Inside With The King of Jugglers.
A short story about crimes and slutty dresses.
“A person who learns to juggle six balls will be more skilled than the person who never tries to juggle more than three.” Marilyn von Savant
I ran into Buzz coming off the subway the other day. He was back from serving two years for dealing speed. While he was inside, he met a juggler named Gabe. The guy could juggle eight balls at one time. Buzz thought it was the greatest thing, and decided he wanted to be a juggler, too. When he got out, just like Gabe, he bought one of those army surplus trench coats with the big pockets for all his juggling balls.
He’d go to parks, put down his hat, and juggle.
Anyway, when I met Buzz at the subway, he was in a hurry. He had to get over to his girlfriend’s apartment. “My girlfriend’s holding stuff at her place,” he said. “Come with me.” His hands kept going up and down, rubbing his chin, flicking his fingers. It was clear he was still using.
Buzz was a great talker, going on about juggling and what it was like in Kingston Pen.
I wasn’t doing anything, so we started up Pacific Avenue. Buzz was a great talker, going on about juggling and what it was like in Kingston Pen.
Mostly Buzz talked about the people, the pimps, the cons, the traffickers. But the characters who fascinated him most — outside of Gabe — were the queens. Everyone was wary of them, even the old cons.
The queens ran the hair salon. If you had a visitation, and you wanted to clean yourself up, you had to go to them. “You had to be careful, though,” Buzz told me. “One guy complained that they’d cut his sides too short. The girls stuck him with a pair of scissors.”
Buzz stopped to light a cigarette. He had tattoos on both hands. One said “red,” the other said “yellow.” That was another trick of Gabe’s. You held the red balls in your left and the yellows in your right.
It was all part of being a good showman.
“They bet me in the joint I couldn’t juggle five balls and smoke a cigarette all the way down,” Buzz said to me. “I finished one cigarette and told them to light me another one. I could’ve kept it up all day.”
Buzz sure had a lot of interesting stories to tell.
“Molly’s landlord thinks I’m her pimp or something. His apartment is by the front entrance.”
We finally came to this apartment building, a three-storey job near Annette. I started up the walk, but Buzz pulled me around the side.
“We’ll use the fire escape,” he said. “Molly’s landlord thinks I’m her pimp or something. His apartment is by the front entrance.”
So we climbed the fire escape, having no trouble getting in the door because Buzz had stuck a piece of cardboard over the lock. We went down the hall to Molly’s apartment. Buzz knocked softly and listened.
There was a space under the door. A shadow moved around in there.
“Molly?” he said.
Still no answer. The shadow moved again.
“Molly, I know you’re in there,” he said. “Open up.”
The shadow moved closer to the door.
Buzz kept listening. Everything was quiet inside. He put his hands in his raincoat pockets and twirled the juggling balls around. “Come on, Molly,” he said. “Just give me the stuff and I’ll beat it.”
The shadow moved again.
“Did you do it all, Molly?”
Still no answer. Buzz suddenly shouldered the door open.
A black Labrador was there in the hall wagging its tail. It didn’t make a sound. It came over and started licking my hand with its big pink tongue.
Buzz went to the bedroom and started pulling out drawers. He dumped everything out on the floor. “My fucking clothes are gone,” he said.
So he starts gathering up stuff, her clock radio, hair dryer — even these raunchy long dresses. He stuffed everything he could in his coat.
“Let’s get out of here,” he said.
We went back down the fire escape. When we got to the street, he tossed me the raunchy dresses. “Give these to your girlfriend,” he said.
They were really sexy things with slits up the side.
Back at the subway, we said goodbye and I took off home. I put the dresses on the couch. They were really sexy things with slits up the side.
While I was in the kitchen, getting some wine, Alison walked through the door. She immediately sees the dresses spread out on the couch.
“Where did you get these?” she asked.
“I ran into my old friend Buzz,” I said. “He was picking up some things at his girlfriend’s house. He asked if you’d like these dresses.”
“Why doesn’t his girlfriend want them?”
“I guess she has too many already.”
Alison picked one up and looked at the tag. “This is silk,” she said. She checked the other ones. They were silk as well. “Who gives away silk dresses?” she said. She picked up the beige one, holding it to the light. “You can see right through this.” She pressed it to her waist, turning left, then right. “It doesn’t leave much to the imagination.”
“Try it on, Alison.”
“I don’t even know if it’ll fit. God, it’s sexy, though.”
She went in the bedroom and came out five minutes later. Her hair was tied up on the top of her head. The neckline on the dress went right down to her waist. When she turned around, her whole back was exposed.
“Get over here,” I said, pulling her down on the couch.
The slit at the side rode up exposing her slim legs.
“Let me try on the other dresses,” she said.
“I’m happy with this one,” I replied.
She went in the bedroom and came out in the black number.
“What do you think?” she said, turning around.
“Man, you look good,” I said.
“Hold on. There’s still the red one. It might be even better.”
“How can anything be any better?”
She went back in the bedroom.
“She keeps saying, ‘You do a good deed and guess what happens? You come home and find your place burglarized.’”
The phone rang. I picked up.
Buzz was on the other end. “You’re home,” he said. “Listen, I need those dresses back. Turns out, Molly took my shirts and pants to cleaners. She’s real pissed. She keeps saying, “ I do a good deed and guess what happens? I get burglarized.’”
“Did you tell her it was you?” I asked.
“How could I? I told her I’d check out a couple of fences. She just wants her dresses back. They’re her bed and butter.”
That’s when he told me what Molly did for a living. She worked as an escort at some exclusive men’s club. They tipped her coke or smack, whatever was going. Buzz needed the dresses back as much as she did.
“Look, get Alison in the bedroom,” he said to me. “Leave the door unlocked and I’ll be over in fifteen.”
Alison was coming out of the bedroom in the red dress. It clung to her like it was soaking wet. I couldn’t believe my eyes.
“Who was on the phone?” she asked.
“Some guy looking for Fred,” I said. “I told him I didn’t know a Fred.”
I pulled Alison down on the couch and started fumbling with the zipper.
“Easy, easy,” she said. “Let me do it.”
She undid the zipper and stepped out of the dress.
“Get in the bedroom,” I said.
“What’s gotten into you,” she laughed.
I pushed her down the hall. The dresses were all over the bed.
“Let me get rid of these first,” I said.
At one point, she said, “Someone’s gonna call the police in a minute.”
I took them out to the living room, turned up the stereo, then unlocked the front door. Alison was spread out on the duvet when I came back. I got right down to it. We made a lot of noise. At one point, she said, “Someone’s gonna call the police in a minute.” I told her I didn’t care. She was too hot, sizzling hot, and I wasn’t about to worry about cops.
A half hour or so later, we were both laying there, sweating like crazy.
“That was incredible,” she said. “I’ve never been this hot in my life. I need some water.”
“I’ll get it,” I said. “Don’t you move.”
I got up and went in the other room. Buzz had come and left. The gowns were gone. I got the water and came out to the living room again. Alison was standing there.
“Where are the gowns?” she said.
We both looked around the room.
“We’ve been robbed,” she said.
“I must have left the door unlocked,” I said. I went to the door and checked the lock. “Look, it’s off.”
“Why did they only take the dresses?” she said. “Why not the stereo or the TV?”
“Maybe they figured the dresses were worth more,” I said.
Alison sat down on the couch. I sat down next to her.
“Those dresses really turned me on,” she said.
“Let me talk to Buzz. Maybe he can find some others.”
“Can’t you steal one back from Molly again?”
The next day, I got on the phone, trying to find Buzz. Nobody knew where he was. Then I took the subway out to one of his old haunts and found him juggling on a street corner. He had six balls going.
“I’ve got to find another gown,” I said to him. “Alison looks amazing in those things. Can’t you steal one back from Molly again?”
“She’s already suspicious,” he said. “I think she knew I stole them.”
“I promised Alison I’d find her one.”
Buzz thought for a minute.
“Let me make a call,” he said. “Give me a quarter.”
Buzz used the phone in the pool hall next door, then came back. “A friend of mine has one,” he said. “He’ll sell it for fifty. We can go over there now if you want. You got fifty bucks?”
“I’ve got a hundred,” I said.
“Whatever Roxy says, just agree. Don’t piss her off, whatever you do.”
We walked north, stopping at a row of brownstones just past the funeral parlor, “Be cool upstairs, okay?” Buzz said. “Whatever Roxy says, just agree. Don’t piss her off.”
“I thought you said your friend was a guy?”
“Just be cool, okay?”
Up on the third floor, Buzz knocked on one of the doors.
A chain rattled, then a male voice said, “Who is it?”
“It’s Buzz, Roxy.”
The door opened and there’s this thin guy with close-cropped hair and plucked eyebrows. He was wearing a loose pullover and white jeans. On his feet were some kind of Japanese sandals. “Well, well,” he said, leaning against the doorjamb, arms crossed. “It’s The Juggler and — who’s this?” — looking at me — “The Jugglerette?”
“This is Tom,” Buzz said. “Tom, this is Roxy.”
“Hello, Tom,” Roxy said, shaking my hand. “Look at those shoulders. I’m not sure my dresses are going to fit you, sweetie.”
“It’s for his girlfriend, Roxy,” Buzz said.
“And what size, pray tell?” Roxy asked me.
“Same size as Molly,” I said.
“And who’s Molly?”
“She’s my girlfriend,” Buzz said.
“I’m in the middle of a straight man’s convention,” Roxy sighed. “Come in. Excuse the mess, I’m still getting settled.”
We followed Roxy into the living room. On the walls were posters, all with the word “LOVE” done in different type styles.
“My friend’s an artiste,” Roxy said.
“Go on, darling, have a look. They won’t bite.”
Over on the couch, he’d laid out two silk gowns.
“That’s all I can part with, I’m afraid,” Roxy said. “Go on, darling, have a look. They won’t bite.”
The red one looked pretty good.
“How much is this?” I asked.
Roxy sighed, picking a pack of cigarettes.
“Well, Tom, darling,” he said, “since we’re all business, I’ll put on my dickering hat.” He lit a cigarette and blew the smoke out his nose. “For you — and only you — I’ll say fifty dollars with a codicil. Do you know what a codicil is? It’s an addition. Fifty dollars for the dress if — if, my sweet — you let me cut your hair. That’ll be fifty dollars as well.”
“Roxy’s really good,” Buzz said.
“You’re too kind,” Roxy said. “But I definitely am good.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Swell,” Roxy replied, pointing to a swivel chair by the kitchen sink. “Take a seat.” He started running the water while I sat down, then threw a sheet across me, tucking the ends into my collar. “Buzz,” he said. “Be a dear and put on a record. Feel free to toss your balls.”
Buzz turned on the stereo, took off his coat, and got his juggling balls.
“Please don’t send them flying into the objets d’art,” Roxy said.
He tilted the chair back towards the sink, then started washing my hair, a cigarette in the corner of his mouth.
Symphonic music played. Every so often, Roxy conducted with his scissors, his head swaying, arms going up and down.
“And now,” he said, towelling my hair, “the art begins.”
He pulled up the sleeves of his sweater, and started clipping away. Occasionally, he’d stop to conduct a particular symphonic strain.
Meanwhile, Buzz was working three balls, then four and five. As I watched them go around and around, Roxy pulled strands of hair from each side of my head, measuring the length, then cutting again.
When he was finished, he brought out two mirrors, holding one in front, one behind. “There you go,” he said.
“Thanks, Roxy,” I said. “It looks great.”
“My pleasure,” he said, “straight as you are.”
He looked at Buzz. “And you, my sweet?”
“I’m fine for now, Roxy,” Buzz said. “Give me a couple more weeks.”
“Can’t blame a girl for trying,” he shrugged, going to the closet. He found a plastic bag and started folding the dress. “I hope you have cash. I’m not set up for debit yet.”
I gave him the money.
“Off you go,” he said, handing me his card. “Go wrap your woman in silk. And you — looking at Buzz — “do whatever it is you do with your Molly.”
With an abrupt turn, he raised his hands to the music, and strode across the room to the door. Opening it, he said, “Don’t be a stranger.”
“Those cards are ten years old,” he said. “The apartment belongs to a queen friend. Roxy shows up there every time he gets out.”
Buzz and I walked down the hall.
“I like Roxy,” I said.
Buzz told me to throw the card away.
“Those cards are ten years old,” he said. “The apartment belongs to a queen friend. Roxy shows up there every time he gets out.”
“How many times has he been in?” I asked.
“Hard to say. Roxy’s a sensitive girl.”
Buzz had business back at the pool hall. I watched him cross the street, hair flying around, trench coat full of balls.
Back at the apartment later, I put the dress across the couch and opened a bottle of wine. When Alison came home, she saw the dress.
“Where did you get this?’ she asked.
“Buzz found it for me.”
“It’s pretty tarty,” she said. “I mean, it’s really tarty.”
“Go try it on,” I said.
“Okay,” she giggled. “One tart coming up.”
I turned on the stereo and brought the wine bottle and glasses to the bedroom. She was already in front of the mirror, straightening the dress, smoothing it over her hips. “This look okay?” she asked.
“Better than okay,” I said. “You look incredible.”
“Really?”
“Get over here before I scream,” I said.
“Are you sure?” she said in a sultry voice.
“Hurry, Alison. I mean it, get over here.”
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Robert Cormack is a satirist, blogger and author of “You Can Lead A Horse to Water (But You Can’t Make It Scuba Dive).” You can join him every day by subscribing to robertcormack@medium.com/subscription.
