She had four cats and a string of boyfriends that often spent the night. Her name was Ester. Gordon slept on the couch and paid the rent. The couch always stank of cat piss and spray. Ester wouldn't get the cats fixed; she said it wasn't fair. Gordon even offered to pay for it, since he figured (correctly) that she didn't have the cash. Ester still said no. But whenever she brought some boyfriend or another over and he spent the night, she always made it seem like the place stank because of Gordon. Poor, pathetic Gordon. Gordon who usually drank himself into a stupor so he wouldn't have to listen to Ester fucking another guy all night. Ester was a loud fuck; she wanted everyone to know she had somebody's dick in her. She wanted Gordon to know that it was somebody's dick besides his.
He would wake up early in the morning and leave for work while the apartment was quiet. He worked first shift in a printer factory. He hated his job; but it was the only job to be had. On the way home, he would stop by a bar and have a few drinks. Gordon typically drank alone. He knew it was because of the smell; he always smelled like cat spray. On the way home, he would stop by the liquor store on 9th Street and buy his nightly bottle. By the time he came home, Ester was gone and so was the boyfriend. Sometimes she left him a note. They were out of coffee. They were out of bread. The cats were out of cat chow. Some collector or another had called one of her credit card bills. The cats despised him, but they wouldn't leave him alone until he fed them; so when they were out of food, he'd have to drive to the store and buy them some. Gordon told himself it was the price of peace and quiet.
Things had been going on this way for seven months. Seven months ago, Ester had broken up with Gordon because he was too boring. That was what she said. “I just thought there was MORE,” she said. “I thought you were hiding all this STUFF, you know, UNDERNEATH.”
“I never said I was.”
“But that doesn't mean,” she went on like he hadn't said anything, “that you need to move out right away. You can sleep on the couch until you find a new place.”
He didn't thank her. But he did move his shit – what little of it there was – out of her bedroom. He had moved in with her three months before when he had been out of work. She said she wanted to take care of him. She still had a job then, working in a tuxedo shop. A week after he moved in, she quit her job because she said the owner had been sexually harassing her. It hadn't yet occurred to him that he was the world's biggest sucker. That thought didn't creep in until she brought home the first of her many boyfriends the night after she had broken up with him.
When he got back to the apartment after work, it was quiet. He poured himself a scotch and water and sat on the couch, thinking. One of the cats – a malcontented hermaphrodite – was sharpening it's claws on Gordon's copy of Butler's Lives of the Saints. He'd been reading it the night before, when she had come in with one of her boyfriends. They were both laughing, and the boyfriend – whose name was Morgan – looked at Gordon and shook his head in disgust. Then they tumbled into the bedroom, slammed the door behind them, and got to it. Ester was nothing if not an aerobic fuck. Gordon still remembered the way her tits bounced up and down when she rode him. Her tits bounced and she laughed and shrieked like a little girl on a amusement park ride. She was making those same sounds again, with Morgan. Morgan was a regular. She had known him for years. Been fucking him for years. The problem had been that Morgan had been married. But he wasn't with his wife anymore.
The hermaphrodite cat sat on the edge of the couch and hissed at him. Then, looking straight at him, the cat sprayed his pillow. Gordon thought of himself as an animal lover. When animals were bad, it was usually because they had bad owners. Animals were honest. When they didn't like you, they hissed at you. Or sprayed your pillow.
There was something to be learned from animals.
Gordon drained his glass, stood up, and grabbed the cat by the scruff. The car started yowling and snarling and digging it's claws into his arm; but Gordon didn't care. He let the blood drip onto the carpet, walked over to the bedroom door, and kicked it open. Ester was on top of Morgan and he was reaching up and squeezing her tits. Gordon threw the cat on top at them. Ester screamed and Morgan yelled and Gordon shut the door behind him before he walked over to the kitchen sink to rinse off his bloody arm and wrapped it in a dish towel.
Ester stormed out of the bedroom, still naked. Her stomach had claw marks on it. Gordon poured himself another scotch. “Wow,” he said, pointing to the scratches. “You kids are playing it a little rough, aren't you?”
“YOU BASTARD!” she screeched. “What the fuck did you do to my cat!?”
“Nothing it hasn't done to me already.”
The Morgan came out. He had stopped to put his jeans back on. “Dude,” he said, trying to look all menacing. “What the FUCK is your deal?”
“Let me handle this!” She turned and snapped at him. “So does hurting a poor defenseless creature make you feel like a man? Does it?”
“Defenseless hell,” Gordon answered. He took a drink.
“I LET you stay here,” she went on. “I LET you stay here until you find a place, and this is how you thank me?”
“I CAN'T find a place,” Gordon said. “I'm too busy paying your rent and feeding your fucking cats.”
“Well maybe if you didn't DRINK so much,” she countered, “you'd be able to save up enough to move. You knew how it was going to be.”
“Oh?” Gordon smiled. He was amazed by his level of calm. “I knew that your cats would destroy my shit while you ride every cock in a fifty mile radius?”
“Now you wait just a goddamn second....” Morgan said.
Ester turned and shushed him. “I'M ALLOWED TO HAVE MY OWN LIFE!” She was screeching at the top of her lungs. “YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO ANYMORE!”
“Where do you get that shit?” Gordon answered. “I never told you not to do anything. I had sort of hoped that maybe you wouldn't fuck other people. That's all.”
“IT'S MY BODY,” she was still screeching. “IT'S MY LIFE.”
“Yep,” he said. “And you can have it.” Gordon drained the glass and tossed it in the sink, causing it to shatter. Ester screamed bloody murder. Morgan looked like he was about to punch Gordon. Gordon walked by them both, grabbed his stuff – a suitcase of clothes and a few books that the cats hadn't yet destroyed – and walked back by them, towards the door.
“Where are YOU going?” Ester sneered. “You afraid that a REAL man will kick you ass?”
“Nope.” Gordon looked at Morgan. Morgan tried to look intimidating. Gordon shook his head and focused his attention back on Ester. “I'm leaving.”
“You can't just go without giving me notice!”
“Why?”
“The rent's due in two days!”
Gordon nodded at Morgan. “Ask him. Or earn it. I'm sure some of the guys you have in and out of here can throw some cash your way.”
“You're a bastard!” She was crying now. Big sloppy tears.
Gordon tossed the apartment key on the floor and grabbed his half empty bottle of scotch off the counter. “Besides,” he said. “I quit my job today.”
“WHAT?” The tears shut off almost instantly.
“I said,” he turned and smiled. “I quit my job.”
“You're nothing but a goddamn bum!”
“Maybe.”
Gordon turned and walked out of the apartment. When he got out to the parking lot, he looked back up at the apartment. All the lights were on. He smiled. He got in his car. As he was pulling out onto the street, a police cruiser pulled into the parking lot. He wondered if it was the same cop she had gone down on, she claimed, to get out of a speeding ticket; he remembered when she had come home to him, crying about it. Big sloppy tears. Driving into the darkness, Gordon felt better than he had in years.
