Dirty in Cashmere by Peter Plate Read Free Book Online Page A

my house into the backyard.
    Stuff left by the previous owner was stacked up by the fence. Lawn chairs, card tables with broken legs, a floor lamp, waterlogged photo albums and children’s clothes, aluminum rice cookers, two of them, sneakers, high heels, galoshes, fishing rods, baseball bats, ping-pong paddles, prescription bottles, toothpaste tubes squeezed dry.
    I knelt in the grass before the junk pile, unearthed a hand mirror from beneath a moldy bath rug. I held the glass up to my face, stared into it. A bellicose reflection glared back at me. Yellowed eyes. Slack, drooling mouth. Ashy skin. Scar redder than ever. Nobody I cared to meet.
    I wanted to talk to God, but didn’t know what to say.
    â€œRicky?”
    I slowly rotated. It took forever, even longer. Barelegged and clad in a shiny black vinyl thigh-length dress, Spike was standing ten feet away from me. I coughed once to hide my shame.
    â€œWhat’s going on, girl?”
    â€œYou look like crap.”
    â€œYeah, well, I had a hard day, you know.”
    â€œWhere’ve you been?”
    â€œI was, uh, at General Hospital. An emergency visit.”
    â€œWhat were you doing there?”
    â€œI was in the loony bin. A little vacation.”
    â€œYou were in lockdown? That why you look all fucked up?”
    I silently conceded the obvious.
    â€œThey give you drugs?”
    â€œHaldol. They shot it in my ass.”
    â€œDo you feel bad?”
    â€œCompletely. Worse than dead.”
    â€œWhat are you going to do?”
    â€œNot much I can do.”
    â€œWhy did they hurt you like that?”
    â€œI scare people, I guess.”
    â€œYou don’t scare me. You’re mellow.”
    Spike was extending a friendly vibe, but I couldn’t navigate it. The chitchat exhausted me.
    â€œI’ve got things to do. Sayonara.”
    I did a zombie walk to the cottage. The journey was eight yards. The Haldol turned it into ten miles. My legs were in revolt. Primarily my left leg, which categorically refused to cooperate with any suggestion I made. Each step was involuntary manslaughter. The rain was beating on my head faster than a drum machine. By the kitchen I made a half-assed attempt to boost myself through the window, but couldn’t manage it.
    I perched on the sill. Steadying myself, I searched my pants for the grand Heller and 2-Time had laid on me. At least I still had that. I reached for the wad and cussed. Damn. It wasn’t there. In slow motion I fumbled through all my pockets and came to a sodden, violent conclusion. Fuck. I’d lost the money.

 
    EIGHTEEN
    In Heller’s unoccupied Woodward Street tenement cockroaches ran amok. Joining the festivities, a band of houseflies circled the no-pest strips hanging from the ceiling. The landline burbled four times. The answering machine erupted into a cheery salutation: “Hey, you’ve reached Rance and Mitzi. We can’t take your call because we’re evacuating from San Francisco and relocating to Mexico. No contamination down there. Leave a message after the beep.”
    The hysteria in 2-Time’s voice was out of control.
    â€œRance? Are you there? Pick up the fucking phone. Listen, man. Eternal Gratitude was burgled. We were robbed. Can you believe it? Me and Rita were out getting some food and when we came back to the club all our money was gone. Rita is wigging. She says if Bellamy hadn’t left us, this wouldn’t have happened. I know it’s bullshit, but you try telling her that. Rance, I need to talk to you. I need your help. All right, buddy? I’m going to—”
    The machine cut him off.

 
    NINETEEN
    Friday night I convened with Spike on her porch. I split a tab of Life with her. It was late, past midnight. Moonlight shellacked the leaves of the malnourished avocado tree in the front yard. Each leaf was alone in the light, apart from its mates. A shooting star, rarely seen over the city, arced in the sky,