King Perry (17 page)

I took a king to Alcatraz.

I’ll get excited about that later. In the meantime, I have to remain on guard against over-romanticizing it. Even though it meant the world to me, Perry doesn’t have to feel the same way. No Billy shit today, either. I worked that out of me last night. I’m good now.

At my insistence, we hop a crowded streetcar, the heavily populated F train. I am eager for a sardine-like trolley car experience, and we get that, including a forty-something woman who overapplied her favorite perfume. Wow, that shit is strong.

Perry’s grumbling suggests he is not pleased. “We could have taken a cab. Or any other line to the Embarca—”

He stops when he sees my moronic grin.

After a few pointless questions about our breakfast destination, what happens after that, Perry watches me from the corner of his eye. As the trolley lurches forward, I pretend to stumble off balance, driving my hips into his. He smiles with a funny shyness as if this somehow revealed our sex life to our fellow bus mates. As we bounce along downtown, bumping into each other repeatedly, Perry angles his head next to mine and says quietly, “How long did you fuck me?”

“Don’t know. I fell asleep.”

Perry face sparks into annoyance. “I haven’t had many guys actually fall asleep while having sex with me.”

The streetcar screeches, so when I speak in a normal tone right into his ear, it’s audible only to him. “That’s too bad. I felt lucky to fall asleep inside such an amazing man. The experience was completely beautiful and full of love.”

Perry pulls back, cautious and surprised, checking to see if I’m mocking him.

I’m not.

His eyes gradually soften, melting in recognition, until he finally sees me again, both of us silently acknowledging his deeper trust. I cannot know his thoughts, but I see the subtle shift as the tension in his face relaxes.

He puts his head on my shoulder—an extremely public gesture—and I understand that this affection means something. It was not his brain’s idea to cuddle me this way. Some other power stirs now. Still, I wouldn’t claim surprise if Perry’s brain is seeking reasons to ditch me.

Breakfast could be that reason.

I hope he likes bacon.

H
ALF
an hour later, as we wander up Polk Street, Perry does not mask his disappointment.

The Tenderloin neighborhood boasts transgender hookers and slow-driving johns, an army of teenage junkies, and a few generations of immigrants who have gone ahead and given up on the American dream. Of course, the Tenderloin also boasts great bookstores and awesome noodle shops. Dirty-windowed bakeries hide killer bungeoppang pastries next to tarot card parlors with dusty curtains, secrets of the future totally worth exploring.

But in the Tenderloin, you step over more sidewalk urine than in other parts of San Francisco. Or step around someone actually pissing. The artist who painted this part of town mixed grime into the colors, experimenting with a filmy veneer that does not quite work in the final composition. Still, the Tenderloin is Alcatraz on parole, which is why I feel at home here.

He says, “I know better areas for breakfast. You should let me take you to this place called the Front Porch in Upper Haight. Southern gravy hash browns, Vin. You’d like them.”

“I do like hash browns.”

“They’re fantastic.”

I rub my belly. “But if I’m eating at the Front Porch, I get their cheese grits.”

I catch exasperated surprise in his reaction before he rubs his eye socket with the palm of his hand. He shouldn’t be surprised; it’s a popular restaurant.

We maneuver around discarded takeout Styrofoam, various chunky sidewalk splatters, and sure enough, fresh, steaming pee. Perry skillfully avoids panhandlers, waving them aside as he presses me for more details on my Alcatraz nights. Suddenly, we arrive at the breakfast spot I selected.

He doesn’t seem to mind at first, showing no strong divergence from his general disdain until we continue right past the kitchen-side entrance and head down the long line of waiting patrons. This place is also popular for Saturday morning breakfast.

“Where are we going? Vin? No, Vin.
No
.”

I lead us around the block’s corner and he sputters; I keep walking until we reach the end of the line and I make myself part of it.

He says, “We’re going to
volunteer
here, right? I mean, we’re going to do this king thing and serve homeless people breakfast or something, right? C’mon.”

I grin and say, “We’re lucky. It’s Scrambled Egg Saturday, which only happens twice a month.”

St. Anne’s is one of those stubborn parishes that refuse to give up on the Tenderloin and its forgotten inhabitants. Their worship space smells like the Vietnamese restaurant below. Someone must have obtained permission to convert this small adjoining parking lot into a makeshift cafeteria, for a few hours at least. Wednesdays they serve dinner off card tables in Hemlock Alley. I still can’t believe they serve dinner out of an alley named
Hemlock
.

“Get this. On Wednesday nights, this parish serves free dinner off a cardboard table in Hemlock alley. Would you feel nervous eating soup from Hemlock Alley?”

He looks away. “I avoid eating soup out of most alleys, Vin.”

“Yeah,” I say.

I hoped for rain this morning, some delicious drizzle from gray, deflated clouds, but the morning is sunny and clear. You can never count on San Francisco weather.

He turns back to me and says, “We can’t do this.”

“Sure we can.”

“It’s disrespectful,” he says, his voice quivering, an anger vibration with a hint of distress. His face suggests that disrespecting our fellow diners is not his primary concern.

“I have money,” he whispers.

I cup my hand and whisper back, “So do I.”

“It’s humiliating.”

“Yeah,” I say with a sigh, “I know.”

“We…,” he pleads and then stops.

There’s simply no arguing with my moronic grin. You can’t fight it.

“We meet the dress code, Perry; we’re appropriately scruffy. Look, those two are dressed better than us. So is that woman too. And them. Don’t sweat it; we won’t stand out.”

Young couples in long coats hold hands and inch forward in quiet conversation, and two young women near us fix their makeup, using each other as mirrors. True, some do mutter loudly, mostly to themselves, but who doesn’t some mornings?

“You will survive this,” I say, softly nudging into him and staying there, letting him feel my warmth. I caress the side of his face with the backs of my fingers. “You survived Alcatraz.”

He huffs and jerks his head away.

“I know why you’re doing this,” Perry says, watching a woman stagger into line behind us.

I clap my arm around his shoulders, turning him to face front as the line moves forward, an undulating centipede.

He says, “We’re going to learn how to be nice to homeless people. How they’re just like you and me.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.”

“You have to understand,” Perry says, attempting a casual tone, “when you actually live in San Francisco, it’s different. To outsiders, we seem harsh and cold. But it’s not easy, you know, with so many of them, continual demanding—money, money, money—and then they swear at you if you don’t give something. Sometimes they follow and harass you.”

I say nothing but watch his face while he watches mine.

He says, “I’ll give money to someone sometime, and we end up having a nice connection for a second. But I’d end up broke if I gave money to every person who asked me.”

“What’s your limit to give on a daily basis?”

“I don’t know. I don’t have one. I’m saying that it’s not about the money; it’s how many there are of them, how often they ask. Even stopping to say no to every single one is impossible.”

“Sounds overwhelming.”

“Yeah,” he says. “It doesn’t mean I hate humanity, or I don’t have love in my heart. Actually, it makes me sad.”

“I get that.”

Perry looks at me skeptically. He starts to explain it another way, but I haven’t disagreed with him, so he pauses and his mouth snaps shut.

He says, “You didn’t give money to every homeless person we passed this morning.”

I nod. “True.”

He’s quiet for a moment.

He tries a different approach. “I’m an invest—”

“Do investment bankers eat scrambled eggs?” My voice drips sweetness.

“What if a bank colleague or a client passes us, Vin? What the hell am I supposed to say?”

“How about this: I always eat breakfast here after a night of wild sex on Alcatraz.”

Perry draws a sharp breath. “Don’t talk so damn loud, Vin.”

We peer around, but nobody pays us attention except for the gray-haired woman behind us who seems extremely interested in our conversation. Perhaps she’s just interested in any conversation. I would talk to her if I weren’t busy managing Perry.

I take his hand, and although I feel reluctance at first, he lets me hold it.

We advance.

He says, “I picked up two sticks last night, sharp ones, while you weren’t looking.”

I say nothing.

He says, “I decided to gouge out your eyes if you tried to kill me.”

“I bet you wish you had those sticks right now.”

He turns an almost wistful smile to me, still uncomfortable, but he squeezes my hand.

He says, “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I told you that.”

“You’re pissed at me, and it’s easier to tell me about the sticks than say ‘I’m angry’.”

Perry says nothing.

“Do you have a favorite letter in the alphabet, Pear?”

He does not answer.

Tenderloin residents bustle past us, going about their Saturday morning errands. I notice that whenever a pedestrian pays too much attention to our lineup, Perry turns his back. I start wishing good morning to everyone who passes us. After a few of these salutations, I turn him to face them.

“Vin,” he says with a hint of warning.

“Good morning,” I call cheerfully to a couple of college-age men.

“Hey,” says one in surprise.

Perry nods at them, another minute surrender.

At least I’m not thinking about Billy today. Or
vigor
.

Twenty minutes later, we reach the parking lot food tables.

“I’ll do this,” he says, “but honestly, don’t expect me to go hugging every homeless person I meet because we ate breakfast here. On Monday, twenty people will ask me for money on my way to work, and I won’t have time to ask them all their names.”

“Noted. No love fest.”

The woman behind us, Filipino I’m guessing, has listened carefully to our entire conversation and now chimes in, “I hate them too. They smell terrible.”

When it’s our turn, we present our Styrofoam trays and are rewarded with two ice cream scoops of watery eggs, breakfast potatoes adorned with greasy onions, a piece of toast lightly skinned with red jam, and a substance performing a remarkable impression of bacon.

Perry holds his tray cautiously, as if the food might attack him. “I’m not eating the bacon.”

I say, “Okay, you betcha.”

“I hated
Fargo
,” Perry says.

“Tuesday you said you liked it.”

He says, “Tuesday, I was flirting.”

Okay, no
Fargo
references. I don’t know if he actually hates it or he’s expressing his discontent another way, but either way, message received. He’s pissed.

Two rows of folding tables, the ugly brown ones you might see in a high school cafeteria, stretch the length of the parking lot. I guide us toward a space already claimed by six people, but I spy room for the two of us somewhere in the middle. I motion for him to sit opposite me.

They make room on our arrival, a few with reluctant grumbles. Our Filipino friend was on to something regarding smell. I will admit that it’s hard to focus on breakfast when new odors, largely unidentifiable, make themselves known each time one of our neighbors shifts position.

He says, “This place isn’t helping the new attitude.”

“Compute returns in your head. Think of securities margin trading and the percentages at which the bank sells point margins.”

Perry scowls. “That doesn’t even make any sense.”

“He’s an investment banker,” I explain to the man next to me.

“Hey, Banker,” the man says without looking up.

“Vin. Be cool.”

“But outside you were so
proud
.”

Perry looks at me, a sullen pleading. In turn, I drop my gaze pointedly to his bacon.

He picks up one floppy end of the almost-bacon and puts it in his mouth.

“Good man,” I say with a wink. “I knew investment brokers ate breakfast.”

“Banker,” he says.

Seeing my suppressed smile, he shakes his head and chews. Breakfast has gone easier than I expected; we have successfully navigated another rocky passage.

“This tastes like shoe.”

“Versace or Jimmy Choo?” asks the woman to Perry’s left.

She uses this unanswered question as the opportunity to introduce herself as Francine and then launches into politics. She has decided to vote Republican because she is “
sick of all the fucking shit going on
.” After Francine’s short rant, which draws the attention of three nearby tables, we say hello to another neighbor, who politely explains she’s not in the mood for conversation this morning. One man leaves our table.

Perry looks at me and holds up his finger to an invisible maître d’. He mimes the words, “Check, please.”

He grins at me, the first authentic cheer I have seen since we got in line. He also settles in, swallowing his scrambled eggs and forking the potato chunks. Now that he’s no longer fighting breakfast, I lean across to him. Francine leans in closer too.

“Hey, Francine,” I say, motioning her to lean closer. I stand and meet her halfway across the table. “For ten bucks, let me talk to my buddy in private.”

She says, “For twenty, I’ll leave.”

“Stay,” I say and slip her a ten.

She takes the money, peers around coolly, and resumes digging in her egg mound, perhaps searching for something. I see that her fingers are red and scabbed over near the nails. She must gnaw them.