17 April 2013
This morning was interesting, as in the Chinese curse, “May you live in interesting times.” Joy was on her box as usual, standing behind her was a powerful looking man and a small woman. I recognized them, but hadn’t seen them for about a year.
Joy said, “Dennis, you remember Nick and Lucy in the Sky”.
“Yes,” I said, “I haven’t seen you two for a long time.”
Joy whispered to me, “This is scary.”
Nick pulled out a bottle of sherry, took a swig and passed it to Joy. She hesitated, but Nick insisted.
Joy said to Nick, “I really appreciate you guys coming by, but I don’t want any of my regulars seeing me drinking. I’ve been out here since six o’clock and I’ve only made about two dollars. Have a look in my cap”
Nick said, “No problem, Joy, I’ll help you.”
A man walked past and Nick said, “Hey, don’t forget about the hat!”
Lucy laughed and said, “That’s what he does when we’re panning.”
Joy whispered to me, “Do you know what time it is?”
“No,” I said, “I don’t have my watch.”
“You hid it when you saw Nick and Lucy. Am I right?”
“No, I just forgot it at home
Joy said to Nick, “Have you been in any fights lately?”
“No, not for about a year.”
“Of course, you had your leg in a cast for most of that time.”
“No, it wasn’t that. I didn’t have the need to fight anybody.”
Joy asked, “How about you, Lucy.”
“No, I haven’t been fighting. I robbed a guy yesterday. It was his stupidness. He didn’t see Nick standing in the background. He asked if he could have anal sex with me. I said, ‘Sure, let’s go into the alley.’ Nick followed us in there. He said to the guy, ‘Give this woman all your cash, then fuck off.’ The guy ran. What was he going to do? Call the cops?
Joy said, “Something similar happened to me last week. A guy propositioned me. I said to him, ‘It’ll cost you eighty bucks and cab fare to my place. Cash up front, now.’ We hailed a cab, when we got to my building the guy was busy paying the driver, I hopped out the door — I can be pretty nimble when I have to. I ran across the parking lot, into my apartment and locked the door. The guy didn’t know where I went. Served him right.”
Nick and Lucy moved on toward the library. Joy said, ‘They told me they were feeling drug sick. Nick said he has a check coming, so they didn’t hassle me. When Jake was around, I got in a fight with Lucy. Nick punched me in the side of the head. Jake picked him up by the front of his coat and threw him right on his ass. He said ‘This is girl stuff. Let them fight it out themselves. If It’s man stuff you want, you can take me on.’ Nick just sat there in the middle of the street.”
Joy whispered to me, “Do you know what time it is?”
“No,” I said, “I don’t have my watch.”
“You hid it when you saw Nick and Lucy. Am I right?”
“No, I just forgot it at home.
“I’ll let you get back to work. Will you be at ‘the point’ later?”
“Yeah, the whole gang should be there.”
…
10:00 am, at ‘the point’ (the traffic island)
I sat between Joy and Chester. Chester said, The busses are free for seniors today, but do you have any spare bus tickets for tomorrow?”
“Sure, Chester. How are your legs feeling?”
“They’re okay. They hurt a bit. I’ve been sober for the last three days. I can do that. It gives my body a chance to recover.”
Joy asked Chester, “Can I borrow your phone? I want to call Buck to see if he can bring me some weed and some cigarettes.”
On the phone, Joy said, “Hi Sweetie, where are you? In bed? I’m sorry did I wake you. I was going to ask, Were you whacking off? But, you beat me to the punch. So, are you coming down? Okay, we’ll see you then.”
To me she said, “Poor guy, he walks all the time and he wonders why he gets tired.”
I asked, “How did the meeting with your worker go? Do you have furniture yet?”
“It was a joke. They took me to the Salvation Army Thrift store and gave me a voucher for sixty dollars. I was supposed to get a hundred. Anyway, I bought a comfy office chair and a foot stool that opens up at the top for storage. I also got two black fluffy mats. One I’m going to put under my air mattress. The other I’ll put in the hall. What I really wanted was a love seat they had, but the price was a hundred dollars, so I’ll have to make do with what I got. They will be scheduling a visit to the giant warehouse, that’ll be in about two weeks or so. I guess they’ll bump me to the top of the list. I’m not quite sure how that works.
“When this furniture deal gets settled I’m going to have a showdown with my worker. I want to find out why she treats me the way she does. I know she’s a dyke and I’ve got no problem with that. What people do in their private lives is up to them. What they do when they’re working for me is what I’m concerned about. I’m not the only one having trouble with her.
“By the way, when I went back to the library again, to use the washroom, I saw Nick and Lucy again. They were sitting on one of the top benches. Nick said, ‘We’re up here looking down on everyone.’ When I came back they were both asleep.”
I asked Chester if he knew the time. He pulled out his phone and said, “Can you read the numbers? They’re pretty small.” He shaded the phone inside his jacket. “It’s 10:45.”
“I should be going,” I said. To Joy I asked, “Will I see you tomorrow?”
“Maybe, It depends on how much it’s raining.”
I walked across the street to talk to Uncle Peter and Shaggy. “Hi Peter. I’ve got a book put aside for you. Do you like Ian Flemming?”
“The guy that wrote the James Bond books? Yeah, I like him.”
“I’ll try to bring it tomorrow. I’ll see you then.”
Read about my friends here http://buff.ly/1wyjiKS
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Streetsister 
Reblogged this on Tiffany Belle Harper and commented:
I can feel the compassion in this. The empathy. I hope you will keep going with this. There’s a book in it. X
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