Sexual Perversity in Chicago and the Duck Variations (5 page)

BERNIE
: So what are you guys going to do, maybe . . . what? Go to the zoo, or shopping? . . . She looked very intellectual.

DANNY
: Um.

BERNIE
: That's not always a bad thing.

DANNY
: No.

BERNIE
: I mean what the fuck, a guy wants to get it on with some broad on a more or less stable basis, who is to say him no.
(Pause.)
A lot of these broads, you know, you just don't know. You know? I mean what with where they've been and all. I mean a young woman in today's society . . . time she's twenty two-three. You don't know
where
the fuck she's been.
(Pause.)
I'm just
talking
to you, you understand.

DAN‘
S
apartment
,
DAN
and
DEB
are in bed
.

DANNY
: So tell me.

DEBORAH
: What?

DANNY
: Everything. Tell me the
truth
about everything. Menstruation. I know you're holding out on me.

DEBORAH
: It would be hard on me if it got out.

DANNY
: I swear.

DEBORAH
: It's under our conscious control.

DANNY
: I knew it!

DEBORAH
: We just do it to drive you crazy with the mess.

DANNY
: I just knew it . . .

DEBORAH
: Now you tell me some.

DANNY
: Name it.

DEBORAH
: What does it feel like to have a penis?

DANNY
: Strange. Very strange and wonderful.

DEBORAH
: Do you miss having tits?

DANNY
: To be completely frank with you, that is the stupidest question I ever heard. What man in his right mind would want tits?

DEBORAH
: You're right, of course.
(Pause.)
Ask me if I like the taste of come.

DANNY
: Do you like the taste of come?

DEBORAH
: Do I like the taste of come?

DANNY
: Yes.

DEBORAH
: Dan, I love the taste of come. It tastes like everything . . .
good
. . . just . . .
coming
out of your cock . . . the Junior Prom . . . an autumn afternoon. . . .

DANNY
: It doesn't taste a little bit like Chlorox?

DEBORAH
: It
smells
like Chlorox. It tastes like the Junior Prom.
(Pause.)
See what you cheat yourself of?

DANNY
: Yes.

DEBORAH
: Faggot. (Pause.)

DANNY
: Do you ever fantasize about making love with other women?

DEBORAH
: Do you fantasize when we make love?
(Pause.)
The last time we made love, I fantasized about other women.

DANNY
: The last time I masturbated I kept thinking about my left hand.

DEBORAH
: Did you?

DANNY
: Yes.

DEBORAH
: Did you?

DANNY
: Yes.

Pause.

I love making love with you.

DEBORAH
: I love making love with you.
(Pause.)

DANNY
: I love you.

DEBORAH
: Does it frighten you to say that?

DANNY
: Yes.

DEBORAH
: It's only words. I don't think you should be frightened by words.

Nursery School
,
JOAN
is lecturing two toddlers.

JOAN
: What are you doing? Where are you going? What are you doing? You stay right there. Now. What were the two of you doing? I'm just asking a simple question. There's nothing to be ashamed of.
(Pause.)
I can wait.
(Pause.)
Were you playing “Doctor"?
(Pause.)
“Doctor.” Don't play dumb with me, just answer the question. (You know, that attitude is going to get you in a lot of trouble someday.) Were you playing with each other's genitals? Each other's . . . “pee-pees"? . . . whatever you call them at home, that's what I'm asking (and don't play dumb, because I saw what you were doing, so just own up to it).
(Pause.)
All right... no. No, stop that, there's no reason for tears . . . it's perfectly . . . natural. But ... there's a time and a place for everything. Now .. . no, it's all right. Come on. Come on, we're all going in the other room, and we're going to wash
our hands. And then Miss Webber is going to call our parents.

The Toy Department at Marshall Field's
.
BERNARD
and
DAN
are shopping for a gift
.

DANNY
: Whose birthday?

BERNIE
: My nephew Bobby.

DANNY
: How old is he now?

BERNIE
: Going to be . . . six. Will you look at that?

DANNY
: What?

BERNIE
: They got a fucking fruit at the games counter. I can't believe this. In the midst of the toy department. At the games counter, talking to the kids all day long . . . a fairy.

DANNY
: Yeah.

BERNIE
: You know, one of those motherfuckers grabbed me when I was Bobby's age.

DANNY
: Where?

BERNIE
: At the movies, where else? We're all wondering what this old guy is doing at the cartoons, and he sits down at the end of the row, and halfway through he reaches over and grabs my joint. Reaches over
another
guy and grabs
me
by the joint.

DANNY
: Was he rough?

BERNIE
: What?

DANNY
: I mean, was he rough about it?

BERNIE
: Rough?
(Pause.)
I mean . . .
(Pause.)
Rough? What difference
how
he grabbed me? I mean, he's a
guy.

DANNY
: Yeah.

BERNIE
: And
I'm
a guy.
(Pause.)
But at the time I was only a
kid,
for chrissakes.
(Pause.)

DANNY
: You ever do that stuff when you were kids?

BERNIE
: What stuff?

DANNY
: You know. Stuff with other kids.

BERNIE
: Teasing? Like teasing the girls? Looking up their panties and so on?

DANNY
: No, I mean when you were really young kids. Fooling around with the other kids . . . the other boys.

BERNIE
: Fooling around? You mean like “messing” around with other boys?

DANNY
: Fuck no. I didn't mean that. I just meant . . . you know.

BERNIE
:
(Pause):
You mean fooling
around!
Sure, who didn't.

DANNY
: Yeah.

BERNIE
: Shit, we all used to fuck around.

DANNY
: Right.

BERNIE
: Even when we were little, shit. I mean you
learn
when you're young, right?

DANNY
: Right.

BERNIE
: And what you
learn,
that's what you
know.
Am I right?

DANNY
: One Hundred Percent. It's all in your . . .

BERNIE
: Head.

DANNY
: . .. approach.
(Pause.)

BERNIE
: It's in your what?

DANNY
: Approach?

BERNIE
: Right.

DANNY
: You know how to approach these things and you'll always be all right.

BERNIE
: You don't learn right when you're young, those cocksuckers ruin your life.

DANNY
: Who?
(Pause.)

BERNIE
: Anybody.
(Pause.)
Ruin it quicker'n you can turn around.

DANNY
: Take you and that guy in the movies, for instance.

BERNIE
: What do you mean?

DANNY
: Just that if you'd been a little
older
. . .

BERNIE
: Yeah?

DANNY
: Or maybe the guy, if he'd been a little . . . younger . . .

BERNIE
: What are you fucking talking about?

DANNY
: I'm saying that if the circumstances . . .

BERNIE
: What fucking circumstances? Some faggot queer got the hots for my joint at the cartoons.

DANNY
: I'm not talking about
extenuating
circumstances, I only mean the circumstances of what happened.

BERNIE
: And what exactly are you saying about them?

DANNY
: All I'm saying . . .

BERNIE
: . . . this happened
years
ago . . .

DANNY
: . . . is that it could possibly have been damaging to you.
(Pause.)

BERNIE
: Yeah?

DANNY
: . . . as a total Human Being.

BERNIE
: Damn right.

DANNY
: . . . and you're just lucky that it didn't.

BERNIE
: Well, what the fuck, I was only a kid.

DANNY
: Sure.

BERNIE
: A kid laughs these things off. You forget, you go on living . . . what the fuck, huh?

DEB
and
JOAN
‘
S
apartment
.
Late at night. They are lounging
.

JOAN
: Let's face it. He would prematurely ejaculate. There's no nicer way to say it. And the sooner he would come the guiltier he would feel and the sooner he would come. Because in some ways, of course, he was doing it to punish me. And he was doing a hell of a job of it.