I hadn't breathed, as near as I can figure it, for over thirty years. So it wasn't strictly fair, the wager I had made with these yahoos. I was a ringer, you might say.
Well, that's not strictly true. I had breathed a bit--you have to if you want your vocal cords to work, you know, and certain things like sighs and whistling pretty much require it. But I hadn't felt any particular need for breathing outside those few utilitarian applications of the diaphragm. At the moment I was half-drunk and wanted to be all the way. I had no money at this particular point in my travels, so not breathing became more useful than the alternative.
This particular night, it had already gotten me a brace of free drinks and was about to net me fifty American dollars.
"All right. I'm ready," said the hairy gentleman named "Skeeter." He had been puffing his large chest and blowing out foul-smelling air for half a minute now, hyperventilating. I had defeated his compatriot, "Hawk," and it was up to him to defend the pulmonary honor of his tribe.
A small crowd had gathered to view the proceedings once it became known that a contest was in the works. A knot of grinning faces dipped in and out of the light from the hanging lamp over the table.
Next to my worthy adversary in the grimy wooden booth sat a slim, wan-looking young lady they called Hanna. Hanna was holding the roll of wide duct tape Hawk had intimidated out of the barman.
It was Hanna that really interested me, even before the idea of taking these tattooed laddies for a bit of their hard-earned. I have always been drawn to the frail and vulnerable type of lady, even in the days when I still breathed regularly. There was a feeling I had about certain women that made them attractive regardless of their appearance. Thatpropensity was, I suppose, my downfall...if you consider my state to be a fallen one.
Hanna had struck me that way immediately. She was quiet and distracted in the midst of the bluster and gesture of her two companions, looking a bit childlike in her frayed jean shorts and her t-shirt with the name of an amusement park on it. Her stringy brownhair hung uncombed about her face. She would tilt her glass to sip from it, then run her tongue around the rim. We had locked eyes, as it were, and it was to her that I came across the room.
The two large boys hadn't cared for it, and I had the inspiration of challenging them to a test of endurance.
Hanna pressed five inches of tape across Skeeter's stubbly chin, covering his mouth and instantly starting a whistling noise in his nose. She pressed it tightly around his lips. She was the referee and was determined to be fair. Then she slid out of the booth, into the dark shadow, then reappeared to slide in next to me. She peeled another six inches of tape off and, putting it to her mouth to bite it, looked at me.
I have a certain...insight, shall we say, that most people--particularly those who breathe regularly--do not share. There were things behind those brown eyes that no one else could see. She knew it the moment our gazes met and it stunned her a bit. I suppose it would, at that.
She froze in place, her front teeth clamped on the edge of the tape, looking at me. I saw worlds behind the dull eyes. She saw me seeing.
Skeeter was impatient, however. He made loud "Mumml mummml" noises through the tape and banged the table. From outside our circle of light a laugh ran through the little audience and Hawk's blue-veined nose poked into view.
"Come on, Hanna, goddamn it!" he said.
Hanna didn't move, however, until I reached over under the table and slid a finger down her bare thigh. When I touched her she jumped and ripped the tape. She still stared at me.
"Go ahead, Hanna," I said, "You can take it off afterwards." I smiled at her and she smiled back.
I leaned toward her and she drew nearer. I put the palm of my hand on her leg now and slid my hand down to her inner thigh. Her eyes flickered, but didn't leave mine. She put the tape on my face and pressed it down tightly, caressingly.
Skeeter, who was beginning to annoy me, made more fuss and bother over the time it was taking. Hawk slid into the booth next to him and laid a clothespin on the table in front of Hanna. He held another in his grease-stained palm.
"All right. Let's show this fancy-talking bastard!" he said, meaning me, of course.
Skeeter began once again with his hyperventilation, much louder and more disgusting this time as he was wheezing frantically through a nose that had obviously been broken a time or two.
Hawk announced: "On three," then gathered himself up as though, for him, it might be quite an achievement to count that high, and bellowed, "One...two...THREE!!"
Skeeter took an enormous breath and Hawk clamped the clothespin over his crooked nose. Hanna did the same for me.
There was a great silence which stretched out for the next few seconds. I looked once again at young Hanna and she looked at me. I touched her leg again, lightly, and she quivered.
Across the table, Hawk began a low muttering of encouragement to Skeeter, who sat with eyes closed and palms on the table trying to accomplish some east Texas version of a Hindu fakir's trance. Hanna's eyes intrigued me. As I say, I have a facility for these things--have had since that night with another pale, wan woman in a London apartment thirty-six (or was it seven?) years earlier.
Still, Hanna's eyes were more eloquent than most. They said, "I worry all the time, but I don't know what I'm worrying about. I'm looking but I don't know what I'm looking for."
My eyes told hers, "You've been looking for me, dear one. For me." I took my hand from her leg and clasped one of her hands, massaging it.
Her eyes became watery.
I turned and looked at the hulking, hairy form of dear old Skeeter, whose eyes had opened to contemplate me and who was beginning to break just a bit of a sweat. His fingers clenched and unclenched, loudly scraping his nails on the table top.
"That's a minute!" said a voice from the darkness. A titter and a murmur ran through the crowd. More people had gathered around. My adversary began to look just a shade panicky.
Suddenly I was tired of the game. I didn't care about the money any more or about getting the rest of the way drunk. I looked at Hanna again and she drew in a little breath, then turned and slid out of the booth.
Hawk was almost chanting now to his friend, who was turning crimson. "Hold on! Hold on there! Hold on!" Skeeter began to quake and twitch, his eyes screwed up in pain and his fists pounding on the table and clawing at the wall. He was certainly determined, I must give him that.
I reached up, tore off the tape and pulled off the pin. "You win," I said.
Skeeter tore at his face to free himself and gasped like a drowning man. He wheezed in and out as though his lungs would rip open, then his eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped with a thud against the wall and slid as far under the table as his considerable bulk would allow.
A cheer rang from the crowd and Hawk became somewhat apoplectic. He whooped and beat the table and slapped his unconscious champion on the back. I slid out of the booth and pushed through the crowd, past the bored and sallow bartender behind the short bar toward the front door, which was just swinging shut. Behind me I heard Hawk bellow,
"Where did he go? Hey! That's fifty bucks!"
I kicked the door open and stepped out into cold air and starlight. Hanna stood in the middle of the gravel parking lot, colorless in the glare of a mercury lamp, her arms clasped around herself, waiting for me. I walked up, put an arm around her and turned her toward my car. I looked down at her and she turned her girlish face up again, giving me her brown eyes.
She spoke, stammering, "I...I ain't never been with no Englishman before."
I put a long finger on her lips as I opened the car door for her.
"Don't speak, child," I said, "Don't speak."