Read Online Underbelly by Gary Phillips - Free Book Online Page A

the fritz, though the librarian assured him that there was a laid off gentleman—atinkerer as she put it—would be coming in to fix it this weekend. From there he walked over to Exposition Park and decided to take in an exhibit about ’30s-era jazz clubs at the California African American Museum. This included a recreated section of the Club Alabam.
    Standing in the tableau, a mellow croon by Billy Eckstine filled the space. When he was a kid, he had an uncle, husband of his mom’s sister, who’d lived out here and visited the family in Chicago in the summer. Uncle Calvin would sit around drinking Hamms and Pabst beer, playing dominoes with his father and his friends, telling stories about Central Avenue, the Stem, from back in the day. Later, eating his fries at a McDonald’s inside the Science Center, he watched a group of kids ohhing and ahhing on some kind of school outing. Time was tight indeed.
    Because of traffic and the work around the Emerald Shoals project, he got back downtown on the bus to the coffee house late. There they were showing a ’60s four-waller,
The Brain Invaders.
Angie Baine was second-billed with John Agar as some sort of scientist to his military man. She of course also falls in love with him, but has to electrocute him atop Mount Wilson after he’s turned into a brain eater. All part of some Russki shenanigans it seemed. The audience dug it.
    Afterward, with Angie seated up front and looking pretty together, she answered questions and signed copies of a book about B-movie actresses that included a write-up about her and some cheesecake shots. Magrady looked through the coffee table book and stopped appreciatively on a shot of a nude Baine, hair up in a beehive, in an old-fashioned bathtub filled with liquefied chocolate. Seductively she munched on a giant strawberry with several of the fruit sprinkled about in the chocolate.
    â€œBet you figured I’d be wasted, huh?” she told him as he came up to congratulate her as the crowd filtered away.
    â€œWell,” he began.
    â€œYou’ve inspired me, Magrady. I wasn’t drinking at the King Eddy. But I was on my way to get my hair done, and knew Earl would at least let me make a call.” She squeezed his hand. “Glad you came.”
    â€œYeah, this was great, Angie.”
    â€œYou can be sweet when you want to be.” She kissed him on the neck.
    An octogenarian who’d been hanging back clomped over using his walker. He had on a turtleneck, a wig worse than what Phil Spector had dared to wear in court, and a large medallion on a heavy gold plated chain around his neck. Baine smiled weakly at him and the old fella socked Magrady in the gut. It wasn’t much of a blow.
    â€œThis is him, isn’t it? This is the swingin’ dick bastard you’re schtupping these days?”
    Angie Baine giggled and Magrady took a step back. The clown with the bad rug might not be a candidate for an AARP-sanctioned boxing match, but he wasn’t inclined to take another punch, no matter how anemic, to his stomach.
    â€œBe cool, Jeremy,” she said to the senior citizen. “You don’t want to stroke out.”
    â€œWho is this chump?” Magrady asked, eyebrow raised.
    â€œHe adds yet another insult to his affronts.” His arms shook his walker. “Who am I,” he mocked.
    â€œJeremy was the director-producer of
Brain Invaders
among other such efforts,” Baine illuminated, touching the oldster’s shoulder. This instantly put a calming effect on him, and he relaxed.
    â€œThen how come you weren’t at the screening, Coppola?”
    â€œI was getting my pole waxed, Cool Breeze,” he groused at Magrady.
    â€œLook here, dad,” Magrady started, thumping Jeremy’s medallion with the back of two fingers. It depicted in bas-relief a nude couple doing it 69-style. Real classy. “Shouldn’t you be more concerned with how many times a day