Blue World (49 page)

But it was not. He took the magazine to the display of contest winners, and he snatched the picture Anna had been showing him off the wall.

He held the two pictures, one Polaroid, one pornoid, together for comparison.

His heart fell to his penis.

“Aunt Anna?” he called quietly. Then, louder: “Aunt Anna? Would you come over here for a minute?”

At four-forty-nine, Debbie Stoner pulled her green Fiat to the curb just down from her apartment building and put on the parking brake. She got out, a little stiff-legged. For such a skinny guy, he’d been… well, interesting.

Her skin seemed to be still hot from the camera’s lights. It wasn’t much fun, under those burning lights, grinding and smiling while a director was saying move this and move that and the makeup guy was fretting about a pimple and the sound guy was saying somebody was whistling as they breathed. But she’d thrown herself into her work today with grim energy, because she’d learned one thing from her experience at Bright Star studios: this was as far as she went.

Lucky would be over tonight. Of course, he hadn’t exactly said he would be, but he hadn’t said he wouldn’t be, either. She had another club she wanted to take him to, called the Golden Spike, over on Polk Street. If Lucky had liked the Mile-High Club, he was going to really get a kick from the Spike.

She started up the front steps. Hold it, she thought. What about dinner? The frozen eats were gone. And she wouldn’t mind a nice bottle of white wine, either. Lucky liked white wine. That clinched it; she started walking toward Giro’s, a pretty girl with her hair in a black ponytail, dressed in jeans, boots, and a white cableknit sweater.

“Hi, Anna!” Debbie said as she breezed through the door. Anna was counting out change for an elderly man and woman, and Debbie was past her before Anna could have a chance to answer. Debbie went on into the aisles, picked out a medium-expensive bottle of wine, and saw Giro behind the bakery’s counter. “Giro! Hi!” she called. He stood there staring at her, expressionless.

Must’ve been a bad day, she thought. “Hello! It’s me! Debbie Stoner! Your contest winner!”

Giro turned his back.

Debbie sensed a movement behind her; she swiveled around, and there was Anna.

The woman’s eyes looked as if they’d sunk into her face, and her entire face seemed to hang like a fleshy sack on the bones. She didn’t smile, and not smiling made her face look hard and wrinkled.

“Anna?” Debbie said. Something was very wrong. “What is--”

Anna lifted a can of Lysol spray, and without a word began to douse Debbie’s sweater.

Debbie stepped back, stumbling into the wine rack. Bottles clacked together and tumbled to the floor.

Anna sprayed Lysol into Debbie’s hair, sprayed it into her face and into her open mouth as the girl cried out, “Anna! Please… stop it! Stop it!”

And then the shout came, blasting from Anna’s mouth: “You dirty little whore! Get out of here! Get out of our store, you tramp!” She reached out, grabbed a handful of Debbie’s hair, and flung her along the aisle. “You’ve been laughing at us all this time, haven’t you! Laughing at two old fools! Get out! Get out, and go to Hell!”

Debbie tripped on a rolling wine bottle, had the sting of Lysol in her eyes and its chemical foulness on her tongue. She fell, and went to the floorboard on her knees. Now other customers were peering into the aisle, and they saw Anna take a broom from a rack of household items and begin vigorously, vengefully, sweeping the floor around the fallen girl. “Get out, you piece of trash!” Anna shrieked. “We saw those pictures! We know who you really are, you whore! Get out! Get out now!”

Debbie struggled to rise as the broom whacked at her and knocked her down again. And now, in the midst of dust and a cloud of Lysol, Debbie cleared her eyes and realized what must have happened. Somewhere… somehow… Giro and Anna had found out there was a woman named Debra Rocks, and that she had Debbie Stoner’s face.

“Get out!”

Anna shouted, her voice rattling the bottles. She swung the broom, and it hit Debbie on the side of the head.

Debbie scrambled up, tripped and staggered, slammed into a display of canned soup; then she got her balance and, the broom swinging behind her, ran for the door.

“You stay away from here, you little piece of nothing!” Anna raged as the foul whore ran up the hill. Oh, those pictures in that magazine were enough to make a decent person sick! And they had made Anna throw up, which was why her face was so pasty and loose. One more swing of the broom, through the settling Lysol cloud, and then Giro caught her shoulders. “It’s over,” he told her. “Anna, it’s over.”

Anna sobbed, clutched both hands to her mouth, and Giro--a good husband--pressed her to him.

Debbie ran. She crossed the street, almost ran headlong into a gray Volkswagen van slowly cruising past, and fell over the curb, skinning her palms. She moaned--the sound of a wounded animal--as she got up and staggered on, the tears streaming from her eyes and the brutal world a kaleidoscopic haze.

Her nose was flowing, her stomach pounded with pain, her right palm was bleeding. She crashed into somebody walking on the sidewalk, and the middle-aged man shoved her aside like a garbage bag. She careened into a wrought iron fence, fighting a scream.

You whore.

You trash.

You little piece of nothing.

She ran into her building, and fell on the stairs going up, twisting her ankle. But she pulled herself up with the willpower of Debra Rocks and climbed the stairs, blinded and hurting.

She fumbled with her keys, dropped them, finally jammed the right one into the lock, and burst into her apartment. Unicorn zipped away from under her feet, almost tripping her again. And then her pained ankle gave way and she did fall, crashing over the coffee table and scattering scented candles. She lay on the carpet clutching her ankle and rocked herself as she cried and moaned.

You whore.

You trash.

You little piece of nothing.

And then a new voice surfaced like jagged ice from her memory:

This audition is over.

A sob racked her. Hang on! she told herself, her teeth gritted. Tough it out! Tough it…!

But suddenly she didn’t feel so tough.

The tears flowed down her cheeks and dripped from her chin. Her stomach cramped, her heart ached, her soul yearned… for something. Call it peace.

This audition is over.

You got one shot, she knew. One shot. If you missed the target, the bus only went in one direction. No! she thought as she squeezed her eyes shut. No! You’re a star! You’re Debra Rocks!

She opened her eyes; they were blurred by tears, but she was looking inward. Her lip curled in a sneer. Debra Rocks sucked.

She was a fantasy, Debra Rocks was. A made-up, tight-dressed, high-heeled fiction. A pumping machine. A mask that held a false smile as the flesh of a stranger entered her. A pair of thighs with no shame, a pair of breasts thrust toward greedy teeth. Debra Rocks was not Debbie Stoner; but what was Debbie Stoner without Debra Rocks?

I screwed up, she thought. Her fingers gripped the carpet, and another sob forced the breath from her lungs. I screwed up… somewhere… I screwed up… and it all got away from me.

Her mind was taking a dangerous turn. It was opening itself up to a burst of agonizing light. She couldn’t allow that; Debra Rocks wouldn’t allow it. Where was Lucky? I need him! she almost screamed. Where was Lucky?

With his other girlfriend, she thought. The one he’s so loyal to.

Got to call somebody. Got to call somebody, and get some action going. She got up, hobbling and crying, and went to the telephone. Uncle Joey and his sons had left for Vegas this afternoon, on business, and wouldn’t be back until Thursday. Kathy Crenshaw--Cyndy Funn--had gone to Miami with Mitch, her boyfriend. Mike Laker was in Big Sur on a weekend shoot. Gary Sayles had gone back to his wife, and Bobby Barta was in prison on a three-to-five. She had already looked up the name of John Lucky in the telephone book, and come up empty, but now she grasped the book and flipped through it. Thousands of names went by, and she knew none of them.

Through the rising terror, a line came to her from that movie where the three guys chased ghosts:

Who ya gonna call?

She screamed--a mixture of rage and pain--and hurled the telephone book. It slammed into a cactus pot, and sand flew. Unicorn skittered under the sofa.

She opened the cookie jar and had her white taste.

But even that served not to damp the fires, but to feed them. They were lonely flames, and they burned cold. I can go out to a club, she decided. Sure. If I can’t dance, I can just hang out. Take your pick: the Mile-High, the Spike, Cell 60, Lobotomy, Advance Vision, the Tombs, the Certain Death…

She found herself in the bathroom staring at her swollen, scarlet-eyed face in the mirror. White crystals glittered at her nostrils, and her hair stank of Lysol. And of one thing she was certain at that moment when the dark basement of her soul collapsed into even deeper darkness: there was no God.

Her gaze ticked toward the sink, and there found the straight razor.

This audition is over.

She went to the medicine cabinet, opened a bottle, and took two pills. They were little blue pills, and they were supposed to help you get mellow.

She stared at the straight razor. It looked sharp and clean; it looked like a ticket out of this.

Because she knew what was ahead: you just got older, and keeping the weight off was tougher, and the younger ones came in by bus everyday to San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York, and in offices or bedrooms new stars were being made right now, at this very moment. For her there would be a downward spiral now, because this was as far as she went. There would be guys with bad teeth and zits on their asses, guys with rough thrusts and mean eyes, and sooner or later--sooner or later--she would say yes when somebody brought out a rope and alligator clips.

I want to start all over, she thought. Tears hung from her chin and dropped into the sink. I want to start all over, and next time I want Debbie Stoner to be a star.

She went to the bathtub and turned on the hot water, without bubblebath.

But of course she wouldn’t be Debbie Stoner in her next life, she thought. No, she would be… somebody beautiful. And she would meet her soul mate again too, and next time Lucky wouldn’t have another girlfriend. Next time he would be hers, and she would be loyal to him too.

She picked up the razor and ran her finger across the road home.

She shrugged off her sweater, and then she started to unzip her jeans as sweet steam filled the bathroom.

The door buzzer went off.

Lucky, she thought. It was Lucky! But still she hesitated, her hand clenched around the razor. Lucky was here, yes, but he wouldn’t stay. He’d leave her again, and the loneliness would pierce even deeper next time. Run, she thought. The razor glinted. Run home while you can still get there…

The buzzer went off again.

Debbie lowered her head. Two tears fell from her face into the hot water. And then, her hand trembling, she returned the razor to the sink, shut off the water, and limped to the door. She checked the spyhole. Her heart fell; it wasn’t Lucky. It was a black kid.

“What do you want?” she asked him in a weak and whispery voice.

“Miss Debbie Stoner?” the kid said. “Got something for you from North Beach Florist.” He held up the long white box so she could see.

She opened the door, took the box of flowers from him, and tipped him five dollars because she didn’t have any ones. Then she sat down on the floor, as Unicorn emerged cautiously from beneath the sofa, lifted the box’s lid, and stared at the dozen red roses.

There was a card, what Lucky must’ve either written or dictated. It said:

Debbie. Hi! I’m not going to be able to see you or call you for a few days. But I’m thinking about you. There’s something I need to tell you, and I hope you’ll understand. People do crazy things, don’t we? Stay out of trouble! I love you. Lucky.

She picked up the roses, not minding the sting of their thorns, and crushed them against her. Her head bowed, and her back trembled.

Unicorn came up beside her and sat in silent company.

That night she had a dream: it was in black and white, like one of those old movies they shouldn’t ought to colorize. She was standing on a hill, with Lucky beside her and the concrete towers of San Francisco at her back. The sky was full of drifting white clouds, and as Lucky put his hand on her shoulder, she lifted a dandelion. The wind blew it to pieces, and the dandelion’s white umbrellas spun away, toward the green, forgiving forests of Louisiana.

She knew then: dandelions could not grow in concrete.

And as Debbie dreamed, a vase full of bruised roses beside her bed, Hoss Teegarten sat in his beat-up brown Chevy just down the street. He lifted his automatic-shutter Nikon and, to check the mechanism in this meager light, aimed the lens at the doorway of the red brick apartment building and squeezed off a half-dozen shots.

“Father Lancaster?”

John had been speaking to Mr. and Mrs. Winthrop. Now he turned around and saw, standing in the center aisle of the Cathedral of St. Francis, Hoss Teegarten in his overalls, a loud red-checked shirt and a black Hell’s Angels motorcycle cap.

Sunday Mass had ended perhaps ten minutes before, and

John had been talking to members of the parish, his face composed and serious--a priest face. Now his priest face slipped right off like melting wax, and Teegarten said, “Hiya, Father.”

“Hello,” John answered, getting at least a modicum of his composure back. “One minute, please.” He continued his conversation with the Winthrops, and didn’t even mind how they kept being distracted by his pierced ear. He shook hands firmly with Mr. Winthrop and then the man and his wife left the church. John and Teegarten were alone except for a few people still on their way out.

“Got you a few things.” Teegarten held up a coffee-stained manila folder. “Want to take a look?” Without waiting for a response, the fat man went to the foremost pew and plopped himself down.