Laura Lippman - Baltimore Noir

“In the midst of a liminal moment, you are out of the world,” the rabbi had said. “For that time, it is as if you no longer exist.”

A keycard hissed as it slid into the slot outside the door of Room 213.

Almost at once, Tania knew.

“You’re so beautiful!” Gary Sims spoke in tones of awe. “Even more beautiful than the photographs your uncle-”

“Yoshi.”

“Your Uncle Yoshi sent me. Beautiful!”

“Thank you,” Tania said.

Her face was hot. It did not feel like her face at all.

“Don’t thank me,” Gary said, placing a heavy shoulder bag and a smaller, flatter case on the bed, then turning back toward her and clasping his hands in front of his chest. “I should thank you, Tania. For giving me this chance.”

Gary smiled, nodded his head, made a little bow toward her. He was maybe thirty-five, but looked younger, with a round face, a wispy beard and mustache surrounding red lips that stood out against his pinkish skin. Just an inch or two taller than Tania’s 5’8” and always in motion, hands knotting and releasing, foot tapping, head tilted to one side, then the other, as he looked at her and away.

Making Tania feel like something heavy and ponderous, a cow, an elephant, in comparison.

But Gary seeming to think otherwise. “I couldn’t tell from the photos, but your nose is perfect,” he said. “Those little buttons-they just don’t show up well. And those girls who get their noses broken and reset-” His hand went up and pushed at the tip of his nose. “They look like pigs, don’t you think?” Another quick glance. “With you, though, I was worried about a bump. You know, a lot of girls like you have that bump right here-” Touching the bridge of his nose now. “But not you.”

A lot of girls like me.

“I’m so glad to be here,” he said. “It was worth the drive.” Looking suddenly shy, he reached into his pocket. “I brought this for you.”

A long silver necklace, interlocking links, a chain. Hanging from it was a Jewish star.

He placed it around her neck, arranged it so the star rested in the little indentation between her breasts. It shone against the navy-blue of her Goucher sweatshirt.

Tania knew then.

She understood exactly how this worked.

And why it worked.

“Your uncle told me you don’t have a computer at home.”

She shrugged.

A sympathetic grimace. “Why not?”

“My parents won’t let me.”

“Yes, that’s right.” He laced his fingers, pulled them apart. “And I’ll bet that’s not all they’re unfair about. You probably even have a strict curfew, right?”

She shrugged again.

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” He looked thoughtful. “How old are you, Tania?”

“Seventeen,” she said. “Like my uncle told you.”

He shifted his weight from foot to foot. “So beautiful, so bright, but so… stifled. Held back. Distrusted,” he said, shaking his head. “Believe me, I’ve heard it before, more times than you could believe.” His gaze touched gently on hers. “Seventeen is old enough to start making your own decisions, don’t you think?”

“Yes,” she said. Then: “That’s why I’m here.”

“I know.” His eyes were full of sympathy and understanding. “I’ll help you, Tania,” he said. “I swear it.”

He sat down on the edge of the bed, unzipped the smaller of the two bags he’d brought, and pulled out a laptop computer. He unfolded it, rested it on his knees, and pushed a button. The computer hummed, and a moment later the screen turned from black to gray to blue.

“Let me show you what we’ll be doing together.” He gave her a slantwise look, then patted the bedspread beside him. “You won’t be able to see from way up there,” he said. “Sit.”

When she hesitated, his face turned solemn, as if he was on the verge of taking offense. “Sweetie, I feel like we already know each other so well,” he said. “I understand you. I know what you’re trying to escape from. But you have to trust me. So keep me company. Sit.”

She sat.

It was called TeenHeaven. The letters were spelled out in a flowing script with a pink heart where the “a” should have been. The Place Where All Your Non-Nude Dreams Come True,” a second line read.

“Whose dreams?” she asked.

He turned his head to look at her. She could feel the heat of his leg just a few inches from hers, and all at once she was aware of her body. Her heart pounding beneath her breasts, the band of her panties digging into her hip, a tickle of sweat snaking down the back of her neck.

“Yours,” he said softly. “Your dreams, Tania.”

“And theirs too.” She glanced at him. “The members.”

“Yes,” he said. “And why not? Why shouldn’t we please them? They’re men and women who appreciate the energy and spirit and beauty of youth, and are willing to open their wallets to prove it.”

His smile was warm on her face.

“But deep down they’re nothing to me-just ghosts, phantoms out there in cyberspace. Numbers on a credit-card slip. You…” he sighed. “You’re real. You’re sitting right here with me. And your dreams are the only ones that matter.”

A row of portraits, eight in all, each contained within an oval of a different pastel color. Cameos, they looked like, or popsicles, or candy eggs with girls trapped inside.

Pretty girls, fifteen years old, sixteen, seventeen. A name below each portrait, with the i’s dotted with smiley faces: Jessica and Kristi and Nata, Suz and Miki and Beatriz. Smiling at the camera or giving it a pouty look.

“This is where I’ll be?” Tania asked. “Here?”

“At first,” Gary said. “Just at first.”

He reached up and brushed the side of her face with his fingers, the lightest of touches. “I’m amazed by you,” he said. “You must be the most beautiful girl in Baltimore. I know that the camera will love you as much as I do.”

She blushed.

He turned back to the computer. His fingers moved across the touchpad, the moisture from her cheek leaving momentary trails on the gray surface.

“Here’s how it’ll go,” Gary said. “We’ll do the first few shoots today, here. I’ll introduce you on TeenHeaven as my newest discovery-” She heard him take a breath. “Boy, will the members be happy to meet you And then, in a couple of weeks, we’ll get together again and do a full-scale session, maybe ten, twelve different outfits. Get a thousand great shots, easy, and use the best of them for the grand opening of your own site.”

He paused, thinking, then smiled at her. “What say we call it ‘Blooming Tania’?”

Glorious Gloria was tall and slender, with dark, wiry hair and olive skin. She often wore short-shorts, halter tops that were a size or two too small for her, long dangly earrings, brightly colored headbands. She always looked only half-awake, smiling sleepily over her bony shoulder at the camera or lying on a tan sofa in a living room with splintery floors and peeling wallpaper, her toes pointed to accentuate the length of her legs.

Starlight Stacy lived on a farm someplace warm. Even in winter she was always outdoors, feeding the chickens in her shorty pajamas, posing in muddy boots and a bathing suit amid rows of vegetables, scraping the flesh of an orange off the peel with her even white teeth, swinging on a tire in a miniskirt.

Dream Jeannie had freckles everywhere: her face, her arms, between her breasts. All her photographs were taken indoors. She almost always wore bathing suits, and had moved from tankinis in her earlier galleries to thongs in her most recent, suits so insubstantial as to leave her practically naked.

Tania felt her face grow hot again.

“I know,” Gary said. “Not until you’re ready. But you’ll be amazed at how fast you become comfortable with the… more revealing outfits. Everyone does.”