Me, Lux, Silky, and a few friends been jamming at the Echo, billing ourselves as the Ables ’cause we’re working on touring together in the summer. We asked Laluna. She ain’t into it. I’m hoping she changed her mind when she calls me the Friday before the Super Bowl. I ain’t going to their party, ’cause I don’t want Carlotta to work for Alchy (I want she should quit altogether). It’s real curious when Laluna asks me to meet the next day in Elysian Park at Fix for coffee.
I get my double espresso and stroll to the patio, where Laluna is singing and playing behind a paper sign that reads NOW PLAYING—MARIA. This Maria got long blond hair, sunglasses, and no piercings in her lips. Not doing our stuff but some trad Gypsy music. She warns me off with a shake of her head. I sit alone. I give a coupla youngsters an autograph and take a pic with them. Most people in L.A. are cool about leaving you alone after that.
Laluna don’t take off her wig when we walk down Echo Park Boulevard. I ask why the hell she’s in disguise and say if she wants to play we can all jam, with or without Alchy. Again, no thanks, and she tells me she enjoys the anonymity. She’s done “being a ‘star.’ ”
“Laluna, what’s Alchy say?”
“Call me Maria.” I don’t know if she means just for now or forever. I ain’t going there. “I don’t need his permission.”
Her phone rings and she looks unhappy and declines. It rings again two minutes later. “Jack, I can’t talk now … All is good. I’ll see you at the party.” She shoves the phone back in her pocket. “Ambitious, stop making that face. I’m exploring many new things and kinetic m-edit-ation is one of them.”
“Lal—Maria, I don’t know Crouse and I ain’t as smart as you or Alchemy, but that fucker Barker is a con man supremo. Alchy can blind you with his spieling, but he is genuine. He ain’t no scambooger.”
“I appreciate your concern, but I didn’t ask you here to discuss that. Do you know any woman or women Alchemy was in love with?”
“Nope.”
“Never in all of those years?”
“Nope.” She seems like she don’t believe me. “Only him, best I ever met at keeping secrets.” Except maybe Laluna. “Is Alchemy fuckin’ around on you?”
“No.”
I eyed her.
“Ambitious, I am certain he is not.”
I buy that now because he’d never risk losing Perse. She, more than Salome or Laluna, is his kryptonite.
“What do you know about Absurda’s abortion?”
“Just that she had one when she was sixteen and still living in Fond du Lac.”
“That’s it?”
“Yes. What’s goin’ on?”
We walk a bit without her answering. I figure she’ll talk when she is ready, which she does. “Nathaniel donated his papers to Magnolia College, and Salome couldn’t bring herself to look at them, so Alchemy and I dug our way through thousands of pages. He never threw anything out.”
She hands me a crumpled piece of paper from the Riverhead Abortion Clinic, dated November 13, 1996, and the name Amanda Akin is typed on the top. I’m guessing Laluna don’t know that is like six weeks after we broke up.
“Look at the emergency contact.”
It’s faded, but it reads goddamn Nathaniel Brockton?! That makes no sense. She never would’ve fucked him. Or him her. “You show this to Alchemy? He say it was his?”
“He was there when I found it. He and Absurda weren’t ready to raise a kid. Because of the publicity, Nathaniel went with her.”
Damn it. After all the time when he finally convinced me the shit between us was my fault, he was fuckin’ lying to my face. I wanna go crush the bastid’s head.
“Why you showin’ this to me now?”
“Just come to the party tomorrow.”
“Where the fuck is he?”
She clamped my wrist. Held it tight. “He’s out of town on political business for the day. Please, please don’t contact him before.” I’m sizzling and she can see it. “Come late if you can’t control yourself. We’ll talk after everyone else leaves. I need to settle some things once and for all.”
“You ain’t the only one.”