Taming a Sea Horse (2 page)

The phone rang. I answered it. Susan said, "This is Dr. Silverman. Take a cold shower and call me in the morning."

I said, "Hello, ducky. How has your day been?"

"Some of those people are crazy," she said.

"Your patients?"

"Yes."

"But you're a psychologist. Don't you sort of expect that?"

"My last appointment told me he didn't believe in psychotherapy. It makes you dependent, he says."

"So what's he going to do instead?"

"Snort cocaine, I believe."

"Oh."

"Have you found April?" Susan said.

"I talked with her on the phone, and we're having lunch, she says breakfast, tomorrow noon."

"Is she all right?"

"She sounds all right, but Patricia Utley says she's headed for trouble." I repeated my conversation with Patricia.

"And if she's not willing to leave?" Susan said.

"I could overpower her and bring her to you."

"And hold her while we did therapy?"

"Yeah."

"Even though your neck is considerably bigger than your brain," Susan said, "you probably know that you cannot do therapy with an unwilling patient."

"I was afraid you'd spoil it."

"So what will you do?" Susan said.

"Tell her what I fear, and get out of the way. She'll do what she wants to," I said.

"Or needs to," Susan said.

"Or has to."

"Which makes her like anyone else," Susan said. "When are you coming home?"

"I suppose it depends on April," I said.

"Not too much should depend on April, I think," Susan said.

"I know," I said.

"I miss you," Susan said.

"Yes," I said. "Isn't it lovely."

The Brasserie is on East 53rd Street, right underneath the Four Seasons, a few steps down into a low-ceilinged room with a horseshoe counter to the left and tables with red-checkered tablecloths to the right. It was kind of a semi-elegant French-flavored diner and it was always open.

I had us a table near the wall when April came in and looked around. There's a streetlevel landing before you come down into the room, and it presents a nearly irresistible platform. Most people posed on it when they came in. April posed a bit longer than most. She wasn't pudgy anymore. She was highfashion thin. With very bright makeup, well applied and stark. Very current. Her hair was shoulder length. She was wearing a pink coverall with cropped pants over an aqua jersey top. There were big pink and aqua beads around her neck and matching earrings. The collar of her black tweed jacket was turned up and she was wearing pink-rimmed Elvis Costello sunglasses.

When she finished her pose, she looked at me and smiled brilliantly and came down the stairs.

I stood and she put her arms around me and kissed me on the cheek. She smelled good. She looked good. I held her chair for her. She sat.

"Oh, it's so nice to see you," April said. "What are you doing here?"

"Think about eating," I said. "Then I'll tell you."

"Oh, you order something for us," she said. Her eyes didn't settle on me or anything but moved over the crowd in the restaurant. She was like the buyer at a horse auction.

"No preference?"

She laughed. "No, I know you'll choose something good."

The waiter stopped at our table with the coffeepot. "Coffee?" he said.

April looked at me. I nodded. She smiled dazzlingly at the waiter and nodded too. He poured some for us both. I ordered eggs Benedict for April and a club sandwich for me. When the waiter left, April pressed the palms of her hands together in front of her and said, "Oh, I knew you'd order something just right."

"It's God-given," I said. "I can't really take the credit."

April widened her eyes and smiled even more brightly and nodded vigorously. She looked around the room some more. Her eyes hesitated at the counter, went on, returned to the counter, and then moved away. I shifted into a more comfortable position in my chair and looked at the counter. It was crowded. I couldn't tell who she was looking at.

"How have you been?" I said.

"Oh, it's fun," she said. "It really is. I've met so many people and I have been just everywhere. I went to Nice last year with a client."

"Ever hear from your parents?"

"No."

"You happy?"

"What's not to be happy?" she said. "I have money, I go out every night. Clothes, fun."

"You seem to have learned a lot," I said. "Very adult now. Worldly, sort of. Poised."

"Oh, thank you. Mrs. Utley helped me a lot. She helps all the girls. She really does. I… I'm very grateful you fixed me up with her." Uncle Pandarus. The waiter came by and added coffee to my cup. April's was untouched.

"How is Mrs. Silverman?" April said. She leaned toward me, her hands clasped, her chin resting on her thumbs.

"Loving, intelligent, beautiful, funny, the usual stuff."

April nodded. Her eyes were very green. They hadn't always been. I realized she was wearing tinted contacts. She said, "Boy, are you in love, huh?"

I nodded. April's eyes moved over the room again and stopped. She was looking at the back of a tall black man sitting at the counter eating a croissant. Her eyes moved on. The waiter brought her eggs and my sandwich.

"I love eggs Benedict," April said.

"How come you didn't order them?" I said. "I might have ordered you Raisin Bran or something."

She giggled. "Oh, you would not."

We ate a little. The tall black guy at the counter finished his croissant and had a second pot of tea. While he waited for it he looked aimlessly around the room, his eyes passing over us with no flicker of hesitation. He was slender. His hair was cut short and his thin mustache was carefully trimmed. His pale beige linen suit was stylishly loose. His shirt was an off-white, his tie was a shiny beige silk, and his shoes were light tan with pointed toes. His skin was the color of coffee with milk. Talk about color-coordinated.

"So you still haven't told me," April said, "what you're doing here in town."

"Patricia Utley called me, told me you'd left and she couldn't find you."

"She knows where I am," April said. "I talked with Steven."

"When he found you."

"I'm a big girl now," April said. "I don't have to tell everybody everything I'm doing."

"That's true," I said.

"So why are you here?"

"Well, at first I came down to find you, in case something bad had happened, but now I get here and you're okay, I just wanted to make sure you'd made a wise career move."

"I know what I'm doing," April said.

"That puts you one up on me," I said. "How come you decided to make the change?"

She poked at her eggs with the points of her fork. She made a small shrugging motion, like a bad habit almost broken.

"How'd you hear about Tiger Lilies?" I said.

"A guy I know," April said.

"And the minute you heard the name you were enthralled," I said.

She poked at her eggs some more, her shoulders frozen in their semi-shrug.

"I've got to be a part of it, you said. Tiger Lilies are my life, you said."

April shook her head. "No," she said. "You don't have to make fun of me. It wasn't like that."

"So what was it?"

"Like I told you, it was a guy I knew."

"He wanted you to work for Tiger Lilies?"

"He said it would be good for me," April said.

"Was he right?"

April nodded vigorously.

"Will it be good for you next year?"

April frowned. "Of course," she said.

"How can you be sure?"

"He says so."

"How do you know he's right?"

"He loves me," April said. She looked straight at me. "And I love him."

"What could be better," I said.

"You're in love," she said.

I nodded.

"Well, I am too. You think a hooker can't be in love?"

"With a guy who wants you to keep hooking?" I said.

"He's a musician. He's studying at Juilliard. As soon as he starts making money, I'll quit. Right now it's something I can do for him."

"Juilliard?" I said.

"Yes. You don't know what Juilliard is? It's just the best music school in the world."

"I know what Juilliard is," I said.

"And what I do when I'm hooking is just my job. It's not anything like what we do."

"You and the musician?"

She nodded hard. "That's right. What we do is love."

"What's the musician's name?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"I hate calling him the musician," I said. "What if I have to give the bride away?"

She paused. Her eyes flickered toward the counter. A woman wearing a lavender cape and a huge hat came in, paused on the platform, then swept down into the restaurant. It was like watching The Loretta Young Show.

"His name's Robert," she said.

"Not Bob?"

"No, he hates Bob. His name is Robert. Robert Rambeaux."

I finished off the first half of my sandwich. April had eaten one egg. The monochromatic man had another pot of tea at the counter. If he wasn't Robert Rambeaux, then I wasn't puckish and adorable.

"I'll try once," I said, "and then I'll get off your ass. What I know about the, ah, human condition tells me that a man doesn't love a woman if he turns her out to hook."

April's face started to close down.

"What I hear from Patricia Utley is that this place, Tiger Lilies, will use you up and sell you down scale. And old musical Robert Rambeaux will go out and recruit somebody else."

Tears had formed in April's eyes. "You fucking prick," she said. She stood up and turned away and walked up the stairs and out the door without even pausing for a pose.

So much for puckish and adorable.

I paid the check and finished my coffee and went out. Going out it's easier not to pose. I was halfway to the corner of 53rd and Park when the monochromatic man came out through the revolving door and walked along behind me. I walked up Park toward 59th Street. He cruised along behind me, sampling the spring air, admiring the young women in their spring clothes, checking out the elegance of the avenue. If he were any more casual, he'd have fallen down. He was about as subtle as Jesse Helms.

I turned west on 59th Street and walked two blocks to 59th and Fifth. The Plaza. Central Park. The Pierre just up the street. The Trump Tower just down the street. The great big city's a wondrous toy. Mr. Monochrome studied the artifacts in the window of A la Vieille Russie behind me. The light changed and I crossed and went into the park. Monochrome followed me.

There were people roller-skating in the park, and people with enormous tape players on their shoulders, and people with all their gear stuffed in a shopping bag. There were pretzel vendors and people walking Irish wolfhounds, and some joggers, and two guys sharing a pint of something from a paper bag on a bench. I went past them and found an empty bench and sat down. Monochrome walked past me and looked around and turned and walked back toward me. I gestured toward the empty space beside me. He ignored it and stood looking down at me. I smiled at him.

"Beige," I said.

He said, "How come you're bothering my lady?"

"Ah, it is you, Robert Rambeaux."

"What do you want, bothering her?"

"I was hoping she could get me tickets to your next recital," I said.

Rambeaux sighed and shook his head. "Everybody's a wiseass," he said.

"Now don't generalize, Bob," I said. "All that has been established here is that I am a wiseass."

"Robert," he said. The correction was automatic. "I asked you a question, whitebread, and I want an answer."

"White bread, Bobby? Racial taunts? You're about as black as Grace Kelly."

"I ought to kick your ass for you right here."

"Little question of that, Bobb-o," I said. "But you can't. And if you try, you're just going to get your outfit all wrinkled and sweaty."

Robert stepped about a step away and looked at me thoughtfully.

"You're a cocky motherfucker, aren't you," he said.

I shrugged. "It's just hard for me to get serious about a guy whose outfit took three hours to assemble."

"I'm tired of bullshitting around," Robert said. "I don't want you comin' near April again. You understand?"

"You really go to Juilliard?" I said.

"You understand?"

"I bet you don't," I said. "I bet you're a pimp instead."

Robert went inside the coat of his beige outfit and came out with a straight razor. He held it like he knew how.

"You better listen what I'm telling you, whitey."

"Heavenly days," I said, "talk about ethnic stereotyping."

"You go on back to Boston, fishbelly, and stay there and don't you come near my lady again."

I was still sitting. I put my left foot behind his right ankle, put my right foot against his right knee, pulled with the left, pushed with the right, and Robert went over backward. I stood up and stomped the razor out of his hand. I got a little of the hand in the process and Robert yelped.

"There goes your violin career," I said.

He came up swinging and he was better than he looked, with a lot of fluid speed in his punches. He was almost fast enough to hit me. I caught a punch on my right shoulder and rolled my chin away from another one and hit him in the solar plexus and he doubled over and backed away, holding his stomach, gasping.

"See why I'm cocky," I said.

His eyes scanned for the razor. It was ten feet away on the ground. It might as well have been in Paramus. Still bent over, he looked at me as the semiparalysis began to ease.

"What the fuck you want, man?" he said.

"Mostly I want to know that April Kyle is all right, and is going to stay all right."

Robert had straightened up. His shoulders were still a little forward and he was massaging his stomach with his right hand. But he could breathe.

"She's a fucking chippy, man. How all right do chippies get? How long they stay all right, you know?"

Two black kids on skateboards zipped between us and on down the walk.

"I didn't turn her out, man. She was a chippy 'fore I knew her."

I nodded. "Everything's relative," I said. "I don't want her worse off than she was."