Christmas, 1985
Christmas Eve found me in the International, drinking beer and feeling low. Brenda was to be in Ohio till after New Year’s Day. All my friends were off doing family things; even the bartenders were off. So it was Mary Petruno and me and a couple old neighborhood drunks who never said anything, just sipped cans of Rheingold and chain-smoked.
(continued)
“Why you not go home?” Mary said.
“Ahh,” I said.
“If you have a place to go, you should go,” one of the drunks said.
“What’s your name again?”
“Pete.”
“Shut up, Pete.”
“It ’s gonna be that kind of day then,” Pete said. “Gloomy.”
“You guys don’t know nothing,” Mary said.
“What?”
“Holodomor,” Mary said, and went on to tell us of the genocide that led her and many of her fellow Ukrainians to emigrate. 1933. I listened. Her story had much in common with what I knew of my Irish heritage, but this was first-hand. I saw the old woman in front of me, and the young woman, slipping out of her country with husband and unborn baby. Nazis on one side, Soviet State on other. Hate and death everywhere. I saw them on a ship crossing the Atlantic after much travail. I saw the whole movie as she spoke; it was touching, and I grieved not so much for her story, but my own family’s story, moreso the lack of it, of not knowing, and she saw it in my eyes, said, “Tony, I’m talking here,” and went on and she was right. She was right there.
Nobody said anything when she was done.
An hour or so later, we were all half-drunk. Some other silent drinkers had come in, ghostly. I felt a hand on my back.
“Nadine!”
Mary said, “Your friend is here! See? I buy you both drinks and you play jukebox and…”
“I love this coat,” Nadine said. I’d given it to her, long wool thing I’d stolen years ago from some rooming house. “Merry Christmas everyone!”
“Merry Christmas!” Mary Petruno said.
“Merry Christmas,” some said.
Mary bought drinks for everyone while Nadine and I talked. Mary said if we were gonna yammer on, she would play the jukebox. The room filled with Frank singing New York, New York.
Nadine pulled what looked like a bottle in festive wrappings out of her purse and gave it to me. It was a bottle of wine. I hated wine. I thanked her, she tussled my hair, said, “You,” and I kissed her again. The juke played and we drank and talked and then she started dragging me out of there telling Mary I needed some new scenery. Mary said something and seemed sad. I didn’t know why she shared her real story with me, she never told anyone anything.
“Mary,” I said. I gave her the wine.
“Thank you,” Mary said.
“You’re supposed to wait before giving gifts away,” Nadine said.
“You kids go on then,” Mary said.
We walked up St Mark’s. She’d moved to New Jersey. Her purse was the size of a small suitcase. The cold wind blew flurries. Spencer was tending bar at Downtown Beirut. He grunted a hello when we sat. She ordered beers and paid, then pulled a big notebook out of her purse, started writing in it. “So let’s have it,” she said.
“As soon as I parked my dresser in Brenda’s place….”
“I know, Willie is a junkie.”
“What do you know.”
“You get claustrophobic. So you don’t love her.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Willie doesn’t love me; I just live there with him and his mother. He thinks he loves me and that makes him precious. Hell, people use each other, who cares? Oh, that didn’t sound right, I care and all but, hell.”
“Brenda’s parents are coming to visit after new year’s. She told them we were engaged.”
“Ha!”
“It’s not funny.”
“Poor baby,” she continued writing in her notebook.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“This? I thought I told you.”
“Uh.”
“I’ve been writing about things here. You’re in it.”
“Lemme see.”
“No way, man. Maybe someday.”
“So you got a straight job?”
“Cash register in Jersey City. Record store. I hate it. Now shut up, I need to write some. Pretend you like the people here.”
I walked over, put quarters into the juke and chose. Some leather-boy intentionally bumped into me and said, “Whoa, you got a problem?”
“Hey, Spencer! I’ve got some quarters, you wanna choose some songs?”
He yelled out a few songs and I played them. I decided I liked him, he had an honest hate.
“I’m talking to you, man,” Leather-boy said.
“Look, it’s Christmas. Sit down and relax,” I told him.
“I’m…”
“Cut it out, Ace,” a leather-girl with black lipstick lips and no eyebrows said from the bar. “Excuse him mister, he gets beer muscles and gets into fights. It’s Christmas, Ace. Let’s have a little love. Good song, mister.”
“His name is Tony!” Nadine yelled from the other end of the bar.
“Where’s the love?” Spencer said.
“Sorry,” Ace said. “Where’d you get that boss leather?”
“West Side Army/Navy. Spencer! Get these folks some drinks on me!”
“There it is!” Spencer said.
The drinks and talk flowed. Spencer bought a round, Ace bought a round, I bought another. More people piled in and it became quite festive, juke playing and good vibes all around.
“I’ve gotta call home,” I told Nadine who was still writing in her notebook. “Nadine, put that thing away for the night.”
“I can’t, I’m on a roll; call home then.”
“Did you?”
“Yes. My mother was supposed to be back in Santa Barbara but she’s still in Europe. Don’t ask, I’ll tell you.”
I got some quarters from Spencer and went to leave. Nadine grabbed my arm and asked if I was coming back. What? Look at what you started. I didn’t. You did, come back. Like I wouldn’t.
“People like us disappear,” she said.
I pulled on the gloves Brenda gave me and went outside; flurries and colder now in the night. That girl who was always selling weed was on the corner with the hustle, no. She looked like a scarecrow under the streetlight. I called from the payphone and put in the quarters requested. I talked with my sister a while and then talked to mom.
“What’s that?” she said.
“I’m at a payphone on 1st Ave; that’s the cars driving by.”
“We were watching the news; is it snowing there? It’s still kind of warm down here.”
“Flurries here mom; no big deal but it’s cold. Sorry I couldn’t make it down. I’ll try to make it for Easter.”
“You’re calling from a payphone? Are you having Christmas?”
“Yes, with friends, good friends. We had dinner in this Italian restaurant and we’re about to go to a nightclub. It’s a really good night up here, is everything okay down there?”
“Well, we miss your father but…”
“I miss him too.”
“Don’t.”
“I won’t. Look, I gotta get back, love you, tell everyone I love them.”
When I hung up I stood there for a moment collecting myself because something inside had collapsed. Scarecrow asked if I was okay.
“You should be inside somewhere,” I told her and she said a girl’s gotta make a living.
I asked her what it would take to get her off the streets tonight and she looked at me funny-like. “Look, take this,” I said handing her a 20.
She pulled 2 bags from her purse and I said, no, “I don’t want that shit.”
“You’re giving me money?”
“It’s Christmas. You go on now, go home.”
When I woke up in Brenda’s bed, Nadine was laying next to me fully clothed. Her leg was wrapped around me; I was in my tightly-whiteys and had a hard-on. I pushed her leg off and got up and she mumbled something but slept on.
When we left Downtown Beirut, Scarecrow was still out there. “Hey, Santa!” she yelled.
We went to see Robert Gordon at the Lone Star and I was dancing with some anonymous girl when the bouncer came up to me and said, “Did you come with that girl?” and pointed at Nadine. I did. We were kicked out. Nadine said she didn’t do anything bad; the bartender was just being an ass. I’d a fucked that girl I was dancing with. No you wouldn’t, you’re drunk. “We’re drunk dates, ain’t it cool?”
We walked in the cold over to the International, found Choo and Buddy there and drank entirely too much till last call. Michael, Mary’s son was tending bar. He was an opera singer who used to drink. Choo was a mad ramble of a drunk by himself but teamed with Buddy, they were a gas.
Ugh, I went into the kitchen and made a pot of coffee. I had a cig and thought about the things I always thought about and felt really ugly. I looked out the window at 23’d St.
“Merry Christmas, Tony!”
“Hey! You’re awake! I made coffee, here, I’ll get you some.”
“Jesus man, don’t look at me, I feel like such a hag. Can I get a shower?”
“Sure.”
“Damn, you’re so skinny and white! Put on some pants.”
When she came out we were dressed and ready. I was going to take her to lunch and then…
“Stop; I have to get back to Jersey. Kiss?” and she was gone.
He thinks he loves me and that makes him precious.
People like us.
Mike Boyle is the author of Dollhouse, various chapbooks, and numerous short stories and poems in journals worldwide. Publishers interested in making King of the Streets a reality are encouraged to get in touch with Boyle at their earliest convenience.
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