Seeds and Other Stories

by Ursula Pflug

  Tanya nodded. “It’s stupid for them to say so much before the trial.”

  But perhaps that meant they weren’t real criminals.

  Just inept thieves and murderers.

  “It’s not true,” she told Lulu when they got to the beach. “If that was true they would’ve sailed her into the Ala Wai. He told me once the repairs were done they’d go to northern British Columbia.”

  “I don’t want to know these things,” Lulu said. And then, “Do you wish it had gone another way? If all of you had worked on the boat you might’ve been done and gone and in BC by now.”

  Tanya nodded. “The Queen Charlottes or somewhere even more remote.”

  “You didn’t answer.”

  “We’d have gotten a few months, is all.”

  “Maybe years.”

  “Why are you and Mei both speaking in his defence?”

  “You were a different person after your time with Jim. You were so obviously fucked up before, everyone noticed. Now you’re kind of all right.”

  “Maybe I was his penance. Maybe after what they did on Midway, he knew he needed to help someone. Buy his life back from God. He wasn’t a killer, in spite of his record.”

  “What was it for?” Tanya had been reading the papers too.

  “Possession. Grand theft auto.”

  “A logical progression from there to grand theft boat.”

  “Am I supposed to laugh?”

  “Do you good. What say you we blow this pop stand, fly to Seattle? I can borrow the money. I have a friend with a restaurant there; we can work. Even you, if I ask nicely. Unless you want to wait, see how the trial turns out. Visit him in jail. Where is he?”

  “Honolulu. No bail. Trial’s not for months.”

  “Maybe his friends killed them, not Jim.”

  “Maybe.”

  It was possible. But she remembered again all the times under the waterfall when she’d wondered if he’d kill her. Maybe she was picking up on the boat owners’ fear, their last thoughts clinging to him, ever since that rainy night on Midway when they’d lost everything.

  “You know when we were camping and we got high I always worried he’d kill me, even though he seemed like a kind man right from the moment I met him.”

  “Where’d you meet him? You never said.”

  “At the temple feast. We didn’t talk even though I noticed him right away. And then I got back to the park after and there was the usual fire. I was staring into the flames and then when I looked up, there was his face. I thought I was imagining things,” Tanya laughed. “Anyways, like I said, maybe what I heard was their feelings coming off him, their fear of him, the couple who owned the boat. I always thought I could tell a killer, they’d give off a vibe. The thing is, even though we broke up, you’re right, he was good to me. He got through to me like no one ever has, not even you, Lulu. I feel so much more myself than I did before. And no matter what he did on Midway, you can’t take that away.”

  Tanya remembered now, how just before he’d walked away from her when she’d sat on the courthouse steps crying, he’d reached into his pocket, come out with Mouse, offered her the little animal. “You take him,” she’d said.

  “I can’t.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s not the seafaring sort.” He’d kissed her on the forehead. “Perhaps it’s better this way.” What did he mean? She hadn’t asked. “No matter what happens, don’t think too badly of me. I’ll remember you always.”

  She remembered how complete strangers so often seemed to hate him. It wasn’t just that he was unkempt and wore torn clothes; lots of people did that. Maybe they could smell it on him, what she couldn’t. Grand theft boat. Murder. Almost all had looked at him this way, as if he weren’t fit for human company. Except for Mei, and Michael, and Lulu, and Plumeria. But he’d had a chance to charm them, as he had her. Or else they’d been part of his penance too, part of his desire to take a new tack at this difficult problem of being human.

  After their talk Lulu had gone into town again, back to the laundromat to fold, first telling her not to run away, but it was silly, really. Where was there to go? Tanya left the beach for the fire pit in its scraggly patch of lawn, started the night’s bonfire. The backpackers would be arriving from their day trips soon, and those who knew who she was would want to ask her questions. She got the drums out of their hiding places in the bushes. Tonight, she’d drum so loud she wouldn’t hear a thing.

  sss

  The door bangs; it’s Lulu, returned from her hike. She looks at me, questioning. I put down this pen, pick up our room phone. Koke’e Lodge has room phones now, as it didn’t back then. The mouse jumps off the page while I wait for someone to pick up. Or we could go there together. It’s not too late to learn how to sail.

  Fires Halfway

  OUR FIRST NIGHT IN BERLIN I went out with Katie, the German label’s A and R woman, to a pub called Die Ruine, in a bombed-out building near the Brandenburg Gate, never restored since the war. The second storey, roofless, crumbled upwards into the night sky, while in the tiny, one-roomed club itself, a trio of young women looked like they were falling asleep from terminal boredom.

  I found myself staring and Katie nudged me. “They’re junkies,” she whispered. “Disgusting.”

  Still, I stared. I felt like I was in the bar at the end of time. In those days, before reunification, West Berlin residents received subsidies from the state, hence, all sorts were attracted to the city by the lure of easy living. And heroin was as popular with artists and musicians as among street people, unlike in Canada. So, of course, were Colours.

  The bartender’s name was Max; he wore a western shirt and a flowered tie. He sported slicked-back hair and a handlebar moustache, looking like a character in the Wenders film, The American Friend. There was a record player of elderly but good vintage, and Max played us Velvet Underground and early Rolling Stones. Everyone was dressed in black and very thin.

  I watched an old gay derelict clean tables and empty ashtrays for a few minutes; Max pulled the man a pint in exchange for his trouble. He sat at a table alone after that, sipping beer, opening and eating a can of sardines with a clean fork he got out of his jacket pocket.

  Katie and I were joined by one of her producer friends, but before we could be properly introduced a raven-haired woman extricated herself from the trio and offered to read our Tarot cards. Katie tried to get rid of her but she whined persistently, reeking of patchouli and layered in scarves. At last I gave in, making her promise that once she’d done my reading she’d leave us alone. Leni, for that was her name, agreed, laying out my hand after I’d shuffled. My question, which I didn’t share, was whether Rudy’s German tour would ensure greater success back home. In Canada to be famous you have to be famous somewhere else first.

  Card fifteen, the Devil, came up. She asked me to re-shuffle, as if to want for me a kinder fate, but even when I did, there he was again, and the third time too. I thought Leni must be adept at sleight of hand, would promise to exorcize my devil for some large price, but instead she sighed, “What are you doing with him?”

  I thought she knew I was Rudy’s girlfriend. I was smug enough about his small-time fame to assume bar gossip had already labelled us his for-the-moment prince-less entourage, and told her truthfully: “Even back in high school, his music spoke to me more than any poetry ever had. I even changed my name to the same name as the girl in my favourite song. When we finally met last year, I asked who Kim was and he told me she didn’t exist; he’d made her up. I said I’d changed my name to Kim because of the song and he said he’d hoped someone would do that, become Kim for him.”

  I was so busy delivering my monologue I didn’t at first notice Leni staring as if I were a little mad, and Katie glancing from one to the other of us, suppressing giggles. I could have gone on, but I shut up. Scotch and jet lag, what can I say?
>
  “Who are you talking about?” Leni asked.

  “Rudy Mix, of course.”

  She tossed her locks. “I’ve never heard of him. Does he play with Lou?”

  Katie elbowed me, whispered, “She means Lou Reed. He lives here now.”

  “I’ve met Lou,” Leni said. “I’ve read his cards. Here. Right at this table.”

  Canadian that I was, I unashamedly glanced around the room to see if Lou was there, if I might have to call Rudy, get him to cab over, meet his maker. He’d thank me forever. But no Lou. Just his music pouring out of the speakers, changing us forever like the first time we’d heard it.

  “Maybe he lied. Did you ever think of that?” Leni asked menacingly. “It would be a good way to get in your pants, yes? I bet you Kim is his first wife. It’s your Rudy who’s the devil, I see it now.” Leni tossed her hair again.

  “But the devil doesn’t mean the devil personified,” I said, explaining Leni’s Tarot to her as if it was my profession and not hers. “It can mean addiction of the mind or body, any kind of enslavement.”

  “Precisely.”

  “I don’t even believe in the devil,” I said.

  “No one said you had to,” Leni said. “But you agree with me there exists real evil in the world?”

  “Of course.”

  “Keep it symbolic then, if you prefer,” Leni said.

  I stubbornly kept defending my boyfriend. “Rudy’s music is amazing. He’s not rich but he is by my standards; I’d never have gotten to Europe on my own. What’s devilish about any of that?”

  “All the same,” she said, peering at the rest of the layout, reading a meaning there that was, even with my superficial knowledge of the cards, completely opaque. “I see coming enslavement of a kind.”

  “How precise. You have real talent,” Katie’s friend sneered. I thought maybe he was trying to save face for our little group after I’d made us look like ingénues not knowing who they meant by Lou. Leni just shrugged him off, a piece of fluff, a beetle. Katie pushed several Deutschmarks in small denominations across the table, as if hoping once Leni had her money she’d find someone else to scam.

  “He paid my airfare here,” I said.

  Katie looked alarmed; she hadn’t thought I was taking this seriously. I hadn’t thought so either. Scotch and jet lag, I told myself again, call it a night and get some sleep.

  “That’s worth your soul?”

  “My soul isn’t in danger,” I pointed out, “it’s my self-respect.”

  “How so?” Katie’s sneering friend asked.

  “I’m a fan, for God’s sakes. I went backstage at a concert in Toronto and got him to autograph my programme. I gave him my number and he actually called. How pathetic is that?” I’d never seen myself as a groupie before then. I’d thought Rudy was in love too. “I should come up with an art of my own,” I continued, “not just turn myself into a character in one of his songs.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Katie said. “You’ll do something worthwhile one day—or not. Not everyone should feel they have to. What’s the point of it? And to be pretty and clever is more than most people ever get. Whether you worked for it or not you should enjoy what it brings you.”

  Katie’s friend, whose name turned out to be Hans, agreed. “If a handsome young musician asked me to keep him company on his U.S. tour, you’d be sure I’d go. What if the chance only comes once?”

  I nodded, trying to believe them. Leni reassembled her deck, wrapping it in a square of patterned blue silk with pretentious ritual. Katie and Hans rolled their eyes after she’d slunk off to another table to try her luck. The table was populated by regulars, not a rube like me among them, and she was waved away. Katie pointed and laughed at her as she sat down alone at the bar, nursing a glass of red wine and smoking; her friends had already left. Still, I said good-bye on our way out.

  “It’s through the wall for you then,” she sighed with great import, and Katie laughed the entire taxi ride back to the hotel where she dropped me off.

  I didn’t see much more of Berlin.

  sss

  Rudy hadn’t practised at all but he’d already scored some Purple. Of course I did a few lines with him, even though I was exhausted and more than a little drunk. I thought it was laced with something else, because when we disrobed I saw his penis had turned into a pretty blue candle. It looked like a regular candle, just blue, not one of those penis-shaped candles they have in sex shops, thank heavens.

  Of course I lit it and turned off the lights. Instead of having sex, we watched for hours, his penis’s flame the only blue light in the dark room. Just before it burned to its end we blew it out together: one two three, blow.

  I meant to go to sleep then, but Rudy asked, “Kim, are you ever afraid of going insane?”

  “Yes,” I answered truthfully, “but not here, not now.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It isn’t my time to go crazy yet,” I answered. “This is yours.” I didn’t know where the words came from. Blame it on the Purple.

  And I was right too. The next day Rudy had to check out the club and run through a few songs with his band. I stayed in our room and slept. When he came home I wanted to go out for Schnitzel but he wanted to order from room service and do more of the new Purple. Somewhat reluctantly I agreed. I was here on his dime.

  A brand new candle appeared almost immediately.

  “Where are we, Kim?” Rudy asked. “Have we gone too far in this time?”

  I have no idea where he got the Purple. I know he’d tried in Canada and hadn’t been able to get any; we mostly had Green there, not the same animal at all. Maybe Katie got it for him—I wouldn’t put it past her—or maybe he bumped into Lou on the street.

  Who wouldn’t take beautiful, exclusive, scary new drugs given to them by Lou Reed? I would have, then. I took them from Rudy after all, not nearly so glamorous. I guess he was to me what Lou was to him; Rudy was my Lou. I have no one to blame but myself, that and my age; I was only twenty-two, if clever and sophisticated as Katie and Hans liked to point out.

  Most of the time, I was pretty happy about my life, knowing, as Hans said, it would likely only come once. Only now and then did I fret I was a mere groupie as I had that night in Die Ruine, or that I’d wake at forty, lonely and alone, in need of a long stay in rehab.

  Like what happened to Rudy.

  To answer my question to Leni: Rudy’s little West German tour was the height of his fame. With the exception of “Fires Halfway,” his next album was awful, and the one after that bombed. His contract wasn’t renewed, but he still had habits, and they are harder to kick even than memories of failure. I only know this from hearsay, because after I flew home alone I never saw him again.

  I went to fashion school and now design upscale maternity clothes and am successful enough at it for my standards, admittedly not high, but I have my health and work I love, and that is a life blessed. And if you remember the late seventies or early eighties, you weren’t there, but I didn’t forget Rudy, and there he was last week at a gallery opening, Rudy whom I hadn’t seen in years.

  Rudy who? Everyone asked later as I tried to explain his career—he sells real estate now, or software or something—I’m afraid I’ve already forgotten. Fires Halfway was never more than a minor hit, but it’s the one that got people to know who I meant. It’s still in rotation. Its reputation has grown, if anything.

  Isn’t that enough to get him a new contract, you ask?

  Well, no. Because he didn’t actually write it.

  Sometimes, I have to admit, I’m still pulled in by the past, by the hopeful love I felt for him that I wonder at now. Neither Rudy nor Lou died, neither there in 1982 in Berlin nor in the twenty years since, although not for lack of trying. And neither did I, or I wouldn’t be telling you my story. But enough people have paid the final pri
ce, including Serge, one of Rudy’s favourite drummers, who OD’d on heroin in a Paris hotel room. You’d think we’d all have seen enough by now, but it seems each new generation falls for the same dangerous lies, for the girl at the opening on Rudy’s arm couldn’t have been more than twenty-five, and her pupils were big as saucers.

  “What’s with her?” I remember whispering.

  “Orange,” he whispered back. “It’s so good. Want some? Remember Fan?”

  Maybe he should have died.

  sss

  “Halfway there,” I muttered gloomily, watching his nightly candle. By the third night I felt seasoned, knew what to expect, almost tired of the inevitability.

  The dead pull of Berlin. Out of time, out of space. I could stay here forever, I thought.

  I could stay here forever

  Counting down

  And never get to zero

  I could stay here forever

  With you

  Rudy and I wrote a song that week. It ended up making him enough to pay cash for his Toronto house. We were already split up when he next recorded and it didn’t occur to me to ask for a credit and he didn’t offer me one. It was Hans who tracked me down and told me I should threaten to sue. Which I did, and Rudy sent me a large cheque worth, indeed, half the royalties. I didn’t care about my name. He told me to buy rubber spike heels, thinking he was being cute, but at the time I was back in school and put it towards my loan.

  sss

  We indulged heavily in room service. We didn’t go out, unless he had a gig. His playing was less than memorable, but he looked beautiful. Giggling, we’d take a cab back to the hotel afterwards, refusing all invitations.

  “We’ll hate each other before it’s over,” I said, thinking I already did, a little. But I couldn’t stop any more than him. Once the candles were over, we experimented with sex on the new Purple and discovered it was not just possible but fantastic, inexhaustibly compelling and inexhaustible every other way, until, at dawn, we’d both want to stop but seemingly couldn’t. Sleep, when it came, was always a welcome respite. I felt like we had hormones in an IV drip. It was almost embarrassing.