by J. L. Abramo
Mickey Miller, one of my other pals pawing through Mr. Sullivan’s lusty library, opened up another magazine to reveal a picture of a busty beauty with flame red hair in a matador outfit waving a cape. The caption read in blood red letters “Toro! Toro! Tempest!”
“That’s the one for me,” he said. “Someday I’m gonna get me a gal like that.” The others nodded in agreement. “Bartender, busty redheads all around.”
They busted out laughing, but I was still staring at my gal in the hay. Mickey spoke up.
“What about you, Frankie?” he asked.
“Someday,” I said as I drummed my fingers on the magazine. “Someday, I’m going to take pictures like these.”
CHAPTER ONE
She was still sound asleep as I rolled out of bed. I tried my best to keep quiet but kicked an empty wine bottle parked on the floor. It fell over with a clink and skidded noisily across the room. The hot sun streaming in bright slits through the Venetian blinds shed light on a mine field littered with another dozen or more bottles, all somewhere between half empty and spent.
She stirred a little and reached over to where I had been and moaned softly, her dark skin like chocolate against the contrast of the linen sheets. The lighting was perfect and, man, was she ever a beauty. I reached for my rangefinder and squeezed off a few shots though I wasn’t entirely awake yet myself.
Details were a little cloudy. I tried to reassemble them in my head. It must’ve been a good night because, baby, was I sore. There were drums somewhere in the distance pounding behind my eyes. Back east we called this an Irish toothache.
It began with the blues.
I had taken her home last night after seeing her sing the blues at a little spot over on Central near the Dunbar Hotel called the Hi-Dive. The band was hot but came on like Eskimos next to her bodacious heat. She sang sultry and salty over the little combo’s shag and groove as it shuffled and swung on the little bandstand set up in the corner by the cigarette machine.
One glance and I was gone. I dug her thickness with a quickness. She was soft and lovely; plump where it mattered. She had it coming and going. Her backside jutted out behind her as much as her bust did out front. Her dress was backless, a bright red chiffon invitation; a tease, a promise, pure seduction in its tight elegance. It didn’t get much better than this. What she had in abundance, wasn’t so much dressed, but rather presented, served up. That red dress was a green light. Man, all those curves, and me with no brakes. Even a cat with angles could get lost in those curves. I wasn’t the only one who had her in their sights. Naturally.
As progressive as Los Angeles seemed for 1960, racial tension still ran rampant. And it ran both ways. Sure, white folks fared a little better when it came to run-ins and face time with John Law, but like I said, it was a two-way street—the suspicion, the resentment, the entitlement, the jealousy. Just try being a white man hanging out in a black nightclub, digging the tunes, nursing a beer, and minding your own business. Better yet, just try making a move on a colored woman in that joint. A colored woman every man in the place wants, their mouths watering as if she were a T-bone in that tight, red dress.
I was feeling particularly carnivorous as well, and in the mood for something dark and lovely. I wanted her. If nothing else, I at least wanted to take her picture. That’s my gig: photographer of beautiful women. I never studied it in school, but I studied abroad...for a whole year and still couldn’t figure her out. That’s right, the name’s Frankie Valentine: photographer, wise ass.
I’d been coming to the Hi-Dive and other assorted music joints since I moved out here six months ago.
I had split my time in Rochester, New York, working as a crime scene photographer for the Rochester Police Department while moonlighting as a glamour photographer. I had burned out on the dead body racket and decided to spend more time with the live and lively ones. So, upon my pal Mickey’s urging I came out west to give Hollywood a stab.
I should clarify...I was only here visiting...for a little while, maybe a bit longer. I didn’t know. Put it this way: I hadn’t purchased a round trip ticket. Half a year had flown by already, yet it was still strictly wait and see. But everywhere I looked there was a beautiful girl walking my way or walking away. Either way, it was paradise. The city of Los Angeles seemed to have its own sun. And with hot nights in hot joints like the Hi-Dive, Rochester seemed farther and farther away.
It was apparent, everybody at the Hi-Dive, was tanked and wound up extra-tight last night—drunker than usual. Over and above the music, the joint was loud: loud looking, loud smelling. Loud. A half dozen aftershaves and perfumes battled for attention as harsh laughter and language bounced off the damp red walls in a mish-mash din, a chaotic calamity of confusion and come-ons. It was more than your stock rummy rants and ruminations, more than the usually officious barstool/soapbox debates just shy of an argument, one sip shy of a fist fight. No, last night bristled hot and mean; vicious and pernicious. There was malice in the thick air. I barely made it out of there alive.
CHAPTER TWO
He had been glaring at me for at least ten minutes from his perch at the far corner of the bar as he slouched over his drink. I was leaning casually against the wall off to the side and was about to say something when he beat me to it.
“What you lookin’ at, white boy?” the man asked, his voice slow and heavy with contempt and booze. “Is you crazy? She don’t want you, fool.”
Swell, I thought. Here we go.
I eyeballed his shabby attire, giving him a disapproving once-over twice. I rolled my eyes Eddie Cantor style. His truculence troubled me but I wasn’t about to let him choreograph this dance. I let out a little chuckle.
He was in work clothes that looked worked in, slept in, and lived in. I, on the other hand, was stylin’ and profilin’ with casual effulgence as I had strolled in the joint large and in charge on two-tone biscuit toe kicks that shined beneath the narrow cuffs of my pearl gray trousers. My leisure cut shirt kept it from being too dressy, and my hair was slicked back and up into a towering pompadour with a dangerous sheen. I had just shaved, so my mug was baby-bottom smoooooth. I was clean, Dad...and I knew it.
He looked at my duds in contempt and spat on the floor.
“Sheee-it,” he said. “Just ’cause you dressed like a brother don’t make you no brother.”
I looked back over to the bandstand and at the black beauty that I figured was at the heart of his animosity and our impending exchange. I looked back at him and slugged the rest of my beer before I replied. Of course, I knew what he meant, but I was feeling cocky. I played it dumb—always a smart move when looking to stall the situation and buy a few more moments to assess allies, locate exits, strategize, etc. I tugged at my goatee thoughtfully.
“You tellin’ me that sweet fine thing is your sister?” I asked. I mocked his accent. “Sheee-it, your mama did alright with that, yessir. What happened to you, pal? You look like a can of smashed assholes.”
I started to laugh.
He got up quick and started toward me with a snarl.
“Motherfucker,” he said.
I could tell by the way he slid heavily off his stool, over-compensating for his alcohol-diminished balance, he was going to swing a wide and wild punch at my head.
He swung a wide and wild punch at my head. It had potential, if he could land it, but I was sober and ready. He stood about six feet and was roughly my size. Dipsomania and displaced rage made him sloppy but still dangerous. I ducked and nailed him in the side. That took the air out of him and he went down with a groan. I kicked him solid in the same side I’d punched. Still, he rallied quick. He spun around on his side and kicked upwards catching me on the shin with the heel of his work boot. I stumbled back and fell into some chairs that scattered across the floor with a loud rattle and clack. I reclaimed my footing and went at him faking right and popped him with a left to the jaw. He charged at me and we both hit the wall, winded. He got lucky and landed one on the side of my head. I s
hook the stars away and came at him hard. He swung again and missed, punching the wall next to me. By now our pugilist polka was upstaging the band. They had stopped playing and joined the audience. I could sense I wasn’t the odds-on favorite. This jerk clearly had the home court advantage. No one was rooting for me. I looked up for a glimmer of support; nothing but angry black faces looked back at me. Still, nobody was jumping in to help my opponent either. They probably figured I was half-crazy just for walking in there to begin with. Maybe they knew he had a big mouth and liked to scrap, whatever his name was.
Somebody’s shout filled in the blank.
“Get him, Horace,” they said. The place started to get louder. The place started to get hotter. Horace lunged at me again and it was then that I decided that putting an end to this foolishness was going to be up to me. I faded to the side grabbing him by the ear and slammed his head onto the bar top. I squeezed his ear hard. He flailed his arms while spitting and spewing obscenities, grasping wildly at the air looking for a bottle, an ashtray, anything to hit me with. I pulled out my switchblade, and thumbed it open so fast I narrowly missed widening my back pocket. It flashed as I put it to his eye, the flat of the blade pressed against his sweaty cheek. I didn’t want it this way, but the sonofabitch pushed me to it. I got in his face. Those around us backed up, this was a delicate situation and nobody wanted me to slip, especially Horace. I applied more pressure to his ear and he yelped.
The old man running the joint had wild white hair that looked as if a cloud had landed on his head. He spoke up from beneath the cloud and behind the relative safety of the bar.
“I don’t want no trouble,” he said, gripping a baseball bat he was too skittish to swing. “T-take it outside, goddammit.” He banged the bat on the bar like a gavel, but the disorder in the court remained. He knew better than to call the cops. They wouldn’t come anyway. He was the last line between everyone inside and oblivion. The poor slob wasn’t up for the job.
“C’mon now,” he said. “You hear me?” I looked up at him and smiled. This startled him and he took a step back. A man with a knife and an angry scowl is scary enough; it’s a safe bet he means you harm and you act accordingly. A man with a knife just smiling at you, well, you just don’t know what to think. Just try it sometime. Let ’em think you’re crazy, it may save your life. I was counting on this maneuver saving mine.
I turned back to Horace.
“Look Hor-ass,” I hissed through my teeth. “I came in here for a cold beer and to dig the music. Not get hassled by the likes of you. I know she ain’t your sister and if I wanna make my play, that’s my business, you dig?”
He just stared wide-eyed and panting.
“Well? Brother?”
He nodded.
Nobody had made a move toward me but then again nobody had backed up any further either. I was still surrounded. I couldn’t back down now, but it was probably a good idea to wrap this up in a way that would have me leaving with the same amount of teeth I had walked in with. I screwed my face up into an inquisitive sneer/smirk combo.
“So what’s your poison, pal?” I asked.
“Huh?” he answered breathless, perplexed.
“What are you drinkin’? I’m buying you a drink.” He just stared back at me, wide-eyed.
“Well?”
“Scotch,” he said after a long pause. I relaxed my grip, snapped my knife shut and put it away, still wary of my surroundings. I straightened up the greasy collar on his shirt and patted him on the shoulder. The band had already started back in, the gawkers turned into walkers and those who had stared no longer cared. Within minutes our little fender bender was yesterday’s news. Just like that.
“Set ’em up,” I said to ol’ man Cumula Nimbus, who was still clutching his Louisville Slugger with white knuckles. “In fact leave the bottle.”
He was still a little wary of me. So was Horace.
“Why you wanna drink with me?” he finally asked.
“Because they don’t want us to,” I said.
“Who’s they?”
I waved in the general direction of the door.
“They, out there....they in here...they.”
It took us an hour or so but we raced each other to the bottom of that bottle, laughing and joking all the way down to the band’s velvety rhythm and blues backdrop, and were best friends by the time it was gone. Who would’ve thought? Two Yankees fans in the land of the Dodgers.
The band had knocked off for a short break and the barkeep flipped on the jukebox. He had finally put the bat down, but not away. It sat next to the busted cash register ready to do nothing all over again.
I left my new pal spent and content in a puddle of drool mumbling incoherent words to a tuneless melody at the bar. I stumbled outside.
I spied the singer sharing a smoke with a girlfriend. She was in that tight red dress that hugged those generous curves. It was a frame she didn’t seem afraid to flaunt; a frame I wasn’t afraid to want. Goddamn, she was plush.
As soon as I eyeballed her and her girlfriend standing alone, I tuned-up my stumble into a strut. I was a little drunk from sharing the whiskey peace pipe with Horace and did my best to walk a straight line over to them. Like a Lothario-come-lately, I offered to light their already lit, half-gone cigarettes. Her friend wasn’t quite as pretty...or nice. She just seemed annoyed.
“You think you’re cute,” she said. “Don’t you?”
I pointed at my face.
“Cute?” I asked. “You oughta see my baby pictures.”
She shot me a plastic smile. I stashed my Zippo as the angel in red dragged deep making her bust dangerously close to doing just that. Her breasts had the faint glint of perspiration. I couldn’t help but notice. She couldn’t help but notice me noticing. Her girlfriend noticed too, and let out with an exaggerated sigh. But before I could give her the courtesy of an appreciative glance, the red dress spoke up.
“Tina says that fight was over me,” she said while squashing her spent butt with the toe of her high heeled shoe. I thrust my hands in my pockets and rocked on my heels.
“Naw,” I said coolly, while staring at her feet. “Just a friendly misunderstanding.”
“Who won?”
“What’s it matter?” I said. “Nobody ever wins, anyway. But...in this case if someone had, what would the prize have been?” I flashed a demon grin and winked.
She blushed and looked at the sidewalk, pulling at one of the glossy curls that framed her face.
“Whatchya tryin’ to do, slick?” she asked coyly as her friend slinked off in a huff.
“I don’t try anything, darlin’,” I said. “I just do it. So you wanna go to a party?”
CHAPTER THREE
She was an unforgettable beauty and we had an unforgettable time. I just couldn’t remember her name. Eileen, Maxine? No, Irene? Maybe. Geraldine? I kept fishing around in my sore head for her name but drew a blank. Based on our primal pre-dawn romp, however, she knew mine...and so did the neighbors. Echoes of “Frankie” were still reverberating off the Hollywood Hills.
I slipped on my gold silk bathrobe with blue dragons on it and shuffled regally off to the kitchen with nothing but coffee on my mind. Marisol had just percolated a fresh pot. I poured myself a mug. I reached for the cream but decided to keep it black with a little sugar. I headed out to the patio by the pool. The way the sun hung in the sky told me it wasn’t quite noon as I sat down next to one of last night’s revelers crashed out face down on a deckchair. There was another stirring on the diving board and a completely naked couple intertwined on a chaise lounge under the shade of a large canopy, writhing in slow motion...oblivious, it was obvious. There were clothes and shoes littered everywhere—floating in the pool—along with all the glasses and bottles that glinted their testimony as to what had gone on. This had been some party. It had kicked off Friday night and it was now Monday morning.
But this was nothing. We did this almost every week.
When I say “we,
” I really mean the Captain. Once owned by one of my favorite toughguy actors, Charlie Benoit , this was the Captain’s crib now. I was one of his guests, one of the assorted characters he kept around for atmosphere.
This pad was a thoroughly modern affair. A swank and sprawling one-story spread with at least half a dozen bedrooms, a home theatre, a game room, music room, a huge kitchen, and an extended garage that housed at least one of everything, like an automotive Noah’s Ark.
The yard out back sprawled toward the vista of the valley below. An exquisite man-made waterfall spilled hypnotically into the giant boomerang-shaped pool, partially shaded by the white stucco pool house/outdoor bar. It was all surrounded by an immaculate Japanese garden and eight-foot walls beyond that to keep the inside safe and the outside out. It was another world. You couldn’t help but not luxuriate in the serenity of the Captain’s Casbah.
The Captain was a bit of a mystery. He was originally from southwest Georgia, where he ran a carnival that traveled throughout the American south.
I had assumed he got the title “Captain”—whenever he got it—from the ever-present nautical cap on his dome. He lived in that thing; it never left his head. Evening wear or leisure wear, it was all topped off by his seafaring lid. But “Captain” was more an honorary carny tag than actual military rank.
His background in the ballyhoo was why he surrounded himself with and had an affinity for folks of dubious and colorful talents, especially those in the flesh arts, namely strippers.
Besides the lid, the Captain had the habit of chewing, never actually lighting up, Cuban cigars—figurados to be exact. And despite his imposing size, loud personality, and ex-golden gloves status from his younger days, he was terribly afraid of spiders.
Needless to say, the Captain was a bit of an eccentric cat; an eccentric cat who was loaded. He financed various artistic endeavors that would have otherwise gone unfunded due to their salacious nature and questionable benefit to polite society. Like the stuff produced by my pal and reason I was out west in the first place, the wayward auteur Mickey Miller. Mickey and I grew up together in Rochester and ran in the same circles, though Mickey’s artistic output was more dubious.