Women

87

I was asked to give a reading at a famous nightclub, The Lancer, on Hollywood Boulevard. I agreed to read two nights. I was to follow a rock group, The Big Rape, each night. I was getting sucked into the show biz maze. I had some extra tickets and I phoned Tammie and asked her if she wanted to come. She said yes, so the first night I took her with me. I had them put her on the tab. We sat in the bar waiting for my act to go on. Tammie's act was similar to mine. She promptly got drunk and walked up and down in the bar talking to people.

By the time I was ready to go on Tammie was falling over tables. I found her brother and told him, "Jesus Christ, get her out of here, will you?"

He led her off into the night. I was drunk, too, and later on I forgot that I had asked that she be taken away.

I didn't give a good reading. The audience was strictly into rock, and they missed lines and meanings. But some of it was my fault too. I sometimes lucked out with rock crowds, but that particular night I didn't. I was disturbed by Tammie's absence, I think. When I got home I phoned her number. Her mother answered. "Your daughter," I told her, "is SCUM!"

"Hank, I don't want to hear that."

She hung up.

The next night I went alone. I sat at a table in the bar and drank. An elderly, dignified woman came up to my table and introduced herself. She taught English literature and had brought one of her pupils, a little butterball called Nancy Freeze. Nancy appeared to be in heat. They wanted to know if I would answer some questions for the class.

"Shoot."

"Who was your favorite author?"

"Fante."

"Who?"

"John F-a-n-t-e. Ask the Dust. Wait Until Spring, Bandini."

"Where can we find his books?"

"I found them in the main library, downtown. Fifth and Olive, isn't it?"

"Why did you like him?"

"Total emotion. A very brave man."

"Who else?"

"Celine."

"Why?"

"They ripped out his guts and he laughed, and he made them laugh too. A very brave man."

"Do you believe in bravery?"

"I like to see it anywhere, in animals, birds, reptiles, humans."

"Why?"

"Why? It makes me feel good. It's a matter of style in the face of no chance at all."

"Hemingway?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Too grim, too serious. A good writer, fine sentences. But for him, life was always total war. He never let go, he never danced."

They folded up their notebooks and vanished. Too bad. I had meant to tell them that my real influences were Gable, Cagney, Bogart and Errol Flynn.

Next thing I knew I was sitting with three handsome women, Sara, Cassie, and Debra. Sara was 32,3 classy wench, good style and a heart. She had red-blond hair that fell straight down, and she had wild eyes, slightly insane. She also carried an overload of compassion that was real enough and which obviously cost her something. Debra was Jewish with large brown eyes and a generous mouth, heavily smeared with blood-red lipstick. Her mouth glistened and beckoned to me. I guessed she was somewhere between 30 and 35, and she reminded me of how my mother looked in 1935 (although my mother had been much more beautiful). Cassie was tall with long blond hair, very young, expensively dressed, modish, hip, "in," nervous, beautiful. She sat closest to me, squeezing my hand, rubbing her thigh against mine. As she squeezed my hand I became aware that her hand was much larger than mine. (Although I am a large man I am embarrassed by my small hands. In my barroom brawls as a young man in Philadelphia I had quickly found out the importance of hand size. How I had managed to win 30 percent of my fights was amazing.) Anyway, Cassie felt she had an edge on the other two, and I wasn't sure but that I agreed.

Then I had to read, and I had a luckier night. It was the same crowd, but my mind was on my work. The crowd got warmer and warmer, wilder and enthusiastic. Sometimes it was them who made it happen, sometimes it was you. Usually the latter. It was like climbing into the prize ring: you should feel you owed them something or you shouldn't be in there. I jabbbed and crossed and shuffled, and in the last round I really opened up and knocked out the referee. Performance is performance. Because I had bombed the night before my success must have seemed very strange to them. It certainly seemed strange to me.

Cassie was waiting in the bar. Sara slipped me a love note with her phone number. Debra was not as inventive-she just wrote down her phone number. For a moment-strangely-I thought about Katherine, then I bought Cassie a drink. I'd never see Katherine again. My little Texas girl, my beauty of beauties. Goodbye, Katherine.

"Look, Cassie, can you drive me home? I'm too drunk to drive. One more drunk driving rap and I've had it."

"All right, I'll drive you home. How about your car?"

"Fuck it. I'll leave it."

We left together in her M.G. It was like a movie. At any moment I expected her to drop me off at the next corner. She was in her mid-twenties. She talked as we drove. She worked for a music company, loved it, didn't have to be at work until 10:30 am and she left at 3 pm. "Not bad," she said, "and I like it. I can hire and fire, I've moved up, but I haven't had to fire anybody yet. They're good folks and we've put out some great records…"

We arrived at my place. I broke out the vodka. Cassie's hair came down almost to her ass. I had always been a hair and leg man.

"You really read well tonight," she said. "You were a totally different person than the night before. I don't know how to explain it, but at your best you have this… humanness. Most poets are such little prigs and shits."

"I don't like them either."

"And they don't like you."

We drank some more and then went to bed. Her body was amazing, glorious, Playboy style, but unfortunately I was drunk. I did get it up, however, and I pumped and pumped, I grabbed her long hair, I got it out from under her and ran my hands through it, I was excited but I couldn't finally do it. I rolled off, told Cassie goodnight, and slept a guilty sleep.

In the morning I was embarrassed. I was sure I would never see Cassie again. We dressed. It was about 10 am. We walked to the M. G. and got in. I didn't talk, she didn't talk. I felt the fool, but there was nothing to say. We drove back to The Lancer and there was the blue Volks.

"Thanks for all of it, Cassie. Think nice thoughts about Chinaski."

She didn't answer. I kissed her on the cheek and got out. She drove off in the M.G. It was, after all, as Lydia had often said, "If you want to drink, drink; if you want to fuck, throw the bottle away."

My problem was that I wanted to do both.