“Pity.” Gia looked at her fingernails. “Ethan, are you hungry?”
“Yes, starving.”
“Go get us a couple of slices from No-Name.”
✽✽✽
I reported to Marjorie Meadow the next morning. I didn’t know anyone working there. I guess Percival and Jessie worked a later shift. I stood by the counter for twenty minutes until finally a queen with more attitude than style sneered his way to my side.
“What can I do for you? You’re not buying anything.”
“Uh, no. I’m selling, I mean I’m a new salesperson. Can you let Marge know I’m here?”
“She doesn’t get here until 10:00 am. Later if she’s hung over. She will hate that outfit.”
I looked down at my vintage hippy pants and American Flag suede fringe vest over a ruffled tuxedo shirt. I couldn’t see anything wrong. “Why would she hate this?”
“Because it’s all vintage. She doesn’t sell vintage.”
“Can you help me pick out a different look...I didn’t catch your name.”
“No. No names. No fashion advice. No.”
With that, he sauntered off in a cloud of angry black aura.
I left. It was only 9:30am. I went to Tower Records and browsed the LPs. Nothing jumped out at me. This Tower had a big book section, so I wandered through the stacks when something caught my eye. It was a photobook with essays called “San Francisco Rock.” It focused on the Sixties and early Seventies. I felt a horrible piercing in my heart. I loved my city, and I abandoned it for something much bigger. And yet so much more beauty came from San Francisco. It was my real home. Stark black and white portraits of Grace Slick, Stevie Nicks and Janis Joplin drew me in. The photos of fat bearded Jerry Garcia made me angry. The one and only crush George, the boy I never got over, was a Deadhead. That music mattered more to him than I could ever matter. I was just a discarded hacky sack. I bought the book, and by doing so, changed my fate forever.
Anxiously, I returned to Marge Meadows. The sinister queen gave a wave of his hand, urging me to knock on her office door.
“Who is it?”
“Ethan Lloyd. You hired me a few weeks back.”
Her door flew open. She was in a rage. I knew it wasn’t anything I deserved, but it scared me all the same.
“A few weeks back? A few weeks back? I can’t be held responsible for something I said last month!”
“Do you want me to fill out any paperwork?”
“No! I don’t need anyone. Chester started here a few weeks back.” She gestured at the incredibly rude queen I spoke to earlier.
I felt like I was going to pass out. “But remember, Jessie and Percival recommended me. I moved to New York because I got this job.”
“Well, you’ve learned a good fucking lesson about New York, kid. I don’t have a job for you, so get the fuck out of here.”
In shock, I walked numbly towards the East Village. Fleur was away for a few days in Virginia with her family. Donnie was asleep for sure. I didn’t know what I could do. I headed down West Broadway to Bleecker. I was all paid up for the summer, so I had a roof over my head. But I couldn’t buy food or subway tokens or anything. I was trapped. Mom was up on her commune in Vermont. Dad, well he was Dad. I hadn’t talked to him in ten years or more. Grandma Joan would make me feel like a loser, without meaning to. I couldn’t tell her either.
I wiped the tears away and a blurry street sign came into view. It was Sullivan Street. Why did I know that name? I had seen the address 121 Sullivan Street a thousand times or more. I turned and saw the sign. The address was on every plastic bag at Resurrection Records in Boston. I stopped suddenly, and a stranger bumped into me.
“Watch where the fuck you’re going, asshole.” It was Gladys. “Ethan?”
“Oh, hi Gladys.”
“What’s wrong?” She never showed a speck of kindness, so I was wary.
“Um, I just have allergies.”
“Come say hi to Andre.”
I couldn’t refuse, although I desperately wanted to.
For some strange reason, my arrival was heralded like the prodigal son returning home.
Andre came out from behind the counter and gave me a big hug. He introduced me to Malgorzata and Claudius. I looked into their eyes and saw that fear I knew so well. But the smiles were genuine.
“Ethan worked in our Boston store. Helped set it up and everything.”
I nodded and waved like the Queen at a parade. One wrong word and this would turn into a festival of expletives.
“I love your suede fringe flag.” Malgorzata was Polish but she sounded British. “Where did you get it?”
“Rags. It’s a dollar-a-pound clothing place in Cambridge.”
“It’s so cool. You could wear this over a motorcycle jacket.” She said.
Gladys made her first sour expression. “Back to work!”
Claudius and Malgorzata returned to rolling posters and putting wide rubber bands around them before filing them in the appropriate slot beneath the rack.
“I live just down the block.”
“How can you afford that?” Gladys wrinkled her nose.
“I’m renting a room from a friend.”
Andre broached the one subject I had prayed would not come up. “Where are you working?”
I’m a terrible liar, so I didn’t try. “I was supposed to work at Marge Meadows, I mean she hired me, but when I showed up for work, she acted like she didn’t know me.”
Andre said, “Well look at you in those hippy pants and fringe. I wouldn’t hire you.”
I sighed with relief. “But we pay more here in New York, you know.”
“How much?” Why was I asking?
“Five bucks an hour, under the table. Can you start tomorrow?” Andre smiled.
“Yeah, sure.” I faked enthusiasm.
Gladys said, “We open at 10:00 am. If you’re late, you’re fucking fired. It’s so great to see you!” She rubbed my shoulder appreciatively. It felt wrong.
My mom used to tell this old joke about a man who went to hell. He was given three choices as to where he would spend eternity. The first room was ice cold, and full of naked men and women whose extremities had fallen off from frostbite. If they tried to hold each other for warmth, a demon cracked a whip.
“May I see the next room?”
The next room was a giant rotisserie with people skewered like hot dogs in the 7-Eleven. It passed slowly by a giant furnace, burning the skin as the people shrieked and rotated out of sight. When they came back around, their skin was healed. They had to go through the flames, endlessly burning and healing forever.
“Hmmm. May I see my third choice?”
The third room smelled horrible. The man realized it was because the people in it were standing knee deep in human excrement. They ate powdered donuts and drank hot beverages. Some even dunked their donuts. They chatted amongst themselves. Aside from the horrific smell, it seemed like a pleasant place to spend eternity.
“I’ll take this room, please.”
No sooner had he settled into the room, a demon appeared and shouted through a megaphone, “Okay, coffee break is over, back on your heads!”
That was Resurrection Records.
My first day there, despite receiving a compliment on my shiny patent leather outfit from Gene Simmons himself, Gladys sent me home to wear “something appropriate.” I came back in Jeans and a Ramones t-shirt. She said I dressed like a slob. I wasn’t going to dress up all formal Sunday dinner just to work at a shitty record store. Claudius showed me the ropes.
There were three stores. The main store was on the east side of the street. On the west was the vocals and oldies shop, and a third shop that was only spoken about in hushed tones. Claudius said that people had been killed for asking about that shop, so I just let it drop.
As soon as we were out of earshot of Gladys, he asked me, “You worked for them before, why in God’s name did you come back?”
“They caught me
at a desperate moment. Why do you stay?”
“Look at me.” Claudius gestured to his outfit. He had rings all up and down his ears and dressed like a vampire. A streak of blue ran through his otherwise black hair. “Who else would hire me?”
“If I knew I wouldn’t tell you; I’d be in line submitting my application.”
We giggled. Gladys appeared behind us out of nowhere. “This ain’t a fucking tea party. Get back inside. A customer flooded the toilet. You gotta clean it, Ethan.”
Claudius mouthed a silent “sorry” and slithered back into the store. Gladys took me to the bathroom with a giant string mop, Pine Sol, and a janitor’s bucket.
“You know how to mop floors?”
“With Mop & Glo. I don’t know how to use this.”
“You are a fucking useless piece of shit. I told Andre not to hire you back.” It rolled off her tongue like someone ordering a cheeseburger at the drive thru.
“I’ll figure it out, Gladys.”
The floor was covered with water dyed grey by cheap toilet paper. There was no poop, I took the mop and swabbed the floor. I put it in the wringer and after a few tries, figured out how to squeeze the mop dry. I did this three times, and the floor was dry enough. I hadn’t figured out what to do with the Pine Sol.
Gladys came in and smiled, until she saw the bucket, with just a thin layer of water inside.
“Jesus Christ you’re stupid. You add Pine Sol and hot water first!” She removed the wringer and hefted the bucket, pouring out the dirty grey water into the toilet. She maneuvered it until it was under the bathroom faucet. “Turn on the hot water!”
I obliged. She grabbed the bottle and poured a couple of capfuls of pungent Pine Sol into the steaming bucket.
“Now rinse that fucking mop, wring it out, and give the floor a good clean. Pour it all down the toilet when you’re done.”
I felt trapped at work. When I came home to Gia’s apartment, she was still there, so even though I paid for a summer in her apartment, I had to share her bed for the time being. My money ran out on Tuesday. I didn’t get paid until Saturday. Andre agreed to front me twenty dollars. That bought slices of bad cheese pizza from no-name and a coke when I would splurge.
Friday night I went to the Palladium to visit Fleur in her ladies’ room. I was dressed in my Second Coming clothes. The doorman acted like I was invisible.
“I’m a guest of Fleur.”
“So,” he shrugged.
I tried Donnie’s magic spell. “Club Courtesy?”
The doorman frowned. “You don’t work at no fucking club. Get out of here or pay forty like everyone else! Back of the line!” I gave up and went back to the apartment. Gia was out with some of her Latex Sex Camp friends, so I watched Ben Casey on TV and wished I had a cute doctor like him to take care of me.
When Saturday came, I was rich. I took Gia to the Sheridan Square Diner for grilled cheese and egg creams.
After dinner, she grabbed my hair and pulled on it.
“What?”
She grinned. “I have a bunch of extra Kanekalon extensions in black. I’m not using black anymore. Do you want extensions?”
“Does it hurt?”
“At first.” She gave a private, evil laugh.
I had nothing better to do. “Yeah, okay.”
What followed was a four-hour torture session. Gia gathered tiny ponytails of my hair and wrapped them around the fake hair extension. I don’t think she needed to apply so much pressure. She just enjoyed watching me squirm. The final step was to soak the knot in super glue. She repeated this twenty or thirty times until the hair ran out. She only did the sides and back. Nothing up top.
“Go look,” Gia said.
I didn’t recognize the guy staring back at me from the mirror.
“The extensions make me look like some sort of cartoon character.”
“You look like Captain Harlock!” she screamed.
“Captain who?”
She punched me, then dug through her stacked possessions to pull out a Japanese pirate doll.
“That’s Captain Harlock.”
I studied the action figure. “You’re right, that’s really close.”
She dug through her clothes and found a black sweater with a white skull knitted in. “Here, put it on.”
It was tight in the shoulders, but I was able to stuff myself like a sausage into the acrylic knit.
I checked the mirror. “I’m bulging.”
Gia smiled. “Look at me. The secret is to cover it up.”
She rummaged through another pile, extracting a black and red wool cape.
Once it was on, I looked really fucking good.
We didn’t have any film so there were no pictures, but it happened. I became Captain Harlock, Space Pirate, for one hot summer day in 1986.
“You can keep that.”
“I couldn’t!”
“Do I look like I would wear that cape?” She put her hands on her wide hips.
“I could see you in it.”
Gia punched me again. I think she enjoyed inflicting pain.
The next day at work, I was banished to the vocals store.
“You look ridiculous,” Andre said.
“You’re a motherfucking disgrace,” said Gladys.
The vocals store was a bit of a briar patch. I wanted to play Led Zeppelin and Alien Sex Fiend like we did across the street, but I was under strict orders to choose my music selections from inside the store. Percival Laydown was a regular customer. He snatched up Yma Sumac 10-inches like they were IBM stock. It aroused my curiosity. I put on “Legend of the Sun Virgin” and the store overflowed with Tiki-hut catcalls and jungle ululations. The music was bewitching. Percival told me her dirty secret. She pretended to be descended from Incan warriors, but her real name was Amy Camus and she was born and raised in Brooklyn.
After that, I noticed that the most interesting people shopped at the vocals store. I saw Fred Schneider from the B-52’s. He was a Blossom Dearie fan. David Bowie bought only instrumentals like the Village Stompers and Pérez Prado. After each celebrity purchase, I would write down the buyer and the musician, then play them, like I did when Percival bought Yma Sumac. Some of them were awful. Blossom Dearie was hilarious and chatty. Her voice haunted me until I discovered she was the singer of several Schoolhouse Rock songs from my childhood. That was why she sounded so familiar.
So, I pretended that working in the vocals store was unbearable punishment, but it was like going to popular music college and I loved it. I didn’t dare let Andre or Gladys know or else they would find some real dungeon where to banish me.
Gia’s flight call came in and she left in a rush. Her parting words to me were cryptic, “Don’t freak out if the apartment does stuff.”
What on earth did that mean? I found out almost immediately. It was getting late, and I needed to rest. My extensions tore at my scalp, so I struggled to get comfortable.
My eyelids closed. I heard a snarling sound, like a wolf was under the bed. Every hair on my arms stood up.
“Hello?”
Silence. The old black and white television snapped on. It was an advertisement for a cemetery in New Jersey. I was too afraid to move. Then the mace hanging above the headboard came loose and landed next to my head. Then I heard a scream and realized it was coming from me.
I grabbed the first thing I could find and ran out of the apartment. I didn’t know where to go or what to do. I was holding my American flag suede fringe vest, so I put it on.
I went back to the Palladium with my new painful hair, and the doorman opened the gate like I was royalty. Hypocrite. I guess you must suffer for fashion to get into clubs for free.
Fleur wasn’t in her ladies’ room. It was her night off. I sat on a bar stool and moped. A man with a bowl cut approached me.
“Ethan, right?”
I looked at him and realized he was Bartleby the ecstasy dealer.
“Oh, hey, Bartleby.”
Behind him, a
perky-breasted lady with giant black hair tottered on heels.
“Hi, I’m Eleanor.”
“Ethan.”
I knew very little about Bartleby. I asked Eleanor, “How do you know each other?”
“He’s my husband.” I re-examined the thin, effete drug dealer and marveled at how badly my gaydar was broken.
“Ethan, I have a tab of acid I’m just dying to share with someone tonight. Would you like to drop acid with me?”
“Sure.” I had never tried acid, so a dozen questions arose in my mind, but I knew that asking them would be uncool.
He tore a tiny piece of paper in half and put one portion under my tongue.
“I find it most effective under the tongue.”
I smiled at Eleanor. “You don’t want any?”
She shook her head. “I like to watch and babysit.”
While we waited for the acid to come on, Bartleby interviewed me.
“So, what brings you out tonight, Ethan?”
“Funny you should ask. I’m pretty sure my apartment is haunted.”
“Are you at Gia’s?” He smiled wryly.
“Yes.”
“It’s most certainly haunted.”
Eleanor nodded in agreement.
“How do you know?”
“We’ve both been Gia’s roommate at different times. And don’t ask, because there’s absolutely nothing you can do but live with it.”
The thought of returning to the invisible snarling creature and the medieval wall of cascading torture instruments while tripping on acid suddenly felt like a terrible idea.
“Hey, you can stay with us.” Eleanor offered. “I mean tonight while you’re tripping.”
Bartleby smiled and squeezed her hand.
“Where were you before New York, Ethan?”
“Boston.”
“You have good manners. That’s very Bostonian.” He lit a cigarette and offered me one. I politely refused.
The interview continued.
“How did you meet Donnie and that St. Mark’s Place crew?”
“Through Fleur, of course.”
“Of course. Pity she’s not here tonight. How did you like my ecstasy?”
“I loved it, of course.”
All three of us laughed. The walls were starting to churn a little, and my stomach hurt.
Seventh Avenue South Page 5
