Drunken Angel (9781936740062) Read Online Free PDF Page A

response to this strange fork-stabbing fear in the weeks and
months ahead was to drive my fist into another man’s face, a kind of surrogate stabbing, I suppose, the wrestling, the spurting blood, the furious rush. In the Bronx, fights always had a manslaughter element. And football was like that, a kind of stabbing sex. All of me came to play. I slammed my opponent with everything I had, tumbled like a pit bull locked in a grunting death bout. But at the end of day, there was only loneliness, and the sore trek home under seagull-haunted skies, and the weight of an equipment-laden duffel bag, home to a family who hated my guts. I wanted so badly to entangle my legs with a woman’s, cradle my head on her soft shoulder, lips at her breast, listening to her heartbeat, touching her pussy possessively—and reaching wholeness with a bottle of Gallo port.

9
    LINDA WAS THE FIRST REAL GIRLFRIEND WITH whom I had serious sex. I was seventeen, a high school junior; she, nineteen, a miniskirted, blonde Bronx Community College sophomore with long legs, sweet tits, and blue, defiant eyes.
    Her father, Fred, like mine, worked night shifts in the PO, different branch. Her mom, Raz, was a cripple laid up with MS.
    I would go to her house when Fred had left for work, slide into her bed, spend the night. My first time with her I got so excited I couldn’t get it up; delirious, pardoned myself, went to the bathroom, sat on the toilet, jerked off. When I emerged, she saw a spot of sperm on my thigh and said with a witchy laugh: “What’s that?”
    â€œSnot,” I said. “I blew my nose.”
    â€œThat’s not snot. That’s sperm.” She grinned and, leaning over, kissed me.
    After that, I had no problem with sex, though once in a while I wrestled with stabbing nightmares.
    Sometimes, leaving Linda’s house, hunkered in my black varsity
letter football jacket under bright blue autumn skies, I sat next to scarved old ladies gabbing on the projects benches, and smiled at how nice the world seemed.
    I thought about her all the time, the way she looked, how she loved Laura Nyro, how devoted she was to her mother. I got a job working nights at Krum’s, a big confectioners on Fordham Road, to save for a going-steady ankle bracelet engraved with our names .
    When I presented it, she was so happy she cried.
    It felt damned wonderful, so I bought her tickets to see Laura Nyro and she couldn’t believe it. Also got her a beautiful sweater, Leonard Cohen albums, took her to a fancy-dress dinner restaurant with a foreign-sounding name.
    Our parents got to know each other. My parents liked Linda. Everyone felt sure that someday we’d marry.
    Then, one night, while she was attending to Raz, I happened across a telephone bill lying open on her white dresser and noted a long string of collect calls from Fort Lee, New Jersey, charges reversed.
    When she slipped back into bed, I asked: “Who’s in Fort Lee?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œAll the collect calls from Fort Lee. Who’s that?”
    She froze. “A friend.”
    â€œOh, yeah? Which?”
    His name was Eddie, a former boyfriend now in the National Guard, who was lonely, had no dad, and had a lush for a mom. Linda felt sorry for him, accepted the charges when he called because of how broke he was.
    â€œHe calls a lot. There’s like fifteen calls for this month.”
    â€œHe’s having a hard time. His mom’s dying. Please don’t be upset. It’s nothing, really. I love you.”
    â€œOkay. I’m cool,” I lied.

    Then, over a period of several weekends—our usual hang-out times—she became ever less available, due, she said, to end-term exams; kept canceling, last minute.
    And then one day, on a park bench, she said, “Things have an order. Romance can’t be number one!”
    I thought, She has to study: no sweat. “You do what you gotta do, baby,” I told her.