CHAPTER 18 – THE PIKE
I slept last night like I’ve never slept before. I had dreams of men with masks chasing me through the streets of New York, past Broadway, past the Bridge and into the New York City Library. I was accosted by a cop who asked me my name and then spit on my shoes when I told him I didn’t know. Then I was suddenly at home, but it wasn’t my home, it was like it had been turned into a bar, and Woody raised a glass at me and I looked in the mirror, but I had turned into a stranger. Woody came up behind me and yelled into my ear, “You’re never going to make it old buddy!” and I laughed, and he laughed, and together we pulled back to drink, he from a shot glass and me from the bottle that materialized in my hand, and then I forgot where I was supposed to be, and I yelled back something about finding Aries. Woody sneers at me and then it goes black. I woke up feeling pain in about two hundred of the two hundred and ten bones in my body. I figure with my ribs being possibly broken, I could legitimately count the broken ones as extras.
It’s nine in the am. I’ve still got about forty minutes to kill before Hank and I are supposed to meet. I extract myself from my couch, instantly regretting the action. It’s all I can do to keep from shrieking. The pain in the lower left hand of my chest hits home like Mickey and all his major league friends. And I’ve been hit with a real bat before. This one hurts worse.
I am breathing so heavy I’m afraid I might drop a lung, so I pause there, bent double and panting, panting so I can gain the will to stand all the way up. I have to tell myself it’s for my complexion, but my brain knows better than to believe that American Beauty Pageant crap. This is gonna be one mother of a day.
As I bend straight and breathe in, I can feel it, like a rip in my lung. Oh God! I am sweating profusely, and I wipe my forehead with my palm, exhaling slowly and building up the will to take another breath. I do, and it hurts like hell, though I may be imagining it lightening up. The third and fourth breaths are similar, and by the time I finish counting to ten, I’m standing straight up and breathing in a way that you think of geriatrics as breathing. Hand on upper stomach, helping to push that mass of pectoral flesh that seems to weight a ton upon my lungs. Ache. Breathe. Push. Breathe. My spiritual mantra for the day. Woody would be proud of me.
I make it to my little washroom, and take a look in my face for the first time since last night. Nothing a little plastic surgery can’t fix. These days anyway. Five years ago, I’d have oatmeal for a face the rest of my days. I could handle that. It’s those pearly whites I took for granted that’s got me pushing back a stifled groan of anger. Can’t get too worked up there, Ferret. Easy now. They got dentists who can replace any tooth in your mouth, and some you don’t have as well. Life will go on.
The rest of my face is pretty puffy, so I wet a cloth and set it on my face. I lean back slightly and let it drip onto my neck and chest, and into my ears where it makes me squirm. Like Frannie used to do to me. She’d stick her tongue inside, just inside, and wiggle it around and that got me so crazy I’d yell. Just moving like that sends spikes into my chest and sides, and I double over too quick. Bad move.
I guess life is like this sometimes. There’s nothing to do but let it ride. I’ll start to heal up in a day or two. My joints and muscles will stiffen and my skin will open up a bit, start letting in that air that turns everything a nasty pink and green color.