Ingenue (12 page)

GLORIA

Gloria didn’t want to make a scene.

But she was desperate to get away from Vera.

She shoved through the crowd on the dance floor and into the dining area, trying to avoid taking down one of the artificial palm trees that contributed to the club’s “jungle” décor.

It was only after she had slipped inside the door to the kitchen that she remembered to breathe.

What if the gangsters who ran the Cotton Club noticed her? What if they had one of those
LOST GIRL
flyers hung up in their back office? How many redheads turned up in these jazz clubs? Who knew how far Carlito’s influence reached?

In the kitchen, some servers called orders through a pass-through window while others fed dirty dishes through another. Others stood at metal tables arranging plates and glasses on serving trays before sweeping through the double doors and back into the bustle of the club proper.

“Uh, ma’am, I don’t think you’re supposed to be back here,” a sweet-looking black man said quietly. Three other black men in servers’ tails looked up from the metal prep table, and one rushed over: Jerome.

He tapped the man on the shoulder. “It’s all right, boys, Robbie—Gloria’s here with me. She took in the show from the floor while I watched from back here.” His grin faded as he registered Gloria’s distressed expression.

“You should explain things better, Jerome. Before you get us all into trouble,” Robbie said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me …” He lifted his tray high and exited through the double doors.

“Jerome, you’ll never guess who’s—” Gloria started, but he shushed her.

“This ain’t the place for idle chatter, Gloria. People are working here. Come on.” Without touching her, Jerome led her into a corner, as far as they could get from the bustling workers.

Since the Harlem nightclub was segregated, they’d split up and come in through different entrances. Gloria had dressed up and sweet-talked her way through the front door; Jerome had put on an old suit of tails and joined his friend Robbie’s waitstaff at the back.

Gloria had been surprised when Jerome had proposed making a visit to the Cotton Club. “It’s Ethel Waters’s debut there. If you’re going to sing jazz in New York City,” he’d said, “then you need to see the hottest acts. And Ethel is one of the best.”

Gloria had never heard so many top-quality musicians playing together. It made her all the more thankful to be here, in New York, following her dream.

Jerome put a calming hand on her arm. “What’s wrong, Glo? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“No, not a ghost—your sister. She’s here.”

Jerome gaped. He didn’t talk about Vera much, but Gloria knew he missed his little sister. “Where?”

“Onstage,” Gloria said. “I have no idea why. I got scared and ran and I think she came after me.”

Jerome glanced over at Robbie, who’d just returned from the bar. “Is there a way to get backstage without going through the bar?”

Robbie laughed and pointed to a door on the far wall. “Course there is. How do you think we get the hooch to the band?”

Jerome led Gloria through the door. They rushed down a grimy hallway and suddenly found themselves backstage.

For a moment, Gloria let herself take everything in: the men and women busying themselves with their costumes and instruments, pitchers of water and glasses of gin and whiskey strewn everywhere, cables and wires and lights and curtains and ropes, the hardwood floor—everything about it was beautiful. Dirty, sure, and sort of cluttered, but glorious nonetheless.

This was where music was being made. Where stars were being born.

A young black man with wavy hair and a big jaw immediately approached them. Jerome laughed and swept up the man in a hug. “Jimmy Roads—how are you?”

“Good, good, and great. Laverne and Juicy let me know you stopped by a few weeks ago—why didn’t you tell me you were in town?” Jimmy took in Jerome’s outfit and whistled. “A master like you certainly doesn’t need to stoop to a waiter job.”

“Naw, this is just for tonight,” Jerome replied. “Wanted to see Ethel perform. Gloria, this is Jimmy—we used to play together at the Checkered Lounge before I ended up at the Green Mill.”

Gloria smiled, but she was distracted, looking for Vera. “It’s nice to meet you, Jimmy. It doesn’t look like she’s still here, Jerome.”

Jimmy whistled low again and said, “You mean that black girl who threw herself into the audience? She was standing right where you’re standing now, and then she just hopped off the stage like a crazy bearcat.”

“That was my sister,” Jerome said.

“Well, your sister got thrown out.”

“Damn,” Jerome said. He turned and glanced at the stage. “But look!” he said, motioning to Gloria. “Isn’t that Evan?”

Gloria put her hand to her chest as she recognized Evan in the trumpet section. She was surprised she hadn’t noticed him before. He was the only member of the band at the Green Mill who’d worked to make her feel welcome. At least until the band found out about her true identity. Then he hadn’t been so friendly.

Evan looked over and saw Jerome. Gloria expected him to do something crazy—wasn’t he shocked they were there?—but all Evan did was nod.

Gloria and Jerome stepped back into the chaos of musicians milling around backstage. “Didn’t it look like he
expected
to see you?” Gloria asked Jerome.

“Yeah. But he’s playing—there’s not much he can tell us until his set is over.” Jerome chuckled. “Only a girl like Vera would be dumb enough—and brave enough—to do what she did. Interrupt a show! Leap into the all-white audience!”

Gloria frowned. What were Vera and Evan doing here? If it had been Evan alone, she might have understood—plenty of musicians moved from Chicago to New York. But there was nothing to bring Vera here. Nothing except Jerome. But why now? And how had Vera and Evan even known where to find them? It was a strict rule between Gloria and Jerome: They didn’t let anyone know where they were. But it seemed Jerome had told Vera and Evan all about what he and Gloria had been up to.

A mustachioed white man puffing a cigar came through the door. “This ain’t a farmyard. We’ve got an audience trying to hear the music out there, so all of you shut up.”

The clump of musicians and chorus girls stopped talking and moved back toward the chairs against the backstage wall, leaving Jerome and Gloria standing alone. The man took a long look at Jerome, scratching his chin. Then he pointed. “Hey, I
know
you! You’re that punk piano player that Carlito Macharelli is looking for.”

The man stepped forward and tried to catch Jerome’s collar. But suddenly Jimmy and a slew of other musicians came between them. “Go,” Jimmy whispered to Gloria and Jerome, “get outta here. Now.”

Jerome grabbed Gloria’s hand and pulled her across the backstage area and out a door that opened onto an alleyway—into the darkness, into the night.

The subway ride home wasn’t long at all, but to Gloria it felt like hours.

Jerome sat a seat away from her and said nothing. She glanced over at him a few times but eventually stared at the floor in angry silence. It wasn’t her fault that Vera was in New York and that they’d possibly missed their only chance to talk to her.

But they couldn’t have hung around. Any mobsters who laid eyes on them would’ve sent them right to Carlito.

The silence continued as they walked home. At Park Avenue, Jerome turned the corner on his own, while Gloria had to go through with the usual charade. She went to the basement and shuffled through the boiler room, pulling the stifling coat over her beautiful dress.

The last time she’d worn this dress, she’d been planning to run away with the love of her life to New York. Now she was wearing it while sneaking through a broken fence just to get into her tiny, third-rate apartment.
How quickly life can change
, she thought.
How easily the dreams of a starry-eyed girl can turn into a murky sort of reality
.

She climbed up the back stairway of their building and banged on the door to their apartment.

Jerome opened it quickly, his black jacket already off and his bow tie loosened. “You want to try to be a little louder? I don’t think the entire building heard you hammering.”

Gloria slipped off her monstrosity of a coat and flung her hat on one of the kitchen chairs. “Don’t you lecture me,” she said, taking off her earrings. “
I
wasn’t the one who suggested we go to a club full of Carlito’s cronies.”

“I didn’t
know
the gangsters at the Cotton Club were friends with Carlito.”

“He’s Ernesto Macharelli’s son—every gangster is ‘friends’ with him somehow,” Gloria replied.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot you were the expert on the Mob. Miss Zuleika Rose!” Jerome called out, his forehead creasing with angry lines. “Gangster Know-It-All! Where’d you find that out about Carlito’s father, anyway—one of your society columns?”

“Who cares where I got my information?” Gloria said. Reading the society columns was
exactly
how she’d learned all she knew about Ernesto Macharelli—but she wasn’t going to give Jerome the satisfaction of being right. “At least I actually
read
the papers instead of sulking all day.”

His nostrils flared. “You think I sit here sulking? You know I’m lying low when I’m not looking for work.”

“Right. I’ve learned a thing or two about lying low these past six months. I’ve climbed through that ridiculous fence every day while you just waltz right through the front door.”

“Oh,
you’re
going to preach to
me
about the places I can go and you can’t?” Jerome asked, yanking his bow tie off and throwing it on the floor.

“I’m not talking about a nightclub or the movies, Jerome,” she replied, stepping out of her heels. “This is our
apartment
. Our home.” She clenched her fists, trying to keep her anger in check, but it wasn’t really working. “I’ve given up everything for you! And now I find out that you’ve been telling your sister and your band and God knows who else about what we’ve been doing, putting us both in danger.”

“I didn’t—”

“Don’t you think I would’ve liked to write my mother or father or my friends to let them know I’m alive? But no! You said I couldn’t!”

“But you’ve got it all wrong,” he said.

Gloria wasn’t listening. She looked at their shabby surroundings in disgust. “You already have all your friends here. All I have is
you
, and this dingy apartment.” She banged a fist on the piano, and there was a muddy jangle. “If I’d known you were telling everything to your old band buddies behind my back, I would’ve at least sent my mother a letter. Or sent Clara a postcard.”

Clara. Just saying her name made Gloria feel guilty about ignoring her cousin, who had been so kind to her those last days in Chicago.

Gloria stopped, out of breath, willing herself to calm down. But then she looked up at Jerome—handsome, strong-willed Jerome—and everything, the anger and the frustration and the sadness, came rushing out in a torrent: She complained about the stealing, the constant rejection at auditions, the endless chores she performed to take care of their atrociously tiny home. After so many months of grinning and bearing this sad excuse for a life, she let all her frustration out. She couldn’t stop herself. At last she lowered her voice, her throat scratchy and raw. “I killed a man for you, Jerome.” She wiped tears from her cheeks. “That’s supposed to mean
no secrets
between us. Don’t you get it?”

Jerome’s eyes were wet and glistening. “For your information, Gloria, I have not been in contact with Vera or my band. I sent Vera a postcard when we first got here so she would have our post office box number in case of an emergency, but that’s it. I was as surprised as you were tonight—I’ve got no idea what she and Evan are doing here.”

He cast his gaze around their squalid little home, finally letting his eyes rest on the scarred wooden floor. “As for the other stuff, well, I thought you did all those things—leaving home, sneaking into our apartment every day—because … you wanted to.”