Page 2 - The Myth and the Moment

Morning

Bang! Crash! I’m a bull in a china shop! China bulls, go smash!
Bang! I did exactly as you ordered, Doctor. Yes, good bull, good boy.
Now, take two tablets and call me in the morning. No! They’re too
big: I can’t swallow them. I’ll smash them down! Crash! See, I broke
your word. Then I’ll smash you, bad bull, bad boy. Bang! No, don’t
hit me! Don’t—
Bang! Bang! Bang! Unnh. Don’t hit me. Oh, what a nightmare!
Eyelids: unstick! Daylight? Eyelight. Daylids. What’s that banging?
“You in there, Evangelino? You got fifteen seconds to get out here
and then I’m going to hang up the phone.”
The landlady. Sunday morning. Another ultimatum from the old
tomato. “I’m coming, Mrs. Fulcrone. Just give me a minute. Who is
it?”
“How the hell should I know? This ain’t an answering service, you
old bum. Just be grateful I bother to pick up that pay phone at all.”
Stuff the lame old limbs into the trousers—luckily not a garment
of ambiguous orientation. Same for the deck shoes—no, tennis
shoes—no, sneakers—no, running shoes—ah, can’t keep up with the
trivial terminology of the times. What time is it? Bright enough to be
nine a.m. But it could be earlier: the desert winds have scoured the
basin of all haze and fog; going to be hot again today, maybe over a
hundred. Key’s in the pocket, good. Never bright in the hall. Haven
for photophobic vermin and lodgers. Same old carpet worn down in
a curving path toward the phone; couldn’t get lost in here. Plenty of
bread crumbs to follow, too. Well-scribbled wall-scribblings muted
by the aptly-named fifteen-watt ‘miser’ bulb: Mene, mene, tekel: you
have been weighed and found wanting—by the welfare state. Echh,
better wipe the mouthpiece. And the earpiece.
“Hello?”
“Nathan? It’s Al Hodges. Get ready to roll. We’ve got an
emergency up in Trousdale.”
Great. The boss has to roust me out of bed on my day off.
“But it’s Sunday. Can’t we take care of it tomorrow?”
“Didn’t you hear me? I said it was an emergency. Obviously, I am
going to have to pay you extra for this.”
And what will you charge the client, dear boss?

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