Chapter 20

Tuesday, June 29, 1943

My second day of working for Sal proved as boring as the first had been terrifying. I got guard duty at the gate. It was pretty miserable in the hot summer sun reflecting off the hot beach sand. My partner, Pete Carmine had marriage trouble. He bitched all day about it. He moaned about what a whore his wife was, and then told stories about cocktail waitresses he'd banged. When I asked him where he met his wife he told me she was waiting tables at a bar in St. Joe. I tuned him out by late morning.

About one pm, four black sedans left the compound. The passengers were hidden by curtains over the rear windows, and I couldn't see who they were. So I asked Pete.

"It's the wives going into the city for a baby shower. They'll be back on Thursday." Pete elbowed me, "This means a fucking party tonight."

This perked me up. I remembered the party at Vicki's that got me this job. "So the guys party when the wives leave?"

He grinned, "Fucking-A! Sal will get some girls from town and we'll break open a barrel of whiskey. You comin' by?"

I shrugged and said, "I might have to work tonight."

"Where you work at night? You tend bar or something?"

Not thinking he would believe me about what I really did I gave him the cover story, "I deliver food for a bar downtown."

"Doesn't sound like that's very profitable," Pete noticed.

"I do alright,"

"You're missing a great time kid." Pete made it very clear that fucking some whore was his idea of a great time. Maybe I should look up his wife sometime, I thought.

"Maybe when I'm done, you guys will still be at it." I wanted him to think I was sad to be missing the party. I knew an evening with a lonely woman willing to pay for sex would easily top drunken gangsters and hookers.

Pete laughed, "Yeah, but we might be drunk, and the whores might be a bit used up by then."

I did intend to stop by, but that's not how it turned out.

At four, Pete took a phone call from the main house. When he hung up, he had me help him move a barrier across the road.

"Cal, you can go home. I gotta go out and pickup the girls for the party." Pete didn't look as if he minded the extra work, and I rode my bike home.

I checked at Ellie's house and found she'd gone to Vicki's, but when I got to Vicki's no one was home. When I stopped by Holly's she was out beating rugs and said her mother was in one of her "moods" and she was stuck working.

I hit the park and found Carl playing ball, so I joined up and played a few innings with him. When I got home, Mom had a meatloaf on the table, and I ate half of it without tasting it.

"You working tonight, Cal?" She was too dressed up for a Wednesday evening.

"Yeah. I could pick up a few dollars tonight." I knew if I had a job waiting, I'd make a lot more than that.

"Don't stay out too late. You need your rest." She said this in an abstract way. Her mind was somewhere else.

"You going out, Mom? You're dressed like for a date." I could also smell her best perfume.

"Just for a few drinks, honey. I'll be home before too late." She looked nervous.

"Who you going out with?"

She hesitated, "Just a few girls from the plant."

I knew she was lying, but there was no point in pressing her for the truth. But if she was seeing her drug store lover I was going to kick his ass.

I showed up at work at six and the place was hopping already. Alfie was dressed up like a farm hand wearing a patched dress and a red bandana on her head. "What's up with you?" I asked. She just waved me off to see Hazel.

The boss was smoking a cigar and counting the afternoon's take when I entered her cluttered office.

"How's my boy today?" She sounded too happy. I hope she wasn't expecting another fuck. Even with getting paid it wasn't worth it.

"Good. Got any deliveries for me?" My dick twitched at the memory of fucking the old bitch. If Hazel was getting me horny, I was ready to work.

"Yeah, I got a real special one. It's a private party down on the beach. They're having a big closed party and want some entertainment."

"What kind of entertainment? I don't sing." I sat down. "Though I do fiddle with a hot bow."

Hazel roared. "You do make the bitches sing with that dick of yours. The party wants a sex act."

"I have to fuck in front of people?" Public fornication could bring me some business I thought. Look what the mob party had done for my career when Sal ordered my pants down.

"Yeah, can you do that? I didn't even think to ask." Hazel sounded worried. I thought that there must be a lot of money involved.

"Yeah, I think I can, who do I get to fuck?"

"Alfie. They want a master/slave act." Oh, how innocent I was back then.

"What do you mean by that?" My knowledge of the War Between the States consisted of dividing up between North and South on the playground.

"See that suit hanging by the door." She pointed at an old style suit a rich man would wear. "You're going to wear that and when you and Alfie are on stage she's going to be dressed like a slave."

"Is that why she's dressed that way she is?"

"Yeah, now what will happen is that when you're on stage, she'll pretend to do something wrong, and then you're going to whip her and rape her on stage."

"Shit," I pulled out a smoke and lit it. "I'm not sure I can do that to Alfie. I like her. How can I whip her?" I had not yet learned to hurt the one's I loved.

"For a special job like this, I got triple both your usual rates. You pull down $150 for the show. Plus a third the take when they pass a hat for tips afterward."

I whistled. "Okay, I can do it."

"Take the suit and get dressed." Hazel gave me that hungry look. "Come by and get paid when you're done."

I took the suit back to the dressing room. Alfie saw me come in with it, "So, you're gonna do it?"

"I guess. I've never done anything like this before. Have you?"

"A couple of times, some people like to think the South still lives, like this sort of shit."

"Do I really have to whip you?" I started to take off my clothes.

"Yeah, but it's a special whip that doesn't hurt much."

"Much?"

"Well, you have to make it look good by hitting hard, so it does hurt a little, but the extra money makes it hurt less than it does." I threw my pants and shirt into a small box in the corner.

"How many times do I have to hit you?" I noticed Alfie looking at my white boxer shorts.

"Maybe twenty, I'll be screaming in pain. Remember that I'm faking the screaming. Just lay it on good. Before you whip me you have a tear my dress off. I'll be almost naked; I've got some old style undies on. You'll rip those off when you rape me."

"How do I rape you? I'm sorry if I sound stupid, but I've never thought about raping a woman before."

"That part's easy. You pull me off the rack and throw me down on the

bed hard and rip off my underwear. Just mount me and fuck me as hard as you can. I'll take care of the screaming and moaning. I'll start off struggling so you might have to slap me. Do it hard to make it look good. I'll start liking the fucking near then end, and I'll have a big ol' cum in front of all those crackers. You shoot in me if you can, fake it if you can't. Then we're done."

"It sounds hard." I got into the master's suit. I looked like Rhett Butler in Gone With the Wind.

"Your part's not that hard. You yell at me, tie me up, whip me, and then fuck the shit out of me. Do a good job, and we all make some money."

Jack drove us down to beach.

"Oh shit!" I gasped when he turned into the mob compound. I shrunk down into the seat and covered my face.

Jack looked down, "What the fuck's wrong with you kid?"

"Turn around, Jack. I work here. I can't do this show."

"You gotta kid. Hazel will kill you if you blow all this money." He rasped.

"Jack, these guys know me. They think I deliver food at night."

Alfie open her bag and looked around. She pulled out a small round jar. "Sit up, Cal. I'll paint your face white with this face cream. No one will recognize you."

I could see the house up ahead. "Quick, cover me up, Alfie."

She smeared the thick cream over my face, and in a few seconds, I was the whitest slave master since Simon Lagree. After a glance in the rearview mirror, I was calmer. As long as I disguised my voice no one was sure to recognize me.

Jack pulled up to the back of the house and went inside. Alfie went over everything with me again, and when Jack came out a few minutes later we were all set.

Pete Carmine met us at the back of the door. He looked at me, "You look too young for this." He didn't recognize me.

I smoothly said in a fake Southern accent, "I turned eighteen last month."

I knew he didn't believe me, but then it didn't matter if he did.

He stuck us in a small room and said he would be back in about ten minutes. I was down the hall from were I'd fucked Sal's wife the day before and saw the fink rubbed out.

Alfie was nervous. She went over the whole thing again. I was to be Massa John and she was Mary. She reminded me I had to call her a nigger a lot or the audience won't be happy, and I had to whip her hard. The whip would be on stage. She told me she would whisper at me if I went wrong.

Pete came back and led us down to the living room we stopped at the doorway. The furniture was pushed back to the walls and there was a wooden cross in front of the fireplace with loops hanging down from the ends of the cross bar, and a small iron-frame bed made up with a ratty looking quilt.

I went in first, following Alfie's directions. I stumbled when I saw Vickie and Ellie perched on Sal's knees. Ellie was made up like a whore and was leaning on Sal whose big hand covered a breast I'd sucked on many times. She giggled with she saw me, but I knew she didn't know me. I walked across and sat on the bed. Two standing lights flanked the hearth, but the audience sat in the dark. I could see about twenty men and women. I knew most of the men and I spotted the whore from Sal's last party.