But then he remembered the slap, the power he was starting to tap into. He was on a roll. He had to go with the feeling. And Linda might know where her father was keeping the money. She might not even know that she knew. But Alphonse now had no doubts that he could convince her to talk, and if something was worth finding out, it would come out. He could make it happen whenever he wanted now that he knew how to go about it.
Damn. She should have fixed herself up. You just never knew what was going to happen.
Now here it is before noon on a Sunday and somebody’s at the door, and if it’s Daddy he’s going to see me in my robe and hair still uncombed and the place a mess and he’s going to think I’m a slob. When really I’m just alone and it’s hard to do all these things for yourself with nobody to care about it.
Pushing the voice button: “Who is it?” Pressing the door buzzer at the same time.
“Hey, it’s Alphonse.”
She had to stop doing that, letting people in before she knew who it was. But then, he was probably inside the door downstairs and there wasn’t anything she could do about it now. Besides, thinking about it, what a nice thing. She’d thought about Alphonse a couple of times this weekend, just spaced out watching the tube yesterday.
Sure, he was, like, pretty young and black and all that, but he did have kind of a cute face and a nice hard body, and it was a neat rush just to fantasize.
And driving home from Daddy’s, with Alphonse sitting so quiet next to her, she really had gotten the feeling that he was nervous, like he was thinking about them being together in the car at night. He hadn’t done anything, though. It was like other things were on his mind.
Over Saturday, maybe he’d been fantasizing a little, too. Maybe he really liked her a little. She’d studied him on Friday, after he’d hit her-it wasn’t any big thing, she knew. Guys just got riled up sometimes and had to make a point-Daddy would still do it, cuff her from time to time. But with Alphonse, it had kind of made her look at him different. Like he was showing her this private part of him, opening up. Flattering, in a way.
She was four floors up and it wouldn’t take him long, so she ran into her bedroom, dropped her robe on the floor and pulled on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. No time for underwear. Then a quick brush through the hair-barefoot was okay. In the bathroom the water was cold but felt good on her face. No makeup, but at least she’d be clean. A last look. Not bad.
The place wasn’t exactly a mess. Certainly it had been much worse. A couple of pillows out of place, some dishes on the drain.
On the way to the door she dropped the pizza delivery box into the garbage, then kicked the coffee mug and the box of Ritz and the empty Coke cans under the couch.
“Hey,” Alphonse said, sauntering in past her. “What’s happenin’?” He wore a red tank top under unbuttoned Army fatigues. His face seemed to shine in the room’s light.
“How’d you know where I lived?”
He smiled, looking his real age for a minute. “I looked it up, man.”
He bopped over to the window and looked out. His body became very still, hands at his side. He stared without a word at the Bay and Alcatraz beyond, as though something was on his mind. Well, she could give him time.
She didn’t know him very well yet. This was kind of how he’d been on Friday, though at work he had always seemed more energetic, jumpy almost. Especially that last week when they’d done the toot-then he’d really been fun, laughing and cutting up. He could do Eddie Murphy better than anybody.
He turned around, motioned with his head. “Righteous,” he said, “the view.”
He seemed to notice her for the first time. His eyes rested for a second on her breasts, traveled down her body.
“I’m glad you came by. I wasn’t doing anything.” She made what she thought was a cute shrugging gesture. “You want a beer or something, help yourself in the fridge. I’m not done making up yet.”
She went back into the bathroom, heard the refrigerator door open. A second later he was leaning against the doorway, looking at her in the mirror as she brushed on some powder.
“Hey,”-she made it sound light-“I’ll be out in a minute, okay?”
He just stayed there, sipping at his beer. “Come on, Alphonse, you’re making me nervous.”
He shrugged. “Nothing to be nervous about. It’s just me.” He put the beer down on the back of the toilet, just reaching over casually. She felt his hand on her waist, then move down across her backside. “What are you doing?”
Moving a step sideways, away from his hand, but turning around toward him, giggling. “Come on, give me a minute.”
“I don’t got a minute,” he said. His eyes weren’t laughing. She caught a look at them in the mirror, then turned completely to face him. “What’s the…? Hey,” she said.
“Tha’s right.”
He still wasn’t smiling. His penis was jutting out from the front of his fatigues, his eyes locked onto her face.
“Alphonse.”
He held it in his right hand and pulled her toward him with the other. “You want some of this.”
It wasn’t a question. He took her hand and put it on him.
It was going pretty fast. Now his other hand went behind her neck, and she was kissing him, still gripping him hard as though holding for her life on a thick piece of wood. It felt hard as wood.
She pushed him back. He wasn’t fighting her anymore-they were in it together. She let go of him for a minute and undid her jeans, pulling them half down, getting herself up on the counter-top.
“God, Alphonse.” Throwing her arms around his neck.
“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah.”
“I got this situation.”
They sat at the glass-topped kitchen table, each drinking some Mickey’s Big Mouth from the six-pack that Alphonse had gone down and bought on the corner about a half hour earlier. He was finally getting around to what he’d come for. Or getting around to something else he’d come for.
They weren’t exactly doing lines as a thing, where they’d just keep going through the day and into the night, but they’d had a few toots from the small pile of blow on the tabletop. Alphonse was wearing his red tank top and his camouflage pants. Linda had some hip-cut bikini briefs that, with the T-shirt hanging a little low, made it look like she was wearing nothing when you looked from the side.
Say what you want about the face, Alphonse thought, the girl has got legs that go all the way up. But that part was over for the time being, and he had some business to conduct.
She looked at him with a cocked head, loose now and feeling pretty good. “Talk to me.”
“It’s like this,” he began, and ran down to her the scam he’d developed on the way over, borrowing heavily from his experiences in the past two weeks. He had this situation-he liked that word, the mysterious authority behind it-where he knew two guys. One of them had formed the impression that he, Alphonse, was a dealer. Another dude he knew was, in fact, a dealer. Anyway, the first guy had a couple of grand to lay out for some good blow, but his source had dried up, where the second guy had a good stash and was always looking for buyers.
“So, I figger, put ’em together and what’s for Alphonse?” He sucked on his index finger and picked up some powder, running it around his gums. Then a little wash with Mickey’s. “Get me?”
Linda nodded solemnly.
“But”-Alphonse smiled a big smile-“I lay my hands on some green, I buy the stash, cut it, sell it, keep a pile for you and me to party a bit, and”-he held up his still-damp index finger- “and have some pocket money left over, maybe do the whole thing again.”
“It’s hard to get money,” Linda said.
“Getting started, that’s always the thing.” He sipped at the beer again, taking his time, then reached a hand across the table and patted her face. “You a bad woman,” he said gently. He ran his finger over the table again, pressing into the pile of coke to get a lot on it, and put it at Linda’s lips. She opened her mouth and he put the finger down under her tongue and left it there a second.