Cave Under the City (8 page)

That night, Bubber and King slept on the car seat. Outside, I heard the wind blowing and branches rubbing against the building. When the train passed, it shook the building. King muttered in his sleep. Did dogs dream? I was trying to remember the last time my mother made supper for us. What did we eat? Boiled chicken, steamed onions and carrots, and mashed potatoes. I dreamed white bread and yellow butter. I dreamed.…

21

In the gray light I guessed it was six o'clock. I crept past Bubber and King. I was hungry. I was starved. I wanted food. I went to Allerton Avenue and down the steps to Lazinski's grocery store. The smell of fresh rolls dug a hole in my belly. Mr. Lazinski, in a clean white apron, was waiting on a customer. He cut the round of Muenster cheese with a long knife. The cheese was orange on the outside and pale yellow inside. “A little over, all right? Anything else, my lady?”

I was so hungry I wanted everything. The yellow Muenster cheese, the white farmer cheese, the rows of white eggs in the crate, the fat brown rolls, the sugared donuts.

The woman looked at me, looked me up and down and up again. What was she looking at? I didn't know her. I picked out a half dozen fresh rolls from the bin and waited my turn. It was all I could do not to tear off a piece of roll and eat it right there.

“Where have you been sleeping?” Mr. Lazinski said. “In a coal bin?”

I brushed my face. “I've been looking for deposit bottles. I guess I got a little dirty.”

“A little dirty. I guess you did.” Mr. Lazinski and the woman laughed. I put the rolls on the counter. “What else?” Mr. Lazinski said to me. I pointed to a box of Cream of Wheat high on the shelves and he nudged it down with a catcher on a long pole.

“Eggs.”

“How many?”

“Six.” I ordered bacon and sweet butter and a quart of milk. I watched him cut out a chunk of butter, then stick the knife back into the wooden tub.

“What else, my dirty prince?”

I added two jelly donuts. I had to bite my lip to stop myself from ordering more. “That's all. Charge it,” I said.

Mr. Lazinski frowned. I watched his broad red hands as he studied the book. “You don't have anything to give me, Holtz?”

“My mother said she'd pay you soon.”

“You don't have any money with you?”

I shook my head.

“I told you last time. I can't keep giving you credit.”

“My mother—we're a little short …”

Mr. Lazinski had his arms around my order.

“She said definitely Friday.”

“Today is Friday.”

My hands were on the edge of the counter. Dirty fingernails, dirty fingers, dirty hands. I put my hands in my pockets. Empty pockets. I wished I had a dollar so I could put it on the counter. I prayed for a dollar. I looked at the food. Just one dollar.

“Well, you want me to hold it?”

I couldn't speak. I couldn't say yes. I couldn't say no. I grabbed the two doughnuts and ran out of the store.

I ate one doughnut and then I felt sick. I was still hungry, but it was worse than hunger. I was ashamed. Ashamed to be on the street. Ashamed to be seen. I saw people looking at me. Look at that boy. Look at the dirt on him. He's a thief.

I kept my eyes down and searched for money in the street, so I could go back and pay Mr. Lazinski. I wanted to find a quarter, a dime, even a nickel. I was always finding money. I was lucky that way. I had quick eyes. You needed quick eyes in the city. My eyes were everywhere. I always found money—once I'd found five dollars and given it to my mother. But now all I wanted was a dime.

Pop.
In my head, I wrote my father another letter.
Dear Pop, where are you? Send me some money. We're all right. Bubber is hungry all the time and I am, too. If you don't come soon, maybe I should let him go to the orphan home and let somebody take care of him.

Behind some stores I found a couple of deposit bottles. A man and a woman rummaged through the garbage. They were collecting bottles and rags in a baby carriage. They stopped when they saw me, saw the bottles in my hand. I got out of there fast, then handed in the bottles at a candy store on Burke Avenue. There was a telephone booth in back. I shut the door and dropped in the nickel. The phone rang in our section. It was on the wall on the second floor. Next to it there was a row of buttons for each apartment. I imagined the door of our apartment opening on the fourth floor and my mother running down … or my father.

“Hello?” A man answered the phone. “Who do you wish to speak to?”

My tongue was stuck in my throat.

“Hello? What apartment, please?”

“Holtz,” I said.

“One minute.”

I heard the phone drop and hit the wall. Now he must be pushing the buzzer. It was ringing in our apartment. He wouldn't go up and knock on our door. He'd wait till he heard our door open. He'd call up, “Holtz—telephone,” and then he'd go back to his apartment. I listened, strained as hard as I could. Did I hear steps? Was Momma coming down the stairs?

“Hello.” The man came on the phone again. “Nobody answers. Nobody's home.”

“Try once more,” I said. “Push it harder. Maybe they didn't hear.”

“I pushed it enough. They don't answer. Goodbye.” And he hung up.

I went outside. I walked right into traffic.

Dear Pop, Do you see what I'm doing? Are you listening? Sometimes I don't care what happens to me. You'd better come home. Bubber has a dog now and we're living in a pretty good place. Momma's waiting for you to come back. We are, too. Your son, Tolley.

In our lot I pushed through the bushes, then slid through the hole into the cellar. I smelled damp earth and burned wood and the dog smell.

King came out to investigate, then Bubber. “Tolley. What did you bring us?”

I took the doughnut out of my pocket. I gave it to Bubber and licked the jelly from my fingers.

22

“What day is it?” I asked Bubber.

“I don't know.”

“Saturday. Don't you know anything?” I had told Mr. Lazinski my mother would pay him on Friday. “It
is
Friday,” Mr. Lazinski had said, making me feel like a dirty liar and a beggar.

“When are we going out?” Bubber said.

“Never.” I looked at him the way Mr. Lazinski had looked at me. I sat on a box and fed the fire. I didn't care what day it was. I wasn't going back to that store. I wasn't going out. I wasn't doing anything.

“I'm hungry.”

“Don't bother me.” We were going to pay Lazinski. Sometimes people were, short. It didn't mean they weren't going to pay. We weren't deadbeats. I saw Mr. Lazinski's fat round face and his fat arms holding on to his groceries.

Bubber went out. I heard him calling King.

I lay there. My mind went to my mother and my father. Was there a letter? Had my father written? Was there news from the hospital? Something flashed in my stomach and in my brain. I saw the row of mailboxes, gleaming like the sun, and then there was nothing. Then I didn't think anymore. I was hungry.

I dug my fists into my stomach. Then I drank water, a lot of water.

I slept. Bubber was in and out. I woke up and heard him calling King again. I heard him singing, one of those crazy songs of his. “Jack and Joe went up the pole to catch a kitty cat. Jack fell down and Joe fell down and kitty cat laughed.”

The next time I woke up, he was there with an apple. “Where'd you get this?”

“You still sleeping?” His breath was hot and he smelled like rotten apples.

I pushed him away. I didn't want to eat the apple. If I ate it, I'd start thinking about food again. But then I took a bite.

Bubber leaned on me. “Don't stand on top of me.”

He lay down on the car seat and covered himself up. Later he woke. “Make the fire,” he said. His teeth started to click.

“Cut it out.” I thought he was faking. He sniffled and picked his nose. “Will you blow your nose.”

He sucked snot. “I don't have a handkerchief.”

“Use newspaper.”

“Newspaper hurts.”

His head was hot. His breath smelled. “You're sick.” Why did he have to get sick? I sat there listening to him sniffling. That green snot going in and out of his nose. It was making me sick, too.

What did my mother do when I was sick? She felt my head, she made me stick out my tongue. The doctor came and listened to my chest with the stethoscope he took from his little black satchel. He made me put out my tongue and stuck a wooden stick all the way back down my throat till I gagged. After that, he wrote a prescription on a little pad and told my mother to keep me in bed and give me lots of liquids.

I made the fire and covered Bubber with my blanket. I gave him water. He tossed around. He was talking in his sleep. “King ran away. He was hungry. Let's go look for him … look for him, Tolley.”

“Tomorrow. When you feel better.”

His eyelids fluttered. Then he sat up and said, “The butcher's giving him a bone. Give him the bone!”

That night he had a fever again. I felt his forehead. I told him I wanted him to be better in the morning. He said he would be. By the light of the fire, I could see his big dark eyes and his soft baby mouth.

The next day all he wanted to do was drink. The sniffles were gone. He kept throwing off the blankets and complaining about the heat, then a minute later he'd tell me he was cold.

“I'm going out,” I said. “I'm going to get you some medicine.”

In the window of the drugstore on Burke Avenue, there was a pharmacist's balance scale and a mortar and pestle. Over the door it said Ex-Lax in blue letters. A doorbell jingled as I entered. The druggist came around to the back of the counter, wiping the corner of his mouth. “Yes, young man, what can I do for you?”

I smelled salami. It smelled so good it made me dizzy. “What's good for a cold?”

“Do you have a prescription?”

“It's for my brother.”

“Best thing is to stay in bed.” He showed me cough medicine and throat lozenges and nosedrops. “Vicks is good for the chest, just rub it right in.”

“Could I do some work for you? I'm strong.”

The druggist sighed. “No money?”

“I can sweep, or wash the window.”

“Sorry, I can't afford to hire anyone. The best thing for your brother is rest and lots of liquids. Orange juice, chicken broth, tea. He can have toast, too.”

I went to the door.
Orange juice, chicken broth, tea, and toast. Orange juice, chicken broth, tea, and toast.

“Young man.” The druggist called me back. “Here.” He handed me aspirin powder in a white paper. “Have your mother give this to your brother mixed with a little juice or milk.” I took the aspirin. “Well, go on,” he said. “That's all.”

Outside, a milk wagon stood at the curb, dripping water from the block of ice inside. The horse had the feed bag on. He looked at me. What do you want? The milkman took a rack of bottles and ran into a building. In the back of the wagon were cases and cases of milk in long-necked bottles. I reached in and took one. The horse stamped his feet.

Back in the cellar, I fed Bubber the cream off the top of the milk. Then I gave him the aspirin and more milk. He took long gulps.

I drank, then lay down. I'd stolen a bottle of milk. Was it wrong? It was stealing, but was it wrong? I did it for Bubber. And me, too. We were hungry. I didn't feel guilty. When I took the jelly doughnuts, I was ashamed. Not now. When you're hungry enough and sick, too, you can take things. Was that true?

“I took it,” I said.

“What?” Bubber's lips looked thick and swollen.

“I didn't pay for the milk. I swiped it.”

“What?”

“I took it,” I said. “Swiped it. I stole it. You drank it. You think it's wrong? Okay. Next time, I'll drink it all myself.”

23

The next morning Bubber slept and I went out again. On every block I saw people eating, on the street and at lunch counters. The horse had on his feed bag. The birds ate the oats he spilled. At a hot-dog cart, a woman bought a hot dog thick with relish.

I sniffed and swallowed. On every block there were smells. The cheese smell from the grocery store, the bread smell from the bakery, the chicken smell in the poultry store, and the smell of malteds from the candy store. People were going in and out of stores, buying and chewing, carrying out bags of groceries. “Carry your bag, lady?”

The woman wore a dark cape and a big floppy hat. She looked rich.

“For a dime,” I said.

She shifted her bag to her other arm. She had little fat pillows over her eyes, and where her eyebrows used to be there was just a pencil stripe. She walked away from me.

I caught a glimpse of myself in the store window. There were leaves stuck in my hair and dirt on my face. I spit on my finger and cleaned my chin.

A man pushed a wagon full of bananas up a hill. I pushed with him. On top of the hill he gave me a banana. I ate it. A truckload of crated chickens was being unloaded. “Want some help?” The driver shook his head.

A group of black women stood in the sun by the bank. A skinny woman in a brown coat caught my eye and smiled. There was a wide space between her front teeth. “Your mother send you to get some help for the house, sonny?”

“My mother's sick.”

“Yeah.” The woman's eyes slid away. “Everybody's got troubles.”

In front of Woolworth's, a man with no legs sat on a wheeled platform. He had pencils in a cup and another cup for coins.

I stood by the stairs to the el. How did you beg? I didn't have a hat or a cup. I waited, looking for the right person, the right face. People went by me. I let ten people go by and then ten more. Every face was squeezed tight. A woman smiled. I thought she was smiling at me. I kept my eyes down and put out my hand. She put a penny in my hand.