Inside a hotel that looks like it wasn't here last week, I am surrounded by salesmen. Men from other cities, here for the week to slap each other on the back and tell bullshit stories of their brass balls and dimly illuminated pitches.
I'm here to shake their hands, to play nice. I'm the guy they need once the sale is made, the guy with the keys that start the engines that deliver the goods. They need me. I am in short supply. They're a dime a dozen.
I belly up to the bar and get a free scotch and drink it like water, signaling for another with my free hand as I drain the glass. A fresh-faced man-child from the midwest opens himself up next to me and presents his nametag.
"Hello," he lies, and holds out his right hand. The bartender puts that second drink right into my free hand and his eyes tell me he knows who I am. I set both glasses down, shake Junior's hand with the right and grab a ten from my pocket with the left. I slap it on the bar with a nod to the tender who nods back and he's on my team now.
My life is full of nods and gestures, of secret language and signals and half-steps and subterfuge. Every room I enter, I pick my marks and make them mine. I am soulless and dark and ugly and somehow they all want to be me, and for an hour I will let them.
Anna is there tonight, I know she is. I feel it in the ground, in the air. She wasn't there on Friday, or Saturday or Sunday. She was there on Monday but I was drained, done, finished at lunch with nothing left for the night. Tonight she is mine.
I turn from the bar and the murder of crows awaits, these hapless black birds that beg for approval every minute of the day and every hour of their sweat-drenched dreamless sleep.
I walk the gauntlet with style and grace. I am not a king here, I am an emperor, I am pope. These men kiss my ring and hope to curry favor. Craven worms they are, and yeah it behooves me to have them think I give a shit, but not too much. Cool, yes, not aloof, but not caring, not compassionate, no not that ever.
I am a walking encyclopedia of winks and nods and I shake their hands in just the right way. I know their names. I know their wives names. I know their kids colleges. I know the exact amount of ink that has dried on their closed deals for the past 24 months and I know what they drink for lunch.
I draw myself up and I square my shoulders and my gaze is like steel. I take one long drink and leave the glass behind and walk among them. For each man I have a few words, words that tell him I know him, I remember him, I give just enough of a damn to deliver the goods he has busted his tiny little balls to sell.
No more than fifteen seconds with each one is just enough. Anna is there, and I want her.
For one man I stop. He sells in Chicago, doesn't do so well. He lost his wife to cancer this year. For him I stop. I touch his shoulder and meet his gaze and tell him to call me. Any time. Call when you need me.
I finish the gauntlet and I disappear. I have cased the joint and covered it in 20 minutes. My work is done and I have my hat and coat and I hit the pavement. Here I am not a king, not a pope, just another pair of feet and mine start heading south to 21.
Anna is there. I can hear my heart and my footfalls and I know she is there. Once upon a time the world was green but it isn't anymore. I am just a pair of feet and I am almost there.
Daisy greets me - I have not called ahead as I usually do and she is surprised but pleasantly so. Anna is otherwise engaged. Do I want to see another girl? Not this time. I don't mind waiting...I have appeared unannounced, I can wait.
Outside I can hear the crows in the distance. A murder of crows...black birds, invisible in the dark night. I can hear them caw, I can hear every flap of every wing...I need silence, I need to be a man.
Here, I am a king. Daisy puts me in a room and I give her the house fee. I see Ace and give her a tiny hug. Daisy checks in on me...offers to give me the table shower so I don't have to keep waiting. I look her in the eye...she laughs. She can see I am here for one thing and one thing only and that is Anna. It is in my eyes and on my face and no one can miss it.
I wait a little longer and then a light knock and the door opens and she is there. A tanktop and shorts. The caw of the crows and the sound of their wings fades a little more and I take her softly in my arms and hold her for a moment before we walk down the corridor. She bathes me like a king, dries me, leads me back and rubs me down like royalty and then I turn over and I sit up and I look into her eyes and I smile.
"I like your smile" she says. I brush the back of my hand against her shoulder. "I like you" I say.
I pull her to me and hold her again and then I am pulling at her clothes and she is helping and soon she is as naked as I am. She rubs her breasts against my chest and I am immediately hard. I take one breast in my hand and I taste her nipples. They are hard enough to cut glass and I run my tongue in slow circles around them and she makes a little noise and I smile again. "I like your smile" she says again. "I like you" I say.
I sit up and invite her to lay on the table. I kiss her neck lightly and then I leave a trail of kisses down down down to her breasts where I taste those nipples again before moving down down down and there I am between her legs.
I start slowly and gently, my tongue between her legs...slow lazy circles around her hard little clit...all the time in the world...I want to see her smile. I taste her, my tongue inside her, and then back to her clit. She tastes like the purest spring water, when the world was green.
I move faster and harder and she moves against my face and guides me and she makes little wordless noises of pleasure and I am not a king, I am not a king. I am no pope, no emperor, I am only a man and she is a woman and there is only us. She pulls my head tightly to her and makes high, keening moan and I can feel her throbbing against my mouth and I wait. She looks at me, our eyes meet. Surprised, confused. She smiles. I smile.
I lay down and she rises between my legs and slips the cover on with her mouth. Her lips slide over my hard cock and her tongue caresses me. She rubs her breasts against me and takes my hard cock all the way into her mouth and out and again...and again...faster now, and harder and I am fucking her mouth and she rises and sits on my face. I am a man. Nothing but a man. This is all there is.
She moves faster and harder and I taste her everywhere and I reach down and tear the cover off and she touches me with her hand and I explode.
For now, this is all there is, yes, this is it. She lays with me for a moment. It has been well over an hour since we started. No one has looked at the clock. There are no crows, the world is green. No one owes anyone anything. Here I am just a man.
Then we rise and she gets a hot towel and cleans me up and goes back down the hall. I get dressed and I am sitting and putting my shoes on when she walks in. She sees the shoes and says, "Wow I like..."
I put my finger to my lips and she stops. There is a purity in this moment that may not be sullied by dirty talk. Shoes will wait. I take her hand and she sits next to me for a moment and again I smile. "I like your smile." She says it again. "I like you." I say, and I kiss her forehead and I stand and it's time to go.
I hand her six twenties. More than enough, but what is the price for making a man feel like a king and making a king back into a man?
I reach the street and I listen carefully. I can't hear the crows at all. Nobody owes anybody anything, and all the world is green. I breathe in my city's cool air and I walk. It is good to be a king. But it is great to be a man.