Broken Sleep (54 page)

Salome’s antennae goes berserk and it’s uh-oh time. She gets right in Alchemy’s face.

“Underneath what? You can’t trust her. She talks out of both sides of her mouth and she’s lying from each side.”

“How the hell would you know?” My dad is gearing up his nasty. Salome can match him nasty-for-nasty no problem.

“Nathaniel scouted behind enemy lines and listened to her radio program. I watched her on TV with Alchemy. Complex ideas confound her and her supporters.”

“We all can’t be a gen-ie-us and a crazy bitch like you. Or a millionaire commie like your son.”

“Your simple-minded insults prove my point. You’re a parasite who lives off your son, who Alchemy rescued from his misbegotten life, which, in effect, means
you
live off Alchemy the commie.”

Alchemy slings his arm over Salome’s shoulder and edges her away, which don’t stop Mr. Must Have the Last Word. “Ya
gotta be dumber than a Flushing cockroach to spend a dollar on that crap you call art!” Me and Alchy exchange frustrated sighs. I say, “Dad, shut the fuck up or you’ll be on a plane in two hours.”

Just as they’re serving the cake, Laluna tells me that Persephone isn’t feeling well so she is leaving early. Alchemy is sticking around. I got an idea that ain’t the only reason she’s gotta hop. Laluna gets that Salome was jabbing her as much as complimenting me, and she’s PO’d ’cause Alchemy don’t back her up that
she
is a great Sancho, which is the trap Salome set. No matter what he says, he can’t win.

Carlotta walks Laluna out to the driveway. Alchemy is off in the corner of the yard with Salome, who says real loud, “She’s now the leader of the Salome defamation league.” I start to go toward them. For once, I’ll play peacemaker.

Lux cuts me off. “Don’t, bad move.”

“Yeah,” I says.

Then he teases me, “Who would’ve thought a once skinny little shit like you, with two bucks and a torn T-shirt to his name, would one day land such a great woman as Carlotta?”

“Who you callin’ ‘once’ skinny?”

He pinches my belly through my shirt. “Okay, okay.” I say, “but I know the real reason you shaved your head, and it ain’t just for the look.”

He says real stern, “What’re you implying?” Then he cracks up. But he got me thinking, since I left home, I do got one
wonderful
fuckin’ life.

Say the Secret Word

My ancestors deserted me when I most needed them. To complete or abandon my Margarita mission was my question. Why? Why must I be the one? Yet, although I could not reach him through my DNA, I had sensated that night in the office that he was my son—and Margarita was right, his reappearance boded ill for Alchemy. I forced myself to drop by a few political or foundation events at the house. He was never there. I made an effort to be more solicitous of the entity known as “LAlunamy,” hoping to glean more insight. When they rehearsed and recorded their album
Chansons
, often with Persephone by my side in the studio, I offered only kudos. I never criticized or asked if I could contribute. Or admitted my hurt when Alchemy allowed Laluna to choose another artist to do the art accompanying the text after I offered to help. I began to think that never seeing
him
again was no coincidence, and the completion of the mission might be unnecessary.

That changed after Mindswallow’s wedding. Before we dressed for the festivities, I went to fetch Perse for a morning constitutional. Laluna was in the kitchen talking on the phone. I got a cup of coffee and sat across from her at the butcher
block counter. She pulled at her lip piercing, her anxiety tell. “Okay, Got to go, Jack. Send me the download.”

Sometime back, Laluna had come to my studio with Crouse and Godfrey Barker. Barker was a bloated-cheeked, potbellied blowhard whose uniform of silver-gray silk kurta and white pajama pants gave him the look of an irony-free ’60s TV sitcom hippie, an unctuous purveyor of airy-but-not-airy-enough “science.” I faked serenity as I showed them around. He paused in front of a
Baddist Boy
collage of the Pretender and Malcolm. “Ah, yes, I remember seeing them at your Hammer retrospective. I don’t remember this particular one. Is it for sale?”

“I didn’t exhibit it. And no, not to you.”

He bared his teeth and smiled haughtily. “It’s not for me.”

“Who?”

“Someone I think you would approve of. Can I take a cell phone picture?”

He did. I never heard from him and never gave him another thought—not until that morning in the kitchen on the day of the wedding. Sounding a bit defensive, Laluna told me that Crouse wanted her to try scoring his new film.

“That’s nice.” I said. “Where’s my granddaughter?”

“Alchemy is driving her to Mose and Jay’s for the night. She loves being with them.” She sounded far too self-satisfied. “Alchemy will drive us to the wedding.”

I let it drop.

Except for the petulant Laluna, who left early to pick up Persephone, and maybe Ambitious’s Neanderthal father, everyone had a swell old time. Alchemy beamed, elated for
his true brother. In the car ride home, I broached the necessary topic. “I’ve been considering, maybe, that night in the Nightingale office—I may have let my myopia overtake my empathic impulses, with, you know”—his name choked in my throat—“him.”

“You mean my brother, your son, Mose?”

“Yes.”

Instead of compassion at my suffering over the turmoil of my lost child, my attempt at making peace elicited an accusatory question. “And now, years later, how do you intend to correct that myopia?”

“You and he are close. His wife seems to be friendly with Laluna. He spends time with Persephone. Maybe a family get-to-know-you session.” My tactic was clumsy—I hate clumsy—my words sounded like someone else was speaking them. I backtracked. “I’m sorry. Maybe this is the wrong time. We can talk again and I’ll explain how, from the moment of his conception, his life affected mine in only the most excruciating ways.”

No sympathy. Only a lifeless, “I’ll talk to him.”

Alchemy never spoke his name again in my presence.

Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Wright, 2017

I forget about Elizabeth Borden ’til she e-mails me about a meet. I double-check with Alchemy. For a guy who spent so much energy fogging his personal life, this told me how much he wanted to do this shit. And wanted it from day one.

I meet Borden at the Kasbah offices. Right away she sticks a confidentiality agreement in my face that “prohibits” me from “disclosing to any individual” what we talk about. I sign it Ricky McFinn, which ain’t been my legal name for years.

She starts with Nova’s death and shows me phone records that I called Alchy before I called the cops. “Fuck, this was like a hundred years ago. He told me to call the cops and I did.”

“What were Alchemy’s relations to Ana Perez, who you knew as Falstaffa, and Martin O’Malley and their drug business?”

“He never did no drops. You gotta know he believes all drugs should be legal but that don’t mean he supports using them. Matter of fact, he threatened to boot my ass out over my intake.”

She’s like a zombie with a voice that sounds like it’s giving GPS directions. I got no patience for her bull, so I
volunteer that I been in jail, punched people out, been banned from my share a hotels and restaurants, ingested boatloads a drugs, and who knows what the fuck else she would disapprove of, but I ain’t running for nuthin’, and it got nuthin’ to do with Alchy.

She asks if Alchemy ever propagated the idea of a revolution. That’s a laugher. I tell her that from the first day I met him he says how much he loves America. Since he made three, four hundred million bucks, even if he’s gonna piss it away, I says, “What the fuck is he revolting against?”

Borden don’t smile. “Do you know he met with Malcolm Teumer when you toured Brazil in 2006?”

“Nope. He was always meeting all kinds of people that I passed on. That some relative of Mose?”

She don’t answer. Next up is “some of the women” in Alchy’s life. This subject does not thrill me. “Judging by his relationship to Laluna, would you say he has an attraction for very young girls?”

“Who don’t?”

She frowns. “Did he ever have relations with underage girls?”

Her attitude sounds like she got some info. “What do you think?”

“I think I asked you a question.”

“Young ain’t underage. And if you know Laluna, she was never young.”

“What about Miranda Wright? Did he have relations with her? Mr. Mindswallow, why are you laughing?”

“ ’Cause you shoulda been a comedian.”

I don’t explain Miranda is someone Alchemy created as a signal for us, ’cause I’m thinking that may sound more suspicious. I say Miranda was a young groupie I never met. She don’t give up. “So, did he have had relations with her?”

“My rule was if you think he fucked someone, then he did. So, probably yeah. Ask her.”

“Is it true that you and Alchemy and sometimes Lux, you engaged in group sex with the same women?”

“Lady, you sound pretty damn pervey.”

“Should I assume that is a yes?”

“Assume what you want.”

“Okay, one last inquiry. What do you know about the relationship between Jay Bernes and Alchemy? How long did it last?”

“By ‘relationship,’ you mean how long did they hook up?”

“That’s not what I said.”

“What did Alchemy say?”

“He didn’t. We spoke to her.”

“She told you?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“I guess this confidentiality agreement goes one way, hah? I don’t know squat about Mrs. Mose and Alchemy.”

“Let’s talk about Absurda and Alchemy and their relationship. How long did they date?”

“That’s now a second ‘last inquiry.’ ” I stand up. “And who says they dated?”

“I can’t tell you that. My purpose is to protect Alchemy. Did the three of you orgy?”

I walk up to her and bend over so our noses is almost touching. “My purpose is to protect Absurda. The answer is NO.” I pick up that agreement and rip it to shreds. “And I hear any shit that don’t please me, that’ll be your partner’s face. So, Little Miss Scuttlebutt, you best be fucking careful.”

Twilight of the Idols

Moses did his best to avoid any more face-to-face meetings with Salome in any incarnation—live, cinematic, or papier-mâché. In past years, Salome’s possible presence, more than his disinterest in sports, led him to pass up the annual Super Bowl party. He thought this year would be no different until Alchemy texted that he was dropping by the office the Monday before the Super Bowl to invite the staff to the party. Alchemy also said he wanted to meet Moses in his office.

“I need you to come Sunday. Salome will stay in her cottage or leave altogether. Jack Crouse wants to donate a million to the Nightingale Party. I told him no. Maybe the foundation could use it. He also invited himself to the party.”

“I read that Crouse is now one of Barker’s handpicked ‘seers,’ so I guess, even if it goes to the foundation, you need to speak to Dewey.”

“It gets trickier. Last night, we messed around with ideas for two new songs based on Salome’s latest drawings for
Pearl Diver by the Black Sea
.”

“Are you thinking of re-forming the Insatiables?” Moses had suspected that someday Alchemy would miss making music.

“No. While we were playing, and I thought it was going really well, Laluna brings up that Crouse and Barker had come to the house to discuss doing a remix of the soundtrack she did for a new video. They convinced her to try their secret m-edit-ation orientation. It ‘revealed’ that despite having it all in the material world, she is ‘unfulfilled.’ ” Alchemy’s voice betrayed his exasperation. “I asked her again, ‘Do you want me to quit politics?’ She claims she’s on board as long as she doesn’t have to campaign. I asked if she changed her mind and wanted to join Lux, Silky, and Mindswallow, who are setting up a summer tour. She said no. For the two of us do a follow-up to
Chansons
? Possibly. Take a vacation? Yes, she wants to go far away from here, and without Persephone.” Moses had sometimes suspected that Alchemy steamrolled Laluna into having a child before she was ready. Regardless of how much she loved Persephone, maybe that had sparked Laluna’s restlessness. “And no, Mose, I have not been messing around.”

“Is she?”

“She says no. I asked if she wanted to spend some time away from me. Am I being too cloying or too patriarchal? Not at all. She does exactly what she wants. If anything, she’s spending too much time
without
me.”

“Alchemy, I’m sorry. You should take that vacation. We’ll hold the fort here and leave you two alone. And if there’s anything else I can do, just ask.”

“Thanks. I’ll rent a place far away where we can record some songs, just chill. If all goes well, when I return I’ll declare for the presidency in ’20.”

“I’m sure you and Laluna will work it out. Take as long as you need. But I have to say that Laluna taking up with Barker and Crouse again—not good. If you don’t tell Winslow before he finds out, he may quit. We can’t afford that now.” Moses, lips tight, hesitated.

“Mose, what? I see you thinking.”

“I’m asking you now, as your brother, one last time, please consider again the negative possibilities of this campaign.”

“Mose.” Alchemy’s one blue, one green eye drilled into him like twin laser beams. “You can step away. I can’t. I’ve spent many nights awake, speculating on every risk imaginable. I’ve crossed the Delaware. I’ve set the boats afire. There’s no turning back.”

Three days before the Super Bowl, Moses was in his office reviewing Alchemy’s schedule and what would be the best time for him to take a long vacation. His phone beeped with a text message from Sidonna Cherry, whom they now kept on retainer. “Go outside. Now. Open the package in your office.” A messenger, standing astride her motorcycle, helmet still on, handed him an envelope, which contained a burner phone and a piece of paper with a handwritten note.