by Elyse Lortz
I thanked him curtly, my fingers flitting near my pockets as I turned abruptly and stalked out the door. It is a forbidden thing to look over one’s shoulder; a sin to Lot’s wife and degradation of all human sanity. Shadows lurk beneath one’s heel, though they hide well. Even windows become eyes when the heart is not willing to stand alone in a world to which it does not belong. I wondered how long he would stand there with his hand outstretched in the most common form in the art of money making.
Begging.
I DID NOT ATTEMPT TO follow the man’s directions, for the only thing one ought to do with such advice is to pass it off to someone who believes a broken match is the equivalent of a burning candle. The heat of the sun was doubled by the pavement that insisted on crumbling away at the most inconvenient places. The heavy stench of exhaust felt thick on my tongue, far thicker than one of Keane’s cigarettes and infinitely less appealing. One can find the oddest people in such places; the endless stream of people aiming their cameras at most anything, the men with their tinted glasses, the women strutting about like disillusioned film stars. And then there was another person—the faintest glimpse of a shadow—that was constantly appearing among the crowds. I stopped and allowed the bobbing hat to catch up and stared into a face I knew, and which, in a moment, recognized me.
“Joanna?” She gasped. “Joanna, is that you?”
Ruth Woodsworth, one of my few ties to America that had found me. We had been schoolmates, she and I, though ‘friendship’ might be too broad of a word to truly emphasise our brief acquaintanceship those final months before I left for England. She was the iconic sort of female posted across billboards; slender, fair skinned, and that blonde mass of hair scorched by curlers.
Iconic, but with the obnoxious resemblance to a plastic doll.
Cheap.
“Yes, Ruth. It’s me.” I said calmly as her eyes drilled holes into the scars accumulated over years of adventure.
“Gosh, you haven’t changed a bit.” She noted with something edging near distaste. Of course I had not changed. She was right about that. My hair was still a short, curly mass of a color deceptively near to that of wet sand, and, unlike the makeup meticulously spotting her face, I had never made an effort to conceal my ruddy complexion. She wagged her head. “Still into leather jackets and men’s clothes, huh, Joanna?”
“You might say that. And my name is still Jo.” A quick feminine giggle bubbled into the air.
“Gosh, yes. I remember you giving Tommy Tanner a black eye for using your full name. You don’t do that anymore, do you?”
“Only when necessary.” Ten to one she thought I was joking.
“And what brings you back to the old country? Got tired of England? Or trying to get into show business?”
“None of the above. I came with a friend. And you? I thought you said you were never leaving Ohio; farm country turned industrial, or something like that.” Her hand flew into the air, revealing a gold band.
Ah.
Marriage.
“Guess Mr. Right just didn’t follow my plans. Now, is this friend of yours . . .” Ruth wiggled her eyebrows.
“God, no. Only friends.” Her brow fell disappointedly. I had seen that look before, but more often from those relations shoved into my past, rather than an acquaintance from over a decade ago.
“I swear, Jo, you’re going to turn into an old maid. Is that what you want? Oh, that’s right, you always said you would never marry unless he had—What was it you said? Oh, it doesn’t matter. You always did like the idea of being some old spinster.”
“I prefer ‘bachelor’. ‘Spinster’ sounds like a damn spider.” Her eyes grew wide for an instant before that tedious giggle again surfaced.
“Well, if you ever do marry, he had better be a sailor. My Robert would never put up with language like that. He is such a wonderful man. We should all go out some time. I’m sure he’d get a kick out of you.” Not if I kicked him first.
“That sounds grand, but, like I said, I’m here with a friend and it wouldn’t be right if I just abandoned him.” Not that I could anyway. He had already abandoned me to save his other friend.
At my insistence, of course.
Ruth smiled.
“Of course you can bring him along if you want. The more the merrier. And I want to meet this mystery man.” Again an edge was laid to the words I did not appreciate. I could make no note of it; however, before Ruth had spun off again. “Say, how about you and I go get something to eat right now. Coffee alright? Or would you rather tea? I have a few hours before I need to finish my shopping, and Bobby wouldn’t mind a speck if I took just a little longer. A girl needs her friends, don’t you know?” In truth, I hadn’t known. But, of course, that made no difference. Her fingernails dug into my jacket as she began hauling me down the pulsating streets, tittering on all the while. “I think it’s wonderful you came back, Jo. Bobby would think so too. You’d like Bobby. He’s smart—real smart—went to college and everything. Or do you call it university now? They didn’t take him for the war though. Said his feet were all wrong. Something like that, anyway. I’ve seen his feet plenty of times. They look fine. But you’d never see me parading like a turkey in one of those uniforms. I mean honestly, do you really think they’d want Bobby for the war anyway? They can take all the dirty men off the street, so why should they want good, educated men?” I held my tongue. Keane had discussed the same topic frequently, but our shared opinions had never crossed this threshold so near the brink of immorality. Why should educated men be spared? The man in the firearm factory was just as valuable as a daft scholar. A great deal more so even.
Ruth hardly stopped for a breath before continuing. “I mean, gosh, if you want a lot of men, get the ones who aren’t working. Lucky they didn’t get Bobby. Do you know what he does for a living? Insurance. Makes a lot of money off of it too. Of course, I’m not like Penelope Hasselhemmer. Do you remember her? She was a dirty cow for some of the things she used to say. She was so stuck up about money and things, just because her parents were rich. Well I am not like that. Gosh, if she saw me now she’d take back all those things she said about my clothes in an instant. I bet she doesn’t have a new car. And I know she doesn’t live in California because I haven’t seen her.”
“This is only Los Angeles.”
“Only Los Angeles? All sorts of big Hollywood stars live around here.”
“Do they indeed?”
“Gosh, yes. Just last week I saw—Oh, look, we’re here.”
‘Here’ was the ground floor of, what I could only imagine to be, a women's club. Unfortunately, where the gentlemen were content with tobacco smoke, newspapers, liquor, and billiards, these women seemed prone to prattle endlessly over pots of tepid coffee. As Ruth led me through the well-lit room, I caught a few snippets of conversations that would no doubt be of great use to the political leaders of our separate countries.
“ . . . and little Tim and teething still . . .”
“ . . . hear about Madeline Shoemaker’s party? Fell to pieces. I think she is having problems with her husband too . . .”
“ . . . but if you smear butter on that . . .”
“ . . . poor Tim was crying through the whole night . . .”
“ . . . or if they devorce . . .”
“ . . . the butter melts and . . .”
As it happened, I did not give a fig about a little Tim, nor a crumbling marriage, nor, thank God, what to do with butter. I was; however, infinitely disappointed that these women, the children of those brave suffragettes, would so willingly relinquish their progress and slowly crawl back to the impending stereotypes. It was their safe haven—their blanket—and ought to have been ripped away back when the 19th amendment took hold.
Ruth stopped and sat down at a table already occupied by a woman swaddled in the latest fashions and absolutely reeking of peppermints. How fitting it was then when Ruth introduced her to me as Mrs. Candace Caine. Better known to her friends as ‘Candy’. As she sh
ook my hand daintily, I noticed her eyes flickering toward my other five fingers.
“No ring, honey?” Her voice, unlike her name, was heavy and unwelcome upon one’s ears.
“No. Nor am I married.”
“Oh, too bad. Are you English? You sound English. You must know a lot of handsome boys over there.” I assured her I did not.
“Jo is here with a friend.” I did not appreciate Ruth’s added inflection to the final word, but Mrs. Caine positively swallowed it.
“A friend? Well, that’s different. I’m all for modern girls. Wish I’d had an affair or two before I married.” I shuddered. What a laugh Keane would get out of all this.
At my expense, of course.
“He’s only a business colleague. A professor, actually.”
“How romantic! I read last week that professors can make the best lovers.”
“I wouldn’t know.” Just as Keane would never know of this conversation. “And what is it you do, Mrs. Caine?”
“Do?” She laughed, a rough, dirty screech. “I’m married, honey. I don’t have anything more than that. Why? Don’t tell me you’re a professor too.” You would have thought intelligence a fatal disease from the over exaggeration of syllables flung distastefully from her mouth.
“No, a writer.” A coffee glass shattered on the floor. Mrs. Caine appeared unaware of the fact, gradually floating upwards toward the conversation’s surface, as though my chosen profession had dragged her under.
“Ah. A writer. Well, I suppose we need those. Don’t we, Ruth?”
I DEPARTED FROM THE pair of vocational wives soon after, though it was not so much a departure as a retreat to the sanity of solitude. As evening had alighted upon the tips of buildings, the higher classes had dissipated with the sun and made room for those energetic night lives to make their appearance. It was rather like a ballet; when one group exits, another pulls the full attention of the audience until that first is hidden safe behind the curtains. They were comfortable there; hidden behind a shroud of duties and expectations.
And yet, I was not.
I stopped briefly at some obscure restaurant in the hopes of a cup of tea, but found none. Instead, they made a liquid with the same name, though the taste resembled a handful of lawn grass boiled in a pot of sewage. Liquid sewage perhaps, but even the form could not improve the horrid odour reeking from the glass. I took two sips, paid my bill, and was off again toward my room at the hotel, where I fell asleep moments after hitting the bed.
The following morning I was vaguely aware of an ache in my lower abdomen that only increased as I bathed and dressed myself for the day. It was a feeling I had felt several times throughout the course of my life and possibly more than the average person of twenty-four years.
Hunger.
I did up the laces of my shoes, grabbed my jacket, and was out the door in a matter of seconds. The morning air was heavy with fresh exhaust and the streets cluttered with the bodies of a few drunkards who had not made it to shelter during the night. Men in freshly pressed business suits pummeled the pavement with their well-polished shoes, while women shuffled about with armloads of shopping bags. Such was the life they chose to live.
Such was the life I was working so desperately to avoid.
My legs pulled me back to Dilly’s Diner, which had few customers in spite of the breakfast hour. I slipped onto the same stool as last time and began glancing over the menu when an enormous clatter erupted somewhere off to my right and an object was suddenly hurling toward my head. In a burst of animalistic instinct, my hand immediately shot up into the air and grasped the glass between my fingers. The weight of it brought me back into reality just in time to realise I had an audience greater than just the boy apologizing profusely as he began to sweep up the other glass shards spotting the floor like a minefield. This second person was leaning over the counter with his different colored eyes staring at me with a newfound respect.
“If it isn’t Jo Lawrence. Hey, you didn’t tell me you could catch like that.” I pulled the menu up to my nose.
“Good morning, Frank. Now, I think I’ll have—”
“—What a catch. Can you throw too?” I laid the paper on the counter, inadvertently brushing the glass I had left cautiously beside it.
“I suppose so. Why?”
“Well, see, me and the guys have this little group that gets together and plays ball every afternoon after we get off work. A lot of them are good enough to be in the majors. We are playing today, or at least we were before Clark Martin sprained his ankle sliding into second. Nothing too bad, but he’s off it a whole eight days and—” A spark shot across the young man’s different colored eyes. “Hey, are you doing anything this week? I mean, I know we usually don’t invite girls to play—in fact we never have—but I think the team would be alright with you. Heck, what does being a girl matter when you can catch better than half of them on a good day. So what do you say? The park? Today at one?” I sighed. At least he wasn’t asking me to do something annoyingly feminine. In fact, he was opening a gate no other woman would walk. I grinned and picked up the menu.
“I’ll be there. Now, about breakfast . . .”
I DID INDEED GO TO the park that afternoon. It was a grand establishment, the diamond well-kept in spite of all other filth in the world. ‘The boys’, as Frank constantly referred to them, were the finest example of America’s melting pot as a foreigner could find. Dino Crocieti, the son of Italian immigrants and whose father was a barber just down the street, was an excellent outfielder.. John Logan, who went by Jackie after his baseball hero, was the catcher. Then there was Ned and Ben on first and second base. I was to take Clark’s place at the third.
I will not dissolution myself in saying I am a grand player of the sport, but my knowledge of it assisted me greatly as I participated in throwing the ball with a strength that made a few jaws drop every now and again. We played, not for a want to demolish each other into the dust (though that did occur frequently) but for the love of the game. And when one loves a game as those boys did baseball, life itself may then be reflected.
They had done what the world had so often failed to do. They had created themselves out of the minorities to create a team that might have had a chance at the majors. And I had completed it as an incredible young man had completed the Dodgers. Only, this time, it was not the barrier of race being torn from its hinges, but the divide separating the strength of the male, and the assumed fragility of the female.
And I had done it in one, sound crack.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
SUNDAY PASSED WITH the ease of a winged chariot and Monday approached with an ungodly fury. Helios had biden me well on those days, for he was indeed out; streaking across the sky and banning clouds of impending rain. All was well in the world. I had managed to choke out the first, faint glimpse of plots for a series of short essays considering the advantages of bachelor life in comparison to an existence tied indefinitely to a man. It was a fine idea, I thought, and one I ought to have begun on that very day. However, I thought it best to gain the knowledge of a person who had earned a doctorate in that profession of bachelorhood.
And for that I needed Keane.
In light of his absence, I spent the next few days memorizing the length and breadth of every street, absorbing the society I had left in my past and wallowing in the deep wealth of a library’s walls. Even so, I grew exceptionally bored as time limped by, something I had not known to take effect until one afternoon when I struck out at bat for the third time that day. This would not have been a great surprise if I had not proved my merit the day before through several, well-placed homers. The boys said nothing, but the shame of my failings fell heavily upon my shoulders. I could feel them cringe as I stepped up to the plate for the last time that day, but it is so often in the dusk of our greatest failures that our finest successes take root. I hit a triple play and went back to the hotel exceptionally pleased with myself and ready for a long, luxurious, hot bath.
&n
bsp; But of course, my wishes were not to be promptly fulfilled when the infamous hotel clerk came barreling at me the moment I entered into the lobby, his arms flailing like a madman.
“What kind of establishment do you think this is?” My shoulders immediately stiffened.
“I beg your pardon?”
“This is a respectable place, and don’t think I’m not about to stand by and let you have a man up in your room. Yes, a man. He said he was your uncle from Stubenville, but no one’s gonna pull a fast one on me. If he’s your uncle, I’m your aunt.” An uncle? It was true I had several relations from my birthplace; several of which were uncles, with only a few aunts.
Though it seemed I had another.
“Well then, Aunt, allow me to assure you that the man is indeed my uncle and I have asked him to come and review a great inheritance. He is a solicitor, after all, who studies the law, as well as . . .” What my association with the law began, the prospect of such a sound sum of money soon completed. The coward bowed aside and allowed me to charge up the steps, two at a time, until I entered the correct door and instantly came face to face with the light scent of cigarette smoke.
The man had dragged the desk chair to the furthest corner of the room and stretched his long legs out upon the carpet. I threw my jacket on the bed and grinned widely at my supposed relation.
“Hello, Uncle.”
“Good afternoon, Lawrence. Or should I say Miss Fiona O’Brian? That was a fancy bit of trickery there, but nothing too challenging. Can it be that your imagination is falling short of its usual standards?” There was such a lightness to his voice—a rhythmic easiness—that quickly became the equivalent of a great howl of laughter. The latter of which, I quickly supplied.
“God, Keane, it has been exceptionally dull without you around.” He cocked a grey eyebrow; a cloud raised over the watery blue.
