Tea Leafing: A Novel (6 page)

Mary Jane glanced
briefly toward the locker where the masking tape with “Lena” written on it had
been torn from one of the lower doors. “Where’d you see him?” She asked,
rolling the burned paper ringing the tip of her cigarette around the lip of a
black glass ashtray.

“On the main floor, but
I lost him.”

“The bouncers will boot
him when they see him.” Mary Jane looked at Sam’s reflection in the long
vanity. “Do you think he did it to her?” she whispered.

Sam raised an eyebrow,
“Who knows, but I’d sure like to have a word with him.”

Looking down at her
feet, Sam thought about kicking off the platforms they were wedged into. She
didn’t dare, since they would swell like popovers the minute the shoes came
off. Once those bad boys puffed up, nothing but time would help.

Birdie came slamming
through the back door that led from the stage to the dressing room, soaked with
sweat.

“DAMN! Got any watah
?!
” Birdie said
,
huffing for air
and tromping towards the two huddled by the lockers.

Mary Jane handed Birdie
a big bottle of Evian she’d stashed in her apron. Birdie turned the bottle up
and drank most of it in a single chug.

Birdie’s garter was
crammed full of money, and bills were stuck to her body like tissue paper on a
piñata. Sam knew it had been a good set for the Bird since there were several
Benjamins visible in the mix. Birdie grabbed a towel from her open locker, draped
it across the seats of three empty chairs and lay down, panting.

Sam and Mary Jane
started picking bills off Birdie straightening the origami crap some guys
twisted their bills into. Sam watched the muscles in Birdie’s torso rise and
fall as her lungs worked to re-oxygenate her blood. Her hair draped over the
seat of the chair above her and fell in disheveled ringlets that almost touched
the floor. Small half moons of mascara filled the creases below her eyes.
Mopping her face with the black,
lycra
dress she’d
worn on stage, she tossed it unceremoniously into her locker.

“What’s this?” Mary
Jane asked holding up a particularly strange looking fold.

“Beaver.”

Mary Jane pulled the
bill flat. “Classy.”

Lucille’s walkie-talkie
squawked to life and Gio’s voice hummed through it with remnants of some
distorted bass line.

“Right boss.” Lucille
shouted back into the box. “Okay ladies, nap time is over. Mr. F. wants to see
you three and Grace upstairs in the Skybox. Pronto.”

CHAPTER 7

“I hear about Lena,”
Fedya wasted no time getting right to the point, “She has this tragic thing. I want
you know that we all can’t believe this. Is so sad.”

Nikki sniggered from
her seat next to Fedya.

Fedya turned and gave
her a look that was so
cold,
it made Sam shiver a
little.

Everything was still.

No one blinked.

Nikki stayed put, mouth
shut, head down. Fedya turned his attention back to the girls.

“I want you know that
is anything you need, come to me. I help with whatever. I know you miss work to
take some time so here something helps.”

Gio appeared from
nowhere with four neatly banded piles of bills. He handed each girl a stack and
melted quietly back into the darkness.

There was a fine film
of sweat beading Gio’s neck and forehead and he seemed to be doing his best to maintain
his cool. It was rare that he was nervous in Fedya’s company, but there was an
odd charge in the air tonight.

Fedya was not happy and
Gio wasn’t entirely sure why. He needed to get his mother out the door and then
get Fedya drunk. He wished this business with Sam, Grace, Birdie and Mary Jane
could just be done.

“Something like this
happen and
its
best to put behind. When it
come
into the club and we talk all the time about this, it will
hurt the way the girls feel . . . morale . . . yah? Is best we move on and no
talking about this
again.
This just gift from me to
you so no more talking.” There was a long pause in which Fedya seemed to be
turning something over in his mind, “Okay, now, we square?”

The girls nodded
dumbly, not understanding what had just happened.

Gio smiled, stepping in
front of the girls with his hands outstretched like a cruise director trying to
herd the masses onto the Lido deck. The girls rose from their positions on the
couch, smiled and thanked Fedya. Grace started to say something about not being
able to accept the money but Gio hissed at her under his breath. “Take it and
go.”

“Mary Jane,” Fedya
called after them “Mary Jane will pour here tonight.” Referring to the SkyBox's
dedicated facilities.

The bartender standing
behind the bar looked furious, but naturally, couldn’t argue, so she packed her
few belongings into her apron and followed Gio out to take Mary Jane’s post
behind the main bar. Mary Jane glanced back at Sam, Grace and Birdie as she
ducked under the hinged bar counter and began checking bottles to familiarize
herself with the set-up.

The pocket door slammed
shut behind the girls the minute they emerged back onto the loud balcony. Two
neckless,
crew-cut
mountains of flesh stepped shoulder
to shoulder in front of the doorway as if one of the girls might pull out an
Uzi.

Sam and Grace were both
staring at the money they’d just been handed. Birdie worked to secure her cash
to a garter she wore around her ankle.

“I’m not paying fucking
tip-out on this dosh. The house does NOT get a cut.” Birdie spat. She turned
and resolutely marched off towards the dressing room giving her left ankle an
odd little shake every few steps to test the security of her ankle-safe.

Sam and Grace thumbed
the stack of bills, pulling back the crisp twenties that bookended it,
revealing the remaining bills to be hundreds, not twenties.

“What in the hell did
we just take this money for?” Grace whispered.

“Silence.”

CHAPTER 8

Judging by the small cluster
of cars parked on the street, Sam guessed she was the last to arrive. Tanya’s
lavender, shingled cottage sat in the east Atlanta neighborhood known as
Kirkwood. Pushing the white picket gate open, she admired the pruned landscape
Tanya had created. Low-voltage landscape lighting washed the small yard in a soft
glow, hinting at the splendidly planned array that daylight would set fire with
color. Walking up the path of pavers that Birdie and Tanya had laid down the
previous spring, Sam noticed the porch light was off. Enough light filtered
through the drapes of the house that she still felt the air of warmth and
welcome.

Pushing the heavy, red
front door open, she stepped into the pineapple scented living room. Tanya’s
Chihuahua, Edna, waddle-hopped over to Sam and began the welcome dance at her feet.
Edna, like Tanya, was always dressed to the nines. Tonight she wore a pink
terrycloth bathrobe and teeny tiny bunny slippers, clearly ready for a late
night girl pow-wow. Sam lifted Edna to her chest, nuzzling her face in the
dog’s perfumed hair. Birdie and Mary Jane each rose slightly from
their
sprawled positions on the couch, “Hey Sam.”

Tanya sat on the floor
in front of her makeshift fireplace, a carved antique mantle she’d purchased at
Keller’s Flea Market and refinished. White pillar candles blazed, taking the
place of logs. Sam saw a nail polish wand in her right hand, poised over her
foot.

“Hey Suga’. You’re
looking better than the last time I saw ya’! Come give Mama a hug.”

Sam grinned and made
her rounds, kissing each on both cheeks, as Europeans often do. This would have
seemed a ridiculously pretentious act to the conservative Scandinavians that
dictated social norms in her home state. But in the south she had learned that
hugs and kisses weren’t reserved for lovers and family.

“Gimme a minute while I
finish my top coat.” Tanya drawled, gesturing to her petal pink toenails.

“Did I miss anything?”
Sam said throwing her bag stuffed with smoky, sweat-saturated costumes next to
the door and settled into an armchair with Edna.

“Nope.” Mary Jane said,
“We were waiting for you.”

 
“Where’s Grace? I thought I saw her car
outside.” Sam tilted her head to see if Grace was in the galley kitchen that
connected to the front room.

 
“She had an errand to run. She’ll stop
by later. That’s my neighbor’s car.” Tanya said, replacing the brush in the
bottle of clear polish and giving it a quick twist to tighten the cap.

“So, enough chat! Fill
us in ’bout the geezah and his twit!” Birdie referred to Mary Jane’s night in
the skybox with Fedya and Nikki.

Mary Jane rolled her
torso toward the lace-draped coffee table, pulling her box of cigarettes near
with her fingertips. Sam saw a tired, troubled look on her face and figured the
need to smoke meant there was a story to tell. Mary Jane popped the white stick
between her lips and touched flame to its tip. Her thoughts collected as she
pulled smoke into her lungs.

Resting her head back
onto the arm of the chair, she let the wisps dance between her nose and mouth.

“Just weird.” Mary Jane
said. “I can’t figure out the deal with Nikki. What a cunt.”

 
“Fedya obviously isn’t having any of her
shit,” Sam said.

Tanya fanned her feet
with a copy of Vogue, and rested her eyes on Edna, “Lots a powerful men like
the feeling of keeping their girlies in check. I’m not sayin this is Fedya’s
thing, but a whole lotta them have issues with control.”

Sam knew Tanya spoke
from experience. Her lover was a powerful Atlanta businessman. He’d been
stringing her along for the better part of a year, promising to pay for Tanya’s
gender reassignment surgery. Her big day was already booked in Bangkok, for
late January, a few short months away.
 
Working extra shifts, sewing her own clothes, and buying her toiletries
at drug stores instead of department stores, she’d only managed to save half
the money she needed.
Shug, her lover, promised to provide
the balance.

“I know, Tanya, and
that may be the dynamic.” Sam said, watching Tanya struggle with
herself
, “But Fedya just doesn’t seem like they type. I
think he was really bothered by what Nikki said.”

“They never
seem
the type, baby.”

“Well, whatever the
reason, Nikki got over it quickly after you left and was drunk in no time.
Partying like usual.” Mary Jane stared at the wooden beams running the length
of the ceiling, “Fedya relaxed and that was it. All I can say is that she must
be one crazy fuck for him to tolerate her.”

“Didja make good quid?”

Mary Jane smiled at
Birdie and poked her in the ribs, “You know I did! Better than I would have
behind the main bar.”

Birdie squealed and
twisted, trying to distance herself from Mary Jane’s assault. Tanya laughed and
stretched her long body on the antique rug.

Sam smiled, enjoying
the comfort of the velvety chair and the sleeping dog in her lap. Leaning her
head to the side, she tried to release a knotted muscle in her neck. A
photograph in a small oval frame sitting under a lamp on the table next to her
caught her eye. Her heart sank. Lena stared back at her from an Adirondack
chair. Her smile beamed from under the brim of a large sun hat, frozen drink in
hand.
The flowers of Tanya’s yard behind her.

“That was taken last
summer.” Tanya’s soft voice answered the question in Sam’s mind. “Fourth of
July. We drank all day and never made it to the fireworks. My Lord, that was a
good day.”

Mary Jane and Birdie
stopped their tussling and stared at the picture.

“So, what about
her
? What about her killer?” Sam looked
at the others.

“What do you mean?”
Mary Jane said, pushing herself up to a sitting position.

“I mean, what are we
gonna do about whoever killed her? Doesn’t it bother you that we haven’t heard
anything? Don’t you guys wonder who did this?” Sam pleaded.

Birdie blinked hard,
“Yeah, I do. I think about it but what can we do? The
bobbies
is workin’ on it. We’ll be hearing when they crack it.”

Time wasn’t soothing
Sam’s nerves the way she’d hoped. A heavy stone sat in the pit of her stomach
like an ever-present reminder of the danger she now realized was part of the
life she’d chosen.

 
“Before I forget again, did those
pictures from the funeral ever get developed?” Sam asked.

“I think Grace dropped
‘em off straightaway aftah the service but I don’t know if she picked ‘em up.
Bugger! I keep forgetting to ask her about it.”

“I’ll remind ya’.”
Tanya piped in.

Edna snored softly as
the candlelight danced across the room.

“Don’t you think it’s
odd that the boy scouts haven’t questioned
us
?”
Sam said after a few moments of thought.

CHAPTER 9

With her short dress
pulled up around her waist, Birdie used her buns as a credit card swiper.
Who but Birdie?
Sam thought, always
entertained by her imaginative shenanigans.

“Do you figure this is
how dancers in the future will take their dosh? They can ‘ave their arses wired
with a Telecheck machine?” Birdie giggled.

“Where ya gonna plug
the phone line in?” Sam shot back.

Birdie’s grin prompted
Sam to put up her hands in surrender, “Okay, I don’t want to know.”

“Thought they were an
urban legend like a scuba diver in a tree, yet ‘ere we aah.” Birdie giggled
like a schoolgirl, holding up the Titanium AMEX card.