“Queers and monsters.” Mickey shook his head. “I should’ve stayed dead.”
“Still plenty of time.” Puppy led them down Sheridan Avenue. “But Grandma gave you a free week’s worth of groceries and transportation, so let’s hold off a little.”
“Can I buy booze?”
They lugged two six-packs of Allentown Ale and half a liter of Vossily’s Vodka home. Clouds gathered. Puppy stopped under the awning of a barber shop, the red and white pole circling merrily.
“What’s up?” Mick asked.
“Four o’clock rain.”
“You got good weathermen,” he chuckled.
“Haven’t you ever been outside during the day?”
“I was in a fucking coffin,” he shouted.
Puppy quieted him. “Pours every day at 4:05PM. Also 10:40 in the morning and then at 11PM. Late night showers are romantic and cozy. Couples huddle. Children snuggle,” he dumbly recited the grade school jingle. Rain poured in a slant, thunder and lightning crackling. Some people walked right through, grinning. A few hoisted their umbrellas and skipped along through the growing puddles. Cars slid along, sending up streams onto the sidewalks.
“Everyone looks happy getting soaked,” Mantle said wonderingly, the sky lighting up.
Puppy frowned. Guy had to have been in a mental hospital. Yes, that explains a lot, he suddenly decided. “We contend with little challenges like getting wet. Makes you appreciate when it’s dry.”
Mick shook his head. “Unless you get pneumonia. Or do you appreciate that so you’re happier when you get well?”
“Catching on quick.”
The sun burst overhead, warming them. Mickey suddenly smiled.
“See?” Puppy couldn’t resist a grin.
Mickey sighed. “Queers, monsters and fake rain.”
“We don’t call each other names in Grandma’s Home,” Puppy said softly. Unless you’re an Allah, he almost added.
They dragged their bags, now including take away from Chester’s Fried Chicken, up the steps of the building and into the apartment.
An old tanned man in a straw hat, white linen suit and tie rose politely from the couch. He took off his jacket and easily tossed it onto Puppy’s head.
“Get this pressed, boy.”
6
It took Zelda only a few minutes to pack up her few personal belongings: pencils, a couple photographs of her and Puppy, and Pablo, scarf and mittens, extra woolen socks and a paint brush. She was careful not to take anything remotely characterized as school property. They could claim the brush belonged to PS 75 since she’d used it in class, but this brush was hers. Bought and paid for. High quality, thin fibers, delicate wooden handle, perfect for quick strokes.
She hid the brush into the bottom of the carton and slipped on her bright red coat, tugging tightly around the waist. You have to lay off the Amblin’s Chocolates, girl, she chided herself. Zelda wrapped a blue scarf around her neck.
N’ariti stood in the doorway, smiling shyly. Zelda stared back cautiously. Children were like walking traps. Big sweet smiles and suddenly metal cleaved off your foot.
The girl took a brave breath and marched up to Zelda’s desk. “I’m sorry.”
Zelda tilted her head carefully. “About?”
N’ariti pointed at the box.
“I have a new job,” Zelda explained.
“Another school?” the girl asked sadly.
“No. Something better. Salmon.”
“What’s that?”
“Fish. You know. Fish.” She puffed out her cheeks like gills.
N’ariti took the pad off Zelda’s desk and scribbled quickly, using a charcoal pencil jutting out of her back pocket. “Like that?”
Zelda glanced down at the ugliest fish ever seen. Really looked more like a cat. “Sort of.”
“I don’t think I like fish,” N’ariti said.
“Most people don’t.”
“Then why do they eat it?”
“Because they think it’s good for them.”
“Is that why you’re working there?”
Zelda tore off the drawing from the pad and dropped it into the carton. She paused by the door. “Salmon don’t have tails.”
N’ariti puffed out her cheeks. “How can you be a window? I didn’t understand.”
Zelda’s hand rested impatiently on the knob. “You really can’t. It’s about people looking through you.”
“Why would you want to do that? They could see your intestines and veins.”
“Exactly,” Zelda said brusquely. “There’s another class coming in. Go back to where you belong before you get your new teacher in trouble.”
“What if I see in my brain my salmon with tails? Isn’t that what you meant?” N’ariti called out.
Zelda saw tails on everyone all the way home on the Number 6 train, and then back downtown later that day to Saul’s Salmons on East 174th Street. Children just didn’t know when to shut up; another reason she hated the little brats.
Her new office was tiny and narrow; Zelda could barely take off her coat without elbowing a wall. The chunky department manager Mr. Pietro stopped by, standing behind the glass enclosure rather than the doorway as if afraid she’d touch him.
“Welcome, Ms. Jones.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“This is a good place to work.” He nodded at the Saul’s Salmon poster behind him, featuring an ancient, smiling Saul Ribe sitting on a placid fish below the tagline, “Saul Knows Fish.”
“I’m anxious to pitch in and make it even better.”
Pietro wasn’t convinced. “Marketing’s important. Creativity is good. You’re creative.”
“I was a performance artist.”
Pietro’s eyebrows shot up, lifting his entire face. “I don’t want singing salmon. It’s not dignified.”
“How about dancing?”
“Would you eat a salmon all sweaty from dancing across the stage?”
“No, sir.” It was a good point, she had to admit.
“We want salmon serene. You don’t want an issue with your food. Take a bite and suddenly they start talking? The food’s to eat, not debate. Dignity in your artwork, Ms. Jones. And knowledge.” He left behind slightly steamed glass.
Zelda finished putting out her possessions, tossing N’ariti’s drawing in a small bin. She wound her way down a couple hallways, nodding at intense and determined colleagues clutching very important folders that would decide the fate of humanity. As close as she’d ever gotten to a business job was selling art supplies; that had lasted all of two months because she kept talking customers out of inferior products.
She passed a conference room; her name was on the list of attendees for a meeting in two minutes called “Is Tuna Salad Doomed? Our
