The Virgin of Flames

by Chris Abani

  He shook his head, pulling his hand back. “No. The answer for me lies here,” he said, showing her the photo around his neck. “In my childhood.”

  “Black, love, don’t you know childhood, at least the way most of us remember it, is a violence we do to ourselves? How come you aren’t looking at the journey you made from there to here? There is no core to anything, Black. It’s like an onion; if you just keep peeling away, you will disappear. There is only the you you’re becoming or have become. You’re going about this all wrong, Black. It’s everything, not one thing. Everything and then the cracks in between; especially the cracks in between!”

  “What am I going to do, Iggy?”

  “Well, Ray-Ray’s sick and I need a barista. Wanna job? I hear you owe a lot of rent.”

  “Yes, but could I start tomorrow? I have some errands to take care of.”

  “Always avoiding things, aren’t you, Black?”

  “Shit, Iggy, you sound like Gabriel.”

  “Sure, whatever,” she said. “It won’t harm us to close for one day. I need the rest anyway.”

  “Thanks, Iggy,” Black said, checking his watch. “I’d better go. See you tomorrow?”

  “Sure,” she said, as she watched him head for the back door. Just before he disappeared behind the Anubis statue she called after him. “Black? Sweet Girl called for you. I left her number on your door.”

  His reply was muffled.

  twenty-seven

  fluttering.

  In the draught coming in from the window at the end of the corridor was the yellow Post-it stuck to the door with Sweet Girl’s number. He reached up and peeled it off. Shutting the door firmly behind him, he went over to the stove in the corner and was about to turn on a burner for some tea, but he reconsidered. He needed something stronger. Opening a cabinet in the small kitchenette, he took out a bottle of Jack Daniels that was about a fifth gone. Not bothering with a glass, he took a swig directly from the bottle. The red dye on his hands came off on the bottle and for a moment he was puzzled, thinking perhaps he’d cut himself. Realizing it was just paint, he washed his hands in the sink.

  He paced the room. By the door he noticed that he had gotten some red dye on Iggy’s wedding dress. Swearing under his breath, he took it down and carried it into the bathroom. Running water in the bath, he laid the dress reverentially, as though it were alive. Squeezing some scented body wash into the water, he tried washing out the red dye, relaxing as the warm smell of soap filled the bathroom. Having no luck, he rinsed it, hung it out to dry over the shower curtain and returned to the living room and the pacing, stopping occasionally to breathe deeply from his cupped hands.

  He should call Sweet Girl. Why was he delaying? What was he afraid of? He sat. He knew what he was afraid of. He was afraid that he would be disappointed. He already was. A little. Somehow the distant adoration of her was more rewarding than this intimacy. He put on the television. The fires were still burning and everything was covered in a layer of ash. It was falling as hard as rain in cities closer to the fires. In Los Angeles, the newscaster said, it was still only a drizzle. Then she made a joke about hoping it didn’t rain, otherwise there would be black rain. Black watched her intently, studying the manufactured normality of her. Sexy in the way teachers were, but prim and proper enough to make it seem wrong: a delicious mix. He lit a cigarette and studied her more closely, trying to memorize things about her. With a sigh, he returned to thoughts of Sweet Girl. He should call. He picked up the phone and dialed quickly before he could change his mind.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey there.”

  “Black?”

  “Yes.”

  “What kind of name is that for someone, eh? Negro,” Sweet Girl said and laughed.

  “You love mocking me, don’t you?” Black said. His voice was strained.

  “Oh, come now, don’t be so sensitive,” Sweet Girl purred.

  Pause.

  “So Iggy tells me you called.”

  “Iggy? Oh, you mean Barbara,” Sweet Girl said. “Why do you call her Iggy?”

  “Because she is. So what’s up?”

  “Nothing.”

  “But you called.”

  Sweet Girl was silent for a while and Black wanted to kick himself. Why was he being so aggressive?

  “I just wanted to talk to you,” she said finally. “Don’t you want to talk to me?”

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “So, how’s your day been?”

  “Oh, so-so.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I beat the hell out of George Bush.”

  “What?”

  “I’m sorry. You had to be there.”

  “Clearly.”

  Another long silence.

  “You’re not very good at this, are you?”

  Black chuckled.

  “I guess not.”

  “I won’t keep you.”

  “Okay.”

  Pause.

  “Why don’t you come by the club later.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay.”

  “I could leave early. We could go get some dinner.”

  “Okay.”

  “Or I could come meet you somewhere.”

  Pause.

  “Black?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You know the deal, right?”

  He wanted to say, Sure I know the deal. You don’t really fraternize with the clientele. This is just a bit of fun. You are a lesbian. I know the deal. Instead he said:

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. Black?”

  “Yes?”

  “I like you.”

  Pause.

  “I’ll see you tonight,” he said, hanging up. He took another swig of whiskey, changed the channel to some reality show where people were getting plastic surgery and settled down for a mindless afternoon, but not before throwing a bunch of clothing lying on the workbench over the phone to muffle it. It didn’t have a volume button and he didn’t want to be disturbed. He must have dozed off.

  There was a knock on the door. Black sat up. It was late. There was another knock. It wasn’t hard, but soft. There was silence, then the sound of feathers dragging down a wall. Getting up, careful so that the couch springs wouldn’t squeak, he walked to the door and peered out of the peep-hole. Gabriel walked down the hallway and turned at the bottom to head up the stairs that led to the roof.

  “Fuck!” Black said. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

  This was really freaking him out. He was being stalked by an angel. Then his phone was ringing. He walked over to the worktable and moved some articles of clothing looking for the phone. He finally found it under a pair of Iggy’s white panties that he had stolen from the laundry room. He held them up to his nose and inhaled before answering.

  “Hey, baby.”

  It was Sweet Girl. He felt trapped as he agreed to meet her the next night for dinner. Yes, he knew where the Palms restaurant was on Hollywood, he said. Who didn’t? It was home to Thai Elvis. As he hung up, he was glad Iggy wore regular cotton panties not G-strings.

  G-strings reminded him of Sweet Girl.

  twenty-eight

  Kitsch with conviction.

  That, for Black, summed up the Palms Thai restaurant: deer in crispy mint leaves, wild boar in spicy coconut sauce, deep fried frog’s legs in chili and a Thai Elvis impersonator. Iggy, who called it the Thai-light zone, had brought him years ago. Now here he was again, this time with Sweet Girl. As they were shown to their table, Black felt compassion for the small Thai Elvis impersonator. As convincing as he sounded, as much as he was giving to his performance, nobody was paying attention. In fact the harder he sang, the louder the conversation grew, to drown him out. He came to the end of “Jailhouse Rock” and received a polite smattering of applause. Black felt a real kinship with him.

  They sat. A waitress dropped off menus.

  “So?” Sweet Girl said.

  “So what?”
/>   “Do you like it? Have you been before?”

  “Yeah, I’ve been here.”

  “I guess I’ll have to find something else to make my first with you,” Sweet Girl said.

  He shrugged. Then the waitress was asking what they wanted to drink.

  “A beer for me,” Black said.

  “Me too,” Sweet Girl said.

  The drinks came with the inquiry as to whether they were ready to order. Black looked at Sweet Girl.

  “I’m not sure what I want to eat, though,” she said.

  He smiled at her and took a swig of beer. It was cold, refreshing.

  “Take your time,” he said.

  She smiled, took a drink straight from the bottle.

  “You have cute eyes, you know?”

  “Thanks,” he said. “But no, I don’t know.”

  “I can’t believe nobody told you, you got nice eyes.”

  He shrugged.

  “Well, you do,” she said.

  He nodded.

  “You nervous?”

  “A little.”

  “Don’t be. I don’t bite.”

  He laughed.

  “That’s good, that’s good, honey. Oh, this waitress is giving me the stank eye, so I’d better order. The game, darling. Yes, extra hot.”

  “So tell me about yourself,” Black said.

  “What’s to tell? I’m from Mexico City and when I got here in the . . . anyway, when I got here I couldn’t work, at least not real work. No papers, you know? So I did a few odd jobs for cash. The usual restaurant work at half the pay an American would do it for.”

  “No taxes though, right?”

  She shook her head, unsure if he was being funny.

  “No, baby, there’s always taxes,” she said.

  He laughed.

  “Anyway,” Sweet Girl said. “I got tired of the humiliation so I became a stripper.”

  “How long ago was that?”

  “Long long time ago.”

  “But you look so young.”

  “Right answer, papi. So what about you?”

  “I been around here so long I’m part of the landscape.”

  She laughed.

  “And what do you do?”

  “I’m a painter.”

  “My father was a painter too,” she said. “He painted most of the houses in Mexico City.”

  “That’s a lot of houses. But I mean I’m an artist.”

  “I was kidding. This painting pays your bills?”

  “No,” he said, explaining that he also did odd jobs. She listened attentively, but he got the sense she wasn’t really paying attention.

  “Sounds like you could make more money as a male stripper,” she said, when he’d finished speaking. “Have you ever thought about it?”

  He shook his head when he realized that she was serious.

  “No,” he said. “I don’t think that’s for me.”

  She shrugged and looked hurt, and he wondered if he sounded judgmental, but thought, Ah, fuck it. The rest of dinner passed in an easy silence. Now that they had spoken, scoped each other out in a way, they both knew less about what they wanted from each other. There was sex, there was definitely that. But there was more, Black sensed it, but he was unsure about its shape. He wondered if Sweet Girl knew.

  “Here,” she said, pushing her nearly full plate toward him. “I’m not really hungry.”

  He shook his head.

  “No. I got my own.”

  “This will only go to waste.”

  “You can take it home. Eat it later.”

  She shook her head.

  “No,” she insisted. “You eat it.”

  “Thank you,” he said. He was still hungry. If he was going to pay for dinner, he might as well pig out. Actually, he thought, I can’t afford to pay for dinner. Shit. He hoped she had money on her. She should since she had come here directly from work.

  Picking up his fork, he moved hers to one side. Reconsidering, he put down his fork and used hers. She smiled, although he didn’t see it because he didn’t look up until he had finished the food. He wasn’t sure why he was ravenous or why the food tasted like all his fear and yet also like all his comfort. Contradictory and completely familiar at the same time. Finishing, he pushed the plate away and drank deeply from his bottle of beer.

  “That hit the spot,” he said. “Thanks.”

  Sweet Girl smiled.

  “What was that?”

  “Wild boar,” she said.

  He found that unaccountably funny. He laughed.

  “You’re silly,” she said.

  He sobered up.

  “Is that bad?”

  “No, I like it. Most men take themselves too seriously.” She sounded sad.

  Black shrugged. “Is that bad?”

  She gave him a funny look and said:

  “Not always. But sometimes for a girl like me it can be dangerous.”

  “I need to get out of here,” Black said to her.

  “Sure,” Sweet Girl said.

  “I’m kind of . . .”

  “I know. I’ve got it, baby,” Sweet Girl said, reaching for the check.

  Outside it was cold and a wind was blowing ash from the brush fires around the street.

  “Thanks for dinner, baby,” Sweet Girl said.

  “You’re welcome.”

  They were standing by her car: a shiny silver Honda Civic. Silence. Street sounds. The wind.

  “Reminds me of my spaceship,” Black said, cursing himself as the words came out of his mouth.

  “Is that what you call your car?”

  She sounded shy and coy again. The Sweet Girl from the strip club. That irritated him a little. He smiled tightly.

  “Where is your car?” she asked.

  He pointed to the Blackmobile and she smiled.

  “What?”

  “Looks like Big Bird,” Sweet Girl said, brushing hair from her face. She looked away and then back at him. Her arms were crossed against the cold and she shivered.

  “I’m going for a walk,” he said. “Do you want to come with me?”

  She glanced at her watch.

  “I do, but I have to be somewhere. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. See you soon?”

  “Fine,” he said.

  She could detect a sulk in his tone. She put her hand on his arm.

  “It’s not what you think,” she said.

  He nodded. Not waiting for her to get in her car, he set off down Hollywood Boulevard, heading west. Past the other strip mall that held more Thai restaurants. Past the fenced-in lot that housed a beat-up motor home and statues made by the artist who lived there. Past the public bandstand that the club next door had turned into its dance floor. Past the Hollywood Motel with its 1950s look and its revolutionary promise of telephones, hot water and televisions in every room. Past Espresso Mi Cultura. Past Pier One Imports.

  And on and on.

  Studios. A school. Endless strip malls. The Pantages Theatre with the limo stop opposite that had a limo impaled on a pole, though it wasn’t as tall as Black’s spaceship. Past the decaying and crumbling sex shops and nude bars, the stars on the sidewalk hiding their shame under grime and windblown trash—and now ash. Just before the neon renaissance of the Egyptian Theatre and Ripley’s with the T-Rex on the roof roaring in purple neon, Black paused by the string of gift and trinket shops selling useless knick-knacks to mostly midwestern tourists: the men in shorts and Hawaiian shirts, white socked feet in Birkenstocks, and women in frumpy summer dresses or khaki Gap shorts and sandals. There was the occasional reluctant and inevitably overweight child or two, whose excitement with this no man’s land’s legends of muggers and drug dealers was enough to overcome the embarrassment of parents who were pointing out everything from the pub with the British name to the number of Starbucks franchises in such a small area.

  Black ducked into one of the gift shops when a passing police car slowed down to watch him. He hated the police, the jackal snout of t
heir hoods. Scavengers.

  The shop had a full complement of trashy trinkets: model cars with surfboards on their roof racks, crystal necklaces, glass bong pipes, I ♥ LA key rings. Black stopped browsing to study the snow globes lounging next to the collection of American flags. Some of the snow globes commemorated 9/11. Firemen holding up an American flag amidst the detritus of Ground Zero in the same pose as the Vietnam memorial. He picked one up and studied it.

  He shook it.

  It rained, not snow, but tinsel in red, white and blue.

  He put it back on the shelf and wiped his hand against his trouser leg, feeling dirty. What next, he thought, a holocaust snow globe with a Giacometti stick figure rising out of the lip of an oven that rained ash when shaken? He was shocked to see a couple next to him picking up six.

  “These are great, huh?” the woman gushed at him.

  “Yeah, great,” he said.

  He left the shop and continued down Hollywood Boulevard toward Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. Outside the Roosevelt Hotel, waiting for a light, he wiped his hand across his face and then looked at his hand. Nothing. The ash drizzle had stopped except for a few big pieces. Maybe the wind has changed direction, he thought. He wondered what time it was.

  “Excuse me,” he said to a man passing, intending to ask for the time.

  “Get a job,” the man snarled.

  Black shrank back as though he had been struck physically. Muttering under his breath, he headed back to the Palms. The Blackmobile was parked in front where he had left it.

  Gabriel dozed on the roof.

  twenty-nine

  a donkey.

  And an old woman waiting patiently for the lights to change at the corner of Olympic and Alameda, just a block short of the Spearmint Rhino Gentlemen’s Club. He pulled up alongside, smiled and said hello. She ignored him. If she was an omen, he thought, then she’s probably a bad one. As if to confirm this, the donkey let out a steaming pile.

  He stopped abruptly under the overpass, satisfied when he heard Gabriel fall from the roof of the bus and hit the ground with a grunt. Gabriel stood up, head lost in the shadows near the top of the bridge, and with one flap that sent dust flying everywhere, took off.

  Black pulled off the road and parked. He felt constrained, like there was a band across his chest and he needed to feel free, to gain release. Already the erection that had begun stirring over dinner with Sweet Girl was full blown and hard. He needed to do something. He sat there and tried to imagine Iggy or Brandy naked while he masturbated, but he couldn’t find the release. Instead he took off all his clothes and stood there for a moment feeling his body fill the night. Reaching into the back of the Blackmobile, he took the bag that held Iggy’s wedding dress and wig. After she’d found it in the spaceship, he had taken to carrying it around with him. With a sigh and gentle swing of his penis, he headed off into the night.