Maybe Sport controls the whole damn prostitution business on Manhattan. It feels like it, the way his girls keep creeping up on Freddy, even down on sixty fifth street. None of the real high end girls, the leggy blondes and the ones who stay away from smack enough to keep their veins tight he keeps close by. But some of the older models skulking around the nudey cinema two blocks away he definitely recognises. The first time he spots a pair of them, staked out, waiting to pounce on the first John who ducks out of the place once the film has run its course, pure terror grips him by the hairs on the backs of his necks.
Ten minutes later he's feeling stupid for entertaining the possibility that he might be important enough to send spies across the island for. They're just working, the same as every other whore in town.
He walks straight on past the cinema, letting his feet tug him forward before his brain can think too hard about it Presumably, if he walks far enough, he'll be able to see the ocean. For all the time he's been in New York, he hasn't yet had time to get a proper look at the Atlantic. It was dark on the bus in, and if the ocean was there it was so perfectly hidden in shadow as to be unrecognisable.
Freddy walks and he walks and he walks. When he hits the sea wall his hair is wet and he can't remember when it started raining. He still doens't have a proper jacket, but it's kind of hard to care anymore. Now he's living in a place where the roof doesn't leak and he always knows where he's gonna be sleeping the next night the urge to stay dry is less urgent. Sure, Brown's place is a long way off cosy, but sleeping in the living room Freddy gets the full benefit of the heat pouring off the oven. Blue actually cooks, and Pink tries, even if Brown is almost as dependent on fast food as Freddy.
The wall rises a shade too high for him to really see anything. Freddy braces himself against the concrete and hoists himself up just far enough to catch the view, his arms locked in front of him to stop him from falling as his feet fail to find any real purchase against the wall.
An ocean's supposed to just be an ocean, but the Atlantic looks nothing like the Pacific as Freddy remembers it from weekend trips taken to calm him down and give his parents a chance to do fuck all in the sun while he wore himself down. That ocean, if not picture perfect, had come with a distinct blue tinge and a steady rise and fall that you could recognise as the junior cousins of the mammoth waves that picked up further up the coast. He'd always thought the surfer kids he saw on his infrequent trips to LA were so cool, but the one time he got to ride up to see some serious surf with a friend he had wiped out the first five times and after that the knack for staying upright on the board had abandoned him.
The Atlantic is smaller and crueler and you couldn't pretend it's great grey maw was blue is you tried. The surface ripples at random, never big enough to really be called a wave and the foam that froths up beneath his feet as the water strikes the wall seems cursory at best. Fishing line and plastic form a reef he can see stretching out towards the bleary horizon and though he can see the barnacles struggling to keep hold of their lousy hoard it doesn't seem possible that anything could survive here.
The curve of the island and the thick set skyscrapers in the distance make it impossible to see Lady Liberty from here. Deep into November, she's probably not going to be worth the trip till the spring.
Without a watch, he has no way to tell the time, but Freddy's stomach thinks it's somewhere around lunch. That's no time spent. A whole Monday and Tuesday stare him down and he has no clue what he's supposed to do with them. His first instinct is to reach for the nearest stack of comics but with his job keeping him more than in pocket on that end he's at a loss.
He needs a hobby. His mind winds back to the nudey theatres, more titillating and less exciting than regular cinema. Freddy could go see any number of decent films, he's seen the names pasted on the outside of the bright, shiny places that don't attract gaggles of girls wearing the bare minimum. Carrie. Rocky. He could go see a film like that.
Nestled down in the dark, everyone supposedly sharing the same experience as they let sound and colour take them away into the world on the screen. Freddy tries to picture himself in the cinema and can't pint the picture without hanging t huddle himself as far doown in his seat as he can reach, glancing out of the corner of his eyes every few seconds to be sure that none of the other patrons are looking too hard at him.
That shit ain't for him. Freddy hops down from the wall and resolves to find himself something to eat. If he's still bored after that, he can always follow the sea wall down to the end of the island and find out if the ocean looks any different from there.
-------------
Half way back up to sixty fourth street, the lights of Time Square still stinging the back of his retinas, Freddy runs smack into Travis, who apparently doesn't bother to check where he's going when he tears round corners.
Freddy doesn't even get an apology till Travis does a double take and recognises him. "Hey. Freddy. How you doing?"
It's been more than a week since anyone called Freddy by his real name, it takes a moment for him to slip back in to it. He nods. "Yeah, fine."
"Sure." Travis nods, his eyes lingering on Freddy's woefully inadequate leather jacket.
The conversation stagnates instantly and as ever, there's nothing Freddy can do but look up at Travis's impassive face and wish he would fucking say something. "I, uh, you seen Larry?"
"Don't work with him no more." Travis shakes his head.
"Oh. He got fired?"
"Nah. I did."
"Sorry."
There's a weird tension in Travis's shoulders that was probably always there but feels new just for this evening. Freddy attempts a commiserating smile and gives up half way through. It never makes any difference.
"Well, I gotta-" He moves to duck out of Travis's way.
"You still living up in Harlem?" Travis asks before he can get away, his eyes focusing sharply on Freddy and he feels so perfectly seen that he wants to duck into the nearest doorway on instinct.
He shakes his head. "I moved."
"When you were up there, you see any of the girls who worked the corner?"
"Sure, plenty."
"You see this one girl, real young. With a big hat. Name's Iris."
Fucking foul. Fucking Travis in all his creepy glory. The worst. Freddy could spit in his face. Pedo shitbag. "No." He snaps. "I gotta go."
His mother always told him not to be rude, but she did it in a raised voice and peppered it with so many curse words it was hard to see the forest for the trees. Freddy turns away from Travis without worrying about whether or not he's pissed.
He could go to the cops about it, cry them a river. And that would leave him exactly nowhere.
-----------
"Thought I saw Mr Blonde coming out of your store this afternoon." Blue prompts Brown. They're all four of them crammed into the living room for lack of anything better to do on a weekday evening.
Brown straightens up, eyes snapping towards him from his spot on the floor by the arch through to the kitchen. "What were you snooping around for?"
"Wasn't snooping, just coming and going at the same time as him." Blue replies. If Brown is pissy and Pink couldn't calm down if you paid him, Blue is immovable as they come. Like the missing face on Mount Rushmore.
"He's a customer! He wants comics sometimes. I help him out."
Blue looks too Freddy like he's supposed to understand anything about some guy he's never met. What he does understand is that Blue thinks Brown is full of shit. "He ain't exactly a guy who I would encourage to visit my shop."
"Well when you're running a fucking comic shop, don't you invite him in!"
"I fucking hate that guy." Pink cuts in, wrestling with the oven. "You know he chased me down the street one time? Joe sicced him on me when he thought I was stealing from that deli his cousin runs."
"Were you?" Blue raises an eyebrow.
"I mean, yeah, of course. Doesn't mean you can go setting a psycho like that on a guy."
"Who's Blonde?" Freddy ventures.
Brown shoots him an irritated scowl. "Don't you fucking worry about Mr fucking Blonde?"
"He used to live here?" Freddy extrapolates.
Pink shakes his head. "Nah. He just got lucky with the nickname."
"Cuz he's Blonde?"
Pink and white start giggling almost immediately and Brown looks about ready to murder the both of them. "You know what? I thought he was Blonde one time, under different lighting. It's really not that fucking funny, jackasses."
"But the way it gets you so angry is always good for a laugh." Blue replies.
"Fuck you!"
"Eh, go fuck yourself, kid."
"He's muscle for some of the mafia guys round here." Pink clarifies, still smiling. "Blonde, I mean. Not the kinda guy you want to get a visit from."
"Unless he's buying your comics!" Brown retorts through gritted teeth.
"Listen, if he was really in to buy some comics, it's all good." Blue shrugs. "But I'm telling you, kid, I was involved with the Cabots for too long. If you don't want him hanging around, and you don't, then you best stop doing whatever it is you're doing for them."
"I ain't doing shit for the Cabots." Brown splutters, but the lie rings hollow, even to Freddy.
Re: Sport/Orange - shady skeevey stuff - 8/?
Ten minutes later he's feeling stupid for entertaining the possibility that he might be important enough to send spies across the island for. They're just working, the same as every other whore in town.
He walks straight on past the cinema, letting his feet tug him forward before his brain can think too hard about it Presumably, if he walks far enough, he'll be able to see the ocean. For all the time he's been in New York, he hasn't yet had time to get a proper look at the Atlantic. It was dark on the bus in, and if the ocean was there it was so perfectly hidden in shadow as to be unrecognisable.
Freddy walks and he walks and he walks. When he hits the sea wall his hair is wet and he can't remember when it started raining. He still doens't have a proper jacket, but it's kind of hard to care anymore. Now he's living in a place where the roof doesn't leak and he always knows where he's gonna be sleeping the next night the urge to stay dry is less urgent. Sure, Brown's place is a long way off cosy, but sleeping in the living room Freddy gets the full benefit of the heat pouring off the oven. Blue actually cooks, and Pink tries, even if Brown is almost as dependent on fast food as Freddy.
The wall rises a shade too high for him to really see anything. Freddy braces himself against the concrete and hoists himself up just far enough to catch the view, his arms locked in front of him to stop him from falling as his feet fail to find any real purchase against the wall.
An ocean's supposed to just be an ocean, but the Atlantic looks nothing like the Pacific as Freddy remembers it from weekend trips taken to calm him down and give his parents a chance to do fuck all in the sun while he wore himself down. That ocean, if not picture perfect, had come with a distinct blue tinge and a steady rise and fall that you could recognise as the junior cousins of the mammoth waves that picked up further up the coast. He'd always thought the surfer kids he saw on his infrequent trips to LA were so cool, but the one time he got to ride up to see some serious surf with a friend he had wiped out the first five times and after that the knack for staying upright on the board had abandoned him.
The Atlantic is smaller and crueler and you couldn't pretend it's great grey maw was blue is you tried. The surface ripples at random, never big enough to really be called a wave and the foam that froths up beneath his feet as the water strikes the wall seems cursory at best. Fishing line and plastic form a reef he can see stretching out towards the bleary horizon and though he can see the barnacles struggling to keep hold of their lousy hoard it doesn't seem possible that anything could survive here.
The curve of the island and the thick set skyscrapers in the distance make it impossible to see Lady Liberty from here. Deep into November, she's probably not going to be worth the trip till the spring.
Without a watch, he has no way to tell the time, but Freddy's stomach thinks it's somewhere around lunch. That's no time spent. A whole Monday and Tuesday stare him down and he has no clue what he's supposed to do with them. His first instinct is to reach for the nearest stack of comics but with his job keeping him more than in pocket on that end he's at a loss.
He needs a hobby. His mind winds back to the nudey theatres, more titillating and less exciting than regular cinema. Freddy could go see any number of decent films, he's seen the names pasted on the outside of the bright, shiny places that don't attract gaggles of girls wearing the bare minimum. Carrie. Rocky. He could go see a film like that.
Nestled down in the dark, everyone supposedly sharing the same experience as they let sound and colour take them away into the world on the screen. Freddy tries to picture himself in the cinema and can't pint the picture without hanging t huddle himself as far doown in his seat as he can reach, glancing out of the corner of his eyes every few seconds to be sure that none of the other patrons are looking too hard at him.
That shit ain't for him. Freddy hops down from the wall and resolves to find himself something to eat. If he's still bored after that, he can always follow the sea wall down to the end of the island and find out if the ocean looks any different from there.
-------------
Half way back up to sixty fourth street, the lights of Time Square still stinging the back of his retinas, Freddy runs smack into Travis, who apparently doesn't bother to check where he's going when he tears round corners.
Freddy doesn't even get an apology till Travis does a double take and recognises him. "Hey. Freddy. How you doing?"
It's been more than a week since anyone called Freddy by his real name, it takes a moment for him to slip back in to it. He nods. "Yeah, fine."
"Sure." Travis nods, his eyes lingering on Freddy's woefully inadequate leather jacket.
The conversation stagnates instantly and as ever, there's nothing Freddy can do but look up at Travis's impassive face and wish he would fucking say something. "I, uh, you seen Larry?"
"Don't work with him no more." Travis shakes his head.
"Oh. He got fired?"
"Nah. I did."
"Sorry."
There's a weird tension in Travis's shoulders that was probably always there but feels new just for this evening. Freddy attempts a commiserating smile and gives up half way through. It never makes any difference.
"Well, I gotta-" He moves to duck out of Travis's way.
"You still living up in Harlem?" Travis asks before he can get away, his eyes focusing sharply on Freddy and he feels so perfectly seen that he wants to duck into the nearest doorway on instinct.
He shakes his head. "I moved."
"When you were up there, you see any of the girls who worked the corner?"
"Sure, plenty."
"You see this one girl, real young. With a big hat. Name's Iris."
Fucking foul. Fucking Travis in all his creepy glory. The worst. Freddy could spit in his face. Pedo shitbag. "No." He snaps. "I gotta go."
His mother always told him not to be rude, but she did it in a raised voice and peppered it with so many curse words it was hard to see the forest for the trees. Freddy turns away from Travis without worrying about whether or not he's pissed.
He could go to the cops about it, cry them a river. And that would leave him exactly nowhere.
-----------
"Thought I saw Mr Blonde coming out of your store this afternoon." Blue prompts Brown. They're all four of them crammed into the living room for lack of anything better to do on a weekday evening.
Brown straightens up, eyes snapping towards him from his spot on the floor by the arch through to the kitchen. "What were you snooping around for?"
"Wasn't snooping, just coming and going at the same time as him." Blue replies. If Brown is pissy and Pink couldn't calm down if you paid him, Blue is immovable as they come. Like the missing face on Mount Rushmore.
"He's a customer! He wants comics sometimes. I help him out."
Blue looks too Freddy like he's supposed to understand anything about some guy he's never met. What he does understand is that Blue thinks Brown is full of shit. "He ain't exactly a guy who I would encourage to visit my shop."
"Well when you're running a fucking comic shop, don't you invite him in!"
"I fucking hate that guy." Pink cuts in, wrestling with the oven. "You know he chased me down the street one time? Joe sicced him on me when he thought I was stealing from that deli his cousin runs."
"Were you?" Blue raises an eyebrow.
"I mean, yeah, of course. Doesn't mean you can go setting a psycho like that on a guy."
"Who's Blonde?" Freddy ventures.
Brown shoots him an irritated scowl. "Don't you fucking worry about Mr fucking Blonde?"
"He used to live here?" Freddy extrapolates.
Pink shakes his head. "Nah. He just got lucky with the nickname."
"Cuz he's Blonde?"
Pink and white start giggling almost immediately and Brown looks about ready to murder the both of them. "You know what? I thought he was Blonde one time, under different lighting. It's really not that fucking funny, jackasses."
"But the way it gets you so angry is always good for a laugh." Blue replies.
"Fuck you!"
"Eh, go fuck yourself, kid."
"He's muscle for some of the mafia guys round here." Pink clarifies, still smiling. "Blonde, I mean. Not the kinda guy you want to get a visit from."
"Unless he's buying your comics!" Brown retorts through gritted teeth.
"Listen, if he was really in to buy some comics, it's all good." Blue shrugs. "But I'm telling you, kid, I was involved with the Cabots for too long. If you don't want him hanging around, and you don't, then you best stop doing whatever it is you're doing for them."
"I ain't doing shit for the Cabots." Brown splutters, but the lie rings hollow, even to Freddy.