I can't deny that I'm nervous when I finally get out of the rain and into Faxo's lobby. Pale light stumbles through a thick slab of glass reinforced by hundreds of St. Andrews crosses made of chicken wire. There are four units in the building: one on the ground floor, one on the second floor, and two on the top floor. Faxo's unit is on the second.
When Faxo opens his door, I am surprised to discover that his apartment is actually a wood shop, and that the majority of the space is something of a showroom as opposed to what one might call living quarters. He does not own a television, and, with the exception of the kitchen appliances and stereo, the only piece of furniture in the apartment not made by Faxo goes by the name of Scooter, a dopehead with the attention span of a toddler. A bong sits in front of him, as does a huge bag of what appears to be primo weed. Faxo quickly apologizes for the noise from the workshop downstairs, which, he informs me, specializes in refurbishing limousine engines. The two units upstairs, he adds, have become lofts. “I think there's five kids in each.” He looks to his friend. “Yo', Scoot, have you seen any of them yet?”
“No,” he mumbles. “Hey, dude, blow more doja.” It's pronounced dō'zha.
“What?”
“Fucking Detroitisms,” Faxo says with a smile. Scooter looks confused. “These are the same assholes who 'smoke down'.”
Scooter responds with a gurgling sound that does not come from his throat.
“So you're interested in finding Mordy?” Faxo resumes as he takes a seat in a rocking chair.
“Yes,” I respond. My eyes wander in search of a seat and land on a stool. “He is Coprolalia, right?” as I sit.
“I really don't know,” casually. “I only lived with the guy for a month or two.” He pauses. “You want anything to drink? Water, tea, a cocktail maybe?” He stands.
“No, I'm fine,” I respond as Scooter coughs out a wall of smoke.
“You sure?”
“Yeah. I'm fine.”
“I have some wine.” Before I can decline, he lets out a brief, shallow laugh. “I just realized it's barely noon,” as he makes his way back towards the rocking chair with a 1.5 liter bottle of water retrieved from the nearby counter.
“Actually, it's ten-thirty.”
“Either way, it feels like it's the middle of the night to me,” as he takes his seat once again. “It always takes me three or four days to get used to the time difference. I'm left pretty much wandering around in a fugue-state until then. That being said, I apologize if I'm a bit spacey or…what's the word I'm looking for?”
“Loopy?” Scooter asks.
Willis looks to me with a grin as he unscrews the cap. “Does 'loopy' sound good to you?”
“I would go with faded.”
“Faded? California boy?”
“No,” I respond, “Just a word that came up yesterday.”
He nods. “You know what I just thought about?” Silence. “I haven't thought about this in years: California was supposed to fall into the ocean.”
“I remember hearing that.”
“And yet it didn't.” He takes a sip from the bottle, and quickly screws the cap back on. “Was it a joke, or was it based on scientific study? I don't mean to mock global warming by means of a poor analogy, mind you; I just think it's odd that we don't hear about the death of California as often as we used to — especially now that it's such a drain not only upon our culture, but upon our economy as well. Proposition Thirteen, man,” he shakes his head.
“What's that?”
“Proposition Thirteen. It pretty much allowed the people to vote on the budget. Their choices reflect just how myopic Americans are when it comes to government. They voted to have lower taxes and more social services. It's like wanting…you know, I can't even think of a good simile. It just shows you are fucking stupid people are.” He takes the cap off the bottle. “You know what, I’ll just shut up — you're here to find out about Mordy.” He takes another sip. “I just want to emphasize the fact that I don't know him very well. Our story is pretty brief.”
“It doesn't matter. Any information will help.”
“Well,” recapping, “In the fall of ninety-three I moved into a two bedroom apartment on First Avenue and Seventh. The place wasn't all that nice, but the location was all that mattered to me. You know, back then the Village was really thriving artistically. Today it seems to be nothing more than a bunch of yuppies living out an ironic elegy. Anyway, back then I lived with this guy, Tommy. We were roommates for about a year and a half or so. He was a nice kid out of the Poconos, who tended bar at some place that's not around anymore; it was one of those East Village dives that used to attract a lot of punker kids and deadbeats…something like the International Bar, if you've ever been there.”
“Once or twice,” I respond. “They've closed, you know.”
“Figures,” spitefully. “Regardless, you know the type of place I'm talking about — kids and regulars, dudes down on their luck, dudes that ain't never had any luck to begin with. Tommy used to brag and say that he knew ninety percent of the people who came through the door, maybe not by name, but by face or by drink. And he got on with just about anyone — he was a real chill cat. He would get me and my buddies loaded whenever we went in. I'd cook him dinner the next night. We had a good thing going.
“But, you know, sometimes good people turn into bad people just because of one stupid decision. And Tommy was no exception to this aphorism, trite as it may seem. That being said, there was this one group of kids who came in a lot. A bunch of fucking punks. Everyone hated them. Everyone except this one girl, Hannah, who used to hang out with them quite a bit — not just at the bar, either.
“Now Hannah was a good girl. And she was a fucking piece, too. She had these eyes — Tommy and I used to call them the 'fuck me eyes'. It's not like she tried to do it. She couldn't help it. She just looked like she wanted to attack every dick she saw.
“So, by no real fault of her own, she ended up getting a lot of attention. And, due to her surroundings, it wasn't the kind of attention that a girl necessarily wants. But she handled it well. She was one of those free spirits — not free in the sense that she was flighty or blind to the harsh realities of the real world like most of those liberal arts white girls you meet in Park Slope these days. No, it was more that she was comfortable. With herself. With her surroundings. She was always smiling. She was always laughing. If you called her a chick or a bitch, though,” he laughs and shakes his head; “Man…heads would fucking roll.
“I never could figure out why she spent so much time with the Burnouts, which was the epithet the rest of the regulars attached to the group of losers she hung around. Drugs would be a rational assumption, but she didn't fuck around with that shit. She was a mild drinker; vegan; had hair the color of cotton candy — not too different from some of the types you see running around Williamsburg these days. Only she was for real, know what I mean. And that's what attracted Tommy to her. He wasn't really into the scene at the time, but he certainly liked the music. She knew a lot of the bands floating around the City back then — and not 'know' in either the heard-of or Biblical sense; she knew them personally because she was the beautiful girl with pink hair who everyone wanted to fuck or, failing that, talk to.