Her head ached. She had been lying paralyzed in a field earlier that day and now stood in this room the same night, and the two parts were not meant to fit. She slipped into slacks and a loose cream blouse. At first she put on loafers but decided instead on suede pumps. Impossible to be alone on such a night even if it meant joining Robert and that ambivalent crowd. Her saving grace was that only Darrow had witnessed her failure. She poured herself a glass of water and her hand shook as she raised it to her lips. The old-fashioned ceiling fan shuddered above her head. She stared at the shabby bedspread and remembered the glare of the sun on the paddies, making it impossible to see; the fields bleached by the fierceness of the sun. The only vivid color she could recall the red of blood on the young soldier’s thigh. Darrow’s point, of course, that no matter what group she traveled with, one went out alone, hand in hand with only one’s own fear.
Michael. Determined to follow in their father’s footsteps. To outdo him if possible. Graduated with honors. He could have done anything, but he wanted only to be in the elite corps. Because Dad wasn’t. Her father would have been dismissive of what she was doing, unless, of course, she succeeded. But Michael would have been bemused and not surprised at all at his big sister, always trying to play catch-up.
She drank down the glass of water and poured another. The niggling humiliation that she had not snapped even a single picture. The second glass of water gulped down so fast it dribbled down her chin and onto her blouse so that she had to change again. When she finally managed to make her way to the hotel dining room, she couldn’t hide her disappointment that Darrow wasn’t there.
Ed, the straw-haired man from the previous night, grinned. “So how was the maiden voyage out, love?”
She said nothing.
“It’s always a bear, the first couple times,” Gary said.
“Maybe next time you can bring film,” Ed said, laughing.
“You don’t need film where you go, Ed,” Robert said. “Everyone knows the inside of your girlfriend’s thighs.”
The table broke up in laughter. Helen ate quickly, not tasting her food, then excused herself. Had they known because she didn’t make the rounds of the wires to sell her pictures? Or had Darrow told them?
Robert went after her and stopped her in the lobby. She had gone out with Darrow and returned with no pictures, and he hoped that mortification would give him back the upper hand. Time to hang on a man’s arm. He had decided to pretend the previous night, and his defeat, had not happened. “Are you okay?”
“I need sleep is all.” She needed so many things, putting any one thing into words seemed inadequate. “I failed.”
“It’s not a place for a woman. I’m just grateful you came back whole. I’ll check on you in the morning.”
She was so relieved to get away, she gave him a kiss on the cheek. He backed away for a moment, startled, then moved closer.
“Should we have a drink?”
“I need to rest,” she said.
Robert stepped back into the restaurant, stopping at the entrance to light a cigarette. He hadn’t taken her for the sort that fell for a guy like Darrow. Usually his women were the type who for one reason or another couldn’t ask for much. With her intelligence, she must guess the string of women that Darrow discarded. The gold band on his finger a kind of shield against commitment. He watched Helen in the lobby, fumbling through her purse. He would take her down Bourbon Street; they would laugh and dance all night. He liked her. A possibility for that house in his mind, filled with children. But Helen didn’t move toward the elevators; instead she left the hotel and waved down a waiting cyclo. Of course, he thought, he could be wrong.
At the meeting place of silk and lacquered bowl streets, Helen found the moon-shaped entrance of the alley, still puddled from the rain, retracing her path as if she could return to the time before her failure that day. Reckless, she ran through water the color of ink at the alley’s mouth while men stood at the corner and stared, ran through a cacophony of incense and spice smells she could not yet name. Past stores that sold only twine. What had before seemed strange now became soothing. We are hardwired for the comfort of familiarity, she thought. Again, the airless effect of buildings so packed together, the lights within storefronts dim, darkness and closeness smothering her.
She ran down the narrow, murky throat of the path till she saw the yellow building that listed to one side, darkened like a sweat-stained shirt. Looking up, she saw the glow of the lampshade in the window, and the weight on her chest grew lighter despite her anger. Wanting to forget the day, she pushed open the lacquered door, unable to see the peacocks and tigers painted on it, and felt her way up the black, groaning staircase that smelled of cedar and fish.
As she knocked on the door, the sounds of jazz inside and the high staccato of female laughter, made her feel like a fool-the idea that just the sight of Darrow would heal her childish wounds. She turned to escape before anyone came, but the door swung wide open to Darrow holding a glass of scotch in his hand.
“Helen of a Thousand Ships.” He smiled, a victorious plea sure in his eyes.
She stood, unable to move. He was a stranger to her.
“Who’s there?” a voice called.
“Come in,” Darrow said, taking her arm, pulling her inside. The air thick with the grassy smell of pot.
“Jack, it’s our new… intrepid girl reporter.”
Nothing else to do for it, so she hauled back and punched Darrow in the face as hard as she was able, closing her eyes at the point of contact so that when he bent, she wasn’t sure what she’d managed. His glasses flew off, and blood trickled from one nostril.
“What the hell?”
“You ordered me to leave. I had no choice. And then you come back and tell everyone I didn’t take any pictures.”
“I didn’t.”
“Everyone knows.”
“Everyone knows because everyone’s interested in watching you fail, girlie,” Jack said.
Jack was sitting cross-legged on a cushion, a fat, hand-rolled roach pinched between his fingertips. Next to him, a Vietnamese woman was kneeling on a cushion. She had a wide, acne-scarred face, and she winked at Helen, her bright orange lipstick smudged.
“You ignored me. You didn’t help me at all, show me anything.”
“That’s because I treated you out there like a man. No special treatment. Decide what you want.”
“So that’s cleared up,” Jack said. “Introductions.”
Darrow blinked, a napkin against his nose. “That is…”
“Tick-Tock,” Jack said.
Darrow pursed his lips, and she could tell he was drunk. “Formal introductions, please. That is Miss Tick-Tock.”
Jack patted the woman’s thigh. “Just in time for the party. Here, Helen, have a puff of Cambodia ’s finest.”
“Let me pour you a drink,” Darrow said and led Helen to a chair. “Let’s not corrupt her all in one day.”
“If I was wrong, I’m sorry.”
As she sat down, Jack pointed to her feet. “Didn’t anyone tell you not to wear heels in the paddy?” He burst out laughing.
She looked down and saw her ruined suede shoes. Darrow went to the armoire and got a towel. He sat on the floor, took off her shoes, and rubbed her feet. No one had explained how to deal with the residual fear of physical danger; she felt five years old and in need of someone’s arms around her. His eye was red and beginning to swell. Unable to stop, she reached out and ran her fingertips across his cheek. In the most illogical reasoning, she had chosen him because he wouldn’t nurture her like kind, dependable Robert.
“Well, folks,” Jack said. “I’ll leave the joint with you, but I’m going to have to push off.”
