“I know a place might work for you,” the hotel night clerk called out.
One of the two elevator doors opened. Ben turned back toward the front desk. The brown smudged walls ooze onto the sticky carpet.
“For tonight?” Ben asked.
“No. But it’s a place you might like, if my guess about you is right.”
“Anything’s got to be better than this.”
Agreeing heads bobbed in the rundown lobby, except all the heads bobbed in the lobby all the time, agreeing or not.
“I’ve got an uncle with a place in Brooklyn. The number’s on this paper here. Can’t hurt.”
Besides the phone number were directions for the subway.
“I’ll call him.
“Call him now. His name’s Pete. He’s up.”
All around Ben lay bags of a man on his way into the city, or on the way out.
“I’ll do it in the morning,” he said.
“He’s expecting your call.”
“I haven’t been in town thirty minutes. No one is expecting anything from me.”
“That’s not the way this town works,” the clerk said. “You hear something, it’s something tossed your way, you jump on it. You jump first. This is one of those. Call now, or don’t call. Now is the time to call, not tomorrow.”
Ben started strapping his bags back on.
“He’s got a place?”
“Top floor. He owns the building.”
“It’s quiet? I’ve got to have quiet,” Ben said.
“This is a pretty busy city here. It ain’t Shady Acres.”
The clerk pushed a phone across the counter. Ben picked up the handset then wiped the ear piece off on his coat. It left a black smear.
“What is this shit. It’s all over the place.”
The clerk nodded.
“We live with it. Nothing else. From the busses across the street, like the one you came in on. All of us in this city breath this shit, and you will too. It gets in you and stays. New people come here and it kills us. Kills us with this black shit. All part of the deal.”
A thin layer of dust settles on Ben’s luggage, puffs of soot billows across the room each time the door moves open or shut.
Ben dials the number for Uncle Pete.
