Esi Edugyan - Half-Blood Blues

‘I ain’t got nothin to give you, Delilah,’ I said quietly. ‘But I wish to all hell that I did.’

My face gone hot, hearing myself talk like this. I ain’t never spoken to a jane this way, not even in my greenest years of dating. Delilah’s great intelligent face, the rough pureness in it, like both pain and happiness left their mark on her. Hell.

She stood there looking at me, her lips like a ripe bruise. She ain’t said a word. I felt sick.

‘Hell, girl,’ I muttered. ‘I sorry. It ain’t right, puttin all this on you.’

I touched my old hat with two fingers, nodded, turned back to the door.

‘Sidney.’ She said it full of a sullen tenderness, like she irritated with herself.

I stopped. The oak flooring creaked under my heels. I felt a hot radiance in my nerves, my whole body filling with a confused, battered feeling, like a moth caught in a lantern.

‘Come in,’ she said. ‘Shut the door.’

She reached across, drawn the curtains shut in the office windows. That cramped awful place with its heatless heaters. Her thin blue dress so sheer I could see the hooks of her undergarments through the satin.

I moistened my lips, nervous.

Staring hard at me, she raised her arms real slow. Her gaze was full of such awful intensity I ain’t known what all I should be watching — the teasing lift of her arms, or the tension in her green eyes. I glanced from one to the other, feeling frightened, excited.

She untied the gold fabric of her headwrap, unwound it slowly, then pulled it off and held it balled up in both hands.

Holy hell. She was bald . Her scalp was rough with tufts of hair, the pale skin shining eerily between them.

Her face was utterly still, utterly empty. But her eyes shone with defiance, water glistening in them. She put one hand on her rigid hip. ‘Still want me now, Sid?’ she said bitterly. ‘You still itching to have a go at me?’

I ain’t said nothing. Just stared.

In a dark voice, she said, ‘They said it was stress . It was supposed to grow back .’ But her voice sort of choked off then. She glared hard at me.

I took off my hat, blinking sort of slow-like.

Then I stepped forward, leaned down. And kissed her.

She ain’t even moved. But I could feel the relief through her body, the tension going. And then she was kissing me back, her mouth soft and warm on mine. I thought, Hell, this girl don’t even know what she is. She the most stunning and original thing I ever known.

She pulled back, put one hand to my chest. ‘What’re you doing?’

I put a hand on her scalp, real gentle.

‘Don’t, Sid. Don’t. It’s ugly.’ She turned her head away.

‘Hey. Hey,’ I said, brushing my knuckles real soft over her wet cheeks. ‘It ain’t. Come here. It don’t matter. This goin sound crazy. You been here all of a bug’s age, girl, but already I feel like I known you a lifetime. I think I fallin in love with you.’

She looked quickly up at me. Then pushed me hard on the chest. I stumbled back.

‘Don’t you go messing with me,’ she said. ‘I mean it. Sid? I mean it.’

I stood rubbing my chest.

‘Say it again,’ she said.

‘What?’

‘What you just said.’

‘I fallin in love with you?’

‘Come here,’ she said.

My legs unsteady, I stepped closer. Her ropey fingers, the marble wrist bones, that slender pale throat like some young birch. She was all length and grace standing there, and seeing the shadows pooled at her collarbones, like a dent made by a human finger, I wanted to put my mouth there.

She took my hand, drew me over to Ernst’s old sofa. I ain’t took my eyes from hers. She lay herself down, shyly drew me down on top of her.

‘What you doin, girl?’ I whispered. ‘Ernst could come in.’

I could feel her breathing beneath me. I brought my mouth down real soft on her head, kissed the cotton-floss. She made a soft noise, lifted her face, and I kissed her again. Then I rose on one slow elbow and yanked open the front of her dress.

What I remember as I kissed my way down her ribs was the peace she seemed to be in then. The absolute peace.

Shooting out of sleep in the morning, I lifted up onto one elbow, peering through the darkness of Ernst’s office. I was covered in a thin blanket, my trousers, shirt and socks strewn around me like some tentacled beast. I could still feel Delilah’s warmth on me, like a shadow. Turning to touch her, I got a handful of nothing.

‘Lilah?’ I said softly. ‘You here, girl?’

I got this weird feeling in my chest, like something bad was prowling in the damn rafters. The door stood half ajar, and looking across I seen that foul cat sitting in the crack, studying me with its yellow eyes. Then it turned, slipped out.

I shivered. ‘Delilah? Where you get to?’

I got up, slipped into my trousers, come out onto the stairs to stare down over the club. Chip and the kid sat at a table, not saying much. The kid’s horn stood upright at the table’s centre, like it on display.

‘If it ain’t Captain Romance,’ Chip called, as I come down.

I smiled, blushing. I was still buttoning up my old shirt. ‘Where Delilah? You seen her?’

Hiero give me a long measured look. That’s right, buck , I thought. It ain’t all bout you no more .

‘What, she missin too?’ Chip run the back of his hand across his damp lips. ‘Is my lips bleedin?’

I give him a look.

‘Feel like they bleedin. What?’ He blown out his cheeks. ‘Paul gone out early this mornin. Ain’t none of us seen him go. Ernst out lookin for him.’

‘You foolin.’

‘Ask the kid.’

‘What he go do a fool thing like that for? What he thinkin? Hell.’ But then it felt like I not even in the room, my nerves driving me so far back into myself. All a sudden my throat felt cold.

‘What is it?’ said Chip. ‘What you ain’t sayin, buck?’

I cleared my throat, sat down. I stared off at the exit, at the doors to the front lobby. ‘He was askin yesterday bout goin back to the flat. He said there was somethin he needed.’

‘What he needin so bad?’

I shrugged. ‘He ain’t said. He was embarrassed.’ I fixed my eyes on his old piano, standing open and grinning whitely at the room. Dread was rising up in me. ‘I said he ought to ask Delilah to help him,’ I muttered, real soft.

‘He wasn’t lookin so good,’ said Hiero. His fingers picked absently at his frayed sleeve. ‘I kept askin if he sick. He kept sayin no, but. Hell. You known somethin was wrong.’

I thought of how Paul was yesterday evening, his blond hair upright as quills, that slack drunken laugh of his. Chip exhaled, set his thick hands on the table.

‘Hold up. Ernst gone out there?’ I said. ‘Jesus Christ. We lose Ernst, we good as buried.’

‘It alright,’ said Hiero. ‘If they just goin off to the flat, they like to be back soon. It ain’t far.’

‘Paul been gone all damn day, buck. It been hours .’

I felt sort of lightheaded, thin, near transparent with fear. ‘What time is it?’

‘You missed lunch,’ said Chip.

‘Ernst was goin check the flat,’ the kid said soft-like. ‘He find them. Don’t you worry, Sid. Maybe they ain’t even together.’

I give him a despairing look. Shook my damn head.

‘If they been pinched,’ said Chip, ‘if they been pinched, we got to get out of here. The Boots be comin here next.’

But if they been pinched, hell. Ain’t nothing else matter no more.

‘We got to stay calm,’ said the kid. ‘They could be comin back right now. We just don’t know.’ There was a undercurrent of strength in his voice I ain’t recognized. And then I did. It sound like Delilah.