Alpha 1 (2 page)

At the time they lost the house, Lucy had already been looking for her own place. She’d wanted to move in with some roommates in the city and get some independence. But the blow of losing their home had been such a shock to her parents. A week later, Shirley announced that she was pregnant and didn’t know who the father was. Their mother couldn’t even understand that. She was in such shock from losing the house, it was as if her entire world was being pulled from under her feet. “How can you not know his name?” she’d asked. “How can you not know who the father is? How did you even meet? Who introduced you?” She was an old-fashioned woman, a simple woman who’d lived an honest life and couldn’t picture her own daughter picking up strangers at a bar on Nassau Avenue on Friday night.

There had been a lot of tears that winter, a lot of stress on the entire family. Lucy had tried to make things easier on her parents. She’d dropped out of art school and took the job waitressing at the diner so that she could help out financially. She’d organized a baby shower for her sister and invited all her mother’s sisters. None of them had shown up. They were too proud. They’d said if Shirley didn’t have a man to father the child she had no business having a child at all. It had broken their mother’s heart. And the stress of it all had begun to take its toll on their father. He was still fighting for his business. He believed the turbocharger he’d invented was going to make them all rich. But Lucy knew he couldn’t fight forever. Eventually it was all going to catch up to him and he would lose everything. She just couldn’t leave her family at a time like that. She’d moved in to the little apartment, initially as a temporary thing, but that had been well over a year ago and things weren’t getting any better. Her father was struggling harder than ever to keep his business and the addition of the new baby just added to the mouths to feed.

Lucy let herself in through the shared entryway and climbed the stairs to the front door. She entered the apartment very quietly. Her mother had left a light on in the kitchen but everyone was fast asleep. Her parents were in the first bedroom, her sister was in the second with the baby. Lucy went into the bathroom and washed up quietly. She removed her makeup, put on some moisturizer and brushed her teeth. Then she went into the living room and pulled out the sofa bed. She took off her jeans and slept in her shirt and panties. She was too tired to put on her pajamas in the dark. As soon as her head hit the pillow she was asleep.

III

H
OLDEN AND JIMMY WERE AT
a bar on Fulton called Ruben’s. It was a local, working class joint with a good atmosphere but being so close to Wall Street it sometimes got the fancier clientele from the financial district too. It was a friendly place. As long as no one tried to cause trouble everyone usually got along just fine.

“Two more, Charley,” Jimmy said. He was sitting next to Holden at the bar and they’d been enjoying a few well-earned after-work beers.

The bartender brought over their drinks.

“So, you going into the office tomorrow?” Jimmy said.

“Might have to,” Holden said, but only if they call me. “I’ll be at the shop at eight though.”

Jimmy nodded. “I’ll be there.”

“You bringing the coffee?”

Jimmy nodded again. “I’ll bring it.”

Holden took a sip of his beer.

“How’s your hand?” Jimmy said.

“Fine. She cleaned it up nice.” Holden hadn’t taken off the bandage since lunchtime.

“Nice girl,” Jimmy said.

Holden looked at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, I’m just saying.”

“I know what you’re saying.”

“Well what’s wrong with saying that?”

Holden sighed. He looked sad. “Nothing I suppose. It’s just….”

“Difficult?”

Holden nodded. “You should ask her out,” he said to Jimmy.

“I can’t ask her out. You’re the one she likes.”

Holden shook his head. “You’re imagining things,” he said.

Jimmy shook his head. “You’re a lost cause,” he said.

Holden looked behind him. There were some guys at a booth back there giving the waitress a hard time. The waitress was a good-looking girl and she had a short skirt on. The guys in suits and white shirts took that as a sign that they could do whatever they wanted with her. One of them reached under her skirt and pinched her butt. She was so surprised she dropped her tray and the bottles and glasses that were on it smashed to the ground. The men, four of them, all laughed and made rude gestures to each other as the waitress bent down to clean up the mess.

“Charley?” Holden said. He nodded toward the group at the back questioningly. Holden wasn’t one to start a fight if he didn’t have to, but if he did he wasn’t one to shy away from it.

Charley looked at him gratefully. “You don’t have to,” he said.

Holden got off his seat and made his way to the table of rowdy Wall Street traders. They were all laughing at the waitress, giving her a hard time. “You fellas got a problem?” he said.

The men were wearing thousand-dollar suits. They were about Holden’s age, thirty or so, and he estimated they probably each earned close to a million dollars a year. They were showy and pushy and they were used to going into bars and acting like they owned the place.

They all looked at Holden. Their faces turned from jovial to angry as they took in his dirty overalls, the black smear of engine grease on his face. They sized him up and wrote him off. Holden didn’t care about that. He was used to guys like this.

“We don’t have a problem,” one of the guys said to Holden, “but you do.”

He got up from his seat and approached Holden. Holden sized him up. The guy was a beefy, two-hundred pounds of muscle and fat and probably did weights at the gym. He had a small mole under his left eye. Jimmy watched everything from the bar. He was ready to get up and help Holden in an instant but he knew the guys were less likely to start a fight if Holden approached them alone. It would take a rare group of assholes to jump a guy who was on his own.

Holden stood his ground. “I’ll clear this up, Sarah,” he said to the waitress. She got up and went over to the bar where Jimmy was and watched to see what would happen.

“I’ll tell you what’s going to happen, Holden,” the guy who’d approached said, reading Holden’s name from his mechanic’s uniform.

“No,” Holden said, “I’ll tell
you
what’s going to happen. She’s going to bring you your bill. You’re going to pay her and then you’re going to leave.”

The man laughed. His friends laughed. Holden smiled.

And then the man swung. Holden leaned back and narrowly dodged the flying fist. His three friends were up from their seats and coming toward him. Holden raised his fists. Jimmy was up and making his way toward them, shaking his head.

“You guys are going to wake up tomorrow and wish you didn’t do this,” Holden said but it was too late. The man swung again and Holden caught his fist in his hand and pulled it toward him. The man fell forward and Holden brought up his knee to meet the guy’s stomach, then he let him fall to the floor. The second and third men were right behind him and Holden dodged another punch and landed one on one of the guy’s faces. The other guy swung again and this time connected with Holden. The force of it knocked Holden back a step but Jimmy was behind him now. Jimmy floored the guy who’d hit Holden with a single uppercut. Holden got the third with his elbow. The fourth man had been approaching but stopped when he realized three of his friends were on the ground.

Holden eyed him. He looked ready to run for it.

“Sarah,” Holden said.

Sarah was at the bar watching the fight with Charley. “Yes,” she said.

“These guys want their bill.”

Sarah went to the cash register and rang up the check and then brought it over and handed it to Holden. Holden handed it to the fourth man. “Don’t forget to tip,” he said.

The man hastily took some bills from his wallet and threw them on the table. Then he gathered up his defeated friends and they all hobbled out of the bar together. Holden went back to the bar and got the broom. He cleaned up the broken glass and went back to the bar where he’d been sitting with Jimmy and finished his beer.

“Thank you,” Sarah said, handing Holden some ice wrapped in a bar towel.

Holden held the ice against his eye and nodded at her.

IV

W
HEN LUCY WAS WOKEN UP
by the baby the next morning she felt as if she’d only been asleep for an hour. She looked at her watch. It was six-thirty. No matter what time she got home from work, she had to wake up at the crack of dawn with Shirley and the baby.

“Sorry, Lucy,” Shirley said.

Lucy smiled. “Bring her to me,” she said.

Shirley handed Lucy the baby and then started making coffee in the kitchen adjoining the living room. “You want some?”

“I’d kill for some,” Lucy said as she made faces at the baby and rocked her in her arms.

Shirley turned on the gas stove to boil water. “I’m just grateful the gas hasn’t been cut off.”

“Didn’t mom pay it yesterday?”

“She was going to but we had to buy groceries with the money.”

Lucy shook her head. “How did we get to this?”

Shirley shrugged. She brought Lucy a cup of coffee and took the baby from her. She sat next to Lucy on the bed and began nursing.

“I’m going to hop in the shower,” Lucy said.

Lucy took a long shower, longer than she should have. She now knew only too well that hot water cost money. As the water flowed over her body she couldn’t help staying in there. She felt like it was her only chance to relax in the day. When she got out of the shower, Shirley had put away the sofa bed. Her mother and father were up and everyone was sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee.

“How are you doing today, dad?” Lucy said.

“Come here and give your old pops a kiss,” he said. “I’ll be doing just fine when I get that.”

Lucy went and kissed her father on the cheek. She hated seeing him like this. He was a proud man, and smart. He’d spent his life building up his company, Mayfair Automotive. She didn’t blame him for the way things had worked out. He was an inventor and it was his job to believe in his invention. The fact that it hadn’t worked out and had cost them everything was beyond his control. There was no point being angry about it. She loved him and she loved everyone else in her family, that was what mattered.

Her dad went to use the shower. Shirley went to get dressed in her room. She left the baby with Mabel. Lucy smiled at her mother.

Her mother sighed. “Your father’s getting so thin,” she said.

“It’s the stress, mom.”

“He’s got to go into court today.”

“What for?”

“They’re trying to take the company from him.”

“The loan shark?”

“Yes. It’s just a preliminary hearing, it will all take time, but I suppose they’ve got his signature on the right piece of paper to make it all go their way. They wouldn’t be taking him to court if they weren’t going to win.”

“He’s too trusting,” Lucy said.

“He’s a damn fool,” Mabel said. Her voice cracked as she said it. Her lip trembled. Lucy knew her mother loved her father more than anything else in the world. She’d rarely heard her speak of him like that. But she understood where her mother was coming from. She’d lost everything, her home, her security in old age. Even their dignity was being eaten away, bit by bit, day by day.

Lucy went to her purse and took out the hundred dollars she’d made in tips the day before.

“For the gas bill,” she said as she put the money on the table.

“Oh, Lucy. You keep that. You earned it.”

Lucy didn’t even consider taking the money back. She just kissed her mother on the cheek. Then they both sat there, sipping their coffee in silence, worrying about the future. Lucy looked at her mother. There seemed to be more lines on her face than there had been a year ago.

Mabel cleared her throat. “I wanted to say thank you,” she said.

Lucy looked up at her. She could tell that her mother was saying something that was difficult. The way she was speaking was strained.

“You’ve had to give up a lot this last year,” Mabel continued. “Don’t think I don’t appreciate that. I understand what you’ve done.”

“Mom, it’s just some tips. I’m an adult. I’m happy to contribute.”

“I know you were looking forward to getting your own place, sweetheart. I know you wanted to move out and start your own life. You were going to go to college.”

“How could I leave at a time like this?” Lucy said.

“Well, you could have. But you didn’t.” Mabel started crying and Lucy began to choke up too. She always hated to see her mother cry. “I don’t know what we’d do without you, my dear child.”

Lucy got up and hugged her mother. Then her mother went into her bedroom. Lucy stared across the table blankly. She felt as if she was going to burst into tears. Everything had changed so much. She’d heard the explanations a thousand times and she still couldn’t understand how a perfectly happy, secure, stable family could end up like this. She gasped as she choked back the tears. She knew any minute someone was going to come into the kitchen and see her sitting there, crying. She didn’t want to be seen like that. She had to keep it together. She had to remain strong. They were all counting on her.

She got up and opened the window out to the fire escape. She sat there sometimes and the others usually left her alone when she was out there. They understood that she needed some space, some privacy. She was the one who didn’t have a bedroom.

She’d gone from being the baby of the family to the principle breadwinner in the space of a year. It was too much pressure. She hadn’t even seen any of her old school friends in months. What had happened to her? What had happened to Shirley? Shirley had been the homecoming queen in her senior year. Now she had a child and no man. And their father? He’d been so proud. He’d been a professional, a skilled craftsman, an engineer. Now what was he?

She looked at her watch. She still had a few hours before her shift started at eleven but she figured she’d go into work early anyway. It was easier to be there than to be here.