Denis Johnson - Tree of Smoke

The mamasan slid over in her flip-flops and said, “You waiting for the

bus?” “There’s no bus this time of night.” “No bus now tonight. You take a taxi.” “Can’t I stay? May I have some tea, please?” “Sure! Sure! Take a taxi later, okay?” “Thanks.”

happy. Sociable you know. So much for the family history. Next up I’ve got a few opinions for you.

Opinions concerning America’s enlarged adrenal cortex and its sacramental lie. Dear Skip: You’d best be careful now of your human heart or you’re liable to break it permanently. Lending your efforts to the cruel mad devastation here.

You may find no place of repentance though you seek it carefully with tears. Where is that from? Somewhere in the Bible. There I go again! Carefully with tears.

The day I left Damulog with Timothy’s bones I saw you at the spring having a bath.

— She’d gone to say goodbye to him as she headed off for Davao City and then Manila. From down the dirt lane she’d seen him come out of Freddy Castro’s three-story hotel, walking through the yard in zoris and checkered boxer shorts, carrying a white towel over his shoulder and a saucepan in his hand. She’d left him to his bath, had headed for the entrance of Castro’s to say goodbye to the family, but had heard the cheering voices of little children and gone after all into the small glen to see Skip Sands bathing before a crowd of urchins. The pipe came from a rock and spilled its water into a large natural basin and the children, perhaps three dozen, had arranged themselves around it as in a small stadium, in the arena of which the young American soaped himself and poured water from the saucepan over his head, chanting back and forth with his wild audience:

“WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SHOW!” “THE SKEEP SANDS SHOW!”

“WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SHOW!”

“THE SKEEP SANDS SHOW!”

Kids all around you, making them laugh. That was kind of a golden

era.

She put away the pen and paper and drained the bottle and returned to the club.

With three beers in her head the ruckus seemed more uniformly unintelligible and pointless. The woman who might have been Lan wasn’t there, only the skewed off-speed voice of Nancy Sinatra and these chirping whores and bullshitting men of the infantry all at least as woozy as herself—as tipsy as herself—as happy.

“You were gone long enough!” It was the same bald GI.

“I’ve been here all along.”

“Really? Never happen!”

She went around him to stand so his face caught the light. He looked vacuous and friendly. He might have been a noncom, but he wore civvies, and it was only a guess. He didn’t want anything from her. If he wanted a woman there were women all around him. He told her as much. He had a woman in Pleiku. He paid her an allowance. She wasn’t a prostitute. She was his girlfriend. Her family had been killed, all but one nephew who’d been left with only half a face. The boy’s brain was damaged. There was a concrete cistern out back to catch the rain. Sometimes the kid climbed up on the cistern, nobody knew why, and fell off and hurt himself. Several families lived in the building, a glorified hooch, but it had two stories, and stairs leading up outside, stairs of rough lumber without a railing, hardly more than a big ladder. At night the boy had to be tied by his leg to a nail in the floor because he wandered, he walked in his sleep, he could pitch over the side and break his neck. Well, you were sad about the kids for a while, for a month, two months, three months. You’re sad about the kids, sad about the animals, you don’t do the women, you don’t kill the animals, but after that you realize this is a war zone and everybody here lives in it. You don’t care whether these people live or die tomorrow, you don’t care whether you yourself live or die tomorrow, you kick the children aside, you do the women, you shoot the animals.

I970

H e crouched by the window and listened shuddering to the sound of ripped high-voltage wires out there stroking the darkness, humming closer and farther, feeling along the darkness after fear. The voltage sucked along the shaft of fear toward any heart emanating it and burned the soul right inside it. That was the True Death. Thereafter nobody lived in that heart, nobody saw out of those eyes. The stench of such burning floated in and out of the room all night.

As soon as a little daylight came up, the flies started taking off and landing around the room. The radio on the windowsill said, “I’ve got the guys here today from the Kitchen Cinq. You’ve heard the music of the Kitchen Cinq, known primarily for their ‘happy sound.’ Fellas, what about the name? Where did the name come from?”

“Well, Kenny, the name was brewed up for us by our manager, Trav Nelson. And we just kind of liked it, so—”

“And how about the way you spell it? C–I-N-Q, that’s unusual.”

“That spelling means the number five in the French language. And there are five of us, and the way it’s pronounced in French you say ‘sank.’ And we’re all from Texas, so we pronounce it kind of like that too— ‘Kitchen Sank.’ “

“And you’re known for your ‘happy sound.’ ” “I’d say that’s just a result of various personalities, Kenny, because we’re all generally pretty happy folks.”

“And I’d be happy to talk all day with you, but we’re gonna say goodbye, stay happy, and thanks.—The Kitchen Cinq. Five happy guys. This is Kenny Hall and the ‘In Sound,’ for the Military Radio Network.”

“So long, Kenny, and thanks to you too.”

“Let’s get back to the music.”

He let the music play.

“What’s burning?” he asked, although he knew.

“I don’t want you to mention burning ever again. You’re on that

twenty-four hours.” “Very good.” “It’s the fucking punk, man, the Mustique. You gotta know that’s all

it is.” “Got it. Mustique.” “The fucking green spirals they set on fire for the mosquitoes? Some

body’s burning it downstairs. Okay?” “Okay.” “Okay, James?” “You’re doing fear,” James warned him. “Hear the hum?” “Oh, man.” “Vanquish fear.” Joker sat beside him on the bed. “I think I have to say this: you are fucking fucked-up, man.” “Giant discovery.” “Well, I mean —can’t you cool it down?” James shrugged. No profit in continuing this stupid little conver

sation. Ming came in from another universe somewhere and said, “You want

noodoos?” “No, I don’t want no fucking noodles.” “Can we go noodoo place?” “No, I said no. You think I want to watch a pack a Gooks eating with

their faces?” “I need some money, Cowboy.” James said, “Goddamn slippery fucking wiggly fucking noodles.” Her stare was like a lizard’s. “Gip me money, Cowboy. Tell him gip

me money,” she said to Joker, “my sister is so hungry, and her stomach is hurting.” Joker took the little girl on his knee and said, “You’re just as pretty as two new aces.” The kid said something in Gook and Ming answered in English: “He

kill some people.” James told her to quiet her kid down. Ming said, “Boo-coo fuck you,” and took the kid outside somewhere. Joker said, “That ain’t her sister.”

“She says it’s her sister.” “It’s probably her kid.” “Either way it ain’t no thang.” He stood and walked over and un

zipped his fly and made water into a blue chamber pot with red flowers on it in the corner. There wasn’t any indoor plumbing. He didn’t see where she made water. When she wanted to piss she went downstairs someplace.

Joker said, “Let’s go. Listen to me, man—Cowboy? Cowboy? —I

know how this shit goes.” “I gotta believe you.” “There’s a difference between downtown and the bush.” “Whichever one, it ain’t real life.” “I didn’t say that. Will you listen to what I’m saying? You can’t come