Hotel Venice and the Bohemian Blue
by C. F. Pierce
“Only one thing that I did wrong
Stayed in Mississippi a day too long”
— Bob Dylan
Allegro et libre
“Time to check out,” I tell myself, looking at sailboats and surfers from the open window of my hotel room. I inhale minty incense and gaze down on a dark-skinned woman in a sombrero beneath towering palm trees. Laid out before her on a folding table are glazed ceramic skulls with empty eye sockets decorated with white teeth and yellow flower petals to celebrate el dia de la muerte. Her stall is between a “Fortune Teller ‘’ in a purple head scarf and a bearded man in dark glasses selling oil portraits of Jim Morrison and Jimi Hendrix.
I tap my feet to the live reggae beat. On the stretch of grass behind the drummer of the three-piece band sits a nylon orange dome. The moment has come for me to turn off my laptop, toss my T-shirts into my suitcase, hop into my car and blast back on the 10 East to the blistering heat of the inland. But I can’t do it. Not yet.
I had requested two weeks leave from the City of Cactus Medical Center where I wear a long white coat, a rubber stethoscope coiled around my neck and people call me “doctor.” It was my dream to get away to a beach or island and write the Great American novel. Fourteen days is not much time for such an endeavor. But enough for a start.
The novel is about an offbeat physician with issues: Write what you know, isn’t that what they say? He is an MD by day and rock musician by night, lead guitarist in a heavy metal band called DSR which stands for “drugs, sex and rock ‘n roll.”
After one particularly spirited late-night gig, the sleep-deprived zombie crawls into work and prescribes the wrong medication to a patient who goes into a coma and dies. He alone knows about the fatal error. To deal with the guilt, he consumes alcohol in excess and self-medicates. Co-workers notice changes in his behavior and start asking questions. As for the title, I’m considering: “Doctor Rocker,” “Heal Thyself,” or “Ain’t No Cure.”
I’m definitely onto something but need a few more days to make it truly great. When I return to the routine in the desert, away from the coastal community of crazies, I will finish it but fear it won’t be the same.
“Sorry to hear that,” replies the hardcore woman in HR who checks her email 24/7. Heaven forbid she’d give it a rest on Sunday. “Hope you feel better. Be sure to bring in prescriptions and receipts for any medical visits.”
For Alison, with whom I am supposed to have dinner tonight, I opt for text. “Sorry babe. Been bit by the bug. Must be something going around. Need to stay put a few more days. I’ll give you a buzz soon.”
The terse reply was almost immediate: “Call me.” Alison is very devoted. But when it comes to my literary ambitions — or art in general — she doesn’t get it.
I walk under the midday sun by the blue Pacific holding my writing pad and aluminum beach chair, which I implant in the sand across from an unassuming brick building, a rehab clinic. The words Venice House are discreetly displayed on a metal plate by the entrance. I get to work on the next chapter, the part where people start asking what’s up with the doctor.
I barely start putting words and phrases to paper when I hear the high treble sounds of a violin playing Beethoven from the boardwalk. I turn my head and stand up.
The violinist of Venice has long dark hair and intense brown eyes. She is wearing a long silky black evening dress. The music fills the salty breeze with a complex melody from an allegro movement of some concerto. The notes are extracted from hollow wood by fast delicate fingers dancing on nylon strings with perfection. She moves her bow up and down with intense concentration while surfers in wetsuits pass, crossing hot sand to brave the waves.
As I stroll toward her, my movements feel involuntary. I am in a quasi-hypnotic state, almost possessed.
I stand still to listen, hanging on every note and watching with eyes wide open under my shades.
Why is she is playing fiddle by the sea and not performing in some symphony hall with plush seats, high ceilings and crystal chandeliers? Dollar bills and quarters are strewn on the red velvet interior of her torn violin case set out on the concrete sidewalk near a canvas backpack and rolled-up nylon sleeping bag.
A scary guy stands next to me in a black and white striped shirt, black beret, with white makeup covering his face, black lines accentuating his eyebrows, and red lipstick. He blurts out, “Isn’t she great? I can tell that you are someone who appreciates great music. For 150 bucks, she can do a private concert just for you. In your home or hotel or wherever.”
“She’s incredible,” I say. Several seconds of silence. “I don’t get it. Are you her manager or something?”
“Not exactly,” he laughs. “Name is Ian.” He holds out his hand and I shake it. “As you can see, I do mime on the boardwalk but I’m also a stage and screen actor.”
“That’s interesting,” I say.
“Yeah. Up for a big part in a new movie. Should get word real soon. Real soon,” he repeats with an angry edge and wild-eyed stare that makes me uncomfortable.
“I see.”
“How about that private concert?” he asks with a wink.
I hesitate but realize if I don’t do this, I might regret it. “OK. Why not?” I say nodding, thinking, What the hell are you doing?
“Sofia, you have a new admirer,” shouts Ian. The violinist, who is at intermission, forces a smile.
“Where are you staying?”
“I’m at the Hotel Venice, right on the boardwalk. Room 305.”
“Perfect. She’ll come by at about 9 tonight. Be ready. Cash is good. And tipping is welcome. You here on vacation?”
“Something like that.”
Heading back to my hotel, I think about piano lessons when I was a military brat in Italy, trying to master the Moonlight Sonata on an old baby grand in the school auditorium at the base in Camp Ederle. I should have kept it up.
When father got leave, we would go to concerts in Gothic cathedrals in Milan or Florence and sit on wooden pews listening to string quartets in candlelight by images of saints and guardian angels in red- and blue-stained glass.
On one occasion, he took me to the original sinking city with canals and bridges that inspired Abbot Kinney to build a replica in America.
Young dancers in pink bikinis and faces covered in silver paint slow pedestrian traffic on the boardwalk while somersaulting to loud rap music.
I pass a souvenir shop facing a henna-tattoo artist. Through the window, I see a life-sized black and white poster of Amy Winehouse. I stop to look and nearly collide with an electric guitar player on roller skates in a white turban with a small amplifier attached to his waist blasting fuzzy solos from his Stratocaster.
When I step into the hotel lobby, something is different. Across from the reception desk, a large rectangular canvas occupies most of the wall. “That wasn’t here this morning, was it?” I ask.
“We just got it. Check it out,” says the blond-haired clerk behind the counter. I picture him on his surfboard riding the waves at the end of his shift.
The imposing tableau is one I would expect to see at the Louvre or the MET. There is a small wooden boat in the middle of a deserted ocean. Most of the canvas is covered in different shades of ocean blue. A round orange sun is just above sea level in the background. Standing in the boat is a bearded man in a denim apron holding a paintbrush in one hand and a pallet in the other. His brush with reddish orange paint on the end is touching the canvas which is on an easel in the middle of the boat. The vessel is noticeably low on the surface of the sea. Water is entering a small crevice on the hull visible on the waterline. The man holding the easel and paint brush is so immersed in his creation that he is unaware his boat is sinking.
By the bottom right corner of the gold-carved wooden frame, I notice a white card with black, italicized font. I lean over to read it.
Manfred Thomas
English (1971-1998)Descending Into Bohemian Blue, 1996
Manfred Thomas was born in Oxford, England and immigrated to the United States in 1994. His sculptures and paintings have been displayed in various exhibits in Manhattan and Boston. In 1996, he moved to Venice, California, where he remained until his death.
“Pretty cool, isn’t it?” says the clerk.
* * *
Poco a poco accelerando
The red illuminated numbers on the clock radio read 10:00. I sit back on the leathery sofa flipping through a torn copy of The Moon and Sixpence. Laid out on the glass coffee table is the latest edition of The Atlantic and The Paris Review. I tried writing earlier on the small wooden desk with my laptop but managed only a couple of sentences before being distracted by the upcoming concert. I’m wondering if I should’ve just said no.
From the open window, I hear muffled voices and skateboards scraping the boardwalk between the crash of intermittently breaking waves. The television is turned to the foreign film channel. Yesterday a retrospective of the work of Luchino Visconti. Today it’s French classics, Truffaut’s Four Hundred Blows. The black and white scenes of the streets of Paris with the different instruments playing the same melody by Constantin always get to me.
The woody aroma from the open bottle of Chianti that washed down the pasta bolognese from the Italian restaurant on Main Street still lingers in the room. I see four unread texts on the bubble icon of my mobile device. I already know what they say.
It occurs to me that I have no way of contacting Sofia. No phone number, no email. At last, I hear a knock on the door.
Sofia stands in the dim light of the hallway against pale yellow walls. The opening guitar riff from Nirvana’s “No Apologies” seeps under the door from one of the nearby rooms. She is wearing the same thin, black dress. Her backpack looks full, the canvas stretched to the limit. She is carrying her violin case in one hand and plastic shopping bag in the other. Her eyes are covered by large, pink-tinted sunglasses with a white frame.
“I wasn’t sure you would make it,” I say as I open the door.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” she says smiling in that hard-to-pin-down accent. “I am not very good with schedules.”
“Why don’t you come in?” I say.
She rotates her head taking in the room. I inhale an off-putting odor, perhaps a perfume gone bad.
“May I use your bathroom?” she says, slurring her words, the smell of whiskey on her breath.
I try to decipher the accent. Is it German? Dutch?
“Over there,” I say.
She closes the door and locks it. I hear running water.
Three minutes later she re-emerges.
“Are you ready?” she asks in an animated upbeat tone of voice, standing straight, almost cheerful, bearing little resemblance to the woman I greeted moments before.
She sets her belongings on the mahogany TV cabinet and walks back carrying only her violin and bow. I wonder what is inside the backpack. I notice a slight tear in the back of her dress by the shoulders
“Okay if I stand by the window?”
“Are you going to keep your sunglasses on?”
She removes the sunglasses and drops them in her open violin case. I notice a red welt under her left eye.
“How is Ian?” I ask.
“He’s in one of his moods. He didn’t get the part he was counting on.”
She places the violin under her chin, methodically picking up the bow with a stern expression before closing her eyes. The bow touches and tugs on the strings and high-pitched tones emerge. She could do this in her sleep.
I lean back on the couch and recognize the dramatic solo passages from Mozart’s 5th Violin Concerto.
I would be totally immersed, but I am distracted, wondering what she may have stored in her bag. Not long after Dad’s tour in Europe, we moved to Oceanside so he could be near Camp Pendleton. I was sitting in a nightclub in downtown San Diego, watching my classmate Roxy, a lead singer in an indie rock band. perform on a small stage. I was 20 years old. I was snorting cocaine in a corner booth. Who would notice? It was a weeknight and the place was practically empty.
Before I knew it, the cops burst in and put me in handcuffs. The arrest and the rehab program that taught me that former addicts can never be casual users were an experience that got me interested in med school but almost kept me out of it.
Despite all I know, I am fighting a huge temptation to ask her what she has in her sack.
Copyright © 2024 by C. F. Pierce
