She met my eyes straight on.
'Oh, I could give it to you straight,' she said.
'We could go through all that crap, and then what would you know? And who's to say anyway what name is really real, the name you're born with or the name you give yourself? Is it 'Bob Dylan' or 'Robert Zimmerman'? 'Cary Grant' or 'Archie Leach.' Or take Lauren Bacall-you say I remind you of her. Well, I read she was born 'Betty Perske.' So is that her name? Or is her real name 'Lauren Bacall'?'
As we walked along Margaret Street a light tropical wind blew through Kimberly's hair. She looked good. Maybe too good, I thought. I decided to step up the interrogation:
'Why did you lie to Jess Harrison?'
'I don't know that I did.'
'You told him you did tricks.'
'That wasn't a lie.'
'Rakoubian says you didn't.'
'He's the biggest liar around.'
'He said Mrs. Z never ran an escort service.'
'She didn't. But some of us actresses made side arrangements with her clients.'
'Jesus, Kimberly-do you know how hard you sound?'
'I never pretended I was soft.'
'You did with me.'
'N, Geoffrey. With you I didn't pretend.'
Good, I wanted to believe her! 'Why didn't you tell me you liked doing sex for money? ' My question came out almost like a wail. From the way she looked at me, I think she understood my pain.
'Because you never asked me, and I stopped doing it before I met you, and what I did with you wasn't for pay. She caught her breath. 'There was another reason too.
'What was that?'
'I didn't think you'd understand.'
I shook my head.
'I understand a lot of things. But not unnecessary lies.'
'The only lies I told you were necessary ones.'
'I see.' I groaned.
'What about the Duquaynes?'
'What about them?'
'Did you make it with them?'
'Yes.
'In performance? Or privately?'
'Both.'
'God damn you! Why didn't you tell me?' 'Right… like: 'Gee, Geoffrey, I'm taking you to these people's home for dinner, and, by the way, I've had sex with the wife while the husband was tied up in a chair. ' '
'Whose idea was that?'
'Harold's. 'Fun!'
'Actually it was.'
'You like girls, don't you?' 'Sometimes. Don't you?'
'You and Shadow were lovers.','We had been. Occasionally.'
'Yet she knew nothing about the blackmail?','That's right.'
'So she suffered for what she didn't know?'
'Yes, Geoffrey, she did. She certainly did. And that's the reason I'm not done with this yet.'
At the intersection of Angela Street and Passover Lane, the city cemetery spread out before us. The white graves, as in New Orleans, were set a 'bove the ground, and the bordering palms arched high against the clouds.
Kim was panting. I grabbed her. Then I pushed my mouth hard against hers and kissed her viciously. She took it from me, even when I cut her lip with my teeth.
'Why did you do that?' she asked, breaking away to spit out blood. 'I felt like it.'
'Good enough reason.' She looked at me, smiled.
'I liked it. You knew I would.'
'I didn't give a damn whether you'd like it or not.'
'Why then, Geoffrey?'
'I wanted to see how tough a little bitch you really are. '
'And? Well?' She eagerly awaited my appraisal.
'You're tough enough,' I said.
Walking south on Truman Avenue, the last stretch of U.S.I, the cars and trucks jammed up and honking, the leaves of the palms thrashing heavily in the early evening summer wind: 'Where do you live?'
'Catherine Street. I share an apartment with two other girls.
Waitresses.'
'Bother you-being a waitress?'
She shrugged.
'No big deal. I've done it before.'
'Why Key West?'
'why not?' u knew the place?' She nodded.
'And I liked it too. It's a kind of re ge. 'The end of the line.'
'Maybe that's the trouble with it.'
'What do you mean?'
'One way in and one way out. It's like a box canyon. Not the best place to hide.' We walked in silence for a block. Then I turned to her.
'You never really cared for me, did you?'
'No, that's wrong. I did.'
'But not very much.'
'A lot more than you think.'
'But you weren't honest with me.'
'I couldn't be.'
'Damnit! You keep saying that. Every time you do, I feel like kicking you in the shins.'
She stopped walking, stood still, then balanced herself on one foot and stuck out the other.
'Go ahead,' she said, exposing her shin. 'Go ahead, Geoffrey. Kick!' :'I'd like to.' 'Do. No one'll stop you. In Key West people beat up on people all the time.'
'Put your stupid foot down,' I said.
'I wouldn't want to damage your precious tattoo.'
'You remember!' She looked pleased as she lowered her foot.
'I got it here, you know.'
'Figures.'
'This Chinese-'
'Woman did it. She's probably gone now too. Tattoo artists are always on the move.'
She looked at me curiously.
'You're a funny guy. I didn't realize it until today.'
'You 'underrated' me, didn't you?'
She looked at me, then laughed. Suddenly I wanted desperately to make love to her right There, most emphatically there in Key West, in the shadow of all the lush decadence of that little island, with the hot stifling air carrying a hint of rot, while the palms thrashed and the gays cruised and the rednecks drove by in their pickup trucks and the six-toed cats in the Ernest Hemingway House shrieked and screwed violently in the night.
While I was unlocking my door at the Spanish Moss, my neighbors from Arizona pulled in from one of their metal-detecting expeditions at the beach. When they saw Kimberly, they turned to each other and smiled. I could
