The Zilchers by Utahna Faith

1.

 

"Oh, you put up my postcard!" I ran into Sergei and Lilly's living room, waving the card in one hand and splashing g&t from my glass in the other.

 

"Of course we did." Sergei took the card and read. "Darlings, a week in the middle west (I like to say middle west, like they used to) is torture. Please come and shake things up. Shock the matron--and even more so the patron--with me. Oh, I know, you won't leave the Quarter until it's time to go somewhere even close as interesting. See you soon. Love, Arielle."

 

Lilly soaked up my drink spill with a retro rooster tea towel. I apologized, and she waved her hand and said it was nothing. She stepped into the kitchen and came back with a slim, glowing-green bottle.

 

"A little Chartreuse to welcome you back to civilization." Lilly poured the liqueur into my drink and the g&t began to glow.

 

"Mmm. Thank you." I reached for her and she leaned to kiss my cheek. I turned my lips to her and made a wet, smacking sound. Lilly licked the licorice flavor from her lips as she walked away. She returned with ice and glasses and mixed a chartreuse g&t for herself and one for Sergei.

 

"Lilly, remember when we toured Poland and they thought I was a criminal?" said Sergei.

 

"You are a criminal, honey."

 

"Why did they think you were a criminal?"

 

Sergei leaned forward, his eyebrows and forefinger rising. "It all started when--"

 

"Let's do some coke," Lilly said.

 

"But we're going out to dinner," said Sergei.

 

"We'll just do a little."

 

"Let's wait 'til after. We won't be able to eat."

 

"I'll eat."

 

"You said that last time. You said that, and you ate zilch."

 

"Zeelch?" I said.

 

"So what? Zeelch. It is legit."

 

I laughed. Lilly went to the kitchen. Sergei got out a piece of paper and a fountain pen and wrote "zilch" on it in two-inch-high flowing letters. I heard the gas burner flare in the kitchen and a solid clanking sound. Lilly came back in a moment with the jagged slab of pale pink marble that set my heart racing.

 

"Feel," she said, handing the marble to me. It was very warm.

 

"Nice."

 

"It keeps the stuff from clumping in this humidity."

 

She pulled a baggy of white powder from the drawer of Sergei's cherry wood desk.

 

"But I wanted to sniff it off my new novel," he said. He poked out his lower lip.

 

"Someone's going to bite that," I said. He pushed it out farther. Lilly dipped her pinky finger into the bag and dabbed a bit of coke onto Sergei's pout. "There," she said, "now he's had dental work."

 

Sergei pulled his lip in and sucked at it. He ran his tongue over his teeth. He held out his hand to Lilly. "Give me that," he said.

 

"I thought you wanted to wait until after dinner."

 

"Fuck dinner."

 

Lilly shook the powder onto the marble in my lap, kneeled on the floor by my legs with a razor blade, and started chopping.

 

 

2.

 

We flew down to the river, over the crumbling sidewalks, under the wrought iron balconies, under fat ferns dripping. Sergei took our arms as we crossed intersections. We were all three talking, fast and at once, but somehow we were all three listening a little, too.

 

"The creamy, buttercup buildings!" I screamed. "There they are! Look at them!"

 

"...and then the woman next in line held out her book and said, will you inscribe it, 'To Tammy's pussy--'"

 

"I don't know if I should let Lane borrow the Volvo or not; he's only sixteen--"

 

"The buildings! The creamy, buttercup--"

 

"Yes, you wrote about them, didn't you, darling? That was a lovely story."

 

"Well, at least Volvo is the safest; that's what it's known for, so--"

 

"Let him borrow whatever he wants to borrow."

 

"So did you sign it that way?"

 

Then we were through the little park with jazz trumpet playing, down at the railroad tracks, and then at the door of the restaurant. Small and nondescript, old European, no name, the number engraved. Inside we went up in an elevator. We held onto one another, laughing as the car jerked and took its time up two floors, and the uniformed attendant stared up at the lighted numbers. Sergei gave the attendant two dollars and we fell out into the room that ran long and narrow past windows overlooking the Mississippi. A pianist played something soft and background at a black baby grand.

 

A maitre d' appeared. "Right this way."

 

He started for a middle section of four-top tables by the windows.

 

"Excuse me," Sergei said, "we would like this little table in the corner." He gestured to a smaller table in the far right corner where river water sprayed up from a small pier onto the sparkling glass. Lights twinkled on the pier. A candle flickered on the table. It was set a bit away from the others.

 

The maitre d' stopped, lowered his head slightly, looked quite serious.

 

"I'm very sorry," he said, "but that table is for couples only."

 

Lilly and I looked at one another.

 

"We don't give a crap about that," said Sergei. "There's plenty of room. We'll take that one."

 

The maitre d' lowered his chin farther, then lifted it. "I'm very sorry, sir..."

 

"We'll take the small one." Sergei walked away toward the corner table. Lilly and I followed.

 

Sergei held out chairs for us, grabbed one for himself from another table. We jiggled their wooden bases as close as possible around three sides of the table. Sergei stood again, stole a third place setting from nearby. He was arranging it, clinking and jingling, when the maitre d' rushed up, sweating, followed by a manager-looking guy and a waiter.

 

"You see, sir..." said the maitre d', his voice shaking. The manager stepped in front of him.

 

"I'm very sorry, but as we have explained--"

 

"Do you have any idea how much money I've spent in this place?" Sergei said.

 

"Sergei, let's go to another table. It's fine." Lilly stood.

 

"We want this table!" Sergei slapped his palm down on the white linen.

 

"Sweetie." Lilly took Sergei's hand and pulled him to his feet, ignoring the wait staff and everyone else, and started walking. She caught my eye and tilted her head in the direction of the larger tables.

 

"Fine." He snatched his hand away from Lilly and crossed his arms. We all walked. The pout he'd shown earlier was patrician compared to this one.

 

We sat down at a four-top in the center of the long row of window-view tables. I felt exposed. The maitre d' threw menus at us and went away.

 

"What a lovely scarf," said Lilly. She leaned over to touch the material at my neck. "Unusual knit. Is it vintage?"

 

"I made it. The yarn is really fancy, so that makes it look more difficult than it is, really."

 

"That's a wonderful boot, too. The color, the height, the heel angle. Excellent find."

 

"Thank you!" I glowed in Lilly's approval. Sergei frowned into the menu.

 

"Where's that piano player?" he said.

 

"What are you guys ordering?" I said.

 

"I'll just have the cup of mango soup," said Lilly.

 

"See! See!" said Sergei. "I knew you wouldn't be hungry."

 

"You could play the piano," I said to Lilly. "I'll order for you."

 

"Oh, no, I..."

 

"Yes, play!" said Sergei.

 

"You're so good," I said.

 

"They wouldn't want--"

 

"They should be honored."

 

"I'm bashful."

 

"You're a shy girl who loves attention," said Sergei. "Go play!"

 

Lilly rose smooth like a leopard and crossed the shorter length of the room to the piano. She slid onto the bench and placed her hands on the keys. Her eyes closed.

 

"What will she play, do you think?" I said.

 

"A scherzo."

 

"What's a scherzo?"

 

She began. It was lovely. It sounded like Chopin to me, but darker.

 

"That," Sergei said.

 

 

3.

 

Back outside we were feeling a little low but tried to stay chipper. We wandered upriver for a few minutes, then went over the levee and came back down in front of Cafe du Monde. As we passed, a man in a French New Wave cinema hat stood and leaned over the rail.

 

"Aren't you Sergei--"

 

"I am no one."

 

"Your book is like a pornographic folktale! I loved it!"

 

"Thank him," I said, grabbing Sergei's elbow and leaning toward his ear.

 

"I can't. He will follow us."

 

We crossed Decatur, ducked into Tujague's and ordered an oyster po'boy to share. Lilly and I left for the bathroom while Sergei sat at the bar under bright lights looking at lions on the Animal Channel.

 

"Do you have the stuff?" she asked.

 

"I think Sergei has it."

 

"Damn. He won't want to give it to me until we eat something."

 

We washed our hands and went back out, trying not to touch the doorknob. Lilly finished Sergei's drink.

 

On the sidewalk we took turns with the sandwich and walked toward Frenchmen.

 

"Mmm, the oysters. The bread. It's so good." I chewed, took a breath, made myself swallow.

 

"Delicious," said Lilly. "But I can only eat a bite."

 

"I told you," said Sergei.

 

"They bake their own bread," I said.

 

"Lilly is a wonderful baker." Lilly ducked her head and smiled.

 

"And an amazing piano player," I said. "That stupid manager and sick headwaiter--"

 

"The other diners loved you," said Sergei. It was true; some had clapped for her Chopin rendition, and no one seemed happy about it when the staff made us leave.

 

"Look, it's Choo!" Sergei pointed up.

 

"You can't see Choo from here," said Lilly.

 

"Why not?"

 

"It's Venus," I said.

 

"You are Venus," said Sergei.

 

We finished our sandwich and stuffed the paper bag into an overflowing trashcan.

 

 

4.

 

It was early for The Abbey, and no one was sloppy yet. The floor-length fringes of plastic were tacked back from the doorway to let in cooler late-night air. AC/DC was on the jukebox, and Madeline was behind the bar. Her dimples popped out when she saw us. She shook her high black ponytail and pushed at her Betty Page bangs. She twirled and danced toward us as we squeezed up to the bar. Her ruffled skirt bounced up and down showing glimpses of lace-rowed knickers.

 

"Hey dudes, what can I get you?"

 

Sergei and Lilly ordered Makers Mark on the rocks, and I a cosmo. We watched Madeline, impressed with how she could mix drinks and dance on chunky six-inch platform heels without getting klutzy. She leaned over and left a classic red lip print on Sergei's cheek. The hardware-sized chain around her neck jangled on the bar top.

 

A four-piece Dixieland jazz band was setting up in the back, one table pushed aside to make room for them. We squeezed past and leaned against the wall in the tiny hallway that led to the larger and less smelly of the two bathrooms. A mailbox-lettering sign high on the wall read "ladies" and below it was written in tilting magic marker "and sex and drugs".

 

Sergei spotted a decapitated red rose on the floor. "A posy," he said, picking it up. He held it out to Lilly and she looked at it, at him, at the dirty floor. He pulled the outside petals from it. He spat on his finger and wiped the short bit of remaining stem. A speck of blood welled on his finger. He put the finger in his mouth and held the rose out to me. I tucked it into the center of the palm-treed twist of hair atop my head.

 

"C'mon! People are waiting," yelled the woman in front of us. She banged on the bathroom door.

 

"Hold up, bitch," came a guy's voice. "Chill," came a girl's. When the couple left the bathroom they looked straight ahead, holding ha