I returned with the cigarette to hear James roaring with laughter, Margot saying, “So the Spaniard is now on the floor after sliding off the banquette on his sweaty behind pants around his ankles and the very large black woman on top of him and he starts singing. Singing!”
I handed her the cigarette from behind my ear. “What Spaniard was singing where?” I asked.
“At the Sex Club.”
I had warned James about a political and social grilling; apparently it was to be more of a saucy basting rather than a BBQ. Margot happily detailing an apparently less than blessed visit to her and Taki’s favorite sex club.
“Where was I?” asked Margot.
“Spaniard — floor — large black woman,” James said helpfully.
“Oh, yes. The Spaniard, he starts singing canzone. You know what canzone is James, yes?”
James nodded.
“So the canzone. The Spaniard sounds like Il Divo you know, he is very, very good, but filling the club with so much noise no one can hear themselves talking dirty. The large woman begins to shout something in a language I do not know. Taki and I have paused in our lovemaking because we can see the staff at the bar and they are looking on with horror, paralyzed not knowing what to do because these are foreigners and foreigners do not always understand rules even when you explain them, most carefully plus the black lady is very large and intimidating in that way very large black ladies can be especially when much of her is falling out of a yellow mini dress.”
“Plus they are having sex”, adds James.
“Oh yes, they are humping and bumping and the large woman succeeds in knocking over all the glasses on the table next to her.”
“Not the table?”
“No they are bolted to the floor,” said Margot taking a large drink of her wine adding, “for good reason.”
“I can imagine,” said James.
“God I have no matches, Sacha,” she looked at me, “I have no matches.”
I usually carry a book not tonight though, I shook my head. Holding the cigarette she leaned back from her stool – we were at the tables by the windows the long ones with the high stools, you know — asking in Japanese for a light. Since the entire table was puffing away this was not hard to procure in fact one of the men gave her his little plastic lighter along with his business card.
“So,” she blew smoke up into the air, “the glasses, bottle, tray and a large dish of mixed nuts are scattered as she begins to climax. Miraculously she switches to English shouting ‘Your cock, I feel your cock all the way inside me, filling me to heaven, oh, I am going to die, I am going to die,’ or words like that. He is singing and she is yelling so now they have the attention of all of us.
At the bar the waiters push one of the young men towards the couple Before he can get more than a few words out of his mouth she grabs the poor man and wrestles him down screaming once again in another language. Over he goes, knocking into the couple on the opposite side spilling their drinks all over. Now they begin with the shouting. Running over one of the staff pleads in Japanese to get up off the floor and be a little more quiet. She grabs him around the waist, squeezing till his eyes bulge, the Spaniard pops up grinding her hips into his and they both start to convulse in ecstasy the waiter trapped between them. The other patrons have had enough Now the entire staff is trying to get them off the floor helped by a number of patrons and they are dragging them still humping towards the cloak room and they hope I am certain out into the street. Unfortunately the staff is quite thin and the Spaniard and black woman are very large so not much progress is being made. By now all activity in the club has stopped except for one girl in a black eye mask at the bar masturbating with a very large dildoe who seems completely not to notice what is going on.”
She took another drink, tapping ash off her cigarette.
“At last the Spaniard hits a high note in his song and reaches climax only to collapse silently on the floor. Taki and I cheer and clap. We are all fascinated to see what will happen next. The staff stops trying to drag them because the man, he is no longer moving. Even the large woman is concerned. Shaking off the little Japanese like bugs she tries to wake the Spaniard. He is not waking up.
She begins to pound on his chest and Taki and I think he has had a heart attack and the large lady is trying to revive him. But no she is shouting in what I think are several languages finally ending in English ‘don’t you die you bastard you haven’t paid me.’ She is not trying to resuscitate him, she is beating him! The manager is practically crying.
Everyone in the club is watching what will happen even the girl in the mask.
The staff is piling on top of the large woman trying to pull her off the man and she is shouting. Soon we hear the siren.”
James is fascinated, “They called for the ambulance? Did they call the police as well?”
“Oh no, the last thing a sex club wants is trouble with the police. And the last thing the police want is trouble with a very large, very angry woman. The ambulance comes and brings in the, they bring the, what do you call it?”
“Gurney?,” I supplied because I am like an ESL psychic after so many years abroad.
“Yes that into the club and are trying to load the man into it while the large mostly naked woman has hysterics screaming about money. Out they went into the night the large woman in nothing but her bright yellow slip dress being chased by the manager in tears holding her bag and shoes and the bill.”
“And that,” said James laughing, “is why you like going to sex clubs.”
She nodded vigorously, “Yes. Liberating and entertaining. So difficult to find those two pleasures in one place. Do you want to go? Of course you do. Don’t lie. I am French and know these things. All men want to.” She drained her glass. “Come on, it is early but I will take you, many people want sex early in the evening, I know I do. Don’t you?” Without waiting for an answer she climbed off the stool saying, “I have my card still.”
James looked at me, his eyes wide.
Seeing the look Margot made a ‘tch’ sound saying, “Oh Sacha does not want to visit this particular kind of place, she told me so. She does not like to be bohemian, not like me,” she ended the sentence on a flourish. “What about you James, are you bohemian?”
“Actually I thought we’d spend some more time here with drinks, I haven’t seen Sacha for awhile.”
“Sacha doesn’t mind. You don’t mind do you Sacha dear? I feel much better already. You were so right to suggest we go out. Isn’t that what you wanted for me to feel better? Because I do. And I like James very much he is simpatico as the Spanish say. I have been convincing Japanese doctors all day to buy medicines they do not really want and I need some fun. Let us go have fun James from Pasadena. ”
I wasn’t sure I wanted Margot to like James – simpatico or not. He was, in a manner of speaking, mine. It didn’t matter we hadn’t actually done much of anything but hang out
He was certainly more mine than Margot’s and I had not expected the night to turn out with him skipping gaily off on the sex club circuit with one of my best friends especially since I had turned down the opportunity of dining at the Roppongi Hills Club — certainly one of my very favorite destinations — so she could cry on my shoulder.
I had no right to be jealous. In fact he seemed to be one of those annoying sorts who might actually be looking for a relationship. I had given up on relationships with men years ago not relations you understand, just relationships. So what did I care besides a missed dinner if the two of them hooked up?
Composing my face I said in my most noncommittal voice, “Go then, I’m a big girl I can amuse myself.”
Margot grabbed James hand and looking over his shoulder all the way out, they disappeared into the gathering dark. Of course at that moment the waiter brought our meager tapas. Bastards, though whether I meant the timing or my departed friends or the food even I wasn’t sure.
Looking around the bar I couldn’t help feeling rather disappointed in A971, large number of foreign men notwithstanding the service was mediocre, the selection of tapas unexciting. . I should not have been beguiled by the lure of easy sex and stuck to Orange practically next store, a place I had come to love for a before or after dinner glass of Champagne and which had an amazingly friendly bilingual staff that always welcomed me by name. Maybe I would go over there now and chat with the head waiter, a surfer who must be ecstatic that the bad weather shadowing Japan seemed to have finally lifted. I abandoned the table, the tapas and the text messages from my heart saying ‘smiley face — James might have been different if you let him – heart, heart’ and headed for Orange cell phone in hand speed dialing a fellow I knew in the biblical sense. Midway through the dial I cancelled the call ringing Miriam instead.
“Hey Kiddo,” I said as she picked up.
“Sacha, hello beautiful. What are you up to?”
“No good, as usual. Listen I know its dinner time but any chance of you hopping a cab and meeting me at Tokyo Midtown for a glass of Champagne?”
“Oh very tempting but I can’t, in the middle of making dinner for the girls. You know how it is and then I need to help Elizabeth with a school project on the rain forest.”
I was disappointed.
“Can we talk on the phone? Wait hold on a second.” Waving and bowing my way past the staff at Orange I pointed to the sidewalk terrace and one of the waiters walked me over to a table where I could watch everyone passing by. Taking the menu – I was nearly faint with hunger — I got back to Miriam, “Sorry. So did you have the movers come for guesstimates?”
“I did, I did. I think we’ll go with Crossover Movers, they seemed very reasonable.”
My heart gave a little lurch, “That sounds awfully final, have you talked again with Thomas? You don’t really have to go, you guys can work it out so you can stay I know you can.”
I knew because it had been me that had given her that new option.
“You can’t, I don’t want you to.” I felt tears prickling my eyes. I had gone through some dark and depressing times during my marriage and right after my divorce – despite rediscovering the delicious naughtiness of men. Standing on the subway platform the whoosh of air streaming out of tunnel through my hair, the train following close behind I would wonder what it would be like to step into that blackness soft as vaginal skin letting it blot out everything else. No more running for the event horizon of love and success.
I thought I needed the power of Dr. Who and the Tardis to swoop in and drag me out of that suicidal gravity well, instead five years ago I met Miriam. Miriam was all about comfort and cozy chats over a cup of tea or glass of wine in the kitchen.
Never, never discount the power of cozy kitchen chats. For a woman they are a wonder drug for infections of the heart every bit as powerful as penicillin.
I generally did not talk abut myself much. As a journalist it is my job to listen and pose questions and my husband, well, he was always interested in my mind just never my heart. With work related friends pre-Miriam we talked issues, cultures, politics, destinations anything but each other. Miriam wanted to talk about me.
How could I say good bye?.
“Sacha, Sacha, are you there?”
“What? Oh yes, for sure. Listen if you are set on going you have to let us give you a big send off, okay?”
“Not a big send off.”
“Whatever you want. Choose who you want to invite, check your calendar for the day, and let me handle the rest, deal?”
“Deal.”
Miriam who was in awe of my work and intellect helped me rediscover the cool person I was and continue to be. Those talks sparked an internal dialogue; realigning my interpretation of success beyond the size of my byline. Taking a large stick — metaphorically speaking – I beat my ambition into if not submission at least a corner and decided the truest measure of success was the depth of my friendships.
Miriam taught me that.
And Margot, I added silently to myself while ordering today’s special of roast chicken and potatoes, taught me never to mix sex-club frequenting Frenchwomen on the rebound with my men.
