In Gallup, Greed

by Tower Lowe

“Okay.” The honesty pierced Lolo’s denial. “Redemption felt like the real thing. But, I know, it wasn’t real. I don’t know if I can be serene the way Mom is – I want more.”

  “You might get what you want. But you have to earn it, like Lonnie said. We have to earn respect with time and luck – and the help of the spirit.”

  They drove through the broad dusty landscape while Lolo thought about the spirit. Mirage looked out at the landscape Lonnie loved, where he saw three-dimensional visions of cultures and cures and decorated them into his acrylic landscapes. Mirage was committed to truth. If Lolo didn’t want that, she could turn around and take Mirage back to Gallup.

  “Okay,” Lolo thawed. “But you have to admit, plenty of people don’t wait for hard work and time and luck. Plenty of people are connected, or come from money. Plenty of people get a head start.”

  “We’re not those people, Mirage.”

  She considered. “Mom has a good life because she chooses to see it as good. That’s her religion – seeing the good in things.”

  “I’m only asking you to consider it – for Lonnie’s sake,” Mirage said.

  When the two women arrived at the small house in Black Rock, Lolo’s mom, Raquel, served bitter herb tea.

  “I ‘m sad about Lonnie,” she consoled.

  “Me, too,” Mirage responded, “but I believe his death will have meaning if we continue to live in the spirit of art he believed in and practiced.”

  Raquel nodded at her daughter’s friend. She didn’t ask what Mirage meant by the spirit of art.

  Lolo showed her mother photos of her work from Redemption.

  “These are beautiful, Lolo. Will you be able to make such big pieces now that the gallery money is gone?”

  “No. I’m stuck.”

  “Make them smaller,” her mother suggested. “Use copper interlaced with silver. Make a few works at a price people like us can afford to pay.”

  “If I do that, it’s accepting less than I deserve, less than you deserve, less than all of the native artists here deserve.”

  “It’s accepting what is,” Raquel answered.

  Lolo reached over to cover her mother’s hand with her own. “Mom, I’ll make the small pieces you suggest. But I’ll never accept what is. Deal?”

  Raquel smiled. “Deal.”

  After tea, Mirage and Lolo walked through the town of Zuni, watching the trucks and small cars navigate narrow streets. They passed an old friend from high school, who expressed sorrow about Lonnie.

  They walked on.

  “I heard Blue Dog leave Lonnie’s house the night of the party,” Mirage confessed to Lolo.

  “I thought you blacked out.”

  “A little bit came back to me. I heard a figure with heavy footsteps passing me in the night. I was afraid he would see me lying there in the alley, so I held my breath and he kept walking. His breath was fast and heavy. Where did you meet him that night?”

  “I met him while I was walking to your place. So it makes sense that he came by you in the alley. I had stopped to think about what I saw – you know, Clark holding Lonnie and all that blood. Blue Dog standing there, in the middle of the road, looking at me. We’d slept together once before, so I thought, why not? I don’t know why I did that – either time. He was old and lascivious. The awful part is that I wanted him to buy my art, and, if I refused him sex, I worried he wouldn’t buy, you know? It’s crazy now because he only bought my art to launder the money. So I was mistaken all around.”

  “Led astray,” Mirage suggested.

  Lolo accepted the kindness.

  “What happened after you met him that night on the street?” Mirage continued.

  “He walked up to me, took me in his arms, suggested we get a hotel. I said we could go to your place. I swear I knew nothing about the knife.”

  “Wasn’t he bloody?” Mirage gave words to her thoughts.

  “No. But he wore a black trench coat, and he undressed when I wasn’t in the room. So, maybe, you know? It’s sick, I realize that, Mirage. I slept with the man who murdered your brother, and I never even suspected it. I didn’t see him stow a knife under your mattress. Even when Cinnamon and Burro told me about the knife, I never thought Blue Dog put it there. He was money bags, a sugar daddy – I thought I was in control of him.”

  “Let it go, Lolo. We all did things – look at me and Jerry – that were sick. Maybe even evil.”

  The two passed a pile of sagebrush, shivering against a barbed wire fence. A wind gust grabbed a small piece and tossed it free for a moment, then the withered bush fell back against the barbed wire.

  “You think that I plan to stay the same, but I won’t, Mirage. I am different. I won’t keep after money for money’s sake. I plan to keep after recognition, a fair deal for native artists, after respect, and after redemption —redemption for me, for all native artists. If I find myself longing for another Lexus, I’ll reflect back on that night in your apartment with Blue Dog.”

  “Don’t torture yourself, Lolo.”

  “No torture, my friend. I’ll look for beauty. Like my mom does.”

  The two spent the night in Black Rock in Raquel’s spare room, under a Navajo saddle blanket, listening to cicadas sings out from the deep black dark of the high desert.

  Ω

  Serenity, Like Silk

  Johnnie looked around, saw Nez’s parents out on the porch, a pitcher of iced tea on the table. Not his kind of scene.

  “You sure they’re okay with me being here?” he winced.

  “Yeah. Of course. You’re not a leper, Johnnie. You’re an old friend of mine.

  Johnnie chuckled. “This place is real peaceful,” he admitted.

  “Why’d you want to meet, Johnnie?”

  “I wanted you to know how I felt about Lonnie...and Redemption. Lolo and Mirage, we never shared much, but you and I had a little bit of a bond over the years, didn’t we?”

  “A little. We talked at Sammy’s every couple of weeks. We’ve known each other a long time.”

  “See, that night, Jerry wanted me to fire Lonnie. Lonnie figured out about the Pleasingly Plump Paramours by researching on the web. All that money paid by Blue Dog and Drew for the artwork of the three unknown Gallup artists made him suspicious. Jerry refused to explain anything. It was easy enough to figure out we were laundering money with Redemption. Jerry counted on all of you not to suspect him of lying to you. And he counted on me not to tell.”

  “Did you help Jerry with the website?”

  “I wasn’t involved with the website, but I helped in little ways. I kept the keys to the Cactus Drive house and let the johns and the girls into the place. It was mostly Blue Dog and Drew – or Jerry. The other girls met their guys in hotels around the country – I didn’t get involved in any of the other locations. But Jerry had to have his own little house here – claimed it was important to keep Drew and Blue Dog happy.” Johnny shook his head, looked out the kitchen window at the hollyhocks flowering in yellow and red, standing straight by the white wooden gate.

  “Did you fire Lonnie?” Nez wanted to know what happened between the two men that night.

  “No. Jerry expected me to get Lonnie to step down as an artist – offer him a bribe, ask him to keep quiet and let the rest of us enjoy the ride.”

  “What happened?”

  “First off, and I said this to Jerry, but you know how he never listens? I said, ‘How can I fire a man who’s threatening to quit, Jer?’ But Jerry had this idea that all I needed to do was calm Lonnie down, explain that sex is no big deal, talk to him about how you and Lolo were getting great exposure and good money and Mirage was working the first steady job of her life.”

  “That was all true,” Nez confessed. “I wanted Redemption to be more, to get critical acclaim, but I was happy enough. I complained, Johnnie, but I took the money from my sales quick enough.” He glanced out the front window at his parents, laughing in a splash of sunlight. “It helped us all, even my parents. We had to dig u
p the plumbing last summer—$10,000. It was easy for me to pay for that with the sum I earned at Redemption.”

  “Thanks, Nez. I suppose there was truth in what Jerry said. We all went along. But I knew the conversation with Lonnie wasn’t going to go the way Jerry wanted it to go. I knew Lonnie was beyond accepting the fraud. He didn’t want to ruin it for you guys, but, the way Lonnie saw things, he thought Jerry’s prostitution website was poisoning our souls – or some damn spiritual thing like that. He was a true believer. No compromise, that boy. You know I’m right, Nez.”

  “He did believe that life was run by the spirit. But, come on Johnnie, he took the money for his artwork, too. God knows what he did with it, but he took it.”

  “He donated all of it to the Navajo Relief Fund.”

  “How did you find that out?” Nez asked.

  “Mirage. She showed me the receipts.”

  It was time for Nez to gaze out the window. “I put mine in the bank—in a mutual fund. Now the feds will claim most of it. Lonnie really was better than the rest of us.”

  “He was, I think. I talked to him at the party.”

  “What did you say to him?”

  “I started off with Jerry. That’s as far as I got. Lonnie sat down on that narrow bed of his, asked me to sit across from him.

  “’Don’t worry, Johnnie,’ he promised me. ‘I’m not getting you involved in any of this. I knew your dad – you remember how he was with me, don’t you? He was like a father to me, set me straight. And your mom – I think she wore her knees out praying to the Virgin for both of us. I remember those things. I understand that you like Jerry and want to help him. And I know this Pleasingly Plump Paramours was not your idea. I know that.’”

  “He was letting you off the hook for the prostitution ring and the money laundering?”

  “Yeah. I planned to plead for Jerry and the artists, but he said Redemption was bad for all of us, but only Jerry needed to go to jail for it.”

  “No fight or skirmish or anything?”

  “Nothing. I left. The stabbing was later, of course, and, and there wasn’t a skirmish.”

  “Lonnie must have been asleep already when Blue Dog came in,” Nez said. “I figure he sat up, probably recognized Blue Dog, and the scum bad sliced Lonnie through the stomach and left the house.”

  “And had sex with Lolo.”

  “That, yeah. Hid the first knife under Mirage’s bed, but he had two more.”

  “After the knives spoke to him, telling him to kill,” Johnnie added.

  “Is he sane?” Nez asked. “Now he’s making all these claims about a force that propelled him towards his mission to be a—redneck? Is he pretending?”

  “Who knows? I never liked the guy. The way I grew up, Nez, with my dad, there was no nonsense. These rich lawyers – even you artists – that’s not the life my dad taught me to live. He believed in good, honest work and good, honest prayers.”

  “You got away from that with Jerry, huh?’

  “I did. But if I stay out of jail, I’ll open a security business. Guard property, leave it at that.”

  “Maybe I’ll work for you,” Nez conceded.

  “No way.” Johnny shot back. “You paint. I like that big wise Indian you painted for the gallery. I bet you do all right with the paintings if you give it time. I bet you do.”

  The two men sat quiet for a few minutes in that small, peaceful house, feeling a power settle over them, feeling serenity, like silk, fall over the past and the future.

  Ω

  Wrong All Around

  “You go to prison?”

  “Hope not buddy,” Jerry threw Clark’s backpack into the trunk of the Audi.

  “Prostitution? Women sell sex for money?”

  “Basically that’s it.”

  “You and Mom prostitution website?”

  “Mostly me, not your mom. She went along to make me happy.”

  “Oh.”

  “Are the kids teasing you, bud?”

  “Some. I laugh. They laugh. Okay.”

  “I’m sorry, Clark, I really am. See, I figured, well, men and women – when they grow up – like sex...so....I kidded myself that it was okay. But, kid, it wasn’t okay. The whole thing, the prostitution, laundering money through Redemption, the whole ball of wax-o was wrong-o.”

  “Wrong. Definitely.”

  “You know that, huh?”

  “I know.”

  “Your dad, me, I...I thought I found the easy way out. But there’s no easy way, kid.”

  “I know.”

  The judge had Jerry going to AA meetings and staying off the booze as a condition of his parole. Jerry didn’t like it much, but his marriage was on the rocks, maybe over, his website shutdown, the gallery closed, so he didn’t have much choice. At least it was a chance to be honest with Clark. That felt good even if nothing else about his situation felt good.

  “Hope no prison.”

  “Me, too, son. I got a good lawyer. It’s complicated. I made my situation worse with some of my actions, but maybe I can still get off.”

  “Thought you kill. Lonnie.”

  “No, No, boy. I got no stomach for stabbing a man – certainly not Lonnie. Lonnie was a good person, full of love.”

  “I left after you-Mom asleep, on bike. Rode to Lonnie. Angry at Lonnie... I think...beat him up. Door broken. He there in blood. I hold him. Not mad now. Sad. ”

  “I’m sad too, Clark. It was never Lonnie that kept me away from you, son. Me. I did that. Lonnie tried to help. Lonnie, he knew what I was doing was wrong. He knew in his gut – like by instinct. He called it spirit. I think you are like that. You know what’s right and wrong. Me...I start thinking about what’s good for Jerry, and then I make up all kinds of reasons why what’s good for Jerry is the right thing to do.”

  “How Lonnie know right?”

  “Lonnie stopped to think about other people. Like with the prostitution. That’s not right for the women. It’s degrading, really. I told myself everybody was having fun, so what? But it’s not fun for women to make money like that. It’s not really that great for a guy either. It’s better if sex is connected to love, and Lonnie knew that. The same with the art. Those guys are good artists, but it takes work and luck to earn the kind of money we paid them for their art. I figured it’s good money, who cares where it comes from? But Lonnie understood that taking money for the art – from people who didn’t even care if it was good or not – corrupted the soul of the artist. I was wrong all around, and Lonnie was right all around. I should have listened to him, Clark.”

  “Hated Lonnie. He took you.”

  “No, boy. Don’t hate Lonnie. I took myself away from you and your mom. Not Lonnie’s fault.”

  “Not Lonnie?”

  “It was me. I abandoned you.”

  “It’s okay.”

  Jerry cried, but silently, out of eyesight as he followed Clark into the house.

  “Mom! Sopapillas!”

  Holly looked up as Clark ran in the door, threw down his backpack, and pulled a wrinkled paper from his jeans pocket.

  “Social Studies. Food culture. Sopapillas.”

  Holly took the paper. It was a recipe for the Northern New Mexican puffed bread. The teacher wanted students to bring a Northern New Mexico dish to school in the next three days.

  “Make today,” Clark declared.

  Holly laughed, a surprise, because she had been depressed for days. But the idea of making puffed pastry with her son brought out a memory of joy that was buried way back in the past.

  “Dad can help.”

  “Okay,” Holly agreed. “If we have the ingredients.”

  Holly searched out the flour, oil, and sugar. Jerry stayed and the three of them mixed batter, dropped balls of dough into hot oil and added honey to the hot bread. Laughter swept up the stairs, bubbled near the ears of the alabaster maiden and lightened the heavy air, filled for so long with corrupt hopes and fraudulent dreams.

  Ω

  To Be
Redeemed

  I sat in Earls with bandages wrapped around my waist, wearing a blood red sweater trimmed in orange lace and waiting on sweet tea and enchiladas. My appetite was returning in spite of the painkillers. Alice and Burro nestled with me in a booth, telling what they knew about the Lonnie stabbing.

  “Didn’t Lolo guess that Blue Dog left the knife under Mirage’s mattress?”

  “She says it never occurred to her. The Blue Dog didn’t seem to care about Lonnie or the gallery.”

  “Kind of creepy,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Alice agreed. “He hid the bloody clothes while he had sex with her, the buried them in the back yard of that house.”

  “How did he know Lolo was at the gallery that night?”

  This time Burro answered. “Lolo called and told him she was going. She thought he supported her work because he bought so many pieces.“

  “She invited him to kill her,” I said. “It’s like all the artists had turned off their intuition.” I adjusted my position. The wound was wrapped in gauze and dulled with ibuprofen, but it still hurt.

  “No kidding,” Alice agreed. “The newspapers are full of this story about how he thought he was fulfilling his destiny to marry a woman named Molly – one of the Pleasingly Plump Paramours, I guess. He claims the knives empowered him to kill Lonnie and Lolo.”

  “And me.”

  “Sorry, you don’t rate. The knives told him to scare you.”

  “Ah. Wrong place at the wrong time, then.”

  “That’s it.”

  “Is Molly the one who pretended to be Momma?”

  “She claims she thought it was a practical joke.”

  “The joke’s on me for believing it,” I said.

  “It was cruel,” Burro insisted.

  “Maybe Momma was cruel to leave in the first place.”

  “She was confused, Cinnamon. Scrambled, you might say.”

  I smiled. “There were quite a few scrambled brains in this mystery. No wonder we didn’t understand. There’s Clark, with the Traumatic Brain Injury; Jerry and Blue Dog who were both deluded – albeit in different ways. The artists were confused, too.”