—The list of times you’ve made an ass of yourself?
—FUCK YOU!
He walks away down the sidewalk, Hurley a few steps behind him.
I turn to Terry.
—It really safe letting him walk around with Hurley?
—He’s an OK guy, Joe. Good at his job. Pretty mellow most of the time. It’s only when he’s around you that he loses his cool.
—Well, that’s the only time I see him.
—Think there’s a connection there?
—Got me.
He smiles.
—Uh-huh. So. Something you wanted to see me about?
—Yeah.
—Well, come on in, my friend. I’m just brewing up some chai.
—Lucky me.
—The thing is, Joe, the thing is, I really thought I’d be seeing more of you. After the last, you know, realignment, I thought we had gotten back some of that trust, some of those good vibes we used to share.
—Thought it’d be just like old times?
He takes a big whiff of the branches and dirt brewing on the stove.
—Well, old times. You can never get those back. But I thought we’d reached an accord, an understanding. Something to build on. But you haven’t really been around. Why do you suppose that is?
—Got me, Terry. Maybe because I don’t like you?
He laughs as he pours the mess in the pan through a strainer and into a cup.
—Well, yeah, I guess that’d explain it. Sure I can’t interest you in some of this? It’ll mellow you right out, put you in a good frame for conversation.
—I don’t like to be mellow.
—And that, Joe, that is too bad. Too bad.
He picks up his cup, walks across the dingy kitchen and takes the chair next to mine.
—Well then, what is it, my man, what’s on your mind?
—A job. I need a job.
You could say Terry saved my life.
You could also say that over two decades back he found me on the bathroom floor at CBGB, bleeding my life away through a hole that had been chewed in my neck. The guy who put the hole in me must have had a real taste for that shit, a real yen for the old-school style. That kind of thing ain’t easy, a person’s got to be desperate-hungry, or just be the sort who enjoys it. This guy, he’d taken his time with me, buttered me up, picked me out of the crowd as an easy mark. He was right. Nineteen seventy-eight: me, seventeen and living on the street, a hard-ass punk looking for cash, looking to score. He offered me a twenty to suck me off. No brainer at the time. Terry found me right after. Scooped me off the floor and took me to a Society safe house. Not like this deal they got now, but one of the holes they used to skulk around in before they had fully secured their turf. I ran with him for a few years, learned the ropes, saw how some things got done.
Salad days, those.
—Not to make light, Joe, but we’re not really an employment agency.
—No shit, Terry. I don’t need a career, I need a gig. I need to beef up my stash and make some money.
He shrugs.
—I don’t really see where we can help. Now, don’t get me wrong; you’re hard up, we can, you know, front you a little something to get you by. But our resources are limited. You know that.
—Sure.
—What we do have, we need to use it to help support the cause. World’s not gonna change on its own.
—Sure.
—The Society is always looking for opportunities to reach outside, to aid anyone afflicted with the Vyrus, but the pledged membership, the people doing the actual dirty work of trying to integrate the infected population into the noninfected, they have to come first.
—Right.
He takes a big sip of his gunk, ponders a moment, then lays it out.
—Now if things were different, if you were still a member, there’d be a few more options. There’d be, you know, emergency funds and such that could be tapped. But for a Rogue, even one like you, one we like to think of as an ally? Well, the politics of charity are more complicated than they should be.
—That an offer?
His mouth drops open a little.
—An offer?
—You asking me to come back?
He waves his cup.
—Joe. If you wanted to come back in, all you’d have to do is ask, man.
He sips again, watching me through the steam rising off his cup.
—Well I’m not asking.
—Too bad, man. Too bad.
—Besides, you got yourself a security chief. What would you need me around for?
He sets the cup on the table.
—Your ego need stroking, Joe? Self-esteem been suffering? Need an old friend to tell you how much you meant to the cause?
I stand up.
—You’re not my friend.
I start for the door.
He talks to my back.
—Actually, I am. More of a friend than you know. And I can prove it.
I stop.
—How’s that?
—Have a seat.
I stay on my feet.
—Joe, have a seat, man. And tell me about that deal at Doc Holiday’s last night.
I stay by the door.
—Guy was spazzing on something and I took care of him before he could cause more of a scene. Why do you care?
He picks up his cup.
—Because he was one of ours.
—Why should I care?
He takes a sip, swallows, smiles.
—Because maybe there’s a job in it. For the right man.
I take a seat.
Something happens on Society turf, Terry knows about it. Fourteenth to Houston, Fifth Avenue to the East River, if it happens on those blocks, Terry will hear. Especially if it involves anything having to do with the Vyrus. That kind of stuff is very close to the Society’s whole charter: their ultimate goal of integrating the infected with the general population. That’s Terry’s personal daydream: uniting all the Clans, bringing together a population of Vyrally infected individuals that is large enough to have a political identity. He thinks that if he can bring us aboveground, we’ll be able to get the resources of the world behind finding a cure for the Vyrus. It’s a nice thought, I even believed in it for awhile myself, then I woke up. We go public, the world community is gonna take note all right. They’re gonna take note and start opening concentration camps.
But the man dreams on. And he keeps a tight watch on anything that surfaces down here, anything that might upset his long-term plans. Plans that I sometimes think have nothing at all to do with all that Society party-line BS.
—So everyone saw you ride off with the guy?
—Yeah.
—And the cops were on their way?
—Yeah, but it won’t make a difference. The bartenders know they owe me one for getting The Spaz out of there. Anyone else who maybe knows my name knows better than to mention it to the cops.
—What about the citizens?
—What do they know? Big guy dealt with The Spaz. Took him away in a cab. What the cops gonna do with that?
He stares into his cup, looking at the sludge that’s settled at the bottom.
—Yeah, yeah, I can see that. Still, I wish you hadn’t dealt with him so harshly.
—Harshly? Guy was a troublemaker. Figured you’d be happy to have him off your turf.
—In principle, yes. But he was a pledged Society member. That makes it, you know, just a little more complicated. I mean, sure, we’re completely opposed to any overt acts of violence against the noninfected population. Any behavior that will increase anti-Vyral bias when we go public is an issue. But he was pledged, and we have a protocol for dealing with these things. Ideally, we would have, you know, liked to have seen him subdued and brought to us. We could have maybe gotten him down, mellowed him out, found out what was up. Then, you know, depending on the circumstances, there might have been a tribunal kind of a thing, to determine if he had acted irresponsibly. Afte
r that, sure, there might have been a punishment phase. But, you know, vigilantism…that’s never been a tactic we’ve endorsed.
—Funny, I seem to remember you endorsing plenty of my vigilantism when I worked for you.
He looks at me over the tops of his lenses.
—Be fair, Joe. Technically, that wasn’t vigilantism. You were enforcing Society doctrine back then. That’s just worlds different from this case.
—I don’t remember too many tribunals, Terry. I just remember you taking me aside and whispering names in my ear.
—Well. Well, that’s true.
He gets up, walks to the sink and dumps his dregs down the drain.
—But that was a different era. Due process wasn’t a luxury we could really afford back then. And we do things differently now.
—Uh-huh. Not whispering in Tom’s ear, Terry? That what you telling me? Murder by decree out of style?
He rinses his cup, puts it on the dish rack, leans his hip against the sink and looks at me.
—Look, Joe, let’s not dig into some irresolvable past issues. There’s no benefit to anyone in going that route. Did we have a different way of doing things back then? Sure we did. But that has no bearing on things today. Living in the past. That’s not healthy, that’s not how you get things done. And the Society is all about getting things done. Anyone can talk, but it takes action to change the world.
I think about the building around us, the tenement that he has managed to legally purchase through whatever series of blinds and cutouts. I think about the other properties the Society has locked up down here. I think about the partisans he has bunked out in the barracks upstairs, the soldiers he can mobilize. And I think about the way it used to be, back in the seventies when I came on the scene, just ten years after the Society was born, after Terry’s little Downtown revolution had forced the Coalition to concede this territory.
It was different back then: Coalition spooks everywhere; scrapping with the smaller Clans to keep the turf intact; trying to build our own major Clan out of the fringe elements: the socialists, the women’s libbers, the anarchists, whoever else would listen. Terry had the numbers when I got infected, but he had a hell of a time keeping them all pointed in the same direction. I did more than my share in getting them all unified, had more than my share of names whispered in my ear. I know what kind of action it takes to change the world, all right.
—Sure thing, Terry. I got no interest in talking old times. So why don’t you cut to the chase? Tell me what you want.
He pushes away from the sink and comes back to the table.
—That’s it, man, that’s it, right on. Let’s get grounded in the now.
He sits down.
—So here’s the deal. Let’s just say that no one really knows much about this particular situation right now and we can kind of talk about it in pretty simple terms. OK? Talk about it more as a social concern than as a Society security issue.
—Fine by me.
—Great, that’s great. So that guy last night, and spaz isn’t really the term I’d like to use, but, in any case, he was, you know, pretty much a kid. In all senses, I mean. Young in years and also just very recently infected.
—So he was a new fish.
—That’s right. And you know how they are, the new ones, they need lots of supervision. I mean, sure, some people, you, for instance, some people take to it right away. Others, they need some help adapting. This one, he was still in the adapting phase. Not even supposed to be out on his own yet.
—OK.
—But he slipped out a couple days back.
—How many days?
—Three.
—He stayed low for three days?
—Yeah, yeah, I know. Doesn’t seem like a new fish should be able to keep such a low profile, does it?
—OK. So, what, you want me to find out where he went to ground? Make sure that crack is sealed up? Doesn’t sound like a gig that’s gonna pay out the way I need.
—Well, thing is, yeah, I’d like to know where the fish was, but that’s not really the gig.
—What is?
—That scene you described at Doc’s? The way he “spazzed” out? He wasn’t the first.
—Say what?
He runs a hand over the top of his head, smoothing loose strands of his long hair.
—We had another case just like it earlier this week. A new fish went kind of haywire. This one had gone through his, you know, adjustment period, but he was only out in the population about a month. Then he just went…well, I guess spastic is the word.
—What’d you do with him?
—Hurley was there.
—Oh.
—So that was that.
—It’d have to be.
He pulls his hair free of the rubber band that holds it in a ponytail.
—Yeah. But that’s not the whole deal.
He collects his hair, pulls it back.
—What I’m hearing, there’s been others.
He redoes the rubber band and fiddles with the new ponytail until it sits the way he wants it to.
—So when I say that I don’t think we have to deal with this as a security problem, but as a social issue? I mean social with a lowercase s. ’Cause I think what we may have here is, I don’t know for sure, but it looks like kind of a drug problem in the community.
Junkies. They get infected, they go one of two ways. First way, they couldn’t be happier to be off the junk. Second way, they can’t believe how hard it is to get high.
Sure, the blood is a rush, it’s a rush like no other. But it’s not the kind of thing you can do recreationally. There’s too much demand and not nearly enough supply. With a few thousand of us trying to make it on the island, and all of us needing at least a pint a week to get by, there’s just no way to get your hands on enough blood to keep a steady natural high going. You might get your hands on enough to gorge for a week or two, but the havoc you’re going to wreak doing it is gonna beat a path to your door. And someone’s gonna follow that path. Could be the local Clan looking to get rid of a troublemaker, could be a Rogue looking to get what you’ve stocked up, or it could be a Van Helsing. Any way you slice it, that kind of deal won’t last. So a junkie who wants to keep getting high? It’s gonna be a problem.
You pump enough junk, crack, crank, x, morphine, special K, LSD, or whatever else into your veins and you’ll get high. But soon the Vyrus is gonna clean it right out. Your everyday junkie has enough trouble keeping himself in dime bags. Now what if that same junkie needs a week’s worth of skag just to put him on the nod for a half hour?
Bleach, Sterno, gasoline, formaldehyde, glue, cleaning products of all types; all those standard alternative highs get a run for their money. I’ve seen a junkie with the Vyrus so desperate for a good old-fashioned high, he shot Prestone into his eye. Didn’t give him a buzz, but it sure as shit distracted him for awhile. These types tend to weed themselves out of the population.
But if it was out there, if there was a readily available substance out there that could cut its way through the Vyrus and get you dependably high? Everybody would be trying it at some point.
Lot of time on your hands in this life. Hard to punch in on a nine to five. Hard to make a regular living that lets you go take in a movie or grab a bite out. Hard to fill the hours when the sun is up. Something that could make the time pass a little more quickly, I’d give it a shot. And Terry, he’s no prude. Check out the aging hippie look he’s sporting and you got to figure he tried it all back in the day. But he has other concerns.
Terry’s trying to change the world. That takes time. And it takes subtlety; so he says. Not only is a bunch of guys spazzing out in public bad for the cause, it’s also more than a bit perplexing. These are new fish, for Christ sake. How the hell are they tapping into this shit? There’s some new way of banging DMT, or some new cocktail of industrial solvents out there, word should have gotten to Terry before the fish stumbled across it.
—So y
ou want to know what it is and who cooked it up.
—That’s it. Just, you know, the skinny on where these kids are getting it.
—And that’s it, just the info?
—Well, yeah, what else would there be?
I fiddle with my Zippo, snap it open and closed.
—I just don’t want you thinking that I’m gonna be dealing with anyone who might be making this stuff.
He strokes his chin.
—I’m not sure I follow. What’s your point?
—The point being, I don’t kill for you anymore, Terry.
He scratches the back of his neck.
—Wow. That hadn’t really occurred to me. Like I said, Joe, I see this as a social issue. That’s why I feel comfortable asking you, as an associate in the community, to look into it. Because I know we share many of the same concerns.
He stops scratching.
—If it turns into a security issue, well, we’ll deal with it in-house at that point.
—Fine by me.
I stand up.
—Guess I’ll get to it.
He stands.
—All right. All right, Joe. That’s good to hear. It’ll be good having you doing some work with us again.
—Yeah, sure.
He walks me to the door.
—And, you know, like I say: a social issue. Just between us for the moment. Till we know what we’re dealing with.
—Any way you want it. You’re paying.
—Great. Great.
He leads me down the hall to the tenement’s entrance and opens the door.
—So, hear from you in a couple days?
—Sure.
—All right.
He slaps me on the shoulder.
—Good to see you, Joe.
—Yeah, you too, Terry.
I go down the steps and cross the street. On the opposite sidewalk I look back and Terry is still standing there in the open doorway. He gives me a big smile and a wave.
—Keep the faith, Joe.
I lift my hand slightly and he pops back inside and closes the door.
At the end of the block I turn the corner and see Tom and Hurley coming in the opposite direction. We walk toward each other, Tom pretending like he doesn’t see me. Hurley takes up three-quarters of the sidewalk, and I know Tom ain’t gonna budge off the rest of it. I step into the gutter to let them by.
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