by Thomas Cobb
In spite of himself, he is laughing. On the floor, she doesn’t look naked or sexy, but like a child who has just completed a simple chore.
“I think I better do the other,” he says.
“You’re damned right,” she says, then, noticing his withering erection, “Oh hell.”
“You come here. Everything will be all right, as soon as I get this damned boot off.”
After the initial rush of passion, they slow and luxuriate, then grow shy. He gets up for drinks and a cigarette and puts on his shirt to walk the eight feet to the dresser. She pulls up the sheet and tucks it around her.
“That was nice,” she says.
“That was something more than nice.” She leans into his arm, and he touches her hair with his fingers. “You’re very beautiful.”
“No,” she says. “But thank you. I’m a lot of things, but I was never beautiful.”
“You are,” he insists. “And I would bet you’ve gotten more so over the years.”
“Is this the famous country charm I’ve heard so much about?”
“I guess I wouldn’t know a whole lot about that. I’ve never been real famous for charm. Country or any other.”
“But you’re famous. What’s that like?”
“What’s being a reporter like? Sometimes it’s nice. A lot of times it’s a pain in the butt. When people know who you are, they think they know who to ask for whatever they think they want. I never figured out whether I liked it or not. I started out wanting to be rich and famous. Then I was. Then I wasn’t. I guess I want to be again. I don’t know. I’d like to have another hit. I’d like people to know I can still do it.”
She raises her glass. “I’ll testify to that.”
“Reporter’s charm?”
“Reporters aren’t famous for charm, either.” She tilts her head up to kiss him.
He eases the sheet down from her breasts. She grips it and then relaxes. “I guess I don’t have anything to hide anymore, do I?”
“That’s maybe the best part, not hiding for a while.” He continues working the sheet down, following it with his lips and tongue, over breasts and ribs, belly, over the lateral scar. “You really are beautiful,” he says.
“Don’t talk.”
He wakes from dreamless sleep. Her head is cradled on his arm, her breathing regular and shallow on his chest. Love starts this way always, waking, his arm pleasantly numb from being slept on all night. And it always ends trying, in sleep, to get as far away as possible, until no bed is big enough to get the necessary distance. It always starts in sleep before it works its way into waking and consciousness.
It is still early, he knows, the room full of deep shadows. He gently lifts her head and eases his arm out from underneath. She stirs and groans, but her breathing eases and flattens out. He gets up and puts on his pants. He calls room service for coffee to be left outside the door. He lights a cigarette, moves their clothes from the chair and sits, watching her sleep.
“You could call in sick,” he says.
“Don’t think I wouldn’t like to. I don’t exactly have seniority on the paper. If I let up, I’m going to end up out on my ass. Besides, when you stick around, you get the good stories. I’m tired of movie reviews and interviews with the county agricultural agent on thrip control.”
“And fading country singers.”
She is sitting on the bed, in her slip, eating toast. She stops to lick a drop of butter from the side of her hand. “I worked to get this interview. It was my idea—well, Wes’s actually, but I pitched it and got it. I thought it would be fun.” She smooths strawberry jam over the toast. “My God. I had no idea how much fun it was going to be.”
“Best damned interview I ever got.”
“No one can say Jean Craddock doesn’t throw herself into her work, or at least at her work.”
“I got something else you can use if you still need something.”
“I haven’t put it together yet. What is it? Something salacious, I hope.”
“Actually, no. I’m opening for Tommy Sweet in Phoenix in a couple of days.”
“That’s great.” She looks puzzled at his expression. “That’s not great, is it?”
“It’s great,” he says. “My agent has told me how great it is. It’s good money, it’s exposure. But hell, it’s a hard thing, you know, opening for the guy who used to be your sideman. Hell, I gave that kid his start.”
“What is it between you two?”
“It’s that. I taught him how to sing and I taught him how to play. I got his teeth fixed. I got him exposure, I even helped him go out on his own. Son-of-a-bitch won’t return my phone calls. Next time you see him grinning at you from one of those album covers, think about this: those teeth are mine. I bought and paid for them. Soon as things started to pop for him, he never looked back. Not a thank you, not even a damned Christmas card.”
“But you did an album together.”
“We did a hell of an album together. My agent did that. Tommy was cutting duet albums right and left. Jack just convinced him that that was the logical thing to do. He got sixty-five percent of the son-of-a-bitch, too. I put that album together. He cashed most of the checks.”
“He is good, though.”
“He can be good. He used to be good. He doesn’t work at it hard enough. When he started out, he was the hardest damned worker I ever saw. I really liked that. But now he just sort of slides by. You noticed how flat he is on the new albums?”
“No. I guess I haven’t really noticed.”
“Most people don’t. They hear the voice, recognize the phrasing, that’s Tommy Sweet and they’re satisfied. Yeah, he’s always sung flat. In the old days, he used to work past it. He used to work and work until he found the notes, and he’d push himself to stay there. Now he just slides along. On the last album he wasn’t close enough to most of the notes to hit them in the ass with a double handful of rock salt. And his playing is sloppy as hell. He got himself famous and quit trying. That burns me. There are too many people working too damned hard for him to get away with that crap.”
“Like you?”
“Like me and a lot of others. This business uses talent like paper. Most of it is wasted. There are all sorts of talented people out there who are never going to get anywhere. And here’s old Tommy just sliding by.”
“Why’d you work so hard with him?”
“He was good. I could tell that. And he wanted it so bad. I needed a guitar player, and he was on the way to being one. I figured I could teach him right. And I liked him. He was a good kid. And old Eldon Morton. He took a chance on me. I figured I owed for that. One day when I needed a picker, there he was. He wasn’t a hell of a lot better than a hundred, five hundred, kids trying to break in. I mean, he could play. Damn, he was quicker than a hiccup, but he didn’t know the instrument very well. Neither did I when I started. I taught him the way others taught me. He sang flat, so I worked with him. I made him sing with me. I made him reach for the notes until he got them. And he worked. He worked like the devil.”
“But people taught you, and then you moved on. You got famous. Eldon Morton never got famous.”
“Right. But I never turned my back on them. I mean, people move on. That’s the way it works. But you don’t forget where you came from. Tommy never looked back. He acts like he did it all himself. Hell, I don’t want to talk about this anymore. Anyway, I’m opening for him in Phoenix.”
“Well, I don’t know what to say. Good luck, I guess.”
“Why don’t you say you’re coming back tonight?”
“I’d like to. Believe me I would. But I have a child. I’ve left him with someone two nights in a row now.”
“How about your ex?”
“My ex doesn’t have anything to do with him. Besides, that’s not really the problem. I don’t think you should go running around, shuttling your kid from house to house. I need to spend some time with him.”
“I’d really like you to come back. This is
my last night here.”
“I want to, Bad. I really do. Let me see what I can do. Maybe Barbara can keep him just one more night. I don’t know. Can I call you?”
“Please. Please call.”
She calls. It is three o’clock in the afternoon. He is watching television. But he can’t get interested. He turns up the sound. In a courtroom, two grown men argue over cookies. “What I ordered,” one man explains, “was four gross of three-and-one-half-inch-diameter oatmeal cookies.” Bad gets up and turns off the sound. The phone rings.
“Bad, listen. I’m really sorry. I have to stay home tonight.”
“This is my last night. I’m in Las Cruces tomorrow night.”
“I know. I know. I really want to. It’s my son. I really have to stay home with my son. You understand that, don’t you?”
“Sure, darlin’, I understand.”
“No, no, of course you don’t. I just can’t go off and leave him again. I have to think of him before me, before us. I just can’t.”
“Look. Do you really want to see me?”
“Yes, Bad. Yes, I do.”
“Can I come over there? I don’t get off until one-thirty. He’ll be in bed.”
There is a long pause at the other end. “You can’t stay. I mean, you have to be gone before seven.”
“I can do that. I can’t do it pretty or graceful, but I can do it.”
“O.K. Come on over.”
“How do I get there?”
“Well, when you leave the motel, turn right and go about a mile and get back on the interstate, then it’s about three miles….”
“Is this north or south?”
“It’s north, for about three miles, maybe more. Oh hell. I’ll sneak out and come and get you. Will you be ready at one-thirty?”
“I’ll be ready.”
“Promise me. I’ve never left him alone.”
“I’ll be ready. I promise.”
Chapter Six
The Saturday house is not as good as the Friday house, but it’s crowded and the audience responds. He sticks to the play list, working his way through it. He fights the feeling he should hurry this up. The band isn’t a new treat anymore. He has become comfortable with them. He plays easily and concentrates on singing. They remain steady behind him, and there are no surprises. It is a work night, the way it is supposed to be.
At the break, Wesley Barnes comes up to him. “I want to thank you,” he says, “for helping Jean out. She’s a real nice girl. I mean, she’s not a girl anymore. But she’s real nice. She hasn’t had an easy time of it. Her divorce, the boy, and all. But she’s solid as a rock. I think the world of her. She’s just real nice, you know?”
Bad looks at him, unsure what this means. “She is real nice,” he says. “You’re right to be proud of her. She’s just real nice.”
Wesley gives him a big smile, like he has just got something settled, something that was gnawing on him. There are little drops of sweat on the top of his head.
“And,” Bad says, “thank you. For playing with me. You’re real fine. Better than a lot of professionals I’ve played with. I wish I had a road band again. I’d like to have you with me. This is the most fun I’ve had in years. You, and the rest of the boys, you’re all real good.”
“We just do it for fun.”
“That’s the way it’s supposed to be. It usually isn’t, but it’s supposed to be. You all have made it fun for me. God, I hope I get to come back and play with you again sometime.”
Wesley Barnes grins. “Yes. Yes, that would be fine. We’d like that.”
“You all just keep having fun.”
By the end of the last set she is not there. By the end of the encore of “Slow Boat” she is not there. He packs up and says his goodbyes to the band, the barmaids and the manager. As he is loading up, Rocky Parker comes up behind him and hands him a picture. It is an eight-by-ten, an old publicity still. Bad remembers the picture. It must have been ’63 or ’64. In the picture he is wearing a blue suit with silver sequins and a white scarf knotted at his throat. He has a Stetson 4X beaver pushed back on his head. He is holding the Guild archtop he lost years ago. He remembers. It was a sweet guitar.
“This is kind of embarrassing,” Rocky says, “but would you sign this for me?”
“To Rocky and Sureshot,” Bad writes, “Bad’s Boys in Santa Fe. With my thanks, Bad.”
“I really appreciate it,” Rocky says. “I’ve always been a big fan.”
“Tell you what, old buddy, now I’m one of yours.”
He has been sitting in the van, smoking, lighting them off the butts, hoping no one notices he is still sitting in the parking lot like he has nowhere to go and nothing to do. The bar is closed and he needs a drink. He considers going back to the room for his bottle, but he is afraid he’ll miss her. It is a quarter of two when she finally pulls into the parking lot.
“I’m sorry,” she says, “I was out of gas. You know how hard it is to find a gas station at one o’clock?”
“I get off work at one o’clock. I know how hard it is to find everything at one o’clock. I’m just glad you found me.”
She knows how to drive with someone following her. She slows to make sure they will both make the lights, and he stays right with her. They wind through a complex of apartments, twenty or thirty two-story buildings with six or eight apartments in each.
“Sweet Jesus,” he says when they are inside her apartment. “You read all of these books?”
“Most of them. I was an English major in college. I love to read. We’ll have to keep quiet. I don’t have men over. I’m not going to have him wake up in the morning and find a stranger in his house.”
“Did you know I have a boy, too? He’s twenty-four. Name is Steven. He lives in Los Angeles.”
“You get to see him very often?”
“No. Marge took him when he was four. I never got her tracked down. Here, look at this…” He takes a gold money clip from his pocket. “This is his. I bought it for his eighteenth birthday. Somehow I figured I could send it to him. But I never knew where he lived. I carry it with me. Someday I might run into him. I want him to have it.”
“You’ve never heard from him in twenty years?”
“Not once. His mother took off and left. I tracked her down to L.A. Then, I don’t know. I just couldn’t figure she was really mad enough to try so hard to get away from me. I figured she’d cool off and call me. You know, want alimony or something. I never heard from either of them again. But kids, you know, they’re all trying to find their mothers and fathers these days. I keep hoping he’s going to find me.”
“Why Steven?”
“It’s a real name. I wanted him to have a regular name. One that wouldn’t embarrass him like mine did me.”
“I don’t know your name. Goddamn. I don’t believe it. I don’t know your name.”
“Otis. Otis Arthur Blake. Otis Arthur Blake, Junior, as a matter of fact. I loved my daddy, I really did. But ain’t that a damned awful thing to do to your own kid? I sure as hell wasn’t about to do it to mine.”
She is trying to keep a straight face. “I don’t know,” she says. “I mean, it was your father’s name. That’s nice. Oh hell. You’re right, Otis Arthur is a damned awful name.”
“Worse. At home they all called me Otie. Soon as I left, I became Art. That lasted a couple of months, then I was Bad.”
“I promise,” she says, “I’ll never call you Otie.”
“We’ll get along just fine.”
On top of the television is a framed color portrait of a boy about three or four. “This is him?”
“Daniel Rawlings Craddock. Buddy.”
“Fine-looking boy. Fine-looking mother.”
“How about you and that fine-looking mother going into the other room? I hate to bring this up, but you’ve got to be out of here by sunup.”
He had a fiddle player, Cletus Young, who said he played his fiddle like a woman’s body. That was only one sign Clet
us was a jerk. But there’s something about love that’s like music. It’s a way that your body begins something and then becomes what it does. Their lovemaking, still a little strange, a little nervous, is like playing. It’s the counterpoint of single note and chord. It’s the tonic, dominant, subdominant, and the sudden ascent to relative minor. Their bodies are the same chords played an octave apart, the movement familiar from hundreds of times before, but still unexpected. Pleasing in the familiar strangeness of it all. He has the feeling, tangled into her, of being where he belongs, like a progression that takes an unexpected turn and ends up not where he thinks it is going but where it has to go, as if he has known, without knowing he did.
He dreams of water. He pumps it up from the well in Judah, pushing the pump handle in long, steady strokes. The water comes into his cup, copper green, then clears. He draws a drink from the chrome faucet. In the glass, the water is copper green. It clears from the bottom. He considers trying another faucet, though he doesn’t know where the next one is, only that the water will come out copper green and then clear from the bottom up.
It is barely light. He doesn’t know what time it is. There is a clock on the dresser, but it is several feet away, and he doesn’t have his glasses. Jean is asleep beside him, her hands in fists, curled under her chin. They have, he suspects, only a little time. He moves his hand down her back, across her hip and down her thigh. She stirs and turns away, moving her back into him. He is working on getting the angle, when something smacks against his butt.
“Read?” a voice asks.
He rolls over, pulling the sheet over himself. Next to the bed is a small boy, wearing only a pair of baggy briefs. In his left hand he holds a blue bowl made of soft plastic. Milk and Cheerios slosh over the edge. In his right hand he holds a thin paper book by its cover. He smacks the book against Bad’s leg. “Read,” he says.