Memphis Noir

by Laureen Cantwell

  “What’s up?” he asked. “Is the stallion acting up?”

  “No sir, I just called to see if you were on your way out east.”

  “You know I’m at the tennis tournament with Cookie all week. Why would I be heading home before the evening match even starts?”

  “Well, I went to the Belmont to pick up something for my supper,” Nathanial said. “And I saw Miss Cookie seated at the bar, holding court with a young man. I assumed you’d be joining her shortly, sir.”

  Translation: your wife is cheating, and I want to tell you so that you don’t lose face. Justin gripped the cell phone tighter. Message understood.

  “Oh, she’s doing her liaison work,” he said breezily. “I expect she’ll be back here soon.”

  * * *

  The Belmont Grill was more family restaurant than dive bar, but it was the seamiest place East Memphis had to offer. Still, it at least had a bit of atmosphere. The building was ramshackle-looking without being decrepit, and the lights were kept low. Strings of Christmas lights wove across the ceiling.

  Cookie signaled the bartender to bring her another lemon drop martini. Trygve rubbed her knee. “You sure you want another drink? We could leave and make our own party.”

  “Come on, isn’t this fun? I don’t want to spend the whole week locked in your hotel room.” Like staying with Justin, night after night, trapped in the golden birdcage they called home.

  “That sounds good to me,” Trygve said, pulling her closer. His ice-blue eyes seemed to pierce her soul, or at least some of her naughtier bits.

  She giggled and pulled away. “Well, aren’t you sweet? Maybe we’d better go. There are too many people here anyway.” She drained her fresh martini while Trygve paid the tab.

  She allowed him to rest his arm on her shoulder as they made their way to the exit. The door banged open, and Justin stormed in. He stopped, apparently surprised to encounter them at the door.

  “What are you doing here with him?” he demanded. “You’re supposed to be at the tournament. Your big ‘promotion,’ remember?”

  “Justin, lower your voice! Let’s not make a scene!”

  But a scene appeared to be precisely what Justin wanted, because he made a big one. By the time Cookie convinced the bartender to cancel his 911 call, hustled the two men out the door, and separated them, she was exhausted. Trygve and Justin had been eager to fight, a ridiculous thought considering the younger man’s greater strength.

  After a short and silent ride home, Cookie exited Justin’s car, not even waiting for him to open the door for her. Before she could storm off to the sanctuary of the guest bedroom, he grabbed her arm and spun her around.

  “I won’t be made a cuckold,” he said.

  “Who even talks like that?” she shot back. “Welcome to the modern era. You don’t own me, you know.”

  “Bought and paid for,” he said. “Don’t you forget it.”

  She tried a more conciliatory tack: “Look, Justin, I’m sorry you’re upset. You have to understand, nothing happened with Trygve and me. We’re just friends. Give him a chance, and I’m sure you’ll like him too.” She touched his chest. “Come on, let’s head up to bed.”

  She was able to lead him to their bedroom. By the time Justin fell asleep, she may even have convinced him of her loyalty.

  * * *

  Justin found his seat Thursday night before the first of the quarterfinal matches began. Buddy leaned back and tapped Justin on the knee, startling him. Justin pasted on a hearty smile and greeted the sheriff and his wife.

  “I heard what happened at the Belmont,” Buddy said softly. June affected interest in her program. “You come to me if you need to talk, you hear? Don’t let this situation get out of control.”

  He’d been warned, Justin knew. He said nothing.

  “He’s a cocky S.O.B., I’ll give you that,” Buddy continued. “You see that interview with him in the Commercial Appeal?”

  Justin shook his head. Please, God, let the newspaper not have covered Trygve’s extracurricular activities.

  “That Norwegian boy claimed his name means ‘Brave Victory’ or some such horseshit and that he was going to win this whole tournament. Doesn’t lack for confidence, does he?”

  * * *

  “You sure you want to ride?” Cookie asked. “What if you break your arm? You’ve got to play tomorrow.” She already regretted abandoning her duties. If Justin discovered she wasn’t at the tournament, he’d kick her out for sure.

  “I won’t get hurt. I’m a real American cowboy.”

  “Okay, if you say so. But you’ll have to ride the stallion.” She hoped the horse had settled in enough for an inexperienced rider. “You know what, why don’t we just head back and watch the tournament? You have a big day tomorrow.”

  “I am stallion. I am going to have a big day tonight.”

  Cookie gave up arguing with him and set to work saddling the horse. Nathanial’s job, normally, but tonight was his night off. She’d lead the stallion on foot. Considering how the Norwegian clung to the saddle horn, he wasn’t ready to ride on his own.

  When they returned, she groomed the stallion and stored the tack while Trygve explored the barn. He called to her from the hayloft: “Cookie, come up here!”

  She climbed the ladder to the loft and laughed when she poked her head through the opening. Trygve lay sprawled, buck naked, on a horse blanket.

  “You hoping for a roll in the hay?” she asked.

  “Roll? Yes, come here, and we will roll.” He held out his hands invitingly and Cookie joined him, though she knew the hay would be unbearably dusty and itchy. Trygve had great enthusiasm and energy for everything he did, whether it was playing tennis or making love.

  Afterward, he propped himself up and brushed her hair back. “You are beautiful, and you are mine. Leave tonight, and come with me.”

  She turned to him, eyes wide. “Trygve, I can’t. You know that. I have a very comfortable life here. I can’t just throw it all away.”

  “You can because you love me.”

  “Look,” she said, searching for the words to explain. “This is like a summer romance.”

  “It is winter.”

  “Granted, but my point is this is just a holiday romance. Haven’t you had fun while you’re here? Just think of all this,” here she gestured to include their naked bodies, “as part of our famous Southern hospitality.”

  He scowled. “I am a toy for you? I want you to come to my home.”

  “You knew I was married,” she said. She sat up and gathered her clothes, pressing them to her chest.

  “You do not love him.” He said this as if it mattered.

  “I love the life we have together, Trygve. I have no intention of leaving my husband to join forces with a tennis hopeful. What kind of security is that?”

  “When I win, I will earn big prizes.”

  “And if you get injured, what’s your backup plan?” She slid into her panties and slacks. They were covered in hay, but there was nothing she could do about that now.

  He looked genuinely puzzled. “I do not need a backup plan. Tennis will not be over for me.”

  She fastened her bra behind her. “You are so immature, Trygve.”

  He sprang to his feet, naked, and grabbed her shoulders. “Do not call me this. You make love to me, but it is only a game to you?” He shook her. “I will tell your husband about us, and you will lose everything.”

  He shoved her, knocking her off her feet. Trygve loomed, a wild look in his eyes, and Cookie realized how little she knew of this man-child.

  She scrambled up and seized a pitchfork from the floor.

  Trygve laughed. “Come! Are you going to hit me? You love me.”

  She circled him. “Leave. I don’t want to see you again.”

  He rushed her, forcing her to step back. “You will leave with me. We can stay at my hotel. I will win the tournament for us.” He grabbed for her hand.

  Cookie drove him back. The
torrent of sounds that streamed from his mouth were presumably Norwegian expletives.

  He tried to grab the pitchfork’s handle, but Cookie aimed it at his bare chest. Trygve narrowed his eyes. “Bitch!”

  She lowered the pitchfork to a more sensitive target, and Trygve took another step back. Cookie didn’t notice the open trapdoor until Trygve’s right foot landed on empty air.

  The stallion in the barn below shrieked, and Cookie heard the tattoo of its hooves. When she looked down, she saw Trygve’s crumpled body. She glanced at her shaking hands and dropped the pitchfork.

  She needed a plan, fast.

  This was all Justin’s fault. If he weren’t such a control freak, she wouldn’t have to sneak around. If he were someone she could love, she wouldn’t want to sneak around. If he went to jail, she could do as she pleased.

  That was a plan.

  Cookie glanced at her watch. The evening’s match should have ended by now. Justin would be home soon. He wouldn’t waste time, as he called it, socializing.

  Okay, she had to focus. She began noting what needed to be done. One: finish dressing. Two: grab Justin’s work jacket from the house and put it in the barn. Three: hustle to the tournament and help close up for the night, making sure to greet as many people as she could. Four: establish a story explaining how Justin and Trygve ended up in the barn. Five: explain Trygve’s nudity.

  “Cookie? Are you in here?” Justin’s voice called from the barn door.

  She swore and grabbed her shirt and pulled it over her head. Swearing again, she pulled it back off and turned it right-side out and put it on again.

  “Oh, honey,” she called from the hayloft, “wait for me downstairs. It’s been horrible!” Her tears took little effort to manufacture.

  By the time she scrambled down the ladder, dusty and disheveled, Justin had discovered Trygve’s body. His very dead and very naked body. He’d also secured the stallion into its stall.

  Justin turned to Cookie. She found his silence unnerving.

  She spun him a tale, a tale of her plying her liaison duties by showing Trygve a real American stable. Of encouraging him in his tennis career. Of getting him an hour or two away from the high-stress tournament atmosphere.

  In her version, Trygve said he’d discovered an old trunk in the hayloft. “I just wanted to know what was in it,” she said, in tears, “but when I got up here, he raped me.” She lifted her sleeve to show Justin the marks where Trygve had gripped her.

  “Help me! We’ll drape his body over one of the horses and take him up to the cave. No one will ever know. And then we’ll burn the barn.”

  Justin’s calm frightened her more than anything. “That’s a brilliant plan, Cookie, but listen up. Here’s how it’s going to be. I’m going to stand by your side. We can make this work. We can’t be forced to testify against each other.”

  He circled Cookie as he spoke, examining her as if she were a particularly troublesome bond issue.

  “I don’t like the rape story. I won’t have our friends looking at you like that. They’ll assume you lured him here. Believe it or not, your reputation isn’t as unassailable as you might think.”

  Cookie opened her mouth to protest then thought better of it.

  “You’re going to quit the tournament after this year, understood? No more ‘liaisoning.’ No more mixed doubles.”

  “I don’t need your help, you know,” Cookie responded. “It’s not like I killed him. That sorry hunk of horseflesh you insisted on buying killed him, not me.”

  “Try to use your head for once,” Justin said in that oh-so-patient voice Cookie hated. “I spent the evening watching the tournament with the sheriff and his wife. I bet your whereabouts are less established, am I right?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “So we’re going to say that I saw you periodically at the tournament and that we even ate a hot dog together during one of the breaks. That way, my alibi covers you too. This one,” he said, nudging Trygve’s arm with his shoe, “broke into our barn because he’s been stalking you. We’ll put his clothes down here, like he was waiting for you naked.”

  He rubbed his hands in satisfaction. “We left the tournament together, came home, found him here when we decided to go for a ride. Got it?”

  She nodded.

  “By the way, my lawyer will have a postnuptial agreement ready for your signature tomorrow.”

  Cookie allowed herself to be sent into the house to change. Her golden birdcage, now a tarnished trap, seemed even smaller than before.

  Mother

  by EHI IKE

  Germantown

  It’s been a few years now, but I’m older. I have spent more time trying to understand it: our culture.

  As a girl born into wealth, I’ve met some interesting people—people who have worked for my father, schoolmates from other wealthy families, cousins, aunts, and uncles. None of them know how to be sane in our environment. None of them understand consideration. They deceive for their own benefit, even my father. I love him, but he’s a part of this depleting way of living that I vow to never be a part of. Then there are people like my teachers, who allow themselves to ignore our snide attitudes, shallow souls, and materialistic way of living and help us, hoping to find a heart. Little do they know, most of our hearts were gone the moment we called our nannies Mama and grew up to treat them like slaves instead of people.

  Lastly, there’s Helen.

  She doesn’t fit into any of the categories; she may have been the most interesting person I ever met. But I never knew her, considering she was my mother and all. My father developed his mailing company, found Helen, and married her, but we never spoke of her side of the family. I was never allowed to ask. So believe me when I say, it is nearly impossible to write about this woman. I was never even told her maiden name.

  I know it sounds quite odd to have never understood the woman who “raised” me, but what needs to be understood is that she never actually did that. The best way to explain is to introduce my childhood.

  I was born November 2, in Baptist Memorial Hospital off Humphreys. I’ve always been a rather independent child—from my parents, that is. My father nearly slept in his suit after long days at work, and Helen was hardly ever around.

  As I got older, I attended the most prestigious private schools Memphis had to offer. An award-winning movie was even based on a family that attended my school. They apparently brought in some poor boy from North Memphis, and he later became this famous football player, but I never knew them. I’m fully aware of the blessed—no, that’s not the word—spoiled life I lived, and the even more spoiled kids around me. Even after that movie was released, envious parents spat hateful words about that family. They were the talk of the school and soon became the talk of the city, but my parents would have never done what they had. Stories like that don’t happen in Germantown.

  My whole childhood I had nannies take care of me. Helen never had to be a mother. She never had to change my diaper, cook for me, or take me to school. Housekeepers and a driver took care of that.

  The first nanny I can remember was Betty. She was always caring; she’s old now, definitely beyond retirement, yet she continues to make these fabulous breakfasts. My favorite was her blueberry pancakes and veggie omelets. I don’t understand how I wasn’t obese those days. She always helped everyone out, like doing laundry. She would pick up my father’s suits and Helen’s dresses from the cleaners. She even cleaned the bedrooms, including mine, but she disciplined me too. She never allowed me to leave the house unless my room was tidy and my homework was completed. She was almost the perfect nanny, perfect mother really, but Betty had her own problems. She never married or had children, and now it was too late for her. Looking back, I understand that no one wants to be that old and alone. At times I felt the cooking, cleaning, and taking care of me—all of it kept her going. It gave her purpose, and Betty was the closest thing to a mother I ever had, even when I’d find her with my father’s bottle of Gran Patrón. My father soon
caught on, but he appreciated Betty. By this point, she was family, and he could never fire her, so he hired Stacy.

  Stacy was much younger than Betty and always helped me with clothes I wanted to wear for school and with boys I had crushes on. She came into my life when I was about thirteen, and I have appreciated her ever since. The only problem with Stacy was she would rarely arrive on time, and if she did, she would fall asleep, sometimes while making my lunch on the weekends. There were many times I saw her sleeping on the living room couch, her head smothered into the cushions as I got ready, but by the afternoon Stacy was perfect. She would help with my homework, and if I went on dates, she would always find the best outfit for me. Sometimes she would even allow me to borrow her clothes. So I had Betty in the morning to fix me breakfasts and Stacy in the afternoon to help with boys. There wasn’t much else I could ask for, except for Bill, of course.

  My driver was always in my life, and I always called him Bill, never knowing if that really was his name or not. I wasn’t certain if he enjoyed his job, but he was always kind, driving me into East Memphis for school and occasionally stopping to take me and my friends to restaurants, when I told my father we were “studying.” Bill constantly worked, and though he was considerate, he hardly ever smiled. There was something admirable about his work ethic, but saddening as well.

  I can’t deny that Betty, Stacy, and Bill played a huge role in my development. Not to say that my father was a bad man, he was just a busy one. He spent most of his time in an office, but he always made an effort to be home for my birthdays, loosening his tie from his cold pale neck as he walked into the kitchen, kissing my forehead and saying, “Happy birthday, love.” He attended many of my plays and horse shows too, which was more than I could say for many of my friends’ parents . . . and Helen.

  It’s not that I never saw my mother. She just never saw me. When I was younger, I tried getting her attention. I was a strange kid, putting on shows for my parents of songs I had written or dances I had created. I would do this in the family room with Betty watching with her eyes big in false awe, but Helen would never watch. Her eyes would be moving and all, but mostly as she turned the pages of her Vogue magazine, occasionally looking up. That magazine gave her more than I ever could. So, as I got older, I decided I didn’t need her attention. I stopped trying, and soon after my father apparently did too.