These Women

by Ivy Pochoda

  Her head is pot-hazy. In one day she’d run through half of what she and Hector had split, rolling fat joints and blowing smoke into the concrete yard behind her parents’ house. She’d kept her phone on vibrate, only glancing at it every so often to see the missed calls and texts from Coco and Marisol—What the fuck happened to you, bitch? You caused mad trouble at the Rabbit. How come you don’t answer, bitch? You got yourself done like Kathy? Don’t make me worry, bitch. You too good to party with your girls?

  There were even a few messages from Rackelle. Hit me up for the weekend if you want to hang with Miss Molly. She’s in town. And, Ju—if you want to go skiing make sure you get here before the snow melts.

  Julianna picks up her phone and turns the vibrate function off so there will be no alert, no temptation. She opens her photos, scrolling through her time machine to the old life.

  There’s Hector and Isobel asleep on the bed. Click. A blurry image of the back room of the Fast Rabbit—the walleyed customer splayed against one of the booths, the tracks of Julianna’s nails on his face. There’s Coco getting dressed, the apple of her ass front and center, her face visible in the mirror, lips puckered in a gangsta pout.

  Julianna holds the phone away from her, tilts it to the side. She closes her eyes, tries to imagine the picture blown up, museum size, tries to imagine it as art.

  Tap, tap, tap. Back through the photos. Back in time. Again and again. Some of the pictures jump out at her, something about them, the way they are put together, the story they tell, elevates them above the rest.

  “Hector,” Julianna calls. “Could you come in here for a moment?”

  She hears the heavy tread of her brother in the hall. She scrolls back to the photo of Coco looking in the mirror. She holds out the phone. “What do you think of this?”

  Hector appraises it. “She’s got an ass.”

  “I mean what do you think of the picture?”

  “Like how?”

  “Is it art?”

  Hector folds his arms across his chest. He’ll be able to rest them on his belly soon if he isn’t careful. “Is it supposed to be?”

  Julianna swipes her brother across the cheek. “Fuck yes it is,” she says.

  “I like it,” he says, taking the phone from her. Soon he’s scrolling and clicking, zooming in and taking a longer look from time to time.

  Julianna flutters her fingers. “Give it back.”

  Hector turns so the phone is out of her reach. “Hold up.”

  “I said give it—”

  Hector looks up from the phone, looks Julianna right in the eyes, looks at her like he’s never seen her before. “This your life, Ju?”

  “What?”

  “This is your life? This?” He holds up the phone. Julianna can’t quite make out the exact image. All she can see is a mess of bodies, flesh and lace and smoke and what’s probably a coffee table strewn with powder or pills.

  “No, Hector, it’s my art.” She yanks the phone from his grasp and shoves him out the door.

  What the hell does he know? And if this shit gets blown up, hung on a wall, on display for everyone to see, no one’s going to be criticizing her. Her life could be what she makes it. Her life could be a life instead of something that just happens.

  She’s out the door in an instant, the riot gate banging into place behind her. Before she’s second-guessed her own crazy idea, she’s already knocking on the door of the house next door. For a moment she’s filled with the fiery confidence that she usually gets from llelo, the magic that turns her from Julianna into Jujubee.

  Marella’s mother, Anneke, opens the door. Her eyes narrow and her mouth puckers when she sees Julianna. “Yes?”

  “I live next door?”

  “I know,” Marella’s mother says. “I’ve seen you.”

  Julianna stands silently, not quite sure what she’s doing anymore. She looks past Anneke. She can see that the house is laid out exactly like her parents’. But unlike next door, where Armando and Alva painted all the woodwork white, the interior of Marella’s house is dark wood. It even has the glass cabinets and built-ins that Julianna remembers Armando stripping out of their living and dining rooms and tossing on the street. Marella’s family has a sofa done up in some dark fabric and a set of matching chairs. Through the sliding doors, she can see a dining room table that seems built to match the rest of the house.

  “Is there a reason you’re here?” Anneke asks.

  A man has emerged in the hallway, middle aged and white with a graying beard.

  Anneke turns. “I’m taking care of it, Roger.”

  “I live next door,” Julianna repeats.

  “We know that already,” Anneke says.

  Her husband is still standing behind her.

  “I’m looking for Marella,” Julianna says.

  “How do you know my daughter?”

  “She said I could stop by.”

  “She’s not here.”

  “I wanted to ask her something,” Julianna says. “She’s an artist and I have these photos—” She holds out her phone.

  Anneke begins to close the door. “I said she’s not here.”

  “Can you let her know I stopped by? She could just ring my bell or something?”

  “Maybe,” Anneke says.

  Marella’s father clears his throat. “She’s—” he begins.

  Anneke holds up her hand.

  “We’ll let her know,” he says.

  Julianna’s about to reply when Anneke closes the door, leaving her standing on the porch. She crosses the street and lights a cigarette. She glances over at her house. She can see Armando and Hector on the sofa watching a soccer replay. Alva is at the airport car rental working the late shift because one of her employees called in sick.

  Then she sees movement on the second story of Marella’s house. A curtain is pulled back. Marella appears at the window. Julianna watches her until the light goes out. Then she grinds out her butt.

  Now Marella is coming down the stairs. Julianna sees her pass the small window in the front door and disappear down the hall. The front curtains are cracked slightly. She can see the family preparing to sit down to dinner. It’s like a dance. Marella carries a serving bowl. Her mother follows with bread. The father with a bottle of wine.

  The family sits. They look to be eating without talking. Their movements are precise, like they’ve rehearsed them, like they’re performing this meal rather than enjoying it. It’s nothing like the chaos at Julianna’s table—Alva berating Hector for eating too much, berating Armando for storming off to watch soccer, berating Julianna for being unable to eat at all.

  Marella’s invitation was easy and careless. Julianna will never knock on their door again. She’s worlds away. Lifetimes.

  She fumbles in her purse. She’s out of cigarettes. She might as well walk to the liquor store on Western, grab some smokes. She turns and heads off.

  She doesn’t see Marella’s mom leave the table.

  She doesn’t see Marella rush to close the curtains.

  9.

  IT’S THE USUAL CREW AT THE WESTERN LIQUOR—MEN DRINKING sweet wine and forties until they pass out in the parking lot. Julianna ignores their slurred Spanish come-ons, their demands she slow down and let them take a look. She buys a pack of menthols and a wine cooler, then sits on the low wall of the strip mall parking lot just down from Dorian’s fish shack.

  She glances north. She can’t see the fire in the hills but she can smell smoke. She inhales deeply, letting her menthol mix with the ashy L.A. air. A bus passes before stopping halfway up the block. On the back is an ad for the Larry Sultan show. She can’t remember the last time she was in a museum, probably a school trip that she ducked out of midway.

  “Julianna?”

  An inch-long ash is dangling from the tip of her cigarette. Julianna flicks it away and looks at a young woman who’s suddenly standing in front of her.

  “Yeah?”

  “You don’t recognize me?”
>
  The woman is twenty, if that. Copper skin. Pretty enough with straightened ebony hair streaked magenta. A baby face with hard eyes. “You don’t know me? It’s been a while.”

  She’s too fresh faced for the streets, a little too young for the Fast Rabbit.

  “Jessica.”

  The name means nothing to Julianna.

  “Kathy’s eldest.”

  Julianna can feel her eyes widen despite herself. Jessica was in the picture by the shrine, blurry and younger, stuffed into a holiday dress that was supposed to hide the heartache of having Kathy as a mother. “Your mom—that’s messed up.”

  Why can’t she say the words? Why can’t she let her grief loose? Why does she have to be hard?

  Jessica shrugs, like worse things have happened. And maybe they have. Maybe she’d been waiting for the day that Kathy didn’t make it home.

  “You’re okay?”

  “I’m whatever,” Jessica says.

  Julianna tosses her cigarette and fishes for another.

  Jessica holds out her hand. “I can get one of those?”

  It’s not that Julianna doesn’t want to give her a cigarette. She just doesn’t want to have to stick around while they smoke together. But it’s too late. Jessica’s already waiting for her to pass the lighter.

  They both exhale toward Western.

  “So your family is holding up?”

  “It’s not like Kathy was around much,” Jessica says. “She was always working or out somewhere. She was getting high or coming down or sleeping or getting ready to go back out. You know.” It’s not a question.

  Julianna does.

  “She was a bitch. But she brought in cash.”

  Is this the kind of mother Julianna would become? Coming down and cranky in the mornings. Spending herself at night.

  “She worked mad hard,” Jessica says. “Now it’s just me and my two brothers. Both of them still in high school. My dad’s who the fuck knows where.”

  “What about your grandma?”

  “Dead. We live at her place. Some shit with her stomach. Killed her quick.”

  “Sorry,” Julianna says.

  “Everyone’s sorry. But no one does anything. I work at the Carl’s Jr. And it gets me a whole bunch of nothing.”

  Julianna takes a long drag. “Anything I can do?”

  Jessica turns and looks square at her. “Yeah,” she says, “there is. You work at the Fast Rabbit, right?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “But you did.”

  “So?”

  “You could hook me up?”

  “Hook you up?”

  “Like a job. A good job. Like the shit you do.”

  The shit you do. Why doesn’t she come out and say it? Call it what it is. What her mother did. “How the fuck old are you?” Julianna asks.

  “Twenty-one.”

  “Bullshit.” Not that it matters. Ramon and Dean and the rest of them would take her. Fresh and clean and ready to work. “Sorry,” Julianna says. “I can’t help you.”

  “Can’t or won’t?”

  “I said I don’t work there anymore.” There’s no way she’s introducing this girl into that life, doing to Jessica what Kathy did to her. Telling her it’s all fun and drinks and late nights and parties. A few hours waiting tables. Then a few trips to the back rooms, line your pockets, like no big deal. And soon nothing will be a big deal, nothing will be taking it too far.

  “You asked if you could help. I got two brothers to take care of. And myself.”

  “That’s no way to take care of anyone.”

  “You got a better way of pulling in cash? ’Cause I don’t. Anyway, it’s just dancing and a little extra. No matter.”

  “Sorry,” Julianna says again. There’s no fucking way. She rummages in her purse, looking for something that will distract her from the handprints that will mark up Jessica’s smooth arms, the streaks of someone else’s sweat that will roll down her chest.

  “My mother always said she helped you out.”

  “Is that what she said?”

  “She said she looked out for you.”

  Julianna tosses her cigarette into the street. “You have no fucking idea what you’re saying.”

  “Fuck you, bitch,” Jessica says.

  “You have no fucking idea about anything.” Julianna wants to hurt her, scare her, anything to keep her away from this mess.

  For a moment Julianna thinks Jessica is going to slap her. But she marches away, north on Western without a word.

  Julianna watches her go—a young woman walking into the night. But a moment later she’s chasing after her. She catches Jessica, yanking her back by the shoulder. “Where you going?”

  Jessica shakes her off. There’s wildfire in her eyes. “Get the fuck away from me.”

  Julianna’s been around enough to know how to be tough, how to dominate one of these junior bitches who dream they have the drop on you because they’re young and pretty and think they know it all. She places herself in front of Jessica, grabs her wrist. “I said, where are you going?”

  Jessica stops walking. “I’m going to find Brandy or Big Pete, if you want to know. Get their help, since you won’t. Or maybe I’ll find what’s-his-name, Carlo? Carlos? CC?”

  Julianna lets go of Jessica’s wrist. She doesn’t have to know Big Pete or Carlo/Carlos/CC to know who they are. Brandy too. This late on Western it’s obvious who the girl is looking for. And she has no idea what’s in store if she finds one of these people—how quickly they will introduce her to a rougher life than she’d ever imagined.

  “Fuck it,” Julianna says, taking out her phone, click-click-clicking until she finds Coco’s number. She shows it to Jessica. “Call her. She’s my girl. I’ll give her the heads-up. She’ll get you into the Fast Rabbit if she can. But I want to see you get on a bus right the fuck now. I don’t want you looking for Big Pete or Brandy or whoever the fuck else. I want you to cross the street. Get on the bus. And when you do, I’m going to call Coco and tell her you’ll be by ASAP. And you better not disappoint her.”

  The look on Jessica’s face is a mix of shock and surprise. She opens her mouth but Julianna beats her to it. “And don’t thank me. Don’t you ever fucking thank me. Now cross the street and get on the bus.”

  Jessica obeys. Julianna watches her dart through traffic and waits until the bus takes her away. Then she collapses against a shuttered storefront.

  Before she knows what she’s doing she’s texted Rackelle. And before she can second-guess herself, Rackelle’s there because she was just around the corner. And when she sees Julianna looking all beat up and undone, she throws in a little extra baggie, telling her don’t be a stranger and come party with the girls again. And Julianna’s thanked her and before Rackelle’s back in her car, she’s cracked one of the baggies and scooped up some llelo with her pinkie and now the world is buzzing in Technicolor.

  Without realizing it, she’s done half the bag and been pacing Western for an hour or more in her sneakers and shorts, no party to go to, no job. Nothing. And she’s walking home, because she doesn’t want to go to Coco’s apartment and see Jessica again.

  Up north she thinks she can see the fires sparked on the hills again, little electrodes of red in the dark. Or maybe her eyes are playing with her.

  She feels hot and cold.

  She’s saved a girl from the life for a minute, deflected her, sent her elsewhere and bought her time until the streets come calling. They will. They always do. They’ll want their piece, take their due.

  She dips her pinkie again.

  Jessica will find her way to Big Pete or CC one way or the other. Or she’ll find her way elsewhere. It’s only a matter of time.

  Julianna’s head is spinning. Western is streaked with taillights and headlights. Men on the crawl, prowling for women like Jessica. Women like Julianna. The need is endless. It’s never satisfied. Men are always hungry for more and the streets will provide.

  She’s closing
in on her block.

  Who is she fooling that the Fast Rabbit is any better than things up here—somehow more tasteful or respectable? Who is she kidding that she did something noble by sending Jessica that way?

  There’s a car coming down Twenty-Ninth. It’s slowing. She can feel the driver watching her. Shopping. Appraising.

  The car’s windows are tinted. She can feel darkness looking out at her from behind the windshield.

  She knows what the driver wants. She knows what he thinks she is. He’s right. Doesn’t matter that she’s not dressed for the game. The game is in her. She is the game.

  She took a girl from the streets temporarily. And she must give herself in return. Because if not her, he’ll find someone else. Julianna tosses her hair. She rolls her shoulders, sticking out her chest and ass, summoning Jujubee. Because Jujubee’s hard. Jujubee’s not scared of the person she can feel looking at her from behind the tinted window

  Jujubee won’t let the streets get her. She’s got armor. She’s superhero tough.

  Jujubee licks her lips.

  It was inevitable.

  She was always going to wind up here.

  This was Kathy’s doing.

  And now.

  The car rolls over. The passenger window goes down.

  Jujubee leans into the darkness. At first she sees nothing. All she can hear is him breathing behind the wheel.

  “Hey,” he says.

  She thinks she knows the voice. She opens the door. Slides into the shotgun seat.

  “Oh . . .” she says. “I didn’t realize.”

  “Neither did I,” he says.

  “Don’t worry,” she says. “I’m working.”

  “I’m not worried,” he says. “Not at all.”

  Feelia 1999

  WAIT. HOLD UP. I SEE YOU. I SAW YOU. THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING standing outside my window? Don’t think I didn’t see. Like I don’t notice shit. I said hold up. Don’t you run away before I can get a look at you. Don’t you—

  Damn.

  Where the fuck did you go? You get back here, you got something to say, say it to my face.