Page 76 - The Myth and the Moment

Evening

them into electric eels, whipping their victim toward the beach. Now,
there’s a zero-sum equation for sure: robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Drain the reserves now, and spend a lot later to refill them. Certainly
feel like taking a nap now. How long did I doze off at Phil’s? An
hour? Two hours. My papers. At Phil’s. In Phil’s closet, filed under
Death Row. No, no, no! Don’t take my child away! I’m too old to
start over!
“Dollar ninety-three.”
“Eh? Oh.”
Got a few bucks left; get to the bank tomorrow, take fifty out of
my pay-check for expenses until the end of the month. Now, what to
do? Go back to Phil’s? Go home? Place is a mess. Don’t know if I
locked the door on the way out. Got to think of some way to get Phil
to surrender The Myth. Aestheria: she got Phil to listen to me before.
Yeah. What if she’s in it, too? No matter; she won’t try to poison me.
But where did she live? Corner of Montague and... Montague and.
Lost it, damnation! Could just start walking and hope to recognize
the joint. Not the same in the dark. Ham knows. So where is he when
you need him? Probing the soft underbelly of American excess,
location unknown. Wait. I’ve got his card. Yeah. Cleanest piece of
paper in my wallet. Just a little soggy, legibility unimpaired; unlike my
vision. There’s a phone, hungry for a quarter. Got it. 9-3-5-0-9-5-1.
Let it ring. Maybe he doesn’t really have a phone, if he lives in his car.
Maybe this is the number of another telephone booth. Maybe it’s a
bar on Central Avenue. Why am I—
“Hello.”
“Ham? Is that you?”
“Who’s calling?”
“Nate Evangelino.”
Sure sounds like him.
“Oh, yeah. Nate. Well, you sure are lucky, man. I was just leaving.
What’s happening?”
“You know, this morning—or was it afternoon?—you took me to
Aestheria’s apartment. Where exactly was that? I remember it was on
a corner.”
“Right. Montague and Barbossa.”
“Ah. Great. Well, how have you been, Ham?”

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