Murray & Marie

by Doug Draime

I wasn’t sure he had both
oars in the water, but he was
my only connection,
he was “Murray The
Bennie Man”.
He lived in a room above
a hardware store on Clark.
There was always an
invitation to stay,
after I scored. There was
a “hot number” next door, a speed
and sex freak named, Marie,
who liked to
“fuck and suck and do
masturbation shows”.
Nearly every time I was there,
he’d get up from
his filthy bed and creep over
like an institutionalized retard, and
tap on the wall, giggling.
I drank his battery acid, Maxwell House
coffee and dropped
a few of the pills.
Murray would ramble on
about this female, as he walked back to
his bed to lay down.
After a couple minutes, he’d suddenly
jump up and be over at the wall
again, tapping and giggling.
This routine would last for 15 or
20 minutes.
I never saw Marie
in the dozen or so times I
was there. She was
there, though, if not in the flesh,
definitely in the mind
and the dick.
In fact, every time he’d talk about her,
describing in dirty detail,
her sexual
appetite, I’d get
aroused and
have to leave to
cruise the bars in Old Town
for a woman,
any woman.