Half of Paradise

“Well, I don’t want no trouble. Rita says you were acting flip. I give a straight lay and that’s all. You go see one of the other girls if you want something else.”

“Do you remember me?” he said.

“Lots of fellows come in. They’re one and the same to me, honey.”

She lay down on the bed in a receptive position. She rubbed the insides of her thighs with her palms. He poured a drink in his glass from the fifth and drank it down.

“Let’s go, honey. There’s others waiting,” she said.

“Get on top.”

“That means you got a complex about your mother.”

“Watch it.”

“Some fellows want to lay their mother and they don’t know it. I read it in a magazine once.”

“Get on top and do what you’re supposed to,” he said.

“I know my job. You don’t have to worry about that.”

She got on top of him and smiled stupidly. She raised up on her knees and then sat back. She touched him and adjusted herself again, supporting herself with one arm, and sat once more on his legs.

“You’re going to have to do better than that,” she said.

“It’s the whiskey.”

“You give Rita all you had. You ain’t got another lay in you,” she said.

“Wait a minute. I’ll be all right. I was all right before you come in here.”

“Are you saying you can’t get nothing on for me?”

“No. It’s just the whiskey. I’ll be all right in a minute.”

“Come back tomorrow,” she said.

“I hired you for the afternoon.”

“You ain’t got it to put in, honey.”

“I paid seventy-five dollars for you and that other bitch, and you ain’t taking off.”

“You see me tomorrow night and I’ll give you one free.”

“You bitch,” he said.

“Take it easy.”

“You ain’t cutting out on me.”

“I’m not going to stay here and play hand games for you, mister. When you can get something on come back and I’ll take care of you.”

She took her robe off the bedstead and started to put it on. He sat up and pulled it off her. The sleeve caught on her arm and ripped at the shoulder. She grabbed the robe in both hands and jerked it away from him and got off the bed.

“All right, flip man,” she said. She pushed a buzzer on the wall by the light switch and put on her robe. Her shoulder showed at the rip in the seam. He got off the bed and came towards her. She pushed the buzzer again.

“I’d like to watch him beat the piss out of you,” she said, and went out the door.