Onion Street

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

When I got back upstairs, Miriam and my folks were watching Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color. My mom said there was some chicken in the fridge I could heat up if I was hungry. I was pretty hungry, just not that hungry. My dad told me to read the messages he’d written down on the pad by the phone in the kitchen. The messages were mostly from Lids.

“Larry called several times.”

“Yeah, Dad, I can see that.”

“Oy, is that kid Larry a bundle of nerves or what? No wonder he went crackers.”

“You shoulda been a shrink, Dad,” I said, my voice thick with sarcasm.

“What? Huh? Miriam, lower the TV.”

“Never mind. I’m going to use the extension in your bedroom.”

“What?”

I sat down on my parents’ bed, which always made me feel a little creepy, and dialed Lids’s number. His mother picked up.

“Hello, Mrs. Lester. It’s Moe, is Larry around?”

“Wait, please wait,” she said distractedly, worry in her voice. Then she partially covered the phone with her palm. “It’s Moses on the line,” were her muted words. She came back on. “Wait, Moses, Larry’s father wants to speak with you.”

“Moses, I’ve always thought you were one of my son’s good friends and that I could trust you,” said Larry’s dad in his sad little voice.

“Thanks, Mr. Lester. It’s nice to be thought of like that.”

“Then can you tell me what’s going on with Larry?” The baseline sadness in his voice was compounded with worry.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Since this morning he’s … Well, you know he’s had some problems in the past at MIT and all, but he’s been doing much better since he got out of the hospital.”

“Yes, sir, he has.”

“But not this morning. He was manic, acting all meshugge again, spouting gibberish, things his mother and I couldn’t make any sense of. We called his psychiatrist, but it’s Sunday and he’s out of town. Something got him going. Do you know what could have set him off?”

Maybe the fact that one of his customers got murdered on the boardwalk last night and that he’s afraid he’ll be next. “No, Mr. Lester. I’m sorry, I don’t,” is how I framed the lie. “What makes you think I would know anyway?”

“Well, he ran out of here hours ago and then called with a number to reach him at, but I am only supposed to give the number to you. Even I’m not allowed to call him. You’re supposed to call him three times, let the phone ring six times each.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Lester, I wish I could help you. Maybe after I talk to Larry …”

“Yes.” His voice brightened. “See, you are wise beyond your years, Moses. Yes, call him and see what’s the matter.” I tore off the top of one of the pages from the paperback on my dad’s nightstand. It had a lurid cover of half-naked women holding handguns. I wrote the number down on the scrap. “You’ll call after you’ve spoken with Larry?” It was more a prayer than a question.

“I’ll try.”

I hung up.

As instructed, I tried the number Lids’s dad had given me three times. I knew Lids was still a little crazier than he seemed, even when he wasn’t all agitated. Looking back, I realized that Larry having another episode didn’t come as a shock to me. How, I wondered, could his parents have been caught so unprepared? I thought about just how blind parents could be to who and what their children really were. Mine were of me, but my parents’ blind spots were more mundane. With not a shred of evidence to support their beliefs, they saw me as a younger version of Aaron. But the only things Aaron and I shared were a bedroom, good marks, and a last name. We didn’t look alike, didn’t act alike, didn’t think alike. Hell, Aaron had more in common with Bobby.

Lids picked up on the sixth ring of my third attempt. “Moe?”

Man, sometimes one syllable was all it took to suss a person out. And just the tentative, hushed way he spoke my name told me nearly everything.

“Lids, what the fuck is going on? Your parents are freaked out.”

“He’s dead. He’s dead. He’s dead,” Lids chanted in a lilt. “He’s dead. He’s …”

“Who, Billy O’Day?”

“O’Day ODed, O’Day ODed, O’Day ODed. O’Day O — ”

“Enough, Larry. Enough! I know he’s dead. I was there when it happened and just to be accurate, he was murdered.”

“You were there. There were you. You were there. There were you. You were — ”

“I didn’t see it happen, but I was there. What’s going on, Larry?”

“Don’t know. Don’t know. Don’t know. All confused. All confused. All confused.”

“Tell me where you are and I’ll come get you.”

There was nothing hushed or tentative in his reply. “No! Have to be alone. Have to figure things out. Have to be alone. Have to figure things out. Have to — ”

I understood why his parents were so scared for him. “Let me help you.”

“They’re coming for me. They’re coming for me. They’re coming for me.”

“Who’s coming?”

“They are. They. They. They. Aren’t you listening?”

“They who? Which they?”

“Don’t know. Don’t know. Don’t know. More than one they. More than one they. More than one they. Have to be alone. Have to figure — ”

I cut him off. “Why did you want me to call you?”

“Tony Pepperoni is a fat phony. Tony Pepperoni is a fat fat phony. Tony Pepperoni is a fat fat fat phony. Phony fat fat fat a is Pepperoni Tony. Phony fat fat a is Pepperoni Tony. Phony fat a is Pepperoni Tony.”

He was totally lost and now so was I. It seemed the sounds of words, the rhythm of words, how they rhymed, were more important than what they meant. I had no idea if any of this hung together, especially the part about Tony Pepperoni. While I listened, Larry had degenerated into the crazy toothless lady with the wire laundry basket who stood on the boardwalk by the handball courts and cursed at you in a language only she understood. You knew the words were curses because of how she said them.

“Larry, let me come and get you.”

“No! No! No!”

I was running out of things to say when it dawned on me there was something worth risking. Given how little progress I’d made with him to that point, I figured I had nothing to lose if it failed.

“Let me come and get you. Let me come and get you. Let me come and get you,” I fairly sang.

And for the first time since this mind-bending conversation started, there was a pause on his end. I could hear him take a deep breath. Then he sobbed.

“It is you, Moe. I couldn’t be sure. There are enemies everywhere and they can take any shape, speak in any voice.”

“It’s me, Larry, yeah. How can I help?”

“You can’t,” he whispered. “You’re not invisible.”

“Are you safe? At least tell me you’re safe.”

“As long as I’m invisible I am.”

Uh oh, he was losing it again. I went along with him because what else could I do? “Then stay that way.”

“I will.”

There was a click and dead air. Silence. Invisibility.

Aaron was in our bedroom, doing his weekly paperwork for a job he essentially hated. But that was my big brother for you. It didn’t matter that he hated the job. He was learning, getting experience, getting a paycheck. I couldn’t see me doing any of that, not for a second. Even when I was little I couldn’t understand doing things you hated doing no matter the payoff. That said, Aaron was really smart and a good big brother. He was especially good in bad situations, and a bad situation is what I had on my hands. I was worried about Larry, but I didn’t want to tell his parents how worried. He needed help, but to get him that help, his parents would have to bring the cops into it. Once the cops were into it, they might find out about his business and that would just make everything worse for everyone involved. Larry needed a stint in the psych ward at Kings County, not a stretch in Sing Sing.

I opened my mouth to say something to Aaron. Nothing came out. I couldn’t figure out a way to tell him what was going on and still protect everyone who needed protecting. Was there ever a way to do that, to protect everyone who needed protecting?

“What?” Aaron barked at me. “You just gonna stand there like a putz staring at me, or you gonna ask me what you came in here to ask me?”

“Can I borrow your car tomorrow?” I asked, because I had to say something, not because I needed or even wanted his car.

He shook his head at me, but reached into his pocket and threw me his keys. “Your lucky day, little brother. We have meetings in the city for the next two days. Taking the subway in and won’t be home until Tuesday night. But take good care of it and fill it up. Understand?”

“Thanks, man.”

“How’s your girlfriend doing?”

“Better, I think,” I said. “It’s hard to know.”

“Okay. Now get outta here and go watch Ed Sullivan while I finish my work.”

I closed the door behind me. I had his keys, but no ideas about what I should do to save Larry.