In Dark Corners (44 page)

The spotlight blinks out abruptly, and she turns around; but even in the darkness you can see she is covering her pelvic area with her hand. In the dim light she moves along the ramp, coming closer and closer to where you sit, stopping at each row or so, squatting, and raising her hand. Because of the angle you can't really see anything, but the suggested revelation has the crowd in a noisy uproar of anticipation.

She is directly above you, squatting, and—

You now have a direct view of her crotch, only a couple of feet away, but there is
nothing
to see.

Only her wrinkled dark lips.

No
secret hair.

As she stands and moves down the ramp, you remain in place, staring ahead, at the empty stage, feeling numb.

No hair.
None at all
. Shaven…?

Finally, the theater is emptying out—all the noisy, bad people—the spectacle is over. Drained, you stand up and leave, feeling cheated.

***

A few nights later, with the oral directions and lewd encouragement given you by Wilber at the hospital laundry—he works close to you on the big washers—you take the Downtown bus to the tenderloin.

As you dismount the bus into the crowd of pedestrians, your senses are bombarded:
Loud noise
—cars braking, horns blaring, people shouting, western music thundering from an open entry to a bar.
Bright light
—colorful neon glowing, headlights glaring from cars, stoplights blinking red, yellow, green.
Varied smells
—gasoline and diesel, spicy barbequed meat, sweet perfume. And an
electric tingling
of excitement in the muggy air, like just before a thunderstorm.

You gasp, senses overloaded, stumble out of the moving crowd, and lean up against a window front, wiping your face with a handkerchief.

A voice whispers behind you, "Yo, big fella."

You turn and stare.

The black woman is dressed in a low-cut, leopard skin blouse and a black vinyl mini-skirt, her short kinky hair a deep indigo color. She tries to smile through her gaudy make-up, managing only a kind of leer.

You almost shudder, but restrain yourself. "Y-Yo b-back."

She chuckles, moving in closer, pushing her large breasts against your shoulder. You can smell the heavy perfume, but it doesn't quite mask a stronger, unpleasant odor, vaguely familiar…like the gym locker room at Chula Vista full of many young men, sweating heavily: dirty socks, dirty jocks. You close your eyes, but are unable to keep your arms from goose-pimpling.

"Hey, man, ya'all lookin' to party or what?" asks the painted woman.

You nod, stammer, and stamp your foot, finally able to ask, "H-H-H…How much?"

The woman stares back, then shrugs slyly, "Depends, what ya'll got in mind?"

This time you have to stamp down hard, "J-J-J…Just want to l-l-l—"but it's no good; you're unable to get out the last word. "L-L-L-L—"

But the black woman helps. "Say,
look
?"

You blink and nod, gratefully.

"Ya'll want to watch me do another guy—?"

You shake your head vigorously.

"Ah, another chic—?"

"No," you manage to say forcefully.

"Well, what do you wanna see?" she asks impatiently now, a puzzled look marring the mask.

"J-J-Just you…" You point at her and smile encouragingly.

"Jes' me, nekkid?"

You nod.

She nods back. "Okay, how 'bout, ah," she pauses, gazing into your eyes as if searching for the right number. "Oh, twenny bucks? Twenny bucks to look at me nekkid for a couple minutes."

You nod, reaching in your pocket for the money.

***

You are in a dingy hotel room on lower K Street, and the painted woman is facing you, completely stripped of clothes.

You just stare at her naked crotch, speechless.

Her secret hair is very kinky down there but dyed an unusual shade,
pink
, the color of a flamingo. You can't believe it. You edge a step closer, point with your finger, and shake your head.

The woman giggles. "Hey, I know, cute, ain't it?"

Cute? You can't resist reaching out and touching her down there with your fingertips, the tight pink curls drawing your hand like a magnet. Then you grab her tightly around the waist in one arm, while you stroke her secret hair gently, amazed by its stiffness and almost metallic texture. Pink steel wool—

"Hey, buster," the woman hollers angrily into your face, "ya'll paid to look, not cop a feel…"

She struggles to get free, but you are gripping her even more tightly now with your free arm, pulling her to you roughly.

She screams loudly, "Hey, back off, mister…Charlie, hey, Charlie—?"

The door of the room bangs open, and a huge black man rushes in, swinging something from his hand.

A blinding thunder rumbles through your head…and you sink down into dark nothingness.

***

You awaken in an alley behind the hotel, your head bursting with pain. You have to get home, but your wallet is gone and all your change. Despite the throbbing and huge bump on your forehead, you must walk, each step sending a sliver of steel jarring into the sinuses behind your eyes.

On and on, back up J street you go, block after block, a mile or two…

Eventually you make it back to your apartment by the hospital, and to bed. Before you drop off to sleep, you hear a Voice in your head—but it's just a far-off weak echo,
Sam Boy, it is time to call Father John. You need his help, again
. Yes, it is the Light Angel's voice, but so distant and weak.

You are too hurt to respond and so very sleepy.

***

You slowly awaken again, your head pounding, your mouth dry, your tongue thick, dim light shining into your room from the streetlamp outside your window. Even after a shower and two Excedrin, you still feel funny. Kind of like you are watching something happen, not really involved, your movements directed by someone else.

You lie back down on the bed and remember the business with the bad woman, her amazing pink-colored kinky hair, and the black man bursting into the room, hitting you over the head with something very hard—it all seems unreal too, not something that actually happened to you, but like remembering a scene from a movie you've recently watched.

The Voice that shouts loudly in your head is real:
The time is at hand for vengence.

You gasp with recognition.

It is Him, the other one, the Dark Angel.

Then, the glare from the streetlight outside the open window is partially blocked out by the silhouette of a winged figure, who casts His shadow halfway across your room, the humid air stirred into a hurricane by His beating wings; and for the first time in your life you actually see
Him
. The Dark Angel is hovering before you in the dimness of your room!

You squint, attempting to get a clearer view, but it is like trying to make out a figure on a photographic negative held at arm's length.

"Yes, it is really me," He admits, as if privy to your thoughts, his throaty-hoarse voice growling loudly in the tiny room.

You are too stunned to even answer, but you manage to rise again from the bed, forgetting your aches and pains.

"It is time to cut down your enemies with impunity," he orders, still hovering, wingbeats continuing to churn the heavy air. You move a step or two into His shadow and stop, the temperature appearing to drop at least forty degrees. You briskly rub your arms, trying to warm yourself.

"Here is your instrument of vengeance," the Dark Angel announces.

A glint catches your eye, and you reach out, forgetting your chilled state, accepting the instrument…an ebony-handled, straight razor.

"My shadow will hide you from your enemies," He says, moving back toward the window.

You follow Him across the room, able to pause only momentarily, trying to catch a fleeting glimpse of yourself in the mirror over the dresser, before stumbling along in his wake. The mirror reflects
nothing
except a faint shimmering distortion in the middle of the shadow, where your image should appear even in the dimness.

But before you can speak, the voice of the Dark Angel again thunders in your ears, ordering, "Come…The woman with the thick red hair made fun of your name, mocked you."

In the icy darkness, you nod to yourself, growing angry. It is time now, time for vindication. You follow Him out the window.

***

The Dark Angel hovers overhead. You wait in His shadow at the far end of The Red Impala Diner, blending into the darkness, a part of the night. You wait patiently, smiling wryly to yourself.

Footsteps…

Here she comes—Mary Ann—walking carefree, obviously happy to be off work at the Golden Pheasant Club. She passes within inches of you, her shoulder almost brushing against your chest; but you shrink back into the wall, deeper into the shadows, letting her pass by untouched.

Then you follow.

At the entrance to her apartment building, Mary Ann pauses, turns, looks back directly at you, a frown of suspicion on her face, as if she senses something. After a moment she shrugs and takes out her key to the building's main door.

You hurry to her side, always in His shadow, slipping in behind her when she opens the door, unseen; then quietly you follow her upstairs, into her apartment.

Finally, you are inside her tiny room again; and you glance around, vividly remembering the last time…her mocking jokes, her howling laughter.

She goes into the tiny kitchen, opens the refrigerator for a drink of something.

She re-enters the bedroom, flipping on a bright light. Then, Mary Ann gasps with surprise, not more than a croak really, her throat paralyzed with fear—

For you have left His shadow as the Dark Angel hovers in the night just outside the opened bedroom window; and you stand facing the terrified woman, naked and hairless, clutching the instrument of vengeance in your hand. Slowly you flip open the straight razor, the glint of steel matching the glint of fear lighting up her dead eyes and making your pulse race.

You edge closer.

And this time it is Mary Ann who remains frozen in place like a statue…

***

You stare into the mirror over the dresser at yourself, reaching up, wiping the trickle of red from your forehead, and adjusting the spiked reddish-brown hair; then you look down at the patch of coarse darker red hair, and you smile, glancing at your swollen manhood.

Looking back over your shoulder at the woman lying still on the bed, you chuckle and announce flawlessly, "That's right, Mary Ann, I am indeed Samson."

You begin to move across the tiny room toward the window, but you pause, hearing something. A distant whisper. Someone calling your name,
Sam Boy
?

You strain to hear more, cocking your head and listening intently for a few moments—

***

No!

No, it is indeed too late now, there is nothing to hear except the whirring sound of the Dark Angel's impatient wingbeats, beckoning you; and you step to the open window, back into the chill of His shadow…shivering violently.

The Snatch

The asteroid trawler, 49er, on route from its lunar home base at New San Francisco to a mining site in the asteroid belt, came to an unexpected stop, as if caught by a giant invisible hand, the unique event taking the entire crew completely by surprise.

Then, before anyone inside the ship could react in any way, a finger from the invisible hand outlined the bullet-shaped craft with a pencil-thin, faintly luminescent line that quickly increased in intensity to a brilliant neon-blue for a moment or two, just before ship and crew disappeared from the Solar System.

One moment there, next moment gone!

Indigo Glass

It was indeed an odd cell, if one could accurately call it that, Jacob Silva thought, as he paced off the distance across the circle, for the seventh time in his week of confinement. Yes, still twenty feet, give or take an inch or two. Then, after slipping off his right boot and leaving it against the wall as a marker, he ran his hand along the wall surface as he carefully paced off the interior circumference again. One hundred fifty-six feet or so, back to the spot where he'd left his boot. Not a seam, crease, or crevice detectable in the wall either; and it was the same no matter where Jake felt. He'd worked carefully around the wall a dozen times, searching high and low for the hint of a door, a window, any possible exit; and moving his chair about, he'd stood on it and carefully examined every inch of the low-hanging, curved ceiling. Nothing but smooth, unbroken surface, everywhere he felt.

Jake was inside a half-domed room with no detectable method of ingress or egress, containing only himself, a bunk like bed, and a small table and chair, the furniture made from a light-weight, but very strong, plastic-like substance. The wall and ceiling material were a glasslike element, a deep indigo in color, giving off a faint blue luminescence that provided enough light to see clearly and, apparently, enough warmth to keep the temperature quite comfortable.

At different times, a pencil-thin line of luminescence would coalesce and intensify into blinding neon-blue and food would suddenly appear on the table in plastic serving dishes, a variety of exotic cereal-like substances, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and drinks, all quite tasty and apparently nutritious, for Jake felt healthy and strong. From time to time the blue line even provided entertainment and instruction of Earthly origin, what appeared to be videos from the library of the 49er, played on a screen that suddenly coalesced in the same manner in the air of the cell.