Rose Madder

“Well, count your blessings, keed,” Rhoda said.

“We better get back; Curt’ll think we’re practicing weird female rituals in here.” Robbie had called from his office downtown to congratulate her on finishing The Manta Ray-just as she was getting ready to leave for the day, this had been-and although he hadn’t specifically mentioned a contract, he had asked if she would have lunch with him on Friday to discuss what he called “a business arrangement.” Rosie had agreed and hung up, feeling bemused. She remembered thinking that Rhoda’s description of him was perfect; Robbie Lefferts did look like the little man on the Monopoly cards. When she put down the telephone in Curtis’s private office-a cluttery little closet with hundreds of business cards stuck to the cork walls on pushpins-and went back out into the studio to collect her bag, Rhoda was gone, presumably for a final smoke in the ladies”. Curt was marking boxes of reel-to-reel tape. He looked up and gave her a grin.

“Great work today, Rosie.”

“Thanks.”

“Rhoda says Robbie’s going to offer you a contract.”

“That’s what she says,” Rosie agreed.

“And I actually think she might be right. Knock on wood.”

“Well, you ought to remember one thing while you’re dickering,” Curtis said, putting the tape boxes on a high shelf where dozens of similar boxes were ranged like thin white books.

“If you made five hundred bucks for The Mania Ray, Robbie’s already ahead of the game… because you saved maybe seven hundred in studio time. Get it?” She’d gotten it, all right, and now she sat here in the Hot Pot with the future looking unexpectedly bright. She had friends, a place to live, a job, and the promise of more work when she had finished with Christina Bell. A contract that might mean as much as a thousand dollars a week, more money than Norman made. It was crazy, but it was true. Might be true, she amended. Oh, and one other thing. She had a date for Saturday… all of Saturday, if you counted in the Indigo Girls concert that night. Rosie’s face, usually so solemn, broke into a brilliant smile, and she felt a totally inappropriate desire to hug herself. She took the last bite of her pastry and looked out the window again, wondering if all these things could possibly be happening to her, if there could actually be a real life where real people walked out of their prisons, turned right… and walked into heaven.

Half a block away, DON’T WALK went out and WALK came on. Pam Haverford, now changed out of her white chambermaid’s uniform and into a pair of trim red slacks, crossed the street with two dozen other people. She had worked an extra hour tonight and had no reason on earth to think Rosie would be in the Hot Pot… but she did think it, just the same. Call it woman’s intuition, if you wanted. She glanced briefly at the big lug crossing beside her, who she thought she had seen at the Whitestone newsstand a few minutes ago. He might have qualified as someone interesting if not for the look in his eyes… which was no look at all. He glanced briefly at her as they stepped up on the far curb, and the lack of expression in those eyes-the feeling of some absence behind them-actually chilled her.

Inside the Hot Pot, Rosie abruptly decided she wanted a second cup of tea. She had no earthly reason to think Pam might drop in-it was a full hour past their usual time-but she did, just the same. Maybe it was woman’s intuition. She got up and turned toward the counter.

The little bitch beside him was sort of cute, Norman thought, tight red slacks, nice little ass. He dropped back a couple of steps-the better to enjoy the view, my dear-but almost as soon as he did, she turned into a little restaurant. Norman glanced in the window as he went by, but saw nothing interesting, just a bunch of old bags eating gooey shit and slopping up coffee and tea, plus a few waiters rushing around in that mincing, faggy way they had. The old ladies must like it, Norman thought. Fag-walking like that must pay off in tips. It had to; why else would grown men walk that way? They couldn’t all be fags… could they? His gaze into the Hot Pot-brief and disinterested-touched on one lady considerably younger than the blue-rinsed, pants-suited types sitting at most of the tables. She was walking away from the window and toward the cafeteria-style serving counter at the far end of the tearoom (at least he supposed that was what you called places like this). He took a quick look at her ass, simply because that was where his eyes always went fast when it was a woman younger than forty, judged it not too bad but nothing to write home to Mother about. Rose’s ass used to look like that, he thought. Back in the days before she let herself go and it got as big as a goddam footstool, that is. The woman he glimpsed through the window also had great hair, much better than her fa

Perhaps the best thing to happen all day, even better than Rhoda’s stu

“Rosie? Is that you? Oh… my… God!”

“It’s me,” Rosie said, laughing and blushing. She was aware that people were turning to look at them, and discovered-wonder of wonders-that she did not exactly mind. They took their tea to their old table by the window, and Rosie even allowed Pam to talk her into another pastry, although she had lost fifteen pounds since coming to the city and had no intention of putting it back on if she could help it. Pam kept telling her that she couldn’t beleeve it, simply couldn’t beleeve it, a remark Rosie might have been tempted to chalk up to flattery, except for the way Pam’s eyes kept moving from her face to her hair, as if she was trying to get the truth of it straight in her mind.

“It makes you look five years younger,” she said.

“Hell, Rosie, it makes you look like jailbait!”

“For fifty dollars, it ought to make me look like Marilyn Monroe,” Rosie replied, smiling… but since her talk with Rhoda, she felt a lot easier in her mind about the amount she’d spent on her hair.

“Where did you-” Pam began, then stopped.

“It’s the picture you bought, isn’t it? You had your hair done the same as the woman in the picture.” Rosie thought she would blush at this, but no blush came. She simply nodded.

“I loved that style, so I thought I’d try it.” She hesitated, then added:

“As for changing the color, I still can’t believe I did it. It’s the first time in my whole life that I’ve changed the color of my hair.”