Ozzie Fitch: Chapter 19
I can step out of the taxi. Feels good. Flashes and sparks starting to fade into the deep darkness of the skull. Dry air rushing against my face feels good. Hard dry concrete under my shoes. Shoes under my feet. Feet under my head.
Take a deep breath. Smells good. Damn I’m thirsty. Need a sip.
The taxi provides support as Darla climbs out, her eyes tight, looking unhappy at me. Everything’s fine. I timed it. What’s her problem? Everything be fine when I get a drink of water. Coffee. Something. Called ahead, right? I’m sure I did. Feel the drop as the sizzle simmers. A little sizzle still, but dropping. I’m fine. I timed it.
We walk up to the door. Tinny dry music from far away is playing through the air from speakers up in the air. Buzzes in my dry head. I open the door too quickly, hit my shoe. Shove Darla inside, but gently. Nudge. Gentle push. She still won’t look at me. I’m fine.
Dark and dry smokey brown inside. Candles on the tables. Dry white cloths under the candles. Fancy. The waitress at the front smiles a wide smile. Stretches. Past her head.
Her eyes are looking at me. They give me the up-and-down. Darla, she’s dressed to nines, all silky slick and shimmering. Like glass. Fierce and clean. Me, I’m wearing a jacket. Don’t have much to dress to. She made me dress as high as I could. I don’t have much. Got a black jacket, a plain shirt, pants without holes. Still wearing sneakers. Don’t have better. Thirsty.
I blink. Hard. I’m fine.
We have a reservation, Darla is saying as I look at the Raven Hair of the Waitress. Long twisted needles that bend and wind. The smile is still there, and I wonder what she feels like. How she smells.
“Can I get a glass of water?” I ask. My mouth is dry.
“There’s water at the table,” Raven Hair says. The smile parts a little as she looks down. I can see the part in her hair. Her scalp is darker than her face. I see a small fleck of dry skin marring the perfect Raven Hair. I want to brush it aside, to get rid of the flash of color. Shining star of human flesh in the black sea.
Darla’s hand grabs mine and forces it back to my side.
“Under what name, did you say?” Raven Hair asks, her smile framed by furrowed brows.
“Oz,” I say. “Or Darla.” I don’t remember which. Her head dips down again, the smile pulling away from me. She’s wearing black. Darla looks at me from the corner of her eyes. Sultry. She’s trying to look angry, but I see the thoughts in her eye.
“How do you spell Darla?” Raven Hair tries again. Darla sighs.
“Please,” I try nice, “I’d like a glass of water.”
“I can’t find your reservation,” Raven Hair tries. So dry. I know I called ahead. I chanted. I remember chanting before I picked up the phone. Darla is frowning now. Her mouth is smiling and apologizing, but her eyes are frowning. She is angry. I didn’t want to come here. I just want a glass of water.
“I’m sorry,” Darla says again. “I know this is —”
“I want a glass of water,” I know they have one. They have several. I can see them. They’re on the tables. People are drinking from them. I can feel my tongue start to crack. Don’t like please and thank you anyway. Just another part of the grid, way to dust everything down. Like you give another person power over you, and you gotta be grateful. Not what we’re chanting for.
“I’m afraid we’re all booked for this evening,” Raven Hair is smiling. Her eyes aren’t smiling. No one is smiling, even though they’re all smiling. “If you care to wait, there may be a cancellation, and we can see if —”
“I need some water,” I say. Darla grabs my arm and pulls me back. So dry.
Darla isn’t saying anything as we stand outside. She’s making me listen to the music. Musak. She has her back to me, but I can hear the tinny music from the tiny speakers and it hurts. I could walk away. She could start walking, and I’d follow her. But I stay. I stare. I wait. She waits. She wants to punish me and let the music kill my thoughts as my tongue cracks. I wait with her. We’re outside the restaurant now.
She looks like she’s going to say something, but she didn’t say anything. Just turned away. Stood. Stared. Now we’re waiting. I don’t know what we’re waiting for. Perhaps for my tongue to fall out. So dry. I try to smoke. She offers the light without thinking. I can’t keep the stick in my mouth. The Air is helping. I hope the smoke can help with the music.
The night flashes by in an instant. All around us, shapes of people doing the things their bodies tell them to do. All they care about is comfort. That’s what they do. The glitter and gilt and dreams of sillicon slaves. Doing it all for us. We sit back, we smile, we let the world do without us. They all want it. It’s right there for them, if they’d only look down.
“Excuse me.”
Raven Hair is touching my shoulder. It’s light and delicate, not even a real touch. More of a promise. A suggestion. She fills my mind with light and delicate touches that cover her body and mind. I can smell her skin and taste her hair between my lips.
“We just had a cancellation. If you’re still interested, I can seat you in about forty-five minutes?”
I turn and smile at Darla. I can feel the Chant. I know when it works. And it worked. There it was. I got us reservations. Darla smiled back with her mouth. Her eyes were still mad at me. My smile leaves too.
I didn’t want to be here. Darla wanted it, and I sacrificed, to be nice. I just wanted to do something for Darla. I wanted to give her something nice, so I said yes. Yes is a gift. You give it, and they say thank you. That’s being nice. That’s what you’re supposed to do. Raven Hair is looking at me. Asking me the question without asking. I’m looking at Darla. Darla isn’t looking at me. Some apology. It’s all wrong.
“Sure,” Darla says to Raven Hair, “Put us down for the table.”
Raven Hair smiles and opens the door again, escaping the music falling from the ceiling. She’s inside now, safe from the winter and the raindrops POPing on the sidewalk. Even when it’s not raining.
Lists. All neat and ordered lines. Stand up. Sit down. Follow me to your table. Now you’re okay. Now you belong. Now we care about you. No reservation? You can fuck right off. Human? Hardly — you gutter.
I start walking.
“Oz!”
It’s all wrong. I don’t even know why. It’s good not to know, the chant doesn’t work in your brain, it works in your gut. Your heart. Pushing through the conscious mind and settling where you know without thinking. If you think too hard, you miss the message. The important bit slips away, and you’re on the wrong path. Trust the stomach.
“Where are you going?” Darla asks, walking after me. I don’t answer. It’s all wrong. It was so perfect before. The makeup, dressing to the nines, a car, a driver, I would see her smile the whole evening. I didn’t even want to come, but I said yes. Now she’s mad. Mad at me, mad at the chant, mad at Raven Hair, I don’t know, but she’s mad. I need to get away. Get a sip.
I can’t be on a list. I can’t be judged like that.
I don’t look back. I hear Darla’s feet behind me. She’s walking fast to keep up, her heels clicking on the concrete like dog’s claws.
“What the hell, Oz?”
The air is helping. The dim streetlights glow like chrome on the glass and glitter worn by the passersby. Neon lights and lit shop-signs hurt my eyes a bit, but I still need water. I keep walking.
Rules. It was all rules. Stake a claim before someone else came along. Whatever happened to sharing? It was like kindergarten all over again. If you weren’t important, you couldn’t play the game. The rules still applied to you, but you couldn’t play the game. That was what money did to you. It put up walls and drew lines you had to stay between. It took away the Magic of a blank page. It took away the Chant.
So thirsty.
Cold. Sharp. Knife to the throat. Down to the stomach. Feels so good. Fills me up like a balloon.
Water on the tongue soaked up and feels like better than anything. Darla beg for a roll with her blood-red lips? I’d say hold on, gotta drink more water.
No roll tonight, I think. Still angry with me, but confused, like she doesn’t know what happened. Why doesn’t she know? Clear, isn’t it? Plain like?
“Why here?” Darla asks.
The water feels so good. “Always a good sandwich at Donnies,” I say. I haven’t touched it yet. I’ve gone through two glasses of water.
“I’m mad at you,” Darla says, her lips tight. I think about her lips. My mind is numb now. I have water. My mouth feels wet. I think about her wet lips.
“Gonna roll tonight?” I ask.
She doesn’t answer. I know I screwed up. She didn’t want me sizzling for our dinner. She had a plan. I hope it was to stick it to the cogs.
Not what she said. Said she wanted a night without the chant, without the world looking in at our skulls. Just her and me. So here we sit, at Donnies. Donnies is what brought us together, right? Like the first time, in the library. I remember. I was being romantic, wasn’t I?
The night is so beautiful, I wonder if she’s angry at me, or at herself. She wanted to go to a real restaurant with plastic menus and real glasses. Here, there’s no one looking at us. No one looking in. Peace and quiet at Donnies. I gave her what she wanted. Romantic.
Then, Darla looked to the left. Quick like, like she saw something fast and needed to see it. A flash of fortune that if she could look at it, really see it, she’d have it for ever and ever. Flash of a smile. There in her pocket.
“Darla?”
Now Darla looks back to the right, slow like. “Riana?” she says. I turn to look too, because I don’t know a Riana. A woman dressed to the nines is walking towards us. Long silver necklace, two red rings, a gray dress that looks green in the neon. An Eight, I revise. Hangs awkward off her left shoulder. Makes her look misshapen, tilted like. I’d roll her.
“What are you doing here?” She asks my Darling Darla. They hug a weak fish hug. Barely squeeze. Not like I squeeze. Darla must not like her. I decide not to like her.
“Just grabbing a bite,” Darla smiles. “You know Ozzie?”
Darla must hate her. Not ‘have you met,’ but insult her with ‘do you know.’ Everyone knows Old Ozzie. Riana is holding out her hand. I touch it. “Hi,” I say, between gulps.
“We were going to go out dancing in a bit,” Darla says quickly. “You want to come with?”
Poor Darling Darla. Grown up in manners and etiquette. Jumped feet first, but can’t not invite someone she doesn’t like. I need to help her. “No we aren’t,” I say through my first bite of fish sandwich. “We’re just going home.”
Darla looks back at me, eyes dead like a dry fish. I drink more water.
“I was going to go to the Hot Spot,” Riana is saying, her hands flopping about as she waves them back and forth. “Good dancing there. Where were you going?”
“Home,” I insist.
“The Square,” Darla says. “Going to meet up with some friends there and maybe go out to the bar afters.” “Which bar?” Riana twitters.
“Home,” I insist.
“Foresters,” Darla says. Her head is facing away from me, so I can’t see her smile anymore. “Good cocktails at Foresters.”
“Never been,” Riana says, her eyes flickering to me. Dead fish. “Like the Square, though.”
“Nothing special tonight,” Darla says, like lying. “Just a place to go. You up for another?”
Riana, she smiles like she means it. Oz can see she doesn’t. “Sure! Love to have you! What about your friends?” Dead fish.
“Nothing special,” Darla waves her hand. Like nothing. “Soft plans. Text them, tell them where I’m at, we go to Foresters afters?”
“Sure!”
“I’m going home,” I say. Not for Darla anymore.
She looks at me. “Okay.”
Stands up then. Stands up from Old Oz and walks away from her sandwich. Sways away, all glitter and hooks in fishnet, Riana clopping away like a horse. I hate her for Darla.
I eat in silence.
I like the silence. The world is too much noise. Too much sound and tinny music and rushing cars and ringing phones. No time to just sit and stare out at the stars and hear the static. Embrace the static.
I take another bite of my fish sandwich.
It’s better here. Gotta keep moving. Can’t dust by standing still. First you’re making reservations, and then you’re dusted. Can’t be predictable. Can’t follow the lines.
Good fish.
I decided to go home instead of the Square. Without Darla, what was the point? Dance with the circles, find someone to roll at the show, nah.
They say Family is who you can’t run from when they make you angry. Don’t know who says it, but I always hated it. If you’re in jail, you can’t run. You’re chained up. Trapped. So make the best of it, they say. That’s what they mean. Family is who you just deal with. You don’t fix. You don’t work. You just stay.
I’ll never stay with anyone who is mad at me. Life’s too short. You could die tomorrow. They could die tomorrow. Some day, they’ll die, and they’ll remember all the last things they said and have nothing but regret.
Hundred truth. I’m never staying to let someone be mad at me again.
My head was still spinning a bit. The water was good, but the tab, I think it was off. Not good. Things still feel bad in the stomach.
I passed the park on the way back, which was odd, because the park wasn’t between Donnies and Binny’s apartment. I wanted to stay there that night, not sleep at Darla’s. All that glit, all the perfume, too much. Too much irony. There’s lots of people in the park. They bring their dogs and their squeezes and spend their time under the yellow lights of the lampposts. I know why they do that. It’s a little place to get away from the straight lines and sharp angles of the grid.
I decided to wait for a bit, sit down and breathe in the dusk. Light was fading from the sky. Transition, but not really. Cars flying by, such a rush to get somewhere else.
If they had stopped, just for a moment, they could have turned their heads and seen me, there, sitting on a bench next to the park. They would have seen me, and wondered “what’s that dirty little gutter junkie doing there. What’s he thinking about?” They’d see me sitting, being one with the everything, and they’d watch. They’d see me, and through me they’d see a bit of the everything too. They’d be so impressed, so in awe of my natural connection, my infinite threads reaching out like a web, they will sit and stare and dream.
Perhaps they’ll remember me at night, sleeping next to their squeezes, after tucking in their kids and having a fancy dinner. Maybe they’ll wonder what it is that gives me, who has so little, such space around him.
Like a bubble. A huge bubble all around him. Full of space.
People walk around me. They don’t sit next to me. They don’t even look at me. I look at them and they turn away. I am more than just a man sitting on a bench, I’m a presence.
And there, again, was JJ.
He was walking down the street, the same shirt and tie as the last time I saw him. Same bag. It made me happy to see him like that, but it made me sad too. Like he wasn’t doing well in the system. That’s a good thing, right? JJ, all grit. Dressed in suit and tie. Shoulder bag. I see how it bulges, and I know there’s more than paper in there. Dusted. Shambling along. One of the cogs. He looks. He sees me.
“Ozzie.”
He walks over. Smile on his face, all butter and cream. Like we’re still friends. Like he didn’t climb out of the gutter. Turn his back on the chant and pull the curtains over his eyes. “Hey,” I say. Because I’m nice.
“How you been?”
I take out a smoke and light it up. I offer him one. He shakes his head, pulls on his bag strap. Heavy like. He smiles again, the first one didn’t work. Doesn’t work this time either. “Alright,” I said.
“Everyone doing okay?”
Took a deep puff and blew it at his face. He coughs, and I feel better. Just for a moment, natch, but enough to answer. “We’re good.”
“Good.” Pulls on his strap again. Like tired. Aches, maybe. Looks around all nervous, like someones going to jump out at him any moment. He’s ashamed. I can see it on his skin, like aftershave. “You still chanting then?”
I try to think of something to say, but nothing comes. I want to tell him I’m still alive, still breathing, still living the life and so I chant the same as all the real people. Why’d he ask such a dumb question? He left us, and I can see the need in his eyes. He wants a circle. He’s all alonely.
That was why JJ left. He didn’t understand the chant is possibility. Energy of life. You can’t reach that with things in the way. Things like cars that keep your feet from walking, or phones that keep your ears from listening. Roofs that shield you from the starry skies and radio waves that keep the cosmos from speaking to you.
I don’t know how to say that and still be nice, so I take another puff.
“Hey,” says like he just thought it up, “you know, maybe we could get together sometime? The old gang? Leon and Cindy still there? Binny, sure. Ribber to, maybe?”
JJ was such a liar. I could see it in his eyes. How long had he gone without chanting, I wondered, after he left. A day? A week? Now here he was, begging back in the circle.
See, Old Oz is nice. A real wiz, they say. I’d have let him come back. I would have. I’d have gone to the circle and said “let’s give him another chance. He’s learned his lesson.” I’d have worked them over good, and he’d be sitting on the floor in less than a week.
But he lied. He lied to my face. He made it look like he just wanted to talk. He tried to trick me into thinking he wasn’t craving the chant. Like he’d grown up, and just wanted a vacation. Meet some old friends and shoot the shit like we were out in the woods with a beer in each hand.
Poor JJ, always chanted for himself. Wanted green, wanted a girl, wanted a job. Thought he deserved it. Whatever the hell deserve means.
“You all still at Binny’s? Same apartment?”
“Binny’s in the same apartment,” I say. I want to get away. I’m finished with JJ. I want to go home. Melt into Darla’s arms for a bit and forget that she’s there. That I’m there.
“Maybe I’ll stop by.”
“It’s a free country.” I say. It is.
He stares at me for a minute, like he has more to say. He doesn’t say it though. I keep thinking, trying to put into words how wrong he was. I want to say something sage like Binny says, that’ll make him think about all the wrong he’s done in the world by twisting the chant like he did. Make me think he was a real chanter, then turn his back on it. I want JJ to apologize, say he blew it. Say he was wrong to do the things he did, to say the things he said.
But I can’t think of anything to say.
Finally, he walks away, giving a wave like we’re good. I sit there for a minute. Two maybe. Enough to finish my smoke, but really, my heart’s not in it.
It was just me on the bench, and I was so tired. I couldn’t lie down, because the city had put arms in the middle of the benches. It was to keep people from sleeping on them. Just cruelty. That’s the system. Jokes on them. Everyone in the gutter knows how to sleep sitting down.
They try to get us to go away, to hop on a bus or train and go away. They want us to vanish, like invisible. We already are.
I wanted to pry open my skull and let out all the buzzing and whirring things that kept me sitting on the bench. I didn’t have anyone to chant with. Could have chanted on my own, but I didn’t see the point.
I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. Sleep. I knew in moments I would be among the everything.