James Baldwin - Stained Glass

“Hey!” He called out. “The fuck you think you’re doin’ out here?”

What to say? I cleared my throat. “This is your shop?”

“Damn right this is my shop, my alley, and my fuckin’ dumpster. Now get the hell out.” He pulled a set of keys from his jacket, staring me down. There was a wire-screen door set in the wall to my left.

“People giving you trouble around here?” I jerked my head to the door.

“I ain’t worried about no trouble.” His eyes narrowed.

“I stopped three guys from robbing your store last night,” I shot back. “How about that?”

He paused for a moment, wavering in place. “You did what?”

“Kids were trying to steal your shit. I stopped them.” I shoved the fatigue and the pain and the loss down under the mask, the game face. Talking my way out of things had never been a native talent. It was Vassily who had taught me how to spin, with his easy grin and expressive hands. He was a consummate salesman, the kind of man who turned money out of other people’s fantasies. A magician in his own right. My heart ached.

“You did? You ain’t no fuckin’ bum.” The pawnster’s mouth quirked to one side. Curiosity, I hoped.

I shrugged. “It’s true. Help me out, and I’ll keep people away from your store.”

“What? You for fuckin’ real?” He grinned broadly, but his shoulders relaxed. “You fuckin’ serious?”

Pitch a benefit , Vassily told me. Never look away from their eyes. Don’t touch your nose. Try and smile, when they do. Don’t tell them that you need anything – make it all about them. Make them feel good, powerful, and you’ll get whatever you want.

“Of course,” I said. “There’re all kinds of things in your store people around want, right? TVs, jewelry. I’ll watch this place.”

“Well, I don’t want no drugs near my shop, okay? You a junkie, you know, a drug addict?”

“Americans don’t like anything that’s too free, if you know what I mean. So you pitch someone, and they ask you what it’ll cost. So give them another benefit, then a high price.” Vassily had told me to expect this question, in its many variants.

“High?” I asked him. I remember clearly how little sense it made.

“High prices are more believable,” he’d replied, smooth as an oiled razor over soft leather. They give you room to cut a deal.

My price wasn’t that high right now. “I’m no junkie. All I want is food. A sandwich or something, for trade.”

“So you gonna live in my dumpster and chase off gangbangers for sandwiches?” He regarded me with plain disbelief. “And that’s all you want? No girl or crack or anythang?”

I grimaced. “Only drug I want comes in a cup with cream and sugar.”

He laughed out loud, and moved further in to the alley. “Man, you one funny son of a bitch. Right, fine. You watch the street as much as you want, shorty. I’ll get you a damn sandwich and some coffee. What’s your name?”

I was mildly disgusted at how pleased I was: the risen feeling of expectancy, the raw, base need to eat. When he asked me my name, I blurted out the first I could think of. “Rex. You?”

“Me? Ali. You Italian, Rex?” Ali watched me from the corner of his eye as he unlocked the door. “You look Italian.”

I shrugged in a way that could have meant yes or no. “Just not from around here.”

“Fuck if I don’t believe it. Insha’Allah. ” Ali shook his head as he went inside, the door banging shut behind him.

There was nothing to do except rest and recoup, and hope he’d bought the deal. I lay down again, but was too tired and too wired to sleep, so I glanced at the bag across and rifled through it properly. There was a five-dollar bill in a jeans pocket, and my spirits lifted briefly before slumping again. I’d packed proper full-finger gloves, at least. Tucked deep into the corner of the calico bag was a blue velvet pouch I didn’t recognize. Frowning, I pulled the cord and tipped the contents into my palm.

It was a tarot deck: a fresh black-and-white set of BOTA cards. The Builders of the Adytum were an Occult organization who published small, uncolored tarot cards. The Wheel of Fortune was on the top of the stack. Amused and somewhat disconcerted, I turned the next card. The Chariot, card of mastery, and beneath that, the five of pentacles. Kutkha couldn’t speak to me directly… but perhaps there were other ways we could communicate.

The thought brought an odd smile to my mouth, and a stirring in my belly and chest that had nothing to do with hunger. I shuffled the cards, nearly fumbling them with clumsy cold fingers, ran one slowly along the edge of the deck, and drew one out. The Star; the 17th Major Arcana card of the tarot. One of the cards of hope.

“Alexi’s psychic readings.” I repeated one of the jokes Vassily had made when he was still alive, echoing him without irony. “Five bucks a pop.”

I slot the card back in the deck and sighed, leaning back into my makeshift shelter. The fullest extent of my hope, at that moment, was that Ali wouldn’t flake out on me and he’d come back out with the coffee and his promised sandwich.

The urges caused by the upir blood peaked on the dawn of the second day, leaving me unable to rise, arms wrapped around my tearing, aching abdomen. My dreams felt prophetic, even portentous, but they were confusing and disconnected from any greater meaning. I dreamed of the Garden. I saw places I’d never been, heard the names of people I’d never met. The vision I’d had the first time I’d touched Gift Horse blood, down in Jana’s oratory, haunted me from a million different angles. Another me chased Zarya to the ocean’s edge over and over again.

True to his word, Ali bought me food and coffee in the mornings. He was a recent convert to Islam and a Gulf War veteran who’d been discharged with chemical burns, and it turned out that he really was having trouble with the store. On the third night of my stay, the kids who’d found me eating the raccoon came back around and tried to smash in Ali’s windows with a brick. I went at them with razor in one hand, knife in the other, and chased them all the way down to the waterside. When I told Ali about it the next morning, he started adding steak to the sandwiches.

Fifteen bucks was enough to buy a sharpie, some colored pencils, a cheap cushion, soap, vinegar and baking soda. The first thing I did when my energy began to recoup was clean out the dumpster – my kennel, Ali joked – and wash my body and my clothes. On day four, I took the subway to Times Square and set up camp in the mouth of a narrow alley facing the street. On one side, I lay a bowl of salt. On the other, I set up a sign: Fortune Telling and Tarot Readings – $5 .

While I waited, I started coloring in the monotone tarot cards. I was well onto The Emperor when a yuppie in a navy suit and white loafers stopped and looked down at me.

“Hey buddy, wanna tell me my fortune? I’m a, uhm, a Taurus, I think.”

I rolled my eyes up from the card, pencil poised. “Lay down the five and ask a question.”

“Fuck you.” He threw up his finger and stalked off into the swirling crowd of suits, umbrellas, and teased hair.

After that, the sign read: Fortune telling and tarot readings – $5. No stupid questions .

It worked well enough. I began making money, ridiculously small amounts of money I fed into food, water, packing tape, and a screwdriver.

The tape and screwdriver were for boosting cars. On the evening of the ninth day, I jacked a hatchback and drove out to Brighton Beach to case my apartment. I pulled up along Banner Avenue, hunched down in the seat with my cap pulled low, and watched the upstairs window. The plants that lined the kitchen windowsill were still green, and sure enough, the lights were on. Someone started moving around inside come six o’clock.