Tuesday, July 24, 2007

The Hardass Has Hisself a Sex Scene



I'm sure that most of you time-wasters have read at least one crime novel. Either one of the more lawyerly types from Grisham or one of the "gruff man finds the killers, punches them, and has sex with some ladies" type. Go on. Admit it.

Well, what bugs me is that the story will be going along great. Almost believable, even. And then all of a sudden (it seems sudden to me, anyway) the hero will find himself partially or fully naked and in the (arms, bed, backseat, corner office) of some woman. They will of course exchange witty banter, with the woman chipping away at our hero's stony facade, while he smiles ruefully over his glass of gin and sodies.

Then they will have sex. This is the way some characters greet each other in these books. Total time in one another's presence? Forty-five minutes.

Disclaimer: I use some cuss-words in this post. Please tell the children to keep the hell away. Thanks!

The Hardass Has Hisself a Sex Scene

“My stars! You look positively ravishing!” The Hardass said in a lilting soprano. Chastity Prostrate stepped back from her doorway to admit him to her apartment.

“That’s a new side of you,” she giggled.

“I’m hilarious,” The Hardass admitted, reverting to his normal voice, which was like a gravel driveway in December. “It’s a thing I do.”

Placing a large hand on Chastity’s shoulder, he pushed her roughly aside as he moved into the foyer. There was a nearly audible whoosh as the displaced air exited the door, and then he slammed it hard enough to break the glass in the peephole.


“I brought you flowers,” The Hardass rasped, a grin spreading across his craggy features. “But I ate them on the way over. Thorns and all.”

“It’s okay darling,” Chastity said. “You want a drink?”

“Damn yes, I do.”

“What’ll you have?”

“Gasoline on the rocks,” he graveled.

“Oh, you!” Chastity simpered, and squeezed a buttock at him through her negligee as she turned. The gown was a silk so sheer as to completely sidestep any processing by the imagination. This suited The Hardass just fine. Imagination was for children and marketing people. His imagination was vestigial, and he only used it when he needed to punch somebody creatively.

“Damn yes!” The Hardass roared quietly. He swore because it complimented his six-foot-seven, two-hundred-eighty pound frame and slab-like gorilla arms. He took off his necktie and punched a hole in the wall next to the sofa.

Chastity’s voice, drifting on gin-scented air from the kitchen: “I suppose you realize that this little, uh, meeting of ours has to stay on the down-low. We really can’t have the Chief finding out, can we?” A giggle, followed by shattering glass.

The Hardass considered this, his mind’s granite cogs grinding manfully away.

“Look. Mike knows me. He knows as well as I do I ain’t about to let down the force on accounta some broad and her feminine whatsits. God, where’s that drink?” He tore one of Chastity’s decorative pillows in two pieces and stuffed one into his mouth.

“I know, I know, but I just can’t help but think of it like some kind of mystery story! The sexy young lady lawyer and the gruff, lone-wolf homicide detective thrown together by fate, you know?”

The Hardass swallowed. “Fate? Fate my chrome-molybdenum ass! You couldn’t stand the sight of me at first, Chastity.”

“At first,” she said, padding softly back into the den. “But then I realized that there must be something more beneath that ego of yours.”

“Yep. Dumptrucks full of ass-kickery, that’s what. Gimme that,” he said, snatching a drink from the pewter tray she held. His flint-gray eyes disappeared into muscular brows as he squinted at the thick glass and its contents. “What’s this mess?”

“Gin over ice, baby,” Chastity said, seating herself on the arm of the sofa and running her fingers through The Hardass’ thick black hair. “We lawyers are good at deciphering intent.” She winked and poked him in the nipple.

“Nuclear Moses! I asked for gas over rocks, and you bring me some pansy sauce? Nice.”

“Oh, don’t be so whiny,” Chastity said, removing his belt. “Let’s play a game. I’ll be the unwilling hostage, and you can be the billionaire kidnapper with a heart of gold, okay?”

“That’s” bullsh—”

“Oh, unwilling at first,” Chastity explained. “But then you get naked.”

“That’s an improvement,” The Hardass said, and downed his drink in one gulp.

“There’ll be some hot back-and-forth between us, and in the end, I’ll see the validity of your argument,” Chastity tittered, and helped The Hardass out of his regulation wingtips.

“I like stories, so long as they have lots of pictures of motorcycles and naked things,” he grunted. “But I’m game if you are, Chas.” He sucked the last drops of gin out of his glass, then ate the glass.

“In that case, I suggest we adjourn to my bedchambers and deliberate.”

“Damn yes!” The Hardass swore. He stood, and as his jeans slid to the floor, he ripped off his sport coat and shirt, and flung the pieces onto the sofa. He tucked Chastity under one arm, and rhino-charged into her bedroom. He needed both hands to get his socks off, so he set her down next to a dark mahogany bureau, and swore as he pulled.

Chastity, with a smooth, practiced movement, shrugged like some sort of goddess, and the silk negligee fell from her shoulders and pooled around her ankles. The Hardass looked up.


“Golly,” he said.

“You like?”

He squinted at her breasts. There were two of them.

“Damn.”

“I spent all afternoon polishing them,” she said, smiling.

“Alright. Enough playing around,” The Hardass growled. “Playing’s for elves and gnomes. Men —real men— take action.” He picked her up and performed an elegantly gentle dropkick.

“Whee!” said Chastity as she flew through the air and landed on the bed. It was a plush Queen size with puppies on the counterpane. The room was lit by four bulbs underneath a ceiling fan. The Hardass jumped up onto the bed and punched the lights out. Glass flew everywhere, and to show that he could be tender as all hell, he helped Chastity brush it off her bed.

In the darkness, The Hardass explored her contours. He couldn’t read the map without his flashlight, but trivialities barely registered on his hairy radar. The dancing beam illuminated the room in sweeping light-saber fans as he thrashed about.


Five hours later, sated, sweaty and hungry, The Hardass coiled his climbing rope and put it and his ice pick and rock hammer into his pack. He had planned to stay and bite small pieces out of Chastity’s ears as she slept, but he had man’s work to do out on the streets. Catching murderers, wresting information out of crime bosses. He kicked his way through the wall next to the door, and went into his woman’s kitchen, where he ate a bag of coffee beans, washing them down with boiling water.

“Thanks for last night,” Chastity said sleepily from the bedroom.

“Damn yes,” said The Hardass, and allowed a smile to tenuously chisel his crags.


Okay, I'll be the first to admit that I haven't read a lot of crime noir, or crime rouge or any color of crime novel. But if I had a choice, I'd rather the sex scenes be intentionally funny.

4 comments:

Jack W. Regan said...

I'd much rather encounter a sex scene of this nature in a book, then those generally available, because you're right: they are usually unintentionally amusing. This is why I have pondered tackling these issues in my more "serious" writings, not out of a sense of moral superiority, but because 1.) sex scenes are usually pointless and simply bog down the plot and 2.) I'm terrified they will be lame.

Anyway, hilarious post and one of your best satirical offerings.

"Nice."

Paul FooDaddy Brand said...

I wouldn't worry too much about them being lame, as the competition that I'm familiar with is not too strong to begin with.

Now if you were trying to compete with a Romance novel, you might have to do some research first. Those things consist of nothing BUT foreplay, sex scene(s) and little advertisement inserts for other "books" by the same publisher. The "plot" consists of transporting the characters to and from bedrooms and describing the clothes they had once worn.

THAT'S competition. Crime novel? If it's a good one, most parties interested in the story will skim right over 'em.

As some of you may be able to tell, I haven't done any research.

Jacob Nordby said...

I loved this post.

You sprinkled in some (new-to-me) Foo-isms:

Nuclear Moses!

"...dumptrucks full of asskickery.."

Very nice.

In fact, I was reminded of one of my statements at the office today wherein I was upbraiding someone for their basic "dumbassery". My coining of this clever term took some of the horror out of the chastisement I was dishing out.

Basically, you throw "ass" in a word and then end up with "-ery" and it starts to get funny.

"pickleassery"
"assweaselery"

well, not ANY word will do, clearly.

JN "PW"
dictated but not read

Paul FooDaddy Brand said...

Thanksya JN! I shall inform The Hardass that his story has met with approval. He will no doubt punch something with delight.

I've been a big fan of adding the suffix (is it technically a suffix?) "__ery" to my words ever since I read a short article in The Onion called "Toy Buying Tips for Parents". It included such memorable advice as suggesting upscale stores, one of which ended with the word "cocksuckery".

To learn more, visit The Onion here!

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/38326