Setup On Front Street

by Mike Dennis

  A new nine-ball game had started up, complete with yammering bettors. The overhead speakers pushed out more salsa. Over the music, frenzied TV announcers rehashed the blowout of the Celtics.

  But all I could hear were Mambo's quiet words.

  SEVEN

  THE Fun House was up at the artsy-fartsy end of Duval with all the art galleries and whatnot, away from all the bars and the tourists. Kind of hidden down this little alley behind a vacant storefront. No sign on the door, of course.

  The walk downtown took me twenty hard minutes. My brain raced in fourth gear all the way, trying to figure out how I wanted to handle this whole thing. I played out various scenarios in my mind, but they all ended in flames. It was just that I never had to deal with anything like this before, you know?

  Shit, this was Norma, for Chrissake. Norma!

  By the time I stepped through the flimsy Fun House door, I still didn't know what I would say to her.

  The girl at the desk wore too much makeup. Her lipstick made a shapeless red blob on her pinched face. It all stuck out beneath a badly-teased haystack of hair. That's not to say that more careful attention would've improved her appearance.

  She waved her hands around as she spoke. Chipped blue nail polish distracted my attention while she ran through all the prelims, telling me I was only paying for a massage in private, nothing illegal was happening, was I a cop, and on and on.

  When she asked me if there was a particular girl I wanted, I said Norma.

  "Norma? I don't think we have a Norma here."

  "She's here. That's who I want."

  "Well, there's nobody here by that name, but let's see."

  She turned toward the back room, calling out the available girls. Three of them stepped lazily through the cheap gold curtain.

  There she was.

  She gasped as she saw me. I made a soft gesture toward her. The other two disappeared back where they came from.

  The girl at the desk said, "Oh, you want Candy." I nodded as she asked, "Will that be cash or charge?"

  I peeled off a bill without taking my eyes off Norma. Finally, we went to a small room off the hallway in the back. She closed the door behind us.

  The bed took up most of the room. We just stood there for a moment looking at each other, comparing recall to reality.

  It wasn't easy, because the only light in the room came from a small low-wattage lamp on the bedside table. It cast a distorting yellowish glare over the immediate area, fading to dimness. The window AC strained to cool things down, but all it really did was make a lot of noise. A slight odor of mildew hung over everything.

  Her eyes, once a lively and crisp blue, were now washed out, nearly colorless, encircled by thick mascara and dark brows. Her face was never what you would call beautiful — her nose and mouth were way too small, if you know what I mean — so she didn't hit most people as sexy. A lot of hard times showed on that face right now, and her shoulders sagged under the strain.

  I noticed her hair. It still held the beautiful light brown of my memory, but it was messy and looked like shit. Her mouth, so often lit by what I thought to be a pretty smile, now drooped downward at the corners, carved with permanent creases. I'd seen the same defeated look on hundreds of faces in the pen.

  I hated to admit this, but her figure was starting to slip, too. I mean, I know she was about thirty-eight, so you have to expect some concessions here and there. You can't stay young and fresh forever. But this didn't look like any battle with Father Time. It looked more like she'd neglected herself for a while now.

  I took her pale, petite hand in both of mine.

  "What happened?" I barely got it out.

  She looked away.

  With her hand still in mine, I reached up under her chin, gently tilting her head back toward me. My eyes repeated the question.

  Again she turned her head. I gave her a lot of time, so she took it.

  Finally, she said, "I needed the money."

  "Needed the money? What for? What happened to your job?"

  Her eyes were now on the floor, while her voice dripped sarcasm. "My job? Which one?"

  "Well, back when you were working at the Raw Bar."

  "Ha! Sure! The Raw Bar. Slinging beer and oysters. Good for two or three hundred a week."

  "So — so what happened? I mean, it was good enough back then. What the hell happened?"

  "I didn't want to go on working there my whole life. That's what happened."

  She looked back up at me, right through my eyes and straight into my head, where she'd always, always been.

  "I wanted … I wanted to make money. To have the things I never had. I didn't want to have to scrounge for the rest of my life."

  "And you don't think you could get those things working a respectable job?"

  "Respectable job? Look who's talking. When was the last time you drew an honest day's pay?"

  "Okay, okay, but you know what I mean. Did you have to...to do this just so you could buy yourself things? I mean, couldn't you have taken a second job or … or something?"

  Her eyes turned downward again.

  "I needed more. A lot more."

  I stiffened at those code words. Now I was sure, absolutely sure, that somewhere in there was white powder and a straw, or maybe a needle.

  "Tell me, honey. Please tell me." I steeled myself.

  "I can't. I just can't!" Tears found their way onto her face.

  I sat us both down on the bed.

  "Yes, you can."

  I softly stroked her cheek, then dabbed at her tears with a tissue from the table, not wanting to smear her caked-on makeup.

  "Now, go ahead."

  "Oh, Don Roy, I can't! You'll never forgive me. You probably still hate me for the way I left you, and I just know you'll never forgive me for … for all this."

  She swept the squalid little room with an arm gesture. I saw more tears dribbling out.

  More tissue, more dabbing.

  "Listen, honey, I don't hate you and I never will. Now, just take it nice and slow. Start from the beginning."

  She sobbed out loud, burying her head in my chest.

  I could tell she was ashamed of where she went with her life. Both my arms wrapped around her. I didn't even think about it, I just did it.

  At last, I held her again, her familiar shape and form contoured to mine, even in that awkward position there on that squeaky bed. The first time in nearly seven years, but for just a second there, it felt like all that time never passed, or somehow melted away.

  Even though she was crying, I felt joy just having her so close. No matter what happened after tonight, I knew that this moment would be a snapshot I would carry with me my whole life.

  I prompted her again to tell me. She got it together and started to speak.

  "I started doing this …" She sniffled and swallowed. "I started doing this to...to...get money for BK."

  I heard the words but wanted to think I didn't. I wanted to think the rumbling AC drowned them out.

  "What?"

  "It was all to get money for BK."

  My arms released her from my tender embrace.

  My big hands shook her shoulders instead.

  "What in the fuck are you talking about?"

  Her voice was still full of tears. "See? I told you you wouldn't forgive me. I … I …"

  Right then, I didn't know what to do, whether to be pissed off or gently understanding. Actually, I was both, but I just didn't know how to show it.

  I shook her shoulders again, and I tried to say "What?", but my voice wasn't working.

  "He … he … needed a lot of money to … to pay off his gambling debts. He owed, like, thousands."

  "What the — what —"

  None of this was computing. The truth was, I didn't want it to.

  You know, when you hear shit like this, you don't want it to go any farther. You really wish it could somehow back itself up into its stinking black hole as though you'd never heard it in the f
irst place.

  But of course, once it's out, it's like the genie. There's no stuffing it back inside.

  "You'd been gone from here for a few years already. I think it was right after you got sent up. He and I were already seeing each other, you know. Then he got way behind in his gambling debts, you know, betting on games and stuff. Some of Mambo's men threatened to hurt him bad. Oh, Don Roy, I was there that night. It was terrible! They — the things they said they'd do —"

  "Wait a second! BK's been gambling since we were in high school. He's always paid his debts. He never needed money! Shit, the Whitneys are one of the richest families in town! Why, when the old man was mayor, he stole more fucking money than they could print! What — why —"

  She sniffled a couple of times. "Well, one day the old man turned the faucet off. I guess he got tired of making good on BK's debts. Said if he needed to pay Mambo off he was gonna have to get the money from somewhere else. He thought it would get BK to stop gambling."

  "So …"

  "He didn't make me, no, if that's what you're thinking. But he did suggest it. Like it was the only way to come up with cash real quick. I mean, he was only a city commissioner then, and you know, they don't get paid shit. And he owed Mambo about nine thousand dollars. Mambo'd been carrying him for a few weeks."

  "He suggested that you … you do this?"

  "He was desperate! They were gonna break his legs, or maybe kill him! You know Mambo. He doesn't screw around!"

  "But he told you to sell yourself? So you could pay off his debts?"

  The room almost started to spin. I really couldn't take this.

  "He didn't tell me to. I agreed to do it. I cared about him, you know? And it was only gonna be for a little while, until he could get straight with Mambo."

  She reached for another couple of tissues, then wiped her nose. Outside I heard distant thunder. It surprised me. We were still a couple of months from rainy season.

  "Besides, he said he loved me. Said he was gonna leave Rita."

  "Leave Rita?" I had to laugh. "You know how long they've been married? He'd never leave her."

  Not that he'd never leave her, mind you, only that he'd never leave her for Norma, but I didn't want to say that.

  You see, Norma didn't realize that people like BK and Rita lived way up there, operating in their own little gold-plated world with others just like them, drinking champagne and shit, doing whatever the hell they wanted. All the while, people like her and me scrounged around down here, close to the zero, fighting for their scraps while taking their shit our whole lives.

  "Well, he said he was going to leave her. For me. And he said he was gonna do it right after he won the mayor's election. If I could only help him out of his jam."

  "And you fucking did it? You started selling your ass for that motherfucker? To pay off his markers?"

  No matter how hard I tried, and I was trying, I just couldn't bring myself to believe this.

  "I told you, it was only supposed to be temporary. And after about two months, I'd given him the nine thousand plus about another four in interest."

  I groaned.

  "Don't tell me. After he squared himself with Mambo, he kept on betting and losing."

  "Right, and he —"

  "Sure! Because he had you to cover his goddam losses. And you kept on fucking God knows how many guys a night just to keep him in action!"

  My gut churned with rage. It really hurt. I was close to puking it all up in one big industrial-strength retch.

  Her eyes burst with shame as her head plowed into my chest again, sobbing loudly.

  "Yes. Yes. That's right!" Tears continued streaming down her cheeks. "And then he threatened to break it off."

  "Why?"

  It thundered again, this time a little louder.

  "After he was elected in, I think, eighty-nine, then he said he wanted to wait till this year, when he would get re-elected. He said after that, he'd be unbeatable for all time, and then he could leave Rita with no problem."

  She crumpled up the tissue and glanced around for a wastebasket. I took it from her soft hand and tossed it on the floor.

  She continued. "But then about a year ago, she found out about us. She warned him she was gonna go public with it. And that would've ruined his re-election chances. He wants to be mayor so bad, you know, to serve the people …"

  "Yeah, right. But you're still with him?"

  "Well, yeah. Just … just not as often as I used to be."

  "What do you mean?"

  She shifted her weight on the bed and crossed her legs.

  "We used to see each other a lot, you know, like two or three times a week. This was right after you left and I was so alone and …"

  "I know, honey. Go on."

  "Anyway, we stayed like that for a long time until Rita found out about us. Now we don't see each other too often. He comes around once a week for the money and then —"

  "He comes around here to collect your money?"

  I reached for the dice in my pocket. I ground them together with as much fury as my hand could muster.

  "Yeah. But we actually spend time together about once every two or three weeks. He swears, though, that we'll …"

  I put an index finger to her lips.

  "Norma, listen. He's lying scum. Outside of the money, he doesn't give a shit for you. He's got you in here …" I covered the room with a hand gesture.

  "Don Roy," she said, "you don't understand. I mean, I've been doing this for three years now." Her voice was flat, in a scary kind of way, and her reddened eyes came up to meet mine. "The first two years were all for BK. Now I'm doing it for myself. I'm making good money and instead of giving it all to him, I get to keep most of it."

  "What do you mean by good money?"

  The thunder moved closer. I heard rain tapping the roof.

  "About eighteen hundred a week. I still give BK a little, `cause he's still gambling and he needs it."

  "You still cover his losses? How much?"

  "Not all of them. I only give him about eight or nine hundred a week, sometimes more. He actually loses more, but I don't give it to him. I think he's got some way of stealing the rest of it from the city. But sometimes I don't give him anything at all. Those are the weeks he wins. Baseball season is coming up and he can pick those games pretty good."

  "Oh yeah, BK's just a regular champ at picking baseball winners."

  She twitched a little. "But it's not like before, I told you. I get to keep a lot for myself. Sometimes as much as a thousand a week."

  I groaned again.

  She went on: "Most of the girls make a lot more than that, but they're a lot younger'n I am and they get the best customers." She'd calmed herself by now, while I unraveled. "Plus," she added, "I get to control the men for a change, instead of the other way around."

  My mind reeled. Norma … my Norma. I swear, if BK had been in that room with us, I'd've taken him out right then and there, no questions asked.

  She moved around again on the bed but her cheap polyester dress didn't move with her, clinging to her in all the wrong places. She adjusted it a little, then straightened up.

  "You remember I told you what it was like with my first husband?" she said. "All the time hitting me and everything. And then my second one, you know, a real control freak. Mind games all the damn time, till I went damn near crazy. And my father before them."

  "But I never treated you that way."

  "No, you didn't."

  A sweet hand went up to my cheek, caressing it. For just a moment, love sparkled in those faded blue eyes, hypnotic love. And all the rage in me fell away, just like that.

  "You was always real good to me, and I never forgot it. You was really the only man ever treated me right."

  I softened about as much as possible. "So why … why don't you just tell BK to shove it?"

  "You've been gone a long time, Don Roy. I really didn't think you were ever coming back. And like I said, I can't make this kind of money
waitressing."

  I groped for words. "Yeah, but — but you —"

  "When you left, remember, I was living in that shit trailer over on Stock Island. Remember? Scumbags and drug dealers everywhere? I was afraid to step outside. You remember that? Well, now I've got my own apartment at Ocean Walk, that new complex up on South Roosevelt. It's a great place and I'm paying for it myself."

  I still choked on the words. They wouldn't come.

  She said, "I've got a real nice car, too. A Toyota. I mean, I didn't get it new — it's an '88 — but it looks real nice. More important, I saved up and paid cash for it. So it's all mine. You know what that means to me, Don Roy? To pay cash for a nice car?"

  Yeah, I knew. The first time I'd done it, it meant a lot to me, too.

  "Listen, Norma …"

  I swallowed hard, struggling to find the right words. They had to be just right or else, because I only had one shot at saying them. I took a long breath.

  "Right now, you might think you like this shit. You're pulling in a dime a week and paying your rent."

  She inhaled so I could hear it, getting ready to interrupt with a lot of bullshit about how she could do this as long as she wanted.

  I shushed her. "Just let me finish. You've been in the business long enough now to know what every hooker knows: that somewhere out there is that one wacked-out psycho who's looking to cut you up or to strangle the life out of you, and you're hoping he never finds you. Or at the very least, that he gets off on doing it to someone else before he gets around to you."

  "That's not going to happen. Not here."

  "You say that now. But let me tell you, if that ever did happen, I could never live with myself, knowing that I had this one opportunity right now to get you out of this racket once and for all. So...I'm asking you to quit. To come with me and be my woman. And let me be your man."

  "But my —"

  Another index finger to her lips.

  "Money won't be a problem. I'm getting a big windfall — call it an inheritance — next week. I'm talking major money. We can take it and live like human beings. We can even leave the island if you want to."

  I pulled her close to me. Right up on my chest again with my arms all the way around her.