Sips of Blood (34 page)

“Lookit old Sam across the street. He’s going
to wear himself out with all that tidying up. I can hear him
huffing and puffing from here.” The black man spoke the words with
a smile on his face. He liked Sam, but like the others on the block
thought Sam to be an eccentric. “Cliff, how much dirt you think he
manages to eliminate with all his effort?”

Cliff rubbed his red beard and thought a
while. In the midst of his meditation, Cliff set his hands flat on
the ground and lifted his behind, twisting his neck to the side,
allowing himself to check the sidewalk on which he sat. Relieved,
he plopped his rear back down on the ground. “I’d say he ain’t
accomplishing much.”

The black man scratched his crotch and leaned
back against the overpass wall.

“But he sure gives himself a workout each
night, don’t he? Cliff, if you ever see me, myself, and I, Emory
Lansing, doing something like that, call the police and have me
locked up.”

“Shit, I couldn’t do that.”

“I know you’d miss me, but living with a nut
is no life.”

“Shit. I ain’t got the change to call the
police, and if I walked up to a cop to complain, he’d probably
throw me into a cell.”

“Lucky for you that you’ll never have to face
that tragedy. I mean having me put away in a loony bin. Jail you’ll
manage on your own. But I come from good solid stock. Nobody in my
family ever go bonkers. Had an old aunt that used to like to go
down to the local bodega in Harlem topless on hot summer
afternoons. Wasn’t nuts, though; just too lazy to get completely
dressed for such a short trip.”

“Hell, man, when it hits the nineties in New
York, I wouldn’t blame a nun for going topless.”

“You get to the shelter today?”

“Naw, managed to scrounge up some change and
buy myself a burger down at the Mac’s.”

“Hell, you missed a great Jerry Springer
Show. Eleven a. m. each weekday I’m down at the shelter, front
seat, sniffing the beginnings of lunch preparation, goosing my
appetite with some heavy repartee. I love that show. Best thing on
the air. And I think it’s good for society. These people get to go
down to a television studio and work out their grievances within
the confines of a well-refereed setting. Those Springer bouncers
are better than those refs over on the boxing shows. Nobody gets
hurt. Occasionally some babe complains about a broken nail, or
scratch, but on the whole, it’s a real safe way of airing your
disagreements. A couple of times after a commercial I see a guest
with a Band-aid stuck to his nose or forehead, but it don’t get any
worse than that. Sometimes I get so excited I’m whooping and
cheering ‘Jerry’ with the audience. You know what I mean?”

“Yeah.” Cliff gave out with an uncomfortable
chuckle.

“How many times you seen the show?”

Cliff shrugged and rubbed the side of his
face against his camouflage jacket.

“No more than a handful, I bet. You gotta
come down to the shelter with me and catch the action. I tell you,
when they start swinging and the babes start ripping each others
clothes off, I damn near piss my pants.”

A few cars still sped by, but otherwise the
mood was quiet. Most of the homeless snuggled under rags and
cardboard, replenishing the day’s lost energy. All except for
sleepy-eyed Cliff and loquacious Emory.

“You know, I made a few dollars today
myself,” said Emory. “Didn’t waste it on any Mac, though. Naw, I’m
thinking more in terms of French cuisine.”

“They sell French fries at the Mac,” quipped
Cliff.

“Hey, give me a break. I need to dream of
something. Ever have those French snails?”

Cliff shook his head and adjusted his woollen
cap further down on his forehead.

“Me neither, but I once read an article about
them in one of those food mags.”

“You read Gourmet?”

“Hell, I don’t remember the name of the mag.
It was the first one I picked up when I got to the library. Hid
behind it, hoping the librarian wouldn’t bust me. It was pissing
cats and dogs that day, and I wanted to dry off a bit. The
librarian let me hang out long enough for me to read about these
bugs in a shell. Starve the shit out of them for a few days, then
toss some garlic and butter over them in a hot saucepan, and you
got a real French meal.”

“What about that long thing they eat?” asked
Cliff.

“You got a dirty mind.”

“The bread. The bread.”

“Oh, yeah, you need some of that to dip into
the sauce.”

At the end of the block a man in a wheelchair
tried to maneuver onto the sidewalk. He kept slipping back onto the
street, almost spinning out of control into the midst of
traffic.

“What’s that?” asked Emory

“Some cripple.”

Emory slapped Cliff on the side of the
head.

“Didn’t your mamma teach you to respect the
disabled? He looks like he needs some help. Come on, let’s go down
and help him onto the sidewalk before some car smashes into him.”
Emory stood and looked over his shoulder at Cliff. “Come on, get
your white ass up off the ground and do a good deed. It’ll make you
feel better.”

“I don’t feel so bad now. All I need is some
sleep.” Cliff slowly got to his feet, almost falling over half-way,
except that Emory grabbed one of Cliff’s arms to give him
balance.

The two men hunched their shoulders against
the clammy cold fog and walked in the direction of the man in the
wheelchair.

“Wait up, man. We’ll give you a hand,” yelled
Emory.

The wheelchair came to a stop against the
back end of an old Lincoln town car.

Emory checked the sloped sidewalk and
couldn’t see any reason for the difficulty in maneuvering the
wheelchair.

“Something wrong with your wheels?” Emory
moved toward the seated man, and with one hand on the man’s knee,
squatted down to check out the wheelchair.

“I don’t see any problem. Cliff, you used to
run a bicycle shop. Come over and check out these wheels.”

“Bicycles and wheelchairs ain’t the same
thing, Emory.” But he obliged his friend and also squatted next to
the wheelchair.

“What am I supposed to be looking for,
Emory?”

Suddenly Emory was swept backward into the
arms of a dark hulk that gnashed its teeth before burying them deep
in his friend’s neck.

Cliff never made it to his feet, because the
man in the wheelchair dug his fingers into Cliffs voice box,
exploding the fleshy cartilage.