18
That evening Harry drove over to Tad’s, parked at the curb, went to the front door. There was a letter slot there. He took a folded envelope out of his back pocket, looked at it.
On the front he had written in big block letters:
He slipped the letter through the slot and turned away.
Inside the house, Tad, drinking a beer from the can, heard the letter slide in.
He went to the door, looked out the peephole.
Nothing.
He went to the window.
He watched Harry’s back as he walked away briskly.
Tad started to go to the door, call out to him.
But didn’t.
He feared it might interrupt his drinking.
He put the envelope on the table, sat in a chair at the dining room table, and kept sipping at his beer, considered when he should break out the whiskey, maybe get some Kleenex, shell the old corncob.
Nah. All that drinking. It would be too limp.
He might just watch some TV.
Course, he had already gotten up once to go to the door, see who was out there. Getting up twice, he had to give that some consideration.
You didn’t want to overdo it, this getting up business. Not when you had drinking to do.
Besides, the channel changer was far. He had left it in the kitchen. Why he had been carrying the channel changer around was beyond him, but from the dining room table, he could see it lying on the counter. Waiting for him.
“Come get me, Tad,” it called.
Course, he got it, then he had to find the TV.
He looked at the envelope on the table.
If he opened it, he might get a paper cut. Might be best just to let it lie, call in the paper cut squad, have them open it for him.
Was there such a thing?
Really ought to be.
A whole team, glove wearing, so they could open letters and not get cut, a bunch who would do it for someone didn’t want to take the chance.
A paper cut, it could be downright annoying.
Under certain circumstances it could even get infected and you could die.
He patted the letter and let it lie.
Tad took a long drag on his beer, held the can up, said, “Yee-haw. Ain’t life grand.”
19
Harry went over to Joey’s that night. He was surprised at himself for doing it, but the girl, the fine girl, Talia, had emboldened him. Still, he thought he’d stay out of the toilet, make sure he was drained good before he went over. Didn’t want to go there and have his new confidence shaken by the rattling of a toilet lid.
Joey’s place wasn’t much worse than his own, actually. It was down a back alley behind some buildings that looked like a place where Death might go to die. The alley smelled of urine and vomit, and there was a drunk or a bum or a drunk bum always laid out against the wall on a piece of cardboard. It was his home, that stretch of concrete, that piece of cardboard, or one like it. When it rained he was somewhere else, but most nights, when it was warm, he was here.
How’d a guy end up that way, sleeping in an alley on cardboard? How could something like that happen?
Harry went past the bum, carefully up the rickety stairs that led to the second floor where Joey’s apartment was. There was a porch of sorts up there, and a bug-swarmed dim light by the entrance. The bulb was on and there was a knife-thin slit of light sliding out from under the door. Harry knocked.
“Who is it?” Joey said. The walls were so thin it sounded as if Joey were out on the landing with him.
Harry answered, and Joey let him in. There wasn’t much to the place, and like his joint, there wasn’t even a bed. Joey had a foldout couch he had quit folding out months ago. Now he just slept on the couch, same way Harry did. The air smelled funny. A mixture of boiled soup, alcohol, and jack-off juice. There was a kind of stink from the bathroom as well. Which was all the better reason not to go in there.
The lightbulb, a single job in the center of the room in a dusty glass cover, had a greasy quality to it, and it gave the room the feel of a cell.
Joey was in his skivvies. His short, skinny body looked even more emaciated than usual. His ribs poked at his skin as if they really belonged on the outside. His black hair was twisted up on top of his head in what looked like a midnight rooster’s comb.
Joey dropped down on the couch, scratched his balls, said, “What’s up?”
“Nothing, just thought I’d drop by.”
“Midnight?”
“Shit. Is it that late? I had no idea. Believe it or not, I thought it was, like, eight, nine maybe.”
“No, it’s fucking midnight.”
“Hey, I’ll go.”
“Naw. Couldn’t sleep anyway. Was trying to jack off, but I couldn’t imagine a pretty sheep. Sit down.”
There were two chairs and a table with sugar packets under one leg to balance it. Harry took one of the chairs and sat, cautiously.
“You didn’t come over here this time of night just to hang out, did you? Shit, you ain’t come here in a coon’s age. We’re always at your place, or the bar. Which reminds me, weren’t we supposed to meet there?”
“We didn’t say that.”
“You always get drunk on the night after school, sleep in the free day, work in the afternoon…. Hey, how’s
