First he made a kind of wall, a secondary curtain—really useful for a stage like this. Sylvia could set up without anyone seeing her. He could make the wall or curtain look scintillating, way more interesting that just a length of fabric. A waterfall coming out of the ceiling. A curtain of flowers. A rain of diamonds. People couldn’t help but pay attention.
So the audience saw a waterfall right there onstage that looked and sounded real except that nothing got wet. Then a kind of jungle-y, rhumba-y version of “Bolero” played, and the waterfall parted, revealing Andrew and Sylvia transitioning to their first real number, a Latin-beat version of the Sinatra staple “Come Fly with Me.” It was meant to be retro and exotic and cheesy all at the same time, an elaborate tiki bar setting from an old movie.
Andrew wasn’t a great singer—he’d had to take lessons when he went into show business. But what he lacked in skill he made up for with bravado. Expansive gestures, heartfelt crooning, winks to the audience.
The song ended, and the banter started with Andrew announcing, “Hey, welcome to the Bayou Lounge, I’m so glad to see all your smiling faces. I see we’ve taken on some new folks at Baton Rouge—welcome to the Natchez, and the romance of the Mississippi. Hey, Sylvia, you up for a little romance?”
“I love romance!”
Andrew turned to the crowd with a lascivious grin and wink that really shouldn’t have gotten a laugh but did.
Sylvia had worked up a slew of new arrangements for songs that weren’t usually part of the lounge singer routine. Instead of drawing on the Great American Songbook, she’d put together old-style swing and ragtime versions of grunge hits, crooner versions of heavy metal classics that most of their audience didn’t even recognize until they sang the chorus. Old Cole Porter songs done salsa and hip-hop style. They were hoping the new material would appeal to a younger crowd. Give them something new and amazing to work with. Show off Sylvia’s talent as a musician.
The Bayou Lounge wasn’t really a theater, but a bar area with a stage big enough for a jazz trio and not much else. Plenty of room for him, Sylvia, and her keyboard and synthesizer setup. The bar ran along one side of the room, which occupied most of the rear of the Natchez’s middle boiler deck. Groups of tables and comfortable seating were clustered throughout the room. The stage lighting wasn’t much brighter than the house lights—the waitstaff had to be able to see to circulate among tables throughout the show. The bar and tables were polished wood, and brass fixtures on the lights and barstools gave the place a vintage look, but the whole veneer of the place was tired rather than antique. The Natchez was clean but she’d seen better days.
Andrew was competent enough at this that he could look out and take stock. He noted a couple of the old biddies who’d been to every single one of their shows and made sure to smile just for them. Plenty of small groups didn’t seem to be paying attention to the show at all; an undercurrent of conversation ran under the music as people bent together to talk and sip their drinks. They’d probably have a better time if they went somewhere else on the boat, but it wasn’t like he could kick them out. Now, if they were being charged thirty bucks a head to get in …
But no, this wasn’t Vegas. As much as he was tempted to drop an illusion of an exploding bomb or a giant scorpion in the middle of them, he let them be.
A group of young things was at the bar. Recent college grads, looked like, the women in tiny cocktail dresses and the men in silk shirts and slacks. No older than midtwenties, out partying on the money they got from brand-new professional jobs. Or maybe from brand-new newly vested trust funds, judging by the quality of some of the footwear.
Andrew smirked inwardly, congratulating himself on being able to make an honest living—comparatively speaking—when he spotted something he shouldn’t have, and sort of wished he hadn’t. One of the men, a president-of-the-frat, future-politician-looking white guy with a perfect blond haircut and a practiced smile, slipped a couple of pills in a tumbler of rum and Coke before sliding it over to a woman in a red flowered sheath dress and long black hair, stylishly tousled. The guy had very carefully blocked the view from her as he did so, deftly holding one hand just so as he dropped in the pills. But he didn’t block Andrew’s view of the act. Probably didn’t think he needed to. Andrew was just part of the background, after all. Hired help.
In a tribute to his long experience, Andrew didn’t miss a beat, but kept on with their lounge version of Britney Spears’s “Toxic” even as he wanted to leap off the stage and bat the drink out of the woman’s hand. Even if he’d done so, he couldn’t have gotten to her in time before she lifted the glass and sipped, oblivious. The guy kept grinning. He’d wear that same grin on some future election-day press conference if he got the chance.
Andrew couldn’t let it go. He just couldn’t.
He finished the verse, and as Sylvia kept playing he announced, “All right, we’re going to take a quick break now. I just need a minute to adjust my tail. Don’t go anywhere!”
The music trailed out as Sylvia gave him a confused look. Grabbing her hand, he rushed her backstage behind the curtain.
“Hey, babe, call security.”
“What? What’s wrong—”
“Tell you in a sec.”
He took a deep breath, concentrated, held the picture in his mind of what he wanted to do—then breathed out. Phone to her ear, Sylvia watched him. “Hi, yeah, this is Sylvia over at the Bayou Lounge, Andrew says there’s something going on—” She mouthed the word what? at him.
“Date rape drug situation,” he whispered back. Her eyes went wide and she repeated the info.
“Yeah, okay, see ya.” She clicked off and glared. “Andrew—”
A wavy light flickered around him, his illusion settling into place. To an outside observer he now appeared to be someone else. He was about to ask Sylvia how he looked when she shook her head.
“I don’t think so.”
“What, what’s wrong—”
“I don’t think Conan-era Arnold Schwarzenegger is really what you want to go for.”
“I want to be intimidating!”
“Yeah, I know. Just be big, okay? Big, not famous.”
Story of their lives, that.
He breathed out again and shifted his mental image before slipping out from behind the curtain. As far as everyone in the lounge was concerned, he was no longer manic Asian thirtysomething Andrew Yamauchi. He was a big white linebacker with muscles ready to burst out of his suit. He walked straight to the bar.
The woman’s rum and Coke was half gone. Her giggle was turning shrill, and the guy was looming over her, leering. Getting ready to lean in in a way that was totally skeezy even if he hadn’t drugged her drink.
Andrew had to be careful. He couldn’t physically confront the guy. He couldn’t knock him over, punch his shoulder, or even nudge his arm, or the illusion would vanish. Not that Andrew could physically affect the guy anyway. Mostly, he had to keep the guy from doing anything to him. He hoped if he looked like enough of a badass the guy would back off. Sylvia was right, looking like Arnold was probably too much. So this had to be all about attitude.
He marched over, sidled up to the bar, and reached around the woman to take the tumbler of drugged cocktail out of her hand and set it out of her reach.
“Hey!” she said. Her would-be assailant clenched his hands into fists, looking like he might punch Andrew right there.
“What’s wrong with you?” he exclaimed.
Andrew said to the woman, “I saw him slip pills into your drink. But, you know, maybe they were just vitamins. Maybe he’s just worried about your health.”
“Wait, what?” She got off the stool to face him down, but stumbled. Her legs seemed to go out from under her for just a second before she grabbed the bar and steadied herself. She was still with it enough to turn to the frat-boy type. “Greg?”
He missed a beat before managing to defend himself. “What? No, I don’t know what he’s talking about! I would never