A sits there polite as ever, our friend. N seems to trust him. He
sits and watches too. The blues vibrate from the machine. The
room is tiny. There are two or three tables against a wall
where we sit. A sits on the outside of the tables, we are blocked
in against the wall, the men stand around. There are a lot of
them, all crowded in, and then spilling over to the sidewalk.
Billie keeps us company while the men stare and do business.
We are quiet.
*
A’s best friend doesn’t say much. He never talks directly to
either of us. N sleeps with both of them by now. She says they
have quite a routine. She says the puncture marks on A’s body
are holes that go right through his skin. Sometimes she does
their laundry or stays with them a few days.
*
63
N meets some of his women. She is not happy. They are real
Times Square whores.
*
He seems to be keeping N separate, apart. He and his best
friend share her.
*
One night he comes to the storefront all soft-spoken, a
friend. He has been thinking about our situation. We are all
standing in the dark dank middle room, near the single mattress. He wants to help us. He has an apartment in Times Square we can move into, both of us. We don’t have to do
anything for him, absolutely nothing. We can just come live
there. N defers to me to say yes or no. I say no. I have been
thinking a lot about pimps. He is unruffled. He is our friend.
If we don’t want to move in with him, it’s OK. He will think of
some other way to help us. He and N go off. I wonder if she is
going to live with him. She does now and then, for a day or
two. He is a friend. I know he adores her: I can see it. I can’t
see him pimping but for a fact he pimps so so much for what I
can see. I like him and she is loyal to him: her loyalty once
given is not breachable: her code is close to absolute, unspoken,
I have never seen it breached: it is his lost hand, the punctures
in his body, his best friend and the routine, his courtesy and
intelligence, and something in him irredeemably outside: she
even does their laundry. I say to her, you know, N, about
pimps. Don’t worry, she says, yeah I know.
I would believe her except for the smack. She doesn’t do it
regular but who knows what it takes, not much. He is besotted
with her but the smack is easy: and he isn’t any fool. I ask N
what his girls on the street are like. She frowns, looks down.
*
He shows me his drawings, pen sketches, elaborate and skillful,
images of horror and death. I show him my poems: the same.
N plays her clarinet. These are family times.
*
He sits in the coffeehouse, in the bar, wherever, as we come
and go: bringing money back: he doesn’t touch it and buys his
own coffee.
*
64
What else can I do? he says solemnly. I can’t dance anymore.
*
I wait for him to mention the apartment again: to seduce, to
convince. Then I will know. He doesn’t. He is either sincere or
no fool. He is no fool but is he also sincere?
Can a pimp be sincere?
Ah, he says, not too often, I wanted to dance.
*
He brings N a silk scarf: and me a book.
*
I am wondering if I should sleep with him: but they are a real
pair, boy and girl: she waits for him and he comes often. I take
my cues from her. She is not obligated, as far as I can see: she
wants him around: she really likes him, for himself as we say,
a lot. He remains nice. I begin to think I am wrong about the
apartment. Then I remember his girls. Then I think about N
and smack. I keep my distance. She is loyal to me too. She
won’t go without me. I think.
*
He died, my daddy, kind man, in a poverty of loneliness and
disregard. I was not a good daughter. Nothing came to me
when he died. I took a bus to the funeral. The relatives who
raised me on and off were there. I hadn’t dressed right. I was
dirty and hot. I only had pants. Him being dead wasn’t the
main thing for them: it was me, not dressed right. The cemetery
was flat and ugly. There were weeds. I got back on the bus
right away. I got back late at night. I walk into the storefront
and I think fucking pig, what the hell is wrong with her, there
are things thrown everywhere, papers all around all over the
floor and clothes thrown all around and everything is a fucking
mess. She is not there. I know she is out at a bar. I am pissed
like hell. I keep looking around, unable to take the mess in.
Then it registers. There is nothing left. Everything is gone. The
records are gone, the record player, the sax, the clarinet, the
typewriter, almost all our clothes, except that some are thrown
all over, every fucking thing that can be picked up and carried
is gone: I walk through the apartment: the metal has been
lifted off the back door like King Kong had done it: it
must have taken hours to do and had to have been done in
daylight: the neighbors must have enjoyed it: and in the re65
frigerator there had been a bottle of vodka, that’s all, and now
the empty bottle was there on the sink. The fucks had drunk
the fucking vodka. There is nothing left, and at the same time
an indescribable mess of strewn things, like junk, trash, like
garbage.
I go to the bars to find N. She is far east, at a rough place I
have gone to long before I even knew her— I am two years
older and show it— and the bars are littered with my lost late
adolescence— I find her— I have fucked all the bartenders in
this bar and the one she is talking to now is the best— and I
grab her and take her home. She is pissed with me until she
sees. It is impossible to calculate our loss. Everything we own.
They ravaged it. Went through. Decimated it. There hadn’t
been much until it was gone. I barely saw the damage the
first time. Barely saw what was gone. Barely remembered what
had been there. We have nothing left, except some T-shirts.
They have even taken underwear and blue jeans. They have
taken belts. They have taken everything.
The next morning our neighbors all greet us with smiles.
The next morning the boys across the street ask us how things
are going.
The next morning the head of the pack smiles and says hi
girls, next time we gonna come for you.
*
We are sleeping on the narrow mattress in the day. Next door
there is a thunderous sound. The thunderous sound moves
from one end of the apartment to the other and back again.
There are screams and laughs and things crash and break. The
feet are loud and fast, running back and forth. There is only a
thin wooden door between us and the next apartment. The
sound is very loud. It is not precisely human, not identifiably
human: it could be anything: like what? a herd of buffalo: we
are driftin
g off back to sleep: we dismiss it: it can’t be anything:
it is broad daylight: the sound is thunderous, back and forth,
back and forth: we sleep. Later, we go in. They have been
there, while we slept, in broad daylight. Everything is gone
except for what they left broken so we could see it good. They
didn’t take the TV that was in there. Instead they smashed it.
Hey girls we coming for you.
A knock on our door: head of the pack: hey we gonna pay
66
you girls a visit soon. You ready for us. We gonna have a goodtime. He leans against the door. He smiles. I start to close the door. He stops me, still leaning. Hey girl that ain’t gonna help.
Ain’t nothin gonna help. We coming right in. When we ready.
*
lt is having been asleep, hearing them, hearing the smashing,
hearing the plundering, hearing the raucous laughs: hearing:
while out cold: in a coma of sleep: having seen their knives:
knowing them: sleeping through it but hearing it all the same.
They will come: when they ready.
*
I beg N not to go out but she has a date with R. I don’t really
beg, it isn’t in our code, but I ask, unlikely enough. I ask once.
To my way of thinking, it is begging, don’t leave me here
alone. She wants to go, to get out, to get away, with safe little
R in her safe little apartment. She is afraid. Don’t go.
*
I bolt the door behind them, thinking where I can go. The
banging starts. Knocking first. Then banging. The front door.
Hey you got no manners you don’t open the door. Hey it go
worse for you if you don’t open the door. Hey you want we
break it down. Hey you want we come in from next door.
Hey you want we use the back door girl. Banging. Banging.
Silence. Hey girl. Just wanna talk girl you ain’t gonna do no
better than that. You got thirty seconds girl then we come
through the front window girl: it break like a bone girl: you
ever see a bone break girl I gonna show you how you arm
break girl: and I got my boys in the back too you know that
girl. I go to the phone: police, even though they won’t come:
the line is cut: the phone is dead. The back is a jungle.
I open the door. The head of the pack is there. Behind him
there are seven or eight men, slouching, spitting, smoking. They
are several feet behind him. He is smaller than most of them,
dark, curly hair, not shaved, heavy moustache, earring in one
ear, gold, big dark eyes. Now girl this is the way it is, I keep
my word, you open the door we talk. Now you make a choice
girl. See these boys do what I say and now you let me in and
you take care of me real nice girl right now and we have a
good time or you close the door girl and we come in all together
and we get you good girl: you see girl you decide. He pulls out
67
a knife: gold, ornate, the size of a dagger. He fingers it. What
do you want, I say. He says, hey girl I just wanna come in,
have a little smoke, make a little love girl what you think, but
these boys here they ain’t so nice as me they a little rough girl
sometimes they ain’t so nice but you take my word girl you let
me in and I tell them to go home and they go home. I don’t
know what he will do but I know what they will do. I take my
chances with him. I say, you have to leave the knife outside.
He says, no girl hey that knife she my friend she go with me
where 1 go girl. I say, I won’t let you in with the knife. OK,
girl, I put the knife right here, right on this here window girl,
and if anything happen to me girl my boys put this knife right
in your back you understand girl. I nod. He turns to them, says
something in Spanish. They linger. He talks again. They leave.
Ah you see girl you so sweet it hard for them to go but you a
friend of Joe now.
He saunters in, looks around. Oh yeah girl they was nice
records you had, nice. He saunters into the middle room, sits
on the mattress, takes off his shirt. A gold cross glimmers in
his hairy chest. Hey girl now you make me something to eat, I
got to have something to eat girl so I can screw you good. We
got time girl. We got all night. We don’t have much food, I
say. Oh yeah girl that right, well, what you got. I say, there are
hot dogs. You make me hot dogs girl. I want you to make me
hot dogs girl. I am counting the minutes, thinking that maybe
if I can keep him eating or talking or distracted N will come
back or it will get light or he will fall asleep or I will think of
something: I use pacifist strategies, try to make him see I am
human, ask him questions about himself. The boys still outside
girl, I holler and they come, so you cook girl. I cook.
He chatters. He grabs a sharp knife in the kitchen: hey girl
this for me not you. You thinking about using this on your
boyfriend Joe, that ain’t right girl. He eats. Why you not eating
girl? I say I am not hungry. I sit across the huge wooden table
from him, the kitchen dull in the artificial light of a bare bulb.
He eats. Oh this is good girl, you this good girl? We gonna
find out girl.
He drinks iced water. He drinks iced tea. He drinks vodka
out of the bottle. He gets up. OK girl you come.
He saunters back to the mattress. He takes off his pants. 1
68
stand there. There is a banging on the door. I am frozen. Don’t
you say nothing girl or you gonna be dead. The sharp knife is
in his hand. I stand there, quiet, so still. The knocking continues. You know who that is girl? I nod yes, thinking that if I can get to the door maybe I can get help: but afraid it is his
boys. The knocking goes on and on. I don’t dare move. We
wait for it to stop. I say maybe I should see who it is. He says
don’t you move girl, don’t you fucking move. The knocking
stops. He says, now you get over here girl. The knocking starts
again. A deep male voice calls me by name. Oh, I say, it is
someone I know, if I don’t answer he will be worried and do
something, but I can go to the door and tell him to go away.
You do that, says Joe real quiet. You better get him away girl.
You better do that. Or I gonna get you good girl. You ain’t
keeping my boys and me out girl. I promise, I say, I will make
him go away. I promise I won’t say anything. The knocking
continues. I see the knife, I see the cross, I see the hairs on his
naked chest. OK girl you got two minutes then you be here. I
walk toward the door. It is a long, slow walk and I am afraid.
I open the door. It is W, someone N and I know only slightly, a
dealer, a tall, thin, dignified black man: very tall. I step just
slightly outside the door and whisper please help me: I point to
the dagger on the window ledge: I say there’s a man in there I
can’t get out he forced his way in please help me I beg you. I will
take care of it, he says with enormous quiet conviction. He walks
in. Joe is there undressed, on the mattress, the knife in his hand
on his belly. W says, what’s this I hear you fucking junkie you
> trying to take my woman from me, I’m gonna fucking kill you.
He says this very quietly but with a deep resonance in his voice.
Joe begins to shake. Hey man I didn’t know she was your girl
man hey I didn’t mean you no shit man. He fumbles with his pants.
He fumbles with his shirt. He starts sweating bad. Hey man if I
know she was your girl man hey I wouldn’t touch man it was just
a joke man. W says, don’t I know you from somewhere man? Joe
says, yeah man, I buy some smack from you but times is hard
man. W says well you come to see me man if you need anything
but I don’t want my woman here bothered. You understand, W
says with quiet seriousness and authority, this is my woman. You
treat her with respect man you understand she belongs to me.
Hey man I didn’t mean nothing by it man.
69
Joe fumbles and sweats. They talk smack. Joe is sloppy and
scared, W is austere and serious. W shows Joe to the door.
Then he comes back.
I thank him. It isn’t enough. He tears into me. He bites my
clitoris and bites it and bites it until I wish I was dead. He
fucks. He bites my clitoris more, over and over, for hours, I
want to die. The pain is shooting through my brain. I am
chewed and bitten and maimed. I am bleeding. He leaves. I
hurt so bad I can’t even crawl. He leaves the front door wide
open.
*
From now on N and I never sleep at the same time: one of us
is always awake with a knife in her hand. We lie down on the
narrow mattress together, never alone, and one sleeps and one
stays awake, knife in hand, knife clutched, ready to use. She
sleeps a few hours, I listen to every sound: knife in my hand.
The sweat is cold now always: no matter how the summer
heat boils and steams and hangs like fire in the air. I sleep a
few hours, wake up in a cold sweat, always to find her wide
awake, eyes wide open, alert, watching the room: anything
moves, it dies. I count on her. I count on the knife. I think I
can use it on myself, if there are too many of them.
*
We know they will come back. I knew Joe would turn me over
to the others when he was done that night or some other. We
know we can’t keep them out. They know. We wait. We don’t
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