Baltimore Noir - Laura Lippman [49]
“You’re robbing me,” he said.
“Among other things.”
She sat beside him, reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet. Glanced at the address on his driver’s license and sighed.
She could tell that he was looking at her. Tania thought that, despite all his praise for her beauty, he probably hadn’t paid much attention to her face till now. It was her body, and how much of it she would expose to the camera, that had mattered.
He said, “How old are you?”
She raised her gaze to his. “Twenty, Gary. I’m twenty. Much, much too old for TeenHeaven.”
She heard someone enter the room behind her and got back to her feet. “Gary Sims,” she said, “this is my uncle, Joshua Blumen.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Yoshi said, and planted his boot in Gary’s face.
“Shut up,” Tania said.
She was wearing her own clothes, the clothes Gary had assumed were a costume or a sign of rebellion. Herself again, though not quite. Each time she emerged she was changed.
Gary lay there at her feet, hands on his face, exploring the jagged edges of his broken teeth with his tongue, blood from his cut lips streaking his fingers. He hadn’t said anything.
“I’m sick of hearing your voice,” she went on. “I feel like I’ve spent half my life listening to you babble. It’s my turn to talk now. My turn.”
The rabbi always said that any class that had Tania in it automatically ran a half hour late. People who wanted to see Jews as stereotypes saw her as one of the pushy, noisy types, only concerned about herself. But they were wrong too.
“First of all,” she said, “if you say one more word about Jewish girls—if you ever even use the word ‘Jewess’ again—Yoshi will find you and kill you.”
“Can I?” Yoshi asked. Then he scowled. Jewess?
He’d gotten most of his good mood back after breaking Gary’s teeth. But not all of it. Gary cowered away from his dark gaze.
“You don’t know a thing about Jewish girls, if you believe every one of us is hidden away, protected, pure, and innoent—” She brought her face close to his, jabbed him in the chest with a forefinger. “Helpless under your hands.” She made a fist, hit him harder. “Some of us know more than you think. Some of us go to temple and wear jeans and read the Bible and have computers too. We live here—” Another blow. “In Park Heights, yes, but also in this city. In the shtetl and in Baltimore at the same time. Understand?”
He moaned.
“And for those who choose a different way, it’s their choice,” she said. “So next time, you keep your fantasies of peeking under the dress of an Orthodox Jewish girl to yourself, okay?”
Gary’s head lolled. Yoshi said in a mild voice, “I think you made your point, T. And you want him to stay awake for a while, don’t you?”
She sat back, breathing hard. “God,” she said. “No, I don’t.”
Then she sighed, reached into the pocket of her jeans, pulled out and unfolded the sheet of paper she’d printed out the night before. Yoshi squatted beside her as she showed it to Gary.
Gary moved his lips. “Jane?” he said.
“Yes, Joyful Jane,” Tania replied. “The one who never smiles. Is she still your model?”
Gary nodded.
“You still see her—work with her?”
Another nod.
“You swear?” She poked him. “You can talk now.”
“Yes,” he said. “She’s my model.”
Tania felt herself open up. Blooming Tania. “Where does she live?”
He licked the drying blood from his lips. “I told you. Milwaukee.”
“Where in Milwaukee?”
“I don’t know.”
She slapped his face. Fresh blood flew. “Tell us where Jane lives,” she said.
“I told you.” His voice was thick. “Milwaukee. I’ve never—never seen where she lives. We meet—in a motel.”
Tania raised her arm again. “But you do have her address somewhere, don’t you?”
He spat bloody saliva onto the floor beside him, then slumped back against the wall. His eyes were dull. “It hurts,” he said.
“Concentrate, Gary,” she warned him.
He let out a breath that bubbled at the end. “At home,” he said vaguely. “My desk.”
“He lives in New York City,” Tania told Yoshi. “Queens.”
“I know.” Yoshi gave a resigned grunt. “Could have been Kansas City,