In the City of Shy Hunters Read Online Free PDF Page B

asked.
    Living here, I said, Now. Got an apartment: Two-oh-five East Fifth Street.
    Got a job? Ruby asked.
    Restaurants, I said.
    Hard time to get a restaurant job, Ruby said. August. You might try Life Café, Tenth and B, on the northeast corner of Dog Shit Park. You could tell them Ruby Prestigiacomo sent you, but it won’t do any good.
    Dog Shit Park, I said.
    Yeah, Ruby said. You remember—Tompkins Square, not far from you.
    Why’d you move here of all places? Ruby said.
    Shit happens, I said.
    Seemed like a good idea at the time, I said.
    If I can make it here I’ll make it anywhere, I said.
    But it’s not the truth.
    Of all the things I could’ve said right then, practiced things I didn’t stutter, I said this: Because I was afraid to, I said. And also, I said, Because I’m looking for someone.
    True Shot’s mirrors were on me from the left, and from the right Ruby’s too close with his breath.
    Ruby crossed his hazel eyes. Crossed over, huh? Ruby said.
    Crossed over? I said.
    That’s when you stop being one way and start being another, Ruby said. Not something many people can do, or want to do. In fact, Ruby said, The only people who cross over, cross over because they’re on some kind of Mission Impossible.
    I could no longer live and stay the way I was, I said.
    But it’s not the truth.
    I didn’t say anything.
    Then: Two-oh-five East Fifth Street! Ruby yelled, the same way as Waldorf Hysteria!
    We were stopped on a street, in front of a building, double-parked. True Shot turned the engine off.
    Between Second and Third, Ruby said, On the street where you live.
    I have often walked down this street before, Ruby sang.
    THE SIOUX TAPE ’ S drums was the way my heart was beating. Sweat rolling down from my pits, my head still floating. I was way stoned, sitting on a bucket between a guy named True Shot and a guy named Ruby Prestigiacomo, and there I was in all the world, double-parked in front of 205 East Fifth Street, between Second and Third.
    From Door of the Dead van, the light above the steps of 205 East Fifth Street was right behind Ruby’s head. The mercury-vapor streetlamp lightthe color of dust storms, ocher through the windows, hard edges, New York angles.
    I knew it, Ruby said, Soon as I saw you.
    What? I said.
    True Shot’s going to tell you a story, Ruby said.
    What story? I said.
    Who can tell? Ruby said. Maybe the Secret of Wolf Swamp.
    My suitcase with the travel stickers on it, my duffel bag, and my backpack were all lined up. I went to open the side door when Ruby put his hand on my knee, grabbing my knee the way you do when you’re trying to keep something still.
    My butt was on the bucket.
    Just then outside big thunder and a flash of light.
    But it’s not the truth. The thunder wasn’t outside. The thunder was inside me, the flash inside.
    True Shot raised his head up and looked at the roof of the van. From under the chin, True Shot didn’t look Indian at all, or any one way. He just looked like a kid on a summer night looking up at the stars.
    So Will Parker . . . True Shot said.
    Handsome Einstein . . . Ruby said.
    In True Shot’s mirrors, I was a red ball cap with crooked bottom teeth.
    Only silence inside Door of the Dead van. True Shot cleared his throat, spit out the window. He put his fingers up to the buckskin bag with the beaded blue horizontal and the red vertical hanging from the buckskin necklace, turned around, and put his mirrors onto me.
    Just like that, True Shot took my hand, open palm to open palm, and put his fingers in with mine, his silver rings against my fingers.
    It is this way, True Shot said, You will find your friend.
    I will? I said, How do you know?
    True Shot just knows, Ruby said.
    Meanwhile, True Shot said, Have some fun while you wait for the will of heaven.
    The porch light in True Shots’ mirrors made it look like I had a halo around my head.
    I didn’t know what to