Jack's Girls

      "Wie gehts, mein Freund? Kommen Sie herein, bitte." Jack greeted me in an overenthusiastic German accent as I entered his apartment. "Möchten Sie ein Bier oder einen Wein?"
      "I'll start with a water, thanks." I replied; I had grown used to his sudden linguistic shifts.
      "Ah, Wasser, eine sehr gute Wahl." He poured some asinine Norwegian Luxury water into a glass and handed it to me. "Hier, das Wasser ist für Sie!" I took it from him and drained half the glass; I hate to admit it, but his pretentious water is quite good.
      "Vielen Dank!" I muttered to appease him; there was nothing Jack loved so much as to tutor someone enough to carry on conversations in various languages.
      "Klaus, mein Freund, ich fahre nach Frankenmuth morgen!" He announced excitedly as we sat down in his drawing room.
      "Are you, now? What's in Frankenmuth?" He smiled absently.
      "Ein Mädchen, ein schönes Mädchen!"
      "Do I know this beautiful girl?" I queried. It seemed strange that Jack was so excited about going to meet a girl; after all, he had no trouble in the pulling overly attractive women department.
      "You don't," he said, switching back to English, "at least not yet. She's one of my girls from the Grand Rapids Days.
      "Your girls?" I asked, not entirely surprised by Jack's borderline chauvinistic verbiage but slightly taken aback.
      "Yes, my girls." He replied matter of factly. "Obviously, I'm not implying that I own them as one would a horse or a slave;" a cheeky wink as he casually continued his passive protest of the modern conception of slavery—without going too in depth, Jack felt that it was unfair, historically shortsighted, and rather pompous for Black Americans to claim the entire history of slavery as their own ancestral struggle—"they are simply 'my girls'." I had no idea what this meant but I sensed a longwinded and frustrangingly fascinating bardic tale about the good old days. Sure enough, Jack sat down in his favorite chair, lit up one of his imported cigarettes, and began.
      "Many years and several lifetimes ago, I was part of a traveling troupe; akin to the Edema Ruh." I was only later to discover the reference to Patrick Rothfuss' wonderful novel, The Name of the Wind. I will not explain it; instead, I will urge you to read it for yourself, it will change your life. "Our regular Thursday night consisted of traveling to Grand Rapids, playing and dancing at the local céilí, and busking in the center of town. As time progressed, we became somewhat of a local attraction; people knew to come see us every Thursday in front of the statue of Senator Vandenburg. Obviously, the night entailed copious amount of drinking along with a fair amount of womanizing. We had our ups and downs; muggings, alcohol poisonings, and a violent turf dispute with a local carriage driver. All in all, though, it was usually a rather successful and entertaining endeavor, with only one drawback. That drawback was, as it so often is, sobriety. Due to the long drive back to our home base, one of us would have to stop drinking at some point in order to regain sobriety. This was incredibly harmful, not only to our music, but to the group dynamic. Sobriety is horrid on its own, but lone sobriety in a field of drunks is pure misery. Eventually, we were lucky enough to encounter the girls.
      "One Thursday, two fairly attractive young ladies walked down the street and into our corner. We greeted them warmly, playing the good hosts with offers of cigarettes, pulls off of our flasks, and a seat on the adjacent bench. They accepted the cigarettes and alcohol but declined the bench, instead sitting languidly on the sidewalk directly in front of us. We launched into a wonderful performance. Keep in mind, street music is much more than simply playing songs and tunes. One must read and interact accordingly with the audience; lyrics must be adjusted, sing alongs encouraged, jokes and slapstick mini-plays between sets, and so on.
      "The two young ladies, Kandi and Anastasia, were drawn into the performance, eventually becoming non-musician members of the show. They would accompany us in dances, plays, and Kandi even took up cigarette collections when we ran low. It was revealed through our conversations that the girls attended the local art college, quite a prestigious school in the art world. They lived in the student neighborhood with two other girls attending the same school. At the time I was dating the only girl who has ever broken my heart so I kept my flirtation to a friendly level. Séamus had no such qualms and used his Abercrombie good looks and innocent Calvinist charm to quickly win the heart of both young ladies.
      "At this time, we were interrupted by Ed; fucking Ed. Ed was a member of Grand Rapids Street dwelling community. In the past, we had always welcomed the transient citizens of the underground to sit, listen, and converse at our corner. As long as they were respectful and didn't harass our clients, we handed out cigarettes, good cheer, and, after particularly lucrative evenings, profit shares. Ed was not one of the happy harmless winos we were accustomed to. He was a loudmouthed, vodka soaked degenerate. He posted up on our bench and quickly went to work harassing our clients. Kandi, in a kindhearted attempt to prevent Ed's imminent eviction, sat down next to him and distracted him from bothering the passing marks. With our business secure, we left Ed to peacefully ramble on to Kandi, checking on her safety and sanity from time to time. As we were packing up, Kandi remarked to me that Ed was the most evil man she had ever encountered. Apparently, he had been explaining to her how he lived a relatively comfortable life, living off of various welfare programs and working the system. I was not surprised at all by this but Kandi still had a young liberal's faith in social welfare and was scandalized. A young couple walked by and we played one more set for their benefit. We watched the unsupervised Ed, sitting innocently next to our case; too innocently. His eyes gave him away, remaining fixed on the case as the rest of his body drunkenly swayed from side to side. As we knew he would, and failing miserably at nonchalance, he casually reached toward the case with its alluring piles of cash. As one being, the band jumped forwards, yelling warnings to him. He threw up his hands, screaming apologies, moved away in a crab walk, and made a bed on the curb.
      "We were saying our goodbyes to the girls when Ed rolled into the street, right into oncoming traffic. Springing to action, Séan Goubhniu stopped traffic as Séamus and I carried Ed back to the bench. He woke up and began struggling. We explained that he needed to stay on the bench if he didn't want to get squished. He calmed down. We gave him five dollars and ordered him to stay on the bench. He was still singing our praises as we made our way back to the car."

      Jack jumped up quickly, "I need to get my haircut!" He exclaimed, throwing on a blazer and grabbing his car keys. "I'll continue the story at Alfredo's."