"Everybody starts out unknown."

"I give readings 3 nights a week. And I'm an actor so I read very well. I figure if I read my stuff enough somebody might want to publish it."

"It's not impossible."

"The problem is that when I read nobody shows up."

"I don't know what to tell you."

"I'm going to print my own book."

"Whitman did."

"Will you read some of your poems?"

"Christ, no."

"Why not?"

"I just want to drink."

"You talk about drinking a lot in your books. Do you think drinking has helped your writing?"

"No. I'm just an alcoholic who became a writer so that I would be able to stay in bed until noon."

I turned to Sara. "I didn't know you had so many friends."

"This is unusual. It's hardly ever like this."

"I'm glad we've got plenty of wine."

"I'm sure they'll be leaving soon," she said.

The others were talking. The conversation drifted and I stopped listening. Sara looked good to me. When she spoke it was with wit and incisjveness. She had a good mind. Pearl and Jack left first. Then Jean John. Then Pat the poet. Ron sat on one side of Sara and I sat on the other. Just the 3 of us. Ron poured himself a glass of wine. I couldn't blame him, he was her roommate. I had no hope of outwait-ing him. He was already there. I poured Sara a wine and then one for myself. After I finished drinking it I said to Sara and Ron, "Well, I guess I'll be going."

"Oh no," said Sara, "not so soon. I haven't had a chance to talk to you. I'd like to talk to you."

She looked at Ron. "You understand, don't you, Ron?"

"Sure."

He got up and walked to the back of the house.

"Hey," I said, "I don't want to start any shit."

"What shit?"

"Between you and your roommate."

"Oh, there's nothing between us. No sex, nothing. He rents the room in the back of the house."

"Oh."

I heard the sound of a guitar. Then loud singing.

"That's Ron," said Sara.

He just bellowed and called the hogs. His voice was so bad that no comment was needed.

Ron sang on for an hour. Sara and I drank some more wine. She lit some candles. "Here, have a beedie."

I tried one. A beedie is a small brown cigarette from India. It had a good tart taste. I turned to Sara and we had our first kiss. She kissed well. The evening was looking up.

The screen door swung open and a young man walked into the room.

"Barry," said Sara, "I'm not having any more visitors."

The screen door banged and Barry was gone. I foresaw future problems: as a recluse I couldn't bear traffic. It had nothing to do with jealousy, I simply disliked people, crowds, anywhere, except at my readings. People diminished me, they sucked me dry.

"Humanity, you never had it from the beginning." That was my motto.

Sara and I kissed again. We both had drunk too much. Sara opened another bottle. She held her wine well. I have no idea what we talked about. The best thing about Sara was that she made very few references to my writing. When the last bottle was empty I told Sara that I was too drunk to drive home.

"Oh, you can sleep in my bed, but no sex."

"Why?"

"One doesn't have sex without marriage."

"One doesn't?"

"Drayer Baba doesn't believe in it."

"Sometimes God can be mistaken."

"Never."

"All right, let's go to bed."

We kissed in the dark. I was a kiss freak anyway, and Sara was one of the best kissers I had ever met. I'd have to go all the way back to Lydia to find anyone comparable. Yet each woman was different, each kissed in her own way. Lydia was probably kissing some son of a bitch right now, or worse, kissing his parts. Katherine was asleep in Austin.

Sara had my cock in her hand, petting it, rubbing it. Then she pressed it against her cunt. She rubbed it up and down, up and down against her cunt. She was obeying her God, Drayer Baba. I didn't play with her cunt because I felt that would offend Drayer. We just kissed and she kept rubbing my cock against her cunt, or maybe against the clit, I didn't know. I waited for her to put my cock in her cunt. But she just kept rubbing. The hairs began to burn my cock. I pulled away.

"Good night, baby," I said. And then I turned, rolled over and put my back up against her. Drayer Baby, I thought, you've got one helluva believer in this bed.

In the morning we began the rubbing bit again with the same end result. I decided, to hell with it, I don't need this kind of non-action.

"You want to take a bath?" Sara asked.

"Sure."

I walked into the bathroom and let the water run. Sometime during the night I had mentioned to Sara that one of my insanities was to take 3 or 4 steaming hot baths a day. The old water therapy.

Sara's tub held more water than mine and the water was hotter. I was five feet, eleven and 3/4 inches and yet I could stretch out in the tub. In the old days they made bathtubs for emperors, not for 5 foot bank clerks.

I got into the tub and stretched. It was great. Then I stood up and looked at my poor raw cunt-hair-rubbed cock. Rough time, old boy, but close, I guess is better than nothing? I sat back down in the tub and stretched out again. The phone rang. There was a pause.

Then Sara knocked.

"Come in!"

"Hank, it's Debra."

"Debra? How'd she know I was here?"

"She's been calling everywhere. Should I tell her to phone back?"

"No, tell her to wait."

I found a large towel and wrapped it about my waist. I walked into the other room. Sara was talking to Debra on the phone.

"Oh, here he is. . . ."

Sara handed me the phone. "Hello, Debra?"

"Hank, where have you been?"

"In the bathtub."

"The bathtub?"

"Yes."

"You just got out?"

"Yes."

"What are you wearing?"

"I have a towel around my middle."

"How can you keep the towel around your middle and talk on the phone?"

"I'm doing it."

"Did anything happen?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"I mean, why didn't you fuck her?"

"Look, do you think I go around doing things like that? Do you think that's all there is to me?"

"Then nothing happened?"

"Yes."

"What?"

"Yes, nothing."

"Where are you going after you leave there?"

"My place."

"Come here."

"What about your legal business?"

"We're almost caught up. Tessie can handle it."

"All right."

I hung up.

"What are you going to do?" Sara asked.

"I'm going to Debra's. I said I'd be there in 45 minutes."

"But I thought we'd have lunch together. I know this Mexican place."

"Look, she's concerned. How can we sit around and chat over lunch?"

"I have my mind set on lunch with you."

"Hell, when do you feed your people?"

"I open at eleven. It's only ten now."

"All right, let's go eat. ..."

It was a Mexican place in a snide hippie district of Hermosa Beach. Bland, indifferent types. Death on the shore. Just phase out, breathe in, wear sandals and pretend it's a fine world.