Moonwalker, Chapter 6

Waterfire is supposed to be a spectacle in the grand sense of the word, Providence’s own version of Carnevale in Venice, when masked revelers roamed the streets in thrall to the Lord of Misrule who encouraged them to trade their morals for licentious encounters in torch-lit, slippery alleys lining the murky canals. It didn’t quite translate. Even though Providence was a mob city, it was still New England. Not even the goombahs who supposedly kissed the “Pope’s” ring in secret, back-room ceremonies on The Hill (that’s Federal Hill, the epicenter of Italian epicurean delight which welcomed visitors with a neon golden pineapple at the beginning of Atwell’s Avenue), could maintain the illusion for too long. Eventually it became obvious that the mysterious masked courtesans were really strippers at The Foxy Lady pulling in a little cash before their next shift at the “Legs and Eggs” brunch. A couple of guys I’d known from my past life as a barfly clued me in, only because I promised not to tell anyone about what went on in the back of that limo they shared with a prominent city official who shall remain unnamed. I may scoff at the urban legends of what went on in those backrooms on Federal Hill, but even I had a healthy respect for the Pope.

Everybody at Chaos was always going on about how “magical” it was, but I knew it wasn’t really magic. The fires were gas and came out of metal burners that ran through the river like a giant stove.

Supposedly there were musicians and acrobats and all sorts of performers to entertain the masses, but I didn’t really know since I’d never gone, which means I just made all of the above up. I have a fertile imagination, don’t I? Zoe tells me I’m not a liar, I just spend too much time alone. “You have a special gift for storytelling.”

As I’ve mentioned a bunch of times already, I rarely venture out of my apartment once the sun’s gone down. I guess that would make me the opposite of a vampire, except I don’t sleep all night in a coffin. I lie awake on my sofa wondering if the bunny in the moon is going to nibble off my ears and toes.

The whole thing was the brainchild of the city’s disgraced mayor Buddy Cianci, who’d gone to jail twice (so far.) The first time for paying someone to burn the man who’d cuckolded him (isn’t that the greatest word?), as in put the horns on (where did that come from?) with cigarettes, the second for some kind of racketeering, which was pretty crazy because everybody knew that it was pretty much socially acceptable in Rhode Island to be financially corrupt.

Anyway, the city loved Buddy and Buddy loved the city so he came up with ideas like converting the old, abandoned mills from when the textile industry had been huge here into lofts for artists so the RISD students would stick around after graduation and make Providence into an “arts destination,” which had kind of worked. Zoe was here, and there were lots of students who stayed now instead of moving to poseur-filled, expensive New York City, although I had the sneaking suspicion that the reason was because they couldn’t make it there. You know how that song goes so I won’t inflict the grotesqueness of Frank Sinatra on you. Talk about the male gaze. The Rat Pack blows.

“I’d rather stay here where I can be the only one with Japanese kites painted all over my Accord.” Zoe had decided to turn her car into a moveable art project.

There were also lots of punks and anarchists burrowed into warehouses all over the city. They came and dumpster-dived behind the coffeehouse. I liked them and decided I wanted to be just like them when I grew up. My parents were going to be thrilled.

As I was saying, Buddy loved a good party. They say he didn’t stay home one night the entire time he was mayor. If he wasn’t invited to a party, he made one happen, and Waterfire was the crowning jewel on his tiramisu.

I’ll admit, it was better than something really lame like the Superbowl. I was glad Buddy hadn’t pushed for a major sports franchise in the city. Providence didn’t even have one team of its own. The closest thing we had was the Pawsox, the farm team for the Boston Red Sox in Pawtucket, the next dump over. And to give him credit--it wasn’t so easy to set the river on fire since almost everybody had forgotten about it in the first place.

Some progressive soul had gotten the idea at some point in the recent past before people cared about view sheds and quality of life, let alone the health of our planet’s water, to pave it over. Actually, I think it was when they built I-95 right through the city, forever destroying the downtown skyline and dooming its citizens to face a fire-breathing dragon who choked their dreams with exhaust fumes.

Buddy ripped the pavement off and freed the river. Too bad the “Free Buddy” campaign to have him released from jail early didn’t work, too. He served out his jail time in New Jersey somewhere, but was back now hosting a radio talk show. The Free Buddy t-shirts were collectors’ items with both hipsters and regular folks. I even had one myself.

There were also lots of Portuguese in Providence. I guess I should be embarrassed to admit that I couldn’t really tell the difference between Portuguese and Italians, but that’s what happens when you grow up in Connecticut. Supposedly my neighborhood Fox Point was settled by Portuguese and Cape Verdean fishermen, but I hadn’t seen anyone but a couple of forlorn looking Hmong wandering down toward Narragansett Bay with fishing poles, carrying a bucket between them. Now, they were easy to identify since they were Asian.

I knew they were Hmong because this crazy guy who sleeps on the street told me, but I’ll get to him a little bit later. I still have no clue what a Cape Verdean looks like. If it wasn’t for him I’d probably think they were Thai because there were a couple of really good Thai restaurants in the city I loved to go to for a cheap lunch.

Despite my best intentions, I’ll have to admit that my first reaction to the whole scene when Zoe and I finally found a parking space and joined the throngs on the sidewalk was that it was kind of romantic.

Well-groomed couples strolled with their arms around each others’ waists, some trailing delighted children behind them slurping Del’s Lemonade, the Rhode Island version of a smoothie that rotted your teeth and gave you brain freeze, but you didn’t care because it tasted so good. Clam cakes were like that, too. They sunk in your gut like lead tied to a fishing pole, but you didn’t care because you knew all the grease they were fried in would give you the runs.

Girls with big hair and high heels from Warwick who clearly hadn’t realized the 80s went out of style, well--in the 80s, promenaded to impress the boys with gel-slicked hair and collared shirts, no sneakers. That was the dress code in the hottest club downtown where they had go-go girls dancing in stage in giant birdcages. At least that’s what Zoe had told me. “I went down and filmed them one night with my friend for an installation he was working on. They did it for free. They all said they loved the gold body paint. ‘Gilded Cage,’ was the name of the installation.”

“How original.”

“He got an A. The professor loved it.

“Man?"

“Yup. Talk about the male gaze, right?”

As we strolled down the sidewalk I wondered if everyone thought we were lesbians. I kind of hoped so, as long as we didn’t get harassed or beat up or that some friend of my parents would see me and phone my mother, who was convinced I was one anyway. Just last week she’d asked me again if I had something to tell her, and I knew she wasn’t asking if I was pregnant, which was the big worry way back in high school. Now that it looked like she’d never get grandchildren out of me, I bet she wished I had gotten knocked up in 11th grade.

“Want a coffee milk?” I asked my adorable date. I needed a distraction from mulling over my failed life and coffee milk was one of my favorites. I shepherded Zoe into the corner diner we were just passing, famous for its Rhode Island culinary delicacies.

Coffee milk, also known as a cabinet, was something you either loved like mother’s milk or loathed. I have no idea why it’s also known as a cabinet, so don’t ask me. Sometimes it’s best just to surrender to the mystery, also applicable to clam cakes. It was best not to wonder just where the clams were in all that dough, especially best not to contemplate when they’d last changed the fryalator grease.

Whenever I drank that first sickly sweet sip I felt complete. After that I felt sick and usually threw the rest away, trying not to think about what my mother would say. She was a big one for making sure I finished everything on my plate. Not because it was a waste, but because it was good discipline, a remnant of her time in the army. After awhile, punishment and reward felt the same, which meant I had some pretty major food issues as well as being an alcoholic. See, I said it. Just don’t tell the doomsayers at AA. “Once an addict, always an addict,” was not going to apply to me. Future tense noted.

“Yuck,” was her gracious answer. “I can’t believe you drink that swill. It probably has high fructose corn syrup in it.” Zoe was a coffee snob and health freak, which kind of seemed like an oxymoron to me. I guess, working in a coffee shop, I was supposed to be one too, but there were some things in life I couldn’t give up or get over, whatever the case may be.

“Wouldn’t you rather stop somewhere with a little atmosphere and have an espresso with a shot of zambucca?”

“I don’t drink. Remember?”

“Oh--right.” She got that worried look on her face that said I forget sometimes how crazy you are. I knew she was thinking about that one time I had got drunk with her. I’d never told her what happened when I’d told her to go. I would make my own way home. “Well, you could just have the espresso and we could pretend we’re in Italy.”

I had to admit, if you squinted, or didn’t wear your glasses if you wore them in the first place, that the river at that moment did look a little like a Venetian canal. There were even gondolas plying its glowing surface, ferrying “lovers” up and down. I think some of them might have been actors, but some might have been real people out on a first date or having a special anniversary. There was even an old couple who looked especially romantic. They must have been actors, because nobody that had been married that long could possibly sit through a boat ride down the whole river without getting in a fight. The wife obligingly proved us right by whacking her mate over the head with her fan. “Hands off!” she shrieked.

“She’s only a bird in a gilded cage,” Zoe sang. Sometimes her whole “life is a cabaret” routine was pretty amusing.

For a moment I wished I had someone to go for a boat ride with besides Zoe, who wasn’t even single. Her girlfriend Cally was supposed to meet us at the Moonwalk exhibition. She was some kind of grad student at Brown. I wasn’t sure what she studied because I felt so pathetic listening to her career plans that I never asked, or just tuned her out whenever she started talking about whatever she studied, or developed, or whatever fabulous thing she was doing to make the world a better place for all humanity, which wasn’t to say I didn’t like her. As one of my two friends, I thought she was great.

“We are the World. We are the children,” hummed Zoe. “Hey, remember when his hair caught fire?”

“Who?”

“Michael Jackson! I mean honestly, Minerva.”

“Minnie.”

“I’ll only call you that if you trade clothes with me.”

“Not happening.”

“I wouldn’t want to walk around in that uniform you wear anyway.”

She was right. I kind of did wear the same thing everyday, depending on the season. Right now in summer it was a black tank top and dark gray “yogini” pants with a pair of Reefs. I may have moved to the city, but I still couldn’t give up the flip-flops I’d worn for the past twenty years on the beach, and I doubted if any real yoginis wore sustainable fiber drawstring capri-length pants, I think they practiced in saris, which I wanted to tell the pushy clerk in pursuit of a commission, but sometimes even I got tired of questioning every little thing. I justified the seventy-five bucks I’d shelled out for them by wearing them everyday, but I didn’t namaste her back on my way out. She came in the coffeehouse. She was a bad tipper.

“And we really should do something about your hair, too--maybe some layers or something.”

All of a sudden my long, black, one-length hair I’d flipped and let fall over my eyes, that boys had gripped and sniffed and run their fingers through, felt like the heaviest burden in the world. I must look like a crow, or maybe even worse, a vulture. No wonder I couldn’t get a date, although the idea of dating horrified me. I’d always been the kind to fall in love at first sight and move in with the guy the next day.

“Hey! Watch out!” Zoe exclaimed, grabbing me by the elbow and pulling me off the curb into the street. “What a jackass! He almost set your hair on fire!”

I had been trying to get a glimpse of myself in the reflection of the windows of the bar we’d been strolling past to see if I really did look as bad as I felt and had almost stumbled right into a fire dancer.

“It’s not his fault,” I said, stepping back up onto the sidewalk.

“Yeah, it was. He came right at you. It looked like on purpose to me.” Both of us walked to the corner and looked in both directions, but the fire dancer was gone.

“You almost caught on fire, just like M.J.!” Now that I actually hadn’t gone up in flames, Zoe couldn’t have sounded more delighted at what had almost happened.

“When did that happen again?”

“Back in the 80s. You don’t remember? You were in your prime then, girl.”

“I beg your pardon.” I said. Not that I didn’t think she was right. Well, maybe 1991 was the year I peaked.

“Do I remind you of a crow? I had to ask.

“Where did that come from? I thought you were into owls?”

“How many times do I have to tell you I can’t stand them?”

“Not enough, I guess. I’ll have to return the salt & pepper shakers I got you for your birthday.”

“My birthday’s not until December.”

“I like to plan ahead.”

“Yeah, right. Me too. And someday we’ll both have 401ks and health insurance.” We both laughed at that and kept on walking with the crowd down toward Kennedy Plaza where the Moonwalkers were supposed to converge for the big dance-athon.

“Ok, so I know I was the one who was in my prime in the 80s, but could you fill me in on this whole Michael Jackson thing?”

“I can’t believe you weren’t into Michael. Didn’t you even like The Jackson Five? Remember “ABC, Easy as 1,2,3?” How could any kid resist. We used to dance to it in gym class to help us learn our alphabet.”

“You went to a city school. In the suburbs we did the Hustle. There weren’t a whole lot of words. Anyway, I was more into The Partridge Family. I wanted to be a hippie. I refused to feather my hair like Farrah Fawcett and everybody made fun of me.”

“Wow, she’s dead, too, sounds like we’ve got some synchronicity flowing here.”

“Dream on. It’s all coincidence. Nothing means anything. And I promise I’ll cut my hair but you have to come to the salon with me and make sure I don’t end up with bangs above my eyebrows. None of that hipster shit for me.”

“Oh, yeah—so Michael was filming this commercial for Pepsi. It was the first time a celebrity endorsed a product like that on TV,” she continued like a newscaster back from a commercial break, “when his hair just exploded in flames. He was so into his dancing that he didn’t even notice until some other dancers or crewmembers, I don’t know, came running and started beating it out.”

“Is that where he came up with the idea for ‘Beat It’?”

“Omigod. That is so sick, besides being totally ignorant. Michael didn’t become The King of Pop until after Thriller and everybody knows “Beat It” is on Thriller. You really don’t know anything, do you!

“I know you secretly suspect me of not missing an episode of Entertaiment Tonight for the past twenty years, but I’ve actually been really busy.”

“Doing what?”

“Reading People Magazine.”

“That’s awesome.”

“So you believe me when I say I don’t have a clue about Michael Jackson?”

“No, but that’s ok because I like telling this story.”

“How many times have you told it this week?”

“Well Cally’s getting a little sick of it, so I guess that would probably mean about thirty.”

“She must have a high tolerance for pain.”

“You don’t even know.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Are you sure about that?” She and Cally were convinced all my troubles would fade away if I would only become a lesbian. They liked to freak me out with tales of lesbian escapades like fisting. They were probably right. It must be nice not to have to worry that some guy wasn’t going to tell you the reason he couldn’t keep it up was because your pussy was too loose. Sorry, sometimes I just couldn’t help the flashbacks from my life in a bottle.

“Well, a long time ago this beautiful black boy was born who could sing like an angel. He was proud of his heritage and grew his hair into an afro. His name was Michael Jackson and the world loved him so much they would do whatever he wanted, so these evil corporate demons who wanted to rule the world paid him a lot of money so he could build a place called Neverland where he could live and never grow up if he would dance and sing like Mr. Bojangles and convince the world that they didn’t really like Coke better, they liked Pepsi!”

“Amazing,” was all I could say. She was really getting into it now. She’d stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and people had to step around us. “Keep going.”

“Well he secretly blamed his afro for catching fire and burning his scalp and causing him so much pain. If it had been shorter and silkier instead of as wiry as a brillo pad that could scrape catfish skin of a grill maybe it wouldn’t have burned so crazy and he might have noticed it sooner before he had to get beaten on the head by a bunch of backup dancers. As he lay in the hospital drugged on painkillers, he decided he didn’t want to be black anymore so he started wearing silky wigs and weaves, he bleached his skin ever whiter year after year, and had cosmetic surgery on his nose and lips so he could look just like his soulmate Diana Ross.”

“I thought Elizabeth Taylor was his soulmate.”

“Aha! I knew you really did read People!”

“Well, maybe I’ve glanced at it a few times. Was it Elizabeth Taylor or not?”

“No, everybody thinks that but it was really that chimpanzee that he brought to the Academy Awards. What was its name?”

“Bubbles.”

“No comment. Or maybe Emmanuelle Lewis. That little guy who used to sit on Michael’s lap when he was like fourteen.”

“You mean Webster?”

“We’re gonna get in trouble!” Zoe laughed. “I think we better stop going there before someone overhears us and beats us down. Come on. I want to see the Moonwalkers. I bet they started already.”

I linked my arm in hers and we flowed back into the crowd flooding into Kennedy Plaza.

“You know, nothing’s ever hopeless,” Zoe mused as we strolled along. “As long as our imaginations are free we can create whatever we want. I think that’s what Michael was always trying to say.”

“He was?” Maybe I should have paid more attention to him. I’d kind of tuned out after “Beat It” and the misogynistic “Billie Jean,” but come to think of it, Paul McCartney had been friends with him and I loved The Beatles. They’d done that song together—“Ebony and Ivory.” Oh wait--that was Steview Wonder. Screw that theory. Anyway, I liked that song. I wanted to live in perfect harmony, side by side on my piano keyboard. Who didn’t, besides skinheads and Republicans. Oh Lord, why can’t we? I thought, suddenly looking forward to seeing the Moonwalkers. Maybe there was some magic afoot tonight.

Well, Zoe and I were feeling it at least, arm in arm as we walked down the first level of stairs into the plaza. Even though we were there to celebrate a dead guy, the mood of the crowd was upbeat. Cally stepped out of the ring of people and skipped over to us. She may have been a grad student at Brown, but not even she could resist being twee. She was tall and blonde, but somehow it worked for her, too. Both my new friends knew that being cute would get them much farther in life than being gloomy like me.

“Look at all The Michaels!” Callie crowed in delight. How come when she crowed it sounded cute instead of the croak that came out of me?

She and Zoe were always so happy to see each other, even when they’d only been apart a few hours. They had this annoyingly endearing habit of standing forehead to forehead and rubbing noses. “This is how the Maori kiss!” They’d say in unison. People just melted when they saw them, even homophobic ones I bet. They were very non-threatening lesbians. Of course, if I crossed over to their side I would end up with a bull-leather-dyke as a girlfriend who would terrify everyone so even less people would talk to me. I’m not even going to go into the boys that I’ve dated over the years. Notice, though I’m 40, I don’t say men, because I’m pretty sure I’ve never dated anyone in that category.

“Come on. They’re just about to start.”

Zoe and Cally and all their cuteness weaseled a way right up to the front of the crowd. I tried to follow, but ended up stuck in the middle where I couldn’t see anything. Annoyed with myself, I decided to assert my right to see the Moonwalk and began to elbow my way toward the front.

“Excuse me,” I pushed, glaring at anyone who tried to protest. “Hey, Lady!” said one guy with a trophy girlfriend dangling off his arm.


“Hey what?” I challenged him back like I was saying something really threatening. To my surprise he let me pass. It hurt when he called me lady, but I told myself the sting was going to be worth it when I got to the front and had the best view in the crowd when he couldn’t even see past his girlfriend’s fake boobs. I don’t know why women wear high heels. They’re ruined your feet and you end up towering over your shrimp of a boyfriend. Then again, maybe I should reconsider, but if my feet were ruined, I wouldn’t be able to run away.

I’ll have to admit, like those few moments when I’d watched the gondoliers on the river and thought I was in Venice, that the whole scene we’d just entered was a little wondrous. There were big white globes on all the street lights with cutouts of the moon’s face and they’d passed out sparkly silver confetti that everyone was tossing in the air. There was so much it looked like it was snowing and already the ground was covered in swirls of silver. Some kids and even a few grown-ups had lain down and were making snow angels.

In the center of the circle we’d formed, were all varieties of Michael Jacksons. Male, female, short, tall, young, old. A guy in a wheelchair. A fat lady with an afro. Hipsters in leisure suits from Savers who knew that Off The Wall was by far the best of his records. Little kid Michaels (black and white, another good M.J. tune), even a girl dressed up like The Scarecrow from The Wiz. Her boyfriend was Diana Ross as Dorothy. She even had a fluffy little dog under her arm playing the part of Toto. I laughed when I recognized one of my customers from Chaos under a wig, face painted kabuki-white, eyes lined in black, lips in scarlet, with that five-o’clock shadow Michael sometimes had that was so confusing. He was wearing one of those military jackets with the gold epaulets Michael wore at his peak, and of course the one glove. Lots of people with one glove. I kind of wished I had one. Of course, being America, there was a guy selling them, but I wasn’t going to spend my hard earned money on something as frivolous as sequins, even if I was feeling a little dizzy with delight.

As I watched them all start to dance--some of them pretty decent, most of them not-- it came over me, remembering those videos in high school—yes, despite what I told Zoe, I did watch MTV— Michael Jackson could really groove. I mean, he was an amazing dancer, almost right up there with Fred Astaire, though I don’t think Michael could dance on the ceiling like Fred in “Royal Wedding.” Neither could Lionel Richie, who was the favorite entertainer of that high school boyfriend I mentioned earlier who got me to do whatever he wanted by bribing me with fuzzy navels. Not to say that I could dance on the ceiling, but I did hang from a fan the night he serenaded me with “Stuck on You.” He wanted to see just how stuck he could get to a certain part of my anatomy. It might have worked better if he hadn’t been standing on a waterbed that remarkably didn’t pop when we both went flying. Besides, videos were all special effects. Fred had real magic, we had bong hits, booze, and sometimes cocaine we snorted from mirrors in the locked room at parties which nobody mentioned, but everyone wanted to get into.

It was almost like Michael wasn’t really here on earth--like he was just floating over the surface--and I saw suddenly, that that was what the Moonwalk was all about. He was showing us his soul when he did that dance, just a few backwards sliding steps that showed the world that even though he was stuck in a body like us, he could escape whenever he wanted.

Well, maybe not quite. Or maybe he just forgot when he left the stage.

He wouldn’t have needed all those painkillers if he’d remembered. I thought about that zambucca with espresso Zoe wanted me to drink with her earlier and wondered if it would have kept me up all night or put me to sleep, if it really would have been Ok to have just one shot.
I also saw, watching the little kids dance around, that there was no way he was a child molester. Peter Pan would never have allowed that to happen in Neverland. He and Wendy would have vanquished any molesters before they messed with Tinkerbelle just like the way they threw Captain Hook to the crocodiles. It was ok not to want to grow up. The earth made no sense at all, while everything in Neverland did. In Neverland the butterflies had an infinite supply of flowers to eat and Peter and Wendy never looked at each other with the longing I had seen on my own face for so many years now I closed my eyes when I looked in the mirror. I was never going to fall in love again--at least until I learned how to Moonwalk and could truly escape.

As the crowd grooved along with the Moonwalkers, I found I couldn’t hold still myself. I actually forgot where I was for a few moments until I looked up and there was this guy trying to dance with me. He seemed really familiar, but I couldn’t place him. It was hard to get a look at his face because his hat was pulled down over his eyes. He’d cut out two holes for his eyes which sparked at me before shooting away across the plaza. Before I could figure out who he was he was gone and I was trying to scream, but nothing came out of my mouth but dried moth wing’s and moondust.

Someone was dragging me down the stone stairs that led toward the bus stop that took people to the airport. Elbows pinned to my back, wrists held in one hand, the other on the back of my neck. I stumbled, head down. “Minerva,” a voice said. My name fluttered in the air between us then dropped to the ground where it disintegrated.

“You know who I am, right?”

I nodded.

“You know it’s your job to save me?”

I nodded.

“You know what will happen if you don’t?”

I nodded.

“One small step for man, one giant step for mankind. They never think about who they’re stepping on, do they?”

And then I dropped, too. Falling into the mouth of the moon like William Blake.

BLAKE: Pray, Mr Taylor, did you ever find yourself, as it were, standing close beside
the vast and luminous moon?

TAYLOR: Not that I remember. Mr Blake: did you ever?

BLAKE: Yes, frequently; and I have felt an almost irresistible desire to throw myself
into it headlong.

TAYLOR: I think, Mr Blake, you had better not: for if you were to do so, you most
probably would never come out of it again.

When I woke up Zoe and Cally were explaining to the police that I hadn’t had anything to drink. “I did try to get her to have an espresso with zambucca, but she’s not a boozer.” Zoe was rambling on, charming the cop with the old-fashioned word for drunk, “All she wanted was coffee milk.”

“A cabinet,” Cally added as if to assure the officer of her credibility.

“Where did you say you work again?” the cop asked, checking their IDs. I couldn’t blame him because it seemed hard to believe one of them worked at Brown, though who knows what he made of Zoe. Most of the locals thought RISD students were rich, spoiled brats, but she was pretty hard to resist, especially when she talked in her squeaky voice. “Brown University, physics department,” Cally answered, which answered my question as to what she studied, which I remember thinking I needed to remember because I really liked her and it wasn’t pc to be jealous of intelligent blondes as I drifted back to sleep in the confetti that had now formed deep drifts in Kennedy Plaza.

“Well, you girls just take her home now and let her sleep it off,” the cop said, releasing us. I’m sure we were entertaining, but there must have been real criminals out there for him to catch, like the man who had almost scared me to death. The man who sat side by side at the piano keyboard with Paul McCartney, who must have been wearing a wig because his hair had burned, who lined his eyes and wore lipstick that highlighted his five-o’clock shadow. The man with epaulets on his shoulders, who had pinned my arms with one hand, demanding I save him with his other on my windpipe, crushing the air from my throat until I passed out. He left behind one sequin-studded glove to remind me: Don’t try to escape. I’ll be looking down.