The dream had made me start thinking about things I try not to. Like my life.
When I first joined, I tried to think of myself as a business man or on darker days, some sort of “public servant”. As I got older and saw more, I admitted that I was doing it for myself. The money was good and more importantly, I had a knack for the job. This life beats the hell out of posing for a damn camera and hiding behind a SLA badge for protection. It let me live by my wits and die on my terms, or so I told myself.
Maybe I was just trying to get back at someone.
Whenever my mother’s next hit started to take effect, she used to tell us that our father was an operative or some kind of secret agent. Yeah right. He was so secret that we never saw him and he left us to rot in the Palisades when I was seven. I don’t care what happened to him, but I know that I still hold it against him. Rational, no but it’s the way I feel. My feelings for her weren’t any better.
When I climbed out of the truck that morning, I decided that I needed to get away for a while and think. I stayed alert as I took the subway from Shaeffer Street, then climbed the busted concrete stairs to the street level near Mercy Court. There were hardly any people in the area, which was a change from ten or so years ago. I remember people in the streets, vendors, children playing, the smell of ethnic cooking in the air- Ok, maybe I’m romanticizing it too much. It was livable with plenty of people and we mostly got along. I’ll leave it at that.
Where there were scores of families, now there were just scattered drunks and junkies clustered around the occasional burning barrel or huddled in the alleys. The little bit of sky I could remember seeing was blocked by some kind of new construction. I’ve always heard that the sky is blue, but I’ve never seen anything except gray. I tried to remember if there was a sky in my dreams, but I couldn’t.
Some of the same landmarks were still here and triggered memories. I saw old Mrs. Wilson’s stoop where the guys used to meet. Over to the right was the door to what used to be a ShopINgo where I got my first kiss from a cute redheaded girl named Carol. Dead ahead was the rotting husk of what used to be my home.
I walked past the stone gargoyle that used to hold the “Palisades Terrace” plaque and patted it on the head. The metal plate was gone and it was covered with pockmarks and spray paint. What had once been a guardian was now a misshapen old man with a bad back. Sorry gramps, things are tough all over. I stopped just past it to look at the tenement.
It didn’t seem as tall as it once did, maybe it was just my perspective as an adult. After I counted the stories I realized there was a reason. Dull scorch marks crowned the fourth story and left charred spikes where the top floors had been. I started forward and winced as a stench burned into my nostrils.
The once deep moat of paper and refuse was filled with a sea of split orange bags and rotting garbage. I remember having to wade up to my stomach through it, but now my legs were long enough to step without problems. The fear of piggy men waiting for me underneath the paper died years ago, but I was still nervous. What was I afraid of? Ghosts?
I smiled as I still had to climb out of the moat to reach the stairwell. Maybe I wasn’t so short of a kid after all. The stairway beyond was dark and stale, but nothing lunged at me. After a few moments, I gathered my resolve and pulled the flashlight out of my jacket. I needed to do this.
The smell in the stairway managed to be both stale and putrid at the same time, so I pulled a cheap respirator over my mouth and tested it. Its “evergreen” filter covered enough of the smell for me to go on. The steps were littered with trash, bottles, and the occasional syringe or spent condom, but no bodies. I was thankful and swept the flashlight across my path. This part of the building seemed just like I remember, if a bit smaller and frailer. I started my climb.
Near the second landing, a squad of red eyes challenged me, but gave ground when I came closer. I never got a good look at the rats, but the sound of their scuttling was louder than my steps so I pulled my handgun. On the third floor, graffiti decorated sections of the walls and part of the ceiling was eaten away to show the structure above the tenenment. The metal fire door I remember was missing, but then I noticed it was lying on the stairs to the fourth floor. Deep furrows (claw marks?) had split the rusted metal into strips like cracked concrete. I felt my grip on the pistol tighten at the same time my shoulders bundled up. What in hell could do that?
For a few moments I seriously thought about leaving, but held my ground. I had come this far and needed to do this. Keeping my ears open, I stepped as quietly as possible into the passageway. Newspapers pasted by drizzle clung to the floor and walls like a cheap carpet. I glanced at a couple, but the ink had faded into yellow pulp and was unreadable. It looked like no one had been here in years and I couldn’t blame them. The floor creaked and popped under my weight, but didn’t give enough to stop me.
Apartment 304’s doorway was framed by busted molding and rotted wood. Like all the other apartments I saw, the doors were gone, either rotted through or busted off their hinges by looters. This one was still here lying inside the entrance, covered by debris and broken ceiling tiles. I stepped across the threshold and into the shadows of my memories.
The couch that my mother had lived on for years was still here, but it was covered with mounds of mildew and dust instead of her bloated body. Twisted springs stretched upward like barbed wire and stuffing was matted like fur to the cushions. The majority of what crappy furniture we owned had long since been carried off or disintegrated into splinters of compressed wood. I crept forward, but no ghosts came at me from the shadows.
The room that belonged to Jim and I was off to the left and I looked in. For a second, I saw two boys playing contract killer in the room, but they were gone with a blink of the eye. The front wall was blasted out and I could see the orange street below and the falling rain. The apartment was empty and held no connection for me anymore. I felt hollow and mildly frustrated. The part of me I was looking for was dead and had dissolved under the rain.
What did I expect to find? Some kind of closure? Wandering through these halls had only started my mind digging the dirt on wounds that had long ago scarred over. This really wasn’t what I needed and I was leaving. The feeling of the approaching storm was getting stronger and then the hair on the back of my neck stood up.
Jingle.
JingleJingle.
Behind me, something rattled metal against metal. It sounded more like a chain than coins. Besides, no one in these projects had any pocket change.
I carefully clicked the safety off and took a slow breath, feeling reassured by the pistol’s weight. The sound had come from somewhere behind me in the living room. I heard a pop of the linoleum in the walking area behind me and I spun around with the weapon towards the sound.
Nothing.
There was nothing there.My breathing was ragged and I held the weapon at arm’s length for a few moments, waiting for something to appear or my heart to explode, whichever came first. No ghosts, no Slops, not even a rat step up to draw my fire. I lowered the pistol and chastised myself for being jumpy. The piggy men of my youth were long gone and I was alone.
I was wrong
“Oink! Oink!”
I stepped forward and tried to spin around, but something but grabbed my arm. When I saw the grinning pig mask, I almost dropped the weapon on my foot.
He pushed me forward with a laugh and I tumbled backwards into the living room. I gripped the pistol like a drowning man with a life raft and pointed it at him.Dark eye sockets leered from behind the stitched pigskin and regarded me. His wide grin and heavy face stretched the edges of the tanned skin giving the eye sockets an oriental look. I was shaking so badly that I couldn’t breathe. I prayed that I didn’t drop the pistol. How did he get behind me? What was he doing here?
“Surprise! Happy to see me?” he said, looking around. “Nice digs, looks like Mom’s keeping house just like she used to. Looks like shit.”
I gasped, swallowing bile, then coughed it up. Spitting into the floor, I wiped my mouth with my right arm. He started to step forward and I raised the pistol again.
“What’s wrong Mikey? You don’t look so well. Kinda green again. You eating enough veggies?”
I concentrated on trying to recover my breathing and all I could muster was a growl.
“Don’t fucking move.”“Or what, you’ll shoot me? We’ve already went over this little bro-“ he started.
“You aren’t my brother you son of a –“
“Now, now, language. Keep that up and I’ll have to wash your mouth out like Daddy did when you called him an ‘mf’. Remember that? Your tongue swelled up like a dead rat and you couldn’t taste for weeks.”
I had forgotten that, or at least tried to. I had been mad at my father for being gone and called him a motherfucker. He washed my mouth out with window cleaner. I still remember him telling me not to swallow or I’d die.
“There’s no way you can know about th-“
“Why not Mikey? I was there. I’ve always been around. Always been around to watch over you and make you into a man like Dad wanted you to be.” His grin had grown wider and he stepped forward. The linoleum popped, startling me and I clasped the pistol with both hands.
“Oh, come on! I used to pick you up when you fell and fight the bullies for you. I even beat the hell out of you when you wouldn’t help take care of Mom.”
He cocked his head for a moment and the mask took on a darker slant. “ I never did get you for when you tried to kill her that time. Boy, do you deserve a good whuppin. You ever wonder why dad REALLY left?”
The boom of my handgun startled me and it nearly jumped out of my hands. He clutched his abdomen and fell to his knees with a groan, then slumped over. A dark liquid spread onto the floor around him and all I could do was stare. The next thing I knew I was down the stairwell, through the garbage, and away from the Palisades. I calmed down by the time I hit the subway. After a few wary looks, I remembered to put the handgun away.
What had I done?
I had killed him.
I killed the piggy man.
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