At one in the morning, after negotiating the Base Line checkpoint, I round the corner onto my block. The sidewalk is empty, apart from a lone sneaker orphaned in the gutter. I walk to the halfway house and stop short. The house is dark, the consumers asleep.
Sugar Child’s arrest lingers in the air with a magnetic residue that clings to my skin and won’t let go. I struggle to remember her face, a heartwarming memory to comfort me at this late hour. I fail, due to the fact she’s in the psychiatric lockdown ward at General Hospital on Gilbert Street.
I duck into the California Hotel through a revolving door that deposits me in a near-dark lobby. I wait until the front desk clerk turns his back—I haven’t paid rent in weeks—then I sneak across the lobby, making a beeline for the elevator.
The elevator drops me off on the third floor. I tiptoe to my door, unlock it, and step inside a roasting hot two-room suite. My first stop is the kitchenette. There, I peek in the countertop mini-fridge—I’m welcomed by its sole occupant, an unopened pint of plain nonfat yogurt. I take the yogurt into the other room and plunk myself in a battered wingback chair.
I remove the .25 from my waistband. I set it and the tambourine on a three-legged coffee table, the fourth leg a stack of paperbacks. Then I cram the donations bucket under the chair. I dislike the bucket. It’s a junkie with a bitter habit. The bucket doesn’t like me, either—I didn’t bring home any cash. It snarls: you lame fuck. I’m not satisfied with today’s take. I need more money. You worthless asshole.
So here I am. Flat broke. For the life of me, I don’t know what to do. And I can’t get Dalton’s words out of my head: you’re a priest. You attract trouble.
Maybe he’s right.
I flash on the second-to-last time I made love.
I’ve been out of the pen one night. Back in the world for twenty-four hours. I can’t cope with it. There’s too many colors, too many people. It’s enough to drive me nuts. To relax, I cuddle with my wife, Rhonda, in bed. After a spate of kissing and snuggling, I position myself between her legs. I take her in my mouth. I haven’t done this in years. Frankly, I’m rusty.
I tongue her labia. I gently nip her clit. At first, nothing. Rhonda doesn’t call my name or go overboard with ecstatic groans. I continue to labor until my jaw aches. I can’t breathe; pubic hair and vaginal fluid clog my nostrils.
Finally, she responds with a precious trembling in her legs. I strive onward. I get into a rhythm: tongue up, tongue down. Pause and repeat. It’s a wicked formula—she bucks her pubic bone hard against my nose. At long last, she comes. I smile, victorious. I pull myself up into her arms to share the moment. I want to savor it. It’s been a long time. Too damn long. But she recoils from me, repelled by my nearness. Curling into a fetal ball, she whimpers: “Leave me alone, please leave me alone.”
Shortly after this erotic mishap, my parole officer orders me to find gainful employment. To keep me from returning to the joint. Through the grapevine, I hear about Blessed World.
Blessed World is an evangelical church and nonprofit charity established in the late 1980s. They work with underprivileged communities in the Southland. Their membership is modest—a few thousand parishioners. I apply for an internship with them.
Blessed World’s job application form asks if I’m a felon. I don’t answer the question. Too risky. Luckily, I’m hired for the secretarial pool. I staple papers, xerox reports, whatever needs to get done. When a slot opens up to be a donations solicitor on E Street, I jump at the chance. I pay a fifteen-dollar fee and undergo a five-day training session. I’m assigned a secondhand cleric’s uniform—I rent it by the week. I receive a beribboned certificate that proclaims I’m an ordained priest.
Presto: it’s a whole new me.
E Street had been the Southland’s second-biggest cruising strip in its heyday. Frank Zappa cruised it. Along with Hells Angels on Harley panhead choppers.
That was a long time ago. The strip isn’t famous anymore. But I don’t care. I just fantasize how much money I’ll bring in. Oodles of cheese. Baskets of it. Thousands of dollars, thanks to my winning personality. Nobody will be able to resist my sales pitch.
Of course, I bring the .25 with me.
□ □ □
I’m ten when my father buys me the .25. He purchases it from a pawnshop on D Street. “You’re old enough to own a weapon,” he pontificates. “Old enough to learn to use it.” With a child’s wisdom, I’m ambivalent about the pistol. I’d rather have a skateboard. Yet I religiously practice firing it. Plinking daily at bottles and cans. One summer evening I’m shooting in the backyard. An older neighborhood kid jumps the fence. His zit-embattled face lights up when he spies the .25. “Let me see that thing,” he clamors. Cowed by his biological seniority, I hand it to him. Since I’ve already decimated every can and bottle in sight, there is nothing left to destroy. Providentially, a snow-white rabbit hippity hops into view. A renegade pet that has escaped its owners. “Watch this,” he brags. “I’ll nick that rabbit in the ear.” Lo and behold—he misses by a mile, drilling the bunny’s guts. Drenched in its own blood, the animal drags itself under an oleander bush to die. The kid tosses the .25 at me like it’s got cancer. “I’d better split,” he dithers.
I never see him or the rabbit again. That’s my life.
I drowse in the chair while the night spins a path toward morning. The room is hot, but I’m too tired to crank up the air conditioner and too tired to undress. The yogurt has been abandoned on the chair’s armrest. I’ll have it for breakfast, if it isn’t spoiled.