“You’re so busy. When do you find time to write?”
“Oh, when I’m sad. Or depressed. Or happy. I can write pretty much any time. I have a notebook full of poems.”
They parked in a lot in downtown Las Vegas, near Fremont Street, and walked several blocks to the Tortoise Club. It was a typical downtown casino-loud and flashy, but without much substance beneath the facade, as Tony knew from experience. A good way to lose your money in the slots or at the blackjack tables slowly, with minimum bets, without the distraction of shows. Perfect for the businesslike gambler who didn’t have a large stake. And the small gamblers were out in force today-the retirees who came on buses and lost their Social Security checks before returning home to their empty lives.
Tony steered Shahla into the coffee shop, away from temptation, a half hour before their appointment, and they sat down at a table, both of them on the same side, facing the door. A quick glance at the other tables convinced them that Paul had not preceded them here. Tony suggested they order lunch.
“Can we drive by some of the big hotels on the way back?” Shahla asked between sips of a soft drink.
Tony didn’t know whether her excitement was at the prospect of meeting Paul or from the effect Las Vegas had on people. It was probably a combination. He had avoided Las Vegas Boulevard on the way in because traffic on it was so miserable-worse than in many parts of Los Angeles.
“Why not? We’ll give you a look at plastic city. They’ve recreated some of the great places in the world here-Paris, Venice, New York, Egypt. You just have to remember that it’s all fake.”
“Don’t be so cynical. This is all new to me.”
Paul didn’t appear at 1:30, the scheduled time. Tony wondered whether he was going to show up. They finished their lunches and continued to nurse their drinks.
“How much time should we give him?” Shahla asked. She sounded restless, as if she would rather be sightseeing than playing detective.
“We’ve driven all this way. Let’s give him until two.”
At five minutes of two a tall young man walked into the coffee shop, or rather eased his way in. Considering his dominating height, he looked a little timid, as though he wasn’t sure how the world would treat him. Skinny as a broomstick, he wore thick-lensed glasses and had sandy hair that stuck out at odd angles. He had on a T-shirt with some writing on it and carried a notebook.
“That’s him,” Shahla said. She raised her arm and waved at the man.
Tony wondered how she could be so sure, but he spotted them and came toward their table with a shambling step, looking relieved. Maybe it was because they weren’t monsters.
“You must be Paul,” Shahla said, standing up and extending her hand. “I’m Sally. And this is my brother, Tony.”
Tony stood up and shook hands with him across the table. “Sit down,” he said. “Would you like something to eat?”
“Maybe a coke,” Paul said, his first words other than hello.
Tony signaled the waitress while Shahla said, “So what’s this limerick on your shirt?” She read it aloud:
“ Now God was designing a mammal,
With beauty and grace, without trammel,
By computer, of course,
The genetics said ‘horse,’
But the disk crashed and out came a camel.”
“The Association for the Prevention of Cruel Statements About Camels is not going to like that,” Tony said.
Paul looked uncertain, as if he didn’t know whether Tony was serious. But then he smiled. He said, “I won a contest on the Internet for writing it.”
“I like your sense of humor,” Shahla said. “I could see it in the poems on your website. “Does that book have your poems in it?”
Paul nodded shyly.
“May I see it?”
He slid the notebook across the table to her. It was a three-ring binder, crammed full of pages. Tony wondered whether he spent all his time writing poetry. Didn’t he have to work for a living? And did all poets have a similar notebook? Shahla had said she kept her poems in one.
Shahla started leafing through the book, reading and commenting on some of the poems, always positively. She and Tony had agreed that if he brought poems with him-and she had asked him to in her e-mails-that they would try to look at all of them. Of course, if they could find a copy of the spaghetti strap poem, that would be a coup. If not, they would look for other poems with similar style or subject matter.
Tony was relying on Shahla to do most of the work. In retrospect, it was a good thing she was here. He would never have been able to fake enough of an interest in or knowledge about poetry to fool Paul. When Shahla excused herself to go to the lady’s room, he was stuck for something to say. He decided on a subject he knew something about.
“Do you ever do any gambling?” he asked.
“People who live here will tell you they don’t gamble,” Paul said, “but that’s not necessarily true. I like to play video poker once in a while.”
“Where’s a good place to play?”
“I like the New York-New York because it has some machines that pay eighty to one for four of a kind. They’re hidden in a corner as you curve around from the theaters.”
“Thanks for the tip,” Tony said.
Shahla came back, and the discussion returned to poetry.
“I notice that a lot of your poems are about pain,” Shahla said. “You use metaphors for pain.”
Paul didn’t immediately reply. Tony knew from his Hotline training that he and Shahla should remain silent and wait for Paul to say something. The silence dragged on for several minutes. Shahla continued to leaf through the book, looking completely at ease. Tony admired her composure.
In his calls to the Hotline, Paul had sometimes talked about an abusive aunt. Or abusive parents. Somebody had abused him. Maybe that’s where the pain came from. If so, did that trauma color his feelings toward all women? Tony leaned toward Shahla and read pieces of some of the poems. The figures of speech in the poems, such as “a fire inside that makes me scream” must be the metaphors Shahla was talking about. They were not specific as to where the pain originated.
“I’m feeling better,” Paul said finally. “The pain is going away. Maybe I won’t be able to write poetry anymore.” He smiled.
“Has something good happened to you?” Shahla asked.
“I have a new girlfriend.”
“You should have brought her with you.”
“She’s working today.”
“When was the last time you were in Los Angeles?” Tony asked, hoping to speed things up. They didn’t seem to be accomplishing anything and he was getting bored.
Paul hesitated and then said, “I’ve never been to Los Angeles.”
“Never?” Tony said, not believing him. Everybody who lived in the West had been to Los Angeles.
“My parents don’t like big cities, and I just never got there on my own.”
Shahla had finished going through the book. She glanced at Tony and imperceptibly shrugged her shoulders. What now? It was time for direct action. Tony reached into his pants pocket and pulled out a copy of the spaghetti strap poem. It was folded and wrinkled.
He smoothed it out and said, “I’m not much of a poet, but I found one poem that I kind of like. He pushed it across the table and watched Paul’s eyes as he read it, hoping to see a spark of something. He didn’t detect anything.
When he finished reading it, Paul said, “It sounds like it was written by a teenage boy with raging hormones, but very few teenage boys can write poems like this.”
“Why is that?”
“Because it takes a lot of practice and a certain amount of ability to achieve that use of meter, rhyme and organization.”
“So who do you think wrote it, then?” Shahla asked.
Paul pushed his glasses up on his nose. He did that frequently. He said, “It was probably written by an older man who wishes he were still a teenager.”
After some further discussion about the poem, Paul excused himself to use the restroom.
Tony said, “Well, do you think he wrote it?”