by Mahmud Rahman

The man tossed Carlotta Jones the Monday night gig and acted like he was doing her a big favour.
   The Gearshift Lounge on Conant Avenue booked blues bands every night of the week. On weekends they charged cover and the musicians made a percentage. Other evenings they’d get a share of the drink proceeds. Most nights they could pick up some pocket change.
   But Monday night was the pits.
   ‘Take it or leave it,’ the owner of the Gearshift said, stepping back from the bar, his fleshy palms in the air signalling that the negotiations were over. ‘It’s all we got open right now.’ Then, without trying very hard to hide the smirk on his face, he said, ‘Carlotta, you guys aren’t the only ones interested. The Young Falcon Blues Band is also looking for a gig.’
   That settled it.
   They would take Monday evening just as an act of public service to the people of Detroit. The Young Falcons were not a blues band. These four Polish boys had picked up a taste for the music when they were refugees in England. Once they arrived in Detroit and discovered the small but energetic local scene, they thought they had landed in heaven. They were turning out to be halfway decent musicians, but their boy Karl just could not sing. Carlotta wasn’t one of those people who thought that white folks couldn’t play blues music. She’d known some damn good white guitarists, and Bill, their drummer, was white. But singing the blues was another story. The way she saw things, white folks – no matter how much they’d been hurt – just didn’t have the soul to sing the blues. She was adamant that each people had their own way of giving tongue to their hard times.
   ‘They should stick to country music,’ she’d say. Though it had been nearly twenty years since she left rural Arkansas as a sixteen-year old, no one could convince her that country music wasn’t exactly the national music of all white people.
   She took the gig. Her musicians played in other bands, but they could use any extra dollars coming their way. Times were hard in the Motor City in 1983. One by one, the auto plants were chaining their gates and thousands were time-wasting on the streets.
   Working as a nurse at Receiving Hospital, Carlotta felt lucky to have a steady job, but five years on the afternoon shift had turned her into someone she had a hard time recognising: impatient, bitchy, and tired – always tired. When she won her bid for a day shift, the first thing she did was to start spending evenings with her nine-year old daughter Ramona. Second on her agenda was to hustle her connections and cobble a band together.
   As she walked out of the Gearshift Lounge into the chill of an early April evening, she felt a swell of pride; she had taught herself to sing the blues pretty much all on her own. Oh, she didn’t mind acknowledging the help she’d had. Down south she had a neighbour, a quiet old man who claimed to be resting his bones after having travelled the world as a cook in the navy, and when he wasn’t stirring her mind with crazy tales from far-flung places, some with switchblade-carrying women and others involving smooth-talking men with murder on their minds, he would play a tune on his guitar and ask her to accompany him. Shy at first, she gave in and he said she had a voice given her to sing the blues, deep and rumbling like a riverboat’s whistle. At a time when her friends were turned on by Motown, she was drawn to what they sneered at as old timey music. And when she set foot in Detroit where her aunt Millie took her in, she was tickled to discover that they lived right by a blues record store run by a man who called himself Famous Coachman. That coincidence impressed on her young mind that things happen for a reason, a lesson she would eventually work into a conversation with everyone she met. Coachman opened up a whole musical universe to her: from Son House to Memphis Minnie, and even that nasty Chuck Willis (‘Stoop down baby, let your daddy see’). At the store she ran into Detroit legends like Bobo Jenkins who seemed to drive up in a shiny new Cadillac every time he dropped by.
   Getting off the Davison Freeway at Wyoming, the memories of those conversations with the old men made her smile. To Carlotta the blues was about telling stories and one day she wanted to write her own songs. Since those years, she’d more than lived some – and her life had taken some detours – but now here she was, about to claim her dream of singing on stage, even if that stage was a dinky little raised platform in a dingy little bar. Her songwriting would surely follow. By the time she arrived home to tell the exciting news to her aunt and daughter, she’d even begun to look forward to her Monday night gig at the club. An empty house was more likely to give up stories than a full one.
   
   They call it stormy Monday,
   but Tuesday’s just as bad
   
   Just as she’d feared, Monday night was the pits. Oh, they’d get lucky when the occasional birthday party showed up, but mostly they played to a handful of people who became their hardcore fans. She didn’t get to collect any stories either.
   The Monday after Memorial Day, an early thunderstorm passed through and the sirens had sounded a tornado warning. The bar was empty when the band set up. But their fan club was not deterred.
   The Wilson twins sauntered in promptly at 9:30. At the door, they shook off the rain from their matching fedoras and took their regular table halfway up front, next to the wall. Ernest and Robert had both retired from the line at Dodge Main just before it shut down in ’79. Soon after the band started to play, Phyllis stepped in. Her hair bleached blond and tied in a ponytail, she had come in after finishing her shift at the nearby Great Scott! supermarket. Sometime during the evening Karl had come in. He had a way of slipping into the bar like a cat burglar – even though the bar was nearly empty and he carried a guitar case. Karl was one of the Young Falcons, and after the first set was over, he came over to Jimmy the guitar player and asked if he could ‘jam with the finest musicians in the Motor City.’ He came in two or three times a week and used the exact same line on all the bands. Jimmy was glad to extend his break to shoot a game of pool on the other side of the club.
   The band launched its second set, with Karl sitting in for Jimmy. They played Stormy Monday, one of three songs that Karl always requested. This night Carlotta didn’t mind singing it because it fit the occasion.
   Then an Indian man strode in. He was medium height, but he held himself so upright that he appeared taller. Dressed in black slacks and a denim shirt, he had a whiskey in his hand and made his way to a table right in front of the band. Carlotta was surprised. Most first timers didn’t do that and certainly none of the other Indians who came into the bar now and then. They usually came in pairs or threes. Shy and unsure, they would sit at the back tables and they never stayed late.
   This man remained until the last song. The music melted away some of his initial rigidity, and after a couple of shots, he drummed the tabletop with his fingers and tapped his feet to the beat. He wore an expensive pair of black leather oxfords. Whenever Carlotta looked at him, he smiled and met her glance. His demeanour was serious but there was a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. Before he left, he came up to her, shook her hand and said she had sung ‘masterfully.’
   
   I’m a stranger here, just blowed in your town
   If I ask for a favour, please don’t turn me down
   
   The Indian man returned every week, and on some evenings he was the only person listening to the band. On those nights, Donald the bass player would bellow out to the empty house, ‘Our fan’s here!’ And Bill struck up a drum roll.
   On the first night like that, the band took an early break. Carlotta stepped off the platform and pulled up a chair across from the stranger.
   ‘Hello,’ he said, rising to his feet. ‘Can I show my appreciation for your lovely songs by getting you a drink?’
   ‘A ginger ale, thanks.’
   When he returned from the bar and handed her the drink, he said, ‘Forgive me my poor manners. My name is Ali Ashraf. Your name, of course, I know.’ The band advertised its performances as ‘Carlotta Jones and the Blues Assembly Line.’ To Jimmy went the credit for naming the band. A laid-off autoworker now hustling roofing jobs, he said, ‘We should pay tribute to the people on the line. And it goes without saying that we need to feature Carlotta. She got us together.’ No one had disagreed.
   ‘Thanks for being our most loyal fan,’ she said as she clinked her glass to his. ‘We appreciate the support.’
   ‘After I saw – I mean heard – you the first time, how could I possibly stay away?’ He stared into her eyes and Carlotta blushed. ‘You, your band, are marvellous. And I appreciate the company.’ Pausing for a moment, as if debating something, he added, ‘...because my evenings can be solitary.’
   ‘How come? No woman, no family?’
   He shook his head and explained that he was in town just for the summer. He lived in Boston where he worked for a small company that sent him out to computerise print shops with outdated technology. Most of the time he worked in shops in and around Detroit, but his work took him as far as Cleveland.
   ‘Excuse me for making assumptions. I just figured you were one of those Indians who seem to be growing in number around here.’
   ‘You’re very observant. They are not Indians, though. Like me, they are from Bangladesh. But I don’t have relatives here.’
   ‘I’m sorry.’
   ‘Do not think badly of yourself for not knowing. It’s a common misunderstanding.’
   She was embarrassed by her mistake, but grateful that he disregarded it so easily. ‘So you’re some sort of engineer? From the way you look, I’d have guessed you were in the service.’
   ‘You mean the military? Your perception is sharp. I was once a captain in the Bangladesh army, though now it feels that was in another historical age.’
   
   ‘So what happened?’
   ‘You can consider me retired.’
   She waited for more, but he went silent and his eyes grew distant. Thankfully the band had returned and Carlotta rose to join them. She hoped that in future conversations, Ali Ashraf would be more forthcoming. He had stories to tell, she was certain of that.
   
   Wild women don’t worry,
   wild women don’t have no blues
   
   The next evening at home, after the dishes from dinner were cleared away and washed, and after they had watched an old episode of Star Trek, she asked her daughter, ‘Honey, do you know where Bangladesh is?’
   Ramona shook her head. ‘But I can find out!’ She ran to the living room and returned with a volume of the encyclopaedia that Carlotta had purchased from a salesman who had come knocking on their door. Aunt Millie had questioned spending all that money, but Carlotta had said, ‘I didn’t grow up with books around the house, but my daughter will. Like the man said, this one’s a solid deal. You can’t go wrong with something like this.’ It took two years to pay off that bill and the thick blue-bound volumes had mostly gathered dust, but the few times she’d seen Ramona pull a book out to look something up, her heart had warmed. She’d created a little change, from one generation to the next.
   Carlotta reached for the book, but Ramona insisted she would look up the entry herself. She read it aloud, stumbling over some of the unfamiliar names, and Carlotta registered some of the information. Bordered by India. She felt better; she hadn’t been far off. Poverty. That was no surprise; it seemed like that was the case wherever black or brown folks lived. Many rivers. She wondered if those rivers were anything like the Mississippi that flowed not too far from her hometown. Became independent after a war. Had Ali been part of that? Military coups. She couldn’t make any sense of any of that.
   ‘Why did you want to know, Mommie?’ Ramona asked as she shut the book.
   ‘I met someone who’s from there, honey. Just wanted to know where he was from, that’s all. Thank you, sweetheart.’ She pulled her daughter close and kissed her on the mouth.
   Later that night, after Ramona had gone to sleep, Aunt Millie asked Carlotta while they sat in the living room, ‘So what’s he like?’
   ‘Who?’
   ‘You know who I mean. It ain’t every day that you ask your daughter to look up some strange foreign country.’
   ‘Oh.’ Carlotta smiled. ‘He seems like an interesting man. A bit formal. Makes a living as some sort of engineer, but I guessed that he’d been in the service. I was right. A captain. He would have been a smart-looking man. He still is.’
   ‘You always did have a weakness for a man in uniform. After the last time, shouldn’t you stay away from them?’
   ‘Please, Aunt Millie, don’t start. I lost Greg after Vietnam. It wasn’t easy for a man to go fight in a war we’d already lost. The man who came back wasn’t the man I loved. But you know what, I see some of that old Greg in Mona. I adore her curiosity.’
   ‘We had men returned from other wars, it didn’t break them. I tell you, it’s the drugs. They’re destroying our people. And now there’s a new one coming in to make things worser than ever.’
   ‘I tried my best to get him clean. He just couldn’t.’
   ‘More like, wouldn’t. You ever hear from him?’
   ‘No one’s seen him for years. Last I heard he’d moved out west.’ She wiped her eyes, surprised that she could still be affected after she’d sworn she had moved past all the sadness.
   ‘So why you want to mess with another soldier boy?’
   ‘Boy? This one’s hardly a boy. And I’m no longer a lovestruck young girl. Yeah, I know they can be trouble. But, they’ve visited distant places, they’ve had adventures, they tried out words in other languages, they ate different kinds of food....’
   ‘Hmph. More like, they tasted every kind of pussy.’
   ‘Aunt Millie!’ She playfully tossed a pillow at the old woman who sat in her chair, paging through a magazine.
   Her aunt squealed in delight.
   ‘What can I say, it’s part of my weakness – to be drawn to men of the world.’
   ‘And I used to be drawn to women who’ve known the world. I can hardly blame you. Just be careful.’
   
   Been down so many highways
   I can see them all in my dreams
   
   The next time Carlotta approached Ali Ashraf, he had two days’ stubble on his face and ashen bags under his eyes. She said, ‘You look like someone who’s just come off a double shift at the plant.’
   He smiled weakly. ‘I cannot sleep. There is a problem with work I cannot solve. I stayed up all night, and I must have torn a few hairs off my head.’
   Carlotta looked at his hair, past the thinning patch at the top of his head to the curly wisps hanging behind his ears. She wondered what it would feel like to run her fingers through them. She asked, ‘Shouldn’t you be home catching some sleep tonight?’
   ‘And miss the opportunity to hear you sing? Not a chance.’ He laughed, motioning her to sit by him. ‘This is hardly what I would describe as tired. You should have seen me when I had to walk three days through the mountains of Pakistan into Afghanistan.’
   ‘Why were you doing that?’
   ‘It was during the war when my people were trying to free themselves from Pakistan. When the war broke out, I had the misfortune of being under house arrest in Pakistan, under the eyes of the same military in which I’d been an officer for six years. Those people who had been my comrades were now my jailers.’ He screwed up his face.
   When the waitress came by, he ordered another Scotch. She asked for a ginger ale.
   ‘Yeah, you all had a war to free yourselves. Did you fight in it?’
   ‘I managed to get there for the last month of the fighting.’
   ‘How was that?’
   ‘When you are far from your homeland, and your people are in trouble, you feel it deep in your heart.’ He made a fist and struck his chest, hard. ‘You feel utterly helpless. Then, to get a chance to see your country again – and I arrived there just as the yellow mustard flowers bloomed in the countryside – and then to be able to play a small part in making history, can there be anything as fantastic as that?’
   ‘That’s really powerful! You must have been excited to build a new country.’
   He looked bitter again. ‘Well, things got messy afterwards.’
   She nodded.
   ‘There were plots, plots against plots. We were eating ourselves alive. I had friends who were hanged. Some may have been involved in the plotting, but others were not. I wasn’t involved in anything, but I’d been at meetings where people had talked through things. No one was safe. So I got out and eventually made it to America.’ He gulped down his drink and looked around for the waitress.
   ‘Uh, shouldn’t you get home and get some sleep? Instead of the whiskey, maybe you should get a warm glass of milk.’
   ‘Maybe I just need someone to tuck me in,’ he replied with a wink.
   ‘Well, look around,’ she said. ‘Maybe you’ll get lucky.’ There was no one else in the house.
   He passed on the drink. During a pause between songs in the second set, he stood up, saluted her and turned around to leave. She waved back.
   That night on the drive back home, Carlotta tried to picture his story in her mind: being held captive, escaping from one country to another, fighting for a cause you believed in, then everything you held dear being turned upside down. She wished he had been more descriptive, and her memory lingered on the one image he had given her: a field of yellow flowers. When he saw home again, had he wanted to run through those flowers and kiss them? She had gone home, ten years after she’d left Arkansas, and she arrived in October when the cotton was in bloom. When she’d grown up there, she’d worked on those fields and there had been nothing pretty about that; but when she returned, she was simply awestruck by the beauty. The heart plays funny tricks with one’s memories.
   The excitement of hearing his stories gave way to a twinge of sadness: she did not know how to wrap such large happenings around a 12-bar blues tune.
   
   I stood on the corner all night long, counting the stars one by one
   I didn’t make me no money, and I can’t go back home
   
   When Ali missed a week, Carlotta found herself worrying if something had happened to him. But he returned the next Monday and said he’d been out of town for work. She was relieved. He looked relaxed and even happy.
   ‘I had an amusing encounter this weekend,’ he said as she sat down for their now-regular chat.
   ‘Tell me. The drink’s on me today, but only something non-alcoholic.’ She did not want to encourage the man’s bad habit.
   ‘Never mind, then. I’ll get my own.’
   When he returned, again with whiskey for himself and ginger ale for her, she asked, ‘So what happened?’
   ‘I was driving down Van Dyke on Saturday afternoon and noticed a young woman thumbing a ride. I stop and say to the girl, where do you want to go, I’m driving towards downtown. She says she’s a working girl. I say, that’s okay, you work, I work too, but where is it that you want to go? She says no, you don’t understand, I’m working right now. Then she starts to unbutton her shirt. Can you believe that?’
   ‘You’re telling me you didn’t know when you stopped?’
   ‘Know what? I stopped because I’m used to stopping. Back in Boston, hundreds of students hitchhike. I used to give rides all the time.’
   ‘Yeah, right. So what happened when she showed you her stuff? Were you tempted?’
   ‘No. Her chest was too big. To me,’ he said, ‘anything more than a handful’s a waste.’ And winking at her, he asked, ‘Wouldn’t you agree?’
   Carlotta glanced down at her small breasts. ‘Well, you’re not getting your hands on mine.’ She slapped his palm that was resting on the table.
   Ali laughed. ‘Well, I wasn’t about to touch the girl.’ Then, with his voice lowered, he said, ‘You know she offered to do something for five dollars.’ He became quiet for a moment. ‘I’m making a joke out of it, but the reality is sad. Very sad.’
   ‘Hey, you know how it is out there. More people out of work each day.’
   ‘I’ve noticed. All along these major roads – Michigan Avenue, Eight Mile Road – there’s girls who look like they’re barely twelve or thirteen selling themselves. Black and white.’
   All Carlotta could do was nod. In her heart she knew that while poverty was part of the picture, it wasn’t simply being poor that led young girls to the streets. There were other seductions that could work magic on minds that were confused in the place between childhood and womanhood. As she stood up to rejoin the band, a thought crossed her mind: today’s conversation with Ali had started off amusing, then it took a turn towards melancholy. Was that him, or was it Detroit? The way things were going for Detroit, was there any hope for this city? What does one do in the face of hopelessness? She didn’t know about anyone else, but all she could do was keep Mona safe and sing her blues. With her music, she could, for herself and a few others, steal some living, some laughter, and at least a dancing beat from hard times.
   
   I’m gonna leave Detroit, if I have to flag number ninety-four
   And if I ever get back home, I ain’t never comin’ to Detroit no more
   
   Ali Ashraf was not an easy man. He chose a busy night to say to Carlotta, ‘You know, this is one spectacularly ugly city.’
   Her back stiffened. He said that loudly for the whole band, and even some customers, to hear. Carlotta was only a Detroiter since 1967, but the other guys had lived here all their lives. This was like telling them their mommas were ugly.
   Jimmy was at the table, too, though his attention had been focused on a conversation with the Wilson twins at the next table. He reacted immediately, ‘Man, who you calling ugly?’ And to the others, he said, ‘See this man here, he comes from Boston, says Detroit’s an ugly city.’
   Ernie shouted, ‘Boston? Where a coloured man ain’t safe on the streets? Where the Irish shove an American flag into a man’s face just for walkin’ around downtown?’
   Robert muttered, ‘Yeah, that lawyer cat.’
   Ali continued, ‘But it’s a pretty city: grand buildings, a lovely river, gorgeous parks, and beautiful trees.’
   ‘If your soul’s ugly, who cares about the outside?’ Jimmy said.
   Robert chimed in, ‘Yeah, is that how you judge what’s pretty? Now look at Phyllis over there in the back. Outside she ain’t much to look at, but inside she’s a sweetheart. One time our car wouldn’t start and it was 15 below out there, winds howlin’, ice fallin’, but she gave us a ride home. Bless her heart.’
   Ernie said, ‘It was the radiator that done give out. If you’d only listened to me and fixed it, we wouldn’t have been caught out there in the cold. Damn, I can still feel the chill in my bones.’
   Robert was about to reply but Ali Ashraf cut him off. ‘Look, I was driving down Grand River today. I have never seen anything like it. Such a wide road. It must indeed have been quite grand once. But today? On either side it’s just vacant lots with grass growing up to here.’ He put his hand up to his neck. ‘Or it’s boarded up buildings. Or just the shells of buildings. Looks like a war took out that street. What soul? It’s just plain ugly?’
   Why he had to get so belligerent that day Carlotta could not tell. But she knew she had better step in. Otherwise Ali would find out what ugly really was. She said, ‘Look, there’s plenty that’s pretty here in this city. You’re a stranger, you just don’t know what to look for.’
   ‘Okay, you tell me then. It’s not the buildings. Packard hasn’t built a car in, what, 50 years, but that dead plant is still up. Yes, I know, they call it a shopping centre, but there’s nothing there other than that ghetto department store, what’s it called?’
   No one would help him.
   ‘King something. I bet you they’re not going to keep that open much longer. Everywhere you go, it’s just rust, rot, and weeds. You tell me, what’s pretty?’
   Carlotta looked him in the eye and replied, ‘No, I won’t. But you will. You have a lot of time on your hands, right? What do you do on the weekends anyway? Let me give you something to do. Each week, why don’t you explore the city on your own and come back and tell us? See if you can find something pretty in the middle of what you call ugliness.’
   ‘Oho, a challenge. I like a good challenge. What if I’m right? What do I win?’
   ‘An ass whipping,’ Jimmy said in a voice low enough only for Carlotta to hear.
   ‘Hush,’ she told him. To Ali, she said, ‘If you win, you leave with the satisfaction of turning your back on a place you called home just for one summer. If I win, you leave with a bit of sadness. But as a person who didn’t find his stay here a waste of time. If you’re gonna live somewhere, no sense fighting it all the time.’
   
   Eagle flies on Friday,
   and Saturday Ali goes out to play
   
   Sipping a cup of strong coffee and biting into a crisp, sweet and sticky gilebi in the Iraqi Chaldean neighbourhood next to Palmer Park, Ali pondered his strategy. Was there really a way to find beauty in this city? Sure, he could look at some historic buildings, and he knew Detroit had some marvels of architecture. Or he could browse the Detroit Institute of Art. But that wasn’t the point. Every city had showcases, especially if they were old enough or had – at one time or another – great wealth. And surely this city, the heart of the auto industry, must have once overflowed with gold. No, he would drive down Woodward Avenue, through one of the worst looking parts of town. If there was a contest between beauty and ugly, this street was proof that ugly was winning.
   As soon as he crossed McNichols, he entered a world of XXX movie theatres and seedy-looking joints. Then he noticed out of the corner of his eye a sign for ‘World Books.’ He parked the car for a closer look. It had disappointed him that Detroit had so few decent bookstores; he’d been spoiled by the rich treasures around Harvard Square. Nearing the store, he saw that all the windows were boarded up and the sign said, ‘Open 24 hours.’ It wasn’t quite the kind of bookstore he’d been looking for. But across the street he spied another place and crossed over. It had a vague name, but once inside he gathered, from the plethora of books and pamphlets imported from the Soviet Union, that this must be run by the local Communist party. An ancient man sitting in the back was eager to talk to him about how socialism had been defended by martial law in Poland. Ali dismissed him politely; he had no love for military rule. But he did leave the place with two novels from South Africa and a valuable tip about another bookstore.
   
   On Monday when he appeared at the bar, he handed Carlotta a book. It was old, with a grey-bound cover, its pages falling out. Her fingers opened it delicately.
   ‘How nice. A book of poetry.’
   ‘Not just any book of poetry. It’s a 1918 signed edition by Rabindranath Tagore.’
   ‘Who?’
   ‘Our greatest literary genius. He wrote novels, stories, poems and composed hundreds of songs. It is said there’s a song from him to fit every one of our moods.’
   ‘Since you look so pleased, why don’t you sing one for us tonight?’
   ‘Hah. I’m the worst singer in the world. But I could get you a tape. Without knowing the language, you may not get much out of it.’
   ‘Oh, you mean, it’s a Bangladesh thing, I won’t understand.’
   He looked confused. ‘I would like you to have the book.’
   ‘No, you hold on to it. It would mean more to you than to me.’
   Jimmy, who was listening, interjected, ‘Yeah. Keep it as a memento from an ugly city.’
   Ali winced.
   Carlotta had to step away, and Jimmy asked, ‘So where did you get that book?’
   Ali said he had followed a tip to a warehouse on Lafayette, right off the Lodge Expressway. He entered the building through a dark hallway and once inside, he realised he had never been in a place like this: four floors of used books, everything from huge sections on history, technology, industry, to an entire floor devoted to fiction.
   ‘That’s a terrific place. I go there often. If I’d a known you were into bookstores, I’d have sent you there myself.’
   ‘You know about this place?’
   Jimmy’s mouth turned ugly. ‘Why, you think I’m someone who wouldn’t know about such a place? It’s ‘cause I’m blue collar, ain’t it? Mr. Captain, you got a lot to learn.’
   ‘I didn’t mean that.’
   ‘It was in your voice. I’ve heard it before.’
   Ali left early that night. He’d come with contrition in mind, made peace offerings, but they seemed to spurn him. Perhaps by speaking so directly the last time, he had burned his bridges here already. He considered whether he should find another place to drink his scotch.
   
   Next Saturday Ali continued his search for live music elsewhere. He discovered a bar on the southwest side, in a terribly rundown neighbourhood, where gypsies and Hungarians hung out and played their music. There was a lot of joy in the place, but he felt like an outsider.
   The weekend after, he thought he would look around the east side for something different. As he drove along Gratiot, he saw some people milling outside Pat’s Lounge. Inside he found a small nightclub with a DJ. The clientele here was all black, everyone dressed in sharp outfits. Ali was glad that he wore dress slacks and a silk shirt. The fragrance of perfume and cologne hung in the air, mingling with the smell of liquor. By eleven, the club filled up and the small dance floor became a jumble of bodies. He could not take his eyes away. None of the people looked like they were professional dancers – they appeared to be people who worked regular jobs, which in this city would be in industry or service – but on this night they had clearly abandoned themselves to the joy of their bodies in motion. Ali did not dance and the only time he could remember enjoying his body had been during hard physical exercise in the military – past the point of pain – or during sex. But this was not sex in its disrobed manifestation, even though some of the moves on the dance floor suggested copulation. A few times he found himself wondering how one of the women who moved her hips so fluidly would be in bed, but he was mostly just awestruck at how everyone seemed to mould with the beat of the music.
   
   He returned to the Gearshift. Carlotta approached his table, with curiosity in her eyes, as if asking, ‘Where have you been?’
   He greeted her and said, ‘You win. I take it all back.’ He described his explorations around town and tried to convey some of his admiration for what he’d seen at the dance club. ‘I did not know the human body could be so beautiful, no matter what shape, fat or thin. The music, the flirting, the swaying of bodies. If people can move that way in this city, despite how it looks on the outside, there must be something missing to the man who can’t see.’
   Ali bought a round of drinks for everyone in the house. He made a point of apologising to Jimmy. The guitar player asked him to join a game of pool, and while playing, they talked war stories and books. Ali won, but Jimmy lectured him that he should be careful about making assumptions about people.
   He said, ‘Mr. Captain, workers in this city will surprise you. One of them will be a philosopher, reading every philosophy book he can lay his hands on. The next one may quote you Lenin. Five more might be drunks, but another two will be poets. Set your mind on this: my musical tastes happen to include opera. Sung in Eye-talian.’
   
   I can tell the wind is risin’
   the leaves tremblin’ on the tree
   
   ‘Bloody hell!’ A knot tightened in Ali’s stomach as he heard the shout coming from the office he’d been assigned at PrintWords. He smelled burning plastic. Oh shit, he thought, with just two weeks left to finish, something had to screw up.
   As he entered the room, he saw Ed, the janitor, pulling the plug out of the wall socket. Smoke swirled out of the back of the computer on the desk.
   ‘I smelled something burning as I was walking by,’ Ed said. He was an older man, the same height as Ali, but thinned out with age. His hair was all white. Ali had seen him a few times and vaguely remembered hearing he was new to the company.
   ‘Thank you for your quick work. I owe you one.’
   ‘Oh, all in a day’s work. I gotta go tell the security guard.’
   Ali slumped down in his chair and made a call to have a new system rushed over in two days’ time. He walked to the back of the building where PrintWords had its production area, with its giant web presses and supply of huge rolls of newsprint and bond paper. A forklift truck went by with a roll of paper in its teeth. He needed some caffeine and though he hated the brew from the machine, today it would have to do. Pouring a cup, he sat down at the picnic table the company had set out for the production workers to eat lunch. The managers and office staff had a small lunchroom with vending machines and a microwave, but Ali preferred the company in the back. Ed joined him a minute later, puffing on a cigarette. He didn’t usually walk very fast but this afternoon he appeared surprisingly agile.
   ‘It’s the arthritis,’ he explained when he caught Ali staring at his legs. ‘Some days are better than others. So where are you from, India?’
   ‘Next door, a country called Bangladesh.’
   ‘I was in India once,’ Ed continued.
   Ali got irritated. He’d just told the man he was not from India. But he let the feeling pass. He did, after all, ‘owe one’ to Ed. Besides, the man had made him curious: when could he have been in India?
   As if reading his mind, the older man said, ‘Second World War. We were posted on the Burma sector. The Japs were about to invade India, and some American troops – GI’s and airmen – were posted there to back up the Brits.’
   ‘Oh right.’ Ali remembered that from a history class at the academy. ‘Do you remember where you were?’
   ‘Some place called Tejgam. I think it was near a town called Dakar.’
   Hey man, Ali wanted to shout, get your geography right. Dakar is in Senegal. But again he let his annoyance pass. Ed probably meant Dhaka, which had been called Dacca until very recently. Then it hit him, Ed had said Tejgam.
   ‘Could you mean Tejgaon? I was born in Dhaka and Tejgaon was a neighbourhood just around the corner from where I grew up. Do you remember if there was a small railroad station there? And an old Catholic Church?’
   ‘Yeah. At the crossing, we’d get held up when the trains were passing through.’
   Ali pressed him with more questions, seeking details from that time, but Ed said it was a long time ago. ‘I remember the people were very poor. Looking at you, I see that people have done better in the years since.’
   At the end of the day, Ali went to use the restroom. It was occupied, so he went over to the toilet meant for the production workers. Right as he passed by their lockers, he noticed Ed changing from his uniform to street clothes. Ali saw a flash of his bare arm, on it a tattoo of an eagle’s head. He’d seen that tattoo before. But where? The question would agitate him all during the week. Once in a while, he felt like he was closing in on some memory, but the connection kept eluding him. It did not help that an August heat wave hit the city that very week. People said it would last at least a couple of weeks.
   
   Lord have mercy, my heart’s in misery
   Crazy about my baby, yes, send him back to me
   
   The second Ali walked in, Carlotta knew something was wrong. He looked shorter, almost bent. He kept drowning shots of whiskey until the bartender sent him a message of refusal. He even smelled funky like he hadn’t washed in days.
   ‘The heat seems to be getting to you,’ she said, coming near his table, but not approaching too close. She almost said, hey, a shower would both cool you off and make you smell better, but something in his bloodshot eyes told her to tread lightly.
   Truth be told, she was afraid of finding out. Much as she liked hearing people’s stories, she became uncomfortable when those stories started to creep into their present-day blues. The next thing she knew, they’d ask her for advice. Why is it, she thought, that folks think a black woman, especially a blues singer, is some kind of all-wise woman? If they needed help, they should get counselling. Or if they were into spirits, they should find a hoodoo woman. And if they were too broke, they could always ask the bartender.
   She stopped. He hadn’t asked her a thing, why was she getting all riled up? She fanned herself with a paper fan from her purse; it must be the damned heat, now heading into its second week.
   Carlotta got herself a Coke with lots of ice and returned to Ali’s table. Trying to be pleasant, she asked, ‘So did you find anything else pretty this week?’
   ‘No.’ He stared out into space. ‘Other things have been on my mind.’
   Carlotta passed up the chance to ask.
   ‘Maybe I did, but I won’t tell you.’
   She held up her hands. ‘It’s just too hot for games tonight. Look at you, looking like a wreck, letting yourself go. Don’t you care?’
   ‘Why the fuck should I?’
   She had never heard him cuss like that.
   ‘My parents are dead. I cannot go home because there’s a hangman’s rope waiting for me. It took me five years after coming here to get any respect. I had a long career as a telecom officer, but I had to take any menial job I could find – even cleaning floors in a factory – while I took night classes in technical school, learning stuff I already knew, just to get a piece of paper.’
   ‘Look, I’m not responsible for any of that. Why you taking it out on me? I’m sorry I said you don’t care. I know you take your work seriously.’
   ‘Yes, but what the fuck has it been for?’ His eyes glassy, he muttered something under his breath.
   It sounded like, ‘I should shoot him,’ but she wasn’t sure. He looked deranged. Carlotta didn’t need this. The heat was suffocating.
   
   Ali was back the next week. He looked much the same and downed shots of whiskey like it was lemonade. At least it looked like he’d taken a shower. Going up to him, Carlotta said, ‘Look, I know I haven’t asked you what’s going on. But something’s messing you up. I’ve enjoyed your stories and it’s only fair that I hear you out. Besides, if I don’t let you tell me what’s killing you, you’ll probably become an alcoholic and I’d have to bear that on my conscience. Uh huh, I’m not ready for that.’
   ‘It’s too late for that, anyway. But I appreciate what you’re saying.’
   Carlotta put her hand lightly on his shoulder and said, ‘Let’s meet up somewhere outside this time. How about Hart Plaza during the Ethnic Festival next Sunday? If this heat keeps up, we could do with the breeze from the river.’
   
   You’re so fine pretty baby
   Let me love you all the time
   
   The city hosted festivals nearly every weekend in the summer. Some were huge, like the blues and jazz festivals or the Downtown Hoedown. The Sunday Carlotta suggested turned out to be a combo festival, one where the organisers threw in a mix of ethnicities that were not well-represented in the population.
   Carlotta arrived first and waited near the entrance to the plaza on Jefferson Avenue. Ali looked relieved when he showed up. He said, ‘I wasn’t sure you’d really come.’
   ‘And why not? Wasn’t I the one who asked you?’
   ‘Yes, but it feels strange. We’ve never met outside the bar.’ He looked her up and down. Carlotta was dressed in a light summer dress, blue and yellow irises on a beige background. He nodded in appreciation. ‘You look lovely.’ Pointing to her short natural hair, he asked, ‘Did you cut your hair?’
   She laughed. ‘Oh, I wear a wig when I perform.’
   ‘I wasn’t sure that was you when I first walked up.’
   ‘So what do you think of my real hair?’ She twirled her head around.
   ‘It suits you,’ he said with a wide smile.
   Carlotta took his hand and led him forward. ‘Where do you want to go? We could walk to the riverbank. Doesn’t look like much is going on, festival-wise. This week it’s Scandinavian and Indian. I wonder how they came up with that combination.’
   ‘I cannot even imagine.’ He stopped for a minute. ‘Wait a second. Maybe it’s cardamom.’
   ‘Whose mom?’
   He chuckled. ‘No, not a person. Cardamom, a spice. We use it in some of our richer dishes. I read somewhere that the Danish put it in their baking.’
   ‘And from that spice, ladies and gentleman, we present a uniquely new melting pot, the Scandinavian and Indian cultural mix? Uh huh, I don’t think so.’
   ‘We could go down and ask the people in charge.’ He started to lead her toward the steps down to the stage.
   She resisted. “Never mind. But it does raise a question I’ve been dying to ask you.’ She led him toward the river. ‘I know you speak perfect English so you understand what the songs literally mean, but the blues, do they do anything for you?’
   He surprised her with his quick response, suggesting he must have thought about this. ‘Two things. The wailing of the guitar and the beat. They create an impression: the guitar makes you feel melancholy but how sad can you be when your toes want to tap the floor? They make me want to dance.’
   Carlotta said, ‘I think that’s the heart of it. But I have this other notion I want to share.’ She found a spot on the grass facing the river and they sat down. A giant ship chugged by carrying iron ore toward the mills downriver. ‘I do think there’s something universal in music that makes you feel sad or happy. But I also feel there are walls impossible to find your way through. Each people has their own hard times music. What’s yours like?’
   Ali thought for a moment, then replied, ‘There’s plenty of wailing, flutes and in the voice.’
   ‘So while we may each have our own sad times music, there’ll be something untranslatable – even if we could have a universal translator like they have on Star Trek. There’s something only a people will feel from their own music.’
   ‘You mean to say that the music will carry you to a memory that is solely yours, deeply embedded inside the way you’re made as a people. That it will carry history?’
   ‘That’s exactly what I mean. You may feel the pain, your body may feel the music, you may understand the words, you may even sympathise, but without that memory common to your people, you’ll still miss something of the essence. The blues take me directly back to cotton fields, hard labour, the trials of love through impossibly difficult times.’
   ‘I can see what you’re getting at. But isn’t that personal for you because you’re from the south? Because you’ve been around the stories more than simply the music, the same landscape? How about others who’ve grown up here with no connection to any of that? Tell me then, why are so few black people attracted to the blues? And more white people are.’
   She looked at him sceptically. ‘I didn’t say I had it all figured out.’ Then she broke into laughter.
   
   And the days keep on worryin’ me
   there’s a hellhound on my trail
   
   ‘I was suddenly taken back to a place long ago,’ Ali said. He told her about his encounter with Ed at PrintWords and how the image of his tattoo kept nagging at him until one night, in the haze of alcohol, as the world churned around him, it finally hit him. He remembered where he’d seen that tattoo before.
   ‘I had just turned eight or nine. My father promised to take me back to the old part of town to buy me my favourite sweets. All morning I’d badgered him, “When are we going?” Early in the afternoon after a morning shower had drenched the city, we set off. He even treated me to a ride in a horse carriage. I can still hear the tick-tock sound of the horses’ hooves on the pavement. And finally when we were at the sweet shop, I had my fill of my favourite sweets, kalojaam.’
   ‘What are those?’ Carlotta broke in.
   ‘Kalojaam? Sweets named after a black berry. Black on the outside, pink inside. Very soft and deliciously sweet.’ He closed his eyes, tasting something in his mind.
   ‘They actually got sweets like that? You’re not making this up?’ She narrowed her eyes.
   ‘Why would I?’ He looked confused, then broke out in a loud laugh. ‘Oho, I’d never even considered. Carlotta, you have a dirty mind.’
   ‘Hey, I’m a blues singer. Surely you’ve heard songs singing of jelly roll?’
   ‘You mean, that’s not about pastry?’ His eyes widened in surprise.
   Carlotta laughed and shook her head. ‘See what I mean – you can only translate so much.’
   ‘Yes, but that’s just slang.’
   ‘Anyway, didn’t mean to interrupt. Go on with your story.’
   ‘We were about to leave the shop. My father had ordered a package of sweets to take home. In those days they used containers made out of semi-dried leaves stitched together. As we left the shop, we came upon some white soldiers in a Jeep. One of them motioned in my father’s direction. He gripped my hand tighter, though he stopped.
   ‘One of the soldiers shouted, “Hey, how about giving us some of that?” The others rocked with laughter. The driver hopped off the Jeep and came down in front of us. I remember him being very tall. He snatched our sweets and returned to his vehicle.
   ‘”Sir, that’s ours,’ my father said.’
   ‘The man then played a cat and mouse game with my father. Finally he held out the container and leaned over and dropped it on my father’s head. He swore at my father. By this time a crowd had gathered and a murmur went through the people on the street. One of the men on the Jeep stood up, pulled out a pistol and held it up. The crowd parted to let the Jeep drive through. I remember the man holding up the pistol had a picture on his arm, the tattoo of an eagle’s head. I had never seen a tattoo before. My father had put on good clothes to take me on that trip. Now, I remember the look on his face, his head capped with the container of sweets, the sugar syrup mingled with the tears on his face.’
   Carlotta reached over to take his hand. She held it between her palms and found it surprisingly soft. She didn’t know what to say.
   ‘Carlotta, you’re always saying things happen for a reason. I was doubtful. But what if you’re right? Maybe that’s the reason the only thing I care about is my work. It’s my work that brought me here to Detroit, face to face with this man, dredged from deep within my memory. So that I can finally have my revenge.’
   ‘Revenge?’ the words came out in a whisper. ‘Why, what do you plan to do?’
   ‘I’m not sure. I’m considering my options. I could shoot him, or maybe stick a bomb in his car.’
   She was too stunned to act on her impulse to take her hand away from his. ‘What are you saying?’
   ‘I may just settle for getting him fired.’
   ‘For what reason?’
   ‘I’ll make something up.’
   ‘You would make up a lie?’
   ‘Carlotta, it’s him. I’ve seen the tattoo.’ He pleaded with his eyes.
   ‘It’s a tattoo many soldiers have. Thousands.’
   ‘But how many were over there at that time?’
   ‘So what if he was? That’s some shit that went down forty years ago!’ She nearly shouted.
   ‘It’s not just history. Look what happened with those men who bashed in that Chinese guy’s head last year. They got off scot-free. It’s not their world anymore, but to them, we’re still the same: wogs, gooks, niggers.’
   Carlotta didn’t know what wogs were, but she got the picture. He continued, ‘It’s all about power: who has it, who doesn’t. In this case, forty years later, I have power over him.’
   ‘How?’
   ‘He’s just a janitor. And I’ve heard people complain he moves too slow. I work in the front office. I could start something, and it would be my word against his.’
   Carlotta’s mouth dried up and she finally took her hand away. ‘And just ’cause you work out front and wear a white collar, you forget one thing. He’s white, you’re not. Haven’t you learned one thing from living here? White rules.’
   ‘You’ll see,’ he said.
   Damn, the man’s stubborn as a bull, Carlotta thought. Why was he talking to her if he’d already made up his mind? ‘Yes, you have a better job. He’s what, pushing retirement, and what’s he got? A janitor’s job. Who knows what road brought him there? Why do you want to drive him down further?’
   Ali frowned at her.
   ‘Wasn’t it you who told me that one reason you quit the military was that you saw how holding a weapon in your hand makes you do shameful things? Are you forgetting all that?’
   ‘No, but there’s one more thing that came back to me: the reason I joined the military. It wasn’t because I was interested in radio and electronics and a signals career was the fastest way to learn that knowledge. No, it was all driven by this childhood memory of my father’s humiliation. When I saw those soldiers standing above us, I knew I wanted that kind of power.’ His voice was now hoarse.
   ‘Even though the army you joined was someone else’s army and you eventually had to go to war against them?’
   ‘Even so. Why are you bringing that up? I deserted them, didn’t I? I joined the freedom struggle when the time came, didn’t I?’
   ‘Yes, you did, but you seem to have forgotten why you lost faith. Why you quit a second time, from your own army. I’m not the one who said this, it was you who said, “power steals your soul.” I’m not sure how much power you have; it’s just a little pond where you think you’re some kind of bigger fish than this guy Ed.’
   ‘Maybe. Dhaka forty years ago was also a little pond, but these guys were with the sharks who ruled.’ Ali looked utterly dejected. He stood up and shook his head. ‘I thought you would understand. That you of all people would understand. What if you came face to face with a white man who had humiliated your daddy and you’d seen it with your own eyes and now you found yourself in a position to get back at him – what would you do?’
   ‘It’s a long time ago. I would let it go.’
   ‘Forgive him? Christianity has softened you too much. That’s the reason....’
   Carlotta stood up and put a hand over his mouth. ‘No, you’d better quit while you can. You don’t know a thing about us. You’ve picked up a few things by hanging around this summer, but a little knowledge can only get you so far. Let me say this, it’s not about forgiveness. My grandma had a saying, and I think she was right. “You can’t always right every wrong. Just be better than the ones who done you wrong.”’
   They stared at each other for what felt to her like a long time. She was the first one to walk away. Earlier that afternoon when she’d arrived she figured she might end up going somewhere with him afterwards. But she couldn’t see touching him after he got so hard and bitter. Poor man, he was probably just missing home and his daddy. She could have given him a taste of gentleness, but she also wanted a softer loving in return. He was capable of it. She would have made love to the man who went out seeking beauty in Detroit. But she was not ready to lie next to the half-crazed man thirsting for revenge.
   
   Sometimes I want to holler, sometimes I want to shout
   Sometimes I want to cry and I wonder what about
   
   Three Mondays went by and then Robert Wilson asked Carlotta, ‘What happened to your man? He don’t seem to come round here no more.’
   ‘He was never my man.’ She remained calm.
   ‘But you were sweet on each other, all of us knew that,’ Ernie said.
   ‘Lay off Carlotta,’ Jimmy broke in. ‘This is a club. People come and go, it’s the nature of the business.’
   ‘I miss him,’ Phyllis said. The others looked at her; she hardly ever opened her mouth. ‘He brought something else to this bar. An air of mystery, a smell of adventure.’
   Carlotta’s eyes glazed.
   Karl came up to her and asked if he could, for once, sing a song tonight. He said he’d been practising. She’d always said no, but tonight she told him, ‘Why don’t you sing something in Polish? It doesn’t have to be a blues song.’ Karl’s face lit up with such joy that she thought he would try to kiss her. She stepped back from his exuberance.
   He got up, consulted with the drummer and bass player. They laid down a slow tempo beat. Then he opened his mouth and sang. He had a rough voice, and his mouth seemed to fill up with his words. She realised she’d never heard him sing; she’d just gone along with what others had said. Perhaps the song would sound strange to her ears, but there was fullness in his voice. He did something curious with affecting achiness through his voice. It reminded him of what Bob Dylan might sound like speaking in his language.
   The room clapped, asked for one more. He did a more traditional bluesy number, again in Polish. People stomped their feet, and when he finished, Karl took a bow as he stepped off the stage.
   Ali Ashraf did not return that night – or any night after that.
   
   Two months later, as the weather cooled, the trees in the city shed their leaves, and the sun disappeared for weeks, Carlotta could no longer hold back her curiosity. During a break at work, she looked up PrintWords in the phone book and dialled their number. A machine’s voice came on to say that the number was no longer in service.
   A week later when she came to the Gearshift Lounge – the band was now playing Tuesdays – the bartender handed her an envelope. She took the card out; it was a picture of bright orange and red foliage from New England. She read the words inside:
   PrintWords shut down the week after we spoke. The company could not compete. They had bought our system in a desperate move to use their ageing equipment, but others are investing now in more advanced technology. Everyone was laid off. Our contract was terminated and they still owe us money.
   What would have been the point of getting Ed fired? He’s out of a job again, and my partner and I don’t know if our company will survive. While I thought I was some kind of big fish in a pond, I’d forgotten that there are overflowing rivers bigger than any pond. And that the sort of power that really decides things in the world is larger than either of us.
   Thank you for trying to argue me out of my lunacy. You were right. Again.
   P.S. I did find one more thing of beauty in your city. I should have told you. But I was too caught up in my own inside ugliness. A shame, because maybe life in my last couple of weeks there could have shown me (and perhaps you) a different course.
   That night she sang Robert Johnson’s ‘Hellhound on my trail.’ And after driving home, she sat on the hood of her car and allowed herself to feel the stillness of the night around her. It was cold and she pulled her coat tighter around herself. The silence did not last long, it never did in the city. Next door, a dog whined, a car door slammed some distance away, and sirens screamed from an ambulance, probably rushing along the main road. She thought back about Ali’s note. She felt no vindication, no joy in having been right. She felt cheated, that someone else’s demon from so far back in time could jump out of nowhere – no warning ever given to her – and grab something that had felt so close and take it out of her reach. A song began to form in her head, just a few lines – but it was a beginning.
   
   They say you got something sweet, something bitter, and bold
   Umm, got something sweet, something bitter, and bold,
   But the way you been treating me,
   Seems you already got too much to hold.