by Ken O'Steen
The days of walking as a means to Zen perfection came to an end. I pocketed the paycheck hot off the payrolls at Pyramid, cashed the check, and bought myself provisions. Soon after, I matriculated at the SRO of choice. I appointed my single furnished room with additional furnishings, such as a table, a lamp and shelves, all from the second-hand furniture store, nearby. I liberated a small number of belongings, and basic necessities from the storage space: a boom box, books, eating utensils and a coffee maker of which Lila had granted me legal custody.
Lila and I had not tacitly, though had fleetingly, even if obliquely agreed to a no fault policy regarding sex with others while we lived apart. There lurked in neither of us any predisposition to become proprietary, or jealous. Neither of us was the least bit bamboozled by conventional morality, with its inherent hypocritical conveniences, and Everest-sized loopholes for conventional people playing conventional roles, to perpetrate ordinary or extraordinary misdeeds. Understanding accidents will happen in circumstances such as ours, it would be accurate I believe to claim on behalf of both of us that we hoped accidents could be avoided; but also hoped and expected that if any occurred, they would be few and minor. My accident could have been a prototype for the recreational single-night engagement. Douse it with alcohol, and it was virtually a fornication waiting to happen. In any case, the first evening in my own quarters felt like the perfect time to give Lila a call again, now that I was actually where I was supposed to be, and where I was thought to have been for two weeks.
I pushed the initial down payment of change into the phone at a relatively serene car wash, closed for the night. Rather than Cindy, it was Lila who answered.
“It’s you,” she said as soon as I spoke.
“It is,” I proclaimed. “I’m calling from the heart of Hollywood.”
“Yuk.”
“Exactly.”
“How’s hotel life going?”
“Home sweet home.”
“Poor baby.”
“At least I have one somewhere,” I told her, truthful by a hair.
“Maybe it wont be for too long. One good thing is I’m able to save out here. I’m saving whatever I can. It’ll build up eventually.”
“And I did get a couple of the temp things since I talked to you last. I have to call them in the mornings, since there isn’t a number where they can call me. I’m expecting to get a lot more work from them now. Be nice if I could get one of those semi-permanent gigs that lasts for weeks, sometimes months at a stretch,” I told her, lying by far more than a hair. I planned to do all I said I’d done now that I was settling down. Only for that reason, naturally, did I present the plan as fait accompli.
“I miss you.”
“Awww. I miss you too. How’s the valley, sugar?”
“I don’t see much of it. When I’m not at work I’m here.”
“ Moving away to a distant land hasn’t changed you a bit.”
“Hardly. Once in a while I go out somewhere with Cindy.”
“What are the hot spots in the greater North Hollywood, Toluca Lake, Burbank area?”
“I bought some olives and onions and spaghetti sauce at a local Trader Joe’s. There was a shitload of life’s special, bright and shiny people in there just like there are in every other store. But it’s still the best deal in town.”
“I agree sugar. It’s worth getting your foot run over occasionally by the latest sport utility baby carriage when it comes to getting cheap cheese.”
“That’s how I feel.”
“How’s Cindy? Not that I particularly give a fuck.”
“She plays her music too fucking loud; and it’s bad music. That girl never had any taste in music.”
“Like you say, maybe it won’t be for long.”
“As long as I can stay productive, I don’t really give a shit where I am. I’ve got what I need here to keep busy; so I’m feeling all right. In the meantime, I’ll put some cash away, you do the same; maybe we’ll be able to reestablish our sovereign state soon enough.”
“We’ll see. I hope so.” I did hope so. But I didn’t believe we could crawl out of the hole and find our affordable Shangri-La in the near future.
“You stay safe down there in the demimonde.”
“As rat traps go, this is a pretty safe one…like I told you. I’m still dangerous enough to survive, honey. I belong here to tell you the truth.”
“You belong with me.”
”There too.”
“So it’s not all just a bummer?”
“Not at all. I’m still practicing all the chronic, artsy, quasi-intellectual avocations, and partying some, like always,” I reported, winging it, based on general expectations of the days to come and experience of days passed.”
“Good.”
“What were you doing when I called?”
“Drawing. I have that radio book thing from Santa Monica on, on KCRW…Book Germ? I have it on. The host is definitely the Mr. Rogers of pretentious book chat. Gives me the heebies.”
“I treat myself to not listening to things like that.”
“I know. So do I, normally.”
We exchanged our good-byes, so longs, and requisite love and kisses. I’d laid down the first couple of months of rent in advance. Now that I had a neighborhood all my own I was ready to be all that I could be. In the weeks ahead I would stake out the environs: discover the markets, dives, newsstands, the taco joints; mingle with the indigenous population; and most important of all, acquire compatriots and a bar to call my own.
CHAPTER FOUR
THE REPUBLIC FOR WHICH IT SITS