The Desert Rose Read Online Free

she got off the bus in Las Vegas the first thingshe did was walk right up the street and look at it. And about three months later, just when she thought she was going to have to be a waitress all her life there was an audition and she got up her nerve and Didier hired her right away, and then fell in love with her, although he was sixty-four at the time and was the producer of the show and very busy. She had even got to live in his suite at the Trop, which was a pretty big change from life in Tulsa, where she grew up.
    Probably it was Didier who got her to liking fat men, he was French and used to good food and was so fat he was dangerous to himself, which was proved for sure about six months later when he died in bed one morning while Harmony was downstairs unwinding with some of the girls.
    It was her first death, she was not experienced with it at all, she had come in meaning to give Didier a kiss and saw that he was dead, only she couldn’t admit it right away, couldn’t admit it one bit and went on and took her makeup off and looked and Didier was dead okay though she still couldn’t admit it, maybe not for an hour until she thought well I guess now I’ll order some breakfast so she did and Jimmy came up with it. They always sent Jimmy because Didier was fussy about his food, he was fussy about every-thing actually but particularly about his food, and Jimmy came in with the breakfast and stood around waiting to serve it until she just said “Could you go look at him,” which surprised Jimmy, that was a little unusual, and he looked and came back and said “Harmony, he’s dead,” which was when she admitted it and started to cry.
    Years later Jimmy’s wife, who by his own admission had been a hooker once, went back to her old habits, only she took it further and stole some guy’s wallet and he turned out to be pretty big time and the wallet had like a few thousand in it so she got sent to prison and Harmony was driving along the Strip one day and happened to see Jimmystanding at the bus stop in front of the Circus Circus looking so sad that she just immediately took him home, only the problem was all they could ever find to talk about was the morning Didier died, it was not a basis for a relation-ship they concluded, though Harmony had no regrets about it, she had for sure tried worse than Jimmy, he was from San Francisco and dressed nice and would definitely spend his last dime if it was something she and Pepper needed for the house, or doctor bills or whatever.
    Still, it was Didier she remembered every time she saw Wendell standing in Myrtle’s driveway looking down at his feet, it had to be the big belly that caused her to be reminded, they were otherwise not alike. Didier had been a happy man, at least he was as long as the show was okay and his food cooked the way it was supposed to be and he had a girl with an absolutely perfect bust to be his mistress, fortunately hers had been perfect when she was seventeen, Didier had stressed that fact a lot—on the other hand Wendell looked like he would like to stick his head in the pool he helped maintain and keep it there. He moonlighted at the all-night Amoco station and Harmony always felt a throb of love because he was such a gentleman and cleaned all her windshields and even her mirrors, even the rearview mirror inside the car which of course in a desert got dust on it too, she could tell he couldn’t get over his son losing his life like that because of the gayness, or his wife and the cop and who knew what else, Wendell probably had sorrows she didn’t suspect; after all he was in his late sixties and she had only known him for a year or two.
    Myrtle looked up from her Cheerios and saw Harmony but no car, which was a shock but secondary to finding out if there were any garage sales on that day that offered goodies she had urgent need of. Harmony pitched her the paper and squatted down to say good morning to Maude, knowing full well Myrtle wouldn’t even