Walking Dunes (25 page)

Later in the afternoon, after a couple of desultory games of Hearts, Ari changed the music. He played The Midnighters (“Work with me, Annie;” “Sexy Ways”) and Chuck Berry, the Drifters, Little Richard. He had a trash bucket filled with 45's. He played LaVern Baker singing the original “Tweedle Dee,” stolen by Georgia Gibbs. He talked on and on about the way R & B was changing the culture, how even though it had been ‘whited up' we would all see that after Elvis, nothing would ever be the same. That made James remember that there was an Elvis movie, “King Creole,” at the downtown theatre. Patsy ran back to her rooms to cook supper for her father; afterwards, they would all go.

David used the bathroom and washed his face. He tucked his shirt into his chinos and pulled himself up tall. He thought he was better-looking than James or Ari, their advantage was only age. He felt like he had spent the day in a museum (which he had never done); he had learned about culture, hadn't he?

Seated on the couch, his legs stretched out in front of him, he found himself telling his hosts about the fight he had seen a few days earlier. It was like scratching an itch and discovering a mass of bites. Once he started talking—he mentioned it casually, wondering what they would have to say—he grew more and more intense, searching for the right description, the right feeling for what had happened. “I felt like there was a glass wall between me and the fight. There was nothing I could do.”

James drawled, “Nobody wants interference in a fight. That's for cops.”

Ari said, “I must have had two or three fights a week the years I was in junior high. I lived in the streets. Then I looked around; boys had shot up, put on weight. I was never going to catch up. I had to get by some other way. I learned to skirt a fracas. I learned how much it doesn't matter. I've never had a fight since I was fourteen. Not in the army, either.”

James laughed. “Hell no, Finny. Men were too scared of your sharp tongue.”

David asked James, “What about you? In Basin? Did you fight?”

James yawned hugely. “I came very close one time and that was really it. I played football, there was plenty of bruising there. But this one time, I was in eighth grade. None of us could drive yet. There was a ruckus of some sort on the playground at school. I don't remember what it was about. A smart remark I guess. Some stupid junior high insult. There were two big groups of us who stuck together. Sometimes at recess we threw rocks, that sort of crap. Only this day, somebody said, Let's fight it out, shitheads. We agreed. As soon as school was out, we'd meet at the old windmill east of the school, out where the houses stopped and the prairie took over. I was scared to death, I wasn't very big—I had a big spurt the next year, surprised me most of all—but I couldn't not go when all my buddies would. The only thing was, I was wearing this brand new shirt my mama had bought me a few days before. I knew she'd kill me if I ripped it or got blood on it—this went across my mind and I was miserable at the idea. I was more scared of my mama than of the boys, so I said I had to go home and change first. My neighbor, Stevie, in my class, said if we ran home his brother would be home from high school and he would drive us out to the windmill. We ran off, I changed, then we had to wait maybe ten minutes for the car. When we finally got out near the windmill we could see all the boys in our class there, and as many more there to watch; we could hear shouting going on. Kids were shaking their fists and trying to menace one another, but nobody had had the nerve to start punching. And before I could get out of the car, we heard sirens coming from the other way. It wasn't going to happen! I could go home unscathed but not a coward.”

Ari had enjoyed James' tale. “It's always like OK Corral with you Western boys,” he laughed. “We had skirmishes. They happened where they began, nobody ran off to get ready. There would be blood, and we'd scatter, knowing there was always another time to come.”

Suddenly David longed to tell them about LaVonne. There had always been girls like that. What did they do in cities? Duck into alleyways? Vacant lots? He would never have the nerve to ask Ari, but James was a local. David wanted to hear about Basin when James was still young and stupid enough to cruise with creeps, doing things he wouldn't be proud of in the morning. Casually, testing the water, he said, “So, James. If there's football, fights, and fucking, you've only told us about the first two. Were there girls to ride around with? Girls to—” He faltered, aware that James and Ari were looking at him with something very much like disgust. The laughs had all died away.

In a low casual voice, James said, “I didn't start dating till late. I didn't slum with girls, didn't think of them that way. You see, with girls, by the time I'd changed my shirt, so to speak, the scene was breaking up. I joined the Army and went off to life like men live.” James and Ari exchanged looks.

David stood up and beat his chest like a monkey. “Jesus, we've been sitting around the whole damned day! I need to stretch my legs. I'll go see what's keeping Patsy.” He was getting no encouragement from the two men. “We still on for ‘King Creole?'”

“I never miss an Elvis flick,” Ari said.

James said, “Tell Patsy it's my treat,” and instantly David knew he would not. James had meant some sort of insult. David would pay for Patsy. If he had not gone off and lived
like men live
, whatever the
hell
that was supposed to mean, he did know how to act in Basin, Texas, with a girl his own age.

He spent most of the few remaining days with Patsy, Ari and James. No more was said about fights and girls, certainly not in front of Patsy. It crossed David's mind that it was odd, when he was alone with the men, that they never, even then, mentioned the women of Germany, Italy, the Philipines, New York. They asked no questions of David, as if he lived a general life, the details inconsequential, the broad outline available to anyone who looked out on the flat streets of Basin, and beyond, onto the dun prairie. They talked about books and music and politics. Occasionally, they politely entertained comments from David (he had very little to say on any of their topics, but sometimes he had read a pertinent article), then returned to their odd little duet of comments. Their sighs and glances arose out of two years' shared company, the fortune of foreign travel, and the confidence of youth moved into adulthood, still unburdened by debt, ambition, and authority. They were a happy pair, and David envied them both their experience and their friendship.

26.

David attended an opera performance in the school auditorium. Not a whole opera, but pieces—what were they called? arias?—from “La Boheme,” “Madame Butterfly,” “La Traviata,” and others he had already forgotten. Five performers from the Houston Opera were going to Santa Fe, and a local music-lover had arranged for them to stop in Basin. Mrs. Schwelthelm told them about it in English and then Patsy called him and asked if he wanted to go with her and Ari.

The singers were an intriguing group. Two of them were Negroes, a woman and a man. The woman had a massive chest and a fascinatingly huge mouth. The white men wore their hair rather long, combed in an almost womanish way. All their voices were amazing. There were moments in the songs that gave David a chill, but at other times he had to fight his desire to yawn and stretch. He had no idea what they were singing about, though the program summarized the selections. Sometimes he could see the singers' throats trembling.

By the time the singing was over, he was starved. Ari had bought the tickets, and would not let David repay him, so David offered to treat the trio at the Stockman Cafe.

They were eating hamburgers when the five performers came in and took the big circle booth in the corner of the busy cafe. All the customers stared. At the counter, a couple of redneck types cawed, “Look what the cat drug in,” and then called out to Mick, the cook, “You gonna serve niggers in here?”

The pleasant clang and buzz of the cafe came to an abrupt halt. David could not remember ever seeing a Negro in the Stockman, though, technically, he believed Negroes were supposed to be able to eat where they wanted. In fact David could not remember being in the same room with a Negro in his whole life, unless you counted the times they were in the grocery store, or Sears, where they had their own water fountain in the back by the bathrooms. His heart was thudding. Patsy, seated beside him, took his hand. The waitress looked like a statue, her hands on the back edge of the counter. After several moments, a man in the back said, “Any chance of getting more coffee back here?” and the waitress jumped as if he had goosed her. David watched the performers speaking in low voices. The hicks at the counter started up again. “You smell something!” one of them said. The other coughed and gagged. A couple of good ole boys sitting two booths down from the performers got up and made a big show of skirting the corner booth. Patsy was squeezing David's hand hard. Ari had a bland, interested look on his face; hadn't he come, after all, to see the natives?

The performers stood and quietly eased their way out of the booth. All of them left except one, a tall white man, who went to the counter, near where David was sitting, and asked the waitress if he could get an order to go. One of the men at the counter said, “They don't serve no collard greens here.” The waitress, red-eyed, fled into the kitchen. The man from the opera group turned and looked out at the customers, as if he were going to speak, then shook his head and left. David sighed, Patsy sighed, they smiled at one another nervously. At least there had not been a fight. The waitress came back from the kitchen with the cook.

The two men from the counter were standing in the aisle, adjusting their Levi's and sucking on their teeth. “Maybe the Stockman ain't the place to go no more,” one said. The other said, “You figger that? Eating with niggers?” His pal replied, “They was queers, you see that hair?” One of the other customers said, “Where do you think they're from, not knowing no better?” Another man joined the group, chewing on a toothpick. The cook said, “They're gone now, how about a piece of pie, on the house?” He had the steady neutral gaze of a school administrator. One of the men, a sandy-haired roughneck type, said, “I'm full up,” and hitched his pants to make his point. A man at the register, fiftyish and tired-looking, waved his hand at the little gang; “Aw, go home, you jerks, the world is changing.” When he opened the door they could hear the sluggish chugging sound of an engine not quite turning over. Ari, turned so that he could see out the window, said quietly, “Our friends are having car trouble, bad luck.” He scooted out of the booth. “Let's see if we can give them a push or something.” David fumbled with his wallet at the register while Ari went outside. The men, still loitering at the counter, caught on. The car labored, then sputtered and died. “Looks like they're gonna need a little help getting outa here,” the sandy-haired fellow said. The other men snickered and guffawed, and like a sticky lump of insects, went out the door.

David and Patsy followed. Ari was leaning in the window of the station wagon, talking with the Negro driver. The men from the diner strolled to the wagon, one at each bumper. Ari straightened up. “Hey man,” he said. “We can take care of it.” One of the men gave the bumper a hard shove, grunting furiously. Then another did the same, and another. In half a minute they were rocking the wagon violently. The driver tried the starter again. It almost made it. “Shit!” David said. He was still back by the cafe door with Patsy, wondering what to do. Ari started shouting, “You stupid jerks, leave them ALONE.” He was holding onto the edge of the window pane, like a man in a cartoon clinging to a flying airplane. The men paid him no attention at all. He ran to his own car and started it. David and Patsy panicked and ran toward the car too. Ari leaned out of the window, waving them back, “Wait!” he shouted. “Get back!” By now the station wagon was rocking dangerously. The men shouted something back and forth, and the rocking slowed. Two of them came over to the same side as the other two. “They're going to turn it OVER!” Patsy said. She turned around twice, like a confused dancer. There were at least a dozen onlookers from the diner in the parking lot by now. The cook was at the door, wringing his apron. “Do something?” Patsy shrieked. The four attackers, cursing and laughing, were positioning themselves to lift the side of the station wagon.

There was a frightful clank as Ari's Ford hit the back of the station wagon. His engine revved fiercely. The driver of the wagon cranked the starter again. The four men were shoving the side of the car. The wheels on that side were just off the ground when Ari managed to give the car enough push to lurch forward, and in that instant the motor turned over, and the bucking car drove away. One of the men had been thrown onto the pavement by the movement of the car. David grabbed Patsy's arm and yelled, “Come ON!” Ari screeched up to them, and David and Patsy both managed to jump in as he accelerated.

David let out a long noisy exhalation of breath. “God DAMN, Finberg,” he said. “You were slick as spit back there.”

Ari shook his fist in the air. “You don't have to fight people dumber than you.” He was laughing. “If you're in a car and they're not.”

They could not get inside fast enough. They ran from Ari's to Patsy's apartment. There they clung to one another. They were inflamed by what had happened, by the near-miss of it, like passengers out of a wrecked car. “God I hate this place!” Patsy cried. David clasped his arms around her and kissed her neck. There was no one else he would have wanted to be with at the cafe scene.

They lay on the daybed, on the faded chenille spread. He did not stop to think about the ways this was different from the first time, the comfort of her house, the sweet easiness of it. They were together, as they had to be, like exiles.