Black Pussy

A while ago, I was showing a veteran his new apartment across from Bay's Food Market. There was a sign on the building I never noticed before that read "You can't beat our meat," which I thought was clever. I like things that rhyme. Somewhere inside me there lives a Robert Frost making rhymes about my bowels and my esophagus and possibly my urethra. But as I was distracted by the sign and the sudden noise of large military helicopters flying in formation overhead, a black pussy darted across my path. She did so flagrantly, if you ask me. I couldn't have avoided her, but she certainly could have avoided me. She took a deliberate route right in front of me. There was no doubt about it. A few minutes later, the cup holder in my car fell off its mount and a half-full cup of coffee spilled all over my center console and splashed all over the knee of my new pants. 

Chinooks, I learned later, was the name of those helicopters. They haul troops and are prone to crash. If one was a defense attorney for that particular feline noir, they'd argue that the helicopters startled the pussy who, thus, ran unintentionally across my path.

"Sonofabitch," I groaned.

I took the baffled client back to the shelter and went back to my office, shut the door, and canceled my other appointment in Logan. I had plans that evening, but canceled them, too. I took the most direct route home from work, put on my pajamas and went to bed to avoid any catastrophes. Then I thought of it as I was lying there with the blankets over my head. I wondered if the black pussy has a social worker superstition. I wondered if she went home and canceled her appointments, as well. I hope she avoided catastrophe just as I did. I hope she wasn't struck by a car or eaten by a dog. I bear no grudge in particular against black pussies. I'm just superstitious, is all. My superstition even precludes me from referring to them as their more common name, as well, a word that I haven't said in years. Just saying it gives me the willies.

My phone buzzed later on. It was the lady, Charlie, who I had plans with that evening. She sent me a sad face emoji followed by two broken hearts. Her real name was Charlene, but when we met in line at a Home Depot in Canal Winchester, she explained that she preferred Charlie. Charlene was an aunt whom she was named after. Charlie was a beautiful woman. She was thin and short and had an electric smile. She texted and said she was upset that I canceled on her so suddenly and didn't think she would be able to be free again for a while because of her kids and the situation with their father, which was vaguely explained to me when we first started talking. And again when we met in the backseat of my car outside of her townhouse because her kids were inside sleeping and she is loud, so she said, so I found out.

She asked if we could talk on the phone and against my better judgment, still under the hex of that black pussy, I said yes. Nothing good would come of that conversation, I knew, but what is the worst that could happen, I thought. So she called and said me cancelling had given her more time to think about things. She said she had fun the few times I had come up to see her, but she wanted more than just that. She said she was going to try to work things out with her ex for the benefit of their two kids. She didn't want to reschedule the date. She said her leg could have fallen off and she would have kept the date with me — that's how excited she was about it. But I cancelled — for a headache — which ruined everything. 

"Its just not in the cards," she pronounced gravely. "We weren't meant to be together, I guess." She went on about making time for those who make time for you and priorities and such — things I read women posting about on Facebook nearly every day because whatever dirtbag they were dating proved to be a dirtbag, through and through. There literally is nothing worse than women whining on Facebook about some guy, probably on drugs and who doesn't work, who was never worth a damn to begin with. What it amounts to, in all actuality, is an unintentional critique of their own bad judgment. Men do it, as well. They go on and on about "lessons learned." I could have told you that she was whore to begin with, I always want to say. If ever I write a book, that will be the title — I Could Have Told You She Was A Whore To Begin With.

I shouldn't have agreed to the call. I should have told a better lie than claiming I had a "terrible headache." I thought Charlie was the one. The sex was great. She was beautiful. Smart. Witty. She had a good job and we had many common interests. It was too late to tell her about the black pussy. Maybe she would have understood, though, being that she said she had Creole in her blood. Maybe I would have succeeded in making an argument of logic and reason based upon my superstition. But it would be admitting I lied, thus, any credibility I had would be ruined. 

So I stuck to my cards and simply apologized again and said that I understood, but wish she would change her mind. I hung up dejected and in a state of despair. I really wanted more than just sex with her. I'd never get another chance with anyone like her again. It was the end of the world scenario that frequently comes when things just don't work out. I was immensely attracted to her. It was an instant attraction from the moment I met her. And although we never had a single official date, I was in mourning. In my attempt to avoid it, the curse of the black pussy struck again.

Almost to mock me, the local high school was doing a production of "Puss in Boots" and there were signs all over town about it. The universe had aligned itself against me and was rearing its ugly head, mercilessly beating me to a pulp. 24 hours later, the curse wore off and I messaged her a few times, begging her to reconsider, but no reply. So I hired a girl who sort of looked like Charlie. I told her to call herself Charlie, but her hooker name was Aaliyah, and she seemed kind of miffed and looked like a perturbed peacock when I asked her to trade her proud name for something as pedestrian as "Charlie." But then she said to hell with it and we carried on in the backseat of my Mini Cooper the way Charlie and I had those few times, but it wasn't the same at all. I hired her one more time and tried it again just to be sure I hadn't done something wrong the first time or caught her on a bad day, but that time was even more disappointing than the first, so I gave up on her.

Then I went to a strip club and sought out a girl who looked somewhat like Charlie and tried to get to know her as much as possible. But I didn't have enough ones, and I wasn't particularly impressed with the "talent" she boasted of which was ass-clapping, nor of the butterfly she had tattooed in such a way that when she performed her talent, it was as though it's meaty wings flapped futiley. It didn't fly away. The body of that butterfly was lost in the abyss of her crack. The sound of her ass cheeks reminded me of the thunderous propellers of those Chinook helicopters and there was a sign in the bathroom that said, "Don't beat your meat," which reminded me of the day I was cursed near Bay's Food Market. 

When I told her that I was upset over a woman, she offered to do something more for fifty, her "real talent," as she billed it, which she said would permanently erase all other women from my mind. Enticed like a kid at a carnival for a moment, I pulled out a fifty and looked at President Grant and President Grant scowled back at me the way a father might and so I declined. I said goodbye to her and she said, "Goodbye, sugar," stuffing the thirty seven dollars I'd given her like my broken dreams into her frilly garter belts. She was completely oblivious to my dissatisfaction and quickly moved on to a skinny Asian man who looked like a wealthy pencil and who had a stack of ones in front of him, indifferent to George Washington's scorn.

I had one last trick up my sleeve. I decided to invite Charlie to the place I intended to take her. A fancy restaurant in town. Fancy by local standards, but moderatley so if it were in Columbus or Cleveland or somehwere like that. She was excited about going after she looked it up online, and maybe, if I just said I would be there waiting for her, she would show. How desperate, I felt. How terribly desperate. Yet, the Robert Frost inside me was writing in wonderful rhyme about all my hopes and dreams, firmly camped somewhere in my cerebellum. 

She replied back and said she would think about it, but she wouldn't promise me anything. "Gerald and I have been talking..." she texted. Gerald was her estranged husband. What a stupid name. I couldn't believe I was being beat out by a man named Gerald. His last name was Ford, like the president. They had been married five years when he cheated on her with a friend of hers. Then the babysitter. Then a cousin of hers he met at a family reunion. Then some underage girl at Church's Chicken. All that didn't matter, though. She was apparently ready to give him a fifth chance. Wild oats, she called it. 

She would think about it was better than a flat "no," I figured, so I went and got a table for two and there I sat with a goofy grin on my face and wearing a bowtie that made me uncomfortable. I had a boquet of beautiful flowers, which the pretty waitress volunteered to put in water for me, surely vying for an increased tip in the end. I agreed and she asked if I was ready to order and I said no, I was waiting for someone so I just had a drink — a very stiff drink. But it soon became obvious she wasn't coming. I lost the election of her heart to Gerald Ford.

The waitress came back around a while later and didn't ask if I was ready to order. Rather, she sat down on the seat across from me and smiled sympathetically. She introduced herself as Katie. She was even more beautiful on a second look, I realized as she sat there, not in the capacity of my waitress anymore, but as a new beginning. A new door that opened just as the last had apparently shut. She said her feet hurt because she wore the wrong shoes. Then she stuck out her foot to reveal she wore black Chuck Taylor's. She had tattoos on her arms. Different things that caught my attention like angel wings, cherubs, and "777" on the back of her right bicep. 

"What does that mean?" I asked, pointing at it.

"The threefold perfection of the Trinity. 777 is a lucky number because it brings good luck and change into your life. Seeing it means that good fortune is coming to you because angels are reassuring you that changes devised by the Universe are going according to plan. So when people see my arm, it is a good omen for them. That makes me happy."

I smiled. The Robert Frost in my nostrils smiled, too. He wrote something immediately for her. He rhymed arms with charms. And eyes with highs. And lips with hips. She didn't say anything for a moment and neither did I. We were comfortable in the silence. But though we didn't say a word, we said many things. You can learn more about someone in silence than you can in speaking. Then she asked how I was doing in such a way that I knew she cared to know the answer. I exhaled sadly. That is all I said. 

"I'm off work, obviously. Would you like to go have a drink? I'm usually not forward like this, but I believe you were meant to come in here. You were meant to be stood up. Forgive me," she smiled, "of my silly superstitions."

I was flabbergasted. I smiled at her and gave her the bouquet of flowers. We went to a quiet bar on the corner with old wood booths that croaked when you sat on them and nestled in. And as we talked and drank, I realized I agreed with her. It was meant to be. This was the way it was supposed to go. The TV over the bar showed pictures of those Chinooks, but there was no sound except for that of the music that played overhead on the jukebox — some Neil Young song of which I don't know the title, but that wonderfully fit the mood of the evening. I suppose one of those helicopters crashed somewhere, but I didn't want to think of that. I didn't want to think of anything else in the world other than Katie who sat across from me, most fortuitously. 

We went to her apartment and she held the boquet like a baby and smiled. She apologized in advance for the state of her apartment, but when she opened the door and it was revealed, it smelled wonderfully and was clean. Then, out of nowhere, darted two black pussies who rubbed themselves on my leg and circled me. 

"I didn't know you had —"

"Cats?"

"Yeah. Them."

"Oh, no! Are you allergic?"

I looked at her in a moment of panic and something in her eyes quelled the fear and anxiety that nearly overcame me. Then it all washed away, as though it had never been at all. My infatuation with black pussy ended at that moment. 

"No. Not at all," I replied liberally petting both of them. "I happen to love — pussies."

I still couldn't say the word that begins in "c," but my adoration for her was greater than my superstition. She smiled and that night she purred as we made love and we have been inseparable ever since, all because of one black pussy.