A wasteland of strangers (3 page)

"Back out on the water tonight?"

"Unless I want to walk two miles home and another two miles back again tomorrow morning." I smiled again. "My ancestors had it a lot rougher. They used to go night fishing in balsa boats made of tules, dressed in not much more than animal hides."

"Hardy people, huh?"

"Very."

"So you're going to just leave your boat here?"

"Nobody will bother it. I've left it overnight before."

"Nice boat like this? Must not be much crime in Pomo."

"No serious crime, no. We have an aggressive chief of police." Where crime is concerned, anyway.

"What about kids? Vandalism?"

"We don't have much of that, either. And all the teenagers know this is my boat. Besides, I don't know if you noticed or not, but that lighted building across Park Street over there is the city police station."

"I noticed," he said. "You a teacher?"

"Yes. How did you guess that?"

He shrugged. "The way you said teenagers, I guess."

"History and social studies." I pulled the cap down tighter around my ears. "I do have to go. I've enjoyed talking to you, Mr. Faith."

"Same here. I didn't mean to hold you up."

"You haven't."

He hesitated. "Grocery store close by?"

"Safeway in the next block."

"If you'd like some company . . ."

"No, thanks." I smiled again to take the sting out of the rejection. "Enjoy your stay in Pomo."

He had no answering smile. All he said was "Sure." But he didn't sound put off or disappointed; his voice was without inflection, without even a ghost of the wistfulness that had been there earlier. He'd expected me to say no, as if he'd asked without any real hope.

I walked up the ramp to the pier and a ways along it before I glanced back. He was still standing on the float, not watching me but looking again at the Chris-Craft. The thought occurred to me that he might still be there when I returned with the groceries. Well, what if he was? Despite his size, he hadn't given me any cause to be wary of him. And as I'd pointed out to him, the police station was two hundred yards away across Park Street.

You're too trusting, Audrey.

Dick had said that more than once, and he wasn't the only one. It's true, I suppose; I've always believed that people are inherently good, even if some try hard enough to disprove it, and I have never been a fearful person. There's too much fear in the world. Too much blind judgment.

You know, sometimes I think you're a white-man Indian. You love everybody. One of these days some damn white eyes ain't gonna love you back.

Jimmy. My brother, Jimmy, who'd been just the opposite of me, who hadn't trusted anyone and judged blindly and didn't love enough. Dead at twenty-three, and with no one to blame but himself. Drunk and driving too fast on a country road near Petaluma, where he'd been working on a dairy ranch; took a turn too fast and rolled his pickup down an embankment into a ditch. Short, sad, empty life. I didn't want to die that way, with hate in my heart and nothing to show for my years on this earth, not even a legacy of smiles.

Still, he'd been right about one thing. There was a white eyes who didn't love me back. Prejudice had nothing to do with it; no one could ever fault Dick Novak for racial bias of any kind. It was his ex-wife. And Storm Carey. And me—something about me that I couldn't change, couldn't make right, because I didn't understand what it was and perhaps he didn't either.

Just as I reached the end of the pier I looked back again, and John Faith was still standing, motionless, next to the boat. Solitary figure, bent slightly against the wind. Alone in the dark.

Like you, Audrey Sixkiller, I thought. Pining away for a white eyes and spending too many nights alone in the dark.

Lori Banner

I NOTICED HIM right away when he walked into the Northlake Cafe. We were pretty busy for a Thursday night, but you don't miss seeing a guy like that—not even if you wanted to. I mean, he was big. And he had one of those craggy, scarred faces that turn a lot of people off but that I'd always kind of liked. Pretty men of any size turn me off and I don't like skimpy types with so-called normal looks. That was what first attracted me to Earle. I thought that man I married had character, but all it was was hard-rock meanness covered with a layer of bullshit.

I wasn't the only one who stared when the big stranger came in. Everybody did. It got kind of quiet for as long as it took him to glance around and then settle himself into the last available booth, which happened to be on the side of the room I was working. Customers kept giving him looks, mostly out of the corners of their eyes, but he didn't pay any attention. He sat there with his scoop-shovel hands on the table, waiting.

I had an order to pick up but instead I grabbed a menu and took it over to him. "Hi there," I said, and I showed him my best smile. I have a nice smile, if I do say so myself. My best feature. Third-best feature, Earle says. Mr. Crude. "Welcome to the number-one restaurant in Pomo."

He didn't smile back, at least not much, but there wasn't anything cold about the way he looked at me. Whoo, those eyes of his. They'd scare the pants off you if he was in a temper—scare most people just sitting here the way he was. Not me, though. Not once I looked straight into them. They weren't as hard as they seemed on the surface, all shiny and bright like polished silver. There was a gentleness in them, way back deep. Just the opposite of Earle's eyes, which look gentle on the surface but aren't. Earle doesn't even know what the word means.

"What's good tonight?" he asked without picking up the menu. I liked his voice, too. Real deep, like it came from the bottom of his chest.

"Well, everybody seems to like the special. Meat loaf, mashed potatoes, cream gravy."

"That what you had for dinner?"

"I haven't eaten yet. When I do ... the venison stew, probably. But not everybody likes venison."

"I like it fine. That's what I'll have."

"Good choice. Something from the bar first?"

"Bud Light."

I went and put in his order and picked up the one that was waiting. Even as busy as I was the next few minutes, I couldn't keep from glancing over at him three or four times. He really interested me. Not that I wanted to do anything about it. Well, maybe I wanted to, a little, but I wasn't going to.

When I brought him his beer and a basket of French bread and butter I said, "You're from a big city, I'll bet. San Francisco?"

"L.A., recently. How'd you know?"

"You have kind of a big-city look about you."

"Is that good or bad?"

"I don't know. Only big city I've ever been in is San Francisco. You on vacation?"

"No."

"Just passing through?"

He shrugged. "I might stay for a while."

"Well," I said. Then I said, "This is the best place on the lake to eat, no kidding. Lunch or dinner."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Darlene came over as I was pouring coffee to take to the couple in booth nine. She tucked up a piece of her red hair and said, "That's some hunk over there. He looks like a refugee from a slasher movie."

"Looks can be deceiving."

"Yeah? You can't help liking 'em big and nasty, I guess."

"What's that mean?"

"You know what I mean, Lori. New bruise on your chin there, isn't it?"

"No."

"Makeup doesn't quite hide it. It wasn't there yesterday."

"Mind your own business, Darlene, okay?"

"I just hate the way that man treats you."

"Earle's got a temper. He can't help it."

"He doesn't have to take it out on you."

"He's getting better. He's trying."

"Sure he is."

"He is. He promised me he'll stop drinking."

"For what, the hundredth time?"

"I mean it, that's enough."

She said, "It's your life," and went back into the kitchen.

Well? It is, isn't it? My life?

The venison stew came out and I brought it to the big guy. I leaned low when I set the plate on the table and those silvery eyes went right where I knew they would. I let him look a few seconds before I straightened up. I've got nice boobs, firmer than most women in their mid-thirties; I don't mind men looking at them. There's no harm in looking, or being looked at. I think it's a compliment.

"Anything else you'd like?"

"Not right now," he said.

"Just wave if there is. My name's Lori."

He nodded.

"What's yours, if you don't mind my asking?"

I thought he wasn't going to tell me. Then he said, "John."

"John what?"

"Faith. John Faith."

"No kidding? You don't look like somebody with a name like that. No offense."

"None taken."

"What do you do? I mean, for a living."

"Does it matter?"

"I'm just curious."

"I work with my hands."

'Til bet you do."

"I'm not married, if that's your next question."

"Huh?" It wasn't going to be.

"But you are," he said.

His eyes were on the gold band on my left hand. I glanced at it, too, before I said, "Yep, I sure am." But right then I wished I weren't.

"I don't play around with married women."

"Well, that puts you in the minority, John. Most men don't care who they play around with." Some women, too. Like Storm Carey, for instance.

"I'm not most men."

Lord, no. "Truth is, I don't play around either." s "Come on like you might."

"But I don't. See, I'm a friendly person," I said, because I didn't want him to keep thinking what he was thinking about me. "Naturally friendly. I like men and I guess I can't help flirting, but that's as far as it goes. Really, I mean it."

He stared at me like he was trying to see inside my skin. Then he smiled, slow—a genuine smile this time. "Okay," he said.

"You know, John, you ought to use that smile more often. It's a real nice one."

It was, too. He didn't seem as ugly when he smiled, and it made those silver eyes look a lot softer. He likes me, I thought, and I felt good that he'd changed his opinion. I want people to like me, the ones I like in particular.

"I'll keep that in mind, too," he said. He finished what was left of his beer. "How about getting me a refill and letting me eat my dinner before it gets cold?"

He said it like a joke, and I laughed. "Sure thing." I touched his arm, you know the way you do, just being friendly, and picked up his empty and turned away. But I hadn't taken more than about three steps when I happened to look over at the entrance, and all at once I lost my smile and the good feeling I had. If I'd eaten anything before coming on shift, I might've lost that, too.

Earle was standing inside the door.

Standing there with his hands on his hips, glaring at me and past me at big John Faith.

Trisha Marx

WE WERE AT Northlake Chevron, where Anthony's brother, Mateo, works, when the guy in the Porsche drove in. Just hanging, that's all, Anthony and Mateo talking cars cars cars the way they usually did when they were together. Major boring on a good night, and this one wasn't good. The whole week hadn't been good. Maybe the last couple of months—maybe my whole life. I was afraid it was gonna turn into total crap and I didn't know what to do to keep that from happening.

Talk to Anthony, sure. Pretty soon I'd have to. And he'd probably go ballistic, same as Daddy would when he found out. All Anthony cared about was cars, fast cars, and going down to Sears Point to watch the Formula One races and getting high and getting into my pants whenever I'd let him. It was his fault as much as mine, but would that matter to him? Would he want to marry me? And if he didn't, what was I gonna do then?

Total crap at seventeen. If I was really pregnant.

Two missed periods now, and throwing-up sick two mornings this week. Sure I was pregnant.

That's what I was thinking when the Porsche pulled in and this huge guy got out of it. I mean, really huge. Pretty old, around forty, with pocks and a scar on his chin and a head like a carved rock. Anthony and Mateo were staring at him, too, and it was plain they didn't like what they saw. As if he was there to give them a hassle or something, when all he wanted was to buy some gas. He wasn't paying any attention to any of us as he unhooked the hose and stuck the nozzle into the tank.

Anthony said, "Man, will you look at him."

"Ugly fucker," Mateo said. "Wonder if he's tough as he looks."

"Why don't you go find out, man?"

"Yeah."

"So why don't you?"

"Shit, man, I can't just go pop the dude, can I?"

"Think you could take him?"

"If I had to. Yeah, sure, I'm big enough. Look at that face, man. Makes you want to bust it up some more, don't it?"

"Yeah."

"Face like that. .. man, you just want to smash it. You know what I'm saying?"

"Like that Cisneros dude down in Southport."

"Yeah, like him. Ugly puto like that . . . what's he doing around here?"

"Go ask him, man."

"Freak him. I don't care what he's doing here, man."

I quit listening to them. Stupid talk. I don't know what's the matter with guys sometimes. Wanting to beat up somebody just because of the way they look. A person can't help it if they're ugly or deformed or something, can they? And don't they have the right not to be hassled, same as everybody else?

Anthony isn't always such a macho jerk. Only when he's with his buddies, and worst of all when he's with Mateo. His brother's three years older and a total asshole. Always strutting around and starting trouble. Once, when a bunch of us were partying at Nucooee Point, he put his hand up my skirt and tried to tear my panties off—he was drunk on Green Death, that ale from up in Washington, and he's even more of a pig when he's ripped—and I practically had to scream rape before he let me alone. I told Anthony about it and he just laughed. As far as he's concerned, Mateo never does anything wrong. Mateo could blow up the courthouse and Anthony would probably think it was a cool thing to do.

So the huge guy finished pumping his gas and came over to pay Mateo for it. Mateo gave his badass sneer and said something I didn't hear and Anthony laughed. The huge guy looked at them, one and then the other, not saying a word. Anthony stopped laughing and Mateo stopped sneering, just like that. So then the huge guy reached out and tucked a ten-dollar bill into Mateo's shirt pocket, hard and with a sneer of his own, and Mateo didn't move or say a word. Not then and not until the Porsche's engine roared and its tires laid rubber as it went zooming out of the station.