The clerk appeared dubious and undecided. “We don’t have the original color charts for Studebakers.”
“That’s fine,” Adrian said. “We’re after something more modern.”
“A lot more modern,” added Toby.
“Very well.” The clerk led them to a booth in the rear or the store. “This is all we have available. Custom colors can be special ordered. Takes about a week, a week and a half, tops.”
“Thanks,” Adrian said. Toby pushed forward eagerly and began leafing through the colors, immediately ignoring anything not horrifyingly loud. Adrian considered it a blessing that paisley didn’t exist as a color swatch.
“How about this one?” Toby asked, pointing at least thirty times. His choices all centered around making a statement. What that statement might be was still in doubt. It was as if the boy’s unformed choices perfectly matched his unformed ideas about life.
“I like that one,” Adrian said on the rare occasions that he did. “Blue’s nice. How about tan?”
Toby gave him a look of scorn that defined generations. “This one.” He held out the chip proudly.
“It’s yellow,” Adrian said.
“Good choice,” said the clerk. “Chromium Yellow De-Luxe. That’s the color of those new Nissan X-Terra’s you know.”
“Yeah?” said Toby. His voice shimmered with excitement.
“We can have that for you in a week. Week and a half, tops.”
“Mr. B? What do you think?”
“It’s yellow,” Adrian said. I’d never be able to pick a color like that, he thought. What did a yellow car say about you? He considered his clothes: tan cotton pants, pale short sleeve shirt, brown loafers. What did they say about him? He looked at Toby, dressed in monochromatic mode: black jeans, black shorts, dazzling white tennis shoes and a black Oakland Raiders cap, backwards, of course.
“What color is the interior?” asked the clerk in his tell me/I don’t care voice.
“Light blue.”
“Super,”
Adrian had doubts, but he saw the look in Toby’s face and had to smile himself. “Yellow’s great,” he said.
Back in the Ranger Toby asked, “Are we going to paint it ourselves ?”
Visions of a teenager with an air gun spraying Chromium yellow De-Luxe: the ultimate graffiti.
“No.”
“Why not? We did the frame.”
“Yeah, but that’s different, you don’t see it. We did the primer coats, too. But for something this important, we go to the professionals.”
“Why?”
Adrian didn’t answer.
“Seriously, why?”
“Because they can do it better than we can. Because they have air controlled painting rooms and heat lamps to bake the finish on. A man is only...”
“...as good as his tools. Yeah, okay, I get that. You’re saying, to do this right we have to know how much we can do, but let someone else do the other stuff.”
Adrian was impressed. “And you’re only fifteen?”
“And a half,” Toby agreed. “But I’m wise beyond my years.”
“And you had a special teacher,” Adrian added.
“Yes, of course.” He nodded his sincere agreement and let the silence fill the truck until, just as the light changed, he finished, “That Mrs. Delatre, she be one fine Speech and Language Arts teacher.”
“Where?” asked Adrian.
“Jazzions,” Maggie answered briefly. She concentrated on beating the yellow light. “It’s a music troupe, up north in Five Points. We’re seeing ‘Ain’t Misbehavin’ by Fats Waller. You’ll like it.”
Adrian smiled; he already did. He and Maggie had talked on the phone half a dozen times since the Flea Market, long conversations mostly about music, her favorite subject. Though he often felt he added little to the calls, she seemed to accept his reticence and perhaps enjoyed her high percentage of words.
Last week she had suddenly—everything she did except music was sudden—invited him to “Jazzions.” She pronounced it twice for clarity but refused to say more until she picked him up for the date.
The carrot colored Fiero was trying to overcome a late traffic delay and deliver them on time. “Seven,” Maggie told him when he asked. “Seven-seven-seven.” She darted around a Volvo, looked pleased and said, “We’ll make it.”
She parked in the lot of a drug store and they walked to a store front building. The interior reminded Adrian of a church basement: cheap carpet, painted walls, old wood trim and inexpensive curtains. The seats were brown metal folding chairs, the stage a raised platform. An upright piano and a small drum kit sat at the edge of the stage. The crowd fanned itself with programs in the hot dry air.
Maggie read the program avidly, while Adrian fanned himself with his.
“Is this opera?” Adrian asked.
“Nope.”
“Church music?”
“Nope.”
“What—”
“Read your program,” she told him.
The lights dimmed and the piano player started banging the keys with a jaunty old melody The cast was all black, the audience was mixed. For two hours Adrian got lost in the Vaudeville jokes, caricatures and music. The piano and drums became an orchestra. the tiny stage transforming from a nightclub to a street scene to a dingy apartment. Maggie, eyes wide, sang along with every song and her fingers twitched with the piano she was playing on her knees.
“I liked it.” Adrian said.
“Yeah? What did you like best?”‘
“Your Feet’s Too Big was the best,” Adrian said. They walked through the light crowd to the car.
“I liked Mean To Me.” Maggie slid into the low bucket seat and closed the door, making the space more intimate. The evening was dark and she looked at him for a long moment in the green glow of the dashboard lights, then sang softly, “Mean to me...why must to be so mean to me? Can’t you see...what you mean to me?”
“Wow,” he said. “What was that song you were playing when I came to pick you up?”
“You Made Me Love You.” Maggie smiled at him for remembering. She sang a slow melody. “You made me love you...I didn’t wanna do it...I didn’t wanna do it. You made me happy sometimes...you made me sad. And there were times, dear, you made me feel so bad.”
She finished the song and Adrian thought he could feel what she felt in the music.
“You like sad songs, don’t you?”
“Mostly,” she said. “I can play with my voice more on the torch songs, and I can control the piano better. It’s more intimate. I like it better when they make you cry.” She shrugged. “But I do a great version of Blue Finger Lou.” She twisted the key and to the roar of the engine belted out, “Ba-lou finger Lou...my woogie wants to boogie with you.”
The car raced through the dark on a journey Adrian didn’t want to end. “Sing another,” he asked. Without turning her head she answered, “Fast or slow?”
“Slow,” he decided.
She sang, Summertime, and God Bless the Child, and Nothing But a Fool and The Birth of The Blues. At first she seemed embarrassed, sneaking glances at him to see his reaction. She gained confidence and the melodies grew bolder, filling the car with intimacy. Adrian, who had never heard any of them, couldn’t imagine his life without them.
“Do that one again.”
“Which?”
“That fool thing.”
“That fool thing?” she mimicked. She shook her head in amazement and said, “idiot,” under her breath. But she sang it again.
She dropped him off at his office where his truck sat alone under the glare of an overhead lamp. It looked forlorn in the empty lot.
“Well; here we are,” she said self-consciously.
“Will you sing for me again?” Adrian felt like kissing her and had absolutely no idea how to bridge the small space between them. He looked at his truck and felt sad.
“Maybe,” she said softly.
“Or...will you play...piano...some
time?”
“Maybe,” she said again. Her voice was a whisper. She leaned forward.
“I’d better get going,” he said, too loudly.
She pulled back. “Of course you should.” Was there a trace of a smile?
“To my truck,” He pointed.
“Yeah.”
“Yeah,’ he agreed. He touched the door handle but didn’t move it. “This was great.”
“I thought so,” Maggie agreed.
The silence grew. Adrian pushed the door and got out, stretching up out of the car. He walked around to her side not knowing what else to say. It didn’t feel right leaving like this, he thought. but what should he say? He looked at her. She looked back, waiting.
“Well, goodnight,” he said and turned to his truck, walking too quickly, too stiffly,
“Hey!” she called and Adrian turned.
She leaned her arm on the open window. “The next time you have to impress me,” She jerked the car into gear and roared out of the parking lot. Adrian watched her until her tails lights disappeared along the Platte River.
Just like last time, he thought. He smiled easily and went home.
23 – That... Was Corley Sayres
Corley Sayres drove like an idiot, swerving in an out of traffic as if possessed. He took the sharp angled exit to Santa Fe at 20 miles over the limit, almost daring a cop to be foolish enough to stop him. His tires squealed and he leaned sharply with the centrifugal force, nearly lost control, straightened out and sped up to sixty-five.
How the Hell had she suckered him? How the bloody hell? Corley wasn’t used to being the victim.
Monday had started well enough. The call to Wally saying he’d be late. A nice breakfast and waiting impatiently for the UPS truck. The excitement had built as the minutes crept toward ten. Corley was like a kid at Christmas, waiting in the foyer, watching the parking lot.
The brown van arrived at 9:30. Corley was smiling as the guy ambled up the walk, delivered a slim package, handed him receipts and left. Finally, alone with his treasure, Corley ripped the string and tore at the cardboard: Rocket Ship - Galileo fell into his hands. He could see the title through the bubble wrap. But wait—a first hint of disaster assailed him. It couldn’t be...
“No.” He turned the exposed book over and glared. “A book club edition,” His voice was flat in the empty apartment. “A God Damn Book Club Edition.”
Left turn on Dartmouth, just past the Platte. The river was a trickling creek in the wide bed, like a small child wearing Daddy’s too big shoes. He stormed into the office, past Ruth who gestured at him futilely. He left his coat in his own office on the second floor and, too tightly wound to stay still. paced down the hall to the shop.
The doors opened to a vast storage area above the larger floor of the warehouse, jutting like the prow of an ocean liner over the gray floor. Corley walked quickly past piled boxes and dusty drafting tables and shelves of old project drawings. He stopped at a yellow painted railing and clenched his fists tightly around the cool metal.
He leaned forward and flinched. It was nearly twenty feet down to the concrete floor and as always a sense of falling swept over him, making his head spin and stomach muscles clench.
God Damn It! His fury increased at his fear and he deliberately leaned forward just to prove he could. Head thrust out over the edge he held his position for one... two... three seconds before leaning back to safety. He took several deep breathes that failed to calm him, turned abruptly and danced down the metal stairs.
The fab shop office was all the way against the south wall and Corley headed that way without thinking. Where else would he go? To see Wally’s stupid cars? His lips tightened at the thought of a grown man wasting so much money on a hobby. Wally didn’t even drive them himself.
Corley stopped short, staring. Gordon Robertson, the shop foreman, was in the middle of what looked like a heated discussion with Pieburn Dafari.
Pieburn Dafari, the slender black engineer from Nairobi? South Africa? Somewhere far away. He had the odd accent and a way of looking right through Corley as if he didn’t care.
Absence from the office and Wally Clooner’s squawking interference had kept Corley from having an actual confrontation with Pieburn, but at several of the weekly staff meeting he’d come close to yelling, annoyed mostly by the man’s attitude. His anger flared and Corley charged forward like a bull.
Corley opened the door of the fab office to an argument that had long been in progress.
“But you said, Mr. Robertson,” Pieburn said patiently, “that this would be complete by last Tuesday. And today it is Thursday.” His strange pronunciation made even an argument sound liquid. “I have a customer who has a great need for this product.”
“I know that, Pieburn, Dammit, don’t you think I know that? But I’ve got three other projects just as important as yours.” It was apparent that Gordon was upset. Pieburn, though small in stature, held his ground and managed to look calm. Both men glanced at Corley but continued.
“You said that on Tuesday—”
“What the hell’s going on here?” demanded Corley.
“Corley,” Gordon acknowledged. “Nothing’s going on. Pieburn and I are just having a little disagreement on schedules, that’s all.”
Corley looked over at Pieburn. The engineer looked back with cool appraisal and absolutely no sign of fear. Corley was seven inches taller and a hundred pounds heavier. His personality was several notches higher in aggression, but none of that seemed to matter to Pieburn. That stare, so insolent, goaded Corley to fresh anger and he stepped forward, his arm raising.
Pieburn never moved. His eyes rose as Corley closed in, but he never flinched or changed that watchful expression.
“Hey! Now, Corley. Pieburn didn’t do anything! What are you doing?” Gordon’s voice strained at the sudden threat of violence.
Corley had no idea. Propelled by anger and frustration, he saw only a target that refused to back down. Pieburn’s indifference made Corley angrier. He grabbed the front of Pieburn’s sweater, pulling him closer.
A voice behind them said, “Put him down.”
Corley spun around. A stranger stood in the doorway, He had a long straight scar running down the right side of his face, and a look of generally being beaten up by life, but he stared at Corley from cold blue eyes, daring him to continue. Slowly, Corley’s fingers relaxed. He felt the rough wool of the sweater fall from his grasp.
“Adrian,” Gordon said.
Corley turned and Pieburn smoothed down his sweater, Gordon babbled nervously and Adrian stood like a statue, impossibly stiff.
“Corley, this is Adrian Beck. He’s a new engineer. He started a couple of weeks ago. Do you hear me, Corley? He works here. Adrian Beck. Adrian. this is Corley Sayres; the vice president.”
The formality of the introduction broke the mood. A new emotion came over Corley, not fear exactly, but a fluttery feeling in his stomach, slightly like his feelings about heights. As if this stranger was a threat to him.
With a sound almost like a growl, he shouldered around Adrian and swept through the door.
Adrian swallowed. After a while he began to breathe again. Sometime after that feeling returned to his arms and legs. He twisted his neck to remove a creaking stiffness.
That, he thought numbly, was Corley Sayres. No wonder everyone said his name in a whisper. He was a bull in human form, a hurricane on the ground, a powerhouse of personality.
Corley was well dressed, and certainly a large man, but those weren’t enough to cause the sensation of immobility that had overcome him. Something else, like a magnetic aura around the man, a sort of charisma, a way of handling himself that affected people.
At least it affected me, Adrian thought. What was it? The eyes? Brown and ordinary, they had turned on Adrian and he’d felt his legs turn rubbery and his strength turn to jelly. Like a deer in a car’s headlights, or a bird facing a deadly snake. This is your last moment, those eyes said flatly. What
will you do with them?
Those eyes had looked at him, dismissed him, and moved on, but the effect lingered. It wasn’t the panic Adrian was relieved to realize. He’d been having less trouble with that as time went by. This was a new emotion, a feeling straight from prehistory, men around the cave fires, huddled in the dark afraid of noises in the night. This was an emotion in the blood.
This would have struck Adrian as poetic drivel if he hadn’t just lived the experience. It was like euphoria or depression; an emotion that came and swept all others away like a flood.
Adrian was afraid.
Had Corley felt the same? Adrian doubted it. He couldn’t imagine anything except a cocky arrogance, looking down on everyone.
“Adrian?”
“What?” He answered without moving, his eyes held on a distant horizon within himself. The gang on the bus had terrified him, the episodes since had shaken him with their intensity, but this was so much more. If Corley Sayres had been the gang leader on that bus, the girl would have been taken without any savior as unlikely as Adrian Beck.
“Hey! Adrian.”
A long shuddery breath and the world became external again, brightly lit and small, the fab shop office, Gordon and Pieburn looking at him with concern.
“Sorry about that. Corley can be a little rough.” Gordon patted Adrian on the shoulder. “Hope you didn’t take it too seriously.”
“No,” Adrian said vaguely. “No, I didn’t take it seriously.” He smiled at Gordon, picked up his drawing from the floor and turned to leave.
At the door of the office he was surprised to find Pieburn standing next to him. “It is like seeing a lion close up for the first time, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Adrian agreed. “Exactly like that. Did you ever see a lion, close up? In Africa, I mean?”
“No. I saw one in the Denver Zoo last month.”
He leaned against the doorway, his body slender and nearly weightless, held down by thick black shoes and a bulky sweater. His hair was thick wool, square cut on top, thin at the sides, like a flat cap.
“I saw how the two of you reacted to each other,” he said. “I haven’t seen anyone matter to Corley since I first met him. He dismisses me, and others don’t seem to really exist to him, but you...you mean something.”
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