Ham On Rye

by Charles Bukowski

  "Hank," said Jimmy, "I'll see you again. Take it easy."

  "All right, Jim…"

  "Listen," Fastshoes said to me, "You…"

  I shot a straight right into his mouth. He fell backward down the stairway, twisting and bouncing. He was about my size, six feet and oneeighty, and you could hear the sound of him for a block. Two Filipinos and the blond landlady were in the lobby. They looked at Fastshoes laying there but they didn't move toward him.

  "You killed him!" said Jimmy.

  He ran down the stairway and turned Fastshoes over. Fastshoes had a bloody nose and mouth. Jimmy held his head. Jimmy looked up at me.

  "That wasn't right, Hank…"

  "Yeah, what ya gonna do?"

  "I think," said Jimmy, "that we're going to come back and get you.. ."

  "Wait a minute," I said.

  I walked back to my room and poured myself a wine. I hadn't liked Jimmy's paper cups and I had been drinking out of a used jelly glass. The paper label was still on the side, stained with dirt and wine. I walked back out.

  Fastshoes was reviving. Jimmy was helping him to his feet. Then he put Fastshoes' arm around his neck. They were standing there.

  "Now what did you say?" I asked.

  "You're an ugly man, Hank. You need to be taught a lesson."

  "You mean I'm not pretty?"

  "I mean, you act ugly…"

  "Take your friend out of here before I come down there and finish him off!"

  Fastshoes raised his bloody head. He had on a flowered Hawaiian shirt, only now many of the colors were stained with red.

  He looked at me. Then he spoke. I could barely hear him. But I heard it. He said, "I'm going to kill you…"

  "Yeah," said Jimmy, "we'll get you."

  "YEAH, FUCKERS?" I screamed. "I'M NOT GOING ANYWHERE! ANYTIME YOU WANT TO FIND ME I'LL BE IN ROOM 5! I'LL BE WAITING! ROOM 5, GOT IT? AND THE DOOR WILL BE OPEN!"

  I lifted the jelly glass full of wine and drained it. Then I hurled that jelly glass at them. I threw the son-of-a-bitch, hard. But my aim was bad. It hit the side of the stairway wall, glanced off and shot into the lobby between the landlady and her two Filipino friends.

  Jimmy turned Fastshoes toward the exit door and began slowly walking him out. It was a tedious, agonizing journey. I heard Fastshoes again, half moaning, half weeping, "I'll kill him… I'll kill him…"

  Then Jimmy had him out the doorway. They were gone. The blond landlady and the two Filipinos were still standing in the lobby, looking up at me. I was barefooted, and had gone five or six days without a shave. I needed a haircut. I only combed my hair once, in the morning, then didn't bother again. My gym teachers were always after me about my posture: "Pull your shoulders back! Why are you looking at the ground? What's down there?"

  I would never set any trends or styles. My white t-shirt was stained with wine, burned, with many cigarettes and cigar holes, spotted with blood and vomit. It was too small, it rode up exposing my gut and belly button. And my pants were too small. They gripped me tightly and rose well above my ankles.

  The three of them stood and looked at me. I looked down at them. "Hey, you guys, come on up for a little drink!"

  The two little men looked up at me and grinned. The landlady, a faded Carole Lombard type, looked on impassively. Mrs. Kansas, they called her. Could she be in love with me? She was wearing pink shoes with high heels and a black sparkling sequinned dress. Little chips of light flashed at me. Her breasts were something that no mere mortal would ever see - they were only for kings, dictators, rulers, Filipinos.

  "Anybody got a smoke?" I asked. "I'm out of smokes."

  The little dark fellow standing to one side of Mrs. Kansas made a slight motion with one hand toward his jacket pocket and a pack of Camels jumped in the lobby air. Deftly he caught the pack in his other hand. With the invisible tap of a finger on the bottom of the pack a smoke leaped up, tall, true, singular and exposed, ready to be taken.

  "Hey, shit, thanks," I said.

  I started down the stairway, made a mis-step, lunged, almost fell, grabbed the bannister, righted myself, readjusted my perceptions, and walked on down. Was I drunk? I walked up to the little guy holding the pack. I bowed slightly.

  I lifted out the Camel. Then I flipped it in the air, caught it, stuck it into my mouth. My dark friend remained expressionless, the grin having vanished when I had begun down the stairway. My little friend bent forward, cupped his hands around the flame and lit my smoke.

  I inhaled, exhaled. "Listen, why don't you all come up to my place and we'll have a couple of drinks?"

  "No," said the little guy who had lit my cigarette.

  "Maybe we can catch the Bee or some Bach on my radio! I'm educated, you know. I'm a student…"

  "No," said the other little guy.

  I took a big drag on my smoke, then looked at Carole Lombard - Mrs. Kansas. Then I looked at my two friends.

  "She's yours. I don't want her. She's yours. Just come on up. We'll drink a little wine. In good old room 5."

  There was no answer. I rocked on my heels a bit as the whiskey and the wine fought for possession. I let my cigarette dangle a bit from the right side of my mouth as I sent up a plume of smoke. I continued letting the cigarette dangle like that.

  I knew about stilettoes. In the little time I had been there I had seen two enactments of the stiletto. From my window one night, looking out at the sound of sirens, I saw a body there just below my window on the Temple Street sidewalk, in the moonlight, under the streetlight. Another time, another body. Nights of the stiletto. Once a white man, the other time one of them. Each time, blood running on the pavement, real blood, just like that, moving across the pavement and into the gutter, you could see it going along in the gutter, meaningless, dumb… that so much blood could come from just one man.

  "All right, my friends," I said to them, "no hard feelings. I'll drink alone…"

  I turned and started to walk toward the stairway.

  "Mr. Chinaski," I heard Mrs. Kansas' voice. I turned and looked at her flanked by my two little friends.

  "Just go to your room and sleep. If you cause any more disturbance I will phone the Los Angeles Police Department."

  I turned and walked back up the stairway. No life anywhere, no life in this town or this place or in this weary existence…

  My door was open. I walked in. There was one-third of a cheap bottle of wine left.

  Maybe there was another bottle in the closet? I opened the closet door. No bottle. But there were tens and twenties everywhere. There was a rolled twenty lying between a pair of dirty socks with holes in the toes; and there from a shirt collar, a ten dangling; and here from an old jacket, another ten caught in a side pocket. Most of the money was on the floor.

  I picked up a bill, slipped it into the side pocket of my pants, went to the door, closed and locked it, then went down the stairway to the bar.

  55

  A couple of nights later Becker walked in. I guess my parents gave him my address or he located me through the college. I had my name and address listed with the employment division at the college, under "unskilled labor." "I will do anything honest or otherwise," I had written on my card. No calls.

  Becker sat in a chair as I poured the wine. He had on a Marine uniform.

  "I see they sucked you in," I said.

  "I lost my Western Union job. It was all that was left."

  I handed him his drink. "You're not a patriot then?"

  "Hell no."

  "Why the Marines?"

  "I heard about boot camp. I wanted to see if I could get through it."

  "And you did."

  "I did. There are some crazy guys there. There's a fight almost every night. Nobody stops it. They almost kill each other."

  "I like that."

  "Why don't you join?"

  "I don't like to get up early in the morning and I don't like to take orders."

  "How are you going to make it?"

  "I don't know. When
I get down to my last dime I'll just walk over to skid row."

  "There are some real weirdos down there."

  "They're everywhere."

  I poured Becker another wine.

  "The problem is," he said, "that there's not much time to write."

  "You still want to be a writer?"

  "Sure. How about you?"

  "Yeah," I said, "but it's pretty hopeless."

  "You mean you're not good enough?"

  "No, they're not good enough."

  "What do you mean?"

  "You read the magazines? The 'Best Short Stories of the Year' books? There are at least a dozen of them."

  "Yeah, I read them…"

  "You read The New Yorker" Harper's? The Atlantic?"

  "Yeah…"

  "This is 1940. They're still publishing 19th Century stuff, heavy, labored, pretentious. You either get a headache reading the stuff or you fall asleep.".

  "What's wrong?"

  "It's a trick, it's a con, a little inside game."

  "Sounds like you've been rejected."

  "I knew I would be. Why waste the stamps? I need wine."

  "I'm going to break through," said Becker. "You'll see my books on the library shelves one day."

  "Let's not talk about writing."

  "I've read your stuff," said Becker. "You're too bitter and you hate everything."

  "Let's not talk about writing."

  "Now you take Thomas Wolfe…"

  "God damn Thomas Wolfe! He sounds like an old woman on the telephone!"

  "O.K., who's your boy?"

  "James Thurber."

  "All that upper-middle-class folderol…"

  "He knows that everyone is crazy."

  "Thomas Wolfe is of the earth…"

  "Only assholes talk about writing…"

  "You calling me an asshole?"

  "Yes…"

  I poured him another wine and myself another wine.

  "You're a fool for getting into that uniform."

  "You call me an asshole and you call me a fool. I thought we were friends."

  "We are. I just don't think you're protecting yourself."

  "Every time I see you you have a drink in your hand. You call that protecting yourself?"

  "It's the best way I know. Without drink I would have long ago cut my god-damned throat."

  "That's bullshit."

  "Nothing's bullshit that works. The Pershing Square preachers have their God. I have the blood of my god!"

  I raised my glass and drained it.

  "You're just hiding from reality," Becker said.

  "Why not?"

  "You'll never be a writer if you hide from reality."

  "What are you talking about? That's what writers do.'"

  Becker stood up. "When you talk to me, don't raise your voice."

  "What do you want to do, raise my dick?"

  "You don't have a dick!"

  I caught him unexpectedly with a right that landed behind his ear. The glass flew out of his hand and he staggered across the room. Becker was a powerful man, much stronger than I was. He hit the edge of the dresser, turned, and I landed another straight right to the side of his face. He staggered over near the window which was open and I was afraid to hit him then because he might fall into the street.

  Becker gathered himself together and shook his head to clear it.

  "All right now," I said, "let's have a little drink. Violence nauseates me."

  "O.K.," said Becker.

  He walked over and picked up his glass. The cheap wine I drank didn't have corks, the tops just unscrewed. I unscrewed a new bottle. Becker held out his glass and I poured him one. I poured myself one, set the bottle down. Becker emptied his. I emptied mine.

  "No hard feelings," I said.

  "Hell, no, buddy," said Becker, putting down his glass. Then he dug a right into my gut. I doubled over and as I did he pushed down on the back of my head and brought his knee up into my face. I dropped to my knees, blood running from my nose all over my shirt.

  "Pour me a drink, buddy," I said, "let's think this thing over."

  "Get up," said Becker, "that was just chapter one."

  I got up and moved toward Becker. I blocked his jab, caught his right on my elbow, and punched a short straight right to his nose. Becker stepped back. We both had bloody noses.

  I rushed him. We were both swinging blindly. I caught some good shots. He hit me with another good right to the belly. I doubled over but came up with an uppercut. It landed. It was a beautiful shot, a lucky shot. Becker lurched backwards and fell against the dresser. The back of his head hit the mirror. The mirror shattered. He was stunned. I had him. I grabbed him by the shirt front and hit him with a hard right behind his left ear. He dropped on the rug, and knelt there on all fours. I walked over and unsteadily poured myself a drink.

  "Becker," I told him, "I kick ass around here about twice a week. You just showed up on the wrong day."

  I emptied my glass. Becker got up. He stood a while looking at me. Then he came forward.

  "Becker," I said, "listen…"

  He started a right lead, pulled it back and slammed a left to my mouth. We started in again. There wasn't much defense. It was just punch, punch, punch. He pushed me over a chair and the chair flattened. I got up, caught him coming in. He stumbled backwards and I landed another right. He crashed backwards into the wall and the whole room shook. He bounced off and landed a right high on my forehead and I saw lights: green, yellow, red… Then he landed a left to the ribs and a right to the face. I swung and missed.

  God damn, I thought, doesn't anybody hear all this noise? Why don't they come and stop it? Why don't they call the police?

  Becker rushed me again. I missed a roundhouse right and then that was it for me…

  When I regained consciousness it was dark, it was night. I was under the bed, just my head was sticking out. I must have crawled under there. I was a coward. I had puked all over myself. I crawled out from under the bed.

  I looked at the smashed dresser mirror and the chair. The table was upside down. I walked over and tried to set it upright. It fell over. Two of the legs wouldn't hold. I tried to fix them as best I could. I set the table up. It stood a moment, then fell over again. The rug was wet with wine and puke. I found a wine bottle lying on its side. There was a bit left. I drank that down and then looked around for more. There was nothing. There was nothing to drink. I put the chain on the door. I found a cigarette, lit it and stood in the window, staring down at Temple Street. It was a nice night out.

  Then there was a knock on the door. "Mr. Chinaski?" It was Mrs. Kansas. She wasn't alone. I heard other voices whispering. She was with her little dark friends.

  "Mr. Chinaski?"

  "Yes?"

  "I want to come into your room."

  "What for?"

  "I want to change the sheets."

  "I'm sick now. I can't let you in."

  "I just want to change the sheets. I'll be just a few minutes."

  "No, I can't let you in. Come in the morning."

  I heard them whispering. Then I heard them walking down the hall. I went over and sat on the bed. I needed a drink, bad. It was a Saturday night, the whole town was drunk. Maybe I could sneak out?

  I walked to the door and opened it a crack, leaving the chain on, and I peeked out. At the top of the stairway there was a Filipino, one of Mrs. Kansas' friends. He had a hammer in his hand. He was down on his knees. He looked up at me, grinned, and then pounded a nail into the rug. He was pretending to fix the rug. I closed the door.

  I really needed a drink. I paced the floor. Why could everybody in the world have a drink but me? How long was I going to have to stay in that goddamned room? I opened the door again. It was the same. He looked up at me, grinned, then hammered another nail into the floor. I closed the door.

  I got out my suitcase and began throwing my few clothes in there. I still had quite a bit of money I had won gambling but I knew that I could never
pay for the damages to that room. Nor did I want to. It really hadn't been my fault. They should have stopped the fight. And Becker had broken the mirror…

  I was packed. I had the suitcase in one hand and my portable typewriter in its case in the other. I stood in front of the door for some time. I looked out again. He was still there. I slipped the chain off the door. Then I pulled the door open and burst out. I ran toward the stairway.

  "HEY! Where you go?" the little guy asked. He was still down on one knee. He started to raise his hammer. I swung the portable typewriter hard against the side of his head. It made a horrible sound. I was down the steps and through the lobby and out the door.

  Maybe I had killed the guy.

  I started running down Temple Street. Then I saw a cab. He was empty. I leaped in.

  "Bunker Hill," I said, "fast!"

  56

  I saw a vacancy sign in the window in front of a rooming-house, had the cabby pull up. I paid him and walked up on the front porch, rang the bell. I had one black eye from the fight, another cut eye, a swollen nose, and my lips were puffed. My left ear was bright red and every time I touched it, an electric shock ran through my body.

  An old man came to the door. He was in his undershirt and it looked like he had spilled chili and beans across the front of it. His hair was grey and uncombed, he needed a shave and he was puffing on a wet cigarette that stank.

  "You the landlord?" I asked.

  "Yep."

  "I need a room."

  "You workin'?"

  "I'm a writer."

  "You don't look like a writer."

  "What do they look like?"

  He didn't answer. Then he said, "$2.50 a week."

  "Can I see it?"

  He belched, then said, "Foller me…"

  We walked down a long hall. There was no hall rug. The boards creaked and sank as we walked on them. I heard a man's voice from one of the rooms.

  "Suck me, you piece of shit!"

  "Three dollars," I heard a woman's voice.

  "Three dollars? I'll give you a bloody asshole!"

  He slapped her hard, she screamed. We walked on.

  "The place is in back," the guy said, "but you are allowed to use the house bathroom."