Mannequin Man

Crime Fiction by Pandel Collaros

An October evening ride in a hansom cab through Central Park, as two dark figures in breakaways flicker on the distant horizon of a frozen ocean—fiending a head.

They all looked so real. That’s what people always said. He knew they were real. People are so ignorant, he thought. They couldn’t see the life in art, the art in life, the beauty of death, completion—and then something like this had to happen. He should have noticed it earlier. But then he had been ignoring her lately. He shouldn’t have just let her go untended after all that attention.

Maybe he had used her too much. But she was his favorite, his first. Anyway, who could have known what she would do? Women. And now this. It was distasteful and rude to the other girls, although personally it didn’t bother him too much. He rationalized it as perfection gone sour, rancid butter, dreams dissolving into the ceiling blur—unfortunate, but completely natural and inevitable.

He got up and padded softly across the parquet floor of his whitewashed studio, over to the small bar along a counter which separated the circular loft into left and right hemispheres. He lived in the right and worked in the left. A bottle of bourbon rested next to the bitters and sweet vermouth on the shelf above the bar. Ice, but no cherries, came from the tiny refrigerator. He never ate the cherries anyway. He liked that one drink only, and he never had any visitors except for the girls. He never offered them a drink anyway. So, with glass in hand, he sprawled across the recliner and surveyed the accoutrements of his trade. A toast to art.

Obviously, everything throughout his life had figured in to what he had become. He knew that fact instinctively, but today the thought had floated listlessly up into his consciousness. It was a pseudo-question that millions had asked before and would ask until the last sigh. As long as there were people, they wondered—whether out of despair, boredom, or even cheerful exhaustion. His mood wandered with his thoughts. College years.

A background in organic chemistry, post-graduate research into latex polymers, metallurgy—delicious coeds. How he had feared rejection by the vacuous creatures who would someday grow fat and useless. He had hated himself and them for it. What potent entity had bestowed upon them such a mysterious and complete power, most times only to be squandered in the satisfaction of petty manipulation.        

If it weren’t for chemistry, this feminine asphyxiation would have to be mitigated by some other means. But chemistry gave him power. He had discovered it.It being a revolutionary polymer of remarkable strength and hardness when dry, but so unassuming that it handled like ordinary house paint when liquid. Also miraculous was that no matter the contour or detail of a surface, or ability of the applier, the substance would adhere and settle into a uniform thickness to within a few microns. Furthermore, if desired, an aerosol spray could be prepared. In any case, within a matter of thirty seconds (a period during which any woman could comfortably hold her breath) the latex polymer would set. When hardened into the titanium-strength substance, an exact replica of the surface is rendered, and all without the necessity of casting from within! No, he wasn’t going to waste it as house paint.

And, to think that the fairer sex had inspired this spark of inventiveness. It warmed his heart to look at the girls he had around him now. Only the most beautiful women became his models, women he chose, women who needed no artifice in order for him to attain the perfection of his work. Of course, there were not many. Anyway, he couldn’t be too prolific; that wouldn’t be wise. Quality, not quantity, he mused.

Sometimes well-known models, but more often their agents, would approach him. In neither case would he have anything to do with them. There was no need to grind his name into the gossip mills of high fashion media. Already the early morning fluff had propositioned him—the so-called television “news magazines” with their effeminate anchor-wimps and pretentious she-men. There was no point in submitting himself to their idiotic ignorance. What could they possibly ask? They could never be able to get it together enough to ask a truly intelligent question. They’d have to approach it from a ridiculously cutesy or sensational angle. He took his work too seriously. If PBS wanted to do a documentary, well, that might be something else.

But he didn’t want the notoriety anyway. That was why he chose only the unknown beauties. He knew that nothing could be more distracting to a piece of figurative art than a “name” being associated with its subject. Each she must be a nobody. Under different circumstances, the girls probably would never have noticed him either. Even though he was not bad looking, he was not suave. He lacked the confidence that so often in itself is sufficient. But no matter. Women were fascinated by his reputation and the mystery that enshrouded it.

He laughed to himself. How much mystery could there be to a man obsessed with his work, with no outside interests, who seldom roamed from his loft apartment/studio except to acquire the raw materials of his trade? He didn’t need to hustle placements anymore; his agent, who scarcely knew more than anyone else about him, did that. He was an artist, and part of his art was in the choosing of the models who were presented to him. That was part of the mystery also. How really did he choose?

And that the girls thought him a little strange? No, that was not the case now. He had been a bit paranoid in college. Back then, those who by some chance had come to almost know him grew increasingly apprehensive at the equipment in his basement room. Not a lot of stuff, but things they could never quite figure out—or forget. Obviously he was into chemistry, but a carpenter or maybe a dentist would find something like this or that useful. That was then. Now, the girls were fascinated by the mysterious tools that could only be the instruments of a special talent. Far be it from the uninitiated to understand the techniques of a master in an unusual form.

He had made a lot of money too, which wasn’t very important to him, except for the freedom it bestowed. He loved his mannequins. Most importantly was that he could have them back, virtually upon demand. That was to be understood from the beginning. He would never sell—only rent. Of course, his clients would agree. The dolls were unique. The only complaints were about their weight which made them difficult to transport, and their inflexibility which limited display possibilities. They were more like statues creatively posed, than mannequins. Anyway, it was his agent’s problem to explain it as part of a secret artistic-process-take-it-or-leave-it. Having his own agent was definitely a plus.

It also gave him more time to spend with the girls. He would rotate them. Sometimes he would become lonely for a particular doll. He had Roxanne back for a while now. Yes, she was his favorite, his first. But he had abused her so much. Sometimes he would get bored with her posture, and then he would stray to the others.

Posing was a very important part of the process. The girls said that the latex felt funny at first, before he would do their faces and they didn’t talk anymore. Sometimes it was hard to keep them from blinking when the spray came. So, some of the dolls had closed eyes. That turned out to be an interesting feature in some of his work. However, he preferred strong attitudes as opposed to passive, and in general, that tendency prevailed. He enjoyed the feeling that came when he did a doll in an aggressive posture, eyes staring at him, suggesting an attitude that might have intimidated him in his college days. Of course, now he was the dominant one.

The girls before him didn’t talk. He had to chuckle out loud. Perfect women. He became aroused when he contemplated them. He had posed Marianne defiantly on all fours—a cat poised to strike—her pert, full mouth open in feline provocation. After the spray had set, he had met the new-found hardness of that pert mouth (still warm for a few moments more) with his own. The mouth, not for talking now, not for thoughtless insults to his masculinity. Forevermore, an open invitation.

Barbara. He eyed the firm buttocks flexed and sliding across one another as she climbed upon a high-backed chair, a close-lipped look of conquest on her back-turned face. He had fitted a hard latex ball onto a modified electric toothbrush. That was one of the first gadgets he invented to enhance his experience. How many times had he thrashed convulsively against the dark inner crevice. 

And then there was Karyn, saluting the ceiling with perfectly shaped twin points, arched back in a sinuous stretch. Quite a number of times he had wilted into that valley, bruised and swollen after having been excited. Facilitated by the hose of a vacuum cleaner attachment…even he thought it comical in the afterglow.

He had rigged up Candy, Tabitha, and Camille in similarly creative ways. What names, he thought. But ultimately and firstly, Roxanne. He looked down at his glass wistfully, shook the ice. His eyes shifted over to her. Yes, he had used her too much, and then had neglected her. He felt a slight sadness as he watched the small puddle almost indiscernibly grow larger on the floor between the perfectly painted toes. His eyes followed the line of brownish liquid, tracing it up the inside of her left thigh to the hairline crack he knew now existed where the prize was hidden. The drill was not all that powerful. He had mounted it upside-down in a makeshift harness that vibrated below his belt line. The drill bit was covered with a large soft swathe of rubber to protect the doll. The latex must have been fatigued after so many encounters.

He considered ways in which he might save her. If he had caught it right away—but putrefaction had set in, and it wouldn’t be right to keep her here with the others. He was sad, but not devastated. Still, sadness sapped his energy for any effortful immediate action. But he had better check the others, he thought, maybe even plan to make sneak inspections where the other girls had been placed by various transactions. What a drag. Well, he couldn’t do much tonight. Taking his cue from Scarlett O’Hara, he would think about it tomorrow. Shaking the ice in his glass again, he didn’t even notice the smell much anymore.

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Bio: Pandel Collaros has taught at Bethany College (WV), Ohio State, and the University of Kansas. Recent publications include a poem published Oct. 12 in Yellow Mama, a short story published Sept. 14 in Chewers by Masticadores, and a short story published Oct. 23 in Freedom Fiction Journal. Forthcoming is a poem to be published in 7th-Circle Pyrite on Nov. 15.

Cover photo by: Amanda McCoy

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