Numbers

John Rechy

• Publisher: Grove Press
• Year: 2007
• ISBN:
  9781555847302
• Topic: Literatura
• Subtopic: Literatura general

An aging male hustler wages an obsessive battle against the passing of his youth in this darkly compelling follow-up to the cult hit City of Night. Johnny Rio, a handsome narcissist no longer a pretty boy, travels to Los Angeles, the site of past sexual conquest and remembered youthful radiance, in a frenzied attempt to recreate his younger self. Like a retired boxer—an undefeated champion—who refuses to accept the possible ravages of time, Johnny is led by some unfathomable force to return to combat once again. Combat, for him, takes place in the dark balconies and dismal bathrooms of LA's all-night movie theaters and on the hot sands of the city's gay beaches. But these are only warm up bouts. The real test, Johnny soon learns, will be in the shaded glens of a rambling park on the outskirts of the city. Through those alcoves, as a gallery of sexhunters emerges, he sets out to discover whether the passage of time—as terrifying to the male hustler as to the dancer or ingenue—has diminished the allure that was the source of his pride. For Johnny, the final proof resides in numbers. So he sets himself a rigorous time-table—ten days—and goal: thirty "numbers" to prove is mettle. But through all the sexual episodes, the self-indulgence which comprises Johnny's tawdry world, there resounds the universal cry of a human being's desperate need to be loved.

EIGHT

JOHNNY RIO is wearing a faded-denim Western-style shirt unbuttoned all the way to his navel, sleeves rolled way up showing off his arms still pumped from exercising earlier, worn Levi’s slung low. He checks his watch carefully as he walks into the green twilight of the Arena the next day: 2:26 P.M.

Back too—“sunbathing”—is the blond youngman in the snap bikini—one snap again unbuckled to create a pouch. This time, however, he’s wearing something more: Wellington boots—either because he thinks they make him look more desirable or because they protect his feet from stickers.

Perhaps he’s on vacation, or else he’s one of the vast wave of the perennially, or semiperennially, idle of Los Angeles.

“Hul-low!” The youngman’s greeting clearly indicates he’s still interested.

Johnny merely mutters, “Hi”—although of course he’s glad the blond youngman desires him again. But Johnny doesn’t want to make it with him twice. He doesn’t know why. He just knows it’s so.

Last night, after returning to the motel, bathing, eating, Johnny lay on a lounging chair for hours by the pool (lighted fluorescent blue) until the Cloud deepened into evening. A man, also sitting by the pool, kept inching his chair closer and closer and gobbling him up with his eyes—obviously trying to make him; he finally moved right next to him and told him how much he admired a well-made body. But although Johnny was, of course, pleased by the attention, his cravings seemed to be—. . . What? Suspended! Even earlier in the evening he hadn’t been tempted to go back to that movie theater, telling himself that scene is too unpredictable. To Main Street? Yes: a part of his life, always. But he didn’t go there—and he cooled the man cruising him by the pool—all because: It’s as if Griffith Park has become the arena of some unnamed game, with rules not yet clearly defined.

Now as a scared child (and he was a very scared kid though he put up a tough front), Johnny would often go to bed saying a rosary (secretly, embarrassed that anyone should know) in order to drive away the unfocused black fears. Sometimes he wouldn’t even actually pray the rosary, he’d just count the beads over and over until he fell asleep.

In bed last night he remembered those childnights because once again he went to sleep counting—but, now, it went like this:

Three people came on with me in the park this afternoon, though, sure, it’s the same number as on the first night in that movie theater, but in much less time, don’t forget, so that makes seven since Saturday night, and it could’ve been eight if it hadn’t been for that shitass car in Lafayette Park last night.

Seven?

Or six?

He counted: the thin youngman in the balcony, one; the guy in the men’s room, two; the weird fucker in MacArthur Park, three; the two in trunks this afternoon, four and five; the man who licked me all over, six. Six. I must’ve forgotten one; I’m sure it’s seven. Let’s see: one, two, three, four, five, six, and—. . . Just six. No, seven! Yeah!—I forgot the man in the movies!—the first one who sat next to me. He didn’t really suck me, just tried to through my pants—but he did grope me earlier and took out my cock. I forgot to count him.

“Count”?

The word, looming large in his consciousness, startled Johnny. Oh, it’s not that I’m “counting” for chrissakes; it’s just that soon I’ll have enough (“have”?) and then I can stay away from the parks and everything (“enough”?). It’s not that I’m counting!

A vague game, emerging, vaguely.

Just in case the blond youngman is still tempted to follow him, despite Johnny’s curt dismissal, Johnny heads for the Grotto but turns in another direction at a split in this path, where it curls around trees (providing many secluded areas along the way), winding like a labyrinth.

The Labyrinth leads to an elevation abruptly sheer on one side like a cliff—high enough above the road to be invisible to passing cars. The elevation affords a long-range view of the Labyrinth and part of the clearing near the entrance to the Arena.

Johnny stands on the Cliff, waiting with cocky assurance for one of the several men he encountered along the way to approach him. He’s begun to notice that although, of course, there are all types of men here, the park seems predominantly to attract the goodlooking and vigorous, the young and desirable.

Floating toward him like sailboats along the gray-green sea are three men—an adverse situation if each merely tries to outlast the other—the stalemate eating severely into his time. Though he certainly doesn’t mind more than one person coming on with him at once—and others watching—several, gathering before any sex overture has been made, can thwart the whole scene.

Almost equally spaced out, the three form a triangle: a small, mousy man who immediately turns Johnny off; and the other two—young—one wearing a suit, the other Bermuda shorts. At another time—hustling—Johnny would have probably encouraged the small mousy man—spotting him as an easy mark. Now he wants to dissuade him and then decide between the other two. Unfortunately, the little man is the most aggressive; he’s advancing more quickly.

It’s 2:32.

Exasperated, Johnny moves away from the Cliff, along the Labyrinth—deliberately taking the path farthest from the little man and almost exactly halfway between the other two so they’ll be encouraged to follow him. Along the way out of the Labyrinth, he encounters two other men cruising aimlessly (the mood of a trance, recurring . . .). Farther on, the blond youngman in the bikini and boots is posing while sitting on a low branch before an interested man. Approaching the Grotto, Johnny sees a man there rubbing his own cock. That doesn’t necessarily mean that he wants to have someone come on with him—as Johnny learned yesterday when the blond youngman made the gesture that turned him off so bad and then came on with him on his one-way terms; but Johnny darts swiftly away anyhow—to the entrance of the Cave.

He’s startled to hear the trampling of running feet approaching him.

Next to him panting, as though he’d sprinted several laps around the park, is someone who’s either a college student or successfully trying to look like one. He’s crewcut, and is wearing white shorts, tennis shoes, sweatshirt. Is he here innocently?

No.

He quickly gropes Johnny experimentally.

Both inside the Cave, “Whattayalike-to-do?” he asks Johnny.

“Nuthin, man—I don’t like to do nuthin,” Johnny answers curtly, annoyed, thinking the guy’s implying a mutual scene.

“Ya wanna get blowed?” the guy in the sweatshirt says bluntly.

Johnny shrugs, pretending indifference.

“I’ll blowya,” the guy in the sweatshirt offers; and he does. A few seconds later he stops abruptly, stands up, unbuttons his white shorts, letting them drop. “You wanna fuck me?”

“Here?” Johnny asks after a few moments during which he decided that’s not an insult, since he’d be assuming the man’s role.

“Why not? . . . Cummon, fuck me. You don’t know what you’re missin if you don’t,” he says conceitedly.

“Naw,” Johnny decides, bugged by the other’s vanity. But: Was he even tempted? He’s not sure.

“Suit yourself!” Once again he squats and blows Johnny.

After Johnny has come and is adjusting his pants, the guy in the sweatshirt says, “Another time you’ll screw me, okay, stud?”

“Yeah—sometime,” says Johnny, already moving out of the Cave.

“Groovy,” the guy in the sweatshirt calls out.

Not even pausing to consider whether or not he’s satisfied, Johnny’s back in the clearing of the Arena knowing suddenly he needs to make it again.

It’s 2:41.

One in less than half an hour! And: I could’ve made it in even less time if it hadn’t been for that little man following me.

And goddamnit there he is again!—watching him from a few feet away. And there’s the man in the suit, too, one of the earlier three.

How to get rid of the little man? I could tell him I’m hustling. No—that might just turn him on more and he’d wanna take me home. I could talk tough to him—that might turn him on too!

Hurrying to the Grotto. But, there—the unexpected sight jolts Johnny severely—the man who was playing with himself earlier is blowing the blond youngman in Wellington boots and, now, no bikini. Johnny dashes away quickly, curiously jarred. In his self-absorption he’s forgotten that others—all over the park—are making it . . . without him. (Too: Johnny Rio’s morality, like his sex scene, is at times one-way.)

Walking swiftly up the path, through the Labyrinth, toward the Cliff, beyond it—passing other men (like ghosts in a cemetery . . . drifting), not encouraging them for one reason or another though they all stare at him. There’s no doubt he’s the main attraction in the park.

He’s moved in a narrow horseshoe almost exactly back to where he started—and the mousy little man is there.

Damn!

Finally Johnny manages to dodge him long enough for the suited man to gravitate toward him.

But this happens, shocking Johnny profoundly: Instead of coming to him, the man moves to one side of Johnny. Turning, Johnny sees the man in Bermuda shorts. The man in the suit is advancing toward him, not Johnny!

Before the hideous feeling of rejection can descend on him like an axe cutting him down, Johnny laughs aloud. They were cruising each other! he thinks in disbelief.

He grasps for ready protection, for a “reason”: Oh, hell, they just felt more easy with each other, he thinks as he watches them moving away together. They want to make it mutually, and they gave up on me because they knew I wouldn’t because I’m so toughlooking, and they probably thought I was hustling—because it can’t help showing—and they didn’t want that scene—and then too the little man was busting it up for me, and—. . .

Johnny’s ego is intact this time . . . almost. What keeps him from really feeling rejected is that neither of the two men was nearly as goodlooking nor as exciting as himself—and he knows that. Had either been really handsome, Johnny’s heart would have been ripped.

It’s 2:54.

There’s the mousy man again!

On wayward inspiration, Johnny walks up to him, crosses his eyes crazily, and begins deliberately to tremble and shake, hands dangling at his sides quivering. That’ll turn him off! he thinks, but he stops the contortions immediately when he sees someone else approaching:

A young kid: 18 years old—at the most.

Much, much too young, Johnny knows immediately, as he moves away (past the little man; is he finally turned off?), feeling a certain sadness for the kid, because he’s so young and already here among the hungry hunters.

But the kid, crossing through the brush quickly, intercepts him on the path. “Wouldyouliketotakeawalkwith-me?” he asks breathlessly as if that’s the only way he’ll get the words out. A sandy-haired boy with blue, blue eyes, he’ll be an awfully goodlooking man in a few years. “Will you?”

Jesus! He sounds so new at it! He reminds Johnny of someone. “I’m—. . . I’m in a hurry!” is all Johnny can finally think to say as he rushes out of the Arena.

Outside, there are nine cars—spilling onto the very road.

Inexperienced or not, the kid is persistent. He’s followed Johnny. “Where are you going?” he asks him.

“Down the road,” Johnny lies.

“Would you give me a ride please?”

“You mean you walked up for godssake?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Get in,” says Johnny.

No sooner are they driving down the road than the kid reaches out to touch Johnny’s thigh, his fingers springing toward his groin.

For a split instant, Johnny lets him, thinking: He’s not inexperienced at all!—maybe he’s older than he looks; maybe—. . . He stops his thoughts, shoves the kid’s hand away roughly. He’s still too young!

“Ouch!” But the kid’s blue eyes are beaming.

“Cut that out!” Johnny says—feeling awfully square—but fuck it! At the foot of the road, where the houses begin, he says “So long,” to the kid.

“You mean you really want me to get out?”

“Right!” says Johnny, thinking, Am I gonna have to shove the bastard out?

“Then please: takemebackupagain,” the kid says.

“Nope,” Johnny says adamantly. “You’d better get out, I’m in a hurry.” Convinced the kid shouldn’t be in the park, Johnny is also determined to have his own way.

The kid gets out. Leaning through the window, he says, “Bye,” looking at Johnny with eyes that hint of a fierce instant crush.

“Be cool!” Johnny attempts to erase the uncomfortable feeling of having come on square.

“So long!”

It’s 3:09.

The little shit queered all that time! Johnny thinks, driving back up the road.

But he isn’t really angered because all of a sudden he knows who the kid reminded him of.

Tina’s boy.

On the radio, the mournful soul-tones of the Beatles, as Johnny, again shirtless, speeds to a place he noticed where three cars are squeezed tightly together alongside the road. He gets out.

A tangle of trees and vines like a tight clutch of wire. A narrow path leading to an even more tightly wound tangle, like a beehive. But: In the Beehive, there are already two men. Pants lowered, they lie on the dirt, face down, one pumping on top of the other. Either they didn’t hear Johnny approach or they had reached a point where nothing would stop them. Johnny turns away instantly.

Back on the road, he notices another path. He takes it—only to discover that it leads once again to th...