fuck
you doin' down here, pretty boy, gonna mess with me? Gon' fuckin
mess
-!" He charged at the young man, grabbing two fistfulls of his shirt, driving him backward.
The young man dug in, struggling, straining, fighting. He took a swing at the rapist's head, missed, got swung around, slammed into a wall. He felt the wood of his beloved guitar shatter, heard the strings pop. His breath caught in his chest. A punch to the stomach, a fist across the face, he dropped, hearing the wooden shrapnel crunch under his body and tasting his blood. Dazed, he thought he saw the man turn around, approach the unconscious girl, get down on one knee, lift her by her shoulders, position her head with his hands.
A loud bellow filled the alleyway. The young man stood over his attacker, a sharp splinter of what had once been his guitar's neck clutched in his hand, dripping the larger man's blood. He dropped the shard, grabbed the other man's head in both his hands and slammed his temple into the brick wall. He immediately collapsed.
The young man gulped air, hands on hips. Then he saw the girl, golden hair stained with sticky red. He ran to her and knelt. Her chest was moving, round breasts slowly heaving. Flooded with relief, he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, hastily punching three numbers. "Yeah," he said, "I'm on Lake Street between Wabash and..." he looked around for a street sign, "Beaubien. Wabash and Beaubien. I've got a... I've got two people here, they're pretty badly hurt. Yes. Yes. No, I'm okay. Okay. Thank you." He hung up.
He sat on the street near the girl, keeping an eye on her heaving chest. From time to time he'd check on the large Fman; he never stirred. In a few minutes he heard sirens rapidly approaching. He emerged from the alleyway to wave and flag them down. Two medics and a police cruiser pulled up and stopped, lights flashing. People from nearby business, bars, restaurants began to gather. There was a flurry of activity. The large man went into one medic, the girl into another.
The young man watched his happen, only half listening to the CPD uniform who was interviewing him.
"I said what's your name, son."
"Parker Herzlich," the young man said hurriedly, "now where-"
"Can you spell that for me?" the officer said calmly, removing a small legal pad and a pen from his shirt pocket.
"H-e-r-z-l-i-c-h," Parker spat. "Where are they taking her?"
"...l-i-c-h," the officer mumbled. "Weird-ass name. Now what happened here tonight, Mr. Hairs-lick?"
Parker sighed. "It's Herzlich," he said, with a sharp "ts" to end the first syllable and soft guttural on the last consonant. "I was walking and I passed the girl and then I heard her scream and I turned around and looked down this alley and that guy was raping her and I fought him off - hey wait!" Parker shouted, waving at the medic that was beginning to pull away, siren flaring back on. "What hospital are they taking her to?"
"You said he was raping her?" the officer said, writing slowly. "She looked clothed to me."
"He was about to, okay," Parker said, growing frustrated, "he was gonna force her to suck his cock, I saw it."
"Look, Mr. Hairs-lick, I'm gonna need you to calm down," the officer said, thrusting his palm toward Parker's chest. "So we've got... attempted rape," he continued, beginning to write again, "assault... okay, looks pretty cut and dried. Thanks for your time, Mr. Hairs-lick." The cop smiled a tight smile, putting his legal pad back into his pocket with his pen and getting back into his cruiser.
"Wait a minute!" Parker yelled, following the officer to his car. "Where are they taking her? I just want to make sure she's okay-"
The cop held up a wait-a-minute finger, talking on his car radio. After an agonizing minute he replaced the radio in its slot on the dashboard. "Can't help you, son," the officer said. He tipped his cap. "Have a nice night." Siren flared on and the cruiser barreled away into the night.
"Wait!" Parker yelled, running into the street. He stopped, spreading his arms in exasperation. "What the fuck?" he bellowed into the night. He then became very aware of the crowd of people still gathered, looking at him. He lowered his arms and walked quickly back into the alley.
Strewn across the alley like autumn leaves were the ruins of his guitar. He knelt to pick up the piece with which he had stabbed his assailant. Slivers of the six silver strings that only minutes ago had sung so soothingly still swirled about the pegs, the broken ends curling into the air. Parker threw it away from him in disgust. He stood, slid his hands into his pockets, then viciously kicked the pile of what was now tinder. "My fuckin' guitar!" he shouted. He stood for a few moments longer, breathing heavily, eyes closed, teeth grinding. Then he turned on his heel.
The rest of the journey was uneventful, or maybe it just seemed that way because of Parker's adamant refusal to meet any person's eye or respond to any sound. He found his way to the Loop, to the Brown Line stop at Lake and State. This train would take him north, away from the Dan Ryan. He climbed the old wooden stairs, swiped his CTA pass, passed through the turnstile, and waited impatiently by the side of the track, tapping his foot. Soon a train came, a great silver thing, which stopped and settled gently and opened its doors to release another crowd of late Friday night revelers. He stepped inside and took a seat in a corner. People packed in around him, even people older and less able-bodied than he, but that night he didn't care, he'd lost his guitar, his only ticket to the part of his livelihood he really loved. This seat was his tonight.
The train rumbled, slid, rocked and bounced along, the crowd around him ebbing and flowing as they stopped and went. The aroma peculiar to the El filled his nose, the sounds of people talking and playing music obnoxiously loudly on their mobile phones melded with the cool male voice that said, over and over, "welcome aboard the CTA Brown Line. Merchandise Mart is next. This is a Brown Line train to Kimball. This is Armitage. Doors open on the right at Armitage. Soliciting and gambling are not permitted aboard CTA vehicles. This is a Brown Line train to Kimball. Welcome aboard the CTA Brown Line. Diversey is next..."
Parker disembarked at Wellington, swiftly descending the stairs to the street level and turning right. He soon took another right turn into an alley, then up to a gate. He keyed it open, ascended 2 flights of rickety wooden stairs, then keyed open his apartment's back door. The sweet April breeze still filtered in through his open window, but it smelled sour to Parker. He entered his bedroom, took off his shirt and tossed it in a corner, lying down on his bed. He cradled his head in his hands, stretching his long, lean, muscular torso. He laid there and fumed, willing himself to fall asleep, muttering to himself. "Fuckin' guitar... the fuck am I gonna do?... that's what I fuckin' get... no good deed goes unpunished..." The Brown Line, barely two hundred feet from his apartment, thundered by. The music of the city. The last thing on Parkers face before he fell asleep, despite the troubles of the evening, was a smile. And, through the darkness and bursts of color, he remembered seeing, for a brief moment, a blaze of gold and a sparkle of green.
Normally Parker liked his morning train ride, but this morning it was just too long. Normally he also would have enjoyed being able to sleep in until 10 to work a 12-to-4 shift, but after he'd woken up at 3 that morning he never got back to sleep for more than an hour. At 7 he gave up and got up, but nothing gave him solace. Not the 3-egg omelet with green onions, mushrooms and fontina cheese that he made himself for breakfast, not his warm shower with the cool morning breeze wafting in the open window that faced the alley, not Facebook, not Twitter, not CNN, not ESPN. Especially not music. Each recording he tried to play only made his hands feel emptier, drew more attention to the now-solitary guitar stand in the corner. Time dragged on.
The train was nearly empty as the Brown Line glided south. The doors opened on the right at Harold Washington Library - La Salle and Van Buren. The people milled about, chatted, hawked roasted peanuts, hailed cabs, played music, swore. Parker walked north 100 feet, west 100, down 20 feet, and onto the Red Line, which bore him south. In 45 minutes, the doors opened on the left at 95th and Dan Ryan. He stepped off the train.
10 minutes' walk west and he arrived at the FedEx warehouse, towering, dirty. A sharp ding as he punched his time card. The smell of cardboard and sweat, the sound of shouts, clanks and machinery, the towers of boxes, resting, an interim on their journey.
The minutes flowed like a dirge, sap in January. Lifting, scanning, conveyor belts, forklift beeps, long rips of tape guns, lifting, scanning... Thoughts, helter-skelter, kept him occupied, distracted from his menial work. Screams, the sharp smell of blood, dialectal slurs, the splintering, the snap of strings, flashes of gold, glimpses of green.
The announcement passed through the waves of workers, and they broke from their tasks. Parker stepped outside, leaned against the wall, hand in pockets. Traffic zoomed by on the Dan Ryan, engines revving, tires zipping, horns honking here and there. Parker closed his eyes and listened. Sounds melded, patterns emerged, a rhythm fleshed itself out...
"Hey," a voice said. Parker started, opened his deep brown eyes. A man, less tall, heavyset, auburn hair, stood next to Parker, cigarette in hand. "You awake?"
"Hey, Ken," Parker murmured, shifting his feet.
"Surly ass," Ken said with a short chuckle. He took a drag, blew it out. The cloud hung, suspended, dispersed. "Rough night?"
"Rougher than most," Parker admitted. He sighed, then said, "can I bum a smoke?"
Ken cocked an eyebrow, full face expressionless behind aviator sunglasses. "Thought you quit."
"A year ago," Parker said.
"Hm," Ken grumbled. "Real rough night." He pulled a half-empty pack, white with green "Marlboro." "Menthols okay?"
"What the fuck," Parker said, reaching out and accepting a smoke. Ken flicked his lighter, a Zippo cut and enameled with the White Sox logo, held it out for Parker. Puff, puff, puff, a steady stream of smoke. Cooling in, cooling out, a gray cloud.
