by Mary Leo
“How long have you known the Captain?” I ask just as she’s about to wind down. Don’t want to tell Mike what the Captain said. He won’t understand. Won’t care. Let Dottie talk. Avoid the problem. It’ll drift away. Anyway, I don’t really know what the Captain wanted. Don’t want to know. Probably a jerk. A jerk with a misplaced conscious. Who cares? Not me.
“I’ve known Bob for about fifteen years or more. Don’t know how he does it. Day after day. Got a sick wife at home, too. You ought to see them two together. Real love birds. Still brings her in here every once in awhile, poor thing. They used to come in and he’d fill that old jukebox up with quarters and they’d dance all night. Laughin’ and smoochin’. That was before Bud put the pool table in. Now there ain’t no room for dancin’. Just as well. She can’t dance no more anyway. Was a sweet woman, though, still is. Had a real pretty smile, looked like…what’s the actress’ name from that Sally and Harry movie? Had an organism in the restaurant?”
“Meg Ryan had the organism,” Mike says straight faced, repeating her mistake. He looks over at me. In spite of myself, I have to smile.
“Yeah, just like Meg Ryan when she smiled. But that damn prison’s a real curse. That’s why my Bud quit it. He was a guard. A Captain, like Bob, but he quit and we opened this place. Couldn’t take it no more. All them devils runnin’ things. Makin’ the guards do stuff they don’t want. Makin’ Bud mad all the time. Yeah, Bob’s got his troubles. Too bad. He’s a real nice man. Can I get you two anything else besides the cigarettes?”
“No. Thanks,” Mike says. Dottie exchanges my ashtray for a clean one and leaves. I put down the rest of my bourbon.
Mike winces and says, “You drink too much.”
I force out, “You don’t drink enough.”
“It won’t solve anything.”
“Not looking for a solution.”
“Are you going to tell me what he wanted or not?” Mike argues.
I’m confused now, thinking about the Captain. Sounds like one of the good guys. Wyatt Earp trying to clean up the town so he can go home to the little woman with his head held high. Seems too good. Like he’s Gacy the clown; little boys buried in his backyard. What the hell does he want with me? And what do I tell Mike? Not the truth. Not now. Need to find out more information from the Captain.
I blurt out, “A part in the movie.”
Mike is somewhat stunned. “He came all the way out to our motel to ask you for a part?”
Dottie returns with the cigarettes. I mumble thanks and she walks away.
“Yeah. How about that?” I answer with false conviction. Smiling. Trying to get him off my back. Should have never mentioned it.
“Why didn’t he ask me? I was with him for most of the day?”
“I don’t know. You’ll have to ask the Captain.” I open my pack, pull one out and light it with a Bic. Mike takes a swig of his wine, puts the glass down and gets that look on his face I hate, that what-are-you-up-to-now? look.
“Carly?”
I give him the same look back, “Mike?”
“You’re not telling me the truth, are you?”
“Absolutely,” I tell him, but I can tell by the look on his face that he doesn’t believe me. Doesn’t matter. He can’t handle the truth. Never could. That little boy crying in his seat couldn’t believe his sister would ignore him. Abandon him for a look at her idol. He’s still that little boy, only taller.
I’ll have to figure this thing out with the Captain on my own. “I’m not leaving,” I tell him. “You won’t be able to handle the action alone. I’m feeling much better. Just needed a day off. I’m fine now.”
“Oh sure, you’re fine. Look at how fine you are. Your hand is shaking.”
I put the cigarette down in the ashtray and fold my arms in tight across my stomach, tucking in both hands. Can’t let him get to me. Can’t let him change my mind.
“I’m cold.”
“You’re cold. Okay. And what about Speck?”
“What about him?” I can feel myself starting to slur, starting to spin. Have to be careful. Don’t want to give anything away.
“What if you run into him again? The man has a physical effect on you. This isn’t a smart move, Carly. Especially after what you’ve told me about him. And especially after last night. I think you should go home. I can take it from here.”
“I keep telling you, nothing happened last night. Just drank a little too much on an empty stomach. You overreacted, like you always do. Look,” I push my glass away. “I’ve had enough.”
“You said you didn’t want to do this movie, didn’t like breathing in the same air as Speck. You told me that you wanted to go home. Needed to go home.”
“No, you said I should go home. I don’t want to. Besides, I have to find Captain Bob—the sweet, depressed lover—just the right part. And you’d miss me too much,” I tell him, leaning across the table, puckering up my lips to give him an air kiss. He’s looking so cute tonight in his black T-shirt and his khaki pants, hair all messy, baby blues glistening with concern. What would it be like to just let go? To love like Captain Bob’s wife loves him. To put that much trust in a man and have him come through. Steadfast. Constant. No matter what.
I tell myself that’s the booze talking and I lean back. Take a breath to ease my silly thoughts.
Mike smirks, shakes his head, then picks up his wine and says, “To Captain Bob,” and drinks down every drop. “Dottie,” he calls out. “A tall glass of milk, please.”
“Two,” I yell.
With a squeamish look on her face she calls back, “Sure, sweet peas, two glasses of milk coming right up.”
Chapter Twelve
July 12, 1966
“Wake up, it’s past eleven o’clock. We’re supposed to be at Beth’s in an hour. Wake up, you guys,” Sharon’s sister called from just outside the tent.
“What?” Sharon mumbled.
“It can’t be. It just can’t be!” I said as I jumped up to look out of our mesh window. “What happened?”
Sharon’s sister, Mandy, opened the flap on the tent and peeked inside. “You guys look dead. Up all night talking? That’s what you get. I guess you don’t want to come to Beth’s and see those Peter and Gordon pictures.”
Beth had taken pictures at the concert. She even made us copies, which was fab, but the three of us had slept right through the night. What happened to Wolf? One of us was supposed to have kept watch. And even worse, we had missed Mass and broken our promise to God.
“Yes, we want to come,” Sharon sighed. “We’re just tired.” She stretched her body out like a willow branch, long and thin. “We’re up. When do we have to leave?”
“In about fifteen minutes. I borrowed the car so we don’t have to take the bus, but hurry up anyway.” Mandy went back up to the house.
Lisa turned over and said, “Wolf left with his suitcases about six this morning. Somebody picked him up. I told you that new spirit wasn’t any good. Now what?” She sat up and yawned, her curly hair in a state of confusion around her face. It needed ironing in the worst way.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Why didn’t you run out there after him? You could have stopped him.”
“He came out and got into a waiting car. There wasn’t any time. Why didn’t you stop him?” she argued.
“It was your watch. I was asleep,” I snapped and punched down my pillow.
“Now what?” Sharon asked me, as if I should know the answer. “This is your fault. You didn’t want to go to Pete’s Tap last night. We could have talked to him if we’d gone. You’ve ruined everything.”
I tried to shift the blame back to Lisa, “If I had seen Wolf leave this morning I would have run out there after him, but Lisa didn’t do anything. She didn’t even wake us up.”
“You would not. You’d have been too chicken, just like you were last night,” Sharon countered.
“Just admit it,” Lisa said. “It’s your fault if we don’t marry the Beatles. You’re
just too scared all the time. Say it, or I don’t want to talk to you ever again.”
Lisa believed that you weren’t human if you couldn’t say you were sorry. She said she read it in the Bible somewhere, which she probably did since she was always reading. It was her very own test to prove that a person was actually real and not some alien or devil.
But I was mad and ready to go straight home. Mandy called out a ten-minute warning and I thought about the pictures. If I left now I would probably never get copies and it could take weeks just for us to be friends again. Then there was Wolf to consider. Maybe he just moved to another boarding house. Maybe he didn’t actually leave on a ship.
“I’m sorry. It’s all my fault,” I said, folding my blankets.
“We better get ready,” Lisa said, and as simple as that, the fight was over.
We left the tent up for later, thinking that maybe we could stay in it one more night—that is if my mother would let me. Sometimes, though, if the three of us were together too much we’d fight and I’d be the one left behind. I couldn’t let that happen this time. Not with somebody like Wolf Dietrich hanging around and the Beatles concert only a few weeks away. We had to be mates, that’s all there was to it.
When we arrived at Beth’s apartment near Stony Island, another South Side community, two of her friends were already there so she didn’t pay much attention to us. She introduced Mandy to her friends and gave us the pictures from the concert.
The friends were her old classmates from nursing school. Beth had to drop out after the first year because she got pregnant and then married—neither of which was acceptable to South Chicago Community School of Nursing.
Sharon, Lisa and I sat together on the floor of Beth’s baby-proof living room, sipping lemonade. We looked over the pictures of the concert, squealed at the appropriate times, while Mandy and the other girls talked and laughed and played with Beth’s baby boy. The two girls had brought over graduation pictures of themselves and fellow classmates to share with Beth. The actual graduation was in a few weeks, twenty-one days to be exact and they couldn’t wait for the day to arrive. From what I could gather, it wasn’t school that bothered them, it was ‘serving time’ at the hospital they wanted to be done with.
One of them mentioned that the graduation ceremony was being held at McCormick Place.
“That’s where these were taken,” I said holding up the pictures that Beth gave us. “When do you graduate?”
“August seventh,” the red-haired girl said. Her name was Mary Ann Jordan. She smiled at me, a warm, genuine smile as if she wanted to be my friend. Right away I could tell I was going to like her.
“That’s only five days before the Beatles concert,” Lisa said.
“I love the Beatles. Did you know they almost played at the Aerie Crown in McCormick Place, but it’s not big enough to hold all the fans,” Mary Ann said.
I nodded yes and said, “If they had played there instead of the Amphitheater we would’ve met them for sure. We know how to get backstage.”
“Are you going to the concert?” the other girl asked. Her name was Suzie Farris. She kept adding sugar to her lemonade, tasting it and adding more. Beth had to refill the sugar bowl just for Suzie. I liked her. I even liked her pixie hair cut, and her outfit, white shorts and a green, cotton shirt. I decided that if I ever cut my hair I would want it to look like hers.
“Yes,” we all chanted.
Mandy said, “Don’t get ‘em started. They’re nuts over the Beatles or any group from England. That’s all they talk about. They’re obsessed. It’s been over a month since Beth and I took them to see Peter and Gordon, and they still haven’t gotten over it.”
“Are those pictures of Peter and Gordon? I love those guys,” Mary Ann cooed. “Can I see the pictures?” She stood up and walked over to us. Unlike Mandy and Beth who didn’t care about the British invasion, Mary Ann was excited over our rock’n’roll heroes.
“Sure. We met ‘em,” Sharon said. Mary Ann was amazed by our ability to get backstage. We told her about the ramp on the side of the building where the stars drove in and out and how we always sneaked back there to get autographs from Sonny and Cher, The Kinks, Chad and Jeremy and even Billy J. Kramer. We also told her about Ciscarama, a talent show for Chicago area schools and how we made the finals.
“They hold it at McCormick Place every year,” Sharon said.
“I think a friend of my sister’s was in it,” Mary Ann answered while she looked through our pictures, studying each one, smiling when she recognized somebody.
Lisa said, “Well, this year it was held on the same day as the Peter and Gordon concert and we got to go back stage when they were practicing.”
“And we saw them through an open door and Beth took the pictures. It was outta sight!”
“I would love to be that close,” Mary Ann said. She looked at the pictures one more time and listened to our stories asking us questions as we went along. She even confided in us that when she first saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan she wanted to marry Paul. I was stunned that somebody older than us thought like we did, about marrying a Beatle. I was also glad she was going to be a nurse and not be any competition for us. After all, she was the same age as Paul and that could be a problem. Mary Ann was so beautiful and so nice. I wanted to be just like her when I grew up.
Suzie couldn’t stop talking about her upcoming wedding. She was engaged to Mary Ann’s brother, and had brought over Bride magazine and a few brochures from restaurants and local florists trying to nail down her wedding plans. I tried to listen to everything she said so that when it came time for Ringo and me to be married I would be prepared.
Suzie wore an absolutely beautiful, wonderfully fab diamond ring. A simple setting of white gold with one big diamond sticking straight up from her finger. It sparkled blue and yellow with each of her movements. I wanted to ask her if I could try it on so I could pretend that Ringo had just proposed, but I didn’t have the nerve.
Beth’s baby loved Suzie. It was a mutual admiration because every time she’d look at him he’d just beam. They laughed and played all afternoon until Beth finally put him down for a nap and even then, Suzie had to help. I thought she would make a terrific mother someday.
Sometime in the late afternoon, it got so hot in Beth’s apartment that even the fans she had going in almost every room didn’t seem to be working. I was getting really tired; so were Lisa and Sharon. The three of us lay almost asleep on the living room floor. I drifted in and out of consciousness catching snippets of conversation.
“It’s so hot,” Suzie said, fanning herself with one of her magazines. “We thought about going to the beach later on, but the last time we were there we met some really weird guy who kept on following us around.”
“He gave me the creeps,” Mary Ann said. “We haven’t been back there since. The guy was such a weirdo. He kept staring at us. Every time I’d turn around there he’d be, watching.”
“I didn’t notice him as much as you did, but the guy even came over to talk to us. Mary Ann told him to get lost. She’s so good,” Suzie said leaning back on the sky-blue, mohair sofa.
“Yes, and he got really mad. Remember? Like we should’ve just invited him home or something.”
Suzie said, “He called us whores. A real nut case.”
“What a creep. Weren’t you scared?” Mandy asked.
“Not really,” Mary Ann answered. “What could he do at a public beach? He was just some ugly creep looking for girls. He smelled of whiskey. Really strong and I hate that smell on a guy.”
I opened my eyes and sat up. Mary Ann made a funny face as if she were smelling his whiskey breath that very minute.
She continued, “I just wanted him to leave so Suz and me could enjoy the sun, but he wouldn’t.”
Suzie said, “We left right after that and haven’t been back there since. He was too strange, with his stupid accent and that acne-scarred face. He even had some tattoos on his arms and fingers. What a cr
eep! Maybe we’ll try Rainbow Beach next time instead of Calumet. Calumet’s getting too crowded anyway.”
“I like Rainbow better,” I said. “It’s bigger. There’s plenty of room for everybody.”
“Next time we’ll go there,” Suzie said, and gave me a big smile. “Maybe you and your friends can come with us. We’ll have a picnic.”
Lisa and Sharon woke up and chimed in that they would love to go to the beach. Anytime. From there, the conversation drifted back to Suzie’s wedding and eventually Mandy decided it was time to leave.
I thought about Mary Ann and Suzie while we drove home on that hot afternoon, thought about how nice they were to us. Suzie had a great smile…I liked her and I liked Mary Ann. They didn’t ignore us like most girls their age did. They included us in their conversations like we mattered. Maybe it was because they were nurses and had been taught to be kind to everybody, or maybe they wanted to be nurses because they were already kind to everybody. I didn’t know. Whatever the reason, I decided we had found the perfect girl to marry George. We just had to work on her a little. Maybe when we all went to the beach together I could convince her that actually George was just her type, and she should join our group. Maybe even come to the Beatles concert with us. That would be perfect. Then we wouldn’t need a chaperone, just Mary Ann. George’s new wife.
Chapter Thirteen
September 10, 1987
Mike knocked on my motel room door early this morning. I couldn’t get up so I gave him the keys to my car. Needed some extra time to talk to the girl in the mirror. Convince her that I was doing the right thing by staying.
After a couple cups of Jacked-up coffee she finally relents.
I grab a cab to Stateville from a cabby who wants to commiserate over visiting a loved-one on the inside. I let him talk while I chain-smoke the noise away, giving him a groan every now and then. Too nervous to speak. Too nervous to explain.
