Jazz Funeral (19 page)

She accepted a hit of his joint, something she seldom did lately. “I’m just trying to keep a stiff upper lip.”

“Uh-oh. The bear growled?”

“He went to another cave.” She handed back the joint, catching Jimmy Dee’s look and considering the tone she’d set with her earlier remark. “Oh, hold it, I didn’t mean—”

He puckered his lips, clowning. “Tell it to Dr. Freud, tiny one.”

“I didn’t mean another woman. He’s not like that.”

“Listen, you don’t have to convince me. He’s not my boyfriend. If that isn’t it, what’s wrong?”

“He wanted to be alone. I think he’s getting tired of me.”

Dee-Dee grabbed one of her feet. “Oh, who could be tired of a great big gorgeous thing like you?”

“Why’d he go away, then?”

He started massaging the foot. “Darling, do you speak English? He said he needed time alone—why make it complicated?”

“That wasn’t exactly what he said. He said he wanted to give me time alone.”

“How thoughtful. For a bear.”

“Well?”

“Well, what?”

“What do you think?”

He shrugged. “You do look kind of peaked. Shouldn’t you be hopping into bed—with the big case and all?”

“Do both feet, Dee-Dee. That reminds me—I never saw you last night.”

“Oh, but I saw you. I got there about the time you were cozying up to Nick Anglime. You had bigger fish to fry than ol’ Jimmy Dee.”

“Never.” She gave him a pat. “What’d you call me about, anyhow?”

“Well, I wanted to tell you a couple of things.”

She lifted an eyebrow.

“Including something I shouldn’t.”

“Ummm. Let’s get married.”

“Listen, I got bad news today.”

Her foot, flexing happily in his grasp, went dead still. She could feel her hands get cold. Jimmy Dee was HIV negative and celibate lately—too depressed to get it up, as he put it—but he was still getting tested every six months after several decades of doing whatever he damned well pleased. And then doing it again. (Or so he told it—she personally thought he’d be dead if he’d really led the life he described—probably of fatigue.)

Seeing her expression, he said, “Oh, my dear, it’s not me.”

“Jesus, Jimmy Dee! Don’t do that to me!” She smashed a pillow in his face.

“You sweet thing, your true feelings are coming out. Leave the bear for me.”

“Oh, Dee-Dee, you ass.” She said it because she loved him and he was half her size and gay; in a way, it was tragic they could never be a couple, and now and then it got to her—particularly at times when she was already inclined to feel sorry for herself. “What’s wrong?” she said.

“My sister’s …” A gurgle came out of his throat. He struggled for control.

She had had cancer several months ago, had had her spleen removed. Skip said, “The cancer’s back.”

He nodded. He had gone to Minneapolis to be with her for the surgery. He was her only adult relative, he’d said at the time, but more than that Skip couldn’t get out of him.

“I can’t do this,” he said.

“It’s okay, Dee-Dee. You don’t have to say anything.” She tried to catch him, to give him a hug, but he stood up, avoiding her.

“There’s more.” It came out a croak.

Skip moved back on the sofa, giving him room, and patted the place beside her. He sat down and swallowed, staring out the window, not looking at her. He swallowed again, finally said, “I don’t think I can talk about it.” His voice was thin and high.

“Later, Dee-Dee. Another time.” He let her pat his knee. Touching seemed okay, just not closeness; she could understand it. He reminded her of children—of herself as a child—batting away at well-meaning adults dispensing comfort.

“Drink?” she said. “Cognac? It’s supposed to revive you.”

He nodded, smiling a little, still unable to speak.

She brought him the cognac and poured a little for herself. She knew he was depressed—any gay man in New Orleans who wasn’t had to be kidding himself—and she knew he smoked so much pot to keep reality at bay. Hell, she was depressed herself. She took a healthy sip, savoring the richness, rolling the brandy on her tongue, losing herself in the pleasure of it.

In a few minutes Dee-Dee said, “The epicurean cop at home.”

“Beginning to go slightly cross-eyed.”

“I’m going to tell you something you never heard, okay?”

“I’ve just gone deaf.”

“My firm represents a giant conglomerate that shall remain nameless, but which would very much like to own Poor Boys; they’ve been trying hard to buy out the Brocatos. However, the outcome is still very much in doubt.”

“And thereon, I gather, hangs a tale.”

“One simple sentence, my dainty darling; one sentence tells the tale: some members of the board want to sell and some don’t.”

“Ah.” She sat up straight, alert as a hunter. “And who might they be—these fractious board members?

“Brocato family members. Every one of them.”

“Ham was one?”

He nodded.

“Which side was he on?”

“Sorry—that’s as much as I know.”

She wondered why he had told her this—it was unethical, she supposed, violated some code or other. It was probably because he wanted to give her something, felt close to her tonight.

But he said, “Use it well, Thumbelina. This isn’t meant to be a precedent-setter. I feel sentimental about Ham is all.”

Melody woke up on the sidewalk, Chris bending over her. “What’s wrong? What is it?” he said, and she remembered. And would have passed out again if she could have.

“I don’t know. I just got sick.”

“Come on.” He helped her up, and she could walk perfectly well, but she pretended; leaned on him all the way back to the apartment.

“I want to lie down.”

“Maybe it’s hypoglycemia.”

She nodded. But when he brought her some toast, she found she couldn’t eat. “I have to sleep,” she said, and rolled over.

When she awoke again, she was alone. She didn’t know if it had been half an hour or several hours, but she had slept soundly, had fallen asleep immediately. Lying there, on the smelly sleeping bag in the dingy apartment, she felt like puking her guts out. That was the phrase that came to her, and surely the muscle action couldn’t have been that different, but it was sobs, not vomit, that were issuing from her belly; from her pelvis; perhaps from her toes. From the bottom of her being, each one as wrenching as a fit of vomiting, but none so purging. And that was what she wanted. With each sob, she tried to cast out the knowledge that Ham was dead, free herself of this despair, this hopelessness. But it remained like an anchor in her soul, dragging her back, taking her again and again to the depths.

She screamed, she rolled around on the filthy bed, she tried to think what to do. No plan presented itself, but one thing became obvious: She couldn’t bear to see Chris. Or the other two, Sue Ann and Randy. How was she going to pretend that nothing was wrong? Her brother was dead.

She said it to herself:
My brother is dead.

But the words had no meaning at all, she couldn’t begin to comprehend them, understood only the dolor that had invaded her body and captured her spirit. Understood only that she wanted to die if she had to hurt like this.

She got up to go to the bathroom and was surprised that she could still walk, her motor skills were intact, though she occasionally bounced off walls, but that was due to shock and lack of focus, she thought. She hadn’t thought she’d have the strength to make it, had thought she might have to crawl. But strength she did have; she wasn’t actually sick, just out of it.

On the way back she strayed into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator, not out of hunger and certainly not out of curiosity, but because that’s where her automatic pilot happened to take her. There was some ketchup and mayonnaise, some bottled salad dressing, a box of days-old doughnuts. With no enthusiasm, she opened the box and closed it again, not even registering what kind of doughnuts were in it. And then she happened to notice a can of beer.

Barely realizing what she was doing, she popped the top and took a swallow. She took it back in the living room and over to a table where she could sit and look down at the street. She swallowed and stared, swallowed and stared, paying no attention to either action, simply letting her mind roam free, and it worked much better than she could have imagined. If anyone had asked her what she was thinking about, she couldn’t have answered. Her mind, though not still—she was aware of movement—was almost literally blank. “Almost” because she knew it really wasn’t, every now and then came into focus to catch the tail end of some thought, almost like seeing it with peripheral vision. But for the most part she didn’t notice her thoughts, had found some inner space to go to, where she could cover her pain with gray clouds. When she finished the beer, she felt better.

She thought: The thing to do is stay loaded.

She could do that. She had money and she was tall enough to reach the bar. And she had the sense to know that no matter how ugly she looked to herself, for some outlandish reason there would be men who’d be interested, who’d offer her things. Drinks. Pot.

She could get by.

She went back into the kitchen and got a rock-hard doughnut, knowing she couldn’t afford to fall off any bar stools. If someone took her to a hospital, or some juvenile facility, or jail, her parents would find her and she was dead. So she had to remember to eat. It was the only thing she did have to remember except a key … but there wasn’t one.

Who cared? She probably wouldn’t be coming back here anyway. She had no idea where she’d sleep that night. Maybe outside. By the river. In an alley. She’d be too wasted to notice.

She found her sunglasses and, slipping them on, stepped into the glare, biting into the doughnut, feeling it give beneath her teeth, crunching it but not tasting. She threw it out. She could get a Lucky Dog. She’d lived in New Orleans all her life and never had one. The thought almost cheered her up.

She ate the hot dog, went into an Irish bar, and got a beer. But not soon enough. The dog had hit her stomach with a thump that dislodged feelings, stirred up thoughts—about what it meant that Ham was dead, what that would do to her life. She drank quickly. She couldn’t think about that.

A man sitting two stools down from her, a short guy with muscles and a tan, played an Irish song on the jukebox. The sadness of it penetrated every cell of Melody’s body, locked her into a grim spasm of desperation so strong, so severe that if she didn’t tense all her muscles, keep them tight, not give a millimeter, she’d fly apart, faint again, maybe melt, she didn’t know; she just knew she had to stay tight to keep it together.

The man said, “You cold?”

She shook her head.

“You looked cold. Holding your elbows, curling up almost.”

She knew she was making a spectacle of herself.

She tried to uncurl but couldn’t. “The song is so sad.”

“That it is,” he said. “That it is.” As if that was the only fact he knew in the universe. Melody wished he would talk to her—about anything, it didn’t matter much. It might be distracting.

She wanted to talk to someone about Ham, to somehow rid herself of this horrible burden she was carrying, but she reminded herself anew that she had no friends, no boyfriend, no family. She was alone. Except for Chris, of course, and she couldn’t talk to him. A thing like a roach, all crawly and ugly, lodged in her throat when she thought of it. Wasn’t there anybody?

Madeleine Richard!

But no, not Madeleine Richard. She’d already been through that. Richard would turn her in.

She got another beer. Was there someone in the Quarter? Surely there was someone. How could a musician not know someone in the Quarter? A musician and a sister of Ham Brocato’s. Ham! Of course. She did know someone, someone Ham and Ti-Belle knew. Someone she probably couldn’t trust, but who couldn’t be bothered turning her in either. Somebody she’d always liked, who was as much an outlaw as she was.

He lived way on the other side of the Quarter, near North Rampart, dangerously close to Treme. Ham had told her never to walk there alone, but Ham hadn’t known that one day soon she was going to be completely alone, no one to walk with, no one even to lecture her, as he had. He didn’t answer his bell. But where would he be? Nowhere.

She knew he had to be home—he didn’t go anywhere else anymore, except to Ham’s once a week. It was very sad, Ham had said—the wreck of a fine musician. Ti-Belle had laughed: “Another of Ham’s strays.”

She looked through the courtyard gate—yes! There he was, in a ridiculously brief blue bathing suit, eyes closed, stretched out in the sun, skin like milk, and a squeeze bottle of sunscreen right beside him.
Why was he bothering?
she wondered. He was always going to look like
pompano en papillote
.

“Andy! Andy, it’s me! Melody.”

He didn’t budge.

“Andy Fike! Wake up!”

A kid about her age, black, but somehow nothing like Joel, came ambling down the street. “Wha’s wrong, baby—your boyfriend throw you out?”

“No. I just, uh—dropped by.”

The kid moved closer.

She noticed that two more black guys, also their age give or take, were about to join them. Should she be worried? “What do you want?” she said.

“I don’t want nothin’. Just thought you might need some help.”

She had on the sunglasses, but she glared anyway. It made her feel powerful. She planted her feet about a foot apart and faced him. “Thanks, anyway. I’m fine.” She kept glaring. The other two were getting closer.

“Hey, Dejuan,” one of them shouted, “what you got down there?”

He gave Melody one last, assessing stare. “Dyke,” he shouted. “Just some ol’ dyke.”

He trotted off to his friends. Melody knew it was crazy, but her feelings were hurt.

Where does he get off calling me a dyke? He didn’t interview me on my sexual preferences. Why would he say a thing like that?

Andy Fike rolled over and blinked. “Who’s that? Wha’s happenin’?”

“Andy, let me in, goddammit! It’s Melody.” Her legs were beginning to shake. Dejuan and his friends were long gone and probably hadn’t meant any harm in the first place, but tell that to her body. Sweat was breaking out around her hairline, in her palms.