The Fuck It List Ch. 02

Michael had always preferred the Café Beignet on Royal street over the larger, more touristy place on Decatur. In the afternoon like this, it was just an alcove, almost a hideaway. Once breakfast and brunch had become an afterthought and the afternoon heat brought a perpetual trickle of sweat down the backs of necks, it was usually easy to get a seat here. This afternoon, his theory had worked out perfectly as he took the hot plate and the steamy cup of café au lait to the table with the most shade.

The first bite brought with it a flood of memories; the powdered sugar coated his lips just like it had his first time here and all the subsequent times since then. The grease and the sugar transcended into something almost spiritual. He washed it all down with the coffee. Almost too sweet, it was thick and syrupy and just on the verge of bitter. It was perfect to chase off his numbing afternoon fatigue.

Michael hadn't been prepared for how tired his body was. Sure, when he'd been in the midst of the chemo battle; when his skin had been gray and his face damn near skeletal, he'd been weary of it all. Fuck, it was that or dead so there hadn't seemed to be another choice. He'd felt lucky to have made it that far. But the exhaustion lingered long after the drugs had given up the ghost.

It had taken him three days to drive down. He couldn't spend ten hours behind the wheel. It was more like five before he began to nod off and the car sensed his lack of attention. Even in hick, back road motels, Michael had slept hard. He was regularly clocking ten, sometimes twelve hours a night. He'd also eaten with gusto, with a verve that he'd never had for, well, anything really. He'd had lots of truck stop breakfasts, even at dinner time. Biscuits and gravy, eggs over easy, pancakes with syrup and piles of crispy bacon and he'd wiped the plates clean.

He wondered as he wiped the powdered sugar on a napkin if his body was just acclimating to the invaders. The cancer cells demanded food and sleep and sucked down every morsel like hungry caterpillars as they grew and grew. He was a host for something that wanted to murder him and Michael wondered how long they might have been uneasy roommates.

Or maybe, he thought, as he eased back into the wrought iron chair, maybe it was his new zest for life that must be fed. It was a demanding thing, like an ancient god who required blood sacrifice. This sexual flame that was now ignited like never before was a constant and all of his hungers were more acute than ever before. It was almost as if the blonde in the dressing room had stoked the almost sputtered-out flame. After years of neglect, it had become a raging fire that burned almost out of control.

Michael had gotten a blowjob in the back of a Waffle House somewhere in Arkansas. He'd checked it off the list when he had come back to his mostly lime-green room at the Red Roof Inn. But, he understood now as he let his sugar-sticky fingers linger on the notebook paper, that, like Net, it had been so much more than a single act.

Her name was Naomi and they had touched hands when they both reached for the communal syrup. It was a sticky, tin pot that made a brown ring on the recently disinfected, orange laminate countertop. They had both laughed and insisted that the other one go first until she finally did. Once the introduction had been made, Michael openly watched her as the two of them chewed.

Naomi's thick, chocolate brown hair glinted with gold in the sunlight. She'd had one braid that was almost lost in the wild spray of hair that ran down one shoulder. Naomi had worn faded blue jeans with a rainbow patch over one hole and a bare knee had peeked from another. The neck had been cut out of her black Pink Floyd tee shirt and.it had settled down over one shoulder, revealing that her bra was tan.

He had never seen more of the bra than that strap and looking back, Michael regretted that he hadn't had the opportunity to discover her breasts under the shirt. He would never know whether or not Naomi had panties on either, although he highly suspected that she had been delightfully commando in her hip-hugger jeans.

Michael did have carnal knowledge of Naomi's mouth though. She had worn Chapstick. He'd watched her put some on at the counter as she waited for her check. She'd dug the little black and white stick out of her enormous canvas purse before they had gone outside. She didn't taste like Chapstick though if it had a taste. Her kisses in the back seat of his Acura tasted like maple and bacon grease. She had made little noises as she had breathed into him, soft little sighs that Michael had imagined that she would have made in her sleep.

When her small hand had eased up his inner thigh and crept up to his zipper, Michael had opened his eyes just to make sure that it had been real and not just his imagination. No, sure as shit, her hand had been there and she had made a purposeful outline of his dick in the front of his jeans. She had been patient about it, slow and deliberate. Naomi had known the size and girth of his hardness before she'd unzipped him. He'd watched her study his erection with her small hand that wore jade-colored bands of various sizes and shapes on every finger. She had worn no polish and her nails had been short and chewed. They had looked like hands that had been neglected and worked hard and if there had been time, Michael would have liked to know what she did with those hands. Besides pull his cock out of his jeans and a new pair of black Calvin Klein briefs, anyway.

Once his dick had appeared, Michael had felt the old familiar hesitation well up at first. Overthinking, his mind had been a whirl of what to do, playing chess when the game was actually quite simple. Should he insist that they make this official and go to the room? Should he stop her? Give her money? Naomi had stopped all the questions as she bowed her head. The gush of warm breath had run down all the way to his balls.

Oh yes, that was the answer.

It all came to him in a flash, an epiphany that came with the tip of her tongue. He knew then that he should just ease back into the upholstery and let her have her way with him. He should open his legs a little wider and give himself over to the magic of a wet mouth. With skilled lips and a devilish tongue, Michael had decided that no decision was needed. He'd just drifted off into the ecstasy of Naomi.

Her tongue had washed him, the full length of his cock and her lips had drawn him in, tight and sticky. Fuck, he could almost hear it again as the last of his beignets melted in his mouth. The frantic, animal sounds that had come from deep in his chest. Her rhythm up and down had been impeccable, her tongue had kept steady and her saliva had flowed down his shaft and puddled on his sack.

Michael could clearly remember that he'd curled his fingers in her hair at the end, at the moment of no return. He'd pushed her down just a little. Instead of warning her that he was about to explode and giving her an opportunity to spit him out, Michael thrust deep. When he came, his eyes had closed tight and there was white heat behind his eyelids. He was nothing but sound and sensation.

He'd heard himself whisper, "Fuck," more than once and there had been no holding it back.

The old Michael would have apologized for the unruly outburst once she had finished, but he hadn't said a word. Instead, he'd just smiled and held her heart-shaped face in both hands. He had felt grateful for the gift of her mouth and a tad guilty that that was as far as it was to go. That had been the end of the road for them and Michael had kissed her one last time and tasted himself on her lips.

He'd napped for two hours afterward and that, spent sensation had taken him in. He had melted into pleasure, a happy and empty sensation had swallowed him down like water.

Michael decided as he rose from the wrought iron chair, which was exactly what he planned to do right now. He'd amble back to the Hotel Monteleone and crank the air conditioning up as he burrowed down under the comforter.

***

The next night, Michael meandered through the French Quarter as the sun went down. He felt strangely energized in spite of the time. Michael had eaten dinner at the Gumbo Shop. He felt that he'd been fortified by a hearty helping of red beans and rice. He'd also gobbled down three thick slices of cornbread that dripped with melted butter and yet somehow, still soaked up the leftover sauce in his bowl. He washed it all down with two ice-cold Abita Big Easy's which seemed just about perfect.

He was enjoying the slight cool off as the sun lazily eased back towards the horizon with purple and pink cloudy banners. The sweat had stopped running down the back of his neck and now it was just sticky and Michael knew that he'd dry off in the starlight. The French Quarter was always a universe unto itself, where every moment, every cell reverberated with life. From this place where he'd stopped on the sidewalk, he could hear classical piano music that came from the other side of the open french doors. If he waited for it, from the other direction, some drunk crooned Margaritaville in his best attempt at Buffet at the karaoke bar. Then the slide trombone broke through and interrupted with a bit of "When the Saints Come Marching In". Underneath all of it, it wasn't even a sound as much as it was the vibration in his chest, the throbbing base that pulsed of sex, sex, sex. It came from the strip club.

And that was just the sounds, Michael thought with a smile. The scents were every bit as colorful. The odors were vivacious and boisterous and downright acrid. Sweaty, drunk people were a pungent lot, he told himself. Then came the cloud of girlish perfume, warm and reminiscent of baby powder. The strippers were outside, hawking their wares. They wore pasties and G strings and teetered on clear plastic shoes.

Michael took a flyer and shoved it into the pocket of his jeans. He wasn't saying no, even though he'd never been a fan of strip clubs in the past. He was saying maybe like he was to everything else that came across his path lately.

Right now, he was headed to Marie Laveau's House of Voodoo. It was a place that he'd passed many times before, maybe even twenty and he'd always scoffed at the idea. Just one more place to buy overpriced tee shirts, like New Orleans didn't have enough of those. Tonight though, he felt something that could only be described as an urge.

The scuffed wooden floors creaked as Michael entered the store. There were the expected items, the tourist's version of Santeria. There were crocodile heads and chickens feet, none of it authentic but they made great souvenirs. Like the little voodoo dolls with button eyes and yarn hair, meant as a trinket, something that a traveler would bring home to show how much fun they had.

The altar was something else entirely though. Michael looked at it nervously as the vibrations that rolled off of it palpitated through his frame. It felt like a drum, like a separate heartbeat that pulsed and echoed and called to him. He tried to ignore it, so he turned his back on the altar. He walked all the way over to the far side of the store and busied himself with tee shirts but he could feel it. There were prickles on the back of his neck, he could feel that the hair had risen. His fight or flight response; nature might make him larger in an attempt to scare off a predator but really, it was him who was scared.

In spite of the trickle of air conditioned air, there was a stream of sweat that ran down his collar, down his back all the way to his haunches. It didn't make sense though, Michael told himself with a hard, dry gulp. Considering that he was the walking dead, what was left to frighten him at this point? It was time to grab his balls, he told himself, and quit being such a chickenshit. First of all, it wasn't real. How could it be?

It sure felt real though.

Shit, he thought as he crossed back over to the altar, it felt a hell of a lot more real than anything he'd felt at church, back when he'd gone. This was something more visceral than Jesus nailed to the cross, his passive, peaceful expression as he looked down with the somber expression over the congregation. The altar emitted something earthy. Sweat and cum seemed to pulse through the wood and the candles and the statues. Sex and blood and greed and rage and that most powerful thing in the universe; belief. It called to him.

Michael realized that he could leave an offering there. A token, something for the high priestess to take note of. Perhaps she would be his intermediary to the afterlife. After all, none of that Jesus stuff had really taken hold. Michael had never believed that there was anything after this life but just in case he was wrong, it might be a good idea to have a friend. A guide.

He asked the girl at the counter for advice. She was no more than a girl, a white girl with purple dreadlocks and a ring through the cartilage in the middle of her nostrils. "What is a good offering for," he didn't say it out loud. Michael was sure that he'd offend whoever it was. When he considered the lightning bolts of energy that seeped from the altar now, he sure the hell didn't want to make anyone mad.

She looked up at him, slowly, as if she'd been somewhere far away. Her eyes were rimmed in makeup that was the same color as her hair. "Money's always good," she gave him half a smile. "It should be meaningful to you."

Michael nodded and turned back to the altar. She beckoned to him. He called the energy "she" because something that enticing, that utterly impossible to refuse could only be feminine. He stood at the altar and felt that he'd been transported back in time, to something ancient and pagan. Something almost as old as the earth itself. A power that was old before Jesus and all the bloodless, pristine, suburban religions were born into their scrubbed clean little churches.

He had just the thing. It wasn't money. It wasn't that he was so rich that money meant nothing but here, in the last relay of the race, perhaps it only meant what it should have all along. There was something else in his wallet that Michael had carried for far too long. He'd never known why but he'd needed it. He got crazy once or twice over the years when he thought that he'd lost it amongst other random things he'd tucked inside between the folds.

It was worthless really, at least it would be to anyone else. Just an old folded scrap of paper, porous now and limp from so many years folded into a tiny square. Michael didn't open it. It was a secret, he wouldn't share it with anyone else but for some reason, he felt that Marie Laveau would understand that it was sacred to him. A life for a life and given where he was and the elemental nature of the altar, it felt about right.

He studied the altar and let his eyes take in the treasures that had been strewn. Jewelry and pictures, love notes and tiny cloth bags, gold coins and scraps of paper, candles, dolls, candy, and paper with bloody fingerprints. It was a riot of excess, like the city itself. Michael held the paper from his wallet firmly in the center of his palm and lowered his head respectfully. It wasn't a prayer really, it wasn't even words, more of a feeling.

If, if something could be done, if someone could intercede, if there was a purpose for him to be granted an extension, he'd take it. That was all. No promises to be good or to be anything other than what he was. The pagan goddess seemed to be more realistic than the Christian one. Michael set down the scrap of paper and nodded his silent thanks to the entity before he left the store.

He hadn't returned fully to the all-consuming noise and the sweltering humidity yet as he walked back into the street. It was only because he still felt that he was in the soundless presence of deity that he even heard her.

"What you leave for Madame Laveau?" It was a female voice with a Cajun accent. It was a voice with depth and softness, it dripped like molasses and was just the same kind of sweet. A rich sweet with something deeper underneath, it was sensual darkness, perhaps hidden danger. Michael turned toward the voice quickly.

It was a she. Actually, there were two of them. Two girls, although they were probably women it was impossible to guess their ages. They were timeless, as if something so mundane and trivial as time just didn't apply to them. Angels, perhaps. Both girls were only about shoulder height to him and each had long, black hair that they wore in cornrows. There were beads and jewels at the end of each piece of hair.

The girl who had spoken to him stared at him with a slick smile on her face. She had a glow about her and her skin was warm, glistening caramel and her lips were shiny like she'd just licked butter. What glorious lips they were too, full and pouty and voluptuous. Her mouth was provocative. Michael felt himself stir just looking at it and he wished that he could outline her lips with his finger.

"Umm, if I tell you, doesn't that ruin it?" It sounded so stupid, but Michael laughed it off immediately. Like Madame Laveau was Santa Claus instead of an immortal voodoo queen who called to him from the netherworld.

The girl laughed at him and the other one smiled and their beads made clicking sounds when they tossed their hair. The other girl, the silent one, had one brown eye and one whitish, blue one. With that eye, she seemed to peer into his soul, into his mind. Michael felt her read him like a book, taking her time with the pages like she had all the time in the world.

Both girls wore frayed, cutoff shorts that revealed strong, curvy, caramel legs and the swell of cheeks. There was no ignoring the bottom crease where ass and thigh met, it was visible and suggested all the further study that should be done.

"I know what you want, cher," the girl with thick lips told him, radiant and cocky. "You want the cure, don't you?" Her accent slid down his spine like the sweat that had trickled there earlier. "Come see and we fix you right up now."

She beckoned with two fingers and Michael felt his dick lurch like it had been watching the whole exchange. She had talons for nails, painted sparkling pink. They clicked together as she reached her other arm around her silent partner's waist and let her fingernails move down her hip.

Fuck. Did that mean what he thought it meant, or maybe he just wanted it to mean that.

"What are you going to do?" His body had already decided. It didn't matter that his brain was almost screaming, warning him about pickpockets and god knew what else that made up the always slightly seedy stuff that no one talked about. The underbelly of the French Quarter, the inkling that there were dark forces here long before the tourists tried to civilize and whitewash it all. "I mean, how do you know what I want?" he asked.

"She know," the talkative one cocked her head toward the silent one. "She got the eye, cher. You gonna die soon, right?" The black girl asked and it was almost a relief for someone to just say it out loud. Say it boldly and without regret while she looked him dead in the eye with a wisdom beyond her years. Timeless and wise, just like a goddess should be.

"Yes," Michael said quietly and shrugged his shoulders in acquiescence.

"You want to live?" There was the other question, just bold-faced and out in the world with no preamble; something else that no one else had the balls to talk about. Because not that long ago, back when Michael had been wrecked by the chemo and held onto the toilet for dear life, there were days when that the answer would have been a resounding no.

"Yes," he whispered. Now he really did. It was like he had to think about it all ending when it verged on sweet once more that he never wanted to let go.