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You Better Work! Sashay, Shante
Situated on the northeastern edge of Love & War on the north side of the tracks, the Badlands bloomed, against all odds, like an apple on a cactus. The Bohemian community that made its home amid the abandoned trailers and detritus of a long-defunct trailer park comprised transients, squatters, wayward artists, and hippies. Though banded together by little more than a long streak of bad luck in life, the settlers of the Badlands slum stuck together and looked out for each other, which was more than could be said of folks with more affluence in larger towns, so by some measures, the folks in the Badlands were getting by better than maybe they realized.
Insular and forgiving as it was, the Badlands had come to attract misfits and nomads of various sorts: pagans, nudists, ex-carnies, gypsies, and communists. What was once merely a blemish on Love & War’s backside had developed into a full-blown infection, but one that, to their credit, the townsfolk saw little reason to treat. As long as the folks in the Badlands kept their philosophies, worldviews, and medicinal herbs mostly to themselves (which they were generally happy to do) the residents of Love & War left the Badlands well enough alone.
Which was a shame really, because the Badlands was a spectacle. Colorful, decrepit, and exuding the constant stench of nag champa, marijuana, and body odor, the Badlands encompassed a variety of contradicting stereotypes and lifestyles without so much as batting an eye. Broken-down RVs and silver trailers were strewn with tie-dyed scarves and motley assortments of table cloths, shawls, and tattered American flags. They served as personal banners, marking territory, announcing to the community an intention, a presence, an expression of self. Belly dancers sewed tiny bells to the scarves that hung from their doorways; makeshift tribes claiming 1/8th Blackfoot heritage decorated their trailers with animal skins and feathers. NPR, tinny drums, and the crackling of cooking fires composed the bass line of the Badlands soundtrack, against which all other sounds were a blissful, discordant descant.
In the center of this chaos, Mitsuo was sitting cross-legged on the ground, drawing pad balanced precariously on his knee, sketching the profile of the unsuspecting young woman who had arrived the week before with a couple of bikers. She was unconventionally pretty, with a crooked nose and a mouth slightly too big for her face. He liked her eyes the most; they were the color of turtle skin.
He had just begun sketching the curve of her nose when he was bumped from behind by a black and pink whirlwind who tumbled to the ground beside him, flashing a bright smile. “What! You drawing that girl again?”
Mitsuo frowned, scooted away from his assailant. “What’s it to you?”
Satsuko shrugged. “Nothing to me. You could try talking to her, though. Pretty sure she speaks English.”
“Better than you do, I’m sure,” Mitsuo quipped. He shrugged. “I don’t have anything to say to her.” He sketched in rough outlines of her lips. He made them too thin. He erased.
“Well,” Satsuko said, scratching her head, “who knows how much longer she’ll be here, anyway. She’s not permanent. She looks like city to me.”
Mitsuo looked up at the girl, squinted. Satsuko was right. With her hair pulled into a loose ponytail and a faraway look in her eye, the girl had an air of culture about her, and her cheeks were too full to have ever known true hunger. She was probably just passing through, sowing her wild oats before going away to an all-women’s college on the east coast. They got a surprising number of folks like that in the Badlands: folks with an artistic or counterculture curiosity trying to see how the other half lived. They meant no harm. But they were insulting all the same.
“So now I got your attention, why don’t you draw me for a little while? I need a new portrait.” Satsuko tossed her mop of shaggy, badly cut hair and struck a pose. “You haven’t done any of me in a long time.”
Despite himself, Mitsuo grinned. He flipped the page and penciled in a quick sketch of Satsuko with her head tilted back and eyes closed. Her sticking-out-in-every-direction, black and pink hair framed a pale, heart-shaped face with high cheekbones, a broad nose, a full mouth. Her almond eyes had been painted, as usual, with so much shadow she appeared to be wearing a mask. Today she had painted tiny pink stars at the corners of her eyes and the tops of her cheeks. If she were a snake she’d be a warning: too colorful. Poisonous.
“Hey hey, Satsuko, strike that pose, girl. Like RuPaul. Do a twirl!”
Opening her eyes, Satsuko fell out of character and turned to see a tall, skinny white woman strutting behind her, hands on her hips, doing a decent imitation of a model on a catwalk. She strutted a few paces, turned sharply, and posed. Her dreadlocked hair was pushed off her face and held in place by a bandana. She was as deeply tanned and dirty as she was unwelcome. Satsuko scowled at the intruder. “What you want, hippie?”
Stone snapped her fingers, gave a sexy look over a bony shoulder. “You better work! Cover Girl! Sashay, shante!” Her RuPaul impression was flawless, but neither of the teenagers smiled. RuPaul was before their time.
Stone smiled, became herself again. “You got any weed?”
Satsuko and Mitsuo exchanged irritated looks. Satsuko sat down beside her friend as Mitsuo flipped back to his original drawing, concentrating. “No,” he said. “We don’t smoke.”
Stone wasn’t dissuaded. “You don’t smoke, or you don’t smoke?” She wriggled her eyebrows up and down.
Mitsuo looked up, gave Stone a hard, cold stare. The hippie held up her hands, shrinking away from the glare. “All right, all right, the straight-edge vibe, man, I dig.” Craning her neck, she stretched to see Mitsuo’s art pad. She let out an appreciative whistle. “Hey, Mitsuo, that’s pretty good,” she said.
“I don’t need you to tell me that,” he muttered.
But Stone didn’t take the hint. “No, man, I mean, you’re really good. Like, professional quality. I bet you could sell those if you wanted. Well, I wouldn’t pay for it,” she said, smiling, “‘cause I’m broke as shit. But folks with money would. Definitely.”
Mitsuo grunted in response, but stopped sketching just long enough to evaluate his work. He’d started drawing when he was five, and over the past twelve years he’d honed his talent considerably. Having moved beyond the mechanics of catching a person’s physical characteristics on paper, Mitsuo had learned to capture something of his model’s inner fire, that spark that made them who they were. Every line seemed to jump off the page and breathe with life. He’d amassed hundreds of drawings over the years, but having nothing else to do with them, he’d boxed them up and stowed them in one of the trailer’s empty closets.
The sketch on his lap was breathtaking; he’d perfectly captured the new girl’s prim expression, the self-assured way she enjoyed her own company. As a drawing it was lovely, but the portrait would become even more beautiful when he laid down the watercolor. But he’d meant what he said about not needing Stone’s approval. He wasn’t sure of anything else about himself or the world, but he was sure of his talent.
His sketchbook was full of impromptu sketches and watercolors. It was a snapshot of how he saw the world.
“Her name is Alison,” Stone said, pointing with her chin.
Mitsuo flushed a deep red, turned his back to Stone as much he could and still keep Alison in his sights. Satsuko growled.
“Hey, Stone, ain’t you got nothin’ else to do? Can’t you see we’re busy?” Satsuko’s voice was rich with contempt. She gave Stone the evil eye over Mitsuo’s shoulder.
“You’re not doing anything,” Stone said, brow furrowed. “Mitsuo doesn’t need you to draw pictures of other girls.”
“She’s my muse,” Mitsuo said, chuckling. Satsuko punched him playfully in the shoulder.
“Anyway,” Stone said, changing the subject, “I was gonna tell you. Y’all going to the church for that blessing thing?”
The two kids looked up at Stone, this time without scowling. “What blessing thing?”
Stone straightened her back, clearly proud to have town news they didn’t. “You know those Applewhite chicks got that new office over on Church Street? The ones renovating Trinity?”
The kids nodded.
“Well, they’re having some kind of blessing. I think they called it a consecration ceremony? To dedicate the renovation and the ground or something? Everybody’s invited.”
Mitsuo and Satsuko exchanged looks. “Why the hell we’d go to that?” Satsuko asked. Her broken English was completely affected. She was capable of speaking properly if she wanted to. She just rarely wanted to.
“There’ll be free food,” Stone said in a sing-song voice. Her smile was smug.
In the Badlands, “free food” was a magic phrase. Although those in the community who managed a meager income were quick to share what they brought in with the others, nobody every exactly got enough to eat. Cast-off cans of black beans were common debris around the grounds.
Mitsuo shrugged, returned to his drawing. “Sure, that sounds good. As long as they don’t expect us to sing any hymns or anything.”
Stone took a chance and crept closer, dropping to her knees when she got as close as she figured Mitsuo or Satsuko would tolerate. She was in bad need of a shower. “You ain’t got religion?”
Mitsuo smirked. “Don’t have much need for it,” he said, eyes fixed on his model. “They want us to donate money we don’t have to save souls we don’t believe in. I figure if there’s really a God, He wouldn’t be so concerned about whether or not I believe in Him. He’d have better stuff to do.”
Stone snorted. “I guess. Those two women, though — they know somethin’ I don’t. They got this…way about ‘em, I guess? Makes you curious, don’t it?”
Mitsuo shrugged. “Lilac and Lakmei, you mean?”
Stone nodded.
Across the way, Alison stood, stretched, and disappeared into one of the trailers. Sighing, Mitsuo closed the drawing tablet and leaned back onto his hands. “I don’t know much about them,” he admitted. “Haven’t ever seen them come into the bakery. Saw them once with a work crew outside the church, taking pictures. I haven’t ever talked to them, though. Just heard stuff.”
Now, even Satsuko was interested. “What kind of stuff you heard?”
Mitsuo, who wasn’t much for gossip, gave a little shrug. “I don’t know, same kind of stuff you hear about newcomers to any small town, I guess. They keep to themselves too much. They don’t leave their office. They didn’t go to the Simon St. Laine show in Placerita. Stuff like that.”
“I heard the show was awesome,” Stone said. “I heard he floated this woman up off the stage and everything.”
Satsusko sucked her teeth. “No way. That magician need to learn a thing or two about not sucking. Who do you know saw the show anyway, hippie? Your friends ain’t got ticket money,” she said.
“I know some folks,” Stone said, cool as a cucumber. Nothing seemed to rile her up much. She managed to keep pretty mellow no matter what Satsuko said to her, which only served to irritate Satsuko all the more. “So y’all are gonna go, then? To the blessing thing?”
Stone’s intense curiosity was suspicious, and Mitsuo cut his eyes at her, drawing a breath. “Why are you so interested?”
Now, Stone’s cheeks flushed pink and she rubbed at an invisible spot on her arm. “Well, I just wondered, since you got that job at the pie place, if that pie lady was gonna be there? ‘Cuz I’d like to meet her, maybe? And she could tell me what kind of pie I like. Maybe she would let me try some. On the house?”
To anyone else, the request might have sounded ridiculous, but Mitsuo understood. It wasn’t the pie she was after; it was what those pies were purported to do to the eater that she wanted.
With this new understanding, Mitsuo felt slightly less antagonistic toward his irritating neighbor. He gave her a small smile. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said.
November 9th, 2009
I like Stone. She doesn’t seem irritating so much as Mitsuo and Satsuka seem easily irritated, especially for people living in a community of outsiders.
November 9th, 2009
*chuckle* I like Stone, too. But I remember being easily irritated as a teenager. That’s what’s so great about teens: hormones make them deliciously unpredictable.
Thanks for stopping by, Sarah. I had no idea Qof7 was going again. I’m glad to see that!