Gravesend (14 page)

Walking away from Alessandra’s house, Conway looked down at the sidewalk. Crack-lumpy. Weed-stitched. Candy wrappers like ripped flowers dotting dirt squares where the city had put in shitty little trees. Fire hydrants that resembled squat patrolmen. Telephone poles with the copper wire picked clean, probably by some kid who sold it over at One Stop Salvage. He crossed the street as he passed Stephanie’s house and kicked into a run. Conway lifted his head and had a thought about the neighborhood: it had never let him do anything right.

He was close to home, just up the block. As he got closer to the house, he saw a dark, hooded figure sitting on the front stoop, head down. It was Ray Boy, hoodie drawn over his forehead, staring at the ground. Conway looked all around, as if there would be witnesses to this meeting, as if people would imagine that they were somehow in cahoots, as if that
Village Voice
reporter might leap out from behind a telephone pole and question the ethics of this encounter.

Ray Boy didn’t get up. He just sat there.

Conway approached him. Maybe Ray Boy had been fucking with him all along. Or maybe he’d reneged on their deal, gone bad. What would it take to make him what he once was? Probably not much. Some prodding. A reminder that he ruled the neighborhood before prison, before the shit with Duncan.

Ray Boy said, “We doing this or what? I can’t wait anymore.”

“We’re doing it,” Conway said.

“When?”

“Whenever I want.”

Conway couldn’t tell if Ray Boy was smiling, but he could see his yellow teeth, filmy, a gap in the back where he’d lost a tooth, maybe had it yanked in prison.

“I’m saying now,” Ray Boy said.

“You don’t get to say,” Conway trying to walk past him up the steps, “get it?”

Ray Boy reached out and gripped Conway’s leg. “I do get to say. And I’m saying now. We’ve played games enough. I’m gonna make you do this, I’ve got to. Down to the last thing. I gotta hold you at gunpoint to make you kill me, I’ll fucking do it. No more waiting. You can fail at anything else you want, but you can’t fail at this.” His eyes cut through Conway. “Hear me?”

Conway nodded.

“Where’s your car?”

“Up the block.”

“Walk.”

Conway didn’t move. “I don’t have a gun anymore.”

Ray Boy let out a breath. “Christ.”

“Can I do it with something else?”

“Something else? You’re kidding, right? You want to go inside, get a fucking butter knife?”

“No, I’m just saying, how am I gonna do it?”

“I’ve got a shotgun at the house in Hawk’s Nest. You’ll use that. You’ll hold it up,” Ray Boy miming how to hold a shotgun, “and blow a hole in my chest. Sound good?”

“I’ve got to go inside. Get something.”

“Then we’re getting in your car and going upstate.”

“I know.”

“I’m coming in.”

Now it was Conway’s glance digging into Ray Boy. “You can’t.”

Ray Boy said, “Hurry up.”

Conway walked up the steps and went inside, shutting off the alarm. He thought about resetting it. What would Ray Boy, not knowing about the alarm, do then? Conway could just set it and hole himself up in the house. Scared. A pussy to the bitter end. If Ray Boy tripped the alarm, the cops would come. They’d haul Ray Boy away, that was it. They wouldn’t go inside, wouldn’t go near the bathroom. Didn’t have a reason to. No one knew about Pop. Conway’s fingers hovered over the buttons. He looked out the little window in the door at Ray Boy, sitting on the stoop, his back still to the house. From behind, he kind of looked just like some guy waiting for his buddy. Could’ve been McKenna. Conway didn’t set the alarm, though. He walked into the kitchen and looked under the sink. He found the tin box full of matchbooks that Pop kept there—from the Golden Nugget, Benny’s Fish & Beer, Villa Roma, Peggy’s Runway, Amendola’s, some of them so old he wondered if they’d even ignite—and pocketed a few. Then he looked for lighter fluid. There was some around, he knew, because one afternoon Pop had taken out two yellow bottles and was ready to give them to the garbage—the bottles twenty years old at least, Pop never wanting to go out in the back and grill and never wanting Conway to either—but he kept the bottles, just kept them, because it was such a waste to toss them. Conway found them turned over in a dish basin full of old rags under where the pots and pans were. He put one bottle down on the kitchen table and uncapped the other. Sliding the chair out of the way, he opened the bathroom door and looked in at Pop. All that blood. Poor Pop. To die like that. Conway stood back and sprayed the lighter fluid in an arc onto the blankets covering Pop. Next he made a trail out of the bathroom and sprayed the kitchen table and the curtains on the window over the sink. He went into his bedroom and sprayed his records, his cassettes, his stereo, the bed, all his clothes. Nothing was coming with him. Nothing at all. In the living room he doused the carpet, the lamp, the TV, the recliner. Pop’s room was full of ghosts. He sprayed the ghost of his mother and Duncan’s ghost and the ghost of what Pop used to be and he wanted to spray himself because he felt like a ghost, but he didn’t do it. He dragged a line of lighter fluid close to the tips of his black Converse sneakers and cut the flow. He was almost out of fluid in the first bottle. He took the cap off and poured the rest on Pop’s bed. He got the second bottle and went to what used to be Duncan’s room in the basement. Pop hadn’t changed much. Conway never went down there. A framed Nirvana poster hung over the bed. A cassette of Sonic Youth’s
Daydream Nation
was out on the desk where Duncan had left it. The desk was covered in other things that screamed Duncan. A VHS copy of
A Streetcar Named Desire
. Vonnegut’s
Cat’s Cradle
with
DI
written on the spine. Fanned out issues of
Entertainment Weekly
and
Premiere
. An eight-by-ten picture of James Dean. Conway sprayed everything. He walked upstairs and went back to the kitchen, continuing to spurt the lighter fluid in a trail on the floor behind him, and he opened the gas burners on the stove so that the gas didn’t come on but he could hear it hissing. He sprayed the stove and then he made a trail back to the front door. Looking out the window at Ray Boy, he considered dragging the motherfucker up the steps and starting the fire on him. Guy wanted to die so bad, let him die that way. But Conway didn’t do it. Couldn’t. He leaned over and flicked a match and then twisted it until the other matches in the book sizzled to life and he was holding a ball of fire in his hand like a witch, feeling the flame licking his palm. He tossed the fire at the trail of lighter fluid and watched a quick glow open up in the center of the house. He walked outside, closing the door behind him, and told Ray Boy to move fucking now.

Twelve

Lou Turcotte was on the phone, jabbering on, sounding like he had a toothpick between his front teeth. He said, “I think this is a great opportunity. A great opportunity. For you. For me. For Beau. You understand? The things we could do here. Enormous potential. You, you’ve got that star quality.”

Alessandra was still shaken up from Conway coming over. It was way worse than anything she had anticipated. She saw something pass over Conway’s eyes in the kitchen, something that said he might be dangerous, not just a harmless, sad-sack doofus with a dead brother. Her hands were unsteady. She had smoked her last American Spirit down to the filter. She was trying to roll one of her dad’s cigarettes now. She was uh-huhing Lou Turcotte. She hated guys that talked in this phony Hollywood-speak.

“What I’m saying is, I guess,” Lou Turcotte said, “we need more money. Not boatloads. Just a little. Few grand. You know anyone who’d want to invest, that’d be just terrific. Maybe you yourself want to invest? Something to think about. Get that producer credit. Looks good, someone’s considering you for a role down the line, they look at your resume, they say, ‘Oh, she’s a star and a producer. Sign her up. That’s special.’”

“Breathe, Lou,” Alessandra said.

“You think you might want to invest?”

“I can’t, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Keep your eyes and ears open. Maybe you meet a rich doctor, maybe he wants to put down a few grand, more than that. We get twenty grand, we’re set. The things I could do for twenty grand. The bells and whistles.”

“You change the title yet?”

Lou paused. Alessandra could hear him shuffling through papers. “I’m thinking
Brooklyn State of Mind
,” he said.

“That’s terrible, Lou.”

“Okay, I’ve got a whole list. We’ll find something else. For now, I’m gonna work on finding investors. I’ll touch base soon.”

Alessandra closed the phone. She took a long drag off her cigarette, the cheap tobacco burning the back of her throat. She’d spoiled herself with the pack of American Spirits and now it was back to the bottom shelf. She was sitting Indian-style on her bed with the window open a crack to air out the smoke. She thought about Conway ripping the phone cord out of the wall mount. Looked like a kid throwing a tantrum but with some genuine psycho action behind his eyes. He’d been an inconvenience up to that point, but now she was afraid he’d cross the line, keep coming back, begging, maybe get violent. One perspective was you had to feel sorry for him, no matter what. And maybe she should’ve been nicer, more understanding. But she had no patience. Not an ounce. She was almost thirty.

She turned on her laptop and plugged in her headphones and listened to her favorite Deer Tick song, “Twenty Miles,” on repeat. She blew smoke out the window.

When she heard a thumping over the music, she looked up. Someone was knocking at her door. Conway, she thought. Stormed back into the house and just came up to her room. But it couldn’t be. The knocking was gentle, not harried-weird, no pathetic edge to it. She got up and opened the door, deciding it was probably just her father, checking on her.

Stephanie was standing there, tears stitching her eyes. “Your dad let me in, said come on up.”

“What’s wrong, sweetie?” Alessandra said. She put an arm around Stephanie’s shoulder. Stephanie was wearing a tattered XL St. John’s sweatshirt. She’d put make-up on again, poorly, and it was running down her cheeks.

“It’s nothing.”

“Come in.”

Stephanie sat on the edge of the bed and put her elbows on her knees and dropped her head in her hands. “It’s really nothing. I just . . . I had no one I could talk to. My mother, my mother’s just a total nut. I can’t . . . I mean, I can’t even be around her right now. I had to call in to work.”

“Did something happen?”

“I don’t know. I mean, nothing I didn’t want to happen. It just wasn’t, it wasn’t, nice.”

“What are you saying, Steph?”

“Just. Nothing. Really.”

“You can talk to me.”

Stephanie looked up, her cheeks zippered with inky mascara. “Me and Conway, we did it.”

“You did it?”

“Like we went all the way.”

“I know what you mean. When did this happen?” Alessandra sat next to her and rubbed her back.

“Just,” Stephanie crying again, hiccupping, “this afternoon.”

Alessandra made the chronology in her head: Conway having sex with Stephanie and then coming to see her. Disgusting.

“I guess,” Stephanie blubbering, “I guess I sort of threw myself at him. I’ve always liked him, and I wanted the experience, and I wanted it to be with him. Because what if it never happened? Or what if it happened with someone I didn’t care about? I wanted it to be Conway.”

“Was he rough?”

“He wasn’t, I don’t know, he wasn’t rough per se. But he wasn’t gentle. It was, he was, I don’t know. He wasn’t thinking about me, I know that, which was okay, I told him not to, but it still hurts.”

“Oh, Steph.”

“And he didn’t use, he didn’t use protection. He said he’d,” her voice going to a whisper, “pull out, but he didn’t.”

“You’ll be fine.”

“But what if? I could just hear my mother.
‘Puttana
!
Disgraziata
!’”

“You can get a Morning-After Pill. It’s still soon enough. You can probably get one pretty easy.”

Stephanie put her head back in her lap. Alessandra rubbed her neck and shoulders. She took her brush off the nightstand and ran it through Stephanie’s hair. Poor girl had probably never had her hair brushed. It was full of knots and tangles.

“I feel awful,” Stephanie said. “How can I ever go back to church? How can I look at Monsignor?
Puttana
. That’s all I am.”

“Don’t say that. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I did. I did a lot wrong. I should’ve known better.”

“He shouldn’t have taken advantage—”

“He didn’t. I practically had to force him.”

Alessandra put down the brush and worked on separating a clump in Stephanie’s hair with her fingers. “Your hair, it’s . . . it’s tough.”

“I’m a mess, I know.” Stephanie stood up, ripping her hair out of Alessandra’s hand, and started to pace, taking off her glasses and wiping her eyes with the backs of her hands. The whites were bloodshot, streaky. The pupils pretty, Alessandra noticed, brown, mocha almost. Stephanie’s face was square-shaped. Pimples under her chin. Peach fuzz glowing on her ears. Poor, poor girl.

Alessandra said, “You’re not a mess.”

“What can I do? This is gonna be my life until I die?”

“Tell me more about Conway.” Alessandra wanted to know the dirt, wanted to know exactly what kind of degenerate scumbag she was dealing with. “You sure it was consensual?”

“I told you. It was. He didn’t want to. I had to convince him. I told him pretend I was—” Stephanie stopped talking. Stopped pacing.

“Pretend you were what?”

“Another girl.”

Alessandra chewed on this. Didn’t take much figuring. “Me?”

Stephanie nodded, and there was something in her nod that made the whole goddamn world just seem like a double-awful place to Alessandra. All of Stephanie nodded. Her mustache. Her pimples. Her clumpy hair. Confessing. “I didn’t mind. I closed my eyes, too.”

“Steph—”

“I wanted to feel like you for a little while. Nothing weird. I just wanted to know what it was like. To be pretty. To have someone want me.”

“He went along with this? He pretended?”

“I think so. I felt like you. I felt like he was with you and like I was you.”

Alessandra was skeeved out, wanted Stephanie to leave, but she couldn’t tell her that. She couldn’t tear this girl down any further.

Stephanie said, “You’re upset? Please don’t be upset. I couldn’t take that on top of everything else.”

“I’m not upset.”

“You are.”

“I’m, it’s, I . . . I just want you to be okay, I want you to feel better. I don’t want you to feel bad about yourself. There’s no reason.”

“I’m a
puttana
. Even worse.”

“Stop saying that. Please.” Alessandra stood up. “I hate that word, always hated it. You’re no
puttana
,” struggling with the word, something her father used to say about girls up on Eighty-Sixth Street, girls on the bus in short skirts, any girl showing skin. “You’re not that, so stop saying it about yourself.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You think I felt that way when I left Amy’s house this morning?”

“I don’t . . . I’m not . . . I don’t know. Did you?”

“Course not. Why would I? Feel shame? Over doing this very human thing. Anybody makes you feel guilty about this stuff is just trying to keep you down. Your mother, she’s gonna think you’re what, a whore? Fuck her, Steph. Really. Fuck her. You don’t need that. Nobody needs that. You’re just a human. You did what you needed. Fuck your mother. Fuck Conway. You’re a beautiful person,” Alessandra laying it on thick, “you really are. I don’t say that lightly. You need to start feeling that about yourself. Fuck Conway for not realizing that.”

Stephanie laughed, spit dangling at the corners of her mouth. She said, “Fuck my mother,” almost choking on it, and then she stomped her feet. “And fuck Conway. That chooch.” She paused. “I drank a lot today, too. I’ve never done that.”

“It’s okay.”

“I hope I’m not pregnant.”

“You’ll get the Morning-After Pill.”

“That’s not, you know. Morally, I’m not sure I can.”

“You’ll do what you have to do then.”

“I’m sorry I’ve wasted so much of your time.”

“It’s not a waste.”

“How are you? How’s—what’s her name?—how’s the girl from Queens?”

“I haven’t talked to her again yet.”

“I might have to throw up.”

“That’s okay. Bathroom’s down the hall.”

“My mouth already smells like puke and I haven’t even thrown up. You think that means I’m pregnant?”

“You wouldn’t be sick so soon.”

“I’m gonna use the lavatory.” Stephanie left the room and walked down the hall. Alessandra heard the door open and close and then she heard Stephanie retching, like she was sticking a finger down her throat and trying to make herself throw up, almost like vomiting would cancel out the chance of pregnancy. Alessandra pictured what Conway was doing now. Guy was dirt. Such a shame. She had no doubt he’d been fucked up by Duncan’s death, but she didn’t feel pity for him now. To do what he did to Stephanie, that was just a dirtbag move, dead brother or not. And it bothered her to think about him picturing her like that. Just so sickening. And then to come to her house, angry, like she owed him something.

Stephanie came back out, and she said, “I can’t puke. I feel like I have to, but I can’t.”

Alessandra tried for a laugh, but it came out more like an exhausted growl.

“You smell that?” Stephanie said. “I smelled it when I was in the bathroom. Now I really smell it.”

Alessandra got a whiff of something—maybe—a smell that reminded her a bit of California in the summer. Something burning. Like when you blacken bread in the toaster oven and it rinds up into heat-smoky curls.

Stephanie went to the window and opened it. Dampness swirled in, carrying a hard burning smell. “Something’s on fire.” She pressed her face to the glass and tried to see over the rooftops.

Alessandra came up behind her and made out a billowy trail of smoke behind the telephone wires. It was coming from what seemed like a few blocks away. “There it is,” pointing, “what’s that, two, three blocks?”

“Oh yeah,” Stephanie said. “More,” wiping her mouth and then her eyes, “four maybe. Let’s go check it out.”

“Steph, I think you should go home, get some rest.”

“I’m going over there. Gotta see whose house it is. Could be Mr. Nicola’s. That old pyro. That’s right over by Conway’s house, too. Maybe God struck him down, smote him.” Stephanie scrambled out of the room, saying, “Come on.” The gossip in her pushed the Conway stuff out of her mind. Stephanie was not-so-secretly like every old bag in the neighborhood: up in everyone’s business.

Alessandra followed her, rolling a for-the-road cigarette as she walked. She was curious.

Even her father wanted to know what was going on. He followed them out of the house, struggling to lock the front door, as Alessandra pulled on one of her mother’s long coats over her shorts and T-shirt.

“You’re gonna get sick out here,” her father said.

“That’s a myth,” Alessandra feeling the dampness in her bones. “You don’t get sick from weather.”

“‘Myth!’ Listen to this one. Now she’s a weatherman.”

“I think that’s true,” Stephanie said. “I think I saw it on TV one day.”

“Oh, bullshit!”

They walked up the block, following the smoke. Sirens were screaming, the fire department fast behind this. Could be a car, Alessandra thought. Could be anything. She remembered, as a kid, guys starting a fire in the middle of the avenue out of abandoned sawhorses, blocking traffic, throwing fireworks into the blaze.