MEMORIES OF A MOMBASA GIGOLO

Thursday, November 21, 1912 My precious Hazel. You have left behind a garden of mementoes, a lacy field of pubic hairs on my bed that you pulled out in your sleep. A good Brahmin would have his servant throw them away, burn the sheets, scorn the woman who polluted his space, but I shall collect each and every hair, put it in an envelope, and remember you, each hair representing a tear that you shed in my presence. You do not need to say a word: you are beautiful, with hair or without. Hazel was not meant to spend the night, but who am I to turn away a lady's sudden change of heart? She buried her face in my neck and wrapped her arm around my chest and told me that she didn't want to leave. I asked her the requisite question: “Will your husband expect you home?” “Most certainly,” was the reply. “Will he know how to find you?” “No.” “What will happen to you if you don't go home?” “I don't care.” “Truly? Don't think of me. Think of yourself. If you get the rod for thoughts of pleasing me, I'll let you know straight away that it doesn't please me in the slightest.” I don't know why women think that letting themselves be beaten would ever make me happy. I refuse to comprehend the mysteries of female submission; maybe my own prejudices are showing, maybe I should analyze them, but I won't. I won't, because then I may have to examine the origins of my own submissive tendencies, and that, I'm afraid, will ruin everything for me. It's better I don't know myself too well. This is a serious problem: self-knowledge. Hazel appears to know me, possibly as much as I know myself, and it made matters difficult for myself. First of all, that piercing gaze while we sat on the beach together: fearless, utterly fearless. That's all I have! Those first five minutes of enervation, that's all I have to protect myself, and she just bypassed them, as if I had merely been Hadleigh after staying up all night, without a shave, with gin splashed on his tuxedo shirtfront. Benign, not in the least intimidating. It must be Hadleigh after a hard night – Hadleigh at his best is probably twice as terrifying as I could ever be, red eye and all, but tired, damp, stubbled Hadleigh, there never existed a more harmless potted fern, with the eyelids low over those horrible, clever eyes of his, drunk, giggling like a little girl at whatever stupid thing that I might say. That's how Hazel looked at me, like how I look at exhausted, inebriated Hadleigh. She saw me for what I truly am: a quivering jelly, simultaneously apprehensive and desirous of being consumed, swallowed, digested. What is that stupid children's story that Hadleigh likes, that he quotes, Eat Me, Drink Me, as if I cared, but for the fact that those labels should be hanging around my neck. And yet! The cracking in her throat as she speaks to me about her emotions! It is not me that she fears, but herself. And so, we two, fearing nothing more than the faces that stare at us in the mirror, were meant to be in sacred union. She began to cry almost immediately. Her hand was so cold when I held it. She saturated her handkerchief, and then saturated mine. I offered her the ends of Shiva's locks; I would expect a laugh, not the earnest and grateful eye-wiping that I witnessed. Hungry for hair. We made a date for last night. She came alone, a full hour earlier than I expected, which I actually appreciate. I spend the whole evening panicked anyway waiting, I cannot work, all I can do is smoke, smoke, smoke, scratch my scalp, smoke some more, call downstairs for tea and biscuits every twenty minutes, knowing full well I should just have them send up everything they have all at once. So, catching me off guard is the best, most compassionate thing one could do for me. She came inside slowly, in a stately way, and, without thinking, I laid down my rule: no clothes in my bed. Instead of grasping anxiously for corset or stocking, Hazel's little hand went to her wig. I decided to give her one last chance to back away from me, to obey her fear. “Only if you take it off, sweet Manik.” Quick to adopt my given name, so desperate to please me. Don't try to please me, Hazel, I felt myself saying inside my head. I agreed, but decided to undress myself first, in order to instill that sort of horror, at least. Then, when I approached her, I started from the top down, without warning. But still, no fear of me, only of herself. She clenched her eyes shut tightly. Hazel is not completely bald. She has an uneven pattern of dark hair on her pale scalp. The hairline is completely undisturbed, with long, lonely hairs framing her face, in some areas as wide as an inch, in others only as wide as a single hair. There are large patches on either side of her head, over her ears, with only vellus down. No real rhyme or reason, I am describing it poorly, for it is not nearly as even or symmetrical as I have just made it sound. A better metaphor: as confounding as patching pattern on right quadricep. No islets, but completely uneven, variegated frontiers = right quadricep. Islets, speckles, and spots = left quadricep. Oh, how clear it is to me now, my memory crystallized. Really, when generals plan their battles, they should use my thighs as descriptive terminologies for locations of the enemy. “I am aware, sergeant major, that the Zulu are concentrated in discreet cells across the territory. It is like Manik Mudigonda's left quadricep out there.” I am stupid and self-indulgent. The things I do to amuse myself.