Thomas Adcock - New Orleans Noir

No fewer than six of our intrepid contributors (including our cover photographer) rode out the storm here — Christine Wiltz, who finally left when the looting got nasty; Jeri Cain Rossi, who got out by commandeering a van (along with five other people, five dogs, and a cat); James Nolan, who escaped with musician Allen Toussaint in a stolen schoolbus; Patty Friedmann, who got trapped in her Uptown home, hitched a rowboat ride to her sister’s also flooded house, and had to wait four more days for a second rescue; Olympia Vernon, who was marooned for days in Hammond, Louisiana with no gas, food, or electricity; and photographer David Spielman, who took shelter in a convent with a group of cloistered nuns.

But one of us actually came here voluntarily that week. Ace Atkins blew in from Mississippi on a magazine assignment, and saw things that... well, that he injected into his powerful story, “Angola South,” along with the raw emotion of one who’s seen things nobody should have to see.

Last, Eric Overmyer looks through the jaundiced eyes of an Eighth District homicide cop to sing a sort of love song to the noir side of the city. Or maybe it’s more like a love-hate song. The first paragraph alone will take the top of your head off — and the funny thing is, it really happened, as did most of the narrator’s memories. He reminds us just how violent our history has been, how much of our culture was already lost even before the bitch blew through.

Since the recovery process is more or less a holy cause with most of us, a percentage of the profits from this book will go toward rebuilding the New Orleans Public Library, which is mounting a brave and massive campaign to get the funds it needs to reinvent its broken self.

In addition, the authors were given an opportunity to help their colleagues by waiving their fees and donating the money directly to Katrina K.A.R.E.S. (Katrina Arts Relief and Emergency Support), an arm of the New Orleans Literary Institute that makes small grants to individual authors affected by the storm. We’re proud to say we raised money for eleven such grants.

Julie Smith

New Orleans, Louisiana

February 2007

Mid-City

The door swings open, in walks Reggie. Paul, on the stool next to me, gives him the once-over, shakes his head. “Man,” Paul whispers, “they say being black in the South is like being black twice. Being a dwarf, too? Man, what’s that like?”

Reggie’s eyes are bloodshot, yesterday’s clothes soiled. He stands, legs bowed, lets the door swing shut behind him. Give him a cowboy hat, it’s like he’s sizing up a Western saloon.

He’s got the swagger. He should. None of us have ever beat him at pool. Reggie plays up the angle for the newcomers, What, I’m just a dwarf AND a nigger, think you can’t beat me? Half-hour later your wallet’s lighter, and Reggie’s drunker.

First time I lost to him, I just shook my head. Maybe it’s his height. He sees things we don’t.

At the end of the bar, Reggie sidles up to Wayne, the meanest son of a bitch in the bar. Old rugby player from Wales. Reggie says, “My nigga.”

“My nigga,” says Wayne.

Billy, behind the bar, pulls out a Coke and an Abita, puts them side by side on the counter in front of me. “What’ll it be?” he asks in his thick Irish brogue.

“What time is it?”

“Uh,” checks the wall clock behind me, which I could’ve done. “Eight in the morning. What’ll it be?”

“You know me,” I say, “caffeine before alcohol.” Billy hands me a glass of ice. I pour the Coke over the cubes, down it like water. Already hot as a motherfucker outside. You’d think Billy could turn up the a/c. Cheap bastard. Billy waits. “Right,” I say, “guess I’ll have that beer now.”

Billy laughs and pops the top off. I take a swig, survey the crowd. Everybody’s baked. I’m always bringing up the rear.

Five televisions hang from the ceiling, various points, all with the pre-match commentary from across the pond. Ireland versus Switzerland. Onscreen, three fellows dressed for a night on Miami Beach break down the X’s and O’s. Billy’s got it turned down low, for now.

“What do you think they’re saying?” I ask Paul.

“I’m Scottish, who gives a fuck. What are they saying? Ireland are going to play like shite.”

I look around the bar. All familiar faces. The soccer fans in their jerseys, the neighborhood fellows, black, keeping to themselves by the pool table, watching us warily, wearily.

“Once again,” I say, “Louisiana’s Swiss community has let us down. Maybe they forgot to set their watches.”

At the end of the bar, other side of Reggie and Wayne, someone yells, “Fuck Switzerland!”

Hear hear, fuck Switzerland.

“Who plays after this?” I ask Billy.

“England versus Turkey.”

Again, from the end of the bar: “Fuck Turkey!”

Billy raises his glass with a hearty, “Fuck England!”

“Think you’ll have a good turnout?”

Billy shrugs. “Be plenty of English bastards,” he says, so the bastards hear it. “Don’t know of many Turks in the city. Wish I had a Turkish flag.”

The brothers hang back by the pool table, occasionally sending an emissary to the bar, whispering PBR orders like sweet nothings.

The Ireland game comes on. Reggie’s the only brother watching. He’s excited. “Fuck, I didn’t know they was any Irish niggas! Look at that one! Who that?”

Billy laughs. “Clinton Morrison.”

“Yeah! Clinton Morrison! Man, that ain’t no nigga name. The fuck?”

“He plays for shite.”

“Nigga plays for you , Billy!”

Wayne says, “Irish first, nigga second. Doubly fucked.”

“Nigga, you Irish.”

“Welsh, you dumb fuck.”

“Ain’t that worse than Irish? Welsh still answer to the Man, don’t they? Hell, it ain’t even the Man, it’s the fucking Queen.”

Wayne glares at him, doesn’t say anything.

“Yeah, Wayne, you think a dumb nigga don’t know nothin’ about history, huh? I fuckin’ went to school. Probably know just as much as you ignorant Welsh muthafuckas.”

Paul’s already up out of his chair, gets between Reggie and Wayne. Wayne’s got a short fuse. Rugby player, you know.

Reggie backs off. “Come on, Wayne, just fuckin’ with ya.”

Wayne forces a smile. “You’re lucky I like you, man.”

White guys in English jerseys begin pouring into the bar, waving Union Jacks, awaiting their game. Don’t ever bet the farm on Irish football. They play like shite. Switzerland wins it, two-nil.

Paul nods approvingly at the crowd, better part of a hundred, mostly English now. Waving flags, drinking Budweiser. “That’s a lot of English wankers,” says Paul.

It’s an hour until England-Turkey. The front door bursts open. A collective roar, singing as if in tongues, a wall of people wrapped in red flags, pours into the bar. We’re struck numb. The brothers in the corner, by the pool table, scurry out the back door.

Paul speaks first. “Fuck. Al-Qaeda.”

There has to be at least two hundred Turks, singing, yelling, waving flags. None of us can move. Literally. Try to fall down, you’ll stay upright. Fuck the fire code.

The Turks take over the pool table. They take over the dartboard. They pin Turkish flags up on the wall, over Celtic crosses, over printed lyrics to “Danny Boy,” over family photographs.

“Fuck,” Billy says, behind the bar. “Muslims. They don’t drink.”

Happily, not true. Like their English nemeses, it’s Budweiser all around.