Still Life Las Vegas Read online

She hadn’t felt that way since just after Walt was born. During those terrible months, the merest hint of exuberance in her husband’s smile was enough to send her reeling to the bathroom. She had such an acute sense of panic then, of being responsible for everything when all she wanted to do was sleep.

  But this time it was worse. Much worse. After arriving in Wisconsin, Emily would stare at Owen’s inert, drugged body lying in her childhood bed and imagine screaming at him, “Get up! Get up! Do something!” even though she knew that wasn’t fair. Her husband was sinking fast into a depressive episode, which she understood was a) clinical, b) diagnosed, and c) perhaps unavoidable, but more than that, she knew there was nothing he could do that would make her forgive him. It was she who needed to get out.

  The Lucky Stop was exactly what Emily was looking for: a local trucker’s hangout, small, ramshackle, three loose boards shy of condemned; no place for children. Her previous stops for coffee and restrooms so far had been hit-and-miss: truck stops were generally safe; Mickey D’s were out, of course (play structures and Happy Meals), and so were the more well-known fast food establishments. Too many station wagons in the parking lot and she veered away immediately, no matter how full her bladder was. No, the Lucky Stop was perfect: nobody in sight but a muddy pickup truck at the pumps and a woman in a dirty green apron chatting with the driver. The name on the front sign was so faded it might have been part of the wood grain.

  No one was inside. The Lucky Stop contained not only a gas station and a convenience mart, but a lunch counter as well. It was a tiny one: three torn gray vinyl stools patched up with gray duct tape, a dusty countertop, one small grill, and a deep-fry basket. A grimy box fan blew hot air into the hot air, and a yellow fly strip hung above the cash register, lazily revolving. Four flies, two flies. Four flies, two flies.

  She stood in the doorway, dust particles floating down a shaft of light like a screen between her and the counter. She was a movie archaeologist, stepping into an exotic, long-forgotten temple. Years of calorie counting, label watching, and nutritional vigilance fell away. She sat down.

  The menu, posted behind the fly strip on a board with removable letters, was a model of economy:

  HAMBRGER $2

  ADD CHEESE .50

  GRILL CHEESE $1.50

  CHI KEN FRIED STEAK $4

  FRIES $1

  0NION RINGS $1

  PENNZOIL SALE $3.50

  LOTTERY TIKS HERE

  A piece of cardboard was tacked up next to the menu board with the beverages listed: coffee (two sizes), Coke, and Diet Coke.

  The door flapped open and the woman with the apron bustled in. “Sorry, sugar,” she called out as she made her way behind the counter. Her hands were smudged from leaning against the truck’s tires and she tried wiping them onto the still-green spots of her apron. “That man just goes on. What can I do you for?”

  Emily studied the board intently. “Chicken fried steak,” she enunciated carefully.

  The woman reached down into the small refrigerator (without washing her hands, the old Emily noted) and pulled out a gray breaded oblong, tossed it into the wire basket, and set the basket into the oil, where it bubbled weakly. “You want fries with that?”

  Yes, Emily would have fries. And coffee.

  “No problem,” the gas attendant/waitress/cook said, grabbing a handful of frozen fries from a crumpled bag in the freezer and throwing them after the steak. The oil barely registered the addition. “M’name’s Lydia. Where you comin’ from?”

  Lydia looked to be about the same age as Emily, pushing toward mid-thirties, but with much more mileage clocked in. Her hair was the shade of sand, pulled back into a loose ponytail. There was a mole, liver-colored, by the side of her mouth.

  “Chicago. I mean, Milwaukee,” Emily said.

  “Mm. Milwaukee. That’s nice. Never been there.” Lydia took a plastic jug from the refrigerator and poured some thick, coagulated white liquid into a plastic cup. To this she added a spoonful of Heinz chipotle sauce from a glass jar. “This is my secret,” she told Emily, winking. “Gives the gravy some kick. You like it hot?”

  Emily usually avoided anything spicier than Dijon mustard. “Hot. Yes,” she said.

  Lydia plopped an extra spoonful of sauce into the cup, then set the cup into the microwave and punched in a minute. She poured out a cup of coffee. “You Filipino?” she asked brightly.

  Emily offered her a tight smile and a shake of her head.

  “My brother’s wife is Filipino,” Lydia said, by way of explanation. “Where you headed to?”

  Emily fixed her eyes on the coffee mug set in front of her, then raised her gaze up the arm that placed it there to Lydia’s grease-stained shirt to Lydia’s mole. “I have no idea.”

  “Mmm.” Lydia turned away, hoisted the fry basket up, gave it a shake, and pulled out the cutlet with metal tongs. She slapped it down on a hamburger bun upon which a translucent sliver of tomato and a leaf of iceberg lettuce nestled, waiting. Two quick stirs of the heated gravy, then that was slathered over all. A rainfall of crisped fries, and the plate was complete. Lydia slid it over to Emily. “Enjoy.”

  Emily paused, head bowed over her food to avoid Lydia’s gaze. The thought of eating this gargantuan, deep-fried, trans-fatty mess in front of its maker seemed suddenly too intimate, too obscene. Her stomach churned.

  A car honked twice out by the pumps. Lydia wiped her hands on her jeans and excused herself, leaving Emily alone.

  She started off slowly, nibbling on one fry—hot and crisp. Then another, dispatched in two bites. She took up the sandwich carefully with two hands. Gravy was spilling along its seams. She brought the unwieldy mass up, opened wide, and dove in. The softness of the bun sinking under her teeth gave way to the sudden crispiness of the breading, and as her teeth bit down, the squirt of hot oil and juice exploded in her mouth. The smokiness of the surprisingly tender meat, the sweetness of the bread, the silky saltiness of the gravy, and the fiery sauce igniting all: it was the worst and best thing she had eaten in five years. She devoured it in less than a minute.

  “The condemned ate a hearty meal!” Emily turned to the door still pinching a cluster of gravy-swabbed fries; she hadn’t even heard Lydia enter. “Must have been hungry.”

  Emily nodded and quickly shoved the fries into her mouth. She swallowed and reached for the napkin dispenser.

  “Good. Good,” Lydia said. “Glad you liked it.” Her words were light, but her eyes fixed hard on Emily. “Saw what you did to your Volvo out there,” she said in a friendly voice. “You got lots of space now, without them back seats.”

  Emily looked back at Lydia, her eyes expressing only the mildest interest. Lydia stayed by her side, rubbing the vinyl of one of the stools with her hand, back and forth. “You could sleep in there,” she went on. “That’s what I did, first time I got out here. Slept three months in my car, and it weren’t near as nice as that one.”

  Emily focused on the crumpled napkins in her hand, carefully wiping each finger. “I don’t sleep,” she said quietly. Which was true; she couldn’t remember the last time she slept for any significant amount of time.

  Lydia continued as if she hadn’t heard. “What’s that in the back? An instrument?”

  “An accordion.”

  “Funny thing to take, and no suitcase.” Lydia kept twiddling with the stool in front of her, as if she were waiting to be invited to sit down. “I remember when I run out of my house, five years back, I grabbed my KitchenAid hand mixer. Forgot my address book, forgot my underwear, but took the mixer. Don’t know what I thought I’d be mixing, but … your brain don’t think of those things.” Again, the hard look. “No, no it don’t,” she said aimlessly, and then, sharply, “You got kids?”

  Emily felt her stomach constricting. She kept looking at the coffee mug.

  “I got three,” Lydia volunteered, as if Emily had answered her. “Two little girls and a boy. We all slept in a Chevy wagon. Three months. Me in the front seat, boy in
the backseat, girls in the way back. They were young, it was all right. Long time ago. Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, right?”

  Lydia slipped onto the stool. Her knee touched Emily’s. “Look, honey,” she said softly, “you don’t look so good. You in some trouble?”

  The knocking of knees sent Emily sliding out of her body and to the furthest corner of her mind, where she could watch her corporeal self proceed from a safer distance. Emily was pushing her plate away from her. Emily was taking up another napkin. Emily was wiping her mouth.

  Lydia leaned her face closer. “You don’t have to tell me.” She fingered the little silver cross around her neck. “There’s all sorts of places you could go. If you wanted to”—here her voice lowered—“get safe. If you wanted to.”

  Emily made no move, which Lydia took as a sign of complicity. She leaned closer, so close that Emily could smell her unwashed hair. “You know what helped me? What really helped?” Emily registered the touch of Lydia’s fingers on her shoulder. From her distant corner she willed her body not to flinch. Lydia gave a glowing smile and lowered her head, conspiratorial, almost flirtatious. “Let me ask you this, honey. Have you been saved?”

  Emily’s eyes widened. She almost laughed. Here was one avenue she was quite certain she wouldn’t be traveling down. She had dealt with this kind of thing many times before: Jehovah’s Witnesses, Baptist evangelicals, Emily had turned them all successfully out from her gate in Chicago for years. She had defenses for this, well practiced and obdurate. It was almost a relief.

  “Don’t worry about me,” she said coolly, pulling her purse close and getting out her wallet.

  Lydia didn’t move. “I just know, it sure helped me.”

  Emily flicked out a ten. “I’m fine.” Her condescension was mighty.

  As she sailed out of the Lucky Stop, restroom key in hand, Emily did feel fine, and mighty, leaving Lydia and her wide-open mouth to catch flies and other people’s souls. Emily was not going to be saved, not at all.

  She turned the corner and began running for the bathroom door but already knew it was too late. The twisted knot in her stomach finally released, and with it, her beloved sandwich. A moment later she was kneeling on the ground, arms wrapped around herself, heaving out the last remnants of chipotle gravy and bitter coffee.

  And it was there, next to the bits of once-again steaming sandwich, that she found the feather. It was by her knees: a bright patch of color amidst the totality of bleached dirt and gravel. The feather should by all rights have blown away, but there it was, its vermillion brilliance held fast by the merest wisp of scrub. The feather was unsullied, and when Emily picked it up she could tell by its softness and texture that it was the real deal—an exquisite, fan-shaped marabou feather, big enough to cover her palm. She looked up immediately, as if expecting more to rain down from the sky, or to spot the large, exotic bird that could have shed such a treasure.

  Instead, the sky yielded up a vision. Set dark against the fierce radiance of the sun: a man’s face, wreathed in an effusion of burning feathers. The kindest of smiles beamed down upon her, perfectly even teeth glowing white from the shadows. Soft, black eyes twinkled like bright rhinestones. “Come,” he said breathily. The sound was everywhere. He was Comfort. He was Forgiveness. He was Liberace.

  Liberace, come not to save her, but to offer guidance. In a moment of dizzying clarity she realized where she was heading. Where she had been headed to all along. Her wheels were already pointing south.

  • She would drive to Las Vegas.

  • She would find Liberace’s museum.

  • She would take the pills.

  Emily looked down at the feather she held in her hand, and then up again, but he had disappeared, leaving nothing else behind but the vast blue sky.

  WALTER

  HOME

  LATER

  When I get back to the apartment, seven hours later, everything is exactly the way I left it. Not a good sign. Even the open package of Double Stuf Oreos I’ve laid out as bait on the kitchen table has been untouched. Usually, by this time, he’s made an appearance.

  The floor tilts, just a little.

  “Hello,” I call out.

  No answer.

  My shirt’s soaked from the five-minute walk home from the bus; it’s that hot out. I strip off my work clothes. There’s a Holy Reckoning of laundry to do—my pants are getting crusty and the apartment is taking on the delicate aroma of dirty socks. I throw my clothes in the hall closet and grab a pair of gym shorts from the pile. Sniff. They’re okay.

  I hear him in the next room. He’s turning himself over slowly under the sheets. I know the sounds: one small grunt, pause; a long exhale.

  Dinnertime. I crank up the fan, cook without a shirt on. Grilled cheese. I have to use the bread ends, ’cause that’s all we have. Bread, I scratch on a list pinned to the fridge, while I’m waiting to flip over the sandwich. Do Laundry! I draw a sock with stink marks floating up the page.

  Pickles, chips, sandwich, on a tray. How professional is that? There should be one of those small institutional white bowls with Jell-O in it, little red blocks of Jell-O with a crusty rose of whipped cream stuck on top. Or fruit cocktail, I could get him that next time, the kind with the one half cherry slowly bleeding pink onto all the washed-out blocks of pear and peach and those three gray grapes, all tasting the syrupy same. But we don’t have any of those small, institutional white bowls. Next time I take him to LV Med Center, maybe I’ll swipe a few. Maybe it’ll make him feel more at home, at home.

  “Your turn, Georgia,” I say, but there’s no one going in but me.

  The bedroom is dark and sour-smelling. Curtains open, curtains closed, he doesn’t care. Lunch is still on the nightstand, untouched. Next to it are the plastic cups, yellow and blue, Morning and Night, for his medication.

  The air conditioner hums steadily. He’s on his side, eyes closed, but I know he’s not sleeping.

  “Ready for dinner?” I ask.

  There are two long breaths before he answers. “Hey, champ,” he croaks. His eyes don’t open.

  “Get up. You gotta eat something.”

  He shakes his head.

  “Look, don’t be stubborn. Eat.”

  But he won’t be persuaded. Five minutes of pleading and bullying and he isn’t even talking anymore. We’ve gone down this road before. Maybe I’ll be getting those white bowls sooner than I thought.

  I sit next to him on the edge of the bed, munching on half of the grilled cheese sandwich. There are more patches of gray in his hair. They spread out in blotches on his shaggy head, like mold.

  “Hey,” I say, “they almost finished renovating the Luxor. The pyramid’s back up. It’s bigger. And there’s a big eye on the top. They’re gonna call it the ‘Deluxor.’”

  No answer.

  “Hey,” I say, “you know that big sphinx in the front? They got a new one.” I’m talking too loudly. “It tells riddles. And if you guess the right answer, it spits out a poker chip in between its paws.”

  No answer.

  “You know that sphinx?” I say. “Is that the same sphinx as the Oedipus sphinx?” I know damned well the Oedipus sphinx is from Thebes, he’s told me the story enough times, but at last his forehead furrows, and though he keeps his eyes shut at least his voice has some prickle to it.

  “No. You know that,” he grumbles. “Different sphinxes.” He sighs. “Originated in … Egypt. Monuments. Named by the Greeks.” When I was younger, this would have been the beginning of at least thirty minutes of Oedipus, birth to blindness, but now, his voice is already fading.

  “Yeah, but do they both tell riddles?” I ask quickly.

  He shrugs one shoulder. “History’s … fluid,” he says distantly.

  “But—”

  “Sorry, Walt. Sorry.” He waves his hand like he’s rushing off to a meeting.

  “Yeah, okay.” I stand up. “Look, I’m leaving the food here. Eat it before you take your pills.”


  I mean to leave, but the next moment my hand’s on his shoulder and I’m whispering in his ear. “You know, at work today, there was this woman…” I’m twelve years old again. “I don’t know, it could have been her.”

  His breathing stills, and I think, it’s worked, he’ll turn and say, “How exciting! What did she look like?” and the game would begin again, but instead he gives an indistinct moan and settles deeper into the pillow. Dismissal complete.

  I grab the tray and swing it toward the door. Almost out, I turn around just in time to see a small smile creep onto his face. He thinks I’ve left the room. It’s a sly smile, it’s the tail of a secret swishing over his face. He doesn’t want to come back, I think. Maybe I’m keeping him from a fantastic dream. Or oblivion, maybe that’s what he’s after, and he’s shuffling toward it eagerly, like this big water mammal pushing through the mud, about to take a sudden slide into the river.

  He wants to be light again. He wants to be free.

  * * *

  Snow. I think of snow. White, pure, obliterating snow. I heard there were once occasional flurries around here, years back, but global warming’s taken care of all that. It’s about time for the Strip to invent some. I imagine a casino shaped like an igloo, with gaming tables made of ice slabs and cocktail waitresses with fur-lined miniskirts and hooded sealskin parkas. Every hour on the hour, in the hotel atrium, there would be snow: big, white, glorious flakes descending from the ceiling in manufactured, five-minute blizzards that would taste only slightly of plastic. The hotel would be called Tundra, and I would work there, pouring frozen drinks at the bar, or training the penguins to sweep away the flakes with their furry feet. I’d be known as the Aleutian; I’d squint off into the distance, and no one would ask me what I was.

  My Oreos are melting.

  I’m wedged into a little green plastic lawn chair out on our balcony, waiting for coolness to set in. Balcony’s too fancy a word for this tiny space I’m crammed into; it’s more like a playpen made of iron railings and concrete. My back presses up against the wall, my legs are folded up onto the rusty bars—it’s the only way this baby’ll fit. I stare out at the magnificent view: the dusty parking lot littered with candy-colored X-rated flyers; the identical rusty playpens on the other side; and far, far off, on top of a building, the glimmer of red neon that’s Lady Luck turning her back to us.