"Don't Call Henry James"

And as the urine poured seemingly endlessly out of him, Addison felt himself becoming one with all the universe.

He must try to remember this feeling, and, in fact, it occurred to him that he would do well to try to inject this feeling of transcendence into his novel-in-progress, Six Guns to El Paso. 

But how? 

Oh, now he knew. 

He must needs include a scene – probably comprising an entire chapter, if not an entire section of the book, perhaps a "Book" in the book – in which his hero, the lone wandering gunslinger, knight errant of the Old West, Buck Baxter, voids his bladder luxuriously and experiences just such an access of ecstasy as Addison experienced now. But where did people urinate in the Old West? Did the El Paso of his tale have houses or hotels with indoor plumbing, or did they have to use chamber pots, or outhouses? He must try to get up to the library on Fifth Avenue for an afternoon's research, and soon – oh, not tomorrow, not with all this snow, and with the debilitating hangover he would no doubt be suffering from, but perhaps the next day, or the one after that.

Why was it, anyway, he wondered, and not for the first time, why was it that people in novels never went to the bathroom? Why did you never see people ducking out to the alley for a peaceful pee? Why did no one ever defecate? Addison couldn't speak for other people, but it seemed to him that at least a quarter of his life had been spent micturating or defecating, or else preparing and eagerly looking forward to doing either. People wrote of wars and of love, but never of going to the bathroom, or, as Addison preferred, to the nearest alleyway. Why had this great swath of human existence been so ignored in literature?

Yes, this was a great lack in the world of literary and even popular fiction, and Addison was just the man to fill up that lack.

At last the great yellow stream approached its end, and, after a few manual shakes, achieved it, and that which had been part of Addison now filled the bowl almost to its brim.

My essence, he thought. My golden essence. The best of me and the worst of me, and now I must flush it, down the pipes, where it will join and merge with the essence of all mankind, and of the universe. 

The toilet had one of those old-fashioned chains attached to an overhead tank, and, heedless of the ladylike germs that no doubt swarmed profusely on its ceramic handle, he gave it a good yank, and, with a great roaring his essence was flushed away down the pipes.

Addison stuffed away what a generous chronicler might call his manhood and buttoned up the fly of his old serge trousers, thinking, Now I am merging the germs of the toilet-chain handle with the germs on my fly buttons, and this is as it should be.

He realized that he was still smoking the hand-rolled cigarette dangling from his mouth, breathing in its thick fragrant and dream-laden smoke, and he took it out of his lips and looked at it. So this was the "reefer" (the "maryjane", the "muggles") he had heard so much about! Not bad, not bad at all…

He turned around and for a moment forgot where he was. 

What was this green metallic wall facing him? 

Scrawled upon it in red lipstick were the words

For a good time don't call Henry James

Well! Who knew that women inscribed waggish statements in ladies' room stalls?

He looked down and there was the door bolt. If he shot the bolt back, what would he find on the other side of this door?

He could hear the chirping babble of women's voices, so much nicer than the harsh barking, the cruel laughter, and the exaggerated groaning that you commonly heard in men's rooms.

He suddenly remembered that he had just fallen in love again, with that lady called, what was it, Hettie? No, Hattie. Hattie, that was it. Would she be out there? And what about the one who had brought him in here, what was her name? Jane? No, Ann, he was pretty sure it was Ann. Ann Broadstreet? No. Bradstreet, that was it. Anyway, she wasn't bad either. Not that Addison was one to be choosy or judgmental. He would gladly take whatever he could get, so used he was to nothing and to the worse than nothing of ridicule and derision, and worse still, the bleak nothingness of invisibility, of virtual incorporeality.

He fingered the bolt through its notch and pushed the door open, revealing a resplendent world of females, chattering, laughing and wielding cigarettes, and he entered into it, breathing in their varied perfumes and the warmth of their bodies, the smoke of their gentle tobaccos. To the right he saw several sinks, partially hidden by female torsos, and his feet carried him in that direction.

Two of the women were the lady Ann and the other lady Hattie, and they were passing one of the thick hand-rolled cigarettes back and forth.

"Well, look who finally came out into daylight?" said Ann.

"How many beers did you drink tonight, anyway?" Hattie asked him. 

"I haven't the faintest idea," said Addison, "but I should love another one. Would you ladies care to join me?"

The two women shared a glance. It was the kind of glance the authors of the cheap paperbacks Addison preferred would probably call a "meaningful" one.

"Who's buying?" said Hattie.

Addison remembered that ten dollars in his wallet, all he had left of the twenty his "friend" Milford had given him in aid of the divesting of his virginity. 

"I should be delighted to buy you good ladies a beer," he said, which was a monumental statement for him, as he had never volunteered to buy anyone a drink in his life.

But this was his new life. His life to live, come hell or high water, yes, and come death as it certainly would, but not before he had lived his life to the full.

"I have a ten-dollar bill in my pocket," he continued, "which is all the money I have to my name in this world. And I can think of no better way of spending it than buying rounds of alcoholic beverages for you two ladies, and for myself it goes without saying. And when it is spent I will regret nothing, except perhaps not having more money to spend in just such a manner."

"Okay," said Ann. "Wash your hands then, and we'll help you spend that ten dollars."

"Yeah, just don't get any ideas," said Hattie.

"Heaven forfend," said Addison.

"Don't worry about it, Hattie," said Ann. "Albertson is as homosexual as they come."

"He told me he didn't think he was," said Hattie.

"Did he?" said Ann, and she cast a look at Addison, who stood there, as if awaiting a verdict with courage. 

"That's what he said, anyway," said Hattie.

"Okay," said Ann. "But we'll be the judges of that."

And feeling as a man must whose case has been postponed indefinitely, Addison stepped forward to the sink, and turned on both the hot and cold water taps.

{Please go here to read the unexpurgated "adult comix" version in A Flophouse Is Not a Home, profusely illustrated by the illustrious Rhoda Penmarq…}