"I'm sorry I'm late," said Walter. "An extraordinary series of occurences prevented me from getting here at the appointed time. I'll try to hurry along. I don't want to hold up the evening's performances. I can't entirely blame the Japanese mob, extraterrestrial intelligence, or a secret division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for my tardiness but they did play a certain role in it."
Mary-Beth wasn't impressed. The poor woman had been told plenty of outlandish stories since she and Walter had been seeing each other -- it was Walter's outlandlish stories that had, in part, attracted her to him in the first place -- but tonight she just wasn't willing to give him much benefit of the doubt. He had been missing for several days, hadn't called her, hadn't returned her messages and had worried her. She was too old for this kind of nonsense and she was pissed.
"Bullshit, Walter. Just get your notebook and let's get outta here."
Walter had a gig that evening, and Mary-Beth was driving him. He
was supposed to be the opening act for three bands at the Wrex Tavern,
where, as usual, everything would start late, but Walter was even later
than that. Mary-Beth was further insulted by Walter ending his AWOL just
so he could make a gig.
"Scotty B. came up just before you to remind me of the rent. It was due some time ago. I'm hoping to make some rent money from the gig tonight."
Mary-Beth assumed this was a passive-aggressive way of asking for a loaner. She ignored it.
"Scotty B. came up just before you to remind me of the rent. It was due some time ago. I'm hoping to make some rent money from the gig tonight."
Mary-Beth assumed this was a passive-aggressive way of asking for a loaner. She ignored it.
"Whatever, Walter. C'mon, hurry up."
Outside, in what might have been the heavy shadow of the Duwamps Hotel but for the interminable overcast, the relentless rain and the evening hour, awaited Mary-Beth's merry chariot, a rusting yellow Subaru, ass hiked up in the air, a long rusting dent on the passenger side that prevented any use of the back door and made difficult use of the front door, depending on the weather. When Walter was satisfied with the secure hold of the padlock on the door to his room, Mary-Beth shoved his bony-ass frame in front of her down the splintered stairs to the street. They got in the cold car and Mary-Beth coaxed the engine to useable power. Walter started up his explanation for his disappearing act of the last few days.
"Honey, I can only ask you to trust me when I say I tried very hard to contact you. Most of the time I was in transit, so it was hard to get to a phone. My best chance of reaching you was actually during my abduction, but I could't figure out how to dial out of their system. Nine didn't work."
Mary-Beth leaned into the wheel and drove under the freeways for downtown, grinding the transmission a couple of times on the way. The windshield wipers squeeked a lot and did little else.
Walter backtracked.
"I was a little stuck on a poem I was working on, so I thought it would be a good idea to go for a walk, to get some fresh air. This was last Thursday. I walked so far I ended up at the ferry terminal.
Outside, in what might have been the heavy shadow of the Duwamps Hotel but for the interminable overcast, the relentless rain and the evening hour, awaited Mary-Beth's merry chariot, a rusting yellow Subaru, ass hiked up in the air, a long rusting dent on the passenger side that prevented any use of the back door and made difficult use of the front door, depending on the weather. When Walter was satisfied with the secure hold of the padlock on the door to his room, Mary-Beth shoved his bony-ass frame in front of her down the splintered stairs to the street. They got in the cold car and Mary-Beth coaxed the engine to useable power. Walter started up his explanation for his disappearing act of the last few days.
"Honey, I can only ask you to trust me when I say I tried very hard to contact you. Most of the time I was in transit, so it was hard to get to a phone. My best chance of reaching you was actually during my abduction, but I could't figure out how to dial out of their system. Nine didn't work."
Mary-Beth leaned into the wheel and drove under the freeways for downtown, grinding the transmission a couple of times on the way. The windshield wipers squeeked a lot and did little else.
Walter backtracked.
"I was a little stuck on a poem I was working on, so I thought it would be a good idea to go for a walk, to get some fresh air. This was last Thursday. I walked so far I ended up at the ferry terminal.
"I was standing on the observation deck watching the ferries dock,
empty their cargo of cars and people, and fill up again when a man in
an expensive Italian suit walked up to me and said, 'Would you like to
go to Winslow? My plans have changed so I won't be needing this ticket
anymore.'
"'Sure,' I said, 'Thank you very much,' and I walked onto the ferry for Bainbridge Island.
"Little did I know that he was part of the plan.
"Before long, the ferry pulled out from the dock. I noticed that no cars had driven on and no other walk-on passengers had boarded with me. I was, it seemed, the only passenger on the entire ferry. I was a little uncomfortable.
"Part-way out to sea, far enough away that only the tallest buildings in the skyline stuck out, something very strange happened. A thousand yards off the bow, the water was churning as if fed by a giant underground spring. As the ferry got closer, I could see something large and dark begin to take shape just below the surface. It was far too big for any whale, and I thought it might have been a Trident nuclear submarine.
"Meanwhile, the sky had become very dark, and some of the lights on the ferry had been turned on. I glanced up at the pilot house, but I couldn't see anybody in the glass. Maybe the ship was being driven by remote control, by someone onshore, or in a helicopter hidden above the cloud cover.
"'Sure,' I said, 'Thank you very much,' and I walked onto the ferry for Bainbridge Island.
"Little did I know that he was part of the plan.
"Before long, the ferry pulled out from the dock. I noticed that no cars had driven on and no other walk-on passengers had boarded with me. I was, it seemed, the only passenger on the entire ferry. I was a little uncomfortable.
"Part-way out to sea, far enough away that only the tallest buildings in the skyline stuck out, something very strange happened. A thousand yards off the bow, the water was churning as if fed by a giant underground spring. As the ferry got closer, I could see something large and dark begin to take shape just below the surface. It was far too big for any whale, and I thought it might have been a Trident nuclear submarine.
"Meanwhile, the sky had become very dark, and some of the lights on the ferry had been turned on. I glanced up at the pilot house, but I couldn't see anybody in the glass. Maybe the ship was being driven by remote control, by someone onshore, or in a helicopter hidden above the cloud cover.
"The thing in the water wasn't a whale, and it wasn't a submarine
either. It was the size of a Dutch cargo freighter, steel, and dark red.
It rose out of the water like an office building. Before I knew it, me
and the entire ferry were swallowed up by the thing.
"It was a diffferent world inside. There were thousands of luminous fish swimming around me. Some of them were huge, big enough to swallow a car, some were microorgansms floating in front of my face like dust. Tiny eels swam between my eyes and the insides of my glasses. They all glowed in the dark in a spectacular array of colors. A giant squid hovered above my head, black bowling bowls for eyes.
"The oddest thing was the smell. It was that same acrid odor that comes out of the smelter in Tacoma. It smelled like Tacoma in there. It made me cough, so I rolled a cigarette while I thought about what might happen next.
"A small submersible vehicle landed on the ferry deck and three people in white jumpsuits got out. One was a Swedish man named Bolage. Evidently, he was the captain. The other two were a Russian who said his name was Hank, and a young Chinese woman named Edie. They were all from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminisration, and Bolage said that I had stumbled onto a secret project. For security reasons, they would have to sedate me and take me away.
"'We don't know how you got here,' said Hank the Russian. 'but we can't let you out now.'
"I thought about telling them about the man in the Italian suit, but I didn't want to get him in trouble. For all I knew, he might have been one of the good guys.
"I was about to get in the submersible with them when the Chinese woman, Edie, pulled a small caliber handgun and aimed it at her co-workers.
"'Sorry, gentleman,' she said, 'but the Mission has been changed. I'm taking him with me.' She took me by the arm and backed us up to the edge of the ferry deck while she kept her piece trained on the two men.
"'Don't look. Just jump!' she told me, and I did. We landed in a twenty-foot speedboat driven by a large bald man with pale blue skin and several sets of eyes in his skull. They glistened and blinked at us as we made our getaway.
"Edie told me that NOAA had made a mistake trying to hide the project from The Masters. The whole thing had supposedly been cooked up as a cover for the next move in The War, but any idiot could see that. That was why they had sent me, their double-agent, to find out what was really going on. This was the first I had heard of my identity as a double-agent, so I became a little concerned.
"I admit, when Edie made a pass at me there in the back of the speedboat, I found her charming. However, between my loyalty to you, Mary-Beth, and the dilating gills on the sides of her neck, I had to gently decline her sexual overtures.
"At first, I told her I was gay, but that only got her more excited. Her gills opened and closed even faster, and they began to turn a little purple around the eges. Finally, I told her I was carrying an experimental sexually transmitted disease that was part of a side project being conducted by The Masters, and she relented.
"By this time, the weather had cleared and we were in the open Pacific, heading west.
"Just before sunset, we were intercepted by a flotilla of mine sweepers armed like porcupines, gun barrels sticking out like so many quills. Edie and the driver and I raised our arms in surrender. Edie's gills became thin and tight, and our tall blue driver kept all of his eyes on the boat guns. The prow of the main boat had a red chrysanthamum glyph painted on it. 'Yakuza,' Edie whispered to me. 'The Emperor's secret clan.'"
"They put is in separate cabins for interrogation. The Japanese mobster in charge of my interrogations was an ugly sort about four feet wide with a flat-top haircut and no neck whatsoever. He was missing the first sections of all of his fingers, and some of the second, so he must have been a serious fuck-up assigned to the unimportant jobs. This made me relax a little because it must have meant I wasn't too important to them. Even so, I told him I was a heroin dealer in Seattle, just to be on the safe side. He was satisfied with that, and let me alone in my cabin for a couple of days. The food was very, very good and I got to eat shark steak whenever I wanted.
"The problem was I couldn't leave the cabin, and it had no windows, radio, not even a magazine, so things become very monotonous."
Mary-Beth stomped on the brake and the Subaru skidded a few feet. A bicycle cop arced through the intersection into the southbound lane, cutting off Mary-Beth. It scared the hell out of her.
"Ohmigod! I could've hit him! Jesus! Did you see that?" she yelled at Walter.
"Wait," he held up his hand and looked in the direction where the cop came from. "There might be more."
The windshield wipers dragged in pain across the dirty wet glass. The light changed to yellow. A car behind Mary-Beth honked. She looked in the rearview mirror and got blinded by headlights.
"Oh, fuck you!" she answered, and creeped the car up to the line. The light turned red.
The car stalled and died. Mary-Beth tried to start it again.
"Don't flood it," Walter advised.
"I'm not flooding it. Walter, who's driving here, huh?" She tried again. No go.
Mary-Beth was getting close to going off, but she restrained herself. "Maybe you should just get out and walk the rest of the way. It's just up another block, right?"
The light changed, and the car behind honked again. Mary-Beth ignored it and tried starting the car. Walter rolled down his window and waved his arm over the roof to tell the honker to go around. It did, honking the whole way. Mary-Beth got the engine going again and the light turned red.
Walter continued.
"I got the impression my guards were getting bored. After a couple of days, one of them came to my cabin and took me to the ship's recreation area. Several of the Japanese mobsters were sitting at pachinko machines, constantly shoving coins into them and watching the marbles fall and bounce down the obstacles, setting off bells and making a lot of noise. In the middle of the room there was a very serious card game going on. I asked if they could deal me in.
"One of the players was the tall blue alien who had driven the getaway speedboat. Apparently, he was another double agent. In order to ensure he was playing fair, a lot of his eyes were taped shut.
"'Good to see you again,'" I said to the blue alien and reached out my hand to shake. "'I didn't introduce myself properly before. My name is Walter,'
"He was holding his cards with two hands, but he pulled out another one from under the table and shook mine.
"'Konbawa. Hajimamashite,' he said. 'Ich heisse Larry.'"
"He patted his chest with a fourth hand, indicating his name was 'Larry'."
"He cut the cards and dealt me in.
"For awhile there, I lost a lot of money, but that was my strategy. I knew I could outlast these guys, so I waited until they got tired, and then I started winning my money back. They got cleaned out before they knew what hit 'em. The Yakuza might be pretty tough enforcers in Osaka but at cards on the high seas they're pussycats.
"It was down to me and Larry. We had been up thirty-six hours straight. The kitchen kept the shark steaks coming for me. Larry only drank soda water. That had me worried. It was like the movie 'The Hustler' with Jackie Gleason and Paul Newman, except I kept my cool a lot better than Paul Newman's character. But Larry was as tough as Minnesota Fats, and I didn't know how it would end."
"It ends with you getting out of the car." Mary-Beth slammed her door, opened it again, locked it, then shut it again. They were parked across the street from the Wrex Tavern, and Walter got out.
Half a block away, a woman was standing at the curb, waiting for the DON'T WALK light to change. It was nine o'clock on a dead Thursday night in the Regrade, there wasn't a single car going either direction on First Avenue for at least three blocks, it was raining like hell, and this woman was waiting for the light to change before she could cross the street. Seattleites are thus conditioned to not jaywalk.
"Linda!" Walter yelled at the woman. "We just got here -- " He stood in the middle of the street, holding his notebook to his chest. It was getting wet, and some of the ink was starting to blur.
"Walter! Where the fuck have you been?"
The light changed to WALK and Linda crossed the street. Linda was Walter's manager, for all the good that did. Walter was pretty slippery, and Linda had once mentioned putting Walter on a collar and a leash. Walter said he liked the idea. Linda dropped it.
"Hey, I just got back into town. I was abducted."
"What, by aliens?" Linda scoffed as she came up the sidewalk. She was a collection of flapping layers of fabric and long black hair, topped with a crocheted beret of hippy purples and magentas.
"Walter, get in here -- ," scolded Mary-Beth, who was holding open the door of the tavern. "Hey, Linda, howzitgoin'?"
A kick drum pounded out a dull succession of sound-check beats. The explosions richocheted off the faces of the buildings across the street.
"I'm OK. What's the story? Was Walter being held hostage in a brothel?" Linda grinned at Mary-Beth.
"Gee, thanks, Linda."
Linda laughed through her nose. "Oh, I'm sorry, Mary-Beth, that was mean."
"Hey, I was worried," said Mary-Beth. She pushed Walter along. "Go, go, get in there. Get set up, if we're not already too late."
Linda backpedaled, "Oh, I know. I was, too. I thought he was going to float up in the canal with a bullet hole in his head. Who knew?"
That didn't make Mary-Beth feel any better.
"It was a diffferent world inside. There were thousands of luminous fish swimming around me. Some of them were huge, big enough to swallow a car, some were microorgansms floating in front of my face like dust. Tiny eels swam between my eyes and the insides of my glasses. They all glowed in the dark in a spectacular array of colors. A giant squid hovered above my head, black bowling bowls for eyes.
"The oddest thing was the smell. It was that same acrid odor that comes out of the smelter in Tacoma. It smelled like Tacoma in there. It made me cough, so I rolled a cigarette while I thought about what might happen next.
"A small submersible vehicle landed on the ferry deck and three people in white jumpsuits got out. One was a Swedish man named Bolage. Evidently, he was the captain. The other two were a Russian who said his name was Hank, and a young Chinese woman named Edie. They were all from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Adminisration, and Bolage said that I had stumbled onto a secret project. For security reasons, they would have to sedate me and take me away.
"'We don't know how you got here,' said Hank the Russian. 'but we can't let you out now.'
"I thought about telling them about the man in the Italian suit, but I didn't want to get him in trouble. For all I knew, he might have been one of the good guys.
"I was about to get in the submersible with them when the Chinese woman, Edie, pulled a small caliber handgun and aimed it at her co-workers.
"'Sorry, gentleman,' she said, 'but the Mission has been changed. I'm taking him with me.' She took me by the arm and backed us up to the edge of the ferry deck while she kept her piece trained on the two men.
"'Don't look. Just jump!' she told me, and I did. We landed in a twenty-foot speedboat driven by a large bald man with pale blue skin and several sets of eyes in his skull. They glistened and blinked at us as we made our getaway.
"Edie told me that NOAA had made a mistake trying to hide the project from The Masters. The whole thing had supposedly been cooked up as a cover for the next move in The War, but any idiot could see that. That was why they had sent me, their double-agent, to find out what was really going on. This was the first I had heard of my identity as a double-agent, so I became a little concerned.
"I admit, when Edie made a pass at me there in the back of the speedboat, I found her charming. However, between my loyalty to you, Mary-Beth, and the dilating gills on the sides of her neck, I had to gently decline her sexual overtures.
"At first, I told her I was gay, but that only got her more excited. Her gills opened and closed even faster, and they began to turn a little purple around the eges. Finally, I told her I was carrying an experimental sexually transmitted disease that was part of a side project being conducted by The Masters, and she relented.
"By this time, the weather had cleared and we were in the open Pacific, heading west.
"Just before sunset, we were intercepted by a flotilla of mine sweepers armed like porcupines, gun barrels sticking out like so many quills. Edie and the driver and I raised our arms in surrender. Edie's gills became thin and tight, and our tall blue driver kept all of his eyes on the boat guns. The prow of the main boat had a red chrysanthamum glyph painted on it. 'Yakuza,' Edie whispered to me. 'The Emperor's secret clan.'"
"They put is in separate cabins for interrogation. The Japanese mobster in charge of my interrogations was an ugly sort about four feet wide with a flat-top haircut and no neck whatsoever. He was missing the first sections of all of his fingers, and some of the second, so he must have been a serious fuck-up assigned to the unimportant jobs. This made me relax a little because it must have meant I wasn't too important to them. Even so, I told him I was a heroin dealer in Seattle, just to be on the safe side. He was satisfied with that, and let me alone in my cabin for a couple of days. The food was very, very good and I got to eat shark steak whenever I wanted.
"The problem was I couldn't leave the cabin, and it had no windows, radio, not even a magazine, so things become very monotonous."
Mary-Beth stomped on the brake and the Subaru skidded a few feet. A bicycle cop arced through the intersection into the southbound lane, cutting off Mary-Beth. It scared the hell out of her.
"Ohmigod! I could've hit him! Jesus! Did you see that?" she yelled at Walter.
"Wait," he held up his hand and looked in the direction where the cop came from. "There might be more."
The windshield wipers dragged in pain across the dirty wet glass. The light changed to yellow. A car behind Mary-Beth honked. She looked in the rearview mirror and got blinded by headlights.
"Oh, fuck you!" she answered, and creeped the car up to the line. The light turned red.
The car stalled and died. Mary-Beth tried to start it again.
"Don't flood it," Walter advised.
"I'm not flooding it. Walter, who's driving here, huh?" She tried again. No go.
Mary-Beth was getting close to going off, but she restrained herself. "Maybe you should just get out and walk the rest of the way. It's just up another block, right?"
The light changed, and the car behind honked again. Mary-Beth ignored it and tried starting the car. Walter rolled down his window and waved his arm over the roof to tell the honker to go around. It did, honking the whole way. Mary-Beth got the engine going again and the light turned red.
Walter continued.
"I got the impression my guards were getting bored. After a couple of days, one of them came to my cabin and took me to the ship's recreation area. Several of the Japanese mobsters were sitting at pachinko machines, constantly shoving coins into them and watching the marbles fall and bounce down the obstacles, setting off bells and making a lot of noise. In the middle of the room there was a very serious card game going on. I asked if they could deal me in.
"One of the players was the tall blue alien who had driven the getaway speedboat. Apparently, he was another double agent. In order to ensure he was playing fair, a lot of his eyes were taped shut.
"'Good to see you again,'" I said to the blue alien and reached out my hand to shake. "'I didn't introduce myself properly before. My name is Walter,'
"He was holding his cards with two hands, but he pulled out another one from under the table and shook mine.
"'Konbawa. Hajimamashite,' he said. 'Ich heisse Larry.'"
"He patted his chest with a fourth hand, indicating his name was 'Larry'."
"He cut the cards and dealt me in.
"For awhile there, I lost a lot of money, but that was my strategy. I knew I could outlast these guys, so I waited until they got tired, and then I started winning my money back. They got cleaned out before they knew what hit 'em. The Yakuza might be pretty tough enforcers in Osaka but at cards on the high seas they're pussycats.
"It was down to me and Larry. We had been up thirty-six hours straight. The kitchen kept the shark steaks coming for me. Larry only drank soda water. That had me worried. It was like the movie 'The Hustler' with Jackie Gleason and Paul Newman, except I kept my cool a lot better than Paul Newman's character. But Larry was as tough as Minnesota Fats, and I didn't know how it would end."
"It ends with you getting out of the car." Mary-Beth slammed her door, opened it again, locked it, then shut it again. They were parked across the street from the Wrex Tavern, and Walter got out.
Half a block away, a woman was standing at the curb, waiting for the DON'T WALK light to change. It was nine o'clock on a dead Thursday night in the Regrade, there wasn't a single car going either direction on First Avenue for at least three blocks, it was raining like hell, and this woman was waiting for the light to change before she could cross the street. Seattleites are thus conditioned to not jaywalk.
"Linda!" Walter yelled at the woman. "We just got here -- " He stood in the middle of the street, holding his notebook to his chest. It was getting wet, and some of the ink was starting to blur.
"Walter! Where the fuck have you been?"
The light changed to WALK and Linda crossed the street. Linda was Walter's manager, for all the good that did. Walter was pretty slippery, and Linda had once mentioned putting Walter on a collar and a leash. Walter said he liked the idea. Linda dropped it.
"Hey, I just got back into town. I was abducted."
"What, by aliens?" Linda scoffed as she came up the sidewalk. She was a collection of flapping layers of fabric and long black hair, topped with a crocheted beret of hippy purples and magentas.
"Walter, get in here -- ," scolded Mary-Beth, who was holding open the door of the tavern. "Hey, Linda, howzitgoin'?"
A kick drum pounded out a dull succession of sound-check beats. The explosions richocheted off the faces of the buildings across the street.
"I'm OK. What's the story? Was Walter being held hostage in a brothel?" Linda grinned at Mary-Beth.
"Gee, thanks, Linda."
Linda laughed through her nose. "Oh, I'm sorry, Mary-Beth, that was mean."
"Hey, I was worried," said Mary-Beth. She pushed Walter along. "Go, go, get in there. Get set up, if we're not already too late."
Linda backpedaled, "Oh, I know. I was, too. I thought he was going to float up in the canal with a bullet hole in his head. Who knew?"
That didn't make Mary-Beth feel any better.
They went inside.
"I had no choice. If I hadn't sewn up Larry's hand, the wound would have become infected. When we got back to civilzation and stopped at a hospital the surgeon on shift said it was good work and that probably I had saved Larry's hand. Not that he didn't have a few extra.
"In any case, since the airport in Tokyo was infested with agents, I was escorted to a private yacht belonging to a member of the family that owns General Electric. I can't tell you his name, but he plays a pretty good mandolin. He lent me one of his guitars and we played bluegrass music on the trip back over the Pacific. He had an appointment in Portland, so I took the bus from there back to Seattle. My lovely fiancé picked me up at the station and brought me straight here. At the moment, she seems to have disappeared. I don't see her in the house," Walter shaded his eyes from the stage lights and peered into the dark bar.
"I had no choice. If I hadn't sewn up Larry's hand, the wound would have become infected. When we got back to civilzation and stopped at a hospital the surgeon on shift said it was good work and that probably I had saved Larry's hand. Not that he didn't have a few extra.
"In any case, since the airport in Tokyo was infested with agents, I was escorted to a private yacht belonging to a member of the family that owns General Electric. I can't tell you his name, but he plays a pretty good mandolin. He lent me one of his guitars and we played bluegrass music on the trip back over the Pacific. He had an appointment in Portland, so I took the bus from there back to Seattle. My lovely fiancé picked me up at the station and brought me straight here. At the moment, she seems to have disappeared. I don't see her in the house," Walter shaded his eyes from the stage lights and peered into the dark bar.
"Maybe she's in the ladies room, too embarrassed to be seen with
me. I'm sorry I'm late."
The crowd at Wrex applauded the ridiculous story, and Walter took another slug of water from his bottle. He put down his notebook and fished into a pocket of his overcoat draped over the back of the chair.
"You are so full of shit," said Linda. "Mm'mm, more sugar."
She tore open two more packets and emptied them into her coffee. She had found a table up in a dark corner near the front after she had deposited Walter on the stage. Linda was in recovery -- fourteen years without a drop -- so rather than a beer, she had another cigarette and a cup of coffee with lots of cream and sugar.
"Why do these shows have to start so fucking late on a weeknight? Some of us have work in the morning," she said rather loudly, stirring her coffee.
Linda was sorry Mary-Beth was late. Walter was in good form, and Mary-Beth would have liked the part about Walter turning down the Chinese double-agent with the gills out of loyalty to his so-called engagement with Mary-Beth. She'd have eaten it up, with a spoon. Linda, however, would never have believed Walter to turn down sex, even from an amphibian. The way Linda figured, Walter's two ex-wives were good cases in point. But, then, to be fair, Linda shuddered at the idea of anybody or anything wanting to have sex with Walter. In any case, if the people in this joint knew the real reason Walter had gotten to Wrex almost as late as the bands, they would have preferred the spy story.
The front door of the tav opened and there was Mary-Beth, late again as usual. Linda flicked on her cigarette lighter and held it up in the air -- in concert position -- and waved it back and forth in the blind hope Mary-Beth would notice. She didn't. A couple of other people did, instead. Somebody laughed, more lighters went on and they began to sway in the air.
"I was opening for Boz Skaggs in Los Angeles the first time people did that," Walter claimed. "The Cricket lighter had just come out that summer..."
"Mary-Beth!" Linda gave up and yelled across the tavern. Mary-Beth stood in front of the bar, peering into the dark through her rhinestone-studded cat-eye glasses, as if she could ever find anybody that way.
"Jesus," Linda muttered and got up from her table to go get her.
"I've got this new poem here I'd like to read you," Walter went on.
The crowd at Wrex applauded the ridiculous story, and Walter took another slug of water from his bottle. He put down his notebook and fished into a pocket of his overcoat draped over the back of the chair.
"You are so full of shit," said Linda. "Mm'mm, more sugar."
She tore open two more packets and emptied them into her coffee. She had found a table up in a dark corner near the front after she had deposited Walter on the stage. Linda was in recovery -- fourteen years without a drop -- so rather than a beer, she had another cigarette and a cup of coffee with lots of cream and sugar.
"Why do these shows have to start so fucking late on a weeknight? Some of us have work in the morning," she said rather loudly, stirring her coffee.
Linda was sorry Mary-Beth was late. Walter was in good form, and Mary-Beth would have liked the part about Walter turning down the Chinese double-agent with the gills out of loyalty to his so-called engagement with Mary-Beth. She'd have eaten it up, with a spoon. Linda, however, would never have believed Walter to turn down sex, even from an amphibian. The way Linda figured, Walter's two ex-wives were good cases in point. But, then, to be fair, Linda shuddered at the idea of anybody or anything wanting to have sex with Walter. In any case, if the people in this joint knew the real reason Walter had gotten to Wrex almost as late as the bands, they would have preferred the spy story.
The front door of the tav opened and there was Mary-Beth, late again as usual. Linda flicked on her cigarette lighter and held it up in the air -- in concert position -- and waved it back and forth in the blind hope Mary-Beth would notice. She didn't. A couple of other people did, instead. Somebody laughed, more lighters went on and they began to sway in the air.
"I was opening for Boz Skaggs in Los Angeles the first time people did that," Walter claimed. "The Cricket lighter had just come out that summer..."
"Mary-Beth!" Linda gave up and yelled across the tavern. Mary-Beth stood in front of the bar, peering into the dark through her rhinestone-studded cat-eye glasses, as if she could ever find anybody that way.
"Jesus," Linda muttered and got up from her table to go get her.
"I've got this new poem here I'd like to read you," Walter went on.
He held a few creased sheets of paper with both hands, sidelong to
the microphone. His big putty nose pushed out from his horn-rims like
they were all one piece he set into his head every morning. In the
randomly colored stage lights, the crowd could see the copper green of
an old tattoo scribbled around one of Walter's wrists.
"Linda, hey. Am I late? Shit, when did he start?" Mary-Beth was harried, out of breath, a little wet from the rain.
"Well, Walter's a little late, too. You haven't missed much. I have a table up front."
"The car wouldn't start," Mary-Beth explained, still on her own buzz track. "I was going to call a cab, but I didn't have any cash so I tried to borrow some from Dominic, but he told me he would have to charge me interest. Can you believe that? Interest! He's my son, and he lives rent free ---"
Linda rolled her eyes, "Is he off his meds again?"
"I don't know, I don't know."
"So did you take a cab?" Linda asked as she pulled Mary-Beth to their table.
"Ah, no, I drove, but I had to get a jump from the neighbor. He's this guy upstairs who says he's a merchant marine. He's gone a lot, then he's home a long time, then he'll take off again for a month. He's kinda creepy. He kinda reminds me of Ted Bundy. I think he's a dealer."
"Shocking," said Linda, sitting back down to her coffee. "Is he cute?"
"What -- ? Linda -- ! God...," Mary-Beth made some noise of damaged dignity.
"Oh, I'm kidding."
"Ssshhh," somebody hissed.
"But do you know his phone number?" Linda snickered like Ernie the Muppet.
Walter continued reading from his poem. "'Because there is no way for me to know which of the orderlies on the ward are crazy and which ones can be bribed, I make many, many mistakes...'"
"Linda, hey. Am I late? Shit, when did he start?" Mary-Beth was harried, out of breath, a little wet from the rain.
"Well, Walter's a little late, too. You haven't missed much. I have a table up front."
"The car wouldn't start," Mary-Beth explained, still on her own buzz track. "I was going to call a cab, but I didn't have any cash so I tried to borrow some from Dominic, but he told me he would have to charge me interest. Can you believe that? Interest! He's my son, and he lives rent free ---"
Linda rolled her eyes, "Is he off his meds again?"
"I don't know, I don't know."
"So did you take a cab?" Linda asked as she pulled Mary-Beth to their table.
"Ah, no, I drove, but I had to get a jump from the neighbor. He's this guy upstairs who says he's a merchant marine. He's gone a lot, then he's home a long time, then he'll take off again for a month. He's kinda creepy. He kinda reminds me of Ted Bundy. I think he's a dealer."
"Shocking," said Linda, sitting back down to her coffee. "Is he cute?"
"What -- ? Linda -- ! God...," Mary-Beth made some noise of damaged dignity.
"Oh, I'm kidding."
"Ssshhh," somebody hissed.
"But do you know his phone number?" Linda snickered like Ernie the Muppet.
Walter continued reading from his poem. "'Because there is no way for me to know which of the orderlies on the ward are crazy and which ones can be bribed, I make many, many mistakes...'"
-- TRG
