Club Storyville

by Riley LaShea

  “He was a musician?” I couldn’t withhold the question that came instantly to my lips, and when those dark, pained eyes turned on me, I realized Mrs. Green didn’t want to be angry. She looked as if she wanted so much to feel anything else, she just didn’t know how.

  “He played the guitar,” she said. “Played so good all the girls had a crush on him. He used to go around the country with it, but he always came back home. Twenty years ago, he got one of his songs done by some jazz man and did real good for his family. Was able to get his mama in a real nice place before she died. We didn’t see them much after that.”

  “Do you know where they moved?” Ariel questioned.

  “Somewhere east of Iberville,” Mrs. Green responded, but Ariel looked just as confused as me.

  “It’s a new housing development,” Joyce explained. “It’s just west of here.”

  “You don’t have the address?” Ariel appealed to Mrs. Green.

  “I’m sure I have it here somewhere,” Mrs. Green responded, “but I ain’t goin’ go diggin’ for it.”

  Understanding then that Mrs. Green telling us about Desmond didn’t mean she liked us standing on her front walk any more than she did before, I was amazed she had given us any help at all.

  “Well, thank you,” Ariel sounded as if she too realized we had pushed our luck enough. “You’ve been very helpful.”

  “Hold on a second,” Mrs. Green called Ariel to a stop as she started back to me. “I told you I had questions too.”

  Though her feet had paused at once, Ariel was less anxious to turn back around, but she did so anyway, her shoulders setting as she met Mrs. Green’s eyes.

  “Why is it,” Mrs. Green’s voice grew quieter, but thicker with accusation, “my boy, who was always a sweet, beautiful man, worked hard, loved hard, never hurt nobody, walk into a white neighborhood, and those white folk can’t just toss him out, they got to beat him within a inch of his life, so bad he can’t speak no mo’, or work no mo’, or even look at me no mo’, and you walk right up in this neighborhood as if it belong to you? Why them invisible lines apply only one way?”

  Somewhere else, from someone else, it might have sounded like a threat. In the urban neighborhood, coming from Mrs. Green, it sounded like an honest question. As if she thought benefitting in some ways from the world meant we had some greater insight into the way it worked or the ability to change anything.

  “I don’t know,” Ariel confessed we had no more power than she did, and maybe Mrs. Green didn’t expect us to have any answers after all, because she only nodded in response.

  “Well, I’m real glad I could answer your question,” she said. “Don’t come back here again ‘til you can answer mine.”

  Turning into the darkness beyond her front door, Mrs. Green closed us out, and we were left staring at the solid wood surface, a small step closer to finding Desmond Caster, but the ground rockier beneath our feet.

  Chapter Eighteen

  East of Iberville was no place to begin a search. That could be anywhere from the next street to the Atlantic Ocean.

  Thanking Joyce and saying goodbye on the sidewalk in front of Mrs. Green’s house, there was distinct feeling there would be no more help out of Desmond’s old neighborhood, and I knew that was why Ariel suggested we go back to Buddy’s to wait for lunch.

  “Moving up east of Iberville?” Buddy was anxious to offer what assistance he could as we ate the split pea soup he kept back for us with bread he had thrown into the brick oven outside next to the roast he’d started for the night. “That’s gonna be the far side of Tremé. Faubourg St. John, maybe. That’s where I would go.”

  “Any of these addresses?” Ariel asked, sliding the directory across the table to him.

  “There are a few that might fit,” Buddy scanned the page. “I can tell you which ones.”

  “That would be helpful,” Ariel returned, head dipping over her bowl for a bite.

  “You ladies just going to go knocking on more doors?” he asked us.

  “That’s all we can do,” Ariel said, and Buddy looked like he didn’t care much for her answer.

  “Why don’t you let me make a few calls for you?” he suggested. “See if I can’t help you find a place to start.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” Ariel told him.

  “I would feel better,” Buddy admitted, and when Ariel looked up at him, it was with something that looked a lot like affection, and might have even made me jealous if I didn’t know there were many reasons Ariel could only like Buddy as a friend.

  “All right,” she said. “Do you want us to just wait here?”

  “Somewhere close by,” Buddy replied. “You don’t mind stickin’ close to my place, do you?”

  “Of course not,” I answered, watching Buddy gather up the directory.

  “You know where the kitchen is,” he reminded us as he started off. “Help yourself if you need anything else, or come find me. I’ll be around.”

  Then, he went off, and, left at the table, I cleaned my bowl with the crust of bread I had left, glancing to Ariel’s half-eaten soup as she took another small bite, looking as if she could barely get it down.

  “Don’t you like it?” I asked her, though it seemed impossible. Aside from Nan’s, Buddy’s split pea soup was the best I’d ever had. Though Mama made the same soup Nan made, she said the ham was salt enough, but it never was, and I didn’t know why Mama felt like she had to change something done so right. Often, it felt like the only reason Mama refused to salt her split pea soup was because she couldn’t stop arguing with Nan, even just standing over the stove.

  “I do. It’s really good,” Ariel answered, but it seemed contradictory when she put her spoon down to wipe her mouth and take a drink of water. “I just... I’m still full from breakfast, I guess,” she said, though she hadn’t eaten nearly as much as I had at either meal and our walk had made quick work of Buddy’s early-morning pastries. “I’m going to run upstairs for a minute. Would you take our dishes into the kitchen for Buddy?”

  “Okay,” I uttered, watching Ariel rise from her chair. “You’re not going to finish?”

  “No,” she shook her head, not fully looking at me, and, though I didn’t know what was different about her exactly, Ariel just didn’t look herself. “Do you need anything while I’m up there?”

  “My book?” I requested, and she gave a small nod.

  “I’ll be right back,” she declared, and when she hurried out the dining room door, I thought she might be sick.

  A few minutes later, our lunch mess cleaned up, I was browsing the magazines in the parlor when the two men who were staying in the room next to Ariel’s and mine came in. Blushing furiously upon sight of them, despite having convinced myself I’d hallucinated their noises in the night, I smiled weakly at their restrained hellos, before pretending to be engrossed in an article about fly-fishing in New Orleans’ lakes.

  As impolite as I knew it was, unable to contain my curiosity, I situated in my chair so as to pick up on their conversation, but, getting only snippets of dialogue from across the room, it sounded like a conversation any two men would engage in with each other. There was something about the war, a terribly boring chorus about the price of oranges, and the floating notes of occasional laughter as they drank their lemonade in the light pouring in through the picture window.

  Wondering if it was regular sugar water, like I drank at home, or if it was Buddy’s special mix, I thought I could use a glass of my own, and that Ariel could probably use a glass. Realizing, at the thought, she had been gone some time, I looked to the parlor doorway. I wanted to give her privacy. I knew what a constant presence I had been, and that she might just need some space. When a few more minutes ticked by without her return, though, I started to worry and my feet took the quickest route out of the parlor and up the stairs almost of their own volition.

  “Ariel?” I called softly as I knocked on the door of the room we shared.

  “Yes?” she
responded, but only after I had already opened it to search for her inside.

  Her back going rigid where she sat, faced away from me, on the bed, Ariel’s hands rose to her face, and I knew she was wiping away the tears I could hear in her voice.

  “You didn’t come back.” Not knowing what else to say, I stated the obvious.

  “Sorry,” she sounded so weak, so insecure, I felt suddenly as if I had no choice but to find some strength, to form a backbone I didn’t naturally have. “I just, um...” Already caught, there was no making excuses or denying anything. “I have your book,” Ariel finished instead.

  Up in a flash, she tried to go past me to the door, anxious to get away, from me, or from being caught, or from what she was feeling, or didn’t want to feel. My hands reaching out on reflex, they pulled her back, and Ariel huffed a small breath as she avoided my eyes for a moment, before finally giving into the weight of my stare.

  My own breath catching at the storm that swirled in her eyes, I knew she was still bothered by the story of Mrs. Green’s son, because it was bothering me too. Everything about everything just felt wrong, and there was nothing I could say or do to change the past or the present or to alter the future in any meaningful way. I didn’t even know how to make the world easier to endure.

  Forgoing all thought instead, I stepped into her, letting my arms close around her, as they always ached so much to do, ignoring the sensation that Ariel wished I wouldn’t. Holding on as long as it took, I felt her finally relax into me as her arms closed around my shoulders, and, even knowing her embrace could fix nothing, no more than I could fix anything for her, it felt as if it fixed everything.

  Ariel’s smell invading my senses, her heart pounding against my chest, I noticed my feelings had changed again. They felt protective, like they wanted to shield her when she lost faith and couldn’t fight, though, until the moment I walked into the room, I wasn’t sure Ariel suffered such weakness.

  When at last she pulled away, because I couldn’t - left to me, we would have stood that way for all eternity - I felt my book, still in Ariel’s hand, brush against my back.

  “Are you okay?” I asked her, trying to make her look at me as the last of her touch, her hand on my arm, abandoned me and left me hollowed in its absence.

  “Yes,” she lied badly, casting her gaze to the wall, and the sunlight streaming through the window gave her hair an even lighter glow as her face darkened to shadow. “There are just a lot of things.”

  Nodding my agreement, I felt powerless to do anything about any of them as Ariel held my book out, prompting me to take it.

  “It’s warm up here,” she declared, and, though it wasn’t nearly as warm as our first night in that room, I was anticipating an excuse and gave into it with an accepting bob of my head. “Let’s go downstairs.”

  “All right,” I breathed, though it wasn’t what I wanted at all.

  Since I didn’t know what it was I wanted exactly, though, there was nothing for me to fight for, so I simply followed Ariel as she left the room before I was ready for my time alone with her to come to an end.

  “There you are,” Buddy was waiting in the front room for us when we made it back down the stairs, and the smile that animated his face was like a shining sun against the darkness that seemed to follow us from the second floor.

  “Sorry,” Ariel said. “We just had to run upstairs. Do you have a place for us to start?”

  “Not exactly,” Buddy declared, and, suppressing a sigh, I wondered why he looked so happy about it. “How about the exact address instead?”

  “Really?” The announcement perked Ariel up considerably, and I was grateful Buddy could restore the energy in her I couldn’t. “Just like that?”

  “Come on now,” Buddy countered. “It wasn’t just like that. I did make quite a few calls.”

  “I am in no way discounting your efforts,” Ariel found a smile for him. “I just can’t believe you got the address this quickly.”

  “As it turns out,” Buddy explained, “while there are plenty of Casters in New Orleans, there aren’t too many who got a song on a Duke Ellington record.”

  “Duke Ellington?” The famous name came as surprise, and it felt strange hearing it associated with someone once close to Nan.

  “So says the grapevine,” Buddy returned. “Are you a fan?”

  “Yes,” I breathed, remembering all the nights when the music would spin in the background at Nan’s as we played a game or made cookies or huddled down for bed. “My grandmother loves that music, and my brother Edward, he played the trombone and he would always listen so close to the speaker when he played those records. I don’t know,” I shook my head slowly, remembering Edward’s face, the way his eyes closed as he practically hugged Nan’s old phonograph to listen. “He was trying to imitate them, I guess.”

  “Well, I can think of no better people to imitate,” Buddy approved of my story. “As you might imagine, people tend to remember those kinds of details, and, if what they remember is right, this has to be the place.” He held up the slip of paper in his hand.

  “Thank you so much, Buddy,” I said, hit by a wave of something I couldn’t entirely describe, such sudden excitement, but such fear tinging it.

  “Is it near enough to walk?” Ariel thought to get the details of actual importance.

  “If you don’t mind a long walk,” Buddy returned. “The trolley lines will get you there, but you’ll have to go out of the way.”

  “Would it be better to get a car?” Ariel asked him.

  “I’ll tell you what,” Buddy mulled the question over. “It shouldn’t be too long before Reggie gets back with those supplies, and I’ve got some friends over that way I haven’t checked in on in a while. Why don’t I see if Reggie can stick around, and we’ll go together?”

  “We don’t want to be a hassle,” Ariel was quick to say.

  “You’re no hassle,” Buddy assured us. “It’s a real pretty drive up there. I don’t mind at all, if you don’t mind the wait.”

  “We don’t mind waiting,” Ariel replied. “That would be incredibly kind of you. Thank you.”

  “You know how to drive a truck?” Buddy threw the question out as the phone rang, looking to Ariel for the answer as he stepped behind the desk.

  “I’m sure I could manage,” she said.

  “Good,” he grinned. “‘Cause you’re drivin’.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  One can convince herself of anything, and sometimes not even know why.

  Riding next to Ariel in the cab of Buddy’s beat-up Ford Model A with Buddy in the back, I convinced myself Buddy wanted the fresh air and relaxation, and not that he knew there would be fewer questions if people thought Ariel was the vehicle’s owner and he was just a hired hand picked up to help her do some work back home.

  Coming to the first stop sign at the block’s end, the gears grated as Ariel tried to force the gearshift back into first. “That’s that sticky gear I warned you about,” Buddy called up through her open window. “Just jiggle it around some. It’ll go.” And, following the advice, Ariel pushed the shifting knob into position with a small grunt.

  “Sorry,” she called back to Buddy as we took off down the street in a series of hops.

  “Don’t worry,” he laughed. “It’s a hand-me-down, barely still goin’, and you drive a helluva lot better than Reggie.”

  The rest of his laughter lost to the wind as the truck picked up speed, I watched Ariel stare seriously ahead as she tried to shift more smoothly, wondering if I should have demanded to drive, or to at least be considered for the position. Despite spending most of my life inside the city limits, where things were near enough to walk or take the streetcars for the most part, driving might have been the one thing I did better than Ariel, even if I hadn’t wanted to learn when I did.

  “Elizabeth, come on,” Daddy came into my room one evening after work.

  It was January, three weeks after we’d gotten the news about Edward,
and the cold had become a burden upon the apartment like I had become a burden upon all of them, the person who took a lot of work while offering nothing in return. If forced, I would come and sit with them at the dinner table, but I had to be reminded to take each bite, to bathe, to go to sleep at night, and to wake up in the morning.

  Mostly, I just stayed in my room, staring out at the gray street or the walls, though both looked the same.

  Knowing better than to argue, I got up at Daddy’s order, not bothering to ask where we were going until Daddy made me put my coat on and we were standing on the street next to Edward’s old roadster, the one he’d worked and saved so hard to own. Nearly as beat up as Buddy’s old truck, Edward was convinced he could turn it into a “shiny gem of a car,” but he didn’t get the chance.

  “Get in,” Daddy said, opening the passenger door for me.

  “I don’t want to,” I returned instantly.

  “Elizabeth, get in,” Daddy demanded. “We need to run to Nan’s.”

  “Why aren’t we taking your car?” I asked him.

  “Elizabeth,” Daddy would hear no more of my questions, and, with no choice but to do what he said or try to run off, I got in the car, knowing I was too weak to get far.

  The roadster giving a groan when Daddy tried to start it, as if it wanted to be left to die along with Edward, the engine fired up at last, though it sounded more like a grumble than a rumble, and, riding in silence, Daddy and I had to listen to the clatters of all the parts, just a screw from falling off, Edward never got to fix.

  It was halfway down the old county road that took us to Nan’s that Daddy pulled the car over.

  “Get out,” he said.

  “What?” I turned to him, but the look on Daddy’s face was serious.

  “Get out,” he stated again, and all thoughts I might be abandoned on the side of the cold road left my mind as he got out first. “All right,” he declared, keeping me steady on my feet when I stumbled on the dirt road in the falling darkness. “Get in the driver’s seat.”