“Hickory dickory dock,” I said. “Took two Sudafed . . .”
“. . . Now I can’t feel my cock,” Broder said, finishing the couplet we’d written senior year as part of a Wu-Tang-style anthem called “Law & Order (Marathon on TBS).”
Ricky said “salut,” and the three of us drank.
“Found this little bitch sucking dick for coke by the West Side docks,” said Ricky. Broder didn’t laugh, and Ricky said he was only kidding, that Broder had shown up on his doorstep looking like hell in a Whole Foods basket. Ricky had spruced him up and brought him to the party.
“Something like that,” said Broder.
Ricky offered me a bump, which, even in my drunken state, I wisely declined. He suggested something more mellow, and held out a pill. It was mint green and marked with a capital M. This was more my speed. I was nicely buzzed and looking to lose what little edge was left. Nothing in my Duane Reade bag would do the job. In the morning I’d face Wendy, but tonight I could obliterate the fact of my mistakes.
“Two milligrams Klonopin,” I proudly announced.
“Not bad. How about this one?”
He produced another pill, of a similar hue but larger in size.
“Oh shit,” I said, and snatched it.
“You sure?” Ricky said. It was already inside me.
“Don’t most people snort them?” said Broder.
“Sinuses,” I explained.
I asked Broder what he was doing in town, and he shrugged and looked at his boots, mumbled something about trying to get the DJ thing going again. I told him that sounded cool, that I hadn’t made music in a long time, that I missed it, missed it terribly, but such was life, and, anyway, I was trying to write this book, a book that considered so many things we used to discuss, the theories we’d developed in those ripe, creative days. I thought Broder would be interested, but I could tell, from his wandering eyes, that he was not.
The Jay-Z song ended, and Biggie came on, the rags-to-riches tale of his rise from humble beginnings reading rap magazines, to the spoils of stardom, owning gaming consoles, racking up long-distance charges. The bong-ripped bankers tried to rap along, emphasizing the end rhymes and mumbling the rest. They mostly muted themselves when B.I.G. used the N-word, though a few of them, I noticed, seemed to take satisfaction in saying it aloud. Ricky chugged toward the doorway, a conga line of one, heading back to the bar to get the three of us another round. Broder and I hit a conversational impasse. We stood and listened to the song.
“You’ve done well,” he said. “You and Ricky both.”
I had practice with this genre of uncomfortable exchange. During my visits home to Pittsfield over the years, I’d always managed to bump into a former classmate and be forced to endure this sort of quick-fire appraisal and resentful third degree. Against instinct, I’d learned not to downplay my position by acting falsely humble or condescendingly nonchalant, so I told Broder, “Yeah, things have been good,” though of course this was a lie—things had never been worse—but I knew, from past experience, that no one had much interest in the complicated truth.
I waited out another pause as Broder took a cinematic drag on his cigarette and stubbed it out in a ceramic teacup that must have belonged to the hotel. “It hasn’t been so easy,” he said. “Not for me.”
“No,” I replied. “I don’t imagine it has.”
“You don’t know the half,” he said, and I tried to make a sober and sympathetic face, though the Oxy I’d taken had begun to spread its wings, and I could feel a heated current floating skyward up my spine.
“Look Michael,” he said. Through the doorway we saw Ricky lining up shots at the bar. Broder asked if maybe there was somewhere quiet we could talk.
Fucked up as I was, I could sense what was coming: the big pitch. He was going ask me for money. I’d had the same nervous hitch in my voice when I’d pitched Ricky that morning. Broder was about to explain that he had this sweet deal for studio time at some spot in Williamsburg, and a suitcase full of sick beats and guest MCs lined up, but the thing was that they needed a deposit on the equipment.
Or worse, Broder’s pitch would not be for studio time at all, which I’d have been happy to help with if I’d had the cash. No, the pitch would be for a more outrageous and expensive venture, some scam on which he’d spent the last of his savings, and now needed a loan to push through to completion.
To preempt the pitch, and because it was true, I said, “Actually, I wanted to talk to you too. I’ve been meaning to tell you I’m sorry, for the past, for losing touch.”
“It’s okay,” said Broder, “It’s not important.”
“It is important,” I said. “I was a bad friend. I’m sorry for not visiting you at your parents’ house after you left school, for not coming to your wedding.”
“Seriously, that’s not important, but if we could find a quiet place . . .”
“Would you go back and do it differently?” I asked.
The question gave Broder pause. He scratched his chin.
“Look, Michael,” Broder started, but before he could continue, we were interrupted by the nearing thrum of a familiar chant:
“WHOSE STREETS?”
“OUR STREETS!”
The door burst open. Someone killed the lights.
Wendy
I woke on the couch. My father had wrapped me in an afghan and put a pillow beneath my head. I checked my phone and found no word from Michael. I checked my feeds and caught mention of a riot at the Zone Hotel, where a group
