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October 29, 2005

The Night Clerk - Chapter 3

The sleepy leg

I wish I had time to rest than funneling down markings and secret ops on the passers-by, checks, rents, appointments and roses. Yes, roses. My sub-staff of Filipinos, bums. As you know, it has been raining for 3 days now, with furious winds and subarctic temperatures, and thick and sharp snow falling all over the metro area. Cry baby, cry, it won’t be like this in April. Lying in bed and pedaling to work and I just feel like I want to cry. My only cozy went to visit olds in Biloxi, ham hock, corn bread and all. But New Year’s I’m off, alright.

I dreamed that I was at a party having stuffed shrooms and cheese and checking tattoo listings, waiting for a spark to choose the carrier when I noticed the face of a man idling carelessly, smooth and shiny, staring at me. I closed my eyes and let the waves of some tropical warm shore wash away my wrinkles, the crummy chats, the expensive white palms. Restless, when I opened my eyes I saw a blue-eyed boy with red hairs falling forward on his sunglasses, smoking from a crackpipe. He was shaking. He had a gun, a silly huge black thing. And I saw the other man, still, eyes open, smiling, calm, happy that it was over. He had a tiny hole on each side of his forehead. The party was on, following the score of laughs, small-talks, avances and fake palm trees.

At twelve I woke up with a sleepy leg, the word “Med” pounding in my head tickling voodoo, a reassuring view of empty cans and socks piled up in the pit and a plan to sweep anonymously thru the last day of the year. My sassy girl was coddled in very parental arms, the Caribbean in the viewfinder and work happily understaffed on plenary indulgence.

I forced myself to visit a tattoo parlor with the backyard barber and got out bold and fantastic, hairless and senseless in a rain of snowflakes. By late afternoon it was dark and the celebrations had started in full. I had a Blueberry and several cups of Tazo in Third Ave at Starbucks where I met the boss and his smooth cluster of businessmen, secretaries and insurers on daily rations of lemon chiffon pie and Expresso. Left and walked south-west realizing only after an hour that I was in Times Square. A sprawling of shoppers, staring at displays, making faces at strangers and pushing a pattern of liturgical worshipping. Drugs were at knocked down prices. I did not have any but rather drank every kind of the old drug that I could put my lips on. Beer, brandy, tequila, rum, martini, vodka and even Mexican gin and tonic. I dragged a puffy midget with blazing green pupils that forced me to Mulagatani soup at the Electric Lotus. I never liked chicken but dipping into chaos with a smile is me. We got a room and hit it like animals for two hours. Outside naked people started to appear at every corner, windows were falling, riots began. Cars started to smash against each other for the fun, police joined the ride, fires started.

Midnight arrived in Times Square. Thousands, hundred of thousands amassed elbow to elbow, between the 46th and the 42nd, laughing, screaming, happy and for an hour I was squeezing on somebody’s boobs, the only quay in an ocean of sheer mass derangement.

I was terribly drunk. I was thrown away and run with the crowd, fighting to catch breath, and I fell. I covered my face waiting for a second hit but it did not arrive. At the first terrifying thunder the collective orgy stopped and started to rain. Blast after blast, a torrential rain welcoming us into the new year. I was naked. I let the rain wash out of sweat and drowsiness but after that I felt shaking. I dragged back home. By the East Side I was frozen to the bone and by the 58th the rain was snowy particle dust. It was 5 when I got home, crashed naked on the bed, waiting to die. And I started dreaming.

In the hall I’m having a break with the girl. Between a croissant and a sip of coke she’s listing reasons why the job at the burger's line sucks. Rolling dice and eyes methodically, aligning the count with no regret or anger, playing with her chin and expression, she whips her communication into a usable vector of calibrated empathy.

This is my card, this is my job and this is my name. Yes, my name.

© Fortunato Caragliano. All rights reserved.

Posted by lck at October 29, 2005 07:05 PM