Henry of Atlantic City (16 page)

“Why did you let the gorilla out of the cage?”

Henry said he didn’t know.

“I’m sure you don’t,” the old priest said. Then he smiled and showed his gold teeth. “Do you still remember
The Apocryphon of John
and the other things you told me about?”

Henry said he remembered everything.

“Do you remember your dreams?”

Henry said yes.

“Tell me about them.”

Henry asked which dreams, the sleeping ones or the awake ones.

“Any ones you can remember.”

Henry told Dr. Alt that he dreamed he was with his father and Sy and the Whore of Jersey City and Helena and they all lived on a boat together and sometimes Sy’s sister and Big Henry Game to visit.

“Is that an asleep or an awake dream?”

Henry said it was an awake one.

“Do you miss your father?”

Henry said I am not like him but I clothed myself with everything of his.

Dr. Alt took out a handkerchief and blew his nose. Then he folded it and put it back in his pocket. “Where did you hear that?”

Henry said the angel in his ear.

“Has the angel always been there?” Dr. Alt asked.

Henry said yes and without the angel in his ear he wouldn’t know what to say or think. Every saint has to have an angel with wings to carry him away.

“Away from what?”

Henry said from all earthly things.

“I see.” Dr. Alt smiled and his gold teeth showed again. “Sort of like a divine spark, right?”

Henry said in Greek the word
philosophy
means
love of wisdom
.

Dr. Alt laughed. “Yes. That’s exactly right. What interests me is where the spark—or the wisdom—comes from. That’s the most fascinating question I can think of. It’s a beautiful mystery. It is what gives shape to my faith. I don’t only think like a priest, you know. As a psychologist, I
consider the words and pictures which occur in the mind to be an
epiphenomenon
of that mysterious spark.”

Henry asked what an epiphenomenon was.

“I’m glad you asked. It’s a Greek word too. It means something that arises out of but does not depend upon. Just as consciousness can be seen as a by-product of brain activity, words and symbols can be seen as an
epiphenomenon
of consciousness. You don’t seek the meaning of a symbol in the
brain
. The brain just is. You look to consciousness and to the symbol itself.” He stopped and smiled. “But I don’t want to confuse you.” He reached down and picked up his cane.

Henry asked Dr. Alt who his favorite saint was.

“Thomas Aquinas,” the old priest said. “Maybe one day you’ll learn about him.”

Henry said his favorite was Saint Augustine. He asked if Thomas Aquinas had foreknowledge of the Perfect Mind.

Dr. Alt laughed. “I’m sure
he
didn’t think so,” he said. “Aquinas was a realist. He would not have claimed anything like that.”

After the meeting Henry went back to the dormitory and lay down on his bed. He wondered what Dr. Alt would say if he told him about Mr. Earl and Pearl and figured it would only get him in trouble. He was glad he had kept his mouth shut but he hoped Mr. Earl and Pearl went to jail and were put to slow and painful deaths because they deserved it. It was like Sy said, you had to keep the
stuff you took seriously to yourself. Dr. Alt would probably agree with that.

Mr. Miller came in. “What are you doing here, Henry? It’s time for gym.”

Henry stared at the ceiling and even though his eyes were open he pretended he was sleeping.

“C’mon, Henry. Get up.”

Henry kept looking at the ceiling. The angel in his ear said the flesh will not rise.

“Are you feeling sick?”

Henry tried and tried not to repeat the angel’s words but he couldn’t help himself so he said the flesh will not rise.

“Very funny,” Mr. Miller said. “If you’re sick, you should report it. You can’t just go off by yourself without saying anything to anybody.” He put his hand on Henry’s forehead. “You don’t have a fever.”

Henry tried not to blink. His eyes began to water and spots of blackness began to appear on the ceiling.

“I’ll excuse you from gym today,” Mr. Miller said. “Stay here and take a nap. But you’re not to leave the dorm. I’ll get you at dinnertime.”

The angel said it is necessary to rise in the flesh since everything exists in it.

Henry turned on his side. The beds were lined up one next to the other with a small table beside each and a trunk at the foot until the last one disappeared into the wall at the end of the room. That was Otis Redding’s bed. Henry could
hear the hum and echo of the empty dormitory and all he could see were the shadows that the late-afternoon light made coming in through the windows. He thought about his mother and wondered why his father had never told him her name or even that she was dead until that day when they were ice skating in New York City. Saint Augustine’s mother was named Monica. He loved her very much and she cried and cried when he left Carthage and went to Rome. Truth is the mother, knowledge the father. Only he who has knowledge of the truth is free. Henry fell asleep and dreamed that he saw his mother. She was beautiful, with eyes set straight ahead into the future and all the secrets of her nature broken up into many little bits of colored stone.

That night Elvis Presley stood at the foot of Henry’s bed and shouted, “Okay! Listen up!” When things got quiet he said, “It’s name time, dudes!” He made Henry stand up on his bed. “What’s your name?”

Henry didn’t say anything.

“Tell us your name, dude,” Elvis said.

Everybody laughed and someone said, “Yeah, faggot.”

Ernest Whiskey Red Brown jumped up and down. “Faggot. Faggot. Faggot.” Then John Lennon slammed his pillow into Ernest Whiskey Red Brown’s face. They began to wrestle. Someone began to chant, “Fight, fight,” and the two boys began to wrestle more seriously until Otis Redding told them to break it up.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Otis yelled. He pushed them both backward onto their beds. “You want to get free time cut back again? Any of
my
free time gets cut because of you I’ll kick both your asses!” He looked at Henry. “Same goes for you.”

Henry lay down on his bed and looked up at the ceiling. Elvis grabbed him and tried to make him stand up again.

“That’s enough,” Otis Redding yelled. “Cut it out!” His voice was louder and deeper than any of the other boys’, and since he was the oldest, Elvis Presley backed off. “Okay, dude, relax,” he said and went back to his bed and threw himself down on it.

Otis Redding went down to the end of the room where his bed was. “We already lost fifteen minutes of free time because of
fuckin’
John Lennon over here,” he said. “No way I’m gonna let it go to thirty. Not for any of you dumb
fucks
.” Just as he lay down Mr. Miller came in. “Five minutes to lights out,” he said.

The next day everyone was mad at everyone else and nobody paid any attention to Henry until night, when Elvis Presley came over to Henry’s bed again. “Okay, dude, time’s up. What’s your name?”

Robert Johnson jumped up and down on his bed and sang, “I went down to the crossroad fell down on my knees.” Then he fell back onto the bed and pedaled the air with his legs like he was riding a bicycle and strummed an invisible guitar across his belly.

“You finished?” Elvis asked.

Robert Johnson kept strumming the invisible guitar on his belly and singing, “I believe to my soul now, po’ Henry sinkin’ down.”

“Well?” Elvis Presley demanded.

Henry said nothing.

“You have to have a name,” Elvis said. He put his hands on his hips and tried to look tough. Then the other boys all came over and surrounded Henry’s bed.

“C’mon. You can become anyone you want to. Anyone you ever wanted to be. It’s easy.”

“Where’s Elmore?” Otis Redding said.

“Over here,” Elmore James said.

“Why you sitting over there all by yourself? We got to get the new kid his name.”

“Chill, man. Stop acting up,” Elmore James said.

“What you thinking about, Elmore?” Otis asked.

“Gettin’ the fuck outa here,” Elmore James said.

“You always thinking too hard. That’s a problem.”

“Where’s Honeyboy?” Robert Johnson called.

“Over here,” Honeyboy Edwards said.

“Where’s Honeyboy?”

“I’m over here, man.”

“Honeyboy; where’s Honeyboy gone off to?”

“He’s over in the bafroom pullin’ on his dick.”

Robert Johnson cupped his hands and shouted, “Honeyboy? You playing with yourself again?”

“Fuck you,” Honeyboy Edwards said. He got up from his bed and everyone started laughing.

Elvis Presley motioned everyone over to Henry’s bed. “C’mon!” He held up his hand for everyone to be quiet.

Henry looked at the boys surrounding his bed and told them he was Saint Augustine. They all looked at each other, then at Henry. Elvis said, “No way, man. You can’t do that.”

“You can’t be a saint,” Howlin’ Wolf said. “You got to be somebody
famous
.”

Henry said Saint Augustine was famous.

“Saints aren’t allowed,” Otis Redding said.

Henry asked why not.

“It’s a sin, that’s why,” Otis Redding said.

“And besides, it’s a
pussy
name,” Sid Vicious said and started laughing.

“Hey! Shut up, man,” Robert Johnson said. “That’s
blast
phemy.”

Sid Vicious made a face and stuck his tongue out and went back to his bed.

Henry said call me Barbelo, then.

“Who the fuck is that?” Howlin’ Wolf asked.

“Never heard of him,” Sid Vicious called over from his bed. “Is it a group?”

Barbelo is the first thought, the womb of everything, the mother/father, the first man, the Holy Spirit, the thrice male, the thrice powerful.

“Say
what
?” Howlin’ Wolf said.

“You can’t just make up any old name you want,” Elvis Presley said.

“Yeah, you got to be somebody!” Howlin’ Wolf said.

“How ’bout Queen,” Kurt Cobain said. “You could be Queen. They’re a band.”

Everybody laughed and said, “Queen! That’s it!”

“He can’t be Queen,” Jimi Hendrix said.

“That’s right,” Ernest Whiskey Red Brown said. “No way he can be Queen. Prince, maybe.”

Everyone laughed.

Henry said Barbelo was the first thought that came forth from the invisible virginal spirit.

“Sure, man, whatever you say,” Elvis Presley said. “It’s just that you got to have a name that other people can
relate
to.”

Otis Redding pushed his way to the front of the group. “You ’member what we told you?”

Henry said nothing.

“Pick a name or we’ll pick one for you, dipshit.”

“Hey, Dipshit, I like that,” Ernest Whiskey Red Brown said.

“He
picked
a name, man,” Jimi Hendrix said.

“It can’t be just any name he ever heard,” Otis Redding said. “It has to be a
real
name.”

“That’s right, man,” Honeyboy Edwards said. “We all
famous
here.”

“That’s right,” Keith Moon said. “We don’t want anyone hanging around who
isn’t
.”

“Pick another name,” Elvis Presley said.

“
He picked
a fuckin’ name,” Jimi Hendrix said.

Henry said Barbelo was the first thought, which was the thought of God.

“Gimme a fucking
break
, mate,” Sid Vicious said. “You some kind of born-again Christian?”

“There ain’t nothing wrong with being born again,” Honeyboy Edwards said. “Robert Johnson got born again.”

“He was a bluesman,” Sid Vicious said.

“Where you think he got the blues
from
? Piece-of-shit punk,” Honeyboy Edwards said.

Elmore James laughed.

“Kiss my ass! You piece of honky dogshit!” Honeyboy Edwards kissed his hand and slapped himself on the rear with it.

“Just shut the fuck up!” Jimi Hendrix said. “All of you.”

“Okay, okay,” Otis Redding said. “Name some Barbelo songs. If anyone ever heard of them, you can be Barbelo.”

Henry said there were no songs, only some books that were found in a cave in Egypt.

“What the
fuck
?” Robert Johnson said. He clapped and spun around on one foot and John Lennon did it too.

“Yo, man, why you always copy everything Robert Johnson does?” Otis Redding asked John Lennon. “Names that come from books ain’t allowed,” he said. “They got to
be
famous
names. How the fuck are we supposed to know someone’s name who came out of a cave in Egypt?” He laughed and everybody started to laugh. “Yo, man,” he shouted. “The kid wants to be a fucking Egyptian caveman.”

“Is Barbelo a
brother
?” Honeyboy Edwards asked. “If the dude’s from Egypt, then he’s a
African
.”

“That’s right,” Ernest Whiskey Red Brown said. “Has to be a famous
white
dude.”

“That’s right,” Elvis Presley said. “When I got here I wanted to be Kokomo Arnold, but nobody let me. That’s why I had to be Elvis Presley.”

“I bet Elvis thought he was Kokomo Arnold too,” Honeyboy said.

“You’re being racist,” Jimi Hendrix said.

“It ain’t racist,” Otis Redding said. “It’s just the way it is.”

“It’s still racist,” Jimi Hendrix said.

“You don’t know what the fuck you talking ’bout,” Otis Redding said. “Elvis
wanted
to be black. Ever’body knows that. Don’t mean it can happen! Michael Jackson wants to be white. Don’t mean it’s gonna happen.”

“It’s racist!” Jimi Hendrix said.

Otis Redding got mad. “You too caught up in that sixties shit.”

“Yeah, shut the fuck up,” Honeyboy Edwards said. “Is Barbelo a brother? Or a white dude?”

Henry said he didn’t know.

“Pick another name, man,” Otis Redding said.

“He
picked
a fucking name,” Jimi Hendrix said. He pushed his way out of the circle and went over to his bed. “Bunch of fucking idiots.”

“No way Barbelo’s famous if you don’t even know what he
looked
like,” Otis Redding said.

“That’s right, man. You don’t even know if he’s black or white,” Elvis Presley said.