She stops outside of what I remember to have been a sheet-metal fabricator’s place. It’s now a bar. In place of the steel roll-down door is a glass-paneled one. It’s halfway up — as though it got stuck when they opened for the day.
“I’ve never been here before, but I hear it’s kind of cute.”
She gestures for me to go in first, but I extend my arm as if to say, “No, after you.” She shakes her head. “You’re funny.” The music is loud — some girl band. There’s a round bar in the center and large Eames-like common tables throughout the room. Along the walls are banquettes with bullet-shaped tables. All the surfaces are clad in periwinkle Formica. Except for the bartender, waiter, and ten or so scattered patrons it’s empty.
There are large television monitors up in each corner and four more above the bar. All of them are playing videos. On one a troop of astronaut dancing girls are in outer space. It takes a moment for me to realize that they’re all the same out-of-sync video and a bit more time to figure out that the music booming out of the many speakers is linked with only one of the monitors, the one above the bar, facing the door. There’s about a second delay between each monitor. They must have spent about three weeks’ take on this A/V system. They’re not going to make it. Somewhere an old tin-knocker is laughing. The cat-suited astro-girls do a kick-ball-change in the intense gravity and poisonous atmosphere of Saturn. It’s amazing that they haven’t suffered any casualties on this unique mission to the stars.
She chooses a banquette. It’s blue-painted plywood with orange vinyl cushions. The back isn’t sloped, so it’s uncomfortable to sit in unless I slouch. The waiter comes over, bored stupid by the lack of business. He’s skinny and young and his posture is terrible.
“Stoli martini — dirty.”
“May I please have a Coke? Thank you.”
He calculates his potential tip from us and decides it’s not worth straightening up or smiling. She looks at me.
“That’s all you want?”
“Yes, thanks.”
“I’m buying.”
“That’s fine, thank you.” He trudges back to the bar, far too heavily for his slight build.
“Do you not drink?”
“I do not drink.”
She slouches and squeezes her pigtails. She’s quite lovely, but she’s tiny, as though she’s another species. She can’t weigh much more than a hundred pounds. One martini will probably stupefy her.
“How’s Claire?”
“She’s well. Thanks.”
She shakes her head, closing her eyes as she does. “You’re so — formal?” She laughs and drums the table. I can see why she’s prone to smiling. Her teeth are straight and white and beautiful against her dark lips.
“Where is she?”
“She’s at her mother’s.” She stares at me, toothy and amused. Perhaps I’m still too formal.
“Oh.” She closes her eyes. “At the beach for the summer.”
“Where are your people?”
“Upstate. Greg took Toby up to see Nana and Grandpa.”
“Are they coming to see your show?”
“Oh, no,” She scoffs, losing the teeth. The waiter comes with the drinks. The astro-kids are doing backflips. He sets them on the table.
“Should I start a tab?” He asks rhetorically.
“Yes,” she says, surprising both the waiter and me. She starts on her martini, then stops. She raises her glass.
“Sorry. Here’s to family.”
I hold mine up as well. “Cheers.” We drink. I can feel the cool tingle of her vodka on my lips, the warmth on the roof of my mouth, the olive’s dull fruitiness, the point of the spirits on my tongue, and the incongruity of the heat and ice in my throat.
“I got this show — whatever — on a total lark. Someone else backed out.” She looks at me as though I should say something, about either the show or her family. I don’t. I wonder if the waiter’s spiked my drink.
“So how’s that crazy boy of yours? What’s he calling himself now?”
“X.”
She spits out her drink. “I’m sorry.” She dabs at the spittle with her napkin. “That’s hilarious.” She sighs and gives me her teeth again. “What does Claire think of that?”
“She calls him X.”
“What’s that about?” She doesn’t wait for an answer. I imagine she already has one. I first saw her on the street, pregnant, one hand resting on her tummy, with her man, waiting for the light to change. I was alone and she was anxious and he kept his head down, the way many white men do when they’re with a black woman and they encounter a black man — as though I cared. I would see them later, walking around with their stroller. She would smile at me when she was alone. She brought her girl to the same kiddie gym classes and the same kiddie art classes that Claire brought X to, although she never talked to Claire, never even acknowledged her until I showed up one day. And then there were inquiries and invitations — she let Claire pass on my ticket.
She looks off dreamily to the monitor above my head. She smiles. A few seconds later I see why: One of the astro-girls has grown to enormous size. She throws a spinning crescent kick to the side of a space monster’s head, which sends him into orbit — all while singing. She bends down and rips the top off a space cage, where I assume the space monster has incarcerated her pals.
“School starts soon?”
“Yes.”
“How do they like it?”
“Cecil loves it. I suppose his brother will, too.”
“Is it worth it?”
“What do you mean?”
“The tuition. The homogeny?”
A new video has started. Three brown women of varying shades and hair texture are in leather thong bikinis dancing on what looks to be a panzer tank. They’re out of step because they’re moving to the beat of the previous song. Finally, their beat kicks in. They’re still out of sync, but it’s a little better. They start shaking it.
“Even if we could afford it, I don’t know if I would do it — you know?”
“X likes to be naked.” I look down from the video. “They’ll let him be naked. All day.”
She shakes her head. “What about your other son?”
“He’s doing fine.”
She’s ready for another drink and signals the waiter. Her arm is unusually long for her body, but she extends it gracefully — the dark skin complemented by her sleeveless pink top. Her shoulders are the same size as her breasts. She senses me looking at her. I look back up at the monitor. A college-age white kid with heavy sideburns and a Brooklyn Dodgers cap gestures spastically at the camera. In the background the girls are still shaking it. The video cuts to a close-up of one of them. She’s stunning. My butt gets warm. I look down. Judy or Jane has had prior knowledge of the flesh parade and has been watching me watch. She’s smiling again, extra toothy, as though she’s discovered some great secret about me: I’m a man.
“She’s pretty hot, huh?”
I shrug my shoulders. She’s not entirely right, anyway. I’m a man, yes, but my thoughts shift from her and the dancing ladies to junior high English — Ms. Rizzo’s class. She’s only twenty-four. She calls me to the board, rolling the chalk in one hand, her other on her jutted-out hip. I’m in my seat, stiff and immovable in my wide-wale corduroys. Ms. Rizzo has just said “diphthong” and let her tongue peek out through her perfect teeth and stay there. I know she has peppermint breath and her perfume smells like citrus water. The other boys are in heaven. I’m in hell. I try to think of ugly girls and bland literature. “It nods and curtsies and recovers. .” The heat from my ass moves its way up my body and settles in my neck and cheeks.