Motor City Burning (18 page)

“Uh, sure, Mr. Murphy.”

“You got a driver's license?”

“Yessir.”

“You think you could run me home in my car? I really don't need to be driving.” He rattled the ice cubes in his glass, surprised to see it was already empty. He would run his brilliant idea by Willie on the way home. “You can bring my car back here tonight—and my wife'll bring me by to pick it up in the morning.”

“Uh, sure.”

“If it's too much trouble I could call a—”

“It's no trouble, Mr. Murphy. I'm spending the night here anyway. Gotta work the lunch shift tomorrow.”

“Well, then, I'll have a short one for the road and we'll go.” He turned toward the bar but Chi Chi had vanished. “Ah, what the hell.” He set his empty glass on the bar. “Let's roll.”

Minutes later Willie found himself sliding behind the wheel of a 1968 Deuce and a Quarter, silver with a black vinyl top and black leather seats that smelled like sex itself. He could see there were only 67.8 miles on the odometer, which meant the car was a demo. Chick Murphy probably drove a different one every day.

“Take a right,” Chick said, lighting a cigarette. They headed east on 15 Mile, the same route Uncle Bob had taken the day he took Willie for a spin in his new Deuce. It was well past midnight, traffic was light. “Go ahead and see what she'll do,” Chick Murphy said. Then, seeming to read Willie's mind, he added, “Don't worry. If a cop pulls you, I'll do the talking. Give her the gas.”

Willie eased his right foot down on the big accelerator pedal and the car gathered itself and broke into a gallop, a throaty, thrilling, groin-tingling gallop. He glanced at the speedometer and was astonished to see he was doing eighty-five.

“You like that pickup?” Chick Murphy said.

“Hell yes I like it, Sur—Mr. Murphy.” He'd almost slipped and called him Surf. All the clubhouse staff, even the white guys, called him Murph the Surf behind his back because his glossy yellow hair could only have come from a beach or a bottle.

It was not that Willie and the other black guys on the clubhouse staff disliked Chick Murphy. He was not one of those members who told nigger jokes in the men's grill and then lowered their voices if a black waiter or busboy approached, thinking they were being discreet. If anything, the Surf tried too hard in the opposite direction, tried to be chummy in a way that made most of the black staff uncomfortable. Willie could remember the night when the Surf came down to the basement, drink in hand, and popped his head into the Quarters to see if anyone could use four tickets to an upcoming Tigers game. Someone turned the radio down. Waiters looked up from their craps games—what they called African golf—and the dice stopped flying. Everyone was obviously uneasy, and it got worse the longer the Surf lingered, trying to make small talk and act like one of the guys. There was nothing wrong with the gesture, it was just that he had crossed the invisible line and it was obvious he was unaware that the line even existed. Like so many white people, he assumed that good intentions—in this case, an offer of free baseball tickets—was enough. Watching him there in the doorway of the Quarters, feeling how tight the air had suddenly become, Willie thought of how his mother had drilled into him never to trust white people, especially the ones who profess to have good intentions. Racist peckerwoods were easy to deal with, she said, because they were so predictable; it was the white people with good intentions who will ambush you every time.

“You need to drop by the dealership,” the Surf was saying as they sailed along 15 Mile. “Take a test drive. You look real sharp behind the wheel of a Deuce, if I do say so myself.”

Deuce, Willie thought. White guys never talked like that. “Aw, Mr. Murphy, no way in hell I could afford a ride this nice.”

“Take a left at the light, on Lahser. Money's no problem. What're you driving now?”

“The DSR.”

“The what?”

“Detroit Street Railway. The bus. Or I catch a ride to work with my uncle or one of the guys.”

“You mean to tell me you live in Detroit and you don't even own a fucking car?”

Willie thought of his '54 Buick parked out of sight in the garage behind his apartment. He considered telling the Surf the standard lie about the Buick's leaky Dynaflow transmission, but that would lower the car's value at trade-in time. Besides, there was no future in letting a white man know more about yourself than he needed to know.

“Course I got a car, Mr. Murphy. Matter of fact, it's a Buick—a mint-condition '54 Century. Restored it myself.” The lie began to beget more lies. “It's in the shop for a tune-up is all. The mechanic working on it's slower'n molasses in January, says he's having trouble finding a set of points. So for now I have to catch rides with friends—or take the good old DSR.”

The Surf launched into a spiel about some nice clean used Skylarks he just got in, but Willie didn't hear much of it. He was too busy enjoying the power of this Buick, how easy it was to handle. He could control it with his thumb. It was like driving a 400-horsepower stick of butter.

“Okay, easy does it,” the Surf was saying. “Take your next right, on Long Lake.”

They took a quick left after that, onto a smooth silver street that ran between the biggest houses Willie had ever seen. They were fortresses tucked back off the road, behind stone walls and tall hedges and thickets of trees, immense houses with four-car garages. Chick told him to turn up a driveway, a long serpent of blacktop that deposited them in front of a brick mansion with exposed wooden beams and a slate roof. The word Tudor came to Willie, and he thought of his mother's description of Uncle Bob's new house. That house would fit into this place's garage. Every light was burning, which made the house seem even larger, more unreal.

“Let's go see what there is to see,” the Surf said, opening his door and lifting himself out of the car with a groan.

“You want me to come in?” Willie said.

“Sure. Why the hell not?”

Halfway up the sidewalk Chick stopped and put a hand on Willie's shoulder. His breath smelled minty. “Oh, say Willie, I almost forgot. I had an idea back at the club. You ever think about selling cars for a living?”

“Nosir, can't say that I have.”

“Well, I could use a sharp young guy like you on my lot. Someone who can talk to, you know, to all kinds of people.”

Willie stiffened. “You mean to black people.”

“I mean black people, white people, rich people, working people. I get all kinds. And I'm sure you'd make a hell of a lot more money than you're making at the club.”

“I don't doubt that.”

“Well, give it some thought.”

“Yessir, I will.”

“I'm serious.”

The front door was unlocked. Willie followed him into a slate-floored foyer, through an enormous dining room lit by a chandelier, then down a long hallway that led toward the back of the house, toward muffled music.

“Where the fuck is she?” the Surf muttered as he went. Then he cried, with too much joy, “Ah, there you are, Shug! I'm home!”

The woman sitting on the sofa was reading a magazine and smoking a cigarette. She looked bored and angry, like someone who'd been waiting for a bus a long time. She was a fading beauty with dyed blonde hair that was going black at the roots. She was wearing suede high-heels the color of burgundy wine. At first Willie thought her legs were bare, but then he realized she was wearing stockings. Flesh-toned, Willie said to himself. She put down her copy of
Town & Country
and took a pull from a glass full of ice and brown fluid. Chick Murphy turned down the stereo on his way to her. Willie recognized the music—that Herb Alpert chump with his Tijuana Brass. So this was the kind of swinging shit rich white people listened to. Smoke was leaking from the woman's nostrils. “So Chick, what possessed you to buy a gun?”

“Who says I bought a gun?” he said, pecking her cheek and tearing at his necktie. “This is Willie Bledsoe from the club, darling. Willie, my bride Blythe. Willie gave me a lift home because—”

“Because you're stone drunk, as usual. I say you bought a gun. I found it in your sock drawer this morning.”

“I bought it . . . I bought it for protection.” He gave Willie a sheepish look. “But mainly, Shug, I bought it because I woke up the other day and realized I've got to be ready to kill any man who tries to come between you and I.”

“Between you and me.”

“Oh for chrissakes, Blythe, lay off the grammar lessons already and fix us a drink, wouldya. Willie, you want something?”

“Nosir, I'd better be going.”

He watched the woman rise from the sofa, shakily, to her full height. With the heels she was nearly six feet tall. She must have been a fox in her day. Still not bad, but the skin was getting leathery from the sun, the hair was kind of scorched looking, and the ass was widening under the tight silk skirt. He noticed that her legs were still good—a woman's legs are the last thing to go—as she wobbled over to the bar in the corner and poured from a crystal decanter marked
SCOTCH
. She picked up tongs and added two ice cubes from a sweating silver bucket. “You sure you don't want something—Willie, is it?”

“No ma'am. I really need to be getting back to the club.” He took in the scene. Two people with more money than they would ever be able to spend, with a gun in the sock drawer, unable to speak proper English or act civilized in front of a stranger, listening to Herb Alpert while drinking themselves blind day in and day out, the bitterness between them growing like some malignant tumor. Again Willie thought of his mother—and how this scene would confirm every suspicion she ever had about white people, especially the ones with money.

The woman handed the drink to her husband. “You need to protect me,” she said, “why don't you learn how to fight?”

He collapsed on the sofa next to her magazine. “I already know how to fight. I was Golden Gloves champion of Detroit when I was sixteen, case you forgot. Let's drop it. Have a seat, Willie.”

He sat in an overstuffed chair facing the sofa. Through the large bay window he could see a lopsided moon hovering above their heads. Behind them the lawn ended in a distant stand of trees. Looking around, it occurred to Willie that this room was nearly as big as the house he grew up in. Yet the room somehow felt cramped, stuffed with too much furniture, too many lamps and vases and flowerpots, too many pictures on the walls, too many winking decanters. Willie sensed desperation in all this clutter.

The Surf gave his wife a recap of the Tigers game, which clearly bored her. Finally, when she gave out a big yawn he took the hint and drained his glass and stood up. “Willie's going to take my car back to the club, Shug. Can you give me a lift over in the morning to pick it up?”

“Sure.” She accepted another peck on the cheek. Willie stood up and shook Chick Murphy's hand and wished him goodnight. Instead of going upstairs Chick stepped into the half-bathroom under the staircase and, without closing the door all the way, took a stance at the toilet.

While Blythe struggled to light a fresh cigarette, Willie glanced at her husband. As he was zipping up his pants Chick gave out a little yelp of pain, then struggled to free his dick from his zipper. It was all Willie could do not to laugh out loud. Witnessing a white man's distress—without him knowing it—was without a doubt one of life's most under-rated joys.

After Chick made it up the stairs, Willie turned to say goodnight to Mrs. Murphy. But she said, “Sit down, Willie. Let me fix you a quick drink before you run off.”

What the hell, he thought. He was in no hurry to get back to the Quarters for the inevitable late-night poker game and sparring session with Wiggins and Hudson. “Thank you, Mrs. Murphy. I guess I could drink a beer if you've got one.”

She went to the bar and leaned over to fish in the refrigerator. Her skirt rode up far enough to reveal the tops of her stockings, the clasps of black garters, creamy slivers of thigh. Willie felt a pleasant buzzing in his groin and wondered if she was giving him this show on purpose or was just sloppy from the scotch.

She brought him a bottle of Cinci beer. “You need a glass?”

“No, ma'am,” he said, reaching for the bottle.

She didn't let go of the bottle. “Cut the ‘ma'am' crap, would you? We're not at the club anymore. My name's Blythe.”

He thought of the hippie girl Sunshine on Plum Street giving him the same command on Opening Day. He said, “The bottle's fine, Blythe. Thank you very much.”

She released the bottle and returned to the sofa. Her stockings made a crackling sound when she crossed her legs. The Herb Alpert record ended, and to Willie's relief she didn't ask him to turn it over. “So tell me, Willie, where's your home again?”

“Alabama. A little town called Andalusia, down around Mobile.”