Jonny jumped up from his stool. “Hey, hey,” he said, ever smiling. He put a hand on mine. “Stay with me tonight,” Jonny said, trying to take me off the stool, but I shook him off. “Come sit at the back booth with me, Kid. Cool off a little.”
“It’s illegal,” Fish said, really leaning into me. “I can’t let some—Christ, Kid, how old are you, anyway? Sixteen? Not even?”
I could hardly believe she didn’t know. “What does that matter? You’d rather I was living on the street?”
“I’d rather you went home and worked it out. I’d rather that I stayed out of jail and kept my bar so I can at least get to see you—and Konny and Felix and Jonny and the people I love—before you all start fading out and blowing up and disappearing on me.” Fish’s fist came down hard on the bar. “Shit.”
She grabbed up her bar towel and jammed it into her back pocket as she walked away, toward the end of the bar and past the pinball machine, out of sight.
Jonny’s arm was around me, and I let him lead me off the stool. I picked up my bag.
“Let’s clear out a little while,” he said.
It was even hotter outside. We strolled easy toward Greenpoint Avenue, and Jonny deposited me on a chair among the tables outside the Pencil Factory. “I’ll get us each a drink.”
I sat and looked into the bar, where Jonny was standing, with one foot on the golden rail, leaning over the waxed wood and giving some other bartender his two-thousand-megawatt smile, then down Franklin toward West and the old warehouses.
“You’ve got a new roommate, Felix,” I said under my breath. Then a vodka and cranberry with three wedges of lime landed in front of me, and Jonny sat down.
…
Jonny eventually bought me four more drinks and a grilled cheese. Looking at him over the last drink, wiping some butter onto the thighs of my jeans, I said, “Thanks. You don’t have to do all this for me.”
Jonny waved me off and pretended to blush.
“I’m serious,” I said. “I mean, I have a little money, and I can get by. Besides, I’m going to have to learn to, right? You can’t support me forever.”
He shrugged. “If you needed me to, I would.”
I just shook my head and slurped at my drink. I was already pretty drunk. “Why do you have such an easy life, Jonny? You never seem to work. You just hang out, buying drinks and drinking drinks and getting phone numbers of the prettiest people. What gives?”
I knew about Jonny, really. And Jonny knew I knew. But no one ever said it out loud, at least not around me. Even Konny never said it aloud, and she’d call out a priest in church if he looked at her funny. Maybe the vodka made me finally say something—finally challenge Jonny to tell me to my face. Maybe I hoped it wasn’t even true. But for that apartment and hundreds of free drinks and adoring looks in every bar in Brooklyn, there was no other explanation. Jonny’s assets were his smile and his body.
Instead of accepting my challenge, Jonny laughed and stood up, then grabbed my empty plate and a couple of empty glasses. When he came back to the table, I was gone, west on Greenpoint, my duffel bag bouncing against my thigh and the slippery residue of grilled cheese on my lips.
…
I should have paid closer attention when Felix was leading me through the warehouse that morning. Blame it on my condition and the distraction of going anywhere with Felix. His entrance was easy to find, because Konny and I had sat there, dangling our feet off the docking bay, smoking cigarettes and passing a bottle back and forth, dozens of times. But once I climbed up and inside, the daylight was gone, and the few rays of sun that snuck in through the cracks and holes in the roof just disoriented me even more.
I tightened my grip on my bag and stepped over some chunks of concrete and rebar. There was a broken window mostly covered with a beat-up sheet of pressed wood in front of an iron grating; it looked familiar. I went toward it and peeked through a splintery hole out over the river.
There were steps to my left, and I knew Felix had led me upstairs, so I took them. They were cracked and crumbling in places, and up the left side was a railing of old pipe and repurposed two-by-fours. As I climbed, my head began to swim, with alcohol a little and with the climb itself, longer than I remembered it being with Felix. I knew I’d gone the wrong way.
The steps ended in a wide-open room, piled full with garbage: old mattresses, a couple of empty barrels, hundreds of empty clear bottles, even the removable seat from a van. It wasn’t garbage, of course. It was someone else’s home, not Felix’s, and I’d wandered in. I stood there a moment, holding the makeshift banister, letting my spinning world slow down, come to a stop. The room was cluttered, full almost to the cement ceiling in places, with junk—old rusted barrels, like the kind that sit in the alleys on Northern Boulevard, between Quick Lubes and dealerships; some old box springs and two thin, stained mattresses, piled together; rags, piled together in corners and under a broken coffee table, with just two legs on the same end, so it sat like a long right triangle. But the stench hit me hardest.
I pulled my sleeve across my lip, under my nose, and sniffed. It reeked of gasoline and of piss and alcohol. The whole warehouse had those smells, but in here it was overwhelming. I thought the inside of my nose might singe and bubble into flames. Then something crashed to the floor at my feet and I jumped. Near my feet the shattered remains of a clear glass jug spread into shards and dust. Quickly, I turned and headed back for the steps, but someone grabbed my arm. I pulled it away and ran, taking the steps two at a time, until I slipped and took the last few steps on my ass.
I got to my feet and faced him. He was old and bald, and bent at the waist so his shoulders hunched a little. He looked fat, but it might have been layers of clothing.
“Don’t ever come up here,” he shouted at me in a heavy Polish accent. I started to turn away, then quickly covered my face with my arms as another empty jug flew at me. It bounced off my elbow and smashed against the wall, shattering. “Fat little toddler! Don’t ever come up here!” I grabbed my arm and backed away, picking up my bag. The pain flew up to my shoulder like a shock. I hoped nothing was broken; it would definitely bruise.
I turned and spotted another set of stairs across the floor. Felix was coming quickly down as I reached them. “Holy shit,” I said, and I threw myself against him.
“Yeah, you shouldn’t go up those steps,” he said, almost laughing. His eyes were dark and deep, and mostly closed. “That guy’s bananas. ‘Don’t ever come up here!’” he added, aping the man up the other stairs. “I think that’s all the English he knows. It’s definitely all he ever says.”
“He called me a toddler.”
Felix stood and looked at me, more than he ever had before. “You have a young face.”
I let him lead me up and up to his little room with a view. I collapsed onto the couch. “Fish won’t let me sleep in the cellar.”
Felix shrugged. “I’m not surprised. Me and her, we fight about it all the time. That’s why I usually sleep here.”
“She let Konny, though,” I said. Even I was getting sick of that argument.
Felix dropped onto the couch next to me and patted his lap, so I slid over and rested my head on his thigh. “So you’ll stay here,” he said. “I have plenty of room, and the rent is really reasonable.”
I forced a little smile and looked up at him, but he wasn’t looking at me—he was fiddling around in the pocket of his hoodie, I figured jonesing. He came out with just a couple of cigarettes, though, and slid one between my lips.
I said thanks between my teeth and let him light it for me, then curled up on my side. My bag was on the floor in front of the couch, and as Felix let his fingers run through my hair—absentmindedly, not really there—I realized I’d moved in.
…
I woke up alone. For a moment I was confused; the light was dim now, and nothing looked familiar. Then I remembered the couch I was on, and the view over the access road behind me off the little cast-iron balcony. Then I r
emembered the Polish man down one set of stairs and up another.
I hissed into the dark, “Felix.” Nothing moved. I grabbed my bag and moved slowly out of the room. When I found the steps, I ran down, into a deeper darkness, then spotted light around a corner and went to it. As I hit the doorway, I nearly fell off the loading dock, but stopped just short and hopped down.
It wasn’t as late as I’d thought. The sun wasn’t even all the way down behind me and the warehouse; inside, on the first floor, it had seemed like the middle of the night. I figured Felix was up at Fish’s, and Jonny would be too. Besides, it wasn’t like I had any other place to go: I couldn’t stay with Konny. I mean, she probably would have let me, but did I want to sleep on the floor of her little studio behind the comic shop, while she and Ace worked their way through the Kama Sutra on the twin futon across the room? No, thanks.
Valentino gave me a very smooth and gliding high five as I walked in, with a little smileless nod—Valentino’s not much of a smiler. Fish’s door guy was a tall man, always dressed like Joey Ramone with a dash of Prince, and up on his stool he towered over me. He always felt something like pride to me, like a lion, with his neat dreads and long face.
Fish hardly looked up from behind the bar as I walked in, but she did shake her head thoroughly and push the air in front of her like it was me. Jonny sat on his stool in front of her, surrounded by plenty of drinkers vying for Fish’s attention. He jumped up and grabbed my elbow when I turned to walk back out.
“Kid, wait,” he said. He glanced over his shoulder at Fish and said in my ear, “Head downstairs and hang out a few minutes. I’ll talk to Fish, okay?”
I tried to say okay, but my mouth was dry, so it came like a click of phlegm with a hot breath on each side. Jonny pulled me deeper into the bar, through the crowd in the front and past the pool table out the back door. The cellar door stood open, and Felix’s Christmas lights flashed inside.
“Just give me five minutes,” Jonny said. He winked and gave me a solid slap on the rear to urge me down the steps into the cellar.
Felix wasn’t there. He might have been up in the bar, with how quickly Jonny pulled me through there. The place was a swimming mass of hot bodies, and I’d just kept my head down and let Jonny pull me through. My parents could have been humping on the pinball machine and I probably wouldn’t have seen them.
I found some sticks in fairly good shape, on the floor near the tom, and sat on the throne. I wasn’t really feeling like a beat, so I just closed the snare and let the sticks fall onto the skin, very gently, letting them bounce and barely adding to their momentum—just enough so they’d stay on rhythm. When the roll was nice and tight, I let the volume go up, and up. My eyes closed, and the snare swelled, totally under my control. At my whim, the roll suddenly snapped, then dropped back down to a soft, long hiss.
But Jonny didn’t need five minutes; at least, I don’t think it could have been that long. When I opened my eyes, Fish was standing in front of the set. I pulled up on the drum roll.
“Hi.”
“Sweetie, I’m sorry.” Fish smiled at me. She looked out of practice.
“Does that mean I can sleep down here?” I asked. I laid the sticks across the floor tom and then flicked open the snare. It rang for a second, until I put my palm over its skin.
Fish’s smile became a bit tighter. I jumped up from the stool and headed for the door.
“Wait a second!” Fish said, moving to block the door. I didn’t look her in the face. Instead I looked at her hair—cropped short, dark blue. I looked at her cocky stance, her black boots, planted apart. Her legs were tree trunks. “Kid, you have to understand, I can’t let a sixteen-year-old kid sleep in the basement of my bar. I will go to jail.”
I started to say “Konny,” but she cut me off. “Konny was a mistake. Honestly, if I’d known then how young she is … I can’t believe I still let you two hang out upstairs.”
I looked at my sneakers, eternally damp and covered in grunge, and slid my fists into the pockets of my jeans, feeling barely my fifteen years—Fish didn’t need to know I was still four months shy of even Konny’s age.
I felt her hand on my shoulder and cringed a little. “You know,” she said, her voice calm now and soft, “you could go home.”
“And what?” I snapped, twisting myself to get her hand off me. “Ask for forgiveness? Fake it until I can move out for real, or until I’m done with college, or maybe I can wait till my father is dead and hasn’t been driven to write me out of the will because I’ve managed not to offend his fucking sexual sensibilities for fifty years?”
“Kid, I—,” Fish started, but I wasn’t done.
“Is that what you did, Fish? Did you wear a pretty prom dress in 1995? Did you smile just right for the boys so your folks would let you stick around?”
She didn’t have anything to say to that, so I grabbed my bag off the cement floor and stomped past her, out into the garden.
“Wait,” she called after me. “I want to help. Somehow.”
I stopped at the steps and turned around. “How are you going to help? Want to talk to my dad for me, teach him about ‘live and let live’? Maybe sing ‘My Conviction’ for my mom? She’d get a real kick out of it.”
Fish looked at me, and I felt bad for an instant. She wasn’t my enemy; she wasn’t my mom or my dad. She was just like me, in a lot of ways.
“You need money, right?” she said, reaching into her pocket of tips. “You have to eat.”
“I’m not going to take your money, Fish,” I said. “Come on.”
She thought for a moment. “Go upstairs and sit with Jonny. I’ll keep you sweet with Cokes all night, okay? Then help me clean up a bit, and I’ll pay you.”
“Are you giving me a job?”
She shrugged and managed to smile, but I think she was crying a little too. “No vacation time, and no health benefits. And I can’t match 401K contributions. But some cash, all the Coke you can drink, and unlimited use of this cellar … to practice, not sleep.”
I took a deep breath and let myself smile back. “Okay.”
When Fish opened her arms at me, I ran into them and forgave her.
…
The night was long, but fun. Jonny spiked a couple of my Cokes, and we laughed at the poseurs and at Konny and Ace when they showed up and drunkenly made out against the pool table, sending four dollars worth of spot-saving quarters all over the sticky floor. Cleaning up with Fish was fun too, since she let Jonny and Konny stay to goof around while I mopped and carried empties around. It was almost five when Fish finally locked up. Felix hadn’t shown all night.
The worst part of the night came after Ace took off. He and Konny had just finished one of their fights that usually proved to be foreplay, but this time Ace was drunk enough that he just stormed out of Fish’s to walk back to Konny’s apartment. She fell into the back booth next to me, and I squeezed a little tighter up against Jonny’s side.
“Fuck,” Konny said. She dropped her head to the table with a thud. “Ow.”
Jonny elbowed me, so I put an arm around Konny’s shoulder. “Wanna stay with me and Felix tonight?” I asked.
Konny rolled her head back and forth twice to say no, then suddenly lifted her head. “Fish is letting you stay in the cellar?” she asked, stunned.
“No, down at the warehouse,” I said.
Konny shook her head again and laughed.
“What?” I said. Jonny reached out his free hand for his drink and took a long, loud sip of melted ice, barely tinted the red of his vodka cranberry.
“I can’t believe you’re staying at the warehouse, that’s all,” Konny said. “Your dad finally kick you out?”
“Your sympathy is overwhelming,” I said, and I ran my finger through the puddle of condensation next to Jonny’s glass.
Konny shrugged. “What do you expect? Since Felix showed up, I’ve hardly seen you. Maybe if you would hang out sometimes we’d share a place or something. Someplace, you kno
w, safe and clean and free of junkies.”
“Right, it’s me,” I said. “Like I’d be able to pull you out from under that asshole Ace anyway.”
Konny laughed again and got up. “Okay, Kid,” she said without looking at me. “I’ll see you in school in September. Later.”
And she walked out. Konny and I had fights before—respectable ones that didn’t lead to screwing and we always worked it out. Konny’s hot-blooded, I guess, and sometimes when her hot blood mixes with my icy veins, it storms.
Jonny gave me a squeeze, but I was okay and told him so. He smiled back, and for the first time ever I saw it in his mouth but nowhere else on his face.
…
“Where are you heading?” Fish asked me after the gate fell with a clank, probably waking the poor suckers who had to live above her bar. Jonny was already gone, to his apartment across McGuinness, and Konny was by then back at her little studio, where Ace had already slept off his drinks and was probably up for her by the time she showed up.
“To Felix’s place,” I said without turning around.
“The goddamn warehouse?” Fish said, like it was huge surprise, and she moved to stop me, but I hopped backwards with a smile—not totally sincere—and started away quickly while Fish fumbled with her heavy padlock. Soon I was walking fast toward Calyer and Quay, and hoping Felix would show up to stay with me soon.
…
Felix never invited me to play with him. He acknowledged my drumming now and then with a soft smile or a hard glance—if I fell in the pocket just right, or hit a nice on-the-one, or if I wasn’t dropping back into halftime just how he wanted me to—but mostly I just filled in some space for him. I didn’t mind; jamming with Felix was the most reliable way for me to hear his songs and his voice.
Still, we’d become a band somehow, just by virtue of my showing up. We played every day, every night—usually more than once. We’d stop for food sometimes, and plenty to smoke out in the garden. Sometimes we even crashed on the couch, or on the grass in the back garden, despite Fish’s rules; she never knew. And I guess I didn’t see Konny a whole lot, then. Her prediction of missing me until September looked about ready to come true. Not that it was entirely my fault. She barely made it to this side of the BQE, between work, her place behind the store, and giving it up to Ace whenever he asked.
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