Every Last Drop

by Charlie Huston

Give her the score.

  Let her decide.

  So I smoke. And wait. Wait for the Vyrus to finish working her over. Then we can have a talk.

  Christ I hope she doesn’t scream too much when I try to explain it to her.

  —Here’s how the rest of your life works. You’re fucked. Your family, you don’t get to see them ever again. Same with your friends. Your job is over. Wherever you live, you don’t live there anymore. You see someone on the street that you used to know, you go the other way. You see those people, you get tempted to talk to them. Try to explain. What you try to explain is that you’re sick. You try to explain it’s not what they think. It’s a virus. A thing living inside you. It makes you sicker than they can imagine. And there’s only one way to treat it. To treat the symptoms. That’s to feed it. And there’s only one thing to feed it. That’s blood. People blood. Know what happens when you tell them that? They get the same look on their face that you got on yours right now. Know the difference? They’re not infected. They didn’t just get jumped and beaten and have their tongue bitten out by a pack of wilders who proceeded to suck on their mouth like it was a water fountain. And because that didn’t happen to them, they can’t feel what you’re feeling. That burn inside, the heat and tingle around your wounds. They can’t look at the cuts on their bare arms and see they’re already closed up, turning pink to white. They can’t feel the scab grow over their stub of a tongue, feel it flaking away, feel how smooth and perfect it is now. Feel that it almost seems to be growing back. Unlike you, they hear a story like that, they got no reason to think you’re anything but out of your fucking head, and get you locked up. And that’s the happy ending. The unhappy ending is if they should believe you. If someone should somehow find out you’re telling the truth. Because they sure as shit won’t think you’re sick, they’ll think you’re a goddamn monster. And won’t it be fun to see that look on their faces. So, no more life. It’s over. Other things are over too. You’ll never see the sun again. Not unless you’re about to die a horrible death. The virus in you goes crazy if it’s hit with shortwave UVs from the sun. Your whole body becomes cancerous. Fast. Good news, none of the other crap is a problem. Crosses, holy water, garlic. That shit, it’s shit. You’re infected, not damned. Or maybe you are. I don’t know. A stake through the heart will kill you, just like any asshole. But when it’s fed, the Vyrus will crank up your system. Stronger, faster. Heightened senses. And tough. But keeping it fed is the thing. A pint a week. Blood. Human. More if possible. Think about drinking blood. Not a happy thought. Now think about getting it. The kids that attacked you, they’re not the norm. Well, up here they may be a little more normal, but still pretty fucking baroque. The City, Manhattan, it’s organized. Clans got it carved up. Coalition, Hood, Society, others. Each one’s got an agenda. A Clan takes you in, they’ll help you get settled. Adjusted. Not a joiner, you can go Rogue, stay the fuck off Clan turf. That means staying off the Island. Means getting blood on your own. Means hurting people, mostly. Means sometimes someone gets killed. But better if they don’t. Better if you develop a system. Find a junkie on the nod you can tap him for a pint. Vyrus doesn’t care about the junk. Doesn’t care about any kind of illness or poison. Keep it healthy, it keeps you healthy. And maybe I’m wrong about your people. Maybe you’re special close to someone. Could be your boyfriend. Could be your sister. Someone that’s got a taste for being used. You know the type. Maybe they got it in them to let you cut into a vein every few weeks. That makes things a lot easier. Still need to make some moves, but you have someone like that, a Lucy like that, and things get easier. Not that easy is a word gets thrown around much in this life. What else? People know about us. Not a lot, but a few. Well, some know about us, others just hope we’re real. Some, they want in on the game, want to make the scene. Fucking Renfields. Others, they got an axe to grind. Some of them got real axes. Van Helsings. A real one is bad news. Someone who can go around in the day, poke into things, has a credit rating to buy guns and bullets and stuff, and who also knows the real score on us, that’s a serious danger. And? What? And there’s some infecteds think the Vyrus isn’t a virus. Like maybe it’s something, I don’t know, something supernatural. Enclave. They’re crazy. And there’s a bacteria. Kinda like the Vyrus, ’cept it turns people into brain eaters. Zombies. But that’s pretty rare. So. I don’t know what else. I don’t usually talk this much.

  I blow some smoke at the ceiling.

  —I feel like I’m forgetting something. Vyrus. Clans. Zombies. Stay out of the sun. Don’t get shot. Abandon your life. Drink blood to survive.

  I shake my head.

  —No. Guess that pretty much covers it.

  I flick my cigarette butt away.

  —So, question is, can you take it? I lay it out like that, do you think you’re the kind who can take it?

  She wipes at the drying tear tracks in the grit on her cheeks. She sticks a finger in her mouth and touches her healing tongue, takes her fingers out of her mouth and looks at me.

  Says nothing.

  I nod, point up at the barred window at ground level, the night sky above.

  —Look up there.

  She looks.

  I pull out my gun and use my last three bullets.

  Walking down the street, heading north, my ears ring loud from the shots fired in the basement.

  I’m a good shot. But shooting from the hip, I didn’t want to worry about the first bullet missing the middle of her brain and her having a couple seconds to think about it. To feel it. Better to put all three in her face as fast as possible. Leave nothing to chance.

  She wasn’t stupid, she’d never have been able to make that play herself.

  Someone who knew me might say I was trying to make up for some kind of mistake I made in my past. Trying to do something like compensate for the mess I left behind on the Island. Trying to make right for a time when I moved too slow and let someone slip away from me.

  But no one knows me here.

  Any other reason to be in the Bronx, I don’t know what it could be.

  At the north end of Joyce Kilmer Park, a rust, primer and white station wagon that looks like it was recently firebombed cruises up next to me and a match flares inside.

  —Tell me, Joe.

  I put a hand on my gun, wishing I’d maybe used just two bullets instead of three.

  The match flame touches the end of a cigarette between two red lips.

  —Was doing that as unpleasant as it looked?

  —You see who hit her?

  —Yeah.

  —Want to share?

  —Know anything about tweens on pocket rockets, wilding for blood?

  She looks at me, puts a tilt on her head, looks away.

  —Yeah. I know that picture.

  She leans her arm out the open window of the decaying station wagon, looking at the towering glass façade of the Bronx County Hall of Justice across One Sixty-one from the Concourse Plaza shopping center where she’s parked us.

  —Was it them?

  I do my own head-tilt.

  —Did the four spastics buzzing the Stadium crowd chew the chick’s tongue out? Tell ya, Esperanza, I didn’t witness the act, but I’m assuming they did the deed.

  She flicks a spent cigarette butt out the window.

  I blow rings at the windshield, watch them explode against the glass.

  Not to be outdone, she lights a fresh Pall Mall and blows a ring of her own.

  —That girl without the tongue. You made a lot of noise. Cops are already over there.

  —I guess even around here someone is bound to call in shots fired in their basement.

  —Well, we’re not savages up here.

  —Didn’t say otherwise.

  Smoke jets from her nostrils.

  —Girl with her face shot off, gonna create some interest.

  —Maybe. As much interest as another gun killing gets these days.

  —Could get more than usual attention if anyone saw you. White g
uy in the Bronx murdering a Rican girl. Never know with a story like that. Turns out she was a college student, maybe supporting her grandma and her little sister, a story like that could end up with legs. Social outrage. White men coming to the Bronx to hunt our Latina sisters. End up with Reverend Sharpton doing interviews at the scene of the murder.

  I peel a strip of fabric from the shredded headliner.

  —Better give the Post a call. Give your exclusive before it’s too late.

  She blots some sweat from her temple with the back of her hand, a cross tattooed in the flesh where her thumb joins her hand glistens.

  —I’m not arguing whether it was the thing to do, I’m just saying you could have been a little quieter.

  —Sure. I could have left a nice quiet corpse of a woman with a broken neck. And they could have autopsied the body and found nothing else wrong, except that she had only half a tongue. Nice and pink and healed and looking like she’d been born that way. And wouldn’t that have provoked some interest when her family found out about it. Half a tongue? What are you talking about? Oh, and I imagine the M.E. might also have been intrigued by the way she was missing about half her blood with no fresh wounds through which it could have come out.

  She pinches the butt of her cigarette between thumb and forefinger.

  —And when you showed the fuck up here on my turf I could have cut a deal with the Mungiki and had you escorted into the fucking river. But you said you’d be cool. So if I want to talk to you about shit that doesn’t play cool by me, you can listen and not talk hardcase. Yeah?

  I flick some ash.

  —Didn’t know you had pull with the Mungiki.

  She lights a fresh Pall Mall.

  —Yeah, well, you don’t mix enough to know shit up here, do you?

  —Nope.

  —No one has pull with the Mungiki. But since they moved to Queens they sometimes need a favor here.

  —How you get that gig?

  She sighs.

  —I used to date one of them.

  —Dated a Mungiki? Filed teeth and all?

  She gives me that look again.

  —Don’t believe all the shit you hear, man. They don’t file their teeth.

  She watches as a handful of couples file out of the Multiplex from the last show.

  —Not all of them, anyway. And he wasn’t Mungiki when we were hooking up. Just a guy.

  —Huh, well, fascinating stuff, but if we’re done threatening each other, I thought I might get on. Maybe look into those kids.

  She blows ash from the tip of her cigarette.

  —Don’t fuck with the kids.

  I eye her.

  —There a reason I shouldn’t?

  She eyes me back.

  —Yeah. I just told you not to.

  We do a stare-down while I chew it.

  Lady looks twenty-one. Maybe younger. She older? Yeah, a few years, but not by much. You don’t feed heavy in the Bronx, not heavy enough to keep the years at bay. Look at me, couple years back I looked maybe late twenties. Now I’d be pressed to pass for thirty-five. At this rate I’m gonna catch up with forty-eight in a hurry.

  But she’s got youth on her side. Real youth, not the borrowed kind.

  Long in the legs. Khaki cargo pants, white retro Jordans, a black tank tucked at the waist, tight over a black sports bra. Tattooed shoulders, hands, neck, designs dark against brown skin. Black hair, short and greased back. Sinews running down long arms. Loping muscles built playing point guard with the boys at Rucker Park over the river.

  Esperanza Lucretia Benjamin.

  Closest thing the Concourse has to a boss. Only one up here seems to care if the lid ever blows off. Only one can talk to the Mungiki and come away with her head unsevered. One tough chick.

  Warden.

  Two ways you go to prison.

  First way is keep your eyes down and suck up against the wall when the big dogs pass by, hope no one notices how harmless you are, how badly you just want to do your time and get back to your life on the outside. Spend your days counting the minutes till someone maybe decides you got a mighty pretty mouth.

  Second way is go in and take a look around and find the chair in the day room with the best view of the TV, go up to the skinhead sitting in it, spit in his face, and shank him in the ear with the sharpened end of your toothbrush. Let everyone know you’re not going anywhere. You’re not a guest, you’re fucking home. Do it that way, and when you get out of solitary you’ll find that chair waiting for you to plop down in it and watch General Hospital.

  Guess which was my approach.

  Found a patch of Franz Sigel Park, a patch near the corner of Walton Avenue and Mabel Wayne Place where they got that cute red, white and blue sign. The Bronx. All-American City. A patch of trees and weeds and rock that reeked of some fucker doing his thing there for years.

  Then I staked it out, waited till he dragged someone back into his favorite spot, came up on him as he was getting ready to put on the feedbag and I broke his spine in three places and let him lie there paralyzed and watch me while I dined out on his handiwork.

  I peed all over his yard.

  Then I killed him.

  Soon enough, Esperanza called. Made it clear she was what passed for law around here. Made it clear what she was looking for in a neighbor. Made it clear that One Sixty-one and the Concourse being about as close to civilization as you get up here, she wanted to see it remain that way. Made it clear that the only kind of profile that would do in these parts was a low one. And I made it clear I couldn’t agree with her more. Proved the point by showing her the corpse I’d made out of the guy who’d been living in Franz Sigel. A guy it turned out had been the source of Monster in the Park stories amongst the citizens. The kind of stories that attract undue attention.

  She was pleased.

  And I was home in the Bronx.

  Again.

  Not that I’ve strayed over to Hunt’s Point to walk down memory lane and see the house I grew up in or anything. Do that and I might get inspired to burn it down. And I kind of doubt that my folks are still living there, so what would be the point?

  Any case, not an easy woman to get on the right side of. And, once there, you don’t want to circle round to the wrong side.

  Not on her turf.

  Our cigarettes go out and, in the interest of lighting new ones, we end our staring.

  I inhale smoke, blow it out.

  —OK. I’ll stay away from the kids.

  She looks me over, nods.

  —That out of the way.

  The tip of her finger touches the corner of her mouth.

  —You got plans the rest of the night?

  I wave my cigarette.

  —Smoke this. Steal some money so I can get more cigarettes. Go hide from everybody.

  —Very nice.

  —Yeah, and I got a good book and a lovely bottle of chardonnay to curl up with later.

  —Feel like company?

  I look at her. I try to do it from the corner of my eye, but why bother? She knows I’m looking.

  This one, pure hell on wheels, asking me if I want some company.

  Do I.

  I take a drag, chew on it, let it loose, and climb out of the car.

  —I want company, I’ll find a dog.

  She keys the ignition and the wagon grinds to life.

  —If that’s what floats your boat, Joe, you have a good time.

  She puts the car in gear, rolls to the drive, exhaust pouring from her tailpipe.

  I stand there and watch till her lights are lost in traffic.

  It ain’t the first time she’s asked. Not that I’m bragging. I’m just saying she’s the kind of woman knows how to complicate a man’s thinking.

  A place like the South Bronx has a way of narrowing a person’s focus. So you’d think my thinking would be pretty uncomplicated all the way around these days. That would be smart.

  People having a conversation about me, that word, smart, it doesn
’t come up often. And I’m just smart enough to know there’s a reason why.

  But not smart enough to do anything about it.

  What can I say? This old dog, he’s still too busy chasing his own tail to bother learning any new tricks.

  Across the river I had a life. Or a thing that I’d shaped into a semblance of a life. Had a face in the straight community. Folks downtown, citizens without know-how of this other life of ours, they knew me as a local fixer and rough hand. A guy could take some shifts when your bouncer got picked up by the cops for armed robbery and you needed a quick replacement. Guy you could come to when that deadbeat boyfriend still hadn’t gotten out of your apartment four months after you dumped him. Guy you could slip a few bucks to escort said boyfriend to the curb. Trace a skip. Kick the vig loose from a welcher. No office, mind you, but a guy around that if you knew the right person I might get pointed out as the type could solve your problem.

  Not what you’d call steady work, but I made my own hours. Kind of a key point, all things considered.

  And some gigs for the Clans. Do some deeds in the cracks, unofficial and off the books. And toward the end, a real job with the Society. But that didn’t go so well. Low job satisfaction. Engagement terminated by agreement between both parties. No references forthcoming from previous employer.

  Guess it was that nail in the artery thing. That and maybe that I didn’t give two weeks’ notice. Not really sure which it was that queered the deal.

  Any case, on the Island I was a face, and a face can make some money. Make moves. Get his hands on the necessities of life.

  Food. Shelter. Clothing.

  Blood. Bullets. Money.

  Those kinds of things.

  Blood is tricky. But blood is always tricky. Money can help you lay hands on blood but it’s always tricky. No doubt it’s trickier up here, you expect that. No local organization means no hustlers, no infrastructure to support a dealer who might be able to buy pints off the local junkies or something, act as a clearinghouse. Means no friendly faces at Bronx-Lebanon or St. Barnabas who you might slip some cash to and come away with a bag.

  No, it’s all pretty much smash and grab up here.