Intimate Stranger

BERNARD

This in-between season when it is not clear whether one is still in autumn or already in winter, but already it is dark, can be bitter. Some days are balmy, the late afternoons in the park may be warm with an orange glow staining the brick facades of the buildings around. But the sun dies earlier, the nights are longer, they may even seem endless when one is poor and homeless. Often, there’s a dirty wetness in the air billowing from the two rivers on either side of the city and from the opaque ocean further out. The tops of buildings are obscured, swathed in ragged fog. Everything is hard. The sidewalk under one’s feet is hard and cold.

Bernard’s only hope is to last out another year. By now he doesn’t remember how long he’s been in this city. He came here many years ago to pursue a career as a writer. He knew he had his twin brother Simon somewhere in one of the boroughs, they’d lost contact long ago when they still wanted to study medicine and both dropped out, mostly because they couldn’t afford the tuition and had nothing against which to borrow. They went their different ways. Bernard already had this problem with drink. It made him smell bad and caused him to be sour company. Once, in the shop of a man framing prints, he heard it said that Simon was married and living somewhere in the anthill; he wouldn’t know where to start if he wanted to find him. He did not linger to ask for further information because the framer’s vicious dog attacked him, ripping a wound in his leg, maybe because he smelt of dirty streets and old vomit. He didn’t particularly wish to find his brother either. By now, if they crossed one another in the street, they wouldn’t recognize each other. And if they did, what would they have to talk about? It is a city filled with strangers, some of them mumbling, each with her or his own anger or despair or illness. People are nicer to dogs than to one another. When they come upon a pooch on a leash they go down on their hunkers and purse their lips to baby-talk to the animal. They cannot help but fondle the animal’s ears to show what clean lives they’re living.

In earlier years Bernard managed to find lodging with other bohemians, people with bright but dirty shirts — and in the beginning there was a woman, older than him and with rolls of puckered cellulite around her thighs, the relationship did not weather well — but since many seasons now he has been shuffling from cheap boarding house to asylum to vacant lot or the porch of a derelict building. He knows some of the other vagrants — the little old Chinese woman in baggy clothes transporting a mountain of collected empty cans, the mysterious lady with the long overcoat reaching to the ground, the gloves, the dark glasses and the broad hat pulled deep over her face, pushing a pram with all her earthly belongings, the old men with their stiff movements and their hand-printed cardboard signs imploring help — but he seldom speaks to any of them. In a duffel bag slung over his shoulder he has some clothes and a wad of manuscripts. Lately, particularly now with the cold coming, a cold wind blows from hell, he has started using a push-carriage to keep two blankets and some unfolded boxes upon which he sleeps at night. He will be an isolated animal entering its burrow, safe in its own smell.

Tonight he has returned to a sidewalk on the Lower East Side where weeds grow from the cracks. A broken awning offers some protection against the inclement weather. The police don’t patrol here too often and mostly they let him be. It is going to be a long night and he knows already that his leg will be aching again.

He lays the cardboard strips flat on the cement and then wraps himself in the blankets before lying down. He has covered his head but is not yet asleep when he feels somebody or something, it could be a stray dog, gently nuzzling or prodding him. He folds the blanket away from his face and looks up with a disgruntled squint. A very old man is bending awkwardly over him.

It is immediately clear to Bernard that this old-timer is a bum. The clothes are reasonably clean and a soft cap partially shadows his features but the air of indigence is unmistakable. When one is at the end of the road you always recognize the fellow travelers. You mutter a curse and you look away, but you can’t help seeing them.

What do you want, I have nothing, Bernard says. The old man shakes his head. It looks as if he has difficulty speaking. Then he says: Warmth. All I want is some warmth. Why come to me? Bernard asks. There’s a flophouse on Bowery. Why don’t you go there? No, no — the old one protests — my legs won’t get me that far. People steal your underwear. I just need some warmth. I won’t bother you. Tomorrow, I’ll move along tomorrow, promise. Can I lie down here with you?

With an expletive and a grunt Bernard covers his face again. But now he can’t find the relief of dark sleep. After about ten minutes he lifts the blanket. The old man is sitting on his haunches some five yards away, arms wrapped around his knees, staring at the ground. Hey you, you old-timer! — what’s your problem? Bernard asks. Are you sick?

The old man smiles and repeats that there’s nothing wrong with him, he’s just tired and looking for some warmth. That he intends moving along first thing in the morning. Look, he says, and opens one hand to show a coin.

Bernard sighs and scratches himself. Then he reluctantly motions to the old man to come over. In another faraway place, a lifetime ago, an ancient one once said to him with a toothless complicit and wet smile: Us sinking rats don’t abandon one another. He moves closer to the wall, lifts the blankets and tells the old man to get down but not to try any funny tricks or else he’ll smother him with his own cap. I’m not that kind. The old man snuggles up as close to Bernard as he dares and pulls the blankets over him. He says thank you several times. After a while he announces: My name is Jesus Smoke. Bernard says he’s not interested, didn’t ask, and in any case it is a silly fucking name. He can feel the slow heat of the old man seeping in under their shared covering and finally it is not unpleasant to drift off to sleep in this brooding, enhanced warmth.

It must have been well past midnight when he wakes up to a low monologue interspersed by sobs. The old man is addressing some absent person, perhaps a forgotten god, alternately telling what his life has been like and urgently attempting to convey a message. Tell Lilac I didn’t mean it, I just got lost, he says. He seems agitated. I got the money, Lord — he says loud and clear. The coin glistens in his open palm. Bernard angrily jabs the old man in the ribs, curses, tells him to shut up and let decent folk get some well-deserved rest. Jesus Smoke shudders as if his frail frame is rent by a suppressed groan, falls silent, rolls over on his back. He has taken off his cap, which he now clutches to his chest. The lips quiver as if from the backwash of the earlier speech. There is a silver tear in one of his wide-open eyes. I got the money, Lord — he says again, a little softer now.

When Bernard wakes up the next morning it takes him some time to remember where the unfamiliar weight of another person next to him comes from. Wake up, he says and prods the old man. Jesus Smoke — what fucking kind of name is that? Are you a freak, or what? When the old man doesn’t respond Bernard struggles out of the blankets and sits up. The old man is lying on his back, the hands crossed on his chest, the coin just protruding from his closed lips, and his open eyes, opaque and grey now, are still wet. The dark face, though very old, is remarkably smooth.