Down to the Dirt (17 page)

I calmed down and caught my breath when I figured it was safe. Started walkin’, always keepin’ an eye out for cops and cabs. One thing I learned from a pretty early age was how to spot a cop car by the headlights. And if you weren’t sure, then you’d just
assume
it was a cop and hit the ditch anyhow.

I was on a mad rampage. Reelin’ in and out the alleys, across people’s lawns. Up North Street and right on Gottagen or Gattigan or whatever the fuck it’s called. Young Street, everyone’s got a fuckin’ Young Street. Charles Street, West Street, back on North again, left on Robie and up Quinpool Road. Fuck. Creative bunch, whoever named the roads. Still, for all that shaggin’ around, Agricola Street was nowhere to be found.

I realized right then and there how full of shit I really was, thinkin’ I’d find Natasha’s place through sheer force of will. In a strange city with fuck all money. No place to sleep and I doubt that I was welcome
anywhere
considering the state of me. A fine sight indeed.

Natasha wouldn’t turn me away though. No. She likely already knew I was in town, or at least on my way. Andy probably had her warned. He’s like that. Still, for all I knew, Agricola coulda been out in the goddamn boondocks. ’Tash coulda been in some stud’s bed with her wrists tied to his bedposts. Havin’ a fine time for herself. Of course this possibility
enraged me and I started in screamin’, no longer givin’ a shit about cops or cabs, or anyone for that matter.

—Natasha! Natasha! Naataashaa! Listen up, Halifax. Ye’re all abunch a thievin’, horse-fuckin’ Scottish rejects! Go on and have at yourselves!

Another few minutes of ravin’ and wandering before I found myself slumped on a bench in some dodgy park.

Halifax City on a Friday night.

Loaded drunk.

Down to my last match.

I downed a little bottle of rum and got this…this overwhelmingly tragic and hopeless feeling as I watched the bottle fall from my hand to the battered old asphalt at my feet. A fine sight, there beneath the dusty old orange streetlight with my bag and my bad attitude. I stretched out across the bench and closed my eyes for a second.

Was it so much to ask for a little honesty? That’s all I wanted. She coulda given it to me over the phone. There was no need for all this. I coulda been home in bed or downtown drinkin’, playin’ pool at the Hatchet. Friday night in St. John’s, home-turf and all that.

I started thinkin’.

I made a few plans.

When I gets through with all this nonsense, I’ll be makin’ a few changes. I’ll find me a place where people’ll feel like wipin’ their boots when they drops by, rather than leavin’ ’em on for safety’s sake. I’ll get me a straightlaced, uncomplicated, almost
fulfilling
sex life by pickin’ out the right movies and changin’ the sheets on a regular basis. I’m gettin’ a new toothbrush, maybe one of them fancy electric ones.

—That wet towel don’t belong on the bedroom floor!

—Isn’t it my turn to do the dishes?

I’ll be walkin’ a four-legged dog and curlin’ up to the Wednesday night sitcom marathon. I’ll be all the time quittin’ smokin’. And if you happens to open my fridge, you’ll find light mayonnaise, whole grain bread, some kinda smoked fuckin’ cheese, and some of that French fizzy water in the green bottle. Sure you’ll have to compliment the curtains that match the carpet that go so well with the little place mats.

I’ll be soberin’ myself up too.

—Can I offer you a cup of coffee? Sorry, all I got is decaf.

Listen here, I’ll take my chances with the devil I don’t know. Can’t be much worse than the one that I knows.

Someone was nudgin’ me, shakin’ me in a most aggressive manner. From the back of my soggy brain I could hear:

—Hey! Buddy? Get up! C’mon, you can’t sleep here.

I musta dozed off. On such a pissy park bench. Halifax City. Friday night. My neck all stiff and feelin’ like it might break. My head pounding. Limbo. Floatin’ somewhere between rip roarin’ drunk and mildly ossified. I reached for a match to light a cigarette and it all came rushin’ back to me. Fuck. I squinted up into the face of one ragged-lookin’ old night crawler. Faded denim skirt, black tights, red cowboy boots with white trim, a black low-cut blouse and a white leather jacket with fringes. I thought there must be a Sally Ann around there somewhere. And she was standin’ right in front of my face, pushin’ fifty if she was two days old. She had a bottle of beer in her hand. It looked some good.

—Fuck d’ya mean I can’t sleep here? Is it
your
goddamn bench or something?

Ms. Sally Ann proudly informed me that this was her place of work, verifying my suspicions. As if her queer rig-out hadn’t already made perfect sense to me. I gave her a good sizin’ up, asked her for a light and inquired about her prices.

—Twenty for a blowjob, fifty for a fuck. I don’t waste time on handjobs if you’re wondering.

I drained a little bottle of Bacardi and slipped her a twenty, wishin’ it was a fifty. That left me with about seven bucks in change after what I forked over for the shuttle bus from the airport. Thievin’ bastards. And that schemin’ fuckin’ cab driver then. Lucky thing I’m such an easygoin’ fella.

Ms. Sally Ann took me over behind some shack at the other side of the park. There was a swing set and a busted merry-go-round just to our left. Her knee cracked when she eased herself to the ground in front of me. She laid her beer down and slid her cold hands up under my coat. She was searchin’ me. I almost took offence but then I figured that even though her job must be jam-packed with all manner of glamour and perks, it wasn’t without its share of risks. I raised my arms skyward.

—I’m clean, girl. Search away. They cuntfiscated my lighter at the airport, so I can’t even set your hair on fire. No, seriously. I’m only coddin’ ya. I wouldn’t harm a fly.

She started in on me. I couldn’t help wonderin’ where that mouth was after bein’. Fuck it. I let my head fall back against the shack and waited for something to happen. Waited. But nothing happened. Something was wrong. Like my lad was gone numb or simply refused to wake up. Sally Ann kept at it though ’cause this was her job and I was a payin’ customer and she knew I wanted my money’s worth. I did too, seein’ how I
was basically broke. But something was definitely wrong. She was goin’ up and down, up and down, squeezin’ and spluttering, but I wasn’t responding at all.

After about ten more minutes I got to feelin’ all guilty and told her to stop. Don’t know why
I
felt guilty about it though, seein’ how she just took my last twenty bucks for not even twenty minutes’ work. That’s over sixty bucks an hour, for Christ’s sake. Fellas don’t make that on the goddamn draggers.

—Ah shag it, girl. Shag it. It’s no use. Been drinkin’ since last Wednesday. Don’t know, girl, never had it happen before…Well, once or twice I suppose. But only when I’m drinkin’.

I pulled my pants back up. She held her hand out to me like she was lookin’ for more money. I was about to tell her to fuck off before I realized she just needed a hand gettin’ back to her feet. She moaned on the way up, asked me where I was from. When she heard I was from Newfoundland she went over the moon and insisted that I come back to her place to meet the man of the house. Her invite struck me as a bit wacko, given that she just had my cock in her mouth. But, she assured me that all was well, that the man of the house was totally supportive of what she did for a livin’. She only had to give him sixty percent of her income and that covered her rent and a few small habits. In fact, he was the only man allowed
up in her
without a condom. So, there was his sense of security present and accounted for before I was even in through the door. But what about mine?

She handed me the last of her beer. I drained it and smashed the empty bottle off the merry-go-round. She laughed and
slipped her arm around my waist. As we wobbled back through the park, I found it hard to tell for sure whether she was holdin’ me up or just usin’ me to support herself. A car backfired somewhere in the city, the engine spluttering, asking to die.

We walked for a bit. She swore on her dead mother that everything was fine and dandy with her man. Not to worry. I was still feelin’ pretty stupid and apologetic for my…lack of performance. I tried to explain myself, but she wasn’t really interested. I s’pose she’d heard it all before. Then, for no apparent reason, she stopped, put her two hands on my cheeks and looked straight at me.

—You’re young and you think you know it all but you don’t know anything yet. Everything is already laid out for you, written in the stars. You can only go with it, wherever the road takes you. But you have to slow down and enjoy the ride because life is short and we only pass through once.

—Bullshit. Life is—

—Life is short as shit, little man! Believe me I know. You take your eyes off the road for a split second and then glance in the rearview to see forty-five years behind you. Gone. I know.

Sally Ann lit a smoke and shook her head. She stared off into the dark, all forlorn and teary-eyed. For the first time in a long time I thought about Glenda Devereux. I s’pose Glenda’d be about thirty-three or thirty-four by now. Haven’t laid eyes on her since she left the Cove. Standin’ on her doorstep with her life packed into boxes. Someone mentioned a while back that she was runnin’ a club out in Torbay. I s’pose you never knows from one minute to the next where you’ll end up in the world. Life is fuckin’ long.

Myself and Sally Ann stumbled up the walkway and in through the front door of this lopsided old bungalow that was badly in need of a facelift and a paint job. That’s where I met Renny.

Renny in his cheesy sneaker-boots with the chunky tongues. Thick gold chains on his wrists and neck. Hair cut short on top, long and stringy on the back. Green, blurry, tattooed prison knuckles. One of them Pat Garret beards, and the beady, sunken, dead eyes of a shark. The world owes Renny a favour. Probably never out of jail long enough to settle in somewhere. Back and forth between halfway houses, boarding rooms, crack houses and prison. He sparks up a smoke in the non-smokin’ section and gets six months for parole violation. He’ll never leave the system behind and it’s only a matter of time before he murders someone. Lifer.

The pissy, spiced stench of free-base cocaine hit me square in the face. It wasn’t lost on me that I’d just gotten a blowjob off this guy’s missus. I parked myself down at the head of the table but he hardly noticed me. Sally Ann told him where I was from, that I was lookin’ for Agricola Street, lookin’ for my girlfriend. He mumbled something about Newfoundland but he couldn’t muster up enough coherent thought to make a full sentence. Our Renny struck me as a bit of a time bomb. Just tickin’ away. I whipped out a couple of the little Bacardi and, for a brief moment, his eyes came alive, only to retreat just as quickly, back down into the depths of criminal limbo. Tick tick tick. He fumbled over one of the little bottles, tried to read the label. Unable to decipher the strange markings on the bottle, he opened it up and poured it down his throat like water. He slammed the bottle down hard on the table in front of me, darin’ me to walk down the same roads he had. Psycho crack-head or not, though, he wasn’t drinkin’ me under the
table, especially with my own liquor. I guzzled mine too, only, not wantin’ to come across as confrontational, I was a little easier settin’ the bottle back down. I tried hard not to acknowledge the burnin’ fire in my guts. Tough as nails is our Keith. Renny stared at me for a long time, but I don’t think he was really
seein’
me. I looked around for Sally Ann. She was gone. Renny started to sway back and forth, starin’ at me with them sunken, lifeless eyes. Starin’. Hateful. Pasty, bone-white skin. Spittle ran down his beard and it suddenly became a great effort for him to keep his head up. Renny was leavin’ me. I stared straight back at him, feelin’ safer due to his wasted state, and I flattened another Bacardi. Before it even hit my stomach, Renny slumped over, slid off his chair and plastered himself to the kitchen floor. Lifeless. Well, not dead but close to it.

I swiped one of his smokes.

The fridge cuttin’ in and out.

Renny snorin’ away.

Lucky fucker.

Next thing out strolled Sally Ann in a spandex suit, her tits saggin’ out through roughly cut holes in the fabric. I got on like it didn’t shock me in the least, probably ’cause at that point it didn’t, and I suggested that she see to her husband or her pimp or whatever she called that droolin’ lump of snot on the floor.

I made my way to the toilet.

There was no light to guide my passage to the end of the hall, where I assumed the bathroom was. I was gettin’ a bad case of the spins and I thought I might vomit. The door at the end of the hall turned out to be a spare room. No furniture, but
neatly adorned, wall-to-wall, with boxes of what looked like cartons of smokes, cases of liquor and beer. A sobering moment for our Keith. It dawned on me that Renny’s house was more than likely bein’ watched and, for that matter, so was I. His place was probably wired for sound. So much booze and smokes was worth at least a few years in jail. Liftin’ Christ. I switched off the light and left.

Takin’ a leak in the bathroom and something didn’t feel quite right. Something was a bit off. Wasted as I was, it took me a moment to realize that nothing was hittin’ the toilet at all. I was actually pissin’ into a condom that Sally Ann, the Queen of Spandex, had, unbeknownst to me, hauled on over the old lad before we did the business back in the park. Fuck. I jammed it tight at the top, yanked it off, and tossed it into the bathtub on top of a thousand old butts and roaches. Hot piss runnin’ down my thighs. I was fuckin’ outraged. No wonder I couldn’t get it up. Sure it was wrapped up in a rubber suit. Who ever heard tell of suckin’ someone off with a safe on? Especially a payin’ customer. A first for me.

I could hear Sally Ann in the kitchen crucifying the chorus to the “Ode to Newfoundland.” What a goddamn madhouse. I had to get the fuck out. Fast. Before I was killed. But I was gettin’ my money’s worth first.

I peeked out into the hallway. No one around. I slipped out of the bathroom and crossed the hall to the contraband bedroom. I left the door open a crack so’s I could see. Didn’t want to turn the light on in case Sally Ann looked up the hall. I popped open a case of, lo and behold, Jim-fuckin’-Beam. Don’t know if I even had more than a taste of the vile shit in my life and there I was rippin’ off a second bottle of it in the same night. I moved on to another box that said Player’s on the side.
It wasn’t sealed. It was full of loose Styrofoam packing. I rooted around but couldn’t find any cigarettes. Then my hand found something heavy and cold down in one corner. When I wrapped my fingers around it I knew right away what it was. I’d never even seen a handgun before, let alone held one. Not in real life. I had no clue what kind or calibre or any of that macho shit. I just knew that I wanted it in my own pocket. And that’s where it went. Get fifty bucks for it back home. Then I really started to panic ’cause I figured if there was a loose gun lyin’ around in here, then someone obviously misplaced it, or worse, miscounted it. Either way, it was safe to assume there was more guns around the house. And Renny was just the type to use one on me. I had to move fast. Faster. I opened another box and pulled out a handful of Nevada tickets. Stuffed ’em in my arse pocket. Finally I found cigarettes. A carton of Player’s Light. Not my brand but they were gonna have to do.