It Feels So Good When I Stop Read online

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Hey.”

  “How you feeling? ”

  “Like shit.”

  “I’m not great, but I’ll live.”

  She stayed as far away from me as she could without leaving the room. She lit a smoke from the pack on her dresser and finally faced me. Her eyes were saddled and dark. “How exactly did you get here? ”

  I told her.

  She nodded. “Did I suck you off? ”

  “You tried to, but—”

  “But you stopped me.”

  I nodded.

  “Did we fuck? ”

  “No.” I peeled back the covers to show I was still wearing my pants. “We made out, but nothing really happened.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She was sorry? I wasn’t expecting an apology. “Don’t be, please. Nothing happened.” I got up and started to gather the rest of my clothes.

  “It’s not fucking you I’m sorry about.”

  “But we didn’t.”

  “I don’t care if we did. I’m sorry for showing up at your door in the middle of the night wasted.”

  “You weren’t that wasted,” I lied.

  “When you can’t remember if you let a perfect stranger come in your mouth . . .” She was leaning against a desk. She put her head down. “I’m just sorry, that’s all.”

  “Okay.” If that had been Jocelyn there on the other side of the room, I don’t know what she would have done to me. She sure as fuck wouldn’t have apologized.

  “ ROY ’S GETTING really big,” I said.

  Pamela grunted as she extracted him from the car seat. “Tell me about it.” She looked tired but, on the whole, the best I’d seen since before she’d had Roy. Maybe it was the clothes. She wasn’t wearing one of her usual frumpy Sears pantsuits.

  I touched her turtleneck sweater. “Is that cashmere? ”

  “Silk,” she said proudly.

  “Nice.”

  “I figured, what the hell, right? ”

  Roy’s feet hit the sidewalk, and he ran directly into my arms. “Hey, buddy, remember me? ”

  Pamela lit up. “Wow. He only goes to people he really knows.”

  “That is so amazing.”

  “It’s only because you and I have the same nose.”

  “No, it’s more than that.”

  “You think? ”

  “You’re a natural. I told you so.”

  “Natural what?” Roy tried to reprise the glasses-swiping game.

  “Gentle, baby,” Pamela said. “Gen-tull.”

  “It’s okay.” I folded my glasses and put them in my pocket. Roy was pissed off. He hollered.

  “It’s okay, baby.” Pamela distracted him with the small flashlight on her key chain. “He’s at that age where he wants everything. And if you don’t give it to him, watch out.”

  No shit.

  “He bit my neck the other day, look.” She rolled back the foreskin of her turtleneck. There was a purple bruise over her carotid artery.

  “Holy shit. He got you pretty good. What did you do to get that? ”

  “I wouldn’t let him have a lightbulb.”

  “Oh, Christ.”

  “I know, right? ”

  “Sounds rough.”

  “It is rough. Really rough. But it’s easier, too, in some ways, if you know what I’m talking about.” She didn’t want to say too much in front of Roy. “Has he been around much? ”

  “Who? James? ”

  “No,” she said with the kind of sarcasm that has sunk many a sitcom pilot. “Yes, James.”

  “A couple times, quick. Him and Dogshit.” Pamela shook her head at the mention of his name. “They stopped by and fixed something. Fuck if I know what.”

  “Easy with the language,” Pamela said. “He’s starting to repeat things.”

  “Sorry.” I turned to Roy. “Sorry, kid. Don’t do what I do.”

  “You sound just like Dad,” Pamela said. Countless times I’ve heard my father say those very words—don’t do what I do—seconds before doing something like stick a screwdriver into a dark recess of a running car engine. “Him and Ma been down yet?” She sounded like she was privy to something I wasn’t.

  “You fucking told them I’m here?”

  “No, I did not. And watch your mouth, please.” Roy recognized the annoyed and imperative qualities in his mother’s voice. He stopped jiggling the keys and gave us his undivided attention. Pamela softened. “But you know how they are. Empty house. Neighbors gone for the winter. I wouldn’t be surprised if they drive down once a week to make sure nobody stole the paint off the shutters.”

  She was right. “Or the sconces,” I added.

  “Or the sconces.”

  Our parents were mildly insane that way. It should have been much funnier than it was. Roy was smiling.

  “What about ‘Show me the couch’? ” I said. It was a famous story in our family.

  “Oh, Christ almighty.” Now it was Pamela who sounded like our father.

  When Pamela was sixteen, she volunteered to hang out at our aunt Christie’s apartment in East Boston and sign for the new couch that Jordan’s Furniture was delivering sometime between nine in the morning and four in the afternoon. My aunt Christie was an air-traffic controller at Logan Airport and couldn’t miss work. Her apartment was on the top floor of a four-story walk-up.

  My old man was not into the idea of Pamela’s being alone with three or four furniture movers, as it’s well documented how fond furniture movers are of squeezing unscheduled gang rapes into their busy days.

  My old man walked Pamela through the correct answers, then quizzed her:

  Old Man: And what are you going to say when the movers buzz up from the lobby?

  Pamela: Who is it?

  OM: And when they knock on Aunt Christie’s door, then what are you going to say?

  P: Who is it?

  OM: And after they identify themselves as the movers, and you see them through the peephole, what are you going to say before letting them in?

  P: Just a minute, I’m naked?

  OM: Don’t be a smart-ass. I’m serious here.

  P: Show me the couch. I say, “Show me the couch.”

  OM: Exactly. Show me the couch.

  I took a smoke from my pack, and Pamela motioned wordlessly, like a blackjack player who wants the dealer to keep ’em comin’.

  “You don’t smoke,” I said.

  “Oh, shut up.” She tickled Roy’s chin and said in a cartoon voice, “Show me the couch. Your grandparents are crazy, crazy, crazy.” He collapsed in a giggling heap on the driveway. Pamela turned to me. “But you are going to have to tell them you guys split up, you know?”

  “Thanks,” I said sarcastically. “I had no fucking idea.”

  “I’m just saying, you might want to do it sooner than later.”

  “What for?”

  “They’re reserving the function room at the Knights of Columbus for a party for you guys.”

  “Are you fucking serious?”

  She nodded. “Around Christmas.”

  “Shit.”

  “I told Ma you guys meant it, you didn’t want a party or anything.”

  “What did she say?”

  “That it wasn’t about what you wanted.”

  “Fucking Ma. I swear to God, we should have kept getting married a secret.”

  Pamela couldn’t resist. “What were you going to do, never tell anyone?”

  “Not never. When we knew it was going to work out, then . . .”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “What, is that so wrong?”

  “Whatever. It’s your business.” She didn’t want to get sucked deeper into the conversation she’d started. She took refuge in her pocketbook, feeling around in it like doing so was her sole purpose in life. “Tell me I did not forget my Visine, Roy.”

  “Not telling anyone certainly would have made splitting up a lot easier,” I said.

  Pamela responded
by not responding.

  I had at her. “And do me a favor. Spare me the ‘You can’t leave yourself a trapdoor and expect your relationship to work’ crap.”

  “Fine. Do I look like I’m not sparing you?” She had the contents of the bag emptied onto the sidewalk.

  “But you do think that, though, don’t you? That you can’t have a trapdoor?”

  “Are you asking me or are you not asking me?”

  “Yes, I’m asking you.”

  “The answer is no. You can’t.”

  “Oh, okay. So you honestly thought you were going to stay married to James? Forever?”

  “I didn’t think it was going to be easy, but I thought I was signing on for good.”

  “Yeah, well, it looks like I was right, and you were wrong.” That hurt her.

  “Why are you being such a fucking asshole? Just because you’re screwed up and having a shit time doesn’t mean you get to be cruel.” She was right, and I was sorry I’d hit her that hard. “And to me of all people. You call me out of the blue—”

  “I know. I know. I didn’t mean that.” I was trying to head her off before she could recap her generosity and my selfishness. But she wasn’t going to stop until she’d gone through at least one cycle of letting me know how she felt about the whole thing. I got out of her way.

  “And you tell me all this crazy, über-dramatic shit—like my plate isn’t buried already. You need a place to stay, a few dollars, and I say, ‘No problem.’ ”

  I felt like a shit for making her cry right in front of Roy. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Please, stop crying.” I touched her arm, partly so Roy would sense that affection still existed in the world. “Mommy doesn’t feel so good, Roy.”

  Pamela regrouped.

  I looked her right in the eyes. “I appreciate everything. I really do. If it wasn’t for you, I’d be screwed royally.”

  “No you wouldn’t, you idiot. You’d be inconvenienced. Confused. Scared, God forbid. And then you’d have to figure it out like every other slob. Jesus Christ.”

  I was going to say something smart-assed to Roy, like how Mommy was obviously feeling a lot better, but I didn’t. I watched as my sister threw the former contents, one item at a time, back into the bag. When I finally spoke, it was just above a whisper. “Well, I do mean it. Thanks for helping me.”

  “Right.” She didn’t look at me as she snapped her bag closed.

  “What, you want me to get out of the house?”

  “No. Come on, Roy. Mommy’s got to make a detour to CVS.”

  “Well, maybe I could watch him here and there. You know, to earn my keep.”

  Pamela laughed.

  I WOKE UP a few hours after Jocelyn split for work. Waking up alone was one of my favorite things about New York. I had a smoke in bed and listened to the wilderness. Sixth Avenue just below Ninth Street in Brooklyn was lined with old elm and oak trees. From late spring to early fall, Jocelyn’s bedroom looked out into the jiggling bosom of an enormous green sequined dress.

  I was planning on going out to Shea Stadium for an afternoon guided tour. Jocelyn thought baseball was sexist, and on top of that, she wondered, why should baseball players make so much more money than teachers or social workers. I told her it was about supply and demand. She said two-thirds of the earth was covered with assholes.

  Luckily for me, Redbook was “in ship” that week. Even Jocelyn’s lunches were working ones. She was bummed out because she wanted to squeeze every last drop of together time from my visit.

  Jocelyn had one of those Bodum plunger coffeemakers. They make horrible-tasting coffee. Jocelyn disagreed, which is why she had one in the first place. I called it a Scrodum instead of a Bodum. She didn’t think that was too funny.

  I poured the rest of the cold coffee into a three-pound mug Jocelyn received as a gift when she was a second-semester lesbian in college. The potter’s name was Sue, but she went by Brianna. She and Jocelyn had a brief thing. Jocelyn was stingy when it came to divulging the details of it. I asked her if Brianna was good looking. Jocelyn said it wasn’t about that. I asked her what they did in bed. She said they pretty much just made out, and, no, asshole, the first time wasn’t after a Sweet Honey in the Rock concert.

  I couldn’t believe they didn’t go any further than making out. When I pressed her, she asked me why I wanted to know so much. I told her it was the responsible thing, what with AIDS and all. Jocelyn held up her pussy finger and wiggled it ever so slightly, then left it in the “Fuck you” position.

  I brought up Sue/Brianna’s names once while Jocelyn and I were fucking. It was a big no-no. She was unpredictable like that. She’d ask me to slap her on the ass now and then, but if I initiated it, she acted like I’d asked to watch the gutter bum of my choice take a piss in her mouth.

  I was craving some toast, but Jocelyn only had rye bread. I didn’t have any because it tastes like medicine to me. I lit another smoke and sat at the table with my coffee. My hands were shaky. The latest issue of The New Yorker topped a neat pile of back issues. I read a few cartoons, then got the show on the road. I took my smoke and coffee with me to the can. Jocelyn left a note for me on the back of the toilet because she knew I’d find it there: “Tried to wake you. Free for lunch, after all. Come by office. Noon sharp. xoxoj.”

  Fuck me. I lifted the seat cover, and the note slipped out of sight behind the shitter. Problem solved. I sat on the hoop and pulled a random issue of Redbook from the wicker magazine box. Cybill Shepherd was on the cover wearing a Calvin Klein tan herringbone tweed skirt and blazer ($1,995; Saks Fifth Avenue); white pinpoint Oxford shirt by Pink ($295; Pink, NYC); green armadillo cowboy boots by Justin ($895; Barneys New York).

  According to the blurb on the cover, Cybill was revealing to Redbook’s readers her secret to having it all: children, romance, and career. I found Jocelyn’s name under the junior editors’ section of the masthead. Then I went straight to the Cybill Shepherd article. I jerked off to a photo spread of her—in full equestrian gear—grooming a horse named Lemonade.

  Around one o’clock I called Jocelyn from Shea Stadium. I knew she’d be too busy to pitch a proper fit. I got the short form.

  “Where the fuck were you?”

  I could hear telephones and fax machines exploding in the background. “What are you talking about?”

  “Didn’t you see my note?”

  “What note?”

  “You know what? I can’t talk to you about this now.”

  “What note?”

  I TOSSED AND TURNED most of the night. My dog bite itched, and I was trying to calculate the size of the wrench I’d tossed into things by spending the night with Marie. It was plenty big enough to beat myself up with. I finally knocked myself unconscious. I couldn’t have been asleep too long when James barged in with Roy. They were an hour early. I had no intention of telling him about Marie or the dog attack. Roy couldn’t rat me out even if he wanted to.

  “It’s Roto-Rooter,” James said. “We’re here about your clog.”

  “Fuck, James. You said you’d be here at nine.” I was not my usual ray-of-golden-sunshine self.

  “Definitely not.”

  I pushed back at him from beneath the covers. “Definitely yes.”

  “Definitely not the case, but we’re here now, aren’t we?” He underhanded Roy on top of me. “Teach ’em a lesson about punctuality, kid.”

  Roy squirmed his way up like a slimy newborn kangaroo trying to make it to his mother’s pouch. When he got to my head, he licked my chin. It tickled. Roy laughed after I did. Why he was so happy to see me, I had no idea. It felt pretty good, but I was suspicious.

  “Pamela told me she stopped by with the kid,” James said. “I assume since she didn’t chew my dick down to the nub that you didn’t tell her anything. But then I got to thinking, What if you did, and she was just playing dumb and collecting evidence?”

  “That seems kind of elaborate.”

  “Maybe yes. Maybe no.”

  �
��I got to tell you, I don’t feel so hot about lying to her. She’s down on me as it is.”

  “That’s crazy,” James said. I was letting Roy bounce on my chest. “You and Roy can’t do no wrong in her eyes.”

  “I still don’t like lying to her.”

  “But you did lie, right?”

  “Yeah, I lied to her.”

  James wasn’t satisfied. “What did you say, exactly?”

  “I don’t know. I just pretended like I hadn’t seen you in a while.”

  “Good. Just so long as we’re on the same page.” He went to the bathroom to see how his hinge repair was still holding up. “It’s not really lying,” he yelled. “And I’m the one who’s lying anyway.”

  I heard him open and close the door a few times.

  When he came back he said, “God, this room really stinks. Did you queef?”

  “Yes. Right out of my vagina.”

  “I’m not kidding. It smells like a sore throat in here.” He took a more forensic, sour-faced whiff. “A sore throat and old butter.”

  For once, he was exactly right.

  JOCELYN AND I had maybe five or six “officially broken-up” periods. I initiated all of them. During the first one, I promptly slept with an older waitress at Esposito’s who was into kayaking and talking about being “on her moons.” Her name was Leyla. I heard every third word she said. Her face was perpetually sunburned and her hair was a blown-out yellow. She was in an open marriage with a carpenter named Dylan. She called him Dill when she referred to him—which she did a lot; it was a testament to their open-marital strength. Dill was off somewhere building houses in the Pacific Northwest. We lubed ourselves up by drinking the beer he brewed. Each brown bottle had a label with a roofer’s hammer and Dill’s Own Lager printed on it. As I sunk into his wife, I half expected him to pop home and sink a roofing hammer into me before driving straight back to fucking Spokane.

  “It’s obvious you’re still in love with her,” Leyla said as she wrestled herself out of her Wranglers. “Look at me and Dill. We’re in love with each other. Sometimes though, you need a freebie.”

  “Don’t take this the wrong way,” I said as I stuffed my socks into my shoes to expedite my exit. “But isn’t a freebie when a hooker gives you a turn on the house?”