Ozzie Fitch: Chapter 6
Kyle didn’t chant for Wellen. I got better. Doing well now. Kyle got mad. Left then.
Could have stayed. Could have waited til I knew the rocks, but gotta jump feet first. All hop like. Down the gutter goes, sluce. Swinging free. Could have been lost. Dangerous, like. No one know old Oz then, look over him like a heap o’ trash.
Didn’t have time. No rest. No sleep. Gotta find a rock. Gotta keep moving. You stay, you dust. Left Kyle’s circle that night.
Took weeks. I talked. I listened. I heard about Horse, who was a real rock. I heard about Linds, who was real nice, likable, soft and gentle. Not a real rock, but didn’t let no one stray. Like a sheepdog. Heard about all the rocks in Upper West, but Binny’s digs were only a street away from where I was, so I head over to the street corner where they say he hung out.
Turn the corner, and there’s this old gas station, like fifties. He sits around back, they say. You go, you bring a gift, he give you something in return. They say.
What did I have? Bit of Luck, bit of Attention caught in a folded piece of paper. Nothing much. Nothing a real wizard could use. Almost ran back then and there. Why not? Bit of cheat. Borrowed Courage. Took a shot of old rot whiskey, then took a half a tab. Yeah, brain sizzling when I go to talk to Binny the first time. Real smart.
Otherwise I run. But no, brain popping, I walk around back and see him sitting there on the ground, legs stretched, back against the brick.
Had seen him before. Remembered. Never knew his name. Sat there like an old wizard, smoking a long pipe. Blue smoke curled up like a flower. Minding his own business.
But I could see it. Not power, but presence. He was there. Real. So peaceful, zen-like, he never moved. The world moved. He opened his lips and the pipe slipped in. Half-closed eyes moved across everything. Saw everything. Looked at nothing. Drank it in like breathing. Held it in him like a bowl, blew it out again, like letting a bird go. Free.
Girl was there too, at his side. Paula, but didn’t know it yet.
Watched. Didn’t push, didn’t press, just sat and watched. Knew then, that Binny was a real sage. Knew the chant. Knew the real. Fell in love then and there. I knew, more than I knew the chant, that I wanted to be in his circle more than anything.
I asked to join. Truth, I walked right up to him and asked to join. Wanted to chant with him. Like a kid. Brain sizzling, didn’t know better.
Binny, he smiled at me and blew smoke over my head. Like a crown. Anointing me. Never felt so good. Didn’t see Paula up and downing me, didn’t see Binny looking me in and out. Opens his mouth and says: “What are you running from?”
Me, what do I say to that? What does he mean? No idea. But I need to chant with Binny, right? I look at the girl and she doesn’t say anything. Like she knows the right answer, but it’s my job to say it, right? Like Open Sesame. Password, right?
Wasn’t running from anything, but don’t ask the question if the answer is nothing. Can’t say nothing, can’t answer nothing, gotta make something up, right? Gotta be running from something to be a real wiz. Gotta have scars. Knew Binny didn’t want no detritus, no gutter trash. Wanted someone who knew pain. See, you in pain, then people help you. If you don’t need help, they respect you. You in pain, you have power.
Made up a story then and there. Kinda true. Said they kicked me out. Made like they were religious. Kinda were. I was popping and sizzling, don’t know what I said.
Paula, she up and downs me. “Where you come from?”
“Kyle,” I say. “He’s a real shit. Doesn’t even like the chant.”
Binny nods, like a sage, and says, “we only got six. Need a seventh. That you?”
I say yes, and that’s it. I’m a part of Binny’s circle.
Binny lived, still lives, in a tiny apartment on the east edge of Brakes Street. Run down apartment, barely anyone uses it anymore. He pays crap for rent and everything’s rusted or broken, but that’s all we need in the gutter.
The stairs creak something awful when you climb them. Binny’s on the third floor, and it hurts your head when you climb up the stairs after your brain fizzles back down and you just want a bed, sleep like.
Followed Binny up those crumbling stairs with pockmarked walls, listening to the creaking and the moaning of the building. Sorrowful like. Old. Creaking and cracking old bones of plaster skin. Yellow-like. Like nothing was the same back then, and everything hurts. Tried to put it out of my mind. Hummed a little. Tried to whistle, but my mouth was too dry.
Got to Binny’s room, and he pushed the door open. Handle was broken. No lock. Nothing to steal. Tiny entry room was living space, with two couches, big chair, card table folded up against the wall. Space to crash. Tiny kitchen down the hall across from the toilet. Tiny back room with a couple of mattresses. Only one frame. No legs.
Met Leon, met Ribber, met JJ. Met Cindy too, I guess. I thought she was a real nine, then. Before Darla. Paula was there too. Paula wanted to be Binny’s big squeeze. Rolled once or twice, I think.
Binny was a real rock. You supposed to keep moving, but some stay still, and don’t dust. Like mountains.
He showed things. I tried to write it down. Had a notebook, took notes. Hundred truth! Took notes. Like fuckin’ school, like chant was recipe. Makin’ Algebra on my paper. The Chant isn’t numbers, it isn’t flash and sparks. It’s smooth rain or soft wind. Binny makes like a shaman, talking spirits and energies. I didn’t care. Just wanted the Chant.
Cindy laughs at my notes. I like her. Throw away the notes, and offer a roll. Says no, but she thinks about it. Spiky hair with shaved side. Punk like, old. Classic. Spikes in her soul. Maybe pain there. Maybe I can get close.
Sometimes we all chant together, in the same room, like a real circle. Other times, we chant wherever we want. We do what we need. What we feel like. We support when we squabble. We let it go when we tire. We just relax into the flow. Keep moving, like dust in the sunlight. Never settle. And over us all was Binny, watching us like a Buddha, a mother, a king, a mountain.
Seven little islands all together. Archipelago. River flowing between us, around us, through us, together us, tied and tight and loose all at once. We did what we needed.
That’s the real gold. Family to the nines. Never talked about helping the helpless or screaming at the silent; just lived the life we made for ourselves. Never tried to talk me down from being me. Never tried to dust me. Never tried to fit me into the box they had ready for me, the me shaped box. No, we made special. We got it.
Smooth and easy.
Paula’s gone now. Didn’t much care for Paula, nothing special. She left, and I found Darla. She’s our seventh, now.
JJ’s gone now too. Back to six. JJ, man, JJ was real grit. You know grit. Gets in the gears. Rough like sandpaper.
A little grit is good. Makes rough things smooth. Breaks cogs. Too much grit grinds the smooth down, makes it rough. That’s not the chant. Not what we’re about.
JJ, he knew how to make things rough. Thought he was in charge of every room he walked in. Threw his weight, but he was skinny. Short hair. Always dressed in suit and tie. Even when chanting, like he was better than everyone. But he wasn’t.
We none of us are better than everyone. That’s the gutter for you. All the same down here. Hierarchy, ladders to climb, shoulders to stand on, that was the system. Crabs in a bucket. All out there. A dusty game of smoke and mirrors, lies to keep you working for the man above you.
JJ, he bought into it. Dressed for the job he wanted. Thought the chant could fill in for talent. Didn’t chant for luck, for love, for health, for clarity. He chanted for the car. The white picket. Wanted the job. The promotion. Wanted to play the game by his own rules.
That’s not how it works. Binny knows it and old Oz knows it. Everyone knows it, even Ribber. Not old JJ. JJ the jerk. Real grit. Makes everything uncomfortable. Liked to shout at us, JJ did. Called us layabouts. Lazy. Never going to amount to anything. Sometimes said he didn’t even believe in the chant. When he got a job, always stopped by to rub it in our faces. Called it hard work. Personal responsibility. He knew he’d get it, because he was smart. Old Oz knew the truth.
What did Ozzie chant for? Different things. Not important. JJ chanted for himself. See, JJ, he said the circle exists in boardrooms. He says circles become boardrooms. Like we get together, we pool resources, we be “in,” and we win. Like that’s magic. Like we get what we want if we dress up.
“Chant doesn’t work,” he says. “It’s all about power, right? Well all the CEOs have power. They have green. So we get green, we get power. That’s a circle.”
“The chant works,” I keep telling him.
“Okay,” he’s being nice, he’s not yelling, “okay, if it works, it’s not obvious, right? Like it’s ephemeral? Only green’s not ephemeral, is it? We chant for green, we get green. We got green, we don’t need the chant.”
“You got green?” Leon asked. “You got a job?”
“Bad luck,” Cindy said.
“Bad economy,” JJ said, like it was no one’s fault. “No such thing as luck. Just the way things are.”
“Then why are you here?” Binny smiled his sage smile. We all knew. The chant was better than luck.
JJ didn’t answer. Never did when he was asked. Only got an answer once. When he had no job, no squeeze, suit and tie all rumpled and stained. Our brains were sizzling. A good chant, full veins, lips were open. “It’s me, you know?” mumbling on the couch. “All me. The good and the bad, my responsibility. Got to make the best of it. Can’t blame them, they got their own problems. Everyone does, right? Only me, I got the problems. I got the power. Won’t give it up to them, won’t close my eyes and step away. The world, right? The world is the world. The world. The world, right? Right? It’s the world, and I got it. Right here. I won’t give it up for no lies.”
Knew him, then. He wanted the real. We all do. He saw the fake, the shadow, the smoke and mirror, and knew it was all a lie. Hated the cogs. The blood and oil. I liked JJ when he shouted at the right things. Punched up. When he was at his worst, that’s when he knew the truth of it.
But that smoke and mirror, it caught him every time. Like a silver hook in his cheek. Pulled up the ladder, thought he climbed it. Thought it was real when he was on it. I know why. Thought that green was more real than magic. Wrong way round. Wanted to hold it in his hand, like feel it. Master it. Like dominate. Didn’t want the world, wanted to think he was special.
He didn’t know real special. The chant was special. Not everyone chants. Not everyone sees the smoke and mirrors. But he bought in to the ads and copy. He wanted the caviar and bubbly. He thought that was easy. That’s how the cogs pull you in, grind you down. Dissatisfied. Grievance. If only. When you want, when you hunger, they pull you in. Lure on hooks.
They’ll never catch old Oz. Ozzie’s a real wiz. Don’t want anything, and they have no power over you. Need? Sure. Need’s human. Want? Wanting’s human. But thirsty for it? Need a want? They got you by the cheek. You’re never free, then.
JJ right about one thing. Ephemeral. Subtle. the chant, see, the chant not like snapping fingers, poof. Chant is quiet. Chant is secret. You chant for something, you got to go find it. You chant but don’t look, you might miss it.
“Saw a fire start once,” Ribber giggled once. “Hundred truth, chanted up a fire in the middle of the circle.”
Binny blew a cloud of smoke, and smiled like a mother; “Chant don’t work like that.”
“Hundred truth,” Ribber giggled. “Was with this girl, got pillows, got legs, got a cushion. Real ten. Wanted me bad, and took me to her circle.”
“Never happened,” Leon laughed as his brain sizzled away. “No ten gonna roll with you, Ribber.”
“Hundred truth!” Ribber bounced on his knees. “And we chanted and called up a fire, right in the middle of the circle.”
“Bullshit,” Cindy’s head rolled around. Licked her lips. Wondered if she’d give me a roll. Didn’t ask. Waited, let it simmer. Linger and savor on the tongue.
“Lazy,” Binny smiled. “Chant don’t work like that.”
He told truth, there. Real chant is little things, like a breeze, like a pebble. Shift your eyes, let them linger, hide a sound or a small thought. Nothing, really. Gentle like. A million tiny things all working together. Push one to the side, and a new world. You get Luck. Visible. Green. What you need.
“Confirmation Bias,” JJ said it was. This was back before Darla. “You want it to work, so you say it worked.”
Binny just laughed. “It’s the chant because it works.”
“What did it do?” JJ rolled his eyes. “What has the chant ever done? What can you point to and say that’s what it did?”
“Got me laid,” Ribber said. “Like, ten times.” The liar.
“Never,” Cindy laughed at him. “Chant is personal. You can’t point, ‘cuz it’s inside you, right? It changes you.”
“Fire,” Ribber giggled. “Middle of the circle. Truth!”
“Fuck that,” JJ said. “Changes you? What bullshit is that? You changed?”
“Like the world,” Cindy punched JJ in the shoulder. “Like the world’s different because of something inside. Changes the world through you. Not just how it looks, how it is, right?”
“Nah,” Leon said. The Nut. “Chant brought us all together. We together now. We a circle. That’s the real magic.” We all laughed at him. He laughed too. Everything was funny, because we were sizzling hard.
JJ left the circle maybe a month after Darla joined up. Only came back once. Nice suit and tie. Cleaned up. Says he got the promotion, and wasn’t coming back, but had things to say.
I was lying on Darla’s stomach, looking at the ceiling. Had some Kabbage. Garbage smoke, Kabbage. Never smoke it.
“Fuck you all,” he said.
“Grit,” Darla smiled. Damn, that smile. Lick the lips, I want to be her tongue. Feel the slip and slide around soft pillows.
“You’ll never amount to anything,” he says. “Idlers. Layabouts.”
“Heard it all before,” Leon’s face down on the couch. Said he was tired a while ago, just lay down. Thought he was asleep. Did he wake just to fight JJ? The nut.
“You amount to something?” I asked.
“Got a promotion,” said it like pride, like a punch, like we were supposed to sit upright. “Don’t need the chant.”
“Everyone need the chant,” Binny muttered through his cloud.
“It doesn’t even work,” JJ pointed his finger in Binny’s face. “It never works. Your chanting doesn’t work.”
“Works fine,” Binny said, smile on his face. Smoke through the teeth. JJ got angrier while Cindy moaned: “Pass the chips.”
“It never works! Green works. Boardrooms work. Cubicles. When has it ever worked?”
Binny, the sage, just smiled and blew a plume of smoke into the room. In time, it would spread out and fill the entire ceiling, and descend to settle on our heads like anointing oil. I felt it flow down on me through my popping brain like mist like a blanket like soft wind on grass like mist. “How’s Michelle?” I asked. Felt my smile past my face.
“No,” JJ shook his head. “Not Chant. She reads. We talk a lot. It’s work.”
“Love shouldn’t be work,” Binny smiled.
“Hard work. There’s families. There’s jobs. There’s kids. You can’t just let it happen. You chant, and think that works. It doesn’t. Green. Value.”
“You dusting,” Cindy giggled. “You dusting out. Pass the chips.” she holds out her hand to the crinkling plastic bag. I stretched my hand out, but it was so very far away. Then, I’d have to stretch to Cindy, and that was even further. I’d never make it. I stretched anyway. Felt the muscles pull. Felt good.
“Fine, I’m dusting out,” JJ said. “I’m settling. I’m leaving this made up space and living in the real world. I’m tired of the sitting and waiting for the chant. I want to make my life. You, you all won’t ever amount to nothing. You know why? You know why you’ll never amount to nothing? No job, no money, no nothing?”
“You say something?” I mutter. My favorite. Damn, tongue is dry. Need a drink of water. Ribber’s giggling on the floor. Binny, Binny’s just sitting there with his pipe in his mouth, smoke around his head like clouds on a mountaintop. Tongue is dry. Need a drink of water.
“You like it. You actually like it. You love it.”
“When’s the show?” Leon asked from the couch. He fell asleep when we were talking about a show. The nut. The world had passed him by, and he wanted to get back on the train. The nut. Needed water.
“Ten?” Cindy blew a puff. “Pass the chips?”
“Idling. Amounting to nothing, I mean.”
“I won’t go,” Binny said with a slow rolling tongue. “Tired. Have a wank.” Darla giggled, and my head bounced on the soft waves of flesh. It felt so good, and I kept stretching.
“Cinnamon canes.” Ribber giggled louder. I don’t know where he was popping.
“You could be something, and you hate that. You want to be nothing.”
“Too much grit in here,” Leon groaned into the couch. “Need a sip. Any juice?”
“Check the fridge,” Darla shifted under my head. It hurt. “Saw some milk in there.”
“No good,” Cindy sniffed and blew. “Gone bad. Someone should throw it out.”
“Why?” Binny waved his pipe. “Good things and bad things all live in the same world.”
“Smells bad,” Cindy blew again. “Pass the chips.”
“You want to be miserable, so you can complain! Just sit there, pretend nothing matters, say it’s the world’s fault! Feel like none of it’s your fault.”
Couldn’t Cindy see how hard I was trying? Fine. Why bother? I let my arm drop. If she didn’t notice, why bother. Pops in the brain. So thirsty.
“Fine,” Leon waved his hand from the couch. “I’ll throw it out.” He didn’t move.
“It’s our fault. It’s always our fault! Why can’t any of you see that?”
“Get that grit out of here,” Leon mumbled. I laughed. Darla laughed too, and my head bounced like a bouncy ball. It made me laugh. Darla laughed too. Bouncy bouncy.
The door slammed. JJ was gone. Everything all smooth again. Leon quiet. Cindy quiet. Ribber giggling, and Darla breathing under my head. Nice.
“He’ll be back,” Binny hummed to himself in a cloud of smoke. I didn’t want him back. Grit. Hoped he was gone forever, then. Can’t blame him, though. Got one thing right, in all his ranting. JJ kept moving. Like a shark. I hated JJ, but respected him for that.
Leon mumbled from the couch. “Lost Pool that way too.”
“Pool?” Darla giggled. I didn’t know either, but I wouldn’t say.
“A real gal,” Cindy smiled. “Pretty. Dumb as dust. Chanted to get through college. It worked.”
“She’s Wall Street now,” Leon giggled. “Pool’s Wall Street.”
“Waste,” Binny shrugged. “He’ll be back.”
“Yeah?”
Binny took a deep breath from his smoke and blew it out again. He closed his eyes, and opened his mouth. Like poetry: “Thinks he’s outside the chant, now. Thinks he’s free. What does he have now? Thinks the system, all lined up in a grid, thinks that’s what it was. Thinks the system finally gave him what he deserved, and the chant did nothing but take. But it’s the chant what gave him his, not the grid. Not the lines and right angles. He thinks he been done wrong by us, and being a cog going to get him what he needs.”
“He left before,” Leon slurred through thick lips. “Got a job. Left. Came back. Left when he got a girl. Came back. Left when he got a car. Came back. He comes back.” JJ real grit. He always comes back.
“First Pool, now JJ,” Cindy sighed.
There were more than just those two. Paulie. Dominic. Bob, hundred truth, Bob. Some hungarian, couldn’t pronounce her name. Elsie, he was cute. They come and go. I stay. Binny stays. Some times they leave because they dust out. Other times they just vanish. Sometimes they think the Chant isn’t real. Happens a lot, Binny says. Not flashes, it’s whispers. You have to believe for it to work.
Me, I hope JJ never comes back. I feel my sizzling coming. POP go the thoughts like JJ thought he got Michele because he was Nines. Binny knew it was the easy chant easy to do. Binny says that’s why so many dust out. Chant too easy. Can’t be real if it’s easy. Can’t be real if anyone can do it. But they can anyone can it’s not flash POP and sparks.
But you see the real and turn away? A wiz who leaves the chant? Some grit that thinks the chant isn’t the chant, isn’t worth the chant. That’s not a real Chanter never leave the chant. Disrespectful. Like what’s real isn’t there. Like ignoring. Like what do you matter, your pain your respect because you not real so what you do not real neither ‘cuz the chant is just not your fault playing games. POP. Let the thoughts come and bang about like it means nothing it means. ‘Cuz it means something it’s real I’m real. I want and I need and the chant POP cares about me and you and all of us we are all of us together as one chant. Back and forth up and down laughing together stretching out further and further and further until we reach each other.
Stretching out and out further and further. JJ turn away. He’s no chanter. He hurt us all.
POP I breathe static.