Spondulix: A Romance of Hoboken

by Di Filippo, Paul

  “The Millionaires.”

  “Don’t know ’em.”

  “Yo La Tengo under a different name. They didn’t want to get in trouble with their label over playing for free at an illegal gig like this.”

  The opening to Pink Floyd’s “Money” rang out, sampled cash-register noises. The singer came in:

  “Money, it’s a drag—”

  Rory downed the last of his beer. Beatbox had left to circulate with his Mexicanized crullers. Rory threw the remainder of his sample down and ground it surreptitiously underfoot. Courtesy extended only so far. He braved the mass at the kegs again and drew another cup of dark ale. Then he went in search of Erlkonig.

  Dancers filled the center of the pavilion. The energy and enthusiasm of the thinly disguised Yo La Tengo had brought dozens to their feet. Rory skirted the swirling couples, reaching the balustrade along the perimeter of the patio. As alert as anyone who had just polished off a pint and a half of Glaswegian beer, Rory scanned the scene for a glimpse of Erlkonig. But the mischievous man didn’t possess the grace to show. Netsuke neither.

  The music, now a hypnotic jam, began to have a soothing effect on Rory’s stressed nerves. Perhaps he was misjudging Erlkonig. Look at all the happiness the anarchic auteur was producing here tonight. Surely his motives were good, his heart pure. Rory decided to speak gently to the albino, sound him out, attempt to temper Erlkonig’s enthusiastic largesse with elderly wisdom. No need to get excited. Arguments and violence never solved anything.

  Strolling on until he reached the Manhattan side of the curving stone rampart, Rory stopped. He set down his second beer with exaggerated caution atop the broad barrier and looked out and down, away from the party at his back.

  Beyond the pitted stone railing the land fell vertically away, straight down some fifty feet to Sinatra Drive. Cars streamed along the curving expressway, headlights sweeping across the night. The sounds of blatting horns and hissing tires drifted up. Just beyond this busy highway lapped the wide Hudson. Its gently rippling velvet surface reflected the lights from the fabulous gemmed cliffs of Manhattan, remote as some mirage of Baghdad. The river diffused a musky, estuarial smell, not at all unpleasant. Tonight the grace notes of its scent complemented the omnipresent coffee signature smell of Hoboken.

  Midway out in the river a luminescent white form broke the surface briefly. Rory received a swift mixed impression of perhaps a crest, a neck, a snout— Axel? Axel! But the apparition disappeared almost as soon as Rory sighted it, leaving him without a definite ID.

  Rory blinked three times fast. He wasn’t that drunk yet, was he? Had anyone else witnessed the manifestation? He turned to his left.

  Rory had been vaguely aware upon arriving at this spot that a woman he did not recognize had been leaning on her forearms on the stone railing, dreamily regarding the distant city. Now however she stood straight up with a shocked expression on her pleasant face, the palms of her hands pressed flat to the stone.

  “Did you see anything in the river just now?” she asked Rory.

  “I sure did. Looked like a horse to me.”

  “Do you think it could be one of the Central Park carriage horses, gotten loose somehow? They’re stabled not too far from the river.”

  “I don’t think so. Why would it swim so far out? Maybe though. But didn’t the beast seem awfully big to you?”

  “Hard to tell with nothing for scale.”

  Neither Rory nor the woman seemed able to dredge up any further insights into the odd phenomenon, the vision they had shared. They looked about for other witnesses, but no one else appeared to have caught the evanescent sight. The exclusive and mutual hallucination, if such it were, had formed an instant and almost tangible bond between Rory and the woman, almost embarrassing in its intensity. The woman lowered her eyes for a moment, and Rory took advantage of her diverted attention to size her up.

  A thick mane of brown hair with golden highlights tumbled over her shoulders. She wore a peach-colored halter top accentuating nicely her ample bust. A short khaki skirt displayed her attractively coltish legs. Leather sandals laced up her calves. By no means unlined, her face nonetheless shone with graceful beauty, an assemblage of entrancing planes and alluring symmetries. A pair of prescription eyeglasses, secured by a cord draped like reins, shielded hazel eyes. Rory guessed she might have attained nearly his own age.

  Rory felt the residual emotions from the experience they had just shared developing now into a powerful attraction. Just then The Millionaires ceased playing, paused for applause, and launched into an old Byrds tune: “Chestnut Mare.”

  Rory watched the woman’s eyes widen in astonishment at the synchronicity of song with riparian ghost, and knew that his own face too bore a look of amazement. Then they both burst out laughing.

  “Well,” said the woman, wiping a happy tear from the corner of one eye, finger swiping beneath plastic lens, “all my friends told me Hoboken wouldn’t be what I expected, I guess they were right.”

  Rory’s mouth had dried right up. Her laughter had sounded so lovely. He sipped at his beer, hoping the alcohol would confer the power of witty banter on him. But as so often happened, the beer opened up a channel only to banal clichés.

  “So, you’re new in town?”

  “Yup. I just moved to Hoboken from Chelsea. My building went co-op.”

  “What made you pick this place? I mean, how did you hear about Hoboken?”

  “Daniel Pinkwater.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “A writer. The Hoboken Chicken Emergency…?”

  Rory felt like an illiterate idiot. “I’m afraid I don’t read all that much these days. And I never— “

  The woman’s laugh denied his chagrin. “Who would expect a big athletic guy like you to know a kids’ book anyway? Unless you’re married with kids of your own, of course…?”

  Big athletic guy? Promising, very promising. But he’d better clear up one misconception. “Married? No, not married. Never married.”

  “Lucky you. I was, and it didn’t last. So now I just sit at home reading good kids’ books. They take your mind off so many adult things like bills and work.”

  Rory latched onto the life preserver she had thrown him. “Work. You work. Of course you work. But where? What’s your job?”

  “Oh, I’m just one of your typical paper-shufflers. Low-level management at a firm too boring to describe.”

  Rory saw no signpost to further inquiry, and the conversation faltered. The Millionaires segued into the Clash’s “Julie’s Been Working for the Drug Squad.” Desperately wanting their talk to continue, Rory turned back to the topic of the city.

  “Hoboken’s a nice place to live. Small, friendly, accessible. Not the quietest place though. We’ve got some real weirdoes here, wild types.” Rory halted, struck by a sudden fear. “You don’t know them do you? The Beer Nuts?”

  “No, I don’t know a soul here.”

  Relief flooded Rory. “They’re throwing this party tonight. Nice enough people, but they get a little crazy sometimes, if you know what I mean.”

  The woman looked around her. Across the lawn a large rubber kiddie pool had been inflated and filled with creamed corn. Two naked guys wrestled in the slop. Leather ’n’ Studs were playing badminton without a net, using a small sex-toy as a shuttlecock. To further enhance the game, Leather rode atop Beatbox’s shoulders while a huffing Nerfball supported Studs. The score seemed tied. Another dozen people had formed a human pyramid just for the hell of it. Cardinal Ratzinger appeared out of nowhere and scampered to the top, eliciting ouches from liberal use of claws. Once atop the fleshy ziggurat, the cat let out an unearthly yowl. A high- school-age girl had climbed atop the bandstand to dance while The Millionaires strummed “Can’t Buy Me Love.” The volunteer had doffed her pants and top, gyrating in her underwear.

  The Outlaw Party had reached escape velocity.

  “I think I understand. I know I should be more hip or something, but sometimes this type
of party makes me a little scared. It all seems so out of control.”

  Rory could hardly believe his ears. Did such women still exist? Her lack of prior connection to the Beer Nuts had only been enhanced by her evident distaste for their more outrageous dimensions on display. Rory felt immensely attracted to this stranger.

  “How did you stumble onto this party anyway?”

  “I don’t live far away. I set out for a walk and just sort of got carried along in the crowd.”

  “Are you enjoying yourself?”

  “Well, to tell the truth, I wasn’t much—until we saw what we saw and started talking.”

  Rory took another sip of his beer to hide his excitement, Unbelievable!

  “Actually, I could use a drink. But I didn’t have any luck getting to the refreshment table. Everyone was so rough. One woman actually yanked my glasses string in order to get ahead of me.”

  Rory experienced a protective anger. “What jerks! But I’m almost as big a jerk for not offering to get you something. Don’t go anywhere.”

  “That’s very kind of you. I won’t move an inch.”

  Rory floated off to the kegs to draw a Stella. During the time he was gone the Millionaire’s played the Wonder Stuff’s “It’s Yer Money I’m After, Baby,” and Rory’s thoughts spun in a hundred delightful directions.

  Rory returned. The band had swung back to classic Beatles: “You Never Give Me Your Money.”

  Handing the frothy cup over, Rory said, “My name’s Rory, by the way.”

  “Addie.”

  They shook hands. Addie’s was slim, warm. From within his own skin, Rory felt his mitt to be a big sweaty bear paw.

  “Unusual name,” Rory said.

  “I was just going to comment on yours. Mine’s short for Atalanta. Atalanta Swinburne.”

  “Mine’s not short for anything.” Opting for further nominative deterministic commentary, he blurted, “Honeyman.”

  “Please?”

  “My last name’s Honeyman.”

  “Do you own—”

  “The sandwich shop on Washington?” Rory was slightly mortified. “Yeah, that’s me.”

  Addie sipped her beer, eyeing him slyly and sexily over the rim of her cup. “I’ve been meaning to try you.”

  Rory gulped. “Oh, please, come on in. Anytime.”

  “I will.”

  The Millionaires stayed in a Beatles groove: “Give Me Money (That’s What I Want).” Rory timed the silence taffying between him and Addie at thirty seconds, though it seemed much longer.

  “The water looks cold,” Addie said finally. “I’d hate to be in it myself. Do you think a horse could swim safely all the way across the river?”

  “Oh, sure, don’t worry about old Axel.”

  “Axel?”

  “Sorry. Just a horse I knew once.”

  Addie shivered. “Feel that breeze! Do you mind if we move?”

  Rory’s heart raced. She had said “we.” The pronoun had never carried such seductive heft.

  Looping around the dancers and spectators, they left the river view behind. Trying to stay together in the tumult, Rory dared to grip Addie’s upper arm. She didn’t complain.

  Addie and Rory found an unoccupied bench beneath a big maple. They sat. Addie crossed her legs and her skirt slid further up her thighs. In the shadows her flesh resembled cool marble. She didn’t tug her skirt down, and Rory tried not to stare. Quietly, they began to talk.…

  Atalanta Swinburne had been born in Asheville, North Carolina, Thomas Wolfe’s birthplace. (As soon as she revealed this origin, Rory could detect a muted trace of accent in her voice.) Her father, Weston, had taught English at the University there, with a focus on his Victorian namesake and peers; her mother, Corinna, was employed as a secretary in the same department. Quite old when Addie had been born, an unplanned addition to two older siblings, Weston and Corinna had retired by the time their teenaged daughter enrolled at the same school, circa 1968, just when Rory had been rather confusingly busy some distance further south. After graduation with a liberal arts BA, Addie had gotten married to her high-school sweetheart. (Unnamed, and Rory didn’t press.) The marriage lasted five years before a breakup about which Addie revealed little. No children cluttered the split.

  Looking to flee bad memories, Addie moved to Chicago, where she had some relatives to facilitate her transition. There she had quickly gotten a job with the Encyclopedia Britannica organization. Over the years, her editorial responsibilities had enlarged to include all entries beginning with the letter “Q”. One day she had a big fight with her boss. Her superior had sided against her in an important spelling argument. Addie had wanted to spell the name of the Moslem holy book in an arguably more authentic fashion, “Quoran,” thus gaining a significant additional entry, while her rival editor—”Mister K,” she dubbed him—insisted on the more traditional “Koran.” Addie quit on principle.

  She moved to New York and got her current job. After that her life had settled down into what she supposed was a rather boring routine. Her market-forced removal from Manhattan to Hoboken constituted the biggest thing to happen to her in years. The change made her feel, she admitted, more alive, as if she were entering some exciting new era of her life.

  Enraptured, Rory listened with his full attention. The parallels between his life and Addie’s astonished him. Both born in small towns. Both steeped in early disappointments—romantic and vocational—that caused them to relocate. Both washed up by life’s currents on the shores of Hoboken.

  When Addie had finished talking, Rory tried to convey this sense of how his past dovetailed with hers, spilling personal history long dammed up. He stressed how marvelous the coincidence of their meeting seemed to him. When he had finished, Addie offered her complete agreement, except with one disclaimer:

  “You’ve seen so much more than me, though, Rory. Imagine actually being in the Olympics, not to mention working in a real circus. Why, when I was little I dreamed about being the girl who rode the elephants!”

  “Hell, I haven’t done all that much— “

  Addie leaned closer to him. “Oh, but you have!”

  Her breath issued sweetly from her parted lips. Rory leaned toward her —

  At that exact moment someone chose to deliver a hearty slap upon Rory’s back, just as The Millionaires broke into Van Morrison’s “Blue Money.”

  “Hey, moll, glad I finally found you here! Come meet a great new buddy of mine.”

  Rory looked up into Erlkonig’s ghostly leering face. “Earl, really, couldn’t these unwanted introductions wait until another time?”

  Ignoring Addie, Erlkonig spoke insistently and with dope-tinged brightness. “No, no, moll, this is crucial. You gotta talk to this guy right now. C’mon.” He tugged at Rory’s arm.

  “Okay, okay, I’m coming. Let’s get this craziness over with. Addie, would you please wait here for me?”

  “Of course.”

  Rory got reluctantly up and followed the manic Erlkonig. The Millionaires were playing Three Dog Night’s “Mama Told Me Not To Come.” The chief Beer Nut brought Rory to a waiting couple, an unknown man and a familiar woman. Suki Netsuke wore a severe pout. She daggered Rory with her eyes, then looked haughtily away after insuring he had adequately registered her mysterious displeasure.

  Her partner was The Man in The Suit. Young and sleek, with neatly styled hair and a smooth-shaven face that looked as if it had been razored clean mere minutes ago, he appeared as out of place in this setting as a bruise on a fashion model’s cheek. Far from showing unease at the bizarre surroundings, however, the newcomer exhibited a kind of unflappable ignorant confidence.

  Thrusting out his hand, the man said, “Mister Honeyman, pleased to meet y’awl. Name’s Sterling, Lew Sterling.” Sterling’s accent was thick as a steer’s skull. Rory felt a mean urge to imitate it, but refrained. Instead, he politely shook the outstretched hand.

  “Take my card, please,” Sterling said. Bemusedly, Rory accepted the to
ken. The card said:

  Lewis Sterling, President

  Houston Savings & Loan

  “no indictments since 1989”

  “Houston?” said Rory. “I’m afraid I don’t— “

  Sterling snatched the card back. “Sorry. Old card. Here.”

  The new card proclaimed:

  Lewis Sterling, President

  Hoboken Savings & Loan

  “banking for the new millennium”

  In Spondulix We Trust

  Crimson filters swung over Rory’s vision. He spun around and gripped Erlkonig by the throat.

  “Earl, you and I are going to step aside for a little talk.”

  Erlkonig’s face had mottled in intriguing patterns in response to Rory’s chokehold. Livid islands and swollen veins interrupted his epidermal milkiness. Rory switched his grip to the nape of Erlkonig’s neck and hustled the man offstage.

  Some distance away, in a small eddy of quiet around a trash can, Rory stopped and released his captive.

  “Earl, exactly what the fuck is going on?”

  Rubbing the back of his neck, Erlkonig said, “I can’t discuss anything with you when you’ve been drinking.”

  “Drinking! I’ve had two beers! What about you! You re as high as the space shuttle.”

  “See now, this is what I mean. You’re flipping out on me. Anger is conquering your rational side.”

  “I think I’ve got good reason to get angry, Earl. What does that creep’s card mean, ‘In spondulix we trust’? Out with it! Tell me!”

  “Later, moll, later. I’m sorry I interrupted your makeout session. Obviously your hormones have flooded your brain. No way you can talk sensibly now, pumped up with estrogen.”

  “Testosterone. The male hormone is testosterone.”

  “No, man, it’s estrogen.”

  “Testosterone.”

  “Estrogen.”

  “Testosterone!”

  “Estrogen!”

  Rory’s head spun. Why was he shouting the name of a human bodily chemical like this? Once more he was allowing himself to be diverted. He had to concentrate on learning Erlkonig’s schemes.

  “Well, I’ll see you later, shell,” said Erlkonig gaily and began to slink off.