“No,” I say.
“Just outside Erie, Pennsylvania, I built the most ass-kicking clean-air geodesic dome you’ve ever seen, and spent my last dime on rich soil and some ash saplings. Are you following me? Of course not, no offense, because that was my moment in the sun, the instantaneous showing-out of my genius, not yours. And the culmination? Do you know it, the culmination?”
“No,” I say.
“GlamorDivans,” he says. “A difficult period while my ashes came to maturity. Then whammo, Sector A gets buzz-sawed, my special team of overpaid but brilliant carpenters swoops in, and before long, do you know what occupied the center of my warehouse under a special spotlight?”
“No,” I say.
“Six damn GlamorDivans,” he says. “Were their cushions specially handsewn by an incredibly talented seamstress I found in a rinky-dink tailor shop in Milwaukee? Yes. Did the ash shine under my spotlight like something from an earlier and more sane age? You bet. Did I tromp my ass off to identify loaded potential buyers? Yes yes yes. Did I own a car? Nope. Did I walk over five hundred miles and ultimately succeed in selling all six and buying a whole other load of ash saplings et cetera until I was the loaded and very happy man you see before you?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Yes!” he says. “I thank God every day for the saga he gave me to live out. And now I say to you, because of the courage you manifested in saving that nameless little brat: Want aboard? Want to change your life forever and for better? Want to be part of the GlamorDivan Team and earn five hundred dollars a month?”
At the facility I made fifty a month and was the envy of every dispossessed who stood outside the retaining wall gaping up and swearing.
“I’ll take that involuntary exhalation as an enthusiastic yes,” he says.
I stand there nodding my head with my eyes watering.
“Here’s the situation,” he says. “I blame love for my woes. Not my love, but a barge guider’s. Over seventy GlamorDivans, bought and paid for, hang in the proverbial lurch because my pal Sid, whom I literally dragged out of the gutter, has met the woman of his dreams and suddenly loathes travel. That’s neither here nor there. What’s here is, some of Buffalo’s wealthiest are sitting around in their parlors even as we now speak, thinking: I hope old Blay didn’t screw me out of four thousand bucks. And with each passing moment my name’s sinking deeper into the muck, because buddy, I’ve already cashed the checks. It’s routine. It’s a cash-flow thing. Totally aboveboard. But all the same. My not-thin ass is in a sling, not that it hasn’t been there a million times before in this catch-as-catch-can line of work, but at any rate my question to you is: Do you have a hankering to see Buffalo or make me very happy or accrue some serious money real quick? If yes to any of the above, it’s on the scooter with you and let’s see you use some of that coolheadedness and courage to make us some loot. Ha ha! Life is good!”
His scooter’s hidden under some branches. I climb on. We fly along the side roads. He’s got a sweaty back and a nice touch on the curves. Scrawny subsistence farmers gawk at us and walk away shaking their heads as our dust settles on the brims of their economy hats. Finally we reach the Erie Canal, where two armed Flaweds guard his blue barge.
“Why the weapons, you might ask?” he says. “The common man is my friend. I used to be him. But I’m not him now. You wave some beautiful household furnishings in front of the common man’s nose, there’s no telling what he might do. And these are my GlamorDivans. My body built those ten thousand mud huts. My signature went on the check for the saplings. Anybody fucks with my product, I sadly have to bite their head off. Or rather you do, in my stead. Shoot their heads off, rather. Whatever. Haw!”
“Sir,” I say, “I’ve never driven a boat before.”
“Who’s driving?” he says. “You’re pulling. I apologize. I realize this was mule work in the old days but hey, these are the new days, so we best turn up our collars and deal with what is, what is now, the existing lemons from which lemonade may be made, eh? Ah, it’s exciting to see a rich man in process. You, that is. Don’t think of yourself as a surrogate mule, think of yourself as an entrepreneur of the physical.”
I should have known. Mules are at a premium. Thousands have died of a bone marrow disease. The ones that lived lost the use of their legs. You’ll walk past a field and there’ll be fifteen or twenty of them lying on their sides braying. High-school kids get a kick out of pouring gas on them and lighting them up. It’s a craze. The animal rights people do their best to prop them back up and slap on feed-bags and post antivandalism signs, but no sooner are they back at headquarters than the mules are either toppling over or burning.
“There’s ample grub in the hold,” Blay says warmly. “It’s good food. I’m a man who likes to eat. And here’s two bills. The rest I pay on arrival in Buffalo. Mike and Buddy know the details. Meet Mike and Buddy.”
So I meet Mike and Buddy. Their Flaws are dental. Buddy was born with no teeth and Mike has twice as many as he needs. Both smile at once. It’s disconcerting. I look at the barge.
A nice barge.
Alike and Buddy take a cash advance and go into town to get ripped.
“Truly nice fellows,” Blay says, “albeit none too swift in the head. Between the two of them they have maybe one-third of a brain. Watch them closely. Rarely leave them alone. You’re to be the thinker and planner of the operation. The nerve center. The guru. The Normal.”
“I’ll try,” I say.
“You’ll succeed,” he says. “I can look at you and see a winner. Dream big, win big. Stick with me. Self-actuate. It’s been a pleasure meeting you. See you on the other end. I’ll be the one proffering a huge wad of cash with your name on it.”
He gives me a hug. What a sweet man. He likes me. He trusts me. The way his girth makes him rasp even when he’s standing still is endearing.
I sit on the deck of the barge with a semiautomatic. The water’s brown. As prescribed by federal regs, all inflow pipes are clearly labeled. RAW SEWAGE, says one. VERY POSSIBLY THORIUM, says another. Dusk comes, an early moon pops up over the swaying trees, the barge slips around on its tether like a mild dog happy to be tied, and I help myself to some noodles and milk.
Noodles. Milk.
Freedom, I think: very nice.
In the morning Buddy cooks eggs. They’re good eggs. He gums them. Bits fly all around. Bits get on his chair and the saltshaker. Buddy and Mike fart with impunity, making a big comical show of lifting their butt cheeks. I think about participating to win their respect but then Mike says it’s time to start pulling. We each take a tether. We walk in a row. It’s not easy but it beats toadying to the whining rich. At nine we take a break and apply salve to our shoulders and have some bottled water. Every now and then a kingfisher pulls something out of the muck and looks askance at it and eats it anyway. Along the shore are decaying tract houses which now serve as bunkhouses for barge pullers. At noon we stop at one for lunch. In the yard is a filthy man digging up potatoes with a taped-together hoe.
“Go on in, fellas!” he says. “My wife’s put out a heckuva fine spread today. Mostly it’s just potatoes, but she does great things with a spud. Don’t take my word for it! Go in and see for yourself, by tasting some!”
Inside are nine kids and one other guest and an astounding tableful of potato-centered dishes. She’s carved potatoes into crude figures. She’s baked them and fried them and disguised them with sauce. She’s mashed some of them into pulp and dyed them and spread them across the surface of others. Understandably the kids are husky. Everyone pitches in. The youngest walks along wiping the face of the second youngest as the second youngest carries bucket after bucket of water to the mother, who’s washing and washing potatoes, then pitching them across the kitchen to identical twins, who cut them up while jabbering in pig Latin.