Do you believe in me now? he asked.
Thomas and Chess walked into Carson’s All-Night Restaurant on the Lower East Side. They had been lost on the subway for hours, sure they were going to be mugged at any time.
“Why aren’t we dead?” Chess asked Thomas as they sat in a booth.
“Probably because we looked too pathetic to mug,” Thomas said.
“What do you want?” asked the waitress who came to the table. She had an unusually beautiful voice for a waitress, but it was New York. That waitress had been blonde at several different points during her lifetime, even though she was currently redheaded. Still, she was pretty and had even been called back for a few television commercials. She hadn’t gotten a role yet, but there was a bathroom cleaner spot in her future.
“Hey,” Chess said, “you ain’t seen two Indian men come in here, have you?”
“What?” the waitress asked. “What do you mean? From India?”
“No,” Chess said. “Not that kind of Indian. We mean American Indians, you know? Bows-and-arrows Indians. Cow-boys-and-Indians Indians.”
“Oh,” the waitress said, “that kind. Shoot, I ain’t ever seen that kind of Indian.”
“We’re that kind of Indian.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Hey, Kit,” the waitress yelled back at the fry cook and owner of the deli. “Have you seen any Indians in here?”
“What do you mean?” Kit asked. “You mean from India or what?”
“No, stupid,” the waitress yelled. “Indians like in the western movies. Like Geronimo.”
“Oh, I ain’t seen none of those around for a long time. I saw a few in a book once. You sure there are still Indians around at all?”
“These two right here say they’re Indian.”
Kit the fry cook came out to look at the two potential Indians. Chess and Thomas saw a fat man in a dirty white t-shirt, although they weren’t sure where the shirt ended and the man began.
“Shit,” Kit said. “They don’t look nothing like those Indians in the movies. They look Puerto Rican to me.”
“Yeah,” the waitress said. “They kind of do.”
“Do you speak English?” Kit asked.
“Let’s get out of here,” Chess said to Thomas.
“Yeah, let’s go home,” Thomas said.
“Hey, you speak good English,” Kit yelled after Chess and Thomas. “Have a good trip back to Puerto Rico.”
I’m pregnant, Lynn had told Junior after they dated for a few months during that first year in college.
“I’m pregnant,” Junior said aloud as he sat with Victor in their sixth bar of the night. After hours. Victor would have been falling down drunk if he had been standing up.
“Who’s the father?” Victor asked and laughed.
What do you want to do? Junior had asked Lynn after she told him.
“Am I the father?” Victor asked and laughed some more.
Lynn had just shrugged her shoulders.
Do you want to get married? Junior had asked her then.
“Do you want to get married?” he said aloud in the bar.
“I ain’t going to marry you if I ain’t the father,” Victor said.
I can’t marry you, Lynn had said. You’re Indian.
Junior had turned and walked away from Lynn. He always wondered why they had been together at all. Everybody on campus stared at them. The Indian boy and the white girl walking hand in hand. Lynn’s parents wouldn’t even talk to him when they came to campus for visits.
Junior walked away from Lynn and never looked back. No. That wasn’t true. He did turn back once, and she was still standing there, an explosion of white skin and blonde hair. She waved, and Junior felt himself break into small pieces that blew away uselessly in the wind.
“Nothing as white as the white girl an Indian boy loves,” Junior said aloud.
“What the fuck you talking about?” Victor asked. “I ain’t white. I’m lower sub-chief of the Spokane Tribe.”
Junior walked away from his memories of Lynn and looked Victor square in the face.
“You know,” Junior said, “the end of the world is near.”
“Shit, I know that. Don’t you think I know that? I’m a fatalist.”
Spittle hung from Victor’s mouth, his eyes were glazed over, and his hair was plastered wetly to his forehead. He smiled a little, a single tear ran down his face, and then he passed out face first onto the table.
“It’s time to take you home,” Junior said.
Junior picked him up and carried him out the door. The bartender watched them leave, cleaned the glasses they had drunk from, and erased their presence from that part of the world.
Do you know how many times I’ve dreamed about you? Sheridan asked Checkers.
It couldn’t have been very many, Checkers said. You haven’t known me very long.
I’ve known you for centuries.
Jeez, now you’re starting to sound like Dracula. And I don’t believe in monsters.
I want to kiss you, Sheridan said.
No, Checkers said. I don’t believe in you.
Sheridan slapped Checkers hard, drew a little blood. A little is more than enough.
Do you believe in me now? he asked.
You ain’t nothing, you ain’t nothing.
I’m everything.
You ain’t much at all. You’re just another white guy telling lies. I don’t believe in you. All you want to do is fight and fuck. You never tell a story that’s true. I don’t believe in you.
Sheridan kissed Checkers, bit down hard on her lips. He was pulling at her clothes when there was a knock on the door.
George Wright knocked on the door of Coyote Springs’s hotel room. He couldn’t sleep at all. He had tossed and turned, worrying about the band. So he jumped into a taxi and came over. He wasn’t even sure why. He knocked on the door again. He heard a woman’s voice inside and then her scream.
“Shit,” Wright said and threw his shoulder against the door. He was surprised when the unlocked door flew wide open and sent him sprawling.
From a letter Junior kept hidden in his wallet:
Dear Junior:
It’s over. I went to the free clinic and it’s over. My parents will never know about it. You don’t have to worry about it. I’m okay. I barely even felt anything. I just closed my eyes and then it was over. I hummed a little song to myself so I couldn’t hear anything and then it was over. My parents will never even know it happened. You don’t have to think about it anymore. Just remember that I love you. But that’s all over now.
Love,
Lynn
Just before sunrise, Thomas and Chess walked into the lobby of their hotel and discovered America. No. They actually discovered Victor and Junior sleeping on couches in the lobby. No. They actually discovered Victor passed out on a couch while Junior read USA Today.
“Where’ve you two been?” Chess asked. “We’ve been looking for you all damn night.”
“We’ve been here a couple hours,” Junior said.
Thomas and Chess looked at each other.
“Didn’t the hotel hassle you for being here?” Thomas asked.
“No,” Junior said. “I think they figured we was rock stars and didn’t want to piss us off.”
“Well,” Chess said, “we certainly ain’t rock stars.”
“Why didn’t you go up to the room?” Thomas asked.
“I couldn’t carry him any farther,” Junior said. “And those damn bellboys wanted five bucks to help me.”