Dhalgren

  "Shit, these cocksuckers get drunk and don't aim at all. And you know one of 'em's gonna piss on it just to see it rust."

  "Aw, come on, mother-fucker-"

  "No, man! Hey, Denny, can I put it in there?"

  "I guess so." Denny stood by a doorway, both arms full of paper bags.

  Kid walked up to him, took his shoulder. "She go?"

  Lips pursed, Denny nodded, looking from one bag to the other.

  Inside, someone leaned the shovels against the wall beside an ironing board.

  They backed up the Harley to wheel it in.

  "Hey, is this gonna be your room, Kid?".

  Kid said, "Probably."

  "It ain't gonna take up too much space. Later I can maybe find some place else for it, you know?"

  "If it's in the Kid's room, nobody's gonna bother it."

  "That's okay."

  Kid squeezed Denny's shoulder. They stepped inside.

  "Hey," Denny said. "It's got a loft!"

  Kid's spine chilled. He stood very still. "Denny?"

  "What?"

  "Did the place where we came from have a loft?"

  Denny looked puzzled. "Sure it did. But it wasn't as nice as this one."

  "It wasn't?"

  "This one's a lot bigger," Denny said. "And it's got a mattress on it."

  "What was the place like we were living before?"

  "Huh?"

  "Describe it to me. I can't remember it. I can't . . . remember anything about it."

  "What do you mean?"

  "What color were the walls painted?"

  "White weren't they?"

  Frowning, Kid nodded. The walls about them were green.

  "You really don't remember where we lived before?"

  Kid shook his head.

  "We had," Denny began, prompting, "a bunch of spades across the street from us? It was down about eight or nine streets from here. And over a little."

  "How did it compare to here?"

  "What . . . do you mean?" Denny asked again.

  "How is this place different?"

  "Shit," Denny said. "This place is about twice as big! Don't you remember how cracked the walls and everything were? This place is in pretty good condition." After a moment, Denny asked: "Is this gonna be your place?"

  "I guess so," Kid said.

  "Can I put some of my shit up there? These cock-suckers will walk off with anything you just leave around."

  "Sure. Go ahead."

  Denny flung up one of the bags, then the other. "I sure wish this one had a ladder. You're supposed to really climb up and down this thing?" The supporting beam had triangular notches cut into the side. Denny climbed up two, and looked back. "Hey, it ain't that hard . . . you really don't remember where we were before?"

  "I guess . . . no."

  "Wow," Denny said and pulled himself up onto the mattress. "You lived there an awful fucking long time." He looked at Kid again, frowned, responding to something Kid could feel moving in his face but could not identify. ". . . maybe not that long," Denny recanted, dubiously. He disappeared.

  More people moved in the hall behind him.

  "Hey, Kid," somebody said, but was gone when he looked.

  He went to the post and climbed up after Denny. In the corner, he sat back and watched the boy thumbtack Koth the Dark Angel next to the day-glo Scorpio. Now Denny emptied the other bags between his knees. "I guess," he said after a moment, "she really got it all. That was pretty nice of her, huh?"

  Kid nodded.

  Denny crawled over the mattress, hesitated, then put his head in Kid's lap. Kid rubbed Denny's neck, looked down, surprised. Denny took two deep breaths.

  He's gonna cry? Kid wondered. "You all right?" Denny asked in a perfectly controlled voice.

  "Yeah," Kid said. "What about you?"

  "I'm fine," Denny said, listlessly. After a while, he said, "I'm gonna go down and check things out, huh?"

  "Okay."

  He sat alone, listening to the sounds of the house. Once he picked up Denny's radio and turned it on. There was not even static. No battery?

  He turned the glass dice, watching reflected ghosts of his face. He turned up a mirror on his chain; comparison of the two images told him nothing. But he looked back and forth.

  Someone banged on the boards beneath him.

  "Hey, you up there? Kid?"

  He opened his eyes; the dice rolled from his lap as he crawled to loft's edge.

  Black eyes, broken tooth, hair with a braid undone: Between huge shoulders, the smooth and the scarred, Nightmare grinned. "Hey, you got yourself a real nice nest set up for you here, huh?"

  "How you doin', man!" Kid swung his legs over, dropped to the floor. His body tingled, heels, chin, knuckles and knees.

  Nightmare took a stiff step back, another to the side, and bobbed his head. "Yeah, you really got yourself set up. Really nice." He looked into the hall, nodded at someone who hailed him. "Stealin" all my folk away from me?" He glanced back, brows high and forehead furrowed. "You're welcome to the scroungy mother-fuckers! The niggers are okay. But the white ones, man. Shit . . . !"

  Dollar said, "Hey, Nightmare-"

  Shoulders raised; head lowered, Nightmare spat on the floor.

  Dollar swallowed, and disappeared at a gesture of Nightmare's fist.

  Nightmare turned, annoyance and concern weighting the ends of his eyebrows, the corners of his mouth. "Fuckin' psycho! You gotta treat these bastards like horse turds, man! Like fuckin' monkey puke! They all like you now. But you're gonna have to show 'em soon." He turned his boot on the gobbet. "And watch out for the ladies, they are particularly bad."

  "Nightmare," Kid said, "most of the time, I can't even tell which ones the ladies are!"

  "Got a point there." Nightmare nodded. "Altogether, how many you got here?"

  "Don't know."

  "I never did neither." In the hall, Nightmare squinted at the ceiling; "Yeah, this is going to be interesting."

  Kid followed him.

  "Somebody told me you fool around with boys, huh?" Nightmare nodded again, considering. "I was in reform school four years. Yeah, I know about that shit." He leaned out on the service porch (where two blacks manhandled a chipped washing machine), and pulled back, still nodding. "So you got Copperhead, Glass, and Spitt all here in the nest with you. That's pretty cool, I guess. I wouldn't have the balls for that I tell you that now."

  "Which one is Spitt?"

  Nightmare's face swung back, ruptured with disbelief. "Which one is Spitt?" Disbelief erupted into mockery. "You wanna know which one is Spitt?" Mockery erupted into laughter. "Hey, Spitt! Come here." He turned in the hall.

  "Yeah?" The white youth came from the room. A matted belly, massing toward the pubic, disappeared under a turquoise and silver buckle. A scar careened across the tight, bald pectorals, and turned down toward his navel. He wore no vest. His only chain was his projector. Wrists and forearms were furry, his biceps veined and bald. His cheeks wore the few hairs of someone who could never have a beard. "What you want?"

  "The Kid here thought he'd like a formal introduction. Kid, this is Spitt. Spitt, this is the Kid."

  "Huh?" Spitt said. "Eh . . . Hi." He wiped a wet hand on his black jeans and held it out.

  "Hi," Kid said, but didn't shake.

  Spitt put down his hand and looked uncomfortable. "I was in the kitchen, trying to wash up some of the God-damn dishes. They ain't gonna stay clean very long, but I thought for the first day, maybe. Did you want something?"

  "You go on back," Kid said. "Nightmare's a clown, you know? Yeah, and throw out some of that garbage, huh?"

  "I was gonna." Spitt's eyes flicked, questioning, between them. He looked down, moved his feet a couple of times, grunted, then went into the other room.

  "Now you mean to tell me you don't know who put the split in Spitt's tit?" Nightmare demanded; with his finger, he flicked the orchid hanging at Kid's neck. It ticked and chattered in the chains.

  After sile
nt seconds Nightmare, aping frustration, shook his head and assumed a theatrical whisper. "He's the guy you cut, man, when him and Glass and Copperhead first beat the shit out of you up at Calkins'! You mean you didn't know that?" Nightmare's expelled "Ha!" of laughter made at least two of the scorpions in the front hall turn around. They turned back. One, a black Woman, was hammering a nail into the wall, using a piece of plank to hit with. "They been tellin' me you're a little punchy sometimes, too. Like you're not always there, you know? Well, I tell 'em just to watch out for you, huh? The Kid knows what he's doing better than any of you mother-fuckers, I tell 'em."

  "Glad you think so," Kid said. "You going to stay here?"

  "Me?" Nightmare buried a thumb in the links looping his chest. "Am I gonna stay here, with these scroungy mother-fuckers?" The thumb wagged. The links rattled. "Shit!"

  "What about you and Dragon Lady?"

  "We're around, you know. Dragon Lady used to have this all-suede gang, man, over on the edge of Jackson. You know where Cumberland Park is?"

  Kid nodded.

  "Man, they were some mean mother-fuckers. I mean, man . . ." Nightmare looked in the living room again, stepped inside.

  Kid followed.

  On the table in the corner were stacked a dozen copies of Brass Orchids.

  "You got to watch out, down there," Nightmare said. "I mean it's getting pretty hungry, down there. Since the water main broke, it's just been sort of terrible. Two guys I know already got killed, down there. Yesterday. And somebody else two days before that."

  "I heard most of the people moved."

  "And the one's that are left, man, are pretty Goddamn strange, you better believe it. Dragon Lady got her nest down there. She's pretty cool, you know?"

  "And you're really going to leave all this for me?"

  "I don't want it." Nightmare frowned at the table.

  "Why?"

  "You asked me that already."

  "And I may God-damn well ask you ten times more, too! Until I find out." "I told you I was just curious-"

  "Me! Why me!" The three scorpions who came through the room now and didn't look were making a noticeable effort. "Come on, Nightmare. Talk to me."

  "Well; you come." Nightmare turned around and leaned his butt on the table edge. "You go. You got a certain style." He shook back his hair. "You're crazy. People say you don't even know who you are. That's okay by me. I don't want nobody asking about Larry H. Jonas before he come here, either- Then, every once in a while, you do something really crazy-ass brave." Nightmare gripped the edges of the table. "Now I ain't brave. I think anybody who is, is stupid. I'm just not so spaced out today I can't remember what I did yesterday-which is more than I can say for you. I think that's the only reason I ended up the boss." He shrugged. "Now you got it. You don't want it, you just take off all them chains, ball 'em up in a little ball, throw 'em in Holland Lake and go on do something else. Somebody else'll pick it up-Copperhead, Raven, Lady of Spain . . . maybe some nigger you don't even know their name yet." Nightmare's face twisted. "But I don't see you doing that, you know?" He pawed something from his back pocket, brought it up between them. "And this shit-" A copy of Brass Orchids, folded. "You know I been actually trying to read this? I don't understand shit like this, man! But every day for a fuckin' week you got a fuckin' page or half-page in the fuckin' newspaper. Like it was a fuckin' movie, or something." Nightmare turned, and with his book knocked the stack. Copies spread the table. Three fell on the floor. "You don't ever talk about it; least I never heard you." Nightmare turned the folded book. "It ain't got no name on it. I mean I don't even know if it was really you wrote the stuff. I mean that's what some people are saying. But I'm gonna look at it anyway, see? And I'm looking. Then I find that part about me!"

  Kid frowned.

  Nightmare conducted the next sentence with the folded book. "Yeah, you know; don't tell me you didn't put nothing about me in there." He opened the cover, brushed over the pages.

  Kid stepped around to see.

  "Here!" Nightmare thumped the page with bunched fingers, leaving four prints. "That ain't me you talkin' about?" The whole page was grey with finger marks, the corners limp.

  Kid took the book. The next page was clean. So was the page before. "Yeah . . ." Kid said. "I guess I had you in mind when I was writing that."

  "You did?" The question's falling inflection rang with mistrust.

  Kid nodded, closed the book and thought how La-accurate a truth he was perpetrating.

  "Oh." Nightmare pulled the book from him. The pages parted automatically at the questioned passage. "Well, reading a fuckin' book and finding somebody talkin' about you is some pretty weird shit, you know? I mean I haven't made up my mind whether I like it ... course, you didn't say anything bad about me." Once more he nodded, pursed his lips, parted them in a silent shape: "You don't say anything good, either." Again he stared at Kid. "That is pretty weird. I just wish I understood shit like this better, you know?" Suddenly, a grin opened around Nightmare's broken tooth. "That really is me, huh? And you weren't puttin' me down or nothing? I told Dragon Lady that was me, and she tried to tell me I was full of shit. You just wait till I tell her." He folded the book, tapped Kid's arm with it, and stabbed at his back pocket a couple of times, till it went in. "You are a very strange person. And you do some very strange things." Nightmare stood up and walked out of the room.

  Kid saw Spitt and Glass, who had been standing just inside the kitchen door, going toward the table.

  Nightmare mumbled very loudly:

  "Too much."

  "You want to come to a party?" Kid called after Nightmare in the hall.

  "Here?"

  "At Roger Calkins'."

  Nightmare's head went to the side. "What am I gonna do at a party up there?"

  "It's my party. Calkins is giving it for me at his place. Bring Dragon Lady along."

  "Just your friends? In his place?"

  "His friends, too."

  "Oh," Nightmare said. "She ain't gonna come without her sidelights."

  "Adam and Baby?" "Yeah."

  "That's all right. All of you come on up. It's in three Sundays, by the paper date. Soon as it gets dark."

  "Calkins' friends, them people you read about in the paper?"

  "Probably."

  "That astronaut guy gonna be there?"

  "I guess so."

  "Mother-fucker," Nightmare said. "You know, Baby don't put no clothes on. I mean he's funny and he just refuses, flat out, you know? And Dragon Lady ain't gonna come if he don't."

  "He can come. If he wants to come buck naked, that's all right with me."

  "Yeah?"

  "You guys come any way you want. Bring your lights. That's all they probably care about."

  "I don't got nothing to dress up in," Nightmare said. "This ain't a party you have to dress up for?"

  "I'm coming like this."

  "You know I'm gonna tell Baby you said to come on up to that party buck naked." Nightmare frowned. "He probably gonna do it, too. Cause he's a real funny mother-fucker. I mean he walks around in the street like that, all the God-damn time." The frown broke before laughter. "I gotta see that. Yeah, I gotta go see that shit."

  "Three Sundays," Kid said. *

  "Maybe we all come over here first?" Nightmare offered.

  "Okay. I'll see you then, if I don't before."

  From the nail hung the framed photograph with the broken coverglass. Father, Mother, the two brothers and the sister gazed reprovingly in their dated dress. With black marker, on the glass, someone had drawn, across the boy's and the woman's mouth, outsized mustaches.

  "Hey, there, pops!" Nightmare saluted the bearded gentleman in the photo. "Kid, I'm gonna split. Thanks for the invitation. I'll tell the Lady. We're all waiting to hear about your next run."

  Nightmare opened the door.

  Their shadows spilled the steps into night.

  "So long." Nightmare trampled his own down to the sidewalk, waved, and stalked away. br />
  Kid looked back down the hall. All three light bulbs were working, as well as the one in the bathroom. I guess, he thought, I picked a good nest. The films of his thought hanging beyond words curled and withered, made all the motions of the thinnest tissue caught in blasting flame. I guess . . .

  Spitt stepped out of the living room. "We gonna eat out back, hey, Nightmare still here?" His hand, straying on his chest, concentrated its motions around the scar.

  "Nope."

  "Oh."

  Behind Kid, the closing door clicked.

  "He could'a stayed," Spitt said. "We got plenty of food for tonight-"

  Kid wandered down the hall,

  I am a parasite. I have never made a home. Even here, I have not instructed a home to be made. In my whole stay, though I cannot recall looking for food, among these twenty, twenty-five faces, some among them must take that care. I crawl from place to place, watching homes created or crumbling around me.

  He wondered what kind of party Calkins expected.

  Breath bucked from his nose; that was laughter.

  On the service porch, Kid looked down into the yard (fire light on the ceiling beams), grabbed the sill of the window, reared back, vaulted: "Whooop-peee!"

  Others laughed.

  "Jesus Christ," Raven said. "You'll break your fuckin' neck!"

  Kid staggered, agonized.

  Three hands came to steady him.

  And three voices:

  "Man, that must be fifteen feet!"

  "It ain't fifteen feet--ten? Twelve? Here, Kid, have a drink. You know there's a God-damn liquor store just around the corner and ain't nobody even broken in the window?"

  "It's broken now. Shit. We're gonna have to work a week to drink up all that booze."

  Kid took another step, grinning, between the scorpions who flanked him. Pain shot again from calf to thigh. Did I break my knee, he thought. No. It'll be all right in a minute. . .

  "You all right, Kid?" That was one of the black girls with bare breasts joggling jingling links. "Man, you scared me good when you come leaping out like that!"

  Kid took another breath and grinned. "I'm okay." He leaned on the black shoulder, while she pulled away from another girl to support him. She laughed, shifted, steadied; and Kid pulled away, took another step, another breath. "Yeah, I'm okay. What we got to eat?"