I was 50 years old and hadn’t been to bed with a woman for four years. I had no women friends. I looked at them as I passed them on the streets or wherever I saw them, but I looked at t...
A day or so later I got a poem in the mail from Lydia. It was a long poem and it began: Come out, old troll, Come out of your dark hole, old troll, Come out into the sunlight with us an...
One morning a few days later I entered Lydia’s courtyard as she was walking in from the alley. She had been over to see her friend Tina who lived in an apartment house on the corner. Sh...
I was editing a little magazine at the time, The Laxative Approach. I had two co-editors and we felt that we were printing the best poets of our time. Also some of the other kind. One o...
I didn’t see Lydia for a couple of days, although I did manage to phone her 6 or 7 times during that period. Then the weekend arrived. Her ex-husband, Gerald, always took the children o...
Lydia liked parties. And Harry was a party-giver. So we were on our way to Harry Ascot’s. Harry was the editor of Retort, a little magazine. His wife wore long see-through dresses, show...
We came in low over Kansas City, the pilot said the temperature was 20 degrees, and there I was in my thin California sports coat and shirt, lightweight pants, summer stockings, and hol...
I got back, made love to Lydia several times, got in a fight with her, and left L. A. International late one morning to give a reading in Arkansas. I was lucky enough to have a seat by ...
Lydia and I were always fighting. She was a flirt and it irritated me. When we ate out I was sure she was eyeballing some man across the room. When my male friends came by to visit and ...
I was surprised the next morning when April knocked on the door. April was the one on ATD who had been at Harry Ascot’s party and who had left with the speed freak. It was 11 am. April ...
Lydia had two children; Tonto, a boy of 8, and Lisa, the little girl of 5 who had interrupted our first fuck. We were together at the table one night eating dinner. Things were going we...
I went to my place, started drinking. I snapped on the radio and found some classical music. I got my Coleman lantern out of the closet. I turned out the lights and sat playing with the...
A week later I was driving down Hollywood Boulevard with Lydia. A weekly entertainment newspaper published in California at that time had asked me to write an article on the life of the...
We had another fight. Later I was back at my place but I didn’t feel like sitting there alone and drinking. The night harness racing meet was on. I took a pint and went out to the track...
Lydia phoned me in the morning. “Whenever you get drunk,” she said, “I’m going out dancing. I went to the Red Umbrella last night and I asked men to dance with me. A woman has a right t...
The ex-Japanese wrestler who was into real estate sold Lydia’s house. She had to move out. There was Lydia, Tonto, Lisa and the dog, Bugbutt. In Los Angeles most landlords hang out the ...
Dee Dee had a place in the Hollywood Hills. Dee Dee shared the place with a friend, another lady executive, Bianca. Bianca took the top floor and Dee Dee the bottom. I rang the bell. It...
In the morning Dee Dee drove me to the Sunset Strip for breakfast. The Mercedes was black and shone in the sun. We drove past the billboards and the nightclubs and the fancy restaurants...
Dee Dee had to pick up her son at the airport. He was coming home from England for his vacation. He was 17, she told me, and his father was an ex-concert pianist. But he’d fallen for sp...
Lydia returned and found a nice apartment in the Burbank area. She seemed to care a lot more for me than before we parted. “My husband had this big cock and that’s all he had. He had no...
I kept getting letters from a lady who lived only a mile or so away. She signed them Nicole. She said she had read some of my books and liked them. I answered one of her letters and she...
Lydia’s sister Angela came to town from Utah to see Lydia’s new house. Lydia had made a down payment on a little place and the monthly payments were very low. It was a very good buy. Th...
I blacked out after that. I guess I had consumed more whiskey than I thought. I don’t remember arriving at Nicole’s. I awakened in the morning with my back to somebody in a strange bed....
I began receiving letters from a girl in New York City. Her name was Mindy. She had run across a couple of my books, but the best thing about her letters was that she seldom mentioned w...
I kept the date in mind. It was never any problem creating a split with Lydia. I was naturally a loner, content just to live with a woman, eat with her, sleep with her, walk down the st...
I sat in the airport and waited. You never knew about photos. You could never tell. I was nervous. I felt like vomiting. I lit a cigarette and gagged. Why did I do these things? I didn’...
We drank all day and that night I tried again to make love to Mindy. I was astounded and dismayed to find she had a large pussy. An extra large pussy. I hadn’t noticed it the night befo...
Mindy stayed about a week. I introduced her to my friends. We went places. But nothing was resolved. I couldn’t climax. She didn’t seem to mind. It was strange. Around 10:45 PM one even...
The phone rang the next morning. Lydia had gone back to her place. It was Bobby, the kid who lived in the next block and worked in the porno bookstore. “Mindy’s down here. She wants you...
To pacify Lydia I agreed to go to Muleshead, Utah. Her sister was camping in the mountains. The sisters actually owned much of the land. It had been inherited from their father. Glendol...
It was 3 or 4 days before I had to fly to Houston to give a reading. I went to the track, drank at the track, and afterwards I went to a bar on Hollywood Boulevard. I went home at 9 or ...
Lydia met me at the airport. She was horny as usual. “Jesus Christ,” she said. “I’m hot! I play with myself but it doesn’t do any good.” “Lydia, my leg is still in terrible shape. I jus...
Within a day or two, about 1 pm in the afternoon there was a knock at my door. It was a painter, Monty Riff, or so he informed me. He also told me that I used to get drunk with him when...
The next day Katherine phoned me. She said she had the tickets and would be landing at L.A. International Friday at 2:30 pm. “Katherine,” I said, “there’s something I’ve got to tell you...
I came out of the bar and checked the message board. The plane was on time. Katherine was in the air and moving towards me. I sat down and waited. Across from me was a well-groomed woma...
After dinner we came back and we talked. She was a health food addict and didn’t eat meat except for chicken and fish. It certainly worked for her. “Hank,” she said, “tomorrow I’m going...
I took women either to the boxing matches or to the racetrack. That Thursday night I took Katherine to the boxing matches at the Olympic auditorium. She had never been to a live fight. ...
Luckily I had auto insurance that paid for a rental car. I drove Katherine to the racetrack in it. We sat in the sundeck at Hollywood Park near the stretch turn. Katherine said she didn...
The next night Bobby and Valerie came over. They had recently moved into my apartment building and now lived across the court. Bobby had on his tight knit shirt. Everything always fitte...
Katherine stayed 4 or 5 more days. We had reached the time of the month when it was risky for Katherine to fuck. I couldn’t stand rubbers. Katherine got some contraceptive foam. Meanwhi...
That evening I started drinking. It wasn’t going to be easy without Katherine. I found some things she had left behind—earrings, a bracelet. I’ve got to get back to the typewriter, I th...
Two mornings later, at 4 am, somebody beat on the door. I let Tammie in. She sat down and I opened a couple of beers. “I’ve got bad breath, I have these two bad teeth. You can’t kiss me...
“Be quiet. Don’t wake Dancy. She’s my daughter. She’s 6 years I had a 6-pack of beer. Tammie put it in the refrigerator and came out with two bottles. “My daughter mustn’t see anything....
I had been sleeping on a terrible mattress with the springs sticking into me for several years. That afternoon when I awakened I pulled the mattress off the bed, dragged it outside, and...
Tammie came by that night. She appeared to be high on uppers. “I want some champagne,” she said. Then the phone rang. It was Lydia. “I just wondered how you were doing. ...” “You know D...
It was noon the next day when the phone rang. It was Lydia again. I heard a long insane wail like a wolverine shot in the arctic snow and left to bleed and die alone. . . . I slept most...
Two nights later I went over to Tammie’s place on Rustic Court. I knocked. The lights weren’t on. It seemed empty. I looked in her mailbox. There were letters in there. I wrote a note, ...
I was sitting with an anarchist from Beverly Hills, Ben Solvnag, who was writing my biography when I heard her footsteps on the court walk. I knew the sound—they were always fast and fr...
That Tuesday night we were sitting at my place drinking; Tammie, me and her brother, Jay. The phone rang. It was Bobby. “Louie and his wife are down here and she’d like to meet you.” Lo...
I saw Bobby out front the next day when I went to buy a newspaper. “Louie phoned,” he said, “he told me what happened to him.” “He ran outside to vomit and Tammie grabbed his cock while...
That night I took Tammie to the harness races. We went upstairs to the second deck and sat down. I brought her a program and she stared at it a while. (At the harness races, past perfor...
Bobby’s wife worked two nights a week and when she was gone he got on the telephone. I knew that on Tuesday and Thursday nights he would be lonely. It was Tuesday night when the phone r...
On Thursday night Bobby phoned again. “Hey, man, what are you doing?” “Oh, come on, man, I’ll just stay for a few beers. . . .” “You treat him mean. He gets lonely when his wife is at w...
I was the last one off the plane and there was Joanna Dover. “Joanna, let’s have a Bloody Mary while we wait for my baggage. Oh hell, I don’t have any baggage. But let’s have a Bloody M...
Upon awakening I got up and used Joanna’s toothbrush, drank a couple of glasses of water, washed my hands and face and got back into bed. Joanna turned around and my mouth found hers. M...
That evening after dinner Joanna produced some mescaline. “You ever tried this stuff?” Joanna had some paints and brushes and paper spread on the table. Then I remembered she was an art...
I stayed five days and nights. Then I couldn’t get it up any more. Joanna drove me to the airport. She had bought me a new piece of luggage and some new clothing. I hated that Dallas-Fo...
We had a 3:30 pm flight out of Los Angeles that Saturday. At 2 pm I went up and knocked on Tammie’s door. She wasn’t there. I want back to my place and sat down. The phone rang. It was ...
We ran up the long ramp. I was ca… At the escalator Tammie saw the f… “Please,” I said, “we only have f… “I want Dancy to have the money.” “All right.”
We were in the air twenty minutes when she took a mirror out of her purse and began to make up her face, mostly the eyes. She worked at her eyes with a small brush, concentrating on the...