On this day though, headin to my first proper session at Yolanda’s, after my introductory approach to obtain her agreement with my business proposal, I’d got lost in my thoughts and wandered outside for a little too long. I didn’t realize how that sun had got to me till I looked back at the distance I’d aimlessly strolled from the vehicle and instantly thought I’d better close it fast. The Land Cruiser looked like a mirage in that shimmerin heat; there was no way to determine how near or far it really was. I was panickin some, till my hand suddenly seemed to make contact with the scorching metal of the chassis. I slipped back into the shit-sweet coolin of the vehicle, to find my head throbbin with blood, forcin me to flop down across the passenger seat and max up that air con. It took me a good few minutes before I felt okay bout haulin myself up onto my butt. When I did, I pulled the newspaper from above the dashboard. The terror alert was green and the burn limit stood at sixteen minutes.
As I recall, that was when my cellphone went off. This registered cause it was my agent in LA, Martha Crossley, who never, ever called me on my cell. Nothin was so urgent or important it couldn’t wait till I got to my landline. — Got some good news, she squealed in that high whine of hers, — you’ve been shortlisted to shoot the Volkswagen commercial!
— That’s fine. But you know that they’re going to give it to the likes of Taylor or Warburton, I told her. I ain’t normally a glass-is-half-empty sort, but I knew that I was makin up the numbers on that list against the big-dicked assholes with the track records and the contacts.
— Hey! Buck up, cowboy, ya gotta be in it to win it! I’ll keep you posted, she enthused, — Ciao!
I put the phone on its cradle and pulled a cold one from the icebox; not beer no more, though that terrible thirst will always be there, just waitin till things get bad. Right now there ain’t no room at Ray’s for that ol slut these days. I wasn’t for fillin my gut with no soda nor cola either; that shit’s drivin us all to a lard-assed hell, clogging arteries and sidewalks both. No, it was cool, clear water going down my hot, raspin throat, always so damn dry, and it felt good. After a while I started up the Cruiser and powered through the shale, back up onto the road.
Like I did so many times, I turned for a second to the passenger seat to imagine Pen sittin alongside me, shades on, sweet perfume fillin the cab, the painted nails on her fingers as she fiddled with that radio dial till exactly the right tune would fill up the Cruiser. It’s in there somewhere and she can always find it. That’s something I never could do on my own, and I guess that’s cause there ain’t no right tunes without that gal. That night I’d go along and hear her play her fine music and sing her pretty songs. But first I had business with ol Miss Yolanda. Glen Halliday business.
Glen Halliday, my obsession, was the all-American anti-hero. The legendary filmmaker spent his last reclusive years out here, and he spent them in the company of that woman. Yolanda was his second wife, the first being Mona Ziegler, an ol gal from his hometown of Collins, Texas. It was that town that was the inspiration of many of his films (and in my view the best of them), particularly The Liars of Ditchwater Creek.
Mona I’d already seen several times last year and talked to her at some length. She’d remarried and now lived in a dull subdivision of Fort Worth. She was polite but cold about her relationship with Glen. Basically Mona reckoned that Glen just worked, and when he wasn’t doin that he drank and hollered. I suppose because Glen Halliday was my hero and my inspiration, I didn’t take too kindly to what I was hearing. I guess I’d put a lot of it down to Mona’s bitterness and I left her to her suburban life. Unfortunately, he didn’t get a better posthumous reception back in Collins. It was a small conservative town and some folks were mighty irked by the way he’d portrayed them. But I came from a similar shithole and reckoned he’d got it just about right, and nothin I heard or saw in that place convinced me of anythin to the contrary.
The desert abruptly gave way to another walled and gated subdivision, and I was thinking that those places were what Halliday railed against in his films and writings. His overridin concern was how we’d gone wrong; concrete, preachers, emperor television, and the greed of the smilin suits that made a killin from that whole crock of shit. And those raggedy dumbassed baboons that just smiled and rolled over as those jerks shafted them where the sun don’t shine. I met some of those assholes back in Collins, and Glen Halliday’s vision was still touchin their nerves from beyond the grave.
This subdivision was like interminable others I had passed on the way out here. They all had a huge Old Glory hangin outside in the still desert air, as limp as the dick on one of them ol fellas in the rest homes that lined the route. Then I’m through it, back into more desert land, so complete it was like a mirage recedin to nothin in the rear mirror. So I got to Yolanda’s farm where they now only used the water for the swimmin pool nobody swam in, the land long turned bear-assed brown.
The house itself was a low stucco dwelling. It was large enough, but nuthin near as spectacular as the surroundin huge, perimeter stone wall, nor them big iron gates, which a wheezy, thirsty ol motor opened up when I rang the intercom. The residence was painted white, with some plants and cacti growin a few feet up its walls.
As I said, that ol Yolanda gal didn’t get much in the way of company. Only other fella I saw out here was the pool-cleanin boy. That pool was always full and thoroughly maintained. Always struck me as really crazy out here, especially with her not usin it. But I guess you don’t live out there alone in that kinda place without being just a little crazy.
Drivin past the pool, the boy couldn’t have missed the Land Cruiser, but he didn’t take no notice, just carried right on rakin up the scum from the water’s surface. He had a mean face. His eyes squinted tightly, and his mouth was just as ungenerous: a tight slash under his nose. Yolanda was standin in the doorway to greet me, in that swimsuit. She kissed me on the cheek and I screwed up my nose a little; there was a strange rank odor comin from her that I hadn’t noticed on my first visit. I followed her inside. Her front room was painted white, two big circular fans overhead whirling to the max. But most of the cool seemed to be coming up from the floor. She went to fix me some lemonade and I could hear her talking to herself. — Esmeralda, why are you standing around looking at me like that…
At first I reckoned that there was somebody else in the house, then I guessed she was talking to this cat or pooch. Then I realized it was a stuffed cat, which was mounted on an old mahogany sideboard. She was a strange ol gal, okay, but in fairness to her, Yolanda, as she insisted I called her, had been generous enough to cooperate with me in my researches on her late husband.
What I liked about being out here was that it was always so goddamn cool, especially those slate tiles on the floor. When she came back with the drinks, lemonade for me and gin for her, I had slipped off my shoes and my soles were freshinin up real sweet. — This is so good, I told her in appreciation.
— Underground cooling. There’s a refrigeration system that feeds the water we pump up from the aquifer. It supplies that pool too, once we put it through the filter, but we still get a lot of minerals and deposits. That’s why I need Barry to come by a whole bunch. She pointed outside to where the pool boy was still doin his thing.
I didn’t know with any great precision what an aquifer was, but the sonofabitch sure as shit must have held a whole bunch of water. I was gonna ask her but I reckoned she was the sort who could go on a little and I had my specific business. — As you know, ma’am, I’m trying to find as much as I can about Glen. He was your fourth husband, right?