DESCENT

by Sandy DeLuca

  A beautiful black woman, dressed in a red spandex jump-suit materialized from somewhere behind us and tapped Paul on the shoulder. I was glad not to be the only woman in the place.

  “They said you’d come when you got out,” she said.

  “And here I am,” he said running his fingers through the woman’s silky hair. “Meet my sister, Julia. Julia, this is Kim.”

  Kim took my hand and kissed me gently on the cheek. ”So this is the lovely Julia I’ve heard so much about. We’ve gotta dance later, honey.”

  Two more girls sauntered in. Paul told me their names. The dark-haired beauty was named Andra Perri and the petite blonde named Lucy Felici. They looked tough. You could tell that they were full of hell just by the way they carried thems-elves—the way they talked.

  “Ladies, give Paul a kiss.”

  Andra pressed her lips to his—kissed him right in front of everybody. Lucy gave him a peck on the cheek.

  “Too bad your tastes have changed, baby,” said Andra.

  Paul laughed. “Meet my kid sister, Julia.” He put his arm around me. “Sis, this is Andra and Lucy. The two hellions of Elmwood Avenue.” His eyes darkened.

  “Watch over her if anything happens to me.”

  Andra smiled a serious smile. “We will, sweet baby. We will.”

  Paul smiled and everything was okay.

  We sat down at the bar. Paul noticed a hickey on Andra’s neck. “You got somebody new Andy, girl, or just a remnant from one of your wild nights at the pool hall?”

  “Lucy and I were hanging out at the park a couple of week-ends ago. There was something going on over at the Temple of Music, some black guy preaching about the magic of the soul. So we stopped to listen.”

  Lucy was doing shots at the end of the bar with a couple of drag queens. She looked comfortable. I gathered that both she and Andra went to Xavier’s a lot just to hang out. God knows it was slim pickings as far as finding guys.

  “So what’d you do, jump his bones right there and then?”

  Andra laughed. “Nope. We waited until he was done talking. We figured he had some good dope—guys like that usually do. So we introduced ourselves and before you know it we’re cruising through the city in his convertible.” She gave a wicked smile. “I never did it with a black guy before. Lucy had another date lined up so we dropped her off. I got it on with him, right? Then he started telling me things—freaky things. Afew days later he brought me and Lucy to this gym over in South Providence. He introduced us to the owner. He took one look at us and said we were just the kind of chicks he was looking for—”

  “Bad shit goes on there sometimes—”

  “Nah, it’s all good. Ask Sammy the bouncer. All good people hang there.”

  I knew a lot of the downtown clubs hired those big, good-looking, Spanish guys from DePesto’s gym, but I didn’t know the half of it at that point. That is how I first met Sammy, though, not long after. Sammy DeSouza.

  My Aunt Lil told stories about DePesto’s gym. She said bad magic happened there.

  A dark feeling filled me and then the mood changed when Andra toasted Paul’s home coming.

  “May your life be filled with good dope and good sex.”

  We all laughed.

  I have to admit I had a great time that night. We danced, drank and chatted with artists, poets and even lawyers—all men—and some women—who didn’t hide the fact that they were gay. At first it seemed as though nothing was a secret at Xavier’s, but there was something furtive, unsettling lurking within the laughter, within the freedom-loving atmosphere.

  “Plague and misfortune sometimes waits beneath the veils of a beautiful goddess,” my brother said, tapping his fingers on the bar.

  “What?” An odd feeling came over me, sunless and sad.

  Kim chuckled. “He’s just tripping, little Sis. Don’t mind him.”

  * * *

  Her veil covers the right half of her face. Her left hand is beneath the folds of her dress. She is solemn, her eyes vacant. She possesses death’s pallor, yet around her a city is ablaze with lights—yellow, red and brilliant orange. Specks of glitter shine on the sidewalk. Crowds of people walk beside her, yet she is alien, seemingly lost in an alternate dimension of deep blues and cloudy grays.

  I set my paintbrush down. The final painting is complete.

  I pack paint tubes and bottles in my wooden chest, dip the brushes in mineral oil and breathe the smell of the oils.

  The woman in the painting seems to shift. Her eyes move slowly back and forth.

  I shake it off. Another illusion. Tricks of a mind desecrated by too much coke. I decide to try to rest the remainder of the afternoon.

  I pick up newspapers I laid beneath my easel. A sheet remains on the floor. There’s an article about the girl they found dead two weeks ago. I pick it up, read it carefully and hear the screams deep inside me when I come to the part about the nametag she was wearing. Marla.

  The police are baffled. The investigators have discovered that the tag is old—perhaps twenty years or more, but have yet to make any sense of it.

  I try to remember what Sammy did with Marla’s nametag after he killed her. Did he remove it? It doesn’t matter. It can’t be him. He’s got to be dead. If he isn’t then he’s rotting away in a cell, or in an institution where the criminally insane reside. Only memories of him can haunt me. Flashbacks, like my brother Paul had when he came back from Nam.

  I toss newspapers in a bucket, except for the lone sheet on the floor. I pick it up and fold it carefully then collapse on my bed. I hear sounds outside, prop myself up on my elbows and peer out the window above my bed. There are people in the street. Yellow police tape surrounds a neighbor’s house.

  The voices are loud. “Her name was Kim,” says an elderly neighbor. “She was dressed in the prettiest outfit.”

  “Julia.”

  I open my eyes. My mother is standing in the doorway. I realize I’d dozed off. It must have been a dream. “Ma,” I say, “you’re awake.”

  She nods, looks at my finished painting.

  “That woman looks evil—decadent.” She turns to leave, then stops. “There’s coffee in the pot downstairs. I laid out the morning paper for you. It’s opened to the classifieds. There’s a few banking jobs. You should check them out, get back into the real world.”

  I close my eyes again and feel my body drift away.

  I stand naked in my shower. Soap bubbles fall into swirling tub water. Sammy opens the door. He doesn’t say a word, doesn’t touch me, just strips off his clothes and joins me beneath scalding water. I know that any moment he’ll begin doing things to me. Horrible things.

  He bends down, reaches into the soap bubbles. His hands return clutching a bloody knife.

  My work is never done.

  I awake with a start. My mother is standing over me. She’s angry. “Fucking loser, get yourself together and try to behave like a normal person.”

  Her hand is bleeding.

  “What did you do—?”

  “Cut myself slicing bread. It’s your fault. I was doing it for you.”

  I swear I can hear Sammy laughing.

  CHAPTER 6

  I bandage my mother’s hand and then sit down at the kitchen table with her. She talks endlessly about the neighbors.

  “The lady next door hasn’t changed her curtains in twenty years. And that pig across the street had a new guy over last night. Oh, and did you notice that Mr. Arsenault hasn’t come home in a week?”

  “He’s in the reserves, Ma. He’s away for two weeks. Remember Monica Arsenault told you about it last week?”

  Ma bites her lip, tears fill her eyes. “They don’t have the draft anymore. If it wasn’t for the fucking draft your brother might still be here. That war did things to his head. It—”

  I rise from the table, leave her mumbling about Paul.

  * * *

  I hung out with Paul a lot for the next few months.

  Xaviers’s became the place
we’d go on weeknights. Andra, Lucy and Kim would all be there. I loved going and listening to everyone’s stories. Especially Andra’s stories about a guy named Jimmy Chingo.

  “Well, babies, between the meetings at the gym and the private sessions I’ve been having fun with Jimmy I’m getting to be a regular magic woman.”

  Paul shook his head. He nudged me. “Did you introduce her to our aunt?”

  Something Lil had said flickered through my mind, a vague warning over dinner. “There are demons and angels. Then there are the fallen angels, the ones who have penance to pay. You have one watching over you. I know this. He’ll rescue you from the demons if you don’t look back. I know one day that he’ll tell you that. I’ve dreamed it. Hope the demons don’t win in the end.” A chill ran down my spine and then quickly dissipated as laughter and music permeated the air.

  Andra giggled. “I even learned to read the Tarot.”

  Lucy looked on, smiling and sucking on a joint. She was the quiet one, but just as crazy as Andra. She passed the joint to my brother.

  “Tell the story about Jimmy, girl.”

  “We were doing it up in my room. My drunken aunt was asleep downstairs. She’s always fucking asleep; either that or drinking.” She grabbed a handful of peanuts from a dish on the bar. Chewed them and then took a swig of beer. “Anyway, he asks me if I want to do the ultimate magic. Of course I did. Ultimate is the freaking end of all my experiences.”

  We all laughed. Paul rolled his eyes.

  “So he takes me down to Olneyville. I mean, talk about derelict city. There’s this old bum sleeping in a doorway—you know, down at the old Atlantic Mills? Anyway, we offer to buy him some food.”

  “I cannot believe Jimmy allowed that old dirt bag in his car,” said Lucy.

  “We cleaned it later.” Andra motioned to the bartender for another drink. “We took him to The Rib House. Fucking douche ate like a pig. It cost us ten bucks just to feed his face.”

  “Your good deed, my dear,” said Paul.

  “Yeah, I guess. Damn it’s hot in here. Anyway, we take him back to my house. Walk right past my aunt and up the stairs to my room.”

  Lucy looked to the door, “Andra—Jimmy just walked in.”

  Sure enough, bigger than life, a tall man with ebony skin was coming our way. He wore jeans and a tie-dyed shirt. He smiled at Andra. His teeth were white and straight.

  “What’s happening, my lady?” He took her hand and kissed it, and then he looked across the bar at Lucy and gave her the peace sign. She just nodded.

  “Jimmy, love, I was just talking about you.”

  “Everybody’s talking about Jimmy Chingo. Same as they’ve talked about my family for years.”

  The mood was changing. Like right before the monster pops out of the closet in a horror flick—or when you discover the serial killer really isn’t dead and he’s been sitting in the back seat of your car the whole time.

  Sammy DeSouza was the bouncer that night. He’d made his way into the club. He skirted the edge of the bar until he was standing behind Andra. They exchanged a few words, but I couldn’t hear what was said above the music and the excitement of the crowd.

  Sammy smiled at me. His eyes were amazing, dark and brilliant. His longish hair was a rich, deep brown that shined beneath the club lights. He was confident, had an air of strength and conveyed a feeling of mystery that filled me as his eyes held mine. There was also something else, something dangerous and exciting, but I didn’t understand the power of his danger at that time.

  Sammy turned his gaze to Andra. His expression changed to one of anger and for a moment fear spread across Andra’s face.

  Three leather-clad, muscle-bound guys made their way into Xavier’s. They didn’t fit in with rest of the crowd and didn’t look like they were there to meet other guys.

  Sammy put his hands on Andra’s shoulders and whispered something in her ear. He looked at Jimmy and nodded.

  Sammy moved close to Jimmy’s side. His words were loud enough for all of us to hear. “Be careful, man. Word is out. Victor and the crew are on to you. They just came in.” He walked away.

  Jimmy yelled out, “Bullshit! I’m cool with them. Just smoked with them over at the gym. I gotta take a leak.” He nudged Andra. “Get me a Bud. Be back in a sec.”

  “Sure, Jimmy, sure.”

  “Back to the story. So what’d you do with the old scummy guy?” Paul asked. “Did you fuck him?”

  Andra watched Sammy circle the bar, come up behind Jimmy. Victor and the crew separated and disappeared into the crowd. Sammy and Jimmy were swallowed up by a bunch of drag queens. Minutes later, when it cleared, Sammy was still standing there. He looked at Andra before he made his way back outside.

  I won’t forget that look—ever.

  Andra chewed on her nails, stubbed out a cigarette, then quickly lit another. “No, Paul, it was all a joke. Nothing happened. We just fed the guy and then dropped him off again.”

  Ten minutes or more passed. Somebody yelled. There was a commotion outside the restroom.

  Next thing we knew somebody screamed. I heard a guy shout, “Found the black guy in the men’s room with his throat cut.”

  Andra screamed. She ran to Lucy’s side. I thought I heard her say, “Can’t believe he meant it—can’t believe he’d do it.”

  The cops came. They cleared out the place.

  We stood outside. Paul held Andra as she cried. Lucy rubbed her back and kept saying she was sorry.

  “Fuck around with the big guys and that’s the kind of shit that goes down. Too many beat bags and too much talk,” said Sammy standing there with his arms crossed over his chest. He shook his head. “Too bad. His family and mine go way back.” He looked over at me for some reason, and winked. “Such an innocent one,” he said, almost as if he weren’t talking directly to me. “Why does your brother bring you to this hell side of town?”

  “I—”

  Paul put his hands on my shoulders and gently shoved me away. “Come on, Julia, don’t talk to that pig.”

  Later, Paul told me that Jimmy Chingo sold beat bags, bags of fake dope, to the wrong people. They got pissed and bumped him off.

  Years later I realized the truth.

  A lot went over my head back then, like the look in Sammy’s eyes before Jimmy’s throat was slashed, and the way Andra clammed up after Sammy spoke to her. I was just a kid, really, still a virgin. In more ways than one.

  * * *

  I pick up the phone. I hear laughter. I’m stalling, but know the meeting is inevitable. “I’ll come to you, but not yet. I’m not ready.”

  I watch my mother from the window. She’s retrieving the newspaper from the front lawn. She walks quickly, looses her balance and falls. Raises her arms, doesn’t get up. Snow covers her hair. The wind opens her robe, revealing a stained flannel nightgown.

  “I have to go. Something has happened. Call me tonight.”

  My mother is light, only about ninety pounds. I lift her over the threshold, ease her into her rocker and try to determine as best I can if she’s suffered any serious injuries in the fall. “Maybe I should call 9-1-1.”

  “Let me sit for a while,” she says. Her face is white and her mouth twists into a grimace of pain. “Prop my leg up on some pillows. I’ll be all right after some aspirin takes effect.”

  “Ma, maybe you broke something. I should call—”

  “I said I’ll be fine.” She shifts her weight. “My God, nothing ever hurt so badly.”

  “At least let me take you to the emergency room, let a doctor make sure you’re OK.”

  “Maybe.”

  As I lift her from the chair she screams in agony.

  I manage to get her to the door and eventually into the car. She cries as I maneuver her right leg inside.

  “Ma, we should have called—”

  “No, the neighbors would have seen.”

  “You think they didn’t see you fall? Or all the time it took to get you inside the car?” />
  “Let’s go.”

  Moments after we arrive at the emergency room, the doctor who examines her tells me my mother has broken her hip. He wants to operate immediately. “It’s a clean break,” he tells me. “The bones didn’t shatter. She’s lucky. It could have been worse.”

  Throughout the conversation he continually asks me if I’m all right, and offers to have one of the other physicians on duty look me over as well. I tell him I’m just tired and stressed over what’s happened, but I wonder if he knows about my coke habit. Can he tell just by looking at me? When he realizes I have no intention of being examined, he tells me to go home and to try to get some rest. He promises he’ll call when the operation is over then slips behind the curtain where my mother lies in bed.

  “It was her fault,” I hear her tell the doctor as I walk away. “The girl is good for nothing.”

  On the way home I stop at a fast food drive-through and order a grilled chicken sandwich and coffee.

  The snow has intensified. I drive slowly.

  Once at home, the cats greet me as I open the door.

  I remove a deck of old Tarot cards from my bag, shuffle them slowly as I think of what happened to my mother today. I spread the cards on the table, sigh as I pluck one from the deck. I choose Justice.

  The scales will soon be balanced and justice can be a bitch; cold, uncaring, but it’s the right thing, sometimes the only thing you can do.

  Was my mother’s fall just?

  My stomach turns as I unwrap the sandwich. I shred the chicken and feed it to the cats.

  I pour dry food into their dishes and then turn on the TV and try to relax.

  But the phone rings.

  It can’t be the doctor. It’s too soon.

  I watch the phone a moment before I pick it up. When I finally do, the voice on the other end soothes and terrifies me all at once.

  The scales of Justice will soon be balanced.

  I begin to cry.

  CHAPTER 7