“Huh—” But I couldn’t finish. A hand slapped against my mouth and held there. The whole palm tight. Calves next to my calves, hairy chest on my back. Stick of flesh at my waist, then hips, and moving down, down, down. Pushing in. Pushing in some more. The pain. Pain. Pain breaking me and entering. Someone threw my back forward, my hips up and out. Then I was down on tile and pushing away and slipping on the wet floor and trying to yell but couldn’t make a sound. Everything in me was open. I heard my own voice somewhere saying, “Help me. Help me.”

I remembered darkness. The darkness taking over the gray steam. I thought of pearls, gray pearls and blankets. Then red as something started wetting me all over and seeping from me like from a torn place inside. It was red, all right. Red October leaves. Copper-brown November leaves. Hands from everywhere falling, falling onto me, into me. Rushing, pushing inside. Into me. I was open everywhere. The last voice was a tongue in my ear, “You got to relax, baby. My bid for breaking and entering ain’t for nothing. I just want to get a nut.”

“Hold him till I get mine.”

“And mine.”

“And mine.”

I thought about the girl in the abandoned hallway and the twenty dollars we gave her. I had been in Cuddles’ denim then. Riding her on the feet of roaches, too. Getting in. Getting off. The smell of pussy and Cuddles’ denim armpit. The man on top was grinning at me, his teeth black and yellow in the cooling steam. Arms twisted mine. Opened my thighs wider and wider. The hand on my mouth eased off. I could breathe. I could look at what he was doing. I told him his name was Cuddles.

“My name is Jack, man.”

“Tell me your name is Cuddles, man.”

“Nobody here but me. And my name is Jack. Jack.”

“Tell me it’s Cuddles. Cuddles.”

“Shit, man, you crazy or something?”

The air turned colder than before. I couldn’t move from the tile floor. Steam like icicles settled on me everywhere. Cold needles. I found my voice again. “Does it feel good to you, Cuddles? Is it good to you, man?”

“Look at this shit. You bleeding, boy. You bleeding like hell.”