I've met far too many fallen angels in this world. This one called herself Cindy.
She was waiting for a friend. He was late, she said, trying to look wounded.
“I wanted to see him before I headed home. I’m dying of cancer, ya know. Already feels like I’ve started slipping away.”
She casually repeated this opening line to several patrons in the place before slipping up on the barstool next to mine. Just as easily she slipped out of an oversized blue coat. It was spitting out bits of down feather from a tear in the sleeve. Beneath the protective outer layer, she wore a black tank top tucked into a pair of Salvation Army blue jeans. The over-sized denims were barely kept in place by the vigilant restraint of a thin black leather belt.
My first impression was that of a long time barfly trying desperately to imagine herself as a butterfly. Tonight would be no different, I thought, than any other night in her adult life. It wasn’t a hard call. No one would come to meet her. It was just her way of saying she was alone in the world.
I glanced at her briefly as she pulled the coat under her, a guarded action I had seen many street people do without even thinking.
As a musician, my first real stage had been the streets of several west coast cities. Since coming to New Orleans, I had found little difference in the social dropouts, the gutter punks, the winos, the mentally ill, the lost and forlorn. I’m not more than one step ahead of that pack myself, burning up my fingers night after night, hoping to make enough gas and food money to get me through another week.
My late-in-life dream to become a paid musician and writer of songs was and is still very much alive. However, I have often found it necessary to supplement this meager pittance with a revolving series of day jobs, anything from washing dishes to selling real estate over the telephone. I guess that makes me responsible. And yet, over the past five years I have also unconsciously slipped into the role of midnight counselor, falling back on skills from what seems like a previous lifetime. The street folk know me as a drop out, of sorts, but also as a good listener and someone who can be trusted.
Tonight I was waiting to perform at this little dive, the Buddha Belly. It would be a short set, an hour maybe, a trial run. It was after midnight. I had half an hour to kill and I didn’t know a soul in the place.
I must admit, despite all my people skills, I was never was much good at singles’ bar socializing, or any kind of socializing for that matter. Halfheartedly, I looked up from my beer and smiled at the stranger now sitting next to me. We exchanged names. She called herself Cindy.
Cindy had no future in her eyes. They were a cloudy-blue and bloodshot. The features of her face were hardened, reminding me of a vintage store mannequin. Her hair was dirty blond streaked with a faded orange dye. The dimly lit room did little to conceal a bruise that, at first, appeared to be a negligent smear of mascara. Curiosity got the better of me and I inquired about it.
“Oh that. Jim hit me. But it’s ok. He barely tapped me. He was mad, though, so I guess I had it comin’. Living with this guy is like reliving Viet Nam over and over. It messed him up pretty good. He lived that shit, ya know!”
I had to admit the reference to the Viet Nam Police Action, as it was innocuously labeled by that era’s politicians, had put a few dents in my psyche, too. On the other hand, her casual acceptance of the abuse seemed more than a bit masochistic.
“He’s ten years older than me. I like ‘em older.” She smiled, waiting for me to take the bait. “Could ya buy me a beer? I’ll drink anything cheap.”
“Sure,” I cautiously acquiesced, motioning to the lady in the Heineken T-shirt sitting on a stool next to the cash register at the end of the bar. She had her nose in a book and looked up, seemingly annoyed.
“You need to take care of yourself,” I said. Immediately I felt the need to separate myself from the sanctimonious crap that had just come out of my mouth. I fell silent.
The barmaid finally walked over and I ordered two Abita drafts. The Goth queen grabbed two relatively clean glasses, filling them from the tap like she was forced to hoe a row of beans or something. I dug a five dollar bill from my near-empty wallet. The lady on the barstool next to me eyed the transaction wistfully.
Bits and pieces of memories, like a storm swollen river filled with rain swept debris, now began to flow from her small rounded lips. Her conversation had the feel of a well rehearsed narrative that had been run through a meat grinder. Her eyes sailed off into the distance, the look of a thousand young starlets confiding their dreams to the moon.
The three-piece band that preceded my set was playing rock and roll, a Neil Young tribute. There were eight people in attendance, counting the two of us. A small mounted color TV offered up a South Park episode with closed captioning for the hearing impaired. It had been muted so as not to interfere with the so-called live music. Two of the locals were seated at a table in front of the stage, engrossed in the silent narrative. Two more of the neighborhood patrons were paired up in their own mundane conversations on the other side of the rectangular bar. The last two were doing separate sets of laundry in the machines conveniently located in the back.
Cindy didn’t seem to be able to focus on anything except the beer. I imagined her seeing it as a manifestation of some magnificent magic trick she had just witnessed. Her eyes widened as it was placed on a napkin in front of her. She was like a little girl trying not to act too excited. She immediately wrapped her right hand around the glass and closing her eyes, lifted it to her lips and took a generous swig.
Casually she told me that she used to be a party girl.
“I wasn’t always like this,” she confided. “I used to be a real fireball.” She winked mischievously. “I’d burn for days and days when I was a stripper in Atlanta. That was before I came down to New Orleans. I was big on gay rights until all of my friends started dying of AIDS. Ever heard of AIDS Atlanta?”
“I lived in Atlanta for a year, back in seventy-nine,” I mustered bravely.
“Ever hear of Trigger’s Mount?” I hadn’t and shook my head. “Punk rockers,” she informed me as if promoting her favorite band. “They were great! I knew this guy named Tom. He was their lead singer. I lost it when I took care of him for a while. He was a nice guy before he got sick. But then the asshole went and died on me. I had to get away from that shit.”
Bad ending, I thought, almost relieved when she asked if she could bum a smoke. She didn’t seem to mind that I wasn’t really holding up my end of the conversation. I pulled my pack of Camel filters from a vest pocket. She used her long, poorly kempt fingernails to extract one. The ends were split, the flamingo pink nail polish badly chipped. I lit the cigarette for her and continued to produce an occasional nod and look of concern as she talked on unaware that I was now thinking about finding another place to sit. My options were nil so I remained in place, not wishing to appear overtly rude.
At one point, as I had responded to something she’d said, she laughed as if
I was Jay Leno. I couldn’t recall a joke or a punch line. There was none. I sipped my beer, silent again.
“I’ve got family in Newnan.” she continued. “South of Atlanta, ya know.” I nodded my head, actually I did know.
Newnan was a town that prided itself on not having been ravaged by General Sherman as he burned his way across the south. The reality was, it wasn’t considered that important. Atlanta fell shortly after it was bypassed. As I recall, the antebellum community boasted a large statue of some Confederate soldier and the only doctor taking indigent patients lived several miles outside the city limits. Bigotry still lingered there like a festering sore. I had worked there for the county’s Family and Children’s Services Department. That was my second and last year spent in the great state of Georgia.
I felt no urge to reveal my insights.
“I gotta get back to see ‘em. They might even die before I do. They’re in their sixties by now. Haven’t seen ‘em in a long time. My mom and I don’t really get along but she understands me. I love my dad the most. The best drinkin’ buddy I ever had!” She smiled broadly and tried to make the image out to be as honey-dipped as a Sunday dinner of fried pork chops, sweet potatoes, and black-eyed peas.
“I’d really like to spend my last days up there,” she paused as if something annoying had distracted her.”
A lifetime of trying to save people like this woman had begun in the turbulent days when my own father had walked the planet. He was, and always will be an enigma to me; forever self-absorbed, embittered, and usually drunk. I’ve told my own stories about wonderful Sunday dinners, feasting on fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, and fresh blackberry cobbler. Perhaps it was a useful illusion, but I was never sure to whom.
I decided to dust off the old “councilor’s cap” and asked her when she had last seen them. Had she considered writing or calling to let them know what was happening? I even deluded myself enough to add, “It’s good to be with family when things are tough.”
Her response was predictably evasive. It turned out; her mother actually lived with her step-father in Florida now. Then there was something about the time she and an old boyfriend borrowed a pickup truck and were confused and then upset when old Fred called the police and had the two of them picked up outside of Biloxi, Mississippi. She told me her mother understood but couldn’t cross her new husband, so she stood by and let them take the rap for grand theft, auto.
As soon as I realized we‘d taken another problematic detour in the conversation, I endeavored to get a quick look at the other side of the family tree. This proved to be even less productive. She actually wasn’t sure where her father was, no address, no phone. She thought he might still be in Newnan but wasn’t sure.
She took another slow, measured, swallow of her drink and a last drag on the cigarette before crushing it out. I finished my Abita but was hesitant to order another, fearing this might trigger the obligatory round.
“Let’s Roll,” vibrated the room as the lead singer ate the microphone and croaked out the lyrics. He, the bass player, and drummer seemed oblivious to the fact that the place was near empty. The guitar screamed in defiance. I knew my turn to be ignored would come soon enough. Tonight I was paying my dues.
From some unknown, unfathomable place, the talk of serial killers was injected into the conversation. She was going into some detail, relating names, personalities, and types of victims. This was something she had taken to reading about during her time in jail. I must’ve been staring as if I were witnessing a bloody still birth. I began to wonder about the actual content of prison libraries. She, on the other hand, cheerily continued, never missing a beat.
“My real mom was a member of the Manson family. You remember the Mansons? I’m not sure who my father was. Could have been Charlie himself, for all I know. My parents in Newnan adopted me. I just found out last year. I’m forty-three and just finding this shit out. Can ya believe it? I had everything when I was growin’ up. Didn’t want for nothin’. I had it made back then.”
She sighed and I watched as the dark cloud settled back over her. “Then I set out on my own at eighteen. Atlanta’s a big city, ya know, but it’s not as big as New York. Too many crazy people to deal with there! I was bein’ taken care of and all. That part was ok. I did lots of drugs in the city, speedballs, narcotics, acid, and heroin. Have you ever done any heroin?”
I hesitated to make any sudden moves at this point. I shook my head slowly.
“Things kinda went bad after I left home,” she summarized succinctly in her next breath.
Cindy fell back on her beer for some sense of connectivity. The amber beverage wasn’t her first today. Surprisingly though, she nursed it as if it might be her last.
I could tell that this woman was afraid of death, despite the fact that the specter hovered near, a constant companion. Her body was thin and emaciated like a Nazi concentration camp survivor. She had lost all hope many, many years before this night and this place. She needed someone to care for her now but had long forgotten what being cared for could possibly mean. I knew my attention was not really helping her. Then, I started thinking it probably wasn’t hurting her, either.
“I’ve had the cancer for nearly three years now.” The narrative cycle was spinning back towards the introductory chapter. They cut on my breast two years ago but I didn’t want the radiation and chemotherapy. You lose all of your hair, ya know,”
Small pieces of her decaying autobiography began to flake and separate now, like lead paint peeling off the walls of a long abandoned house.
“I’ll never touch a burrito again. Got busted for stealing one, ya know. The guy behind me offered to pay for it. But that asshole store guy called the cops anyway. Damn Arabs! They think they own the world!”
For my part, I was now feeling a dull throbbing centered near my right temple. I recalled the time I had set for two hours in front of a column of stacked speakers at a Molly Hatchet concert. It was more than just the rendition from the frantic trio on the stage of “Rockin’ in the USA” that was taking its toll.
Was she looking for answers? Could she even conceive of the questions? Who was this lady and why was she spilling her guts to me? I was a sap, that’s why. I had given her a temporary port in the storm. It was warm in here and she would have no trouble with the bar staff if she was dutifully drinking. In the end, her garbled stories were meant to evoke sympathy, although I doubt she thought about it in those terms. People are creatures of habit, often repeating whatever brings them some little scrap of attention. I don’t like to judge, but I quickly realized that her payoff was anything she could come by to kill the pain.
“I guess I should be grateful. I needed to get off of the crack, “ she said, leaning into my ear as if the sound from the stage had just begun to drown her out. “I went to an NA meeting yesterday. They had good coffee. I need to make some changes in my life. I really need to get away from all those crack heads…” I nodded in the affirmative.
“Maybe I’ll stick it out until after Mardi Gras. It’s only a couple of months away. I wish my Daddy could come down here to see it just one time. Then maybe he could drive me back home when it‘s over.”
I decided not to resume the therapy session and stopped offering suggestions. It was a no-win situation. I began to feel like a large rock on the Pacific coast, relentlessly pounded by wave after wave. Her tale of lament did not, would not abate. It merely flowed in its fractured form from sentence to sentence as if some unseen current possessed her.
At some length, she talked of crack cocaine and the evil it does to the soul, the damage to the body. She spoke of friends and lovers pushing and pulling her into one ugly crack house scene after another. I began to worry about the possibility of nightmares.
“I got clean the last time I went to jail,” she proudly announced. “It’s been almost a week!”
There was no time for recovery. Another brutal wave hit the shoreline.
“I’m getting old. I was going to get a facelift five years ago,” she recounted stoically. “I just didn’t have the $2000 to get it done. I did get a boob job done when I was twenty, though.”
I wanted to look away as she cupped her beasts for emphasis. I couldn’t help mixing the thoughts of the scarred tissues of a mastectomy with the insertion of artificial implants. The bride of Frankenstein came briefly to mind. I wondered if I was supposed to become aroused or sympathetic. The latter quickly outweighed the former.
“I’ve got to tune my guitar and get ready to play.”
I stood and backed away from her and her lot in life. I gestured to the guitar case leaning against a wall across the room, reminding her of the reason I had come here tonight. In a quiet shuffle the three players were packing their gear and moving off of the tiny platform stage.
She smiled, gratefully, “Thanks for the beer and for listenin’. I didn’t think I would be having such a good time tonight.”
It breaks your heart, I thought to myself, and then signaled the barmaid to put another beer on my tab.
“I’ll play ya my best blues, “I said in earnest as I hopped up on the stage.
I plugged my Ibanez acoustic guitar into the house amp and toyed with the settings before turning to face the one bright spotlight. I guess you could say I’m addicted to that rush of adrenalin that pushes me out there in front of anyone, anywhere. I squinted at the room and thanked the few who remained for staying to listen. I started out with a tune I call, “She Don’t Live Here Anymore”.
Cindy dutifully clutched her second drink until each song was over and then put it down just long enough to politely applaud. Her eyes drifted between me and the deserted tables and stools surrounding her; that orange-streaked head of hair bobbing ever-so-slightly with the beat of each song. The liquid inside her glass inched ever lower as the hour drew nearer to its end.
Much of my music is about loves lost or unrequited love. You may call it a weakness, but I keep trying to sort the whole thing out. Often in my lyrics I’ll admit that I have made my fair share of mistakes when it comes to this evocative emotion. I’m a sucker for a sweet voice and a pretty face. But, I’ll also remind anyone who listens that, “It takes two to tango.” Likewise, I’ll ask; when love becomes nothing more than a game, why do people continue to play? Ah, why indeed! To me, this is the essence of the blues.
Minutes before I finished the set Cindy silently waved and walked out the door.
There are so many lost souls out there. Not everybody gets saved, I rationalized, wanting desperately to shrug off any responsibility I might have considered. “Why do you always attract the needy ones?” I shook my head as I placed the guitar back in its case, settled my tab, and headed out into the unusually cold New Orleans winter night.
She was sitting on the curb just down the street, bundled in her dirty blue parka when I spotted her. My car was nearby but she couldn’t have known. She didn’t look up as I drew near.
“Do you need a place to crash tonight?” I asked, knowing that her response could only be a numb acknowledgement of her never-ending misfortune. She nodded, silent for the first time all evening. The frail lady could barely keep her eyes focused and leaned on me heavily as she rose to her feet. Her gait unsteady, we continued the walk to my car.
“When was the last time you had anything to eat?” I asked. There was no reply.
I wasn’t sure quite what I was going to do as we arrived minutes later at my sparsely furnished apartment. I almost wished that she were young and attractive and that I had, for the first time in months, gotten lucky. In this case, I wished that I still had connections with one of the half-way houses I’d worked with back in California. It seemed that we were both a long way from home.
Finally, I decided that I would fix her some food, let her get some sleep, and then try to find a local agency that might assist her the following day. I’d use the sleeping bag tucked away in my closet. The whole matter, however, was abruptly settled by her fifth wobbly step into the one-room flat. Like a sack of potatoes she collapsed onto the wooden floor.
I was beginning to panic. Perhaps she really was telling the truth about the cancer. I tried to stir her.
“Are you ok? Let me get you to a bed,” I said as calmly as possible and attempted to help her to her feet again. She shook her head in refusal, squinting up at me.
“I’m ok,” she muttered softly. “I’ll sleep here.” Then in a faint whisper she added, “Could you play me some more music?” Her eyes closed and the even breath of sleep came upon her quickly. I got a blanket and laid it over her crumpled form.
For over an hour I sat on the small bed in the opposite corner of the room and lightly strummed my guitar. I knew it was more for me than for the stranger who just happened to be lying in the middle of the darkened room. Tonight, the music was all either one of us would have to hold.
Well, I don't know what made me pick this out, of all the things you wrote, but I did, and it brought back so many memories of California nights in the early 70s. I was married to a musician, and met many Cindys and the male equivalent. And as you said, we were often a gig away from being there ourselves. I think you were lucky that your Cindy left, and you did not have to deal with it; it could only be a sad ending either way. It happened to you because you have a heart. I think this story is brilliant, and I hope I soon find time to read more.
L
Reality hits you right between the eyes with this potent and compelling narrative. When I got to the end, I found that I had been holding my breath for some time.
Rx
The trio of covert operatives from Area-51 are back. Black Widows Bondage continues the action packet sexy spy-fi
adventures of the “super agents” from Angels Keep Watch, led by Dr. Sterling Striffe, with his paramour partner, the
mysteriou
Undercover Reunion, a novel of romance and adventure for Baby Boomers,fans of “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” and anyone who has ever attended their high school reunion!
