STORIES

Last Tuesday, Alice, a new secretary stopped by my cube to ask a typical greenhorn question. At some point she sighed, "Man works from sun to sun, but a woman's work is never done." Eventually I fished enough information out of her to learn that she took this job to teach her husband a lesson. She's married to some stingy bastard who drives the Madison Avenue bus. No phone, no television at home. Nothing but the expectation that the laundry gets done, his dinner gets cooked, his lunch is packed, and his raccoon cap is steamed.

So, she's working because he dared her to go to work to pay for a phone if she wants it that bad. But she knew, and I knew and you know that this was about calling his bluff. She would soon have the phone disconnected, quit the job and return to being a stay-home wife. And she sticks with him in spite of his rantings about her mother being a blabbermouth; and his mercurial temperament; and his well-intentioned feelbe ideas for getting rich. What could you expect from a wife in the 50s-especially on television?

I noticed when she came by my cubicle she'd kicked her shoes off and walked in her stocking feet past the fax machine and through the decades. I looked down. and through her stockings I saw the prettiest toes. and a warm feeling expanded across my chest. I think she knew something-a lot of things-because she just let go. Alice said something about curiosity about Colored men, while simultaneously reminding me that this was the 50s and a married woman isn't as free as she ought to be. Today, the consequences would never make any transgression worthwhile.

Alice was cool though. She'd told me about times where Ralph was forced to back down. Times she'd made a monkey out of him. She told me about that time Ralph found all the counterfeit money on the bus, then went on to lose his fucking mind. She told me she'd thought things about Ed Norton, but was sure he'd tell it if she ever tried anything.

I gave her a ride back to Bensonhurst in my 2000 silver Hummer. On the way from East Greenwich Village, I parked somewhere just inside of Bensonhurst and we crawled into the back. "Lemme see that Black pecker," she said in a nasty voice. I unzipped and pulled it out while she kicked her shoes off. Facing toward each other, our legs stretched out between us, and each leaning against the inside of the Hummer. She ran one of her nylon-ed soles across my dick, pressing it against my stomach.

"Ralph would never do this for me" she whispered. I looked over and her smallish breasts were exposed. But, like the Alice Kramden we all know, she didn't get too carried away. Reminding me that she had to get home to cook because this was "Tubby's bowling night" and he wanted his supper, or else he'd give her that ".to the moon, Alice!" shit when he gets home. Not that she was scared of him, but she just wasn't up for dealing with his malarkey tonight.

She managed to pop the balloon all over her pretty toes & crimson nails. It was good. All good. Very good. Alice Kramden & me. Oz and Alice. And that's what happened last Tuesday. Somewhere between 1954 and 1999. I never saw her again in real life. Like I said. that night she went on home and relented to Ralph. No modern furniture, no electric refrigerator. No phone. But one day, I'm hoping she'll think about me. and have Trixie lower the phone, by its cord, down to the Kramden residence so she can give me a call on my cell phone. There's magic in Alice's feet. I can only say:

The lady on the #135, she's got a 2 of DIAMONDS face up. But how many Aces have already been played? AW! She just doesn't know. But, Margie is bringing the two kids, and Jerry has RSVP'd, confirmed that he's bringing one guest. And With her fingers crossed tight enough, the lady on the #135 hopes her god will just work it all out and keep it worked out.

She jots down in her notebook: cold soup. I want to say, "Lady, it's called gazpacho, or maybe borsch." I've eaten gazpacho in Spain when I was a single man, and even had a pile of baby eels in a garlic sauce. and I'm still a single man looking forward to going & eating fried praying mantises in Thailand; and there'll be no one shrieking, "EWWW How can you do that?" Yes. Yes. maybe we all need to pray.

Why does anyone bother? Jerry & Margie and the two kids, and Grandpa with his oxygen tank on a red tricycle without the cotter pin that should be holding the left wheel on, and the groomsmen. Everyone participating in this specious gala where there's a turd at the center of the silver lining at the center of this cotton candy cloud, at the center of this city where the dealer waits for her decision.

And I hear that song about momma's got a squeezebox ... in & out & in & out and daddy can't sleep at night. "Hit me!" She shouts. And there's a 10 of diamonds. 10 plus 2 make 12. she's got 12 showing. How many 9s have already been played? I've got one of them: 9 of clubs, or a 9 of puppy-toes as my girlfriend's father used to say.

YES! And Jisella has confirmed that she's bringing one guest. And so have Todd and Fran. One guest each. RSVP! Bridesmaids & groomsmen and the lady on the #135 flips to that page in her saccharine-sweet scheduler, and in parentheses she's listed how many dresses and how many tuxes and she's got lists of how many whos and whats and wherefores and whens and does and didn'ts and shit-god-dammits. OH! Hit me, Papasan! Slam me with a 9: 9 inches or 9 of spades . spaded 9 . black 9 . square root of 81! whip it on me and make me bust! Literally. The shit that I'm full of and the genius that I beg for . it's all gonna hit the fan ... it's all gonna squirt & splatter all over you & you & you & especially you sitting in papasan's chair, tuned out with your texas ruby red grapefruit regrets. And god says,

God removes his fedora and his toupee comes off with it. But we don't laugh. this isn't pre-television and this isn't vaudeville, it's our very lives. so if you know what's good for you, you don't laugh at god's five-dollar toupee. you just say, "hey god, nice wristwatch! I've got one just like it." Then you shut up and hope he throws the cat at someone else in this flotilla of left-cocked & laughing-stocked, right-brained brittle-brimmed brick-a-brack broom-jockeys.

"Showing 12 miss," the dealer SAYS, "WOULD you like another card? none of this is any more than so much hocus-pocus, any way." he slides a card toward her, his cranberry-colored jacket sleeve rides back toward his elbow, revealing a rhythm of scars from cuts he made on himself in an effort to let out all of the evil. Crisscrossing scars making some italic checkerboard pattern of varying widths amongst the columns & rows. if you could play that rhythm it'd sound like a major pentatonic scale.

But he didn't let out all of the evil. he couldn't. our 21st century, self-appointed messiah/blackjack dealer couldn't even wash a shot glass, much less dilute 9 liters of fresh-SQUEEZED-just-this-morning sin. and the lady on the #135 flips a page, nods, and makes a circle on an uneven sheet of paper made of magic carpet lint and POMEGRANATE skin. Sure, her guests should enjoy the asparagus with sesame seeds-especially those evangelical vegans MARIGOLD & cosmo who aren't bringing any guests-just themselves and their funny little odor from eating so much organic garlic. it's a WONDER that marigold can suck his dick, it must be like a big bar of garlic with a creamy GARLICKY vegan-y tofu-y SURPRISE-y.

So, she makes an asterisk. asparagus syringes sprinkled with cotton wads, stick a fork in and lift two of the syringes into your mouth: the hypodermic needle end goes first, and don't spill any of the skag on your shirt. that shit costs too much money goddammit! i had to boost a john deere green hugo boss suit in order to get it. don't fukk around with me cause there ain't no one for to give you no name! shit shirt shoot shot the shit wanna hit? mira, mira, mira, baby! mira, mira, hit me, papasan! POW! the lady on the #135 gets a 4 of DISEMBODIED heads, and there you go! flip over the hole card and there's the other 2.

Thelma Lou danced for me while Barney was in Raleigh. Yes! She got drunk on cheap merlot down at the diner. As I finished my cherry pie, Thelma Lou asked if I had left room for some Thelma Lou Pie later. Then she laughed like a little girl, and fluttered her false eyelashes. But I knew better. I recall all those episodes when the lights would go out, and she'd shellac Barney with lipstick kisses. Thelma Lou was a wild one. And don't forget the episode where she punched Barney in the nose.

I found myself next to Thelma Lou, sitting on her couch, television had gone off and there was nothing more to do. AH! But this was the era of burlesque shows and Thelma Lou wondered what it was all about. I told her a little of what I'd seen in Chicago. Not much actual nudity, but enough to rouse most any man. "Well, shit! I could give you a better show here. Right here in my front room," she offered.

What does a person say to that? Just hearing her say shit put a crack in my composure. I cast a glance all over the black & white setting. And I figured that this couldn't be happening in Mayberry. Looking back into Thelma Lou's eyes, I knew she was ready to drop the bullshit little girl's act. She hopped up from the sofa and came back with a jug of something that came out of a still. And she was carrying a stash of records that she says I ought not tell Barney about. She put one on, and out came old blues tunes. Black blues from the deep south. Far deeper than North Carolina. OH YES! And drunken Thelma Lou looked toward the heavens: summoning energy from the crescent moon. Her body seized up, her arms wrapped around her, as a Negress moaned,

And in the middle of her living room, Thelma Lou struck a pose. Yes Thelma Lou. Her body was angled, twisted slightly and her womanliness incensed the room like an open e-string on an electric bass guitar. And her left hand began unbuttoning her blouse. Her black hair had come down over her face and she gave me my first glimpse of the evil Thelma Lou that I'd intuited over the years of watching her on reruns. Drunk high, nasty, and with a few buttons undone, I could see that she wasn't wearing a bra. I suppose, in 1963 Molotov cocktails didn't wear bras. In a town like Mayberry, a braless woman would be expected to commit seppuku-if they'd had knowledge of such things, and it's a good thing that they didn't.

Thelma Lou came close, and straddled my legs. She pushed her hair back & away from her face then grabbed me by my necktie. She tightened the knot against my throat. Her breath was cool against my face, and burned like moonshine. "What do you want?" She whispered. "Oz, you want me, don't you?" I said nothing. I couldn't say anything. Baby, all I could do was let it happen . whatever was going to happen, goddammit!

Thel hiked up her skirt and put her knee on my crotch. She whispered, "Let's see what going on down here." There was a saxophone solo crackling from the stereo; mournful, melodic and running counterpoint against the violence in Thelma Lou's eyes. Full of estrogenized hell, she stared into my eyes as one of her hands fished my dick out of my pants and began to tease at it. "Oz, I belong to Barney," she sneered, "but I know what you want." She reared back, sat down on my lap and snatched her shirt completely open. Buttons flew like flaccid bullets. She kissed me on the mouth, bit my neck, put one of her breasts on my lips and demanded, "Suck me, baby!" Thelma Lou grunted and didn't care that her fingernails were digging into my scalp.

When she pulled away, I heard the ripping of her stockings. No panties on underneath, just stockings and a big patch of black hair. "You want to fuck me, don't you Oz? But you can't. That belongs to Barney." She was sure to put the accent on the fuck, a hard quarter-note in a glistening blues, and some man was singing,

Thelma Lou sprinted off to turn out the lights. Her silhouette strutted back, returned to perch on my lap. Right there! Thel pressed my dick against her wet pussy hair, rubbing against the opening and that's when the heavens opened and Thel offered up a long arc of piss. She stood on the edge of the sofa, pissing all over my dick, my necktie, and washed my face in it. All of her merlot and moonshine . baptizing me in secreted small town debauchery. Droplets sparkled in the little bit of light, like a stream of fireflies. The piss was hot, and drained into a new-found niche in my libidinous consciousness. And that's when I couldn't take any more. No more of this passive shit. I grunted, stood up with Thelma Lou hanging onto my front, her legs wrapped around my waist, she was panting, "What are you doing? What's going on, Oz?" Our clothes were partly off and mostly on and Thel had chased me into foreign territory within my own skull. Drenched with this devil-child's pee, I carried her into the kitchen, Thel wrapped around my waist, and my hands were desperately searching the kitchen cabinets and drawers-spatulas and panting and noise and black blues and tinkling glass, the smell of pee, slamming of wooden cabinet doors and metal utensils rattled against each other-until I found a 15" bread knife.

Panic began to unsettle Thelma Lou's coquettish whispers. ""What's going on?" she asked, again. I laid Thelma Lou out on the livingroom floor and very deliberately sawed her clothes off of her with the bread knife. I took one of her shoes and threw it. Glass broke. The two of us, two silhouettes, violently vibrating duet of ruthless decadence. This was better than cuckolding Barney. We were cuckolding all of Mayberry. Mousy little Thelma Lou, with the big pretty eyes, and she was into it.

Her clothes were all over the front room. Ragged shards of nylon and cotton; and I was lapping at her pussy as she snatched at and sawed at my own clothes. She arched up onto her heels, her toes curled, and she squealed until she tore the arm off of my shirt. She used her teeth, she used the knife, she struggled and her pussy got wetter & wetter.

I poured as she lay flat on her back. Booze ran down her cheeks, into her ears. I poured it onto her breasts, sat the jug down and pressed my bare chest against hers. Kissing, and snarling like wolves. Thel picked up the jug and moonshine sloshed onto my back. It BURNED! I screamed. Moonshine was seeping deep into the mosaic of fresh cuts, scrapes and abrasions on my back and shoulders. It stung and it felt good and it felt awful.

Thel tightened up, she clung against me like a snake. Tighter & tighter & quiet. She stopped breathing. She was suspended in the air: me on all fours. Thelma Lou clasped around my neck and waist; her thighs fastened uncomfortably against my ribcage. Then I heard the long whine of her inhaling. "Barney never make me fucking cum like that before. Oh! God." And she was finished. She collapsed in all the filth & destruction, and I laid down next to her and went to sleep.

Around 5am, she woke me up; let me know that we had to get me out of her house before the neighbors wake up and see a strange Colored man hanging around. Thelma Lou's living room looked like Hell. The Molotov cocktail had been set off, and this was the aftermath. I looked up at her as she straddled my chest. She was an accurate memory of delicious terror: wearing one false eyelash, dried moonshine, piss and sweat, with my dried blood in flakes around her mouth and breasts, and under her fingernails. And I don't know how many times that record had replayed & replayed

That record was still going, round & round. Thel shut it off then shoved me a pile of Barney's clothes, some gym shorts, mismatched socks and a dress shirt. "Sorry, but that's all I can give you without Barney noticing that something's missing." She led me through the kitchen and into the garage, then she drove me back to my hotel out near Wally's gas station. She kissed me on the cheek with genteel Mayberry style, "Have a nice trip back to Chicago, Oz."