conspiratorial way that my buddy Richard made fun of the band Smash
Mouth. Now, a pop band is a pop band, and I know that, but I like
Smash Mouth. Apparently, people either really like, don’t care for or
hate Smash Mouth. And furthermore, I have been known to make fun of
certain pop bands too, perhaps it’s because I never cared for the
music, the fans or the shear number of times I’ve had to listen to
it. However, all of this is neither here nor there. I like the band
Smash Mouth and at the time of the conversation, Richard was
incredulous to say the least.
The longer the conversation went on,
the more and more disbelief came from Richard. He asked if I’d been
to any of the Smash Mouth concerts. I haven’t. He asked if I’d seen
any of their videos. At the time of the writing of this blog post, I
haven’t. Although, I will look at a few now. He asked me if I’d
recognize the band if they walked in at that very second. Of course
not, I have no idea what they look like. It warranted the next
question: “What kind of Smash Mouth fan are you?”
still not sure why, is what I then told him. I have written several
short stories inspired by Smash Mouth songs. For instance, my story
“Summer Girl” shares the same title as their 2006 album, and it
is particularly inspired by the song “Right side, Wrong Bed” and
Richard’s jaw dropped. I don’t see why this should be so crazy. The
other piece of the story “Summer Girl” is inspired by Edward
Weston and his relationship with Charis Wilson. Incidentally, had we
been talking about old photographers and their very young
girlfriends, and I mentioned the story, perhaps it would not have
arouse such laughter and disbelief. Who knows?
pop music. I like clever music, and I think Smash Mouth has some of
that cleverness. I also like pop music that is fun, light. I like
love songs. I think there is plenty of bullshit out there in life, in
history, in our personal histories that lead to heavy stuff. I don’t
want to hear protest songs about war. I’ve been to war, I don’t need
to be there anymore. I already believe in the broken window theory
and the broken window fallacy and please don’t get me started on
social disorganization, I don’t need to hear about that either.
Perhaps it may seem shallow of me but pop songs about love and
heartbreak really seem to be about the height of pop music. If I
learned anything from Jim Crace’s 2000 novel Being Dead
it is this:
transcend, transport, because there’s a such thing as love. But hymns
and prayers have feeble tunes because there are no gods.
where does that leave Smash Mouth, Richard Duggan and “Summer
Girl”? Well, this is it, as elegantly as I can, when I write, I
listen to music. I’m listening to Conor Obrest right now. I often
listen to jazz and the 20th
century composers are my favorites: Debussy, Ravel and Gershwin. I
allude to all of these in various things I’ve written. Do they
influence what I write, maybe. You be the judge, you have video and
here is the short story:
Summer Girl
Tess gave no heat to the bank teller.
After all, it wasn’t his fault that her account was overdrawn. There
were no real solutions. This was a Thursday night, and there was no
money to spend. The heat was not unbearable, the bills were paid
through month’s end. There were records to play and a stack of
magazines to flip through. Things were not going to get out of hand,
this was the truth. Things were old, antique, everything: the house,
the magazines, the records. She had never heard of any of the pop
bands, country music singers or the likes of vinyl heroes.
Tess walked down 3rd all the way from
Main Street to Front Ave. She hoped that Marcy was still half naked
on the patio of her little beach rental. Marcy, for whatever reason,
had not been able to comply to real life. At length, sometime in
June, then again in July and yet another time just the week before
had told Tess at length about her falling out with her job, her
husband and her life back in Portland. To no end, obviously, because
even after the whole summer at Nye Beach, Marcy had not come closer
to any sort of perspective.
It didn’t matter much anyway. Marcy
had left the canvas chair which was now filled with sunlight of an
aging day.
Standing alone on the corner, Tess
looked down the line of vacation houses all of them mixed with sand
and grass and the salted air of the Pacific in such a peaceful way.
The next choice, clearly, was Charlie. Tess could knock on Charlie’s
door and not feel in the least bit bad about it. Charlie, like
Marcy was suffering from some sort of
malaise that took him from his comfortable home in the middle of the
country somewhere to the beaches of Oregon. Unlike Marcy, Charlie’s
malaise seemed to be born out of boredom and fixed (if temporarily)
by this residence at Newport, Oregon.
“Young Tess,” Charlie said as he
opened the door. “Well, come on in, I was just about to begin a
relationship with a bottle of rum.”
“That’s funny,” she said. It was
funny, yes, but the cadence of statement made for the humor more than
the words themselves.
“Well, it’s not going to be a very
long relationship, and it’s going to be more fun as a threesome,”
Charlie said.
“Dirty,” Tess said. The age
spread was nearly twenty-five years. That conversation happened in
June, after Tess’s birthday on the 13th and before Charlie’s birthday
on the 21st. Twenty five years, minus one week. “But I kind of
like it,” she said.
“Good,” he said. “I’ll get all
the fixings together, and all you have to do is squeeze the melons.”
“Squeeze the melons?” she asked.
“That was dirty,” he said. “I
meant squeeze the fruit, limes, not melons. I don’t know why I said
melons.”
This cause a nervous chuckle in
Charlie. He thought melons because of the stripy bikini top and
Tess’s melons underneath. Tess knew. They were not the size of
limes, and she adjusted the top string just behind her neck which
pulled the cleavage tighter and higher. “Were you a photographer
in another life Charlie?” she asked.
He cut a few limes and set them next
to her and the old fashioned juicer. “Photographer? No,” he
sighed. “I never had an eye for that. I was in insurance.”
“Salesman?” she asked.
“Underwriter,” he said.
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“What is an underwriter?”
“It means that you’re not squeezing
these limes fast enough.”
“Melons,” Tess said.
“Squeeze your melons on your own
time, right now we have drinking to do.”
“Threesome?”
“Squeeze,” he said. “This
banter is, is—”
“In serious need of a rum drink?”
Tess said.
“Yes, exactly,” he said. Blender:
rum, lime, sweetened, mint, ice. Glass: the blended mix, soda.
“Now,” Charlie said, “Outside.” He led the way. On the back
patio of his small cottage, he climbed the spiral stairs first. On
the yacht-like roof top patio, Charlie took in the sight from the
south to the north looking over the waves of the mighty, mighty
Pacific in such a way to suggest the man had never seen it before.
“This is it,” he said. He took off his Hawaiian shirt which had
not been buttoned in days.
“Yup,” Tess said. “You seen
Marcy today?”
“This morning,” Charlie said.
“Why? What did she say?”
“Nothing,” Tess said. “I just
haven’t seen her.”
“She’s probably tired,” Charlie
said. He looked out to the distance. A few kites dotted the sky and
they were already moving out to sea the clearest indication of the
coming of the evening.
“Now, what does that mean?” Tess
said.
“What?” Charlie said quickly.
“Why would Marcy be tried?”
“What was this about being a
photographer?” Charlie said. He moved closer to Tess and quickly
sat down on the paint blistered wood bench. He set his drink between
them and quickly looked away.
“Nice way to change the subject,”
Tess said.
“You like that?” he asked.
“Well, it was feeble attempt to make
a comparison,” Tess said.
“Between what?”
“You and me,” Tess began. She
took a huge drink from her glass. “And Edward Weston and Charis
Wilson.”
“I don’t know them?” Charlie said.
“Is this a TV thing?”
“No Charlie,” Tess said. “They
came before TV.”
“I don’t know them. Pretty esoteric
stuff,” he said. “Listen, go downstairs and make another batch
of this stuff, use the rest of the rum.”
Tess returned with the entire blender
full of the mojito blend. She set the thing down next to Charlie.
He did not move. His eyes focused deeply into the ocean’s distance.
“You okay?” Tess asked.
“It’s a funny thing,” Charlie
said. “You know? I used to listen to all those whinny people who
thought they deserved to be rich. Like they were entitled to it.”
His attention lifted from the distance and to the small railed-in
patio and lastly to the blender full of rum. He poured his glass to
the top, took a huge slug from it, then refilled it. “It was like
being rich was something that they deserved. I never did too poorly
myself, and I saved and saved my money so I could be happy some day.”
“What’re you talkin’ ’bout?” Tess
said.
“It’s a quality of life issue. I
think too many people are out there thinking that money and being
rich makes for a better life. Or a better quality of life at least.”
“Doesn’t it?” Tess asked.
“I don’t think so. But we’re not
going to talk about it,” he said. “We’ve come up here to drink
this rum.”
“Okay Charlie,” Tess said. “Why’d
you bring it up?”
“Well, I don’t want it to turn into
a lecture.”
“Okay.”
“Look at us,” he said. “Marcy’s
out here because she got the vacation house in the divorce. I’m here
to fritter and waste the last of my days, why are you here?”
“What?” Tess asked.
“Why are you here?” Charlie asked.
“Last days?” Tess asked.
“You know, for years I lamented the
one who got away. I thought if I just had more money, a better job,
a bigger house I would have attracted her to me. It’s pretty stupid
really.”
“What is all this Charlie?” Tess
asked.
“Well, whatever it is, I’m done
talking about it. Why are you here?”
“Here? Here?” she asked pointing
down to his house below. “At your place?”
“No, here in Newport?”
“Got a good deal on the rent. My
place belongs to some old people back in Portland, I guess they
needed the money. I rented it for the summer.”
“I see,” Charlie said.
“I’m here at your house because my
bank account is overdrawn and I wanted to hang out.”
“You need money?” Charlie asked.
“No,” Tess said. “Not if you’re
dishing out the rum. But I wouldn’t mind a few bucks for
cigarettes.”
“Cigarettes?” Charlie asked.
“Cigarettes, smokes, squares,
rockets, fags, you know?”
“Those things’ll kill ya,” Charlie
said.
“I thought you weren’t going to make
a lecture?” she said.
“How much do smokes cost these
days?”
“Eight bucks,” Tess said.
“Eight dollars? Holy hell,”
Charlie said. “I quit because they went to 80 cents a pack.”
“Hell’s not holy,” Tess said.
“I’d like some, but I don’t need them.”
“No,” he said. “You don’t.”
The statement served only to quiet them too much. The surf below
came through louder now, louder through the dunes and the grass and
the kites and the beach and the world. “Listen,” Charlie said at
last. “There’s some money in a coffee can on top of the fridge.”
“Coffee can?” Tess asked. “Is
everything here old school like that?”
“Old school coffee cans? The coffee
can came with the house, I didn’t bring it.”
“I can pay you back Charlie. I just
need like ten bucks, you know for the smokes.”
“Don’t worry about it. There’s a
little more than ten dollars. Take what you need.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Like ten
bucks.”
“Listen, take it all.”
“I can’t do that,” she said. She
poured the last of the blender’s contents into the two glasses. “Do
you want me to make more?”
“Take the money, and go buy your
cigarettes first,” Charlie said. He rested his head against the
railing and looked from her to the distance of the ocean.
“You all right?” she asked.
“Just getting drunk,” he said.
“Take your time, okay?”
“Okay, Charlie,” she said. She
took a long drink from her glass. She stood and picked up both her
glass and the blender. “Should I get Marcy on the way back?”
“Marcy?” Charlie asked.
“Yeah,” Tess said. “You know,
the one who’s probably tired.”
“Yeah, okay, good,” Charlie said.
“I’ll feel okay about that.”
Tess hesitated at the staircase. She
looked back over toward Charlie. Apparently he was just quietly
letting the drunk settle in. He looked over the railing to the
misting, kite filled beach sky where the sun races down to circle the
globe. “Okay,” Tess said. She took a few steps down and turned
to watch him when the direction of the stairs took her the other way
around. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
In the kitchen, the coffee can was
where she expected it to be. Looking at it, she tried to remember if
she had seen it before. The thing was old, this was apparent just
looking at it. The top, a pliable plastic at some point was now
brittle and stiff, cracked in places. “Fuck you Charlie,” Tess
said. She pulled out the first wad of money only to see the second
wad underneath. “I’m not going to take all of this.” She
unwrapped a single bill from the outside of the roll. “Twenty
dollars only,” she said. That’s the ten dollars and ten for good
measure. She pushed the twenty between the clothe and her skin into
her bikini. The rest of the money she restored to the can and she
set the can back where she found it.
Outside, the air felt cooler on the
street level than it had on the roof top. Tess quickly walked back
to 3rd and then headed toward Main St.
The gas station was its normal flurry
of activity. There were carloads of tourists from all over, BC,
Washington and Oregon namely. They were going here or there, many of
them were no doubtedly heading into Newport to see the sights, or
they were heading farther out to take in the cheese factory of
Tillamook or the wine of Willamette valley.
Jerry stood calmly behind the
register. He took his time with each of the customers as they
approached. His general disinterest covered his face like a plastic
prefab Halloween mask. He did not notice Tess standing at the end of
the line. In fact, he did not notice the line moving however slowly,
nor did he see her approach.
“Blues,” she said in her turn.
“Tess,” Jerry said.
“Hi Jerry. Can I have a pack of
blues?”
“Yeah,” he said. He reached up to
the rows of cigarettes above the till. His hand, accustomed to the
location of the varying brands went straight to the desired box. He
did not take his eyes off of her, something that made it feel like
she might vanish at any point. “Where have you been?”
“Here and there,” she said.
“Being cryptic or just don’t want to
tell me?” Jerry said. He put the box on the counter and touched at
the register’s buttons. “Seven-fifty,” he said.
She handed him the bill in one fluid
movement from her breast to the counter.
“Listen, let’s talk. I feel
terrible about it,” he said.
“Me too,” she replied. She took
the box of cigarettes and waited with an impatient stare complete
with arm crossing.
“Listen, I can get you the money
back.”
“Can you tell me the truth?” she
asked. She was ever aware of the few people filling up the small gas
station store; tourists on the way to the restrooms or coffee urns.
“I’ll tell you everything,” he
said. “Please.”
“Only because I’ve had a few drinks
and I’m feeling like humane or something,” she said.
“Listen, I’m off at nine.”
“What’s it now?” Tess asked.
“Ten minutes of eight,” he said.
“I’ll come over there.”
“No Jerry,” Tess said. “I’d
rather come here.”
“Okay, nine then.”
Back outside, Tess wasted no time with
the task at hand. She quickly stuffed the money, coins included,
back into the bikini top and unwrapped the box in one movement from
door to trashcan.
She put a cigarette to her mouth and
stopped into a motionlessness with the unlit thing in her lips.
She looked over her shoulder. Crowds
had developed like mold on a lemon inside the little store. As she
turned about, there were cars every which way and the attendant
moving between them. No one was smoking, and of all the likely
places in the world for people to be smoking, the gas station was not
one of them.
There would be people smoking, this
she knew closer to the beach along the strips of restaurants and
bars. But for whatever reason she didn’t feel like waiting so long
for a light.
In the old weedy parking lot from the
defunct garage, a rock-a-billy looking couple moved around their old
travel trailer. To Tess, this couple, on their way across America
all the way from Kansas (both license plates: car and trailer) had to
have a match.
The woman looked up to see Tess as she
approached. She looked at Tess with a level of suspicion that is the
sure telling look of a traveler, or at the very least a look of
someone not from Newport. “Hi,” Tess said. She held up the
unlit cigarette. “Do you have a match I might have?”
The young woman stood still and looked
at Tess with a sidelong glance through her vampy makeup. “Lawrence,”
she called. “Gimme your lighter.”
Lawrence poked his head out of the old
travel trailer door. His black hair, piled high and greased back and
into one piece was the model of jailhouse rock. When he stepped out,
his tattoos were an impressive collection although not tidy or
hinting at continuity. “Yeah,” he said. He looked at the woman
and the woman looked at Tess. Lawrence, probably a genius when it
came to old carburetors or the reading of old maps was not too clever
when it came to stand offs.
“Go light this girl’s cigarette,”
she said.
Lawrence hopped to it. From the
pocket of his jeans he produced a cliché Zippo. “There,” he
said.
Tess leaned into the flame, tried her
best to hold herself steady as she touched the the tip of the
cigarette to its ignition. “Thank you,” she said.
“No worries,” Lawrence said.
Tess leaned around Lawrence to gain a
view of the woman. She looked like someone from a movie, only
scarier. “You really from Kansas?” Tess asked.
“K.C. By way of Manhattan,” she
said. “You live here?”
“Me,” Tess asked. “Yeah,” she
said with a level of pride that even surprised her. “I’ve been
living here all summer.”
“Huh?” Lawrence began. “Summer
girl,” he said. “Must be nice.”
“Yeah,” Tess said quickly. Truth
was, that yes, it was nice. She had spent her days doing what she
wanted to do, which was next to nothing. She read all the popular
magazines from the Bush administration…the first Bush
administration. She hung out all day with her friends, first Marcy
then it was Charlie and then Jerry. Jerry wasn’t so bad, just a
liar, and really, he wasn’t all that bad of guy because of the lie.
And Marcy was always good for meal, even if she took too long to talk
about what she had to talk about which was kind of a waste of time.
But that’s all Tess really wanted to do was waste time. “It’s been
a good summer. What about you two? Where have you been?”
“All over, national parks mostly,”
Lawrence said. “We’re on our way to Yosemite.”
“Lawrence, give her a book of
matches,” the woman said. To this, Lawrence disappeared for a
moment inside the trailer. In his absence, Tess smoked her cigarette
and the woman just stared.
“Here,” Lawrence said. He handed
Tess the book of matches. “When you’re in KC stop by and see us.”
Tess looked over the book of matches.
“Little Apple Tattoos and Piercing?” she asked. “Cool, I
will.” She slipped the book of matches between her bikini top and
the money already resting there. “So long,” she said.
Lawrence nodded and the woman waved.
Tess walked away slowly with her flip flops flip flopping all the
way. She smoked in a pensive way and looked at her skin, from
shoulders to toes. Not a single scar, not a single tattoo. “Not a
scar on Tess Marr,” she said. “Manhattan by way of KC?” she
repeated.
Back on 3rd, she walked straight to
Marcy’s house. She climbed the three stairs to her front door and
knocked. She waited the normal amount of time which felt more like
an eternity before knocking again. After the third round of
knocking, Tess moved close to the door, put her ear to it and
listened for signs of life and was genuinely surprised to find none.
The day was cooking on. She had a few
things that needed doing. First order of business was the returning
of the extra ten dollars to the coffee can. If she could swing it,
she might be inclined to have another round, or two of drinks with
Charlie, that is if he was willing to make more for her. Then there
was the issue of warmer clothes for the night. Then there was Jerry.
Jerry.
She had not held anything from him.
She had been honest from the get go. She explained that she would be
gone come September. She told him that this was a summer escape.
She told him that she wanted to get back home to Portland in the fall
and that she was going to get serious. Sure, he was a nice guy, but
she had a future to consider. She never once lied about her ways,
her feelings, her status or her views. She did not lie about her
break up in the spring, she did not lie about how she felt about
marriage, God, children and the daily grind. She did not lie about
what happened: she met a nice guy in a bar and saw no harm at all in
spending the summer seeing him around a little. She did not lie
about what was going to happen: she was on her way back to the world
at summer’s end to resume life, graduate school, research and the
beginning of a career. She did not let her views be left to guesses
or to chance.
Why Jerry had lied about everything
was beyond her. He could have told her that he was a miserable
failure. That he lived with his mother. That the mother of his
daughter was taking him for all that he had, which wasn’t much. He
could have told her that he had made a mess of his life. He could
have told her that the money he wanted to borrow would be more, much
more than she had to loan to him. He could have told her these
things. She had no intention of staying with him anyway. “Probably
didn’t even graduate from high school,” she said as she thought
about Jerry. She made it back to Charlie’s place. “Didn’t have to
be forever Jerry,” she whispered.
She moved through the small house and
stalled at the coffee can. She took the now damp money from her
bikini top and rolled it to the outside of the wad of money.
The counter top still looked like a
ready laboratory complete with tinctures and plants and the raw
ingredients of tiki worshiping elixirs. Tess waited for a moment,
gathering her thoughts. The last thought of Jerry made her consider
the task at hand. Mix two drinks and then get back to Charlie?
Clean the kitchen? Get to Charlie first? “Charlie?” she called
at the back door. “Charlie, you still up there?” She closed the
back door behind her and began to walk up the stairs. “I stopped
by Marcy’s and she wasn’t there.”
“Here I am,” Marcy said to Tess
after the latter made her way to the top of the house. “Here I
am.”
“What’s happened?”
“Don’t get excited,” Marcy said.
“I just want a few minutes with him before we call.”
“What’s happened?”
“I got the call a few minutes ago,
and he was gone before I got here.”
“No!” Tess said. She moved in
closer to Charlie and then through tear clouded eyes she looked to
Marcy. “No, this can’t be. I wasn’t ready for this.”
“Come here,” Marcy said. She
pulled Tess closer and under her gentle touch, Tess yielded and
shrank to the small size of a child. “I just need a few minutes
before we call.”
“You knew this was happening?”
Tess asked.
“Yes,” Marcy said. She held Tess
tighter. “I just want to spend a few minutes with him, okay?”
“Why were you so tired out?” Tess
asked.
“What dear?”
“Tired, you were tired because of
Charlie?” Tess asked.
“I don’t know what you mean dear,”
Marcy said.
“Like you two stayed up all night
together, he made it seem like that’s what happened.”
“We have time to talk about this
later,” Marcy said. “Just now, I want to spend a few quiet
moments with him.”
Tess nestled into Marcy’s side. She
looked over Marcy’s small body and saw Charlie sitting right where he
had been sitting before she left. He held the phone which had
replaced the rum drink. He looked relaxed. He looked peaceful, she
thought. Whatever he looked like, he did not look dead.
Tess’s eyes dried. The comfortable
buzz she once had had gone now and a low level headache replaced it.
The headache was just moments away from a full blown hangover and she
knew it.
“Do you mind if I smoke?” Tess
asked. She leaned up and pulled away from Marcy.
“I wish you’d quit,” Marcy said.
“Any day now,” Tess said. “Any
day but this one.”
“Yeah,” Marcy said. “He loved
you very much.”
“How do you know?” Tess asked.
She stared at the match book, Little Apple, had she not talked to
them so long, she’d have been with Charlie. “Did he tell you
that?”
“Said that you reminded him of the
one that got away,” Marcy said.
“What?”
“He also said that no matter what,
you must not leave without the coffee, do you know what that means?”
“Coffee?” Tess asked. “I wasn’t
ready for this.”
“No, me neither,” Marcy said.
“I was suppose to see Jerry
tonight.”
“A date?”“To work out a conundrum,” Tess
said. “Which seems pretty small and insignificant now.”