Out on the Street Pt. 03

Hi everyone - thanks for sticking with me! This is the final instalment. Note that the tenses switch back and forth - this is intentional, as some of this chapter is 'as recalled' and some 'as experienced'.

-----

Wilmington, Delaware, 1905.

Vittorio:

I don't like to be touched these days. Morton took care of that. But I do like to people-watch, and I wonder if perhaps I have Frank to thank for that.

There's a place I'll make for at the end of a day, down toward the river. A telegraph pole at the corner of Market Street, well leaned on, made smooth by others before me, warmed by the afternoon sun.

I'll claim a spot there, lighting a cigarette and eyeing the workers traipsing past me, eager for a drink after their day at the shipyards, on the wharves. With quite a few Irish and a good number of Swedes hereabouts, any given evening I'll see scores of well-made men with blond hair and pleasing features pass by.

Some days it gratifies me in an odd sort of way. Others, I wonder what it is I'm grasping at. I not even certain I recall what he looks like, now, not truly...only that he was beautiful. But despite that, I know - I'm sure - that none of these hordes of men come close to equaling him.

They saunter by me in big laughing clumps, in smaller, quieter huddles, sometimes in simple pairs. I always notice the pairs. I watch them striding easily along in concert with one another, talking, laughing, sharing a joke, a match, one cupping his palms for the other's cigarette, and sometimes - sometimes, I think I see a current passing between them in their gaze, an unspoken pact, and I understand why I'm here.

I'm not watching for him, or even somebody who reminds me of him...I'm watching for that.

-----

We left Frank's house for the last time. We walked, just like always. In silence, just like always. Except...that it was the last time. The last time Angelo would reach his peak with me, leave his essence inside...

And not only that. It was the last time I'd know for sure there were five extra dollars waiting for me come the weekend. Now...now it was back to alleys, strangers, and uncertainty.

Angelo stopped four or five blocks from our building and lit a cigarette. I didn't follow suit. I was so churned up inside I felt in danger of bringing up my supper.

He drew hard on the cigarette several times, filling his lungs to capacity. He was looking away from me, out to the street, when he spoke.

"I don't think I'll do...any of this...anymore."

"Nor me." The words were out of my mouth before I comprehended them, but hearing them, I knew them for the truth.

It was that simple. I couldn't go back. In near six months of receiving five dollars every week from Frank, I had, in addition to a good warm coat, some gloves and one or two other niceties, a little money put by.

There were four dollar bills folded and worked up between the layers of the tongue of each of my boots, two underneath each inner sole. And Frank had given us both another ten dollars tonight, along with the St Christopher medals.

But without any 'overtime' it'd slowly dwindle to nothing as my expenses outran my earnings, and then...?

Then, in my spare hours, I'd shine shoes, carry bags, run errands, and if it wasn't enough - I'd sleep in a flophouse. With my boots and my belt on.

I felt both better and...worse, in the wake of that decision, but less sick. With shaking hands, I lit a cigarette of my own as Angelo finished his, and turned to follow him as he paced on toward our room.

There were three more days. Three more days where life was the same, aside from the fact that Frank was done with us. We worked and we ate, we walked and we talked, we slept and we woke.

Then...when I opened my eyes on Thursday morning, I was alone in our little room-within-a-room. Angelo wasn't in his bed.

I told myself he'd stepped out for cigarettes, he'd needed to void his bowels, he hadn't been able to sleep and had taken a walk to pass the time. But an ominous feeling had awoken already, an awful gnawing somewhere deep in my gut.

It took me most of a week to accept it, but some part of me knew from that first moment. He was gone.

All day Thursday, I never quit the room in case, in case, in case he should come back. I pissed in the pot, I drank from the pitcher at the shared washstand, and between times I sat and smoked, facing the door, watching it like a cat at a mouse-hole, while the world seemed to draw in at the edges, grow smaller.

By the time darkness fell and the other men tramped in to take to their bunks, noisy, boisterous, laughing, some of them staggering a little, I was shivering, though I had my coat on. I supposed I was hungry. I didn't feel hungry. I didn't feel anything at all. Couldn't feel, couldn't think, couldn't...

I lay down, coat and all, on Angelo's mattress, pulled his blankets over me, and rested my head on his pillow. It smelled of him. His hair, his sweat, his body...him. I turned my face into it, brought it up around the sides of my head, opened my mouth wide and gasped through the obstruction, breathing him in.

I fell asleep, and in my dreams he surrounded me - then I woke up with the light of day and he was still gone. Gone all over again.

Friday passed as Thursday had. I ran out of cigarettes a little before midday and shortly began to feel even colder. I fetched my own blankets down from the upper bunk and laid them over top of Angelo's as a supplement, sleeping for snatches, waking, shivering, sleeping some more.

Reality crowded in as we were all roused Saturday morning by the landlady pounding on the door, demanding rent. With Angelo not there, I had to pay for both of our bunks, and because I'd stayed in bed all of Friday, I'd forfeited being paid even for the three days I had worked that week.

Madre di dio, I thought, handing over seven of the final ten dollars Frank had given me. After she left I righted my clothes, found my cap, prepared to go out and eat. By Monday, I needed to be finished - done with my grief-storm. I literally couldn't afford to continue it longer.

If I'd been thinking more clearly, I might've realized...I might've seen it coming. As it was, Monday brought another shock. Another door shut in my face.

"And you can tell Corsetti not to bother either," the foreman shouted after me as I trudged away.

No I can't, I thought, tears welling up. I can't tell him anything. Not even how sorry I am.

-----

By the time I tumbled out of a third-class carriage onto the platform of North Philadelphia Station three days later, having shelled out two dollars for my fare, my pockets were empty. All the money I possessed now was in my boots.

And around my neck. I stood fingering the little coin-like medal, the outer side nubbly with its embossed image of the saint, the inner smooth against my skin, as the crowd thronged around me, making for the concourse. Maybe things will be better here, I thought, joining the stream of people. They could hardly be worse, after all.

How wrong I was. The city was enormous - no, not as enormous as New York, but I'd only ever inhabited a small corner of that city. The farthest I'd ventured out of my comfort zone, in so very many ways, had been Frank's house. Here, in these totally unfamiliar surroundings, and with no way to get my bearings, how was I to tell where somebody like me might find lodgings, might get work?

I never discovered the answer.

A month passed, and fall was creeping in. The days continued mild, but the nights began to have a genuine chill. There was one dollar remaining in my left boot. I'd found scraps of work here and there, a day, two, loading wagons, carting boxes - a dime for an hour's labour cleaning shop-front windows. Enough that I could eat, but with winter coming...

With winter coming, shelter was my most pressing need for the next several months. Food and cigarettes I would enjoy on the days I could afford them. And...my fingers found their way once more to the gold charm lying against my chest and clutched it through the fabric of my shirt. If it came to it, I'd sell my body again before I gave this up. For so long as there was the slimmest hope that Angelo wore its twin, I'd keep it with me...

There seemed no point in waiting. I made my way to a patch of sidewalk perilously close to one of those nefarious alleys, easily discerned even in an unfamiliar town, and stood holding a piece of board I'd found, with 'will work for lodgings' scratched on it in charcoal.

Today, this is my work, I told myself. And if by evening I have nothing, then I go down the alley, and tomorrow I try again.

I didn't have to wait until evening. After maybe five hours of being either ignored or jostled not entirely accidentally by passers-by, a man stopped and squinted at the board, then raised his frown to me.

"What kind of work?" he enquired.

"Any kind of work, sir," I told him.

He scoffed. "We'll see about that. Come with me," and he turned away, beckoning sharply with his head for me to follow. I scurried along keeping a couple of steps behind him for several blocks, twisting this way and that as the streets grew gradually more suburban.

He came eventually to a stop in front of a store that read 'Morton D. Daley - Dispensing Chemist'. Next door were a butchers and a greengrocers cheek-by-jowl, separated from the chemists by a narrow alley, which he trod down as I once again followed.

I waited while he unlocked the door of a lean-to and entered at his gesture. He stepped inside also, squared his shoulders and glared at me for several silent seconds, before saying;

"You're a whore, aren't you?"

I felt tears prick my eyes. I'd so hoped for something...anything...different. But - I was, wasn't I?

"Yes, sir," I admitted.

He nodded curtly. "Well, whore," he said, indicating the space about him. "I have no need of this storeroom for my stock, so I let it out as lodgings instead. You may lodge here from now on free of charge provided you are prepared to abide by the stipulations I set, so listen up."

"I live above my store with my family - you will not speak or interact with any one of them for any reason, at any time. You will make yourself available to me here at eight o'clock every single evening save for Sundays.

"You may conduct your...activities...as it pleases you outside of these times and far distant from here, but you may not under any circumstances use this room to pursue your business. Do I make myself quite clear, boy? If you ever bring anybody else here, I will discover it, and I will beat you until you wish for your death - and then I'll stop."

I took him in while he laid out his conditions. He was a fairly slight man and his hair was tidily slicked down. He wore small gold-rimmed spectacles, sported a thin mustache above a rigid upper lip, and he sniffed while he talked.

I felt no enthusiasm whatever at the prospect of servicing him, but I needed somewhere to stay above all things...the bed looked decent and had three blankets, the space was clean though narrow and sparse, with shelves and hooks on the walls as you'd expect from a storeroom, the door had a locking latch on the inside, and there was no hint of occupation by rats or mice. I supposed a chemist would know how to keep rodents at bay better than most folk.

"Well, boy?" he suddenly barked. "Don't waste any more of my time - take it or leave it! If you're not interested, speak up! There's no shortage of other skinny dagos out there auctioning off their hindparts!"

I swallowed. "Thank you, sir. I'll take it, sir."

He nodded dismissal. "Very well. I'll see you here at eight o'clock this evening. Leave the door unlatched."

"Sir, I haven't a watch," I told him.

He drew in his chin and glowered. "Then you'd best allow ample time, hadn't you? I don't suffer fools. You can hear three different sets of church bells from here. The two that ring together are compline at seven, the other is evensong at seven-thirty. And if you ever keep me waiting I promise you you'll have cause to continue to regret it for several days afterward." With that, he left.

I walked out for a short while to orient myself with my new neighborhood and to buy something for my dinner, making sure to be back in my room...my cage, before sundown.

I paced back and forth, hoping I could keep my distaste for him hidden, hoping I could please him enough to be allowed to stay, reminding myself that I'd done this before many times, that men mostly weren't difficult to satisfy - generally all they were looking for was wooden compliance, someone prepared to unhesitatingly mold himself to their needs. Frank hadn't been like that of course, but this fellow didn't particularly remind me of Frank.

He reminded me even less of Frank when he arrived at the appointed time, latched the door behind him, and immediately instructed me to face away, unclothe my lower half only, and to be sure I didn't turn back around.

I did as I was bid, and a second or two later felt the sole of his shoe at the rear of my calf, nudging me forward.

"Over the end of the bed," he snapped. "You know what to do." I assumed the position, and he said, "I expect to find you already arranged in this manner when I arrive tomorrow, and every day thereafter - do you understand?"

I mumbled a "Yes, sir," into the blanket and had barely closed my mouth again before he was right to work.

It was awful. Of course I was out of practice, but more than that it seemed I had forgotten just how awful it could be. I had a nasty suspicion I was going to be given a great many chances to remember in my near future, and my hunch wasn't wrong.

On the third evening, bruised and wounded already by his previous exertions, he managed to wring a cry from my lips as he shoved unceremoniously up into me, and I noticed he finished quite quickly after that.

The next day I allowed myself to whimper while he saddled himself, and got a similar result. So that was how he ticked. He wasn't merely indifferent to my pain, he was invested in it. He wanted to know that he was hurting me - that was what pleased him.

Before long, I hated him with a cold ferocity I'd never felt for anyone before him. It wasn't just the brutality, it was the contempt he communicated in a hundred non-verbal ways. He'd arrive to find me bent forward over the high brass frame at the foot of the bed, waiting for him naked from the waist down as instructed.

I'd keep my gaze fixed ahead of me while hearing him loosen his flies, and he'd bark at me to hold my cheeks apart - he called them 'buttocks' - then he'd clear his throat and spit directly on my hole.

Out of all of it, that was the thing I hated most. I knew I should be grateful that he was using something to ease his passage, but I wasn't. Submitting to being buggered was one thing - I had agreed to that, if only out of necessity. I hadn't agreed to being hocked on, and I couldn't detach myself from the insult of it.

But that wasn't all...because he required me to keep my hands on my 'buttocks' while he pleasured himself with my channel, I had no means to brace myself against his thrusting, I had no choice but to be tossed back and forth like a rag-doll as he worked me, the nubbly brass frame slamming into the front of my hips over and over, raising bruises on bruises on bruises, while being near garrotted by the neck of my shirt because Morton had it screwed into a bundle at the back, gripped in his hand.

He never actually touched me, not once. Not an inch of his skin ever made contact with mine. He lubricated me remotely, manhandled me by my clothes, kept his trousers and belt on while he thrust, and wore a rubber johnnie over his prick which he peeled off and left lying on the floor for me to clean up for him, once I was permitted to stand again after he was gone.

It riled me, that I was deemed too pox-ridden to be touched, but not to be utilized. It disgusted me that he cloaked himself in the sort of piety that forbade him to sodomize me on the Sabbath, but not on the other six days...and every time I thought I'd already pawned the last shreds of my dignity to him, he found more to take from me.

He was late arriving, one January evening. I stood bent forward, awaiting him in the frigid cold of my little room, as the backs of my thighs protested the position and my feet slowly prickled, throbbed, then numbed against the bare board floor. After a period of time, I righted myself and ducked beneath the covers, still unclothed in my lower half, ready to spring up quickly if he should show.

Not quickly enough. The door swung open and I was caught, frozen in the act of slipping back to my feet, dread pooling in my belly as I took in the look on Morton's face.

"What is this?" he hissed. His voice, so quiet and modulated even in his outrage, unnerved me enormously.

"I...I was - I got cold..." I stammered.

His lip curled. "Cold, are you, boy? Well, I have the cure for that." He began drawing off his belt. "Come over here and I'll warm you up."

I shrank back. "Please...sir? I'm ever so sorry."

It had no effect. He thwapped the belt, now folded in two, across his palm, and gestured to the bed-frame. "Get yourself here, boy. Bend over and take it like a man."

I didn't take it like a man. I howled and sniveled and begged, knowing that was actually what he wanted, all the while hating myself for my weakness in being prepared to perform my weakness for him, just to spare myself a few seconds of his savagery.

For four days following, he made me wait. Even longer - perhaps for an hour after the appointed time, half-exposed in the chill of that room, to underscore his point. And wait I did, teeth chattering, thinking of better times, warmer days, places far from here...

There were no means by which he could force me stay, and I felt reasonably certain he wouldn't attempt to track me down if - when - I absconded. But...I'd arrived in this place with twelve dollars saved, and it hadn't been nearly enough. And paying rent with my body like this meant I didn't spend all I earned, despite the fact that still all I could find was day labor, even after months of searching.

But it was slow, so slow building up. And in the meantime, if Morton wanted to beat me...well, he would beat me. There was no guarantee of anything better until I had money enough saved to buy better.

It took a little over a year, but the day I'd been waiting for came. I had twenty dollars. It ought to be enough. It had to be enough.

-----

I can smell the river from my watching-pole near the warehouses and the wharves. Briny, yes, and on a day so warm as this, also a little...overripe, rank. I'll walk alongside, upstream, on my way back to my room, see what face she has on today...she changes, this river, she has moods to go with her rhythms. They named her for a queen, and like a queen she goes where she will, does as she pleases...

A brick shatters at my feet, snatching me out of my daydream, as I look across...

Oh, help, there's four of them, and all so much bigger than me...

But not united in belligerence, thank god. Already, the tallest one has the red-headed thrower's arm in his grasp, holding him back.

"What the devil's wrong with you, Fergus? Can't you go an hour without starting a ruckus?"

"He's some kind of shill, that fellow!" the guy hisses, stabbing his finger at me. "He's always here, watching people! It's not normal!"

"It's not normal to throw bricks at people, Ferg," the third one drawls. "You want to fight him? Well, go ahead and fight him - but use your fists, like a regular person."

The fourth one hasn't said a thing. And he won't. The fourth one...is a man of few words.