To our right bearded men in turbans cajole the curious to buy a tee shirt, a Frisbee, balloons. To our left in the far distance stretches the Pacific Ocean, then closer a band of California sand, and finally grass abutting the boardwalk where freaks have unpacked their wares. Short-haired, dread-locked or bald, all of them stoned, the freaks are strung along the promenade like a line of fish, a display for legions of tourists crowding in a two-way flow of traffic, identical to LA’s freeways. 

It’s the last of a three day visit with my husband, now living in California, and I am desperate to start the overdue conversation—my flight back to Iowa is scheduled to leave at midnight.  

“Let’s go to the beach,” I suggested upon waking. “Venice Beach.” 

Of course he agreed.  

Magicians, painters, jewelers, mimes, and nameless acts of wonder work within inches of each other on the boardwalk. A glassy-eyed mermaid spray-painted gold sits on a chair with her tail demurely tucked beneath her. Beside her aging hippies arrange and rearrange bundles of sage on a fading cloth. Atheists pass out pamphlets outside their miniature tent, neighbored by a youth with a network of tattoos that envelop his face, a ghetto box blasting a baseline to his raps hawking knock-off designer sunglasses. Paintings of glistening-muscled aliens emerging from spinning nebulas line the sidewalk. Nearby, brooding artists stare us down, as if daring us to stop, to buy. A man dressed in a diaper prepares a box of glass shards beneath a four-foot high platform, promising to jump into it forty-five minutes from now.

I’m in a panic. The monologue I rehearsed to deliver to the man I’ve been married to for nearly five years is long gone.  Trepidation squeezes my throat, knots my stomach. I’m thanking God the kids are from other marriages. We walk side-by-side the space between us—too close—too far away. Instead of talking to him, I turn my attention to the freaks: Do they actually live in Venice Beach? Are they married?Do they have children? Would playground bravado include “Myfather can swallow a three foot sword,” followed by retorts like “That’s nothing, my dad can jump into a box of broken glass without shoes and then go dancing”?

“Hungry?” he asks.

I’m not, but say yes anyway.

Seated in the outdoor restaurant, I resolve: Now is the time, for sure, it’s now or never, can’t put it off another minute, no-siree. 

I’m going to tell him:

Our marriage doesn’t really seem to be working out. 

Or:

I want a divorce. 

Or:

Let’s divorce. 

Or:

I’m divorcing you buddy, that’s right, go ahead, cry, throw your napkin down, beat the table with your fists, because nothingon this planet is going to keep me from filing papers since this thing between us, whatever-it-was, is gonegonegone and why didn’t I notice it sooner, actually, I did, but Jesus, I denied it, I didn’t want to have to admit that once again I made a mistake—I married you—shit, I asked you to marry me, the words, they fell out of my mouth, and then in secret—out in that damn field, that 280 acres I was paying 1200 buck-a-roos a month for because you were in love with that land, you just had to have it, so I plunked down a deposit (“He says he’s in love with the land? the therapist had asked. Isn’t he in love with you?)—secretly we married, a dozen white roses, their petals strewn, a cake from Hy-Vee, two witnesses who said, How romantic, and yes, I suppose, the love letters, the clandestine meetings, because technically I was still married, though separated for most of our courtship, divorced one husband and married you three days later, holy shit what was I thinking, well, obviously thinking was not part of the process because maybe I would have picked up on some of the signs, inconvenient truths so to speak, that would have clued me in, like locking me, with you, in the bathroom—who would have thought tile was so cold?—and you, strong as Atlas, my neck at the squeezing end of your hands against that tiled wall, or your inability to hold a job, sure, telemarketing sucks so you quit, and me, I said it’s okay, then supporting you our entire marriage, which I wouldn’t have minded except you bitched and complained, roaring that no one was buying your screenplays and I was writing too, but you, you were the real writer, the king of writers, boy I fell for that one for quite a while but when years roll by it gets old and, besides, I have no interest in being with a man who won’t help a young child who has climbed too high in a tree.

It doesn’t sound right.  Worst of all, predictable. Another statistic for those charting the inevitable. But while mulling over the impossibility of announcing the divorce, I realize two things: I have less than 10 hours left to tell him our marriage is unequivocally over, and I’m a coward.

A waiter appears, pen in hand. “Would you like to order a drink before selecting lunch from the menu?”

As a matter of fact, I’d like a Bloody Mary, chased by a shot of tequila—make that two—and then bring me whatever the boardwalk freaks are cruising on.

“Water for me.”

“Likewise,” he says.

Complicating this three day trip to Southern California has been an additional item on my agenda: I needed to get laid. 

He’s been in LA for fourteen months now, and even with my attempt at an affair, and sundry sexual opportunities back in the Midwest, I’m convinced no one can suck, fuck, or titillate like this husband, a man born under the sign of Scorpio. And for the past three days he has been more than obliging.  Naturally he thinks things—our life, relationship, our incongruent living situation—are wonderful. It hasn’t occurred to him that living a couple of thousand miles apart may prove dissatisfying. The last thing he expects to hear sitting across from me in this café on Venice Beach waiting for our lunch to arrive is that I cannot bear to be married to him for another bloody second.

The waiter places a basket of bread between us.

“I’m broke, you know.”

This is the third time he’s said it.

“I’ll pay for lunch, don’t worry.” 

I hate him for saying it. Hate myself for continuing to finance his car payments, insurance, rent. Karma, I tell myself. Will I pay for his divorce attorney as well? Lunch is the least of it. Plus, I’m the one who set this up—who let the three days pass?

Lunch is inedible. Baby-leafed lettuce and tender avocado slices morph into chunks of gravel in my mouth. Water slithering down my throat turns to oil. My husband, however, eats with gusto, unaware of my discomfort, though I can see it is beginning to dawn on him that something is up. 

Halfway through the meal, a mime slips in off the boardwalk and moves between the tables. His black fedora, tattered jacket, and speechless white face are a merciful relief, and yet another excuse to dodge fate. Clueless patrons dine while the mime imitates their eating movements with bawdy exaggerations. Soon he’s bored with diners, and the boardwalk beside the café becomes the mime’s personal stage to mock the cocky swagger of gang members, shuffling housewives, well-endowed blonds and bratty kids. Only the freaks remain free of his parodies. I laugh harder than anyone. I want to join the mime, take his hand, dance in his arms. Mrs. Mime. No—Ms. Mime. I want his life, a crumb of his existence. An honest life. To be on the outside the freak I’ve become since committing to marriage number three—“You’re getting married? Again?”Apparently, three times is one too many. Divorcing twice is one thing, marrying three times quite another. Over-the-top. I didn’t know. Friends shook their heads, laughed as if I’d sprouted a tail. My sisters threatened to tattoo “Don’t Marry Me” on my forehead to warn the next unfortunate fellow who might stumble in my direction.    

The show is over. The mime passes his fedora amongst the café dwellers, bowing with each offering, mostly pocket change. The manager of the café approaches, and my yet-another-excuse-to-dodge-fate begins his exit through the labyrinth of tables. I grab five dollars, hurry to the door and plop it in his hat. Take me. Dark curls fall to his gaunt cheek bones as he performs his final bow. I feel my husband’s gaze pulling at me, like a rope. 

 

“Let’s sit on the beach,” I suggest. 

But the lure of the boardwalk sucks us back in. Pedestrian traffic is thicker than before, congregating in clumps to witness the bizarre, the profane. Time and time again I find myself walking alone—my husband has vanished. He offers no warning that he’s about to stop. Retracing my steps, I find him listening to the rotten-apple-faced man playing gypsy tunes on an accordion, or arguing with Social Party Members outside their blue tent. Then we stroll along, once again, as if.

Three days earlier, standing curbside at LAX waiting for him, nothing could stop the mind-fucking chatter in my head—not jets blasting overhead or buses roaring, cabs screeching or cops whistles blowing. Possible worst-case scenarios (following my divorce announcement) went like this:

1. He cries, drives off, and I live inside LAX for three days until my return flight to Iowa.

2. While driving to his rented room in Manhattan Beach, he cries, screams and pushes me out of the car into oncoming LA traffic.

3. Once inside his rented room, he cries, throws books, computer printers, potted spider plants, then spits in my face.

4. He drives to LA—without telling me—and asks me to send him money to support his budding screenplay writing career. (Never mind, he already did that.)

5. He threatens to sell the TV series that I wrote, promptly attaches himself to it, and cheats me out of the sale.

Here’s what really happened: He pulls up in the Ford Escort I bought two years ago, places my luggage on the back seat, hugs me and says, “I have a surprise for you,” opens the car door, waits for me to be seated, slams the door, then walks in front of the car in real slow motion to the driver’s side, his shoulders twisting in opposition to his hips and, oh man, he belongs on stage naked except for a gold spandex thong with lights pulsing to the beat of his strut and, whoa, his tight short-sleeved t-shirt tucked into his belted jeans reveals spangly-new-muscled arms and his thighs fills his jeans in a hitherto unknown fashion. I stare, unbelieving. We drive in silence, palm trees swaying in the misty morning sky.

He cleared his throat. “Have you noticed anything?”

I played dumb.

“Well,” he continued, “I used to weigh one-hundred fifty-two pounds.”  He waited a moment, to let the number sink in. “Now I’m up to one seventy-two.”

Later in his rented room, he paraded some more in his new denim-colored underwear. I remained unmoved, even after he showed me before and after pictures.

“I did a twelve week weight-lifting program, and this,” he pointed to his pectorals, flexed his biceps, “is the surprise I’ve been promising you.”

My horniness far outweighed the wall of strangeness between us. So while he ripped numbers my way about how his fat ratio was blahblah, and now it’s blah, all I wanted was sex.    

Soon we were naked, our bodies rubbing against each other. His lips whispered around my nipples and the strangeness began to peel off like an old t-shirt. I could love him if it weren’t for the memories reminding me fuck me of what actually went on during our marriage. Memories organized in files, like film clips fuckme fuckme—starring me—victim extraordinaire! in full living color, that I replayed with the fanaticism of an aficionado. His dick pressed, balls rock hard, against my inner thighs and before long all thoughts dissolved and he fucked me yes the way I like it.  

The next morning we were at it again, juices flowing, while guilt nipped at my heels I have to say something. But I’m swallowed up in an expanse of sensation, surrendering myself physically to the asylum of this man I was, am, married to. He stopped mid-thrust to point out a particular muscle in his lower abdomen that he had worked on especially for me. 

“Remember?” he whispered in my ear, “You told me once you loved that muscle?” 

Did I? Silly me. I preferred his long lean body before his weight-lifting regimen. Yet aren’t we both playing on the final filaments of the superficial here? While he was building a new body, the damage, a lifetime of rage—initially against his dead father, an alcoholic, who had dispensed beatings regularly—had festered and remained, untouched, inside. 

 

Even from a distance, the man with black tights commands an audience. For one thing, he’s wearing nothing but black tights and a fireman’s hat. And he knows how to work a crowd. He especially enjoys flirting with the good-looking young men, tweaking their nipples, real quick, and running his hands with care down their arms, even kissing them.

“I am not gay, ladies and gentlemen,” he shouts to the crowd, “but if I were,” he points to a red-headed eighteen-year-old boy, nods holding his heart, then adjusts his dick, “this would be the one.”

The crowd, nearing fifty and growing, laughs. I climb a grassy mound, having lost track of my husband twenty minutes ago, for a better view of the arena where the man with black tights reigns. Despite his middle age, he runs the inner perimeter of the crowd with boundless energy, cracking jokes, grabbing video cameras from women and pulling open his black tights, then thrusting the camera inside to film his cock. They love him. Can’t get enough. The circle swells to a hundred souls, the size itself acting as a magnet. The crowd films the spectacle, photographs it. The man in black tights will become a permanent part of their collection, something to marvel over one evening after dinner— nothing on TV—so out will come these clips to keep them from the gates of boredom months, even years, later.

The man in black tights places a cigarette in the mouth of an Asian man, then squirts an ungodly amount of lighter fluid into his own mouth. The Asian man is nervous and pushes the cigarette out as far as his lips permit. Then the man in black tights blows a torch flame toward the cigarette to light it.

“Suck, man! Suck!” the man in black tights yells.

The cigarette fails to ignite. They try again. After the third failure, the man in black tights insists we clap anyway. It’s then that I see my husband at the far edges of the crowd. He catches sight of me, too, but doesn’t wave or come nearer. I can see better up here, I tell myself. I’m not going down into that crowd.

For the final trick, the man in black tights is going to lift a girl, seated in a metal folding chair, into the air with one chair leg held by his teeth. He asks the spectators if his teeth move when he grabs hold of them and wiggles, opening his mouth and demonstrating for this person and that one. Each onlooker nods yes—and I’m not surprised since he lifts girls with his teeth for a living. Better than sitting in an office, selling insurance, butt forever flattened with boredom. Yes, far better to lose a few teeth and be free on the street, the Pacific Ocean your personal theatrical backdrop.

The man in black tights picks a young adolescent girl, seats her, then lifts her and the chair chest-high, groaning with the effort. Sweat tracks down his neck and he roars. Leaning back he staggers, knees buckled with the weight. Again he lifts, placing the chair leg in his mouth, struggling for the point of balance. The man in black tights opens his arms, eyes about to pop, staring at the girl in the chair sky-high. He’s not going to drop her, I can tell, and it’s not until moments later that I feel the throbbing in my chest, my breath suspended. In another era, some distant place, couldn’t this be construed as gallant, even romantic? To be able to trust a man, strong as a bear, to keep you safe? And if she falls, he’ll be there. That intimate connection—the man in black tights, the girl in the air—I want that just once.   

The muscles in his neck bulge, his feet stammer for firm ground as he completes a crude, yet miraculous, circle. The crowd hoots and whistles its appreciation. He holds her for as long as he can. It takes some time to lower her safely to the ground. By then the applauding throng has scattered, blending with the boardwalk’s traffic.

“Hey!” the man in black tights yells. “Come back here!”

He stands on a milk crate, fireman hat in hand, and calls after the deserters. “You watched my whole show and you’re fucking walking away without putting anything in my hat?”

Stragglers dunk dollars into his fireman’s hat. “Thanks, man,” he says softly, then, “Fuck you!” at the too-far-away renegades. And this, too, becomes another part of the performance to admire. I circle down the hill toward my husband who tosses a dollar into the hat. A chilled Pacific breeze promising fog slips onshore. We head back to the car. 

 

Four hours before my flight, back in his room, I tell him. Something about needing to be alone did I say free? while my body convulsed, stunned because very little worked out the way I wished it had. I listened, his words racing to re-imagine bygone scenes from our marriage—his final desperate act to keep me from walking out.

At one point he fell to his knees beside the bed, “In high school, when I competed in long distance running, I never stepped off the track. I wanted to, many times, but I didn’t.” He rammed his fist into the bed. “I just want you to know that I have never, never, stepped off the track during this marriage.”

I didn’t say: But you left. I didn’t say: You walked out, without a word. I had no idea you were in LA. You disappeared. It was then I realized that the love we felt once-upon-a-time remained. I began to fall, an unremitting plunge, with no one to catch me—like my youngest in that tree scraping the sky. There she was, four-years-old, t-shirt damp from clinging to that damn branch because I had hiked ahead, certain you two would be along any time. When minutes turned into too many I turned back fast, soon running, because shouldn’t you be caught up by now? Then rounding the corner, my God, so high, my heart smack against ribs, and you with grim determination telling her: “I’m not going to help you. All you have to do is….” telling her, technically, where to place her foot, but she’s not hearing. She’s hanging on, face streaked with tears. And without a word I climb up, your words barking up my spine, “You’re ruining her, she’ll never learn.” Hold on, honey, I’m going to give you a piggyback ride. It took some time to lower her safely to the ground. By then I stopped hearing you. I stopped wanting you. I stopped needing to be in pain.

 

After I told him, we crawled into bed nose-to-nose, knees touching. No aerial acts here. No applause to spur us on. Mute tears sank into the mattress turning cold as cement. We eventually fell asleep, clothes on, not unlike a couple of homeless people free on the street, the Pacific Ocean a distant backdrop.