The Tides by Melanie Tem Read Free Book Online Page B

check from the welfare came on the fifth and then he could do it like it was meant to be done, man; heavy sweet purple port wine, the first long swig going down like an alto sax in his head, the next like the thrum of a big ol' bass, man, the natter and search of drums. Twenty-nine dollars from the welfare every month, and on the sixth and seventh he didn't have to do no favors for nobody. But often he did anyhow: a six-pack for the Mexican dude, a sampler Jim Beam the old guy in the wheelchair could hide under the sheet they used to tie him in. It was a rare twenty-nine dollars that Gordon spent entirely on himself. Since he got the puppy, a lot of it went for dog treats.
     
    But now it was the middle of the month, a long time till the next check. Gordon sat back a little, rocking and bouncing on the L-shaped metal supports of the chair, and dozed in his purple haze, which was already beginning to fade from his eight o'clock trek to the liquor store. The puppy rearranged itself in his lap and fell back asleep, too.
     
    All of a sudden Gordon wanted to dance. All of a sudden he was dancing. His feet in their tennis shoes with flopping soles moved on the concrete in a sliding two-step he'd never learned, and his squat body swayed gracefully. Groggily nonplussed, he opened his eyes and looked around to see who was making him do these things, but he was looking outward, which was the wrong direction.
     
    After a few minutes, Gordon sank back into his torpor, which was rather a pleasant state to be in. He stopped moving and his awareness was swaddled again in thoughts of drink. He knew the lady who ran the liquor store was afraid of him and felt sorry for him, both, because he lived in a nursing home. He'd heard her indignant, embarrassed conversations on the phone. 'He's up here again. I feel sorry for him and all that, but you better come and get him and you better keep him out of my place. This is a place of business.'
     
    And it used to be they'd do that. He'd sit on the curb in the sun or the shade, depending on the season, and chug as much of his bottle as he could before they got there. They always poured out whatever was left, a sad little puddle disappearing down the gutter. But by then he could usually be pretty well flying, stumbling, singing
     
    'Stormy Weather' and at least he didn't have to walk the two blocks home.
     
    Things had changed. Lately he could tell from his end of the conversation that somebody at the nursing home was telling the liquor-store lady to treat him like any other customer. That new little broad, probably, that new little boss-lady with the round face and boobs no bigger than a handful and white-blonde hair; he'd known her before and he called her Princess. He felt sorry for the liquor-store lady, and he knew she hated to do it, but lately she'd been refusing to serve him if he got too rowdy, and twice she'd even called the cops, who'd put him in the slammer overnight and then next morning he'd had to get himself home, stone cold sober and slow on his feet, and that was a damn sight farther than two blocks. The new little boss-lady must have been talking to the cops about him, too. It took him so long to get home he was worried about his dog, but somebody else had fed and watered it and changed its papers, and Gordon didn't much like that, either. It was his dog. He'd always wanted a dog.
     
    He looked head-on at the sun, waited impassively for the pink haze to clear from his eyes. Not yet noon. He'd be damn near sober before he could risk another trip to the liquor store. The thought of being sober had always scared and sickened him, while he was married and had kids and then through the years in back wards and under flophouse beds and in various other forms of the loony bin.
     
    Gordon made himself laugh. Then, to give himself something to laugh at, he tilted sideways in his chair so the metal popped in and out with a pong . He laughed again. He stopped himself from falling with an