Breaking Night (27 page)

But under the condition of need, friends’ apartments and friendships alike warped into something stressful. When 90 percent of the time I visited because I needed something, and 10 percent was just to hang out, even my most valued friendships were tested. Whether Bobby actually wanted company became the smallest component on my list of worries, next to his outright sacrifice of privacy, tension over depleted food supplies for which he was blamed, and the evidence of our sleepovers that Paula might find.

“Shamrock, listen, you can’t sweat that. You’d do it for them, wouldn’t you?” Carlos reasoned with me. “Come on, it’s not like you have other options right now. Your situation is messed up compared to theirs.”

But comparison between people was tricky; it seemed an all-purpose rationale that could be wielded in any direction. Yes, compared to Myers and Bobby, who enjoyed sleep in a warm bed and food they had only to open the cabinets to find, you could reason that we weren’t asking much of their resources. Still, did we have it all that bad?

It’s not like we were those homeless people you saw pushing shopping wagons full of sad things like picture frames, electronic parts, and bags of clothing; such obviously broken people that you could guess, just by looking, what it was that bent and broke to get them there. Compared to them we were lucky, without whole lives that needed pushing in carts or carrying in bags that kept busting open and spilling to remind them just what it was they held on to, and why they refused to stop carrying it.

We were still young. And no matter where we slept, I knew, resting my head to the ceaseless lull of the D train, northbound, or closing my eyes against the unyielding boards of the parkway benches, under stars, I had only to carry with me my family and the notion of home. A bundle easy enough to grip, made light by familiarity, things I’d carried with me all along, far before I ended up in Bedford Park or heard the sound of Sam’s warm, sullen voice. In this way, compared to some, I could have explained to Carlos, I had it easy. I’d been practicing all my life for this, carrying things. For others it came as a shock. No matter how exhausted we were or what slant he put on our situation, I was only breaking night, fending off the dark until the sun rose each day, when I’d start over, ready and able to do it again.

I turned sixteen at Fief’s house. The group chipped in and bought me a Carvel ice-cream cake. They carried it in, already melting, candlelight illuminating the bare mattress Carlos and Sam and I had been sleeping on, far in the back of the dark apartment. In my slowly waking state, I mistook the dirty mattress for my parents’ on University, the one that had been riddled with holes. While everyone sang, I was there, back on University, running my fingers over the coils of the springs, talking to Ma. Someone mashed ice cream on my face and brought me back. There was clapping while Carlos kissed the cream off of me, but everything felt wrong without Ma, Daddy, and Lisa. Shouldn’t I be celebrating with them, too? In the bathroom, I turned on Fief’s shower, slumped to the filthy floor, and stared at the wall, numb.

By that fall, three or four times a week, Sam and I would wake up to Carlos’s absence. If we crashed at a friend’s house, he might have left word of where he went, when he’d be back. If we’d slept on the top landing of a stairwell, the most we could hope for was a note. Sam and I might spend a whole morning deciphering it, sitting in the parkway, or while she showered at Bobby’s and I sat on the bathroom floor, clutching the paper. This was becoming routine.

Hey Shamrock,

I had to bounce right quick, today’s Grandma’s birthday. I want to get her something nice, like some Indian oil and two lampshades. Be on the roof landing at Brick’s or at Bobby’s. If you can’t, I’ll find you wherever you go.

One Love, Always,

Your Husband,

Carlos Marcano

“You think it’s really his grandmother?”

“I don’t know, Liz, how can you really ever know with him?” Sam said, leaning out of the shower to shave her legs, her large breasts hanging down as she made careful strokes with Paula’s disposable razor. Her arms and legs were sticks, and her head was covered in fuzz too short to look wet.

“Sam, you’re losing weight,” I said.

“I like food, I just don’t catch up with it often. You’re no picture of good eating yourself,” she said, chuckling.

Lowering Carlos’s note, I stood to gaze into the mirror—the same place Sam and I had stood just two months before, after she’d cut her hair off. I kept a single braid of hers taped inside my journal, next to a page of cartoon caricatures Sam had drawn of the two of us, and of Bobby and Fief. Squinting at my reflection, I saw my own weight loss, pale face, and tired green eyes. Momentarily, I was startled to see Ma staring back at me. Sick and weary, she blinked, wondering why I had visited her in the hospital only once this month and when, if ever, I was going back to school.

“I guess if he needs the space, I should just give it to him,” I told Sam, pushing Ma’s image quickly out of mind. She shut the shower off, leaned on my shoulder to climb out, and began drying herself.

“Yeah, but I know why you worry. You have every reason to; I worry myself. Sometimes I don’t know how we would do this without him,” she said, looking at me with concern. “I mean, it’s one thing to wait it out ’til we get settled, but I couldn’t take this crap if I thought it would never end.”

“We’ll be okay, Sam,” I assured her for no good reason.

It was a legitimate fear. Every time Carlos left, we had to wonder whether he was ever coming back. I knew in the same way Sam knew that your life could change in an instant. People caught viruses. Eviction notices were served. You fell in love. Parents just let go of their children. Stability was an illusion. Carlos had similar holes in his life; so did Sam. Without him or her, I wasn’t sure I could manage.

The group cared. But they went home at night, kissed their parents, complaining if dinner was burned. I could enjoy them, but only by forgetting portions of myself. And I was done with being lonely. I would grab Carlos and Sam and hold on as tightly as I could.

“I don’t know if we can do it without him, either,” I finally told Sam. The thought frightened me; saying it out loud made it that much more real.

By Halloween night, the unspoken tension that was bottled up between us snapped. Homelessness was becoming more difficult, and I think we all could feel it, how the strain of not having your most basic needs met can drive you a little crazy. Hunger wears on your nerves; nervousness wears on your energy; malnutrition and stress just plain wear on you. I hadn’t realized how uptight it was making me until Halloween, when I decided to join in on Carlos’s craziness and to let go of some of the tension myself.

“Happy Halloween . . .
Heepy halawana!
” I screamed behind Carlos as we walked up Bedford Park, loud, surprising myself. Seeing me get into it, Sam jumped in. “Happy Fettuccini!” she yelled. For blocks, I shouted until my throat was sore, screaming into the night sky, kicking up autumn’s red and gold leaves in the gutter where I walked. Suddenly, just like Carlos was doing, I began throwing things, smashing bottles on the cold cement, helping him overturn trash cans. We completely lost it together. I was so tired from walking; I felt delirious and angry at people who were sleeping in their homes, rageful even. The more I let loose, the better it felt. Carlos smiled at the sight of it, passed us bottles to toss, egged us on.

The three of us walked for hours, screaming obnoxiously, chucking hard candies in all directions. Perhaps it was out of spite that we’d traveled past most of our friends’ windows, in some inadvertent effort to wake them. The closest we’d come was when Bobby, who’d already been up, stuck his head out the window, TV remote in his hand. His hair had grown down to his ears and it shone in the moonlight.

“Waz up?” he asked coolly, looking down at the three of us. What could we say?
“We’re tired? This sucks? Can we sleep on your floor tonight again?”

“Heepy Halawana” was all that came out, from Sam, in one cute yelp that made Bobby laugh. Carlos stood away, aiming hard candy at cars, laughing sickly. A girl’s head popped out of the window beside Bobby’s. It was Diane, one of the few girls from the group.

“Hiya, guys,” she said, so chipper I became irritated. She leaned over and planted a soft kiss on Bobby’s cheek. They looked good together, so healthy, rested, and cheerful. I thought of how she probably slept peacefully in his arms, comfortable on his soft pillows. Carlos appeared at my side. I noticed his five o’ clock shadow, the way his eyes were pink from lack of sleep. “Let’s go, Shamrock,” he said, and I followed him up to the Concourse.

Our only other stop was at our friend Jamie’s, on whose ground-level window we tacked a note using smashed M&M’S to make it stick. It had a smiley face and read:

Stopped by real quick. Chillin. Heepy Halawana. 10-31-96

Despite our noise, she never woke up. Despite our shouting, the others never knew we’d come by at all.

By sunrise, we had stolen a blanket that had been hanging out of someone’s closed window to dry. We camped out with it, leaning against the warmth of the token booth in the Bedford Park D train station. Rush hour brought traffic, people swiping MetroCards that beeped incessantly, rattling us out of any comfort we’d managed. Sam and I cuddled for warmth, tucking the blanket, which was still somewhat damp and smelled soothingly of fabric softener, underneath and over us. Carlos marched in aimless circles around the station and shouted commentary.

“The girl in the green coat knows karate,” he announced through his makeshift bullhorn, a poster that he’d stripped off the wall and curled into a funnel. She shot a nasty look his way. Mostly though, he was ignored. “The man in the booth digs disco dancing,” he went on and on, fading into a thin, wiry buzz in the distance.

In my dream, Ma was starving to death. Nurses and doctors made a semicircle around her hospital bed, but could do nothing to help. Nearby, trays of steaming food sat in Tupperware. She smelled the food, cried softly for it, but would eat only if I fed her. While she waited for me, all moisture drained from her body, wrinkling her like a raisin, collapsing her eyes. I walked the halls of the hospital, frantic, lost, and worn, too tired to climb the stairs. When I finally arrived at Ma’s room, exhausted from the journey, only red and gold leaves filled her bed.

When I woke up, Sam was nudging my side.

Carlos had vanished.

For the first two nights after Carlos’s latest disappearance, Sam and I crashed at Bobby’s. In his little room, we tried to stick to the futon and keep as low-key as possible. We washed whatever dishes we used and folded whatever blankets we slept on in hopes of becoming invisible. Though use of the bathroom couldn’t be helped, we did our best to do it in runs, together. At least food consumption was a matter of willpower, staved off until absolutely necessary. Bobby was happy to see us, and I could tell that he took little to no notice of our efforts to hide our presence. Good, I thought.

By the light of his television, I thumbed through my journal and studied Carlos’s letters.

Your Husband
, he always signed them. Curling up beside Sam that second night, I wished I’d never met him.

Our third night without Carlos we spent on one of the rooftops of a very small roof attached to an entrance into Bronx High School of Science. Surrounding us was the large expanse of Clinton High School’s football field, deserted and nighttime eerie. The sky was gray and billowy; wind whipped past us in ghostly howls. With our backs pressed to the stark tar landing, Sam and I devoured a bag of salt-and-vinegar chips and slept, cold and still as stones. That night, we were the only two people on earth.

On our fifth night of walking, taking the train all night, and trying to crash at friends’ houses, we were worn out. Sam brought up the idea of a group home. It came about when we were so hungry that we couldn’t make jokes anymore. As we walked through Tony’s diner during the graveyard shift to wash up in the bathroom, the smell and sight of food was just too much. We passed through the club-going crowd typical of predawn hours. Their night magic had visibly worn off, and subtlety was lost: women sat in sequined dresses with their runny makeup, bra straps showing, while men forgot themselves, leaned in close, and put their hands on everything. Together, couples drunkenly occupied the booths, dining on rich breakfasts of hash browns, eggs, and tall glasses of orange juice that made me want to scream.

“I smell like a moose,” Sam said in the bathroom. “I don’t know, Liz,” she continued, looking over her shoulder as she scrubbed her panties in the sink. “I know you say St. Anne’s was the worst, but I’m starting to find that hard to believe,” she told me, rubbing circles of pink metal-dispenser soap into the cloth.

My period had come. No tampons; I substituted carefully folded toilet paper, again.

“I don’t care what happens, Sam, I’m not going to let myself get locked in some prison again.”

“Well, all I’m really thinking is food and sleep. You should at least consider coming.”

We shoplifted instead.

A few hours later, when the gates of the local C-Town came up, we slipped in, pretending to be customers. With quick sweeps of our hands we made cold, spicy, sweet, and crinkly things disappear into our backpacks. Clanking nervously out the sliding front door, we bolted and made our getaway, pursued by no one, to the nearby P.S. 8 playground. We sat on a jungle gym and tore packages open, stuffing bread and cheese and turkey into our mouths, chewing, coughing, and laughing, drinking orange juice right out of the carton.

That night, I lay in the stairwell of Bobby’s building with Sam and considered my options. I thought of returning to Brick’s, but quickly decided against it. Mr. Doumbia had promised to put me in a home if I kept up my truancy, and now I hadn’t been to school in months. I was
not
going back into the system. But being on the streets was not working out either. I would go pack bags for tips again, but child labor laws had become more strictly enforced over the last few years. Now those packing bags were men in their twenties and thirties, usually immigrants officially employed by the supermarkets. As for the gas station, I was old enough now that I feared doing anything that could get me arrested, so that was out. I really did not know what to do. On a whim, I went to a pay phone and dialed Brick’s number, looking for Lisa. I hung up after getting Brick the first time. So I called back a few hours later and got Lisa.