by John Rechy
Outside, police were kicking at the bare dirty feet of a body on the sidewalk. Another body faced a broken wall.
“What they do?” she asked.
The cops were about to handcuff two men.
“You wanna come with us and find out?” the young cop said.
I did!
She heard the handcuffs click—loudly, like bolts, like iron-barred doors.
That's why Emmett never came back. They chained him while I waited for him under the subways. Then I couldn't wait anymore—but I did anyway, in the green-walled hospital taking pills.
Near padlocked warehouses, bodies lurked. Windows had been gouged, covered over with nailed boards, the boards had been torn apart, to create shelter inside. But now the heat rotted the waste within, releasing fumes of decay, and so the bodies floated into the hot but cooler shade outside.
“The attacks began right after winter,” a man was telling her. They were sitting on the steps of the abandoned building. The late afternoon stretched its shadows, and the distant tall buildings shed theirs, shortening the day here. The man had long disheveled brown hair, his feet were sockless. He wore a jacket—but no shirt. His ribs cut his torso into brown slices. “They come in a car and rush out. First they just beat up on people, now they slash. This heat don't help, either. Saint Moses got it in the library park.”
“I was there,” Carla said. “I bled on him.” She held out the hand he had bled on.
“Eight murders in three, four months. Used to happen far in between; you could rest nights when you didn't get to the mission before it filled. Then two, slashed in one day. No women, though. Ain't killed no women yet,” he assured her. He touched his beard, throat.
He smelled sweet—of sweat and booze and urine and flowers.
He took a secret drink from a bottle hidden under his coat.
“Give me some,” she said.
“No.” He tucked the bottle back into the coat. “They burned a man.”
“I was there,” Carla said.
“I was in a hotel that night,” the man went on. “Looked out the window, saw an orange glow, alley lit up. Heard the groans, and I seen him burning, trying to lift himself from the papers he was sleeping on.”
The sound of drunkenness, pain, despair, rage—she heard that from then and now. She laughed, but that did not block the louder roar. “They tried to kill me earlier,” she said. “I kicked at them, acted crazy, like Emmett taught me, they disappeared.”
“Saint Moses—he didn't get killed,” the bearded man revised. “It was Sam, Sam got it; he and Saint Moses were sleeping in the same place; used to be together all the time— …”
“My mother and father were like that,” Carla said, “until he killed her; she killed him first. When they were gone, they'd leave flowers for me, so I knew they were with me.” In the hospital she demanded them, screamed into the night. They tied her. When they had to let her out, she said to the nurse, a hairy man, “You stole them, bastard!”
The wind whined against the reeking building. Beyond the tracks, the orange sky bled smoke; but directly above, it deepened into clean purple.
She had been talking to this man for limbo days, empty or full, an hour and a lifetime. Time was the color of the sky, early morning and early night were the same color, so you didn't know whether to try to sleep or try to wake up.
She walked along the row of the bars on 5th Street. Some open wall-less into the street. A television set was on. A woman said from the screen, “I asked a man how he had come to allow himself to sink so low, Ken, and he couldn't give me an answer.”
She was still standing in the lobby of the hotel looking into the television. She had to get upstairs before the man stabbed the laughing woman he was with. “If you don't get out of here, I'll call the cops,” the man like a hawk in a cage said.
“You already called them just because I looked at the blue poster,” she told him.
On the steps of the abandoned warehouse, the bearded man took another hidden drink when Carla bent to loosen her shoes, her feet swollen with heat. “Saint Moses says he's a priest, sometimes claims he's a minister, changes his religion depending on the congregation,” he laughed a phlegmy cough. “Had his own church once.”
“But he left because he was so angry when he saw that priest run me out,” Carla said.
“He was the best preacher in the Square. Didn't preach damnation like the others, no, sir, Saint Moses, he preached salvation!” Again he tried to drink secretly from his bottle. This time, Carla pressed her cheek against his, to force some of the liquor into her mouth. He allowed a few drops to dot her tongue. She grasped his hand, tilted the bottle, and took a full, long swig. He wrenched back the bottle from her. “Saint Moses made a miracle in Pershing Square, I seen it. Cured a man with a twisted leg. Saint Moses prayed all day, called on God, lay hands, and the man walked straight as you and me.”
“I remember,” Carla said. “The man walked straight.”
“He tried to preach at the mission the other night, and they wouldn't let him.”
“I was there,” Carla said. The sun festered on the smoke-scratched horizon. Carla felt hot; the heat of her body radiated into the heat of the windy night.
“What the hell you doin’ on Skid Row?” she asked the youngman sitting next to her in the bar that opened into the naked street; the woman was gone from the television. The youngman next to her was in his twenties, tall, skinny, wearing a sleeveless shirt, his arms tattooed like blue maps; he had dark, weather-lashed skin. “Still got youngblood,” she heard her voice, “lots of fight ahead, save giving up for the last, this is the last stop before— …” Before the beach. She looked up and saw only the sky, then the stars, dim but there; she couldn't see them till Emmett told her to look. “You're not due yet,” she told the youngman.
“Shit,” he said, “what's it to you?”
His name was Tattoos. He was in his twenties.
“I'm Carla,” she told him. “I'm Emmett. You can't panic like that, you're too young, still got youngblood, lots of fight—and eyes, strange eyes, like a deer's.” He held her; they sat on the rotting piers. Behind them, the city was rancid despite the sprinkles of distant lights. She could still hear the roar of the subways she had been riding for days when he joined her, made her get off—but he told her it wasn't the subways she heard here on the piers, it was the ocean. “There's no beach,” she said. “Miles of it in— …” “And that's why I'm here, smartass,” she told Tattoos, and she walked out into the world she had forbidden him.
She sat in an alley. She had a full bottle of wine with her. No, she had already drunk half of it. She bought it in the liquor store, waiting outside until no one but the clerk was there; she hid the bottle while she paid for it—so no one would see her, follow her, take it from her. She didn't open it until she was in the alley. That's when she drank half of it. In her bag she still had much more than a dollar.
The steps of the warehouse were darkening. The orange sky tarnished into gray. New shadows lurked about in the heat.
Suddenly the bearded man shoved her against the bolted door of the warehouse where they had sat for days talking about Saint Moses and Sam and murder. She pushed her bag behind her. “I don't want your bag,” he said. “What do I get for all the booze I gave you?”
“Couple of swigs—and I had to take them,” she said, and raised her knee, thwarting him.
“For another one?”
“It's all gone, you threw the bottle,” she reminded him.
“I'll get another, give you half.”
“Get it first,” she said. Her knee became firmer. “Or give me the money and I'll get it.” He was much drunker than she was, weaker, and he knew it. She could knock him down the steps by straightening out her leg—he knew it. “I got a dollar,” he said.
“Two,” she upped it.
He searched in his pocket. There was a crumpled bill and some coins. “ ‘Bout fifty cents and a buck,” he estimated.
She snatched the money from him, put it in her bag, replaced it behind her, and lowered her leg.
“Give it back,” he said—but he raised her dress, opened his pants, and pressed his soft cock against her cunt. He rubbed against it, pushing with his hips as if he were inside her—pushing her against the bag behind her.
She closed her eyes and breathed in, collecting smells, rancid, sweet, rancid, rancid!
She shoved him against the wall.
“Gimme back my money!” he yelled.
She squeezed past his pressing body, lowering her dress, not bothering to run, knowing he could not catch up with her. In the liquor store in light as white as bones she looked at the crushed bill when she paid for the bottle. It was five dollars!
Soon she would fill the perfume vial before the wine was all gone, and then she'd forget she had it, until morning.
Tattoos asked her why she was in that bar and warning him to stay away. “Because I'm looking and you haven't even started!” she said and walked into the sphere of hot night.
She heard the sobs of an old man. Several bodies gathered about him, black, white, emaciated, shirtless bodies. A black bony woman in a slip kept saying, “Amen!”—raising her trembling hands, closing her eyes. Nearby a youngwoman kept squeezing her own arm; she sat on the curb of the street, trembling, perspiring.
“There were three of them, one slashed Sam's throat, the knife ripped past his neck to here on mine.” Saint Moses pointed to the edge of his neck, right under the earlobe. “I rolled over on the ground, and I wish I hadn't, I wish they'd slashed mine, too.” He sat on a littered curb.
She peered out of the leafy pocket where she'd slept on wet papers. Behind the bleeding man. Saint Moses touched his own neck. With the blood-smeared hand she clawed her way into the thicker part of the ledge, and on the other side they waited for her because she had seen it all. One held the bloodied knife. She felt it like a lit match searing her flesh. The man died over her, killed by his own knife.
“I'm going to sleep outside, in the open,” Saint Moses sobbed, “until they find me and slash my throat like they slashed Sam's.”
One of the men offered him a drink. He took it thirstily. Another man cursed him and walked away.
He needs to make another miracle! Carla remembered when he had cured that cripple in Pershing Square. He'd prayed and prayed, laid hands, and the man walked! She slid through the sweaty bodies about Saint Moses crying on the curb. She protected her bag and the bottle in it. She went limp, quivering, “Cure me!” she moaned. The men began to laugh.
“You're mocking me!” Saint Moses rose up wrathfully.
“No, no, I want you to cure me like you did that man in Pershing Square. I was there!” Carla pled.
Laughter!
“You're trying to rob me of my miracle, even that.” Saint Moses shook before her. “You're not sick, he really was, and I cured him!”
Carla began to cry, urgent gasps and tears hurled against the growing laughter. No, she protested silently. It's your fault! “No!”
He pushed her away, she toppled back. Her bag fell beside her. One of the men lunged for it, but he slipped because the bottle in it broke and spilled the liquor. She clutched for her bag and fled.
Hidden in the jungle of steamed shadows in the alley, she removed the pieces of the shattered bottle from her bag. The remains of roses would be wet. That was all right. Like watering them. She licked the wine, which moistened her probing fingers. She still had the money the man had given her, rubbing his prick against her, rubbing his soft prick against her and pushing her against the door of the warehouse.
“That's enough!” she told him.
“I'll come like this.”
“Not even hard.”
“I can come, though.”
She felt moisture on her thighs. “No!” she screamed, pulling away from him. “No!” Her vision erupted into brutal redness.
Saint Moses shoved her into the street. She fell into the liquor-and-urine-spattered gutter. She grabbed her bag. Night blew heat on her, into her eyes, drying all moisture. She closed her eyes.
When she opened them, she was peering into the tattoo shop. It was washed in light but it was closed. An iron-grilled gate blocked it. She heard sobs. Next to her, a Mexican youngman was crying, crying. He moved away along Main Street. Carla looked inside the tattoo parlor. She saw the drawing of a naked woman. Then she searched out the framed roses. She clenched the black bars—the iron bars of the jail—and the bright light forced her to blink. “Don't cry,” she said to the Mexican youngman, but he was gone. Don't cry. She leaned against the bars. Don't cry. She closed her eyes and opened them— …
… —in an exposed bright room. She stood before rows of youngmen and a few women, all in white. An older woman also in white was standing with her. “. . . —give my permission, in exchange for professional care— …” She signed the paper. A young hand in the room shot up: “In this stage, then, is chemical treatment a pos— …?” The older woman next to her said to the seated young people, “No—all of it is buried forever in her mind, scorched in by pain. Whatever brutality she was exposed to was so enormous she's collected all memories into one deep, unhealable wound. Perhaps there are two overwhelming memories, perhaps many; perhaps one was joyful.” The woman looked at her and said; “I hope so, my dear, I hope you have at least one beautiful memory. You have beautiful eyes, you know. I've never before seen eyes quite that color.” Carla rested her head on the woman's shoulder and closed her eyes.
When she opened them, her head was against a pocked paint-spattered wall in an alley, the three muggers were trying to ambush her. The blond one with the pitted white face and skinny arms kicked at the back of her legs, and she dropped kneeling to the ground. There were two blond ones—twins. The Puerto Rican danced excitedly about her. ‘Tramp! Hag! Bitch! Cunt!” The blond boy lifted her dress, exposing her naked flesh. Then he turned her over, face down. “Look at that,” he giggled. The Negro rolled her over, face up. “Look at that!”
“It's too dry!” The blond boy spat on her.
“Can't shove nothing in it!” The Puerto Rican added phlegm.
“Try this!”
She tore at flesh. In the shadows of the alley, the shadows of the freight car, the crouching shadows of the jail, she screamed a scream wailing up and down like a broken siren.
She screamed a scream wailing— …
It was Saint Moses who had screamed. Three bodies tore away from him. They had pressed him against a leprous wall. They ran into a parked car, then raced away into darkness. Throat sliced open, blood blooming from his mouth, Saint Moses sank onto the blemished ground.
The blade of a streetlight cut the darkness of the black bludgeoned alley she fled into.
“What you got in that bag?” a voice came from the dark.
“My life,” she said.
Feet advanced.
Carla closed her eyes, to push this assaulter into invisible blackness. But this time when she opened them again, the shadow had become a man facing her. “Give it to me,” he demanded.
She tried to run. Two strong arms grabbed her. Growling, she fought fiercely. The man yanked the bag from her. She felt the handle tear. In a puddle of invading light, the man turned the bag over, shaking it. Her cardboard-protected mirror, the unfilled vial of perfume, the aging brush, some cloth, the lipstick tube, shards of the wine bottle, the money—all spilled out. He took the bills and the change. Then he shook the bag over and over, to make certain there was no more money.
Shaking out the ashen roses!
“No!” she screamed.
“No!” she screamed.
He flung the bag at her. She knelt over it. It was ripped, still wet from the spilled liquor.
She would get another bag. She had had many. All that mattered was saving the roses.
Her fingers traced the seams of the bag, searching out the dried, flaky petals. They were gone! But maybe along the upper seams— …
A finger stung, she pulled it out. A piece of glass had cut it.
In the severed light, she looked at the red blood. It would dry, the way blood always did. She lowered her finger between her legs. Yes, the blood would dry into flakes and then she would transfer them into a new bag.
Standing, she pressed her bleeding finger between her legs, and with the blood, she drew there the outline of a rose, another, then another, until there was one huge scarlet blossom.
Lost Angels: 10
“White Heat,” Lisa said coolly when Jesse, shirtless and soaked with sweat and exhilaration, returned to the car. Orin had waited for him outside in the whipping wind over the entangled freeways. “You were trying to do White Heat, Jesse. That's easy to guess because that's about the only movie you ever talk about.” She took advantage of the fact that Jesse couldn't answer her because he was panting so heavily. They had frightened her, with all that yelling and laughing in the wind over the howling freeways.
Crashing from the soaring elation of the earlier moments of aimless defiance, Jesse lay back in the seat of the car and closed his eyes as Orin drove away from the area.
Cody Jarrett! Cagney! Jesse could see the bulldog face, tough and sad; yes, even Cody was sad sometimes. Clinging to the rusting ladder earlier, Jesse had felt an invasion of sharp memories of that favorite film: scenes of dark wind outside the motel where the gang stayed—like them, in a motel—and the money—hundreds of thousands in a suitcase—was in the trunk of the car! And Cody had this “red-hot buzz saw” inside his head—because as a kid he'd faked headaches to get attention from his father, who soothed him, the only one who could until he died, or stopped, or Cody's mother took over, tried, but— … The events of the film began to blur. When they told Cody his father died, he went crazy, in prison—no, that was later when Ma was killed by Big Ed and sexy Verna, the two-timers. And most of it happened in Los Angeles! Here, in this city! They might be on the very same street Cody drove on, on his way to that plant they went to rob: Huge metallic spheres and columns, and Cody climbed a steel ladder. All the others in his gang abandoned him, of course, surrendered. Not Cody!—he wouldn't surrender even when the cop said he didn't have a chance. Cody said— … shouted— … ‘Top of— …!” No, that was when he talked to his dead Ma on a black, windy night.
