Careless love CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CARELESS LOVE
U2 Window In The Skies
The shackles are undone
The bullets quit the gun
The heat that's in the sun
Will keep us when there's none
The rule has been disproved
John T. Hoffman, a real estate developer, lady's man and Éminence Grise in both New York's Democratic Regional Committee and the party's National Committee was a handsome and charismatic 29 year old. He persisted in asking the statuesque waitress out to a night on the town. Alicia relented on his fifth attempt.
He picked her up in an Uber XL and they hit all the spots. People knew him and greeted him at The Supper Club. They went right in without waiting at Studio 49. He's a pretty good dancer for an white guy who's into women. He even cleared the dance floor.
When they left Studio 49 in SoHo there was a light spring rain going on with muffled thunder.
"I love walking in the rain don't you?"
"Yeah, I do too."
Hand in hand they wandered the streets of Soho for an hour or so. Hoffman whistled down a taxi and brought her home to her apartment door and stole a little kiss.
The second date ended up in his bed.
Alicia moved in with Hoffman in his townhouse off Greenwich Street. She kept her job though. She was head waitress, learned to create exotic drinks and provide silver service.
These were the happiest days of her life. When she became pregnant, things started to change. Hoffman suggested they go down to Cuba and get an abortion. Alicia absolutely refused. They fought about it for weeks. It was a difficult pregnancy, with headaches nausea and losing her job. Alicia moved into a homeless women's shelter run by Ladies of Charity of the Episcopal Church. In the shelter she and her baby boy Hector were given a small two room suite, sharing the kitchen and bathroom with another household. Her name came up for a public housing apartment in the Pleasant Avenue Houses.
Hoffman chose to settle rather than force a paternity suit. After trying to convince to have an abortion ("you'll love Havana. We'll hit all the spots.") and accept $300 a week for four years hush money, which she refused (the abortion, not the money) Hoffman was on the hook for fifteen thousand a year until Hector turned twenty-one or finished two years of college, which ever came first. She qualified for a Public Housing apartment. She also visits her mother from time to time and pays a weekly cleaning woman and two relief caregivers for Hugo cash under the table to sleep in her old room and be available to help Hugo through his nightmares and to spoon feed him.
There are two caregivers who are sent by BCW but they only officially are with Hugo five hours a day. Hugo is a clear danger to himself and others. The little progress he had made was lost while he was handcuffed to a bed in George Corley Wallace Hospital for three months, after criminal charges against his mother were adjourned contemplating dismissal.
There are two caregivers who are sent by BCW but they only officially are with Hugo five hours a day. Hugo is a clear danger to himself and others. The little progress he had made was lost while he was handcuffed to a bed in George Corley Wallace Hospital for three months, after criminal charges against his mother were adjourned contemplating dismissal.
Albanian Louie plays it cool but he’s freaking out.
Louie was not such a cool cucumber as he appeared to be at the toast fire. He was trembling inside and he couldn't go back to sleep. He laid down on the sofa after the fire and felt he was drenched in sweat, a freezing cold sweat. He felt like the room was spinning and that he was going to fly out through the living room window and crash to the ground.
"That's not gonna happen. That's imagination." He repeated this mantra a few times and gathered up his strength and courage. He got up off the sofa and went to the bathroom and with all his will he showered himself. He swallowed a fist full of B6 and B12 vitamin pills because he believed they get him through these episodes, along with those blue benadryl and pink melatonin over the counter sleeping pills.
Louie has his own personal religion. He prays but he doesn't go to church. He believes that there is a God that watches over him, or else sends an angel to watch in His stead, as God is probably too busy to watch over one guy. He imagines this angel is small and invisible and perches on his right shoulder and sees to it that he survives every night of taxi driving. Until he didn't quite.
Not that God or the angel make every night perfect but so far at least Louie finishes his shift still breathing. And not high.
The night Louie picked up Big Mishpucha on Madison Avenue near the big museum seemed to have started out as one of these reasonably blessed ones. The car wasn't too great, it pulled a bit to the right but it ran strong and the gas gauge didn't drop down to three quarters until after ten o'clock. This wasn't the first car that pulls a bit that Louie ever drove. He had had a few little fender scrapes but no one in the garage seemed to be angry about that.
Louie and The Mishpucha had crossed paths before and so they recognized each other. The Mishpucha gave Louie his card and told him he was looking for a good DJ for a strip club and that Louie should give him a call.
Louie doesn't count his money until he's done with his shift but he had a sense that it had been a pretty decent night for a Tuesday until the shivers came. Sometimes Louie's angel turns into a demon and this demon rubs ice cubes up and down Louie's spine and ties Louie's guts all up in a knot. Louie calls this the shivers.
As fate had arranged it Alex Castro had been temporarily tossed out of his house by his wife in a spat and had jumped into his Mercedes and scrambled down to the garage to do some paperwork. He parked across the street on the right hand side facing North. W Jeremiah Jones wanted to ask Castro for permission to take pictures on his property and so he was sitting in the passenger seat pitching to Castro. Louie was driving North when he thought he saw a cat or a dog dash in front of him. Louie hit the brake. The taxi swerved into Alex Castro's Mercedes and missed running over the windswept paper bag that wasn't a cat or a dog. Louie was out of a job. He figured that fate had sent The Mishpucha and Andrea back into his orbit. Louie decided that he'd be spinning disks and doing security pretty soon.
When Louie's car smashed in the left side of Alejandro's Mercedes Alejandro was just getting out of his car. This was a real high impact crash and the piece of shit taxi swerved. As it happened W Jones Jones had been sitting next to Alejandro pitching. He pulled Alejandro hard back into the car fast enough and hard enough to save Alejandro's left foot that already extended out of the car. It was a mess, with unnecessary ambulances. Cops came to document and assign blame. One of them noticed that Louie had only one functional eye. In New York you can have a driver's license if you only have one good eye but you cannot have a taxi driver's hack license.