Rails Under My Back (36 page)

The following afternoon, Hatch met the preacher-mortician in the floral chambers of his office. The undertaker explained, fingering his paintbrush mustache, that he had tired of the typical organ sound. Every funeral parlor had one.
Even the angels are bored.
He wanted an instrument that sounded equally celestial. My chariots need some new shoulders at the wheel, he said.

Hatch couldn’t stand funerals.
Down-home spooks in their Sunday best. The chemical stench of preserved death. Dearly departed cramped in the casket. (Strange to see how death gets hold of the flesh.) White-skinned Dave eternally at rest in the black casket. Uncle John puts a brick of E&J—Old Rocking Chair, Sheila said, that was Sam and Dave’s drink—in his stiff pocket. Bad enough he’d drink you out of house and home, Sheila said. Bad enough he wouldn’t lift a finger to help raise those kids. He was the biggest liar. Oh, he could lie. Told Lula Mae that I smoke reefer. Big mouth—her tongue flopping up and down like a vessel on stormy sea—Beulah commenced to whooping and hollering. Sam, if I hada just been there to hold up your head. The preacher—Rise in the flesh up to heaven—resurrected the dead with the saliva of his voice. Once at the cemetery, the pallbearers (in ant formation) carry the morsel of casket to the rim of the grave. Dust dust and ashes, fly over my grave.
And he had never played one, but he took the assignment.

IT WAS A CAB like all the others, small and functional, bug-shaped.
Aerodynamic.
Uncle John, yo cab ride smooth as a Cadillac.

Don’t it. Spokesman worked on it.

Hatch, Uncle John said. Bet you don’t know this one.

Uncle John, that’s corny.

Where Abu?

That nigga sleep. He was sposed to come and help me with my gear.

You ain’t get him in on the gig?

The—

That’s yo running buddy.

The undertaker didn’t ask fo no drummer.

Uncle John shook his head.

Well—

Uncle John kept shaking his head.

Maybe next time.

How he payin? The undertaker I mean.

Good.

Good?

Yeah. Real good.

Good for you. Get that money.

CARIBE FUNERAL HOME swam into focus. The letters formed large bright yellow boxes like at a supermarket.

Thanks, Uncle John.

Break a leg.

THE FUNERAL HOME was an apple, red outside—cherry-wood panels—and white—oak walls and pews—inside. The assembled marched like a long line of black ants up to the raised coffin. Small clouds of handkerchiefs at their faces. Wept before the body stuffed in eggshell velvet in a gleaming bronze casket. Looped back to their seats.

Preacher Bishop started them out slow.
Brothers and sisters, how often I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chicken under her wings. But such is the life of man.

Yes.

Hatch whipped organlike waves from his guitar.

Because Adam fell from grace, each of us must fall into the hands of sin, let Death lower us into the grave.

That’s right.

Reverend Bishop caught fire in the assembled’s faces.

But the grave is not our home. I say, the grave is not our home.

Lord said it ain’t.

As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the Word that they may grow thereby, you gather at the table of my sermon.

Take yo time.

Let us sit at the Lord’s table. His breasts are full of milk and his bones are moistened with marrow.

Preach.

Brothers and sisters, one of ours has fallen but we must keep the bread of life fresh.

Fresh he said.

The breath of prayers and sermons floated in the air.
He has made his bed in darkness, but as long as I am in the world, I am the world’s light.
Hatch’s breath grew fat. He concentrated on producing his thick music.
Yes, I’m pressing on the upward way. New heights I’m gaining every day. Our Father, lover of my soul, let me to thy bosom fly. Gabriel will wrap you up in his wings and fly you out of the storm.
He felt the wings of an angel hard-flapping overhead.
Shall we gather at the river where bright angel feet trod?
The assembled roared in front of him. Laughter touched him from behind. He turned his head to investigate. There he saw a woman among the odor of roses, standing in the doorway of the hall leading to the undertaker’s office and holding a red-and-black sailor’s cap on with both hands so that the winds of Hatch’s music would not blow it off. Dark hair spilled in deep folds. And smiling. The coiled spring of Hatch’s guts twisted and raised him from his seat. He was lifted up in a sea of music, pouring out of him, churning and eddying about him in warm spirals, burying him in a glittering shower.

Later that night, Hatch loaded his instrument and effects into Uncle John’s trunk.

Uncle John, take these home for me.

What? Do I look like an errand boy?

I know I drive a cab but—

A fille. I met this fille. Elsa.

Uncle John smiled. Show her who’s king. He kicked the cab into yellow motion. The sound of its backfiring faded at the end of the street.

HATCH AND ELSA cleared the last ashes of music from the chapel.

I like the way you play. Elsa brushed her hair back from her forehead. Her eyes were bright.

Thanks.

You play with a band? Her eyes burned two nails in his heart.

I got my own band. He had to unpin the words.

Your own band?

Yeah. Third Rail.

Nice name. I sing a little.

Oh, yeah. Well, we need a backup singer.

I don’t sing that well.

Don’t hang your harp upon the willows.

Elsa smiled. So you’re a poet too.

Could be. Could be.

FREEPORT? MY SISTER WENT THERE. Well, just for one year.

I should talk to her.

Elsa had moved their conversation to the seclusion of her father’s office. Are you lookin forward to going to college?

Yes, I am. I plan to study accounting, then I’ll do my year of mortuary school.

Massive furniture, shadow presences in the room.

It runs in the family?

I guess so. My dad wants me to do a year or two at the seminary.

The seminary?

Yes.

Bet you already know how to preach. Yo father sure can.

I really want to be a model.

A model?

Yes.

Why you want to be model?

What do you mean?

You’re a talented individual. Why waste your talent?

She thought it over, fingers at her ruminating chin. Are artists born or made?

Made.

So, how’s that different from modeling? Natural talent.

He thought about it. My sister’s a model.

Now I know I have to meet her. Are you going to introduce us?

Well, she’s not that kind of model.

What kind of model is she?

NOBODY IN OUR FAMILY HAS A GRAVESTONE. Nobody.

Why not?

No money.

Money? They aren’t that expensive.

No?

No.

We don’t even have a car. My sister does. And my Uncle John. Hatch thought it over. People in my family barely get a decent funeral.

You have to watch what funeral home you choose. Have you ever heard of Sleepytime Incorporated?

I’ve seen them all over the city.

They are nationwide. They have a warehouse where they stack all the bodies. They’ve lost a body or two here and there.

What?

Yeah. A coupla times they tried to convince a family to have a closed-casket funeral because they had lost the bodies. Empty casket.

Damn.

And they also do mass incinerating.

What’s that?

When they put more than one body in an oven at a time. Like they might cremate a baby with an adult. Or two kids together. The ashes get mixed up. The family thinks they have Bill’s ashes, but Bill’s are mixed with Sue’s, Larry’s, and Baby Tom’s.

Damn.

It happens all the time.

I know one thing. They don’t do no good funerals down South.

Next time somebody in your family dies, let us handle it.

WHAT’S YOUR SIGN?

Cancer, Hatch said.

Pisces.

Two fish.
My sister a Pisces.

Oh. Then she must be a good woman. Elsa smiled.

Hatch returned it. An easy silence in the room. He looked at his watch. Wow! You know how long we’ve been talking?

I can imagine.

Let’s do something.

You like Chinese food?

My favorite.

I know a restaurant.

At the restaurant, Elsa showed him how to eat shrimp fried rice with chopsticks. There was something magical about it, working the sticks like puppet handles and seeing the rice rise on invisible strings to your mouth.

Let’s have coffee, Elsa said.

Coffee? That’s for old folks.

So we can talk.

Okay.

I know a place where they have quality coffee.

MY GRANDFATHER, MY MOTHER’S FATHER, was a cigar maker in Puerto Rico. He died long before I was born. But my father’s father died a few years ago. He had a funeral home down South and he had pictures of the old days and was always telling stories. He had two horses that pulled the funeral procession.
The horses would cry if someone was going to hell. And they would stop twice if someone was going to heaven.

Hatch and Elsa blew laughter back and forth between them.

Who gave you those? Elsa’s fingers reached out and seized his dogtags. Blind to him, they had slipped out of the V of his open collar.

Lucifer.

Steam rose like a white bird. Her fingers made two hot wafers of the metal.

Lucifer? She studied the dogtags closely. The hot metal sizzled and sang.

My dad.

Was he in the army?

Yeah. He and my Uncle John.

She studied the tags. Red shadows played over her light brown face, two small red coffins.

This is good coffee, he said. They were drinking thick brown coffee in thimble-sized cups.

Thanks, she said. She released the tags. They went instantly cold.

He sipped. She sipped. He tried to keep his reckless eyeballs in check, keep them from surveying the saxophone curve of her neck, the float of her breasts.

Who learned you this coffee? he said.

My mother.

She the Puerto Rican half of the family?

She laughed, molasses-thick laughter that sweetened the air.

Am I that funny?

No, honey. She took his hand into her own. The sheen of his skin seemed to add a shimmer to her own. She gave his hand a light squeeze, then returned her own hand to her lap. Give me your cup.

My cup?

Yes.

He handed her the thimble. She upended the cup, dumped the sediment into her saucer. She peered into the hollow. Let me read your future.

My future. You believe in that stuff?

She parted her lips, a light smile. She looked into the cup. He leaned forward to see what she saw. Patterns. There were actually patterns inside the cup.

Well, what you see?

Your future.

Well?

A bird.

LET’S GO TO THE PARK.

The park? he said. It’s winter.

So.

Collar turned up, he agreed. The coffee had formed a warm sanctuary inside him. He felt free from the fears that had choked him in the funeral parlor. They left the coffee shop and took the train to Circle Park.

They strolled in the cold night. The sky sat awake above them. The air clean and stinging the nose. From a vast black vault, stained with city lights and stars—the floodlights of heaven—millions of snowflakes drifted down silently in a straight path. Brilliant moonlight transfigured her red-and-black sailor’s cap, her black wool scarf and matching gloves, her body-hiding coat which reached down to her ankles, and her black leather boots that came above her knees. They strolled through darkness spangled with wet snowflakes. The night widened around them. Except on those lucky occasions when the moon shone just right, Elsa’s face was lost in the shadows. Tracing a huge circle, Hatch and Elsa covered the entire park.

They found a quiet bench. He sat down facing her, so close their knees touched. They spoke in the perfumed darkness. He saw her in sharp detail in the moonlight. He hoped the darkness would protect his face, make him appear even the slightest bit handsome. He took both her hands in his. He kissed one hand, gently, a small trembling bird.

In the subway, they held hands while the panting monster of a train screamed down the tracks. He took her home through the flying underbelly of the city and on the El, the city’s high skin above. She invited him inside. The Bishops had painted every room of their house yellow, pink, or purple.