Windwhistle Bone

by Richard Trainor

  Ram was standing within a foot of her. The distinctive scent of her perfume buckled his knees and he felt his brow beading with sweat. Oscar moved around to the far side, removing the one obstacle between them. He placed his arm lightly around the woman’s rose-printed waist. “Well, Vera, it seems that you have yet another new admirer. This is Ram Le Doir, Vera. Ram, this is Vera Dubcek.”

  “Hello, Ram,” she said lowly, reaching out her hand for him to shake or kiss; Ram couldn’t tell which. He slowly reached for it, unsure of what to do next. She looked at him, taking him in appraisingly. Then she noticed his outfit. “So, are you a real cowboy or do you just like to dress like one?”

  “I never thought about it,” said Ram, “probably a little of both.”

  “Oh?” she said. “Really, do tell me, Mr. Ram Le Doir.”

  “Well, I’ve been living on a ranch out in the desert for the past year or so and I’ve been doing a lot of riding, but I do like the style too.”

  “Maybe you should join the rodeo… or the circus,” she laughed.

  Ram blushed. He smiled back at her crookedly. “Maybe I’ll do that.”

  Vera looked down at her hand, still in Ram’s firm yet tenuous grasp. A new song started and she moved closer to him, smiling slightly, the light catching her eyes and glinting off them. “So cowboy, do you dance?”

  Ram nodded slowly. “A little.”

  “Then dance with me, or I’ll have to start charging you rent for my hand.”

  She smiled fully at him and he returned it, opening toward her. He took her in his arms, his right arm around her slim waist, and they moved slowly, gliding to the music filling the room. They danced one dance after another, talking lightly in one another’s ears while the music was playing and then more intimately when it stopped. After a few songs, Vera noticed her coterie noticing them. Then the coterie dissolved into the crowd, wandering off in different directions. Some stopped to bid Vera goodbye. She chatted with each one of them briefly for a moment or two but remained in Ram’s arms all the while, introducing him to them if the spirit moved her. Sometimes it didn’t, sometimes it did. When she did, Ram would extend his hand and his counterpart would grasp it, sometimes glaring when they did, Ram noticed.

  But Ram was completely enraptured and couldn’t care less what they thought. After a while, Ram remembered his manners and asked Vera if she wanted something to drink. He brought her a glass of red wine as she had asked him to do and replaced the beer he’d lost somewhere with a fresh one. Oscar approached them with his new friend on one arm and Emily on the other. “You two seem to be enjoying one another,” he said.

  Ram smiled and Vera drew close to him.

  “Where have you been hiding him, Oscar,” Vera burbled sweetly.

  “We work together.”

  “Oh really? So you’re in theater too?”

  “No, Vera, at Endymion,” Sands corrected.

  “You’re a record clerk?” asked Vera, her tone slightly dismissive. Oscar took notice and flinched, which Vera saw.

  “Not that there’s anything wrong with being a record store clerk, Ram. It’s just that you don’t look like one,” she said.

  “I’m not,” said Ram. “I’m a carpenter. I build the Endymion stores.”

  “Oh really?” she said, beaming again. “How fun! A builder. And do you design the stores too?”

  “Sort of. It’s sort of a team effort and I’m just one member of the team,” said Ram haltingly.

  Oscar and his companions saw the focus of the conversation shift back to a dialogue and began disengaging themselves. They moved off toward the kitchen door that led downstairs to the basement.

  “If you want us, you know where to find us, Vera,” Oscar said, smiling and blinking.

  “Ha!” said Vera. “Touché, Monsieur Sands. Yes, I know just where you’ll be.”

  Ram looked back and forth between them while Oscar and the women moved off downstairs. Vera’s attention was fully focused on Ram again. She looked at him for a long moment then smiled again and grabbed his arm, guiding him to a sliding glass door leading outside into the backyard stretching up the hill beyond the house.

  “Come on, cowboy. Let’s smoke a cigarette and look at the stars.”

  On the tree line out back, they paused in the clearing. In the distance above the ocean and out on the horizon, a thick fog bank was stacked, but in the interim since his arrival at the party, the land-bound fog had thinned. Directly above them, the sky was clear and bright, festooned with ice-white stars against an ink-black sky. The broad band of the Milky Way was an opaque gray cloud against the predominating black, and the constellations were clear as they wheeled through the sky. Ram stood alongside Vera, facing westward out toward the ocean, transfixed. Her right hand looped through his left arm and lightly gripped his bicep. “So, do you know anything about the stars and what they signify?”

  “A little, but not much,” said Ram, nodding and looking over at her to find her staring just as transfixed as he was.

  “Well, tell me what you see then.”

  “Well, there’s Orion the Hunter,” Ram pointed, “and there’s Canis the dog Star, and Venus right above the cloud bank, and then back this way and a little bit that way,” he said pointing left, “is Mars—that sort of pinkish star there.”

  Vera nodded and gripped his arm more tightly. “Anything else?”

  “Well, there’s the Milky Way and over there is Andromeda, just about to set, and that one, that bright one almost directly above us is the polar star, the North Star.”

  “I see,” she said, “anything else?”

  “Not that I know of,” said Ram.

  Now Vera turned Ram eastward and a little to the north, directing his attention to a small cluster of stars just visible on the horizon. “There,” she said, “see that string of stars and the diamond-shaped cluster?” she asked him, pointing. “That’s Hercules, and that bunch,” she said, turning him slightly and pointing up, “that cluster there is Leo. The Lion and the Strongman… They both sort of remind me of you,” she said smiling. “Now, follow that same line of the big star in Leo just to the west a little bit. Do you see that cluster, the three big stars with that V in the middle, just above Orion?”

  Ram scanned the sky in the direction she indicated but couldn’t see it. Then he stood behind her, his hands on her shoulders so he could sight a straight line from her outstretched and pointing finger to where it indicated. Then he saw it and told her so.

  “That one, that bunch is me,” she said. “My birth sign, Gemini, the Twins. Do you know the significance of that sign Mr. Cowboy?”

  “I can’t say that I do.”

  “Are you mocking me, Mr. Ram Le Doir?” she said, turning enough so that Ram could see her eyes harden.

  “Not at all, I just don’t know much about astrology,” Ram said, stuttering as he did.

  “Well then, do you want to know about Gemini and what it means to be a Gemini?”

  “Very much, tell me.”

  “Gemini, the Twins, the Dioscuri, from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. They were two young boys, half-brothers, Pollux, the son of Leda and Zeus, you know the Yeats poem Leda and the Swan? And the other brother is Castor, the child of Leda and Pyhndareus. They were the brothers of Clytemnestra and Helen of Troy. Castor was a breaker of horses. Pollux was a boxer. The Twins are the gods of athletes and the guiders of mariners at sea. They were followers of Dionysus and their performance and bravery in one particular Roman battle, I forget which, was rewarded by the gods who raised them up there, into the heavens… They’re a transformed pair of twins. They can turn darkness into light. But Gemini, the astrological sign, is ruled by Mercury, by Hermes, the wayfaring messenger, the fleet and winged one who is sort of the coyote of the ancient gods. The Twins have a strong association with paganism too and they can also turn light into darkness. The body part they’re associated with is the throat and those who are born under this sign are generally skilled at speech and communication.
But you’ve got to watch out for Mercury, the old coyote trickster, because sometimes that skill with speech can be a double-edged sword—especially so when the light is transformed into darkness. We Gemini’s can be very good liars and deceivers, and we are not ones to be trifled with or crossed without there being severe consequences,” said Vera, cocking her head slightly and raising one eyebrow to see Ram’s reaction.

  Her warning did nothing to dissuade him, had no effect whatsoever on the devotion he already had for her, did nothing to deflate the ardor he already felt for her, did little to lessen or slow the glow of what he was already feeling for her. He turned her toward him and they kissed fully and deeply under the night sky, under the Dioscuri. When the kiss ended minutes later, the sky was beginning to change and the fog was flowing in again, swallowing the stars and constellations one after another as it marched inland.

  “That was nice,” she said, taking Ram’s arm even tighter as they walked toward the house. Inside it, she quickly gathered her things to leave and Ram assumed he was going with her. But she stopped him.

  “I’m not that kind of woman. I’m going home alone. If you’d like to see me again, you can call me. Oscar has my number. I’ll tell him it’s OK to give it to you.”

  Ram struggled for words but none came. He leaned over to kiss her and she gave him a perfunctory peck on the cheek and a slight embrace. Then she parted with an au revoir and an à la prochaine. Ram gaped as she walked down the drive and disappeared into the street. He went to the bar and poured himself two shots of tequila, which had somewhat of a soothing effect but not really. In the living room, he picked out Phil through the crowd. Ram poured three more shots, grabbed two new beers, and walked over and stood beside him. Phil looked at him. “What’s the matter? You look like you seen a ghost or something.”

  “Not just seen one, Phil, met one and kissed one.”

  “Uh-oh. Sounds like trouble to me,” said Phil.

  “Could be. But I just don’t give a damn. She’s magic… or something like that.”

  Phil flagged Milo and Cisco down and the four men stood off in a corner, trading shots and smoking joints discussing Ram’s developing situation with Vera. They laughed and joked over Le Doir in love. Ram accepted their jibes good-naturedly and laughed along with them. After a while, they decided to go back to Sally’s and wrap up the evening there, which they did, quitting at just past two.

  But Ram was restless and couldn’t fall asleep as quickly as his friends did. His mind was full of Vera, as was his heart, and what he felt to be his soul. His thoughts went out to her on the wings of Mercury. It was dawn with Andromeda rising before he could finally fall asleep.

  For two weeks, he tried unsuccessfully to see her. She was cordial and friendly over the phone, but she was always busy. She was in rehearsals, or auditioning for a new play, or she had parties or receptions to attend and couldn’t or wouldn’t squeeze Ram in. One Sunday, while he was doing laundry, Ram called to ask if he could see her that evening. She said she was sorry; that she and her girlfriends had something planned for weeks and couldn’t break the engagement. She said she hoped Ram would understand. “I think I understand. I think I’ve got the picture,” he said. She told him it wasn’t like that; that she truly wanted to see him and spend time with him, but the timing wasn’t right. Ram sighed and said that he understood, but his frustration had gotten the better of him. He said that maybe he shouldn’t call her again. She said that she understood; that if it was best for him that way, then that was okay with her, but she was sorry she wouldn’t see him again. In the silent moments that ensued, Ram felt a frost rising between them and anger began growing in him. He told her he was sorry for bothering her and he understood the demands put upon her and would respect them. The conversation ended without incident. Ram replaced the phone in its holder, finished his washing and drying, and then drove back to Sally’s. When he got there, he drank one of Cisco’s home brews, watched a baseball game and had a nap.

  That evening, Ram went to see a movie—a new Nicholas Roeg film playing at The Nickelodeon. He drove downtown and parked in the main lot near the mall. He had almost an hour to kill and he went to the Oak Room to have a drink before the movie started. “Bourbon rocks,” he said to the bartender. Ram took a deep sip and set it down. Then he reached for a cigarette and put one in his mouth. He fished about for his lighter but it had somehow vanished. Then a flame appeared before him.

  A hand holding an antique, ivory-handled Ronson lighter came toward his mouth. “You seem to be without fire, Mr. Le Doir,” she said, bringing the lighter up to Ram’s cigarette. “I’d not have expected that from someone like you.”

  He was speechless, then Ram recovered. “What do you mean? Just how am I exactly and why wouldn’t you expect me to be without fire?”

  “I don’t know, a carpenter and an old cowboy like yourself would seem to suggest someone more prepared for smoking, if in fact they did smoke, which you most certainly do. I don’t know, I’d have taken you for someone prepared for battle—a Zippo man or at worst an old Ronson, like this one,” she smiled. “May I join you?”

  Ram inhaled and expelled two jets out his nostrils. He looked at Vera, taking her in. She was in a simple black dress highlighting her figure, with black silk stockings and a sheer black scarf with embroidered red roses. Her neck looked even longer now with her hair up, pinned in the back with a Chinese ivory comb. Her lips were the deep crimson he remembered, her cheeks lightly rouged. She wore the same intoxicating perfume and had a small gardenia pinned behind one ear. Ram smiled up appreciatively and laughed. “Be my guest,” he said, indicating the chair next to him at the bar.

  “Not here,” she said. “I’d prefer we sit over there, by the window,” indicating the table looking out on the outside patio. “It’ll give us more privacy, don’t you think?”

  Ram picked up his drink and followed her to the table. A waitress came and took their order for drinks. When they were brought, Ram lit two cigarettes Paul Henreid style and then looked at her for a minute or so before speaking. “I must tell you. I’m kind of surprised to see you.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Well, you sounded so sure about your plans when I spoke to you earlier.”

  “Ah yes, yes I was.”

  “What changed?”

  “I did. I changed my mind.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, it is a woman’s prerogative to do so, and you seemed so upset, so frustrated, so final… Maybe I just wanted to find out what I’d be missing,” she smiled, leaning over the table and taking Ram’s hand. “Then again, maybe I just thought that a night out with the girls would have been boring.”

  “Which is it then?”

  “I don’t know, the evening’s young yet. But the most important thing for you to know is that I am here. Let’s just play it and see.”

  They played the scene all night long in the Oak Room bar, sipping drinks and smoking cigarettes at their corner table. They talked lightly of their pasts, hazily of their futures, and passionately of their presents and their passions and aesthetic preferences. Ram spoke of his admiration for Roeg and Andrei Tarkovsky. Vera liked Cocteau and Marcel Carne. Ram admired Shelley, Keats, and the Romantics. Vera worshipped Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and the symbolists. Ram loved Graham Greene, Thomas Hardy, and Scott Fitzgerald; Vera preferred Djuna Barnes, Jane Bowles, and Balzac. Ram liked Weston; Vera, Moholy-Nagy. They spoke of different philosophies and philosophers, of religions and movements, of foreign lands they’d visited or hoped to see. When it was close to midnight, Vera excused herself and went downstairs to use the bathroom. When she returned, her makeup was freshly adjusted and the scent of her perfume strong again. She stood alongside Ram at the bar and smiled playfully. “Pay the man,” she said, indicating the bartender. “You’re coming with me tonight.”

  Ram peeled off a twenty, laid it on the table, and followed Vera outside. “I’ve got my car in the city lot.”

  “Leave it,” she
said. “We’re walking, we don’t have far.” Then she grabbed Ram by the shirtfront and pulled him down to her to kiss him. When their lips parted some minutes later, she took him by the arm and snuggled close to him, guiding him down the quiet streets to a two-story building surrounded by an adobe wall. She opened an iron gate and crossed the patio to a set of stairs climbing to a landing on the second floor and turned the key in the door. “It’s my lawyer’s office downstairs,” she said indicating. “He’s given me a good deal on this place,” she laughed, turning on a small table light on the work table beside the door. “Make yourself at home. I’m going to mix us a drink and put on some music.”

  While Vera was doing this, Ram looked about the large main room. It was set up as a studio, with easy chairs and a large bed in the corner. On the worktable were sketches of scene arrangements, characters, and costumes. Scripts littered the table along with foreign magazines and old photos and antique postcards. A number of small bowls—Chinese and Art Deco and Art Nouveau—were scattered about the table, and in them were various aromatic herbs and dried flower petals. Ram was examining one of them when Vera reentered the room with their drinks. She handed one to Ram.

  “What are these?” asked Ram.

  “Offerings from admirers… from past performances,” she said, a smile curling the ends of her lips.

  “For plays you did?”

  “You could say that,” Vera said warmly, the smile spreading and widening so Ram could see her teeth. They were white and evenly spaced with a small gap between the front teeth, almost like his, but not as wide. She laughed softly and opened her mouth wider until he could see her still intact tonsils in the back, as his were still. She raised her glass and clicked Ram’s in toast, swallowing her drink whole. Ram imitated her gesture and threw his whiskey back, feeling the heat behind his ears and in the pit of his stomach while the music welled up from the loudspeakers. An acoustic guitar figure was followed by a woman’s distinctive voice that he had never heard before. Ram asked Vera who it was. “Her name’s Phoebe Snow,” she said, leaning over Ram and kissing him lightly around the mouth. “The song is called Poetry Man. The first time I heard it, I thought of you. That’s what you are, Mr. Ram Le Doir. My poetry man, my old cowboy who’s missing his Zippo,” she laughed.