Out of the Easy

  He nodded in appreciation and took out his checkbook along with an elegant fountain pen. Forrest Hearne was in high cotton, to be sure.

  “What is it that you do in Memphis?” I asked, trying to sound casual.

  “I’m an architect and a developer,” he said. He signed his check and handed it to me, smiling. “I build things.”

  I nodded.

  He walked to the door, still staring at me with a quizzical expression. “Well, thank you for your help and the conversation. I sure do appreciate it.”

  “My pleasure.”

  “And good luck at college, whichever one you choose.” He opened the door to leave and stopped suddenly. “I almost forgot—Happy New Year,” he said, putting on his hat. “It’s gonna be a great one!”

  “Happy New Year.” I smiled.

  And then he was gone.

  FIVE

  I sat on my bed staring at the check.

  Forrest L. Hearne, Jr.

  73 East Parkway Avenue North, Memphis, Tennessee

  Memphis Bank and Trust Co.

  His words seemed to whisper back at me. Decisions, they shape our destiny.

  I went to my desk and pulled the yellowed sheet of paper out from its hiding place. I had started the list when I was thirteen with the name Tom Moraine, a journalist who had come to the bookshop. One day, when I was mad at Willie, I told her I had found my father and was going to leave. Willie laughed. She told me that Moraine wasn’t my father’s last name. It was the name of a gambler Mother had run off with when she was seventeen. The marital bliss lasted all of three months and then Mother came back. She kept the ring and the name.

  Willie said fathers were overrated, that my father could be one of thousands, most likely some rotten crotch creep that loved clip-on ties. She said I should forget about it. But I didn’t forget about it. I couldn’t. So the game continued, and for years I added names to the list, imagining that 50 percent of me was somehow respectable instead of rotten. And creepy was certainly relative. After all, what was creepier, a man who loved clip-on ties or a girl who kept a log of fantasy fathers hidden in her desk drawer?

  The red neon sign from Sal’s across the street blinked and buzzed, washing my curtains and desktop in a rosy glow. The volume outside increased as midnight drew closer. 1950, and the promised opportunity of the new decade, would soon arrive. I added the name Forrest L. Hearne, Jr., to the list, along with the few details I knew about him. I estimated him in his late thirties or early forties.

  Football player. Memphis. Architect. Likes Dickens and Keats, I wrote.

  Keats . . . He certainly wasn’t an average tourist in the Quarter.

  He had asked me about college. I had graduated from high school last June but had packed college in mothballs and shoved it up into the attic of my mind, where I wouldn’t have to think about it for a while. High school was hard enough, but not because of the course work. That was easy for me. It was constantly trying to stay invisible that was exhausting. When people noticed me, they talked about me. Like the time Mother came to parent day in the eighth grade. She came only because one of Willie’s girls had said my history teacher, Mr. Devereaux, was handsome and a bit wild.

  Mother showed up in diamond earrings and a full-length rabbit coat she said had “fallen off of a truck.” She was completely naked underneath.

  “Don’t be such a prude, Josie. I was runnin’ late. No one’s going to notice,” she told me. “Besides, the linin’ feels so silky smooth. Now, which one’s your history teacher?” She had been drinking and had a hard time keeping the coat closed. All the fathers stared while their wives gripped and pulled at their arms. The kids stared at me. The next day, several students whispered that their mommas had called mine “that whore.” And then I felt naked and dirty too.

  She must not have found my history teacher interesting. Mother never came back to school, not even for my high school graduation. “Oh, that was today?” she had said, dotting a fake mole on her cheek in front of the mirror. “Did you wear one of those ugly hats with the tassels?” She threw her head back and laughed the laugh I hated. It started innocent enough but then tightened in her throat, traveled up through her nose, and slithered out a cackle. I could see the ugly just pouring out of her.

  Willie came to my graduation. She rolled her black Cadillac into the lot and parked in one of the spots reserved for administration. The crowd parted as she strode into the auditorium and took a seat up front. She arrived in an expensive tailored suit with matching hat and gloves, along with her traditional dark sunglasses—which she wore through the entire ceremony. Cokie came too and stood in the back with a large bouquet of flowers, smiling from ear to ear. People whispered about his toffee-colored skin, but I didn’t listen. Cokie was the only man I felt truly safe with.

  Willie gave me a gorgeous sterling locket from Tiffany & Co. for graduation, engraved with my initials. “Engrave your pieces, Jo, and they’ll always find their way back to you,” said Willie. It was the most expensive thing I owned, and I wore it every day, tucked within my blouse. I knew if I took it off, Mother might steal it or sell it.

  I wrote, Asked about college, in the margin near Mr. Hearne’s name and tucked the paper back in the drawer.

  I heard commotion in the street below, along with voices in unison,

  “Five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . . one . . . HAPPY NEW YEAR!!”

  Horns honked, and people yelled. I heard glass breaking and rounds of laughter.

  I took out my mirror and set to work on my pin curls. I wound my thick hair around my finger, pressed it tight to my scalp, and slid a bobby pin across each curl. New Year’s Eve was a mess. I wasn’t missing a thing, I told myself. Last year, a salesman from Atlanta decided to show off his riches for the girls at Willie’s by burning dollar bills in the parlor. They cooed and ahhed until one of Willie’s oriental chairs caught fire. The next day I had to drag the burned-out shell to the alley and got covered in soot. Mother laughed at me. Her bitterness increased with each year. Mother had a hard time getting older, especially among all the young girls in Willie’s house. She still looked to be in her twenties and lied about her age, but she wasn’t exactly a favorite anymore.

  I finished my curls and decided to read a bit until the merriment died down outside. Besides humming, reading was the only thing that blocked out Mother, the Quarter, and allowed me to experience life outside New Orleans. I leapt eagerly into books. The characters’ lives were so much more interesting than the lonely heartbeat of my own.

  My book was downstairs in the shop. I unlocked my door and stole down the tiny staircase in my nightgown and bare feet, staying within the dark shadows between the stacks so as not to be visible through the front window. I was on the other side of the store when I heard a noise. My shoulders jumped. There was a push at the door. Suddenly, it clicked and the bell jingled. Someone was in the shop.

  I looked across the room to the staircase, debating whether I should make a run for my room and my gun. I moved to the side and stopped. Footsteps. They got closer. I ducked behind the stack and heard the deep chuckle of a man’s voice. I searched for something to defend myself with. I slid a large book off the shelf in front of me.

  “We seeeeee you,” taunted the deep voice.

  My heart lurched. We? Cincinnati had brought someone with him. A shadowy figure emerged in front of me. I hurled the book at his face with all my might and made a run for the stairs.

  “Ow! Josie, what the hell?”

  It was Patrick’s voice. “Patrick?” I stopped and peeked around the bookshelf.

  “Who else would be in the store?” said Patrick as he rubbed the side of his face. “Sheesh, you really got me.” A second figure stepped out beside him.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked, moving forward. I smelled stale bourbon.

  “We c
ame to get a book,” said Patrick.

  “Jean Cocteau,” said the man with the deep voice, laughing and holding up a book. “Le Livre—”

  “Shhh,” Patrick told him. His friend answered with what sounded like a giggle.

  “Who are you?” I asked the man.

  “Josie, this is James. He works at Doubleday.”

  “Doubleday Bookshop? Don’t you have enough books of your own over there?” I asked.

  “Not this one.” He looked me over. “Nice nightgown.”

  “It’s late, and I have to work early in the morning,” I said, gesturing them toward the door.

  “You’re working on New Year’s Day? Everything’s closed. What do you do?” asked James.

  “Family business,” said Patrick. “Come on, let’s go.”

  “Make sure you lock the door,” I called after him.

  Patrick turned and walked back to me. “You think I’d leave my dad’s shop unlocked? Jo, what’s wrong with you?” he whispered.

  “Nothing. You surprised me, that’s all. Happy New Year.”

  “Happy New Year,” said Patrick, reaching across to punch me on the arm. He tilted his head and looked at me, then nudged me into the pool of light that spilled in from the front window.

  “What are you doing?” I asked him, clutching my book to the front of my nightgown.

  “Jo, you really ought to part your hair on the side, instead of down the middle.”

  “What?” I asked.

  His friend laughed.

  “Nothing,” said Patrick.

  SIX

  As expected, the house was a mess. I tightened my apron and pulled on the thick rubber gloves Willie insisted I wear. Ashtrays overflowed with cigar butts in the parlor, and empty liquor bottles crowded the tabletops. I spied a silver high-heeled shoe dangling from a planter as I stepped over a rhinestone earring in a sticky puddle of champagne. Something smelled like sour apples. The floors would have to be scrubbed and the rugs beaten. I cringed, imagining the condition of the bathrooms. Happy New Year. I opened the windows and set to work.

  I started up in Sweety’s room. She lived with her grandmother and rarely spent the night. Sweety was a beautiful quadroon girl, a quarter negro like Cokie. She had a long, thin neck, jet-black hair, and eyes like a fawn. The men loved Sweety. She was a big earner and worked loyal to Willie. But she kept to herself and didn’t socialize with the other women outside the house. I always wondered what she did with her money. Sweety was the only one who left me tips. Sometimes she took her sheets home at night and washed them herself.

  Dora was a buxom redhead with wide hips who wore nothing but green. She had every shade imaginable—jade, mint, forest, apple, but absolutely everything was green. Dora was rough-and-tumble. I’d often find her snoring in a collapsed bed with a melted ice pack between her legs. She loved to sleep and could slumber through anything. Dr. Sully came every Wednesday morning to examine the girls, and sometimes Dora slept right through it, naked, with nothing but a green feather boa around her neck.

  Evangeline stood only four foot eight and looked like a schoolgirl. She played up the part but was mean as a snake. Evangeline was a reformed kleptomaniac. She didn’t trust anyone and slept with her purse over her shoulder—even wore her shoes to bed. But she didn’t steal from the dates. Willie had rules. No stealing, no drugs, no freebies, and no kissing up in the rooms. If a man came downstairs with traces of lipstick on his mouth, Willie would throw the girl out. “You think you’re sitting under the apple tree? I’m selling sex here!” she’d yell. Evangeline’s room was always filthy. Today there were dirty tissues stuck all over the hardwood floor. I had to peel them up one by one.

  “Shut up and quit your hummin’. I’m trying to sleep, you little wench!” screeched Evangeline.

  I dodged the shoe she threw at me from under her covers. Evangeline had no family. She certainly didn’t have a father like Forrest Hearne. I sighed, thinking about Mr. Hearne. He assumed I was attending college. And why not? No one said a girl like me couldn’t go to college. Then I laughed. How many college girls cleaned cathouses?

  “I said SHUT UP!” screamed Evangeline.

  I walked down the hall to Mother’s room and turned the knob gently, careful not to make a sound. Cokie had oiled the door for me. Mother hated when it squeaked. I slid quietly into the room and closed the door, smiling. Mother’s room smelled of her Silk ’n’ Satin powder she bought at Maison Blanche. As usual, her stockings hung over the chair, but her black garter belt wasn’t there. I peeked into her high, red-canopied bed. Mother wasn’t in it.

  The bell tinkled downstairs. Willie was awake. I picked up my pail, left Mother’s room, and headed down to the kitchen.

  Sadie, the cook and laundress, was scurrying around the sink.

  “Happy New Year, Sadie,” I said.

  She nodded, smiling with her mouth closed. Sadie was mute and never spoke a word. We didn’t even know her real name. Willie named her Sadie because she once knew a sweet crippled horse named Sadie. The horse ended up getting shot. Willie said she wished we were all mute like Sadie.

  I set to making Willie’s chicory coffee. Like many in New Orleans, Willie was particular about her coffee. I perfected her brew when I was twelve, and she’d insisted I make her coffee ever since. There wasn’t really a secret. I bought the coffee from Morning Call and added a little honey and cinnamon. With the pail in one hand and the coffee tray in the other, I walked through the parlor and back to Willie’s door. I tapped my foot gently against the bottom.

  “Open,” said the hoarse voice.

  I pushed the door with my hip, catching it again and closing it with my foot. Willie’s apartment was nothing like the rest of the house. Potted palms throughout her sitting room and bedroom gave it a tropical feel. Willie’s rolltop desk sat on an antique Aubusson rug next to a buttercream marble fireplace. An ornate birdcage hung empty from the ceiling in the corner. As usual, Willie sat in the center of her high bed, propped against the pillows in her black silk kimono, platinum hair combed, red lipstick freshly applied.

  “Happy New Year, Willie.”

  She scraped a file across her long fingernail. “Hmm . . . is it?” she said.

  I put the pail down and set the tray of coffee on her bed.

  She took a sip and then nodded in approval. “Paper?”

  I pulled the paper out from the back of my apron and handed it to her.

  “How bad is it?” she asked, propped against her thick pillows.

  “I’ve seen worse,” I told her. It was true. I had seen much worse, like when the insurance salesman from Florida got so drunk he fell down and hit his head. There was blood everywhere. It looked like someone had slaughtered a hog on the floor. I scrubbed for days and still couldn’t get the stain up. Willie eventually bought a large oriental rug to put over the spot. She even rearranged the furniture. But the stain was still there. Some things just won’t go away, no matter how hard you scrub.

  “So, what do you have?” she asked.

  I picked up the pail. “Well, first, this huge thing.” I pulled an enormous red shoe out of the bucket.

  Willie nodded. “From Kansas City. He paid two bills to dress up in stockings and dance with the girls.”

  “And he left a shoe?” I asked.

  “No, the other one’s under the settee in the parlor. I keep them up in the attic for guys like him. Wipe them off and put them back up there. What else?”

  I pulled a twenty-dollar bill out of the pail. “In Dora’s toilet tank.”

  Willie rolled her eyes.

  I produced a silver cigarette lighter from the bucket. “On Sweety’s bedside table.”

  “Well done. It belongs to an Uptown attorney. What a horse’s ass. Thinks he’s so smart. He doesn’t know the difference between piss and perfume.
I’ll have fun returning that to him. Maybe I’ll drop by his house at dinnertime.”

  “And this,” I said. “I found it in the upstairs hallway.” I held up a bullet.

  Willie put out her hand.

  “Did you have one of the bankers here last night?” I asked.

  “This isn’t from a banker’s gun,” said Willie. “It’s for a .38.”

  “How do you know?”

  Willie reached under her pillow and pulled out a gun. With a flick of her wrist she opened the cylinder, slid the bullet in the chamber, and snapped the cylinder back into place. “That’s how I know. Get your mother.”

  “She isn’t here,” I said. “Her bed is empty, and her garter belt isn’t on the chair.”

  “Such a liar. Said she didn’t feel well. She had that sack of trash in my house. I haven’t gotten a report from Frankie. Did anyone see Cincinnati last night?” asked Willie.

  “I don’t know. For a minute I thought he was in the store, but it was only Patrick. He scared the bejesus out of me.”

  “Patrick, hmph. He’s nothing like his father, that’s for sure. How’s Charlie doing?”

  “Talking crazy. I feel so bad for Patrick. I’m going to stop by today,” I told her.

  “Charlie’s not crazy. His brain is a touch soft somewhere—that happens to some people. Happened to Charlie’s dad.” Willie sighed. “But don’t go saying he’s crazy, or he’ll be hauled off to the mental ward at Charity. I won’t let that happen. Not to a good man like Charlie. He took you in when none of us could be bothered. Here,” said Willie, throwing the twenty from Dora’s toilet at me. “Buy him groceries or whatever he needs. Let me know if he wants a girl sent over.”

  I nodded. Charlie had been good to me. One day when I was fourteen, I told Charlie that I hated Mother. “Don’t hate her, Jo,” he told me. “Feel sorry for her. She’s not near as smart as you. She wasn’t born with your compass, so she wanders around, bumping into all sorts of walls. That’s sad.” I understood what he meant, and it made me see Mother differently. But wasn’t there some sort of rule that said parents had to be smarter than their kids? It didn’t seem fair.