The Syntax of Seduction Read online

  THE SYNTAX OF SEDUCTION

  A collection of erotic and semi-erotic stories by Carlos Malenkov

  © Copyright 2017

  All rights reserved, except as granted by the License, below.

  License:

  This is a copyrighted work. Permission is granted to copy and freely distribute it. It may not be altered without permission from the author.

  Contributions accepted.

  If you enjoy and/or find value in the following stories, you may help support the author by sending a contribution via Paypal to

  [email protected]

  Thank you.

  Cover illustration: Leighton, The Fisherman and the Siren

  Contents

  About the Author

  Preface

  Sins of the Mothers

  New York Has Some Characters

  Kiss You

  The Syntax of Seduction

  Tight Jeans

  Aggie

  Slot B

  Frigid

  Moonstruck

  Backdoor Justice

  Making an Ass

  Dirty Old Man

  The Phantom of the Subway

  Bent

  The Glass Box

  Mushrooms

  No Matter What Shape

  Bizop

  Glory Hole

  The King's Pleasure

  The Deal

  A Perfect Likeness

  A Red Christmas

  Sinister Bend

  Personal

  Honey Pot

  Advice for the Bride

  Bigger

  You're a Big Girl Now

  The Courtship of Miles Standish

  Growing Old is a Bitch

  The Consolation Prize

  The Odds

  The Token

  Wait Your Turn

  Belonging

  Stupid

  Wild Change

  Agendas

  The Young and the Ugly

  Fat

  GenderChanger

  Love and Marriage

  Fit to Print

  Over a Barrel

  The Naked Truth

  The Tiger of the Lady

  All the Good Men

  Impersonation

  Buying Time

  New Kid in Town

  Ursula

  In the Sandbox

  The Ice Maiden

  Clothesline (a poem)

  Bachelor Party

  Initiation

  Fool's Gold

  Poor Little Rich Girl

  A Changed Man

  Plunder

  The Most Intimate Part

  Don't Break the Chain

  Who is this Carlos Malenkov?

  There is some doubt about whether Calos Malenkov even exists. It has been alleged that he might be an illegitimate offspring of a temporary liaison between Georgi Malenkov, former Soviet Premier, and Dolores Ibarruri, the so-called La Passionaria of the Spanish Republic. This is likely no more than a scurrilous rumor designed to discredit his literary credentials, such as they are. But, no matter. Manuscripts of his scribblings were discovered buried deep in a dumpster behind UN headquarter in Manhattan.

  Preface

  These stories are not about sex, they are about what happens to people when they have sex. Raw sex, especially of the accidental variety, is an acid bath that dissolves and strips away illusions, pretensions, and social masks. It lays bare the inner, inner self, the very kernel of what we are, in all its ugliness and, yes, magnificence. In the spirit of John Collier, that overlooked master of mordant wit, the stories both laugh at and celebrate what makes us human.

  + + +

  SINS OF THE MOTHERS

  I asked her to dance, and she was none too steady on her feet. Her breath reeked of liquor and she had a faraway look. I was twenty-two years old, in a strange city, and with few friends. Dances were the only venue I had for meeting women.

  It was almost midnight, and I had to get up for work the next morning. Walking out the door, a hand grabbed me. Her again. She was afraid. Afraid! She needed someone to take her home. I felt mingled pity and disgust.

  Pity won. We made our way down Eighty-fourth Street under the hard orange glare of sodium arc streetlamps. Where did she live? Some town on the Island. Long Island. Where the rich folks live. What the hell had I gotten myself into?

  She wasn't a bad looking broad, maybe on the wrong side of forty by a couple of years and somewhat the worse for wear . . . but pretty classy for all that. Tight-fitting slacks and sweater top. That view from behind had attracted me like a magnet. Dammit, that's why I had asked her to dance in the first place. I've always been a sucker for a nice-looking ass.

  There was the parking garage where she had left her car. She had to be an Islander. It figured. Only an out-of-towner would pay $25 to park in the city for a couple of hours.

  She seemed to have a problem getting the key into the ignition. Did I dare let her drive as zonked out as she was? "Lady, maybe you'd better let me take the wheel. I haven't driven in a couple of years, and my license isn't exactly current, but . . . " She had leaned over and was kissing me sloppily on the mouth. That damn liquor breath again.

  Ten minutes later we were in the Midtown Tunnel, heading toward Queens and points east. I had been a little wobbly at first, but her late-model Caddy rode steady as a tank.

  "Over there. That'll lead you to the LIE."

  "The what?"

  "The Long Island Expressway. I can tell you haven't been in New York long. Don't worry, you're doing fine. You're a real gentleman, by the way. Not like my ex-husband, that lousy cheating bastard."

  She had snuggled up to me as I was squinting in the glare of oncoming headlights. Not an unpleasant sensation, but dammit, she was sloppy drunk. Did I really need this?

  Half an hour later, I was still undecided. She nudged me and pointed to an iron-gated entrance on the left. It must have been a quarter mile of tree-lined driveway from there up to the house. Some house! Where I came from, they would have called it a mansion.

  She fumbled through her purse for the house key, dropped it, and finally managed to insert it into the lock. All the lights were on inside and it blinded me for a moment.

  Chandeliers. hardwood paneling. Multicolored wall hangings. Antique furniture. Wealth on display.

  "Help me up the stairs, guy. What's your name, by the way?"

  "You can call me Jake."

  She held on to me with a death's grip as we precariously navigated our way up toward the master bedroom. The last time I had seen a grand staircase like that was at the Majestic Theatre in Des Moines. I seemed to be coming up in the world.

  The four-poster king-sized bed had a quilted cover over light rose silk sheets. Silk. Luxuriously slippery-smooth.

  She kept sagging as I undressed her. I gently lowered her to the bed and tucked her in.

  "Sleep tight, my darling, my love." Ironic words for a ironic situation. She would be neither darling nor lover to me tonight. Just a drunken, snoring body for me to keep vigil over.

  I got in beside her and held her from behind. I kept my underwear on. A chastity barrier between us. Her warmth was comforting, almost compensating for the alcoholic fumes she was emitting. Her behind, round and soft, pressed against my crotch. It occured to me that I could just slip inside her and no one would ever know, least of all this person sharing a bed with me. I drifted into darkness.

  Sometime during the night her cries awakened me. She was shivering and drenched with sweat.

  "Daddy, Daddy! Help me! It hurts!"

  I stroked her forehead and massaged her neck. Gradually, her breathing calmed and she slipped back into sleep. A bit later, so did I.

  The light coming
through the window hurt my eyes. She was sitting up in bed beside me.

  "We did it, didn't we?"

  "Did it?"

  "Made love, you darling fool!"

  "I was sorely tempted. You're a beautiful woman, but I couldn't take advantage of you in your helpless state. I'd better go. I don't belong here."

  "No, stay. Stay a while. Please. I'm afraid."

  "It would be better for both of us if I just left and we both forgot this ever happened."

  "Don't go. Please."

  She pulled a fifty-dollar bill out of a purse on the nightstand and thrust it at me. I pushed it back. All of a sudden I felt dirty.

  I left the room. She was bent over, sobbing.

  A pretty teenage girl was sitting on the sofa downstairs. On second thought, she was not quite a teenager, maybe just an exceptionally mature 12-year-old, an unspoiled version of her mother, but regressed thirty years. She motioned me over and patted a spot beside her. I sat down as far away from her as I could.

  "So, you're the latest of mom's pickups. I've got to say, you have a bit more class than most. You should have seen the one last week. A biker of some sort, greasy as all getout and he must have been crawling with lice. When mom's whacked out on gin and tranks, she'll take on anything on two legs with a hairy chest and -- "

  I held up my hand before she could finish. "You have no cause to speak that way about your mother. She's not a well woman."

  She stuck her tongue out at me, got up and calmly walked out of the room without looking back.

  Time to boogie.

  It's twenty-five years later, and Alayna Marston runs my life. Well, my work life anyway. Her family firm bought up our small engineering design shop when we ran into a cash flow problem a few months back. Now she's summoned me to her office, but for what? Will she give me the advance I need to avoid foreclosure on the mortgage, or will it be an anonymous white envelope with a pink slip? I shouldn't get my hopes up. She has a reputation to maintain as the miracle worker who brings failing companies back to profitability by cutting expenses to the bone and ruthlessly laying off staff.

  How coldly self-assured Alayna had been on the morning I walked down the stairs. If only I could have explained to her that I had been noble, that I had not taken advantage of her mom. For that matter, if only her mom had gotten professional help . . . Then maybe she wouldn't have joined that damned cult and abandoned her child. Alayna, Alayna, I did my best.

  I'm afraid.

  NEW YORK HAS SOME CHARACTERS

  Nobody who has any choice in the matter stays in New York City in the sticky July heat. Jack didn't have a choice. It was his second month on the job and he wouldn't be eligible for vacation for a good while.

  The apartment had its advantages, but amenities weren't among them. "Air conditioning? Forget it. With all the old wiring in this building, it'd prolly start half a dozen fires."

  "But the nights are too damn hot for sleeping, even with all the windows wide open and three box fans running full tilt."

  "You'll get used to it."

  Jack lay on an old mattress on the tarpaper roof -- under the stars, and with the cool night breeze. There were footsteps behind him.

  "What? Who is it?"

  "Not to worry, young fellow. I am not going to rape you. I heard noises up here and wanted to make certain everything was in order." The voice had a slight, lilting accent. Swedish?

  It was a woman, a gray-haired woman. She must have been in her fifties, at least. She squatted down at his side.

  "Lived in this neighborhood since I was a girl. Never thought I would see unrenovated tenement apartments rent for such ridiculous money. It is crazy."

  "Have I seen you before, lady? I moved into 21A last week and I hardly know anyone here."

  "Just down the hall from you. 29B. You know, had I children, they would all be older than you now."

  Her hand was resting on his thigh. They sat in silence. The moon had risen.

  "Sometimes I wish I could step off the edge over there and just float like a leaf to the bottom."

  "A poetic image, lady."

  She looked down into his eyes and smiled sadly. "It is much too late for poetry."

  She stood up and walked away. At the parapet, a low ceramic tile-topped brick wall circling the edge of the roof, she stopped. "It has been a long time since I have had a man," she said.

  He looked up. She was bending forward over the top of the parapet. The hem of her skirt was flipped up over her waist in back. Her plump bare buttocks were gleaming in the moonlight.

  "You do not have to do this," she said.

  She was warm and moist inside. He held on to her hips and moved forward and back in a slow, measured rhythm. She reached backward to grab his hand and pulled it around her breasts. They were soft and yielding. When he had finished, she manipulated herself until her eyes clenched shut and she gasped.

  "You were a virgin, correct?"

  "How did you know?"

  She smiled.

  No one was answering in 29B. Jack had a bouquet of wildflowers clutched in one hand. Gray morning light was filtering through the dirty hall windows.

  "What're you pounding on that door for?"

  It was the building manager.

  "I'd like to show my appreciation to the lady who lives there. She's been very helpful."

  "You're joking. Nobody's lived in that apartment for months. Can't keep it rented, even with the housing shortage in this damn town. Tenants always move out after the first week or two. Claim the place is haunted."

  "Haunted? What do you mean? And what about the lady I'm looking for? Gray hair, maybe 50, round face, full figure. Has kind of a foreign accent."

  "You're pulling my leg, Jack. If you know about the woman, then you've already heard the story."

  "Story? What story? I'm new here, remember?"

  "All right, all right. I'll start from the beginning.

  "Round about thirty years back, way before my time, there was this dame who lived right here, in 29B. Nice, respectable lady -- everybody thought she worked in an office uptown. Karina van der Hals, her name was. Came over as a girl with her parents from Holland.

  "So she takes up with a boyfriend. Young kid, maybe half her age. They were going at it hot and heavy for a while, and the guy starts cheating on her with another woman. She freaks out and cuts his throad in a fit of jealousy. Then she ups and jumps off the roof, the roof of this here building.

  "You see, Jack, she's kind of a legend around here. The Flying Dutchwoman they call her. Yeah, sure, flying -- then splat. Every once in a while somebody says they see her wandering these halls here. Or up on the roof. Or inside that damn apartment. Sure wish I could rent the place."

  "But I saw her, I tell you. She was talking to me and -- "

  "Better lay off whatever it is you're smoking, kid. Other guys seen her too. Only thing is, if they see too much of her, funny things start to happen. Like they end doing away with themselves. Dead, with their throats slashed. Just like her boyfriend."

  "Maybe you're right. Could have been a case of mistaken identity."

  "New York has some characters, don't it? Say, what's that mark on your throat, Jack?"

  "Must have cut myself shaving."

  KISS YOU

  "who pays any attention to the syntax of things will never wholly kiss you" -- ee cummings

  Don't laugh, Joe. Fifty dollars can ruin a man's life. That's what this whole fucking mess is about.

  We had dropped in at the Millers' party. I don't have much occasion to go back to the neighborhood where I grew up, but Jack and Ellen Miller were old friends. It happened to be one of Joanie's sleepover nights and the two of us had decided to indulge in a bit of nostalgia. Some of our old schoolmates were going to be there.

  The snacks were pretty good, actually, and the party hadn't yet gotten to the point that everyone was either bored out of their skull or sloppy drunk.

  The Millers had pulled out all the stops. There were
even professional entertainers. The blues singer sure knew her stuff, though the jugglers were only fair, but the hypnotist . . . oh, man, that fucking hypnotist.

  Posthynotic suggestion can make people do very strange things, Jack Miller was telling me. Sometimes even things completely out of character. A Bright Idea hit me just then.

  I had noticed Tara Jameson sitting among a group of people watching the juggling. Tara. She was an old flame of mine from high school. Unfortunately, it had been a rather one-sided flame. I had been a grind, an ultra-geek, a complete social zero -- about as far outside as it was possible for an outsider to be. Meanwhile, Tara was playing Little Miss Cheerleader and bucking for Homecoming Queen. The couple of times she had condescended to notice me had been for purposes of taunting and bashing my fragile ego. Just good clean fun, I guess. My dented self-esteem had mostly recovered after twenty years, but the memories still hurt.