We enter the halfway house through the back porch, cocooned by dark metallic fabric. The nuts have finished eating and are digesting there, sitting on the wooden chairs. Upon entering the house, Frances and I separate. She goes to her room; I go on to mine. I’m singing an old Beatles song:
He’s a real nowhere man
Sitting in his nowhere land
Hilda, the decrepit old hag, steps in front of me and asks for a cigarette. I give it to her. Then I grab her head and give her a kiss on the cheek.
“Thank you!” she says, surprised. “That’s the first kiss I’ve gotten in mannnnny years.”
“Do you want another one?”
“Okay.”
I kiss her again, on the other cheek.
“Why, thank you,” she says to me.
I continue on my way, singing Nowhere Man. I get to my room. The crazy guy who works at the pizza place is on his bed, counting his money.
“Hey,” I say to him: “I need you to give me a dollar.”
“A dollar, Mister William? You’re crazy!”
I pry his wallet from his hands. I look for a dollar. I take it.
“Give me my wallet,” the crazy guy groans.
I give it to him, then throw my arm around him affectionately.
“A dollar, man. Just a lousy dollar.” I say to him.
He looks at me. I smile at him. I kiss his face. He ends up laughing himself.
“Okay, Mister William,” he says.
“I’ll pay you back tomorrow,” I say.
I go outside, toward the corner. I’m going to buy today’s paper to look through the ads for a good apartment for Frances and me. A simple apartment, no more than two hundred dollars. I’m happy. Oh, damn it! I think I’m happy. Let me say “think.” Let me not tempt the devil and bring fury and fatality onto myself. I get to the corner bodega. I grab a paper from the rack. I pay with the dollar.
“You have a pending debt,” the bodega owner says. “Fifty cents.”
“Me? From when?”
“A month ago. Don’t you remember? A Coca-Cola.”
“Oh, please! A woman as pretty as you is going to tell me that? Surely it’s a mistake.”
When I call her pretty, she smiles.
“I must be confused,” she then says.
“That’s alright.”
I smile at her. I can still play a woman. It’s easy. You just have to spend some time on it.
“Why don’t you dye your hair blond?” I ask, still keeping up the act. “If you dyed your hair blond, you’d look so much better.”
“You think so?” she says, running her fingers through her hair.
“Sure.”
She opens the cash register. She puts the dollar in. She gives me back seventy-five cents.
“Thank you,” I say.
“Thank you,” she says. “The thing about the Coca-Cola must have been a mistake.”
“That’s alright.”
I leave with the newspaper under my arm, singing Nowhere Man softly. A black man looks at me from the doorway of his house with sinister eyes. As I walk past, I say, “Hi, paisano!”
He smiles. “Damn, Slim. How are you? Who are you?”
“Slim,” I reply. “Just Slim.”
“Damn, well I’m glad to have one more friend. I’m Clean Dough. I arrived on a boat five years ago. I’m here for you. You’ve got a home here.”
“Thank you,” I say. “Thank you, Clean Dough.”
“Now you know!” Clean Dough says, waving his fist in the air good-bye.
I continue toward the home. As I pass a house surrounded by a tall fence, an enormous black dog jumps up and starts to bark angrily. I stop. Carefully, I reach my hand over the fence and stroke his head. The dog barks one more time, confused. He sits on his hind legs and starts to lick my hand. In command of the situation, I lean over the fence and give him a kiss on the snout. I continue on my way. Upon arriving at the boarding home, I see Pedro, the silent Indian who never talks to anyone. He’s sitting in the doorway of the house.
“Pedro,” I say to him. “Would you like some coffee?”
“Yes,” he says.
I give him a quarter.
“Thank you,” he says, smiling. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen Pedro smile.
“I’m Peruvian,” he says. “From the country of the condor.”
I go in. I go to the women’s room and gently push the door. Frances is on her bed, drawing. I sit next to her and kiss her face. She stops drawing and takes me by the arm.
“Let’s look for a house,” I say.
I glance at the front page of the paper.
PEKING REJECTS MARX’S IDEAS AS ANTIQUATED.
AIR PIRATES ARE GOING TO KILL MORE HOSTAGES.
WOMAN WHO KILLED HER HUSBAND EXONERATED.
That’s enough for me. I quickly search for the classifieds and read: “Furnished apartment. Two bedrooms. Terrace. Carpeted. Pool. Free hot water. Four hundred dollars.”
“That one, my angel!” says Frances.
“No. It’s very expensive.”
I keep searching. I read the whole list of rentals, and, finally, point at one with my finger. “This one.”
It’s on Flagler and 16th Avenue. It costs two hundred dollars. You have to go and speak with the owner in person. A woman named Haidee will see people from nine to six. It’s three in the afternoon.
“I’m going there right now,” I tell Frances.
“Oh my God!” she says, pressing herself against me.
“Do I look okay?” I ask her, smoothing my hair with my hands.
“I think you look okay,” she says.
“Then I’m going to talk to that woman,” I say. I stand up.
“My angel,” says Frances, looking for something in her drawer. “Take this and put it under your tongue when you go talk to that woman. It never fails.”
“What is it?”
“A cinnamon twig,” she says. “It brings good luck.”
I take it and put it in my pocket.
“I’ll do it,” I say. I take one of her hands and kiss it. I go out to the street. As I pass by Pepe, the older of the two retards, I take his bald head in my hands and kiss it. He takes my hand.
“Do you love me, little boy?” he says.
“Of course!”
He takes one of my hands and kisses it.
“Thank you, little boy,” he says, moved.
“And me? And me?” René, the other retard, asks from his chair.
“You, too,” I say.
He stands up and comes over to me, dragging his feet. He hugs me tightly. Then he laughs boisterously.
“And me, William?” asks Napoleon, the Colombian midget. “Do you love me? Am I worthy of your affection?”
“Yes,” I say. “You, too.”
Then he comes over to me and hugs me around the waist.
“Thank you, William,” he says, also moved. “Thank you for loving me, too, a sinner.”
I burst out laughing. I loosen myself from his embrace. I go out to Flagler Street.
Upon arriving at Flagler and 8th Avenue, an old American in a wheelchair asks me for a cigarette. He has a blond dirty beard and is wearing rags. He’s missing a leg.
I give him the cigarette.
“Sit down here, just a minute,” he says, taking me by the hand.
I sit on a bench, by his side.
“Have a drink,” he says, taking a bottle of plum wine out of his middle.
“No,” I say. “I have to go.”
“Have a drink!” he orders energetically. He takes a long swig and then passes me the bottle. I drink. I like it. I drink again.