Skin Deep

by Timothy Hallinan

  "You can hold me if I start to cry again. You can wake me up if I scream in my sleep. I'm not asking for community property, for Christ's sake. But that was Amber."

  "And who was Amber?" I stopped at the red light at the top of the hill. It was either right or left from here on, either east toward Nana's or west toward Topanga and home. Amber's death hadn't slowed the planet's revolution any, and four a.m. was rolling toward us.

  "Amber was Amber. She was fucked up, like the rest of us, and trying to get straight, like the rest of us. Don't do this to us now, okay?"

  "Don't do what?" The DONT WALK sign had started blinking, its apostrophe a casualty of bureaucratic economy.

  "Don't start acting like you're dense, even if you are a man. You're not that much a man, and I'm not that much a woman. We both know."

  "Know what?"

  "That it's hard either way. Maybe it's impossible either way. Maybe it's all luck, and you either have luck or you don't. If you don't, maybe you end up like Amber. Or like me. Maybe you decide to check out."

  The light flickered and changed to green. Nana put her hand on my wrist and dug at the skin with her nails. I turned left and pointed Alice toward the ocean, toward home. Nana sighed. The pressure behind her fingers eased.

  "Like your father," I said.

  "What?" Sunset was empty. The moon had gone down long ago, taking with it most of the Hollywood lights.

  "Your father."

  She rubbed her head slowly against my shoulder, and then she laughed. "My father. Dear old dad." She laughed again. It wasn't the most pleasant laugh I'd ever heard. "Dead old dad."

  I slowed the car. "It isn't true," I said. "He didn't hang himself."

  "Sheer wish fulfillment." She stroked my arm again. "You were in trouble, remember?"

  "So he's alive."

  "Alive and kicking. Kicking everybody in sight."

  "You made all that up, that whole story. Cutting him down and everything. The magic."

  "Oh, no. He really did use to do magic, when he was drunk."

  I didn't say anything.

  "Come on, Simeon, I told that story because you were chewing on your shoe."

  "I already said thanks. Is there anything else I'm not supposed to believe?"

  "I don't care what you believe. No, that's wrong, I do care. If you have to decide right now what to believe, if you can't wait a day or two, then believe that my father makes Toby's dad look like Santa Claus. My fifth-grade teacher told me once that a bad lie always comes true. You can't imagine how many people I've told that my father is dead."

  "What did he do to you?"

  "That doesn't matter. Anyway, he's not dead, remember? He's still trying to do it."

  "Do what?"

  She looked out the window. "How about we let that wait?"

  "We're letting a lot of things wait."

  She attempted a laugh again. It was less real, but more pleasant, than her last try. "Please," she said. "Let a girl keep a little mystery."

  Sunset curved sinuously to the left, and I willed Alice to follow the dotted line. She obeyed, with the usual groan of protest from the rear axle. Two or three miles piled up behind us in a tidy, linear fashion before either of us spoke. I turned on the radio, and some deluded disk jockey threw Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" at us. It seemed like the only song I'd heard in months.

  Nana beat me to the volume control, and silence reigned again. "Don't judge me," she said. "Don't pass any cheap judgments. Not yet, at least."

  "I'm in the judgment business. I don't always like it, but that's what I do. I can't buy the feminine mystique. As far as I'm concerned, mystery is just sloppy business. It only means that someone hasn't asked the right questions."

  She made an impatient gesture. "Questions. Can't you leave it alone for a while?"

  "If you're satisfied to put Amber into the ground without talking about it, I can leave it alone."

  "We weren't talking about Amber. We were talking about me."

  "You're part of it. You and Amber had the same job. If I understand you a little better, maybe I'll understand Amber, too." I wasn't being entirely truthful. "She's not around to tell me about herself. I thought you wanted me to do something about Amber."

  "I want somebody to burn at the stake," she said flatly.

  "Then stop being Mata Hari. If you're not going to talk to me, tell me so. I don't want to hear about the feminine mystique. Like you said, it's hard either way, whether you're a man or a woman. So as one screwed-up human being to another, tell me the truth."

  "I am telling you the truth."

  "As far as it goes."

  "If I tell you the truth," she said, "who knows how far it's going to go? Damn, Simeon. Maybe there are some things I don't want to tell you. If I want to hide something here and there, then let me. Maybe it hasn't got anything to do with Amber. What if there are things I'm ashamed to tell you?"

  "Why?"

  "Boy, you're simple sometimes. Maybe I care about something that doesn't have anything to do with Amber."

  "Like what?"

  "Like me. Like you, maybe."

  "Nana, this is a job."

  She straightened abruptly. "I am not a job."

  "Okay," I said, "so you're not a job. So sit on your secrets. Keep them warm. Maybe they'll hatch into nightmares." Another mile passed, and she didn't say anything. I yawned. "Long night," I said conversationally.

  "Don't make small talk."

  "I'm not allowed to make any other kind."

  She passed her fingernails lightly over the back of my hand.

  "Think it'll rain tomorrow?" I said.

  She settled herself resignedly into the seat. "I'm sure it will."

  "Who do you think will win the Republican primary?"

  "Somebody who dresses in feathers and gobbles."

  "What's your favorite color?"

  "Only men have favorite colors. Women choose colors that reflect their aura, and every fool knows that a woman's aura is always changing."

  "What do you use to polish your aura?"

  "Spit," she said. "Spit and saddle wax. What do you use on yours?"

  "I have a no-polish aura. It's new from Du Pont."

  She stretched like a cat and rolled her head back and forth. She had an extraordinarily long throat. "Do you really have to ask me questions?" she said.

  "Only if I want answers."

  "Okay," she said in a businesslike tone. "I started dancing because I had this girlfriend who was doing it and she kept asking me to. I was sixteen and a half, and my father had chased me out of the house a year before. He chased me all the way from Killeen to Hollywood. Killeen is a service town, lots of guys who used to be in Korea and lots of Korean women who were married to them. I got to Hollywood, got a fake ID, and started working at a bookstore, but I wasn't making any money. And then my girlfriend, who had become my roommate, started in on me. I knew the girls weren't whores or anything because I knew my roommate, and she was a nice girl. She still is a nice girl. I made a hundred and forty dollars a week at the bookstore, and they knocked off an hour if I went to lunch, so I didn't go to lunch. I was hungry all the time. The first night I danced, place down near the airport, I made three hundred and ninety, in cash. One guy tipped me a hundred bucks. I was the only Oriental girl in the club, and I guess I was a novelty."

  "I didn't ask you how you started dancing."

  "You were going to. Weren't you?"

  "Sooner or later. Why did Amber start dancing?"

  "She had a boyfriend who was supposed to be a writer. He was working on the great American haiku or something. Well, naturally, he couldn't do that, juggle all seventeen of those syllables and hold down a job, too. So he moved in with Amber and let her take care of him by dancing while he slaved every day over a hot typewriter."

  "How was the haiku?"

  "Who knows? He never finished it. Probably never started it. From what people tell me, he spent most of his time looking for something to stuff up
his nose."

  "Is he still around? You didn't mention him to the cops."

  "Long gone. He picked the cutest way to move out. Amber went down to San Diego one afternoon to dance a party, and she stayed the night because they finished so late. When she got home the next day, she found some of her furniture in the front yard, and the door to the house was wide open. There was nothing inside, and I mean not a dish towel. He'd had a yard sale while she was gone. Sold all her stuff and split."

  I negotiated a curve. "Sensitive guy."

  "You know artists."

  "When was this?"

  "A couple years ago. Right about the time I came to the Spice Rack."

  "I thought Amber was Tiny's."

  "What a Southern way of putting it."

  "Maybe you could put your feminist umbrage on ice for a while so we could discuss the issues."

  "She was pretty wiped out after el creepo split. I guess she thought she loved the jerk. Tiny came to the rescue, took care of her, let her move in with him, and picked up after her for six months or so. It could have been longer. I don't think he even fooled around with her. He just wanted to get her straight."

  "It's hard to imagine Amber straight."

  "She never really doped until Claude left. Claude, that was the creep's name. Jesus, I thought I'd forgotten it. Oh, you know, she coked once in a while to get her up so she could go on stage. Most of the girls do something. They have to."

  "She had more tracks than the New York subway system."

  "That was later. I don't think she ever shot up until she was living at Tiny's."

  "Have you ever shot up?"

  "We're not talking about Amber now," she said.

  "No," I admitted.

  "I tried it once. Somebody had to do it for me because I was afraid of the needle. I couldn't even look. I was sick for days."

  "Lucky you."

  "For once."

  "So who hated Amber?"

  "Nobody. Why would anyone hate her? Most days she couldn't put on her nail polish, much less hurt anyone. She danced to make money so she could do smack, and she did smack so she could dance. There wasn't much in between."

  "No other men?"

  "Not after Tiny. She got enough of men in the club."

  "Do most of the girls have boyfriends?"

  "Most of them have pimps," she said shortly.

  "I thought they weren't whores."

  "They have guys who pocket the money their girlfriends make dancing naked in front of other men. That's a pimp, as far as I'm concerned."

  "Did Amber ever make a move on another girl's boyfriend?"

  This was a new thought, and she looked out the window. "You think a woman could have done that to her? Broken her fingers like that?"

  "It depends. If the woman was strong and Amber was wasted enough, why not? She was pretty thrashed earlier this evening."

  "She was totaled. If she was a car, you would have had her hauled. But I don't think a woman could have done it."

  "That's what they said about Lizzie Borden. An axe isn't a woman's weapon. Now who's stereotyping?"

  "Naw. It's her fingers." She shuddered against me. "Whoever did that really hates women. Like Toby does."

  We had come to the end of Sunset, and I turned north up the Pacific Coast Highway toward Topanga. The ocean was invisible to our left, suggested here and there by the mooring lights of a sailboat that bobbed up and down on the water's dark skin, the people in it asleep and dreaming of freedom.

  "So did Amber ever fool around with anyone's boyfriend?"

  "Simeon, I've told you. She never did anything except dance and try to find a vein. Honey, can we make a deal? You leave me alone now, and I'll talk to you tomorrow till your ears fall off. Right now, all I want is a soft bed and a warm shoulder. Give me about ten hours, okay?"

  "I've got Toby tomorrow, too."

  "You can handle us both."

  "I'm not so sure. I haven't handled much so far."

  She put her head on my shoulder and made a drowsy sound. "Stupid," it sounded like. The PCH was wide and dark and empty. After a few minutes I turned right up into the mountains, and we left the deep sleep of the sea behind us.

  When we finally reached the top I shook her awake. With her hand in mine, I led her up the steep, unpaved driveway, steering her around the more cavernous ruts until we got to the house. The lights were on, courtesy of the electric timer, but darkness masked the grimmer dilapidation of the exterior. I opened the back door, and Nana stumbled in sleepily.

  "Cozy," she said, her eyes half-open. "Where's the bedroom?"

  "Well," I said, "there are only three rooms, and you can see the living room and the kitchen. So it must be the other one."

  She focused. "Through that door," she said.

  "You should give some thought to a career in private investigation."

  "Tomorrow. You coming?"

  "In a minute. Just go get comfortable."

  She nodded drowsily and headed toward bed.

  I gave some water to the birds, who didn't acknowledge it, and did a little fruitless tidying up. The red light on my answering machine blinked at me, heralding yet another thwarted attempt at human communication. I got a beer, pushed the playback button, and sat on the rug.

  Calls one and two were from Toby. He wanted me to call when I got home, he said in the first one. He gave his number, as if I hadn't already called him once that evening.

  In the second message he said he was going to sleep, but that I could call and wake him up if I wanted to make sure he hadn't gone anywhere. The third call wasn't from Toby.

  "Hello, Simeon," Eleanor's voice said. "It's almost three in the morning. I couldn't sleep, and I wondered if you couldn't, too. Since you're not answering, I guess you can. . . . Um, I hate talking to this machine. Do you want to have dinner tomorrow night, or Sunday? If you do, call me in the morning. But not too early, please. I may get to sleep yet. I'm going to close my eyes and imagine myself enveloped in a bright white light. Or something. Bye-bye." There was a final-sounding click, and then a dial tone hummed across the wire.

  I finished my beer. The narrow, safe life I'd led with Eleanor seemed as remote as an earlier incarnation. The curtains she had made for the house still hung on the windows, but nothing else tangible was left.

  I gave the empty bottle a push, and it rolled under a table. I'd get it in the morning, I promised myself. Trying not to think about much of anything, I went into the bedroom.

  Nana was lying on top of the blankets, fully clothed and fast asleep. I eased the blankets out from under her and covered her with them. She didn't even murmur. Then I closed the window next to the bed and looked down at her. She was breathing evenly, and she looked about fifteen.

  There was a spare blanket folded at the foot of the bed. I grabbed it, turned off the lights, and went back out to the living room.

  8 - The Morning After

  Saturday may have dawned rosy-fingered, but I missed it.

  When I finally swam reluctantly toward consciousness, it was already ten o'clock. Birds—not my birds, but their more energetic colleagues outdoors—were singing melodiously to warn each other to stay the hell out of their territory. I gave my lips an exploratory lick. My tongue felt like some supernatural prankster had sneaked in during the night and inserted it into one of those sheepskin seat covers that sports car drivers for some reason covet. A dull and monotonous brass bell clanged regularly in my forebrain. Samuel Johnson, who had something to say about everything, once said that when one woke up one should get up, and when one got up, one should do something. I weighed a very short list of the things I could possibly do and chose the bathroom. I figured I could lift my toothbrush.

  Normally, I like waking up alone. I'm used to it. Of all the civilized skills, the power of speech is the last one to drop in on me each day. After I hung up the brush, wiped the rabid-looking foam from my chin, and turned off the water, I listened gratefully to the sound of Nana snoring daintily fro
m the bedroom. I was happy that she wasn't up and around and bombarding me with snappy chatter, but those were pretty cloggy snores. I wondered whether someone had helped her to Toby's prized pink while Toby wasn't watching.

  I spit out some Listerine and looked up. My face in the mirror looked like my face. I searched it for a moment and then turned the cold water back on and splashed myself to wash away the sleep. I keep waiting for some cataclysm to change my face. No dice. The only thing that seems to change the way I look is the patient accumulation of years. No matter what happens, nothing seems to make it to the surface, any more than the dirt of Toby's life left any unscoured stains on the all-American billboard of his grin.

  Feeling a little better, or at least a little cleaner, I went in and checked out the living room. It was a wreck. It looked like Grendel's lair, except that in place of the gnawed human bones Grendel and his mother scattered around after their nightly Viking shish kebab were more commonplace odds and ends: a woman's hairbrush I didn't recognize, an ashtray full of somebody else's cigarettes, and dust rats curled languidly under the furniture. I hid the hairbrush under a couch cushion, studied the lump it made, and resolved to see what was causing the other lumps at some time in the near future.

  Eleanor, my ex-girlfriend, was born to tame furniture. She'd managed to keep the place presentable during our years together, but I'd given up the effort, waiting for the occasional girlfriend to drop by with a sponge and a roll of paper towels. It had been weeks since that had happened. I was definitely not next in line for the cover of Architectural Digest.

  Since I had time to putter, I puttered. Wrapping a towel around my middle, I gave some more water to the birds. Birds go through a lot of water. To my surprise, I was rewarded by a grateful cheep from Hansel. At least, I thought it was Hansel. With birds, who can tell? After last night, I wasn't even sure I could tell with people. Who, for example, was Toby? Or, hitting literally closer to home, who was Nana?

  I realized I was gazing dully down into the birds' watering trough, roused myself, and headed for coffee. For what seemed like several hours I leaned against the kitchen counter, averting my eyes from the landscape of my life while I waited to hear water boiling. I managed to pour the water over the grounds without fatal consequences, found a relatively clean cup, and let the whole deal drip directly into it.