by Mike Miner
Our Man Julian
by Nikki Dolson
Two weeks after his diagnosis, Julian strode into the bank, the tip of his cane clacking on the marble tiles. He nodded at the security guard, a man in his mid-fifties with a mean-looking gun holstered on his hip. All guns looked mean to Julian. They were designed to inflict pain, to cause fear. Julian understood their uses. You couldn't be black and have lived through Jim Crow without understanding the purpose of a gun. Guns were not for him.
Julian was an entertainer. His purpose was to try to make his audience understand those unlike themselves. He'd played thugs, wife-beaters, doctors, technicians, mechanics—and quite a few pimps. He'd been the dead body in the room too. Now he would be the old black man trying to open a checking account. He was harmless, armed with nothing more dangerous than his cane and two cell phones.
Julian had reached the peak of his talent in the seventies acting in movies, the kind they called blaxploitation. He never became a star like Richard Roundtree or Pam Grier, but he'd done okay. He'd made some money—more from the behind-the-scenes deals he cut than the movie roles, but he'd done well enough to put away a nice amount and still send money home to his mother. The rest of the money went to fueling his recreational fun.
And he'd had fun. He'd been a fool and reckless, he'd learned to admit that much. After 1973, he sent a large portion of his money to the women who were pregnant with his children.
There was Gwen, who had refused the money saying she didn't need it or him. But Julian insisted, telling her that once her family found out that their pretty blonde daughter was carrying a black man's child they wouldn't be so accommodating of her situation. He'd been right, and she hated him all the more for it. She was furious with him and heartbroken when she'd found about the other impending baby.
The other woman, Leandra, was a stone-cold woman, no doubt about that. She had a calmer head. She took the money and promised to give the child his last name, Morningside. Julian had seen the name written on the side of a building the day the bus he was on pulled into L.A. and he'd loved the idea of it.
The morning side of life. The good side. Everything looks better in the morning, he'd thought. He changed his name that day from Adams, respectable but common, to Morningside. At his first audition he introduced himself as Julian Morningside.
The day after Julian's doctor visit was a Tuesday and as always his friend Maxwell showed up to play dominoes and drink beer. Julian hadn't wanted the company and almost called to cancel, but forgot. His head was filled with images of his daughters' faces and figuring out insurance co-pays. Just the initial outlay of money required to possibly save his life would wipe out the last of his savings.
When Julian opened the door, the sight of Maxwell, all of five-foot-five in height, scowling up at him through the fronds of one of Julian's larger plants, killed the lie on his tongue. Maxwell always had a comment about Julian's front yard, and hearing the man grumble was often the best part of the visit.
"Why would you have plants that look like they want to eat you?" Maxwell said, giving the offending plant—known as Delicious Monster because of the fruit it bore and the prehistoric widths of its leaves—side eye as he pushed past it to enter the house. "Fucking Jurassic Park shit."
Julian liked the feeling of isolation the plants gave the house. They muffled the sound of the freeway that flowed through the tunnel beneath the neighborhood and exited ten yards over from his place. The whole front yard was filled with trees and plants with massive leaves and fronds that hid the front of the house. Julian had spent quite a bit on the plants a decade ago. Now they had matured, and once a month the son of the guy who had sold him the plants stopped by to check on them.
Maxwell was a sore loser, but he liked to talk. He talked about his son and his ex-wife and Jasmine, the pregnant girlfriend, and how all of them were expensive: college, alimony, gifts. "They all want a piece of me, man. I just want be old."
Julian laughed at him. "Your son calls you three times a week like you're a church he needs to visit to keep himself on the straight and narrow. He loves you and hates that he has to be a better man than you. You are your own problem."
Maxwell shrugged. "Like you ain't done nothing."
"I have daughters, one who wants nothing to do with me and the other who would never side against her to be nearer me. All I want is to have something to give them when I pass. Damn housing bubble. This place won't be worth anything by the time it's theirs."
"What I'm saying is that you don't have the kind of monthly dues I have. I live in a crappy apartment and you got the Land of the Lost in your front yard and a badass jacuzzi in your back yard." Maxwell slapped his domino down, completing his house and ending the game.
Between the first cancer treatment and the IRS threatening jail for overdue taxes, Julian had run through the bulk of his savings five years ago. He was lucky the girls hadn't wanted him to pay for college. He was afraid of becoming a burden to them. He was sure that Thessaly, despite her disappointment in him, would take it upon herself to make sure he was cared for, even if it meant doing it herself. Julietta, his insider, was the one who sent him pictures once a year. When she was little, she told him whenever her mother was thinking about cutting him off from her or taking him back to court. Julietta would follow Thessaly's lead.
He was proud of his girls. Their mothers had effectively steered them away from acting and Hollywood. His daughters lived in Vegas. Julietta worked as a secretary for a lawyer, and Thessaly was a civil engineer. He occasionally wondered if Etta was really a showgirl in one of those shows where they only wore rhinestones and heels and just couldn't bear to tell him the truth. She was tall enough for it; five-foot-ten in her bare feet.
For Thessaly, it was her mother's genes that held her height back. At barely five-foot-two, she'd always been sensitive about people looking down at her. But she had her mother's coloring—her skin a high golden brown and her eyes a very light brown, attributes that had drawn boys to her like moths when she was in high school and college.
But she had rules, and boys who only played football or baseball didn't interest her. He wondered now if Thessaly had love in her life. Etta would regale him with her dating stories, but all he heard about Thessaly was how many hours she put in at work and some large public works project she headed up. He wondered if engineering fed some part of her like making movies had fed him when he was younger. Even if it did, Thessaly would need love, companionship in her later years. It had taken Julian decades to figure that out for himself. Now he only had Maxwell.
"You know, I might have something for you," Maxwell said now as he mixed the tiles then divvied them up between them. "I was going to do it, but Jasmine is due any day now and she swears she doesn't want me there. But I just know it's gonna happen soon and I gotta be there for the newest Robison to be born."
After Maxwell left, Julian stood at the end of his driveway looking down at the note he'd been given with a room number and address for a motel in La Jolla. Maxwell wouldn't tell him what the "something" might be. Julian let his gaze wander to the end of the street where a chain-link fence was all that stood to stop a fall onto the freeway. When they were little, the girls would stand there and loop their skinny fingers through the links. He'd walked up behind them once and listened to them talk as they watched the cars and wondered aloud where the drivers were heading. Then where they would go when they were old enough.
"Alaska," Thessaly offered.
"Nah, Antarctica," Julietta insisted.
"I think we'd need an icebreaker to get there," Thessaly said. She was the detailer. Etta would dream big and Thessaly would research and plan.
"Is that a boat?"
"A ship."
"A real big one?" Julietta asked.
"Not sure."
"Sounds like a big ship."
"We can check the Britannica in Daddy's house."
Etta shrugged. "But you'll come with me?"
"Yep. First Antarctica then Alaska, okay?"
"Okay."
In his head they were always this age, not more than six—innocent and above all, happy to see him every visit. He'd let them down over the years. Telling them he was coming for a visit then letting something change his plans (usually it was a woman, for a couple years it was stuff harder to shake).
But he kept to the custody schedule no matter what: Christmas breaks on the odd years and spring breaks on the even, and the month of July every year. He always tried to be sober for their visits. He never brought a woman home during his time with them. The three of them spent a lot of happy times on this block. Then they grew up and his best wasn't good enough to keep them from being angry about his choices. Their mothers had gone on, married other people and provided his girls with better lives than he had. Julian needed to leave them something, and the only thing he had was the house. The idea of his death didn't faze him, but knowing he could go and leave them nothing broke his heart. Without a better plan he'd end up mortgaging it to afford the hospital bills. He needed another option.
The man on the other side of the motel door was in his late twenties. Michael was barrel-chested, had a shaved head and a neck tattoo of something Julian couldn't quite make out. Its curved lines inched up over the collar of his white button-down shirt and reminded Julian of whales breaching water. Last time he'd seen whales, the girls had been ten or eleven and they'd all been on a boat together, each girl gripping one of his hands and grinning so hard he thought their faces would never recover.
"You're Julian. Come in."
Julian stepped into the room and glanced around. Bed, dresser, table with two chairs and one closed door where the bathroom should be. Julian didn't think they were actually alone. Michael sat on the edge of the bed. "You were in Shaft."
Julian frowned. Few ever recognized him, none as young as the light-skinned boy in front of him.
"Yeah, Max mentioned you were some big-time actor. Looked you up, saw you were in Shaft and I had to watch that shit again. I haven't seen that since I was little. You know when they'd show the real violent stuff on late-late night? My mom, she worked night shift and I'd spend the whole night watching TV and listening to people fight and fuck in the apartment next door."
"Shaft was a long time ago." It'd been a small role. He'd been on screen all of five minutes before he died, but he hadn't ended up on the editing room floor, so it counted.
"Sure was. Look, I need someone to go somewhere and tell me when a certain man shows up. Simple as that."
"Simple."
"Simple, man."
Julian sighed. He sat in one of the chairs and arranged his long limbs more comfortably. "I can do that. It's hardly a stretch of acting skills. Details are needed though."
"If I tell you, you're in. Stand me up and you better be dead."
Julian gave a little nod. Michael said, "Rigby." And the door to the bathroom opened. A man—young like Michael, but white—emerged. He was short, thin with a head of blond hair in desperate need of a cut. He rolled a toothpick back and forth between his lips while he looked at Julian.
"He in?" Rigby asked.
"He is. Julian, this is Rigby. We all are gonna rob a bank."
Julian stood up.
Rigby laughed and said, "Relax, old man, we aren't doing it today."
Julian hadn't stood up because he'd been shocked by the news of their goal. It was because of the idea that came to him in that very moment. The lightning strike. His salvation. His solution. If they didn't die in this endeavor, which he knew was likely, prison was now a destination between him and his imminent death. In prison, he'd be treated for his cancer until the very end. His girls wouldn't have to spend a dime or a minute of time on him. All he had to worry about was the house. He had to make sure they got it and not the state.
"How much is my cut?" Julian wanted to know, settling again in the chair. The idea twisted around in his head.
"Ten grand. Half up front."
"I need all of it now." Michael's square jaw shifted, but he said nothing. Julian said, "Look, if this goes as planned, no big deal. But if anything goes off-plan, maybe I don't come back. I have debts to settle."
Rigby said, "Bullshit."
"And I need to know how much time I have before this happens."
Rigby paced. Michael looked at Julian for a long moment. "At least a week, maybe more."
Julian called Julietta that night. Her voice was heavy with sleep when she answered. "Dad? You okay?"
Julian said, "I sure am, now that I'm talking to you."
She giggled and asked him to hold on. He listened to her get out of bed. She got back on the phone and they discussed nothing. The weather. New shoes she bought. Her sister's desire for a dog. Then Julian came to the point of his call.
"I need…no, I want to sign over the house to the both of you."
"What's wrong?" Her voice fluttered up high.
"Etta, relax. Nothing's wrong. I'm old, honey, I won't be here forever."
"Daddy," she said.
"I want you girls to have this house. I bought it for you two anyway. A place where we could all be together. We had good times here didn't we?" Julian heard her sniffle. "Sweetheart, I just want you girls to have this place. Inheritance taxes might keep it from you."
"It's just a house, Daddy. We want you." Etta sighed. "But I'll get her to sign whatever you need."
Three days later, he registered the signed and notarized document with the state. The house was theirs. That night he slept better than he had in years.
Julian entered the bank five minutes after it opened. He signed his name and waited in one of their almost-comfortable chairs for customer service to call his name.
The pain in his side was not constant, but it was letting him know it was there; slowly growing, still unchecked, an advancing army in his undefended body. There would be surgery then chemotherapy. He'd barely survived the last bout with cancer, and he'd been fit and sober then. Sixty-five years old, but in better shape—more like a man of fifty, his doctor had said. He spent three days in a coma after his colon surgery. They didn't know why he didn't wake straight away. Then they had to stop the chemo because he wasn't strong enough for it. They'd wait. Do more tests. He'd start feeling like a person again, and then it would begin again. Months and months of see-sawing the medications trying to figure out how to save him. He didn't look forward to doing it again.
Julian was pulled from his thoughts by a soft voice. "Mr. Morningside?"
The woman—a beautiful woman by his quick estimation, olive-skinned, dark hair and darker eyes—watched him closely as he rose. He saw the look and he cursed himself. He was so rarely recognized these days, but she was near his age bracket—at least within fifteen years of him, he thought. She'd be the right age to have seen his movies when they were big. Some people remembered him as the young black cop who died at Sidney Poitier's feet in They Call Me Mister Tibbs. Most remembered him as the second pimp Pam Grier shot for getting her sister hooked on heroin in Coffy. Few actually knew his name though. He extended his hand to her. "That's me."
Her hand was soft and cool to the touch. He released her, but she held on a moment longer as she looked at his face. She invited him to have a seat in her cubicle. The sway of her hips was impressive. He watched one hip swing her skirt close to the edge of the desk, and the next step brought her skirt brushing against the fabric-covered wall of the cubicle. He couldn't tell if she walked that way naturally or if she was turning it up for him.
"You don't remember me, do you?" She sat down across from him with a smirk on her face.
"How long ago are we talking?" He leaned his cane against her desk.
"The wrap party for Night in the City."
Julian blinked. That'd been his movie. A retelling of Hamlet. It was going to be his breakout role. He'd had two kids on the way and the world, he thought, was finally opening up for him as an actor. Deep down in the secret corners of his heart, he'd harbored the wish to be as good as Sidney Poit
ier, his one great idol. Night in the City was going to make him something. Then the NAACP went on record deploring blaxploitation pictures and the money dried up for independent distribution and no studio would buy it after. Suddenly every studio was wary of movies with all-black casts. But all that disappointment would come later. The wrap party that night was a blur of bodies and alcohol and drugs and Julian had been king of it.
"Sorry, I don't. I mean I was pretty full of myself in those days. I probably spent a lot of time with a lot of girls—women, I mean, back then." Julian winced.
She laughed. "It's fine. You were very kind to me. We made out for a little bit and then you were off with another girl and I floated out of there higher than any drug could've made me that night. I was twenty-two and you were a fine-looking actor."
"Did I at least get your name back then?"
"I don't remember. But let's do this: Hello, Mr. Morningside. My name is Sonia Landry. What can Bank West do for you today?"
She told him about the accounts available, interest versus no-interest and the fees that would apply. Her scent—lavender and something else, something earthy—drifted across the desk to him, making him lean closer. Each time he looked up from the brochure in front of him, he found her watching him steadily. Julian forgot himself. He mentioned Thessaly's childhood obsession with counting. Then they were discussing kids.
"Do you have pictures? I have a son, Hector."
Julian removed his phone from his inner jacket pocket and shuffled through the photos to find the picture Etta sent him last New Year's Eve. She and Thessaly dressed up in short skirts, heels, and were sparkling from head to toe. He handed Sonia the phone.
She looked closely at the photo then handed the phone back. "They're beautiful."
"Like I said, I was full of myself back then. I did a lot of things I shouldn't have but I was lucky. I have my girls."
Julian had completely forgotten his task until a man called out good morning to Sonia and she glanced up and waved. "Morning, Mr. Alvarez."