Dancing Lessons (38 page)

Celia stopped and shook her head, and then she looked straight at me.

“You know what, G? I'm glad I went. She was so happy to see me. Really, really happy. So was I. When she saw me she screamed for joy and the two of us grabbed each other and started hugging and dancing around and yelling and crying. Poor Junior! I'm sure he was embarrassed, but of course no one else was paying us the slightest attention.

“Once I got a good look at her, though, I was hoping my face didn't show how shocked I was. She just wasn't bothering anymore to take care of herself. She was thin and dirty, full of old scabs, and her hair was out to here, like a wild woman. It was the middle of summer, a real New York scorcher, and she was wearing these big boots and combat pants—you know the real army ones with these huge pockets everywhere, sort of barely hanging on her hips even with a belt, and a skimpy little T-shirt and an old leather waistcoat which she wore open, like some Western marshal. Pockets, pockets everywhere, and all seemed full of stuff.”

Celia paused then. None of us said a word. I was suddenly feeling so breathless I wondered if I was having a heart attack.

Celia gave a half-smile and shook her head. “Junior told me afterwards she also carried a Glock 9-mil stuffed down her boots, but I never believed him.”

“A Glock?”

It was Herman who replied. “A handgun, G. The fave accessory of the posses.”

I opened my mouth but no words came out.

“You know what?” Celia smiled again, but this time as if recalling something pleasant. “The one thing that remained of the old Shirley was her big laugh and kind of energy. While we were there, she was behaving like the mama of that squat, calling out and joking with everyone, bussing that huge laugh. The laugh is what made me fool myself into thinking hey, it's still there. We just need to get her away from here, get her cleaned up, get her to a doctor, get her dried out. Get the old Shirley back.

“Of course Junior had warned me from the start not to bother; he had been down that road many times. ‘She has to want it, Sis,' he kept saying. ‘She has to decide she wants help. Don't even bother to take this on your head, please. You are just setting up yourself to get run over.'

“But of course I thought I knew better. When Shirley took us down the street to a West Indian club to eat, I thought we were halfway there. It was a grotty little place with a memorable name—Sunshine Stables—isn't that great? Well, inside was kind of scary for it was dark and smoky with a funky smell and full of rough-looking guys playing dominoes and pool. Everybody called out to Shirley as she came in and she was calling greetings right back—she seemed to know all their names. We sat in a little room at the back and Sugar Baby—this little man-woman who ran it, a former jockey wouldn't you know, and who obviously adored Shirley, brought us curry goat and rice and peas. We ate and drank Red Stripe and chatted and laughed and believe me, it was almost like old times. But by the end of the meal I could see Shirley getting anxious and then frantic and her eyes suddenly sort of retreated in her head, as if we were no longer there. She was scratching away at her skin and patting her pockets in a crazy kind of way and then she turned to Junior as if to a stranger and said, ‘You have change for a phone call?'

“Junior just rolled his eyes and fished out some dollars from his wallet and gave it to her. She grabbed it like it was a lifeline. I was such a fool that by this time I had my wallet out too. Shirley didn't say anything, she just stuck out her hand, and I opened the wallet and handed her a wad of notes, I don't even know how much it was. I remembered noticing the dry, ashy skin on the back of her hand and her broken fingernails. By the time I looked up she was gone. Not a word of thanks or anything. Junior just looked at me and shook his head and smiled and he stood up and said, ‘All right, we can go now.'

“‘What? Aren't we waiting for Shirley?' I asked. You know, I was that foolish. Junior said in his deadpan voice—you know Junior and his cool—‘Yeah, you can stay here if you want to wait forever, Sis. You've just given Shirley enough for a few big hits.' I felt so awful then. We left, Junior and I, and we never talked about it again. I hadn't even got around to mentioning the wedding to her. Junior had made me take off my engagement ring and all my jewellery before we set out. That was the last time I saw Shirley.”

Herman got up from the table while she was speaking, and as he came back and handed her a tissue I realized Celia was crying. No expression on her face, just the tears streaming down. Herman stood behind her and she leaned against him, and he had both arms around her in a loose hug as she wiped her eyes and blew her nose. Across from them, I was blinking, trying hard to keep my own tears in. Ashley, who was sitting beside me, had her elbow on the table and was leaning her cheek on her arm, looking from her parents to me, her eyes wide. She seemed terribly young and vulnerable, not the bold high-heel-wearer I'd gotten used to.

I raised my eyes and met Herman's. He gave a small smile and said, “G, you might as well hear the whole truth. Shirley was killed, but it was no accident: she was a small-time dealer and seemed to have crossed her supplier so he had her taken out. At least that's the official version of events. She—well, this is the awful part. Her body was found in a Dumpster on the other side of the city with no clothes, no identification on her, so it was some time—months—before they found out who she was.”

Ashley gave a little gasp, as I did.

“Even when the police identified her we still wouldn't have known who she was,” Celia continued. “It turned out, she was married to Pinto. Not a word to any of us. And that wasn't even his real name. Well, it was his mother's name and he used it, as the Spanish do, but her name was given as Shirley Aguilar. It was probably carried in the papers here, no doubt in the
Star
. But even if we saw it, we wouldn't have known it was our Shirley.”

I could see Ashley screwing up her mouth as if she wanted to say something, and I fully expected “Awesome!” to come out. But it was Herman who spoke.

“Shirley wasn't a bad kid, but her life went off the rails.”

I was tensing myself to hear the rest of it, but just then there was a loud halloing at the front door and the grim atmosphere dissolved. Ashley's friends had arrived. Celia dabbed at her eyes and immediately turned into her smiling, gracious self as she greeted the youngsters and introduced them to me. Herman looked at his watch and said he had promised to drop by his parents. “We'll talk later,” he said, looking over at me. I nodded, feeling that we had made a breakthrough. Somehow I knew this time I would hear the truth. Celia and the youngsters trooped out, and I was left alone. I sat and then I got up from the table and was surprised at how weak and confused I felt. I tottered out into the garden and sat on a bench that overlooked the city and the sea and I took deep breaths and allowed the beauty of the morning to pull me away from the darkness of Shirley's last days. I forced myself not to think of that.

I was truthful when I said I didn't know about Shirley's drug use or her relationship with Pinto, but somehow I wasn't all that surprised at what I had just learned. Did I already know it, at least subconsciously? Had I heard rumours? Was it a mother's intuition? Or was it that I already knew the narrative so well? So many other children had fallen victims to violence in the years since then, to drugs and guns, perhaps we had simply lost the capacity to feel anything but helplessness.

I couldn't help myself from asking, why? What had turned Shirley so weak and foolish in the first place? What signals had I missed? What signals had I failed to give? Was it the way she was raised or some internal flaw she was born with that had widened over the years? I didn't have the photo with me, but I didn't need to look at it now to understand the depth of the sadness in her eyes.

WE CONTINUED TO TALK
about Shirley on and off over the weekend, not in any formal kind of way, but just whenever one of us felt like saying something. Sometimes it was all three of us, or just me and Celia or me and Herman. I noticed that when Ashley wasn't out with her friends, she was hanging around us all the time, as if she didn't want to be left out of anything; but, unlike her usual chatty self, she was mostly silent. I couldn't help thinking how differently she was raised, as if she had a right to share in whatever was happening and not be banished from adult conversation the way I had been and the way I treated my own children. Staying in Celia's house that weekend opened my eyes to a lot of things, to what I suppose was a normal family life. Well no, not normal, for I had banished that word from my vocabulary. Ideal, perhaps? I certainly think Celia had found the ideal in Herman; I could see he allowed her to be herself, to be free; and, with a twinge of envy, I wondered what path had led her to find her soulmate.

The most important thing I learned was that Junior had had nothing to do with Shirley's death. It was pure coincidence that his own troubles started around the same time and he went underground to save his skin. But he did feel guilt that he was the one who had introduced Shirley to Pinto, Celia said.

“Though at the time he and Michael and Pinto were just good mates from school. They had no idea at the time what a madman Pinto was.”

We were talking in the kitchen, because I'd insisted on cooking dinner. Celia and Herman had looked relieved at that suggestion and both had vanished to their bedroom for the afternoon. It was Ashley who showed me where to find everything and how to work the fancy stove and oven. The latter was vital, for I let her into my little secret: I had decided to make devil's food cake with caramel icing for dessert!

“Mm,” Ashley said, “my favourite. Mum's too. She always makes it for my birthday, but she ends up scarfing down most of it herself.”

“Oh really,” I said. “But don't say anything, I want it to be a big surprise.”

Most of the dinner was prepared and the cake was in the oven when Celia appeared, looking rested, smelling fresh with shampoo and body lotion, wearing a long wrap skirt and a tight knit top that made her look like she stepped out of
Vogue
. And though I could see how toned her body was, I still couldn't help noticing her bones. She immediately started sniffing, “Mmm, am I smelling what I am smelling?” But I pretended innocence. “Just a little something I'm whipping up for dessert,” I said airily, praying to high heaven that the devil wouldn't make my chocolate cake in any way inferior to Mrs. Reverend Doctor's.

I didn't want Celia to focus on the cake, so I busied myself at the sink with washing the lettuce and spinning it.

“Gosh, G, this is so nice. I'd forgotten what a great cook you are.”

“You can thank your grandmother Samphire for that,” I told her. “She taught me everything.”

“Makes a change, doesn't it, to have a nice mother-in-law. Herman thinks you are one, you know.”

“Yes,” I said, turning back to the sink and running the water to hide my confusion, for I still wasn't sure how to take compliments, how much trust I could place in what people had to say. I changed the subject by asking her to tell me about Junior. Maybe that wasn't a good idea, as it became another emotional roller coaster ride for me. This time Celia seemed quite matter-of-fact as she talked. She went to the fridge and took out a bottle of white wine and took down two glasses and held one up to me, but I shook my head; drinking alcohol is something I had never learned to do. She continued talking as she opened the bottle and poured herself a glass.

“The thing with Junior and Michael is that they were playing with the big boys and didn't know they were just small fries. They thought they were real big businessmen, suits and ties—or kareebas when that was in, Chamber of Commerce and Rotary and everything.”

It took me a while to find my voice. “You mean they didn't have a factory? What was this Samjam Enterprises, then?”

Celia laughed and, glass in hand, leaned against the door. “Oh, they had a factory all right. But it was mostly turning out ackee cans stuffed full of compressed ganja. Michael and Junior were like a pair of schoolboys among the sharks. Pinto was the one that got them into it and he was the one that understood the runnings. But then Pinto got into guns and violence and was a crazy cokehead, a real user—I don't know about Michael, but Junior at least was never into taking drugs, I believe him when he says that. They got cold feet when Pinto decided to go in with the Colombians, who were all over the place by then, introducing a new spin. They were into selling the ganja abroad, but instead of U.S. dollars they were bringing in coke and guns. I think Junior and Michael came to some kind of deal with Pinto—an amicable parting, or so they thought. They stuck to their small-scale op while Pinto went off to the States to do his thing. Junior went ballistic when Shirley went with him.”

I was trying not to show anything on my face as I listened, but Celia must have sensed what I was thinking.

“Oh, come on G!” She was smiling when she said it. “Don't tell me you didn't know what Junior was up to? Those thousand-dollar suits? His cars? His racehorses? His houses?”

“Houses?” I said, as if that gave me something tangible to hold on to. “Celia, you will find this hard to believe, but though Junior came to see me from time to time, I didn't know a single thing about his life.”

“You mean, not even your precious Millie made you any the wiser as to what was happening right under your nose? Come on! All the young men in the district were growing ganja for Junior. Everyone. That fellow there, what's his name again—Bertie—he was in charge of transportation. Your local MP was the facilitator with the police and customs. Everybody had their role in the operation. This is Ganja Nation we're talking about!”

Celia took a sip from her glass and then continued as if I wasn't there.