... A romantic interlude.
... Of sorts.
... Ms. Guiterrez was power-suit disheveled and straw-coated, yet every strand of her black hair was still miraculously chop-stick fixed in place. She nestled her cheek against Buck’s furry chest. In this position, she could smell the funk wafting from under his arms, but that was fine. More than fine. She liked a man who smelled like a man. Deodorants repulsed her—they were the mark of a world divorced from all primal scent-codes, a secret, ancient language lost to people’s fixation with clothes and the belief that the natural odor of the body was somehow abhorrent. True, Ms. Guiterrez was forced to wear a suit as La Gorda’s chief of staff, and the fat bitch had cottoned to the lipstick lesbian look, but Ms. Guiterrez quietly rebelled by never wearing any undergarments. Noticeably jiggling as she moved, she subsequently earned the nickname of Maxicans amongst La Gorda’s kitchen staff, who cooked up even more lewd fantasies about her than they did hot meals for La Gorda. Ms. Guiterrez was every bullshit sexy librarian/secretary/teacher fantasy stuffed into a buttonhole-stretched cream-colored blouse, but the only man at La Gorda’s chicken-ranch to ever pop those buttons open was stable-boy Buck.
... Aside from his odor, Buck’s great fortune derived from the fact that he was broad-shouldered and barrel-chested. His physique was a throwback: all chest and lats. He was a hirsute, tattooed Charles Atlas, complete with leopard-print bikini briefs pulled up near his belly button. Along with Atlas, his body recalled the most powerful of luchadors and, for as long as she could recall, Ms. Guiterrez had had it bad for luchadors.
... She had been brought up around the sport of Lucha Libre, which goes some way in explaining her predilection for sweaty men. Her father was noted rudo Mascara Negro, a heel so hated that he was stabbed to death in the parking lot after unmasking his wildly popular opponent, Tito Titan, one fall into a two-out-of-three falls match. Some say that the near-riot that followed was caused not by the unmasking itself, but more by the fact that Tito was not only hideously ugly but recognized as the son of an infamous serial rapist.
... The dreams of señoritas shattered nationwide, Mascara Negro paid the price: a butterfly knife buried in his ribs as he lay slumped across the hood of his purple 1958 Impala, a death soundtracked by nearby drunken mariachis. Making matters worse, the unmasking itself was an accident. Tito Titan neglected to tie the laces of his mask tight enough. It simply popped off as he slid out of a particularly strong Mascara Negro headlock.
... Mascara Negro’s murder was never solved.
... His daughter, the eight-year-old Ms. Guiterrez, was canny enough even then to dispose of her knife thoughtfully.
... As for Buck, well, his origin is not so interesting. Conceived at Penetration Point by a john with a foot fetish and a hooker with retro size eleven Natural Comfort polka dot clogs, he was what he was: he groomed La Gorda’s equines and thanked Jesus every night for his musk and 1950s buffness that afforded him the opportunity to fuck Maxicans against the hay bales nightly.
... After what Ms. Guiterrez just told him, however, Buck took a long look at his lover’s cooch, upskirt-style, for what he feared may be the last time. He contemplated asking her to run off with him all romantic-like. He kept the notion to himself, though. Ms. Guiterrez was ornery, but she was loyal to La Gorda.
... “What are we going to do?” he said, “If Dumble is as unhinged as those fucking bowlers say—”
... “Buck, dear Buck, our fates lie in the sweating, unwashed palms of Brent Weinbach. As much as I hate to admit it, there is no clammier clasp I would prefer my fate to be in.”
... “That motherfucker. I don’t think he’s as tough as he makes out.”
... “Have you seen his jar of Mexican penises?”
... Buck blinked.
... Ms. Guiterrez picked straw off her suit jacket. “I thought not. One night he told me he wanted to motorboat mis pinches melones and tried to impress me by showing me the jar. He is a filthy, cock-collecting, cologne-wearing degenerate. But he is not to be fucked with. I called him, and he is currently on his way to stop Dumble before he gets to us here.”
... Buck opened his mouth, but she put a finger to his lips.
... “Mark my words, mi gran cojedor sudoroso. There will soon be a wrinkled, white, old-man pecker floating around in that jar, butting heads with all those norteños.”
... Buck smiled. That was good enough for him. Long as he himself didn’t have to peep the jar, it was all cool.
... They went to kiss, but Ms. Guiterrez broke it off mid-smooch.
... She heard it. A tiny bell tinkling faintly, incessantly, along with the call:
... “I still have no fucking flautaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaas!”
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