It took a long time and a lot of effort but I finally made myself come. The words down there were a smudged-up mess; it looked like my dick was cut and bleeding. But I was too tired to clean myself and too drunk to care.
thirty-eight
I was sure I knew him from somewhere though I couldn’t quite place the man. He was trying to wake me up but I was very sick. He shook me and tried to cover my body with my clothes but I kept shaking them off because I was so hot. He shouted at me in a foreign accent: “Boy! Hey, boy! Wake up, boy!”
It was daylight, morning I guess. My stomach was upset and I knew I was close to puking. Rogelio! That was his name. He worked in the building.
“Why you do this, boy? You can’t stay here!”
I tried to get to my feet and run to the toilet but I was so dizzy the floor fell to a forty-five-degree angle and I was on my back again.
“Put the pants, boy. Put the clothes on.” He said clothes in two syllables: clo-thes.
I turned my head away from him and puked on the floor. It spread out in an almost perfect circle. Rogelio jumped back to avoid the splatter but there was none. It was a contained and tidy spread of vomit. He clicked his tongue in disappointment.
“Put the clo-thes, boy! Please!”
I felt bad for him. I sat up and he handed me my pants. I had to lie down again. The room was spinning and I was going to be sick again. I needed water, I was so thirsty. I asked him for some and he left the room clicking his tongue. I closed my eyes and tried to stop the spins.
* * *
When I opened my eyes my mother was cleaning my face with a warm, wet towel. The towel was white but it turned pink very quickly. I was still naked and felt embarrassed that my mom was seeing me in the altogether but then I became aware that I was in the bathtub in my apartment. I was submerged up to my neck in a hot bubble bath and I wasn’t so ashamed. The bubbles had swirls of pink and red—the remains of Lou’s last song. Doomed to banishment down the drain, into the sewers of New York City, seeping into the harbor and washing up at the feet of Lady Liberty.
I asked my mother to make a copy of the words on Lou’s wall. They were his last words, they were important and had to be preserved.
“Shhhh,” she said as she gently scrubbed my chin. She told me to close my eyes and rest. Everything would be okay. Not to worry. Rest. You’re home now. You’re safe.
But my eyes were already closed. Weren’t they? I was confused. I was not in the bathtub and my mother wasn’t with me. I was still on Lou’s bedroom floor.
I saw Rogelio to my left. His face was close to mine and he was trying to get me to sit up. I heard a crackling static sound and a woman’s voice calling out a sequence of numbers and streets. Rogelio put a blanket over my shoulders. The woman’s voice was coming out of a walkie-talkie that hung from a cop’s belt. The cop was on my right side and he was helping Rogelio lift me up. There was a fireman in the room too. He was unfastening the belts of a stretcher on wheels. The cop had kind eyes and kept telling me to stay calm, everything would be okay. Not to worry. You’re safe.
I was wheeled through Lou’s empty apartment, then through the hallway and into the elevator. My mother was at my side by the time I was in the lobby. She was crying, hysterical and unraveled. I was very sorry to have done this to her. She rode with me in the ambulance and held my hand. Neither one of us said a word.
thirty-nine
“GUY WALKS INTO A MENTAL HOSPITAL”
A Comedy in One Act and 180 Days
PLACE: Adolescent psych ward of an NYC Hospital.
TIME: The present. Or past or future. Take your pick.
CAST: Dr. X, a middle-aged shrink from South America.
KID Y: A seventeen-year-old boy from Queens.
ACT 1
IT IS VERY EARLY IN THE MORNING AND DR. X IS INTERVIEWING KID Y IN HIS OFFICE. DR. X REFERS TO AN OPEN FILE ON HIS DESK.
DR. X: What were you feeling when you started to write all these things on your body?
KID Y: I was preserving what I thought may have been the last lyrics written by a famous rock star.
DR. X: And this “rock star,” you know him personally?
KID Y: Yes. I was in his apartment.
DR. X: The apartment was empty. There was no one living there.
KID Y: He moved out.
DR. X: Why were you in his empty apartment?
KID Y: He was a friend of mine. I went to visit him.
DR. X: If he was your friend, why didn’t he tell you he was moving?
KID Y: I don’t know.
DR. X: Did you write on your body first or the wall first?
KID Y: I didn’t write on the wall. My friend did.
DR. X: The rock star?
KID Y: Yes.
DR. X: Why would he write on the wall?
KID Y: I
