Utu, page 14
Ann Brook switched on the ignition and the convertible started up.
“I’m in advertising,” she said to the stars.
“I don’t care.”
She gave a little laugh, distorted by the drug. They drove along the deserted avenues.
“You’re a cop, aren’t you?” she said, braving the sidewalks.
“No.”
She laughed.
“Keep your hands on the wheel!”
Osborne got the car back on track just as it was about to smash into a garbage pail, which went flying anyway. Ann laughed all the louder. Above them, the stars were burning slowly. He smiled at the emptiness uniting them. Already high, Ann had made up her mind. She’d liked this guy right from the start, and that was precisely the kind of thing she refused to fight. Ann lived in a world of instant gratification. Since the dice were always loaded against you, you might as well help yourself to what you could get. Stopping at a red light, she asked, “A park, is that okay?”
It was Ann Brook talking to him, not Hana.
“Yes,” he replied.
The lights turned green.
They passed the reject shop on Queen’s Street, closed like all the other stores, and, at the corner of the avenue, turned toward Auckland. There was a gentle breeze. The coupé pulled up outside the gates of the park. Tall trees were swaying in the mauve night. In the distance stood the Auckland Museum with its neoclassical, neo-Fascist facade.
Ann took off her sandals and threw them on the back seat. “Can you see anyone?”
He looked around him. “Only you.”
The answer seemed to please her. She took his hand, but it was the moon that guided them through the darkness.
There was nothing stirring in the park, only a few owls. They partly stripped under the branches of a gigantic matai.
“Shit!” she cried. “It’s full of thorns!”
Osborne made out her little white panties on the ground, her smile in the shadow of the branches, and that long, caressing body at his fingertips, as if surrounded by a wonderful halo. He could barely stand. Ann pressed herself against him and stroked his testicles. Two round black eyes told him that he was handsome, that she really wanted him. She bent to suck the tip of his penis. Time passed, hanging from invisible threads. Ann looked at his exposed penis, blew gently on its erect tip, then stood up again, heedless now of the thorns nibbling at her feet, and lodged it like an ardent secret between her thighs.
That, at least, was the vision he had of it. Everything else seemed to be swimming in a haze. In three minutes, Ann had turned the world upside down. He abandoned himself to this cosmic gymnastics, forgetting everything. Supporting themselves against the trunk of the old matai, they made love with all the intensity of those nights when you forget everything. Ann came before he did, then, still shuddering, went back to his penis and took it fully in her mouth. Hana crossed his mind, in flames, but he didn’t care. Ann kept going, using her hand as an aid, and felt the pleasure mount in her lover’s penis. He ejaculated in her mouth. After that, blackness: the ecstasy, the alcohol, the datura, everything exploded at once.
When Osborne opened his eyes again—a second later, two seconds, ten?—the branches of the matai were swaying in the odorless night.
“Are you OK?”
Ann was picking up her panties, abandoned on the carpet of thorns.
“Yes. Yes.”
But he was swaying under the branches. He had just experienced his first blackout of the night. It had only lasted a few seconds, but there would be others. A little more effort and he would forget that he even existed.
“Are you coming?”
Ann Brook had dressed again at the speed of light. She was waiting in the moonlight, her pupils still dilated. Gradually recovering his balance, Osborne followed her warm hand across the park. A few red squirrels sitting on a tuft of grass watched them pass.
The car was waiting at the exit of the park, doors open. Ann put her sandals back on as he collapsed on the seat.
“Do you want more?” she asked.
More of what, he didn’t know. “Yes,” he said.
Ann gave a half smile and switched on the ignition. From that point, everything tipped over the edge.
* * *
K Road. Flashing signs, a few night birds moving like ghosts along the sidewalks, and the smells of Asian fried food fading away on the warm night air. There was one club after another here, with their sad doormen and their neon lights and their electronic music filtering out through their doors. Ann took Osborne by the sleeve and pulled him into the neighboring alley. The car ride had perked them up a bit, the effects of the datura were starting to wear off, and the lights of the street lamps danced in the puddles, even though it hadn’t rained.
They soon came face to face with a Maori with arms like legs, the Herculean guardian of a discreet door from which no sound emerged. The Phoenix.
“Hi, Will!”
Ann kissed him on the cheek. The guy must have been nearly six and a half feet tall, his build and belly were impressive but, curiously, his head was so small it seemed to belong to somebody else. Not only was he out of proportion, he didn’t look terribly affable either. He gave Osborne the once-over.
“He’s with me,” Ann said, to placate him. “No problem.”
The big Maori jutted out his chin but didn’t bat an eyelid. He opened the door, and they walked in beneath his muscular arm.
“He looks nasty,” Ann said, “but he’s really quite a nice guy.”
There was no cash desk inside the entrance, only a cloakroom plunged in gloom. There was a single purple ceiling light to illumine the legs of store window dummies that had been stuck to the walls, women’s legs daubed with paint that seemed to have sprouted there like strange plants. A girl appeared, a live one this time, a blonde in a fifties swimsuit and high heels, smiling like a starlet on the Riviera.
“Is he with you?” she asked.
Ann nodded.
“Okay, go in.”
Heavy bloodred drapes separated the counter from the club proper, where an electro rhythm was pounding out. The purple light guided them into the next room.
Osborne stared wide-eyed. “What’s this?” he asked, like someone discovering America.
There were costumes hanging from the walls, dozens of them.
“Disguises,” Ann replied, clearly amused by the turn events had taken. “You have to choose one and put on a mask if you want to go in.”
Ann took down a lamé fairy costume and quickly put it on. It was very short, with a plunging neckline, and, Osborne had to admit, really suited her. She looked like Barbarella out for a good time.
“What do you think?” she simpered.
Her tapering thighs swayed his judgment. “Not bad,” he said.
She laughed. “Put one of these on and follow me!”
Ann chose his costume—a kind of Roman toga that drew stoned giggles from both of them. He didn’t know where she was leading him, and he didn’t give a damn. They put on their masks. Hers was of sequined feathers, and he couldn’t see her eyes behind it.
There was a door hidden behind the heavy drapes. She opened it, and they entered a large room with a vaulted ceiling and a long wavy counter. It looked like a converted cellar. At a far end was a dance floor where masked and costumed figures were milling about. Blue spotlights and Chinese lanterns brought out the luster of the costumes. The music was almost deafening. There was also an ostentatiously decorated sitting area with rococo armchairs. Everyone was feeling up everyone else with their hands, but nobody seemed to mind.
Ann Brook had brought him to a swingers’ club. This one seemed a very special one. Osborne’s eyelids flitted back and forth between the various figures as they approached one another.
Ann slid her hand over his penis. “Coming?”
She took his hand and led him to a cubicle concealed behind a thin gilded curtain and furnished only with two designer armchairs and a transparent plastic coffee table.
“What is this?” Osborne asked. “An art installation?”
“No. Quite the opposite, in fact.”
She must have given a signal, because a man soon came in through the gold netting, carrying two bowls, which he placed on the table. They sat down in the armchairs, almost tipping backwards. The man was huge. He wore a plumed serpent mask and an Inca costume that revealed his rippling muscles. The first thing he did was to tie towels around their necks. Ann was still smiling. That should have aroused Osborne’s suspicions.
The Inca took a pinch of brown powder from one of the bowls and crammed it in the end of a tube of dry wood. Having done that, he motioned to them to put their heads back.
“What is that? Osborne asked.
“Thunder,” Ann replied.
The giant approached him and abruptly blew the powder through the tube into his left nostril. Osborne let out a groan, but the Inca’s hand maintained his head in position. An intense pain hit him, a pain he’d never experienced. It was if someone had struck the bridge of his nose with a hammer. The powder burned everything in its path, spreading a wave of fire in his throat before reaching his lungs. Tears ran down his face.
Unable to breathe, Osborne felt himself going a long way away. A viscous liquid was oozing from his nose. He was choking. He was going to die. He was plunging into a dark pit. At that point, a wisp of oxygen reached him through the lump of mucus ejected by his sinuses. On the verge of dying, he breathed the cold air into his torn lungs as if he was being reborn.
A stream of snot and phlegm sprinkled with powder poured out of his nostrils, inundating his chin and neck and the towel. He couldn’t see anything. Ann and the Inca had both disappeared. Osborne was dizzy, shaking in every limb, regurgitating bowlfuls of slimy dribble, his lungs as fragile as lace. The acridness of the powder drew floods of tears from him. He was going to suffocate, he was suffocating. Then another influx of air unblocked his sinuses, phlegm and vomit spattered on the towel, and the pain faded.
Opening his eyes, Osborne realized he was still alive. His airways clearer than they had ever been, he didn’t feel sick anymore. He didn’t feel anything anymore.
The cubicle had grown bigger, his sight was becoming sharper, and he even made out the objects and people around him with extraordinary clarity. Ann, the Inca untying their towels: he was aware of every detail, and they seemed familiar and almost reassuring.
Ann was the first to stand, helped up by the Inca, who next did the same for Osborne. Their brains were reeling, but they could walk. Or rather, they flew. Somewhere below him, Ann’s smile seemed gigantic. Borne aloft by the tide, Osborne took her hand and left the cubicle. Didn’t they have eternity to themselves? A golden veil enveloped his mind. Freed from his carnal envelope, he was entering a world where the transmigration of souls was possible, where fragments of collective memory floated about in no particular order, only taking shape once put back side by side, as if by a miracle.
And somewhere through the haze the swingers’ club was still there, with its throbbing lights.
Emerging through the small door from this strange, repetitive coma, Osborne was still quivering. Space and time had cracked open beneath his feet. Ann having vanished from his field of vision, he wandered for a moment beneath the vaulted ceiling, searching for her. He could hear sounds without really being aware of them. His mind hovered, as if he could see everything from a great height. He felt double, triple even.
Through the storm, he saw a muscular man mounting a skinny girl who was kneeling on all fours, dressed as Donkeyskin in the fairy tale. A small audience had gathered to watch them, among them two tall and curiously identical figures in Highland costume, their legs hairy and thin under their kilts. The girl was breathing heavily. After a final groan, the man withdrew from her arched buttocks, and the girl moaned, whether in pain or pleasure it was hard to tell. The first man was immediately replaced by another, who sank into her as if into butter. Donkeyskin was breathing heavily again, seemingly barely aware that a substitution had taken place.
Still high as a kite, Osborne walked to the bar, where a masked girl in a Wonder Woman costume was serving glasses of champagne. He felt a hand slipping under his toga.
“Are you sure you don’t want to come into the salon?” a distorted voice reached him.
His fairy godmother was smiling behind her silver mask. Ann. Ann Brook.
“What salon?”
They could barely hear each other over the cacophony of noise bouncing off the walls. Ann took him by the hand and led him to a room at the far end of the club. The music wasn’t as loud here, but the light was harsher—a disco ball hit by red and purple lasers, reflected in the masks.
There were half a dozen people standing around in a circle. There were no tables or bar in here, just a damp clay floor where two men were fighting like sumo wrestlers. One was dressed as Peter Pan, the other as Jason, with a silver helmet pulled down over his eyes. Holding on by the shoulders and breathing noisily, each was trying to throw the other to the floor, egged on by the spectators. Jason appeared to be out of breath, and, in fact, he soon collapsed on the clay floor and stopped moving. The victor took up position behind him and, still panting from the fight, penetrated him to the hilt. His potbelly lying flaccid on the other man’s ass, he braced himself and started thrusting, harder and harder. The aim was clearly to push the loser out of the circle.
The spectators’ cries increased in intensity—it would soon be their turn. Jason was sliding about on the damp floor while the fat man straddled him and punctuated each thrust with an aggressive hiss that pushed them a little farther. Maintaining balance with his hands alone, Jason was visibly weakening. He collapsed on the floor and was ejected from the circle.
Peter Pan rose to his full height, glowing with malicious joy, his penis still hard. He wasn’t wearing a condom. Those awaiting their turns applauded. The next opponent got ready. Somehow still standing, Osborne watched, in a daze. The champion had barely had time to breathe before a girl entered the arena. Donkeyskin.
The spectators cried out insults. The fight began. The poor girl was so scrawny, she wasn’t able to put up much of a struggle, and soon fell. Peter Pan immediately rushed forward, held her down with her face to the ground, parted her buttocks with both hands and penetrated her so violently that she screamed, then writhed a bit and started weeping softly.
It was a disquieting spectacle.
Ann had joined the contenders, and was following everything with rapt attention. Donkeyskin was literally sliding on the clay, pushed toward the edge of the circle with great staccato thrusts, and finally ejected. The man had come with one last groan, and his penis now hung flaccidly beneath his leaf-green tunic.
The insults intensified when Ann entered the arena. Leaning back against what seemed to be a stone wall, Osborne held his breath. His fairy looked magnificent under the glitter ball, her brown pubic hair just visible under her lamé costume, but, lost as he was in his delirium, he feared for her. Savagely, the two fighters grabbed hold of each other. The man had the advantage of strength, the silver fairy that of agility. As slippery as an eel, she kept escaping his grip, while somehow maintaining her balance. The cries from the spectators grew ever louder. Osborne didn’t know if he was dreaming. Peter Pan almost brought her down but Ann’s thighs were powerful. She took advantage of the abortive attack to pull him to the ground. Was it because he had just come that he was a little weak?
The crowd moved in closer, applauding the Silver Fairy for bringing down Goliath with a wave of her magic wand. Ann grabbed a huge dildo, tied it around her waist and, still panting, bent over her victim. She gave him a couple of kicks to force him to get on all fours, then adjusted her terrible tool, and slowly plunged it into his anus. The man gritted his teeth as she dilated his sphincters. The virtual penis seemed thick and long enough to kill. Ann sank it deeply into him, then, whether out of sadism or a desire for revenge, kept pushing and pushing. Almost dislocated now, Peter Pan moved forward on all fours, closer and close to the edge.
At last, he left the circle, not so much defeated as thoroughly beaten.
Osborne couldn’t hear anything anymore, and could barely make out the movements of anyone’s lips. His mind whirled in the kaleidoscope of the disco ball as he left the salon. Walking to the bar counter, he felt nauseous.
Reality had escaped him, and he had no desire to catch up with it.
He turned one last time toward the clay floor. Now it was Ann who had fallen. Her little skirt was pulled up over her back, and a phallus, a living one this time, was digging into her intestines . . .
* * *
The Southern Cross had appeared in the sky by the time they left the club. The effect of the “thunder” was slowly wearing off, and Osborne was left with a jumble of images and a strong desire to vomit. Ann was smiling beneath the street lamps, her eyes half-closed. Stoned as he was, she appeared unruffled. He remembered her on the floor, beautiful and cruel in her fairy costume.
“You’re a strange girl,” he said.
“You’ve got to have fun somehow.”
Between her and Hana, there was an abyss, into which he was sinking.
“There’s a party at Julian’s,” she said. “Coming?”
Osborne shrugged by way of consent—given their state, they wouldn’t get far. Even getting to the coupé took them a while.
“Can you drive?” he asked.
“No. How about you?”
“Me neither.”
Laughing, Ann switched on the ignition. Then she lit a cigarette, turned up the volume on the car radio, did a U-turn in the deserted street, and set off for Ponsonby.
She’s . . .
So . . .
