The Two-Bear Mambo

by Joe R. Lansdale

  Leonard settled back in his seat and sighed slowly. “Shit,” he said. “Raul’s right. I always got to be the tough guy. I really like that fag. Really. Why have I always got to play it tough?”

  “You’re black and gay and inadequate sexually, and therefore find yourself doubly oppressed by white society, as well as being ill-suited emotionally for adjusting to the macho, black community that is your birthright.”

  “Oh yeah. That’s right. I forgot.”

  “You also smell like a smoked ham.”

  Charlie slid in behind the wheel and closed the door, sharply. “We’re leaving a couple of cops here to watch your house, Leonard. Make sure Raul’s okay too. Least till he gets packed up and out. He said he’s, and I quote, ‘gone like the fucking wind,’ unquote.”

  “All right,” Leonard said. “Thanks.”

  “Will he really go?” I asked.

  “Who’s to say?” Leonard said.

  Charlie cranked the car. Leonard said, “Could we stop for ice cream before we go in?”

  “It’s cold for ice cream,” Charlie said.

  “I like it anyway,” Leonard said. “So, what do you say? I’m kinda depressed.”

  “I don’t see why not,” Charlie said. “Frozen yogurt all right? I’m on a diet.”

  “Suits me,” Leonard said. “You’re paying though. I don’t have my wallet on me.”

  “I’m not paying shit,” Charlie said. “You brought it up, you treat. Damn, Leonard, you’re making my eyes burn.”

  “It’s that cheap paneling in the house,” Leonard said. “It goes up quick and stinks and the stink gets on you. Fucking walls are like they’re made out of starter logs, which I guess is okay, seeing how I’m lighting the fire.”

  “I didn’t hear you say that,” said Charlie.

  “I got money,” I said. “My treat all around.”

  Charlie eased away from the curb. I took a last look at the burning house. Some timbers were sagging and crashing in with an explosion of sparks and smoke. Raul was standing on Leonard’s porch watching us drive by. Leonard looked in Raul’s direction. Neither of them waved.

  I said, “Oh, Leonard, don’t let me forget. We ever get back, I got your Christmas present in the pickup.”

  “Yeah, well,” Leonard said, “I hope it ain’t HIS and HIS towels.”

  2

  We were in Lieutenant Hanson’s office finishing off what was left of our yogurt cones, but the Lieutenant wasn’t there. Considering we hadn’t bought him anything, I guess that was best.

  Charlie was sitting behind Hanson’s desk. I was in a chair against one wall, and Leonard was in a chair against the other. We were supposed to be in a cell like Mohawk and the little guy with the burned head and the others, but we weren’t. You might say we were getting special treatment. We were also getting a shadow show.

  Charlie had the overhead light out and he had the desk lamp on, and he was using his fingers to throw shadows on the wall, make shapes. He did a pretty good dog and duck, but after that everything else looked like a spider.

  “How about that?” Charlie said. “How’s that?”

  “It still looks like a spider,” I said.

  “I got to practice some more,” Charlie said. “I got me a book now. Wife says I ought to have a hobby, so I got this. It relaxes me, but the wife thinks it ain’t much. She wants me to go to the gym and work out, but this way, I can stay home and sit in the easy chair with the big light out, use the end-table light to throw a few shadows. I get tired of it, I watch a little TV. Look here, this one looks like a pussy, don’t it?”

  “How in hell do you get a cat out of that?” I said.

  “No, a pussy. You know, a vagina. Women have ’em.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said. “I faintly remember.”

  “Look here, it does, don’t it? It’s kind of a dark V, ain’t it?”

  “It looks like a spider with its legs pulled in,” Leonard said. “And don’t tell me that book of yours has a section on shadow vaginas.”

  Charlie stuck out his middle finger and wiggled it. “This one’s for you, Leonard.”

  A blue suit opened the door and light flooded in and the blue suit came in with it. He stopped and looked at Charlie and Charlie’s hand shadow.

  “What’s this look like to you?” Charlie asked him.

  “What?”

  “The shadow, Jake, the shadow.”

  “Oh. I don’t know. It looks like a shadow.”

  “Swell,” Charlie said.

  “Hey, listen,” Jake said. “Chief ain’t in—”

  “Surprise, surprise,” Charlie said.

  “And Lieutenant Hanson’s out.”

  “He’s on his way.”

  “Well, we got a guy in cell three, he wants we should call his wife, tell her to tape a National Geographic special on bears. We got to do it now, he gets to catch it. It starts in fifteen minutes.”

  “What?” Charlie asked.

  “He’s gonna miss it,” Jake said. “ ’Cause he’s gonna be here tonight. Drunk and disorderly.”

  “What the hell does he think we’re running here?” Charlie said, not looking at Jake, but wiggling his fingers in such a way that brought him back to his shadow shape standards. A dog, which he made a barking sound for, then a duck, which he quacked for.

  “I’ll tell him no,” Jake said.

  “I guess you will,” Charlie said. “I can’t believe you came to me with that shit. Wait a minute.” Charlie swiveled in the chair and looked at the cop. “A National Geographic special?”

  “On bears,” Jake said.

  “Hell, call her. I ought to be glad it’s not Charlie’s Angels, some shit like that. Maybe we’re getting a better class of criminal in here. Go on and do it.”

  “All right,” Jake said, and closed the door.

  “Can we go?” Leonard said.

  Charlie was back to trying to make a pussy. I think.

  “Go?” Charlie said. “You fuckin’ me? You burned your next-door neighbor’s house down. That’s three times, man. First time you and Hap did it, we worked it out. Second time you did it, we worked it out. But you’re gonna have to take up shadow shapes or something, Leonard. Quit this arson. We could put you behind bars so long, you got out, hair on your balls would be white.”

  “They’re scum, Charlie,” Leonard said, “and you know it.”

  “I went around burning houses belonged to scum, this town would mostly be a cinder.”

  “Bullshit,” Leonard said.

  In the middle of our examining another of Charlie’s shadow shapes, the door opened again. It was Lieutenant Marvin Hanson this time. He was framed by the hall light behind him, and it made him look like the Golem. His black skin was all shadow and no features. He watched Charlie a second, then closed the door and turned on the light. I suddenly realized I preferred looking at him in the dark. That rugged face of his could be scary.

  “Talent show’s over,” Hanson said. “And so’s sitting behind my desk.”

  “Yassuh,” Charlie said, and he eased out from behind the desk and took a chair and lit a cigarette.

  Hanson went over and sat down behind his desk, swiveled his chair and looked at Leonard.

  “Well, well,” Hanson said, “If it isn’t the Smartest Nigger in the World.”

  “Hi,” Leonard said.

  “That’s the N word again,” Charlie said to me.

  “Yes,” I said, “but it’s two black guys talking to one another, so we’ve got the same problem as before. Is it racist, politically incorrect, or all in fun?”

  “Ain’t nothing fun about it,” Hanson said. Then to Leonard: “You dumb motherfucker. I’m sick of your goddamn cavalier attitude.”

  “They killed a kid last year,” Leonard said.

  “He took the dope on his own,” Hanson said.

  “He was a kid,” Leonard said.

  “All right, all right, one house burning is okay,” Hanson said. “But twice? Then three times? You g
ot to respect my position here.”

  “Your goddamn Chief of Police has ties to the fucks who provide that house, and you know it,” Leonard said.

  “That’s a point for Leonard,” Charlie said. “He’s right. You know it, I know it, the guys in the slammer know it. They know too they’ll be out of here come morning. If it takes that long. They’ll be suing Leonard, most likely.”

  “Shut up, Charlie,” Hanson said.

  “Yassuh, Massuh Marvin.”

  “That’s kinda racist, isn’t it?” I said to Charlie. “A white guy doing slave talk?”

  “Think so?” Charlie said.

  “Will you two assholes shut up?” Hanson said.

  I could see “Yassuh” forming on Charlie’s lips, but he decided to just wiggle them instead. Wise choice, I thought.

  “What are these two fucks doing in here watching you and your fucking shadows?” Hanson said. “Why ain’t they in a cell?”

  “I figured they were kind of guests,” Charlie said. “I mean, hell, I like ’em.”

  “Yeah, well, I don’t,” Hanson said. “Especially the Smartest Nigger in the World here. He’s always doing what he wants. He doesn’t think the law applies to him. He’s some kind of crusader. Some kind of vigilante. Yes sir, he’s the Smartest Nigger in the World.”

  “I don’t know,” said Leonard. “I hear great stuff about you and Jesse Jackson.”

  Hanson moved suddenly, and considering his size, it was a fast move. He grabbed the lamp on his desk and jerked it hard enough the plug came out. He threw it at Leonard, who slipped casually sideways in his chair, as if avoiding a punch. The lamp went by and hit the wall and exploded. Leonard and Hanson both stood up.

  There was a beat of silence during which a lot of things could have happened, but didn’t. Finally, Leonard smiled. Then Hanson smiled. Hanson and Leonard slowly sat back down. Hanson said, “Shit, my ex-wife gave me that desk lamp.”

  “And what a special little prize it was,” I said.

  “What I do when I lose a family heirloom,” Charlie said, “is I go get drunk.”

  “That sounds about right,” Hanson said. “Boys, get your coats.”

  3

  Hanson said, “Can you believe that, two bears fuckin’, right there on the television set?”

  We were at Hanson’s house watching the National Geographic special. Hanson and Charlie were drinking lots of beer. Leonard was nursing one, and I was having a Sharp’s nonalcoholic beer. I’d given up drinking because I thought it was stupid and expensive and not very healthy.

  Beer, however, didn’t hurt Hanson’s and Charlie’s feelings.

  Charlie said, “Actually, Marve, my man. Them bears are neither on, nor in, the set. Those bears fucking is recorded on videotape or something. Then they play it back so we can see it. You see those trees? That grass? It’s spring there behind them. That means those bears could have done this fucking a year or two ago. Anytime really.”

  Hanson wasn’t paying attention. He took another drink from his can of Schlitz, said, “Can you believe that shit? I was a kid, they wouldn’t show two dogs one behind another for fear you might think one was gonna mount the other. And now, right there, in front of God and everybody, two bears doing the mambo.”

  “That’s kind of a sexy angle too,” Charlie said. “Only thing we’re missing here is a diagram showing us the inside of the girl bear’s ass, so we can see the boy bear’s dick swell into a knot. They do that, I think. Like a dog.”

  Not being specialists on bear’s dicks, none of us responded. We didn’t want to look like fools.

  The bears on the special finished up the mambo, as Hanson called it. Neither of them lit a cigarette, but they both looked fairly satiated. The camera cut to a guy in khakis. He was talking about bears as he walked. The guy came across a pile of bear shit in the woods and you’d have thought he’d found a fifty-dollar bill. He whisked that shit around with a stick and told us about the health of the bear that had left it. In fact, he told us everything about that bear but its blood type and hat size. I was impressed. I know how to track in the woods, know most of the species of trees and bushes, and can tell some basic things about critters from their stool, provided I have the urge to stir their shit around with a stick. But this guy was remarkable. It just looked like a pile of bear shit to me, but here he was seeing all kinds of stuff in it.

  I wondered if you went to college to learn about bear shit.

  The bear show was pretty good, but I got to admit, I burned out on it. I think decoding bear shit was about as far as my interest in bears went, and I felt uncomfortable at Hanson’s house. I kept fearing Florida would come in. It was bad enough there was plenty there to remind me of her.

  It wasn’t any specific thing, it was the way the house looked. I’d never been in Hanson’s house before. We mainly insulted each other at the police station and bad hamburger joints, but it was apparent there had been a feminine hand at work here. And not Hanson’s mother.

  Florida might still have her apartment, might not stay here all the time, but from the well-decorated Christmas tree to the way objects were laid out on the shelves, the house spoke as much of her as it did Hanson.

  And there were little clues. For instance, I seriously doubted the books in the shelf on aerobic dancing and how to make love to a man were Hanson’s, though you can’t be sure about something like that.

  I did observe, however, that all around Hanson’s chair it looked like the city dump, but a little less organized. It was littered with cigar butts, ashes, junk food wrappers, and beer cans. When we came in through the kitchen, I noticed, while kicking a plastic bag of spoiled celery out of my path, that it appeared as if the place had been blown about by a tornado. I know I don’t keep a greasy frying pan full of molding scrambled eggs upside down on the floor or leave my refrigerator door open when I’m out of the house. And most everyone agrees the floor is a bad spot for celery.

  I tried not to let old-fashioned ideas about women and kitchens get into my thinking, but they did. I knew Florida. She wasn’t a classic housewife type any more than she was a classic women’s lib type, but she wouldn’t have let the joint get like this. Even if it was confined to the kitchen and around Hanson’s chair.

  I couldn’t imagine Hanson, slob that he was, allowing the place to get this bad either, unless his head was somewhere sad and distant.

  And earlier, hadn’t Charlie made some crack about Hanson going around as if a weight was tied to his dick? Then there was that lamp-throwing business. That seemed a little intense even for Hanson.

  And inviting us over to his place to watch a National Geographic special? That was too nice. That wasn’t the Hanson I knew. And why hadn’t he mentioned Florida? Was she visiting relatives? Caroling?

  I began to suspect he and Florida had broken up, and a sense of warm well-being flowed over me before it was replaced by a warmer sense of shame, because secretly, I had been hoping me and her might get back together. This was a somewhat bitter and wistful sort of thought that came and went from time to time, and truthfully, I was glad to feel it go. Hanson was an all-right guy, and Florida and I had taken our shot and it hadn’t hit target. She had decided on Hanson, and I reckoned it was best all around. I knew it was over for me and her, and always would be. But I couldn’t help remembering her soft honey-brown skin and the way she moaned when I gave her pleasure, the way her legs moved, the smell of her. I couldn’t forget her smile and the razor sharpness of her thinking. And, of course, I couldn’t forget she was kind of an asshole.

  I asked about the bathroom, and Hanson pointed it out. I had to go through the bedroom to get there, and as I went, I looked at the bed. It was unmade and the covers were thrown back and it smelled of sweat and perfume. Chanel No. 5. Not Hanson’s brand. He was an Old Spice man. The rest of the room looked in good shape, except there was a pile of Hanson’s clothes on the floor at the right-hand side of the bed.

  The bathroom was clean and orderly except for too
thpaste and whisker hair in the sink. Hanson had made a kind of pig trail from the kitchen to his chair to the bed to the bathroom, leaving the rest of the joint neat and clean.

  When I got back from the bathroom, Leonard was still on the couch, but he had the book that told how to make love to a man. He was turning it at an odd angle.

  He said, “I didn’t know you could do that.”

  “Maybe you can’t,” Charlie said. “That’s man and woman stuff.”

  “Homosexuals are pretty smart,” Leonard said. “Sometimes we improvise.” He put the book in his lap. “Figures. Me and Raul are broke up, and here’s something nifty we could have tried.”

  “Leonard,” I said, finding my Sharp’s and my place on the couch. “You got to quit watching bears fuck. It gets you worked up.”

  Hanson cranked back his easy chair, laid his catcher’s mitt hands on his chest and looked at the ceiling light. We looked with him. Nothing really important seemed to be going on up there.

  “Guess I need to figure what to do with you boys,” Hanson said.

  “How about paper hats and whistles and we all go home?” I said.

  “I don’t think so,” Hanson said.

  “Well, how bad could it be?” Charlie said. “You got them over at your house drinking beer and watching TV.”

  “What I’m gonna do,” Hanson said, “is make you boys a little deal. You two go over to Grovetown and do me a little favor, and I’ll find a way not to press charges. You don’t, I’ll find a special way to press charges.”

  “Hey,” Leonard said, “that’s blackmail. And what the hell would you want us to do in Grovetown anyway? Look for antiques?”

  “No,” Hanson said, “I want you to check on Florida.”

  “I was wondering about her,” I said.

  “Figured you were,” Hanson said. “Deal is, she went over there to do a little lawyering, kind of. You fellas hear about that Bobby Joe Soothe problem?”