Bullit

Fred doesn't want to go home. He's washed his hands, his face, his balls, and still he smells like that blond little woman from the whorehouse on 59th. What a sweet thing, what young skin, such willingness to earn a little money. Her pungent scent envelopes him like a toxic cloud. Her presence is relentless, and refuses to part his side hours after her body is gone. After frequenting the shack, he is often so pleased and disgusted with himself that the two feelings have become one, indiscernible.

He stops at Jackson Hole and sits at the bar on a corner that avoids the mirrors. Reflected in them, he is just another balding, fat, short man.. somehow the lack of a reflection gives him depth, and for a moment he can forget how flat his existence is.

In the middle of summer, sweaty women wearing silk blouses pasted to their arched backs greet their flirting coworkers and lovers, and with a straight face, Fred sees them moaning with pleasure, undisturbed by their runny makeup: a hypothetical romp that they will never know about. He's raped one after the other in his mind, and only rarely does he smile at the thought that they will go on to their husbands, faithful and virginal, after they've licked and sucked and done all he wanted.

He sees a commotion by the front door, but he is too absorbed by the beer he sinks into: he doesn't notice the reason for the altercation, until a loud bang awakes him from his daydream. He is missed by centimeters, or so he thinks. There is a wave of heat on his right ear, and after touching it he looks at his hand, surprised at the lack of blood. He was sure of it, he could have sworn he was hit. But no, he wasn't.

People run in and out of the Jackson Hole, and Fred sits there, transfixed. Even this ray of hope escaped him. One more centimeter and it would have been over: the waking up, the working, the eating in the same apartment with his mother, the smell of the 59th street women. There would have been no more guilt, no one would have judged him. Death had never occurred to him, but its lack of interest in him felt like another rejection.

A deep sadness took over him, and it was quickly replaced by a feeling of resignation. "It wouldn't be the first time." he muttered as he slowly paid his beer and headed home, where mother was waiting with a lukewarm meal.