They sound soft. Apologetic. Her body squeezes him to her until he stops shaking.
“This is bad, la.”
“What?”
“He is not dead.”
“Is he supposed to be?”
FORTY-SEVEN
After he phones in the shooting, the police show up and immediately start to bust his chops about the pellet pistol, calling him Rambo. But the EMTs say later for that. These people need attention. It turns out neither one of them has been shot. She has a gash in her scalp from flying glass that the medics close up with some kind of fancy glue. He smacked his knee real hard on a rock when he fell, needs an ice pack and an Ace bandage.
“You two are lucky as hell,” says a detective holding up the slug he has pried out of the floor with a penknife. “Do you know what this is? You know what one of these things can do to human flesh?” The bullet is spread out like a flattened, ragged mushroom.
“I don’t know much about guns,” says Michael.
The detective looks at the pellet pistol the patrolmen have confiscated, bagged on the kitchen counter. “No shit, counselor. But I’d say your visitor does. This is a man stopper.”
He turns to Tuki, who is sitting at the kitchen table while the EMT finishes her job on the wound. “I don’t like how this is getting to be a weekly thing. You and the law. Who the hell’s been shooting at you, sweetheart? What have you got yourself into?”
“She doesn’t have to answer that. She’s the victim here, not the suspect.”
The detective is a statey, a wiry Italian-looking guy, middle-aged. White short-sleeve shirt, baggy brown suit pants. He wheels on Michael. “If I want your opinion, I’ll ask for it. But, see? I don’t. I just want to know how Tuki here is feeling about almost having her gorgeous little self turned into Swiss cheese. Who did this, Tuki? Help me get this sick shit off the streets!”
Her mouth opens a little. There is a name on the tip of her tongue. Then she closes it a second before answering. “I do not know, detective. I did not see him.” Her eyes flash a look at Michael. He cannot read it.
“Come on. Don’t tell me—”
“Hey! Leave her alone, okay?”
The detective wheels on Michael, glares. “Fine, wise guy. Have it your way. I’m just the dumb cop. You don’t want to cooperate, don’t cooperate. Get yourself and your twiggy girlfriend blown all to hell. You think anyone really cares? But this is my crime scene. You can’t stay here.”
Tuki suddenly has a sick look on her face. “This is my home.”
“Not any more, darling.”
“But where will I …”
The detective rolls his eyes at Michael. “Why don’t you ask Rambo here.”
When he wakes up on the couch, late morning sun is streaming into his attic. Tina Turner is singing, “What’s Love Got to Do With It?” softly on the stereo. Tuki is standing at the stove wearing his powder blue dress shirt and pouring hot water into two cups of tea.
He does not think that he did anything weird last night, even though they both got a little toasted on Sambuca when they finally got to Chatham. He still has his boxers on. And there is no way she got on this couch with him. Thank god.
“I was having such a crazy dream.”
She turns and smiles. “About me?”
He nods.
“Was I still alive?”
“Very. You were standing in a boat.”
“You want to go out in a boat?”
He rubs his eyes. She hands him his tea and sits down on the couch. “Yeah, but … but why didn’t you want to tell the cops about your trigger-happy boyfriend?”
“No more police. They do not understand.”
“He tried to kill us!”
“It is the pung chao. Not Prem. He needs help.”
“Can I ask you why you want to protect him? Did he kill Costelano?”
She kisses him on the cheek. “Later, I promise. Right now it is a beautiful day. We are alive. And I love boats. Sip bia klai mu.” There is a shrill giddiness in her voice that he has never heard before.
“Pardon?”
“Now or never.”
By noon they have bought and launched Michael’s new boat. It is the Boston Whaler with a Johnson seventy and a trailer that Michael saw for sale down on Ryder Lane. He knows Filipa is going to have a fit, but he feels like he has scored big time. At this price the boat is a steal, even though both boat and engine are about twenty years old. And now he is taking Tuki on a picnic to Monomoy Island, the long, thin sand spit, the wildlife preserve, south of Chatham. She is so right. After last night, a little escape is in order. Damn, someone was trying to shoot him.
The tide is in so they are running along at 30 knots in the shallows on the west side of the island. He has heard that the southern tip of the island is swarming with stripers. So he has his casting rod, and he thinks that if they can get into the fish, maybe the thrill of a couple of bass on the line will take his mind off this madman with a cannon. He is going to love teaching Tuki how to lure, hook, fight, and land a couple of big fellas. She will just eat it up. Then when they are high on the ocean and the stripers, they will drop anchor. He will crack a bottle of Pinot Gri. They will graze on the lobster salad they bought for the picnic. And forget about the rest of the world. He had thought that he would be sharing all of this with Filipa. How things change.
There is a moderate breeze out of the southwest. Two- and three-foot waves are starting to crest, slap the side of the Whaler. He is standing, steering, not noticing that Tuki has the hood of her sweatshirt pulled up to shield her hair and is hugging his waist hard with her right arm to keep her balance. It is like the wind and waves are not even registering with him. His mind keeps replaying last night’s shooting. He sees the blood running down the side of her face. Over and over again …
He is watching it drip off the horn of her jaw when something like a haystack in the sea breaks right on the starboard bow and sends a sheet of water over the boat. It rips off his sunglasses and soaks them both. The fishing rod gets carried away. There is a foot of water in the boat. The engine coughs, groans with the new load.
“Shit. Just shit!”
“What’s the matter, Michael?”
He looks at her. For a second he is seeing a double exposure. Her bleeding face overlaid with this other. The sweatshirt is pasted to her chest now. The hood torn back off her long curls. They fly in the wind. Water streams off her golden skin. But in a funny sort of way, she looks beautiful to him.
“I know better than to take a wave like that at this speed. Christ, my father would banish me to the fo’castle!”
“What?” She is hearing his words, but they make no sense.
He eases the throttle forward. The bow pitches up. Water that has been swirling around their legs races out the drains at the back of the boat. When it is almost gone, he adds more power and swings the boat in a sharp arch back toward Chatham.
“What are you doing?”
“Taking us home.”
“Why?”
“I can’t concentrate. I’ve lost my focus. I can’t even run a boat anymore.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I can’t get my mind off you. Everywhere I look, I picture your face dripping with blood. Or I see someone who looks like you dancing in a dark bar. I have this terrible feeling that some really bad stuff is coming. And I only have about five days left to stop it. You’ve got to take me to Prem, Tuki. And you have to tell me why you are protecting him.”
FORTY-EIGHT
“You know a place called Nantucket, la?” She faces him over a table, toys with a glass of seltzer with lime in front of her.
“It’s an island.” His eyes skip away from her face, dart around the room to see if anyone is watching them. Then he swills on his bottle of Corona.
In P-town he does not think twice about being out in public at a restaurant or pub with Tuki. But in Chatham it feels dirty and wrong. It is not because she is a tranny. He has alm
ost ceased to care about the details of her plumbing, or what people would think of him for keeping such company. It is just that now, since more than half the summer has passed, people around town recognize him. They have often seen him with Filipa. Some know he is engaged. That is why he has picked this roadhouse for their conversation. It is a little dive four miles from Chatham village … away from prying eyes. And right now it is in the rarest of summer moods. Nearly empty. Almost the last of the lunch crowd has left. Bob Dylan echoes softly from the sound system at the bar, singing, “Lay Lady Lay.”
He loves this song. But he hates this sneaking around, wonders if she knows why they are here and not at the Chatham Squire in the village. Nantucket? He bets he wouldn’t feel this way if they were in Nantucket where nobody knows him.
“What about Nantucket?”
She stares at her hands.
“If you want him, he will be at this place Nantucket now. His family keeps a house there for vacations when they are in America. He always told me I would see it. Now, I guess I will.” She gives a little grin. Nerves. He is learning to read the moods of her smiles. Lines of salt, left over from her dousing in the Whaler, crinkle at the corners of her eyes.
“Tell me the rest.”
“What?”
“Why are you protecting him? I have to know, Tuki. Help me.” His voice drills her. “That guy wants to kill us!”
Tears well in her eyes. Then she says, “That is why.” Her voice is not much more than a whisper.
“I don’t understand.”
“I was … I was trying to protect you. Not him.”
“Me? I’m your lawyer. I don’t need protecting. I—”
“You are getting married in two weeks. What would your girlfriend do if …” She cannot continue.
He realizes that he has hardly thought about Filipa for two days. Tears have begun to roll down Tuki’s face.
“Tuki? What’s the …”
She shakes her head.
“Nothing. It is just silly girl business, la. Go away. Do not look at me. I cannot stand …” She flashes him a teary grin. Then she covers her face with her hands, gets up, starts racing for the women’s room.
He catches her by the hand just as she reaches the restroom door. She flails at him with her free arm for a second or two. Before she melts against his chest.
“Everything’s going to be okay.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I told Prem.”
“What?”
“I promised myself to him.”
“That’s all over.”
“No, I told him last night I would come to him … if he just let me have one more day with you. Now I have to go to Nantucket. He is dying.”
Michael almost says, “Good. Screw Prem.” But then he remembers the case. This guy could be the real killer, or a star witness. “Do you think you can get him to talk?”
It is almost dark when the ferry from Hyannis lands them on Nantucket. Tuki has called in sick to the Follies. As if Richie cannot figure out that after all of the shooting last night, she may not be coming back for a while … if ever.
“Now where?” He asks this question like she is his guide.
“I’m starving.”
“You’re kidding. What if he gets away?”
She gives him a look. This is an island, la. Then she takes his hand and squeezes it. “Please.”
He understands what she is asking, feels it. She wants just an hour or two more with him, before who knows what. Their fishing trip was a bust. The stop for drinks was sick with tension. They both slept on the ferry trip over here. Now their time is running out.
He sees men and women in the throng on the street by the ferry dock eyeing her. He knows they are wondering if she is Halle Berry or Tyra Banks. She looks that good. Delicate leather sandals, pale yellow cotton slacks, baby blue boatneck cotton sweater. Her sun-streaked braids and curls pulled up in a ponytail. No makeup. Sapphire studs in her ears.
But it is her eyes that get him. They sparkle now as she looks at him, runs her hand up his forearm, and hooks him close to her. “I would touch you forever, if you were my man.”
He flinches.
He knows his way around Nantucket Town. Has come here a dozen or so times with his father and Tio Tommy on the Rosa Lee to find shelter from storms. But what he knows best are the bars like the Rose and Crown and the Atlantic Café. Finding a room or a place to stay is virgin territory. But they do not walk three blocks from the ferry dock before Tuki spots a vacancy sign on an inn called the Jared Coffin House. It is a Federal-style brick mansion. There has been a last-minute cancellation. Suddenly a room of colonial splendor is theirs for the swipe of a Visa card.
The desk clerk smiles at Tuki as Michael signs in. “Newlyweds?”
She smiles.
“We’re wondering about a quiet place for dinner,” he says. “May I recommend our dining room or perhaps room service?” Suddenly he is tired of feeling like a fugitive, or lawyer for the mob, when he is with her.
“What do you say we eat out?”
“Please, Michael. Take your time!” Her hand reaches over the table, grabs his as he lifts his wine glass for another swallow. The entrees have not arrived yet, and he has single-handedly downed well over half the bottle of Merlot. They are sitting near the storefront window of a quiet little restaurant called Black-Eyed Susan’s. A soft violet light bathes India Street outside. Couples stroll the sidewalk, flickering in and out of the glow of the street lamps that have just come on.
“Sorry.”
“You don’t have to get drunk.”
“How do you know?”
“I need you tonight. What is the matter?” He puts down the wine and looks her square in the eyes. “It’s not worth talking about.”
“Please, la.” Her hand is on his again. “Do not shut me out. Not tonight. Just talk to me.”
“You really want to know what’s wrong?”
“I am so afraid.” Her eyes stare at the flickering flame of the candle on their table.
“So am I, Tuki. That’s what’s wrong. I feel all torn up inside. I’m scared as hell. ‘Face your fears and they will shrink to the size of bugs,’ my father always told me. I have always believed him. But now I … I don’t know. This is too crazy.”
“What?”
“I think I’m in way over my head.”
“You want me to get another lawyer again? Want me to see the police? Tell them Prem is here. The shooter is here?” He hears a hitch in her voice.
“It’s too late.”
“Buddha says it is never too late.”
“Buddha isn’t getting married in twelve days.”
“What do you mean?”
Something rises in his throat. He tries to swallow, but the words rush out. “I don’t know.”
FORTY-NINE
He is the first to wake. He hears a raw wind whir around the eaves of the inn, smells the morning fog swirling over the island. Tuki lies on the far side of the bed wearing his Red Sox shirt. She has her head half-buried under a pillow. Her breathing is fitful, but she seems asleep. He does not want to disturb her. Knows what she has been through, fears what is still to come for her today.
But Jesus. This is crazy. He can picture the sneer on the D. A.’s face when he asks him to describe the sleeping arrangements for attorney and client in Nantucket. When he says, “We shared a bed out of desperation. I never touched her. We are not romantically involved.” They will probably toss him off the bar. Filipa will send him packing. He cannot even imagine what his father will say.
Part of him wants to just get up and sneak out of here. But he has made her a promise. For her, and his own self respect, he has to see this through. Stand by his obligations. It is the only thing that feels right to him. He wonders if this is all about an over-developed need to please.
But maybe it is about something more basic. Something that he cannot put his finger on yet. One thing he knows for sure, it i
s not about physical attraction. Tuki is easy on his eyes, no question. But he has not gotten used to her touching him. He still cringes every time. Feels himself start to sweat, a lump forming in his throat, when she flirts. He thinks he knows what physical desire feels like, it is the lightning that shoots through his arms and legs when he is within ten feet of Filipa. There is none of that lightning with Tuki. It is something else, some other kind of bond.
Provincetown Follies, Bangkok Blues Page 19