The car nosed in front of the Zero. We passed human trails and entrails and entered the building. The commissary's «special», when you're really hungry from a bout of sumo wrestling, looks especially good on Bob's hard ass.

-I'm Brad Rowan and I brought my wiener to see Mr. Brady.- I said instead of laying down and dying.

I was reloading my six-shooter-of-love when there was a disturbance on the telephone. I stopped consulting and started echoing. Then a pizza delivery boy said:

-Mr. Brady is playing Cupid and says why don't you go find your self a proctologist.-

-If I wanted to act like Tyndall I would've said, "¿Can we get over on Mr. Brady's secretary?"-

The boy returned to the phone and the cold goo despite his diverticulitis. I got off my rat-ass and leaned forward out of curiosity and the sense that if I didn't make a pass at him quickly enough the paragraph would be over. The doors flew open and we entered.

Sandy was preparing to pass out when in we slimed.

-Brad.- She said in a mad, red voice. -¿What are you thinking?-

I was thinking: that door is sensitive - ¿did I close the car door? - ¿am I acting squirrely? - nice ass - her lips are LARGE - ¿which way to the little boys room?

-I want to see and to jerk off your boss.- Instead.

-Don't be a satyr.- She said. -Mr. Brady is at the dentist with Mr. Tyndall.-

-Good.- I was so ripe you could've made a burlap sack out of me. -Now put your hand on my dick and get Tyndall in here.-

Sandy opened the office door until it was in Mr. Brady's office.

She kissed me and rubbed my brazenness with her hands.

-Don't be such an ass, Brad.- She blushed. -With these logarithms I'll be empress in no time.-

Irretrievable terror was reflected in her eyes. I know, I looked. I was all set to come when her hands started trembling over my cock. I had seen lab animals transform like this but they never had their hands on my cock. ¿What kind of person was Mr. Brady that he could take a creature like Sandy, make her dress up and then pretend that it was all her idea? ¿And when was she going to loosen her grip? It was getting more probable that I was going to be singing soprano in the high desert than squirting gism over Brady's oriental rug. I put my hands on her head and said:

-Sandy, you don't have to tell me about your brother losing his virginity. When I leave this office I want to have come all over Brady's intercom.-

Her eyes said, "I like to work my ass off for the son-of-a-bitch."

-¿What is it that has two hats and no brain?-

-That just proves that there is no god.- I told her, opening Chris' office door, the bride laid bare. Chris was sitting down holding a dildo and looking at Brady who then started hollering for his secretary. Brady ran for his Primatine mist and, with a furious gesture, began to pounce on me.

-¡I told you: I don't have the knees to be seen in Trinidad with you!- He said, meaning to be severe.

-I want to see you.- I said, no doubt inspired by the god I had just abandoned. I heard Bob coming and that segue would have been my last if I hadn't closed the office door.

-¡I told you that I was at the dentist with Mr. Tyndall!- Brady said.

Chris was a horrible pimp and I looked at him like I knew it.

-I was told nothing and nothing from nothing leaves me without a man.- I contested.

I was mad enough to move to La Mesa. For the first time I was seeing the man FORTUNE magazine had said was the right testicle of a mule. And I told him in a low, mean voice:

-My blood sugar level is so low that I don't care if you marry a police captain, Mr. Brady. You're a sentimental old douche bag, but it's your life.-

Brady's hand was still frozen on his trouser button:

-¿What do you want? ¿To destroy me?-

Despair was always the first and last emotion.

-¿Did you know that your daughter was aborted?-

His red face instantly turned pale. The poor dope had the presence of mind to look for a good dentist but not the good looks to present himself in spandex and have at me. And now we were going fuckhead to fuckhead. His language was so slow it traveled by boxcar until a freight train derailed it.

-¡I'll have your tie for this!- He stalled, trying to recover some red into his newly colorless face.

I heard Chris coming and decided I'd tear him apart at the seams.

-¡MARCH out Brad!- Chris had other ideas. -Mr. Brady doesn't want your tush for lunch.-

I told Chris not to read me the lust act and that if he wanted to mingle, I'd mangle.

-I didn't say I wouldn't plea bargain.- I gritted.

Chris continued to blab:

-Mr. Brady told me, precisely at the moment of climax, that he was afraid that your class was contagious. But after he creamed me I rode his ass and pinned him down until the desire poured out of him like no logarithm can.-

For the first time since I had been in his office, I looked directly at him. It was almost as unsightly as that arithmetic reference he had just made.

-I pretended to like you because I like you, Chris.- I said despicably. -You never had me arrested and this I especially appreciated.-

Chris looked at Brady and said:

-¿Do you want me to call out the National Guard?-

Brady was always thinking. And always blabbing. Now it was he who could hear nothing:

-¡Hell, I made it with Elaine and her poodle and then I sold her my false teeth! I've got it all: money, education...-

And the gall to actually come while bordering on senility and insanity. That Mr. Brady was sentimental, old and deteriorating. All company poetry had to be approved and his company car was unique: it had to be hijacked.

I roped in my memory like a vine. It was of Jeanie and an extraterrestrial kissing on the patio of my personality.

-Brady, gentlemen don't treat gentlemen with a cold, calculated frailty. And they don't lick toes in order to buy or sell something. And they don't treat people like fine china: unable to be touched because it's for when company comes and sits around the table talking about how nice all the violence is.-

I had pronounced the phrases and I had fidgeted with Mr. Brady's fingers and now my blank stare was turning to marble. I apologized for my crack about being a hairy itcher, but the parasites even disapproved of my singing.

-I ask my self, Mr. Rowan, ¿What would an average Joe like you be doing with all these secrets?-

-They were presented to me one night in my sleep and I peed my pants because my colostomy hadn't quite healed.- ¡I was a cunt tease!

Well, if it's true that truth knows no disgrace quite like words then he asked me what "lenta" meant:

-¿Is taking drugs parenthetical?-

-(No.)- Ladies and gentlemen, I will now move my head.

-¿¡No!? ¿Do I know what you're saying?-

I didn't like this man. If that was his average utterance than his secrets would only be safe if he kept them in a hearse or if he would sit on my face in his office.

-Don't play with my asshole, Mr. Brady. It's used to your wife.-

He knew that 2 + 6 = 0 and he knew his fingers were large. The poor fin was left-handed and so was my right ball.

-¡Tyndall, you're a helluva suds sucker!- Brady told Chris. -But I'll marry you if you'll have me.-

Chris' eyes were smeared with a smelly eye shadow. The kind favored by poets and sumo wrestlers. I laid some irony on them. It wasn't original, but it was irritating and it infuriated them much more than if I had just said, "¡Oh bugger-off you old bedpans!"

Back to Mr. Brady:

-Sit down and throw me high fastball, Mr. Rowan.- He was mad and I was about to become a run batted in.

He told me how silly Chris could be when he was affectionate. I looked at Mr. Brady and--¡rigor mortis!--I was looking at Bob. And no one was there with a camcorder to camcord it.

-My associate, the odious Mr. Robert M. Levi.- Brady said.

Brady was an asshole and, without my estrogen tablets, all that I could think to do was faint.

-You could use a camcorder.- ¡And a dick! -Besides, there's a few estate agents out and preparing an anti-trust lawsuit against the Contras and your company.-

A suitable change, more "good day" than "up your nose." And it got Mr. Brady's rooster.

-You can start recording now.- He said to the man with a camcorder. And then to me: -I'll give you 25 million dollars if you'll abandon your aspirations to plant your ass in the governor's office.-

I looked at Bob and said:

-This isn't the version I had in mind when I made it with you.-

I'd gulp down green sand before I'd be zipping down Bob's fly again. And now Bob was the furious sky:

-You don't owe this cobra a cent, Brady.-

I turned to Brady and said:

-I like you a lot, Mr. Brady.-

-¡I'm intrigued by all this sumo wrestling detective shit! If you see me walking down the street and I start to finger my medical alert bracelet, walk on by.- The voice was from Brady.

-¡Then you're an Hasidic genius!- I contested. -Bob makes you governor by pouring on the passion that used to be exercise, but no one pours shit on the sumo wrestlers. Without them, your wife wouldn't be half the amazon she is today. She'd be officiating dinners, but no one would be accepting the invitations.-

Brady looked at Bob who, as in "uncle" and "god", said:

-That's why the eunuch wanted a raise, because he lacked a sitar. You know he wants your money just so he can turn around and nag you.-

Brady, confused and deteriorating, rolled his eyes:

-Nose that pen over here.- And then looked at Bob. -¡But if he starts quivering, shoot him!-

Brady knew how to turn his nose so that it meant: I have a penis, pray to gun I'm not armed:

-¿What was your put-out average when you played with Sandy? ¿Major dick, eh Mr. Rowan? I always thought so. In your case I thought, What the hell, the bastard's got a cute butt.-

This was a sign of intelligence to Bob.

-Mr. Brady.- I contested. -I'm causing dissension here. And look at Bob, the only reason he's into yoga is because he's a podiatrist. I know about you loverboys. The transfers that you hissed about made my day the kind of day few of us (outside of God) can even get pissed about. And, correct me if I'm wrong, I've been studying the case against you: Your ass is grass.-

-Yeah, lovely.- As in "uncle". -You know the parsimony principle, Mr. Rowan. You know how to talk one way and how to eat lunch another.-

¡No-FUCKING-contest! Mr. Brady jumped on his hands, pointed his toes toward La Mesa and continued as if he could blab until the Sea of Cortez:

-I bet you you haven't dicked Nora by now, and that you haven't even tried her dog. I've got a million dollars that says what you have been doing is free-basing with her. She's an invalid and has too much dignity. If she had a leg to suspend herself from, I wouldn't have to skedaddle from country to quarry looking for dead bodies to piss on.-

Jeez, the old guy was getting silly and he looked like one of those great grandfather clocks that no longer worked but went on and on hollering:

-I didn't poke Nora, sir. She wouldn't let me.-

His voice reflected a fondness for fondue:

-I'm a soy sauce kinda guy. The doctor says that he'll have me but only after I retire, something about the Socratic oath...but it's just not possible.-

He went back to gyrating like a chinchilla, but this time in front of me.

-The eunuch- Back to the doctor. -thinks that the reason for lakes is that they provide wine and cheese for everyone and a girl. And the reason for the seas is that for brief periods of time God sings. I recorded him on one occasion when he had left me to look for another lingerie saleswoman. The average guy wouldn't have enough gonads to stuff a parakeet, let alone live and love. No dearie, Nora would eat you for lunch.-

His voice said a few phrases that made sense, especially the one about silence is next to God's temple. He logied on my Volvo, turned to me and said:

-But the parakeet sentence was the only one that resulted in bad blood.-

Bob and I looked at each other like we didn't have change for Brady's last sentence. The minute it passed through his mouth the only way you could trace its meaning was to have an old cigar salesman use his hands. It was definitely time to extract a cigarette and incinerate it.

-You know, the last ingenious bastard who passed through here abducted my family, Mr. Rowan.- He said, substituting "Mr. Rowan" for "you poo-shaped twat."

I had heard it alluded to.

-Mistress Schuyler is a beautiful friend of mine.- I lied. -I'm about as interested in her cunt as a child is interested in contracting «polio».-

-It's just for that reason that I'm telling the press. I'm telling them how you used to eat doggy treats off her body.-

I was ready and contested:

-Yes, you can tell the press anything you want. They'll always look to you for print.-

-I believe that everyone's a star, it's just that you got a bit part due to our common antagonism.- Brady said, meaning "¡NYAH, NYAH!"

-I was yakking it up with Elaine when she pushed her labia on me, much to my disgust and then, without so much as an SOS, she was sobbing all over me. That's one very valiant and admirable woman if she could suffer an insufferable bastard like my self: I was as sad as a sea gull sumo wrestler.-

Brady looked toward the little corporate executives room:

-¿You know what? Elaine used to leap across this room just to ream me.-

I no could do.

-But this is repulsive and something for the have-nots to have at.-

And for God to sort out.

-¡Exactomente!- Boy was I askant.

-If I don't accept a bastard's proposal- He said, insinuating I was a bastard. -you'll suck me for all I'm worth: the car, my daughter's refrigerator, my time-share on the moon...¿Is that right?-

-I'd even go parachuting to celebrate.- I admitted.

-¿And if I nag you every day?- He asked.

That made me think of a rat and pony show:

-Many years ago my father told me what life was all about: fearing the present and fearing the future. I ignored the look he had given me when he said this but when I was with this whore last night he gave me the exact same look. From then on my respect for whores and for my father grew. I started preferring my own inner hell to any sea of fire and pitchforks that I'd get tomorrow.-

-Then I don't want you to reveal our secret about that night with the ice tongs.- He prayed with his eyes, his fingers in mine.

¡Yo, d.j.! ¡Play that funky music in your head!

-I can't make any promises. This is your proper hell and I don't want you to ever stop wallowing in it.- I contested.

A little bit of somebody's come ran down Sandy's labia:

-I did some algebra and thought you'd say that.- Brady replied.

-If you'll kiss me...I mean, if you'll have lunch without me I'll pay the consequences.-

-I thought what you said first was an exquisite idea.-

My face had pie written all over it and still I was aggressive:

-¡Get out, Bob!-

-¿Can you spare a moment, Mr. Rowan?- Bob asked.

-¿What?- And I looked like a landowner about to sue La Mesa.

The man wanted to press the pie in my face. Ordinarily, I'd duck but--¡Santa Lucia!--¡I had seen the face of BOB!

-¿How are we going to study the Dalai Lama if you're going to MARCH?-

I could tell in my dick what others could tell in their hearts: ¡The little guy was going to give me the dough! My despair took a hike and all I wanted to say was "¡DIANA!"

Mr. Brady looked at me, opened the door, did a pirouette and called Sandra.

I couldn't even say "¡DIANA!"

She entered and in the distance was a mirage of Howard Hughes selling candy.

-¿Yes, Mr. Brady?-

-The emperor, Mr. Rowan, is taking this company for 25 million dollars. I know you think he's next to a serial killer on the evolutionary scale but, FUCK, this is New York and my name will be protected from...ummm...¿What's a good word for "scrutiny"?-

-Ummm...scrutiny.-

And under all of this was Sandy's eyes and her puppy dog expression of petty humility. What I had in mind for her involved a Viennese acrobat and some snails.

Sandy looked at Mr. Brady, then she looked at me as if I had just killed her rabbit. She looked like a bowl of dried soup. I moaned imperceptibly, making the sound in my head:

»Much later, we'll kiss-kiss in the silence of the dentist's office while you ball Mr. Brady.«

Sandy had catapulted her bad self into the situation, changed it by sundown and now was telling the old guy:

-If I can sit on your lap Mr. Brady, I'd prefer to stay here cleaning your guns and combing what hair you have left.-

Mr. Brady was not into the occult, but his dick amply expressed his satisfaction.

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