| THE
GAP OF MADONNA
By Jerome Augustus Parker
Douglas looked at himself in the mirror, more intensely today
than all the times he looked before.
Not that he lacked confidence in his looks; his awareness of his
features and their renowned powers at the baths, at the clubs,
at the office, in the streets and in homes allowed him to move
through society with tremendous ease. Once at a party he overheard
someone call him handsome, thus confirming what he already knew.
Well acquainted with his own proportions, Douglas firmly gave
credence to his high rankings on the scale of attractiveness as
put forth by Laney’s scientific journal report on the subject
of Beauty in the Sexual Male of the Human Species for Modern Times.
A number one best seller since its publication 10 years ago, Douglas
knew that most of the reading public acknowledged and accepted
his elitist position as a beautiful man among men.
Though Douglas only surrounded himself with men who were beautiful,
his attitude toward the less comely tipped towards generosity.
Upon catching his colleagues’ eyes admiring his face, he
would allow them to stare. Sometimes Douglas did not feel the
need to speak, and truthfully, he didn’t have to –
his God given face and his self made body stated their potent
message more clearly than anything he could possibly think to
say. He saw his purpose on earth, confirmed each time artisans
and tourists alike would stop him for a photograph while strolling
on the Boulevard, as a representative of all that was possible
with the human race. For this reason he found himself in deep
non-conversations with trolls at the baths – giving them,
with solely his presence, a reason to live.
Douglas was a politician of beauty. Douglas was a duke of charity.
Today he planned to shave off his beard. He needed to sport a
younger look at the office to match the spirit of his next potential
client - a Venezuelan soda pop heir noted for his high pitched
voice and expert blow jobs given on his personal yacht during
the months celebrating gay liberation. Since Douglas couldn’t
possibly appeal to the queen’s masculine side, he decided,
instead, to appeal to his youth.
Out with the antique razor and the lather and the towel. Carefully
and gently, in the direction the hair grows, off with the beard.
Rinse thoroughly. Pat dry with the cream colored, face towel.
Moisturize. He performed this artistic routine with the dexterity
of a professional dancer. Rinse and clean the tools. Moisturize
again. And eyedrops. And eyedrops. And q-tip. And q-tip. Tools
away. Rinse out the brass plated basin. Smile. And one final look.
This final look was supposed to be a short one, lasting only two
counts: just enough time for his conditioned eyes to compute if
all the lather had been rinsed, or if excess moisturizer clung
to the side of his cheek. If Douglas ever did find something,
which was seldom the case, it would take him only a half, step
to the left, kick-high count to fix the problem. Then he’d
be off to the more delicate art of adorning his fat-less body.
But today, nude in front of the bathroom mirror with the gold
trim, he stood transfixed by a vision. On his otherwise sculpted
and polished face, on the lower 2nd quadrant of the chin, appeared
a mark whose kind he’d never encountered before.
Douglas studied it. After an hour and a half of staring and an
extensive consultation with his scientific journal, he devised
the following: A nick from his razor succeeded in ripping two
of the outer layers of his epidermis – leaving a small discolored
patch, the size of a pinpoint. In conclusion, a horrible accident
rendered him scientifically, albeit temporarily, ugly.
Of course he missed his meeting with the heir. His colleagues
suggested that he take as much time as he needed until he could
make himself presentable for work again.
English not being his first language, the soda pop queen misinterpreted
the “horrible accident” as one where Douglas had mistakenly
castrated himself while styling his pubic hair. The queen instantly
empathized with Douglas, knowing first-hand the difficulty of
pubic design, and, without viewing any kind of presentation from
the company, decided to hire their services. To all the employees
of the firm he gave coupons for a lifetime supply of Fizzy Lime
Drop Light, the flag ship soda brand of his father’s empire,
as well as tickets to his next yacht outing. On the back of Douglas’
reserved ticket the queen wrote, “I will take care of your
penis, no matter what state it is in.”
The board decided that Douglas should make partner. His colleagues
called him with the good news and also thanked him for the tickets
to the famous, hard to get in, outing with the heir. And of course
they had to roast him a bit about his “mangled noodle”.
Not that Douglas wasn’t happy; he’d wanted to make
partner of the Public Relations firm every since graduating from
Public Relations school. But, he lost all will to celebrate the
moment he stumbled upon his most unpleasant discovery. He was
able to sleep that night, though, blanketed in the assurance that
nicks were born to heal. According to the journal, the healing
process should take three days.
After five days Douglas became confident that the nick on his
face had finally stopped growing. In all fairness, the nick actually
stopped growing after the third day, but it took Douglas two days
to examine and confirm its stable condition.
It wasn’t a nick. Like a second skin, with a texture akin
to cow hide, this thing formed an island on his face. It now resided
in the entire 2nd quadrant of his chin and spilled over, unevenly
of course, into the 1st and 3rd. It was lighter in color than
his own skin, thus making it the focal point of what used to be
his main tool of communication. Underneath this second skin, in
a thin but palpable layer, was a substance that ostensibly compared
to apricot marmalade. He was not able to confirm this suspicion,
though, as the skin proved impenetrable.
At one point during those three days that seemed to last a lifetime,
Douglas prayed to God that the skin would overtake his entire
body. Orthodox at his core, this solution would allow him to keep
with the natural laws of unity and beauty as written in the journal.
But after the 5th day, when he finally acknowledged and accepted
that God only answers the prayers of beautiful people, Douglas
gave up hope. In a preemptive strike, Douglas banished God from
his personal universe. His sixth day was spent equally stewing
in the juices of his depression and masturbatory exercises; the
latter he performed with more self masochism than usual while
wearing a paper bag over his head. On the 7th day he rested.
Of course he could not return to work. His colleagues begged him
to see a cosmetic surgeon, but Douglas had already developed an
irrational fear of strangers looking at his face. The soda pop
heir, anxious to get on with both his personal and private business,
was the only person to visit Douglas during the early days of
the thing. When Douglas answered the door, nude with a bag over
his head, the soda pop heir finally understood the error of his
interpretation. He made sure to make Douglas cum but fled disappointed
that he wasn’t able to practice his skills on a deformed
version of the object he dedicated his true life’s work
to master. So, he took his personal business away from the firm
citing irrevocable differences with the intention to mislead in
the 2nd degree.
The colleagues called to roast Douglas about his demotion. It
turns out that the board expected him to return to work after
being appointed partner. During a teleconference he pleaded his
case. However, the circumstances surrounding the dropped soda
pop account demanded redress.
Did they not care that his life had lost the nectar of its meaning?
Did they not care that all he wanted to do was jump head first
off of the designer terrace of his high-rent, high-rise, condo
and crush his face on the concrete to cure his acute devastation?
Douglas would have jumped too, if he didn’t live on the
ground floor. Didn’t they care that Douglas had experienced
what the journal calls a back breaking moment?
Then he remembered – he was ugly now. And he knew, somewhere
deep inside of himself, that this thing on his face would never
go away.
Of course they did not care. So, he struck the board from his
personal universe.
Soon he would banish his colleagues as well. Douglas detected
their growing disdain with each succeeding phone call. His colleagues
applauded the lucidity of his perception, especially considering
the fog-like stress brought on by his illness. It was heard that,
directly after their final phone dalliance with Douglas, the office
erupted into a rather bacchanalian fiesta, replete with go-go
boys, cages, and make-shift darkrooms. Suffice to say, they were
eager to be free of the man who had become a troll.
With a piece of broken glass from his bathroom mirror with the
gold trim, Douglas began to cut around the area of the thing on
his face. Cutting away from its contours. Making waves with his
blood. A line here. Up and around to the left. Going deeper with
every layer. Grazing vessels and nerves he never knew existed.
Scabs forming. Picked at. Dug into. Scooped out. Let there be
puss oozing from the eyeball socket. Let there be infections and
rashes. But most of all, let there be no pain.
Though Douglas never came out of his apartment again, he had everything
to live for.
All it took was a change of perception.
He began to view the thing as something unique, like Mona Lisa’s
smile or Madonna’s gap. Having created an excessively small
world, free of women, free of God, free of a board and of colleagues,
Douglas’ thing grew into the center of his life. The ugly
duckling turned swan. Now - he took note of how its shape followed
in the tradition of the sacred art of nature. So mountainous and
haughty. Always poised to rise into the high noon position. Now
- the most attractive feature on his maimed, living corpse. Prominent.
A light from the lighthouse.
However, the thing grew tired of being treated like an object.
Since adopting a masculine identity he understood that it should
be he who abandons the relationship. What more, he did not enjoy
the extravagant gifts that would pop up, embedded in his nightly
dinner of beef wellington and portobello mushrooms. The epic love
tomes left under his pillow while he slept gave his neck a crick
that would stay with him until he died. Officially, he cited irrevocable
differences with the intention to mislead in the 1st degree as
his excuse to leave Douglas. But in a dear John letter, he unofficially
explained, “I need someone who can look past the surface.”
Travelling towards the bus terminal, towards his next stop on
the road of life, towards the next quick and torrid love affair,
the thing felt something akin to freedom. He was happy, for freedom
was what he liked to chase. An unfortunate twist of fate it is,
then, to be born a creature in need of a host.
Among the objects left behind by the thing was a pair of worn
gym sneakers, a partially smoked cigar, and a huge gaping hole
in Douglas’ face. Douglas convinced himself that this was
just an oversight, faithful to his man until the very end. As
his torch dimmed, and he lay bleeding to death on his bathroom
floor, he made no attempt whatsoever to remain in this world.
Without his thing – his beautiful, strong, precious thing
– it was bare, despair and stormy weather all the time.
The only attendees at Douglas’ funeral were the soda pop
heir and his entourage. Unfortunately, the young queen never received
the message that Douglas had banished him from his universe. Out
of respect, he wore a paper bag over his head. He found the donning
of this cap to be extremely spiritual; the holes he had designed
for eyes cosmically reminded him of the many glory holes he knelt
before. The paparazzi caught some photos of him in this private
garb, and the following season paper bags could be seen on international
runways as the “it” accessory of Mid-Fall.
He had always been frightened by the uncertainty of death. But
today his curiosity churned him closer to the casket. Creeping
ever so slowly, drawn by the never ending hole in the middle of
the dead face, the heir stopped just short of being pulled in.
He hoped that the maelstrom inside would suck harder, knowing
that somewhere deep therein resided a great sphinx who would reveal
the answers to all of life’s great mysteries – reinterpreted,
of course, into languages and settings instantly recognizable
to him and only him. The mothers and sisters in his life would
surely reappear. The comrades lost during the war for gay liberation
would return for one last dance. The first cock other than his
own. His pain.
The hole waited.
He maneuvered his obscured eyes, instead, across the landscape
of heaven and hell that was Douglas’ body. His limp hand
inched towards the web of cloth that shielded Douglas’ pelvis
from view. And with the excitement of an archaeologist, he unearthed
the artistic masterpiece that was Douglas’ sculpted and
carved penis.
Since it would have been in bad taste for the young queen to act
in the manner his personal nature dictated, he could only sigh
and think, “Oh, thank God for this sight. To think he made
this just for me.”
Jerome Augustus Parker
is a playwright who resides in Brooklyn. His works have been seen
at BAX in Brookyln, BAAD in the Bronx and as part of HOP Pride
Festivals in Manhattan. In the fall he will be attending UCLA
to pursue a MFA in Play Writing. Previously, he studied theater
at Williams College.
jerome340@excite.com
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