Street Music

by Timothy Hallinan

  “We’ve all got stories,” Campeau says with sudden force. “I know to someone like you, who comes here late, when things are pretty much shot to shit, we probably look like useless old fuckups, guys hanging around a mirage hoping for a glass of water, but you know, we all got to where we are one fucking day at a time. This place was magic once. The girls came down from the villages, nice girls, girls you could fall in love with, you know? Clean, modest, honest. Sweet. They worked a year or two, sent money home, and then packed it in and went back, and more new ones came in. They were nice to us, interested in us. Wasn’t all just boom-boom. Nobody even knew what a short time was, not like now. Back then you’d take a girl out and she’d stay with you for a week. Now the girl’s clock starts running the minute you leave the bar with her, just tick tick tick. In the old days, people fell in love all the time. Hell, I fell in love.”

  “So did I.”

  “Yeah, and you got the last good one, you asshole. Most beautiful girl ever. Now they got tattoos, they smoke like chimneys, they got half a dozen fucking poultry writing them love letters on the Internet, sending them money every week so they can go to school while they’re popping in and out of the bar, getting fined out for a short time three, four times a night. Getting a degree in the old horizontal mambo. You get them in the room, you hide your valuables, ’cause they’ll swipe them any chance they get. Making more money than we are, making as much money as a fucking banker, and they’ll still kipe your stuff.”

  Rafferty chokes back the suggestion he was about to make, that what really pisses Campeau off is the transfer of power from the customer to the bar worker, but he knows that’s only part of it. As atypical and remote from the normal American moral code as Campeau’s life on Patpong was, it had been his youth, and almost everyone mourns the loss of his or her youth. And for certain kinds of men, of which Campeau was a prime representative, this shoddy, banged-up old street was once Eden, an improved Eden with multiple Eves, whole teams of Eves, and no pissed-off God polishing his thunderbolts just around the corner. Guilt-free wish fulfillment forever and ever, amen. Until it wasn’t.

  But, of course, Rafferty has had eight years to get Rose’s perspective, the view from the other team, a look at the things they endured: the ever-needier family at home, the drunks, the rough guys, the occasional woman-hater like the one who had tried to murder her, the ones with special tastes, the incremental degradation of being displayed and sold night after night like varieties of hard candy, the corrupt cops who could be depended on to take the customer’s side and the woman’s money, no matter what the problem was. And then there were the women who couldn’t handle it, the friends damaged beyond recognition, the cutting, the booze, the yaa baa and all the other dope, the despair of waiting for life to change. The ones so ruined they could never go home, might never have a home again.

  “God damn, she was beautiful,” Campeau says, his face almost soft at the memory.

  “I’m sure,” Rafferty says.

  “I’m talking about yours, you idiot. Rose.”

  “She is. I’d never argue that.”

  Campeau nods a couple of times. After the second nod he keeps his chin lowered, staring at the center of the table. Just as Rafferty is about to push back and go home, Campeau says, without looking up, “So you got all the bar girls keeping watch over the kid.”

  “You know, if she was home in the village every female relative within fifty miles would be there, but since she’s down here—”

  “Since she’s down here, they’re her sisters,” Campeau says, surprising Rafferty. “That’s one of the things about women, isn’t it? They can slip into families like that. Woman needs a sister, she’s got one. Probably more of them than she wants. Men don’t do that.”

  “No,” Rafferty says. “We’ll punch somebody for each other, but it’s not like we brother up. It might get embarrassing. Might need to hug or something.”

  “That fucking guy-hug,” Campeau says, “with two pats on the back so it looks manly.” He sighs, and when he looks up at Poke he seems surprised to see him there, but then he nods. “Yup,” he says, although Rafferty isn’t sure what he’s agreeing with. “Yup, two different tribes. We got the good end, though.”

  “How do you figure?”

  “We get to look at them and they gotta look at us. And they do all the work when the kid comes. It’s hard enough for me to clear my throat, can’t imagine pushing out a kid.”

  “Hadn’t thought of it that way.”

  “What’s the kid’s name?” Campeau raises a hand with two fingers extended, toward Toots. “Two, on me,” he calls. “And give my friend a fucking beer, wouldja?”

  “Thanks. The name is a problem. Rose honored my father by calling the baby Frank.”

  “Not a bad name. Kind of 1940s, I guess.”

  “Well, the actual name isn’t the issue. The issue is my father.”

  “Don’t get along, huh?”

  “You remember Top Forty?” Rafferty says. “When I was a kid, there were radio stations that played records—”

  “’Course, I remember Top Forty. They played real music. What about it?”

  “If my family were the Top Forty, my father would be about number fifty-seven.”

  For a moment Rafferty thinks Campeau will laugh, but he gets it under control. “My old man was a pile of shit. Drank himself to death the hard way a year after I went to Nam. Got so drunk he fell into a threshing machine. My mother said it was the best thing that ever happened to her although it was hard to clean up.” Toots puts two beers on the table with unnecessary force and wheels away.

  “So,” Campeau says, and tilts the bottle. He gets about a third of it down, celebrates with a seismic belch, and says, “So how is the kid?”

  “Seems to be fine,” Rafferty says. “Sleeps and eats and everything. Fills his diaper. Cries. Pretty much the full complement of skills, far as I know.”

  “Not that kid. Probably shouldn’t say this, not now, anyways, but I’m not a baby guy. I’m talking about your daughter. Even the times when I don’t like you, I have to remember the job you’ve done with that little girl.”

  “Not so little now, but I don’t think I’ve done anything. Miaow is like Rose. She’s who she was when I met her. I’ve probably learned more from them than they have from—”

  “Oh, bullshit. You know, you don’t gotta do the who, me? thing every time someone says something halfway nice. Rose, sure, she was born complete, everything in place, like a fucking butterfly, minus the worm stage. But that little kid, she’s different now than she—”

  “That’s not to my credit—”

  Campeau puts down his bottle and softly backhands Rafferty on the shoulder. “Stick it up your ass. She was a street kid, dirty as Pittsburgh, didn’t trust anybody, thought she was ugly. Spoke beggar’s English. Now she’s acting in Shakespeare.”

  Rafferty feels a little electric sizzle he identifies as pride. “She did that, Shakespeare, I mean, couple of years back. Now it’s George Bernard Shaw.”

  “Yeah, yeah. My Fair Lady, I remember how she lit up, like a fucking billboard, when Louis told—”

  “It’s not actually My Fair—” Rafferty says, and then he replays the second part of Campeau’s sentence. “Who? Louis? Who’s—”

  “Him, for Chrissakes,” Campeau says, lifting his chin in the direction of the Growing Younger Man, who now is supervising the preparation of his next drink, a concoction that involves a great many stalks of celery. He brings in bags full of vegetables daily for Toots to pulverize in a special blender he purchased and installed, a deafening whopper that could probably puree a pound of nails. “Bet he poops green,” Campeau says. “Like a parrot.”

  “I’ll take the bet,” Rafferty says, “but you’ll have to take the picture.”

  “You don’t remember when he said that about the play, when Louis did? Sw
ear to God, I never seen anyone light up like she did. It was all that—that stuff about a street girl, learning to be a princess.”

  “I remember the conversation. It’s his name I forgot. Him and the guy with the hair. I can never remember the—”

  “Ron, you fucking snob,” Campeau says. “You know what she looked like? She looked like someone who’d just had Christmas explained to her.”

  “Yeah, well, the whole idea of, of turning into somebody else . . . I mean, I’m probably to blame. I put her in this snotty school, and she felt like everyone looked down at her. And then, she’s dark-skinned, which doesn’t help. But listen, you should hear her work on this accent, it’s—”

  “Exactly what I’m saying,” Campeau says. “She wanted to be somebody else, and you—”

  “She was always somebody else. She just didn’t know it.”

  “Probably easier to shoot you than to pay you a compliment. You changed that kid’s life, and just shut up about it.”

  “Well,” Rafferty says, “thanks.”

  Campeau rests his head on his hand and burps. “But I know what you mean, I really do. There was always a high-class kid hiding in there somewhere.”

  “You’ve got to be careful, Bob,” Rafferty says. “You’re going to make me like you.”

  “Don’t worry,” Campeau says. “I’ll never go that far.”

  6

  A Slum Girl’s Idea of an Interesting Man

  An outburst of laughter finds its way in from the bedroom, followed by a little spattering of applause, like the first moment of rain.

  “Wonder what that’s about,” Edward says, wiping his forehead with his sleeve. He and Miaow are on the living room couch, books face down and out of easy reach on the glass coffee table. He’s volunteered to work overtime to drill Miaow on her lines although he’s the one who really needs the memory work, and she’s compensated him by giving him an impromptu dinner, sharing some leftover som tam, the spicy green papaya salad that most Thais can eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and, probably, in the casket. Edward, who hasn’t yet developed the internal asbestos required by much Thai cuisine, is in full sweat mode from the chili.

  “The baby probably drooled,” Miaow says. “Blinked both eyes at the same time.” She looks down at Edward’s socks, visible through the glass top on the table. “How come your feet never smell?”

  “I change my socks?” He pushes his plate away. “He’s just a baby, you know. He can’t help it if women get all gooey around him. It’s not like he’s playing to the crowd. And you shouldn’t call him it.”

  “I change my socks,” Miaow says, “but my feet still smell. It, it, it. It’s my brother and I’ll call it what I want.” She pulls Edward’s plate toward her. “You’re not going to finish this, are you?”

  “I’m already on fire,” he says. “How can you eat anything that hot?”

  “You’ll get used to it.” She had hoped the thing about his feet not smelling was a compliment, but he’d shrugged it off, so she tries a new tack. “You’re getting really good as Freddy.”

  He shrugs. “I am Freddy. I’m ornamental and dull.”

  She sits up, pushing the plate away. “You’re not dull.”

  “I wanted to play Higgins.”

  Miaow looks down at the food. After a moment, she says, “You’re not right for Higgins.”

  He lifts his chin a little and looks down at her over his large, but to her perfect, Western nose. “Really. Well, thanks.”

  “No. Dieter is right for Higgins. He’s dry and kind of old-papery and he doesn’t seem to have anything except a head. I mean, he doesn’t feel anything except getting pissed off, far as I can tell.”

  “And he’s smart,” Edward says.

  “So what? You’re smart. But you’re a good kind of smart, you don’t use it all the time to make other people feel dumb. Dieter’s always keeping score. He’s perfect for Higgins.”

  “I still wanted it.”

  “You have a heart. It shows. That’s why you were so good as George in Small Town.”

  “George,” Edward says gloomily. “Another hole in the air.” He picks up his book. “You’re perfect as Eliza.”

  “I was born,” Miaow says, “to play Eliza.”

  Edward says, “Oh, for Christ’s sake.”

  “Well, look at me. I mean, I’m sitting right here with you, short and stubby and as dark-skinned as a farmer, and you can’t see me on a sidewalk somewhere? Selling flowers? Or maybe gum?”

  “Miaow,” he says. He puts the book back on the table and slides it side to side with his fingertips. “I already know about that, remember?”

  “You know the—the fact of it. You have no idea what it felt like.”

  “It makes me admire you.”

  “I don’t want admiration. Well, I do, but that’s not what I really want. What I really want is never to have been that girl.” She closes her eyes and says in a careful British accent, “My aunt died of influenza: so they said.” Lapsing into Cockney, she adds, “It’s my belief they done the old woman in.”

  “But it’s my belief,” Edward says, picking up his book.

  Miaow snatches up her own copy. “No way.” She’s flicking through the pages.

  Edward says, “You know what your problem is?”

  “Poop,” Miaow says, looking at the book. “But”—she makes a tsssss sound, like something landing in a hot pan. “But it’s my belief they done the old woman in.” She marks the place with her forefinger. “I don’t have a problem.”

  “Oh, well,” Edward says. “Fine. You don’t have a problem.” In a falsetto intended to suggest a woman’s voice, he reads, “Done her in?”

  With her eyes closed, Miaow says, “Yes, Lord love you, why should she die of influenza? She come through diphtheria right enough the year before. They all thought she was dead; but my father he kept ladling gin down her throat till she came to so sudden that she bit the bowl off the spoon.”

  Edward is laughing, but he says, “You missed a couple of—”

  “No. We cut them to get to the laugh sooner.”

  He stops laughing. “You cut them.”

  “Sure. They were just slowing things—”

  “I’m in this scene, Miaow. Why don’t I know about that? Are there any other cuts I might want to hear about? Any of my lines, for example?”

  “No. And so what? We made my speech shorter, not longer.”

  “Who’s we?”

  “Me and Mrs. Shin. She cut Small Town, too, you must remember that. And you weren’t in The Tempest, but she cut that—”

  “Fine. Are there other cuts? Are the two of you planning to share them with the rest of us any—or, wait a minute, was it the three of you? Was Dieter in on the, the script conference, too?”

  “I don’t know why you’re—”

  “Maybe we should go through them now and I could, you know, write them down? Might be good if we all had the same script.”

  “You were being so nice a minute ago.”

  Edward leans back on the couch and closes his eyes, and Miaow briefly envies him his lashes. Why couldn’t she have lashes like—

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “We’ll do some more tomorrow.”

  “What’s wrong? I mean really wrong?”

  “I just—I just—” He raps his knuckles, hard, on the glass tabletop. “I just can’t stand this part. Freddy. I feel like that, that thing in a, in a department-store window that they use to show off stupid clothes.”

  “A mannequin.”

  “Thank you for that. Yes, as you remind me in your second language, a mannequin. They could put me on a dolly and wheel me around the stage. That way I could keep the crease in my pants.”

  “You hate the part that much?”

  “I do. He hasn’t got an idea in his head. He’s
—he’s a slum girl’s idea of an interesting man.”

  Miaow nods and busies herself straightening up the table.

  Watching her, he dabs the tip of his index finger into the som tam and touches it to his tongue, then wipes his tongue on the back of his hand. “Is it really always this hot?”

  “Fon likes it that way.” She looks at the plate he’s just touched and says, “Are you finished with that?”

  “I might take it home and sneak some of it onto my dad’s plate. Then maybe lock the door to the toilet.”

  “I’ll wrap it up for him,” Miaow says, and picks up the dish.

  He says, “You are not a slum girl.”

  “But I was. It doesn’t just wash off.” She starts to get up but he puts his hand on her arm. She pulls away and says, “So what’s my problem, then?”

  “What do you mean, what’s your—”

  “A minute ago. You said, You know what your problem is?”

  “Yeah,” he says. “That sounds like me.”

  Miaow sits forward, as though to get to her feet, but instead looks over at him. “Well, what is it? You must have had something in mind.”

  He looks down at his lap for a moment. “Do you really believe you can—anyone can—turn into someone else?”

  “That’s a trick question. If it wasn’t, you wouldn’t ask me. You know too much about me to ask that unless you’ve got some stupid argument in—”

  “Do you think you’d be who you are now if you’d never lived on the street? It you’d been some, some brainless, useless rich girl who thinks God dealt her a royal flush for no reason, who spends her time counting her dresses and getting her hair done and practicing makeup tips from YouTube, do you think you’d be who you are? If the worst thing you ever worried about was that your dimples weren’t the same size or you were wearing last year’s shoes, do you think you’d be who you are? Do you even know who you are?”

  “I know exactly who I am.”

  “Excuse me, but you haven’t got the faintest fucking idea who you are. At least, you don’t have any idea who you are to me, or to the people who—who care about you.”