Philadelphia Noir

She has given the Ghost Walk for ten years, and she suddenly feels too old, at thirty-nine, to speak in the exaggerated cadences she uses for drama, and to wear navy-blue nail polish and a tight black dress: her witch outfit. Did the man even recognize her? She hurries along, her ankle aching. Trees and restaurants along the avenue twinkle with strands of tiny white lights. Every store, every bank, has a glowing jack-o’-lantern out front, or cornstalks and baskets of gourds. She smells the raw squash of pumpkins and the potpourri of candles. Fake cobwebs drape the doorway of the Irish bar. She lifts them up and ducks inside.

It’s a busy night, but Dale, the manager, seeks her out to talk.

“It’s like this,” Dale says. “Everywhere we go, people give my wife pigs. Knickknacks and stuff. Always pigs. She don’t even like them. She don’t know how it all got started.”

Dale never talks to her, not like this. Annie can’t get rid of him, because he’s her boss, so she has to listen and keep busy, cleaning the bar, wiping it down with a towel until it shines.

Dale says, “It started when she was little. She had a birthday party, and all the kids brought toy pigs. My wife thought her mother told them to, but her ma said no, she didn’t. So my wife grows up and meets me, and we get engaged, and her friends give her a shower.”

A customer signals for another beer, and Annie gets it.

Dale goes on: “And at the shower, everything’s pigs. Salt and pepper shakers. Pig bookends. A clock that’s a pig’s face, and a curly tail going tick-tock underneath. She busted out crying, and they said, What’sa matter? Don’t you collect ’em? That was in Pittsburgh. So we move to Philadelphia, and we don’t tell a soul about the pigs. And then yesterday was her birthday, and the people she works with, they give her a party. And guess what.”

Dale slaps his hand on the bar and Annie jumps.

“How far do we have to go?” Dale asks. His mouth opens, but it’s not a laugh, it’s a soundless, slack droop.

Suddenly, Annie is frightened. This is her life. She lives alone; there’s a screamer in the neighborhood- somebody who shrieks in the night for no apparent reason, as if there really is a captive in a basement, as if Frances never got out. A screamer, the police say when she calls to report it. She has sat up clutching the covers, heart pounding, fingers slippery on the phone. There have been burglaries in adjacent apartments; she has smelled cigarette smoke and heard gravel crunch in the alley behind her bedroom window, as if some intruder is staking her out. Robbery she can deal with, but please God, keep rape and murder away.

“You look scared, Annie. What’s the matter?” Dale asks.

She shakes her head.

“Come outside,” he says.

She follows him out the back door, into the humid evening.

There, they are surrounded by sounds of invisible revelers. Laughter, chatter, ring tones. She hears with keen uncanny clarity: dogs’ nails scraping the sidewalk, a sneeze from the direction of the old water tower. Yet she and Dale are alone. A weathered fence separates the backyard of the bar from the parking lot of the farmers’ market.

Inhaling, Dale says, “Tell me what you smell.”

Annie breathes in and out. “Garlic, shrimp, wine, leather, perfume.”

“It’s the smell of happiness,” Dale says. “People who live here, they go out to eat every night, buy stuff in all these stores. Me, I came up the hard way. Still coming up.” He shrugs. “But tell me what’s wrong.”

They might be in a movie, Annie thinks. A harsh bulb over the bar’s rear door backlights Dale’s head. They’re a man and a woman having the first real conversation they have ever had.

“I’m scared of getting old,” she says, “and there’ve been break-ins close by. Nothing feels safe anymore. I don’t feel safe.”

“What if I gave you this bar?” Dale says. “What would you do?”

She pauses, considering. “I’d take the Irish stew off the menu. It sucks.”

“Okay,” he says. “What else?”

“Keep the windows open during the day. Air it out.”

“How would you manage the rowdies?” he asks.

“Same as I do now. Cut ’em off.”

“What do you do when you’re not working here?”

“I just gave a Ghost Walk,” Annie says. “Have you ever gone on that?”

“No,” he replies, moving closer.

“You’re not going to give me this bar,” she says, meaning: What would your wife say?

Then he kisses her, planting his lips on hers slowly, so that she has time to think the word lingering, and all she has to do is stand there and feel how much taller he is, how big, and how she must feel like an escape to him. If this were a movie, she’d lay her head on his shoulder, curl into the embrace. But she can taste Dale’s worries on his lips, the dry breath of another’s fear. She steps away.

“Do you give good ghost?” he asks.

“It’s funny,” she says, “the way people want to be scared. The Ghost Walk, horror movies. Why? When there’s so much real stuff to be afraid of?”

Something like anger flickers in his eyes. He says, “That pig stuff. That’s what’s scary. My wife’s going out of her freakin’ mind.”

“Get her to collect something completely different,” Annie suggests, “to throw people off the scent.”

“You think we didn’t try that already?” Dale snaps.

He jerks open the door and goes inside, and Annie follows.

Costumed celebrants stream into the bar for food and drink: devil, clown, cowboy, pirate. Annie takes their orders. The pirate grins when she hands him a plate of fried mozzarella, and hope shoots through her. His teeth and his earring catch the light. She imagines lying in bed with him, telling him about the woman who turned into soap.

Her twisted ankle throbs, and she kicks off her shoes. The floor of the bar feels ice cold, and every passing car on the cobblestones outside sends a tremor beneath her feet.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS

MEREDITH ANTHONY is a Pennsylvania native who spent considerable time on Philadelphia’s Main Line with her beloved mother-in-law, the late Nancy Light. She is the coauthor of the thriller Ladykiller, which received many rave reviews and was nominated for the year’s best mystery by ForeWord Magazine. Her short stories appear in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. She currently lives in New York City and is working on a new thriller.

DIANE AYRES is the author of Other Girls, a widely praised satirical novel. She also does editorial consulting, and her “Fiction Addiction” workshops, developed at the University of Pennsylvania, have inspired many students and professional writers. Ayres has lived in the Bella Vista neighborhood of Philadelphia with her husband, author Stephen Fried, for over twenty years, so they are still considered newcomers. For more information, visit www.dianeayres.com.

CORDELIA FRANCES BIDDLE is the author of the Martha Beale novels Without Fear,