A night of profound love

I was looking for healing, so I drove to a house of ill repute.

When I arrived, the madam took me by the hand and asked me to repent for my sins, but I wasn’t in any mood for repentance; it was the Sabbath, and I’d recently recovered from a bout of bacterial gastroenteritis. As she lit an opium-laced bidi, she told me a fairy tale about grief and loss. When

the curtain finally fell on the third act of her story, she was laughing, but Iwas in tears.

I was about to excuse myself when an up-and-coming ingénue appeared. She was pale, frail, and had a G-rated walk and an X-rated face.

The madam (she was really a madwoman) introduced us.

“Lolita, I’d like you to meet…”

“Boris,” I lied.

I could feel Lolita sizing me up. Her eyes focused on my package for about two and a half seconds. Not that I’m bragging.

“How long have you been alone?” Lolita said.

I swallowed with some difficulty and felt my Adam’s apple bobbing and my nervous system short-circuiting. “Alone?” I said.

“Looks to me like you need a little lovin’ in your heart,” she said, smiling like a woman alive in the line of duty.

My first impulse was to run away (that always seems to be my first impulse whenever confronted by a strong woman). Still, I maintained eye contact and even managed to smile (although my erection subsided).

“Do you enjoy your work?” I said.

Lolita looked at the madam, who rolled her eyes and pursed her lips.

“We don’t typically describe our work as enjoyable,” the

madam said. “But it sure beats the hell out of bein’ an admin assistant.”

They both laughed. It was one of those two-fold laughs designed to humiliate me and stop me from saying anything else.

“If it’s a hiding place you want,” Lolita said. “I think I can provide you with a shroud of privacy.”

“Or perhaps you like the zaftig, chatty type,” the madam said, signaling for one of the other girls.

“Actually, uhh,” I said.

“Oh, don’t worry,” the madam said. “She’s as gentle as rain.”

“I really should go,” I said. “I’ve had this bacterial gastroenteritis thing and…”

“Ursula!” croaked the madam.

Just then, a wasp-waisted qualmish femme fatale entered the room.

“Ursula’s still exfoliating quiet hysteria from her pores,” she said to the madam; then she looked at me. “Perhaps I can quell your hunger.”

“This is Adrianna,” the madam said with a smirk. “She says she was put here on earth to enable the divine unfolding of the universe.”

“Well,” Adrianna said. “My word is all I have.”

Lolita rolled her eyes, sat down, got on her cell phone and ordered a refill of liquid Valium.

“Well, I’ll leave you two alone,” the madam said, leaving the room.

Adrianna approached me, wiping allergies from her eyes. “I don’t want you to be intimidated around me because I realize, like, I project that all the time.”

“I’m not,” I said. “I’m just trying to acclimate myself to my

surroundings.”

“Mmm. A man of letters.”

“Not really. I was in prison. I read the dictionary a lot.”

“What did you do?”

“Grand theft and vandalism.”

“Excuse me?”

“I stole a koi fish from a Japanese restaurant, barbequed it, and ate it.”

“Hunh…”

“It was a fraternity prank. Spent a year in the county jail.”

“Interesting.”

“I think the district attorney was just trying to make a name for him in order to position himself for the state senate, he prosecuted me.”

“A real-life felon. That’s a turn-on.”

“Misdemeanor.”

“Ahh-hah.”

That’s when her beeper sounded. As soon as she realized who was beeping her, she practically began to hyperventilate.

“Oh my God. Oh my God! Oh my God, oh my God! Habib! It’s Habib!”

“Who’s Habib?”

“He’s an African prince from the Republic of Congo. Well, he says he’s a prince. I think he’s just using that as an angle, but he is loaded. And he loves white women. And he’s gotta huge…Well, you don’t wanna hear that. Anyway, it was great to meet you!”

“Same here.”

Adrianna began gathering her belongings. “I really wanna hear more about your time in the county jail,” she said. “I hear such horror stories. Must’ve been awful…”

“It was mostly a question of holding onto the soap, really,” I said.

She laughed. “Oh, that’s funny…Well, bye!” And she left.

That’s when my nausea subsided.

As I walked out the door, I noticed an aging drag queen standing in the shadows, checking her makeup in a compact, affirming herself. “Beautiful white b***h born to drive men wild.”

I got in my car and headed for Goldenrod Kisses in York Beach.

It had been years since I’d had a decent piece of taffy.