fume or some glass trinket.
9
10
11
By the time Ricky and Bethany arrived, I was making 12
dinner. Hot and sweet Italian sausages fried with whole 13
cloves of garlic and then simmered in red wine and 14
tomato sauce. The water for the vermicelli had just come 15
to a boil when Ricky and Bethany came in. She was a few 16
inches taller and almost twice the size of Ricky, but 17
Bethany wasn’t fat. She had a big chest and powerful legs, 18
but the stomach was flat. Her face was wide and the color 19
of dark amber. She had big teeth, an embarrassing laugh, 20
and eyes that glittered when they saw you.
21
“Hey, Charles,” she called. They had let themselves in 22
the front door. “That smells delicious. You got some for 23
us?”
24
“I didn’t know if you guys had time to eat. From what 25
Ricky said I thought you were real tired and had to go to 26
bed.”
27 S
“Uh-uh,” she denied. “We came to see you and eat 28 R
some sausages too.”
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She put her arms around me and gave me a kiss that 1
made me hug her back.
2
“Let’s eat!” Ricky declared. And for a while I had some 3
company and no thoughts in my head.
4
Bethany loved eating and sex, as I have said before, but 5
she also loved to talk about herself. We heard all about her 6
plans of moving down to Atlanta and starting a braid-7
and-nail parlor. She loved children and had gone to some 8
wild parties at crazy artists’ homes in Southampton. One 9
well-known painter had asked her to model three times, 10
but every time he was so moved by her ample beauty that 11
he had to make love to her instead.
12
I could see that most of her stories were designed to ex-13
cite her male audience. It worked. Ricky was almost 14
swooning over her words. He had run into her at a shop-15
ping mall near Riverhead a week or so earlier, and she 16
gave him hopes. Now he was only a sausage away.
17
“Hey, Bethy,” he said.
18
“Yeah?”
19
“I wanna show you somethin’ upstairs.”
20
“What?” she asked.
21
“Somethin’.”
22
“You comin’, Charles?” Bethany pursed her lips and 23
lowered her eyelids. If we were out in nature, I would 24
have killed Ricky right then.
25
“In a few minutes,” I said.
26
Ricky sighed in relief.
S 27
“Okay,” she said, smiling. “But you come on up now.”
R 28
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Walter Mosley
1
“I’ll be there.”
2
“Come on,” Ricky said, grabbing her by the arm.
3
“Ow! Don’t be so rough, Ricky. I’m comin’.”
4
I washed the dishes and looked out the window. I was 5
thinking about Anniston Bennet and the bag of money 6
that I had hidden in the foldout sofa bed in my father’s old 7
library. A bagful of money was not a normal thing — that’s 8
what I was thinking. No matter how much the little white 9
man had acted like it was a simple business transaction, it 10
was obvious that he wanted to hide what he was doing. It 11
made me nervous, but I couldn’t see any way out of it.
12
Twenty-five hundred dollars of the money was already gone.
13
But how bad could it be? He couldn’t hurt anybody in 14
my basement. He was just little so I knew he couldn’t hurt 15
me. Unless he had a gun. But I could lock the doors while 16
he was down there. Of course a man with a gun could get 17
through a door, or a window.
18
But why would he need to pay me money? Why not 19
just shoot me in the breakfast nook?
20
“Ohhhh.”
21
I couldn’t believe that Bennet had any designs on my 22
welfare. I decided to get drunk and stop worrying about 23
things I couldn’t change.
24
“Ohhhhh.” It was only a whisper. But, I thought, it had 25
to be a roar to make it all the way down into the kitchen 26
from my parents’ room on the third floor. That was the 27 S
deal I usually made with Clarance. He could come to my 28 R
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The Man in My Basement
house with one of his girlfriends. They’d stay on the third 1
floor and I’d sleep downstairs in my father’s den. But it 2
was the first time that Ricky had asked for the deal.
3
I never imagined that Bethany, who spoke in a small 4
high voice, could get the volume to disturb me downstairs.
5
That’s when I remembered being a child. Now and 6
then my parents wanted to be alone, to talk, they said.
7
They’d go into their room and tell me to go play. But all I 8
wanted was to play with them and talk to them. After 9
they sent me away from the door a few times, I’d wander 10
down to the pantry with my toy soldiers and guns. I was 11
happy then because there was a vent that let me hear my 12
parents’ soft murmuring voices while I played soldier.
13
“That’s it, baby,” Bethany said. She might have been 14
talking to me, her voice was so clear. “Right there. Right 15
there. Right there.”
16
Ricky was saying something, and she replied with a 17
whole drawerful of yeses.
18
I hadn’t masturbated in three days because of the alco-19
hol. By the time I got around to that, I was too dizzy to 20
do anything. Bethany was telling Ricky where to move 21
and when he got it right she let go with a strained roar.
22
That was my first orgasm too.
23
I could hear the furniture rocking and Bethany’s 24
squeals. She knew what she wanted and was very specific 25
in her requests. To hear a woman ask for pleasure like that 26
had me on my knees among the boxes of cereal and plas-S 27
R 28
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Walter Mosley
1
tic containers of grape juice. After my third orgasm I had 2
to leave the pantry for the living room. There I began to 3
drink. It was necessary to slow down my beating heart.
4
From the sofa I could hear the occasional moan or 5
gasping sob, but the whiskey dulled my urges and I fell 6
half into a doze.
7
8
9
“Charles?” she said. “You awake?”
10
I was asleep on the couch in the living room. At least 11
I think I was asleep. It seemed to me that I had been 12
looking at Bethany in her tight satin slip for quite some 13
time.
14
“Are you awake?”
15
“Uh-huh.”
16
“Ricky’s asleep,” she said as if it was an important piece 17
of information.
18
She sat down next to me and I got up, almost without 19
thinking, and moved to the chair. That made Bethany 20
smile.
21
“You scared of me, Charles Blakey?” she asked.
22
“You know a lot of those rich people come in here from 23
New York, don’t you, Bethy?” I asked.
24
She was confused by my changing her subject but still 25
answered, “Some.”