Gabrielle Taylor's "Cockluck"
February 21, 2002
I dreamed the girl wore blue, blue satin, a long strapless dress slit up her left leg, and her honey blonde hair was pulled up in a little curly puff at the top of her head. She had blue eyes, two in her face and two in the back of her head, but to look through one set she had to close the other. I see her in the Duchess's private bathroom meticulously ransacking cosmetics and perfume. It's all going into a little white lace bag but she's not found what she came for yet.
She closes her eyes and looks back and sees someone else is in the staterooms. It's a Jack. She's never met one before but she knows one on sight: white skin and Irish red-gold hair in a pageboy. He is wearing gold and white silk. She sees his double, translucent, hanging on the Jack's back, smaller, legs dangling uselessly in the Jack's golden cape, hand curled over a black pommeled sword. The double seems to be asleep.
She opens her eyes and turns around and comes out of the bathroom. The Jack sees her frontwise now. He's standing in front of a swung-out painting of a fat brunette pulling fistfulls of loose jewelry out of a small square safe.
"I heard the security was good on these Galahan liners but that's obviously just PR," he says. His voice is like apple juice; she'd expected rum.
"That's what I came for," she says. She snakes her hand past his arms into the safe and grabs a velvet box, opened, with six little lime-rose cut glass bottles. He takes everything else in the safe, even the dust. He is smaller than she and very quick. He adjusts his cloak and now his double is nothing more than a fold of shadow.
They walk down long curving stairs together toward a huge open area like a curved maze. "Who are you?" she says.
"Just a Jack," he says.
"No title?"
"Titles are easy. I wanted to start at the bottom." They walk around knots of people. She sees herself reflected in the polished metal walls. She is conscious of her beauty but suddenly concerned that he might see someone more interesting or have someone more interesting already. Then again, a thief without even a title. He's made her feel insecure but she's not sure she wants him. She wants him to want her.
She decides she wants to see more of him before she decides if she wants him enough to make him want her. "Come up on deck," she says, taking his arm. They look for an elevator. She sees one sunk in a maze-curve of white plastic.
She looks at the elevator buttons. Barking dogs and polygons. No numbers. One says "warning". He leans against the wall and lights a cigarette. She pushes a large white oblong button with three black ripples vaguely thinking they must be water. The doors open immediately. It is a four person elevator and two people are in it. The walls are mirrored. They squeeze in. Sarah looks at the mirrors clouded by Jack's smoke and she sees the beginnings of lines so delicate only she would notice. She fingers her bag with the velvet box full of bottles and looks at Jack. She catches him with his hand in his pocket and a secret grin.
Th elevator goes up a bit and stops. A middle aged woman is waiting to get on. Jack and Sarah get off, the woman gets on, the other couple stay on.
They are on another floor. They walk forward looking around. Sarah sees the deck railing through an archway behind her. She takes Jack by the arm and turns. A short man in green with sharp long features walks through the arch toward them. He offers them a Simple Horn cigarette and says his name is Sir Holm Pen. "I'd like to help you," he says.
"Help us what?" says Jack.
"I can't hurt you," Sir Holm Pen says. "I don't have the authority. I can't even search you. Not even if I suspect you of being criminals. You must confess first."
"How often do they confess?" Sarah says.
"Almost never."
Jack takes Sarah's arm and hauls her back into the elevator. The elevator doors open and the floor is on fire. He slams them shut. The next floor is flooding. The water level is rising but not coming into the elevator, as though there's a second set of invisible doors. The next floor is misty with green gas.
Sarah sees a new button and punches it. The doors open and they are at almost the very top of the ship. They step out onto a huge round platform with no railings and they can see in all directions. Above them is an enormous metallic spidery tower with a round glass room at the top.
"Communications," Jack says.
The sun is rising and the wind is up. "I'm cold," she says. Jack puts his arm around her. He kisses her neck. Sarah looks down at the ship's smokestacks and sees painted on them, 'Merlon Ship Line'. "This is Galahan Line," she says stupidly. "Don't kiss me. We're not married. It's illegal."
"Why have you been following me around then? Did you want to marry me?"
"No, never. You're not a gentleman."
He looks briefly upset and then laughs. "Loosen up," he says. "Who'll know? Who'll arrest us up here?"
He pulls her dress down to her waist. The colour leaches out, leaving it peach flesh white cotton. He throws down his cloak and she sees his double, and hurriedly lies on the cloak where she can't see it. He struggles halfway out of his clothes while kissing her. She closes her eyes and then hears the thud. She opens them.
A severed black goat's head lies on the deck next to Jack's knee. Sarah screams. They run into the elevator with their flesh gray and exposed. Jack jams the elevator stop button. Sarah tugs up her dress and tries to fix her makeup in the mirrors. Three of the mirrors change. They see the couple they shared the elevator with before. One mirror looks straight down on them and one shows them from the front. The last one shows a woman with puffy auburn hair handing out long gowns of woven flesh-coloured elastic and large soft white hats with wide brims. "Be sure you're covered up!" she trills. "The acid is meant for them but there is the possibility of accident! Besides, these are just so comfy sometimes I like to bundle up in one at night when I'm all by myself!"
Then a solid block of liquid acid fell on them and their flesh evaporated. Their bones lifted up in a cloud of pale gray steam. Nothing remained but a couple of gold watches and a heap of wallets.
Jack and Sarah were being coerced into getting married before they were executed. I had an idea that they could still save themselves but I think they did not... I think they did not.
Posted by gtaylor at February 21, 2002 11:02 PM