Nathan in Spite of Himself

by Bernie Silver

  Well, maybe one day I’d grow up and find out.

  Chapter 67

  About a week after the groundhog saw his shadow, much to my dismay, I received a call from Wonderman. He had a couple of announcements to make, a couple of major announcements. So major, in fact, that he insisted on making them in person. He suggested we meet at The Cottonpicker for old-time’s sake and, in a classic case of luck-pushing, proposed a Friday night because all his other days and time slots were occupied.

  I hadn’t seen Wonderman since shortly after the New Year began, so meeting in person was fine, as was the suggested venue. But I usually visited Mario’s on Friday and Saturday nights to prove to Jane Bartolo that my “alcohol problem,” as she called it, was under control. On these occasions I drank one or two beers, three at the most, while rewarding my restraint by watching Jane work her butt off. So meeting Wonderman on a Friday night would require a sacrifice on my part. But I was feeling contrite these days, halfway interested in becoming a better person, and what better way to do that than by sacrificing my interests to someone else’s? I was sure Ellen’s hero, old JC, would applaud.

  Short story shorter, I agreed to meet Wonderman at The Cottonpicker on Friday.

  #

  Still shivering from the cold as I entered our favorite haunt, I almost didn’t recognize my friend even though he sat, as usual, at the far end of the bar. Wonderman normally dressed like a lumberjack at this time of year, but tonight he wore a dark-blue suit, starched white shirt and red power tie. It couldn’t be Halloween, unless they’d switched it to February. So what the hell?

  Once I arrived at our spot I saw something as odd as his get-up. At Wonderman’s elbow stood an ice bucket containing a bottle of champagne. I stood there gaping while he laughed, loud enough to turn some heads in our direction.

  Beau Brummel patted the stool next to him. “Better sit down fore you fall down.”

  I sat.

  “Wisht I had me a camera. Yo face goin every which’t way.” He made a show of filling the glass in front of me. “Drink up, my man. We celebratin.”

  This time I stared at the glass. “Celebrating what , may I ask?”

  Another spurt of laughter. “You may axt, but all in due time, all in due time. First get you a taste a the bubbly.”

  What choice did I have? I got me a taste and discovered, happily, that this bubbly was authentic.

  Wonderman took a sip. “The reason we celebratin,” he said, “is I’s a businessman now.”

  I swallowed more champagne. Well okay, gulped more.

  Wonderman. Businessman.

  Seemed like an oxymoron to me.

  “I don’t believe it” was all I could say.

  Given his response, I should have said something else.

  “What? You think we coloreds don’ know nothin bout business? You believe we juss fit to scrub floors and shine shoes, drive a livery truck if we lucky, or maybe a fancy limo ifn we hit the jackpot?”

  “I didn’t say that. I’d never say that.”

  “No, but you’d think it. You thinkin it right now.”

  Obviously I’d touched a sore spot since Wonderman rarely got angry. That was my specialty.

  “How do you know what I’m thinking?” I said angrily. “You a mind-reader too, besides being a businessman?”

  He sipped again while appearing to think this over. Finally he grinned and gave me a fraternal slap on the back.

  “You right. I’s prolly been hangin round you too long, gettin overly sensitive.”

  This could pass for an apology or another insult, the latter of which I’d earned, seeing as how thin my skin was. And if I were honest, I’d concede his other allegation might be true too. Maybe I had bought the myth that blacks were fit for little more than grunt work. Why else was I so shocked at his news?

  Newly penitent, I clinked his glass and tossed back half of mine.

  “What kind of business?” I asked.

  “You ain’t gonna believe it.”

  Jesus, what now?

  To prepare for his next revelation, I polished off my drink.

  Wonderman promptly refilled my glass. “I done bought Harry’s.”

  Again I spoke without thinking. “Yeah, right, good one.”

  He clenched and unclenched his jaw. “I ain’t shittin you, man. I’s in the grocery business now.”

  Wonderman drained his glass and replenished it, then took out his Kools, removed one and offered me the pack. Menthols weren’t my favorite but I accepted his invitation, maybe to prove I how unbiased I was.

  My friend lit our cigarettes with a Ronson instead of the usual match, another sign he’d come up in the world.

  “Thing is, I heard that Harry complain alla time bout how he gettin tired of the damn place and thinkin of retire’n. So I got aholt a three frien’s lookin to invest in somethin and made the … how y’all say it? … smuck? I made the smuck an offer.”

  “Schmuck,” I corrected.

  “Shhh-muck. Yeah, thass it. So guess what the shit-fo-brains say?”

  Knowing Harry, I could almost guess, but instead of answering I took a drag on my cigarette and blew smoke at the ceiling.

  “He say, ‘Well, y’all takin over the neighborhood anyway, may’s well have yo own store.’ You believe that shit?”

  Easily.

  Wonderman tapped his cigarette on the metal tray lying between us. “Anyway, once’t all the bullshit out the way, we settled a few details, businessman to businessman, and did the paperwork … you wouldn believe how much they is … and the place be mine now.”

  “What’re you saying? You own Harry’s outright? Now?”

  “Yezzuh. Started all the gotiating ’n paper shit a year ago, but dint wanna say nothin till the deal be done, which it was last week.”

  “I don’t believe …” I started, then stopped and switched to Sheldon’s favorite expression.

  “Holy fuck!”

  “Thing is, though, it ain’t ‘Harry’s’ no more,” Wonderman said.

  “Meaning?”

  “It be ‘Marty’s’ now. Thought of callin it ‘Marcus’s’ but that hard to say and ’sides, Marty more Jewish-soundin, right? And they’s still some kikes left in the neighborhood, so I figures even if they don’ wanna buy from no Negro, they maybe’ll pay-troh-nize a place what sound like their own.”

  Jews would be willing to patronize blacks, all right, but that aside, I searched for the slightest sign that Wonderman knew he’d used a racial slur. He rattled it off the way others tossed out spic, nip, mick, wop, dago, chink and polack, not to mention nigger. Casually, as if referring to a candy bar.

  Wonderman seemed oblivious, so I felt obliged to say something.

  “Please don’t use that word,” I said, my voice shaking a bit.

  “What? What word?”

  “Kike.”

  “Aw man, I dint mean nothin by it.”

  “I know, but it’s a close relative of nigger.”

  “No shit?”

  “No shit.”

  Wonderman’s brow furrowed, then smoothed. “Okay, no more kike round you.”

  “Around anyone.”

  His jaw tightened again as he snuffed out his cigarette. “All right, round nobody.”

  And so we had another irony. Jews calling blacks shvartz (or nigger), blacks calling Jews kikes, Jews adopting Christian names, blacks adopting Jewish names, and where all the craziness would stop nobody knew.

  I was getting a headache, so maybe it was time to drop the subject.

  “You know anything about running a business?” I asked.

  Instead of answering, Wonderman flicked his Ronson and stared at the flame as if hypnotized.

  “I street savvy,” he finally said. “That count for a lot, in business and otherwise. Plus Harry, no shit, he say he teach me a few things. And one a them investors … Bailey Sanborn? … he own a donut shop with his brother Leroy, and he promise to hep me run the store, least till I git the hang of it. Should
n take long, though, cuz I’s a fast learner.”

  I’d be willing to grant him that, but I recalled the plight of my Uncle Sol on my father’s side. He owned a shoe store in Ypsilanti and never tired of kvetching about how hard it was to run a business, what with keeping books, maintaining inventory, staying abreast of current trends and dealing with fussy, to say nothing of fickle, customers. “Plus, you can’t get good help these days,” he never tired of saying, “and what you do get are goniffs who steal you blind.”

  Whether these grievances were valid I couldn’t say, but Wonderman would find out soon enough. So I moved on.

  “What’s the other thing you wanted to tell me?”

  “What you talkin bout, man?”

  “You said on the phone you had two major announcements.”

  With this reminder his face lit up. “Oh yeaahhh!” Pause. “I gettin married.”

  I tried not to sound shocked, lest he take offense again, but the best I could do was, “You’re fucking kidding me.”

  “No, I’s serious, man.”

  I lit one of my Luckys for support. “Who is she?”

  “That Doreen gal, from the place y’all brung me to.”

  Miss Proper, about to become even more proper.

  “We started seein each other reglar right away, and after a while she moved in wit me, you know, at my place.”

  He finished off the bottle of champagne by filling both our glasses.

  “I done messed up once’t, but the thing is I felt bad bout it, real bad. So I figured muss be love and next thing, I axt her to marry me. Naturally she done said yes.”

  Naturally.

  I congratulated him, knowing I’d need time to process this disclosure.

  Wonderman sipped his champagne. “She the reason I got to thinkin bout goin into business, doin somethin more’n deliverin bread. Doreen, she deserve bettern that. She a real lady, and fuck so good like to pop my head off.”

  He followed this tribute with another of sorts. Instead of admiring the tawny-skinned woman who’d just sat at the bar—and ogling women was a longstanding habit of his—he kept his mind on the conversation.

  “So what you think?” Wonderman asked.

  I redirected my own focus, though not without difficulty.

  “Think about what? You owning Harry’s … uh, Marty’s … or getting married?”

  “Both.” He caught Roy’s eye and pointed at the empty champagne bottle.

  “I think it’s great,” I said, “and I wish you well with both, uh, endeavors. When’s the wedding?”

  “Ain’t set a date yet. Prolly next year sometimes.”

  I hardly heard the answer because I was thinking. About Sheldon owning a business, getting married and fathering a child. About Wonderman owning a business, getting married and, most likely, fathering a child. And about Nate Rubin, unmarried, childless and working for the man. What the hell was I doing with my life?

  The second bottle of champagne disappeared faster than the first and, by my estimate, I’d consumed most of it. After the last drop was gone I still had no answer to my question, nor had one occurred to me by the time I got home.

  Unless, of course, you counted I have no fucking idea what I’m doing with my life.

  Chapter 68

  Following my champagne-fueled chat with Wonderman I cut down on the booze again, slowing it to a trickle with maybe a spurt now and then, while Jane Bartolo and I continued to spend Sunday afternoons and some late-late weeknights together. Our rendezvous were mostly harmonious, meaning we were equally eager to get between the sheets. Then one Sunday afternoon Jane spoiled things by inviting me to a party.

  To most people this would seem a harmless, perhaps even benevolent, gesture. But to me it was like an invitation to the netherworld. My hatred of parties hadn’t diminished over the years and this one, a July 4th bash, promised to be worse than most because not only would I be surrounded by people, a major challenge on a good day, but I’d have to endure them while sober. Either that or risk pissing Jane off, maybe this time for good. And on top of that, the outdoor shindig would feature an open bar, making moderation next to impossible.

  You see my problem?

  Then you can also see why I nearly panicked when Jane issued the invitation, which she did sneakily, springing it on me as we lay in the afterglow of sexual congress. She simply rolled over and asked whether I was awake, and I made the mistake of saying yes, and then she sprang her trap.

  Seems Larry Rattigan, head of some department or other at Chrysler Corporation, had stopped by Mario’s last week for his usual after-work string of martinis and invited Jane to the annual Independence Day barbecue he and his wife threw at their Birmingham home. She figured the party might be a fun thing for us to do together, so she asked Rattigan if she could bring a guest and he hesitated only briefly before saying yes.

  I didn’t hesitate at all before declining her invitation.

  “But why?” she asked. “It’ll be a nice change of pace.”

  “Hey, I like our pace the way it is.”

  “Don’t be a poop.”

  “I’m not being a poop.”

  I might mention here that the greater the opposition to my resistance to something, the greater my resistance becomes. This phenomenon is based on a scientific principle, though I’m not sure which one.

  “Yes, you are being a poop,” Jane insisted.

  “No, I’m not. I just don’t like parties.”

  “Why, for God’s sake?”

  “Too crowded. And I hate crowds.”

  “Oh piffle.”

  “That may be true, but I still don’t like parties.”

  “Smart-ass. Or should I say stubborn ass.” She turned on her side to face me. “I’ll hold your hand if you like, so you won’t get lost in the crowd.”

  Her smile alone produced stirrings down below.

  “I’d rather you held something else.”

  “Don’t be crude, dear.”

  “Why not?” I gave her my best wicked grin.

  Well, maybe not my best, but it produced the desired result, seeing as she grabbed my something else. And then by tacit agreement we tabled our discussion.

  #

  After our breathing returned to normal I asked an impolite question. “Why’d he invite you?”

  Jane turned her head sideways. “He who? Invite me to what?”

  Apparently she hadn’t fully recovered so I gave it a couple seconds. “Larry Rattigan. To the party.”

  “I don’t understand. Why’re you asking me that?”

  Something told me she wouldn’t want to know so I came in the back door. “Well, machers tend to hang out with machers, and to invite machers to their parties.”

  “What’s a mocker?”

  Her pronunciation was a little off but not bad for a shikseh.

  “A muckety-muck,” I said.

  “Then whyn’t you say that?”

  I might have explained that I sometimes slipped into the Jewish vernacular with which I grew up, but then she’d ask me why, moving us even further off topic.

  So I tried, “I should have. I’m sorry.”

  Jane squeezed my hand under the sheets. “Okay, so mockers hang out with mockers and invite them to parties. What’s the problem?”

  “I’m not a muckety-muck,” I pointed out, “and neither are you. This guy wouldn’t have invited me to a party if I were the bartender, so why—”

  “Oh, I see. You think he’s trying to get me into bed.”

  She took my silence as affirmation, which it was.

  “Well, what of it?” Jane asked. “Lots of guys try, and most of them fail. Sometimes, and only sometimes, one of them succeeds.”

  She gave me a puckish grin but all I could offer was a listless “Thanks a lot.”

  Jane rolled toward me, kissed my forehead, then rolled back and sat up against the headboard. “Um, I sense a little insecurity here. But just to let you know? When I’m with someone, I’m with them, whi
ch means I don’t sleep with other men … especially if they’re married. So relax, hon. Let’s go to this party and have a good time. Okay?”

  I said nothing.

  “Okay?”

  “I still don’t like the idea of attending a party hosted by a guy who wants to get in your pants.”

  “Get in my pants?’ My but you do have a way with words, Mr. Writer.” She sounded playful and edgy at the same time.

  And I wondered if I was I screwing things up again? Was this another situation that called for sacrifice on my part? I decided the answer was yes.

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Okay what?”

  “Okay I’ll go to the party.”

  “You will?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  With that Jane grew pensive, signaling she had something else on her mind.

  “What?” I asked, not sure I wanted to know.

  “Uh, I need to talk to you about something.”

  “About what?” I asked with a feeling of foreboding.

  “Your drinking.”

  What about my drinking, for chrissake? I’d slowed down, and I mean way down. What more did she want?

  I inquired.

  “I appreciate your cutting back,” Jane said. “Honest, I do. But you still drink too much. You know that, right?”

  “I used to drink too much, but not anymore, not since New Year’s Eve.”

  “You don’t drink the way you did, but you still overdo it sometimes.”

  “How often is sometimes?”

  “Often enough.”

  “Could you be more specific?”

  “Goddamnit stop acting like a lawyer. The point is, often enough is too often. Capeesh?”

  Not really. What did she expect me to do? Never get buzzed again? Stop drinking altogether? Join the Temperance League? What?

  “I’m not sure what you want from me,” I said.

  “For now, I want you to promise you won’t get plastered at this party.”

  “If you’re so worried about it, why’d you invite me?”

  “Because we’re a couple now, and couples do things together. But, I don’t know, I sometimes wonder about us. About our future together.”