Michael Rizza - Cartilage and Skin

“You can’t even get that from its parts. The only thing worth anything is inside the gas tank.” The man chuckled now. “I don’t mean to slight you,” he said.

“Yes,” Ralph said. “Well, how much do you think the gas is worth?” He wasn’t looking at the man.

“About seventy-five dollars.”

“All right then,” Ralph said as he pulled a slip of paper out of his suit pocket, placed it upon the hood the car, and quickly signed it. “Two fifty.” He handed the man the paper.

The man raised the paper and inspected it, as if checking for counterfeit money.

“I can take a crap and give you the title, if you want,” the man said. He laughed at himself as he folded the title several times, until it was a small square, and stuck it in the breast pocket of his coveralls.

Ralph continued to smoke his cigarette, as if the man hadn’t said anything at all.

The man revealed a clip of money from beneath his bib. He took out a hundred dollar bill and handed it to Ralph, who briefly glanced at it and then tucked it away in his pants pocket. He seemed to imagine that the transaction was over, and he merely stood there to finish his cigarette. The man, who continued to talk to Ralph, could have simply dissolved and drifted vaporously away. After Ralph smoked the cigarette down to the filter, he flicked the butt onto the loose gravel and started to walk away, without bothering to take leave of the man. Even so, the man came up beside him, as if he didn’t realize that he’d been disregarded, and handed the yellow license plates to Ralph. The two men walked side-by-side across the car lot, the man talking all the while and occasionally pointing at one car or another with a screwdriver he had in his hand. He escorted Ralph up to the gate.

“It was a pleasure,” the man said.

Only then did Ralph seem to acknowledge the man, by giving him a slight nod. Ralph walked along the fence, which ended at the corner of the block, and then he turned right, angling across the street. He stepped between two parked cars and continued along the sidewalk, still holding the plates, though now raising them up and looking at them, as if he’d just discovered that he was holding something. He was on a narrow side street, where the buildings were faceless, with neither curtains nor blinds in the windows. When he came upon a subway grate, he bent down and tried to slip the license plates through, but they wouldn’t fit. He turned down a busier street. After a few paces, he suddenly stopped and headed back in the opposite direction. At the corner of the street, a drainage gutter was along the curb. Without losing stride, Ralph dropped the plates into the gutter, and then his bandaged hand rose up to his suit jacket and took out the pack of cigarettes again. Smoking the newly lit cigarette, he approached a cart on the corner, where a man in a bulky brown coat was selling hot pretzels. Ralph looked at the man intensely for a moment, and the man looked back at him with a puzzled expression, but before he could say anything, Ralph resumed walking. A little farther up, at another stand, Ralph bought a newspaper and a cup of coffee. With the paper tucked under his arm and the cigarette in his mouth, he descended the stairs into the subway.

XV

There was a girl this time, standing beside a tree behind Kyle’s small detached garage and watching Ray as he walked up to the back of the house and then lifted himself up to peer into the bay window. He glanced at the girl. Before the back door, there was a slab of concrete, where a gas grill sat beneath a black tarp. He waved the girl over, and she left the cover of the tree and came across the lawn. She was slender, the openings of her short shirtsleeves flared a bit at her shoulders, and her sandy brown hair was pulled back from her face with a purple barrette. Ray looked at her as she inspected the house.

“There’s no car in the driveway,” Ray said. “That fat real estate lady hasn’t even been here in almost a month. They’ll never sell this place, especially that woman. She’s a cow.”

“Stop it, Ray,” the girl said.

“It’s true,” he said. “Wait here. I’ll let you in.”

He walked alongside the house, and just on the other side of the air conditioner unit, he sat down on the grass and lightly tapped the bottom edge of a casement window with his heel. The hinges squealed, and they were so rusty that once the window was open, it didn’t swing itself shut. Ray turned onto his stomach and slipped himself feet first through the narrow opening. Shortly after he disappeared, the window closed, from the inside.

The girl waited on the concrete slab. She stooped down and lifted up a ceramic flowerpot that was on the ground beside the door. When Ray opened the door and stuck his head out, he saw her standing there with the pot in both of her hands.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Looking for a key.”

“I’m already inside.” He smiled at her. “You’re a goofy girl.”

Putting the pot down, she said, “You’re a goofy girl.”

He held the door open, and she stepped past him. He followed her from the foyer, into the kitchen, where she took a seat at the table. He glanced out the bay window for a second, as a precaution perhaps, and then sat across from her. He kept his eyes upon her face as she looked about the kitchen as though it were a museum. When she met his eyes, she let her gaze linger a moment, before standing up and walking out of the kitchen. He followed her.

“You figure someone would sell the furniture,” she said. “Have a house sale or something.”

In the living room, she sat down on the couch. He stood for a moment, looking down at her, and then seated himself beside her. He put his feet on the coffee table, and she pushed them off.

“Don’t be an ogre,” she said. “Somebody’s got to own this stuff.”

“He had no family. They all left him without a word. I heard his wife took off with her lover and the kids,” Ray responded. “As my dad said, ‘Lonely people are a tragedy waiting to happen.’”

He stood up and walked over to the television.

“He’s got some movies down here. We can watch something, as long as it’s daylight.”

“I don’t feel like it,” she said. She leaned forward, untied the laces of her sneakers, and slipped them off. When Ray returned to the couch, she said, “What does your dad know?”

“I don’t know.” Ray shrugged. “That’s what he said.”

“It takes more than one person to make a tragedy. Tell him that.”

He smiled at her again, and she turned her head away.

“I’m not going to tell him anything,” Ray said. He leaned back on the couch and moved a little closer to her, so his thigh touched her thigh.

“Let me kiss you again,” he said, still staring at her.

“You are an ogre.”

They sat silently, and after a while, she began to inspect her surroundings casually, as if Ray no longer sat beside her, touching her leg and looking at her face.

“It’s like you’re all coiled up inside,” she said at last, not so much addressing him as speaking to the room itself. “And you’re ready to spring on me.”

“Let me kiss you,” he said.

She turned her face toward him, and no sooner, he leaned in, pressed his mouth against hers, and let his hand glide up the bare flesh of her arm. She pulled her face away, but he kept his hand on her. She stared at his eyes, which were bright and eager.

“You’re never satisfied,” she said, a little breathless, and they kissed again. This time his hand slid up to her throat, where her fingers lightly touched his.

“You’re like a puppy,” she said. “All coiled up inside.”

He smiled, his face close to hers. “I thought I was an ogre.”