One Foot Off the Gutter

Author:Peter Plate
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
Published: 2010-07-26T16:00:00+00:00

Bellamy and myself cruised north on Mission Street toward City Hall. We drove by the Seven Coins Nightclub, Ana’s Cafe, The Mai Hing Restaurant, Zapatillas De Deporte, the Guadalupania Bakery, Ready Freddy’s Auto Repair, the Full Gospel Church, Speedy Gonzalez Reproduction Services, and more listless dope dealers then we’d ever seen before.

I never patronized the local businesses and Bellamy did so on rare occasions. It was enough that we protected the merchants; we weren’t about to spend our meager salaries on them.

Another squad car passed by, drifting in the other direction. I saluted the brothers with a curt bob of my chin, not moving the rest of my head. Other cops were part of the job, no different than the citizens or the assholes. It paid off to keep an eye on your brothers.

“You know those guys, Bellamy?” I asked.

“Yeah, I’ve seen them at the Central Station. Haven’t had a chance to say hello to them. Don’t know if I want to, either.”

“Why’s that?”

“Ah, you know,” Bellamy said in between puffs on a cigarette. “These fucking rookies. They’re into weightlifting, steroids and going to rock and roll nightclubs. I mean, really. This a job, not a lifestyle.”

The traffic on Mission was manic, divided between the drunk and the mad. Cars were sharks in two lanes going north and south. A Vietnamese man was spearing bottles from a Muni garbage can with a coat hanger. Children were playing around piles of cast-off Mack truck tires. It wasn’t quite noon yet, but my perennial headache was getting ready to lay down a migraine groove that would nail my sinuses to the back of my tongue for the rest of the day. I couldn’t do a damn thing about it; aspirin didn’t even touch it.

Around the corner from the Purple Heart Thrift Store, the needle exchange program was going full blast. Intravenous drug users stood in long lines under the shadow of the decomposing brick fortress known as the Armory, waiting to trade in their tainted spikes for clean needles. It was a one-for-one deal. The junkies were getting a free ride. I was copacetic about that. I was getting tired of picking up after their shit.

“Do my eyes deceive me, Coddy?” Bellamy said. “I swear it’s the end of the world.”

“You’re being premature with your forecast, Bells. Give it a few more weeks.”

We sped past Las Palmas, Payless Shoe Store, El Tico Nico, Coronitas Sports Bar and Cocktail Lounge, the ghostly upper stories of the Graywood Hotel, Lelenita’s Cakes, and the Norma Hotel. I was flatulent, passing noxious bubbles of gas. Bellamy noticed it, but he didn’t say anything, much to my relief. I wasn’t in the mood to put up with Bellamy’s sense of humor, which was boorish.

“You feelin’ okay, Coddy?”

“Bells, I’m fried.”

I had been working for the last seventeen straight days, and I was feeling taxed. I endured what I had to. I’d pushed at my own limits on such a consistent basis, that I surprised myself. How long I’d go on like this, relying on raw nerve, I didn’t know.

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