David Goodis - The Blonde on the Street Corner

He fell back, crashed against a radiator, and rocked back and forth. He was not blinking now. His eyes were wide. Lenore looked at his eyes and she started to move away. His shoulders were hunched, and he took a step toward her. She moved back, faster. He closed his eyes, opened them again and saw her and closed them again so that he should not see her. He was shivering now, and his eyes were shut tight. He was shaking his head, telling himself to get out of here fast.

Lenore watched him hurry out of the house. She walked to the door and watched him moving down the street. Lenore smiled. As she re-entered the house, her smile widened, and then it faded, and her lips were set contentedly.

Late Sunday afternoon, Dippy walked into Ken’s house and a few minutes later Ralph came in.

Ken was at the piano, playing the song, singing the words that Ralph had submitted to him.

George was on the sofa. There was a wet towel around his head.

“Jesus Christ Almighty,” he said.

Ken looked at Ralph. He said, “You know how much you had last night?”

“I don’t know,” Ralph said.

“I bet you had a quart, easy.”

“I think I’m dying,” George said.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Dippy said.

Ken looked closely at Ralph and said, “How do you feel?”

“I feel all right.”

George said, “Oh, God—”

“What is this?” Dippy said.

Ralph leaned against the window sill and said, “Starting tomorrow, they’re taking guys on down at Blayner’s. My sister told me. She got the wire from a girl friend of hers who works there. If we all go down early tomorrow morning we might get something.”

George sat up. “No kidding,” he said.

Ken said, “Look at him. He’s all excited.”

“It’s a job,” George said.

“You wanna come down with me tomorrow?” Ralph said.

“I’m in,” George said.

“Saps,” Ken said. “They’ll go down to Blayner’s and wait in line all day. If they’re real lucky they’ll get jobs for the Christmas rush. Two weeks’ work. A big deal. Twelve and a half bucks a week. Working their heads off in the shipping room.”

“It’s twenty-five bucks,” George said.

Ralph said, “You worked there last year, Ken. It wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“It was miserable,” Ken said.

“Yeah, I know,” Ralph said, putting his hands in his pockets and slouching against the window sill. “But even so, it’s something.”

“Sure,” George said, “it’s something.”

“It’s nothing,” Ken said. “It’s worse than nothing. I can see you guys, getting up at six-thirty in the morning and I mean a cold morning—”

“Aw, shut up,” George said.

“— a real cold morning,” Ken said. “Getting up and going down to that madhouse and working like dogs. And at the end of the week you get twelve and a half bucks. Right away we slice six bits off that for carfare. And what about lunch? You put in a morning’s work at Blayner’s, you can eat a horse.”

“Well, we’ll take lunch from home,” George said.

Ralph said, “I’ll split my lunch with you, George.”

“No, I won’t let you do that,” George said.

“Look at these two guys,” Ken said. “They look starved already.”

“George, don’t you worry about lunch,” Ralph said.

“All right, you guys,” Ken said. “Don’t listen to me. Go down to Blayner’s. Wait in line. Get the hunger jobs. And when the two weeks are up, you’ll go to the poolroom. Remember last year? Remember how we went up the poolroom? We had about thirty-five clams between the three of us. Two weeks of slavery. Thirty-five clams. We thought we could run it up. We walked out of the poolroom without a goddam cent.”

Ralph said, “Maybe this year we can talk ourselves into steady jobs.”

“Yeah, you got a good case.” Ken waved in disgust. George yelled, “Well for Christ’s sake, we gotta do something! We gotta get some kind of action! Something’s gotta happen!”

“Listen to this guy,” Ken said. “Listen to this jerk. He’s all worked up. I’ll tell you what will happen. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. In two weeks you’ll be back on the corner, eating Indian Nuts without a red cent in your pocket. There’s only one way that things happen. That’s when you make them happen.”

“Here it comes again,” George said.

“I’m trying to show you guys what’s uptown. I’m telling you that the only move is to slide out of this hungry set-up and shoot down to Florida.”

“Florida,” Dippy said, “Florida, with the beach.”

“Yeah, Florida,” Ken said. “That’s the place where I’m headed.”

“I’m going with you,” Dippy said.

“When are you going?” Ralph said.

Ken stood up. He raised the cigarette butt high in the air and his long arm swished down and he slammed the butt to the floor and stamped hard on it and said, “Goddammit, I’m going tomorrow!”

“I’m going with you,” Dippy said.

From all parts of the city, from the suburbs and the small towns across the river and to the south of the city, from all parts, the smoky factory sections, the close-packed neighborhoods, from all over the city the people poured into the center of town and huddled against each other in the slicing cold. There was tinsel and colored paper and bright lights in the windows of the stores along Market Street. All along the street there were rows of colored lights on ropes attached to telegraph poles. From the amplifiers came Christmas carols and jingling bells and the voice of Santa Claus. In the cold the people poured along the street, close against each other. They were smiling or trying hard to smile. They were happy or trying hard to be happy. Above them the lights glittered. The carols leaped merrily. Many people joined in the singing. On the corners the Santa Clauses hopped up and down from cold. They blew on their hands and smiled at the children.

In the stores the salesgirls sweated.

The shipping clerks bent and ran and reached and grabbed and ripped and tore and tied and cursed and reached and grabbed and tied and threw and cursed and tied and reached and grabbed and threw and cursed.

From the amplifiers the ribbon of sound narrowed as it twisted its way down into the stock rooms of the big stores. Santa Claus was asking a little boy if he had been a good little boy to his father.

Ralph grabbed at a package and threw it into the arms of a big Polish fellow named Paul who had blue eyes and freckles.

Santa Claus said, “And have you been good to your little sister?”

Paul said, “If I was that kid I’d clip Santa Claus in the teeth.”

Ralph wound hemp around a big package.

In the stock room the men heaved and sweated and grabbed and threw and heaved.

Ralph grabbed at a package.

Paul said, “This your first day?”

“Yeah.”

“You worked here before?”

“Last Christmas,” Ralph said. “A little in between. Easter too.”

“I work here all the time,” Paul said.

“How do you like it?”

“It’s wonderful,” Paul said. He wiped sweat from his face.

Ralph heaved at a big package and said, “Some of these are sort of heavy.”

“That ain’t nothing,” Paul said. “Wait’ll they start giving us the hurry-up talk.”

“Last Christmas there were more guys here,” Ralph said.

Paul nodded. “Yup, that’s just it. Last Christmas they had more guys. This year the cheap sons of bitches figure they’ll save themselves some dough. They hire less guys and give us the hurry-up talk. Last week there was a guy here named Sol, strong like an ox. He just got the job. He was scared. He was out of work for a long time and he had a wife and two kids and he wanted to make good. He wanted to keep the job. I told him to slow down or he’d wear himself out. He didn’t even hear me talking to him. So then it’s a busy day and one of them big shots from upstairs comes down and tells us to get a move on. Just when that happened this Sol was coasting. He was all in and he was taking a minute or so time out. This guy from upstairs points at Sol and tells him to get a move on. You shoulda seen that Sol jump. He starts working a mile a minute. He grabs at big packages like they were feathers. Sol grabs at a package that needs three guys instead of one. What happens? He drops to the floor like an earthquake hit him. It’s a rupture. So now he’s up the creek.”