Year of the Dog

by Henry Chang

  The television news program segued from Fukienese protest to Thanksgiving pageantry. Seeing the Macy’s Parade roll across the screen reminded Lucky of his father, Thanksgiving Day being the birthday of the old abusive drunk whom he hadn’t seen in five years, the last time being a chance encounter on a Flushing Chinatown street when the sad loser shamelessly asked for a handout. The fuckin’ bum, thought Lucky, the reason why his mother had run out on them before his teenage years. He wondered if the son of a bitch was still alive, then decided he didn’t care.

  Disgusted, he punched off the TV.

  When Lucky appraised himself in the mirror he still saw a street warrior, but too much Chinatown fast food, beer, and brandy had turned his gut to flab, made him appear bearlike and lumbering.

  He checked his Oyster Rolex. It was 9 PM. He glanced toward the darkness of the November night outside his Bayard Street condominium. The wind gusted and banged against the windows. It was freezing outside and he knew most of the Ghost Legion streetboys would be wearing their dark down-filled jackets, puffy enough to hide their guns. He himself, as dailo, would only wear the black leather blazer, which made him appear oblivious to the cold, more macho than the others.

  Condensation formed at the bottom of the metal window frame, and the spoon-sized thermometer outside the glass read nine degrees. It was almost time to cruise through his rounds, to check on his empire.

  Outside the window the streets of the Bowery were empty. At the street corner six flights below, the traffic light, swaying and swinging at the end of the long metal arm that hung over the intersection, was frozen on red. A bus proceeded cautiously through the intersection, rolling north along the Bowery. There was not one person on the frigid streets beneath the dim yellow street lamps.

  He could see the Manhattan Bridge, in the darkness looking like a black ribbon suspended from two parallel strands of pearls, arching across the East River toward the Brooklyn waterfront, the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

  Two car-horn blasts from directly below broke his reverie. A black car pulled smoothly up to the curb, its white headlights momentarily lighting up the front of the Rickshaw Brother’s garage. He pictured Lefty behind the wheel, all spiky haircut and gel, with Kongo, the big dark Malay, riding shotgun by his side. The headlights went to black and the Buick sat like a water bug squatting beside the curb.

  Lucky crushed the burnt marijuana roach into a glass dish. He lifted the leather blazer off the recliner, and felt its heft as he slipped it on. Normally, he would not carry the Smith &Wesson, but tonight, going out to the Chinatown fringe at East Broadway, he followed his instincts, and assured himself he was not being paranoid. Better strapped than sorry. He turned off the lights and the TV and closed the red door of his condo, took the stairs down, and felt the weight of the pistol in his jacket pocket. Thinking about Fukienese East Broadway, and about how easily power could shift, he went down toward the dark Chinatown street, and the black Buick at the curb.

  Black Car, Black Night

  The black Buick was a 1988 Riviera, a beefed-up muscle car straight out of Detroit, a wide-body chassis fitted with a thick set of Pirelli tires, and dark-tinted windows. The Riviera had 44,000 miles on it when the Ghosts took it as payment from a gambler who’d lost it in a fan-tan game down one of the basements. Its finish was fading but underneath the hood, a 3600 V6 engine was still capable of churning out a catlike acceleration. The wide tires made it a perfect car for narrow Chinatown streets with corners that were tight and uneven. With Lefty driving, the black car rolled low to the ground and bit into the curves even at a high speed. The car had four-wheel independent suspension and traction control. It sprinted from zero to sixty in six seconds and it could cruise at eighty, and still have enough horsepower for passing in heavy traffic. In the inner city the car was good to go for getaways and drive-bys. It could leap into a sprint and cornered better than the Firebirds and Camaros. Nothing the cops drove could touch it, their standard Dodge cars, running on the cheap gas of a tightfisted city budget, were too weak.

  Lucky had had steel diamond-plate sheets inserted into the door panels, courtesy of Chin Ho Auto Body Repair, in exchange for not making the monthly “contribution” payment. Lefty’s cousin Hom Mo, the mechanic at Victor’s Fix-Rite garage, kept the engine purring and made sure the oil was fresh.

  It was nine after nine when Lucky slid into the backseat of the Riviera.

  Lefty fired up the headlights and urged the car away from the curb. They took the backstreets out to Centre Street, then rolled north toward Walker. Lucky never said a word, watching the night go by behind the shadowy mass of Kongo. Lefty knew the first stop was always at Willie Eyeballs, to pick up cash and cigarettes. Willie Wong had eyeballs that bulged, a condition that made him look like a bugged-out horny lecher. An On Yee henchman, he ran a warehouse on Walker Street that stored a thousand cartons of counterfeit cigarettes. Fake Marlboros and Camels, made in China, became part of the flood of untaxed cigarettes into the city that occurred after state taxes went up. The fakes were half the price, and the real butts from out of state were even cheaper. One container load of fakes, fifty thousand cartons, arrived on the docks every month, and two truckloads of tax-frees from down south arrived every other day. The operation sucked in a hundred thousand a week.

  The cigarettes went from a container port in Queens to places like Eyeballs’s warehouse, out to stores on Canal Street, and in Chinatown, spreading through the Lower East Side and out to the five boroughs and into New Jersey. It was a multimillion-dollar operation run by south China elements of the Red Circle triad partnered with the On Yee tong in New York City.

  The Ghosts provided protection for the warehouse and received cash and cases of knock-off smokes in return.

  Willie came up to the car shivering, careful to let Kongo see his hands at all times. He handed over an envelope with the five hundred weekly, and a large plastic bag full of cartons of fake Marlboros, complimentary cigarettes for the high rollers in the Ghosts’ gambling basements along Mott Street.

  The frigid air streaked in as Lucky powered shut the window, watching Eyeballs scurry back into the warehouse.

  “Stop by Mimi’s,” he told Lefty.

  They continued north, the streets still empty except for a few factory ladies shivering and sloshing their way down into the subway entrance. Lucky leaned back, watched the nighttime neon colors blur by and considered the rash of robberies of On Yee businesses at the far fringe of Chinatown. Out there at Pike, Allen, other streets adjoining East Broadway. Complaints had been coming in from On Yee merchants. After all, they paid for the protection already, what the fuck was going on?

  Lee Watch Distribution, a local supplier with a shop on Orchard Street, was part of Skinny Chin’s operation that brought in high-end Hong Kong watches bypassing customs. Someone had gotten in and out and took a hundred thousand worth of Rados, Movados, Cartiers, and Rolexes. Skinny was crazed because there was no forced entry, no way in or out except for a tiny bathroom window, too small for anyone to get through.

  What am I, a fuckin’ detective? Lucky thought, sardonically. But he knew his face, his honor, was at stake.

  Since he was a relative of the On Yee treasurer, Skinny’s pitching a bitch was sure to make Lucky lose face.

  Fuck that, and fuck him, too, thought Lucky.

  The next robbery hit had been at the Jung Wah warehouse on Allen Street, cleaned out of a hundred cases of canned abalone bao yee, and a half ton of dried bird’s nest, expensive delicacies all. Who cuts out with a hundred cases and no one sees or hears anything? Another hundred thousand ripoff. Once again, no forced entry. Inside job, yo?

  Nothing made sense.

  Broome Street came up and they rolled to a stop in front of a shuttered storefront with an awning that read Wholesale Fashions Inc. Lucky knew the basement contained a quarter-million worth of fake designer handbags, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Prada, Chanel. Knock-off Nike sweatsuits and bogus Tiffany jewelry. All made in China. Thousand-doll
ar handbags selling for eighty-eight bucks.

  Lefty punched the horn twice and the front door cracked open. A girl with a rice-bowl haircut peeked out, then stepped toward them carrying a shopping bag in each hand. Some kind of Asian, Lucky couldn’t tell which, she was petite and wrapped in an oversized down coat. She smiled and handed over the bags through his window. He returned her smile and checked the items as she went back inside. There were three each of the Vuitton and the Prada bags, gifts for his favorite whores at Fat Lily’s and Flavio’s. And three fake Tiffany tennis bracelets; more gifts to express his extravagance when Christmas rolled around. Trademark, what fuckin’ trademark?

  “Kenmare, then Chrystie,” he said to Lefty.

  The black car came to a garage and pulled in. The garage was on the block of Kenmare before the street changed to Delancey. It was a half-mile walk from the heart of Chinatown at Mott and Bayard. Kongo stepped out and stood away from the car, let the scattergun slide down into his right hand. Lefty tapped the horn once, and killed the headlights.

  A side door of the garage opened and a short Chinese man came out with a sack in his hand. He took one look at Kongo with the scattergun, and slowly placed the sack on the hood of the Riviera before turning and stepping back inside the garage. Kongo took the sack as Lefty backed the car out, and swung it wide, then Kongo climbed in. They drove toward Chrystie.

  There were a thousand Ecstasy tablets in the sack, Lucky knew, and the count was sure to be good. The pills were the result of a handshake deal between the Montreal Ghosts and the Vietnamese crew that manufactured the “club drugs” in Canada. The Vietnamese got the raw materials from The Netherlands and operated several Ecstasy mills in Montreal, Toronto, and Edmonton. The Ghost Legion handled the mules and a million pills a month were smuggled south across the border into the states, winding up in nightclubs and dance-halls across the country. Kongo stashed the sack inside a hidden compartment behind the stick-shift panel. The thousand tablets wouldn’t last two weekends in NYC.

  They came to a red light and a police cruiser passed in the opposite direction. Lucky felt for the butt of his pistol, but as the police car faded in the rearview mirror, he turned his thoughts back to the robberies out past East Broadway. The USA Garments factory had had its payroll ripped off by armed masked intruders who never uttered a word but instead, communicated with hand signals and signs. Fifty gees cash.

  Fuk Ching gangbangers? The Dragons again? It didn’t seem like their style, and Lucky didn’t think they were smart enough anyway. More than one crew working no-man’s-land? He thought about Koo Jai and the Ghost Legion crew out on East Broadway, farthest from the center. It was Koo Jai’s responsibility to control things out there, even though they’d banged up against some Fuk Ching lowboys and were now operating on disputed turf under an unspoken, unofficial truce. Koo Jai, the pretty-boy hustler with the short pal, Eddie Ng, the stupid Jung brothers, and a few other kids who used to be called the Stars, or something corny like that.

  Lucky would need to call in Koo Jai for a sit-down after the transfers at the gambling basements, and after the whorehouse on Chrystie, toward which Lefty was now turning the dark car.

  Chao’s

  Chao’s was a cathouse in a renovated five-story condo building on a quiet part of Chrystie Street near the old junkie park. Lucky brought along one of the Prada bags and dropped a fistful of Ecstasy pills inside it.

  Angelina Chao, fortyish, a one-time Hong Kong hostess, ran the tidy little show out of her two-bedroom suite on the fifth floor, with a balcony that looked out over the park and the jumbled maze of rooftops in the distance. Angelina rotated a posse of Asian pussy from Miami, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and New Orleans.

  Appetizers, blowjobs, were fifty bucks a pop.

  Chaos, mused Lucky, playing the thought off of Angelina’s last name. He had called ahead to Angelina and she’d assured him he’d be the new girl’s first suck off of the night. Earlier, he had heard some out-of-town gamblers laughing about a jop-jung mixed-breed girl, a fresh one over at Angelina’s, a half-Cuban half-Chinese ho who performed something called a “yingyang” or “blackout” blowjob. Some johns had actually passed out. What? She knew how to squeeze a john’s balls just right, at just the right moment while she was sucking the head so that the juices exploded out as she drained it dry.

  He considered wearing a condom, and saw himself as test- ing the new merchandise, seeing what the girl’s skills were, sort of like quality control.

  Lefty and Kongo waited in the car, patiently aware that the basements on Mott Street would be the next stop.

  Lucky didn’t see any johns hanging around and Angelina waved him into one of the bedrooms. There was a twin bed, a nightstand, and a chair in one corner. The bedspread, the carpet, the curtains, were all red.

  He stood by the door and rebuckled his belt after running it through the loop handle of the Prada bag. He swallowed an Ecstasy and waited. After a few minutes the jop-jung girl came in through a connecting door. She saw the Prada bag dangling in front of Lucky’s crotch and smiled. When she let her red silk gown slip off her shoulders, Lucky saw she was naked, a bodacious tanned body with an exotic face that displayed the best of her two bloodlines. Feline brown eyes and lips that were puffy, swollen, and sexy. Long silky black hair that shimmered when she turned her face.

  She knelt down before him and unbuckled his belt, carefully placing the Prada bag to one side, never taking her eyes off him even as she unzipped his fly. She tugged down his pants, and pulled his lun cock out, caressing it with her French-tip fingernails.

  “Dios mio,” she exclaimed softly, “Nei dai sai.” My god, how big you are, playing him along in two languages.

  “Nei ho yeh,” he answered sarcastically. “You’re the winner. I heard you’re the best.”

  She smiled again, licked her lips, and then ran her tongue in a circle around the head of his cock. She licked it until it was swollen, and proceeded to suck him slow and strong.

  The Ecstasy was working against the sensimilla now, working him like a yo-yo.

  He felt the strength draining from his arms, his legs, all his blood rushing toward his cock, his heart pumping hard to keep things working. The shortness of breath caught him as he saw the mass of shiny black hair bobbing up and down at his stomach. She tightened her lips and deep-throated him. The pressure was building in his head, ready now. She was stroking his shaft, caressing his balls with her other hand. His orgasm exploded into her mouth, four, five, six loads. The noise he heard was his own groaning, the sweet anguish throbbing in his loins.

  He was sucking in air through his nostrils, his mouth gasping like a fish, his thighs quivering as he braced his back against the door. He let his heart slow down as he came back to earth. When she turned her head he saw a sweet face, contemplating her palms. She looked up at him with her big brown eyes, then opened her mouth, and tilted her head to let the thick milky jism spill over her lower lip, her tongue pushing the spittle and saliva out into her palms. A thick translucent strand clung to her chin. She smiled and wiped it off with the back of her hand. Reaching into the nightstand, she took out a small towelette and wiped the stickiness off his shaft. There was no need for words and he watched her as she turned, still on all fours, crawling her way off with the red gown and the Prada bag in tow, giving him a rear view of her departing pussy. She stood up at the connecting door, and their eyes met a last time before she exited the room. China-cubana.

  He took a deep breath, pulled his pants up, zipped his fly, and after a few shaky steps, made his way back to the frozen night and the black car.

  * * *

  It was a short ride back from Chrystie to Mott Street, so Lucky left the window open, the cold wind on his face working with the Ecstasy, refocusing his mind.

  The On Yee always collected cash off the streets before holiday weekends, and squared up the Chinese accounts, before the crush of waiters crowded into the gambling dens, their pockets fat with Thanksgiving Dinner tip money
from the gwailo white devils.

  When they reached Bayard Street, it was almost ten-thirty, early yet for the gambling crowd. Lefty parked the Riviera on Mulberry, facing north, and out, toward the Holland Tunnel or the Manhattan Bridge, a quick left or right if they needed to bust out of Chinatown.

  Lucky, Lefty, and Kongo walked onto Mott and the street was quiet except for the shrill whistle of the arctic wind.

  They went into Number Nine basement first.

  The basement was brightly lit, and Lucky saw one mahjong game underway, but otherwise there was only a smattering of the association’s cronies hanging around making lowball bets just to keep the action going. It was cold out, and anyway, the night was young for the night crawlers, he thought.

  Kongo gave the fake Marlboros to the house manager and stood to one side, overlooking the one active table of thirteen-card poker. There were no players at the fan-tan or paigow tables, and the dealers were smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee, and watching Chinese cable television. Lefty took the Ecstasy pills over to Number Sixty-Six basement, where other Ghosts would package them into small plastic baggies before delivery to local karaoke joints and uptown discos and dance clubs.

  Lucky dropped another hit of Ecstasy, and then chased it with a shot of Johnnie Black. He waited as the managers tallied their accounts. The players would show up soon enough so the basements would be jammed again, and he still wanted to place a hot bet with the Chinese bookie at the OTB, but the troubles out at East Broadway kept bouncing to the front of his mind and crowded out the images of blowjobs and bodacious bodies. Instead, he saw a crew of incompetent Ghosts, thought about Koo Jai—Kid Koo—and called his pager. Lefty came back with a suitcase of cash for the manager and turned it over to the house accountants. Then he swallowed an Ecstasy and stood next to Kongo by the door, watching the house take money off the card table.