The Rabbit Factory: A Novel (17 page)

He pulled the commode lid down and sat on top of it while he read the instructions and some testimonials from satisfied customers. There were satisfied customers in Cherokee, Alabama, Marion, Arkansas, Dayton, Ohio, and Las Cruces, New Mexico, and he noticed after unpacking everything there in the bathroom that his model had come with an educational videotape and a discreet carrying case. You could take it on vacation. You could pay for one with Medicare. It said so right there in the booklet. He hadn’t known that some of the government’s money was going for stuff like this. U.S. taxpayers shelling out their hard-earned for a hard-on seemed unreasonable, but no more so than paying people not to raise two thousand acres of soybeans or financing studies of studies. He looked again at the couple on the horses. He pictured the guy in the picture doing what he was about to do. The whole thing seemed pretty broke-dick even to somebody as broke-dick as him.

He raised his face and looked at nothing on the wall where the paper was decorated with roses wreathed in vines, red and white and yellow. He was trying to remember what it had felt like the first time they’d done it in Montana. He couldn’t. Maybe it was just time for him to give it up. It wasn’t like it was something he hungered for all the time anyway, now, especially after everything that had happened. He’d felt a lot of humiliation over it, still felt a great deal. But if he wanted to do it with Helen again, what else could he do? It was either Viagra or this. Or an operation.

No.

Maybe he needed a drink first. He didn’t know where Helen was. Her Jag was gone, but sometimes she did some shopping or went to restaurants. He knew she went to the Peabody bar sometimes, too, but he was afraid he’d get mugged on Beale Street.

He held the thing in his hands and looked at it. He saw the rings that were included. He understood that after he got his motor running, he had to put on a ring that would trap the blood until he got through with it. He wondered what would happen if he dozed off while it was still on. Would there be any permanent damage?

Maybe he needed to watch the tape. But how much sense was that going to make, to watch some guy like the one on the horse put himself into a plastic tube and suck all the air out of it? He just didn’t see how it could work. But he was going to try it since he’d paid $335.00 plus tax.

He put it all back in the box except for the tape and hid the rest of it behind the door beneath the vanity. Then he went downstairs.

It was quiet. He looked in the pantry. The kitten was sleeping and Helen had opened the cage door because there was a bowl of cat food in there with it, a full pan of water. Maybe it was going to calm down. Maybe they’d be able to eventually keep it around the house like a regular pet. He hoped so even if he had been attacked and slashed and traumatized by one in his childhood. Maybe Helen would take an interest in it.

He went to the window and looked out to see if it was still snowing. Everybody else did. Everybody else seemed to have a pet or two. Already he missed Jada Pinkett. And Eric even more. Helen seemed to like him a lot, too.

“Do what?” Merlot said, indoor pale and naked as a jaybird beneath her, and then chuckled, his head on the pillow. He took another long lazy lick at her leathery brown nipple and said: “Ooh. You want to look at this, School Nurse?”

She raised up. They were over at her neat little house just north of Water Valley, in the country. He wasn’t ready to take her to his house yet since he was afraid Candy might have shit on the sheets again and wanted to get over there first and make sure Mrs. Poteet had cleaned it up just in case Candy had.

“Is it something wrong, Mister Professor?”

The weed she had was some potent stuff. Had taken it off some stoned Czech dude at the bus station one day. Penelope said keeping it didn’t seem like stealing since it didn’t really belong to anybody anymore unless you wanted to count the entire state, which was actually a whole lot of people who didn’t even know anything about it and never would and wouldn’t miss it, and although individually some of them wouldn’t do it, collectively and regulated by the lawmakers and the people like her paid twice monthly to enforce the rules, the “state” would eventually just pour some kerosene over it one afternoon and set it afire for the fun of it. Merlot said God made pot the same day He made potatoes, according to how you read your Bible.

She had Alejandro Escovedo’s
Gravity
playing on the big Kenwood speakers she’d paid for with money she’d won playing the slots at Hollywood, in Tunica. There were lots of violins and cellos. The shades were down. They’d done it in the living room on the couch first, then on the kitchen table, and then in the bathtub. It was pretty restful to finally be in the bed. He was about to get sore and red and run dry both, but naturally he didn’t want to stop.

“Uh, School Nurse, yes, I think it’s a small…” He searched for the proper word. “I think you’d have to call it a protuberance. It’s like a small potato. Somewhat elongated.”

She giggled with delight, stoned like him, maybe worse.

“Well, do you think, maybe…Mister Professor…it needs a good massaging?”

“Eh, I think maybe you could palpate it and see.” He giggled some, too.

“Ooh, lover,” she said, all serious, her eyes going serious, ducking to kiss him again. “Ain’t nobody ever made me come the way you do.”

And then she started kissing on his neck again and held him down and grinned at him and pressed her lips close and started blowing against his skin so that her lips vibrated and made noises like somebody passing gas uncontrollably while he flapped his arms and shouted happily for her to
quit it
!

She was alone in the bed. She found her cigarettes and lighter on the bedside table and turned the lamp on. A few glasses that sat in rings of water held the remnants of drinks. Ashtrays with stubbedout cigarette butts wearing her lipstick. She lit a fresh one and pulled the pillow up behind her and then got the other one and propped it back there, too. She stretched and yawned a long slow yawn with the cigarette in her fist.

She looked for a clock and finally saw on a small brown box some luminous red letters that read 11:47. Almost lunchtime, and she was hungry. She wondered if he’d paid the hotel bill before he left. If he hadn’t, she’d have to sneak out.

There was a thick red robe with the hotel monogram on it hanging in one of the closets and she put it on and tied it around her and went into the bathroom and brushed her teeth. She was rinsing out her mouth and spitting into the sink when she heard the doorbell ring. She stopped and shut off the water. What if it was the cops?

But how would they know she was here? It was probably only housecleaning. It was probably time to check out.

She went back into the suite and the doorbell rang again.

“Yes?” she called.

“Room service, ma’am,” came a muffled answer.

There was a peek hole in the door and she peeked. No cop. A nerdy-looking guy in a gray tunic was out there. He had on white gloves. She opened the door and he flashed her a polite smile. He had a table on wheels with him and it was covered in a large burgundy cloth.

“I didn’t order anything,” she said.

“Late breakfast, ma’am. Where would you like it?”

She looked. Her clothes were scattered. But there was a table fairly clean.

“Over there, please. Come on in.”

He wheeled it in and she could hear dishes rattling gently. Once he stopped it, he removed the cloth to reveal covered dishes with metal lids, all kinds of condiments, syrup, napkins, coffee, a cup and saucer, juice, a dish of kiwi fruit covered with clear stuff, silverware.

“What’s all this?” she said.

“Late breakfast, ma’am. Comes with the suite. Enjoy.”

He didn’t wait for a tip or anything, just went on out the door and pulled it shut. When she heard the lock click, she took the lid off one of the dishes. There was a large mound of hash browns with buttered toast. Another dish held sausage patties and bacon and fluffy-looking scrambled eggs. Another was full of pancakes. The last lid hid an envelope sitting on top of a note. She picked up the envelope and looked inside. It was full of used fifty-dollar bills. It didn’t take her long to count it and there was eight hundred dollars in it.

The note:

Had to go, baby, but I’ll hook back up. Go buy you some clothes.

Stay here long as you like, it’s on me. I’ll call. You rock. Lenny

She could go shopping this afternoon. Stay here? Hell, why not? There was food and a good TV and a very nice bathroom and bed and a place to hide until she could decide what she wanted to do. She got a chair, pulled it up to the table, unrolled her silverware, and grabbed a fork. The cops probably wouldn’t look for her in a place this nice.

Then she stopped. She looked at the money again. Hell. She could go home now. But it wouldn’t hurt to buy a few clothes since she couldn’t get anything out of her apartment. If she hung around Memphis much longer, the cops were going to pick her up.

She laid down her fork, picked up a piece of bacon, and bit into it. She was going to have to make a move. Pretty soon. But there was Lenny to think about. What was he going to say if she skipped town with eight hundred of his dollars?

Hell. If she never came back to Memphis, what would it matter? There had been nothing but trouble for her up here lately. And there were other places where she could work. There was Atlanta. There was Nashville. Chattanooga even. She could go anywhere in the whole country if she wanted to.

But she had to eat. She picked her fork back up and took the lid off the eggs. She smelled them, kind of hoping they’d smell like her grandmother’s, and they did, a little bit, maybe, good enough to eat anyway.

She went upstairs to the room she stayed in and took her leg off and dropped it on the floor and lay down on the bed and put one arm over her eyes. She hadn’t gotten a phone number from Nub and didn’t know how to get in touch with him. She guessed she could call directory information. Everything was still so cloudy in her mind that it seemed now more like a dream. She hated she couldn’t remember the lovemaking. It was kind of like it almost didn’t happen. It wasn’t a satisfying feeling. Next time she picked up a man, she wouldn’t drink so much.

She figured the little dog was hiding from her somewhere. That was okay, if he wanted to hide. Right now she needed a nap more than anything since she was so tired.

It was silent in the room, in the big empty house. She dimly heard something kick on and run for a while and then go off. There was a clock ticking. It ticked her softly to sleep. Outside the window the snow fell in soft ragged flakes over the woods and fields and rivers and roads of north Mississippi, under a sky low and gray. Black ducks shot overhead, past the big house, wheeling south, wings driving fast to the coming dark.

After she told Merlot what was happening, she sat on the bed naked and cross-legged eating a banana to get her strength back as well as for the potassium. Merlot was rolling a super-thin joint, which he then licked and sucked on the ends until it was nearly perfect. He had eight others already made, lined up on her bedside table, drying. He glanced up at her. When was the right time to tell her about Candy and how it was with them? Would it be best to wait? Maybe so. There really wasn’t any kind of deception going on. Was there?

Penelope stripped the skin off the banana and shoved the rest of it in her mouth. Her cheeks bulged while she chewed. God, he loved her lips. They tasted like grapes. She dropped the peel on the floor.

“I need to get back home and check on things,” Merlot said. “I’ve got to teach class tomorrow and give out grades. Then I’m done.”

“Ummhummumm,” she said.

“I’ll probably get another car from my insurance company. There’s a party before long and I’d like you to meet some of the people at the school, maybe some of my students who aren’t going home for Christmas. They’re pretty cool kids, some of them.”

“You like kids, Merlot?”

“I love kids. I wish I was still one myself.”

She laughed, but then got all shy and said: “Yeah, but I mean do you want some one day?”

He stopped rolling. She had finished chewing her banana. Her lips were shiny with banana grease.

“Yeah,” he said. “With you I do. About ten of them. Or maybe twelve.”

She crawled across the bed to him and kissed his naked leg.

“So,” he said. “You got some time off, huh?”

“Yep. Sure do.”

“And right here at Christmas. What you gonna do with it?”

She rolled over onto her back. She folded her hands across her massive flattened titties.

“I don’t know. What do you want to do with it?”

“Are you asking me?”

“I’m asking you, baby. You are my baby, aren’t you?”

“I guess I am now,” he said.

“You better be.”

“Well…” He laid the joint aside with the others and folded down the top of the baggie and put it beside them. He got his pillow and propped it up against the headboard and slid closer to her.

“What would you think about a little trip?”

“A trip?”

“Yeah. Just a little one. Say, for a few days. I’m through after one more class. And giving out grades.”

“How long does that take you?”

“Couple of hours.”

“Ooh I love trips,” she said. “We went to New Orleans on the bus one time when I was ten and I just about died from excitement.”

She rolled over onto her side and his heart gave a leap when her titties rubbed up against him. He picked up one of the joints that was dried and found the lighter on the table beside it and fired it up. It was the best shit he’d smoked in a long time. He took a couple of tokes and flicked the ash in the ashtray and handed it to her.

“Where would you want to go if we went somewhere?” he said.

“I don’t know. Where would you want to go?”

“You want me to tell you?”

“Tell me, baby.” She sucked on the joint.

“Okay. I’d like to drive down the Natchez Trace and go to Natchez and stay in Texado. I’ve always wanted to do that.”

“What’s that?”

“Texado? It’s the oldest house in Mississippi. It was built in 1790 when this whole state was still a Spanish territory.”

“Oh shit, baby,” she said. “That Natchez Trace is pretty nice, isn’t it?”

“Fifty miles an hour,” Merlot said, and took the joint back to suck on it. “No stinking trucks allowed. They don’t even let UPS on it. Nothing but streams and woods and deer and wild turkeys.”

“And this old place is nice?”

“Oh yeah. I saw some pictures of it in a
Southern Living
Mama had one time. We could call ahead of time and see if we can get in. We probably can since it’s close to Christmas. They got a casino down there, too.”

“I know it. I love to play those slot machines. I hit that hot streak at Tunica that time. Can we play the slot machines?”

“We can do anything you want to. We’re free birds.”

What he didn’t say was that he hadn’t made up his mind yet what to do about Candy. He knew Mrs. Poteet would stay with her for a while longer. He thought maybe if they took off for a few days and did some riding and talking he could break it to her gently.

“When you gonna take me to your place?” she said.

“I don’t know. It’s probably dirty.”

“I don’t care.”

“Probably a bunch of dirty dishes in the sink.”

“I’ll wash ’em for you.”

“My carpet hasn’t been cleaned in a while. Garbage is probably full.”

She propped herself up on her elbow.

“Is there some specific reason you don’t want me over at yo house, white boy?”

He sucked on the joint and then passed it back to her. She held up a hand.

“I’m good.”

“Oh. Okay.” He took two more hits off it and then put it out. “It’s just a mess,” he said. “All my papers and shit are probably all over the place.”

“You got as many books in it as you got in your van?”

“More,” he said.

“Well, you let me know whenever you get ready to go,” she said.

“Now c’mere and gimme some sugar.”

And he didn’t have to worry about it anymore right then, which was real good.