Richmond Noir

by Andrew Blossom

  A knock on the bathroom door pulled me out of my self-hating trance. I opened it a crack and saw nothing, then looked down and saw an Arab guy, a kid really, a head shorter than me, in a black shirt and a silver tie.

  “Jamila, right? Jamila.” I nodded. “I’m Marwan. Can I talk to you for a minute? All business, I promise.”

  What did I have to lose? I followed him to his table. Mar-wan’s heavy, copper-colored eyes locked on mine as he pulled from the hookah.

  “Jamila. You’re a good dancer, Jamila. How much you make tonight, two hundred, three hundred?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t talk money with strangers.”

  “Good policy. Smart girl. Hey, Jamila, I’ma be honest with you. I run a club. A nice club. What you call a gentleman’s club. The best one. I can tell you for a fact you could make a thousand dollars a night there, easy. You dance like that, Ma fi mushkila, no problem. Only just a different costume.” He leered a little and licked his lips. “So what do you say you come by tomorrow and work for me? I put you on the main stage, none of this tables. Inti Jamila. You so pretty.”

  I reached across the table and took the hookah tube from him and sucked in a deep draft of gray smoke. I held it in my lungs and considered my options. I could be one kind of cliché and end up dead in the trailer park on a Saturday night. I could be another kind of trailer park cliché and dance around a pole with my tits out for money. Or I could go back home tonight and see what Saleem Hassan’s next piece of advice was for me, with a couple of hundred dollars in my pocket for which I had him to thank. That looked like the best choice. If dancing around a pole was what he wanted for me, I’m sure he’d tell me—though from what I’d heard the Arab say about girls who did that, I had a feeling it wasn’t what Hassan wanted. I blew the smoke politely toward the floor and shook my head.

  “I appreciate the offer, Marwan, but I don’t think I’m cut out for that kind of dancing. Thanks anyway.”

  Before he could argue, I threw my backpack over my shoulder and walked out. As I unlocked Bobby’s bike, I could see Marwan scrambling to throw money on the table, but I was down the street before he made it out the door There are men you trust and men you don’t, and there was something sketchy about that little dude I just didn’t like.

  Back at Rudd’s, I locked Bobby’s bike to his porch and walked across the gravel road to my trailer I could see Beau through his window, drinking a beer and watching wrestling. I went inside and sat down at my little kitchenette, wondering what tomorrow was going to bring. I could stay and try and reason with Ivan, giving him what money I had, or I could just disappear—but to where? To do what? Although it felt strange to even hear myself think it, the idea of leaving the trailer park filled me with sadness I’d never felt when leaving Christiansburg.

  For once, I realized, I was living in a place where the list of things I didn’t hate was at least as long as the list of things I did. I didn’t hate the fact that I shared my walls with no one, thin and aluminum though they were. I didn’t hate the way outsiders avoided our potholed roads that were occasionally blocked by the Mexicans’ work trucks and junker cars, because that meant I didn’t have to deal with anyone I didn’t want to. I definitely didn’t hate the cheap rent. And, though it’d taken me awhile to trust him, I didn’t hate the Arab. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that Rudd’s was the closest thing to a real home I’d ever had, and the Arab was the only person I’d been able to count on in my whole life.

  I knew that if it came down to it and I told him what was going on, I would have sanctuary in the trailer park as best he could provide it. I’d watched him pretend not to speak English and stall the inmigradón, the cops, and the dogcatcher long enough for Bill Baldy and Bobby Harvey to hustle folks—and dogs—to higher ground. And when the people from Social Services came to take Judy to a group home, he’d chased them all the way out of the trailer park and up Jeff Davis, spitting and cussing in two languages. “Neek hallak! She already lives in a goddamned group home! What the fuck do you think this is?”

  I had no plans to ask the Arab for help, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized I wasn’t willing to take my chances anywhere else. This was where I belonged. Whatever was going to happen would just have to happen here.

  A knock at a trailer door after midnight is never good news. Sometimes it’s crack whores, sometimes it’s drunk Mexicans, and occasionally it’s Bobby Harvey coming home to the wrong place after too many sips of Wild Irish Rose. But tonight? Since it was technically tomorrow, it must have been the knock. I took one more sip of coffee and one more drag off my cigarette. At least I would get it over with now, without the dread. It’s the dread that kills you. Well, the dread and the four hundred and twenty-eight dollars in old crack debts that you didn’t make back belly dancing in a diner.

  I stood behind the closed door and said a quick prayer of intercession to Jesus, Allah, Iggy, Saleem Hassan, and whoever else might be listening. I hoped that it would be Ivan himself, and not one of his lackeys, so that maybe memories of all the good times might buy me another day or two. Or less cruelty, at least. Not that there had actually been any good times.

  I opened the door and looked out, and then down, to see not Ivan but Marwan standing on my step, his low-slung champagne-colored Mazda as out of place as he was in Rudd’s Trailer Park.

  “Jamila, habibi, I followed you here. Look, I want to talk to you for real, because you’re making a mistake.”

  “There’s no mistake,” I said, angry that he wasn’t Ivan. I had already gotten psyched up for getting killed. “I’m not going to work at your club and I don’t like being followed, so get lost.”

  “No, seriously.” He placed his hand on the door to my trailer. “Lemme talk to you because you’re making a big mistake.”

  “I think you’re the one who’s mistaken,” I said through my teeth, leaning my weight against the door to keep him out. “I don’t want anything to do with your club. Now get lost.”

  “Fuck you. I drive all the way to the Southside to a fucking trailer park to give you a job and you don’t have no manners?” He stuck the toe of his Italian leather shoe against the door and kept it there. “You fucking piece of trash, you should be grateful I even talk to you!” His breath came through the crack of the door, hot in my face, smelling like fruity tobacco. Over his head I could just see the window of Beau’s trailer. Beau stood up slowly from the sofa, looked my way, and turned out his light.

  “Fuck you, sharmouta!” Marwan spat once, twice on the steps of my trailer. “You’re not even beautiful! Kelbeh!” After his last insult, he smacked the side of the trailer hard with his open palm. The vibration made the cymbals on the table chime faintly, like a distant call to prayer. Marwan wedged his arm and shoulder into the crack of the door and grabbed a handful of my hair. I leaned back to pull myself loose, but I couldn’t get far enough away and keep the door shut, so instead I tried to twist around and bite him. I had just gotten a good toothhold on his wrist when his body jerked up like a marionette. Through the crack of the door I saw Beau’s big arm hooked around Marwan’s neck. Beau pulled him out of my door, off my step, and up into a standing camel clutch that would have made the Iron Sheik proud.

  Beau held Marwan like that for a good thirty seconds, just long enough to scare him, and then flung him loose onto the ground. It was a short fall, broken by an errant cinder block. Every trailer park has them. Unfortunately for Marwan, this one happened to be exactly where it was, and its corner made a sickening thud as it connected with his temple.

  Beau and I stood there for a long time. Looking at Marwan, looking at each other, feeling bad, but not as bad as we might have.

  Bobby Harvey came wandering through after a while, making his last evening check of the trailer park.

  “I didn’t see anything,” he said to us. “Did y’all?”

  We both shook our heads.

  “Good. Now get on inside before somebody does.”

  Th
ere are some things that don’t warrant much investigation. A dead strip club manager in a shiny tie on Jeff Davis Highway is one of those things. Particularly if nobody in the trailer park heard anything or saw anything. And, not to gild any lilies, but just suppose there was a crack rock or two in his hand when the police got there, well, these things happen in trailer parks all the time. Such is life. I’m sure the Arabs have a saying about it, and it’s probably close to what my Arab said when he realized that the body he’d been called out of bed for was one of his guys. “Rahimahullah! His daddy should have beat him harder.”

  The police took a report, but beyond that there was no investigation to speak of. The man’s wallet was empty. According to the girls at the club, he usually kept about five hundred dollars in cash on him—usually meaning on the nights he didn’t drop seventy-two dollars at a hookah bar on baba ghanoush and shoulder shimmies—so robbery was the obvious motive. The police made a point of coming around and reminding us to lock our doors. They were especially concerned about me, what with it happening right outside my place. I told them not to worry, that the Arab was letting me move to a bigger trailer in the back of the park. Same rent, more room—and with nobody next door, I could play my cymbals as late as I wanted every night.

  Now, instead of waiting tables, I dance two nights a week at the hookah bar for better tips than I ever got slinging eggs when it was a diner. Word’s gotten around and the place is usually packed—Muhammad actually pays me now, and he’s even put a picture of me in the window, next to the picture of his famous kebabs. I still clean a trailer for the Arab every couple of months, not so much for the money but just to keep my title and help out. Because that’s what I guess family does. Saleem talks to me in my dreams every now and then, mostly to call me Jamila and ask me when I’m gonna get married. And sometimes he tells me I should eat more, I might blow away.

  UNTITLED

  BY MEAGAN J. SAUNDERS

  Jackson Ward

  To my mom, who showed me strength

  An uneasy silence engulfed him. Occasionally, he would glance toward the driver’s seat and stare at Janie, who still wore her factory clothes. She didn’t look at him. Sighing, he moved his eyes back to the window. They flew past abandoned buildings, past Ebenezer, where he found God, and Armstrong, the school where he discovered Janie and everything else. Men sat on curbs heading nowhere, complacent. He knew them intimately—knew their stories, their fears, and their delusions. “So you ain’t gonna talk to me?” he asked, finally.

  She hesitated. “What you want me to say? You don’t wanna hear what I gotta say. I ain’t ready to talk to you yet.”

  “Well, you could say somethin’.” Her eyes narrowed. Still, he pushed the conversation: “How’d you pay the light bill?”

  Words flew from her mouth like venom. “You ain’t gotta worry ’bout that, Jayden! I found a way. Not that you helped me. Not that you care.” The silence lasted until she pulled onto Marshall Street. She slammed her car door and pushed past him, through the overgrown grass and the trash people constantly threw into their yard. He followed close behind.

  Once inside, he rushed to the back room. He opened the door. Nothing.

  “Janie!” he screamed. He found her on the living room floor peeling potatoes into an aluminum bowl. He could barely breathe. “Where’s my piano?!”

  She didn’t look up. “We need to do somethin’ ’bout all these holes in the roof. Don’t make no sense. I wake up every mornin’ and start my day covered in—”

  He squatted in front of her, lifting her chin until their eyes met. “I said, where’s my piano?”

  She smacked his hand away. “You ain’t gonna put your hands on me. You better get that idea out your head right now.” Her voice intensified. “Don’t you dare disrespect me, Jayden. Today is not the day.”

  He paced, hands shaking. A lump grew in his throat.

  Janie sighed. “Naw, I ain’t sell your piano. Things hard but they ain’t that hard. All these damn holes in the roof. I had to move it.”

  “Where?”

  “Back there.” He raced to the bedroom, where he saw it pressed against the window. He collapsed beside the doorway, smiling. But his smile didn’t last long. He walked back into the living room, dragging his feet. Janie looked up momentarily, then continued her work.

  “I’m sorry,” he stumbled, “guess I overreacted a little. Who helped you move it? Quincy?”

  “It got wheels.”

  “Guess it does. So how’d you pay the light bill?”

  “That was Quincy.”

  His eyebrows rose. “Really?”

  “I called my mama, Jayden.”

  “Oh. You want help with them potatoes?”

  She shrugged. Jayden grabbed a knife and sat beside her. They peeled together in silence, the tension building with the rhythm of the wall clock.

  Then she exploded. “Where were you, Jayden? You couldn’t call me and let me know where you were?!”

  “I was over Charlie’s place.”

  “For a week? Tonya told me she saw you over on Belvidere talkin’ to Angelo. Called me all frantic, told the whole neighborhood, making me look like a fool. I rush from work, drive up and down the street tryin’ to find you, beg you to come with me, and for what?”

  Jayden gawked but said nothing.

  She slammed her knife into the bowl, producing a harsh ring. “You ain’t gonna say nothin’, Jay? You gone for a mutha-fuckin’ week and you ain’t got nothin’ to say?”

  “It was only five days.”

  Tears fell, but she wiped them away. “Don’t you know how worried I was? What am I supposed to do with you? What am I supposed to do?”

  “I’m sorry, baby—”

  “You’re sorry?”

  The words slid off his tongue as if rehearsed. “That was the last time. I promise. You know I got that big audition comin’ up soon—”

  “It’s always the last time. Always for some reason or other.” Their eyes met. “It’s always a lie.”

  He dropped the knife and hurried down the hall. He made his way to the piano, tracing the contours of the keys before he pressed down. A minor chord rang out. He exhaled, then modulated. Notes at first, then the sounds became something deeper. Ellington. “In a Sentimental Mood.” After some time, he sensed Janie in the doorway watching him; sensed her anger, her sadness, and her love. He played harder, letting his soul seep through the music. “I’ma change, baby. You wait and see.”

  “What are words?” she replied, and walked away.

  “Don’t forget I got you booked at the Hippodrome. The gig’s tomorrow.” Quincy mixed bacon into a sea of hard-cooked eggs. He barely swallowed, yellow bits sprinkling an unkempt goatee. He wiped it away, greasing crisp sleeves.

  Jayden tried to lift coffee to his lips but his hands shook uncontrollably. Coffee spilled down his shirt before the cup finally made its way to his mouth. He gulped, then placed the cup back on the table. “I’ll be ready.” He smiled uneasily. “Ain’t no thang, you know? I was born to do shit like this.”

  Quincy leaned back in the booth and laughed. “Fuck. You can’t even drink coffee, let alone play some keys.” He pointed his fork toward Jayden. “I can’t have you embarrassin’ me, man. I have a reputation.”

  “I said I’ll be ready!”

  “You got a song, at least? Know you’ve been strugglin’ to find somethin’ that works.”

  Jayden wiped sweat from his forehead. “I’ll have some-thin’ by Thursday.”

  Quincy dropped his fork on his plate, the metal clanging obnoxiously against the porcelain, drawing the attention of the other restaurant patrons. He moved to the edge of the seat, folded his arms on the table, and looked straight into Jayden’s eyes. His voice lowered. “What happened to you, Jay? What are you thinkin’? You tryin’ to go cold turkey right before the Hippodrome? The Apollo of the South. Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, and Billie Holliday all played there. You know how many people get discovered.”
r />   “I gotta,” Jayden said defensively. “If I don’t, Janie’ll leave me.”

  “So what? You gonna let some bitch destroy your dreams? Never knew you as a pussy.” The bell on the door rang furiously as a young man entered the diner. He wore a button-up at least two sizes too big; still, he stood confidently. Third Street smog mixed with the smell of bacon, but the harmony ended as the door slammed. Quincy’s eyes sparkled. “Tré! Tré, over here.”

  The boy approached them briskly, a saxophone case in hand. His hair was conked, he whistled loudly. He looked no older than fourteen.

  “Tré, I’d like you to meet Jayden. With some development, I think Tré’s got a future.” The young man extended his hand. Jayden reluctantly took it. “Jay here’s playin’ at the Hippodrome tomorrow night. He’s gonna sit at the piano and stare at the audience. It’s revolutionary.”

  “I’ll have somethin’ composed,” Jayden mumbled.

  “How’s it comin’?” Tré asked.

  “It’ll come.”

  “He’s goin’ cold turkey.”

  “Damn!” Tré looked around the restaurant nervously. Satisfied, he reached into his coat and took out a small plastic bag. “Here.”

  Jayden examined its contents, then pushed it away. “Naw, man, can’t do it. My girlfriend would have a heart attack.”

  “And so will I if you fuck this up!” Quincy growled. “It was real nice of Tré to help you out.” He leaned closer. “You’ll stop shakin’ and you’ll get a song. Win-win, you feel me?”

  Jayden paused, staring at the bag on the table. He wrapped his hand around the plastic and placed it in his coat pocket.

  “Now you’re thinkin’.” Quincy smiled. “That’s my boy! I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow,” Jayden replied. He placed a few dollars on the table. “Thanks for the chance, Q. Nice meeting you, Tré. You’re real generous.”

  “Ain’t nothin’,” Quincy replied, finishing off his potatoes. He looked up. “Just don’t mess it up.”