The last time I saw Victoria, I was with Cort and it was the weekend before Mardi Gras. It was by the entrance to the MOMs Ball—the Mystic Orphans and Misfits Ball, one New Orleans’ most notorious parties. The MOMs Ball demanded outrageous and lewd costumes. Cort and I were on our way to a formal ball on the same street and ran into Victoria on the way. She was draped in several white feather boas, a matching tutu, enormous white fishnet wings and patent leather go-go boots. She was covered from head-to-toe in condoms, some still in the package and others blown up like balloons. She clutched a wand topped with giant plastic penis, which she waved wildly when she saw me. It matched the Ken-sized penises that adorned the tips of her tiara. Cort tensed and pulled me in the direction of the formal ball. I was barely able to give Victoria a half-wave.
I hadn’t been in her shop since the year after Gabe left. The old door was still a little hard to open. As it shoveled forward I was elated to be greeted by the bell again. It was exactly the same. I even caught a glimpse of the old Navy officer’s dress coat that Gabe would jump around in when he would portray “the Admiral,” one of our favorite characters. I even sketched him as the Admiral once, years and years ago. The sketch was now tucked inside one of my old childhood sketchbooks, all of which were in a fireproof box shoved in the corner of Cort’s attic. (Our attic, I reminded myself). There were hundreds of memories drawn in that box; not just Gabe, but Anna, Cort, Jules, the Quarter.
Mostly Gabe, though.
A thin young woman sifted through a hair magazine at the counter. She didn’t return my smile. Her fair skin was a sharp contrast to her jet back hair and eyeliner and the equally dark tank top that bore the name of a Goth band.
“Hi,” I said. “Is Victoria here?”
She rolled her eyes, like it was a massive inconvenience for a customer to walk through the door while she was reading a hair magazine. “No,” she said. “You can leave a message. I’m taking a smoke break.” She placed a pen and pad on the counter and quickly shuffled toward the racks, floating like a ghost through the clutter.
I stared down at the blank pad and decided not to leave a message. What was the point? I didn’t know this neighborhood anymore. It didn’t make sense without Gabe in it.
And now he was living on St. Charles.
I walked outside, through the wreath of Goth girl’s smoke, and tried to avoid the pull to walk to Gabe’s old place. But I knew I would go anyway. I knew I had to find the remnant from our last day.
I hurried down the street toward Gabe’s old house, if you could call it that. He’d lived in an old and unkempt merchant quarters from the late 1800s, behind an art gallery. The artist who owned the gallery was an old “friend” of Gabe’s mother and felt indebted to looking after Gabe, so after Gabe’s mother left, he gave him a place to stay on the condition that he would watch after the gallery. By day we’d tear through the Garden District and Uptown like it was our own personal paradise. That summer was intoxicating, before everything went to shit. On our last days together, Gabe got drunk and drew a heart with cat ears into the wet cement down the street, like we were still kids. See? You’re not the only artiste, Catherine Martel, he’d joked. As I stared down at it the next morning, laughing, he picked me up from behind and swung me in circles until I almost threw up.
Please, still be here, I thought, walking faster. I turned off of Magazine Street onto his corner and saw it before I even reached his door. I knelt on the sidewalk and traced it with my finger, just to make sure it was real.
That night was the last time we’d made love. Being back here made me quiver. I didn’t think it could happen again, not after all the times I came here and cried after he left, but my body was almost disabled with desire. It was as if he had just touched me. Oh, that night.
We’d been walking home when a rain cloud suddenly burst overhead. Gabe grabbed my hand and we ran and splashed through the puddles, laughing until we reached the corner of his street. He stopped, pulled me close and kissed me deeply, passionately. Our drenched clothes stuck to us like skin. His heartbeat quickened as I felt him grow hard against me. I wanted to feel him. Taste him. I thought we were going to explode. He cradled me in his arms and carried me to the door. We barely waited to get inside before we tore off each other’s clothes. He lifted me against the wall until my thighs were wrapped around his waist. My back took in the coolness of the paint until I felt him thrusting inside of me—over and over. His cock consumed me. I clutched his ass, feeling him flex—hard. His tongue traveled from my neck to my nipples, his lips sucking and caressing them. I ran my hand down his chest over his heart. I felt so full of love and when I looked into his eyes I saw everything. The way he looked at me—there were no words. We were one.
We were like wild animals tearing at each other in the dark, wet night, and when I felt both of us gush down my legs I hungered for more.
I was still kneeling on the pavement, completely taken with this memory, when I decided I had to get out of the neighborhood. Seeing Lady Angelique was enough to overwhelm me for the day—I didn’t need to drown myself in yesterdays, too. I texted Anna that I’d meet up with later then made my way to the streetcar. I picked up a few trinkets on the way; just a few bottle-caps and pop-tops. They jingled in my pocket as I walked, like a ringing reminder of old memories.
-13-
Even as a kid I knew Uncle Jacks was not a favorite among the adults, but when I was a girl I couldn’t understand why. As I got older I came to learn that Uncle Jack’s jolliness had a lot to do with his carefree and irresponsible lifestyle, both of which led to him inheriting Bells, the Belrose family’s least lucrative and only dicey property. Bells was on Bienville, around the corner from Bourbon Street, along a stretch of blocks that made their living off drunken tourists, peep shows, trans strip joints, karaoke bars and college-aged dives where they sold hurricanes by the thousands. It didn’t seem that Uncle Jacks minded his locale very much, though—he was shady in his own right and never seemed to fit in with or understand his more “sophisticated” family members.
I didn’t just spend Sunday mornings in Bells when I was a kid. Gabe and I liked to sneak into the bar, inhale the thick cigarette smoke and sharp scent of beer and ask Uncle Jacks to give us “the usual.” At the time we thought we were drinking just like the grown-ups. It took a few years before we realized he’d been serving us virgin daiquiris.
As we grew into teenagers we spent more of our time around the Blue Note, where my father worked as floor manager. Gabe, Anna and I found jobs there and I had long since bailed on Sunday breakfast, so I didn’t see as much of Uncle Jacks. He never stopped by the Blue Note or any of his family’s other properties.
That’s why I was surprised to see him there a few days after I saw Lady Angelique. I’d stopped in to get a quick drink and chit-chat with Jules, but I was so stunned to see Jacks that I sat quietly at the furthest end of the bar so I wouldn’t interrupt them. They seemed pretty entrenched in their conversation, but it didn’t last long. After a few minutes they wrapped up their talk and noticed me there. Jacks rushed over as Jules meandered his way to greet me, as well. Both of them were their usual jovial selves.
“I haven’t seen you in ages!” Uncle Jacks said. “Well, except at the wedding, but I barely got a chance to talk to you before you were swept away.” He grabbed me, hugged me tight. I smelled a mixture of cigars and cigarettes. “You looked gorgeous that day, but I dare say you look even more beautiful now, in your natural element!”
I smiled. “Thanks, Uncle Jacks. It’s really good to see you.” That was the truth. He was a happy, familiar figure. “What brings you to the Blue Note?” Jules placed a drink in front of me. I took a sip as he and Uncle Jacks exchanged curious looks.
“Well, to tell you the truth I only stopped by for a minute,” Jacks said. “I’m sure you know that I’m not always a favorite around these parts. What with its new ownership and all.”
The fact that he was talking about Cort made me remember the
days when Uncle Jacks, who had no children of his own, tried to befriend his young nephew in the same way he befriended me and Gabe—pulling fake quarters, telling funny stories, serving Shirley Temples—and how Cort regarded him like a diseased relative.
“As far as I’m concerned, you’re welcome anywhere,” I said.
Jacks beamed. “You’ve always been alright gal, you know that? You still drawing them pictures?”
“I still sketch now and then.”
“You oughta get a show in one of the galleries. Show off some of ’em.”
I waved the suggestion away. Me, in a gallery? That didn’t seem possible. Maybe if I’d kept up my art major at UNO, but now?
“They aren’t good enough for all that, Uncle Jacks,” I said.
“That’s not what I’ve heard,” Jacks said. “I heard you’ve got a God-given talent.”
Where had he heard that? Certainly not Cort or my father. Neither of them had ever been interested in my “doodles.”
It had to be Gabe.
“I even saw one of your recent pieces,” Jacks continued. “The Tree of Life, I think it was. It was really something.”
I thought of Gabe’s sunroom.
Jules raised his eyebrows at me. “Wow, Cat. I didn’t know you were the next Picasso.”
“Better than Picasso,” Jacks said. “She puts the noses in all the right places.” He put his arm around me. “You oughta stop by Bells sometime soon. Drinks on me, of course.” He raised his eyebrows. “Unless you’re too put-together now to walk in a place like mine?”
“Of course not,” I said. I chided myself for not stopping by Bells more often. “I’ll stop by soon with Anna. Count on it.”
“What’s Anna up to these days, anyhow?”
Jules answered, “Same ole Anna. She was here the other night trying to hit the town with that waitress I was telling you about—Helene.”
“Anna always knows how to have a good time, God bless her,” Jacks said. “Yes, Cat, you be sure to bring her when you come. Free drinks all the way around and I’ll even pay for your cab rides home if you can’t make the walk. Unless you’ve got a chauffeur or somethin’ now.”
I laughed. “Of course not.”
The door opened. I knew without looking that it was Cort.
He immediately approached us. Jules turned around and busied himself with dirty martini glasses.
“Hello, nephew,” Uncle Jacks said. “How—”
“What’re you doing here?” Cort said. It seemed like every word he’d spoken since the wedding was clipped and curt. I hadn’t told him about my visit to Lady Angelique, and I didn’t plan to. Things had been strange and tense since our last argument. There was definitely something going on with him, I just didn’t know what it was. It wasn’t just about me—at least I didn’t think so.
“Oh, I just came by to say hello to my friend Julian. The best bartender in New Orleans.”
Jules smiled over his shoulder, but didn’t say anything.
Cort glared. “I didn’t know you and Julian were so close. No wonder why you’re a lifelong bachelor.” He laughed at his own bad joke.
I put down my glass, ready to call Cort out, but Uncle Jacks cut him off, saying he was just leaving. He threw a sweet smile in my direction on his way out. After he was gone, Jules continued washing out glasses and Cort turned to me: “What’re you doing here in the afternoon?”
“I came to have a drink,” I said, coldly.
“By the ‘best bartender in town’?”
“Actually, yes.”
Cort made his way toward a narrow staircase near the bar that led to his office, saying, “Don’t have too many. I don’t want people to think my wife’s a lush.”
Once he was out of sight and earshot, Jules returned to me and said, “Don’t take this the wrong way, but your husband’s got something stuck up his ass lately.”
I thought about Gabe’s old joke: See that pile of sticks over there? Guess they finally pulled them all out of their asses.
“I know,” I said. “Something’s going on with him. He’s been acting weird ever since the wedding.”
“Think it has something to do with you-know-who being back in town?”
“I don’t know. I think it’s more than that.”
“Yeah, but you-know-who always got his balls in a pinch in a way I’ve never seen.”
“I know that’s part of it, but it’s not the whole story.”
Jules’ eyebrows furrowed. “Maybe it’s work-related. I’ve heard rumors, but …” He looked away and shrugged sheepishly.
“Rumors? What kind of rumors?”
“I dunno. One of the waiters said the business was in trouble. Losing money or some such shit. I take it with a grain of salt, though. The Blue Note’s been around forever. Cort’s a shitty boss and doesn’t know what he’s doing half the time, but he couldn’t’ve run this place into the ground that fast. This is an established New Orleans relic for Chrissakes.” He looked at me. “Unless you know something I don’t know.”
“I don’t know anything.” That was the truth, too. Cort never talked about work or business. All he ever told me was that he was promoting my father to the Crescent and he wasn’t going to hire a new floor manager at the Blue Note. I want to handle it myself. Figure things out, then decide what to do. That’s what he’d said, months before the wedding. Could things have gone downhill so fast?
I shifted in my seat, anxious to change the subject. I felt disloyal, but also sort of happy that Jules still talked to me in the old way, and then disloyal again for thinking that.
“What was Uncle Jacks doing here?” I asked.
Jules leaned forward on the bar, looked around and said, “Just between you and me? He was here to offer me a job.”
“At a place like Bells?”
“I know, right? That was my first reaction, too, but he told me he was changing the whole scene. Apparently he’s got a grand opening planned. He says pretty soon it won’t be the Bells we know.”
“Sounds suspicious.”
“Maybe, but he offered me twice what I’m making here.” He stood straight and sighed. “I didn’t take it, though. I’ve got a loyal following here and a secure gig, no matter what the rumor mill says. I don’t wanna take the chance. I told him to hire Helene instead, but he didn’t seem too interested in that.”
“Is she looking for another job?”
“She got fired last night.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “All that slacking off caught up with her, I guess.” He snapped his head up like he’d just thought of something. “Hey, don’t tell Cort about the rumor mill and the job offer and don’t tell him I told you about Helene. I don’t want him to think I talk shit on this place.”
God, I hated being the boss’s wife. Everyone’s always afraid you’re going to tattle. Tattling was the least of my concerns right now. You have to talk to your husband to tattle—and we hadn’t been talking much.
This realization suddenly made me want to cry.
“Don’t worry,” I said. I finished off the drink.
He poured me another and said, “Thanks for that little surprise stash behind the bar, by the way. It went straight to the kitty. I’ll find a way to pay you ba—”
“Don’t mention it,” I said.
“Are you okay, Cat? You look like you’ve got a lot on your mind.”
I stared into my drink. I’d spent the last four days thinking about my visit with Lady Angelique. I was even panicked enough to take a pregnancy test. It came out negative, but that didn’t make me feel any better. False negatives were more likely than false positives. And I thought of the other things she said—about a death in my circle, and how someone would need my generosity soon.
“Just tired,” I said, shaking the ice in my glass. “Is Helene’s mom sill sick?”
Jules shrugged. I made a mental note to slip her name into a conversation with Cort somehow—without giving away Jules’ information, of c
ourse.
Maybe Cort didn’t know Helene had a sick mother.
Maybe there was something I could do for her.
-14-
I forgot to mention Helene to Cort when I got home, but I remembered a few nights later as we were getting dressed for the Louisiana Association of Restaurateurs annual banquet – a semi-formal affair where restaurant owners across the state got together to talk about new trends, new restaurants, networking, and all kinds of other stuff that I didn’t care much about. The Cort Show was certain to be on full production throughout the night, and things were still weird between us, so I mostly cared about the open bar.
The tension worsened when I mentioned Helene’s name. I didn’t even get to talk about her sick mother.
“I’ve got a business to run. I don’t have time to worry about that flaky bitch,” he said, which I thought was a shitty choice of words, but then again Cort had been saying a lot of shitty things lately.
The banquet was being held in the Crescent ballroom, the same place where I had my wedding reception. Cort and I would be expected to stand near the entryway to greet guests as they came in. As soon as we arrived I armed myself with a glass of red, which Cort promptly took away, since we “didn’t want to look like drunks” as we said hello to people. He seemed to relish in calling me an alcoholic these days, which was funny since he drank far more often than I did. He drank every afternoon, evening and night at home. I only drank socially. But Cort had always been the type who only saw the world through his own eyes.
I was a pleasant enough greeter, though. I kept a smile plastered across my face, even though I kept thinking about Cort’s strange behavior and the way he immediately tensed when I mentioned Helene. The way he said “flaky bitch” told me there was something else there.
An Easy Dare Page 10