by G L Rockey
“That might be a song.”
She paused, “You know by god, it could be … write that down.” She didn't write anything down but continued: “Anyway, divorced the S.O.B., ten, fifteen, god, years ago. He has a practice in Knoxville now. I kept the house, the furniture, everything. He had no choice. I caught him screwing around. Ha. Bet she didn't feel a thing.” She looked at me and indicated about an inch with thumb and index fingers. “Littlest bitty thing, anyway, I got a cash settlement too, bundle. The son of a bitch.”
“Sound bitter.”
“Who? Me? Bitter. Ha.” She flashed, “My career's about to hit the moon.” She patted the sofa next to her and, like she might be calling Rover, said, “Come, sit.”
Thinking before things get any more complicated, get out now. I walked to the bar, dropped off my drink and said, “Say, I think I better be going.”
“Jack! Don't say that! You're not going anywhere.” She went to the entertainment center and snapped on the CD stereo. Her recording of Dogwood Blossoms began playing and she, humming to the tune, danced with herself.
I lit a Salem and, in the dim light of a whiskey fog, thought I saw Clark Gable staggering down the stairs.
Swaying to the music, humming, she pirouetted over to me, “Penny for your thoughts?”
“Nothing.”
“Let's dance.” She set her drink on the bar.
Arms around my waist, leading, she said, “Oh, honey bun, I'm sooo excited about everything that's happening. It's, I don't know, like things is a four-leaf clover, a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, and I'm right in the middle of it all.”
“That is definitely a song.”
She paused. “You know, by god, it might be.” She puckered her lips. “Kiss, kiss.”
I pecked her puckered lips.
“Stingy Jack.” She took my hand and lead me to the sofa. Sitting, she yanked me down and turned my head to her face. Her mouth close to mine, her jade gemstones peeked through thick mascara.
I started to say, “I….” but she locked her lips to mine and her tongue probed.
Given my natural self-control and current mellow condition, I reflexively reached to undo some of her things.
Abruptly, she stood, faced me, and said, “Bastard.”
Thinking I miscalculated her intentions, I began to stand but she shot her arms to my chest like a jujitsu ace. I fell back to the sofa.
A thin smile spread across her face. “Don't you dare move.”
She pushed the straps from her shoulders and let her dress fall to the carpet. Her amazing nobleness revealed, she pushed her pink panties off and kicked them in the air.
I tilted my head and wondered if this is where I get up and go to her … but, no no, you're the audience, she'll tell you when. To be polite, I smiled.
“What are you smiling about?”
“Nothing.”
“Bastard.” Buck naked, she stepped to my knees.
The stereo clicked, and Ms. Moore's recording of A Night’s a Day In Between Afternoons began.
Kneeling, humming her Night’s a Day tune, she zipped me free, took a good look and said, “My my, him impressive.”
What can you say.
She began peeling my clothes off, throwing them over her shoulder like a shopper searching for a size ten in a stack of sixes. Finished stripping me, she began a damn good imitation of Linda Lovelace in Deep Throat.
I touched her hair and she hissed up quickly, flicking her tongue.
Suddenly lightning illuminated the room and the ensuing thunder, like a widening crack making its way along a crumbling wall, crawled across the sky, then fell into the distance, echoing, echoing, into remoteness, and I felt very alone and empty.
I pushed Peggy head's aside, stood, went to the stereo, turned it off, and walked to the sliding glass doors that led to the backyard and opened them.
“What in blue blazes are you doing, darlin’?” She said.
“Listen.”
“What?”
“Listen.”
“Are you crazy, I was doin’ ya.”
“Listen.”
“Are you batty?”
“I think.”
It started to sprinkle rain. I studied the tiny drops plinking little circles on the turquoise pool's surface.
Peggy came to my side and cupped my limpness in her hands. “Him got soft,” she said poutily. “You sick or something?”
I started to go outside.
“No.” She tugged my arms. “It's lightning.”
“Take a chance.” I stepped through the door and stood, naked, feeling pretty good. A light rain fell and the air was thick with budding honeysuckle, dogwood blossom, magnolia sweetness, and wet grass.
She stepped next to me. “What'n the blazes is the matter with you?”
A strange feeling that someone watched us from the bushes, I said, “Nothing.” She knelt and after some variations on the Lovelace's performance, she pulled me to the grass and we began variations of that famous Shakespearian beast with two backs.
* * *
Then it was quiet except for a few light raindrops. I rolled on my back and felt the coolness of the grass. A wisp of wind blew across my chest.
She said, “Oh, Jack, I can't get enough of you.”
I stood and walked toward the pool.
“Where you goin’?”
“Swim.”
I dove in the deep end and doggy-paddled to the shallow end where I rested on an underwater step.
Peggy followed, wiggled her milky white body through the water, surfaced, and sat beside me.
Wiping her face with her palms, she said, “Penny for your thoughts?”
Thinking, time and chance is mixed up with a fickle free will thing and the exclusive consequences are stuck on the smell of humanity forever, I said, “You know how many wives Solomon had?”
“Silly Jack.”
Lightning clawed the night sky and thunder, this time like a falling giant, rolled off into the distance and I felt that yearning after-Terri emptiness that was there under the surface and the thought came: nothing can fill you now … not even sex … move, adapt, or die.
Lightning smacked nearby.
Peggy stood. “We better go in.”
“Yeah, might get struck by lightning.”
“Silly. I'm already struck, you're mine now.”
She took him by the hand and led me inside.
PART TWO
CHAPTER 1
Real Time
Monday, April 16, 08:32:05 A.M. CDT
Berry Frazer entered the TV12 elevator, punched the down button and, while the car descended from the second floor to the first, twiddled his thumbs.
Twenty seconds later, Berry—six foot one, white shirt with blue collar, red paisley tie with matching breast pocket hanky, blue pinstripe suit, Gucci oxblood tassel loafers, yellow silk socks—strode past the TV12 news room. Five more steps and he entered Jack Carr's outer office where Jack's assistant Joy Lambert, at her desk, opened morning mail.
Berry walked to Jack's office door and, looking in, said to Joy, “Where's Carr?”
She explained that he was not yet in, all the rain, some flooding, traffic, she was sure he would be in shortly.
Berry slammed Jack's door. A picture in Joy's outer office fell to the floor.
Back on the second floor, Berry stopped at his secretary’s desk, said, “Judy, call Joe Galbo. Tell him I want to see him, now.”
Judy—short sandy pixie style hair, smoke-blue eyes, a thin five foot six—looked up from her typing. “Yes sir.”
Slamming his office door, Berry ambled across his office suite, entered his private bathroom, removed his coat and trousers, put them on a hook, dropped his blue Jockey briefs, and sat on the soft seat of his turquoise bidet. After a moment he picked up, in front of him, a wall mounted telephone and pressed Snakebite Walker's unlisted number.
No answer. He pressed Felix The Cat's main number, waited, listened for a second t
hen spoke: “This is Showroom, Snakebite in? …when he be back … oh … want to do some business … why not? … take it, I'll talk to Snakebite when he gets back … it's okay … Showroom … thirty large, to win, Yankees, Baltimore, Pittsburgh … ten large, to win, Mets, Minnesota, Cubs, St. Louis, A's, and Seattle … what's the point spread on the Celtics, Lakers' game … twenty large, Lakers to win … that'll do it … Snakebite calls in, I need to talk to him.”
Berry hung up, finished with his toilet, and went to his marble topped sink. He squeezed SoftSoap on his hands, washed, then, one at a time, on a gold BF monogrammed white hand towel, dried his short lean ring-less fingers. As he dried, he checked, one at a time his manicured nails.
Finished with his hands, he popped out his left blue-tinted contact lens, re-wet it, put it back, then pulled on his trousers and suit coat. He turned to the mirrored wall to the left of the lavatory, ran his palm over his rust-red toupee, then stepped to his office.
CHAPTER 2
Jack’s Time
I awoke to a clap of thunder, a steady rain droning on the roof, and the essence of warm ginger marmalade filling my nostrils. I turned and looked. The back side of Peggy looked like a very ripe Bartlett pear. Knotted blonde hair fell over her milky white shoulders. I followed her spine down to the dark crease that blended into the pink sheet that partially covered her impressive, actually cavernous, settee.
I squinted at Blancpain: little after 8:40 A.M., Monday April 16.
Realizing not only was I going to be late for work, but about twenty-four hours had slipped by in a Jack Daniels’ fog of playing doctor, cook, and bottle washer all over Peggy’s spread. Thinking I would quietly slip out of bed, go home, change, go to work, I moved my leg.
Peggy turned and purred, “Kiss, kiss.”
“I gotta go.”
“Nooo.” She turned and reached to hold him. “Kiss, kiss.”
I looked at her eyelids smeared with shadow. Merlot, I thought and, I also noticed, in the sober morning light, she had grown a very pointed little nose.
I sat up on the side of the bed. “Gotta go.”
She squeezed him, said, “I like him, Mr. Carr. I like him a lot. I think I'm going to keep him.”
I looked out the window.
Peggy tugged. “Kiss, kiss.”
I pecked her puckered lips.
“Stingy.”
I kissed her.
After a moment, pulling on my clothes, I said, “Don't bother to get up.”
“Oh Jack, this has been soooo wonderful. I don't want you to go, darn it.”
“Gotta go.”
“I'm going to call you in an hour, to see if you got to work okay.”
“No need to do that.”
She smiled. “I will.”
Out of somewhere a silly selfish survival thought struck me. I said, “Say, it might be a good idea to keep this weekend our little secret.”
“Silly.”
“Just a thought.”
CHAPTER 3
Real Time
8:45:30 A.M. CDT
Berry ambled to his office's picture window and leaned his hip on the mahogany sill. The window offered, nestled across the Cumberland River, a panoramic view of downtown Nashville. Today charcoal-colored clouds shrouded the skyline and rain pelted the window.
He scanned the misty view then ambled across the thick maroon carpeting to his massive mahogany desk. He looked at his gold Rolex—8:47—settled into his Moroccan leather executive chair, and stared at his desk's top. The polished surface held a white speaker phone, a gold pen set, and a small desk calendar with a leather top. Monday's Wall Street Journal and The Tennessean lay to the side.
Berry turned, behind his desk, to a mahogany credenza. He straightened a silver framed photograph of his wife, Adele, and teenage daughter, Stephanie. Next to the photographs, a half dozen folded white hand towels were stacked. The towels, always a fresh supply, were weapons in his constant battle with, on his neck, forehead, and upper lip, sweat. Next to the towels, in a brown leather case, sat his Pentax digital camera. He took a towel and, as he wiped his face, his phone buzzed.
He flipped the speaker on and said, “Yes.”
Judy: “Sir, Mr. Galbo is not in yet and Mike Walker is on line two.”
“Right.” Berry punched line two and said, “Snakebite, you old son of a gun, how ya doing?”
“Whaddaya doing, prick, making bets, yous is shut off.”
“Mike, this is an open line….”
“Fuck open.”
“What's the matter?”
“Why don't you get somethin’ else on your prick TV news, ‘sides my joints being fucked over by ‘em goddamn do-gooders, huh?”
“I thought you were out of town….”
“Yeah, yeah, never heard a long distance, I got eyes everywhere, you prick media guys all the same, busting my balls.”
“Ah, Snakebite, you'll be all right, always come out on top.”
“Fuck top. My guy said you’s had some big fucking need ta talk.”
“I….”
“So what the fuck is it?”
“I wanted to fill you in….”
“Yeah, yeah, I've heard at fill in shit before, you’s into me so far I quit countin’.”
“Mike, let's not fight….”
“Fuck you, I need some cash.”
“It’s about the weather, our trade deal, Peggy?”
“Yeah, well, when are you gonna do something?”
“Soon.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah … when I see it I believe it.”
“I'm meeting with her tonight, you'll see….”
“Talk is cheap.”
“Say, when are you coming over to The Berry, have dinner?”
“Soon as you have the close out sale.”
Berry paused, “Mike, we're doing great.”
“Yeah, yeah, not what I heard … send some cash, prick.”
“Mike I told you….”
“Bye prick.”
Hearing a click, Berry hung up, “Albino bone head.”
CHAPTER 4
Jack’s Time
Allowing Winston to show her Grand Prix stuff, the past twenty-four or so hours that had slipped by in a Jack Daniels’ fog of playing doctor, cook, and bottle washer with Peggy’s spread, flashed by like grainy promo footage in a B movie:
Arrived Sunday A.M., saw a striptease … Sunday champagne brunch, listened to this end of several Snakebite calls. Sunday afternoon while taking a skinny dip, the pool side door bell chimed. After around ten minutes of chiming, Peggy went to see who it was. I peeked around the corner of the house, a purple PT Cruiser faced Winston. Five minutes later Peggy returned said it was Stella; sworn to secrecy, she had sent her home. Another call from Snakebite. A late night dip … around sometime about an hour ago, I woke up and called Joy, told her I was running a little late. She told me that Berry had been down twice looking for me.
The now clearing up, windshield wipers flapping, I speculated why Berry might be looking for me. I knew he had left last Thursday for New York to meet with the CBS brass. Sometime on these trips to New York he came back with insights on how the world worked, or should work. It's like he went to see these wizards and the wizards dribbled out little tidbits of wisdom they got from other wizards. More often than not, Berry carried the tidbits back on an airplane. I had discovered, later in life than I should have, tidbit wisdom carried around on airplanes can be lethal, especially from New York wizards.
Then there was the surprise that Peggy told me about.
Please be wizardry from New York.
CHAPTER 5
Real Time
8:55:01 A.M. CDT
Berry returned from a second trip to Jack's office, passed Judy's desk without a word, and plunked himself down behind his desk. He pressed a switch beneath the top drawer. In a moment, embedded in the wall beyond the sofa, a 40 inch television screen flickered on with CBS morning fare. He listened for a moment then muted the sound.
He glanced to the left cuff of his shirt which extended two inches beyond the sleeve of his jacket. He jerked the jacket sleeve then adjusted the cuff so the red embroidered BF initials showed on top. He glanced at his Rolex—8:58.
“Son of a mother bitch.”
Underarm sweat showing through his jacket, he stood and, next to the desk, straightened a tan leather reception chair. Then he walked, ten feet away, facing his desk, to his ash-white undulating sofa. He slapped the cushions then flipped on two bulbous table lamps that sat on mahogany end tables. A coffee table matched the end tables.
After angling his two stuffed slate-gray chairs toward his desk, he went to, recessed in the wall opposite his picture window, his four stool bar. A mirror reflected glass shelves, sundry bottles of liquor, and various shaped cocktail glasses. He opened a small drawer, retrieved a Tylox and took the capsule with a sip of water. He then walked to photographs that hung on a fabric covered wall. The pictures, eight by ten, were of himself posing with CBS and Hollywood TV show celebrities. He looked at each then, at the end, he stopped at a black and white photograph of a smiling young man and woman standing in front of a trailer. Large red lettering on the side proclaimed: WNAS-AM Radio Nashville.
On the bottom of the photo's frame a small gold plate: Lamar and Libby Frazer—first radio station.
He looked up and studied, spaced above the photographs, stuffed animal heads from animals he had shot—Cape horn buffalo, moose, elk, big horn sheep, and a twelve point buck. He stepped back to look at, in the corner, under a potted six foot Ficus tree, a stuffed elephant foot. He had shot the elephant last year in Zimbabwe.
Just then his octagon wall clock chimed 9:00 A.M..
CHAPTER 6
Jack’s Time
At my apartment, I checked my answering machine; Sago had left a message, we needed to talk, S-Stuff.