"Gundi alone, apart from all other paintbrush-friendly members of the breed."
"Well, what about you, Jax? Would you perform your music with a...with a grocery sack over your head?"
"I have, as a matter of fact. As a courtesy to my listening public."
She inclines her head again, smiling. Her beaded earrings struggle in the air like small hooked fish. "Would you like to take a bath?" she asks him. "I have a Japanese tub, four feet deep, you float in it."
"I don't float. I sink like a Cadillac."
Gundi laughs. "No, really, it's totally relaxing. I've used it almost every day since the workmen finished it." Jax can imagine Gundi kissing each one of these workmen on the day they departed. She stands up, and he finds himself once again following the irresistible gravity of a woman.
The room with the Japanese tub is the deep slick blue of a starless night, entirely tiled except for a tall window that opens onto a westward exposure of empty desert. Gundi sheds her clothes, which seemed only provisional anyway, so it isn't a big step. Jax follows her example while her back is turned, as she adjusts the steaming water. They sit on opposite sides, waiting for the deep, square hole between them to fill.
Jax with clothes on looks impossibly thin, but without them he is something else, articulated limbs, long and fine without excess. Exactly like his hands. Gundi glances at his legs stretched on the dark blue tile while she attends to the water. The gleaming faucet grows too hot to touch, and she winds her hair around it to protect her hands when she needs to adjust it. She is wearing only earrings and a fine gold chain around her left ankle.
"It's a lot of water," Jax says, looking out the window at dry mesquites and one lone saguaro, its arms raised in surprise or invocation. "Don't you feel guilty, with all those thirsty plants staring in at you?"
Gundi shrugs. "They are plants." She sits across from him, facing him with the full ammunition of her body, her back very straight. A square, steaming lake is rising between them. "We don't really belong in this desert, you and I," she says. "When we have used up all the water and have to leave, the plants and snakes will be happy to get rid of us."
"What about your unconscious Hopi desires?"
"Sometimes I feel I belong to this place. Other times I feel it is only tolerating me with a curled-up lip."
Jax curls his lip. "Did you see how much H2O the blonde puts in that tub?" he asks in a cactus voice.
Gundi laughs. "You should write a song with all this angst."
"I think I was. Before you and Bill the Mailman impeded my progress."
They both watch the surface of the water, pummeled by the incoming stream but still glossy and intact.
Jax asks, "How do you claim your position as a citizen of the human race?"
"I don't know," she says apologetically. "Register to vote?"
"But how can you belong to a tribe, and be your own person, at the same time? You can't. If you're verifiably one, you're not the other."
"Can't you alternate? Be an individual most of the time, and merge with others once in a while?"
"That's how I see it," Jax says. "I'm a white boy, with no tribal aptitudes. My natural state is solitary, and for recreation I turn to church or drugs or biting the heads off chickens or wherever one goes to experience sublime communion."
"The only people I know who experience sublime communion all the time are yogis and heroin addicts." Gundi tests the water with the ball of one foot. "Do you think it's possible to live without wanting to put your name on your paintings? To belong to a group so securely you don't need to rise above it?"
"As I understand it, that's the policy Turtle is being offered."
"It sounds very romantic," she says. "But when I went to the Navajo reservation to buy jewelry, I saw people living in falling-down mud houses with television antennas and bottles stacked by the door."
"And that's the whole story, poverty? Nothing else more important could be stacked behind those doors?"
Gundi is quiet. The clasp of her ankle bracelet winks in the slanted light.
"I think it was bad strategy for them to jump bail," Jax says.
"Bail? Taylor was arrested?"
"Not legally. Morally. She felt accused, and was too freaked out to stand trial, and now they're fugitives. It makes it look like she's in the wrong."
"Why did she go, then?"
"For the reason mothers throw themselves in front of traffic or gunfire to save their offspring. It's not an answerable question."
Gundi places both her feet on the surface of the water and looks at them for a long time. "I don't have children," she says finally. "I suppose I don't know that kind of love."
"I suppose I don't either. To put yourself second, every time, no questions asked? Sounds like holy communion."
Gundi turns off the water and eases herself, a pale crocodile, over the dark bank of tile. "You are supposed to be relaxing. Come into the water, I know a type of massage for bodies floating in the water."
Jax laughs. "The problem is, as I told you, I don't float."
"Of course you do. Every living human body floats."
"Theoretically it's possible that I'm dead," he says. "You decide." He slides onto the scalding water, inhaling slowly. He begins gradually to sink, first his feet and legs, then the rest of him. He empties his lungs and refills them just before his face slides under the surface.
"All right, you don't float," Gundi says, reaching under his arms and pulling him up, dripping and laughing. His hair lies close to his skull and his forehead is gleaming. "You're extremely dense, for a human."
"So I'm told," he says. Droplets of water collect in his eyelashes. Gundi lightly touches them with her fingertips, stroking downward from his face to his neck and then his chest. His nipples are hard. His mouth and hers exchange a gentle pressure and their tongues salute each other, blind sea creatures without armor, touching one another's soft surfaces with hopeful recognition.
Jax slides around behind her, holding her against him, burying his face against the nape of her neck. Her hair is a soft veil around her, still dry except for the ends, hundreds of small dark points like watercolor brushes, ready to paint the world with more than its ordinary light. Jax explores her strong, slick belly with his hands, thinking for the second time in a day of porpoises. But then he turns her around to him, cupping her jawbone gently in one hand and placing his other on the small of her back, yielding to the urge that humans have, alone among all animals, to copulate face to face. At least for the first time. At least with an unknown member of the tribe.
16
Marooned
"SEX-MAD MOM, FIFTY-FIVE, elopes with daughter's prom date," Alice reports.
Barbie, who has already been laughing to the point of makeup damage, collapses in the backseat. Turtle asks, "What's a prongdate?"
"Mama, don't even get started on that one," Taylor warns.
Alice turns to the inner pages of her tabloid. "Here you go, an educational story from nature. The cassowary of Australia is a bird that has been known to kill humans. Eight feet tall, it attacks by leaping in the air and slashing its victim with razor-sharp toenails."
"Mama, that's not exactly educational," Taylor says, frowning into the freeway glare.
Alice reads on, carefully pronouncing all the syllables. "They are kept as pets and form a part of the economy of certain aboriginal cultures as payment for brides."
"What a deal," Taylor says. "I'll trade you my daughter for an eight-foot bird with razor-sharp toenails." Instantly the words "trade you my daughter" seize up in her stomach. She moves the rearview mirror to find Turtle, who has grown dangerously silent in her nest of stuffed toys and dog-eared books. Taylor has been having panic-stricken dreams of misplacing Turtle.
"I want to hear about the sex-mad mom," Barbie whines. "Practically that exact same thing happened to me when I was in eighth grade. My mom flirted with my boyfriend Ryan till he was like, 'Excuse me, I don't even want to come to your house.' I was
so depressed I stopped using hair spray for three weeks."
Taylor snaps the mirror back into driving position. "Okay, read the sex-mad mom," she concedes, since it may be the only hope of fending off another Barbie story. This morning they have already heard about the new ecological Animal Lovin' Barbie, and the mystery of the transvestite Ken, who turned up factory-sealed in a Tampa toy store wearing a lace apron and miniskirt. They have also learned that a Barbie doll's measurements translated to the human figure are 36-18-33, which are Barbie's own measurements except she's still a few inches away from the 18. Taylor asked if Eco-Barbie was biodegradable.
"Here we go," Alice pipes up cheerfully, doing her best to keep the peace. She has been reading tabloids aloud since Tonopah. "What an adventure. Three men were marooned on their overturned charter boat off the coast of Florida and drifted without food for thirty-seven days before rescue."
Taylor shivers. "They must have been ready to eat each other."
"Oh, gag me," from the backseat.
"Taylor, hush," Alice says. "They probably played alphabet games."
"Right."
She reads ahead silently, and a worried expression clots her forehead. "Well, they didn't eat each other. But it's not very nice. They kind of ganged up on the one they didn't like. Oh, dear. They used him for bait."
The air in the car becomes quiet. The only sound is the sticky hiss of tires on the road, coming in through the vents. The women take in this sound as if their lives depended on it.
Alice says abruptly, "Francis the runaway pig on the lam in Canada. Francis the pig broke out of a slaughterhouse in Red Deer, Alberta, jumped a yard-high fence, sneaked through a sausage factory and pushed open the back door with his snout. The butcher chased but lost him." She skims ahead for the good parts. "...took up residence in a large park. Was once seen fighting off coyotes. Case became nationally known when Francis, grown lean and powerful, evaded professional trackers for six weeks. Finally he was hit with a tranquilizer dart, but ran for miles and escaped into the bush. Schoolchildren across the nation contributed money to the butcher, asking that his life be spared. Psychologists explain the support for Francis by comparing him to Jesse James or Pretty Boy Floyd."
"Way to go, Francis," Taylor says.
"Who's for lunch?" asks Barbie.
"Francis the pig."
"Oh, gross, Taylor. Who wants lunch, I mean."
Taylor has the eerie feeling that the cracked brown desert moonscape outside the car will go on forever. That only the four of them are alive. She checks her watch and informs Barbie that it's only eleven o'clock.
"Well, tell that to my tummy. It's like, 'Feed me, okay, I'm starved.'"
Alice gives Taylor a meaningful glance over her newspaper. Taylor asks, "Turtle, do you have to pee?"
Turtle nods.
"Okay. Next exit we'll stop."
"Oh, shoot, it has a sad ending," Alice says. "He was finally installed in his own St. Francis Park. But one of the tranquilizer darts had pierced his intestines and he developed per-i-tone-something or other." Alice adjusts her glasses. "And died. Vets called it a strange twist of fate."
"Mama, this is depressing, all your stories have morbid endings. You're as bad as Lou Ann. She always thinks Dwayne Ray's going to catch perito-something or other at day care."
"They're not my stories," Alice says, raising the palm of her hand toward Taylor, as if taking a vow. "I'm just reading you the printed word."
Taylor wishes with all her might that someone else was in the driver's seat of this car. Even Jax. She's visited with a sudden memory of Jax standing with her in the grocery, leaning down to kiss the top of her head. A gesture that is all give and no take.
"Excuse me," Barbie says to Alice, leaning forward over the seat. "I'm in this awkward situation so I'll just go ahead and say it. I don't know your name. Taylor introduced you as her mom, but it's not like I can call you Mom."
"Alice Greer," Alice says.
"Greer?" Taylor asks.
"I never did like Harland's last name a bit. It never sat right."
"Are you newly divorced, Alice?" Barbie asks, sounding exactly like a talk-show host.
"Well, I didn't get the papers yet, but it's over with. All over but the shouting."
"Didn't sound to me like there was ever much shouting," Taylor says.
"Oh, no. It's just an expression. I don't know what it would take to get Harland to let out a holler. He wouldn't even fart out loud. There was days I'd walk by him in his chair in front of his everloving TV set and I'd think, 'Well, now, what if Harland was to die on me? I wouldn't even know it till the fumes started coming off him.'"
"Oh, gag me," says Barbie.
Don't tempt me, Taylor thinks. She eases into the right lane and takes an exit marked Gabbs. They have spent the morning climbing out of Death Valley, but escaping from that particular death comes only by degree, it seems. The territory still looks empty. Only the square-headed good samaritans of gas-station signs loom above the dead fields.
"We're like Francis Pig," Turtle announces suddenly. "We're runaways."
"That's right, we're heroes. But nobody's going to shoot us with tranquilizers," Alice promises.
"Or take up a collection to install us in our own park," Taylor adds.
"Do you think we could find a place with milk shakes? I would die totally for a shake right now."
Taylor is not too distressed by the idea of Barbie dying totally. Last night she hinted strongly that they should go their separate ways in the morning, but so far Barbie has absorbed hints with the sensitivity of a fire hydrant. And Alice does nothing to discourage her. They pull in at an interstate diner and Barbie leads the way across the parking lot. She's wearing a pink-and-yellow flounced miniskirt over a baby-blue leotard and tights, with a silver-studded pink fringed jacket and pink high-heeled cowboy boots. Her boots make deep scraping sounds on the asphalt and her short skirt swings like a bell.
The diner has gingham curtains at the windows and a surplus of artificial flowers; Barbie fits right in with her Western ensemble. Her purse is at odds, though: she has been clutching the same square black bag against herself like a stomach ache since they left the Delta Queen. She even took it with her into the bathroom when she showered, in their motel room in Tonopah. It looks heavy.
"What do you think she's got in there?" Taylor asks, once Barbie has downed two burgers and a strawberry shake and excused herself to visit the so-called little girls' room.
"Makeup," Alice says.
"Pennies," Turtle says. "I heard it jingle."
"All I can say is she eats enough for Ken too," Alice observes. "I'd like to know how she hangs on to her 36-18-33."
"She acts like that purse is her baby kangaroo," Taylor says. "Why would you have to take your purse to the bathroom every single time?"
"She has a relationship with the bathroom, don't she? Every time she eats something, up she has to get to the little girls'."
Taylor is relieved to feel that she and Alice are on the same side again, united in their mistrust of Barbie. Turtle takes the pen Alice offers and writes her name four times on her napkin: twice from left to right, and twice in reverse.
"I'd like to get a look in that purse. I bet she's on drugs."
"Makeup," Alice says confidently.
"Could be," Taylor concedes. "She has to fix herself up so much from crying. She seems nervous ever since we left Las Vegas. Maybe she's depressed that things didn't pan out at the Delta Queen."
"Well, she can't be that depressed," Alice points out. "She hasn't quit using hair spray yet."
"No, she hasn't. I think we've got our own personal Eco-Barbie hole in the ozone following us across Nevada. We'd better look out where we park it."
Behind Gundi's bed are tall windows standing open to let in the clear yellow scent of creosote bushes and whatever bird or long-legged animal might be passing by. Gundi props her head on one elbow. Lit from behind, her hair is like golden mosquito netting. To d
istract himself, Jax imagines a country where people sleep under such a thing, to protect themselves from tiny golden mosquitoes carrying a blissful golden strain of malaria. He sings with his eyes closed.
She strokes the center of his chest. "You have a problem, don't you?"
"I do." Jax opens his eyes briefly, then closes them again.
"Tell me."
"Do you want to know everybody's problems as much as you want to know mine?" he asks.
"No," she says. "I'm selective. You have interesting problems. Bill the mailman has hives." She waits. "Well?"
"My situation here is something like being Catholic, which I was at one time. It takes a lot of the fun out of the moment of sin when you know you're going to have to confess it later."
Gundi stares. "What we have been doing all week you have to confess to a priest?"
"No. To Taylor."
Gundi draws the sheet up to her shoulders. "Why?"
"Because I can't lie to her."
"You think she tells you everything?"
"She tells me everything. Believe me."
Gundi's eyes grow wider still. "You have to tell her the whole thing? Details?"
"Just the general plot line, I think. Boy meets girl in Japanese tub, et cetera."
Gundi sits up to light a cigarette. She shakes out the match with annoyance, inhales, and crosses her arms over her sarong of white sheet. "Well, maybe she won't ask."
"Yes, by George, that's it. Next time she asks me what I've been up to, this will be one of the tiny little boring things I'll just leave out: Rucker broke his E string during rehearsal, naturally she doesn't want to hear about that, and I mopped the bathroom floor, I had blistering sex with Gundi, I mopped the bathroom floor again."
"A lot of mopping you have been doing."
"Jax mops till he drops." Flat on his back, arms at his sides, he looks as if he may not float even on a mattress.
"Who does it hurt if you don't tell her?"
He sits up, facing Gundi. "Then I know something she doesn't. I've got this robin's egg in my hand. Sky blue, you see it?" He cups his hand and they both look at it and Gundi can see the blue egg plainly.
"Do I give it to her, or do I not?" Jax asks, watching his hand. "Maybe she'll cook it, maybe she will throw it at me, who knows?" He moves his hand carefully behind his back, palm upward, so slowly she can see the ropes of tendon in his wrist roll over one another.