In the Basement of an Abandoned Apartment Building in the South Bronx
Joe Washington grumbled, "Sheeit!" You gotta wake up, Joe Washington! he told himself. Maybe this is the day, man! And he thought he'd called that last voice up from his distant past, that he was trying to give himself hope, or something. "Sheeit!" He put his hands palm down on the concrete floor to push himself to a standing position. He became dimly aware that he'd wet himself in the night, and then that his bottle of Thunderbird was empty. He cursed again. And heard the curse repeated—in his voice—from somewhere close by. He looked about confusedly. He saw the child only for a moment. Then he felt soft pressure at his throat. The pressure increased; he hacked once, a smile broke through his agony, and he died.
In Another Part of the South Bronx
Doris Hall awoke feeling very, very good. Great, in fact. As if, she thought, she'd just spent the night involved in the most exquisite lovemaking of her young life and was basking in the afterglow. Then she remembered that a series of amazingly erotic dreams had carried her through the night. She lingered in bed a long while. She hoped the day wouldn't be a long one.
Something in a corner of the dimly lighted room caught her eye. She looked. The corner was empty. She got out of bed, went to the corner. She felt something brush past her, felt something like a hand touch her bare belly.
She heard a scream from below, from the building's first floor. A quick, abrupt scream, as if it had been broken off midway. And then, from another part of the building, she heard what she knew was gunfire—a handgun, she guessed. Small caliber. It sounded again, and again. Then there was silence.
Several Hundred Yards North
He was an old man, and his eyes were bad, his hearing worse. But his memory was good, and he could not remember seeing anything quite like what he was seeing now.
He rubbed his eyes. He squinted. The image remained. He murmured to himself, "Que pasa?"
It was a bleak landscape he was looking at; one man, a politician, had once compared it to the surface of the moon. The comparison was as much true as poetic.
The rubble of decades of neglect lay here, stretched out over a thousand acres or more. It was normally as still and as motionless as it was bleak.
This morning, it was alive. It moved. The rubble itself seemed to rise up, split into twos and threes, and walk about. Then fall back. Only to rise up again in another place.
But that is what the old man saw. And his eyes were bad. He heard this: ". . . the others, the ones who stayed." And, ". . . survivors, Elena . . ."
And ". . . our island . . ."
He heard more, but thought nothing of it. He spoke no English.
From The Rhinebeck Post: September 27th:
NOSTALGIA CORNER REMEMBER THE STREAKERS
It's the late 70's, you're walking to the library or to your favorite restaurant, you're minding your own business when—whoosh!—from out of nowhere come a half dozen bare bottoms. You gasp. And it's over. The bare bottoms (and God knows what else) are just a memory. "Lord," you say to yourself, "I've just been streaked!"
Remember that?
The good ole days, right?!
Well, they're back!
And they're back with a vengeance!
At least a dozen of the little heathens, all in a line, were reported a week ago on Route 87, just north of Purling, New York—a small town 75 miles north of here—and, in Leeds, several more were spotted in front of the Town Hall, of all places.
Of course, these "sightings" took place in the dead of night, so apparently these streakers are, alas, somewhat less than courageous . . .
From The New York Times, September 29th:
BODY FOUND IN NEW CROTON RESERVOIR A MYSTERY
The nude body of a boy apparently aged twelve or thirteen found floating in the New Croton Reservoir, near Westchester, twenty-five miles north of Manhattan, is baffling investigators. Initial efforts at identifying the boy—who is described as a dark-skinned Caucasian with light blue eyes and very dark, shoulder-length hair—proved futile, and an autopsy performed at Bellevue Hospital by Dr. Urey C. Birnbaum, Chief Pathologist, was, sources say, "inconclusive." The same sources also explained that according to certain confidential documents, the boy's "physiology" is, in several ways, unusual. The sources could not elaborate further.
Asked about the cause of the boy's death, a spokesman for the Coroner's Office explained that the boy "probably drowned," although he would not rule out the possibility that the boy may have been a victim of child abuse.
Dr. Birnbaum . . .