Ambient 06 - Going, Going, Gone

notions hit me like perfume as I stepped out of the ozone into the pressure chamber. Once my peepers adjusted for night vision I made out the personnel on board. In the far distance Warhola's full moon hair beamed through the night. Candy and Jackie had been bookending him but now they got up and were making for the stairs. Judging from the pudding bowls at the far end of the bar I reckoned Mancusian talent passing through town had dropped by to judge the competition. Closer still huddled the usual gaggle of Brooklyn tomatoes and Bronx bagel babies, decked out in their slickest Serendipity flash. If you didn't choke on hayseeds those farmgirl charms could warm the coolest heart. In the middle of the action were my two most usual suspects, and I gladhanded cheer all around.
    »What's happening, hepcats?« I asked, doffing my homburg, and calling for the drink that hits the spot.
    »Walter,« Trish said. »Where've you been hiding?«
    »Here there everywhere,« I said. We pecked cheek and did the vertical rub. Trish and I were hard on the sheets not that long ago but when she showed too much interest in how, exactly, I harvested my cabbage, I took to the fields. Knowledge is danger, knoweth the man, and I doubted she'd have approved of my every escapade. Even so we remained tasty pals. She was wanton that night, a flame-haired vixen, smoky and dazzling, total Gernreich on the hoof. As I eased my paw down her treacherous rear slope I found myself as always sliding across a Lothrop and Stoddard unitock. Trish had spent her heedless youth in a stately Wayne Manor out on the Philly main line, and the domestication clung. »What's with the girdle, Myrtle?« I said. »I'll need brushes to keep the beat on this tom-tom.« Our compadre Borden lounged close by, swilling with a smile, his fedora's awning hanging low. As usual he rode out in standard Fourteenth Street undertaker drapes. Good to see he'd regrown his chin shrub, made him look like a top shrink doing field work. Over time I'd clipped my own hedge down to its most nefarious essential. Kittens purr like mad when you brush their fur with the old pussy tickler.
    »How deep's the scene, my brother?«
    »Subcutaneous,« he said, a man of select words.
    »You've been missed,« Trish said, playing bumpercars with my hip.
    »Just a weekend cruise,« I said. »Felt like a month.« A sudden flood of would-be cognoscenti streaming in threatened to do a Johnstown on us. Felt like I was taking the Sea Beach Express on the fourth of July. We started sliding our feet to the rear of the bus, trying to miss the wave.
    »Care to divulge?« she asked.
    »Lips, ships,« I said, shaking my head. Realized, scanning the room, that I half-expected to spot my silent Cals floating somewhere over the backbar, trying to find space before coming in for a landing. Wished I’d upped the dosage on my nerve tonic. »I earn my gold stars. You?«
    »Mother’s pearl,« she said. »You have to ask?«
    »When’s showtime?« No sooner did I wonder than I felt the vibes ripple through the floor, and saw the lamps start to shake.
    »Shortly. Let’s move,« said Irish, and with Borden we carved a path through the wall of superfluous flesh, making for the ascent. »I’ve been on tiptoes all day looking forward to this. They’re so fabulous.«
    »Utmost,« said Borden, playing jungle guide as he led us off. »Utmost fabulousity.«
    Hard to slouch walking up stairs, but he pulled it off. »After you,« I said to the beauteous one, keen to see what lay under that doily she’d wrapped around her waist, but my chivalry went begging.
    »My turn to take the scenic route,« she said, pointing upwards. »Scamper.«
    I did. Once we topped out we parked ourselves next to sweet Candy and ever-charmless Ondine, near the front. The band kicked off Venus In Furs and we let our heads fill up. The usual goofball light show was in progress, the band looked as if it were being attacked by yellow amoebas. Sterling stood there strumming away, Cale did his Bob Wills on Seconal bit, crazy Angus wandered back and forth whacking that Tibetan oildrum and weaselly Lou glowered like a nine-year-old looking to get spanked. Blondie sat off in the corner slapping her tambourine and making with the teutonics. I was just starting to settle in for a long decadent night when I heard Trish shouting at Borden.
    »New girls in town, must be.«
    »Tres wild,« Borden shouted back. »Canadian?«
    »Hardly,« Candy said; even though she tried