Mark Chiusano - Marine Park - Stories

How much for Gobstoppers? a chubby little shit in a red bathing suit asked.

Two dollars, said Ed. He’d bought them in quantity, each pack for twenty-five cents.

The chubby kid unrolled two sweaty dollar bills from his hot palms, leaving one unknown bill in his grasp. Here, he said. Gimme.

Is that how you ask for it? said Ed. The kid didn’t answer. Ed didn’t have anything better to say. Whatever, he said.

The children, in a screen around Ed and his bike, forced their smudged coins and bills on him, some crisp twenties from their parents, to whom he had to return a handful of ones and quarters. The playground, centered before Ed’s arrival around the old sprinkler, exploded to the four corners with the sounds of fake gun pops and the rainbow colors of string cream.

One small girl came up to Ed and asked if he was selling jump ropes. Some days he did — cheap plastic ones for which he made a five-dollar profit. Sorry, he told the girl, his ponytail wagging. How about a plastic shooter? He picked out a pink one in its shrink-wrapping from his bag.

My mother , the girl said, eye-pointing to a dumpy little woman reading a magazine on a bench, doesn’t approve of guns.

Ed looked the woman up and down, on the bench. She was wearing Crocs. He’d heard about those on TV, from commercials during Knicks games at the Mariners. He leaned down close to the little girl, who herself leaned closer to hear what he said. That’s some cunt shit, he said. What does that mean? the little girl asked. He had nothing to say.

When one of his saddlebags was noticeably lighter, Ed straddled his bike, pedaled through the playground entrance, passing the woman with the magazine and the fat kid in red shorts, and coasted toward the 0.84-mile oval that was the crown jewel of Marine Park. Coming around the bend, he passed the basketball courts he’d grown up on as a kid, when he was the unlikely underdog, white but good. Filled with black kids still, none of whom could shoot. Ed had to admit, even from a quick glance, and he knew it would continue as he pedaled past them: the kids could play. More athletic than he’d ever been. He heard one of the rims shudder as someone tried to dunk.

In the Avenue U parking lot there were three cars waiting for him. They were pulled up against the green, so that they could have been watching the cricket games. Windows closed, air-conditioning on. When Ed reached the middle of the lot he thought in his head about shouting, Peanuts! Crackerjacks! But it would be unwise — he’d always been lucky about police. Instead, he kickstood his bike up on the edge of the cement, pretended to fix a flat. A husky Irish man got out of a car to talk to him.

Holding? he asked Ed in an undertone.

What I always do, said Ed. But step inside my office.

I don’t want much, the man said, fingering the sweat stains on his shirt.

Just take it out of the pack, Ed said. I’m working on a damn tire over here.

The man unzipped the pack, and took out a small ziplock bag. In its place, he left a number of bills. Ed didn’t count them, because he didn’t have to. That’s fine, Ed said. Fine day we having today.

The man, once he had his ziplock bag, didn’t look at Ed, as if he had something communicable. He started walking away. Then he turned around.

You be here Wednesday? he said.

Ed sighed. Sure, he said, why not. The man nodded and went back to his car.

Ed Monahan watched the car pull away, skid around the parking lot entrance, shoot down Avenue U. There were some slum spots as you moved away from Marine Park. Who knew where the guy was headed. Ed only sold the soft stuff. He hummed to himself as he fiddled with the tire on his bike — he took faking it to an art form. From behind him, he heard another car door slam. Two more ziplock bags, and he sent them away like children.

• • •

There was a tap on his shoulder, and Ed turned around. Hi, honey, his girlfriend Margie said.

Ed looked her over. She was tall in the way that women are and you don’t realize it, or, rather, short but because they’re women you think they’re tall. She was wearing a Guns N’ Roses T-shirt, like she usually did. She was skinny. If Ed worried about things he would worry about this, but he didn’t. Instead, he pulled her toward him and put her hand on his crotch. Been waiting for you, Ed said.

Margie extracted her hand from where he had placed it, and instead put it on his hip and into his side pocket. She fingered the slightly damp clump of bills he had mushed there. Seems like it, she said, and withdrew some of the clump, and looked at it.

Keep away from that, Ed Monahan said. I worked for that. Whatever, Margie said.

Ed locked his bike up against a telephone pole, and then he and Margie walked across the street to the salt marsh nature center. The cottontails were high this early in summer, the wind off the bay blowing them back and forth. There was a gravel path that had been cut by the Army Corps of Engineers a few years ago, which made it more respectable. Used to be just about anything was growing in and around the waters. Ed took Margie here for walks in the salt marsh often, because he didn’t like to pay for the movies.

I went into the city today, Margie was saying. Went shopping.

Yeah? Ed said.

Took an hour and a half to get in, because the Q train was slow.

It happens, Ed said. That’s why I don’t go. What’s the point?

I was thinking maybe the two of us could go in for dinner one night, though, Margie said. Ed pretended that he was fascinated with the view of the Marine Parkway Bridge. Ed? Margie said.

Sure, he said. Maybe. For New Year’s or something. I think we could handle that. They arrived at the only tree in the salt marsh. Here, he said. And he sat down.

Margie stayed standing above him.

What? she said.

Come on, Marge, don’t make me have to beg, Ed said. He began unzipping his pants.

Let’s go to the city one day, Margie said. Before New Year’s. Like Halloween. We can go to FAO Schwarz.

Ed’s penis, by this point, was flopping in the cool air.

Sure, he said. Sure, anything you want. Come on.

Margie knelt down.

Do you promise? she said.

Yes, he said. Yes, yes!

All right, Margie said. I’ll let you wait on it. This way you’ll be sure to remember. And she walked away back toward Marine Park.

• • •

Ed Monahan picked himself up, and zipped up his jeans. He stood, breathing hard, under the tree for a minute, giving time to compose himself. Little shit, he said, under his breath, even though he knew that only crazy people talked to themselves. Little pussy shit, he thought in his head. Pinko-commie-liberal shit.

Ed fumed out of the nature center, crossed wide Avenue U, and continued into the parking lot. He went to his bike and started fumbling with the lock, until he realized that the motorcycle pack zipper had been jimmied. It was flapping open on one side. All his leftover string cream and plastic shooters were gone. Ed gargled a noise up in his throat. Who steals from a drug dealer? he wanted to know.

He looked around him. He squinted at the other people around the parking lot. There were the Caribbeans playing cricket. Dressed all in white, like cruise ship waiters. The fucks, he thought. They wouldn’t dare. He looked at the people walking by on Avenue U. He looked at the do-rags hanging out of the back of their jeans. Ed’s eyes narrowed. But what could he do? He got on his bike and rode away.

Coming around the oval, closer and closer to the flagpole, at the base of Marine Park, he approached the basketball courts, the perfect showcase ones that people were playing on, all hours. At the chain-link fence he paused and dismounted. Locked his bike up again.