Payne,” he said. “How do you do. I’m homeless and I’m hungry. If you don’t have it, I understand, because I don’t have it either. But if you do, anything you might see fit to pass on, a sandwich, a few coins, a piece of fruit, will be appreciated. Thank you.”
He stood there swaying, ticking it out. No response came, he’d move along, deliver the same speech verbatim just down the line. Greevy, however, pulled out his wallet and handed the man a ten.
“Thank you, sir.”
“My son was on the streets for years.” Greevy passed the quart of Corona to me. One of the NOPD cars slowed to check us out, then went on.
“I think it’s against the law, our sitting out here drinking,” I told him.
“Yeah. Probably is.” He took the bottle back and drained it. “You up for one more?”
Chapter Fourteen
AS I MAKE MY WAY HOME, traversing abandoned lots, shoulder-narrow alleys, car-beset stretches of St. Charles, Jackson and Prytania, darkness lays its hand on the city, gently at first, then ever more firmly. Portions of sunlight cling to the edges of buildings. Headlights and streetlights straggle on. In houses I pass, behind windows tall as a man, wood floors are held in place by antique dining tables, barrister’s bookcases and overpadded chairs. In there, too, light falls: white light like cool pure water from chandeliers, light yellow and warm from table and floor lamps.
I turned onto Prytania, skirting a house that looked like any other save for a discreet metal sign hung from its eave: Anderssen Real Estate. I’ve probably walked past a hundred times without taking notice. A fortyish man wearing slacks and an open-neck white dress shirt still crisp from the morning’s iron emerged, locked up, mounted a silver BMW and rode away. Almost immediately another man stepped around the low wall of cinder block separating this house’s driveway from that of the next. He made for a niche tucked between house and wall beneath an overbite of roof and there unrolled his blanket, positioning himself on it and setting out with every aspect of ritual a well-used plastic bottle of water, cans of food, backpack, folded newspapers. Then began pulling off braces and supports. The crutch he’d had under his left arm. Neck brace padded with foam. Wrap-around knee support. Plastic form into which right foot and ankle had been strapped. Wrist splint with wide Velcro ties attached. Elastic elbow wrap. Some weird sympathetic magic—he wore these, none of it could happen to him? Or had he from whatever obscure motive—sympathy, instinct for salvage, pride of ownership—simply fished them from refuse bins at nearby Touro Infirmary, slowly accumulating, growing one might almost say, this exoskeleton within which he went about the world?
My own house of wooden floors, high ceilings and windows tall as a man, when I arrived, stood empty. I could have held it to my ear and heard the sea. Deborah away at rehearsal, David simply away (what else could I say just now?), out in the world somewhere. Cars past those windows followed headlights leading them like faithful horses towards the Barcaloungers, big TVs, barbeque grills and backyard swingsets that defined their riders’ lives. Few surprises when these crews disembark.
I brewed coffee, heated milk in a long-handled pan that looked to have been strip-mined at some point for its copper, poured them together into a mug the size of a soup bowl. Rocker and floor, old friends, spoke to one another as I settled. From half-toppled stacks on the table alongside and tucked beneath, guided by who knows what instinct, specific hunger, chance, I fingered out Gustav Meyrink’s The Golem , a book I’d had for years but never got around to.
The moonlight is falling on to the foot of my bed. It lies there like a tremendous stone, flat and gleaming.
As the shape of the full moon begins to dwindle, and its right side starts to wane—as age will treat a human face, leaving its trace of
He stood there swaying, ticking it out. No response came, he’d move along, deliver the same speech verbatim just down the line. Greevy, however, pulled out his wallet and handed the man a ten.
“Thank you, sir.”
“My son was on the streets for years.” Greevy passed the quart of Corona to me. One of the NOPD cars slowed to check us out, then went on.
“I think it’s against the law, our sitting out here drinking,” I told him.
“Yeah. Probably is.” He took the bottle back and drained it. “You up for one more?”
Chapter Fourteen
AS I MAKE MY WAY HOME, traversing abandoned lots, shoulder-narrow alleys, car-beset stretches of St. Charles, Jackson and Prytania, darkness lays its hand on the city, gently at first, then ever more firmly. Portions of sunlight cling to the edges of buildings. Headlights and streetlights straggle on. In houses I pass, behind windows tall as a man, wood floors are held in place by antique dining tables, barrister’s bookcases and overpadded chairs. In there, too, light falls: white light like cool pure water from chandeliers, light yellow and warm from table and floor lamps.
I turned onto Prytania, skirting a house that looked like any other save for a discreet metal sign hung from its eave: Anderssen Real Estate. I’ve probably walked past a hundred times without taking notice. A fortyish man wearing slacks and an open-neck white dress shirt still crisp from the morning’s iron emerged, locked up, mounted a silver BMW and rode away. Almost immediately another man stepped around the low wall of cinder block separating this house’s driveway from that of the next. He made for a niche tucked between house and wall beneath an overbite of roof and there unrolled his blanket, positioning himself on it and setting out with every aspect of ritual a well-used plastic bottle of water, cans of food, backpack, folded newspapers. Then began pulling off braces and supports. The crutch he’d had under his left arm. Neck brace padded with foam. Wrap-around knee support. Plastic form into which right foot and ankle had been strapped. Wrist splint with wide Velcro ties attached. Elastic elbow wrap. Some weird sympathetic magic—he wore these, none of it could happen to him? Or had he from whatever obscure motive—sympathy, instinct for salvage, pride of ownership—simply fished them from refuse bins at nearby Touro Infirmary, slowly accumulating, growing one might almost say, this exoskeleton within which he went about the world?
My own house of wooden floors, high ceilings and windows tall as a man, when I arrived, stood empty. I could have held it to my ear and heard the sea. Deborah away at rehearsal, David simply away (what else could I say just now?), out in the world somewhere. Cars past those windows followed headlights leading them like faithful horses towards the Barcaloungers, big TVs, barbeque grills and backyard swingsets that defined their riders’ lives. Few surprises when these crews disembark.
I brewed coffee, heated milk in a long-handled pan that looked to have been strip-mined at some point for its copper, poured them together into a mug the size of a soup bowl. Rocker and floor, old friends, spoke to one another as I settled. From half-toppled stacks on the table alongside and tucked beneath, guided by who knows what instinct, specific hunger, chance, I fingered out Gustav Meyrink’s The Golem , a book I’d had for years but never got around to.
The moonlight is falling on to the foot of my bed. It lies there like a tremendous stone, flat and gleaming.
As the shape of the full moon begins to dwindle, and its right side starts to wane—as age will treat a human face, leaving its trace of
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