Horizontal Woman by Barry Malzberg Read Free Book Online Page B

before last he had said, without irony, that he loved her and only wanted to please her and from then they had moved into an interesting motivational discussion during which he had definitely promised to stay with school and make good so that he could be worthy someday of a woman like her. But now his mood has changed; he has become arrogant and insulting. She has counseled herself time and again to expect setbacks, revisions in their functioning, sudden deadspots when all will have seemed futile — generations of decompensation, after all, are not to be solved in an afternoon by Elizabeth Moore — but it is painful to see how he is posturing now in an attempt to build up his ego as well as enact a subconscious homosexual attachment to his friend. “Off, Jones,” Willie says, “I want her now.”
    “I don’t care about you, Willie. You take your piece and shove off.”
    “I’ll take my piece,” Willie says. He has undressed and now settles himself between Elizabeth’s thighs. “I don’t need none of your jive to help me take thai nor none of your looks either. Go into the other room.”
    “
Ain’t
no other room,” George says, settling on the bed. “Got to stay here. Come on, Willie; time’s a-wasting; we got people to see.”
    “All right,” Willie says. He leans close to Elizabeth, puts his cheek against hers. “You don’t mind George watching us, do you?”
    “No,” she says, biting her lip, closing her eyes. “If it’s something you really want, your friend — ”
    “Because I can chase him if you want but he feel better if he see there ain’t nothing to it.”
    “I don’t mind,” she says. Willie will have to work out his repressed homosexuality, his unconscious need to enter his friend and this is as credible a way as any, she supposes. Nevertheless, she finds it difficult to maintain her professional detachment and Willie must see this in her face.
    “What’s wrong?” he says, in mid-thrust, taking his hand off her breast for a moment, “I hurt you?”
    “Not you. No, you didn’t hurt me. I’m still a little sore down there,” she says motioning, “from something before.” She considers mentioning Schnitzler to him and then realizes that this would be madness. “It’s nothing really.”
    “Old George hurt you?”
    “Not George.”
    “I didn’t hurt her,” Jones says. “I wasn’t in long enough to hurt her. Don’t make trouble for me now, man. I got enough as it is.”
    “He didn’t,” Elizabeth whispers, “he really didn’t,” and Willie relaxes. Even in these circumstances she can see the old easeful peace of fornication descend around him: fucking literally takes him out of his world and this she can understand and appreciate. She wills George Jones out of her mind, wills herself to an intense one-to-one relationship with Willie Buckingham who is, after all, her client and her concern and as she puts her arms around him she feels him relax, begin to whine with pleasure. “Ah,” Willie says, “ah, this is wonderful,” and bends her toward him so that he can suckle her breasts: remarkable how he has survived his socioeconomic strata to engage in buccal play. He works over her breasts singlemindedly and with passion; she feels him trembling with maternal yearning and she reciprocates this, feels some of it herself. Behind them she hears George Jones cackling, making obscene comments which she knows only come from his profound envy and she turns him off, throws him utterly out of her consciousness to immerse herself with Willie. She hopes that George will not suddenly join them on the floor. She has read about multiple intercourse, knows that it exists but she knows she cannot confront the issue at this time.
    “Ah!” Willie says emphatically moving his head up from her breasts, “ah, ah!” and discharges; the third time today that a man has come into her and this, despite Schnitzler, is the most intense and copious of all. She almost feels a reciprocal