Last Night at the Blue Angel: A Novel

by Rebecca Rotert

  I go to Mother’s desk and try to find some old set lists. There are three, and I choose the one that looks the easiest—nothing that’s going to make her voice, or her brain, work too hard.

  In the bedroom, David tries to get Mother dressed. He won’t be able to dress her without me.

  I don’t want to sing tonight. Let’s just stay in. She looks down and pulls at his belt. He is gently pushing her away by the shoulders when he sees me.

  Please help me, he says.

  I stand in the doorway, wish the whole thing would just come crashing down.

  Sophia? says David.

  I slowly gather her clothes and undergarments and lay them out on the bed.

  Now put those on, says David. He turns her to face the bed. She drops her robe to the floor and tries to dress herself. David stands behind her, holding her by the hips to help her balance. I watch them with my arms crossed until I remember that she probably needs coffee.

  Mother drinks her coffee while we walk to the club. It makes her walk more slowly but she seems to think it’s fun.

  The cool air feels nice, doesn’t it? she asks.

  Yes, it sure does, says David. I look at his face when he says this. It is half trying to talk to Mother and half worrying about how to handle her.

  At the Blue Angel, I leave them to get the set list to Steve. He looks at me when I hand it to him.

  She had a bad day? he says.

  I shrug and go to the dressing room, where David is trying to get her gown on, which Mother also thinks is fun. I pull her merry widow from a basket and hand it to him. This goes on first. She can’t wear that without this, I tell him.

  He opens it and looks closely at its clasp.

  Just sit down, I tell David. He sits, watches me unhook the back of the dress, wrap the merry widow around Mother’s waist, and fasten it. Bend over, I tell her so her breasts can fall where they’re supposed to. She stands so I can fasten the dress and in the mirror I see a cloud come over her face.

  Jim comes back then. I left some stuff here, he says, pointing to his light meter on the counter.

  Does Steve have a set list yet? he asks me.

  Yup, I say, trying not to smile. I knew he wouldn’t leave me alone.

  After much rushing around, everyone but Mother caught up in that backstage panic, which is kind of real but also kind of acting, Mother walks onto the stage. Her heels on the old wood boards sound like the second hand of a giant clock. The lights and the applause connect to her like puppet strings, holding her up. She is suddenly taller, composed, power in her arms and neck, something about her chin seeming to say, I know what I’m doing.

  Jim, David, and I stand backstage and watch. I sit down on my X. David and Jim don’t say a word to each other until David says, I know what I’m getting into.

  Jim snorts. The very fact that you would say that, that you think people ever know what they’re getting into, means you have NO idea what you’re getting into.

  Steve makes a short hiss at them and frowns.

  You’re being too loud, I say.

  Jim and David laugh at me and in that very small moment where they seem to be getting along, David says, Well, now that everything seems to be under control here, I need to go take care of some things. Business, he says.

  I don’t care where you go, says Jim.

  CHAPTER 23

  THE NEXT MORNING Mother feels terrible. David talks quietly and sweetly to her, brings things to her room—coffee, water, magazines, scrambled eggs.

  In the afternoon, Rita appears.

  Well, where is he? she asks when I open the door.

  In the kitchen.

  Rita glides past me, her back extra straight, one arm already out to the side as though getting ready to gesture broadly. I follow.

  Well, look who’s back, she says.

  David faces Rita. Have we met?

  Oh, yes, you probably don’t remember it was so long ago. You stormed into my bar like some sort of two-bit gangster demanding to see Naomi. Ring a bell? Name’s Rita, she says.

  I remember now, says David. Been awhile.

  Rita sits down and looks around the kitchen. What are we making?

  I’m putting on a stew for later.

  Charming, says Rita.

  You like a drink? says David.

  Do I look like I need a drink?

  Yes, ma’am.

  Prosecco, then, she says.

  He takes a deep breath as he passes me and fetches a drink from the liquor cart in the main room.

  Rita looks at me. Where’s Mama?

  Asleep.

  You can say that again, says Rita, watching David return with her drink. You look, I don’t know, more manly than I recall.

  David goes back to peeling a head of garlic. And you look more like a woman.

  Rita tilts her glass. Hmm. All of the glamour, none of the bullshit. She empties her glass and sets it down on the table. Standing, she steps up behind David, rests her hand on his arm, and leans into his ear. I’m watching you. They are almost the same height.

  I walk down the hallway with her to Mother’s room. She sits down on the bed and pulls Mother’s scarf from her eyes.

  Wait, says Rita, pretending to think, Greta Garbo. Camille. 1937. No. ’36.

  Hello, Mother says, and the sound of her voice makes my teeth clench.

  Some night last night, says Rita.

  Was I awful?

  No, not awful, says Rita. But Big Doug rang me this morning, a courtesy call. Told me to have a word with you. Who knows. Maybe you’ll get a bigger crowd after this. Folks wanting to see the wreck for themselves. If that’s how this is headed.

  Oh, Rita, don’t start. Not today.

  And you know what my first thought was? When I heard? Rita sits down on the bed. I thought, It’s that man. The boy from back home she couldn’t WAIT to get all tangled up with again. SO disappointing.

  This has nothing to do with him, whispers Mother.

  Rita leans her back against the headboard and looks around the room. I’ve been thinking. She lifts a hairbrush from the nightstand and tugs the hair out of it. Look that way, she says. Mother looks away from her and Rita begins to work on the swirl of tangles at the back of her head.

  Darling, Rita says as she works. I’ve never known anyone who wants fame more than you. It was this . . . engine humming in you the day we met. I thought, This kid has it. But then you began to realize how hard it is to get there. How relentless it is, the work. You thought once you put yourself on any little stage, the whole world would pound down your door and you’re mad now because it hasn’t happened. Your feelings are hurt. Like a little child wondering why she’s not in the popular group.

  Rita, stop—

  Not done. So the beautiful unavailable man wanders back into your life and you jump at the opportunity. You drop everything, happily, for the distraction. Wait by the phone, buy a new dress, cry to your girlfriends, get too drunk. Look at you. Aren’t you just the most normal girl now, pining over her man. Ambition? What ambition?

  Mother reaches behind her. Stop, leave it be. No more, she says.

  Rita stands. She’s like a pitcher winding up.

  Did the distraction work? Is the disappointment gone now? The pain of your only dream dying on the vine? Is it gone? Are we all better now that the boy’s here?

  Stop this right now! shouts Mother.

  You will leave him, he will leave you, you will stay together forever, whatever way you slice this, your hunger will haunt you, rot in you. It will never leave you be. It is what you are.

  The hell is going on back here? says David, standing in the doorway.

  Get out, yells Mother.

  He shakes his head and shuts the door behind him.

  What would you like to happen here? Do you hope to marry him? says Rita. Would that do the trick?

  People marry all the time.

  Girls who have no other options, who have no imagination, yes. But you? You have everything
. You marry him and you will disappear. It WILL be the final blow.

  Mother kneels on the bed and points at Rita. You’re jealous. You’re jealous because this will NEVER be an option for you.

  Rita pauses and tilts her head. What? To be some nameless, faceless wife shuffling around in a little house, asking herself, Meat loaf tonight? Or casserole. Hmm.

  Mother looks over at me sitting on the floor. Like this conversation suddenly involves me. I am frozen. Mother and Rita fight but it’s often about hairstyles or shoes.

  Rita studies herself in the vanity mirror. Slowly she collects herself, calms until she is as smooth as she was when she walked in here. I have seen Mother do this a thousand times. I don’t mean to be cruel, darling, but please take in what I say. Please know that it comes from my love for you. My adoration. Now you need to get a compress for those eyes. You look like hell.

  There’s something I can do, I think. Make a compress. I go into the kitchen and David and I stand beside each other, he cooking, me filling the blue bag with ice and screwing the lid on.

  Mother doesn’t know what she wants, I say. I heard her with my own ears.

  He grins at me. Ain’t a woman alive knows what she wants. That’s how come you have to show them what they want.

  After Rita is gone and Mother is cleaned up, she says to David and me, Darlings, would you mind giving me some time? I feel I ought to be alone for a little while, maybe work on the songs a bit.

  We stare at her.

  She glides over to the cupboard and gets a glass, filling it with water. They get so old, the songs, I have to confess. Can you imagine singing the same ones over and over, night after night? She turns around to face us, exasperated by the idea.

  David approaches her and she puts her hand on his face. Would you mind? she says.

  I’ve got some things to deal with.

  You can take her with you, she says, dropping an Alka-Seltzer in her glass.

  I think she’s a little young, says David.

  Oh, but she’s not. She’s actually quite old, aren’t you, kitten? Older than you and me, she says as she passes David with her hissing glass.

  We drive to a fancy hotel and get out of the car. David hands his keys to a man in a long coat and we go in. Soft music plays inside and the carpet is thick with huge green leaves all over it. I try to step only on the leaves. David doesn’t scold me for this even though I know it slows him down.

  We go down some stairs, down a long hallway, down another set of stairs.

  Are we going to the bomb shelter?

  Sure looks that way, don’t it?

  Inside there are lots of people. David sits down at a big round table and I sit at the bar.

  The Negro man behind the bar pours something in a glass and adds some red liquid and a cherry on a toothpick. This here is a Shirley Temple. You like Shirley Temple?

  I nod and tell him, Thank you.

  Your dad always bring you to games? asks the bartender.

  I start to say he’s not my dad but I stop. I look over at David and stare. Then it’s like he feels my eyes on him and he turns to look at me, nods and smiles. Right then I know he’s my father. Everybody knows. I know I’m supposed to love him and he’s supposed to love me. But I love Jim. Jim and I are on the same team. The men around the table study their cards and one another, back and forth. They sweat and smoke cigarettes or sweet-smelling cigars.

  When the game is done we leave. David walks fast because he is happier than when he came in.

  Did you win? I ask him once we’re in the car.

  Yes, ma’am, I did.

  Are you the best at that game?

  I’m the best at reading people. It’s all about having an eye for the tell.

  What’s the tell?

  You got any secrets? he asks.

  I don’t answer.

  Do you? he says.

  Maybe, I say.

  Of course you do. Everybody does. You look carefully enough, you can see everyone’s secrets. Right there in front of you, on their face, how they move their hands.

  I do that with Mother, I say.

  She’s a tough read.

  No, she’s not.

  I get her wrong an awful lot, he says.

  I know your secrets, too, I say.

  Really, he says, pulling the car over in front of our place. Shoot, he says.

  We stare at each other. You’re married to another lady.

  He crosses his hands over his knee. Anything else?

  You’re my father.

  He itches his nose. She told you?

  Nobody told me anything, I say.

  He looks out the windshield and sighs through his nose. He presses his thumb against a small, star-shaped crack in the glass then rests his hand on the steering wheel and wiggles it back and forth. I don’t know what to say.

  Me neither.

  You’d be awful good at poker, I’ll tell you that. If you ever want me to teach you.

  I would, I say.

  Mother has the vaporizer going when we get upstairs. The apartment is warm and damp. She is pacing the rooms with her arms crossed doing lips trills.

  What’s going on here? says David.

  Warming up, I say.

  Already?

  Mother waves her hand at David as though to say, Not now.

  Sometimes she thinks her voice is gone, I tell him.

  David frowns. Laryngitis?

  She thinks it’s been taken.

  Taken? says David.

  Jim shows up then and Mother looks so relieved.

  He shakes his head. I’ve got something for the kid. Only reason I’m here.

  Mother opens her mouth, pushes, and a little squeak comes out.

  Well, you pushed it really hard last night, says Jim.

  Punishment, whispers Mother.

  Probably, says Jim. Get some honey and tea.

  She sounded fine this morning, says David.

  That was her speaking voice, I say.

  Jim hands me a package. It’s a record.

  What is it? I ask.

  It’s a cat, he says.

  I pull it out. Skeeter Davis Sings The End of the World.

  Thought you might have something in common, says Jim.

  Mother takes it from my hands and looks at it.

  This is not music, she whispers.

  It’s not for you, Jim whispers back.

  So will she iron out this voice problem? David asks.

  She’ll be fine, says Jim. The problem is here. He points to his head. You two smell like you’ve been sitting in a tavern all day.

  Thanks for the record, I tell him. I’m going to go listen to it right now.

  Jim follows. I think you’re going to like her, he says as we sit on my floor in front of my record player.

  I hold the record.

  What you waiting for?

  I know about David. I know he’s my father.

  Jim takes a deep breath.

  He is, right?

  Jim nods and looks at his shoes. I wonder just how many secrets there are.

  Why didn’t you tell me? Why would you let me feel stupid?

  I thought you might be too young for that conversation.

  Sister Eye says family is who you choose to love, I tell him, trying to keep my voice in order. You chose me. You said you did. I chose you.

  He smiles at me and nods.

  Not David. Mother can choose him but I don’t have to if I don’t want.

  You’re right about that. He looks uncomfortable sitting on my floor.

  I pull the plastic off the record. I wish she could be happy with just us.

  Jim nods. Me, too, kid. Go on, now. Put that sad goddamned record on already.

  CHAPTER 24

  AFTER JIM LEAVES Mother finds me in my room. How was your outing? she asks.

  Fine.

  Do you get along, you two?

  I nod.

  I’m glad. I really am keen on him. Did you do something fun?<
br />
  Poker, I say.

  Very funny, she says.

  David appears in my doorway.

  Will you be staying here tonight? she asks me.

  I study her for a clue as to what I should say.

  I’d like to keep her in, says David. A normal night at home. You know, dinner. My Favorite Martian. Popcorn. Bed by nine. You’ve probably read about it in the magazines.

  A flash of disgust passes over Mother’s face, but she asks, You all right with this plan, baby?

  I don’t care, I say, and turn the volume up on my record player.

  David follows her out the door.

  I might be late, I hear her say.

  Why’s that? says David.

  I don’t hear anything by way of an answer.

  Just come on home, doll, I hear him say before the door closes behind her.

  We make grilled cheese and popcorn for dinner. David spills more popcorn than he eats while he stares at the television. It seems to be a problem of him always grabbing more than he can hold. He tries to think of things to say to me—do I like cats, have I ever seen King Kong—but I don’t say much back. Finally he sighs and says, I think you don’t want to get close to me because you think your ma and I aren’t going to work out.

  Probably, I say, as nicely as I can.

  Why is that?

  Because it never works. With her. Not once in my whole life.

  David looks at me and thinks.

  It’s after ten o’clock when he says, Should I tuck you in or read to you or something?

  I’m not a baby, I say. Back in my bedroom, I write television and Jiffy Pop in my notebook.

  My clock says three A.M. when I wake up to the sound of something crashing, laughter, and then David coming out of Mother’s bedroom.

  Hi there, Mother calls to him.

  I get out of bed and peek out my door. Mother and the brown-eyed woman from a few months back are in the living room.

  Darling, this is Margaret. My friend, Mother says to David.

  He says, I thought I asked you to come straight home.

  You DID, darling, says Mother. That is precisely what you said. And she and Margaret laugh at that or something else, I’m not sure.

  It’s late, says David.

  Is it? Shhh, she says to Margaret, who is bending over, trying to pick up something from the floor.