Taste of Tenderloin (16 page)

He nodded.

The woman held out her
hand. It was cold to the touch. “Nice to meet you,” she said
warmly, handing her key to the young man behind her. “Go on in,
sweetie,” she instructed the guy, who glanced away shyly as he slid
by, unlocked the door, and disappeared into her
apartment.

“
I’m Jen-na,” she said to
Micky D, dividing the name into distinct syllables.

He nodded back. “They call
me Micky D,” he said, letting her hand slip from his
fingers.

She was tall, at least six
feet, heavily bundled in a greyish overcoat and thick black scarf.
Her buzz-clipped hair was almost white, her face pale and gaunt but
not unattractive, and her eyes were her most distinctive
feature—almond shaped, almost Asian, but with nearly colorless
irises. Just a trace of blue, like clouded ice. Even though the
woman was smiling in a friendly manner, Micky D couldn’t help but
feel slightly unsettled because her unwavering gaze was aggressive
and penetrating, almost predatory. Usually people were less
assertive when first meeting him. They found his rugged,
prize-fighter features with the prominent scar tissue over both
eyes and his badly broken nose scary. He knew it was a face that
didn’t encourage argument.

As if privy to the
unnerving impact her own unusual appearance and gaze aroused, she
chuckled and said, “Nice to meet you Micky D,” then spun gracefully
on her heel, glided to her door, and added, “but now I have a guest
to, ah, instruct.” She followed the young man into her apartment,
leaving Micky D staring at the number sixty-five on her
door.

Wonder what exactly she
teaches?
he asked himself, finding the
woman’s exotic features, elegant movement, and gravelly voice very
attractive. Her peculiar accent added to the intrigue because he
couldn’t quite place it. Surely not Asian…perhaps Eastern European.
One thing he was certain of: even though he’d never met her before,
there was something vaguely familiar about Jenna. His nerves were
strung too tight after the wearing trip and unsettling encounter;
he wasn’t thinking clearly. It would come to him.

He unlocked his door and
checked out the small furnished studio. A bed, a closet, a dresser,
and a tiny toilet with shower and sink were all it contained.
Spartan, but surprisingly clean.

He fumbled through his
duffel and found his pill bottles. Cupping a drink of water in his
hand, he washed down two meds: lithium and the substitution for
chlorpromazine—olanzapine. Dr. Gee had thought the new combination
would have fewer energy-sapping side effects. So far the
psychiatrist was wrong. The psychotropic drugs made him sluggish
both mentally and physically. After another gulp of water, Micky D
went to the only window and looked down on busy Jones Street. He
was pretty familiar with this location; six months ago he’d lived
around the corner and down two blocks on O’Farrell in a residential
hotel.

Yeah, there was the
laundromat up the block on Jones where he’d been picked up by the
cops, staring fixedly for almost four hours at his laundry tumbling
over and over in a dryer, moving only to stick a steady stream of
quarters in the machine, coins he’d apparently scooped up from the
bill changer he’d battered. A concerned Vietnamese lady had finally
called 911. He vaguely remembered the cops bringing his caseworker
from social services, Ms. Fingerson. Then time had gotten fucked
up, flashing by in a blur, like his life had been continuously on
fast-forward. He had come around briefly several weeks later up in
Napa, locked down in a secured ward at the hospital with mostly
PCPs—penal code patients—from San Quentin and
Atascadero.

He took another deep
breath. At the moment he needed to wash off the clammy grime, get a
grip on himself, and catch some needed rest. Tomorrow he’d find out
about Jane, then he might check out the Harrison Street Gym and
look up his old manager. He probably should go over to the Mission
and meet his new caseworker, Mr. Rollo. He needed to see about food
vouchers, because he only had about ten bucks in cash.

Oh yeah, the meds were
kicking in on his empty stomach, making him feel fuzzy-headed and
drifty.

With the numbing effect of
his pills, Micky D dropped off to sleep fairly quickly, but only
after listening for a few minutes to whispering, giggling, moaning,
and groaning sounds coming from across the hall. Then there was the
drawn-out, throaty, “Oh yeah…” when he got up to go to the bathroom
at three or so. Sexually stimulating sounds. Something Micky D
hadn’t felt in some time.

When he finally roused
himself from deep sleep, it was mid-morning. He decided he’d first
go out and run down his partner, Blue, before heading over to
Harrison Street. As he was leaving his apartment the door opened to
number sixty-five, and the appearance of the man that exited
surprised Micky D. It wasn’t the shy young dude from the previous
night; instead, an old man, slumped-shouldered and grey-headed,
shuffled off down the hall. What the hell was he doing at Jenna’s?
Certainly not making any of those panting and moaning sounds. Maybe
she
was
really
teaching something to an early morning student, Micky D decided as
the old guy disappeared down the stairwell. For just a moment he
debated knocking on the young woman’s door, checking out how she
looked this morning after all her noisy instruction. But he
couldn’t come up with a good excuse, so he just smiled dryly as he
trucked on out to the street, thinking he might need some of
whatever she was teaching for himself.

It was a great San
Francisco morning, bright and clear, quiet with
most everyone still inside and off the street. The lingering smell
of bacon frying somewhere nearby made his stomach growl. He hoofed
it down to Homeboy’s near the corner of Leavenworth and O’Farrell,
but it was boarded up, apparently out of business since Micky D had
been away. He thought for a minute, then turned and climbed the
hill back up near Van Ness to the Korean’s, where he finally
spotted Blue, hanging out in front of the liquor store.

The thinly-built Army
Ranger veteran, a long-time fight fan, had been Micky D’s closest
friend for over two years, ever since Blue had come to the ‘loin
after getting out of the VA hospital over in Martinez. He’d lost
part of his lower right leg to a mine in Afghanistan, but after
being released from the hospital, he’d received a pretty good
disability pension and some other benefits like counseling and
prescription drugs from the VA clinic near the Presidio.

“
Hey, man,” Micky D said,
walking up to his tall, black friend, who still wore the same
skimpy goatee and old Army fatigue jacket with the Ranger patch
he’d worn when Micky D had last seen him. “What’s
happening?”

Blue, grinning broadly,
tapped Micky D’s closed fist, shook his hand, and hugged him
tightly. “Yo, dude, when did the ‘rales raise you?”

“
Got in on the bus late
last night,” Micky D answered, checking his buddy out. Blue was
still too skinny, but his eyes were clear, his gaze steady, and he
looked healthy. He looked like he was doing okay. “I appreciate you
dropping the bread in my canteen account at the hospital. It
helped, man, but why didn’t you ever send me a card or
letter?”

Blue rubbed his nose,
looking a little sheepish, and said, “Oh,
you know me, dude. Actually, a couple times I considered
roun
ding up the boys and cutting a disc at
Trey’s, but I wasn’t sure they would even let you hear it up
there.”

“
Well, thanks anyhow,”
Micky D said, sighing and pushing his hands deep in his pockets as
he looked down at his feet. He’d put off the question he dreaded
long enough. “Say, Blue, you seen Sweet Jane around? Both my
letters addressed to our old place down on O’Farrell bounced back
marked ‘Moved Left No Forward.’”

Blue’s grin quickly changed
to a hurting frown, like someone had suddenly whacked his stump
just above his prosthetic lower right leg.

“
Ah, man, guess you ain’t
heard. Things got real bad with Janey soon after you left. She
really got strung out. Kept talking about getting back on
methadone, you know. Instead, she lost her dancing gig and your
place, ended up over on Capp Street, maybe three months
ago.”

At that, Micky D stiffened
slightly. Capp Street was the absolute end of the line for someone
like Jane with a serious habit and out of work. Cheap hooker
city.

Blue cleared his throat,
his expression still pained. “But there’s more bad news, man,” he
continued in a husky tone, “and I hate to be the one to drop this
on you, pal, but Janey OD’d ‘bout eight weeks ago.” Blue looked
down at his feet, smiling thinly. “Few of us had a little memorial
after the city put her down, you know. We went over to Trey’s,
slammed down a few of them Polish vodkas she liked when she was
flush. Everybody did a little rap about her biting wit, or great
wheels, or cool dancing and all—kinda nice, you know, considering,”
Blue paused, then looked his friend in the eye and held his hands
palms up with an apologetic shrug, as if to say,
What else could we do
?

“
I know, I know,” Micky D
mumbled. He nodded, trying to examine his feelings like he’d been
taught in group at Napa.

He wasn’t really surprised
about Jane. He’d suspected something like that had probably gone
down. To be honest, he didn’t really feel all that torn up, just
sort of numbed except for a twinge of guilt for not being there.
She hadn’t written after his first month, and when his letters had
started coming back, he’d assumed she’d gone out again. They’d
lived together on O’Farrell, and at first he’d done pretty well,
keeping her away from the junk, on methadone maintenance. Until the
end, there. Jane, with all her problems, had probably kept him on
the street six months or so longer than he’d deserved, paying most
of their bills from her exotic dancing gigs up at the Mitchell
Brothers after the last of his boxing money ran out. But she’d been
unable to permanently prolong his slide. A month or so before that
last day, he’d been having funny spells, wandering around in a
daze, getting paranoid, getting involved in several dust-ups with
the law. But it had been an awkward relationship with Jane from the
beginning, constant fighting over everything, both of them
stubbornly clinging to their dreams: Micky D getting back his
boxing license, Jane hooking up with a musical in the legit
theater. Up and down for three years, a relationship of habit and
convenience more than love, knowing it would probably end badly for
one of them. He’d expected it to be him. Jane had been so tough, a
survivor. But now he realized it had been slipping away from her,
too, as he’d gradually sunk down into his own black
despair.

He stared off idly down
O’Farrell, watching a derelict hold a conversation with a parking
meter, still thinking about the doomed relationship with Jane. He’d
actually been doing both their laundry at the Jones Street
Laundromat when he’d slipped into the abyss. Funny, as screwed up
as he’d been that day, he could still remember every item of her
stuff flopping around in that dryer: five pairs of panties, one
blue, one black, three white; two University of San Francisco faded
green T-shirts; a white bra; three pairs of socks; and her
raggedy-ass grey sweat pants and shirt.

“
Sorry, man,” Blue said in
a respectful whisper.

It was quiet for a few
minutes after that as Blue gave Micky D some space and time to
process the bad news.

A guy wearing the greasy,
multi-layered attire of the homeless limped up, opening and
extending his dirty hand, which was full of small change—mostly
pennies. “Can ya guys help me out this mornin’?” he asked in a
defeated tone. “I need another ten cents to catch the bus over to
the free clinic.”

Blue pulled a quarter out
of his pocket and dropped it into the guy’s hand, shooing him
away.

“
Thanks, man,” the bum
said, grinning and clutching his fist full of happiness tightly.
Then he hurried into the Korean’s to pick up his morning
taste.

Finally, Micky D blew his
nose, sucked in a deep breath, and suggested in a hoarse voice,
“So, Blue, maybe we should go over to St. Anthony’s. I haven’t
eaten since sometime early yesterday, and I’m starving but almost
broke.”

“
Hey, let me get you a
sandwich here at the Korean’s,” Blue volunteered.

At the end of the month,
when they were low on cash, the two friends had worked out a good
hustle. Blue would dig out his old, battered silver sax, then
they’d truck on down to Pier 39 in the afternoon when the wharf was
thick with tourists. Blue would take off his prosthetic leg, sit,
and play some funky blues or jazz and Micky D would pass the hat.
The soulful music by a disabled vet and Micky D’s no-nonsense face
encouraged the tourists to dig deep. Usually in an hour—sometimes
less—they would have a hundred bucks in the hat, enough to get them
by until the first of the month. But it was a gig they could only
manage to organize when seriously pressed for cash.

It didn’t take long this
time before the hat had enough to get what they needed and they
were sitting on some cardboard in the nearby alley with a couple of
ham and egg sandwiches and a bottle of wine. Blue liked to drink
white port, squirting in a taste of lemon juice from one of those
yellow plastic bulbs. When he first passed the bottle and a
Styrofoam cup, Micky D hesitated, hearing Dr. Gee’s stern
admonition:
No booze, Michael. And
absolutely no street drugs
.