There was a time that whenever he suited up for a late night bodega run, J. would take the necessary bills and leave his wallet behind. Crackheads begging for change, knuckleheads out on the prowl: best to make a strategic withdrawal. But nothing ever happened and he stopped. More dreadful than becoming a participant in the city’s most popular street theater (the mugging on darkened corner, a spectacle tourists from all over the globe line up to get to see, easier to get than Broadway tickets) are the black windows in all the buildings. Surely, he thinks when he sees them, he cannot be the only one awake at this hour, he is not alone. But in all the buildings and brownstones the neighbors sleep. The decent folk forsake these hours. Blue TV flicker in some windows tells him there are a few like him awake at this time, not many. Always the same windows too, he’s noticed, scattered and well dispersed from block to block so as to adumbrate this nocturnal isolation to best effect. He waves at one blue dancer. No response. It’s a four-block walk to the trading post with only two sketchy parts: the blind turn from Carlton to Lafayette (who knows what kind of scene he’ll stumble into rounding that building’s blade); and that block where streetlights stare blindly, handicapped by vandalism and city neglect, where shadows confab to trade samizdat decrying illumination. But nothing has ever happened on the walk. Two blocks down he sees the huddled messes group outside the bodega. He takes a deep breath and sallies forth.

  The freaks come out at night.

  He gets in line behind the crackhead who sometime dons a subway worker’s reflective orange vest, a souvenir he picked up somewhere in the tunnels. This character likes to tell passersby he needs a token to get home, the orange vest intended to provide evidence of solid citizenship; why he’d need a token if he worked for the Metropolitan Transit Authority has apparently never occurred to the man. J. sizes up the group before him, they are travelers who have come a long way, certainly troubadours finally come to this neck of the woods: The most popular entertainment troupe in all of ShabbyLand, the Freebase Players. Yayo the Clown, his face rouged by dried blood and nose swollen after a recent third fracture, stands in his gay gray attire—he prefers to play the dignified gentleman raconteur down on his luck, happy to share a comedic tale of woe for some change. Those dynamic men on the flying trapeze, Gordy and Morty, who zoom on leave from gravity through alkaloid extracted from cocoa leaves, death defying, without a net worth, falling to earth only at dawn, when this team is too exhausted to perform any trick except attempting sleep while wired to the limits of human endurance. And of course the elders, Ma and Pa, married for twenty years, half that on the pipe, God bless ’em, keeping vigil over the dirty garbage bags containing the cherished props of their act, deposit bottles and broken toasters. And at the fringes of this group, mingling with the celebrities, are assorted teenagers just ducking around the corner for supplies, some malt liquor and Newports, identifiable by their baggy jeans and beepers and youthful joie de vivre, so refreshing beneath the timer-controlled beam of the streetlight.

  The line progresses slowly. Tonight everybody hassles the night man, they denounce the service at this establishment. But there are no questionable characters hanging around who fall outside the usual disrepute of the crowd, so J. starts thinking about the article, he leaves this corner and is conveyed to its double on Grub Street. Then J. sees him.

  J. sees him zigzagging down the street, stymieing any snipers of euthanasiac bent who might be roosting on the Brooklyn rooftops, an out-of-control prop plane in for an uneasy landing. Tony darts here to finger the coin slot of a pay phone, diddling around in luckless pursuit of change, scrambles there to see if that glint (bottle top) is a dime or mirabile dictu a quarter. J. sees Tony, the ghoul’s fingers wiggling in the air like crab’s legs over wharf bottom detritus. Tony lopes down the avenue, scanning and panning, and J. knows that with Yayo the Clown’s meticulous and agonized counting of pennies (always that same deficient sum, the limited number of pockets in which to search), there is no way J. will get clear before Tony lands at the bodega.

  J. is the only mark in the ragged assembly on the corner; Tony will not approach the malt liquor boys, contusions have taught him better, and the crackheads are his comrade connoisseurs of the pipe and competitors for change, outside the game. During the day the street has enough traffic that J. is not always discovered as the object of Tony’s salvage operation. During the day Tony is a puppy; at night he’s a damned barnacle, strung out on an odyssey for the next piece of rock and there’s no shaking him. J. and Tony have a relationship at this point, going back to when J. first moved to Brooklyn and had a pocket full of change. Tony looked more craving than hungry, but he needed the change more than J., fuck it, J. was in a good mood. Tony smiled and memorized the sucker’s stupid face. The act wed them as mark and con man, till zip code do you part. That first contribution was a binding contract (everyone at the bodega now would attest to its legality) although J. hadn’t bothered to read all those subclauses, the fine print he couldn’t see in the bright and easy light of that aimless afternoon. They have a relationship, with rules. During the day “Sorry, man,” will dispatch Tony to the next mark down the street, that bohemian homesteader of these Brooklyn badlands, the goofy white dude with the goatee. Plenty of marks on the afternoon street, such is the bounty of the neighborhood. Another rule: Tony won’t beg for change if J.’s escorting a lady; he’ll tip a nonexistent hat, but that’s it. At night, though, times are tough, and tonight J.’s the only sap around.

  Tony’s evidently having a bad night. All sorts of tectonic mayhem afoot in Tony’s face this eve: his troubled visage bursts with subcutaneous lumps of calcified ooze and porous eruptions trickling a clear fluid. The hair he managed to grow last week and was quite proud of (they talked about it while J. walked briskly for the subway, forbidden turf for the shambling man; the subway cops had beat him up once, or so Tony claimed), has evacuated in patches, exposing old and angry scabby flesh. Tony arrives just after J. asks the man behind the bulletproof glass for three Coronas. He assumes his hovering remora position and says, “Hey, Mickey Mouse man, you having a good night?”

  “All right,” J. responds, glancing at Tony and then staring dead into the store. J. was wearing a freebie T-shirt from Disney that first day Tony hit him up for cash. Remembering and filing his clients’ distinguishing characteristics helps the crackhead keep his various pitches in order.

  “That’s good, that’s good,” Tony says, nodding to comrades down the line, who pantomime back things seen. “Say, listen, listen, could you spare a few dollars for some food? I haven’t eaten all day, man, and I’m hungry.” Holding his stomach urchinwise.

  “We’ll see,” J. says. This is one night he should have left his wallet behind. In a few moments J. will open his wallet and Tony will take a big thirsty peek at the cash. Can’t really say he doesn’t have any cash when there’s a sheaf of twenties in there.

  “Sure am hungry,” Tony says, nonchalant.

  “Maybe,” J. says. He withdraws a five, holding his wallet close. He thinks of soldiers in trenches cupping their cigarette tips so that the Kaiser’s goons won’t see the flame and draw a bead. The night man returns with three Coronas and rings it up, cue now for J. to slide the money into the bulletproof box and spin it around for approval. The night man slips his agile fingers into the register and drops the change and the bottles into the box, slides it around, transaction complete.

  Tony bobs happily next to him. J. stuffs the dollar twenty-five into his jeans and withdraws from the crackhead bazaar. “Hey, brotherman, how about that change?” Tony murmurs.

  “Sorry, man,” J. says. Cradles beer to his chest and strides.

  Tony’s head rocks back and forth and he pulls up next to J. “But you said so.”

  Semantics now. “I said maybe. Can’t help you out tonight.” He just got two checks in yesterday, so giving the man a quarter is no big deal. Tony can have the change and smoke himself to death, no big deal, it’s spare change. But J. has that article due, he’s been transcribing word for word a Hollywood junkie’s incoherent speeches and he’s had enough of junkies tonight. Coffee curdling in him, deadline creeping: he’s in servitude to one druggie tonight and that leaves him with empty pockets for this neighborhood nuisance. “See ya later,” J. says.

  They’re the same age, J. found out one day. Tony trotted next to him, like he is now, halfheartedly rapping about needing some Similac for his baby, a ploy Tony used the first few months after their original meeting but eventually dropped when he realized that he didn’t come off as a dutiful daddy (no one glows that maniacally with the joys of paternity). Tony said, “How old do you think I am?” and J. guessed forty-five. Tony grinned broken teeth and giggled, “I’m twenty-nine! Twenty-nine years old! Today’s my birthday!” And with that he cackled away down the block.

  Tony is not giving up so easily tonight. He’s hurting for a little something. Tony says, stepping closer than J. would like, “You want some LPs? ’Cause I know a Guy that got some. You like that old funk? I could hook you up.” Switching tactics tonight. He knows a Guy, a Guy who J. has learned is a truly enterprising individual. Over the years this Guy, with Tony as the middle man, has been able to furnish stereos (“Real cheap!”), VCRs of the finest Japanese craftsmanship (“Videos too! You like porno?”), sticky weed (“I saw you walking with that dread last week. Maybe he wants some smoke.”), and women (“The night guy at the old people home pays me five bucks to get a woman for him—I could hook you up!”). The Guy Tony knew was a true entrepreneur. Perhaps one day J. will ask if the Guy has a line on devices that make receipts, but not tonight. Nor is he interested in a bunch of old records that the Guy robbed from someone’s house.

  “No thanks,” J. says.

  “I haven’t eaten all day, man, please.”

  “No.”

  “What do you mean no? I see you every day, motherfucker, and now you can’t even help a nigger out with some money to eat. That’s terrible.” A boil splits on Tony’s face and drips. “Can’t even help a nigger out with a sandwich. I saw you got plenty of money on you.”

  “No.” They’re on the block of broken streetlights. Tony’s mother lives on this block. Tony’s pointed it out to J. before; it’s a nice old brownstone in the middle of the block. Family discord: Tony lives a few streets away in a vacant lot shack. Or he used to. The habitation burned down a few weeks ago and Tony pointed to a glistening pink burn on his arm for proof. A problem with the wiring no doubt.

  “You got money for alcohol but I can’t eat,” Tony says. As if this suppurating shade wanted the money for food, strung out like he was. No one on the street but them and all the windows dark. Tony takes the advantage of his opponent and leans up and whispers, “I’m so hungry I might have to take it then, I’m so hungry,” and the threat sits there in J.’s ear. There was that night when J. was heading for the subway to make it to a book party in Manhattan and he saw Tony prowling around, cussing. His clothes were inside out and blood seeped from a gash above his eye. When he saw J. he asked him if he’d seen these three knuckleheads walking around anywhere. J. replied he hadn’t and Tony said that he got into a beef with them and they beat him up and made him take off his clothes and put them on inside out. Or maybe they made him put his clothes on inside out and then beat him up. At any rate, he was looking for them and he had something: he pulled up his shirt and pointed to the long carving knife tucked into his belt. He was going to cut them when he found them. J. told him to calm down and get himself cleaned up. He wasn’t going to cut anybody. Tony considered this possibility, nodded and agreed. He pulled his shirt down over the knife. Then he asked J. for some change.

  J. doesn’t respond to the threat. They walk in silence for a few feet, and they leave the threat on the pavement behind them. They move into the next streetlight’s circle and Tony says, “Hey, you know I wouldn’t do that. I ain’t like those other crazy niggers they got up in here. But I gotta eat. What do you want me to do?”

  “Can’t help you, man.” If he gave into the crackhead now, it would look as if he was giving in to the threat, even with Tony’s withdrawal of it. A principle involved: he doesn’t want to be punked out. There’s one more block before he gets to his house and he doesn’t want Tony there when he gets to his front door.

  “You want me to sing for my supper?” Tony asks. “You want me to sing for my supper? I’ll sing for my supper.” He spits a gremlin of phlegm to the pavement and scratches his foot across the sidewalk like a pitcher taming his mound for a pitch. Then he jumps up and down and sings from his singed throat, “This old hammer killed John Henry but it won’t kill me! This old hammer killed John Henry but it won’t kill me!” J. looks back at the crack-head. Tony’s eyes bulge out with the strain of producing that gross racket. “This old hammer killed John Henry but it won’t kill me!” And here, J. thinks, this is the essential difference between this neighborhood and those of Brody Mills’s orbit. No one here will call the police about the noise. They hear gunshots and arguments in the middle of the night and they might creep to the window to see what’s going on but they won’t call the police. They’ll pray they don’t hear a rape, something that will force them to get involved, or consider getting involved, but the people behind the black windows will not call the police at this. “This old hammer killed John Henry but it won’t kill me!” It’s up to J. He has no more resistance. He pulls out the change from the five dollars and gives it to the crackhead. Without touching the man’s palm. Who knows what the guy wipes his ass with.

  “You like that song?” Tony asks.

  “You won,” J. responds. Yards between them now, the distance between the mark and the expert con.

  J. hears Tony yell, “Hey, brotherman, brotherman, wait a minute!”

  J. turns, knowing from the volume of the man’s voice that there are distances, old distances, between them. Tony jabs his finger at him and says, “You’re a solid brother, Mickey Mouse, you’re a solid citizen.” He bows and scampers away in the direction of a building without a door, a building with secret steps and codes.

  At his desk J. sips his first Corona and looks down at his notes. He calculates what he’ll get done before he’s dampened enough to fall asleep. He considers how much sleep he’ll get and through the calculus of doggerel arrives at how many words per hour he has to produce by noon. He presses a button and listens to the lying junkie. Only variety of junkie awake at this hour.

  The biggest spud in Summers County is a mean-looking son of a bitch, whole cubic feet of lumpy resentment, a bad-ass tuber from the bowels of Hell. Last year’s winner, enthroned on a table across the aisle and encased in a top of the line plastic sheath to preserve its nefarious glory for generations to come. The proud father, a grizzled farmer garroted by a bolo tie, stands behind junior pointing to the sign at its swollen base that invites the passersby to touch it. Just an exhibit, not for sale. J.’s almost bored enough to walk over and see what kind of tater miracle will be performed on him, but he’s not there yet. It’s comfortable on the beer garden bench, even if he’s not drinking, and the boys are doing well enough by themselves, rapidly exhausting the roll of drink tickets the city fathers, via the taxi driver, gave them when they arrived at the fair. J. can’t keep his eyes off that spud, though. It’s a Paul Bunyan potato, a John Henry snack.

  The boys sprawl across the benches, bending elbows and killing time. Flies alight on their faces for brief disappointed moments.

  “I think they should give us free T-shirts. I want a free T-shirt.”

  “Don’t think they carry your size, my man.”

  “For my mother.”

  “How old do you think she is?”

  “She’s seventy-four. That why I want to get it, for her birthday.”

  “Not your toothless ma, that woman there in the red tanktop.”

  “Those guys over there keep drinking out these jars, man, been watching them. It’s moonshine.”

  “Ever tell you about the time I was interviewing Lynrd Sknyrd and we drank from their still? Drinking a bucket of nails.”

  “What time is this steeldriving thing? It’s like some kind of monster truck thing, right?”

  “I say we go over there and buy some of that shine.”

  “I gotta dig that steeldriving event. Maybe I can squeeze a GQ thing out it. Mano-a-mano is really big right now.”

  From time to time, J. sneaks a peak at the next bench over, where some locals have bivouacked for similar purposes. So far J. has cataloged one “get a load of these guys” thumb gesture, three different rounds of chortles at his friends’ expense, and assorted steel-eyed squints of challenge. Only he has noticed. There’s not a fight brewing, but one or two lessons to be taught to the rude outsiders are being debated under their baseball caps, drawn from fisticuff curricula.

  “Still pissed?” One Eye taps on his shoulder.

  Ever since their embarrassing internment in Lawrence’s bathroom, One Eye has avoided him. J. figured his friend was probably busy with caper preparation: diagrams of heating vents, timing with a stopwatch the length of time it took to get to Lucien’s room from his, counting and recounting paces, calculating lines of sight. At 12:05 on the dot every night the security guard leaves his post for a bathroom break. Now here he is with a white cotton candy cone picked bare except for a few tufts of pink fur, as if he’s been picking meat off a dead cartoon animal.