by the time he got through with her. Out of another room, snores and whistles: begorrah, kinky Ned’s sweet sow at her slumbers. Ned was sleeping in the hall. Enough was enough, I guess. At last I found a john, only it was occupied by Eli and Mickey, taking a shower together. I didn’t mean to intrude, but what the crap. Mickey struck a delicate Grecian pose, right hand over the black bush, left arm flung across the very minimal jugs. I would have believed she was fourteen or younger. “Excuse me,” I said, backing out. Eli, dripping, naked, came out after me. I said, “Don’t make a hassle, I didn’t intend to intrude on your privacy,” but that wasn’t what was on his mind at all. He asked me if we could swing a fifth passenger for the rest of the trip. “Her?” He nodded. Love at first sight; they had clicked, they had found real happiness in each other. Now he wanted to bring her along. “Christ,” I said, coming close to waking everybody up, “have you told her about—”

“No. Just that we’re going to Arizona.”

“And what happens when we get there? Do you bring her to the skullhouse with us?”

He hadn’t thought it through that far. Dazzled by her modest charms, he could see only as far as his next fuck, our brilliant Eli. Of course it was impossible. If this had been pla

“No.”

“And anyway, does it have to be such a fucking secret, Timothy?”

“Are you out of your tree? Aren’t you the very one who practically made us take a blood oath never to reveal a single syllable of the Book of Skulls to—”

“You’re shouting. They’ll hear everything.”

“Right on. Let them hear. You don’t want that, do you? To have these chicks here find out about your Fu Manchu project. And yet you’re ready to let her in on the whole thing. You aren’t thinking, Eli.”

“Maybe I’ll forget about Arizona, then,” he said. I wanted to take him and shake him. Forget about Arizona? He organized it. He lured the necessary three other males into it. He went on for hours and hours to us about the importance of opening your soul to the inexplicable and implausible and the fantastic. He goaded us to set aside mere pragmaticism and empiricism and perform an act of faith, et cetera, et cetera. Now a winsome daughter of Israel spreads her legs for him and he’s willing in a flash to give the whole thing up, just to be able to spend Easter holding hands with her at the Cloisters and the Guggenheim and other metropolitan cultural shrines. Well, crap on that. He got us into this, and, entirely leaving out of the picture the question of how much faith we really had in his weirdo immortality cult, he wasn’t going to shuck us that simply. The Book of Skulls says that candidates have to present themselves in fours. I told him that we wouldn’t let him drop out. He was silent a long while. Much gulping of the Adam’s apple: sign of Great Internal Conflict. True love versus eternal life. “You can look her up when we come back east,” I reminded him. “Assuming that you’re one of those who comes back.” He was pronged on one of his own existential dilemmas. The bathroom door opened and Mickey peered chastely out, bath-toweled. “Go on,” I said. “Your lady’s waiting. I’ll see you in the morning.” Finding another john some where beyond the kitchen, I relieved myself and groped through the darkness back to Bess, who greeted me with little snorting sighs. Caught me by the ears, pulled me down between her bouncy, rubbery knockers. Large breasts, my father told me when I was fifteen, are rather vulgar; a gentleman chooses his women by other criteria. Yes, Dad, but they make groovy pillows. Bess and I celebrated the rites of spring one final time. I slept. At six in the morning Oliver, fully dressed, woke me. Ned and Eli were up and dressed already, too. All the girls were asleep. We breakfasted silently, rolls and coffee, and were on the road before seven, the four of us, up Riverside Drive to the George Washington Bridge, across into Jersey, westward on Interstate 80. Oliver did the driving. Old Iron Man.

chapter eight

Oliver

Don’t go, LuA

Death. What does poor simpleheaded LuA

Death, LuA