The City, Not Long After

by Pat Murphy

  “Hey, Danny-boy!” Danny-boy looked up and saw Snake waving to him from a group of people at the top of the staircase. “Come here—we gotta talk to you.”

  As always, Snake wore his leathers. His left ear was twisted, a knotted fold of flesh that looked a little like a flower bud that had only started to unfold. A scar began at the mangled ear and extended along the line of his jaw. As if to call attention to the scar, he shaved the left half of his head. The tattoo of a rattlesnake writhed across the bare scalp, heading for the protective thicket of his curly dark hair. For once, he was not wearing dark glasses, and his eyes looked curiously naked.

  Danny-boy waved back. Jezebel, who did not like crowds, pressed against his leg on one side. Jax stood on the other. Danny-boy glanced at her. Her right hand had dropped to her knife. “I’ll introduce you to everyone,” he said, trying to reassure her. “That’s Snake. He probably wants to talk to me about the Golden Gate Bridge. And you can see Ms. Migsdale over there; you’ve met her. She’s talking to Books—he lives in the library. I’m sure Tiger’s around here somewhere. The guys around Snake are all graffiti artists. The folks by the fire are all poets of one sort or another. Everyone will be glad to meet you.” Jax’s expression did not change. He touched her hand gently. “It’ll be all right.” She nodded then, but her face did not relax.

  Snake called to Danny-boy again, and he made his way toward the group, leading Jax by the hand. En route, he greeted friends, introducing Jax. “This is my friend, Jax. That’s right, the woman without a name. She has a name now. Jax, this is…” Rose, Mercedes, Zatch, Ruby, Mario, Lily—Jax nodded stiffly at each person he introduced. She kept a strong grip on his hand. It took the better part of half an hour to make their way up the stairs.

  As Danny-boy had expected, Snake wanted to talk about the Golden Gate Bridge. He had been convincing some of the artists in the group around him that they should do sections of the bridge. Danny-boy took a swig of homemade wine from the bottle that was passed his way, and he nodded. “That’s right. The design is up to you. You can use any shade of blue you want, but it’s got to be blue.” “Why blue?” asked a skinny redhead who went by the name of Old Man Hat. “I don’t like blue.”

  Danny-boy shrugged. “It was Duff’s idea. He chose the color. If you don’t like it, don’t sign up.”

  “Who decides what qualifies as blue?” asked another. “I have a broad definition.”

  “I decide. I supply the paint.”

  “I’ll sign up,” said Old Man Hat. “I guess there are worse colors.” “Me too,” said the artist with the broad definition of blue.

  Several others nodded.

  “That’s great. Come to the toll booth next Saturday at noon, and I’ll assign you to sections. If you want to get started earlier, talk to me after the meeting and we’ll work something out.” He was noting the names of the artists who wanted to paint, when Books started calling for silence.

  “Come to order,” the old man shouted. “The sooner we get started, the sooner we’ll be done.”

  Danny-boy looked around and found that Jax and Jezebel had vanished. “Where did Jax go?” he asked the woman nearest him, but she just hushed him and motioned for him to sit so that the meeting could start. Reluctantly, he sat.

  “Any announcements?” Books said. Several people made announcements: Mario, a poet who ran a fishing boat, had a supply of smoked red snapper for trade; Frank was looking for a new supply of prisms and would welcome any leads; a new play would be performed on Friday at five, if the weather was good, by the Vallencourt Fountain; Books would be holding a poetry reading in the library on Saturday at sunset; participants should bring candles.

  During the announcements, Danny-boy scanned the crowd for Jax. He finally spotted her sitting beside Ms. Migsdale. She had a spooked look on her face.

  “Community business,” Books called. The first business was a long wrangle between two sculptors. Both of them had chosen to build a major work in the parking lot at the top of Twin Peaks. Bartlett, a bearlike man with a surprisingly soft voice, had begun erecting a replica of Stonehenge, using refrigerators instead of stones. He explained, at great length, that the Twin Peaks location was the only place he had found in the city where the appropriate astronomical events could be observed. Zatch, a lanky black man who lived with Ruby, had planned a kinetic sculpture for the same location. “I need a place with a lot of wind,” he said. “That parking lot was just fine.”

  Danny-boy ignored the discussion that followed. He had heard it all before. Several times a year this sort of conflict came up and generated what seemed like endless discussion. Usually, whichever artist was the most desperate or stubborn stuck it out and got the site. The other gave up and found another.

  “I’d put money on Bartlett,” Snake said in Danny-boy’s ear. “He’s a touch crazy, and crazy people got stamina.”

  “No bet,” Danny-boy whispered back. “I think you’re right. I heard Zatch talking earlier about the principle of the thing.” Snake shook his head. “He’s out of luck. Principles don’t count nearly as much as stamina.”

  After much discussion, the matter was referred to committee. Zatch sat down, shaking his head. “He’ll have another site by next week,” Snake muttered.

  “I’d like to introduce a newcomer to the city,” Books was saying. “She has something to say.” He beckoned Jax forward into the light. Danny-boy watched her glance at Ms. Migsdale and then step forward. Her eyes were wide and panicky, and her hand rested on the handle of her knife.

  A few people in the back were talking. Jax waited without speaking until they fell silent. “My name is Jax,” she said quietly. Too quietly, Danny-boy thought. Then he realized that people had fallen silent and were leaning forward to listen. “I grew up in Woodland, a town near Sacramento. I’ve come here to tell you that a man named Fourstar is going to invade San Francisco.” She glanced at Ms. Migsdale, glanced at the floor. For a moment Danny-boy thought she might bolt from the room, but she just paused for a moment, then went on. “In the market, I heard that he’s invaded other places. He took Fresno last year; Modesto the year before. I don’t know much about it, but I know he hates San Francisco. He blames you for the Plague, he says that you hoard resources. He says that you’ll invade Sacramento if he doesn’t invade San Francisco. He says he wants to bring the country back together. I don’t know much about that, either. I don’t know much about this place that Fourstar calls America, but I’ll tell you something—if Fourstar thinks America is great, I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all.” She stopped again, her face tight and controlled. “My mother came from San Francisco. She told me to come and warn you. She said you would have to fight. You’ll have to kill Fourstar. You’ll have to kill him, or he’ll kill all of you.” She looked directly at Danny-boy. “I guess that’s all I have to say.”

  Danny-boy took no part in the discussion that followed. Books fielded questions and Jax answered them, mostly with “I don’t know.” She didn’t know how many men Fourstar had, she didn’t know the date of his planned invasion, she didn’t know what type of equipment he would be using.

  “People have been talking about this Fourstar dude for years,” Snake said softly in Danny-boy’s ear. “So what’s new?”

  Danny-boy watched Jax, standing beside Books. In the firelight, she cast an enormous shadow that danced on the curved wall. “Jax seems to think it’s going to happen soon.”

  “You believe her?”

  Danny-boy nodded slowly. “I think so. I wish I didn’t.” Snake shook his head. “I’m not convinced.”

  A few people proposed immediate military action. Others proposed alliances—with the Black Dragons in Oakland, with the farmers in Marin. Danny-boy leaned back against the marble steps, knowing that nothing would be resolved that night. He listened to the artists bluster about what they would do to Fourstar if he set foot in the city.

  Ms. Migsdale and Books were the last to leave City Hall, lingering to extinguish the
coals of the fire and blow out the guttering candles. Together they crossed the Civic Center Plaza, heading for the library. The waning moon touched the trees with silver; the night wind coaxed a few high notes from the aeolian harp.

  “Danny-boy didn’t seem like himself tonight,” Ms. Migsdale commented.

  “Didn’t say more than two words to me all evening,” Books grumbled. “Practically snatched that young lady away from me and insisted she had to go home and rest.”

  “What did you think of the young lady?”

  “Very pleasant,” Books said. “I suggested that she come visit me at the library. She seems to be very interested in the city’s history.” Ms. Migsdale raised her eyebrows. “I like her, but I wouldn’t call her pleasant. I swear she bared her teeth when Zatch suggested we try negotiating with Fourstar.”

  “Oh, come now. She was just a little tense. Not used to speaking in front of groups.”

  “Danny-boy was on edge too,” Ms. Migsdale mused. “But I expect the tension will ease somewhat after they sleep together.” Books stopped and stared at her. “Elvira, you shock me sometimes.”

  Ms. Migsdale glanced at him. “Now Edgar, you might as well admit that you were thinking the same thing.”

  “I don’t believe I was.”

  “Well, then you’re overlooking the obvious, and that’s a poor trait for a researcher. Come on now—let’s get in out of the cold.” Books followed her across the plaza. “I think you’re making some rash assumptions,” he said as they reached the library steps. “How do you know that she won’t just leave the city? You just said you thought she was rather wild.”

  “Not wild exactly,” Ms. Migsdale said. “Shy, in a wild kind of way. But I’ll bet on Danny-boy. He’s always had a nice way with wild things.”

  CHAPTER 11

  MERCEDES HAD SPENT THE DAYS of her childhood leaning on the fender of her older brother’s 1965 Chevrolet, watching Antonio work under the hood. Antonio was seven years her senior. He had quit high school when she was still in elementary school. When she was in junior high, he had moved out of the family home to share an apartment with two friends, coming home for dinners on Sundays just to keep their mother happy.

  Antonio had worked at the corner gas station, pumping gas, fixing cars, tinkering with his own Chevy low rider. After school Mercedes had hung out at the station, watching her brother work. On Sunday afternoons she had helped him wax his car, smearing white paste over the already satiny finish, then rubbing and polishing until she could see her face in the shiny black paint.

  A line of grease was permanently embedded beneath each of Antonio’s fingernails. On his left wrist was a tattoo that said “Maryann.” In his freshman year of high school, Antonio had given himself the tattoo with a needle and the ink from a ball-point pen. The girl, a blonde who was trying out for the cheerleading squad, had broken up with him anyway.

  Mercedes’ dad hadn’t liked her hanging around at the gas station. But then, her dad hadn’t liked the boys she dated (tough guys with bad reputations) or the clothes she wore (faded jeans with oversized shirts) or her music, her friends, her constant swearing. So she had hung out at the gas station and told her parents that she was studying at the library.

  Sometimes Mercedes had helped her brother with repairs: after years of watching him work, she was quick and knowledgeable. Her small hands could squeeze into spaces where his could not. Her ability to diagnose a car’s ailments bordered on the miraculous: she would tilt her head to one side, listen to an engine rattle or wheeze or grind, and then give a repair estimate accurate to the dollar. She had planned to go to work with Antonio at the gas station when she finished high school, and to save her money for a Chevy lowrider of her own. But things didn’t work out that way.

  Her mother had been the first in the family to sicken with the Plague. Then her father. Mercedes had taken care of her parents, bringing food and water, draping cold washcloths over their foreheads, buying over-the-counter remedies that promised to relieve the aches and pains of fever. The hospital emergency room sent her home with nothing. The newspapers were filled with articles on the Plague: they offered warnings, but no hope.

  Though she had never had much faith in God or in the Catholic church, she prayed as she took care of her parents, pleading with the Virgin Mary to help her, asking Jesus to make her mother and father well. Late one morning, after a sleepless night, she fell asleep in the armchair by her parents’ bed. When she woke in the afternoon, both her mother and her father were quiet, lying still and lifeless beneath a thin blanket. Her mother’s head was cushioned on her father’s arm.

  She went to the gas station to tell Antonio and found him slumped in the back seat of his car. His forehead felt hot and dry. When she woke him, he did not seem to recognize her.

  She took the car keys from his pocket and drove him to her family’s home. There, she nursed him, even when she fell sick herself. But all the tea and orange juice and cold remedies and prayers made no difference. He died, just as so many died. She stood at his bedside, looking down at him. His hands were pale, except for the rim of dark grease beneath each nail. The tattoo was dark against his skin.

  Wearing her brother’s old high school letter jacket, she left her family’s home. Though sick with fever, she was overcome with an angry restlessness that made her run through the empty city, screaming in a dry hoarse voice. She carried the tire iron from her brother’s car, and she used it to break store windows, reveling in the sound of shattering glass.

  On the corner of Valencia and 19th, a group of looters saw her and ran toward her, but she swung the tire iron with great authority and raved in a high feverish voice about the Virgin Mary and the blood of Jesus Christ. They ran, from fear of the fever rather than the tire iron, but she never knew that.

  She walked down Valencia Street, smashing the windshields of cars and trucks, until she could walk no farther. Then she found a bed in the back of a furniture store, wandering in through a door that had been broken by other vandals. She collapsed on the bed and slept for a long time.

  She woke up thirsty but still alive. She got a drink from the water cooler in the manager’s office, and then started walking with no destination in mind. The sunlight made her blink, and she had to pick her way around the shards of broken glass that littered the sidewalk. Now and then, she passed a body: a middle-aged man collapsed behind the wheel of a car; an old lady curled in a doorway; a teen-ager—perhaps one of the looters who had threatened her—sprawled in the display window of a jewelry store, among the gems and broken glass.

  Antonio walked beside her and talked to her. He was very pale. She could see bits of broken glass on the sidewalk sparkling through his feet. He was dead.

  “Aren’t you going to talk to me?” he asked her. “Can’t talk to you,” she said. “You’re dead.”

  A burning cigarette hung from the corner of his mouth; his hands were stuffed deep in his pockets. “Yeah,” he said. “I guess so.

  After a moment, she asked, “What’s it like, being dead?”

  He shrugged and took another drag on his cigarette. “I don’t have to worry about smoking too much,” he said.

  “I want to die,” she told him.

  “Ah, muchacha, you don’t want to do that.”

  “Tony, I do. I want to die. Ma’s dead, Dad’s dead, you’re dead. I want to die too.” She ran her hands back through her hair. He shook his head angrily. “I don’t want to hear that kind of talk. That’s stupid.”

  “You sound just like Dad,” she said. He turned away from her and she immediately regretted her words, remembering Tony’s arguments with their father. “Hey, I’m sorry. Tony, wait! I didn’t mean it.”

  He stopped and waited for her. “Maybe Dad was right sometimes,” he said. She had trouble reading his expression; his face was growing more transparent. “Did you ever think of that?”

  “Why should I keep on living?” she asked him.

  “You got to have a reason?” he asked. He
shrugged again. “You can do anything now. Live anywhere. Take whatever you want.”

  “I don’t care about that.”

  A shadow of a grin crossed his face: he never stayed angry long. “But you got to have a reason? All right then, stay alive so you can take care of my car. I leave it to you. You’re responsible for it. OK?”

  “Tony, that’s stupid,” she said. “Why should I…”

  She was talking to herself. She was two blocks from her home, standing in the middle of the street. She walked home, but did not enter. She took Tony’s car and drove around the city, looking for a nice place to live.

  That was a long time ago. On the day that Jax got her name, Mercedes squatted in the Union Square garden, picking the last of the tomatoes from the straggling vines. She looked up and saw Antonio standing on the nearest path. She sat back on her heels and stared at him. In the years immediately following the Plague, he had appeared every few weeks, stopping in to chat with her. But she had not seen him for several years.

  He was smoking a cigarette and staring off into the distance. He still wore the same tattered denim jacket, the same greasestained jeans. “Hey, muchacha,” he said.

  “I’m not a little girl anymore, Tony,” she told him. “I’m older than you are now.”

  “Maybe so. But I’m still your big brother.” He took a drag on his cigarette. “Came to warn you,” he said.

  “About what?”

  “An army’s coming,” he said. “You’d better get ready.” “That’s what the stranger said.”

  “You listen to that stranger, muchacha. She knows what she’s talking about.”

  “Get ready how?” she asked.

  He left the cigarette dangling from his mouth and spread his hands, as if there were no words to describe the necessary preparations. “That’s up to you. I’m just telling you that trouble’s coming. After that, it’s up to you.” Tony dropped his cigarette on the ground and crushed it with his foot. And then he was gone, leaving a scent of cigarette smoke that filled her with a longing for days past.