Louisiana Lament

by Julie Smith

  “I understand you’re one of his best friends.”

  Taylor nodded. “I’ve tried to be. The boy’s had it rough, and he’s got talent—which is also rough but it’s there. He’s quite brilliant, really—his true genius hasn’t begun to be tapped. Have you read his poetry? If you want to understand Rashad, read his poetry.”

  “I’ve read some of it. The piece called ‘Cassie’ was pretty interesting.”

  Taylor reached for something, an imaginary coffee cup, Talba thought. It was a nervous gesture, the pocket-patting kind an ex-smoker makes. “They were close,” he said.

  “As in dating?”

  Taylor seemed to be considering. “Well, I don’t know. I don’t think so, but…”

  She gave him a moment and finally interjected. “What?”

  “I was just thinking of this other girl. Kerry.”

  “What about Kerry?”

  “Look, everybody loves ole Hunt, and he’s my buddy, okay?”

  Talba nodded, wondering where on Earth he was going.

  “He’s a great guy, and one of our finest writers, but he sure leaves a lot of feminine flotsam in his wake. You know about that, right? It’s anything but a secret.” Again she nodded, and Taylor continued as if, having done his duty to his buddy, he was free to speak. “Well, it’s this way—Rashad always felt sorry for them.” He looked at Talba narrowly. “You may have gathered Hunt’s a bit of a racist. Did that make you wonder why he kept Rashad around? If you want to know the truth, he’s cleaned up quite a few of Hunt’s messes. Kerry was suicidal. Really. I hate to say it, but Hunt must have really worked her over—and I don’t think she was that stable to begin with. Rashad nursed her back to health, literally. He even moved in with her for a while.” He shrugged. “The crazier they are, the better he likes them.”

  Talba thought about what he was implying. “You’re saying Hunt was involved with Cassie?”

  Taylor looked surprised. “Uh… I thought…”

  He had thought she knew it. “Are you saying he was, and it was common knowledge?”

  Taylor’s face was flushed. “No, I’m not saying that. I’m just saying Cassie was a little emotionally unstable; therefore, Rashad would have been attracted to her.”

  “Do we know for sure he isn’t gay? Does he actually have sex with these broken wings?”

  “We haven’t discussed that particular matter, Ms. Wallis. All I can tell you is that he falls in love with them. Hunt said there’s another girl involved in this mess—the one who found the body.”

  “He told me Rashad couldn’t possibly be involved with a girl like that.”

  Taylor allowed himself a smirk. “She must be unattractive then. That’s the yardstick by which he measures all women.”

  That annoyed Talba. “She’s African-American and she isn’t thin. Is that your idea of unattractive?”

  Taylor grunted, maybe in disgust. “We’re not talking about me. We’re talking about Hunt. Here’s what I can tell you—if she’s crazy enough, Rashad’s probably involved with her.”

  Talba felt as if she was getting a handle on Rashad’s sexuality, at any rate, which meant she might be able to rule out gay love nests as possible refuges for him. “Let me ask you something, Mr. Taylor.”

  “Wayne.” He crinkled out a smile, having regained his composure. She had the distinct impression he was trying to be ingratiating.

  “Wayne. I’m wondering if you’ve heard from Rashad since all this happened.”

  “Me? No, he hasn’t called. Why?”

  “He’s got to be staying with someone. So far, his brother and his best pals—of whom you’re supposed to be one—don’t know where he is.”

  “Well, he has stayed with me. He had to give up the place he had to move in with Kerry—and after that, he moved in with us for a while, until he found that duplex with his brother.” Something about the “us” surprised her—Taylor wore no wedding ring. “You and your wife?” she said.

  Taylor nodded.

  “She must be pretty understanding if she lets your students stay with you.”

  Again he nodded, not really addressing what she’d said.

  She tried for one last tidbit. “Well, if Rashad didn’t go to you, and he didn’t go to Hunt or his brother, where would he go?” Taylor pinched the end of his nose, as if the stimulation of mild pain could help him remember. “His grandfather’s in a nursing home. So I guess his aunt’s his closest relative. You might try her.”

  The aunt again. “Okay. Do you know her name?”

  “Sorry, I don’t.”

  “Well, I won’t take up any more of your time, then—except for one little thing.” She held out Mahogany Hall. “You forgot to sign my book.”

  On the title page, he wrote, For Talba Wallis—a Baroness in detective’s clothing.

  She read it in surprise. “I didn’t know you knew about that.”

  “You know that poem, ‘I Am Like a Cat’? I teach it.”

  “What? You teach it?” She had no idea her work was being taught at the university level. “I just conducted an interview with a man who teaches me?”

  He stood up and held out his hand. “I admire your work very much.”

  “You have got to be kidding.”

  “It couldn’t be more true.”

  She left feeling all the wrong stuff—utterly disconcerted, and more or less walking on air. And slightly in love with the man.

  Maybe it hadn’t been such a bad day after all. Still, she was exhausted.

  Chapter Ten

  Any hopes she had of a quiet evening were destroyed the minute she opened the door and smelled chicken frying. Miz Clara didn’t fry chicken just for herself and Talba.

  “Sandra, where you been?” her mother sang out, her words more upbeat than accusing. She was happy.

  Talba looked at her watch. It was barely five-thirty, an hour before she normally returned. “Mama, I’m early.”

  “Well, good. Corey and Michelle are coming over. You can make a pie or somethin’.” Talba’s brother and his wife, she meant. There’d been a time when Talba didn’t really get along with them, but that had changed with the arrival of their baby, Sophia Pontalba. Both she and Miz Clara doted on the kid, and if Michelle was coming, Sophia was—Michelle was an ardent breast-feeder. With her niece in the house, Talba really couldn’t say she was too tired to participate.

  She changed into jeans and went into the kitchen. “It’s October,” she said. “How about gingerbread?”

  “Mmm. Gingerbread be good.”

  Talba whipped up the confection and retired to look at a few of Rashad’s poems before the onslaught. Instead, she found herself seated before the computer, trying to locate Rashad’s aunt. Marlon was listed, along with a Walter Daneene, whose number she wasted no time in dialing. But it had been disconnected, and there was no new number.

  She flipped quickly through Rashad’s book for any mention of Kerry, but happy family sounds filled the house before she got anywhere. Smoothing her hair, she hurried to the living room to greet the other Wallises.

  Corey, with his fashionable shaven head, was a doctor, Michelle a full-time mother. They were a handsome couple, though Michelle came from a very different milieu from that of the Wallises. She was a Creole, one of the city’s elite light-skinned blacks. In a way, Corey’s was as much a mixed marriage as if his wife had been white. So far, little Sophia took after the Wallises.

  Talba trotted into the room. “Where’s that girl?” she said. “Sophia, you here?”

  The baby bounced on Michelle’s shoulder, reaching out a hand to Talba. Talba greeted the adults quickly, eager to relieve Michelle of her wriggling little burden. Miz Clara went in the kitchen to make some gravy, and in a little bit, Talba returned the baby and followed to make a salad. Miz Clara wasn’t big on salads, but Talba and Michelle were, so she sometimes went along with it. In all innocence, Sophia had made everybody more accommodating.

  When they were all seated—Sophia in
a high chair that Miz Clara had bought for just such occasions—Miz Clara turned to Corey to “ask the blessin’.” This sometimes annoyed and embarrassed Talba, but it was one of those accommodations. For one thing, the custom wasn’t her own, but she had other objections—first the paternalism of having it done by the ranking male; second, the long-windedness of said male. Unable to confine himself to gratitude for the food, Corey always used the occasion to thank God for everything from good weather to little Sophia’s perfect fingers and toes. Talba half expected him one day to express his thanks for the fortuitous illnesses that he treated so lucratively, but it wasn’t tonight. Tonight, he was waxing fulsome, if not particularly eloquent, about New Orleans being spared from the hurricane, making much of driving rain and merciless wind, when someone banged on the door.

  Not merely knocked, but banged as if they were serving a warrant. Corey stopped in mid-appreciation. Miz Clara exclaimed, “Oh, Lord, it’s the po-lice!” and shrank into her chair. Corey pushed back his own chair, his face grim, but Talba was faster. Whoever it was had to be there for her.

  And it couldn’t be good news.

  Instead of flinging open the door, she mustered as much calm as she could. “Who is it?” she asked quietly.

  “Talba? It’s Janessa.”

  Talba opened the door a crack. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “I gotta talk to you.”

  “Well, now’s not the time. And this certainly isn’t the place.”

  “It’s an emergency.”

  “Everything all right?” Corey called.

  “It’s somebody for me,” Talba said. “Y’all go ahead.” She slipped out the door and closed it behind her. “Janessa, are you crazy? My family’s in there.”

  Too late, she realized her gaffe. Janessa teared up. “Well, I’m ya sister.”

  “You’re not my mother’s daughter. Do you know how much it would hurt her to find out about you like this? What are you thinking of, coming here like this?” Then something occurred to her—her address was deliberately unlisted. “How’d you know where I live, anyhow?”

  Janessa stuck out her lip. “I just know.”

  “You’ve been following me, haven’t you? I didn’t know you even had a car.”

  “Borrowed Coreen’s,” the girl said.

  “They call it stalking. You know that, don’t you?”

  “You my sister! I got a right.”

  The door swung open. Corey, who wasn’t tall, seemed to loom over the two women. “What’s going on out here?”

  “This is my business, Corey. Let me handle it.” She prayed Janessa would keep her mouth shut. Corey stood rooted in the doorway. Talba turned back to him and raised her voice to her brother, something she’d rarely done in her life: “I said I can handle it myself.”

  “You don’t look to me like you can.”

  “Corey, you don’t know what you’re doing. Come on, Janessa.” She grabbed her sister’s arm and frogmarched her toward her car. A light drizzle was just beginning.

  Something in her tone must have finally gotten through to Corey. He slammed the door, furious.

  The danger over, Talba slid to a stop, poised to continue dressing down the girl. But Janessa said, “That my brother?” Her face was so pinched with longing that Talba’s attention turned abruptly from the other Wallises. Suddenly she felt immeasurably sorry for the girl.

  “Yes. That’s Corey, and he’s a doctor, and he’s your brother and you’ll love him. Oh, Janessa, I’m so sorry this had to happen! I really want you to know Corey, and my mama and all of us—but we’ve got to time it right, or everybody’ll be hurt.”

  For the first time, Janessa looked ashamed. “I didn’t think. I don’t know why I came here. Shoulda known!” Her face scrunched up with the effort not to cry.

  But Talba knew why she’d come. Janessa wanted in. She wanted to claim the family she’d never known—possibly causing it immeasurable trouble and pain in the process. And who could blame her? It was what Talba wanted for her. But it wasn’t something she could deal with right now. She’d have to eventually, but not now. She said, “Talk to me. What’s the emergency?”

  “Rashad call.”

  “He did? When?”

  “While ago. But that ain’ the first time he call. First he call this mornin’, cryin’ over Cassie. See, he ain’ know about Cassie. He saw it on the news, in the paper, somethin’, but he don’t know much. He think I know more. He call to find out if I do.”

  Talba writhed with frustration. “Janessa, the point is not what you know, it’s what he knows. If he said he didn’t know about Cassie, that means he did know about Allyson. Did he say anything about that?”

  Her sister looked thoroughly surprised. “Well, no. He didn’t.”

  Talba sighed. “All right then. What’d you tell him?”

  “Told him I didn’t know any more than he did. Said the police thought maybe I did it, maybe he did. Told all about being arrested.”

  “You weren’t arrested. Did you ask him where he is?”

  “He didn’t say.” She wore a stubborn look that meant even if he had, she wasn’t going to admit it.

  “What about the second time he called. What’d he say then?”

  “Say somebody shot at him.”

  “Shot at him? Or shot him?”

  She thought about it. “Don’t think they got him. He didn’t say nothin’ ’bout that. Say he real scared, don’t know what to do.”

  Talba wondered if Rashad had even called. Janessa was quickly revealing herself as a drama queen. Maybe she’d made the whole thing up just as an excuse to bust in on Talba at home. “Did you tell him to go to the nearest police station?”

  Janessa had the grace to look guilty. “No’m, I didn’t. I say I talk to you, see what you say. He say he call back later. Didn’t leave no number or nothin’.”

  Her sister had never called her “ma’am” before. Talba took it as a sign of good faith. “He’s got to turn himself in,” she said. “I’ll call Eddie. You stay here for a minute. Got that, Janessa? Here. Don’t come inside.”

  Her sister looked at the ground, shamefaced. “That ain’ no way to treat family.”

  It was true and Talba knew it. But this wasn’t the time for grand opera on the family front. She put a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Look, we’ve got an emergency here. Let’s deal with that okay? I didn’t look you up at Eve’s Weaves so I could treat you badly. We just have to get our timing down. Can you be patient?”

  Sullenly, Janessa nodded. Talba really couldn’t wait to turn her over to her mother. With a little exposure to Miz Clara, she predicted a rapid improvement in the girl’s manners.

  Talba went back in the house to get her cell phone. At the sound of the door opening, Miz Clara stood up, put her hands on her hips, and demanded, “Sandra Wallis, what’s goin’ on here?”

  “It’s a client Mama. I’m sorry, y’all, but I’ve got to take care of business.”

  She had used the universal masculine phrase for, “Don’t bother me. This is more important than petty domestic matters.” But apparently it didn’t work as well for mere younger sisters. When she started to her room, Corey stood up, too.

  “Sandra, this is inexcusable.”

  Talba saw red. “What Corey? Exactly what is inexcusable?”

  “Crazy people invading your mama’s peaceful home. We’ve got a baby in here, girl. What do you think you’re doing?”

  “I’ve got a client that’s a little upset, Corey. She came here uninvited and for that I apologize, but I will not tolerate your patronizing paternalism.” She regretted the alliteration immediately, even before Miz Clara said, “Hmmph. You talkin’ just like one o’ ya poems.” But at least her mother seemed defused.

  To Talba’s surprise, Michelle stepped in. “Let’s eat, shall we? Corey, she’s a grown woman.” Disgruntled, Corey sat down. Even Miz Clara sat, though not before delivering another loud “Hmmph.”

  Talba retrieved he
r phone and a light jacket. Seeing Laments lying on her desk, she picked it up, too, stabbed by a pang of guilt at not having thoroughly perused it. “I’m really sorry about this,” she said on her way out. “Sophia, Auntie loves you.”

  Hearing her name, the baby looked up, smiled, rocked in her chair, and banged on her plate.

  Talba closed the door and punched Eddie’s programmed number as she walked back to the driveway, where Janessa waited meekly.

  His wife answered. “Hey, Audrey, it’s Talba. Hope I’m not interrupting dinner.”

  “Eddie just finished. You want him? Take him.” It was her little joke. Unlike Eddie, Audrey and Angie seemed to thoroughly approve of Talba.

  Eddie came on. “Whatcha got?”

  “Janessa heard from Rashad. He said someone’s shooting at him.”

  “Oh, Lord. Where’s he at?”

  “Neglected to mention.”

  She didn’t say the rest for fear Janessa would hear, but Eddie supplied it. “So the story goes.”

  “Right. Says she told him she’d consult with us about what to do. I said, tell him to turn himself in.”

  “You did right. Did you call the police?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Do it—just to get it on the record. Get that book of his—”

  “I’ve already got it.”

  “Okay, bring it to the office. I’m going to biker bars tonight, but tell ya what… I’m gonna try somethin’ first. I’ll try to meet ya there in a little while, but if I don’t make it, don’t get upset.”

  “Okay if I take Janessa to dinner first?”

  “Sure.”

  “The cell phone’ll be on.” She slipped it in her backpack. “Okay, Janessa, here’s where I start acting like a sister. You hungry?”

  The girl brightened. “Can we go to Commander’s Palace?” The fanciest place in town.

  “We’re not dressed for it. I know a Jamaican joint that has reggae. Want to check it out?”

  “How about Houston’s? I never been to Houston’s.”

  “Sure.”

  Usually Talba avoided restaurants that dealt in the kind of super-size portions notorious for sparking the obesity epidemic. But with its low light and hospitable feel, its familiar goodies like barbecue and burgers, Houston’s proved the perfect choice—luxurious enough, but not so alien it made Janessa uncomfortable. She was visibly impressed to be there. Talba congratulated herself; maybe she was making progress in the bonding arena.