A Conversation with the Mann (24 page)

I carried a couple of packed bags for the door. My father watched with the same dull sadness of a dog that knew it was about
to be left alone for a long, long time.

“What am I supposed to do?” he mumbled.

“Same as before. Get loaded. Get tight.” I didn't even look his way. “I'll swing you money same as always.”

He said something else to me, but it got lost under my exit-slam of the door. I was wasting no time getting out. I'd already
had most of my life wasted by that man. My emancipation wasn't about to get delayed with the fakery of a drawn-out scene played
to ease his pain. There, there, Pop. It's all right, Pop. Let me put on the performance of both our lives for you, Pop. I
had nothing but a wordless goodbye for the man who brought me into the world and took my mother out of it.

My new apartment was small. Had to be. Paying for two places, Pop's and my own, I couldn't afford much. But it was just big
enough to hold all the independence I'd never previously owned. Wherever I went in the tiny space, there wasn't my father.
I didn't have to tread softly when I got up in the morning or came home late. His drunken rants went unheard, and his odor
was nowhere to be smelled. Instead of always cooling at Tommy's, I had a place I could bring her. I could paint the apartment
any way I wanted, put in whatever furniture I pleased, stock the refrigerator with any kind of food I liked… . Out of all
the choked space had to offer, that was its best feature: It came with prerogative.

The morning after my first night there I woke up happy. The next morning I woke up the same way. By the third day I was simply
content, the unburdened ease I felt quickly becoming a constant of my life.

The fourth day Grandma Mae brought 'round a plate of oatmeal-raisin cookies as a welcome to my new digs. They were still warm.
Since I'd starting working the road I'd had to take a pass on our traditional Sunday night gatherings, so it felt especially
good to see her and to have my own place for her to visit. I gave her the grand tour of the apartment. I spread my arms, said
this is it, and the tour was done. Still, being able to reverse the favor, entertain Mae, made me feel grown-up and a man.
Over the cookies we talked. I told Mae about the stars I'd worked with and all the places I'd been—Philly and Chicago and
Milwaukee. Concerning Miami, there were parts I left out. Mae listened to me, dug my stories the way I used to dig stars telling
tales on
Toast of the Town.

And I updated Mae on Tommy, hinting a little about my hopes to marry her. Hinting right back, Mae hoped that one day I would
make my plans real. She told me how important family was, how the greatest success any man could have was being a good husband
and loving father.

Joking, I told her I'd have to take her word for it.

Mae said she understood; she knew I'd never had much of a home life. But she added to that, different than strangers, in spite
of what passed among them, she was raised to believe that family always took care of family. She eased into saying that no
matter the things my father had done, the kind of man he was, he was still my father and deserved, if not my affection, then
my compassion.

And all at once I got edged up. Even coming from Grandma Mae, hearing that I owed my father—my drinking, hitting, hating father—any
more than a good-bye got me nice and agitated. Hadn't he been the one to abuse me every chance he got eveiy way there was?
Wasn't I still supporting him, giving him money for grub and rent that he was only going to waste on booze and drugs?

And that, Mae told me, as calm as I was hot, was the problem: I supported my pop, I gave him money, but if I left home for
good, there would be no one to take care of him. I brought him his basic needs, food and liquor, and that kept him from having
to wander the streets in a stupor, looking for something to eat or a way get high. I cleaned his clothes, cleaned the apartment.
That kept him from living in his own squalor. Mae had kept an eye on him while I had been away, she'd do the same in the future,
but what my father needed, she told me, was family. He was nothing better than a full-grown infant, and Mae made me think
that without me he would be nothing at all. She did not ask me to return to my father. She knew if she did, for her alone
I would have. But that was a commitment she could not force on me. Mae asked only that I do what was in my heart, then left
me to think.

And I did.

I thought of all the punches I'd taken, all the nasty names, all the hard put-downs, all the rage that man had given and given
and given me. That man.

That man.

My father.

I thought of him alone, preferring dope and drink to food and shelter. How long before those choices killed him? I didn't
care. I didn't want to care. I just wanted to leave him to himself.

But I couldn't. I couldn't because my mother wouldn't leave him. She would not let him be even if it … even though it killed
her. I hated my father for that, murder as far as I was concerned. I hated him, but not as much as I loved my mother. And
to love her, to honor her …

I swore at myself. I told God to damn me for feeling anything in any way for that no-good louse.

I repacked my bags, I moved back those five and a half blocks to again be with Pop. The action cost me a month's rent. That,
and my freedom.

T
HE PHONE RANG
… rang … rang …

“Hello?”

“Fran?”

“Jackie!”

“Get you at a bad time?”

“I was just cooking some.”

“I can call you back if you're—”

“No. Absolutely not. I want to talk to you. Feels like forever.”

“Been on the road.”

“I know. How was it?”

“It was good. Kinda fun, you know? Haven't traveled that much, so that was a gas. Did a week with Buddy G, a week with Vic
Da-mone, Mel Tormé—”

“What's he like?”

“Strictly star: big, but nice. That's the way I want to be if I ever … when I, you know, get over. Big, but decent.”

“And the Copa. Sid told me you're opening up at the Copa.”

“Next week for Tony Bennett.”

“Jackie, that's great. That's so sensational! It's going to be a terrific stand, I know it is. I'm supposed to be in L.A.
next week. I should cancel.”

“No.”

“I can talk to—”

“What are you talking, cancel?”

“It's your big night.”

“First of plenty. I'm going to be regular at the Copa from now on. You can catch me next time, so don't get crazy rearranging
things. What are you doing out in Los Angeles any—”

“Wait. Hold on a second… .”

“… Had to take something out of the oven.”

“Sure you don't want me to call you back?”

“No, no. What were you—”

“What are you up to?”

“… Nothing …”

“How's nothing going to be going on with you? You've got that big deal—”

“Oh, yeah. It's huge.”

“Bigger than my deal, since I don't have one.”

“You know what it's like? Signing up with CBS is like having another dad. These guys are into this grooming thing: I've got
to wear my hair this way. I've got to dress that way …”

“It's television. You've got to look good.”

“I don't look good now?”

“Don't even start with that. You know I think you're a doll. I'm just saying for TV you've gotta look—”

“I'll tell you right now the day they try and tell me what songs to sing …”

“They won't, and quit trying to make the whole gig sound worse than it is, because it's not bad at all.”

“How's Tommy?”

“She met some record guy out of Detroit, wants to sign her to a deal.”

“On the level? Oh, that's terrific, Jackie! She's a good kid. She deserves it.”

“Sure. It's sensational. She's got a deal, you've got a deal. Everybody's got a … What are you laughing at?”

“I was thinking—you remember that, uh, the first time you saw Tommy, at The Angel. You're standing around outside the club
all night waiting for her.”

“That was a real riot.”

“Then she comes out and you tell her … I don't know what you said to her. Nothing. Then she gets in a cab and she's gone and
you're just standing there… .”

“Anytime you want you can quit with the laughing.”

“You should do something about that in your act.”

“Sure. I'll do a bit right up front: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Say, have I told you what a big dope I can be?”

“It's personal, Jackie. It really happened. I just think doing bits that are real are fu— Ow!”

“You okay?”

“Burned my finger.”

“I should let you go.”

“Yeah … I sort of need to finish this up. But call, all right?”

“I will.”

“ 'Cause I want to get together with you. You and Tommy both. I really want to… . Can I tell you something goofy? I know you're
going to think it's goofy with all the other stuff I have going on, but… sometimes I miss the Fourteenth Street Theater. You
ever miss it?”

“Parts of it. Sometimes, I guess I do.”

“But you know what I mean when I say I miss it? I don't, you know, miss the drunks. I don't miss the no pay. I miss—”

“I know what you mean.”

“I knew you'd think I was a goof.”

“No, I don't, Fran. I don't think you're goofy at all.”

…

“So … you're going to call me, right?”

“I will. I'll call.”

“Okay.”

…

“Jackie, I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Fran hung up.

I hung up.

A
ROUND THE CORNER
from Grand Central was a Horn and Hardart. I waited there for Lamont Pearl. He'd given me a call, wanted to talk. I wasn't
particular one way or the other about meeting the man but for two things: Tommy wanted me to have a sit-down with him, and
whatever Tommy wanted, Tommy got. Thing number two: I wasn't so far away from being a starving artist that if a Jehovah's
Witness wanted to buy me a free lunch I wouldn't've found a space in my day.

A cup of coffee occupied my time. Just over the chatter of people swapping noontime clack, the sound of quarters plinking
into and rolling through the automats—soups and sandwiches and hunks of pie being debated over—a radio played. The news of
the day: Albert Anastasia—Al the Mad Hatter, Big Al, Albert the Executioner—while getting his hair cut had his head bullet-pierced
over at the Park Sheraton. The mob handling mob business. A brutal, bloody murder … and we all hung on the newscaster's every
word. No more clack. The quarters quit plinking. Maybe those Mafiosos were all a bunch of ruthless, criminal dog-killers,
but they were as much a part of the city as Times Square and Lady Liberty. They murdered, they stole, they extorted. They
added a phantom tax to almost every good and service in New York. But they made for great copy, so we loved 'em. The bottom
line of it all: Doesn't matter how you're famous as long as you're famous.

And then he came in.

Lamont came into the diner moving with the kind of assuredness that simply took over the joint even though he didn't look
the kind confidence came to naturally. He was half a foot under six. His features carried the baggage of the punches he hadn't
slipped as a daydreaming prizefighter. Working an assembly line of a Ford plant had taken all the tenderness from his hands.
You'd never've thought he was the type of guy who would help create a whole new sound so fresh, so smooth, no matter it was
black, white America would beg to have it poured down their throats. And maybe it was exactly because he didn't fit the bill
that he was one of the advance guard who snuck in under the radar on the way to reshaping the musical landscape.

Taking a chair, Lamont thanked me for meeting with him, especially on short notice as he was heading out of town.

I tossed him a dry version of my Jehovah's Witness crack.

“I get the feeling you don't like me very much.”

“Don't flatter yourself,” I nonchalanted. “What makes you think I like you at all?”

A grin. “Save the daggers.” Lamont waved over a waitress to pour him a coffee. She went away smiling from his dollar tip.
“I can guess where your head is. Regardless of what you might think, I'm not trying to take Tommy away from you.”