PLEASE DON’T HURT ME

 

 

“Real nice place you’ve got here.”

“It’s a dump. You can say it—it’s okay. Sure you don’t want a beer or something?”

“Honey, all I want is you. C’mon and sit next to me. Right over here on the couch.”

“Okay. But you won’t hurt me, will you?”

“Now, honey—Tammy’s your name, isn’t it?”

“Tammy Johnson. I told you that at least three times in the bar.”

“That’s right. Tammy. I don’t remember things too good after I’ve had a few.”

“I’ve had a few too and I remember your name. Bob. Right?”

“Right, right. Bob. But now why would someone want to hurt a sweet young thing like you, Tammy? I told you back there in the bar you look just like that actress with the funny name. The one in Ghost.”

“Whoopi Goldberg?”

“Oh, I swear, you’re a funny one. Funny and beautiful. No, the other one.”

“Demi Moore.”

“Yeah. Demi Moore. Why would I want to hurt someone who looks like Demi Moore? Especially after you were nice enough to invite me back to your place.”

“I don’t know why. I never know why. But it just seems that men always wind up hurting me.”

“Not me, Tammy. No way. That’s not my style at all. I’m a lover not a fighter.”

“How come you’re a sailor, then? Didn’t you tell me you were in that Gulf War?”

“But I didn’t see battle. Don’t let the uniform scare you. Like I said, I’m really a lover at heart.”

“Do you love me?”

“If you’ll let me.”

“My father used to say he loved me.”

“Oh, I don’t think I’m talking about that kinda love.”

“Good. Because I didn’t like that. He’d say he loved me and then he’d hurt me.”

“Sometimes a kid needs a whack once in a while. I know my pop loved me, but every once in a while I’d get too far out of line—like a nail that starts working itself loose from a fence post?—and so he’d have to come along every so often and whack me back into place. I don’t think I’m any the worse for it.”

“Ain’t talking about getting ‘whacked,’ sailor man. If I’d wanted to talk about getting ‘whacked’ I woulda said so. I’m talking ’bout getting hurt. My daddy hurt me lotsa times. And he did it for a long, long time.”

“Yeah? Like what he do to hurt you?”

“Things. And he was all the time making me do things.”

“What sort of things?”

“Just…things. Doin’ things to him. Things he said made him feel good. Then he’d do things to me that he said would make me feel good but they never did. They made me feel crummy and rotten and dirty.”

“Oh. Well, uh, gee…didn’t you tell your mom?”

“Sure I did. Plenty of times. But she never believed me. She always told me to stop talking dirty and then she’d whack me and wash my mouth out with soap.”

“That’s terrible. You poor thing. But let’s forget about all that. Here…snuggle up against me now. How’s that?”

“Fine, I guess, but what was worse, my momma’d tell Daddy and then he’d get mad and really hurt me. Sometimes it got so bad I thought ’bout killing myself. But I didn’t.”

“I can see that. And I’m sure glad you didn’t. What a waste that would’ve been.”

“Anyway, I don’t want to talk about Daddy. He’s gone and I don’t hardly think about him anymore.”

“Ran off?”

“No. He’s dead. And good riddance. He had a accident on our farm, oh, some seven years ago. Back when I was twelve or so.”

“That’s too bad…I think.”

“People said it was the strangest thing. This big old tractor tire he had stored up in the barn for years just rolled out of the loft and landed right on his head. Broke his neck in three places.”

“Imagine that. Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Yeah. My momma thought somebody musta pushed it, but I remember hearing the insurance man saying how there’s so many accidents on farms. Bad accidents. Anyway, Daddy lived for a few weeks in the hospital, then he died.”

“How about that. But about you and me. Why don’t we—?”

“Nobody could explain it. The machine that was breathing for him somehow got shut off. The plug just worked its way out of the wall all by itself. I saw him when he was just fresh dead—I was first one in the room, in fact.”

“That sounds pretty scary.”

“It was. Here, let me unzip this. Yeah, his face was purple-blue and his eyes were all red and bulgy from trying to suck wind. My momma was sad for a while, but she got over it. Do you like it when I do you like this?”

“Oh, honey, that feels good. That feels wonderful.”

“That’s what Daddy used to say. Ooh, look how big and hard you got. My momma’s Joe used to get big and hard like this.”

“Joe?”

“Yeah. Pretty soon after Daddy died my momma made friends with this man named Joe and after a time they started living together. Like I said, I was twelve or so at the time and Joe used to make me do this to him. And then he’d hurt me with it.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Don’t stop. Don’t…stop.”

“I won’t. Yours is a pretty one. Not like Joe’s. His was crooked. Maybe that’s why his hurt me even more than Daddy’s.”

“Hey, don’t squeeze so hard.”

“Sorry. Joe liked me to—”

“Do we have to talk about this Joe?”

“No, but…”

“Hey, don’t stop.”

“But I feel like talking about him.”

“Okay, okay. So how’d you finally get away from him?”

“Oh, I didn’t. He got hurt.”

“Really? Another farm accident?”

“Nah. We weren’t even on the farm no more. We was livin’ in this dumpy old house up Lottery Canyon way. My momma still worked but all Joe did was fiddle on this big old Cadillac of his—you know, the kind with the fins?”

“Yeah. A fifty-nine?”

“Who knows. Anyways, he was always fiddlin’ with it. And he always made me help him—you know, stand around and watch what he was doin’ and hand him tools and stuff when he asked for them. He taught me a lot about cars, but if I didn’t do everything just right, he’d hurt me.”

“And I’ll bet you hardly ever did everything ‘just right.’”

“Nope. Never. Not even once. How on earth did you know?”

“Lucky guess. What finally happened to him?”

“Those old brakes on that old Caddy just up and failed on him one night when he was making one of his trips down the canyon road to the liquor store. Went off the edge and dropped about a hundred feet.”

“Killed?”

“Yeah, but not right away. He got tossed from the car and then the car rolled over on him. Broke his legs in about thirty places. Took a while before anybody even realized he was missing, and took almost an hour for the rescue squad to get to him. And they say he was screamin’ like a stuck pig the whole time.”

“Oh.”

“Something wrong?”

“Uh, no. Not really. I guess he deserved it.”

“Damn right he did. Never made it to the hospital though. Went into shock when they rolled the car off him and he saw what was left of his legs. Died in the ambulance. But here…let me do this to you. Hmmmmmmm. You like that?”

“Oh, God.”

“Does that mean yes?”

“You’d better believe that means yes!”

“My boyfriend used to love this.”

“Boyfriend? Hey, now wait a minute—”

“Don’t get all uptight now. You just lie back there and relax. My ex-boyfriend. Very ex.”

“He’d better be. I’m not falling for any kind of scam here.”

“Scam? What do you mean?”

“You know—you and me get started here and your boyfriend busts in and rips me off.”

“Tommy Lee? Bust in here? Oh, hey, I don’t mean to laugh, but Tommy Lee Hampton will not be bustin’ in here or anywheres else.”

“Don’t tell me he’s dead too.”

“No-no. Tommy Lee’s still alive. Still lives right here in town, as a matter of fact. But I betcha he wishes he didn’t. And I betcha he wishes he’d been nicer to me.”

“I’ll be nice to you.”

“I hope so. Tommy and Tammy—seemed like we was made for each other, don’t it? Sometimes Tommy Lee was real nice to me. A lot of times he was real nice to me. But only when I was doin’ what he wanted me to do. Like this…like what I’m doin’ to you now. He taught me this and he wanted me to do it to him all the time.”

“I can see why.”

“Yeah, but he’d want me to do him in public. Or do other things. Like when we’d be driving along in the car he’d want me to—here, I’ll show you…”

“Oh…my…God!”

“That’s what he’d always say. But he’d want me to do it while we was drivin’ beside one of those big trucks so the driver could see us. Or alongside a Greyhound bus. Or at a stoplight. Or in an elevator—I mean, who knew when it was going to stop and who’d be standing there when the doors open? I’m a real lovable girl, y’know? But I’m not that kind of a girl. Not ay-tall.”

“He sounds like a sicko.”

“I think he was. Because if I wouldn’t do it when he wanted me to, he’d get mad and then he’d get drunk, and then he’d hurt me.”

“Not another one.”

“Yeah. Can you believe it? I swear I got the absolute worst luck. He was into drugs too. Always snorting something or popping one pill or another, always trying to get me to do drugs with him. I mean, I drink some, as you know—”

“Yeah, you sure can put those margaritas away.”

“I like the salt, but drugs is just something I’m not into. And he’d get mad at me for sayin’ no—called me Nancy Reagan, can you believe it?—and hurt me something terrible.”

“Well, at least you dumped him.”

“Actually, he sort of dumped himself.”

“Found himself someone else, huh?”

“Not exactly. He took some ’ludes and got real drunk one night and fell asleep in bed with a cigarette. He was so drunk and downered he got burned over most of his body before he finally woke up.”

“Jesus!”

“Jesus didn’t have nothin’ to do with it—except maybe with him survivin’. Third degree burns over ninety percent of Tommy Lee’s body, the doctors at the burn center said. They say it’s a miracle he’s still alive. If you can call what he’s doing livin’.”

“But what—?”

“Oh, there ain’t much left to him. He’s like a livin’ lump of scar tissue. Looks like he melted. Can’t walk no more. Can barely talk. Can’t move but two or three fingers on his left hand, and them just a teensie-weensie bit. Some folks that knew him say it serves him right. And that’s just what I say. In fact I do say it—right to his face—a couple of times a week when I visit him at the nursing home.”

“You…visit him?”

“Sure. He can’t feed himself and the nurses there are glad for any help they can get. So I come every so often and spoon-feed him. Oh, does he hate it!”

“I’ll bet he does, especially after the way he treated you.”

“Oh, that’s not it. I make sure he hates it. You see, I put things in his food and make him eat it. Just yesterday I stuck a live cockroach into a big spoonful of his mashed potatoes. Forced it into his mouth and made him chew. Crunch-crunch, wiggle-wiggle, crunch-crunch. You should have seen the tears—just like a big baby. And then I—

Hey. What’s happened to you here? You’ve gone all soft on me. What’s the matter with—?

“Hey, where’re you goin’? We was just starting to have some fun…Hey, don’t leave…Hey, Bob, what’d I do wrong?…What’d I say?…Bob! Come back and—

“Well! Can you believe that? I swear…sometimes I just don’t understand men.”