Cornelius Sky by Timothy Brandoff

Author:Timothy Brandoff
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook, book
Publisher: Akashic Books
Published: 2019-06-05T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter four

He came to in the rooming house, a noontime sun attempting to sneak its way past the melancholic window shade. Dried blood inside his mouth produced a struggle for air, blood caked to his gums made it hurt to swallow. He went to shift his body on the bed and realized he was dressed, shoes and all. And also he realized he had at least to some extent shat himself.

Accompanying his terrible physical and psychic hangovers were images that evoked a series of shameful winces. Whole sections of drunks rushed back that would make him want to go into hiding—or have a fast drink.

The night before, Connie and Susan had exited the theater together, after catching the second half of Eugene O'Neill's A Moon for the Misbegotten, with Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst. Smitten by the vision of Miss Dewhurst, Connie recalled strange identification with the character played by Mr. Robards, who seemed hell-bent on self-destruction in an oddly maudlin fashion. He recalled the brightness of the stage when the curtain rose, and how the actors listened to one another, the power of their silences holding the house ever so still.

They went around the corner to McHale's on Eighth for a few drinks and Susan abruptly took sick. They caught a cab back to the rooming house, where Connie stood over her in the shared bathroom as she threw up, rubbing her back.

He smoked and drank in his room, watching Don Rickles work the audience of The Tonight Show. Rickles pulled an elegant, well-spoken Jamaican lady out of her seat, and after setting her up with a few beats of gentility, his arm around her waist, Rickles inquired if the woman would like to come home with him and be his live-in maid.

And there's Johnny, convulsing, swirling behind his desk, choking on a smoke.

Hold on. Everybody laughed at Rickles. Connie didn't watch Carson alone: he stood at the bar in Grant's and watched it on the Motorola.

He ran out of booze. Encountered David on the staircase, accused him of blocking the way, made ridiculous threats.

He lay in bed now, blinking at a fault line in the ceiling's paint job, the heat of shame pressing into his face.

An object poked his back. Connie reached behind himself, produced the rolled-up manila envelope. Some items you hope to misplace, some you can't shake. If the night didn't coalesce with the order of restraint in hand, the blood inside his mouth and nose got explained, and the hangover's fallout intensified.

The distance, Connie thought as he stood at the bar. You can spit from Grant's to my living room. My wife, my kids, my home!

Whitey asked him who he was talking to, the men looked at him, standing at the end of the bar alone, and chuckled.

Connie stared at his room's bare bulb, ears red with humiliation. He struggled to sit up.

At Grant's he had produced the manila envelope. Took it out, made a show of studying its pages on the bar.

He pushed off

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