by John Irving
"Sami Salo doesn't want to meet you," the waitress told her. "You're putting him out of business, and he's not happy about it. That's what I hear."
"I'm impressed by all you manage to hear," Alice said.
The waitress turned her gruff attention to Jack. "You look tired," she told him. "Are you getting enough sleep? Is all the tattooing keeping you awake?"
Jack's mom stood up from the table and held out her hand to her son. The restaurant was noisy and crowded; Finns can be loud when they eat and drink. The boy didn't quite catch what his mother told the waitress. He could only guess it was something along the lines of "Thank you for your concern"; or more likely, "If you want to stop by the Torni some evening, I'll be happy to tattoo you where it really hurts." Alice might also have given the waitress a message for Sami Salo; that the waitress and Sami were friends was pretty obvious, even to Jack.
They didn't go to Salve again. They ate at the Torni and called the American Bar their home.
But what about the church? Jack would wonder, as he was falling asleep. Why weren't they asking someone about the particular organ his father might be playing in Helsinki? Where were the destroyed young women who'd had the bad luck to meet William here? And what about Sibelius?
Jack wondered if his mom was growing tired of looking for his dad--or, worse, if she was suddenly afraid of finding him. Maybe it had occurred to her how awful it would be to finally confront William, only to have him walk away with a shrug. Surely William must have known they were looking for him. Church music and tattooing were both small worlds. What if William decided to confront them? What would they have to say for themselves? Did they actually want him to stop running and live with them? Live with them where?
Helsinki is a hard place to be afflicted with self-doubts. Alice appeared to be unsure of herself. She would not get up at night to go to the bathroom without waking Jack and forcing him to walk down the hall with her; she wouldn't let him leave the hotel room by himself, either. (Some nights Jack peed in the sink.) And those evenings when she roamed the American Bar, soliciting clients, Jack often watched her from the crow's-nest perspective of the iron-grate elevator, which was frozen in seemingly permanent disrepair on the floor above the bar.
Whenever a prospective client decided to get a tattoo, Alice would look up at the out-of-service elevator and nod her head to Jack, who was suspended in it like a boy in a birdcage.
Jack would watch Alice lead the client to the stairs. Then he exited the elevator and ran up the stairs to the fourth floor ahead of them. He was usually waiting by the door to their room when his mother brought the tattoo customer down the hall.
"Why--fancy seeing you, Jack!" his mom would always say. "Is it a tattoo you've come for?"
"No, thank you," Jack would always reply. "I'm too young to be tattooed. I'm just an observer."
It may have been a silly ritual, but it was their routine and they stuck to it. The client recognized that they were a team.
By their third week in Helsinki, Jack had forgotten all about Sibelius. Two young women (brave-looking girls) approached Alice in the American Bar. They asked her about a tattoo--one they wanted to share. In the elevator, one floor above them, Jack couldn't really hear what they were saying.
"You can't share a tattoo," he thought his mother said.
"Sure we can," the tall one replied.
Maybe the short one said, "We shared you-know-what together. Sharing a tattoo can't be that bad."
From the broken elevator, Jack saw his mom shake her head--not her usual signal. He'd seen her say no to young men who were too drunk to be tattooed, or to two or more men; she wouldn't take more than one man at a time to their room. These two women, Tall and Short, were different; they made Alice seem awkward. Jack thought that his mother might already know them.
Alice abruptly turned and walked away. But the brave girls followed her; they kept talking to her, too. Jack got out of the elevator when he saw his mom start up the stairs. Tall and Short came up the stairs behind her.
"We're not too young, are we?" the tall one was asking.
Alice shook her head again; she just kept walking up the stairs with the two young women following her.
"You must be Jack," the short one said, looking up the stairs at the boy. It seemed to Jack that she even knew where to look for him. "We're both music students," the short one told him. "I'm studying church music, both choral and the organ."
Alice stopped on the staircase as if she were out of breath. The two girls caught up to her on the half-landing between the first and second floors. Jack stood waiting for his mom on the second-floor landing, looking down at the three of them.
"Hello, Jack," the tall girl said to the boy. "I play the cello."
She wasn't as tall as Ingrid Moe--nor as breathtakingly beautiful--but she had the same long hands. Her curly blond hair was cut as short as a boy's, and over a cotton turtleneck she wore a grungy ski sweater with a small herd of faded reindeer on it.
The other girl, the short one, was plump with a pretty face and long, dark hair that fell to her breasts. She wore a short black skirt with black tights, knee-high black boots, and a black V-neck sweater that was too big for her. The sweater was very soft-looking and had no reindeer on it.
"Music students," Alice repeated.
"At Sibelius Academy, Jack," the tall young woman said. "Did you ever hear of it?" The boy didn't answer her; he kept looking at his mother.
"Sibelius . . ." Alice said--in a way that implied the name hurt her throat.
The short, plump girl with the pretty face looked up the stairs and smiled at Jack. "You're definitely Jack," she said.
The tall one came up the stairs two at a time. She knelt at Jack's feet and framed his face in her long hands, which were slightly sticky. "Look at you, Jack," she said; her breath smelled like chewing gum, a fruit flavor. "You're a dead ringer for your dad."
Jack's mother came up the stairs with the short girl beside her. "Take your hands off him," Alice told the tall girl, who stood up and backed away from the boy.
"Sorry, Jack," the tall girl said.
"What do you want?" Alice asked the music students.
"We told you--a tattoo," the short girl answered.
"We also wanted to see what Jack looked like," the tall young woman confessed.
"I hope you don't mind, Jack," the short one said.
But Jack was four. How is it possible that he remembered, with any accuracy, what Tall and Short truly said? Isn't it more likely that, for days--for weeks, even months--after he met these girls, he would ask his mother the meaning of that conversation on the stairs in the Hotel Torni, and his mom would tell him what she wanted him to hear? It might not be Tall's and Short's actual words that he "remembered," but Alice's unalterable interpretation of William abandoning them.
There would be times when Jack Burns felt he was still on those stairs--not only because the elevator was more than temporarily out of service, but also because Jack would spend years trying to discern the difference between his mother's version of his father and who his father really was.
Jack did remember this: when his mom started up the stairs again, he had not let go of her hand. The music students kept pace with them, all the way to their floor. Jack could tell that his mother was agitated because she stopped at the door to their room and fumbled around in her purse for the key. She'd forgotten that Jack had it--that was part of their routine.
"Here," he said, handing the key to her.
"You could have lost it," she told him. Jack didn't know what to say; he'd not seen her so distracted.
"Look, we just wanted to meet Jack," the tall young woman went on.
"The idea for the tattoo came later," the short one said.
Alice let them into the room. Again it seemed to Jack that his mom already knew them. Inside the room, Alice turned on all the lights. The tall girl knelt at Jack's feet once more. She might have wanted to take his face in her hands again, but she rest
rained herself--she just looked at him.
"When you get older, Jack," she said, "you're going to know a lot of girls."
"Why?" the boy asked.
"Be careful what you tell him," Alice said.
The short girl with the pretty face and long hair knelt at Jack's feet, too.
"We're sorry," the two girls said, in chorus. Jack couldn't tell if they were speaking to him or to his mom.
Alice sat down on the bed and sighed. "Tell me about this tattoo you want to share," she said, staring at a neutral zone between the two young women--purposely not looking at either one of them. Alice must have sensed an aura of wantonness about these brave girls, and she knew Jack was affected by them.
The tattoo Tall and Short wanted to share was another variation of a broken heart--this one torn apart vertically. The left side would be tattooed on the heart-side breast of the tall young woman; the right side would go on the heart-side breast of the short one. Not a very original idea, but even Jack was learning that there was little originality in the instinct to be tattooed. Not only were broken hearts fairly common; the ways to depict them were limited, and the part of the body where a depiction of a broken heart belonged was self-evident.
In those days, a tattoo was still a souvenir--a keepsake to mark a journey, the love of your life, a heartbreak, a port of call. The body was like a photo album; the tattoos themselves didn't have to be good photographs. Indeed, they may not have been very artistic or aesthetically pleasing, but they weren't ugly--not intentionally. And the old tattoos were always sentimental; you didn't mark yourself for life if you weren't sentimental.
How could tattoos be original, when what they signified was something ordinary? Your feelings for your mother; the lover who left you; the first time you went to sea. But these were mostly maritime tattoos--clearly sailors were sentimental souls.
So were these music students, Tall and Short. They may have been vulgar, but Alice didn't seem to hate them--and they were old enough to be tattooed. Even to Jack, they were noticeably older than Ingrid Moe.
The tall one's name was Hannele; under her faded-reindeer sweater and the cotton turtleneck, she wasn't wearing a bra. Despite Jack's precocious interest in breasts, what struck him most about Hannele was that her armpits were unshaven. She was a broad-shouldered young woman with breasts not much bigger than Ingrid Moe's, and the astonishing hair in her armpits was a darker blond than the hair on her head. Over her navel, like a crumpled top hat the color of a wine stain, was a birthmark the shape of Florida.
When Alice began with the Jonesy roundback, Hannele pursed her lips and whistled. Jack had trouble following the tune over the sound of the tattoo machine. Hannele had placed herself on the window seat, with her legs spread wide apart. It was a most unladylike position, but Hannele was wearing blue jeans and she was, after all, a cellist; no doubt she sat that way when she played.
Years later, when a naked woman played the cello for Jack, he would remember Hannele and wonder if she'd ever performed naked for William. Jack would again feel ashamed that he might have such a moment in common with his dad. He would understand what must have attracted William to Hannele. She was a brave girl, without question; she went right on whistling, even when Alice's outline of her half-a-heart touched her rib cage.
While Alice was shading Hannele's broken heart with the Rodgers, Jack sat on the big bed with the short, plump girl. Her name was Ritva; she had bigger breasts than Hannele, and Jack was trying to stay awake until it was Ritva's turn to get her half-a-heart.
He must have looked sleepy because his mom said: "Why don't you brush your teeth, Jack, and get into your pajamas."
The boy got up and brushed his teeth in the sink, where he was repeatedly told not to drink the water. Alice kept a pitcher of drinking water on the washstand, and Jack was instructed to rinse his mouth out with the drinking water after he brushed his teeth.
He put on his pajamas while hiding behind the open door to the wardrobe closet, so that neither Ritva nor Hannele would see him naked. Then he got back on the bed beside Ritva, who pulled the bedcovers down. Jack lay still, with his head on the pillow, while Ritva tucked him in. There was only the sound of the tattoo machine and Hannele's faint but brave whistling.
"Sweet dreams, Jack," Ritva said; she kissed him good night. "Isn't that what you say in English?" she asked Alice. " 'Sweet dreams'?"
"Sometimes," Alice said. Jack noticed the truculence in her voice; it seemed unfamiliar to him.
Maybe "sweet dreams" was a phrase William used. It could have been something he'd said to Alice and Ritva and Hannele--because Hannele's brave whistling stopped for a second, as if the pain of the shading needles on her left breast and that side of her rib cage had suddenly become unbearable. Jack guessed it was the "sweet dreams" that had hurt her, not the tattoo.
The boy was fighting sleep; involuntarily, his eyes would close and he would reach out his hand and feel Ritva's soft sweater and the fingers of her warm hand closing around his smaller fingers.
Jack might have heard his mother say, "I don't suppose you know where he's gone."
"He didn't tell us," Hannele may have answered, between whistles.
"He's got you and Jack hounding him," Jack distinctly heard Ritva tell his mom. "I guess that's enough."
"He said 'hounding,' did he?" Alice asked.
"I said it," Ritva told her.
"We say it all the time," Hannele said.
"Wouldn't you agree that Jack is his responsibility?" Alice asked them.
They both agreed that Jack was his father's responsibility, but this was one of those Helsinki conversations that the boy at best half heard in his sleep. Jack woke once and saw Ritva's pretty face smiling down at him; from her expression, he knew she must have been imagining his dad in the unformed features of Jack's face. (Even today, Jack occasionally saw that pretty face in his dreams--or when he was falling asleep.)
He never did get to see Ritva's plump breasts--or learn if her armpits were unshaven, like Hannele's. When he woke again, Hannele's sleeping face was on the pillow beside him; she was wearing the cotton turtleneck but not the ski sweater. She must have fallen asleep while she was waiting for Alice to be finished with Ritva's half-a-heart tattoo. Jack could hear the tattoo machine, but his mother blocked the boy's view of Ritva's breasts and armpits. Over his mom's shoulder, Jack could see only Ritva's face; her eyes were tightly closed and she was grimacing in pain.
Hannele's sleeping face was very close to Jack's. Her lips were parted; her breath, which had lost the fruity scent of her chewing gum, was faintly bad. Her hair gave off a sweet-and-sour smell--like hot chocolate when it's stood around too long and turned bitter in the cup. Jack still wanted to kiss her. He inched his face nearer hers, holding his breath.
"Go to sleep, Jack," his mom said. Her back was to him; he had no idea how she knew he was awake.
Hannele's eyes opened wide; she stared at Jack. "You have eyelashes to die for," she said. "Isn't that what you say in English?" Hannele asked Alice. " 'To die for'?"
"Sometimes," Alice said.
Ritva choked back a sob.
Under the covers, Hannele's long fingers lifted Jack's pajama top and tickled his stomach. (Even today, he sometimes felt those fingers in his dreams--or when he was falling asleep.)
The knock on the hotel-room door was abrupt and loud; it woke Jack from a dream. The room was dark. His mother, snoring beside him, hadn't stirred. The boy recognized her snore. He knew it was her hand, not Hannele's, on his hip.
"Someone's at the door, Mom," Jack whispered, but she didn't hear him.
The knock came again, louder than before.
Occasionally the clientele at the American Bar got restless, waiting for Alice to return to the bar. Some drunk who wanted a tattoo would come to the room and pound on the door. Alice always sent the drunks away.
Jack sat up in bed and said in a shrill voice: "Too late for a tattoo!"
"I don't want a tattoo!" a man's ang
ry voice shouted from the hall.
Jack had not seen his mother so startled since the night of the littlest soldier. She sat bolt-upright in bed and clutched Jack to her. "What do you want?" she cried.
"You want to know about The Music Man, don't you?" the man's voice answered. "Well, I tattooed him. I know all about him."
"Sami Salo?" Alice asked.
"Let's make a deal," Salo said. "First you open the door."
"Just a minute, Mr. Salo."
Alice got out of bed and covered her nightgown with a robe. She took out her flash, her best work, and spread it over the bed. Jack, in his pajamas, lay adrift in the maritime world--a child on a bed of hearts and flowers, ships in full sail, and half-naked girls in grass skirts. The four-year-old lay amid snakes and anchors, among Sailor's Graves and Roses of Jericho, and his mom's version of Man's Ruin. There was her Key to My Heart and her Naked Lady (from the back side) with Butterfly Wings--the latter emerging from a tulip.
The boy lay among her flash as if he'd just awakened from a tattoo dream. When Alice opened the door to Sami Salo, she stepped aside and let him walk past her into her world. He was a scratcher, as Alice had guessed; she knew he could never avert his eyes from her superior work.
"The deal is . . ." Salo started to say; then he stopped. He scarcely glanced at Jack--the flash had seized his attention completely.
Sami Salo was a haggard-looking older man with a gaunt, soul-searching expression; he wore a navy-blue watch cap pulled down over his ears and a peacoat of the same color. He was sweating from wearing his winter clothes on his walk up four flights of stairs, and his breathing was ragged. He didn't speak; he simply stared at Alice's best work.
Salo's favorite might have been a toss-up between Alice's Rose of Jericho and her Key to My Heart--the key held horizontally against the naked lady's breasts, the keyhole you-know-where. (The tattoo was unique among Alice's naked ladies in that the lady was not seen from the back side.)
To judge him by his defeated expression, Sami Salo was his own version of Man's Ruin. "The deal is . . ." Alice prompted him.
Salo removed his watch cap as if he were about to bow his head in prayer. He unbuttoned his peacoat, too, but he just stood there. He wore a dirty-white sweater under the peacoat; the faded-gray fingers of a skeleton's hand reached above the crew neck of the sweater, as if holding Salo by the throat. It was as bad an idea as any tattoo Alice had ever seen--or so Jack concluded from his mother's expression. It was a blessing that the rest of the skeleton was covered by the sweater.
