Smoke and Mirrors

Then I sleeped too.

And then we were home, and it was morning, and I dont want to see the end of the world again. And before I got out of the car, while mummy was carrying in Daisydaisy to the house, I closed my eyes so I couldn’t see anything at all, and I wished and I wished and I wished and I wished. I wished wed gone to Ponydale. I wished wed never gone anywhere at all. I wished I was somebody else.

And I wished.

DESERT WIND

There was an old man with skin baked black by the desert sun

who told me that, when he was young, a storm had separated him from his caravan

and its spices, and he walked over rock and over sand for days and nights,

seeing nothing but small lizards and sand-colored rats.

But that, on the third day, he came upon a city of silken tents

of all bright colors. A woman led him into the largest tent,

crimson the silk was, and set a tray in front of him, gave him iced sherbet

to drink, and cushions to lie upon, and then, with scarlet lips, she kissed his brow.

Veiled dancers undulated in front of him, bellies like sand dunes,

Eyes like pools of dark water in oases, purple were all their silks,

and their rings were gold. He watched the dancers while servants brought him food,

all kinds of food, and wine as white as silk and wine as red as sin.

And then, the wine making good madness in his belly and his head, he jumped up,

into the midst of the dancers, and danced with them, feet stamping on the sand,

jumping and pounding, and he took the fairest of all the dancers

in his arms and kissed her. But his lips pressed to a dry and desert-pitted skull.

And each dancer in purple had become bones, but still they curved and stamped

in their dance. And he felt the city of tents then like dry sand, hissing and escaping

through his fingers, and he shivered, and buried his head in his burnous,

And sobbed, so he could no longer hear the drums.

He was alone, he said, when he awoke. The tents were gone and the ifreets.

The sky was blue, the sun was pitiless. That was a lifetime ago.

He lived to tell the tale. He laughed with toothless gums, and told us this:

He has seen the city of silken tents on the horizon since, dancing in the haze.

I asked him if it were a mirage, and he said yes. I said it was a dream,

and he agreed, but said it was the desert’s dream, not his. And he told me that

in a year or so, when he had aged enough for any man, then he would walk

into the wind, until he saw the tents. This time, he said, he would go on with them.

TASTINGS

He had a tattoo on his upper arm, of a small heart, done in blue and red. Beneath it was a patch of pink skin, where a name had been erased.

He was licking her left nipple, slowly. His right hand was caressing the back of her neck.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

He looked up. “What do you mean?”

“You seem like you’re. I don’t know. Somewhere else,” she said. “Oh . . . that’s nice. That’s really nice.”

They were in a hotel suite. It was her suite. He knew who she was, had recognized her on sight, but had been warned not to use her name.

He moved his head up to look into her eyes, moved his hand down to her breast. They were both na**d from the waist up. She had a silk skirt on; he wore blue jeans.

“Well?” she said.

He put his mouth against hers. Their lips touched. Her tongue flickered against his. She sighed, pulled back. “So what’s wrong? Don’t you like me?”

He grinned, reassuringly. “Like you? I think you’re wonderful,” he said. He hugged her, tightly. Then his hand cupped her left breast, and, slowly, squeezed it. She closed her eyes.

“Well, then,” she whispered, “what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said. “It’s wonderful. You’re wonderful. You’re very beautiful.”

“My ex-husband used to say that I used my beauty,’ she told him. She ran the back of her hand across the front of his jeans, up and down. He pushed against her, arching his back. “I suppose he was right.” She knew the name he had given her, but, certain that it was false, a name of convenience, would not call him by it.

He touched her cheek. Then he moved his mouth back to her nipple. This time, as he licked, he moved a hand down between her legs. The silk of her dress was soft against his hand, and he cupped his fingers against her pubis and slowly increased the pressure.

“Anyway, something’s wrong,” she said. “There’s something going on in that pretty head of yours. Are you sure you don’t want to talk about it?”

“It’s silly,” he said. “And I’m not here for me. I’m here for you.”

She undid the buttons of his jeans. He rolled over and slid them off, dropping them onto the floor by the bed. He wore thin scarlet underpants, and his erect penis pushed against the material.

While he took off his jeans, she removed her earrings; they were made of elaborately looped silver wires. She placed them carefully beside the bed.

He laughed, suddenly.

“What was that about?” she asked.

“Just a memory. Strip poker,” he said. “When I was a kid, I don’t know, thirteen or fourteen, we used to play with the girls next door. They’d always load up with tchotchkes—necklaces, earrings, scarves, things like that. So when they’d lose, they’d take off one earring or whatever. Ten minutes in, we’d be nude and embarrassed, and they’d still be fully dressed.”

“So why’d you play with them?”

“Hope,” he said. He reached beneath her dress, began to massage her labia through her white cotton panties. “Hope that maybe we’d get a glimpse of something. Anything.”

“And did you?”

He pulled his hand away, rolled on top of her. They kissed. They pushed as they kissed, gently, crotch to crotch. Her hands squeezed the cheeks of his ass. He shook his head. “No. But you can always dream.”

“So. What’s silly? And why wouldn’t I understand?”

“Because it’s dumb. Because . . . I don’t know what you’re thinking.”

She pulled down his Jockey shorts. Ran her forefinger along the side of his penis. “It’s really big. Natalie said it would be.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m not the first person to tell you that it’s big.”

“No.”

She lowered her head, kissed his penis at the base, where the spring of golden hair brushed it, then she dribbled a little saliva onto it and ran her tongue slowly up its length. She pulled back after that, stared into his blue eyes with her brown ones.