Cathy Ulrich
1. THE DISPATCHLove Songs for Ghosts
The torch singer at the end of the world has found a working cassette player. It is nestled amongst other dust-covered treasures in a Chinatown rummage shop. There is a church cookbook, spiral-bound; a staring-eyed pewter rooster head; a set of mismatched plates, dragons dancing merrily around the rim. The torch singer brushes them all aside, lifts the cassette player as if it is the most precious thing.
The torch singer clasps it to her chest, the torch singer presses play. There is no cassette inside; she hears the whirring of spools.
In the quiet, the torch singer listens, listens, listens.
* * *
Before the end of the world, the torch singer was popular in Chinatown lounges. She wore satin slippers, embroidered cheongsam, held the microphone in both her hands, sang as if her heart was breaking.
There was a plastic fishbowl for dollar tips at the foot of the stage. She remembers flattening the bills in the morning, running them over the edge of her bureau again and again until they went smooth. She stacked them in piles, little dollar towers in her bedroom.
The torch singer remembers the sound of a ringing telephone, the smell of stale cigarette smoke on plush velvet chairs, the way she had to brace herself when the train turned a corner.
The torch singer listens to the spools spin round and round. They make a sound like the ghost of a song.
* * *
Before the world ended, the torch singer had a lover with a neatly trimmed goatee and a day job where he wore a suit. He’d stop by her place on his way home, throw his suit jacket over the wooden back of one of her kitchen chairs, say the way he knew she liked, honey, I’m home.
The torch singer remembers the softness of her satin slippers as she ran to him from her bedroom, the scratch of his goatee against her face when they kissed.
* * *
The torch singer has always loved Chinatown, the dying bamboo in the plaza, the ramune soda at the drugstore, the lilt of Mandarin pop songs in little kitsch stores. She always recognized wo ai ni when it was sung, wo ai ni, wo ai ni, absently touching the carved heads of tiny foo dogs and greed dragons, I love you.
* * *
The torch singer has been drinking whiskey at the lounges where she used to sing, the torch singer has been pulling silk cheongsams out of plastic bags and wearing them till they fray. She darkens her mouth with a scarlet lipstick, she stands on the stage, whiskey bottle in her hand. She wants to sing, but she can’t remember any of the words.
* * *
Before the world ended, the torch singer’s lover left her.
She knows, he said.
Oh, said the torch singer.
She said: Will you come back again, though, but her lover only kissed her knuckles, carried his suit jacket out the door.
The torch singer remembers how she watched him from her window as he walked away, the stiffness of his back, the length of his stride, how she knuckle-rapped the window, softly, with the fingers he had just kissed.
* * *
At the end of the world, the torch singer holds an empty cassette player in her hands, listens to the whirring spools.
I know this song, she thinks. Wo ai ni, wo ai ni.
2. BUREAU INVENTORYVoices of Jonestown book (I’d just finished reading)
Kitty Genovese book (still reading)
Laptop with Sarah Shields “Barfday Girl” sticker
Casket Company notepad
That kind of pen I like
Teddy Bear sweater
3. BIOGRAPHYCathy Ulrich likes the strawberry ramune soda the best. Her work has been published in various journals, including Sepia, Okay Donkey, and Jet Fuel Review.