The Road Narrows As You Go (30 page)

Issue nine of
The Mizadventurez of Mizz Biz Aziz
would sell out its first printing within a week and run through another ten printings before it was reprinted in her hardcover graphic novel published by Pantheon in ninetyone. In the absence of the artist's availability for interviews—Biz refused these requests as a matter of principle—comic critics devoted lengthy Lester Bangsy essays to praising the issue, and joined in the ongoing debate over the truth of the events. Did we eat the artist or not? Was it a metaphor and if so for what? Was it a trick? Whose trick was it, Biz's on her readers or Jonjay's on the guests? When an interview Wendy did with
The Comics Journal
turned to the subject of issue nine, she said,
Biz is the Francis Bacon of comix
,
a terror to the common cartoonist
, and left it at that. One piece of fan mail she received from Kathy Acker, reprinted in the back of issue ten, described Biz's style as
the play of light through the leaves of a tree shaking violently in the wind
. Yes, that's how it felt, we were those leaves. It was like the entire building shook when Biz published issue nine, from the cellar to the attic, and one by one we all fell out. The issue's popularity triggered a sequence of events that forever changed Biz Aziz's life. It tucked her into a spot in the eternal canon of comic history, it stirred endless controversy and debate among comic readers that continues to the present, she lit a fire of wild speculation that created rivalrous encampments, comic gossips who believed different versions of the same event. And the issue would have unintended consequences for Wendy as well, not all for the good.

And for us. Issue nine would act as a turning point in our lives. After its release, everything change. We were in the comic—we appear in those fateful last scenes, those cannibal panels—and those unnamed silhouettes would come to define our future.

Well then, so sounds like Biz is out, said Jonjay, rolling a joint on the coffee table. Who wants to come to the desert?

Mark wanted to. As a representative of her animation studio per se, Mark was the least suited to the role of spokesman, but the daytrip appealed to his need for constant extrasensory stimulation. And besides, Rachael was coming, too, and her specialty was coming across to strangers as colder than a dead fish and incapable of listening to you prattle on about trifling petty nonsense when there was work to be done. Twyla was afraid of flying, didn't want to go, would rather draw in-betweens. Patrick had taken a part-time freelance gig as an in-betweener for
He-Man and the Masters of the Universe
, for some extra cash and the experience. Lately the newspapers were calling Frank the He-Man of Wall Street, making Patrick feel the diminutiveness of his existence all the more. When it came to the practical business of operating
Strays
, Rachael doled out daily tasks, and if no one else had anything else going on, she delegated. It wasn't like Wendy had chained us to her cartoon for the last three years. We all had other projects. Rachael was still performing as Aluminum Uvula and releasing seven-inch records with cover sleeves she designed herself. Mark Bread self-published his comic,
Asemix
, all abstract, which he released monthly give or take, starting in eighty-two; he was up to issue twenty-eight. He printed fifty copies of each issue and with a cover price of a dollar, he still always sold out a run. He never reprinted. Twenty years later they sell for over a thousand each on eBay. After the Christmas group show was over and his pictures were the only ones that sold, Justine Witlaw booked a solo for Mark, and in eighty-three, she framed and hung the best pages from
Asemix
. That was the last time Wendy saw Frank. Afraid that no one but comic book punks looking to mooch free booze would come to Mark's opening night party (probably a valid fear), Justine invited one of her blue-chip clients to organize a reading with her writer's group for the same night. So it turned out that Frank's wife and some other local writers read unpublished work in front of Mark's drawings. Justine's plan worked like a champ—that night a crowd of suburban blue-chippers hobnobbed with the Tenderloin's alcoholics and Oakland's crusty 'zine punks. The wealthy
folks were enchanted by the credibility of the locals here to support Mark, impressed enough to regard his drawings with some degree of seriousness, and the five rows of chairs set out for the reading sedated this unruly side, too. Isn't it weird, Mark's show before yours? Justine said to Jonjay. He shrugged and said, Mark is the real deal, that's why. All that was left of what Mark had drunk was the plastic ringlets of the six-pack. He needed a refresher but was pinned to a wall by curious collectors. They asked about his influences and he replied: Kirby krackle, Kirby squiggle, Biz Aziz. The collectors mistook him and a rumour got around he was a foreigner living in town. Eskimo, one lady explained to her friend, from the Arctic tundra. Nothing Mark did, even slump down half-conscious in the corner, was interpreted as anything other than the delightful backward differences between our culture and his Canadian ways. The icy North resplendent with hundreds of words for snow was one intensely remote and unattainable thing for those who dressed in diamonds and pearls and lived in the tropical valleys south of the city.

Frank had yet to arrive and so Wendy was at a loss trying to guess which of these affluent people was his wife.

Is it her? Twyla pointed to someone about the right age.

Yoiks, don't point. Wendy swatted her hand down.

Must be her, said Rachael. Only the wealthiest could dress like a marm and still get noticed.

Oh my god, there she is, said Wendy.

She was in her mid-thirties, she used ounces of mousse to give rise to the tubular curls of her dark brown bangs, her hair was her best feature, hanging over dull pale skin, smooth and grey as a butter knife. Almost invisible red lips with no shape like the spine on a slim book of poetry. Not to say lovely, but plain in a utilitarian way that could be attractive. A long neck sprouting like a steel pole out of her black tunic, a gold charm hanging between her breasts on a gold necklace, slacks from the seventies. Although there were prettier women and better-dressed women and
more interesting people to talk to at the gallery, she seemed to be the unofficial centre of attention, even though it was Mark's show. More of the guests knew this woman to say hello than recognized Justine. And she rolled and unrolled a literary journal in her hands. Yes, must be Sue Fleecen.

The story I'm going to read was published in
The Kenyon Review
this month and … thank you … it is about a man recovering from a fall, it's entitled
The Dean of Fine Arts
. Sue took a drink from a glass of water and smiled a nervous smile at the audience as she put the glass at her feet.

It opens with a quote from the
Rubaiyat
by Omar Khayyam, Sue said.

There was a door to which I found no key

There was a veil past which I could not see

Some little talk awhile of me and thee

There seemed—and then no more of thee and me.

Reginald Cudworth Jr.—whose closest friends called him Reggie even though he turned forty this year and held the position of dean of Fine Arts—was on his way to his office on the third floor of the John Dutton Building at the University of Southern California, Burbank, when he slipped and, in front of undergraduates, fell down eleven steps and broke his leg, his hip, and his pride …

Not a minute into Sue Fleecen's reading and a hand fell on Wendy's bare shoulder. A whisper in her ear: I knew I'd find you here.

Hush
, Wendy said and flinched to get his hand off. She was standing at the back with us near the exit behind the rows of chairs where the audience was seated, and Sue's voice was barely audible.

When Sue told me the artist was one of your assistants, I had to come see, Frank said.

She turned and said under her breath, Frank, your
wife's
reading.

Ah, I heard this one about the dean before. He runs off with the wife of a music professor. Whereas I never get to see
you
, my number one client.

Hush. You should be in the front row where Justine and Jonjay are sitting instead of creeping in late. Where were you?

I thought she'd be last to read not first.

She
is
last to read.

When her reading was over and the audience applauded one last time before they stood up and began to shuffle out the door and onto the street, Frank said, Why don't I see you more often?

That's enough, Frank.

Another woman who had read interrupted them to tell Frank the others were going to meet at Fino's for a drink and he and Sue should come. He said they would. What are you doing now, Wendy? Want to come for a drink?

No, she said. There's an afterparty at The Farm, she said. Biz Aziz is performing
Hollywood Babylon
, adapted from Kenneth Anger's book, with songs spanning the decades.

Frank's shoulders fell. Come on. Can't we be friends? That
one
time …
one
time. We've done so much good clean work together since then, we should be friends.

That is if you and I are capable of friendship.

Let's talk about this over dinner sometime.

Go congratulate your wife. And buy one of Mark's pictures while you're at it.

The evening was a success from Justine's perspective, even though she had to lock Mark Bread in the broom closet where he could pass out fetal with a roll of paper towel for a pillow or vomit into the mop bucket if need be, and the rest of the crowd could still line up to use her one lavatory in the back room. By the end of the evening there were little red dots on the wall next to most of his pictures. One woman left feeling very pleased with herself, saying that with all the panels on a single page it felt like she just bought six pictures for the price of one. A couple of reputable local collectors who had recently donated over a thousand nineteenth-century
photographs of San Francisco to the museum came up to Justine before leaving and asked, Are you sure
that
one is sold?

Yes, it is, Justine said without hesitation.

Well, all right then, we'll buy the one next to it.

That was last year, and by eighty-four a rough thirteen minutes of the
Strays
summer Christmas special was complete.

Outside on Stoneman Street, Biz pointed skyward and said, Look now, before you all drive away and leave me here: the air's so crystal clear you can see goddamn bulldozers pulling veggies out of Bonnie's farm to put in a city park. Ain't that funny? Ironic shit. See that, Wendy? The Farm's being demolished. The barn is gone. That stage is gone. What kind of anti-hippie bullshit come-together-right-now garbage is that—gutting a
farm
to put in a
park
?

It's farcical, for sure, said Wendy. But Bonnie's promised to start another garden somewhere else, though, so. Meanwhile, you haven't said a word about this redo, she said and bounced her hair.

You looked better before the demolition, said Biz.

The night before, Wendy had started flapping her hands with butterflies about the trip and around one in the morning acted on the urge to dye her hair a Madonna-inspired Marilyn Monroe blond, to match Jonjay's and the landscape for their tour of the desert. This morning she packed a skimpy sundress and flipflops in her purse for a change of clothes in case it was hotter than for what she was wearing, boat shoes, tight white cotton pants, and a blouse with a collar, carrying a leather jacket with her bag, and some prescription sunglasses. No other provisions were required since Frank Fleecen promised to supply lots of water, food, and other sundries.

A month ago, she had called him. You never call, he said from his office. Something's wrong.

No, but I got a favour to ask you on behalf of Jonjay, who doesn't
know I'm calling … he needs your help for his art show with Justine Witlaw, Wendy said. He wants to go back to the desert. But I don't want him going alone. He might never come back.

Frank agreed right to arrange the trip. In fact, he could make it a business and pleasure trip and invite Piper Shepherd so the two could finally meet.

Bring your wife, too, said Wendy. I want to meet her. I didn't get a chance at Mark's opening last year.

My wife …? said Frank, but she hung up.

You go on have fun in the sun, said Biz. When you get back this block will be sold and gutted, too—if
I don't
stay behind and guard No Manors you know those bulldozers down at The Farm will come flatten the manor hella fast, renovate, and swap in an all-new Evangelical family.

Biz fell onto Jonjay's back as he humped down the stairs overloaded with art supplies in an army surplus dufflebag trying to weigh him down to the point he couldn't move, but he was very strong.

Don't go. I hate this idea, letting
that snake
take you without my protection, she said.

No sweat, said Jonjay.

Don't you hate the bitch who stole your ideas? He's a class A exploiter. Watch your step.

Hate hates to hate hate, said Jonjay, enamoured with the wildflowers in bloom in the unkempt yard surrounding the manor; plucked a purple one. You can't steal the truth, he said and gave the flower to Biz. Ready to go, Wendy? Wendy? He looked for Wendy, who was not beside or inside the Gremlin. She was drawing a chalk hopscotch on the street for the Evangelical children next door (a fourth on the way). Wendy was forever trying to make up for the behaviour the Evangelicals had tolerated as neighbours of No Manors. But doing nice things for the children only made the parents more paranoid and unfriendly—the mother shouted for them to come indoors
right now
.

Biz shouted, See, look what you did, trying to be nice. She turned to Jonjay. What are you looking for in the desert you need so bad that you had to use Frank Fleecen?

What else? Eternity, as usual.