He shook my hand and smiled at me again.
“You got all the right instincts,” he told me. “You don’t tell nobody nuthin’ they don’t need to know and you keep your cool.”
I smiled, thinking that Whisper didn’t know how scared I really was.
“When you want a real job, call me,” Whisper said. “I could always use a partner.”
I d r o v e s t r a i g h t f r o m the sidewalk to Fearless’s bun-galow. When I got to the door, I heard Mona crying, “That’s it.
That’s it. Oh yeah, baby, you got it.”
At any other time I would have turned away. But I had to knock. Had to.
The protestations of love stopped. Two hard footsteps crossed the floor.
“Who is it?” Fearless asked, not nearly as angry as I would have been.
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“Paris.”
The door came open, and Fearless stuck his head out.
“Yeah?”
“I know the whole thing. All of it.”
“We got to do sumpin’ right now?” he asked me.
“No. But I need a place to stay an’ I ain’t got no cash.”
The head went away. A few words were traded in the room, and he returned holding out a key ring with two keys on it.
“Go stay at Mona’s, man. She gonna be here tonight. Stay ovah there an’ I get ya in the mornin’.”
I took the keys and walked across two dewy lawns to Mona’s place.
Her tiny house was well appointed, as I have said, but the best thing about it was her bed. It was high and soft, with ever so lightly scented sheets and blankets. There were half a dozen pillows and an azure night-light plugged into the socket to the right.
I fell instantly to sleep. And I didn’t have even one bad dream.
I woke up once in the night wondering why Fearless didn’t marry Mona. She was the perfect woman from where I lay. I glanced over at the sky-colored night-light and thought about blue tomorrows.
I’m sure that there was something psychological about my emotions, but I didn’t want to know. It was rare that I came upon a night of bliss. I wasn’t about to question it.
I wa s s o u n d a s l e e p when someone came knocking on the door.
“Yes?”
“It’s Mona, Paris.”
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I put on my pants and went to the door.
The look on her face told me that she’d had a pleasant night too.
“You know I almost got mad at you,” she said.
She was wearing a white terry cloth robe and Fearless’s big brown slippers.
“Sorry, babe. I just wanted a couple’a bucks to get a room someplace. But I tell ya this much — stayin’ here made me feel like I was at the Waldorf in the presidential suite. That was the best night’s sleep I ever had since I was a child in my mother’s arms.”
I only meant it as a show of gratitude, but I could see that my words touched Mona. She put her hand on my elbow, leaned forward, and gave me the softest kiss on the lips.
“Fearless waitin’ on you,” she whispered.
I put on my shirt but carried my socks and shoes across the lawns to my friend’s place. Mona had shaken me up with that kiss. It wasn’t a passionate thing, but there was something to it, something I didn’t want to know about when my best friend had just spent the night with her.
Fearless was already dressed in a loose silvery shirt and gray slacks. His brown shoes looked new they were so shiny, and he had a fancy gold watch on his wrist.
“Watch?” I asked.
“Mona gimme it,” he said. “I don’t want her to think I don’t appreciate it.”
R e e s e R o u n d t r e e o w n e d a cafe a few blocks from Fearless’s court. Fearless bought me fried eggs and bacon there. He had pancakes with pecan-flavored syrup.
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“I thought Mona wasn’t your girlfriend,” I said at one point, thinking about that soft kiss.
“She ain’t.”
