When the Women Come out to Dance (2002) (6 page)

Lourdes said, "Wos?"

"Wasim. He thinks it's because I don't know how to cook
, which I don't, really, but that's not the reason. The two regular maids are Filipina and speak English. In fact they have less of an accent than you. They won't give you any trouble, the y look at the ground when they talk to anyone. And they leav e at four, thank God. Woz always swims nude--don't ask m e why, it might be a Muslim thing--so if they see him in th e pool they hide in the laundry room. Or if I put on som e Southern hip-hop and they happen to walk in while I'
m bouncing to Dirty South doing my aerobics, they run for th e laundry room." She said without a pause, "What did Vivian a say about me?"

"Oh, how nice you are, what a pleasure to work here."

"Come on--I know she told you I was a stripper."

"She say you were a dancer before, yes."

"I started out in a dump on Federal Highway, got discovered and jumped to Miami Gold on Biscayne, valet parking. I was one of the very first, outside of black chicks, to do Southern hip-hop, and I mean Dirty South raw and uncut, while the other girls are doing Limp Bizkit, even some old Bob Seege r and Bad Company--and that's okay, whatever works for you.

But in the meantime I'm making more doing laptops and private gigs than any girl at the Gold and I'm twenty-seven at the time, older than any of them. Woz would come in with hi s buddies, all suits and ties, trying hard not to look Thir d World. The first time he waved a fifty at me I gave him som e close-up tribal strip-hop. I said, 'Doctor, you can see better i f you put your eyeballs back in your head.' He loved that kind of talk. About the fourth visit I gave him what's known as th e million-dollar hand job and became Mrs. Mahmood."

She told this sitting back relaxed, smoking her Virgini
a Slim cigarette, Lourdes nodding, wondering at times wha t she was talking about, Lourdes saying "I see" in a pleasan t voice when the woman paused.

Now she was saying, "His first wife stayed in Pakista
n while he was here in med school. Right after he finished hi s residency and opened his practice, she died." The woman said , "Let's see . . . You won't have to wear a uniform unless Wo z wants you to serve drinks. Once in a while he has some of hi s ragtop buddies over for cocktails. Now you see these guys i n their Nehru outfits and hear them chattering away in Urdu. I w alk in, 'Ah, Mrs. Mahmood,' in that semi-British singsong y way they speak, 'what a lovely sight you are to my eyes thi s evening.' Wondering if I'm the same chick he used to watc h strip.''

She took time to light another cigarette and Lourdes said
, "Do I wear my own clothes working here?"

"At first, but I'll get you some cool outfits. What are you
, about an eight?"

"My size? Yes, I believe so."

"Let's see--stand up."

Lourdes rose and moved away from the table in the direction Mrs. Mahmood waved her hand. Now the woman was staring at her. She said, "I told you his first wife died?"

"Yes, ma'am, you did."

"She burned to death."

Lourdes said, "Oh?"

But the redheaded woman didn't tell her how it happened.

She smoked her cigarette and said, "Your legs are good, bu
t you're kinda short-waisted, a bit top-heavy. But don't worry , I'll get you fixed up. What's your favorite color?"

"I always like blue, Mrs. Mahmood."

She said, "Listen, I don't want you to call me that anymore.

You can say ma'am in front of Woz to get my attention, bu
t when it's just you and I? I'd rather you called me by my ow n name."

"Yes?"

"It's Ginger. Well, actually it's Janeen, but all of m
y friends call me Ginger. The ones I have left."

Meaning, Lourdes believed, since she was married to th
e doctor, friends who also danced naked, or maybe even guys.

Lourdes said, "Ginger?"

"Not Yinyor. Gin-ger. Try it again."

"Gin-gar?"

"That's close. Work on it."

But she could not make herself call Mrs.

Mahmood Ginger. Not yet. Not during the first few weeks.

Not on the shopping trip to Worth Avenue where Mrs. Mahmood knew everyone, all the salesgirls, and some of them did call her Ginger. She picked out for Lourdes casual summe r dresses that cost hundreds of dollars each and some thing s from Resort Wear saying, "This is cute," and would hand it t o the salesgirl to put aside, never asking Lourdes her opinion, i f she liked the clothes or not. She did, but wished some of the m were blue. Everything was yellow or yellow and white o r white with yellow. She didn't have to wear a uniform, no, but now she matched the yellow-and-white patio, the cushions , the umbrellas, feeling herself part of the decor, invisible.

Sitting out here in the evening several times a week whe
n the doctor didn't come home, Mrs. Mahmood trying hard t o make it seem they were friends, Mrs. Mahmood servin g daiquiris in round crystal goblets, waiting on her persona l maid. It was nice to be treated this way and it would continue, Lourdes believed, until Mrs. Mahmood finally came out and said what was on her mind, what she wanted Lourdes t o do for her.

The work was nothing, keep the woman's clothes in order
, water the houseplants, fix lunch for herself--and the maids , once they came in the kitchen sniffing her spicy seafoo d dishes. Lourdes had no trouble talking to them. They looke d right at her face telling her things. Why they avoided Dr.

Mahmood. Because he would ask very personal question
s about their sexual lives. Why they thought Mrs. Mahmoo d was crazy. Because of the way she danced in just her underwear.

And in the evening the woman of the house would tel
l Lourdes of being bored with her life, not able to invite he r friends in because Woz didn't approve of them.

"What do I do? I hang out. I listen to music. I discuss soa
p operas with the gook maids. Melda stops me. 'Oh, missus , come quick.' They're in the laundry room watching As th e World Turns. She goes, 'Dick follows Nikki to where she is t o meet Ryder, and it look like he was going to hurt her. But Ryder came there in time to save Nikki from a violent Dick.' "

Mrs. Mahmood would tell a story like that and look at he
r without an expression on her face, waiting for Lourdes t o smile or laugh. But what was funny about the story?

"What do I do?" was the question she asked most. "I exist
, I have no life."

"You go shopping."

"That's all."

"You play golf."

"You've gotta be kidding."

"You go out with your husband."

"To an Indian restaurant and I listen to him talk to th
e manager. How many times since you've been here has he com e home in the evening? He has a girlfriend," the good-lookin g redheaded woman said. "He's with her all the time. Her o r another one, and doesn't care that I know. He's rubbing it i n my face. All guys fool around at least once in a while. Wo z and his buddies live for it. It's accepted over there, wher e they're from. A guy gets tired of his wife in Pakistan? H
e burns her to death. Or has it done. I'm not kidding, he tell s everyone her dupatta caught fire from the stove."

Lourdes said, "Ah, that's why you don't cook."

"Among other reasons. Woz's from Rawalpindi, a tow
n where forty women a month show up at the hospital with terrible burns. If the woman survives . . . Are you listening to me?"

Lourdes was sipping her daiquiri. "Yes, of course."

"If she doesn't die, she lives in shame because her husband
, this prick who tried to burn her to death, kicked her out o f the fucking house. And he gets away with it. Pakistan, India , thousands of women are burned every year 'cause their husbands are tired of them, or they didn't come up with a big enough dowry."

"You say the first wife was burn to death." "Once he could afford white women--like, what would h e need her for?"

"You afraid he's going to burn you?"

"It's what they do, their custom. And you know what'
s ironic? Woz comes here to be a plastic surgeon, but over i n Pakistan, where all these women are going around disfigured?

There are no plastic surgeons to speak of." She said, "Some o
f them get acid thrown in their face." She said, "I made th e biggest mistake of my life marrying a guy from a differen t culture, a towelhead."

Lourdes said, "Why did you?"

She gestured. "This . . ." Meaning the house and all tha
t went with it.

"So you have what you want."

"I won't if I leave him."

"Maybe in the divorce he let you keep the house."

"It's in the prenup, I get zip. And at thirty-two I'm bac
k stripping on Federal Highway, or working in one of those topless doughnut places. You have tits, at least you can get a job.

Woz's favorite, I'd come out in a nurse's uniform, peel everything off but the perky little cap?" The woman's mind moving to this without pausing. "Woz said the first time he saw the act he wanted to hire me. I'd be the first topless surgica l nurse."

Lourdes imagined this woman dancing naked, men watching her, and thought of Miss Olympia warning the cleaning women with her Biblical Integrity: no singing or dancin g around while cleaning the offices, or they might catch the ey e of men working late. She made it sound as if they were lyin g in wait. "Read the Book of Judges," Miss Olympia said, "th e twenty-first verse." It was about men waiting for women, th e daughters of Shiloh, to come out to dance so they could tak e them, force the women to be their wives. Lourdes knew o f cleaning women who sang while they worked, but not one s who danced. She wondered what it would be like to danc e naked in front of men.

"You don't want to be with him," Lourdes said, "but yo
u want to live in this house."

"There it is,'' the woman who didn't look at all like a Mrs.

Mahmood said.

Lourdes sipped her daiquiri, put the glass down an
d reached for the pack of Virginia Slims on the table.

"May I try one of these?"

"Help yourself."

She lit the cigarette, sucking hard to get a good draw. Sh
e said, "I use to smoke. The way you do it made me want t o smoke again. Even the way you hold the cigarette."

Lourdes believed the woman was very close to telling wha
t she was thinking about. Still, it was not something easy t o talk about with another person, even for a woman who dance d naked. Lourdes decided this evening to help her.

She said, "How would you feel if a load of wet concrete fel
l on your husband?"

Then wondered, sitting in the silence, not looking at th
e woman, if she had spoken too soon.

The redheaded woman said, "The way it happened to Mr.

Zimmer? How did you feel?"

"I accepted it," Lourdes said, "with a feeling of relief
, knowing I wouldn't be beaten no more."

"Were you ever happy with him?" "Not for one day."

"You picked him, you must've had some idea."

"He picked me. At the party in Cali? There were seve
n Colombian girls for each American. I didn't think I would b e chosen. We married . . . In two years I had my green card an d was tired of him hitting me."

The redheaded Mrs. Mahmood said, "You took a lot of shit
, didn't you?" and paused this time before saying, "How muc h does a load of concrete cost these days?"

Lourdes, without pausing, said, "Thirty thousand."

Mrs. Mahmood said, "Jesus Christ," but was composed
, sitting back in her yellow cushions. She said, "You were ready.

Viviana told you the situation and you decided to go for it."

"I think it was you hired me," Lourdes said, "because o
f Mr. Zimmer--you so interested in what happen to him. Als o I could tell, from the first day we sat here, you don't care fo r your husband."

"You can understand why, can't you? I'm scared to death o
f catching on fire. He lights a cigar, I watch him like a fuckin g hawk."

Giving herself a reason, an excuse.

"We don't need to talk about him," Lourdes said. "You pa
y the money, all of it before, and we don't speak of this again.

You don't pay, we still never speak of it."

"The Colombian guys have to have it all up front?"

"The what guys?"

"The concrete guys."

"You don't know what kind of guys they are. What if i
t looks like an accident and you say oh, they didn't do nothing , he fell off his boat."

"Woz doesn't have a boat."

"Or his car was hit by a truck. You understand? You no
t going to know anything before."

"I suppose they want cash."

"Of course."