New Yorked

by Rob Hart

  Outside I light a smoke. Watch the kids going in and out like it’s a fucking playground, and not the only place left in this city that I feel like I can call home. Something else that’s being taken away. The thought of it not being here opens a jagged hole inside me.

  My head fills with fantasies of benefit concerts and fundraising drives, to get the money to buy the place. Then we’ll tell the people who live upstairs to fuck off and they should move to Nebraska if they want it to be quiet, and we’ll keep running the place, keep things the way they are, won’t change a damn thing. And we won’t let people in unless they can prove they’re native-born.

  I put it out of my head. Right now I should go see Lunette, because what Margo doesn’t know is that Jacqui isn’t a person.

  After ringing Lunette’s buzzer three times I assume she’s passed out. I’m not looking forward to climbing up the fire escape. My leg feels like someone is hitting it with a hammer. Then the intercom crackles and Lunette says, “Yeah.” Her voice sounds further away than three floors up.

  “It’s Ash.”

  The door buzzes. I climb up to her floor, leaning heavy on the railing, and the door to the apartment is ajar.

  The air is stale, like she hasn’t left in days. It’s been less than twenty-four hours since I saw her, but Lunette is good at letting her life crumble at lightning speed.

  I find her on the couch, wrapped in a blanket despite the fact that it’s already pretty warm in here. The coffee table in front of her is a mess of discarded bottles of orange juice and empty bowls crusted over with the remnants of things I hope were food.

  There’s a dead needle, a spoon, and a pile of cotton swabs lying on the table, next to an empty balloon that previously held heroin. Code name: Jacqui.

  I pick up the works, put them in a plastic shopping bag, and leave it in the kitchen. She doesn’t try to stop me. I don’t even know how she got up off the couch to buzz me in.

  I drag a chair next to the couch and sit by her side. I figure she’s asleep but then she says, “I’m sick.” She talks in a sing-song voice, drifting between this world and another. She stares at the ceiling, her eyes opening and closing.

  “You’re not sick.” I go back to the kitchen and get two glasses of water, place them on the coffee table between us. I down half mine, she doesn’t touch hers. “So, what happened?”

  “Me and Margo. I don’t know. We got in an argument about something.”

  “And this was how you handle it?”

  Her face turns down and tears form at the corner of her eyes.

  I ask, “Do you remember what it was about?”

  “No.”

  “Then why are you so upset?”

  “I can’t control myself.”

  There are a lot of things I could say at this moment, about self-control, or about how when something bad happens your first response shouldn’t lean toward self-destruction. I can’t say that with a straight face. So I slide my hand under the blanket, find hers, and hold it tight.

  “You know I love you,” I say.

  “I know. I love you, too.”

  “You know it hurts all of us to see you like this?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize to me. I don’t deserve it.”

  I take out a cigarette and get it lit, take a deep drag, and hold it up to Lunette’s lips. She takes a half-hearted pull, then chokes when it gets caught in her throat. She says, “Thank you.”

  Lunette drifts off and I think she’s fallen asleep, so I go to the closet and find some blankets and pillows and pile them up on the floor next to the couch. I strip off my shirt, my shoes and socks, and click off the lamp. The apartment plunges into darkness, save the narrow beams of light slowly tracking across the ceiling from the headlights of cars passing down the street.

  As I’m getting comfortable Lunette says, “I lied to you, Ash.”

  “What did you lie to me about?”

  “I saw Chell the night she died. And I saw you.”

  I prop myself up, lean a little too hard on my leg, and bite my lip to keep from yelping. Deep breath. “What did you see?”

  “Chell was walking out of the subway. She looked upset about something. And I saw you stumbling down the street. You were so drunk you could barely stand up. You bumped into someone and then started screaming at them.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Because you didn’t kill Chell. I know you didn’t. But I was afraid.”

  “Afraid of what?”

  She doesn’t say anything, and I think she’s fallen asleep again. I think about it for a little while, consider quizzing her on exactly where I was, and exactly where Chell was, but she’s so far gone, I doubt I’d get a straight answer.

  Think back to that night, try to shake my memories loose. But the only thing I can see is Chell’s face twisted in pain.

  No. It’s the heroin talking. That’s all. She didn’t see me.

  Just as I’m drifting off Lunette says, “Can we go to a museum?”

  “Why?”

  “Because all we ever do is sit in bars. There’s so much more we could be doing. There’s so much culture. I want to do things that are different. Different things.”

  “We’ll do that.”

  “Ash?”

  “Yes?”

  “I miss Chell. I don’t want to miss you, too.”

  Then she’s snoring and I can go to sleep. And as I’m drifting, the same thought plays in my head on repeat: What if I just left?

  I could get up and leave and be done with all of this. Margo and Bombay and Lunette don’t need me. My mom doesn’t need me. No one needs me but me. I could go live in a cabin in the woods. Chop down trees and look at the stars and sleep in the quiet. No one would try to kill me in the woods. I’d only have to worry about bears. I can handle bears.

  The problem is this place is all I’ve ever known. I haven’t traveled. I haven’t wanted to. I’ve always loved New York for the diversity, because the entire world crosses right at this intersection. Anything you could ever need is right here, always available.

  But at what point is that not enough for a person?

  Because otherwise, seriously, fuck this place.

  Does that make me selfish?

  My phone buzzes. Bombay.

  Envelope under the door. Says meet at Blue Moon Diner. 9 a.m.

  The threat of morning hangs over my head until I give up on sleep and climb into the shower. I try to wash away the exhaustion and the shame but it coats my skin like oil.

  After I get dressed and change my bandages, I check my phone. It makes me angry. Fifteen minutes to get to Blue Moon. Lunette hasn’t moved but she’s still breathing so I figure she’ll be fine.

  The walk down the stairs is the worst. Every time I take a step down and put pressure on my foot I feel a little pop in my leg. But once I’m outside and stretch a little, it evens out. The pain fades to a small electrical current. Bearable if I don’t think about it.

  Chell isn’t even on the front page on the Post today. The article inside the paper doesn’t say much, other than the cops being unable to find the killer, but that they’re following some promising leads, which probably means they have nothing.

  Blue Moon is crowded and there’s one girl sitting alone. She looks like she showed up for a fancy party fifty years late, with her cream-colored gloves and bobbed, shoulder-length hair. Her outfit is monochromatic. She’s nursing a mug, scanning the room for the person she wouldn’t know if she saw.

  I slide into the booth across from her and wave over the waitress. Retro-girl snaps out of her daydream and says, “Can I help you?”

  “You tell me. My name is Johnny. I’m meeting someone here.”

  She goes to say something about my face, then stops. “So you’re the private detective I heard about?”

  So it’s like that.

  “Yes I am,” I tell her, and take the envelope with the money out of my pocket, slide it across the
table. The waitress shuffles over and I order a coffee, black.

  The girl takes the envelope and puts it in her purse, reaches a gloved hand across the table to shake mine. “I’m sorry, I should have introduced myself. My name is Iva. Iva Archer.”

  “Johnny Marr.”

  She looks at the thick bandage wrapped around my arm and asks, “Are you okay?”

  “Fell down some stairs.”

  “Well.” She doesn’t believe me, and I’m fine with that. She continues, “Mister Marr, the reason I called you is because my sister has gone missing. Two years ago our father took ill and we moved out to Chicago to be with him. She fell in with a rough crowd and flew back out here about a month ago with her good-for-nothing new husband. They were supposed to be staying in the Hotel Chelsea, but when I went there today, they didn’t even have a record of them checking in.”

  She speaks with a very practiced poise. And she’s good, too. I can barely tell she’s reciting a script from memory. And this feels comfortably familiar. It’s what I do professionally. Sort of. I treat it like I would anyone asking me to help them find someone. I rip off a piece of the placemat, dig in my pockets for a pen, and ask, “What’s the girl’s name?”

  She pauses, a little surprised. “Lindsay. She’s using her husband’s last name now. His name is Terry Lennox.”

  “Do you have a picture?”

  She hands me a black-and-white photo. Not Chell. It’s a pretty blonde with bedroom eyes and full cheeks. They look enough alike they could be real-life sisters.

  “Mister Marr, I heard you were the best private detective in the city, that if anyone can find my sister, no matter where she is, it’ll be you.” She places a gloved hand over mine and even though I know it’s an act, my heart races a little.

  “First of all, call me Johnny,” I tell her. “Second, if someone doesn’t want to be found, this city is the place to do it. That’s even if she’s still here. But we’ll operate on the idea that she’s with Lennox. What can you tell me about her habits? Places she goes, routines?”

  Iva looks very pleased at all of this. “I know where you can start. There’s a bar on Staten Island, right on the other side of the ferry. I don’t remember the name of the place, she goes there Sunday nights to play pub trivia. Someone there might know something.”

  The waitress puts down my coffee and a glass of ice water. I toss a couple of cubes into the mug to cool it. Iva smiles, says, “I just gave up coffee.” Her voice drops and octave. She’s off-script.

  “Why would you do a silly thing like that?” I ask.

  “I’m trying to be healthier.”

  “I know that feeling. I’m trying to get off a couple of bad habits. But coffee will always be there. No matter what happens, I think it’ll always be my last vice.”

  “How many vices did you have?”

  “Pretty much all of them.”

  She nods, says, “Johnny? Terry Lennox is a very dangerous man.”

  “So am I.”

  “I’m not kidding. He worked in Chicago’s financial district. That’s where Lindsay met him. I was never able to figure out what he did, but I’m pretty confident it wasn’t legal. He comes and goes at all hours and disappears for days at a time. One time he came home with the most terrible black eye, and he said he got it in a bar fight but I knew he was lying. I don’t know why they even came back here to the city, but I know he’s up to no good.” Iva drops her eyes and frowns. “I’m afraid.”

  This time I put my hand on hers, caught up a little in the story. I can feel the warmth of her skin through her glove. “I’ll find your sister. Now, when should I head out to this bar?”

  “As soon as possible, if you can. Oh Johnny, please be careful.”

  I sip my coffee and put my elbows on the table, lean forward, resting my chin on my folded hands. As I move, the sleeves of my shirt slide up. Her eyes dart down to the blob of black ink poking from the corner. She slides her hand across the table, but she stops her delicate fingers a hair-length from my skin.

  Her eyes meet mine and she asks, “May I?”

  I nod and she reveals the tattoo I got when I was nineteen and way cooler: A skull and crossbones with the words “trust me” underneath.

  She giggles and asks, “So, can I?”

  “Can you what?”

  “Trust you?”

  “You shouldn’t believe everything you read.”

  I want to ask her about Chell. I’ve been itching to drop her name since I sat down. But I’m invested in this lighter-touch approach. I can’t scare off Paulsen. Not when I’m this close.

  We finish up and she pays the bill. As we step outside the diner she says, “I’ll handle your expenses, of course.” She hands me an envelope packed with Monopoly money, says, “That ought to cover it. Call me if you need anything, and I’ll speak to you soon.”

  She turns to leave but then looks over her shoulder at me. “By the way, nice hat. Very appropriate.”

  I tip it in her direction. “Glad someone likes it.”

  And with that, she turns, her hips swaying to the tune of a song I wish I knew.

  It’s just after the morning rush and the Staten Island Ferry terminal is packed with tourists, crowded around guides holding up red umbrellas and plastic light sabers so no one gets lost in the throng. As the doors slide open and let us on, I try to remember the last time I rode one of these orange and blue boats.

  Inside the gate, a Coast Guard officer clutches an automatic weapon to his chest and scans the crowd. On the butt of the gun is a little white sticker with what I imagine is his last name. Something long and probably Polish, in desperate need of vowels. I want to ask him if he expects to lose the gun, but people with firearms usually don’t have a sense of humor.

  No one goes down to the lower level because you can’t see the skyline from there. That’s where I ride, out of the way of the tourists clicking cameras and chasing screaming kids. The horn blares and the boat slides out of the slip into the harbor. The engine is loud enough that it drowns out the scattered conversations around me. I pull my legs up onto the yellow bucket seat and tip my fedora down over my eyes so I can take a nap.

  The first time I rode the ferry was with my dad. My earliest memory of him. We were going to my first Yankee game. I don’t remember who played or if the Yankees won. I remember being outside on the front deck of the boat, and the wind, and the spray of the water, and my dad picked me up and sat me on the wooden railing. He dug his fingers into my waist so I wouldn’t fall.

  It was sunny and the city sparkled across the water. Like it had a light source underneath it that shone even in the day. I had just seen The Wizard of Oz and I was convinced we were going to the Emerald City. That’s the way it looked. I told him that and he laughed.

  I remember a lot about the way my dad looked. Stubble, dark hair with peeks of gray. Broad shoulders. The thing I remember most is that he was tall. He always seemed to be the tallest person in every room.

  After the towers, after I was old enough to want to go into the city for things, I wouldn’t take the boat. I didn’t want to walk across that deck again, or spend the ride staring at the fractured skyline. So I would take the bus over the Verrazano Bridge into Brooklyn, and then take the R train. It took nearly two hours.

  I didn’t take the boat again until I took it with you, Chell. Do you remember that?

  One weekend the R train wasn’t running and my mom needed me home because the basement flooded. I didn’t have the time or the money to come up with a good alternative. A cab would cost four days-worth of food.

  You were laying on my couch. I was standing in front of the door with my hand on the knob but I didn’t want to open it. I don’t know how long I had been standing there when you asked, Where are you going?

  Gotta go see my Ma.

  The odyssey begins.

  Nope. Taking the boat.

  You’re taking the ferry?

  No choice.

  You didn’t say anythin
g. Just put on your boots, took my hand, and led me out the door. The whole train ride to Whitehall you held my hand tight. When the terminal doors opened so we could load, of course it was the same boat I rode with my dad: The John F. Kennedy. Still in rotation all those years later. I froze and you wrapped your long thin fingers in mine and pulled me forward, past that same railing he sat me on, led me to the bottom of the boat, even though I knew you would have wanted to sit outside.

  We hid in the shadows of the bottom deck. You bought us tallboy beers from the snack bar and you pointed to things outside the window and asked me what they were. You asked me about the apartments I lived in before the one I had. You did everything you could to keep my mind off the trip.

  When we got to St. George you didn’t want to come meet my mom because you had a thing about parents, but you offered to wait for me until it was time to go home. I told you it wasn’t necessary. As you were going to get back on the boat I stuttered and looked away from you, trying to say what I wanted to say and drowning in that feeling.

  I’m glad I met you too, Ashley, you said.

  You didn’t need to do this.

  I don’t need to do anything.

  And you stretched up to kiss me on the cheek.

  I never told you this, but I borrowed some money from my mom and took a cab home that day. One trip was enough at that point. But after that, I was able to get used to the ride again. Which was nice. The boat only takes twenty-five minutes.

  I’m skirting the edge of sleep when the loudspeaker blares with the voice of a deckhand telling people that to ride back to Manhattan, they have to get off the boat and go back through the terminal.

  The ferry pulls into the slip lined with wooden poles and scrapes against them with the sound of fingernails on chalkboard amplified by concert-grade speakers. As it strikes the wall of the dock the few tourists that ambled down here lose their footing and nearly fall.

  I knew a girl whose dad piloted a ferry. They hit the sides of the docks on purpose. It’s a fun little game for the deckhands: The tourists stumble and the local don’t. I don’t know if that’s a true story, but I like to think it is.