"I have a homework assignment for you."
Monica wasn't going to give Shapiro the pleasure of asking what?
"Abstain from sex."
"What about him?"
"His homework is to lay off the bottle."
"A day at a time," I piped in, though General Shapiro didn't hear me since he immediately asked Monica, "May I make a point?"
When she characteristically didn't give him the respect of answering, he asked again, "May I?"
"Does it matter whether I say yes or no? You're going to make your point anyway"
"I want to hear his point," I interjected. "What's your point?"
"It's really striking how every time I try to help you folks, Monica always tries to stop me."
"This doesn't help me." Monica crossed her arms defiantly.
"I don't think you want to be happy," Shapiro insisted. "It makes you anxious. Then people will be jealous of you."
"Was that your point?" I asked.
"No." Shapiro plainly wasn't interested in what I had to say.
"What was it?" I persisted.
"Monica doesn't want to hear it; it makes her too anxious."
"Would you reassure him that it won't make you too anxious so we can get on with the session," I pleaded. "I mean, we're making more out of this… no point is so earthshaking…."
"That's precisely my point," Shapiro interrupted.
"That was your point?"
"No, that wasn't the point," he said. "It's another point."
"Why did you say `precisely my point' if it wasn't the point?" I said. "It's confusing."
"It's just an expression."
"Maybe you could find some other way of introducing your so-called point that was more palatable to Monica. You might for instance not keep insisting on making your point. Just say what you have to say, and she won't feel you're trying to shove something down her throat. She won't feel you're trying to win."
"I don't mind if he tries to shove something down my throat as long as it's your cock."
That was one session that ended without General Shapiro being able to make his point, and it made me think that somewhere inside of her, Monica had the genes of a segregationist Southern senator circa 1964, filibustering against civil rights legislation.
But something had to crack. We were struggling. Monica and I had never been in each other's company without fucking our brains out. Living together was another matter entirely. We didn't know how to do basic things like stand, talk, read the paper in an armchair, watch television-without having our orifices filled-and despite Monica's seeming resistance, the enjoyment of the more mundane pleasures of romance was something she secretly longed for. Following Shapiro's advice and attempting total abstention turned our lives upside down.
Monica is an ethical person at heart. So whenever we got a call from one of those companies that does surveys, marketing research, and especially opinion polls, she felt it was her civic duty to respond. In the past, the only problem was that she was usually too horny to make it through a telephone conversation. About halfway into the interview, she'd motion to me. I'd walk over and she'd unzip my fly. Then she would take my cock in her mouth, sucking on it with a self-satisfied grin, and only taking it out when she had to clarify a point. Because her mouth was stuffed, she'd often have to repeat her answers, but she was inevitably gracious and cooperative. Monica was always willing to lend a hand if she had a prick in the other. Now, however, it was getting to the point where she was having no trouble answering the questions, since she had nothing in her mouth.
We sat in an embarrassed silence, not knowing what to do with each other now that the magic of our sexual electricity was gone. Extending the electrical metaphor, I'd say the plug was still working all right, but the socket was dead. I had no problems sticking it in whenever she wanted, but she was as dry as the most dried-out patch of the Sahara Dessert on a 120-degree day.
C99
"I'm no expert on art, but it's my impression the abstract expressionists were very contentious. They liked to talk and converse at this place called the Cedar Tavern. There were tremendous fights that sometimes got physical. Drinking wasn't the only thing they did." Usually General Shapiro would wait for one of us to say something. Then he would interrupt before we finished a sentence. That was the essence of his method. Everyone has their story. The story is what makes people feel special, and it's this uniqueness that General Shapiro chopped down the minute you walked into his office. But today was different; he didn't even wait for us to bother to report what was going on in the relationship since the last time he'd seen us. He was past that. He no longer needed our input at all. He knew 1 have to admit he was right, but there still seemed to be something unscientific about reaching conclusions without the benefit of data or observations.
"What if James just fights with you about art instead of being an abusive drunk? Now, James, whatever you do, don't agree with her. You have to swagger to be a good abstract expressionist, and you have to be a sexist. Constantly attack the validity of a woman having opinions. Come on to her when she is trying to talk. Treat her as dismissively as possible and she'll want you just as much as she did when you drunkenly stumbled in the front door of your bunker."
Because Monica and I had never conversed in a normal way, full-fledged arguments about the nature of art were quite a mountain to climb. During the cab ride home, we decided we had to give it a try, but neither of us knew what to do.
"Do we just start talking?" I asked when we walked into the bunker.
Monica shrugged. She knew how to be contentious, but not being a true intellectual, she didn't have an arsenal of provocative remarks to start us off.
"1 guess you should say something that gets my goat about art or painting or abstract expressionism," I offered.
The problem was, Monica never had any opinions about abstract expressionism; paint being slapped all over the canvas in the exuberant way it was in the work of Pollock, DeKooning, Motherwell, and Rothko just turned her on. Monica had to feel something about art other than it did or didn't make her horny. She had to come up with an idea about it, and I had to find the idea puerile and annoying. Then I had to berate her and somehow relate her simplistic ideas about art to her family background and upbringing. Once the criticizing began, I would try to fuck her.
"Okay listen, here's an idea: just say `Franz Kline was influenced by Velasquez."'
"Franz Kline was influenced by Velasquez."
"That's really dumb. What does a dumb bitch like you know about anything? What'd you read that in Time magazine? Are you going to throw that reductive bullshit out at the next lawn party. It's bourgeois. Now get down on all fours, bitch, and I'll put it up your ass."
Monica looked like she was going to swoon. Her face grew red, and she immediately pulled her jeans down to her ankles and got on the floor.
"Oh yeah, put it up my ass. I'm so hot, fuck me, fuck me, fuck me up the ass."
"Say `Pollock is synchronistic."'
"Pollock is synchronistic."
"That's what everyone who doesn't understand the narrative element in Pollock says. Synchronistic! What do you know about painting? Now just shut up and suck my cock."