BooksBarbecue
Back Thin Skin Save as PDF
Chapters (55)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Acknowledgments
  6. Cast of Characters
  7. Part One
  8. One
  9. Two
  10. Three
  11. Four
  12. Five
  13. Six
  14. Seven
  15. Eight
  16. Nine
  17. Ten
  18. Eleven
  19. Twelve
  20. Thirteen
  21. Fourteen
  22. Fifteen
  23. Sixteen
  24. Seventeen
  25. Eighteen
  26. Nineteen
  27. Part Two
  28. Twenty
  29. Twenty-one
  30. Twenty-two
  31. Twenty-three
  32. Twenty-four
  33. Twenty-five
  34. Twenty-six
  35. Twenty-seven
  36. Twenty-eight
  37. Twenty-nine
  38. Thirty
  39. Thirty-one
  40. Thirty-two
  41. Thirty-three
  42. Thirty-four
  43. Thirty-five
  44. Thirty-six
  45. Thirty-seven
  46. Thirty-eight
  47. Thirty-nine
  48. Forty
  49. Forty-one
  50. Forty-two
  51. Forty-three
  52. Forty-four
  53. Forty-five
  54. Forty-six
  55. A note on the Author

When I got home an hour later, to my utter disbelief, the empty vessel had left a message on my answering machine.

“Hey, Ruby. It’s Aslan. Calling you. On the telephone. Alexander Graham Bell. Belle and Sebastian. Sebastian was your lover, right? I’m sure he loved you very much. Anyway, when you get this message … you should ring me back. Okay? Okay. Peace.”

And there was peace.

Eighteen

image
The New World Order

I shrugged off my coat, ran myself a bath. I shampooed my hair and shaved my legs, although I had shaved them the preceding evening, just before I rang him, sure he would come over and we would make love. This time I was certain. He rang me. Very early in the morning. When men don’t ring you it’s because they don’t want to. When they ring you it’s because they want you. And when they ring very late or very early it’s because they are tortured by erotic thoughts of you and simply cannot wait for a more suitable hour to call.

I pulled on jeans and a sweater, mascara and lip gloss morning makeup, and carried my cell phone in my purse. “Hi. I’ve been out jogging. I just checked my messages. Should I come by? I’m right near your house. You live on Avenue A, don’t you?”

“You’ve jogged all this way?”

“Yeah, I jog every morning.”

“Good.”

I pinched my cheeks flushed and shooed the cab away. Asian answered the door with his headphones around his neck, the wire coiling across his baby-blue sweatshirt like a licorice rope. His sleeves were hanging past his hands. He yanked them up to his bony elbows, the only element of skinny indie rock boy on his finely cut body.

“Can I have some water.”

I leaned to use the tap.

“Don’t do that. It’s bad. It’s stolen water and then they pump it back to us all fucked up, all full of chemicals and bad vibes.”

He reached into the small fridge and retrieved an enormous container of mineral water. I pulled the hood of his blue sweatshirt flirtatiously over his brow and he pulled away from me, flirtatiously, I felt. I felt the flirtation rising real in his jeans and he felt his way out of the kitchen and onto his bed. I followed, placing myself, literally, at his feet.

“Ruby, I rang you on the phone, early this morning, because … early this morning I was thinking about something I needed to make clear. I just wanted to explain something. So now you’re here, in my house and now I can … in my house.”

“Okay.” He let me kiss him.

“Okay, Ruby. I need to explain to you that we can’t be together and why it is, in fact, that I can have no sexual or romantic relations with you at all.”