Wading Home_ A Novel Of New Orleans Part 20

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Ten minutes later, Cole and Julian, in Cole's black Jaguar, pulled into the parking lot of Sherman's Seafood Grill near Highway 90, less than a mile from Cole's office. The bar area, separate from the dining room, was paneled in dark wood, and the bar itself was empty; a television behind it noiselessly flashed highlights of a major league baseball game. From a ba.s.s-heavy stereo system mounted somewhere in the walls, Louis Armstrong's gritty voice belted out "What a Wonderful World."

Cole removed his jacket and draped it across one of the high, tubular chrome bar stools. Julian sat next to him.

"I come here after work a lot," Cole said. "They make the best martini in town, and their shrimp c.o.c.ktail is primo." He glanced at the bar menu, then looked up at Julian. "So I would imagine you're a little surprised?" He grabbed a fistful of peanuts sitting in a dish on the bar and popped a few in his mouth.

Julian, unsmiling, shook his head. Parmenter. Wow. Did he think, somehow, that this would make up for the injustice to his father? Now, when his father can't enjoy any of it, when his father is probably dead somewhere, now now is when Parmenter gets religion. is when Parmenter gets religion.

Julian thought those thoughts, but said only, "Yeah, you could say that."

Cole got the waiter's attention and ordered a martini. He looked at Julian, eyebrows lifted.

"I'll just have a beer, whatever's on tap," Julian said.

When the drinks arrived, Cole lifted his gla.s.s and took a small sip. "Well, Mr. Parmenter was very concerned about your father, toward the end. At Mr. Parmenter's request, I have been making calls all over town, trying to find out about what might have happened to him."

Julian looked at the nut dish, picked out three almonds, and ate them. "Thank you. I really appreciate what you're doing."

"Well, I'm just following my boss's wishes."

A thoughtful silence pa.s.sed between them.

Cole held up a finger to the bartender. "Another one of these, please." And to Julian, "How about you?"

"I'm good."

The bartender brought another martini and placed it on the bar in front of Cole.

"But now, with your father missing, things are a little complicated. Legally, I mean. As your father's heir, you, of course, will inherit what Mr. Parmenter indicated-the house and its contents, as well as the profits from the sale of the red beans and rice mix. Oh, by the way, I bought a bag about a week ago. Found it in the airport in Dallas. I cooked it for a couple of friends who came over. Good stuff."

"Anyway. Sorry to put this so bluntly, but the problem is that your father is not dead. Not according to the law, anyway. And for you to inherit the house, et cetera, it has to be legally confirmed. Which means, we really need to find out what happened to him.

"I talked to someone at the U. S. Coast Guard. The lists of names is very sketchy-some people were in pretty bad shape-so they have no way of knowing for sure whether your father was one of the ones airlifted to the Convention Center or the Superdome, or a hospital somewhere. We do know that he was not on any of the buses that left both those places headed for shelters in other states."

Julian nodded his head soberly and took a long swig of the beer in his frosted mug.

"But he may have been picked up by someone else. There were so many other groups-Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, volunteers, private citizens with boats. There are all kinds of possibilities. Anyway, I want you to know I intend to hire an investigator, as Mr. Parmenter provided. We'll find out what happened to him, sooner or later."

"I've got one question."

"What's that?"

"Why, after all this time, did Parmenter finally decide to do right by my father? He knew all along that that whole business deal was wrong. So why now? What happened?"

Cole took the swizzle stick from his martini and ate the large olive at the end. He frowned thoughtfully.

"You know," he said, "Mr. Parmenter wasn't a bad person. I've known him-both him and his wife-for a long time. My father used to work for him, a long time ago."

Cole's father, he explained, was a plumber and small-time contractor who'd met Parmenter through doing some work for the restaurant when the toilets were backed up. He'd ended up working at the house on St. Charles, painting, plumbing, doing small remodeling jobs, and he and the older man had become friends.

It was Parmenter's wife, Clarisse, who had taken a liking to the bright young boy who hung around the house, giving his father a hand.

"It was just the two of us after my folks got divorced when I was six. I guess I was a smart little kid. When I finished high school, I was third in my cla.s.s. I wanted to be a lawyer. When Mrs. Parmenter-Clarisse-found out I couldn't afford to go to college, let alone law school, she insisted Parmenter pay my way all the way to my last year at Tulane. In return, I agreed to work for him on retainer for two years. I kinda liked the gig, and two years turned into twenty."

Cole looked toward the window as traffic on the busy street raced by. "I'm sure Mr. P.-that's what I called him-he would never have sent me to school, if his wife hadn't insisted on it. He just wouldn't have thought of it. But he would have done anything to please her. He loved your dad like a brother, you know, but he was a businessman to the core. He saw the thing with the red beans and rice mix as a gamble that just worked out better for him in the end than for your father. Simple.

"But when your father came to Mr. Parmenter's house a year or so after the mix took off nationally and saw how he was living, things changed. Oh, your dad was still kind, they were still friends, but things were different. Then, when your mom got sick and your dad was struggling with medical bills, Clarisse came down hard on Mr. P. She knew your father's recipe was the real reason they had so much wealth. She insisted that he do something to help, but your dad, he was a proud, stubborn man, he wouldn't take any money, wouldn't take any 'charity.' Even from a friend.

"Mr. P. told Clarisse that. 'He won't accept any money from me, not now,' he said. But she wouldn't buy it. Before she died she told him, 'Promise me you'll do the right thing.' That's one of the reasons he wanted so much to see your dad before he went. It was her wish. And her wish became his."

Julian remembered the day Clarisse came to their house. How out of place she looked in his neighborhood-ramrod straight spine, pale white skin clothed in white linen, blue eyes luminous against the backdrop of shotgun houses and barbecue grills. A picnic basket on her arm holding a salad of tuna on lettuce leaf, a pot for clove and sa.s.safras tea. The way his mother smiled when she walked into her sickroom.

"Finally, not too long ago, Parmenter got your dad to come over; he'd invited him several times over the years, but your dad kept refusing, always 'too busy.' It was just the two of them. Parmenter brought out a bottle of his special ninety-five dollar port, and he and your dad got pretty plastered."

Parmenter, Cole said, talked him into playing dominoes, for money, nickels and dimes. They were having fun, a couple of old friends, when after about the fifth gla.s.s of port for both, Parmenter had an idea.

"Let's play for something big, just for fun. I'll put up my house against your land, your Silver Creek. It'll make the game more exciting."

"Your dad thought it was just a joke, all in good fun, so he said OK. Well, you know your dad, he was a domino player from h.e.l.l, a demon, and Mr. Parmenter had never played before that night. Of course, your dad won, like he'd been doing all night long. It was just for fun, they both had a good laugh and Mr. P. said, 'Well, take a look around, it's all yours now!' Your dad cracked up, said something like, 'You got two weeks to get outta my place!' and never gave it another thought. But Mr. Parmenter-I think he knew his time was short. This was his way. This was the way he could do 'the right thing' in a way your dad would have to accept."

Julian stared into his beer. You just never know. Never know what's behind people's actions. He had to give it to Parmenter, he had craft, and even a little bit of style. And considering the deathbed promise to his wife, he even showed a little bit of heart.

Something still puzzled Julian. "So what was it that my dad owed Mr. Parmenter? He told me, 'I want to see your dad. He owes me something.'"

Cole thought a moment, taking a sip of his martini. "Oh, that. Well, Mr. Parmenter lived for your dad's red beans and rice. Not the dry mix, because it wasn't nearly as good, but the real thing. Parmenter had never tasted anything like it before he met your dad, or since. He was always raving about it. He'd not had any since the restaurant closed, and he begged your dad to-just once more-cook him a pot. Even offered to pay him like two hundred dollars! Your dad would smile, and say, 'Sure, I'll do that. And you don't have to pay me.' But he never did."

"Hmm," Julian said, nodding, lost in thought, not saying what he was really thinking. For his father, cooking was an act of love-if he didn't feel it, he didn't do it. For Julian, there was sweet irony in the fact that Parmenter, who could afford any indulgence, was to be denied the very thing-the simplest thing-he most desired.

But Julian had his own ideas about what Parmenter believed Simon owed him. Absolution. That's what the old man wanted from him-the chance to die with his heart and mind at peace.

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When the two men stepped out into the sunshine of the afternoon, it was after four. Julian had told Sylvia he'd meet her at 4:30. Blessed Redeemer, her church (as well as Simon's), had organized a volunteer group to take homemade boxes of essentials-canned goods, toiletries, soft drinks, bottled water, Tylenol and other first-aid supplies, Kleenex, and even a few Creole-flavored MREs-to deliver to parishioners who'd returned to deal with their flooded houses. Julian had offered to help with the deliveries.

Cole drove Julian back to his car in the parking lot near his office. They shook hands, and Cole said, "Oh, let me give you this." He reached inside the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a stack of white envelopes. "The checks, for you and the band. You guys did a h.e.l.l of a job."

"Thanks," Julian said, opening the door of the car and putting the checks in the glove box. "The guys-all of 'em-they'll really appreciate this."

"Tell me something, Fortier," Cole said. "You ever think about moving back here?"

This caught Julian off guard. Everyone who knew him knew not to ask this question, mostly because the answer was so obvious. He loved his hometown; it had made him the man and the musician he was. But a musician who wanted a world-cla.s.s career, like him, had to leave. It seemed it had always been that way. That's what he thought before the storm, and now, with the city's future in dire doubt, returning seemed foolhardy indeed.

He quickly censored his first impulse-Are you kidding?-and instead said, "I think New York is where I'm supposed to be right now."

Cole nodded, then looked up and squinted at the sun. "Yeah. Too bad. The city's in for the fight of its life. It could use all the help it can get." He looked at his watch. "Well, gotta run. I'll make some more calls tomorrow about your father. Keep the faith, man. We'll find him."

By now, Julian's hope for finding Simon alive, which had shifted between abundant and minimal all these weeks, had dwindled to almost nothing. Optimism was a fabric easily worn thin by unrewarded use, and his had become so thin it was transparent. Now, he just hoped Simon hadn't suffered too much. And that he could give him his final wish-to be buried on Silver Creek land, next to his wife.

It was the least he could do.

A half-hour later, Julian pulled up to the parking lot of Blessed Redeemer in the Bywater section of the city, a low-slung modern structure of terra cotta brick that looked a little out of place in a neighborhood of century-old shotgun houses and elegantly ornate cottages. Situated close to the river on slightly higher ground than the more damaged neighborhoods of the city, it had been spared the ravages of the floodwaters. A portable marquee on the lawn advertised a sermon never given, the last one planned for the Sunday before the flood: "The Dark Hurricane of the Soul."

The lot was empty except for one car, and it wasn't Sylvia's. He looked at his watch-4:40. She must be running late, too.

He debated about whether to sit outside in the car and wait for her, but then decided to go into the church. He found a gla.s.s side door open and followed the wood-paneled hallway to a spartanlooking room with drop-ceiling tiles and about half a dozen steel tables and folding chairs set up on the far side-the room where church teas, dinners, and prayer meetings were held.

Built in the late sixties, this was the church where Julian had grown up, where his mother (and later, Sylvia) had sung in the women's chorus. He hadn't been inside these doors since he was a child. Even the times when Julian had come back to visit his father over the past few years-Christmases, Easters, Thanksgivings-Julian would pa.s.s on Simon's invitations to church service, preferring to stay in and practice. He wasn't much of a churchgoer, much to Simon's disappointment. But so much had changed; since the storm and Simon's disappearance, it seemed more than once he'd found himself with a fervent prayer on his lips.

He'd just pulled one of the folding chairs out from the table and was about to sit down where he heard someone from the direction of the back door.

"Anybody here? Can we get some help with these boxes?"

A woman's voice. Sylvia.

Julian walked back out toward the gla.s.s doors leading to the parking lot.

"Oh, great. Somebody's in here," he heard her yell to someone behind her.

Loaded down with several corrugated cardboard boxes full of food and supplies, Sylvia came inside as Julian opened the gla.s.s door.

"Here, let me get those." Julian took the three boxes from her.

"Julian!" Sylvia said. "I didn't remember what your rental looked like. Sorry we're a little late."

It took him a moment to spot Velmyra, just getting out of her own car. She wore a white sundress, white sandals, and on seeing him, her face lit up in a full smile.

"You're here!" she said. "I didn't even see your car."

Once again, she'd surprised him; she seemed to have a way of just appearing. And this time, it was at the perfect time. The last couple of days had been a whirlwind of mind-bending activity, and not until he saw her did he realize he hadn't really had much reason to smile since he saw a catfish dangling at the end of his line, two days ago.

Before they went back to the car for the remaining twenty or so boxes, she gushed an apology. She was so sorry she hadn't returned his calls: her folks had been so stressed about the house, and the insurance company was giving them grief, one of her parents' neighbors was still missing, and she'd finally gotten a plumber to agree to come to her house, but he'd never shown up.

He held the door open for her as they made another trip to the car.

"You look great," he said, grateful she'd worn that dress, but knowing it wouldn't have mattered what she wore.

She was dead tired, she said, so she decided to dress up a little, hoping it would buoy her spirits. As they brought in more boxes, she went on chatting to him about the events of the last couple of days-her eyes flashing, her hands in motion-while Sylvia busily arranged boxes on the table according to neighborhood streets, writing addresses on each one. Julian listened quietly, his face stuck in a slightly vapid smile. He couldn't remember being so happy to see somebody in a long time.

Velmyra's eyes, he thought, had always been expressive. He could always look at them and tell what she'd been going through. Today, they told a story of sleepless nights, stress, worry, and a fierce defiance in the face of whatever obstacles she'd encountered.

Dealing with her parents, her relatives and neighbors, and watching the news, she had felt herself slipping into depression, she said. And when she saw her mother's prescription bottle of Xanax, she almost reached for one.

"But I decided to pull out my paints instead."

Her eyes brightened as she told Julian about the rush of energy and creativity she'd had; she couldn't get the paint on the canvas fast enough. It was like an elixir. "I mean, I don't know if the stuff I'm doing is any good. But I don't care. It's fun again, you know? And it's keeping me from losing my mind."

She paused, took a long, deep breath. "Anyway, listen to me, going on and on. How are you doing?"

He'd missed her like crazy, not fully realizing it until this moment. Several times in the last couple of days, at the oddest moments (sitting in Nathan Larouchette's office, playing in the funeral procession, listening to the reading of the will) his mind had drifted back to the small cabin at Silver Creek, the narrow bra.s.s bed that creaked and groaned beneath their weight. The soft rub of her hair against the side of his face. Her calming voice as her hand stroked the knotted muscles in his back. And a million other little things that added up to a sum that equaled love.

Hurricanes and other acts of G.o.d had a way of clarifying things; clearing away the grimy film of uncertainty, they polished everything to shine, wholly rea.s.sessed, in new light. This is important, that is not. That has value, this has none. Silver Creek, his father, Velmyra. His career, even. Everything looked different after the waters had been drained away. Everything. So simple now: the things that really mattered were within his easiest reach, the things he could reach out and touch, but hadn't.

So he reached out now, brought her shoulders into his, and hugged her.

How was he doing? "Better." He closed his eyes, smiled. "Now."

20.

It was one of those autumn days in New Orleans-the air crisper and dryer with the teasing hint of fall, the vast blue shock of sky broken with cottony puffs of slow-motion clouds-that long sufferers of the city's famously intense summer humidity would have called "beautiful," had there not been a flood that suspended use of that word indefinitely. It seemed nothing was beautiful here now, and nothing would be for a while.

With the Neon piled high with boxes of food and supplies for the returning congregants of Blessed Redeemer, Julian and Vel drove to the relatively mildly flooded Upper Ninth Ward, where the houses had only seen four or so feet of water, to make calls to families on the lists.

As they wheeled through the neighborhoods, they each had so much to share with the other that they almost spoke at once. After Vel covered all the details of her family's trials over the last couple of days, it was Julian's turn. So much had happened, he said, he didn't know where to start. Nathan Larouchette's condescending offer did not surprise her, nor did the death of Matthew Parmenter, which Sylvia had told her about. But Parmenter had actually left his house and ownership of the red beans and rice mix to Simon? She was stunned.

"What are you going to do with it?" she asked.

"With what?"

"The house, of course."

He pondered a moment. "To tell you the truth, I don't have a clue."

And he hadn't. Hearing the words at the reading of the will had been surreal. If Julian was now the owner of a million-dollar mansion and a lucrative food enterprise, he sure didn't feel like it. Everything lately felt like a dream, and this latest development felt no more real than the flood that had destroyed so much of the city.

But at least here in the Upper Ninth, the houses, girdled to their waists with water lines, still stood. Their first stop was the home of the elderly Mr. and Mrs. Tubman Miles. Both born in New Orleans and in their late seventies, the former electrician and hairdresser had had hopes of living out the remainder of their retirement years in close proximity to their grandchildren and a great-grandchild, who lived less than three miles away in a house built by Tubman Miles's father in the Lower Ninth Ward. When the Industrial Ca.n.a.l levee burst, the flooding waters slid the house off its foundation, and it landed in a neighbor's yard. The Miles's daughter, son-in-law, and their four children had all evacuated to Illinois, and didn't plan to return.

Mrs. Miles, a small, angular woman with finely sculpted cheekbones and a short gray Afro, stood in the mud-covered front yard while Tubman, facemask strapped on, came out of the pink, Creole-style one-story with a box of sludge-covered items.

"Julian Fortier! Is that you, baby?" Mrs. Miles's face broke into a wide smile.

She hugged him and asked about his father. He shrugged and told her what he knew: nothing. He left the box with her and she thanked him with a promise: "I'ma keep prayin' for your daddy."

Julian got back in the car quietly. "They seem OK," he said to Velmyra, and then wondered what he had meant by that. If being OK meant they were still standing, then they were. But the deep frowns in their foreheads stuck in his mind, and he could only imagine the huge struggles ahead for the aging couple.

"They'll be all right," Velmyra said. "They look like the kind who don't give up easily." She let out a thoughtful sigh. "The neighborhood'll come back, better than ever. You'll see."

He said nothing. They drove on to the other seven houses on the block to find, here and there, neighbors sitting on their porches, fanning themselves, their faces grim masks of puzzlement, despair, resignation. Occasionally there'd be a commiserating huddle of two or three in a yard before piles of debris, bodies slack in postures of fatigue, or sometimes defiantly erect, hands on their hips or flailing as they shared with their neighbors the day's travails.

They drove on through block after block of emptiness, houses standing but water damaged and clearly vacant since the hurricane. Each yard, it seemed, contained towers of debris so large they often overshadowed the houses themselves. When someone was home, they delivered the boxes in person, accepting the "bless yous" and "thank yous" of the grateful church members. When they were not at home but known to be in town they left the boxes on porches with a note attached: "From your family at Blessed Redeemer-may G.o.d bless you and keep you well."

Street after street of houses with their own story inside of lives shaken to the core. An unearthly silence presided where there had been the vital sounds of a neighborhood: kids on bicycles, trash trucks trudging through, and car stereos amped up a little too loud. Julian shook his head, an anger he hadn't felt before rising in him like fever. This place was a ghost town now.