Checker and the Derailleurs Page 6

  “Where is Checker Secretti?”

  A shadow cut the length of the club.

  “What you want with Check?” braved J.K., whose voice sounded strangely high for a 210-pound bass player.

  “His ass in my glassworks.”

  She stepped into the light and the whole band subtly recoiled. Even Eaton wasn’t inclined to say anything smart and private-school. Once more the woman was in her apron and earthy, ancient, unwashed clothes. She hadn’t bothered with a coat, nor had she taken off her dark glasses. Her hair, askew as usual, glittered with sleet. She appeared like the Wicked Witch of the West and Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother all wrapped into one enthralling but appalling creature. You did not know whose side she was on.

  “He got business,” said J.K.

  “He has business with me,” Syria boomed. “You tell him he’s late. You tell him I don’t have time to chase him down in his little clubhouse. You tell him he shows or I throw him in with the next load of cullet. Got that?”

  “Cullet,” Caldwell repeated softly.

  “What?”

  “Check taught us the word yesterday,” he explained meekly. “Broken glass.”

  “My, my,” said Syria. “A for the day, rock star.” She stopped and looked down at him. “You’re cute.”

  “Thank you,” said Caldwell formally.

  “You tell your drummer friend, one more hour, he’s fired.”

  Bang. She vanished.

  “The Towering Inferno!” exclaimed Caldwell.

  They marveled over the apparition until Checker returned.

  When told of his employer’s visit, Checker seemed pleased. Before he hurried out again, Check assured the band that Rachel was all right now—once more, air had been turned to branches.

  “Sorry I’m late,” Checker panted. “I had a problem.”

  “What do you know about problems?”

  “Plenty.”

  She took off her glasses, sifting Checker up and down through a queer mesh; her eyes were green. She seemed to see him differently from other people. Checker felt exposed, and pulled his jacket closed, raising its collar around his neck.

  “Sweep.” She handed him a broom.

  “When do I get to work with the glass?” Check shouted. All their conversation was loud. It had to be. The roar of the furnace was voracious.

  She didn’t answer, and from then on, apart from giving him orders, she ignored him completely. Once again she was at her own work, which soon sufficiently absorbed her that she didn’t notice he’d run out of things to do. Checker settled quietly behind her to watch.

  Syria gathered a lump of molten glass, then swung the pipe like a pendulum until the glob elongated; it cooled and darkened, and she returned it to the top of the furnace, propping the pipe on a stand and rolling it in quick, regular circles until the shaft was warm again. She repeated this process until the glass stretched into a rod with a knob on its end; she hung it glass down and made another form like it on a separate pipe. After reheating the first, she plunged the two shafts together, filed into the glass on one pipe, and cracked it off clean with a rap on the metal. Though working with a huge amount of material that must have been heavy, she manipulated the now three-foot-long piece like balsa wood, swinging it with grace and, he could see, pleasure, feeling its momentum, finding the fulcrum point on the pipe. All her motions were rapid and sure, without excess; they reminded him of good basketball. They reminded him of good drumming. They reminded him of anything he had ever done right.

  Syria hefted the pipe over to a chair with flat arms and rolled it in front of her with her left palm, all the while shaping the middle knot with a wet wooden cup. Steam rose from the glass, hissing at her touch, a whisper of pain—cold water and hot glass don’t mix, but Syria would marry them, anyway. Checker remembered how she tended his cut: this will hurt but it will heal you. She was a person who would do something terrible for your own good.

  It was only when she’d cracked the shaft into the annealer that Check realized that while he’d been waiting for her to blow a vase, a bowl, she wasn’t making a vessel. She was making a bone.

  At last Checker noticed a dark corner room, and ducked inside to turn on the light. There they were. All over the walls, stacked shelf after shelf: glass bones. Clear, glistening femurs. Ice-blue rib cages, fragile, almost breathing. Strange assemblages of knuckles and kneecaps, like remnants of a mass grave turned mysteriously to crystal—deep sad greens and buried ambers. Some of the longer bones were distorted, curved, as if they were melting.

  Checker felt dizzy. It was like walking into a glass morgue, shuddering and deadly, but beautiful, too, shimmering in the glow of the low-wattage bulb. The walls hurt to look at. Nothing should be that disturbing and that attractive. As his intestines began to gather, he closed the door tightly behind him, like shutting the top of Pandora’s box.

  Checker felt woozy and weaved to a nearby bench.

  “So what was so funny?”

  “What?”

  “When I was working. You laughed.”

  “The way you moved,” he remembered. “I played a song in my head and you danced to it.”

  She smiled. “Which one?”

  “‘Burning Down the House.’”

  “Three-hun-dred-six-ty-five-de-grees. It’s hotter than that.”

  “You know the Heads!”

  “What do you think I grew up on, Frank Sinatra?”

  “Sorry.” Checker took a deep breath.

  “You don’t look well.”

  “Give me a second.” The sensation was receding, but not quickly enough, as if he’d woken a sleeping dragon—even if it only yawned and went back to sleep, the ground rumbled.

  “So you went into the crypt.”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What a critic.”

  “That room is dangerous!” he burst out.

  “Sure,” she said casually. “Being alive is dangerous.”

  “The red ones.”

  “Yes?”

  “The red ones,” Check repeated, shaking his head. “I don’t know.”

  Somehow she seemed pleased with his reaction, though Check had said nothing nice.

  “You sell those things?”

  “Not very hard. Nobody understands them. But once they’re cooled they don’t matter. I like hot glass.” Her eyes glittered like the sleet that afternoon.

  Checker returned the next night, on time. Rahim was on his mind, for earlier he’d visited the Iraqi in the basement, where it was hot and dank and boring, and they couldn’t think of any girls. Yet it had been impossible to stay moody, with the rise coming up through his All-Stars all the way to his throat. In the park the car radios had played the right songs, marathon; at six o’clock the sky was purple; the pavement was still icy from Sunday’s sleet, radiant with orange streetlights. The river swept the skyline into dizzy, turgid swirls.

  The broom swished around the concrete, curling dust like whirlpools under Hell Gate, glass tinkling in its wake like the shores of the East River; Checker could feel every individual hair of the brush stroke the floor. Unloading the annealer, he loved all the student pieces. Lurching off center, bubbled and drooped, each vase and goblet charmed him, each bowl would hold ripe fruit.

  All the while he could feel Syria as heat source move from room to room. He liked it best when he was perfectly between the two of them, the woman and the furnace; the sweat would pour evenly down his body. Each drop traced his spine like the tip of a finger.

  Later, the cleanup done, she showed him how to work the furnace; Check felt on friendlier terms with the animal once he could control it. Finally she let him thread one of those sturdy pipes into the mass itself, and wear his own pair of glasses. The heat stung; he wondered how she got used to it. His face stiffened and his knuckles sung. Sweat showered down his chest. Even with the dark glasses he couldn’t focus on the glass itself—it shifted uneasily before him, r
ippling like flesh. He could tell when the pipe hit the glass only from a tugging, a nagging when he pulled it back. Awkwardly he withdrew a drizzling glob, like Little Jack Horner pulling a plum from a pie.

  She showed him how to blow the first bubble, putting her mouth around the pipe. Checker stared.

  “Don’t just stand there. This is your piece.”

  When he pressed his lips to the metal he was surprised how hard it was to blow; nothing happened. The sharp taste of steel mingled with something musty. Syria.

  “It’s too cold now. Heat it up.”

  When he was finished, Check had made a tiny cup he knew was ridiculous, though that didn’t keep him from being enormously proud. It was thick, with a lip that curled accidentally inward, but smooth and round, later to rest perfectly in his hand, like a small breast.

  It was three in the morning; only the glow of the furnace lit the shop. Checker lay on one of the benches, exhausted, having perspired away about five pounds. Syria turned down the gas, so the furnace settled to a steady purr; it was easier to talk. She leaned up against a post and studied her new assistant. Syria herself seemed a little tired, softer; her hair had relaxed.

  “So what’s your story?” she asked.

  Checker laughed. “I drum.” His voice vibrated the bench. “I love—things.”

  She waited.

  “I love this,” he explained. “Glass and color. Heat. Work. Shapes. And shit, the sky tonight—”

  “Fuchsia.”

  “You saw!”

  “You own the sky?”

  “Yes.”

  She was so jagged, he was surprised by the roundness of her laughter. “Well, so do I.”

  “I own every color,” Check went on. “I own this neighborhood. Most of all I own the Triborough.”

  “I’ve wondered whose that was.”

  “Mine. Shore to shore. We’re in love.”

  “I’m jealous.”

  Checker’s whole body was humming; the furnace and the rhythm of their voices were both trembling in the wooden bench now, as if a good song was playing loud. He closed his eyes. “My bicycle is jealous, too. Sure, Zefal’s pretty, thin, tight. But there’s something about a frame so big. Like a tall woman.” Hmm. At that point Checker decided to open his eyes and shut his mouth. Syria had edged away to turn down the annealer.

  “And what’s your story?”

  “When you’re twenty-nine, there isn’t one anymore, there are hundreds. And I don’t feel like telling any of them tonight.”

  “Don’t,” Checker chided.

  “Maybe later,” she said more kindly. “You said you had a problem tonight. What is it?”

  Checker explained about Rahim. “So,” he finished, “I need a woman.”

  “Common complaint. Where will you get yours?”

  Lying on the bench, Checker felt a wave of nausea ripple from his feet to his throat, just as the elation had risen earlier that evening. He swallowed, the taste of his own saliva sour. He waited for the sickness to pass, and used the silence to make his next question seem to be changing the subject.

  “Are you married?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “By the time most men reach thirty they’re picking out their headstones already. All that’s left is to fill in the dates. I’m not interested.”

  “Do you ever want to get married?”

  “Stop it.”

  “Stop what?”

  “Go ahead.”

  Check said nothing.

  “I said, go ahead.”

  Maybe something flew into the furnace, something live. A strange smell passed over the two of them, like singed hair. His saliva was viscous from dehydration. “Syria,” he said thickly, “will you marry Rahim?”

  “That’s better,” said Syria. “Now we’re there.” She sat down on the bench at his feet. “Now, you explain to me why I should do such a thing.” She patted his ankles.

  “To do me a favor.”

  “Oh?” She seemed amused. “You really think I’d be doing you a favor?”

  “Both Hijack’s brothers were murdered in Iraq. If they send him back he’ll be axed right off the plane. Even if they don’t bother, he’ll be drafted. And Hijack says—he says it’s not a nice war.”

  “What’s a nice war?” she asked mildly, not paying much attention. She held the toe of his tennis shoe.

  Checker turned on his side away from her, resting his cheek against the warm wood of the bench as if it were a pillow. He felt like a small boy wishing he could clutch a ragged one-eyed bear. Instead, he reached down and stroked the leg of the bench, conscious of how hard it was. Checker almost never felt sorry for himself; it was a funny curled sensation, shaped like a sickle with a point on the end or like a very sharp question mark. “He’s my friend and he’s in trouble.”

  “Why should I care?” She pulled her hand away and leaned back. “I met you ten days ago spying on my shop and making a mess of my alley. You’re a total stranger.”

  It would be different if she was really trying to give him a reason why the whole idea was ridiculous. But no, she was forcing him instead to make a good case. “I’m not a stranger,” he said muddily, his cheek against the wood. “We’re alike.”

  “That’s arrogant.” Yet she didn’t seem offended, and expected him to go on.

  He couldn’t. He felt as if soon he’d have to go deeply and dreamlessly to sleep.

  “Don’t women usually get paid for this sort of thing?”

  “About three thousand dollars.”

  “And how much money do you have?”

  “Forty.”

  “Thousand?”

  “Dollars.” Checker sat up and pulled a scrumple of bills from his pocket. “Forty-three. But it’s not all mine, it’s the band’s. My share would be six…fourteen. Plus Hijack’s…$12.28, then.”

  “Well. That’s at least six beers. Two apiece. A party.”

  “How’s that?”

  “For the three of us. You, me, and my husband.” She let him hear the sound of it. Checker winced. “How are you going to pay off any woman with $12.28?”

  “And a lifetime’s admission to Plato’s?”

  “Well, what’s the cover?”

  “Two dollars.”

  Syria did a quick calculation. “So, if I went every weekend, I’d start to break even after twenty-seven years.”

  “Want to watch me drum that long?”

  “Maybe.” Checker kept waiting for this to be a joke.

  They both sat facing each other, leaning against opposite posts, their feet on the bench. Sensing they’d reached an impasse, Checker began to cheer up.

  “You know, I’ve never much wanted a husband…” said Syria thoughtfully. “But I wouldn’t mind a wife.”

  “What?”

  “I teach all day, do bones at night. I get tired of carrots and bad Astoria pizza. My apartment looks like glacial slag. At the end of the month my clothes have gotten so filthy that I have to throw them away. I’ve lived this way for years. But it might be refreshing to clean up my act. Only, though, if someone else did the cleaning.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “What else could I possibly get out of this?”

  Checker tapped the bench. “What all would you want him to do?”

  “Cooking, shopping, picking up. Laundry, phone bills. I would like to see out my windows again, maybe even find the floor. Fresh flowers. I have a little money, can you believe it? The stuff accumulates from neglect, like dust. I wouldn’t mind having someone to spend it, which is only work to me. And once in a while he could have the afternoon off to go to the hair-dresser’s or the garden club or to buy a new hat.” She laughed.

  “There’s just one person won’t find this funny,” said Check uneasily.

  “He’s Muslim, isn’t he?”

  “Very.”

  “This could be quite an education, then.”

  “Maybe,” Checker warned, “for both of you.”
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br />   “You are talking about that lean, bright-eyed, dark thing at your heels last Friday, with the pretty teeth? A puppy dog. Needs housetraining.”

  “If Hijack is a puppy, he bites. I don’t think he does windows.”

  “He could learn.”

  “I’m trying to tell you—Hijack has some ideas about women—”

  “That can be changed.”

  “I’ve never met anyone who was actually more optimistic than I was.”

  “Do you think he’d rather clean up the mess his head would make rolling on the runway or my living room?”

  “Good point.” Checker was confused. It was lucky for this to work out, wasn’t it? Then why did he feel so depressed? “There’s another thing,” he added. “The INS is getting tougher. You’d have an interview—”

  “Sounds entertaining.”

  “And you’d have to live together, for a while, anyway.”

  “How else would he fix me breakfast?”

  Syria, Check was all too aware, didn’t know what she was getting into. He tried to imagine Rahim rising cheerfully in the morning to stand at the stove in a little white apron, making sure to put in the toast so that it would pop up just when the eggs were still loose; maybe in the other room Syria would be ordering more oxides, to stride into the kitchen immediately angry if the coffee wasn’t already dripped. He tried to see the Iraqi cringing and apologizing, slipping a spoon between the cone and the filter to make the coffee drip faster, a little trick he’d picked up from the neighbor next door—

  No way.

  “Your Iraqi friend, does he have a lover?”

  “Only me.”

  “Oh?”

  “Not like that. But Hijack is—around.”

  “He adores you.”

  “We’re friends.”

  “That must mean a lot to you, then.”

  “I tried to explain before. Everything means a lot to me. Bridges. Water. So you can figure how I might feel about human beings.”

  “What about yourself?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Never mind.”

  “So we have a deal?”

  “He’d have to work. I’m not the Statue of Liberty.”

  Checker went to get his coat, feeling chilly, though even with the gas low it must have been ninety degrees.