In April of 1976 I drove a stolen car from Boston to New York. The Olds 88 wasn’t really stolen, since a Back Bay lawyer paid $300 for the disappearance of gas-guzzler.
Several hours later I abandoned the Detroit clunker by the Christopher Street pier after midnight. I threw the plates into the Hudson and left the keys in the ignition, hoping for joy riders to drive off with the vehicle. On my three previous trips to vanish a car, I went up to the 42nd Street Bus terminal and caught a bus back to Boston. This time was different.
I was in love with an artist from North Carolina. Ro said I looked like a fallen angel on her candle-lit bed. She had to be in love too. I walked to the restaurant at which she worked on Christopher Street. The owner said she had quit. I rode the subway to Brooklyn Heights and walked to 55 remsen street. She wasn’t there and her roommate explained that earlier in the day the painter had caught a flight to Paris. She had accepted a grant to study art at the Sorbonne. Ro had not left a forwarding address. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t going back to my teaching job at South Boston High School.
I slept at a friend’s apartment on Park Slope. The next day I got a job at Serendipity 3 as a busboy. I moved out of Brooklyn after discovering James Spicer was stealing my tip money. I rented a SRO room on West 10th Street and 5th Avenue. A bed and four walls cost $44/week. I was making about $200 at the restaurant.
After work I took the subway from 60th and Lex to the Astor Place. Usually too wound up to fall asleep I killed a few hours drinking a dive bars before heading back to my miserable room. I wasn’t making any friends fast.
One wintry night in 1977 I stumbled home from a derelict bar at the corner of the Bowery and Houston. The icy wind slashed through my thin clothing and I was about to hail a taxi to my SRO tenement on 11th Street, when the thump of a frantic bass emanated from a white stucco building. The accompanying music was rock and roll at its purest and I pushed open the bar’s heavy wooden door.
The leather-jacketed quartet on the stage covered the 45rpm version of The Rivieras’ CALIFORNIA SUN. The audience heave up and down, as if the floor pulsated in time to the 3-chord progression. I stepped forward to join the frenzy.
A huge hand blocked my way.
“$5.” The monstrous bouncer wore a yellow construction hat.
“Who are they?” I handed over the fiver.
“The Ramones. They play punk,” answered the big man.
Everyone in the bar wore leather jackets and the girls had colored hair.
CALIFORNIA SUN was replaced by a fast-moving song with a chorus of I WANNA BE SEDATED. I rushed up to the front of the crowd. By the end of the band’s set I was hooked to the music and like that I became a punk.
The next day I bought a black velvet jacket on St. Mark’s Place from Trash n Vaudeville and later had my cut my hair at Manic Panic. Those girls were punk from the points of their stilettos to the tops of their teased black hair.
Every night I hung out at CBGBs. None of the stars of the scene were my friends. They played music and my one talent was pinball, so I was a nobody, which was okay, since being a punk was all about not caring about being nobody.
Not everyone felt the same way.
Blondie got noticed by major record labels, the Talking Heads toured coast to coast to bigger and bigger crowds, and almost every girl loved Richard Hell for his song BLANK GENERATION and his nihilistic good looks. None of us knew how to be different, but we had a good idea about how not to be ‘me’ anymore thanks to Richard.
Our devotion to this faith failed to translate into record sales and the Voidoids’ forays into the Top 40 were mocked by an unknown power-pop trio’s song RICHARD IS A FORKHEAD. My own personal lack of success gained me nothing and in 1982 I left New York to work as a bouncer at a Paris nightclub on the Grand Boulevard.
One night a New Wave girl band from the East Village appeared as the Rex’s headliner. The lead singer had a crooked nose and bedraggled hair, but once the ugly duckling hit the stage, Claudia shone with a savaged beauty meant for a dark room and her lanky body encircled the mike stand like a boa crushing a stick. In some ways she was a female version of Richard.
After the show I introduced myself and offered her a drink. We spoke about CBGBs. New York was as close as her body. Claudia’s husband played with Richard Hell. She laughed upon hearing about the song RICHARD IS A FORKHEAD. After closing the club, we ate at an African restaurant in Les Halles.
“What do you miss about New York?”
“Nothing really. I come from Boston.” My reasons for leaving New York were too many to tell.
I spoke about my hometown. I was a big Bruins fan, although I admitted, “I can’t play hockey for shit.”
“Really?”
“My father was teaching me how to skate backwards and fell, cracking his skull on the pond ice. There was blood everywhere. II never learned how to skate backwards.”
Claudia laughed and said, “Richard is a good tennis player.”
“I’m not good at that either.”
“Are you good at anything?”
“Some things.”
“I’m sure.” She touched my hands.
At dawn I walked Claudia to her hotel in La Marais. The rest of the band was waiting by a van and, she said, “I have to go to Lille.”
“Like Cinderella?”
“I don’t think Cinderella ever went to Lille.”
“I guess not, but the fairy tale never mentioned the name of Cinderella’s hometown.”
“No, but it wasn’t Lille.” She kissed me on the cheek and entered the van. No glass slipper marked her departure, then again I wasn’t Prince Charming.
That summer I visited Perpignan with a friend. Roland Garros was on the TV. His father asked if I was interested in tennis. My father had taught me tennis. I had him by thirty years. I couldn’t ever beat him, but my friend convinced the doctor that I had one time been the 17th ranked tennis player in the USA. I protested the obvious lie, but sometimes people prefer to believe something less than the truth.
Upon my return to Paris a music industry friend introduced me to a tousled-hair French singer. Lizzie was promoting her new record and the African influenced single was climbing the charts.
“I know you.” Her eyes swam with recognition. “I lived in New York and you once threw me out of an after-hours club on 14th Street.”
“I don’t really remember that,” I answered, although a crazy French girl tumbling down the stairs of the Jefferson Theater wandered in the shadows of my memory. The infamous after-hours club was renown
“You didn’t ask. I was having a fight with my boyfriend. You tried to break it up. My boyfriend punched you. You tossed him down the stairs. I fell with him.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. It was our fault.”
“It was?”
“Ouais.” Lizzie didn’t hold the forceful eviction against me and later that evening in bed at my hotel in La Marais the wild-haired Medusa told me about her affair with a spike-haired singer in the East Village.
“Richard?” Forkhead had a long reach.
“Yes, Richard.” She lit a cigarette and the tobacco turned her kisses into ashtrays. “Don’t be jealous. Richard and I were never boyfriend and girlfriend.”
“And what about us?”
“Nous sommes un stand de nuit or one-night stand.”
“Those are the best kind of affairs.”
In the morning I watched her leave like another Cinderella, thinking she was gone for good, but the next evening she showed up at the Rex with her Fender Jazzmaster guitar.
“TV?”
“Yes, I am famous in France.”
French stars fared better without the other people in their life and I kept our affair a secret. We had a good time throughout the fall, although our affair ended on a Christmas vacation on the Isle of Wight. My good friend Vonelli was in love with her. Lizzie was in love with him. My saying ‘bonne chance’ was my Christmas present to them and on Boxing Day I took the ferry to France from Southhampton to Dieppe. It was a stormy passage and I was glad to stand on dry land. Three hours later I was back at the hotel in La Marais.
I remained in Paris another two years before returning to the USA to write screenplays for porno films in North Hollywood. Within a month the quasi-mafia producer fired me for being too intellectual. I never thought that I was that smart.
Back in New York I rode motorcycles and worked at the Milk Bar. I watched the Bruins on TV. They went nowhere, but everyone came to the Milk Bar. It was the place to be from 1am to 4am.
One night Richard came to the door. I had never spoken to him before, but he said, “I think we have a mutual friend.”
“Who?” I knew exactly who.
“Lizzie in Paris says hello.”
“She’s a great girl.”
“She is at that.” I offered him a drink and was surprised by how friendly he was. After the second drink he said, “Lizzie told me about some American in Paris calling me Forkhead.”
“I said it, but the first person to call you that was Marky, the lead guitarist of the Ghosts.”
“I know their song too.” Richard no longer sported spikes. “By the way she called you ‘suedehead’, which is funny coming from someone with a hair like a crow’s nest.”
“More a bird’s nest.”
“Depends on your perspective.” Richard was taller than me. He tipped the bartender $5 before leaving the bar. She smiled at him in recognition of his legend. Punk wouldn’t be punk without him.
“I’ll see you around.”
We both lived in the East Village and ran into each other on the street. He invited me to poetry readings at the St. Mark’s Church. Someone said that he edited several alternative magazines. I submitted short stories to each one. He never mentioned them afterwards. I didn’t blame him. My typing, grammar, and spelling were atrocious.
I returned to France in 1989.
Lizzie was dating an art dealer. Vonelli was going out with a top model, whom I had lived on the Ile St. Louis. Paris was a small world. The singer and I played squash in Les Halles. She beat me without mercy, despite wheezing after every shot. I spoke about Richard during a break.
“Richard is so funny. I think he was jealous of you.”
“Jealous for you being with me?”
“You told him about that?” Our affair remained a secret on my end.
“Maybe, it isn’t important anymore.”
“No.” I had been in love several times in the interim. None of my romances had been a success.
“Then let’s not worry about the past.” Lizzie served the ball against the wall for an ace. After her victory we had dinner in the Marais and she said, “Loser pays.”
“That wasn’t much of a game, considering I heard you once were the 17th-ranked tennis player in the USA.”
“I never was, but a friend of mine from Perpignan lied to his father about my ranking. He believed his son.”
“Do I look like I could have ever been the 17th ranked tennis player in America,” I said it, so she wouldn’t believe me and added, “Plus I let you win fair and square.”
“I’m not sure.”
“Up to you.”
We said good-bye in Les Halles. Neither of us suggested a nightcap. We had become just friends.
Nothing more, but friendship lasted longer than love in our world.
In the 90s I began taking around-the-world trips.
ONce back in the city I ran into Richard at a gallery opening. He was fascinated by my tales of opium dens on the Burmese border. I thought about writing a down-and-out travel book. I gave several chapters to a literary agent. He hated my typing and I worked selling diamonds on 47th Street. It was a 9-6 job. I wore a suit and tie. The money was good. I went out at night, but not late.
One autumn night at a reading of Richard’s poetry at the St. Mark’s Church I spotted Claudia at the bar. I hadn’t seen the singer since Paris. Richard kept looking at Claudia and I asked, “Are you two a thing?”
“Richard’s no one’s thing. You have a girlfriend?”
“I was living with a Spanish girlfriend last summer, but she more than a little unfaithful, so I threw her out. The problem was that Elena was a good friend with the old Puerto Rican woman living next to me. A bruja.”
Claudia didn’t understand the Spanish term for sorceress.
“A witch.”
“Witch?”
“Yes, Santeria.” The magic was practiced by the Caribs throughout the Lower East Side.” Senora loved her and the old woman cursed me by saying I would never love again and I haven’t since Elena.”
“Really?”
“100%.” There was no other explanation for my celibacy.
“Maybe I can help you change that.”
We left for my place. Her divorced husband was taking care of their son. We spent the night together and she left before dawn and she spent the night.
“Like Cinderella?” I joked with a towel around my waist.
“Cinderella didn’t have a kid.”
In the morning Claudia kissed my lips and walked down the hallway to the stairs. Mrs. Adorno opened the door. The old bruja had witnessed more than a few women come and go in and out of my life. Senora Adorno's one good eye squinted in my direction and spat something in Spanish before mumbling, “Sex not love. Siempre.”
“Not always,” I said, because I wanted more from a woman than sex.
Claudia and I went to the movies, made love twice a week, hiked on holidays with her son. She fellated me during the NHL playoffs. I wore my Bruins shirt. They went nowhere, but I wasn’t prepared for her saying after they were ousted from the playoffs, “This isn’t working out.”
“What isn’t?”
“You and me. I want something more from a relationship than this and someone wants to give it to me.”
“Who?” I had to ask.
“Richard.”
“Forkhead.”
“Oh.” I had grown to accustomed to finishing in second place.
“He called to say he really wanted to be with me. I have to give it a chance.”
“I understand.” I stood no chance against a rock god, especially since Mrs. Adorno’s curse was stronger than me.
I gave Claudia my blessing and started a course of hard drinking. Drunkenness wouldn’t lift the curse, but I stopped my thinking of Claudia. Of course an affair with Richard wasn’t destined to last forever and a month later Claudia phoned to say it was over.
“Can I come over?”
“The answer is yes, but I’m leaving for Thailand within a week.” I had sold a 5-carat diamond and bought a round-the-world ticket with my commission.
“All you men are alike. You all leave when the going gets tough.”
Claudia hung up before I could defend myself. She never came over to my apartment. Mrs. Adorno was triumphant.
Six months later I returned from Asia to sell diamonds on West 47th Street during the Christmas season and bumped into Richard on East 11th Street. Neither of us spoke about Claudia, but he said, “We should play tennis sometime.”
“Tennis?”
“Lizzie said you were good at squash. You must be able to play tennis. I belong to the club over on the East River. We can play whenever you want.”
“I haven’t been on a tennis court since 1982.”
“The cold scare you?” This was a challenge.
“Not in the least.” I was from Maine. We had two seasons. Winter and preparing for winter. “Name the day.”
“Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny in the high 40s. Say noon.”
“Noon it is.”
The next morning I called in sick to the Diamond Exchange. My boss Manny let his employees have ‘drunk days’ and I slept for another hour.
By noon the temperature warmed up to almost 50. A sunny day too. Richard waited by the riverside court. He had brought an extra racket.
“Your choice.”
I selected the one more tightly strung without knowing if that was better or not. I was no Arthur Ashe and lost two sets in record time.
“You don’t play often, do you?” Richard smashed an ace to my left.
“Not for years.”
“Lizzie said you were once the 17th-ranked tennis player in America.”
“That was a joke. I was once down in the South of France during the Roland-Garros tournament in Paris. I was watching Yannick Noah’s set and my friend told his father that I was the 17th-ranked tennis player. I denied the claim, but his father thought I was being humble and scheduled an exhibition at the local tennis club. I was presented to the town’s mayor and the club president. My friend whispered that they expected me to play the provincial champion.”
“And did you?”
“No way. I said that I was under contract and couldn’t play anywhere without signed agreements. A little later his father found out the truth. He didn’t think it was funny at first, but everyone else in Perpignan got a good laugh. I didn’t think it was funny either. You never do when you're the punchline of a joke.”
“Now, I feel the same way. I really thought you a good player.” The way he said that revealed that this was not about Claudia, but Lizzie.
“Maybe I am. Maybe I was taking it easy on you.” I knew the truth.
“What about another match?” He wanted to know it too.
“Sorry, I’m under contract.” I handed back the racket and walked away from the court with a smile on my lips.
After that day Richard and I didn’t see each other for several years. I was either working or away in Asia writing novels no one wanted to publish. At least my typing was getting better. Finally I left the States to live in Thailand. I had a baby with my wife In Pattaya.
In April 2004 I returned to New York. My Israeli subleasee had squealed to my landlord in hopes of getting my apartment. An eviction notice had been issued in both our names. I threw my tenant out on the street.
Mrs. Adorno said nothing this time. My landlord paid $20000 to speed up my departure from the flat. I was 50 and New York was a tough city for the old. The day before my flight to Bangkok, I spotted Richard on 1st Avenue.
He smiled upon seeing me, and then frowned, “I got bad news. Lizzie died this week.”
“No.”
“It was the cigarettes.”
“Shit.” I really liked Lizzie.
“They had the memorial in the South of France. Corsica I think. Her ashes drifted out to sea with the flowers.” He shuffled several folders of manuscripts between hands. “That leaves only you and me.”
“And Claudia.”
We had nothing else in common than these two women, but his words burned like a fire left unwatched.
I told him that I was leaving the city for good.
“No one leaves the city for good.” He had been living there for over 30 years.
“I just got rid of my apartment.”
“That doesn’t mean anything. You’ll be back, if only to prove you’re the 17th ranked tennis player in the USA.”
“Yeah, in 1982, there’s always that. See you around, Forkhead.”
“You too, Suedehead.”
I waved good-bye.
Richard was right.
I did come back to New York.
We still see each other another time, because none of us were leaving New York. Not even our ghosts, for the dead lived forever in the past for those stuck in the present.
THE END
Lizzie I think of you always.
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