Damon Knight (ed) by Orbit 07

Author:Orbit 07
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

<<Contents>>

To Sport with Amaryllis

by Richard Hill

The neon lights of Fuzzy Lipschits’ Tit City Topless Taco Parlor and Ye Olde Donut Shoppe blinked expensively and seductively through the smog. A neon girl’s breasts became donuts, then tacos, then donuts again, as Harley Mode tooled his 74 dress bike smoothly into the parking lot, pleasantly aware of the soft pressure of his wife, Amaryllis, on the seat behind him. He found a space and cut the engine, set the stand and turned to her. “Honey, we’re here.”

She was beautiful like this, he thought, her eyes closed in pleasure and her plump, dungaree-encased thighs unaware that the vibration had stopped. God, she loved to ride that bike. He kissed her on an eyelid, darkened either by cosmetics or soot, and hefted a soft breast under her T-shirt. “Amaryllis, this is it. We’re here. Remember Andy Warhol, maybe Andy Warhol will be here tonight.”

Amaryllis moved slowly on the seat and opened her eyes. “Jesus, Harley, that was a good ride. That was a gooood ride.”

“I know,” said Harley fondly, helping her off the bike. Amaryllis was still walking tenderly when the doorman smiled and admitted them.

It was clear immediately that Andy Warhol was not there, at least not yet, though there was a gigantic photograph of him hanging from the ceiling, in which he appeared to be accepting a taco and a Margarita from one of Fuzzy’s topless waitresses. The photo nagged at Harley. He didn’t like to think about it but he had the suspicion it might be doctored; it looked too much like an Esquire cover. But he put that from his mind, as a waitress showed them to a booth. After all, there was the Early American furniture, a nice eclectic touch, he thought, and the Visi-Box which showed underground movies, and the Chem-Sac sound system, and, of course, the waitresses, not a minus 37 in the lot. He noticed a pudgy man in a sharkskin suit and wondered if it might be Lipschits himself. The man was standing in a corner, looking worried, and that did not improve Harley’s mood.

Amaryllis and Harley had really wanted to see Andy Warhol, especially Amaryllis, who had visions of herself as a star, but this hardly seemed the right crowd for it. Tourists occupied a few booths, blushing and elbowing one another when a waitress walked by. A dark man in a turban sat alone near the bar and shot frame after frame with his 35-millimeter camera. Some high-school kids were getting juiced on $2.50 Margaritas near the front door. And a very obviously stoned Negro hummed “Bernie’s Tune” in a booth behind them. Altogether a drag.

Harley tried to soften the blow. “Hey, dig, they’ve got Chem-Sac here,” he said with false enthusiasm. Amaryllis was unmoved. But Harley read from the sampler on the wall anyway, hoping something would cheer her: Chem-Sac is a dramatic innovation in the world of popular as well as serious music. The sound you hear comes from strings of various lengths and tensions being parted by the action of a powerful space-age acid.

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