Never Too Far (17 page)

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Authors: Thomas Christopher

BOOK: Never Too Far
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“Wrists,” the landlord said.

Joe stuck his arm out and nudged Mary to do the same. As the landlord pulled out his mobicom again, Joe remembered about the tire.

“What do I look like, a junk yard?” the landlord said.

“You have to go to the Industrial District, near the lakeshore,” came the woman’s voice again.

This time Joe peered over his shoulder. He looked into a dusky side room. A dark-haired, dark-skinned woman sat sprawled on a shabby sofa. Beside her was a fireplace with orange flames in it. Her feet rested on a short table in front of her. White stockings were rolled down her dark legs and looped around her ankles. It was hard not to stare. Her arms were draped along the top of the sofa. In one hand she held a cigarette that she brought slowly to her mouth by bending only her elbow and turning her face, as if any more effort than that was too much. After she blew out a stream of smoke, she glanced at Joe through half-closed eyes.

Just then another woman appeared with her back to Joe. He turned a little more so he could see what was happening. The woman wore a shiny black slip that hugged her wide hips. She walked up to the dark-skinned woman on the couch and sat on the table in front of her.
The dark-skinned woman leaned forward. With the flat of her hand she held her cigarette out to the lips of the other woman who took a drag. 

“Don’t smoke the whole thing, Ina,”
the dark-skinned woman said. “These aren’t cheap.”

Ina let go of the cigarette and coughed out smoke while she laughed and patted her chest.

“Sorry,” she said. “It just felt so good.”

“Put your eyes back in your head,” said the landlord. “Those are dancing girls. Besides, you got your hands full anyway.” Then he raised his voice. “Eve over there used to be something special, a mistress to a top official in the Ministry of Peace and Security. But she screwed that up. Isn’t that right, sweetheart?”

“I can you hear you, Walt,” said Eve. She held the cigarette to her lips, breathed in, and then blew the smoke out in such a way that it fluttered in the air. “You don’t have to shout, either. Give it a rest, why don’t you?”

“I’m only trying to fill them in on our local celebrity.”

“They don’t need to know.”

“You’re just jealous,” Ina said to the landlord, “because you want a piece of that too.”

“Shut up, fat ass,” the landlord said.

“Fat ass? Fat ass?” Ina said. “You only wish you could get some of this fat ass.” She leaned to her side, lifted her thigh, and grabbed a hunk of her bottom and shook it.

“Strumpets,” the landlord said, derisively.

“Speak up, you old wart,” Ina said. “We can’t hear you.”

The landlord didn’t say anything after that. He slapped the key down on the desktop and mumbled, “Room 13. Up the stairs and to your right.” 

When Joe reached for the key, the landlord kept his hand over it. The landlord was obviously the kind of person that enjoyed making other people feel small, and as much as Joe wanted to pound his fist on the landlord’s hand to get him to let go of the key, he resisted. He realized this wasn’t a big deal and not worth making a scene over. Little by little he was getting smarter. “Choose your battles.” It was something Frank always said that Joe didn’t pay any attention to because he thought everything was worth a fight. He was beginning to realize what Frank meant. Not until Joe withdrew his hand did the landlord uncover the key.

 

 

Chapter 29

 

 

 

Joe and Mary turned in front of the doorway into the room where the two women sat. The strap on Ina’s slip had fallen off her shoulder and she rolled it back up with the palm of her hand.

When she saw them, she said, “Oh my. That tiny little thing is pregnant. She’s
about to burst.”

Joe didn’t know what to say, or if he was supposed to say anything, although he didn’t like the way she seemed so surprised at Mary’s condition, like there was something defective about her being pregnant. He wanted to defend Mary and say there wasn’t a single defective thing about her.
It was none of Ina’s business anyway. But he held his tongue. The last thing he wanted to do was blow their cover. 

Eve glanced at Joe and then flicked her spent cigarette in the fireplace. She tapped another one out from a silver case and struck a match against it to light her new one.

Joe knew he should’ve just gone up to their room and forgotten about the women, especially since the two “strumpets” seemed to have already forgotten about them, but he couldn’t. He’d never talked to such women before. Until an hour ago he never knew such women existed. Sure, the old hermit Hans talked of “ladies of the night” and traders spoke of “good-time girls,” but Joe never imagined them being this brazen and nonchalant about how they looked and how they acted. Besides, Frank never said anything about “dancing girls” or “strumpets” or even the Fulfillment District. Maybe he left that part out, or maybe they’d gotten way off course in the city. 

Suddenly Ina noticed them again, as if they’d snuck up on her somehow.

“Did you want to say something, honey?” she said.

He’d been repressing himself so hard that he finally let go.

“She’s my girl,” he blurted out. “She’s breech. We’re here to go to the hospital. Give birth. Our folks died of PB. We’re all we got. That’s it. That’s our story.”

“Slow down, dear,” Ina said. “We’re not interrogating you.”

Eve looked at him for a lingering moment, as if she were trying to figure him out, before she said something that alarmed Joe.

“Who told you to say that?”

“No one,” he said quickly. “That’s the truth.”

“Well, it didn’t sound like the truth. It sounded like you were repeating what somebody told you. You need to learn how to lie better.”

“Leave him alone,” Ina said. “They’re just a couple of dirt-eaters. He’s probably scared. Never been to the city before.”

“Being a good liar is the only way to survive,” Eve continued. “And if he doesn’t want to find himself in a labor prison or his girl’s baby given to some fat cats in the Green Zone, then he better learn to lie better.”

“Don’t be so hard.”

“I’m only trying to help. How is that being hard?”

“I’m just saying you see the bad in everything and you aren’t open to anything else.”

“No, I see reality. I see things for what they are.”

Ina shook her head.

“Give me another drag on that,” she said, and reached out for Eve’s cigarette. She took a smoke and handed it back to Eve.

“They’re still looking at us,” Eve said, “like we’re the weird ones.”

They both laughed.

“It’s okay, sugar,” Ina said. “You go on up to your room.”

“You going to tuck them in too?” Eve asked.

“Maybe I will.”

“Mama’s going to make them feel good.”

“Now why do you have to say something like that?”

“Mama gives good love.”

“You are nasty. You have to dirty up anything innocent, don’t you?”

“That’s the truth.”

“You can’t stand anything nice.”

“Only if it’s nice for me.”

“Where’s your heart?”

“In the same place as the truth.”

They both laughed again.

Eve said, “They’re still looking at us.”

“Shoo, now,” Ina said. “Or Mama won’t bring you milk and cookies.”

They laughed yet again, but Joe didn’t get the joke
, or any of the jokes they were laughing about. It seemed like they were speaking a different language. And he didn’t like that. Maybe nothing was making sense on account of how exhausted he felt. Maybe his mind was all hazy from stress and fatigue. All the same, he got the distinct feeling they were making fun of him. He felt foolish now for being drawn in by these women and standing there, just like a typical bumpkiny dirt-eater, listening to them prattle on about nonsense. He only wanted to rest now, to let the day fade away, and to wake up to a new day that felt better for both of them. They didn’t belong here, that was for sure.

 

 

Chapter 30

 

 

 

Inside the room, Mary immediately crawled onto the bed. She turned on her side and brought her knees up against her big belly and tucked her head in against her breast.

“From here on out,” Joe said, “I think everything is going to be fine. There’s just one thing left to do and that won’t be hard because Frank told me who to talk to. We just have to say we know Frank, and the rest should be easy. I know we’re in a crazy place and none of it makes any sense to you, but we’ll be gone soon. We’ll be back home before you know it.”

Mary didn’t move a muscle. She stayed curled up like a hard little ball. Then her body flinched with a spasm, and she wriggled her hips as if in discomfort.

“You okay?” Joe said. “Was it the baby? Is it moving, kicking?”

He didn’t like how she was all balled up and non-responsive, like a scared centipede. He was afraid she was reverting back to her old self.
If she went back there, she might not ever come out again.

He had to help her somehow, but he didn’t have a clue as to what to do. Maybe she was hungry. She had to be. They hadn’t eaten since they got to the city. Maybe the baby inside was hungry and upset about it. Maybe she’d feel better if she got some food. They had half a jar of vegetable chowder and some pinole left in the wagon. 

“I’m going to get some food out of the wagon,” he said. He pulled the recorder out of his back pocket and set it on the table. “Once you eat something, your spirits will lift. I’ll be right back.”

He hated to leave her, but he didn’t have any choice.

Downstairs he saw Eve still sitting on the couch. She had her head back as she stared at the ceiling. She wasn’t smoking anymore. The flames in the fireplace had died down. Joe didn’t know if he should say hello. He thought he should at least be friendly since she talked to him earlier, even though she wasn’t particularly nice after that. But she didn’t seem to notice him and he didn’t want to disturb her, so he continued on to the front door. Besides, he was more interested in getting food for Mary.

“Where are you sneaking off to?”

Joe stopped and turned. It was Eve.

“I’m going out to our wagon.”

“For what?”

“I forgot something.”

“You don’t know what it is?” she said.

“Just something I forgot.”

“So you can’t tell me?”

“If I did I wouldn’t be following what you said earlier.”

She smiled. “About lying, you mean.”

“Yes.”

“That wasn’t lying.”

“What was it, then?

“Hiding, which only makes you look suspicious.”

“So I should’ve said I was going to get my recorder.”

“Only if that’s a lie.”

“If I said yes, it wouldn’t be a lie anymore.”

“You’re catching on.”

Eve leaned her head back again and looked at the ceiling. Joe was about to leave when he couldn’t resist asking her something.

“What were you thinking before?” he said.

“Before what?”

“Before you called out to me. I saw you looking up like you were thinking.”

“It’s best to stay out of other people’s business unless you want something from them.”

“I was only being friendly. That’s all I wanted.”

“Don’t make that mistake again.”

She turned away and grabbed the poker beside the couch and stoked the flames. Joe couldn’t figure her out. One minute it seemed like she might be nice, then the next minute she seemed mean and cold.

He left her alone. Why was he even bothering with her, anyway, when his chief concern was Mary?

He unlocked the front door and walked outside onto the porch. The night smelled like it was burning, like burning ash in a fire pit. The darkness was thick and hazy. He heard the clomp-clomp of hooves and the squeak of wheels as a horse and wagon drove past.

When he reached the stable, he lifted the wood latch, peeled open one panel of the double doors, and slipped inside the darkness. He felt for the lantern he saw earlier hanging from a nail beside the door. Then he fumbled for a wood match from a tin can hanging from another nail. He set the lantern on the ground, pumped the valve, and lit the mantle.

At the wagon, he lifted the lantern over the side of the bed and peered in, but all he saw were crumpled blankets. He panicked. He set the lantern down in the bed and scrambled over the side. He grabbed the blankets and flung them out of the way. There was nothing beneath. All the water, the pinole, and the half jar of vegetable chowder were gone. All of it. Joe snatched the lantern and jumped out of the bed. Inside the cab, he tore up the floorboards, expecting the worst. When he saw that the bundled-up diesel was still there, he breathed a little easier. 

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