Manifestation of a Dirty Dream

Manifestation of a Dirty Dream
By
T. I. Fraser

I am fairly sure it was Victor who brought me to the whorehouse. That
is to say I believe it was Victor's idea and not mine. Of course,
Victor could not have brought me anywhere. And I suppose I found later
that neither of us had actually provided transportation. But I simply
can't imagine why I would have been in a whorehouse had it not been
Victor's suggestion, or rather, more in the style of Victor, Victor's
justified insistence. I readily admit that this is only to clear my own
name. After all, there are particular parties who would not be pleased
at all with my going to a brothel on my own. Some people would consider
it a disgrace, and for them I say that I am certain, to an extant, that
did not choose to go.
Four of us, if you considered us a group. Victor, Jack Nicholson, Burt
Reynolds, and myself. Jack Nicholson was not the one that comes to mind
most quickly. Similar, very similar, with that maniacal twang that
leapt from the back of his throat. He was rugged, but more rugged. His
face had the same reek of many, many years of excess, but more years.
And his dress was the same casual finery of a man with money, but more
casual. Definitely not the one you're thinking about. Burt I could not
be so sure of. He wore a perfect red suit with a white pimp's hat,
which he rubbed the brim of so often it seemed to be a nervous tick. He
kept silent, and behind the thick moustache and shocks of unnaturally
black hair that framed his leather face, he could have been anybody.
For some reason, I knew him as Burt Reynolds.
Victor was Victor. He was the innocent purveyor of bad occurrences. His
rat-like face always appeared as if it would have had a most perfect
salesman smile, but he didn't smile. His short dark hair and tall wiry
body were as seductive as a serial killer's. Victor had clung to my
life like the fear of Hepatitis ever since he moved in with me. Often I
had considered turning him back onto the streets. I no longer cared if
he was cold and hunted and sleeping in the back of a truck. I just
wanted him away. Somehow I hadn't managed to dispatch him yet, and in
fact still was making efforts to please him, which were all certainly
leading to my demise. I remember looking at him for a long time when we
first entered the whorehouse and thinking that on his presence alone I
should have left. But I stayed.
The interior was nasty, gray, and cubic, adorned only by a sweaty steam
and filth. I don't recall an odor, but it looked like a shitstorm of
yellow light in Albert Speer architecture. No one but the four of us
inhabited the front room. A desk sat in the center of the room, some
bath mats to the left and a few doors, a central door in the far wall.
You could never have assumed the business of this place if you hadn't
known it. But that is the nature of such establishments, is it not?
Ambiguity, keeping those who wish to be left in the cave in the
cave.
The manager eventually came out to greet us. A tall, stocky, dumbish
looking fellow lined the manager's right side like a coat pocket. I
surmised that he must have been the manager's sycophant. The manager
was bald with those grotesque patches of dry hair on a flaky scalp. His
upper lip was split, cracked, and flat under a traditional shylock's
nose. He had the jowls of a greedy man. He slapped one stubby hand
against his protruding gut and rubbed the sticky bulge a moment before
saying his salutations. One by one, he shook our hands, elbowed our
ribs, and made ribald jokes at which only he could laugh. I had to
repress all of my natural urges to vomit, to slap him, to flee. He was
one of those creatures that made you afraid of sex for fear of
conjuring his image.
We followed him and his lackey to the central door in the back. The
manager opened this door with the grand gesture of a magician. The next
room was a variation of the first. It was steamier and the floor was
thick red tile instead of concrete. It had a door in every wall, all of
them closed and noticeably unpainted. I coughed a little on the steam,
and Victor patted my back, an action that only left me sicker. The
manager led us to the door on the right.
A large bed, big enough for ten people took up most of the room. White
sheet and five pillows and such was all for the bed. The steam had
grown into mildew in this room, glutinous and more pervasive. Yellow
light filtered out of a door by the bed and then fractured throughout
the room like weak fireworks. It was obviously a bathroom, cheap and
maybe Greco-Roman. We were instructed to remove our shoes and line them
against the wall. Then we crawled underneath the sheet. Only a few
inches separated us. The manager said that we could take our clothes
off like this. Privacy, he said. I laughed. A quick glance from the
lackey put me in my place.
Before leaving, the lackey performed a peculiar action that I cannot
disregard. The manager had already exited and the lackey was making his
way through the door to leave us to our&;#8230; privacy. But he
stopped. He stopped and looked down at the row of shoes by the wall,
and then back to us, and then back to the shoes. And he repeated this.
I seemed to be the only one aware of it. Victor was engaged in a
telekinetic conversation with Jack. Burt had dozed off under the brim
of his hat. What was wrong with our shoes? I wondered if it was the
shoes themselves. Was it my pair that had offended him so, for his face
did not look happy? Or was it the number of shoes? Was it an uneven
number? Was it greater than eight? Which of us had I failed to notice
was a cripple?
I had only known one cripple in my life. Legitimately known, that is.
Certainly I had distributed change to a number of them, and even
conversed with one, a legless black woman named Joyce who was drunk
enough to urinate in front of me. But the one I had truly known was
named Brandon. I had gone to elementary school with him. He was vibrant
beyond what his affliction allowed. And his legs were not missing from
body, but completely absent from mind. They looked fine to me, though
thin. The rest of him was large, hulking, and muscular. He was
wonderfully nice. So much so that he became rapidly more popular than
me and I barely was able to call him friend. We lost touch after the
third grade.
It was funny to have him come to mind again after so many years. One of
those thoughts of "What's become of him?" I'm sure would have gone
through my head if I hadn't been so terrified of the lackey at that
moment. I was afraid. And I realized that what I was afraid of was
expulsion. The humiliation of ejection from this rotten pit would be
too much for me to bear. Victor must have sensed my fear, because I
suddenly felt his eyes on me in a look of shame. There was a difference
between his normal frown and the one he had put on. And I was worried
about my shoes.
Then the lackey left. He closed the door lightly, as if we were
sleeping children. The others began to disrobe, except Burt who
appeared to have already gotten naked. (His bare hairy shoulders
protruded above the sheet.) Victor's manner of undressing was as manic
as he was. The sheet peaked and dropped, slapped by his knees and feet
and abdomen. He kicked about with grunts. His hair flew up wildly about
his head, and for a brief moment, he was the perfect caricature of a
mad scientist, creating monsters. I was subtler, though I don't
remember how. My clothes slid from my body at such a rate as to avoid
embarrassment. Jack barely moved at all, like his clothes were being
pulled off by a vacuum. And soon the four of us were newborns. I felt
just as tired.
In the sudden profound exhaustion that followed, I fell momentarily
asleep. I dreamed in this sleep. Some part of that dream took place in
a training camp for young recruits of the FBI. Some part was in a
parlor on a rooftop. I was married, or engaged, and happy. Then I was
sad and lost. And so on in this fashion until I was gently
awakened.
Upon returning to the world of the whorehouse, a blurry haze pervaded
my eyes. At first I believed it to be grogginess from the sleep. But it
dawned on me as my mind sharpened that the bathroom door was open. I
was closest to it. Steam rolled out in billowing waves that fell like
rain on my exposed face. The childishly golden light was more intense
now. To my right, I turned to see Victor. His company assured me that I
was no longer dreaming. At best I was submerged in a nightmare. But he
was not alone. Hanging over him with one slender hand on his chest was
a girl. She had beautiful hair that was, almost ironically, the color
of the light. She kept her eyes open in a solid stare as Victor rambled
on about our misadventures that he was obviously concocting as he went
along. She was not only attractive but also confident. A dream girl. I
would have become jealous had I not turned my head away. Clinging to my
left side was another girl. She was black, darker than I could have
imagined. Her hair was a tangle that burst sporadically and
energetically from her head. She, too, had a confident smile. My girl's
boniness was padded lightly in the chest. Unlike Victor's girl, who was
wearing something of glimmeringly expensive silk, my girl wore a plain
red shirt that wrapped her top like a tourniquet. From what I could
feel of her legs against mine, she had nothing on south of the
shirt.
At first I will admit I was a bit thrown off by having a black whore,
though I dreaded using both those words. It wasn't a matter of
prejudice, really. I had been with a black woman once before when I was
a teenager. I had posed as an adult, enough for her standards anyway.
My inexperience gave me away, however, and truthfully I didn't know if
I was attracted to her or if I was simply ready for something at that
point in my life. I do remember I enjoyed it. But this was different.
Now I had gone down many roads of women, but I had never been back to
that dark road that had initiated me so many years before. I wasn't
opposed, but confused as to why she selected me, or was selected for
me, or however it works.
We got along immediately. After my initial hang-up, that is. I found
her to be quite charming. What she first told me about was the
bathroom. That's where the towels were, she said, and we would need
those in the near future. That's also the waiting room for the
employees. She used "employees" not to duck the issue of her
profession, but to point out that it was not only the whores who
lingered there. The lackey, and others like him, also spent their off
time in that bathroom. Right now, she told me, it was empty. Everyone
was predisposed. The day was just beginning for them. I thought back to
when we had entered the establishment and couldn't recall the position
of the sun.
Burt and Jack had disappeared behind Victor and the girl that he was
now lecturing. Even from the spaces between and around their bodies
where I could see to the opposite end of the bed, Burt and Jack were
missing. My attention was pulled away from this puzzlement by a quick
motion. The sheets had begun to rise and fall around Victor's crotch
and I found the source of this motion to be his girl's hidden hand.
Victor continued to lecture away, but his voice was more somber now and
punctuated with hard swallows. A hand job was so his style. It was an
act of non-commitment. He could almost pretend that it wasn't happening
to ease his conscience, that it was he at work on himself, and at the
same time, let his mind run with the idea of his conquest of this
beauty. She seemed impassionate about her task. Her face was bland now,
with a longing to be done with everything. I felt such great pity for
her, just for having to touch and handle him if nothing else. I wanted
to apologize to her. After all, I was probably the one paying for all
this.
Her torment however reminded me that there must be a time limit. If I
wanted anything, I should get to asking. I turned to my girl and she
seemed already perfectly in tune. She kissed me lightly on my chest. I
did not realize how much I had missed lips. My girlfriend's were months
and miles away. The girl's mouth started moving down my torso. I caught
her face with a light touch on the cheek and pulled her back to up to
me. I asked what she wanted. I'm sure that this is a standard question,
maybe not the standard, but heard often enough. She gave a laugh and I
felt her hand brush between my legs. Without a word she slid one leg
over my body and raised our portion of the sheet with her back. She was
sitting up straight, and as seductively pornographic as we must have
looked, we were not engaged in anything. I promise that I never
intended it to go any farther. Of course, I'm only promising this to
those parties that I mentioned in the beginning.
But I was never given the chance to prove my innocent purpose. As
things were escalating to their most fun, the door was violently thrown
open. The outside room flew in on a bright fluorescence that made
sparks above our heads when it collided with the bathroom light. My
girl flung herself down into a sheepish position by my side. We looked
to see the manager and the lackey standing in the doorway. Their faces
were twisting through a range of frowns. Victor shot me a glance of
judgment, though he and his girl had not missed a beat in their
previous activity. What had I done, I thought. How had I disobeyed the
rules? Was it something to do with my shoes? Had the lackey explained
what he had seen? What had he seen?
"Hey," barked the manager, "there's more than just pornography going on
in here." Suddenly it dawned on me that there was a limit. Accepting
their generosity was one thing, but taking them was quite another. This
was not a whorehouse, but the thing that strode the fine line between
one and a simple house of whores. This was a strip club of sorts, one
that allowed us to strip. I looked to my girl, whose eyes were an inch
thick with water. She dove for the bathroom and closed the door behind
her. The manager turned his scowl away and left. The lackey marched to
the bathroom, stopping to briefly to send me a vibe of hatred.
When I realized I had lost my turn, I pulled myself out of the bed. I
had to get on my knees and dig through the sheets for my clothes. I was
unable to find my shirt. After getting my pants on, I walked out the
bedroom door and into the larger room with the other doors from which
to choose. To my left was the door we had entered through, and to my
right and in front of me were the two unexplored doors. I went to my
right first. I believe I was thirsty and looking for water.
The sight beyond this door was to become the first in a series of
shocks from which I fear I will never recover. One could argue that my
psyche was actually damaged from the moment I found myself in the
brothel. Truly I had not felt at ease the entire time. I blamed most of
that on Victor. With every crazy word he spewed forth, especially about
his ex, I felt him eating my immune system. It had gotten so that even
when he was quiet, as he had been today, his vampiric effect was still
drawing life from me. And I admit that my stomach turned a little when
I realized where we were, what we were doing. But all that was nothing,
just a pit in my chest and a lump in my throat. What was to come would
take my mind from me entirely.
I do not recall the speed at which the door opened. All that I can
remember is taking a step inside and looking to the two women on the
bed. It was just them and a tray table with glasses of water. Their
hair was pulled back and their faces plastered with green mud, but I
had no trouble recognizing them. After all, they were my flesh and
genetics, my grandmother and my mother. Color rushed from my skin and
tucked itself with my blood into my innards. All my organs seemed to
stop at once, except my heart, which beat me from the inside. I could
scarcely open my mouth. But my jaw dropped of its own accord. Suicide,
I thought, have you really contemplated suicide? Because now might be a
good time to start.
And then I paused. As my tongue was stumbling for an excuse and my
hands were fumbling for a blade to put through my shirtless chest,
something appeared odd about the situation. Never mind the overt
distress of being in a whorehouse, what were my mother and grandmother
doing there? They couldn't ask me before I could ask them. And they
weren't asking me. What was holding their tongue? Were they as ashamed
as I was to be there? Of course not. They must not have known what it
was. Keeping those who wish to remain in the cave in the cave. I
examined the mud on their faces. They must have thought it was a spa of
some kind, one of those day places to relax.
Naturally I was still in the dark on certain issues. I had no idea they
had come out to California. And the coincidence of finding them at this
embarrassing moment was a bit too much for a coincidence. But I felt so
free of real accusation that I allowed myself a smile, just a little
one. Then, as if it was the most normal and average thing to say, I
asked them if they needed anything. Not like I was working there, but
just as a son and a grandson. I didn't even say hello or ask why they
had come. I simply asked if they wanted any little thing that I could
bring them. Because certainly one can never be too comfortable in a
day-spa.
All my joyous arrogance, however, was soon ripped from me and handed
back, shredded, on a cold plate of stern looks. They did not appreciate
my offer to help. Nay, they did not appreciate my presence at all. They
resented me in the way I resent Victor. Without a word, they shook
their heads, both to turn down my offer and scorn me. They knew. They
surely knew what was happening. They surely knew why I, a young male,
was here- no, was frequenting (in their heads, I'm sure they used
"frequenting")- this establishment. And while normally I would be
surprised at them for supporting a place of loose ethics, I was left
again to fumble and stumble for excuses and blades. But I had none of
each, so I stepped backwards and shut the door.
I don't know why I didn't leave right then. Why I didn't walk straight
out the door and keep walking until I found myself on the highway and
walk across it, back and forth in a zigzag pattern, until finally some
large hurtling piece of metal ground up my body to its most base meat
roots. Or why I didn't run back into that room and jump on the
offensive. Start barking out questions about when they arrived, why
were they in this place, and why hadn't they told me they were coming
out California. Why would they come to California not to visit me?
There were day spas in Florida. I could have reduced them to tears with
my inquiries. But I didn't. I turned to the door on my right
instead.
This door I remember I cracked open in increments. I wanted to avoid
another unpleasant surprise. I couldn't bare to have seen my
grandfather or grandmother on my father's side who'd been dead for six
years. The sight was actually closest to the latter. A forgotten person
of my past. No, not forgotten. I had just thought about him earlier
this day. How strange. Brandon, the young cripple I had known in grade
school, was sitting on a step. No bed adorned this room. Just his step
and some heavy steam. Brandon was facing the opposite wall and barely
gave me so much as a glance when I walked in. "Brandon? Brandon," I
said, "it's me. Don't you remember me?" They were the first real words
I had spoken.
Brandon looked at me and told me no. I wanted to believe that somehow
his memory had been erased in some great capacity, but it was a genuine
no, he just didn't know me, couldn't recall me.
This took care of my next question. I was going to ask if he had come
out for me. I was going to ask if my mother had brought him. None of
that would have ever made much sense. At this point, though, I wasn't
functioning on the level of sensible. I just wanted to know that
something was still good, and that someone still wanted me around. My
mother and grandmother had abandoned me. Victor wouldn't leave until he
was sure I was good and dead. My girlfriend was back home, running
around with every body that came into her club. The manager wanted me
out, and the lackey was ready to enforce it. But here was someone that
I believed might not be able to conjure any reason to hate me or
destroy me. Brandon was never close, and that might have worked to my
favor. I could catch up with him, run over what had happened in the
last fifteen years or so. The people we knew, the places we had lived,
the casual points of our current lives. These things would come easily,
with no more regulations or judgments. But I didn't come right out with
my name. I let him sit for a while, so as to adjust to my
attendance.
Brandon was the only piece of furniture in this room. As I said, he
sat on a step that ran the length of the back wall. Through the overall
murkiness of the dingy luminosity, tiny shafts, like white laser
points, penetrated the air and dug into the floor. Actually, as I
looked to the ceiling, I saw that they didn't just resemble lasers;
they were lasers. Steel tips poked out from the ceiling and shot these
beams to the ground. They didn't look like dance lights or mood
setters. They had a surgical feel about them, a creepy villainish
quality. I was going to ask Brandon if he knew what they were, but it
became apparent to me that he did. His eyes were trained on them,
shaking vehemently with tension. Under his black hair his face had
grown mature. And by mature I mean terrified. And downward still, below
the bulk of his still brawny upper-frame, his puny legs had grown even
thinner. In fact, they had disappeared entirely. He had been stumped,
had his vestigial organs sawed off like rotten branches. Had they done
that here in this brothel? His hands gripped the step- for balance or
fear I couldn't be certain- with such force that his knuckles were
almost screaming. What had become of him? I was suddenly thankful that
I hadn't asked about his recent past.
I saw a glimmer of hope in his eye when he finally turned to me. I
entertained the idea that it was meant for me, that I was here to
rescue him. Maybe I was. But I was not his hope. I was the terror, the
unnerving phenomenon that made turgid seas of his irises. Where did
this hope come from? It was in his voice when he spoke. "They're doing
some work on me." He returned his gape to the lasers, and then back to
me. "Would you like to see?" I swear I meant to shake my head and
running shrieking from the room. Somehow it manifested itself as a nod,
and my body froze.
Gingerly, Brandon lifted one hand to his face. Two fingers he placed on
either side of his nose. With a pinch and a pop, he lifted his nose
from his face and held it out. One might think the open hole above his
mouth would be the most horrifying part of this. Actually, it was the
nose itself that made me cringe. It looked plastic, and probably was,
and why did he want to take it off? Why was he able to take it off? I
finally let out the squeal that I had been holding in since&;#8230;
before I had come here. I was screaming because of my stupid life in
Los Angeles, because of the shitty roommates I had taken on, because of
Victor. I was screaming to go home and forget that this abomination had
ever existed. Before I could turn for the door, Brandon was pulling
himself off the step with his free hand and lunging toward me.
The calamity of exiting the room was so much that at the end, I spilled
through the door onto the red tile outside. My eyes came to rest on
something black, a shoe, which led to the leg of the lackey. Victor,
Burt, and Jack all stood around him, gazing down on me with indignant
grimaces. I pointed back to the door keeping desperation on my face as
I whimpered for understanding. But the manager was at my fallen heels,
already closing the door and covering up my proof. The lackey dropped
my shirt and shoes on my head.
Once I had finished dressing, we were escorted to the front door. Oddly
enough, I never saw any money change hands, though I did see Jack speak
briefly with the manager in hushed tones. On the road outside, in the
grip of a cold orange dusk, a van was parked with its side door already
slid open. It was one of those airport shuttle vans. I didn't bother to
read the name of the company. A brothel taxi service. One could almost
call it cute. Burt strode in first like a cowboy. Next went Victor, his
spider-long appendages gripping every surface of the entryway. I meant
to let Jack by, but he had come up behind me and was gesturing with a
point and a pat that I go ahead. As long as I shall live, which I fear
will not be long, I will always regret entering that taxi.
The drive was an amazingly short distance not back to my apartment.
Instead we were dropped in front of a mansion surrounded by an oddly
placed jungle. The mansion itself was tropical, with a brown
faux-thatch roof and large decorative windows that revealed marvelously
appointed quarters. My spirits were naturally being raised to be
dashed, as we were not led into the house (Jack acting as guide, and I
came to believe it was his manor), but instead into the dense brush.
After making our way through vines and scrub, we stopped at the back of
the house on a large patio. The patio was unlaquered, unkempt wood that
ended at the foot of the jungle. In one corner was some type of outdoor
shower cubicle and next to that was a gray box, maybe four feet tall. I
found my way to the backdoor, which I meant to open, but it was
locked.
Upon turning away from the door, I saw the rest of my party, standing
against the background of the jungle. Somehow Victor and Burt had
acquired martinis. They were hanging on each other, Victor's greasy
hands leaving trails on the lapels of Burt's jacket. Jack stood by the
shower, and everyone fixed their attention on me, though now it seemed
jovial, like I was an inside joke.
"Trevor," said Jack, "I think you may have seen too much." Burt and
Victor let their giggle grow. "I think," continued Jack, "that it might
be time to appraise your value to our team." The lines were coming out
clich?, but Jack's voice made up for it. That and the duo to the side
doing hyena impressions. Should I be apologizing, fighting back,
running? The whole scenario was beginning to play differently. It was
growing increasingly active.
The jungle decided to play its part, too. A large mechanical arm, the
kind they use to retrieve stuffed bears, lowered itself down from a
tall palm. The claw pinched around Jack's head, and I had a brief flash
of Brandon squeezing his nose. Poor Brandon. The claw jerked upward,
but deliberately, and Jack's head did not tear, it merely detached,
letting his old and grizzled body slump to a heap on the ground.
I would like to explain the physical effects of watching a willful
decapitation. Was I pouring sweat and tears and was my skin inching
away from my bones? Of course, but that wasn't anything close to what
actually happens when you see the smile on a severed head and the body
falls leaking to the ground and two people, one whom you know wants to
ruin you, are spilling alcohol and laughing drunkenly into each other's
ear. I'm afraid I can't tell you what the reaction is. You'll know it
when you it happens.
But this was not the end of my horror. The arm lowered again, placing
Jack's head in the shower. However, it did not fall when the claw
released it. It hovered just above the shower door. Then the door
opened, and I saw that his head had been placed on a younger body. More
nubile, more powerful, in a tight fitting white shirt and similar
pants. He yawned and shrugged with this new body, stretching it both
for show and relief. "We've been working, Trevor," he said, with his
voice sounding older and more out of place than ever. His palm came to
rest on the gray box. "This is our new favorite experiment."
His hand ripped the front of the box open and from the darkness inside
a shape emerged. At first only a hoary triangle hovered in the light.
Then the full figure jumped from the box. A giant white dove, beak and
talons of faded metal, cocked its head at me. The jungle began to
rustle and ache with noise. The dove moved mechanically, like it wasn't
comfortable being a bird. It leapt forward with a pound. The beak
looked soldered shut.
"Oh my God," I yelled. "Is that my mom?" Victor burst into complete
hysterics, clutching Burt's shoulder for immoral support. Burt threw
the rest of his martini down his shirt and tie in a fit of laughter.
The bird took to the muddy air and swooped straight into my face. The
beak stabbed at me again and again, tearing off my eyelids first so
that I had to watch it scratch at me. My flesh was being torn and the
blood was slow to come. But more troublesome were the wings, wide and
sturdy, slamming the wind around my head and creating a tunnel of
deafening sound.
And in that tunnel traveled Jack's new convincing laugh, barreling to
my ears like the force behind this beast.
And my screams.
Is that my mother? Oh, God. Is that my mom? Is that my mom? Mom?