Daniel Price - Slick

As soon as I hit the cue ball, I knew its trip would end with a scratch. I took the ball out of the pocket and placed it by Harmony.

“Don’t hold back.”

She gave me a shy metallic grin. “Okay.”

Her orthodontry was one of several revisions to the mental image I’d constructed from the Polaroid. For starters, she was tiny. Even with her shoes on, the woman barely topped five feet and ninety pounds. But that was just an in-person issue. The cameras would never reveal her small stature unless she was scaled against a guy like me.

What bothered me more was her face. Sure, it was round and pretty, with pleasant cheekbones and alluring hazel eyes, but the deep, soulful sheen that made her photo leap out at me was completely absent. Was the photo a fluke? Or was I catching her at a bad time? I figured it didn’t matter. As far as the histrionic media cared, Harmony offered more than enough victim appeal, not to mention sex appeal. She confirmed the latter the moment she leaned forward to line up her shot.

“You can keep talking,” she said. “It don’t mess up my game.”

Mentally, I winced. I knew the street grammar would cost her a point or two on the credibility scale. If only I had more time to play Henry Higgins.

“Long story short,” I continued, “I wound up sticking out in a good way.”

She sank the 12. “How?”

“I rephrased the questions to help get the results my bosses were looking for. For example, when there was a Republican politician at issue, I’d ask people how they’d rate their ‘approval.’ When it was a Democrat, I’d ask how they’d grade their ‘performance.’ It made a difference. Today that kind of stuff is a no-brainer. I mean they’ve got question-loading down to an art form. But back then it was enough to impress the boys upstairs. Within four months I was promoted to associate research consultant. The pay wasn’t much better, but at least it got me away from the phones.”

Harmony made a skillful bank shot, pocketing the 9. “You still a Republican?”

“I was never a Republican. I just worked for them. And I haven’t done that since the late eighties.”

“So who you work for now?”

“Lots of people. In lots of different places. Occasionally I work in the music business.”

She let out a quick, knowing smirk before eliminating the 10-ball. “Me too.”

“I know,” I admitted.

“Yeah? What else you know about me?”

“Not as much as you think.”

She paused her game to give me the stern eye. “You ain’t been following me and shit, have you?”

“No. I’m not a stalker. I didn’t even know you existed until twelve hours ago.”

“What happened twelve hours ago?”

“I discovered your file.”

“My file? Where?”

“Mean World.”

“You work for Mean World?”

“At the moment. You can keep playing, you know. It doesn’t mess up my talking.”

Harmony didn’t see the humor. “What do you want with me?”

“Keep playing. I’ll keep talking.”

I watched as she reluctantly got back to the game. For a woman with brain damage, she sure seemed to be running on all cylinders.

She overshot her cue. I circled the table and took my time finding the best angle.

“You worked with Hunta on the video for ‘Chocolate Ho-Ho,’ right?”

She shrugged it off. “Yeah. Me and like a thousand other women.”

“What did you think of him?”

“He was all right, I guess. He was gone most of the time. I mean, you know.” She took a hit from an imaginary joint. “Gone.”

“But he wasn’t rude to you or anything.”

“No. We never even talked.”

“And did you like working for Mean World? I mean, did anyone there ever give you a hard time?”

She kept her cautious gaze on me, even as I used an impressive bit of backspin to sink the 5.

“Why you want to know about that?”

I smiled. “Just curious.”

“You really work for Mean World?”

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t I?”

She raised an eyebrow. Are you kidding?

“I never said I rapped for them.”

“I still ain’t never seen a white man working there.”

“What can I say? They’re getting progressive.”

I made my shot for the 3. An indentation in the table caused the cue ball to make a wild turn, setting off an unfortunate chain of events that ended with the premature sinking of the 8-ball.

“I guess I lose,” I said.

“Yeah, but that wasn’t fair.”

“When are things ever fair?”

At last I got the look from her. That look. The one that hinted at a world of pain, a lifetime of hard knocks. She was in there after all, under all the bad lighting and makeup. Thank God.

She nervously bounced the cue ball around the table. “So…what now? We play again?”

I approached her. “Got any room in that little purse of yours?”

“Why?”

With the subtle grace of a veteran briber, I slipped her a five hundred-dollar roll of twenties. She looked down at her hand like I’d just spit a diamond into it.

“What…what’s this for?”

“That’s for starters. Do you have a car here?”

“No. I take the bus.”

“Good. Let me drive you home and I’ll give you another thousand dollars. It’s just me talking and you listening. Nothing more. I promise.”

I doubted I was the first customer to try to negotiate an outside acquaintance with Harmony, but her stupefied look made me wonder if I’d gone too high on the up-front. I didn’t want to seem desperate or insane.

“I… I can’t,” she said. “They don’t let us leave with customers.”

“When’s your shift up?”

“Soon.”

“All right. When you get off, come outside and look for a black Saturn sedan with a dented trunk. That’ll be me. If you show up, great. If not, keep the five hundred and have a good life. I promise I’ll never bother you again.”

Good. Better. I could already see her mental alert fall from red to orange. After scanning for witnesses, she stashed the money in her hanging purse. No doubt her mind was still working feverishly to figure out the catch, starting with the usual suspects.

“Just talking,” she confirmed.

“Just talking.”

“Because I ain’t like these other girls, okay? I don’t do that shit. Not with you. Not with Hunta. Not with nobody but the man I marry.”

“We’re just talking.”

She stared me down (or in this case, up) for a good long time.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” I echoed. “Now how do I clock out of here?”

________________

Despite the fact that I was standing in the dingy stairwell of an industrial complex in the heart of downtown Los Angeles, my first breath outside the Flower Club was the sweetest air I’d ever tasted. I felt I’d played a good game with Harmony, figuratively speaking, but the whole taxi dancer experience had left me thoroughly unclean.

It wasn’t like me to be so uptight and judgmental. Ordinarily I was a social Libertarian. Whatever floats your boat, as long it doesn’t sink anyone else’s. But something in there set off a trip wire inside of me. Perhaps it was “Dave’s” valiant but ultimately sad attempt to rationalize the hiring out of intimacy. Or the warped, love-stained pool table that forever ruined the game of 8-ball for me. Or maybe, just maybe, it was the way I’d used hard cash to lure Harmony toward a series of drastic, life-changing events she couldn’t possibly prepare for. I had my suspicions, but whatever it was, it filled me with the overwhelming desire to do something admirable.

That led me to think about Jean and Madison.

Already I saw a bad pattern in the making. I couldn’t keep running to them for free karma refills every time I crossed the moral comfort barrier. Then again, on closer inspection, it seemed they were the ones who kept bringing the refills to me.