Bruce Bauman - Broken Sleep

Nathaniel’s eyes were so bleak, I cupped his cheeks between my hands and placed my forehead against his and held it there for a moment. “It’s because you are you and the way you were born — honest and good — that you do what you do .” I kissed him. He tensed. An egret flew over and cawed — it was Kyle. I clutched Nathaniel’s arm. “You won’t hurt me. You’re no homicider. I told Alchemy about you last night.” The way I talked to and about Alchemy made Nathaniel a tad nervous. “Jesus, Nathaniel, people talk to God all the time, do you think they’re all crazy?”

He laughed. “Yeah, I do.”

“My baby is real and he can hear my voice.” I kissed him again. I envisioned we’d end up together, at least for a while, when the time was right. I never would’ve guessed it’d take another five years! I wanted him then. The sex didn’t make the highlight reel. I didn’t care. Although he wasn’t the father, I treasured the idea that Nathaniel’s seed swam within me and the unborn Alchemy.

He left the next day for a college speaking gig. He promised to be in touch very soon. When I didn’t hear from him, I told myself the untruth that I didn’t care. Then I heard the news on the radio: The Feds busted him for dealing drugs and he jumped bail. I knew they’d set him up. I followed his exploits the best I could from the mainstream and underground papers. I read a piece he wrote in the Voice and heard a couple of taped interviews on WBAI. After almost a year I got a call from a guy who didn’t give his name. “Nathaniel says he is sorry, but he can’t contact you and he hopes you understand.” He hung up before I could get more information or say, “Send him my love.”

After we left Collier Layne, I postulated we’d beeline it to the California surf ’n’ sunbathing society. I mispostulated. I could get around the subway blindfolded, and my compass said Northern Boulevard runs east-west across Long Island, and if I head north I end up drowning in the Sound and that the East River is west of Flushin’, but Iowa, Idaho, all them is the same. So I got no clue we’d sort of detoured in the wrong direction as Part II of the Alchemy Experimental Family Tour. When we stop for taking leaks and gassing up, I see a sign that says D.C. 30 MILES, and I think we’re halfway to L.A.

“We gonna go have a cocktail with the prez? Got some advice for him from my brother and my dad. My brother got back from Iraq last year, and my dad, who was in Nam in ’69, they love Bush and they think nukin’ Hussein and taking the damn oil fields is the right fucking move.” I think he’s surprised I know who’s the president and even more surprised that I’m clued in to Hussein and oil.

“We’re skirting D.C. and heading to the Shenandoah Mountains. We need to swap cars. I need some clothes and cash or we’ll be hitching to L.A.”

He ignored my family’s input on solving the Iraq situation.

“I still say we hit up the prez for some dough. His family’s loaded.”

“I don’t take gifts from an Ivy League warmonger who once was Chief Spook.”

“That’s exactly the cheese balls whose palms I wanna tickle. Makes ’em feel superior and gets me on their good side. Besides, he’s still the prez. Even you,” I razz him, “must respect that.” He just nods like he’s keeping score of my answers. He had this way with everyone, almost never saying out loud that he is judging you so you couldn’t call him on it, but I damn well sensed it.

He announces we’re seeing Nathaniel Brockton, like he’s the pope or maybe Ozzie Osbourne. I inquire, “Who the fuck is that?”

“Nathaniel’s been my mom’s main man off and on for years.” I’m guessing they’d met at a biddy-bip-bippers convention. “He’s been a leader in antiwar movements from Vietnam to Iraq. He just came back from Yugoslavia. It’s unconscionable that we’re letting that happen.” I got no inkling of what we’re letting happen. “He’s a great patriot and the most just man I know.”

“My dad and brother hate antiwar wimps. Me, too.”

“Re-ally?” he says, all sarcastic. “Do us both a favor, don’t argue politics with Nathaniel.” Alchemy takes a sec, then mutters, “Or maybe I should tell you to start an argument, since I’m beginning to see a pattern of contrary behavior that is all too familiar.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment. So, why the fuck not?”

“If you want to spend the night listening to me and Nathaniel debate the intricacies of the failure of American democracy, be my guest.”

“Nooo thank you. Where’s the next stop?”

“Magnolia College. We lived here for a few years when I was a teenager. We, no, my mom was good here. For a while. Nathaniel took a position here because he thought it’d be a tranquil place for my mom.”

We turn down this tree-lined road, and he tells me about the school and the campus and how it was founded by some lady named Sylvia Lancaster in honor of her daughter who died when she fell off her horse and whose nickname was Magnolia. The girl, not the horse. We turn down a road, and I see these gigundo three-story houses. Brockton’s was painted with orange, red, and yellow boxes. Even then I could surmise that was a Salome job.

Brockton ain’t there. The door is unlocked, so we slip in and take a few beers and some slices of roast beef from the fridge. The place is like some minimuseum with paintings and photos covering the walls. I was staring at a black-’n’-white with Brockton and a real young Dylan.

“He hung out with him ?”

“Way back. A little.”

“Ya meet him?”

“No.”

“Who’re all these others?”

He names the faces as we move down the living room wall. “Allen Ginsberg. Angela Davis. Abbie Hoffman in Chicago during ’68. Joan Baez. That’s a cover of Osawatomie , an underground magazine from the ’60s.”

I heard of Baez, she being Dylan’s babe in her prime. I had a vague idea about Abbie Hoffman ’cause Pete Townshend clocked him with a guitar at Woodstock, but that’s it. “Who’s the dogfaced old fart with the funny eyes and big glasses who looks so cum-fucking happy nestling with all them young titties?”

“Jean-Paul Sartre. In Paris. Not sure when. The girls? His groupies, I guess.”

I remember thinking, If a guy that butt-crack ugly could get chicks, so could I . Or maybe I should move to Paree. Alchemy was always giving me books, and he gave me some by that guy. Most of them are boring as a bologna sandwich except the one where the people get locked together for all time — sometimes I think that was us in the band.

Right next to the picture of the Frog was a black-an’-white of Salome in come-on-over pose. Her backside facing out. Man, she had a killer ass. Her face was turned profile with a beret tilted over her forehead. Alchemy nudged me. “Xtine took that. She took hundreds of photos of my mom. Some were for Life . She helped raise me, too. She did some great shots of the Dictators and Television at CB’s way back. You want the rest of the magical history photo tour?”

We start inching down the hall, and I catch sight of some major spiders crawling on the ceiling corners, creeps me out. Alchemy stops and raises both his hands and touches the wall with his palms and fingertips, slowly like he’s searching for an invisible portal. The wood is burnt and charred. “This is why my mom is now back in Collier Layne. She locked Nathaniel in his office”—he pointed down the hall with his chin—“and started a fire.” He shook his head, half laughing in disbelief.