The First

by Glen Kenner

  -Sarah! Hey, Sarah!

  She rushes out of the bathroom holding a towel to her chest with nothing on underneath. The towel’s covering all the fun parts but I can see her hips and even at a time like this I have to tear my eyes away and lock in on her face.

  -I was just getting into a bath. What’s going on? Where were you?

  -I was outside. On the street. We’ve got company in two minutes. Stay calm, grab your clothes, and let’s go.

  -Who? One or two guys? We can handle them.

  -Twelve. Get dressed. They’re heading to our room right now.

  Sarah disappears back into the bathroom. I grab the desk and carry it to the door. The desk is wider than the entryway, which is good, and I wedge it tight between the walls of the entryway and up against the door. That should slow them down 30 seconds. Then I do a quick scan and see Sarah’s pipe on the bed and her phone on the nightstand. I grab both just as she comes out in her skirt and top.

  -Get your shoes on. Let’s go. Outside.

  She slips on her shoes.

  -I have to grab my-

  Just then there’s banging on the door and a woman’s voice, loud and slurred.

  -You guys, let us in. We got the booze. Come on. Party!

  Someone tries the door handle and then there’s more pounding on the door. I can see the door handle jiggle just a little.

  -Come on! Party party!

  I lower my voice to a whisper.

  -They’re picking the lock. Now.

  I grab her hand and sprint across the room out onto the deck.

  -Climb up and push off. Try to go limp when you land. No matter what happens, run to the right and don’t look back.

  Sarah gets up on the railing and hesitates just as I hear the door push open and slam against the desk wedged in front of it. Now there’s shouting from behind the door and I push her and climb up and go over just like before. Sarah hits the grass, rolls, and comes up standing. I drop like a wet sack of shit but spring up with another sprained ankle. We both start running and I hear something fly past me. Then I see a red dot tracking Sarah’s torso right in front of me. I yell out Faster! Two more sounds. Ffffffsh. Ffffffsh. Then another behind me. I look to the left and see a woman standing next to the SUV, the back driver’s side door open. She has a gun raised and pointed with a laser sight. Without slowing down, I pull the pipe from my back pocket, turn my upper body toward the woman, and throw it hard and fast, end over end. I haven’t jumped off of many six story buildings but I’ve thrown a lot of things at a lot of people while on the move over the last few thousand years. The pipe connects with skull and I turn and keep trucking. Sarah is twenty feet ahead of me and pulling away. Goddamn that girl can run.

  We cover seven or eight blocks and Sarah looks back and I wave her to stop. We slow down and come to a stop behind an old oak on a corner lot. We’re shaded from a street light and in nearly complete darkness.

  -Were you hit?

  She pats herself down and says no. All good.

  I check to make sure I wasn’t hit either. Sometimes, if enough adrenaline is flowing, you can get shot, stabbed, or bit and not feel it for five minutes. Looks like I’m still whole.

  -You up for a relaxing jog?

  -Is it safe?

  -No. But it’s safer than standing here. They have at least 13 people and probably three vehicles. They’re going to be up and down these streets any minute. Follow me. We’ll need to make a quick pit stop on the way.

  We head north two blocks, deep into the residential area and closer to some of the sketchier neighborhoods of Wellston. We do a four block circle and I don’t see any headlights following us. So we head east until we see North Skinker up ahead and then cut along parallel on a small street until we get to Taco Bell. I know my fast food joints. There’s at least 10 vehicles in the drive-thru. I see an empty Taco Bell bag and ask Sarah for her phone and to hang back for a minute. I open up the contacts folder on my phone and memorize Glen Ray’s number. Sarah hands over her phone without a word and I put it and mine in the bag, close it up tight and walk up next to a pickup truck in line and drop the bag in the bed of the truck. I keep walking and two more cars up is a small Benz convertible filled with college girls. The top is down, the music’s up, and one of the girls in the back is talking on her phone and moving her body to the music. I reach in, say sorry, grab the phone, hang up, and dial Glen Ray’s number by memory. The girls start shouting and getting out of the car. Glen Ray answers and there’s music in the background.

  -Hey, it’s your new friend. Your cell lot boo is headed to the Moonrise but you and I need to talk. Meet me at the spot I first ran after you. Got it?

  -What? Am I being punk-

  -You got it?

  -Uh, yeah. Yeah. Ok. But I don’t have my car.

  -What? Why?

  -I think I’m being followed.

  -Fuck. Take an Uber. Twenty minutes.

  I hang up and hand the girl her phone. She and her friends were trying to take it away and get in my face but they couldn’t get past my hand.

  -Oops, that wasn’t my phone. Sorry about that.

  I pull a five out of my pocket and hand it to the girl.

  -Enjoy a burrito on me. And…

  I keep talking with my head over my shoulder as I start to jog back to Sarah.

  -...a delicious ice-cold Mountain Dew.

  I should be getting paid for this shit.

  Sarah and I head back north into the residential area of Wells-Goodfellow and then cut east and stick to the sidewalks when they exist. We shoot left or right at intersections if there’s an oncoming vehicle, but so far I haven’t seen a dark SUV with tinted windows and no one has paid any attention to us. We’re less than ten blocks from my house now and I tell Sarah to slow up. I point out some of the boarded up houses. A few are burnt out. I stop in front of a two-story brick with flimsy red-painted plywood covering the door and windows, the first level of the house is covered in so much graffiti that none of it is decipherable. The front yard is almost completely dirt.

  -I lived here for a while. From ‘40 to ‘52 or ‘53. I used to barbeque right out in the front yard. We had block parties in the summer back then.

  I look up and down the street. I’ve been down this way many times since I moved but it’s still probably been five years or more. It just keeps getting worse.

  -The neighborhood was ok then. Pretty mixed. White, black, young, old. Kids running around everywhere. Most everyone poor, just a few paychecks away from being homeless.

  I point to the house across the street, a single story brick bungalow with a light on in the front room, heavy bars on the windows and door.

  -A Polish couple moved in there a few weeks after I moved in. Hardly spoke a word of English. The wife could really cook. They literally escaped the SS in the middle of the night. They were university professors. Atheists, I’m pretty sure, but with Jewish heritage. Nobody wanted them in Europe or America. But this neighborhood welcomed them like I’d never seen before. Helped them both find jobs, helped with their English, the grocery shopping. You name it. It was the most goddamn American thing I’ve ever seen.

  I start walking and Sarah catches up.

  -Sounds like it was a good time.

  -It was a fucked up time with a few good moments. Anyway. I’m sure they’re all dead now.

  We walk on and then pick up the pace a bit. A few minutes later we’re at the corner of East Prairie and James Abram, a block away from where Glen Ray was parked. I can see up the street for several blocks and it looks like all of the spots are taken with parked cars. I wonder if any of them are filled with people with guns, waiting for me or, more likely, for Sarah. But there’s no point in finding out. What happens will happen.

  Sarah and I stand still on the corner, off the sidewalk and in the grass. I ask her where she learned to roll like that when she jumped off the balcony. Gymnastics, she says. I ask her why she handed her iPhone over to me without question at Taco Bell. I trus
t you, she says. I ask her why she doesn’t like Mountain Dew. She says what?

  Right then a small four door pulls up on the corner a block away and we walk up. Glen Ray is in the back seat, talking with the driver. I knock on the window and he just about hits his head on the roof. He looks at me and I look at him. He mouths, what?

  -Get out of the fucking car.

  He jumps out and I lean inside and tell the driver to wait just a minute. The three of us take a few steps away from the car.

  -What were you talking to the driver about?

  -He was trying to tell me that Run-D.M.C. was the best hip-hop group of the 80s. And then he was trying to tell me that Raising Hell is better than King of Rock and I was going to play him a video of Kurtis Blow that-

  -Who’s trying to kill us?

  -What?

  -I mean it, Glen Ray. This isn’t a fucking game. Who the fuck is after us? After Sarah?

  -I don’t know who-

  -On the boards. First Club. No one’s talking about going after us?

  -Shit, John. Everyone’s talking about going after Sarah. And you. Well, not so much you. You’re a legend and most guys think you’re immortal. They’d piss their pants if they met you in a dark alley. Which, by the way, some guy in Paris posted that he chatted with you in the airport right before the time that O’Reilly lost his head. Apparently you were an asshole to him about Camus and then later, after O’Reilly was dead, flipped him off. What’s a Camus? Then a hot black chick walked by and did the same. Double bird.

  Glen Ray looks at Sarah but she has her head down and just mutters shit.

  -As for Sarah, guys aren’t sure what to think. Or they’re scared. Or they just want to look tough on the internet. No one is seriously talking about doing anything themselves. But they really want one of the orgs to step up. To take care of things. New York mostly. Or the Estonians.

  -There’s an organization in Estonia?

  -Just five guys that live in a barn. But they’re seriously insane. They post videos of themselves getting hit by trains and fighting bulls with their bare hands and shooting arrows at each other. They’re insane. And they’re always naked.

  Then he looks at Sarah and tells her that she’s supposed to be at the Moonrise. Whatever that is.

  -It’s a hotel in U City. Yeah, John made that up. He thinks your calls might be monitored.

  I nod my head. Something in his ramble reminded me of something else. Shooting arrows. Arrows. What am I missing?

  Sarah lets out a sigh.

  -So some people want us dead, but not your client? Not Mr High Class?

  -No. I don’t know. I mean, seriously, I don’t know anything. And now I’m being followed. I’ve had an Explorer and one of those big Chrysler 300’s sitting outside of my hotel and tailing me around town.

  -Doesn’t feel so great, does it? Did you get the plate numbers?

  -Oh, shit. I should have totally done that.

  -Was the Explorer black with tinted windows?

  -Yeah. And the 300 I’m pretty sure I saw tailing you around last week.

  I look at him in the eyes the best I can in the night. I don’t really believe that you can tell if someone is lying by staring them in the eyes, but most other people do. And that’s all that matters. Glen Ray doesn’t act like he’s lying. Fuck. Looks like tonight is all about taking chances.

  -Let’s all go for a ride.

  We pile in the Uber and Glen Ray takes the front seat. I tell the driver to take us to the Lumiere. To the entrance on Convention and North 4th.

  Glen Ray looks back at me.

  -The Lumiere? The casino? Are we going gambling?

  I tell him we sure are. I look out the window as we pass the parked cars in front of my house.

  -And, for the record, Public Enemy fucking buried everyone in the 80s. Except maybe N.W.A.

  Sarah doesn’t seem to have any idea what I’m talking about but the middle-aged Uber driver says, my man, and puts in a CD. We listen to Fight The Power full blast all the way east across the city.

  17 - Of Zombies and Strippers

  At the Lumiere entrance on Convention, we stop and the driver turns down the music and tells us to have a good night. And for us to give him 5 stars. Sarah jumps out and so does Glen Ray and I open my door but hold back. I ask Glen Ray if I can see his phone and he hands to me. I hold it down close to the floorboard and bend it in half until it cracks, jam it under the front passenger seat and then jump out. The Uber driver cranks up the Public Enemy and takes off.

  Glen Ray looks at my hands.

  -Where’s my phone?

  -It was broken. So I left it in the car.

  -What? No it wasn’t. You did what?

  -We think our phones are being traced. John doesn’t take chances.

  -Fuck me. That phone was my life.

  I pat Glen Ray on the shoulder.

  -Then you, my friend from Cincinnati, need a new life.

  -I’m from Clevel-

  -Everybody up for a walk?

  Sarah says sure.

  -Across the street?

  I point to the brightly lit Stan Musial Veterans Memorial bridge a half mile north of us.

  -Across the river.

  We head up the streets toward the bridge, stopping at each intersection due to traffic. This part of St Louis never really sleeps. A bank shows the time as 12:20 a.m. and the temperature at 74 degrees. We’re doing alright, as long as no one shoots us. Then we cut right and get on the shoulder of I-70 and follow it onto the Stan Span and start crossing the Mississippi river. The traffic’s not bad with plenty of drivers taking it slow to enjoy the bright white lights that cover the bridge.

  Glen Ray is walking as far away from the side of the bridge as he can.

  -I’m really not crazy about heights, guys. I mean, that’s a long way down.

  He’s a few feet ahead of us, walking faster than I expected. I guess he’s eager to get across the river.

  -You’d survive.

  -I guess. It would hurt though, right?

  -Oh yeah, it would hurt like a mother.

  -I don’t like heights either, Glen Ray. But my dad taught me to just sing when we drove across bridges. Or on the high dive when I started swim lessons. Just sing and concentrate on the words.

  -No Run-D.M.C. And no Hagar. Something all of us can sing along to.

  Glen Ray starts dancing around like a four year old that has to pee, different bits of tunes coming out of his mouth.

  -I wish I had my phone.

  -Forget your phone. Think of a classic. Something everyone knows.

  He looks up, pauses, and spins around to us and says he’s got it. He runs ahead a bit, stops and loud enough for anyone driving by hear, he starts singing Thriller.

  Sarah squeals and joins in. They know all of the words. I didn’t realize it, but I know all of the words. The two of them are doing their best Michael Jackson dance moves. I snap my fingers. And then they both perfectly recite the Vincent Price monologue. I try to tell them Vincent Price was from St Louis. No recognition registers on their faces. And then it’s time for the big dance number.

  The three of us do the entire choreographed zombie dance as best we can on the shoulder of the Stan Musial Veterans Memorial bridge. I mostly lurch and clap my hands over my head. More than a few cars honk. A party bus goes by, honks, and the drunks on board hang out of the windows and someone screams, yeah, Billie Jean! A pale white girl flashes her huge boobs. Someone sticks their ass out the window. A pickup slows down and a guy in a cowboy hat throws a half full can of Natty Light at Glen Ray while yelling goddamn snowflake. Fucking pickups.

  We cross the bridge and stay on I-70 heading east and then south. At the intersection where 70 becomes 64 and crosses 55, we go down the embankment between the two interstates and head straight east right into a residential neighborhood. I’ve been over here more than a few times with Maurice but only once have I walked. And it was back into the city, not away from it. And I was drunk. And Ma
urice and I were singing every song we knew from the Supremes. I’m pretty sure the only reason we weren’t shot even back then was because of just how big and mean-looking Maurice is. That was more than 50 years ago.

  Glen Ray asks if this is a safe area.

  -Don’t sing any Diana Ross and you’ll be fine.

  -Who?

  I turn to Sarah.

  -Hey, Jackie Joyner-Kersee grew up in this neighborhood. Somewhere right on one of these streets.

  Sarah gets a big smile on her face.

  -I know. She’s a hero of mine. There’s a sports complex over here somewhere with ball fields and lots of other things for kids. Maybe we can come back during the day?

  -Sure. That would be cool.

  Glen Ray jumps up and down.

  -I’m free pretty much any time.

  We cross six or seven blocks diagonal to their grid. Up a street, down a street and so on. Some of the blocks have empty lots and we cut through when we can. Then we cross over train tracks and into a mostly empty train yard. Lots of sheds and huge pieces of equipment. Most of it dirty and covered in rust. Another set of train tracks and then we’ll be back into more residential blocks.

  Sarah turns to me.

  -John?

  -Yeah?

  -Are we headed to a strip club?

  -Yeah.

  -Why?

  -I’m looking for a friend of mine. Someone I can trust.

  -A First?

  -Nope. A kid I used to babysit.

  I start picking up the pace.