Michael Rizza - Cartilage and Skin

I contemplated wearing the suit that I had worn at the bar with Stephen; the outfit now hung in a bag in the closet, freshly returned from the drycleaners, who’d hopefully removed from the fabric the stale odor of alcohol and cigarette smoke. But I couldn’t wear a suit. It would have been too ostentatious, too out of place. I decided on a simple pair of slacks and a light gray button-down shirt, presentable but not too formal. The crowning accoutrement, of course, was my father’s hat. It was an old-style felt hat with a snap button on the brim and six seams to the top point. Putting it on, I imagined myself dimly connected to a poor European immigrant of the 1930s or maybe to a migrant farmer. I liked it. Besides making me feel somewhat distinguished, like a man of eclectic tastes, the hat could be worn cocked at a slight angle and thus cover most of my bruise.

Wanting to give myself plenty of time to get to the appointment, I left my apartment as soon as I finished dressing. I knew what bus to take, but not how long I would have to wait for it. Bolting the door behind me, I hurried down the corridor, trying to scoot silently past Claudia’s apartment, then out the front door and down the steps, keeping my head down, in case I accidentally saw my landlord. Out of fear of his rodent eyes, I focused my gaze on each square of the sidewalk for an entire block or two. My landlord and I had said all that needed to be said between us. He had offered me a simple, gentlemanly abolishment of my lease agreement. We never had to see each other again. He had even given me back my month and a half security deposit, so nothing would hold me back if an impulse to leave suddenly struck me one night. I didn’t even have to bother saying goodbye. This was his solution to our altercation on the steps, a horrible, ugly scene that had occurred three days prior to the dreadful phone call.

II

Oblivious to how long I’d remained splayed and bleeding on the cold sidewalk, the instant I regained consciousness, I sat up and ranted at my landlord in a delirious panic. With my head throbbing, I was vaguely aware of him trying to tell me that an ambulance was on its way, but many of the roads had yet to be cleared of snow. I warned him not to touch me, and I called him a vile rat, among other things, as a few windows and doors began to open, allowing curious bodies to see what all the commotion was about. I wanted someone to come to my rescue because I was convinced that he had attacked me with a shovel and if not for the witnesses, he would have been dealing me a deathblow. But no one was helping me. The sight of blood on my palm and the crushing pain in my head drove me into the feverish pitch of hysterical frenzy. The louder I screamed that I had been struck down by this hateful creature, the louder the little man defended himself, bellowing that I was insane. He said that I’d fallen down the stairs all by myself. I said I would sue him and own the building. Hearing the sound of these words on my own lips, I was seized by a sudden flash of insight; I threatened that as soon as I owned the building and everything in it, I was going to throw him out on the street, so he could scurry back into the sewer with all the other vermin. Nobody watching us seemed to care, so we both shifted our focus, and rather than continue to address our audience, we insulted one another directly. We began to criticize the other’s character and point out all the faults we could imagine. Still sitting on the sidewalk, in the process of getting up but not quite able to complete the act, I sensed that I was winning the verbal battle. There was more wit and flare to my abuse. At some point, I called him a loveless gnome, and this epithet must have pleased me because I began to tag it onto everything I said. When he called me gross, I grinned; he was so unimaginative that he had to use the same word for both my neighbor and me. All the while, people lingered in the windows and doorways. We were yelling at each other even after the ambulance arrived and a black woman with long, cool fingers began touching me. She tolerated us for a moment or two, but then she stood up and reprimanded us as though we were children, pointing her finger primarily at me, saying, “Mother of God. Mother of God,” and whatever else she said I don’t really remember. The rodent fell silent, moved back to the base of the steps, and began to glower. The woman touched me and spoke in a soothing voice. She smelt as though she’d been chewing a sprig of anisette. My delirium started to subside beneath this woman’s gentleness. She didn’t think anything was seriously wrong with me, but to play it safe, I ought to get x-rays, which, in the end, confirmed her initial diagnosis: Nothing was seriously wrong with me.

When I returned from the hospital a few hours later, I found my landlord waiting for me. He wanted us to come to an understanding. We acted composed and civil as we stood at the threshold of my apartment. I mostly listened and nodded as he presented his case. First of all, he didn’t own a single brick or nail in the entire building. He managed things for a corporation in New Jersey, which was comprised of two Greek brothers who owned a small strip mall; roughly fifty acres of undeveloped land that, after failing a round of perc tests, only generated revenue from a gun club; and this apartment building. If I wanted the building, I’d have to sue the Greeks. Second, my landlord, who apparently wasn’t my landlord after all, had warned me about the bag of salt. It was my fault that I’d tripped. Third, he gave me back my security deposit, so nothing would hinder me from leaving. Apparently, I didn’t need to give him any notice. I could simply vanish, spontaneously combust, or fall victim to any sort of abduction or annihilation. I continued to nod. We stood silently for a moment, inspecting one another, not shaking hands to seal or confirm our potential pact, nor withdrawing to our separate little rooms. We both assumed that the other was waiting for something else to be added to the conversation. I slipped the money into my pocket. Part of me faintly realized that I could now give back some money to Morris the man; another part of me suspected that my landlord wanted my response right there on the spot. I was about to speak, maybe even concede to leaving, but then his face sagged, as if he were reluctantly about to yield, as if he were giving up. With a hint of a grimace and a small show of fidgeting, he informed me that Claudia Jones’s website was possibly called “Choice Bits” or something similar. At the moment, I hadn’t been thinking about the web address at all, yet I could now see what the man thought about me. In his little brain, “Choice Bits” was part of our negotiation; it was the reason I was holding out; it was my selling point, my weak spot. In response, I shrugged, as if I no longer had any interest or that perhaps all along my interest had been a sham. I thanked him for the money and closed myself in my apartment, where I remained undisturbed until the social worker requested my assistance with the boy. At the time, I never suspected how everything—“Choice Bits,” my security deposit, the phone call — could possibly be connected, but I was on my way.

III

I arrived at the bus stop and concealed myself inside the glass enclosure. The metal bench was wet and frozen, so I stood back against the side wall and shivered. Remembering the day of the mist when I had sought shelter inside a different bus stop, I looked at the walls to see the posted flyers, imagining that I might find “Iago as Id” or “Female Models Wanted.” Besides the scrawl of graffiti, there was only a solitary sign, something handwritten in Spanish and referring to niños; someone named Marquita was offering her services as a babysitter. I had a strange, fleeting idea that even though I was childless, I could pay by the hour to have Marquita sit on my couch and watch television one night. Before the utter absurdity of this thought could check me, I plucked her phone number and stuck it in my pocket. I shrunk a little inside my coat as I remembered the black man on the motorcycle, Dr. Barnett, for I knew that the particular shape of his masculinity prevented him from ever entertaining the notion of paying for female company, sexual or otherwise. This was as likely as his putting a cowbell around his neck and skipping down Market Street in a thong. He was a man, composed of himself, and I was something else, something shapeless, a myriad of oozing parts.