The Paradise Spa on Hemlock, a nasty little alley off Van Ness. Tanning and oriental massage. The very same establishment recommended me by young Jeremy. The sign is barely visible from the street and I might have easily walked by it. Blue neon, pale and wispy. Tucked in along a doughnut shop, a Vietnamese grocery. The Paradise Spa is open until midnight. Because you never know. You never know when you might suffer a pinched nerve, or when you might want to do a little maintenance on that tan. I wonder if they even have tanning beds.

The front door needs a coat of paint.

Open it and step inside and I’m facing a steel mesh door, locked. Dark red curtain behind it. To the right of the door is a small black sign with white lettering that tells me a half hour massage is fifty dollars. A whole hour is very economical at eighty dollars. Tanning is twenty bucks for twenty minutes but who gives a shit. To the left of the door is a buzzer. Press it with my thumb, briefly.

The red curtain is pulled aside and the face of a troll appears, shriveled and brown as a peach pit with black eyes bright. The eyes study me a long moment. Troll apparently decides I am neither cop nor psycho because the door is unlocked.

Come, she says.

Troll takes me by the wrist with little claw, pulls me inside.

Come. You ever be here before?

No.

You want half hour?

I want to be agreeable. Yes, I say. The half hour.

Come.

Warm, soft light. Japanese prints on the walls of the hallway. The furniture is cheap, simple. The kind of shit you find in a Holiday Inn. Troll leads me down the hall past several closed doors, her sandals flapping softly on tile floor. I hear whispers.

Then grunting, man or pig.

Pulse quickening now. Troll shows me to a tiny room with bed and chair. The bed is covered with white towels. On the wall above the bed is a shelf with yellow lamp and radio, a box of tissues, and various oils and lotions. The radio is tuned to soft jazz, elevator-style. Troll holds out her hand, impatient. The money, yes. Fumble in pockets and produce fifty dollars.

You need shower, she says.

What?

Take shower. You wash.

No. I’m clean.

Troll makes a nasty smacking sound with her leather tongue, stares at me. I stare back at her, hoping she doesn’t insist on the shower. I feel relatively cozy in the confines of this room and I just want her to close the door, to go away. I don’t like this idea of a shower at all. I would be vulnerable, paranoid under bright lights. I would be slippery and exposed and I don’t want my asshole inspected.

I don’t want a shower.

Troll stares at me and I decide she wants an explanation.

I’m afraid someone will steal my shoes.

Troll frowns and sighs. Undress, she says. Lie on bed.

The door closes behind her and I sit down in the chair. Unlace my boots with fingers numb, unresponsive. Wonder how it is that my hands fall asleep in my pockets. I flex them a few times. Touch left thumb to throat and find my pulse is racing. I shove the boots and socks under the chair and out of sight. Pull off the rest of my clothes and try to fold them but I’m incompetent and finally heap them on the chair. I stand naked beside the bed a moment, staring at the radio. The soft jazz is maddening and I flick at the tuning knob until I find Patsy Cline and stop. I turn around in a manic circle because country stations are tricky. Patsy may be followed by Kenny Rogers or worse. I tell myself to lie down. There’s a laminated notice on the wall above the radio that lists the house rules of Paradise Spa, with a lot of misplaced apostrophes and inappropriate italics. The thing is framed, like a diploma. Translation: no alcohol, no illegal drugs, no weapons, no violence. No solicitation and no sexual acts of any kind because the Paradise is a wholesome place.

Patsy Cline falls to pieces. The bed smells like disinfectant, with a hint of breezy fabric softener. Bounce, I mutter to myself. Downy. I flop on the mattress, belly down. Then wiggle around like a nervous cockroach and clumsily cover my ass with a towel. Take deep breaths, meditative. I wish my heart would stop pounding and I wonder what Jude is doing to young Jeremy and abruptly Patsy is muscled aside by Kenny Rogers. “The Gambler.” I want to laugh but I can’t.

The door opens with the coo of a dove. Hello.

Open my eyes and at first I think there is some mistake. The girl is barely five feet tall in a little plastic white dress that clings to her like wet tissue. Her hair is a massive, fizzy black nightmare. She has arms and legs thin as sticks and surely this is illegal. The girl is maybe fourteen. I roll over and try to sit up but she pushes me down with a cool hand and now I see her face. Tiny wrinkles around her eyes and mouth. And her breasts are surreal, too large for her body and perfectly round and defined by the clean hard edges of the surgically enhanced. Her breasts swell above her ribcage as if they might float away.

What’s your name? she says.

Um. Fred, I say.

Please. On your tummy, Fred.

And what’s your name? I say.

I am Veronica, she says.

A slight accent but her English is not bad. Better than the troll’s and no doubt better than your average American’s. I think she is Vietnamese but then I am only slightly less stupid than the next white guy when it comes to distinguishing one East Asian group from another. Veronica runs a hand up my thigh and pulls the little white towel aside. I don’t have an erection yet but I can feel the blood gathering. She smiles faintly and I feel a gentle twitch of nausea. I roll over onto my stomach and close my eyes.

Veronica has great hands.

This is not a massage, however. It’s foreplay. It’s like being tickled by silk feathers, by the tiny velvet fingers of dolls. Her hands roam up and down my legs, stroking my ass and thighs and feet with the sweet lazy touch of a lover and now one hand sinks shivering between my legs to lightly touch my penis.

What’s this? she says.

I don’t like this hide and seek shit, usually. But it’s nice to close my eyes and pretend I’m twelve and playing doctor with the girl next door. I don’t remember her name but she has dirty blond hair and crooked teeth and she smells like strawberry lip gloss and maybe, just maybe she has a fucking Band-Aid on her knee, oh my.

What do you want? she whispers.

I open my eyes and roll over. Veronica massages my chest and belly and leans close to me, rubbing her hard round tits against my arm. What do you want. What do you want. I want her to do whatever she wants to do. I want her to be professional. I want her to touch me for money.

You want to make love, she says.

Love. The word seems grotesque.

I don’t think so.

Veronica shoves one finger into her mouth and sucks at it. You want?

Why not?

You will give me nice tip, she says.

Of course.

Veronica is already bored with me. She sighs and mechanically lowers the straps of her dress and her cartoon tits bounce into my hands. She allows me to fondle her nipples for approximately ninety seconds, then pushes my hand away. Veronica straddles my torso, her ass in my face. The white plastic dress is short and quickly rides up over her hips and under it she’s wearing a black lace thong that is too small for her and her shaved red pussy is two inches from my face and I am tempted to lift my head and bite her, to rip at the thong with my teeth but now she is nibbling and kissing at my rock-hard dick and briefly I am confronted with an image of Jude wearing the same black thong and she’s laughing or crying and Miller stands over her and just as Veronica sticks her pinky in my ass I grab her by the shoulders and push her ravenous mouth away.

Stop, I say. I’m sorry, but just stop.

And with that, the transaction is finished. Veronica hops off me and quickly straightens her dress. She adjusts her mass of hair and I see now that it’s a wig. She leaves the room and I lounge there, a frog waiting to be dissected. I have been injected with that shit that makes the blood purple and gelatinous and still I feel empty as hell. I just want to get the fuck out of here. I reach for a tissue and swab at my package but it’s pretty gory down there, still rock hard, now marked with red lipstick. I won’t wash her mouth away without a nice long bath. The door opens again and Veronica slips through, smiling. She holds a Diet Pepsi in one hand and a warm washcloth in the other. She hands me the soda and I sit there like a soiled child while she wipes down my gear with the washcloth. And when she’s finished, she holds out her hand. I give her the Diet Pepsi and she frowns. I reach for my pants and pull out three twenties. Veronica rolls her eyes and I pull out another one and now she smiles and nods and the money disappears into her shoe. Veronica asks if I am not thirsty and I say no, thanks. She shrugs and leaves me to dress myself and when I open the door, Troll is waiting to escort me out.