Save Johanna! by Francine Pascal Page A

the ideal young man, perhaps a touch too quiet and obedient. The summer after his graduation from high school, he took off for what was to be a last carefree adventure before leaving for college. He never came back. For five years, Frank traveled the country before settling down for two more years in a commune in western Pennsylvania. But whatever he was searching for still eluded him, and then he’d heard about Avrum and was intrigued enough to seek him out. That was in May, and now, two months later, he had found his own Joseph Smith, his own private prophet. But this one had imagination, passion, and danger. His search was over.
    Avrum had come into his life. Night after night, he worked at Frank, peeling away the layers of his secrets like the skin of an onion, and finally he reached the center. And, with his exquisite, unerring aim for the soft parts, moved in and took over. Avrum sensed what Frank needed was total release from the middle-class moralities of his background. And he gave it to him, carefully orchestrating the necessary freedom with a tight control.
 
     
    “The first part of my plan,” Avrum confided to the room, “is to expose their uprising before they’re ready.”
    Amazingly enough, no one questioned how so momentous a venture could possibly be accomplished by this small and powerless group. It was Avrum’s strength that, with him, not one of them felt that powerlessness.
    For Swat no questions were ever necessary. Her trust in Avrum was complete. All he had to do was to point the way.
    But Avrum told them they hadn’t arrived at their own readiness yet. Then he told Nellie to get the Oxycontin.
    “I can feel your frustration,” he said to Frank, “a holding back, a discomfort. You want to ask me things, but your ego is restraining you.”
    Frank shrugged his shoulders and tried to apologize. “I guess it just takes me a while to get comfortable with people.”
    “You never will unless you can learn to trust me and rid yourself of that ego.”
    “You gotta do it, Frankie,” said Nellie, flipping two Oxycontin to everyone. “I did, and that’s when I got all my shit together and the whole world came into place. Listen to Avrum, he knows everything.”
    “I’m trying,” Frank said, and then he popped the two white pills far back on his tongue.
    Everyone except Swat took the “downs.” Swat never took drugs or drank or even smoked weed. She sat in on all the sessions but was always totally clean and silent, just waiting.
    In less than fifteen minutes the drug had taken effect, and a loose, easy glaze had settled upon the small group.
    “Hey, baby,” Avrum said to Frank, “come over here and let me show you how to give some good head.”
    “Sure, man,” Frank said and moved over to the cushions where Avrum was lying.
    “Swat?” Avrum said, and she moved to him instantly. “That’s OK, just close those things, huh?” Her entire body registered disappointment as she went to close the shutters. Again the room was dark except for the eerie stripes of sunlight across the floor.
    Now Avrum called Imogene and she came over to the two men, and he told her to get naked and lie back on the cushions. Without a word she took off her shorts and underpants, kicked her sandals in the corner, and slid down on the cushions. Avrum pressed her legs open and buried his head between them. There was quiet in the room as they all listened to him sucking at her. She moaned and squirmed and moved down closer into his face and her hands reached out and grabbed at the air.
    For Swat it seemed an endless time until finally Avrum moved away from Imogene. She watched it all, never taking her eyes from him.
    Now Avrum gave his place to Frank, and Nellie came over and joined them. She took off her own clothes and then lovingly peeled off Avrum’s.
    Now, in the semidarkness, the four naked bodies slid under and over and into each other with no discernible pattern. They seemed to Swat like wet, shiny, white