Charlie’s Fine

A short story

By GUY D. JOHNSON

Originally published Dec. 12, 2021

Major revision published Feb. 10, 2023

From the darkenest depths of some mystic basement, Raul arose before us six inches taller, at least, than before. Some say 10. Anyway, that’s the latest version.

People still talk about it but these tales are getting out of hand. I say if we’re going to mythologize this event, we ought to get a reasonably accurate account into the written record before it becomes about time travel or alien abduction or something.

I can tell you what happened that day at Charlie’s. I saw the whole thing. To begin with, I don’t think that deal with Raul was anything otherworldly. What he actually emerged from was his comfort zone behind a scuffed mahogany bar that shared with the bartender long years of being leaned on.

I’m not saying his startling emergence was no big deal. Make no mistake, Raul came into his own in that moment. We’re still not sure what got into him. But that was just the beginning. My favorite parts of that day came later, so I’m urging you to hear my account before repeating some of the sillier exaggerations going around. The real story, well told, is plenty good enough.

Right up front I should make it clear that I am not a fully impartial reporter of what I witnessed. I’m a regular here and I’m quite fond of the staff. But, at this venerable establishment and elsewhere around town I like to play the part of the loner, more interested in documenting life as it appears in front of me than in making things up.

My knack for finding public solitude buys me quiet time to sit and stare out windows or across courtyards or off balconies and know the characters of the streets, the music of the air, the beads of the trees, the rats of the gutters – the subtropical wonder of the place I call home.

My favorite spot at Charlie’s is a small, wooden table pushed against a side wall. From there I can view most of the room and see St. Charles Avenue through the front window. I usually order a little something to eat and tend to my satchel of books and papers. The waitress smiles at me, knows I don’t like to chit-chat a lot, sees that my water glass is refilled once in a while and never seems to mind when I stay too long – little gems of life I rarely get anywhere else.

What I also love about Charlie’s is that it’s a comfortable, scuffed up, hand-worn space that has for many years served as a stage for the same familiar production. Day and night, familiar players and some fresh faces come and go. The script is under constant revision but the plot remains about the same and the curtain never falls. Consider me a neighborhood drama critic with a seat close to the stage; unpaid, to be sure, but my psychology lectures at Tulane certainly profit from the raw material I collect while watching the show at Charlie’s.

The characters I observed that particular afternoon were mostly locals – veteran actors in the long-running tragicomedy called New Orleans. Except for Gerri, the new girl. She started the whole thing.

She couldn’t have known what she was getting herself into when she walked in that early December day and stood by the door, waiting to be greeted. No one seemed to notice her. To be fair, there wasn’t much to see. She was thin and pale with straight brown hair trimmed just above her shoulders. Her light blue dress, the kind a girl wears to church in the spring, plus her white sneakers, said neither tourist nor local. They said broke. To me, she looked about 20, maybe 22.

Raul busied himself behind the bar. At a back table, Dolores wrapped silverware with paper napkins and stacked them like burritos onto a plastic tray. Around the edges of the dim, rectangular room, a few customers, including myself, sat quiet as mourners. Salt and pepper shakers and bottles of cayenne pepper sauce glimmered, waiting. Beads of water clung to glasses of ice water and sweet tea. Overhead, ceiling fans, slow as the clock on the wall, served next to no purpose except to emit a low hum, audible in that sleepiest hour of late afternoon.

Dolores, without pausing or looking up, invited Gerri in.

“Sit anywhere, honey.”

Gerri walked to the bar, where Raul, a stocky, 30-something man with long black hair, stood with his back to her, poking a cash register touchscreen as if he were mad at it.

“Hi,” Gerri said.

Raul looked back over his shoulder.

“I’m Gerri Miller,” she said. “I have an appointment with Charlie.”

Raul turned his attention back to the register.

“Charlie’s out,” he said.

“Out? Any idea when he’ll be back? I’m here for an interview.”

Raul turned around.

“Wait. Are you Jackie’s sister?”

“Yes. Are you Raul? You told me to drop by around four today and talk to Charlie.”

“I said that? That was a guess.”

“Does Charlie know I’m supposed to be here? Can you call him?”

“He forgets,” Raul said. “And I can’t call him because he never answers his phone in time and he can’t figure out how to call back.”

“Charlie doesn’t know how to make a phone call?”

“He makes calls all the time.”

“What? Can you text him?”

Raul laughed.

“Text Charlie? Hey Dolores, you wanna text Charlie for me?”

“So, should I come back or what?”

Dolores frowned in Raul’s direction and rescued the young woman from the conversation.

“Why don’t you have a seat. Maybe Charlie will be back soon.”

Gerri chose a table in the center of the room, near me, plopped into a chair, crossed her arms and glared at the salt shaker as if she expected answers from it.

I should tell you more about Charlie’s. It’s on the first floor of a two-story mansion that was, about 150 years ago, some family’s very nice residence on St. Charles Ave. It has been remodeled for commercial use so many times the original architect’s intentions are a matter of speculation. Upstairs, the back is divided into two apartments. The room above the restaurant is used for storage because it’s in terrible condition. Like so many old New Orleans homes, its enduring charms compensate for its condition.

Downstairs in the dining room, long-abused wooden tables and various styles of cafe chairs, some with padded seats, line the walls and clutter the middle. If your table wobbles, tell Dolores and she’ll stick a piece of cardboard under one of the legs. A nice thing about Charlie’s is it’s not crammed with furniture to maximize seating. You can move around in here. When I walk in, it feels like coming home.

Overhead, 20 feet up, exposed foot-thick ceiling beams of virgin longleaf pine preserve the grime of a century. Untouched by the ebb and flow of our troubles, they watch over us. Come what may, they hold up, and there is comfort in that.

Across the front picture window, bold white letters declare Charlie’s Fine. At one time it said Charlie’s Fine Furnishings. That was Charlie’s first attempt at going into business.

The store failed. Charlie’s furnishings were too expensive for people who lived just north of his store, and too inexpensive for those who lived in ornate Victorian and Queen Anne showplaces to the south, across the St. Charles neutral ground. So, he cut his losses and turned to an old New Orleans recipe: open a restaurant, hire a good cook, serve food cheap enough for locals and regional enough for tourists, run a friendly bar and pray the Rosary.

To save money, Charlie told the sign guy to just scratch off Furnishings and add a second line.

CHARLIE’S FINE
Po-Boys – Chicken – Gumbo

Dolores walked over to Gerri with a glass of ice water and a menu. She gave the girl a smile that looked like sympathy and amusement at the same time. Dolores was dressed sort of like Gerri except Dolores burst with color. Her dress moved with exotic flowers and vines. Her red sneakers with purple, green and gold laces clashed with her wavy, orange hair. Dolores has hair that looks a mess no matter what she does with it. She tries to keep it tied back away from her face but some of it always manages to escape captivity. Gerri’s haircut was perfect.

Gerri wore a thin gold chain around her neck. Dolores wore spangles and hoops and freckles and age lines.

Dolores sat down at Gerri’s table.

“So, you’re Jackie’s sister.”

“I am.”

“Well, welcome to paradise.”

“Some welcome.”

“Don’t mind Raul. He’s not always like that. Sometimes he’s worse. He’s been that way since Jackie left.”

“Why exactly did she leave?” Gerri asked. “All she told me was that the new job was great but harder and she’s learning a lot.”

Dolores leaned closer to Gerri.

“Business is slow. I have to warn you, it’s like that all over right now. It’ll pick up at Mardi Gras, we hope. We’re not making much in tips and that’s not good. But Jackie, bless her heart, refused to get in a bad mood about it and that made everyone around her feel better. Then one day she just upped and left for a fancy place downtown, better pay, better hours. And Raul the Terrible has been over there stewing about it ever since.”

“Wow. That does not sound like my big sister. The leaving for something better part, sure, but she was never much of a cheerleader. Quite the opposite, actually. In fact, she tried out for cheerleading once and they didn’t take her. I think she wasn’t giggly enough. She said she never fit in anywhere because the world had too few categories of normal people.”

Through the front window they watched an old man who owns a nearby lamp shop limp up the sidewalk, pausing to greet Andre.

“People change,” Dolores said.

“Apparently,” Gerri said.

“Why did your sister come all the way down here in the first place?” Dolores asked.

“After mom died, Jackie hated living at home in little Madison, Wisconsin. She and I are very much like our mother, who wasn’t like anyone else we ever knew. Mom wasn’t raised in the Midwest, like dad. She came from out East. I think mom would have told Jackie to get out of there and live her own life, that she didn’t have to stick around and deal with dad’s moods. So, one morning Jackie started packing that crappy car of hers and said she was moving to New Orleans. Dad had a cow. I don’t think she had much of a plan. She had only been there once before, for some jazz festival mom told her about.”

“I see,” Dolores said. “Well, we really, really miss her around here.”

“Dad liked to say Jackie’s nuts and I’m plain. I was always jealous of her status as the fearless one. I think he always expected her to run off and join the circus someday. But to him I was his sensible one, the baby. He assumed I would always be around to make sure the place didn’t fall apart, like I was the whole time mom was sick. Then Jackie called this fall and said if I wanted to move in with her I could have her job because she was getting a new one. She said Charlie liked the idea of me working here. She gave my number to Raul and he texted me and said come on in.”

“What is hard to make the leap?” Dolores asked.

“There was nothing for me in Madison. No girlfriends anymore. They took off right after high school or they got married and now they’re stuck. And the guys there, uh, no thank you, know what I mean? What I did have was Dad’s stubborn, absolute disapproval of the idea of my going anywhere. But by then, the thought that I would never go anywhere or do anything scared me more than facing dad. I had to go before I got stuck. Find some place that is more me.”

I think that because Gerri had come in expecting an official job interview, Dolores felt a little sorry for her and was doing her best to give her one. At Charlie’s, this was probably as close to a real interview as Gerri was going to get.

Things are rarely done by the book in New Orleans, especially in the service industry. It can take a while for a newcomer to get used to it. Some people instantly get our way of life here, the way we express ourselves in art and music and food, and the way family and friends cling to each other for survival in a place that makes little sense. If you wade into the river of culture here neither you nor the river are ever the same. On the other hand, some people never do appreciate the really good parts of life here enough to make the really bad parts tolerable. And there are a lot of really bad parts.

Gerri seemed to relax a bit as she shared her story with Dolores, who can be nosy. A lot of stories walk into Charlie’s. Dolores always makes time for them.

“How did your dad take it when you told him you were leaving?”

Gerri sighed.

“I tried to explain how I needed my own life and all that, but it wasn’t working. He just sat there and looked at the floor and didn’t say a word. When I finally gave up talking he looked like I had told him his dog died and I was the one who killed it, on purpose. After a while he stood up and went to his room. I knew then I would never be able to leave Madison. I wouldn’t have the heart to do that to him.

“The next day I heard dad leave the house and drive off. About an hour later he came back carrying a bag from the drug store and he set a bank envelope on the kitchen table. He said it was a long trip to New Orleans and be careful when I transferred in Chicago. He hugged me and then shuffled off to the back of the house. He looked old. I took the envelope to my room and cried.

“Anyway, I finally managed to get on a smelly bus and then get bad directions to a crowded train and get on it barely in time and ride it, stop and go and delay, stop and go and endless delay all the way to New Orleans. All the way down I’m wondering what I’ve done. Finally, I climb off the train in the afternoon and it’s raining here and it’s beautiful in the rain and I’m not afraid anymore.”

“Did Jackie show you around?” Delores asked.

“Not really. She could have warned me about how it is here, I guess, but instead she just turned me loose in the city when she went to work yesterday. I found out myself. I hired a ride to the French Quarter but we got stuck in traffic so I walked the rest of the way, through the Marigny, and I watched two guys hanging Christmas lights on mannequins on a balcony. Then I got one of those hot dogs from a street cart even though some tarot card reader by the cathedral said not to and then I went window shopping on Royal Street. I could see myself living here.”

Dolores asked, “Were they the mannequins with the antebellum dresses and no heads?”

“No, they were naked with lipstick.”

“Oh,” Dolores said. “Different ones, then.”

Gerri continued.

“In Wisconsin, winter is long and boring and gray and everyone complains about the weather and about everything else and they get sick and hide inside until spring. But, oh my god, this place is warm and there’s color even in winter and music and people come out at night and stay up late.”

Gerri looked around for Raul, who had gone outside to pick up litter from the curb. She lowered her voice to almost a whisper, which made my eavesdropping that much more difficult.

“So what’s the deal? I was super excited until I walked in your door today and Raul’s like, what do you want? Until that moment I just knew I belonged in this town. I mean I knew, you know? Now I don’t know. I mean, what if.”

Dolores stopped her there.

“He didn’t mean it,” she said. “Why don’t you look over the menu and see what we do here. Let me deal with Raul. You’re fine.”

Gerri lifted a laminated card half the width of the table and unfolded it.

“This is a menu? It’s a book,” Gerri said. “You must have a huge kitchen and quite the staff.”

“We have Neva during the day and Jake at night. You can barely turn around back there.”

“How’s the food?”

“Stick around. You’ll see.”

Dolores stood up, walked to the back and disappeared around a corner.

Charlie’s sells big plates of casual New Orleans cuisine to wandering tourists during the day and keeps service industry people and hospital workers happy late at night, after their shifts end, with cheap eats and drinks. Charlie’s never closes. The kitchen is always open. They may serve the best plate of red beans and rice in the city, and you can get it seven days a week, not just on Mondays. During normal times, business is pretty good. Trouble is, times in this town are rarely what an outsider would call normal. It’s festival or flood, miracle or misery, one extraordinary blessing or disaster after another.

I have to give Charlie credit. It’s not easy to keep a restaurant going this long, but he made a go of it with frugality and good luck.

First, he’s cheap. He never changed anything, which is what locals and tourists alike appreciate about places like this. If you wanted to shoot a film noir in Charlie’s, you might have to modernize the joint to make it look like the 1940s. He also never repaired anything until it came to the attention of some inspector. He hated calling anyone to service the building. Nowadays, if anything goes wrong Charlie hardly notices. Raul fixes everything.

Second, the day cook, Neva, Charlie’s first hire, can coax enchantment from the most humble of groceries. She goes through bay leaves and fresh thyme by the handfuls. Her pots and skillets, blackened from the bottom to halfway up the sides, respond to her every command. I’ve seen her talk sweetly to them and I’ve heard her give them the devil.

Gerri sized up the room. A retired couple, Bernard and Vivien, occupied their usual stools at one end of the bar, near the front, making a mess of the counter with cracker wrappers. Ice in their tea glasses melted the moments away. Raul cleaned something at the far end of the bar near a window overlooking the kitchen.

I could hear Neva washing pans. That kitchen is her domain, and you’d better not let her catch you in there. Not even Raul crosses Neva. You often see her round face just above the window shelf where she slides plates ready to be picked up.

A small bell dangling above the front door broke the near silence of the room. Two city cops, Terry and Darrell, walked in, sat by the front window and gave an upward nod to Raul, who nodded back. Dolores took two glasses of ice water to the officers, pulled two of her silverware burritos from her apron and placed them on the table. She chatted with the men for a bit and left without taking their orders.

Those two always order the same things: a roast beef po-boy, dressed, with fries for Terry and a burger and fries for Darrell. They don’t want anything to drink but water, to save money. And they don’t want to eat right away. Neva knows to let them sit and complain about work or argue Saints football before she starts their food. They like to eat about 5 o’clock, and if the griping goes well they may stay past 6.

Near my table a tall window admits light filtered through branches of an ancient oak. I like the way shadows of the leaves play on the floor. Classes I teach are over at 3 in the afternoon. I come here after that most days because restaurant business is slow then. I can stay a long time and write, read, whatever. From my spot, I can hear streetcars rattle and scrape up and down the avenue, watch water overtop curbs when it rains, and daydream in the timeless haze of Charlie’s. They call me Teach.

Dolores came back with an order pad and stood over Gerri’s table.

 “You want anything?”

“I think I want to go home,” Gerri said.

Dolores scribbled it down.

“Got it. Anything else?”

“Why did Jackie like working here so much?” Gerri said. “No offense, but it’s kind of a graveyard in here.”

Dolores pocketed her order pad.

“Jackie once told me that when she got to New Orleans she felt like she must have somehow come from here, maybe in a past life or something, like this was another planet that had drawn her back to where she belonged,” Dolores said. “She’s not the only one. I’ve heard it a million times. Thing is, she was just what we needed around here. Her good vibes were contagious, and they were good for business. When she urged you to make this journey, maybe she knew what she was doing.”

“I hope so,” Gerri said.

Dolores sat down.

“Look,” she said. “Like I said, business are still down, but tourists are starting to come back. We do need help if you want to stay because I can’t work seven days a week. But Charlie doesn’t know if we can wait this dry spell out. He thinks we might ought to sell. Raul won’t do it, or he can’t, or something, and I’m glad. We’ve seen these times before, maybe not this bad, and now Jackie’s seen it and she’s figuring out how to survive in this city, like we all have to do. I don’t blame her for trying something else. She may or may not like it over there, but she’s learning the game.”

Gerri laid the menu aside.

“So, you’re telling me that after not being offered a single good job with my newly printed business degree I came all the way down here on a bumpy old train to serve chicken to no one? I could have failed this spectacularly at home and gotten free rent with complementary ridicule.”

Gerri softened her tone.

“Hey, I’m sorry. I should shut up.”

“It’s OK,” Dolores said. “This isn’t back home. You’ve been in town, what, two days? Like I said, honey, stick around.”

The bell above the door jingled again. A young woman walked in and sat at the table near Gerri. Dolores smiled at her, handed her a menu and said she’d be right back. The girl scanned the menu and then Gerri.

“What’s good here?” the girl asked.

“This your first time here?” Gerri asked.

“My first time in New Orleans. I’m Pam. I’m staying up the street. I just got in from Portland for a conference. I’ll be here for a week, and right now I’m starving. I keep hearing about shrimp poor boys. That’s what I want.”

“My first time, too,” Gerri said. “I’m supposed to be going to work here but I definitely don’t know.”

Dolores returned to take Pam’s order.

“I want a shrimp poor boy,” Pam said.

“You want that dressed?” Dolores asked.

“Um, I don’t know what that means, but yes, absolutely. And iced tea.”

“Sweet?”

“Is what sweet?”

“You want sweet tea?”

“No. The regular kind.”

Dolores wrote that in her pad and underlined it.

“I’ll see if I can come up with some.”

Dolores tucked the order pad into her apron, clipped her pen to a pocket and started toward the bar, but a scratching noise at the front door made her go over and open it partway.

“Come on in, sir, we’ve been expecting you,” Dolores said.

A small black and white dog of questionable lineage trotted in, crossed under a few tables, hopped onto the barstool closest to the kitchen and looked at Raul.

“What’s up, Freebie?” Raul said.

The dog wagged and then became interested in a show on the television that hangs behind the bar. Raul continued his work.

Pam said, “They let dogs in here?”

“I guess,” Gerri said.

“That’s weird,” Pam said.

Gerri glanced at Freebie.

“What’s wrong with dogs?”

“It acts like it owns the place,” Pam said.

“I think it’s cute,” Gerri said.

“Cute yes. Sanitary? I wonder if those policemen are going to make a doggy arrest or something. Paws up, Rover.”

Gerri looked at the cops, who were laughing at some guy on the sidewalk who was yelling at passing cars.

“It doesn’t look like it,” Gerri said. “And I hope not.”

About that time, Dolores returned with a shrimp po-boy the size of a football; an overstuffed masterpiece embedded in a nest of French fries. Seasoned fried shrimp tumbled from the sides of it and onto the fries. You could barely see the plate.

“Oh my God,” Pam said.

Gerri seemed equally impressed.

“Is this for one?” she asked.

Dolores grinned.

“Yes, ma’am. This is how we do.”

Pam pleaded with Gerri.

“You have to help me eat this. I couldn’t possibly, and if I take this back to the hotel my room will smell like shrimp for like a year.”

Dolores said she would bring another plate.

Pam tried to lift half of the po-boy with two hands but botched the job. A slice of tomato smothered in mayo blooped onto the table. When she got a good bite she paused mid-chomp, closed her eyes and emitted a sound of passion.

“Yeah?” Gerri asked.

“Oh yeah,” Pam said.

When Dolores came back with the extra plate, Gerri asked her about Freebie.

“Who’s your dog friend?”

“Him? He’s a regular,” Dolores said.

“It’s OK to have dogs in here?” Pam asked.

“Why not?”

“Those policemen don’t care?”

Dolores laughed.

“Those two? Nah.”

“Who does he belong to?” Pam asked.

Dolores sat at Gerri’s table and re-tied her bushy ponytail.

“OK, here’s the story.”

Bernard and Vivien rotated their substantial frames on their stools to better hear the story. Raul seemed to take an interest. I, of course, listened in. It was otherwise so quiet in the dining room most of us could hear their conversation, and I’m sure Dolores knew it.

“Freebie belongs to the world, and the world belongs to him. Mr. Andre told me that.”

“Who’s Mr. Andre?” Gerri asked.

“He is the gentleman seated out front, in the middle sidewalk table.”

Gerri looked through the front window. The back of a thin man in a teal beret leaned against the glass, motionless.

“That old guy sleeping out there?” Gerri asked. “I thought he might be dead or something.”

Dolores pulled her reading glasses onto her nose and peered over them.

“Mademoiselle, you will adjust your tone and keep your tongue sweet when you speak of he who guards the souls of St. Charles.”

“Oh,” was all Gerri managed as a comeback.

Dolores laughed, letting Gerri off the hook for her mistake.

Of all of the Charlie’s regulars, Mr. Andre confounds my powers of analysis the most. First, he is the face of this place. Not Charlie, not Raul or Dolores, but Andre, who comes and goes as he pleases and has no official connection to the establishment.

Almost daily, our chief sage makes his way down here and assumes his position of honor. His eminence is never questioned. Everyone knows Mr. Andre but little is known of his history. I’ve heard a lot of stories, like he used to be King of Zulu, and that many years ago he had a band called the Funkety Funks. Then again, they also say he drowned in the river in 1972 and is entombed along with two women in St. Roch Cemetery Number One and comes out every Jazz Fest to haunt the Fair Grounds.

I do know that musicians and many other people treat Mr. Andre with great respect. They say he has a hundred girlfriends. That number may be low. His money is no good in a lot of places, including Charlie’s, where he never sits inside. He likes the sidewalk. People bring things out to him. I’d put his age at anywhere between 80 and 150.

If Mr. Andre speaks to you, it is because you have been chosen to hear what he has to say. The first time I met him, he shook my hand. As I beheld the caramel geography of his face, an almost frightening familiarity presented itself, as if he knew all about me and I had been expected. I’m not sure his eyes see the same world we do. I feel like he sees you as the person you really are deep inside. Spend enough time around him and you may become that person. That’s the best I can explain it.

“So, Andre doesn’t own Freebie?” Gerri asked.

Dolores slapped Gerri on the knee, not too hard, but enough to startle her.

“You’re not listening,” Dolores scolded.

Bernard appeared to grow impatient with the pace of things.

“Yeah, let her finish her story,” he called from his perch. His wife, Vivien, spoke up, too. “Yes, Dolores, please do continue.”

Dolores put her elbows on the table.

“We don’t know how old Freebie is, but he gets around. Reports of his whereabouts come from way Uptown, the French Quarter, even the Bywater. He keeps to high ground.”

What Dolores said about Uptown is definitely true. One time I personally saw that mutt trot right past my classroom door at Tulane. I found him at the end of the hall being interviewed by a postdoctoral fellow.

“I hear he spends a lot of nights in a courtyard over on Governor Nicholls, near Claiborne,” Dolores said.

At the bar, Bernard elbowed Vivian.

“Hey, who’s Governor Claiborne?”

Vivian shook her head and raised her voice so her husband could hear better.

“There’s no Governor Claiborne,” he said. “It’s Governor Edwards I think. That’s who owns Freebie.”

Vivien stirred her tea.

Dolores asked Gerri where she had left off.

“You were talking about the governor.”

“Oh yeah. Anyway, right after Raul took over here someone opened the door and this scruffy guy just followed him in. I thought the dog was with the customer, but the man sat in a chair up front and the dog went to the bar, jumped up on that same stool and wagged at Raul. Those two have been friends ever since. We learned his name when people came in and started saying hi to him. Everyone seemed to know Freebie. He comes in here most days about the same time and watches TV for a while. Neva slips him food.”

Pam had finished her half of the po-boy and was picking stray shrimp off Gerri’s plate when the front door flew open, nearly ripping the bell off its brace. A boy of about 8 raced past.

“Lemme use your bathroom,” the boy said. In a flash, he was down the back hallway.

“What was that?” Pam asked.

 “That’s Go Cup,” Raul said from across the room.

“OK, I’ll bite,” Gerri said. “Why is he Go Cup?”

“You’ll have to ask him,” Raul said. Pam sneaked another shrimp.

From the end of the hall, a door slammed. Footsteps as fast as before approached. The child looked back as he ran, as if being chased.

“There’s a werewolf in the bathroom,” he yelled as he passed. “Run.”

Before the boy could reach the door, Gerri stood up. “Stop,” she ordered.

Go Cup hit the brakes and wheeled around to face Gerri.

“Now,” Gerri said. “What, exactly, is the situation?”

Go Cup was a little out of breath.

“Lady, there’s no situation, there’s a werewolf. In the bathroom. Why ya’ll just standing there?”

Gerri remained calm.

“Take it easy. There is no werewolf in the bathroom. You’re going to scare the customers.”

Go Cup did not back down.

“You think I’m crazy or what?”

“That is a distinct possibility,” Gerri said.

“I’m not distinct, you’re distinct,” the kid said.

“Alright. Wait right here. I’ll go see this werewolf for myself.”

“Go ahead. I dare ya. I bet you won’t do it.”

“You’re on,” said Gerri.

“Hold on,” said Go Cup. “You’re gonna need this.”

The boy reached into a pocket, pulled out a small item and placed it in the palm of Gerri’s hand.

“Is this Voodoo or something?” she asked.

“It’s a red bean,” said Go Cup. “Mr. Andre gave me a special bag of ’em. He said carry one all the time and keep it safe.”

“Thank you,” Gerri said. “That’s really nice.”

She pocketed the bean, pushed back her chair and started toward the back.

“The men’s bathroom?” she asked as she walked.

Go Cup pulled back his narrow shoulders.

“Whatchu think?”

“Just checking,” Gerri said.

Everyone but the cops stared after Gerri and waited. Presently, Gerri reappeared, unshredded, and returned to Go Cup.

“Well,” she said for all to hear. “You were right. There’s a werewolf in the bathroom.”

Go Cup, with the truth of the matter confirmed, smiled broadly.

“See. Now who’s crazy? You dummies stay here if you want. I’m gone.” He turned toward the door.

“Wait,” Gerri told him.

“Now what?”

“Why do they call you Go Cup?”

“Cause that’s what I do. I go.”

“What’s your real name?”

The child thought for a moment, then took a deep breath.

“Sir Jelly Roll Armstrong Neville Marsalis Batiste Debenville. Junior.”

Gerri turned her raised eyebrows toward Dolores, then at Raul and then back to the boy.

“Go Cup it is,” Gerri said.

Go Cup made a visual inventory of the small collection of Charlie’s regulars sitting around not seeming to be doing much of anything. He kept an eye on the hallway to the bathrooms.

“It sure is dead in here,” he said. “Maybe the werewolf got somebody. You fixin’ to go to the cemetery?”

Vivien answered.

“She was telling about ol’ Freebie.”

Bernard added, “That mutt’s got it better than we do around here.”

“Shut up,” Vivien said.

Go Cup pointed to the dog’s barstool.

“So where is Freebie, anyway?” he asked.

Freebie was gone.

“He was right there before,” Pam said.

Go Cup lowered his chin.

“Now see, ya’ll bored poor Freebie to death. He’s probably out there right now, over by the river, thinking about how sad everything is. He’s gonna jump in. No more Freebie. And you guys did it. You killed old Freebie. Probably gonna have a jazz funeral.”

“Go is right,” Raul said. “Freebie finally had enough of us. He moved on to better things.”

“Maybe the werewolf got him,” Bernard offered.

“He did not,” Vivian said. “Don’t get that started.”

Gerri asked Go Cup, “Think you can find that dog?”

Go Cup thought about it. “For a dollar,” he said.

That was Go Cup’s standard reply to any request for his considerable skills of delivering or finding and retrieving any reasonable thing within the confines of his usual territory. Other places cost extra. Crossing Canal Street, $3. Crossing Esplanade, $5. Above Interstate 10, $100.

Neva hollered from the kitchen.

“Food.”

She said it loud enough to be heard outside.

Dolores got up and walked to Neva’s window and picked up plates loaded with grub for the cops. She balanced both platters on one arm and carried a glass of water in another and took them to the front. Darrell always wants more water.

While Dolores flirted with the officers, Go Cup interrupted her.

“Hey, how come you guys don’t have a Christmas tree? Thanksgiving is over and you’re act like nothing’s happening. I know Miss Neva’s back there making her old turkey gumbo. I can smell it. Smells like Christmas coming.”

“Charlie’s not gonna want us to pay for a tree,” Dolores said. “And I wouldn’t bring it up with Raul right now. He’s not in the mood.”

Gerri had been watching this conversation and stepped in to join forces with Go Cup.

“Then we’ll decorate something else,” Gerri said. “What do you think, Go?”

Go Cup scratched his nose. “We could decorate Mr. Andre. Everybody would see him when they went by and know this is the place to go.”

“There’s an idea,” Bernard said.

“No you don’t,” yelled Neva.

Dolores put a stop to that line of thought.

“We are not decorating Mr. Andre.”

“Make your own tree,” Go Cup said. “We made one one time when we went to Nana and Pops’ for Christmas and that year Pops all of a sudden said he didn’t like Christmas trees and Nana said Pops had the sea nile and if we kids wanted a tree we could figure out how to get one but she was too tired and sore to fool with it.”

“What did you make it out of?” Gerri asked.

“Banana trees.”

“Did it look like a Christmas tree?”

“Nana didn’t think so. By Christmas Eve it was all bent over and Nana’s cat ate a bunch of the tinsel and pooped silver rope. Pops said we should make ornaments out of the cat tinsel and invite everybody over.”

Dolores stuck her hands in her apron pockets.

“Forget it,” she said, and then sat at the bar next to Vivien, who patted the waitress on the shoulder.

Gerri walked over to Raul.

“Couldn’t we give it a shot? What’s the worst that can happen?”

Raul smirked. “You’re not from around here, are you?” he said.

Go Cup came to Gerri’s defense. “Come on, man. It won’t cost you nothin’.”

Raul turned toward the front window as if he were watching some suddenly odd thing, but there was nothing out there he hadn’t seen a million times.

Gerri waited for a respectful amount of silence to transpire in that no man’s land between a proposal and a decision, and then made her move before silence became the answer.

She squatted to confer with Go Cup. “Alright, how are we going to make a Christmas tree for cheap?”

Go pointed toward the front window.

“The people in that big house with the naked fountain lady out front just pulled up their bushes and threw them by the street. I can get those.”

“Maybe the city has already picked them up,” Gerri said.

Both cops laughed.

“Can you get us some when you look for Freebie?” Pam asked.

Go Cup did the math. “That’s two things. Two dollars.”

“Fine,” Gerri said.

Go Cup snagged a pack of crackers from the nearest table. “I’ll be back, cause this place has the sads bad, and it’s gonna be Christmas. I’m gone.” Pam told him to hurry back.

Dolores motioned Raul to come over. While he wiped his hands on a towel she stole a look at his black and gray tattoos. His ink designs are complicated and I doubt anyone has had the nerve to ask him to hold still so they could try to figure them out. He’s a bit private and hard to read. Late at night, when he’s staring down some rowdy customer looking for trouble, Raul seems about 6 feet 4. In the morning, sweeping the sidewalk, he’s maybe 5 10.

“You OK with this Christmas business?” she asked.

Raul fiddled with a glass. Dolores moved the glass aside so Raul would stop staring at it.

“You haven’t exactly been merry since, you know,” she said.

Raul slid the glass back. “What’s the point at this point?” he said.

“Since when do we need a point around here?” Dolores said.

Raul cracked a faint smile and watched Gerri trade ideas with Pam.

“The new girl? She gonna be any good?” Raul asked.

“Maybe,” Dolores said. “I think so.”

“Is she gonna be another Jackie?”

Dolores picked a bit of lint off Raul’s black t-shirt.

“I kind of wish she would be, but I don’t think you have to worry about that.”

Raul put the glass away and placed both palms on top of the bar. A streetcar rolled past the front window toward downtown. Traffic lights at the corner changed from Santa red to holiday green. Then, in a feat of now legendary athleticism, Raul sprang onto the bar and leaped to the floor. He should have been wearing a cape. With a thud he stuck a respectable hero’s landing and stood determined before us. I swear he looked taller.

Bernard spilled his drink. Dolores jumped back and brushed some stray hair behind her ears. Pam froze. The cops looked up from their food. Neva peeked over her shelf. Vivien eyed Raul from his boots to the muscles under his t-shirt to his thin mustache and inky hair. We all saw the resolve in Raul’s eyes.

“We’re doing Christmas,” Raul announced.

I think it was the first executive decision I had ever seen him make that hadn’t been whispered in his ear by Charlie, suggested by Dolores or yelled by Neva.

“The new girl’s in charge. And it better be good,” Raul said.

Until then, Gerri had been Jackie’s sister from Madison, but now she was the new girl. It sounded like a promotion.

Pam clapped with glee, but everyone stared at her. The thing with Raul is that his grin looks exactly like his grimace. The only difference, and it’s as subtle as it gets, is that the former betrays a thin but, I suspect, deep vein of mischief. I think sometimes only Dolores knows whether he’s serious or not.

Gerri straightened her back and saluted. “Yessir, sir. I’m on it.”

Raul looked back at the bar and then at the floor, as if he were surprised to find his feet there.

Darrell broke the awkwardness of the moment by asking Dolores for another glass of water, which gave Raul an excuse to retreat to his usual battle station.

Gerri sat down at Pam’s table. Pam leaned forward and held one of Gerri’s hands, perhaps to check for a pulse.

“We’ll figure something out,” Pam said.

Gerri smiled. “Thanks,” she said, “but I can’t expect you to hang around here while …” Pam lifted a finger to Gerri’s lips. “Hush,” Pam said. “You’re not getting rid of me that easily. Christmas is my specialty. I have like a Ph.D. in it.”

“I was hoping you’d say that,” Gerri said. “In that case, you ready for a sleigh ride, drink some hot cocoa, make some snow angels?”

“I’m in,” Pam said.

Dolores asked Pam if the girls were finished with the po-boy. Gerri said she guessed so. When Dolores picked up what was left of it, Pam said “bye-bye” to it.

“By the way,” Dolores asked Gerri.  “Why did you tell Go there was a werewolf in the bathroom.”

Gerri leaned back and looked up. “Well, for one, it’s good business. He’ll tell that story all over town and everyone will want to come see it. For two, how do you know there’s not a werewolf in the bathroom?” Dolores seemed to see the logic in that answer.

The bell rattled. It was Go.

“You back already?” Vivien asked.

“Oh, no,” Bernard said.

Gerri stood up, arms akimbo.

Go Cup posed in the doorway with a complete young holly tree, red berries and all, the kind the city plants in sidewalk containers in the business district. It was as big as him.

“I thought you were bringing branches from the curb,” Dolores said.

“I found this instead. No one was using it.”

“It has roots,” Gerri said.

 “You don’t like it?” Go asked.

Gerri looked at Pam, who looked at Dolores, who looked at Raul, who looked back at Gerri.

Gerri made a show of surrender with her arms. “It’s perfect,” she said. “Where are we going to put it?”

Raul intervened. “You can put that thing in the big pot out by Mr. Andre. Whatever’s in there has been dead for years.”

“Wait,” Pam said. “It has to have lights. Any plug-ins out there?”

Dolores laughed. “Plug-ins? Yeah, we got plug-ins. And they’re deader than that old asparagus fern out there.”

Gerri sighed. “So . . .”

“Figure it out,” Raul said. “You’re in charge of Christmas.”

“Mr. Cup, you didn’t bring Freebie,” Pam said.

“I didn’t see him yet. I’ll get him,” Go said.

Raul opened a cold bottle and followed as Go Cup dragged the tree out to the sidewalk. I watched through the window. Before the two started to pull up the old plant, Raul approached Mr. Andre and sat the bottle on the table next to him. Andre looked up and nodded and reached for the table. His motions, ever fewer and slower, grow more elegant with time.

When they had the new tree planted, I saw Go Cup tug on Mr. Andre’s sleeve. Andre leaned down, as best he could, so Go could speak in his ear. Andre seemed to say something. Go Cup listened, shook his head up and down and took off around the corner. Raul came inside and ascended the rear staircase.

Gerri leaned over my table to watch out the side window.

“Where is Go going? she asked.

“Who knows?” I said.

Pam squeezed in beside Gerri.

“Look at him go,” she said. She held one of her hands to her nose. “I smell like shrimp.” The girls giggled.

Bernard pointed at the front window. Outside, an orange extension cord with a power strip plugged into it snaked downward toward the sidewalk, a foot at a time, from a second-floor window.

Gerri ran to the front.

“Yay. For the lights.”

“What lights?” Pam asked.

“Good grief,” Bernard said.

Vivien elbowed her husband of 50-some years.

“You better cheer up, buddy, or Santa’s gonna bring you a lump of coal.”

Bernard grunted. “Where’s he gonna get it? He’ll have to stop first in Kentucky or some such place and bring it down here and in the meantime he’ll get it all over the presents and some poor girl in Chalmette will get her little Christmas dress all messed up. And I suppose it’ll be all my fault, like everything else. They’ll probably sue me.”

“You’re probably right,” Vivien said, removing the straw from her glass and letting it drip onto the floor. “Anyway, I think the tree’s gonna be wonderful. A tree has to have lots of lights and lots of ornaments.”

Raul returned from upstairs carrying a ripped cardboard box with Sani-Granni Paper Products printed on it. He dropped the box by the door.

“We’ve got lights,” he said. “They’ve been upstairs for I don’t know how long. I just remembered. I don’t know if they work.”

Pam rummaged through the tangled cords. “Let me try them. My dad always let me put on the lights.”

“My dad wouldn’t let us do the lights,” Gerri said. “He said it was his job and it had to be done right, before the balls and tinsel and stuff, but Mom couldn’t get him to put them on until about a week before Christmas. Jackie used to get so mad.”

“That’s too bad,” said Vivien. “I wish Bernard would put the lights on our tree. I always have to do it, and with my bad back. And he won’t take ’em off, either. The lights on the front porch he leaves up all year and turns ’em on for Halloween and they stay on till Easter. He says it’s OK to leave ‘em on for the big holidays and the Mardi Gras because it’s all one thing.”

“I never said that,” Bernard muttered.

Vivien seemed to feel she had won that round. She gave Bernard a little side hug.

“We’re not doing tinsel,” Gerri said. “It’s bad for the environment and it might end up in the soup.”

“Good thinking,” Pam said.

“You got that right,” Neva yelled.

Pam dragged the box outside and was soon elbow deep in a knotted web of Christmas lights. She steered clear of Mr. Andre’s sacred ground, a few feet away. Andre watched Pam struggle.

Raul turned to Gerri.

“Well, what’s next, madam in charge?”

 “Ornaments. Do we have any?” she asked.

Raul shook his head. “Not that I know of.”

Gerri and Pam searched the restaurant and peeked behind the bar for anything that could pass for a Christmas ornament. Anything the least bit festive. About all they found was a Cajun alligator plush toy with a plastic crawfish stuck in its mouth that someone had wedged behind a framed photo of an extra-large tuba player seated on a bench in Jackson Square. Wisely, they left it there.

New Orleans evolves as people add new things to old things. Via a slow alchemy, layers of art and commerce, disdain and affection, sorrow and joy, sin and salvation – the spiritual sediment of generations born of a river and raised upon a swamp – become righteous cultural artifacts no one has a right to disturb. Like Bernard said, it’s all one thing. Pull a seemingly pointless bit of nonsense off the wall and the whole ceiling comes down on top of us.

In this ill-conceived, twice burned, rebuilt, defended, conquered, weather-beaten, badly patched, oft repainted, guilt-ridden and yet shameless, lovable old river port, we keepers of the faith sacrifice ourselves to the waters to grasp the sinking, upstretched hand of a spirit that enchants this place and us, determined to give it breath and in doing so save ourselves. So it will be til the last hopeful note of our trumpet is played for a fish in the sea.

Go Cup showed up at the front door dragging a lumpy plastic bag nearly as big as him.

“I got everything to put on the tree,” he said.

“What did you get?” Gerri asked. “We looked all over and couldn’t find anything nice.”

“Lady, there’s pretty stuff all over,” Go Cup said. “You’ll see.”

Before Gerri could get any more out of him, Go was out the door with Pam in pursuit. Go dumped his Christmas treasures onto Mr. Andre’s table and then ran back in and yelled into the kitchen.

“Miss Neva, you got hooks?”

“Hold on,” Neva said. A few seconds later she tossed a bag of bread ties out her window like a knot of Mardi Gras beads from a float. Go Cup leaped for them and was gone.

Any chance Gerri may have had to go outside and supervise the tree decorating was cut off by a half-dozen or so locals of various shapes and sizes bouncing through the front door, laughing like they had just heard a dirty joke. Dolores waved them in and pulled several tables together in the middle of the room. One of the guys had a pair of drumsticks in his back pocket.

“Where ya been?” Dolores asked.

“Some rich folks Uptown had a birthday party for a pet pig,” the widest one said. “We played for two hours and the only one who danced was the pig. Paid OK, though. Go ask momma if she still loves her boys.”

“Neva,” Dolores yelled.

“What,” Neva replied, just as loud.

“We got trouble again.”

Neva, without looking to see who it was, shot back with, “Tell ‘em I got catfish, shrimp and oysters ready to fry and somebody needs to eat all this gumbo. If they want chicken they gotta wait.”

 “They want everything,” Dolores said.

“They would,” Neva said. “Thirty minutes minimum on the chicken, and they better not get on my nerves.”

Dolores took a deep breath.

“Ok. What to drink?”

Gerri watched all this, probably because if she were going to be a waitress at Charlie’s this might be what it would be like. But I doubt she had ever seen any such commotion back home. The band fired simultaneous orders at Dolores, some changing their minds and then changing them back again. Gerri’s eyes got big. Dolores, unfazed, memorized everything.

Out on the sidewalk, Go Cup teetered on a wobbly chair to reach the upper branches of the holly tree. Andre had him by a beltloop to keep him from tumbling into the tree.

One at a time, Pam attached one end of a bread tie to an ornamental object and handed the other end to Go. She had already strung miniature lights on the tree and plugged them in.

When Go came back inside he went straight to the bar for a conference with Raul. I couldn’t hear what it was about. I had never seen Go say more than two words to Raul. I’m pretty sure Go is scared to death of him. This was new.

Raul tried to say something to Go, but the guy with the drumsticks yelled, “Hey, we want to see the werewolf. Where y’at, wolfman?” The musician next to him howled at the ceiling, which set off the others. It became a competition.

Raul yelled to the wolf pack.

“In the bathroom.”

“Which bathroom?”

“Just stay out of the ladies’ room,” Raul warned.

I had sipped so many iced teas that afternoon that it was time for me to go see the werewolf, so I did. On the way back I stopped at the bar for something more in tune with the collective spirit of the gathering.

I stood at an empty barstool next to Go and waited for a break in his conversation.

Go stared at Raul’s left arm. “Where’d you get all those tattoos, anyway?” he asked.

Raul looked to his left and then to his right and then leaned close to Go Cup.

“In the Outer Innermost Orient. Got ‘em from a blind priest with one golden arm and thirteen toes.”

“Where’s that?” Go asked. “Must be up past highway 10. I’ve been told to stay outa there.”

“Yes,” Raul confirmed. “It is far, far, away. One and a half times around the world.”

Go nodded slowly, as if in appreciation of the horror and ecstasy of Raul’s exotic adventures.

Dolores took drinks to the band, which was fighting over a plastic basket of free butter crackers. One of them yelled to Raul.

“Hey, whatcha got going out front. You having a block party?”

“Yeah,” Raul said. “We’re having a block party on St. Charles during rush hour. The city won’t mind.”

At that comment, Terry and Darrell noticed a knot of pedestrians jostling for a view of the tree.

Terry grinned at Raul. “Go ahead. Throw a block party. We can place bets on how soon a patrol car shows up.”

“I’ll take that action,” said Darrell.

“Me, too,” said Bernard.

One of the band members whispered to one of the others, who jumped up and made his way out the side door, near my table. Dolores saw him but let him go. I guess she knew he’d come back and pay. I’ve seen her chase more than one deadbeat who tried to slip unseen through that exit. She’s faster than she looks, and she’s not afraid of anything except flying roaches.

Go ran outside and came back in with a dirty piece of cardboard. He took it to the bar and showed it to Raul, who handed him a big marker from a jar by the cash register. Go scribbled something on the sign and then took it over to Gerri, who read the sign aloud.

“Anything helps.”

“Not that side. The other side,” Go said.

Gerri turned the sign over.

“That’s not how you spell werewolf,” Gerri said.

Go Cup told her exactly what he wanted it to say. Pam snickered. Go shot her a look.

“Here. Gimme the pen,” Gerri said. “I’ll be right back.”

Gerri ran to a back room and returned with a carefully torn side of a white box. She wrote with a graceful kind of handwriting perfected by junior high school girls who make school spirit banners while seated cross-legged in hallways between classes. Roar Tigers, Bite Those Bulldogs, Skin the Belview Bears; wholesome, inspirational sentiments like that.

Go pulled a sprig of holly berries from his pocket and told Gerri it would look pretty on the sign. They tried to use it but it wouldn’t stay on straight, so Pam slipped it behind Gerri’s ear as she attended to her penmanship. Go Cup had been watching Gerri closely. When she finished writing, he spun the sign around.

CELEBRATE THE CHRISTMAS
WEREWOLF – JUST TONIGHT

Go and Pam ran outside with the sign.

At the bar, Vivien narrated goings-on around the tree, which had by now attracted more passers-by who looked like they had never seen Christmas decorations before. They blocked the sidewalk and were spilling into the street.

“Look, honey. They like the tree.”

“Whoever heard of a holly tree for a Christmas tree, anyway?” Bernard asked.

“It’s just right,” Vivien said. “You’re just a humbug like that grouch in those movies. And they’re gonna play the piano. That’s nice.”

The guy who had disappeared through the side door had returned and parked his rusty car by a nearby fire hydrant. Go helped him unload the trunk and plug a portable electric piano and a small amplifier into the power strip under the tree.

The piano player eased into a jazzy, classic Christmas carol. The growing audience sang along. Terry and Darrell turned their chairs to see better.

“Oh, this is wonderful,” Vivien said.

“It is?” Gerri asked.

“Maybe,” said Dolores.

The rest of the band toasted the piano player from their table.

“Hey, who’s the sax player? Where did he come from?” one of them asked.

“What sax player?” replied another. “Oh, that’s that dude that plays in the Quarter in the mornings, waking everybody up, mostly on Dauphine. I’ve never seen him make a dime but he does it anyway. Rain, shine, don’t matter.”

“He any good?” the drummer asked.

“Nah. He only knows one song.”

It was 74 degrees and muggy outside, but notes of Jingle Bells drifted like snowflakes through the triangular gap under the front door, which Charlie always said he would fix someday. The impromptu choir swelled farther into the street. Terry sang under his breath. Darrell tapped the heel of one foot – he still played trombone a little on the side.

Raul asked Gerri, “What have you got started out there?”

“Um, no clue.”

Raul walked around the bar and headed toward the door. The rest of us, even Terry and Darrell, followed behind him. Neva stuck her head above her food shelf.

Raul elbowed his way to the tree. Dolores and Gerri rode in his wake, with me giving them a little push. Vivien had hold of the back of my shirt and pulled Bernard along behind her. Terry and Darrell stayed back by the curb. Pam danced with the crowd.

The piano player and guest saxophonist played on, taking requests that had transitioned from Christmas music to tunes the audience liked better. The half-circle of revelers danced and sang along to “Little Liza Jane,” getting most of the lyrics right and blocking one lane of St. Charles. I think the saxophonist might have been playing “Down by the Riverside,” but the piano player had turned up his amp to drown him out.

The holly tree ornaments, however, seemed of more concern to Raul. It looked like Go had gathered the prettiest things he could find that he felt no one wanted – the flotsam and jetsam of the good ship New Orleans – and brought them back to decorate the tree. Holly branches now featured pinecones, sweetgum balls and strands of Spanish moss.

The tree’s botanical enhancements were nice, actually, but other objets d’art were of special interest. Mardi Gras beads, freshly harvested from trees along the Uptown parade route, draped heavily among the branches, sending greetings from Endymion, Muses and the Knights of Chaos. Right in front, where no one could miss it, hung a torn-out magazine photo of Marilyn Monroe wearing a Santa hat.

Elsewhere on Go’s tree, the spirit of giving shone from crumpled yellow lottery tickets, strips cut from red plastic cups, a pristine candy cane still in its wrapper, a receipt for a two-piece box of chicken, and half a dozen orange parking tickets. At the very top, in place of a star, the Christmas Werewolf sign beckoned, trimmed in white lights like the marquee at the Saenger Theatre.

Gerri stared. Raul closed his eyes and shook his head. Dolores said it was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen. Vivien and Bernard, pinned mercilessly together by the crowd, clung to each other as they hadn’t in decades, bonded by their inability to see what was going on.

Mr. Andre lifted his bottle in silent toast to Go Cup as the newly conceived work of art slipped free of the boy’s protection, to fend for itself in the open-air art gallery that is New Orleans. Freebie dozed under Andre’s chair. A police cruiser showed up.

Terry and Darrell waved to the uniformed officers in the patrol car. The cop in the passenger seat looked at Darrell for some kind of explanation. Darrell yelled to him over the commotion.

“There’s a werewolf in the bathroom.”

The cop surveyed the crowd, rolled his eyes and said something to the driver, who turned off his flashing lights, spoke into his radio mic and then rolled away, dissolving into a stream of tail lights flowing toward the holiday splendor of Uptown.

Evening approached. By the faint light of the tree, Mr. Andre shone as often he does in the magic of this city at dusk. Drops of rain began to fall. The piano player unplugged his gear. Dolores encouraged everyone to come inside. Mr. Andre, Go and Freebie, dry under the green and white striped canopy of Charlie’s Fine, were the last to join the crowd inside.

Neva had seen the party coming and was already lifting bowls of her gumbo to the window for Dolores to pick up. It was so loud in here she didn’t bother to yell for food pickup. Someone played the jukebox.

Dolores pulled Gerri to the back of the room and removed an apron from a closet. It may have been Jackie’s old one, as the handover appeared ceremonial. Dolores slipped it over Gerri’s neck, spun her around and tied it in the back. From one of the pockets, Gerri pulled out an order pad and pen.

As they returned to the dining room, I heard Dolores tell Gerri, “Follow me and try to keep up.”

Pam stopped Gerri, put her hands on the newly appointed waitress’s shoulders and inspected the apron.

“You look cute,” Pam said.

She turned Gerri to face a mottled, antique mirror screwed to a nearby wall. Gerri met her reflection and adjusted the holly still tucked behind her ear.

“See, you’re a natural,” Pam said. “Better hurry up. It’s getting crazy in here.”

Gerri gave Pam a quick hug and hustled off to catch Dolores, who had waded into the fray.

As for me, Neva’s gumbo was doing that thing where the cayenne isn’t too strong when you first taste it but then the heat comes back around and reminds you what town you’re in. So I got up and shouldered my way to the bar to hit up Raul for something tall and cold. Someone wedged himself in beside me on the left. It was Charlie, gripping a manila folder bulging with papers and envelopes. He interrupted me to speak with Raul; he confers with Raul every evening when he gets in.

Charlie showed a newspaper clipping to Raul, then viewed the crowd.

“Neva giving away gumbo again?” Charlie asked.

Raul shrugged.

Charlie noticed Gerri bending over the shoulder of an elderly man, who I think was telling her what they put in gumbo somewhere out in Metairie a long time ago.

“When did I hire her?” Charlie asked.

“Today,” Raul replied.

“Huh,” said Charlie.

Charlie took off down the hallway. A few minutes later he returned to the bar, still clutching his folder. He pushed in beside me again and then moved to block my view as if he didn’t want me to hear him, which of course I could.

Charlie leaned close to Raul and asked, “Say, uh, why is there a werewolf in the bathroom?”

Charlie’s was loud and warm that night and time went by as it used to do, without much care. When the night shift arrived, Neva, Dolores and Gerri stayed to help. Pam sat with the band and they bought her drinks. Midnight came with stars. Catfish came with potato salad. And in the days to come, we all agreed the whole affair had been, for the first time in a long time, quite a typical day.

– the end –



Guy D. Johnson

Guy D. Johnson is a writer and marketing communications professional. Previously an animation studio owner, daily newspaper editor, reporter and photographer, volunteer fireman, railroad bridge gang helper, FM radio station underling and cave guide. He has lived on farmland trusted to the sun and rain; atop a wooded hill; beside great rivers; upon an arid, high plateau; and at the subtropical coast of the Gulf of Mexico. For 20 years, he worked and wrote in New Orleans.