Bye Bye Blackbird

The old dive stood like a crippled grandfather amongst the fanciful foreign restaurants and avant-garde novelty stores that lay docked across the seawall. The pier supports had been chewed away over the years by an angry gulf ocean, and the oak frame doorway had been obscurely nailed over some time ago. It looked like a great spider-its spindly legs sprawled crookedly and frail across the shore below-and it seemed to be falling into the ocean with each wave's crash, only to recede with the setting sun tide. To call the place a spider was nothing short of a compliment, for no proper description could give tribute to the lives it had claimed during my time andsince. They never died, not while I was there, but something about watching men die while you're fighting for your own makes you almost wish that one of you would hurry  up and make the move. It had been many years now-thirty it must be-since I had left this town and damned the place to hell, and strange ghosts of the victims rang high in the hourless New Orleans afternoon.
         The children used to sneak out nights and stand at the doors calling for fathers and brothers, crying in the night for them to come home while the laughing beaurocrats cursed and threw stones at them from the entryway till they left. Wives wept on the adjacent street corner and howled lonely laments in the early hours, speaking a desperation we'd all lost sympathy for as wayfarers awkwardly looked on. It didn't matter anyhow, nobody inside was listening for anything in particular. The drink makes a man go blind and deaf, making new senses and feelings, and most of the time, making a worse man. It wasn't a place to go for most of us, but more like a ball and chain we dragged behind us everyday that we'd come to hope was death. We'd run away when we could, damning it all and swearing to clean up. But at the end of it all, we'd come stumbling back through the dark, following that chain around our legs until we found our way back to the beginning.
         We'd come back from the war-August 14th 1949 I believe-and found an America that seemed to have forgotten us while we were away. Most of the boys and myself arrived with nothing to lean into, being that most of the time we were thought to be dead, and a place like The Coyote's Den was the kind of monster that waited for people like us. I call us boys, because that's nothing more that what we were-twenty something's who had caught it all in a glimpse and didn't know what to make of the aftermath.
         It started out a nice place at first, and we'd spend most days there shooting billiards or talking late nights while the waves rolled the smoke from our cigarettes away into the cool evening air. Enough time passed to where things were regular and we called New Orleans a nice place to rest after the war-hell, a couple of the guys even settled down with desk jobs and found themselves some fine southern women. Even saw a family or two come out of the mess. But after laying still for long enough while everything around you is moving, you can't help but get lost in the dizzy.
                                          **********************
         "Charlie T, I ain't here to stare at the bottom of my glass all night. Fill em' up."
         "I hear ya I hear ya. Billy, keep him busy till I get over there." Charlie said, as he went back to rubbing the cracked glasses with his stained dry rag. "Jesus put a fork in me now, every night they're tryin' to kill me," he said to himself.
         "Whadaya say Billy, you spot me for another round?" Hank asked, his eyes sunk back somewhere behind the black bags and mess of hair that hung thick in his face.
         "Sure thing Hank," I said. "I'll get ya on this one."
         I'd won big on a few slots tonight, and for the regulars around the bar, you knew to keep an eye on the big winner. As soon as the broken jingle hit from the tarnished slots, you got that hunger in you-the mouth tart from an hour without whiskey, and the eyes burnt from the cigarette cloud that hung from the tips of the peeling wallpaper. We were all hyenas of our own, eating away at the unlucky winner who wore the cross of the evening. Some of the men had been picked dry, always slouched now against the side walls and staring at the glasses they wished they never drank-but they never minded. Most of us weren't men anyhow, to call us that would be a lie. No beast could ever be a man.
         "Billy boy," a raspy voice shouted from the rear. "You wouldn't deny an old man his medicine would you?"
The tattooed arm that rapped its empty glass against the mound of shambled trunks and tattered suitcases belonged to old vagrant we only knew as Patches. He'd been here sometime before we could ever notice him-someone once told me he'd come in after the first war-but he was a constant reminder of the men we were becoming.
         "Don't worry Patches, its coming." I said. "You just see if you can stay alive long enough for Charlie to bring it to you."
         He cackled, stumbling to a stand in his delirium and digging his free arm deep into the pockets of his torn pants.
         "My moufs," he stuttered, dribbling spit and bits of lung. "Ma mouth's too dry to get the bennies down."
         These were no characters out of commonplace, but rather the beating hearts that bumped out of cadence with each other to keep the place alive. The wooden corners were shadowed with addicts and junkies that wouldn't move for days, and if you didn't step carefully, you'd find yourself standing on an old friend asleep in the arms of an overdosed woman you'd had before. Not that they would mind, but man must always attempt to retain some sort of courtesy amongst his peers.
Every so often a new-kicker in leather would come shouting through the peeling velvet door, his shiny speedster winking from the parking lot as we waved it goodbye.

They'd hoot and holler, throwing money at the slots and women until they fell asleep at the bar, and before long that shiny car wasn't waiting for them outside those doors anymore. Tonight it was Tommy, a fresh youngster from Kentucky, down the way shooting drinks with the whiskey hounds. Last month it was James from Dartmouth, who at the moment, was huddled against one of the empty pool tables trying to keep warm while the bouncer went across the street for more pills. We'd come to know-in our endless days at The Coyote-how to pick from the crowds. You could tell who a man was from the first night he came in, and we'd seen the bodies pile high through the hours with innocent somebodys we'd called for the tango. Things stayed full, but never crowded, because a good amount of the boys managed to escape after long enough. But to say they escaped was never a fitting word, for the man who walked through those doors was never the same man who came back out of them.
"Alright Billy, how many am I roundin' up for ya?" Charlie asked with a grin.
"Just keep em' coming," I said, popping three Benzedrine down with the last of my whiskey. "The animals don't seem to be backin' down tonight."
Hank laughed, coughing the last of his whiskey onto the dirtied bar. Somewhere away a stumbling junky tripped into the broken jukebox and managed to get a broken song humming.
"Keep em' coming?" Charlie asked with frustration. "I'm not sure if you boys have been countin', but the tabs are rollin' pretty high around here lately."
Hank continued his drunken laughter, choking momentarily as he swallowed another pill.
"You know we're good for it Charlie T," he laughed as he turned to the rest of the room. "When have we ever let you down?"
A few laughs fumbled from the half-awake sleepers and smokers on the porch, and as Hank turned around he met the frying plate forehand of Charlie.
"Don't blue ball me you piece of shit," Charlie howled, tugging the life from Hank's already torn shirt collar. "I know you's guys keep money on ya, and I'm tellin' you it better end up in my pocket or the machines tonight."
"Keep it cool Charlie," I said, reaching across the bar and pouring myself a glass of bourbon. "We walk out of here every night with empty pockets, you know that." He loosened the grip of Hank's collar. "Most nights we don't even walk out of here, so just sit tight. We'll be good for it."
He leaned in close, his sober breathe unfamiliar in the forever drunk and drowsy air from our mouths.
"Let me tell ya somethin' Billy," he said, keeping out of earshot. "Last time I checked, the whole fuckin' world didn't run on just the doe in you's two's pockets."
He gazed around the bar, his devil stare turning the place cold.
"You two vampires been sucked dry long ago. Bring me some new blood," he whispered, slamming his fist upon the bar.
         His dark hued polish eyes looked wild at me for the moment, and I half expected the collar to be ripped from my shirt. Lucky for me it had already been torn sometime before, and Charlie had other intentions. He was large figure-a much bigger man than any of us in the sight of our whiskey eyes-and probably the reason we could never drink the place dry. He left his hoof-prints tracked across the old pine floors every night with another man's blood-but who could blame him? After the first drinks morality was lost amongst us, and the sane must find new means to develop civilized order.
         "If you boys don't plan on payin' tonight, you better plan on drinkin' yourself stupid." He reached under the bar and brandished a familiar bloodstained plumbing pipe. "Cause I'm gonna get that money before sunrise."
         "Ah, put that thing away Charlie," Hank laughed. "I thought you and you're boyfriend quit makin' it on the bar when we was gone."
         Hank toppled from his stool to avoid the swing of the bludgeon, and had I not ducked to pick a half smoked cigarette form the ground, I would have received more than just the whistle of the hollow pipe in my ear.
         "I mean it boys. You and all the other regulars are getting on it heavy. This place don't run on blood and broken bones, but you bet I'm willing to..."
         A howl erupted from the squeak of the swinging entryway door.
         "Big night boys, big night. Put that money away Billy blue, Mitch is takin' care of the drinks tonight."
         "Thought you went home for the night Mitchell," Charlie asked, returning his bludgeon to the shelf beneath the bar.
         "Yeah, I made an appearance for the kid," Mitch said as he reached into his shirt pockets to retrieve a handful of bills. "And while I was there, I got to thinking, and nabbed some of my old lady's jewelry before I left."
He began proudly counting the bills out on the bar for our pleasure as the drooling men woke from the drunken slumbers to the Christmas morning scene.
         "I thought you'd already sold all your girl's stuff Mitchy," I asked.
         "Nah, nah Billy, when you realize you're a genius like me, these things will make sense." He began laughing to himself. "I forgot she'd given the kid a bunch of her mother's rings and what not-you know the good shit-so's I nabbed em while they were sleeping and sold it on my way here."
         "Ahoo," Patches wailed from the porch window. "Send one my way Mitchy."
         "All around Charlie T, and fill em' up thick." He counted out half of the money on the bar. "Ol' Mitch is outta his debt, yes sir."
         "What about the rest of it Mitch?" Hank asked, a pathetic desperation in his voice.  "You buyin' tomorrow too?"
         "Nah Hank, I'm cleanin' up. I'm gonna keep the rest of this and take care of a few more things tomorrow." He grabbed Hank's long and dirtied hair playfully. "Tonight's the big one baby, and then I'm gone!"
         Charlie lined the bar with the filthy chipped mugs, emptying endless bottles of cheap whiskey, bourbon and assorted vodka's into the never tired glasses. All the merry while he whistled on old tune-something morose and beating like the death of a funeral procession. He'd flip the glasses as he filled them, hooting to the stupid men and tossing glances our way in between orders. It had me sick somewhere worse than the nail-drink could take me-my head droning with thoughts of Charlie and my starving pockets-and I had to remind myself to drown it all away in the shadows of the whiskey.
Before long we'd gotten Mitch to shoot back a couple of quick slugs and had him jolly enough to toss the doorman a few bills for more bennies. His slick Italian hair hung loose across his crossing blue eyes, and after time his jacket had become fresh with alcohol stains. He fumbled around the bar, singing half-songs with the crazies and groping the women we'd all held many times, and before long he found his familiar place on the oceanfront back porch.
         Mitch was no different than any of us-a regular drunken gambler like the rest-but to outside eyes you'd of guessed him to be a hotshot around here. His hair was well enough and his clothes were as clean as could be, but his shoes were the gem that stood him out against the off-white and grey of the characters at the Den. Every night, no matter how twisted or preoccupied, Mitch would sit outside from time to time and wipe his fine leather shoes clean with an old rag he kept in his pocket. He rub them til' they shined off the moonlight streaming across the ocean, and when he put them back on you'd guess him to be a new man.
         I gestured my head to the porch for Hank to see.
"Hey Charlie, we're gonna step out with Mitchy. Throw us a few rounds for the road." I said, as Hank reached for the peanut-dish of Benzedrine that sat on the bar.
Charlie reached for a bottle and oddly looked us over, his eyes speaking eerily as to the gun-patter of the filling drinks. We knew the expression all to well.
"Drink em' dry," he said quietly.
         "Gonna need a few of these," Hank laughed.
          We gathered our belongings-nothing more than a tattered tweed hat and a few glasses-and made for the porch. Sure enough, there was Mitch untying his shoes, and as we sat down he lifted up and smiled.
         "Enjoying yourselves boys?" he asked, lighting a cigarette.
         "Are you kidding Mitchy?" Hank bawled, shaking my shoulder. "We ain't had a night like this since we got back from the war." He laughed, sipping deeply into the emptying glass. "Say pal, you think I could borrow a few so's I can get with one of the girls tonight? It's been a few days."
         "Sure, sure," Mitch said. "Course I'll take care of my boys tonight, cause after this I ain't coming around here no more." He sat back, forgetting his shoes to the wafting gulf gale. "Yes sir, I'm gonna start clean tomorrow, get myself goin' someplace."
         "What were you thinkin' of Mitch," I asked, feeling the drunk begin to hang deep under my eyes.
         "Yeah Mitchy, what's left for an old bottler-beater like you?" Hank laughed.
         "I tell ya boys," Mitch said, looking away from the restless beach, "it's all out there. First thing tomorrow I'm gonna get me a new suit, get my hair lookin' just right, and start movin'. We got plenty out there and I just gotta get away and start lookin'."
         "What about your girl and the runt?" Hank asked. "You just leavin' em here or what?"
         Mitch wobbled his head around, and ran his rattling fingers through his hair.
         "Nah," he stretched out deeply. "Nah, I'm leavin' em here boys. I figure if you're startin' new you can't run off with the same luggage." He drank deeply from one of my stray glasses dotting the table, and rested his arms on his knees. "To be honest with you," he said carefully, "I think I done enough to em' already. I figure it best to let em' alone so's they can figure it out without me interfering."
         He drank again from the glass, this time slowly, as if remembering to stop and enjoy the smooth taste of the drink. "Ah," he said, sitting up and smiling. "It's for the best boys, here's to tonight."
         "There ya go Mitchy," I said, smacking my glass against his and swallowing proudly.
         We talked on through the hours, drinking ourselves awake as the morning crept behind our backs. From time to time, a face would pop through the broken windows to give a howl, and as the monsters inside began to die in sleep, Charlie came wandering out the door.
         "Mind if I join ya boys," he said, waving several bottles of drink. "I brought a few friends if that's alright."
         "Sure thing Charlie, pull up a chair," Mitch said, fumbling about his seat in a whiskey frenzy. "I'll tell ya though, you keep your friends over there, cause I ain't spendin' no more money."
         "Nonsense Mitchy," Charlie laughed. "My friends are on the house, no charge."
         Mitch looked wearily at the full bottles that stood tall under the blinking porch light.
         "Come on Mitch," Hank said. "It's the last hoorah, you ain't gonna turn down free drink are ya?"
         "Ahh, you're right buddy, gimmie that thing." He laughed, swigging deeply from a tinted bottle.
         We rattled late into the sunrise, somehow awake under the drunk and not much for proper men. We'd forgotten the moon and howled long and low under the sun, singing away the early day as the rest of the world began to work outside of us as it would. We four cavaliers traded war stories and tales of women across the sea, laughing wide as the bottles emptied and the overflowing ashtray filled evermore. I'd noticed Mitch had never gotten around to wiping down his shoes-the fool too busy with bottles for the better of himself-and with the last swig of the drink, he stood and tied them haphazardly.
         "Well boys, the drink's run low and I got some livin' to do." He brushed himself off and looked out across the sea. "I'm clean with the house and drunk to boot-can't ask to start a day any better." He laughed to himself and rustled through his pockets for the saved bills. "Big day today gentlemen. Feels like I'm coming back from the war for the first time."
"Say Mitchy," Charlie mumbled. "Why don't ya give the slots one more try, for old time's sake?"
         "Nah nah, I aint fallin' for that Charlie T," he laughed. "This old hound aint hungry anymore."
         "Aww, come on now, you can't leave without doin the slots at least once," Charlie complained. "It aint' ethical."
         "Mitchy," I said, swinging my drunken arm around his tired shoulders. "Let's have it, I'll do one with ya. You know the Den wouldn't let ya go without one more run at it."
         "I suppose you're right, one couldn't hurt. Hey," he said, making the better of his thoughts, "who knows, maybe I'll just make my pockets thicker with this luck I've been having." We all stood, Hank fast asleep in delirium on his chair. "Come on, let's draw the last blood."
         We stumbled inside as one man rather than three, tumbling through the porch door and shielding our eyes from the gleaming darkness of the mid-day bar. All around lay half-naked fools and drunks-most of them I'd guess to be dead if anyone ever cared enough to find out. The musty windows faded the sunlight to a pale macabre orange, and the smoke still hung thick in the crotch of the ceiling. We tumbled over countless sleepers and stray bottles, nestling uncomfortably around the off-humming machine.
         Mitch carefully fingered through his pockets, the half-heartedness of his decision hanging low in the early atmosphere. In the flesh, he was a simple quiver, and you'd only guess him to be anxious at first glance. Underneath, he was a different man-the addict at the limits-fighting monsters within of the likes most men will never know. His palms twitched off balance, each time negotiating within him to stand up and walk away. I knew Charlie's intentions-they rode us to demise-each night drinking us a little drier and sweeping us clean. There were no men here-there wasn't enough life left
in any of us to be of any humanly nature. We'd given it away over time as if we never owned it, and I guessed had they let us, we would've sold the still blood right from our veins for one more drink or roll.
         Mitch fumbled with his first coins, feeding several into the machine and trying his best to look confident.
         "Whatdya say Whatdya say," he said, clapping his hands softly and rubbing the sweat from his drunken eyes. "Kiss me goodbye baby."
         He slammed atop the bent arm of the slot, setting the wheels askew and arousing the off-tune soft shoe that had become our funeral ode. The clank of the rusted gears sent a dart through us both, the cackle of bloodletting rustling the soft of our guts with nausea each time the arm swung.
         "That's it," he grumbled, smacking his fist against the missing glass. "Fucking aces on the last try-you'd think she'd have a little sympathy for me."
         He began to stand, angry at loss but glad to have something after.
         "Hey now Mitchy, you gotta take her easy," Charlie T said, handing him a full glass. "Choke that one down on the house and give her one more shot. You gotta feel em' right if you ever want to get anything out of em."
         "Now I don't know Charlie, I ain't particular to wrestling with this one again. I..."
         "Mitchy baby, where's your head," I interrupted. "No one ever wins on the first try, you knew that before you even put the coins in. Lets see another go now, I want to send my boy off with sails ablazin'"
         "You're killin' me Billy boy," he laughed.
         Mitch coughed down the rusty bourbon, twisting his face and reaching for more coins.
         "She's worse than my wife Charlie," he coughed, filling both his and the adjacent
machine with coins. "Have a go at it Billy, double up with me for the chances."
         I was hesitant to shake hands with the devil, but found myself all too instinctively pressing the arm against my consciences' warning.
         "I got nothing, you?" I asked, unhappy to waste the cash but glad it was not my own.
"Fuck," Mitch screamed, beating the breaking arm of the machine. "Keep the drinks coming Charlie, I ain't leavin' till I get one."
         "I hear ya boss," Charlie laughed, rubbing his palms behind our backs and reaching across the bar for another bottle."
         We continued in our habit, the machines eating deep into our skin as our pockets lightened. I had held from the drinks, trying best to keep a clear head while Mitch disassembled himself next to me. Each time he was quicker to stuff another coin into the slot, each time closer in mind but further in reality. Charlie's encouragement drove him further into bedlam, and as he reached for his final scraps, he had nothing to show but the linted pocket within. He had drunk himself into regularity, leaving behind yet another night's dreams amongst the drying liquor and stale cigarette ash. I had never guessed otherwise-every night began with the same plans-Mitch was just the victim of the day. There was always a tale of clean-up to hear, and not many lasted through the night to play out in the morning. A full pocket was a curse in the Den, nothing more than a higher ladder from which to fall.
As Mitch checked the loose arm a final time for a missed roll, he fell from his stool, hanging desperately to the crooked arm as if it were to lift him away from it all. He moaned and grumbled, swaying array from the metal piece and mumbling a language of sorrow and defeat. He cried out in delirium, the bottle next to him put to empty with a slug, and as he crumpled against the side of the machine, the velvet door swung unfamiliarly opened.
"Son of a bitch," the woman wailed, storming forward and planting a heel in his gut. "Where is it, you bastard? What did you do with it?"
Mitch looked up, his eyes a deep red in angst as the comforting drunk had been kicked from his temple. Hank had awoken from the skirmish, and drunkenly stumbled through the back door.
"Julie?" he asked, rubbing the dryness from his eyes. "What are you doing here?"
"The bastard took them," she yelled, half to tears as she loomed over the crumbling Mitch. "He stole my mother's jewelry, right out of Dannie's room, I know he did it. Things like that just don't go missing."
She looked across us all, wiping the hair from her eyes as the breathe ran heavy under her falling tears.
"Well?" she asked, "Where's it at, there's gotta be something?"
Mitch rang alive, coughing and laughing as he remedied his aching gut. He lit a cigarette and fell back against the metal of the machine with a clang.
"Money...jewelry?" Julie asked, knowing well that the jingle of the machine was the only truth to hear. "Don't you have anything?"
We all spoke through our eyes, our mouths too untrue to ever let her know, even if we meant well. She looked again to us all. Charlie had retired to cleaning the bar and smiling away another night's crazy as his pockets rang with the sacrifice.
"Mitch," Julie yelled, her voice rasping in sorrow. "You think you're all alone, you think everything's just going to work itself out."
He gathered himself slowly, now looking at his wife for the first time since her arrival.
"I'm in here with you Mitch, me and Dannie are in here with you and I can't do this anymore. You're not just tearing yourself apart, you're tearing us apart with you." She looked away, hoping to find comfort somewhere amongst the cold and crowded bar. "Didn't you ever care?"
She began to cry harder, the carefree loll of Mitch's attention nothing less than heartbreaking. "This is you're family now Mitch, you win." She cried. "Don't come looking for us again when you wake up...your not picking from us anymore."
         She turned away, hurrying out through tears and stopping at the open door. A frail hand reached to meet hers as she looked one last time, and their tearless daughter stepped into view to glimpse the forever stabbing image of her dying father.
         "Goodbye Mitchy," Julie said as she clamored out the door.
As the door waved slowly on its hinges, fresh daylight splashed through the room, and the heels bounding down the wooden front steps tossed images of the young girl's hair blowing into the sight of Mitch. He hung his mouth open, unable to speak to the moment at hand, and as the last of the door swings concluded he tried to stand and follow. She hung lightly in the New Orleans air behind the drag of her mother, and never once turned her same sad eyes back to the father she'd never know.
         "Julie wait..." he whimpered, tripping over the bottle that had drunk him stupid and landing roughly onto the wooden floors. "Julie," he lightly screamed, pounding his fists against the planks and rolling about in the dust. He mewled and moaned, unable to stand or consciously put himself back to together. He'd finally caught the crack of the blind man's whip he'd been been dancing around for so long, and quite possibly the last piece of heart he had fighting inside him got sucked away in the bottle.
         "Come on Mitchy, cant have none of this," Charlie said regularly, breaking the silence and tugging at his shirt.
         "Charlie...Charlie," Mitch bawled, pulling softly on his pant leg. "One Charlie...one more drink.
         Charlie jerked his foot away, kick-warning back at the loose hands of Mitch.
         "You piece of shit," he said as he angrily grabbed at his feet. "You're nothing but a beast, worse than the damn dogs in the alley." He began dragging Mitch towards the door. "Take your shit elsewhere vulture, there aint no pickin's left for you."
He backed through the door, clunking Mitch down the front stairs as if the cries and pleas were never there. Hank and I followed, figuring it best to end our times for the day before we too roughed our backs against the cement.
         "Come back when you got somethin' to offer," he said as he threw Mitch against the emptied trash cans. He looked away from him in disgust, and sternly brought his attention upon Hank and I. "You boys are square with the house for now," he said as he walked into the door.
         "Where do I go...Hank...Billy...," he cried, turning to us as we walked away. I looked at him carefully, his black hair toppled across his head. He looked at me with the broken eyes of a man, and for the briefest of moments, looked almost human.
"Billy, Billy I don't know where to go," he begged, his eyes unable to cry anything more than the liquor that coursed through his veins. "I didn't mean nothin', I swear it. She took her away."
         I looked to Hank for guidance, and with a sigh I turned my cold shoulder and began to walk away.
         "We'll be seeing ya Mitchy."