That kid on Pulaski

Excerpt from a letter to Renee Angers

Renee, yeah, I’m doing relatively well, as much as can be expected anyway. Coming home from a late night poker game, well out of my head, had just finished smoking and the normal beer intake, laughing, good music on the radio, and we (the blonde, a friend, and myself) take a back road that's different from our normal route- what a move. It was in conversation around the cards, one of the players says, 'Take Pulaski down to RT25A. It’s much faster and no cops.' and so of course...the blonde behind the wheel while I play with the volume knob, the friend in the back (a well imbalanced brunette) is telling a story that I’m not listening to when the blonde asks, 'What's that?' And I see, and laugh, saying, 'It's just some chubby kid. But what the hell's he doing on the side of the road at 4 in the morning?' The chubby kid; ha, I still call him the chubby kid and so do the rest of us that won the bad lotto that night. We get closer and the blondes applying brakes, we finally see details, the chubby kids face; (he's waving us down) white as milk, bone white, new baby teeth white but you could tell that it wasn't just his complexion. The blonde drives by, more brake, open mouth, 'We have to turn around. That kid needs help.' I second with a bad feeling rumbling around the gut area, the imbalanced brunette is 'No, no, no, I don’t think it’s a good idea.' But by then we’re U-turning across empty lanes (past 4 in the morning and not much traffic) and I’m out of the car much faster than I wish I was because chubby kid rolled-waddled-shuffled his meaty bulk over to me, ‘My friends hurt. By the tree. Somebody hit him with…’ but I’m already (much faster than I wish I was) by the tree and looking; no shoes, clean socks, laid out, bad news, tan cargo pants worn down below the ass and a t-shirt un tucked, arms at all the wrong angles, face, well, features, weren’t a hundred percent because it was dark, also, real bloody…bad news. I moved his arm, felt his chest, no luck, (and it wasn’t just like he was sleeping- that’s what I said to myself; it’ll be just like feeling up some cute chick at a party that’s past out off Rufenol, Ketamine…the wrong idea. It was rag doll dead weight that had no give and no spark, no tension, no nothing, no movement, nothing involuntary even) and then I put my ear to his chest, no luck, checked pulse at both wrists no luck, checked neck (that too, was at a shitty angle, all wrong from a skeletal standpoint) no luck, then shaking blonde next to me, shaking white chubby kid next to her, imbalanced brunette fidgeting in the dark, someone hands me a cell phone, ‘Just talk to them I can’t do it.’ EMT operator asks ‘Is there a pulse?’ ‘None, I checked everywhere, I don’t think there’s any…’ (I’m almost hysterical) ‘Just calm down Sir. Do you know CPR?’ ‘Yes’ looking down though, when she asked me that, I caught eyes for the first time and understood it was green pastures, clouds, harps maybe, who knows, it was something out of reach- ‘Do you want to try giving the boy CPR’ and I looked, wiped the kid’s mouth, that shitty angle of neck- ‘No. I don’t think he needs that.’ ‘Are you sure Sir?’ ‘Yes, he doesn’t need that, call this kid’s family, get professionals out here…’ And eventually the police, the ambulance, notepads and questioning the chubby kid, the blonde taking names (a cop trick to calm nerves when they pulled up and saw us, all of us white and all of us shaking, stupid lost lambs) and I walked away, back to the car, to wait it out.

I stood pissing by the front left tire, but got most of it on my pants. Smoked cigarettes that bounced like a laser light show- burning cherry in the dark, bad hands, bit of a mess) and then somehow we were home. Pacing around the kitchen drinking beer and stirring a pot of Manhattan clam chowder. It was hell of a big pot, too. I used 2 cans of that condensed shit that was on sale last week at the Stop and Shop. Also a large can of ‘Pre-Shucked and Diced Clams’ that had a thick layer of dust around the lid. I made enough to feed a large family. Added spices; paprika, black pepper, a little oregano, tasted it, a little salt, it was good, resourceful chef and all that I am…but the blonde wants nothing to do with clam chowder and neither do dead kids nor their chubby friends. I ate two bowls of it and then tossed the rest into the trash. That was it. I really didn’t see any reason to put it in the fridge.