by John Shannon
“My people were so white they were Dutch!” Boaz crowed. “I been an American for ten years. What a great country we all got. We just got to keep it that way.”
Zook relaxed and sucked down a lot of beer as soon as he realized he wouldn’t get stomped. Hardi Boaz and Shank spun off on a discussion of what it meant to keep America great, and Zook listened closely as Boaz talked about building an armed “troopie” that hired itself out to ranchers along the California border to guard their property, chase off drug mules and wetbacks trying to come over. Boaz loudly invited Shank and all his friends to Zook’s keg the next day to hear him talk about keeping America pure.
Uh-oh, Zook thought. These guys were a lot heavier than he’d bargained on. The teardrops were a prison tat for the number of enemies killed.
Much later, as people were starting to reel out of Rock House No. 2, the ponytail sitting beside Teardrops gave a huge grin for the first time, revealing gold stars set into his front teeth. “I’ll come to your kegger, boys, and let’s us shiver Old Glory right up your flagpole.”
SEVEN
Saturday Night Challenge
After a bit of sleuthing about Miss Blue-hair at L.A. State, Jack Liffey found his way to an old craftsman bungalow not far from downtown Monterey Park. He waited discreetly down the block in his pickup. He’d usually been able to pal up to teens without putting them off. One thing in his favor was that old guys generally didn’t count at all. And he never tried to hold his own with them or top their comments. His ego had become expendable long ago.
“You know a girl with a blue butch cut?” he’d asked.
“Gotta be Rosa.”
He remembered the name Ellen, but he went with it anyway and waited now at the address he’d finally located. He didn’t really think there were whole glee clubs with bright blue hair.
Eventually a little Yaris showed up, the exact equivalent of his own daughter’s old Echo. But where did Toyota get these names? It was Blue Hair clambering out—definitely the girl from the church. He intercepted her on her way to the door.
“Ellen. Remember me from the church? I’m working for Sabine’s family.” She had a skirt on over the leotard now.
“The name is Rosa,” she said belligerently. “For Rosa Luxemburg, the greatest hero of all time.”
Amazing, he thought, a teen who’d read a book. “I agree, but if you’re a political organizer, isn’t your hair a bit too conspicuous?”
“Not where I work.”
Disaffected kids at college, okay. “Fair enough. I started Long Beach State with a greasy flattop, long sides, and a D.A. You know what that was?”
“Sure. A duck’s ass. ‘Ducktail’ is what L7s say.”
He had no idea what an L7 was, but didn’t think it was the time to update his dope sheet on teen talk. “Could we meet somewhere to talk, Rosa? Sabine’s parents are terribly worried. I’ll treat and I’ll go away the instant you tell me to.”
She glanced around, as if FBI agents might be behind the trees. “Down on Garvey to the left, you’ll see the French Victory Restaurant. It’s not very French or victorious but it’ll be quiet. Be there in half an hour. I’ll make my own way, thank you, and I’ll buy my own Coke. I’ll check the street first for white vans with antennas on the roof.”
“Just me, Rosa,” Jack Liffey said.
*
Jack Liffey parked at a city park between Ellen/Rosa’s house and the cafe she’d specified. A half hour—why the delay? So she could say hello to her parents first? So she could summon her pals to beat him up?
It was early afternoon in the late autumn and the clear-sky sunlight was promising its usual lazy magic. Elderly Chinese men squatted near a nondescript building at the edge of the park, playing something on a checkerboard lying on the grass, the game pieces all white. There was a perfectly serviceable picnic table nearby, but they obviously preferred heel-squatting. Not far away, Chinese teens were playing a pretty good game of two-on-two basketball.
Here was Professor Hollister’s laboratory of immigration, he thought. He tried to imagine being stuck with a group of Americans displaced to some far corner of China. He decided he’d probably feel hopeless about learning enough to fit in. How could anyone expect grown people to give up a lifetime of their culture?
A young Chinese couple in jeans strolled into the park with a lively boy hand in hand between them. The boy was maybe eight, and they all skipped happily to a swing set in a sandbox. Immediately they took up their gender roles—the woman and child sitting in swings to be pushed alternately by the man. Nothing about their manner suggested Asia to Jack Liffey.
The grizzled game board players laughed abruptly, and an old man covered his eyes and ran off. Sore loser. Another old man took his place.
The gangly little boy shouted something as he ran out onto the grass. He glanced back and pointed at his mom. She jumped off her swing and ran after him with the kind of tiny mincing steps Asian women often favored, twisting and turning to pretend to elude her son’s lunges. The boy finally poked his mother’s thigh, and the woman reverted instantly to a full-stretch Western run as she chased after her husband.
Okay, Jack Liffey said to himself. The cultural gap can be very complicated.
*
Rosa twiddled the straw in her diet Sprite and ate an occasional sweet potato fry from a paper tub. A low wall separated them from the sidewalk—presumably to keep patrons from absconding with the salt shakers. The counter menu inside had offered various combinations of grease and carbohydrates, plus something called the French Victory Special. He felt like asking the clueless-looking Chinese teen, when did the French ever have one?
Two tables away, a tiny older man with a business suit and a bad scar down his cheek sat opposite an astonishingly beautiful Chinese girl with long, dyed blond hair. She wore a chest sash like a beauty queen over a ball gown, but he couldn’t read it. The two touched hands across the table now and again like lovers, but it was the lack of parity between them that made one suspicious—looking for adjustments.
“Go on,” Jack Liffey said.
She wasn’t Catholic, Ellen said, but she knew that Sabine had been close to Father Soong. She and Sabine had been blood sisters from their teens when they’d read the Brontës and Jane Austen together. Later they’d tipped toward reading Marcuse and Habermas and liberation theologists like Paolo Freire. They’d both scorned the Asian boys who pecked away at their computers, doing math. They yearned for a wild-haired Che Guevara.
“Where’s Sabine gone to?” Jack Liffey asked.
“I wish I knew.”
“Tell me about the Commandos.”
Ellen/Rosa made a face and bonked her forehead with the heel of her hand in self-reproach. Jack Liffey liked the emotionality.
“Back in the day, they were dangerous. Satan’s Commandos, a nasty motorcycle club, and then they became a hate-the-Chinese group. They were on the fringe of the Tea Partiers for a while, but the gang is mostly gone. A few scary guys, that’s all.”
She was interrupted by a whinny from the table nearby.
“I guess I should split right now!” the woman bawled. He could hear outrage in her voice.
“No no no. Please. I’m on top of it,” the man insisted.
Jack Liffey took only a brief glance, as the woman seemed to be subsiding.
“Can we talk more about Sabine?”
“Maybe.”
“I take it that’s her given name.”
“She has a parental name, too. I don’t speak enough Chinese to order noodles in a restaurant. I think her original name was Suong—it’s actually Vietnamese.”
“I wanted to make sure it wasn’t a nom de guerre like Rosa. So her family are Hoa Chinese from Vietnam.”
“You’re about the right age, aren’t you? You were one of the baby-killers.”
The word was like a cattle prod, but he let it go, then didn’t. “Rosa, I had a peace symbol on my radar scope and my buddy had a poster of Uncle Ho on the w
all above his. It was the best we could do.”
“Goody for you.” She looked about to stand and leave.
“Wait, please. I’m just looking for Sabine, and I have no interest in anything that’s uncomfortable for you. I swear I’ll protect any confidences.”
Rosa/Ellen pursed her lips, poised on her own knife edge of trust.
“Sabine and I founded the Berets. I said orange was a lousy color. Combining brown and yellow, of course. I asked Sabby if we were fighting for Halloween.”
He smiled.
She nodded a kind of surrender to him. “Sabby and me have been watching the last few Commandos as a kind of duty. You’ve probably seen the racist posters they put up. Losers like that often resort to terrorism as they burn out.”
There was more bleating from the couple nearby, plus some table-pounding, and Jack Liffey forced himself not to look.
“My own target was the so-called brains—Ed Zukovich,” Rosa said, studying her clasped hands. “He’s only the brains compared to a cactus. We both ignored their poster artist, Marly Tom. His name is Tom McMarlin, and he’s nothing, a nebbish.
“Sabine drew the big dumbhead, Antonio Buffano. He’s known as Captain Beef and he’s reputed to have the largest penis in the Western World. I wouldn’t know. They’re all sad cases, really—like dogs that were kicked a lot when they were puppies.
“That’s all I know, Mr. Liffey, except that they’re holding a keg party tomorrow afternoon. I can find out where it is if you want to check it out. But if I tell you, I want a report. Obviously I’m not welcome.”
He waited, but there was no more forthcoming. “That’s not all you know about your friend, is it? I know she wasn’t clean as Ivory Snow.” He mentioned the baggie and map he’d found in her room, and she stared hard over his shoulder at a ghost from some dire past.
“Please. It may help find her.”
Ellen/Rosa banged her forehead with her palm again as she fought some inner struggle. “Sabby’s family needs money bad, and a lot of people know that. Some of them aren’t nice people—a few angry Latinos on the edge of gangs that we knew from the Berets. I told her to stay away from them, but she said it didn’t matter what happened to her.
“It’s her holy helper complex. Maybe she agreed to be a drug mule for one of them. She’d figure nobody would ever search a Chinese girl on a day trip to Mexico. If she went, it was by herself.” Ellen swirled her straw. “It was maybe ten days ago if it happened, and I don’t know if she went or even if she made it back.”
There was a squeal, followed by a bray of anger. Jack Liffey’s eyes slipped reluctantly to the table nearby, just in time to watch the woman stand up. She wrenched open her blouse angrily toward her companion. He could see she was flashing the little man and the world at large with large, firm breasts. The man with the scar jerked back in his chair.
“Happy now?” the Chinese girl shouted. She clutched the blouse tight as she glanced at Jack Liffey with murder eyes, and then scrambled over the low wall to the outside world. He guessed he’d just seen something to do with the parity adjustment that he’d wondered about.
“What else do you know about Sabine’s big Mexican trip?”
She shook her head. “I’m mum now.”
“Would you give me the names of any of the Latinos who contacted her?”
“I’m no snitch.”
He had a sense he’d reached the end for now. “Tell me where the keg is,” he said.
*
Gloria sat at the kitchen table and offered cooking instructions in her most lackluster voice. She was guiding Maeve in working up a complicated mole poblano for the chicken that was browning in lard in a cast-iron pot.
“¿Qué hubo, señor pito negro?” Maeve said, addressing a foot-tall dried black chile that she held in front of her face and then licked to taunt Gloria.
The odd slang pun—What’s up, Mr. Black Penis?—only really worked if you knew both languages.
“Use proper Spanish, girl. That thing’s not no pecker I ever seen.”
Maeve held up another chile. “¿Qué es esto, mi reina?”
“Una pasilla, mi chica. The pasilla’s not terribly hot as chiles go.”
There were also three fat green anchos, and a mulatto that looked like a big raisin. Real Mexican cooking could be damned complicated, Maeve knew. Her old boyfriend had been satisfied with ordinary burritos and tacos, which he’d splash all over with dollops of hot sauce.
“I thought you were decidedly not Mexican,” Maeve said.
“If you stand up and burn in a church long enough, you’re a candle, hon. My pendejo fosters insisted I learn to cook their way. No frybread or roadkill stew. I must admit, American Indian cuisine leaves a lot to be desired.”
“How about telling me about your growing up?”
“What do I get in return, chica?” Gloria was sipping her beer slowly.
“What do you want to hear?” Maeve said.
“I want to hear the whole truth about Mr. Gangster Alberto Montalvo next door, your irresistible impregnator. I knew him way back to a sullen nine-year-old and a twelve-year-old wannabe, throwing gang signs at me like an animated little monkey. I also want to hear the whole truth about who you’re fucking now, or whatever you call it with girls.”
“My two for your one.”
“My one is mucho grande, sweetie. I haven’t even told your dad about the fosters in Baldwin Park.”
“Deal. You first, Gloria.”
Gloria went on giving cooking instructions on the complex recipe, but interlaced the “stir in”s with a tale of being dumped by Child Services into an East L.A. she’d never seen before. After her mother’s death in Inyo County, the disorderly little Indian girl had been found breaking dishes and throwing food against the walls in her trailer.
“More beer,” Gloria demanded.
Maeve took no time deciding. She brought a Corona and had one herself.
Gloria karated the bottle caps off with the heel of her hand against the edge of the table, as she liked to do. “These two scumbags took in foster kids as their only source of income. If they wasn’t both dead now, I swear I’d drive out there and kill them.”
The household had averaged about six, and the Delgados regularly pitted the kids against each other, to teach them about “real life.” Boxing, wrestling, even spelling bees—whatever they weren’t good at. Those not directly in combat had to watch and root. The main bout was always boxing at the end.
“Bless me, curse me. I’m sorry, my chica, I couldn’t rise above any of this.”
What Gloria had learned was how much she could enjoy hurting—sometimes to escape her own pain, but sometimes for nothing more than riding a wave of cheers. Early in her tenure there, the stringy little girl had resolved to get herself out of the house on top or die at it. She still had visceral memories of punches that had drawn screams.
“That’s so awful,” Maeve said.
“Or is it just the way things are?”
“I totally deny that,” Maeve said. “People can cooperate.”
“Come along with me on a few night patrols—if the brass ever reinstates me. America is an ocean-to-ocean freak show.”
“Some people are decent. Like Nelson Mandela.”
“Like your dad, hon. He’s the second-best man I ever met. And years ago, your dad briefly met the love of my life.”
That hurt, Maeve thought, but it must have welled up from somewhere deeply honest. Truth night stumbled on. Maeve noticed that Gloria had become withdrawn, maybe even crying a little inside with the memories of her big love. It was startling. Maeve had never seen anything but ferocious strength in the woman.
Suddenly Gloria leapt to her feet with wide eyes and staggered straight toward Maeve like a Frankenstein, some kind of urgency driving hard against her broken hip. Gloria gave a terrible bawl of pain but wouldn’t quit the mad charge until the hip gave way and she began to crumple. “Freeze!” Gloria shouted. She rammed her hip against th
e old O’Keefe & Merritt for support and slapped at Maeve’s back. Maeve winced and turtled her head down, expecting another blow. Then she noticed that her blouse was on fire and ripped it off.
Gloria hissed on an inhale and swallowed back her pain. “Chica. You were going to turn into a human torch.”
“My bad. I thought you were going to teach me Challenge Night.” She put her arm around Gloria’s ample waist and helped her back to her chair. “I guess I’ll do better when I’ve grown up.”
“Hon, you’ve used up that line. They don’t make bras any bigger.”
“Oh, I’m sure they do.”
Gloria settled with a sigh and smiled for the first time. “Your turn now, or I will teach you challenge. Tell me about Beto next door.”
Maeve could feel herself blushing. “That’s tough.”
“So was my turn, hon. Flip the chicken over now and turn it down to simmer. You can start chopping up the onions.”
“You know I was really—what?—insane with sex. I would have jumped off a cliff for him. And I had a really bad time when I submitted.” Luckily, the banger was off the grid somewhere now, probably Mexico.
“Anybody would’ve had a bad time with that kid, hon.”
“I had a real fight deciding on the abortion. It wasn’t the best year of my life. Thank god Beto didn’t learn he’d knocked me up. He’d probably have killed me for the abortion.” She was trying hard to be suitably tough, but didn’t feel she was doing very well at it.
“Is that what turned you against guys?”
She shrugged. “It’s not that crude, Tia. But I guess it left a big sore spot that a gentle girl could caress.”
“I’m missing something here. Can you tell me what it is with girls that makes you feel so good—is it just looking into each other’s eyes? The lack of all the pendejo swagger? What’s the really big thing for you: fingers or toys or tongues?”
“Gloria!”
“This is truth time. I want another beer. And I genuinely want to know what it is that turns you on with girls.”
