The Whole World

Michael Loyd Gray

Turns out this gal with the toothy smile had a runty kid, a boy. Of course. I probably should have seen that one coming from at least a mile away. Two miles, probably. Maybe even from outer space. But I didn’t know any of that when I met her after my gig at The Filling Station, a dive bar just off the Black Canyon Freeway north of Phoenix. 

The lights there had been turned down, kind of an amber glow, and that made her smile sexier than it would be in daylight, and it didn’t hurt that I’d had a couple of shots of Jack. Low lighting is very forgiving. Seductive, I guess you’d say. I suppose that’s why lonely folks go to a place like that. They feel more confident absorbed by the protective film of shadows.

Looking back on it, she really ought to have done something about that boy, maybe park him with a relative for the night while she traipsed about all gussied up in her best for the ladies’ night manhunt at The Filling Station. People don’t think things through. They hope for the best and in their hope, they often cut corners. The corners have a habit of catching up to you.

Her name was Gilda, this dive bar queen with the toothy mile. I’d never met a Gilda. The only one I ever knew of was Gilda Radner, back in the seventies on SNL. You know, back when the show was truly funny. Well, I’d seen a few re-runs, anyway. Turns out, this dive bar Gilda was named for the famous one, a dead ringer, supposedly. I don’t know why folks saddle kids with famous folks’ names. Nostalgia, I suppose. Maybe we all think we once lived better times. I try not to go into the past. There’s nothing there for me. It might as well be as barren as the Sonoran Desert outside Phoenix. Unrelenting nothing stretching to a far horizon. The past is quicksand and once back in it, you sink slowly into an abyss.

I shook the past away and mounted the tiny Filling Station stage under some jury-rigged set of red and yellow track lighting. This Gilda had a request sent up to me.  She wanted to hear “Honky-Tonk Women.” I know a goodly number of tunes by the Stones and have seen my fill of honky-tonks and so I was happy to comply. I shot a wink at this Gilda after I sang the famous first line of the song about a “gin-soaked barroom queen in Memphis” and going upstairs “for a ride.” 

My capable version of the song put a grin on her face. Old Mick himself might have been proud of how I handled it. I can sing okay with a useful slice of raspiness in my voice and I play a competent amount of guitar. Good enough, anyway, for the ladies’ night manhunt at The Filling Station. I reckon I’m the soundtrack for ladies’ night. Its narrator. A troubadour, even? Hell, why not?

Or a musical emcee, maybe. I’d pepper my set between songs with sly comments about ladies’ night and whatnot. You know, like that old line from a famous country song – “looking for love in all the wrong places.” Anyway, I must have really been hitting the mark that night like a champ because the crowd was with me, giggling and hooting, ladies clapping and sashaying, and this Gilda eyed me like she was on the prowl at the high school prom. 

She was poured into her jeans and truth be told, she had a good figure. Curves in all the right places, as they say. I suppose that helped smooth the waters when you got to the toothy smile. Her tight pants were tucked into white and black cowboy boots that had these fuzzy orange and blue tassels on them. They were just about the oddest pair of cowboy boots I’ve ever seen, and believe me, I’ve been all over the dive bar landscape for more than a decade.

After my set, I wandered over to the bar for a free shot of Jack, courtesy of this Gilda, who was nowhere in sight. Unexpectedly, I felt a sense of relief.

“She popped out for a smoke,” Sam behind the bar said, nodding toward the door and then grinning at me as I downed the Jack and grimaced.

“She probably just went on home,” I said as the alcohol exploded in my stomach and a warm glow filled me.

“Not hardly,” Sam said while he dunked glasses in the sink. “It’s early, chief.”

“Don’t I just know it,” I said, more to myself than Sam.

“Besides, she’s a regular.”

“Big surprise.”

He arched eyebrows and dried a glass with a cloth.

“Maybe a night for surprises, Ben.”

I smirked.

“It’s just a gig, man.”

“Until it’s something else altogether.”

“She’s an appreciative fan. I do have some, you know.”

“She’s a maneater, son.”

I nodded.

“So, what am I?”

“Dinner?”

He laughed and moved down the bar to refill drinks. That was when this Gilda popped back and cantered like an eager pony over to the bar.

“Well, cowboy,” she said breathlessly, “how are you, darlin’?”

I’m no cowboy. I grew up in Pennsylvania, just outside Philly. I don’t even own a cowboy hat. But that cowboy schtick is par for the course in dive bars. I mix a few country songs into my sets because I know it’s expected. A gesture of goodwill, like speaking a few words of the lingo in a foreign country.

“Doing just fine, darlin’,” I said managing to get some twang into my voice.

“You sang my song real fine, cowboy.”

“That’s your song, is it? I thought it belonged to the Rolling Stones.”

She slapped my elbow playfully.

“You’re a handful, aren’t you, cowboy?”

“Well, I don’t know about that.”

I tossed down the shot into the fire already raging, that was burning away at wisdom and good sense.

“Yeah?” she said. “And just what do you know, cowboy?”

“Ben.”

“Okay, cowboy Ben.”

I glanced at Sam, who winked and went back to dunking glasses in the sink.

Early that next morning, I probably should have just skedaddled at first light while the dive bar queen snored and sawed away at a pile of logs. I don’t know why I just didn’t slink away with my shoes in my hands to beat a hasty retreat. But I’d gone along willingly – fueled by Jack Daniels – and I supposed that meant I had to ride it out to its inevitable end, the sloppy morning kisses and cigarette breath mixed with whiskey, the light of day creating side glances instead of full-on looks at each other, the toothy smile exposed as more like a fractured, sloppy grin. The Jack anesthetic couldn’t cover that up in the glare of dawn’s early light.

She didn’t look at all like Gilda Radner. Maybe as a kid, but not now. Her face was puffy, her dyed hair a Medusa mess of snakes curling off her head. She called me cowboy again, but I no longer winced over that. She muttered something about going down the street to a store, to get stuff for breakfast, and for me to look out for her boy.

“What’s his name?”

“Earl,” she said as she slipped on her jeans and I had a glimpse of cellulite thighs.

“What about his dad?”

I was thinking it was mighty late in the game to be asking a question like that.

“He done gone to hell and back,” she said, buttoning up her wrinkled blouse from the night before and then sweeping that mass of curls back into place.

“What flavor of hell?”

“Jail.”

While she was gone, I got dressed and splashed water on my face and then sat back on the bed, my head hanging over my knees. I’d slurped some water and felt a little better. I was deciding just how long before it was okay to exit. I knew I’d already stayed too long as it was. Once you do them morning kisses and have a conversation, you’ve pretty much forfeited the quick exit option.

And then there was the boy, this Earl, who I hadn’t seen yet. I had no idea how old he was, whether he was just a regular kid or maybe some mental retard or whatnot. I slipped on my socks and shoes and went into the living room. The boy – Earl – sat on the floor playing a video game. Of course. That’s all kids know nowadays.

I watched him for a moment and judged him to be about eleven or maybe twelve. But kind of runty for his age. I wondered if he got enough to eat. He had blond hair and so I figured that was the father in him. Maybe the boy reminded her of her old man now in jail. Maybe the boy made her think of her old man too much. I don’t know. That wasn’t my gig. I’d survived my own childhood with a drunk for a stepdad, and it wasn’t my job to fix everybody else. 

I remembered suddenly that in the heat of the night I’d left my guitar and case in my truck and that was not ever a good idea because it was a vintage Fender Telecaster, a 1953 worth a shitload of money, and people will rob you blind. The boy looked up at me, abruptly aware I was there, but he didn’t look surprised.

“You must be Earl.”

He nodded but there was no emotion on his face.

“You a new friend of my mom’s?”

“Something like that,” I said regretting it immediately. “Sure, a friend.”

He just nodded again and went back to his game. I figured he’d already seen a lot of life, thanks to his mother’s antics as a dive bar queen. His “safe” world was probably inside that video game.   

“She’s got lots of friends,” he said flatly and it made me wince.

“You want to earn a dollar, Earl?” I said, remembering my guitar out in the truck.

“A dollar?”

I heard the biting skepticism in his voice loud and clear.

“Okay, funny man -- how about two dollars?”

  He sneered.

 “What can I do with two dollars?”

“Not so much, I admit. But it’s an easy gig for two bucks.”

“What’s a gig?”

“Well, this particular gig involves you fetching my guitar from my truck.”

“You a gee-tar player?”

“Some say that.”

“So, why’d you leave it out in your truck?”

“That was a mistake, for sure.”

“Things go missing in this neighborhood sometimes,” Earl said with a touch of smugness.

I nodded, thinking I should have gone after that guitar the moment I woke up. But I didn’t because I was drunk and that was on me. I just had this sudden notion to maybe do something for the boy. I didn’t exactly know what. But I wasn’t kidding myself. I knew I was doing it in large part to paper over my presence there in his house. Guilt.

“Five bucks,” I said. “My final offer.”

His face brightened and he got up and went out the front door. While he was gone, I fished an ice-cold Coke from the fridge and chugged it down and belched loudly, but I felt better.

Earl lugged the guitar case in and sat in in the middle of the living room. He stepped back and had an expectant look on his face.

“Now I suppose you expect me to play the thing,” I said.

“Well, I ain’t gonna pay you to,” he said, smirking.

“You learn fast, Earl.”

“I’ve got lots of teachers.”

I knew what he meant, and it made me feel sad as I popped the case open and pulled Old 53 out and onto my lap. It was still mostly in tune. I played an old favorite chord progression, “Simple Man” by Lynyrd Skynyrd, to loosen up.

“What’s that you’re playing?” Earl said.

“Something by Skynyrd. You know them?”

“My momma likes them.”

“How about you?”

“It’s okay,” he said shrugging.

“You’d rather play video games.”

He looked down at the floor.

“I suppose so. I don’t know.”

An idea came to me as I motioned him to the chair next to me and had him put a hand on the guitar fretboard. I showed him where to put his fingers for the first chord. It was hard for him to do it. Hell, it was hard for me, too, when I first picked up a guitar at about his age. Guitars had been my “safe” world when I was as young as Earl. 

I strummed while Earl held that chord in place. He did a decent job of it. His eyes lit up as I strummed. Then I showed him the next chord and the next and I took him through “Simple Man” as he smiled.

“That’s really something,” he said and there were tears in his eyes.

“It’s everything, Earl. It’s the whole world.”