I walked without thinking into a well-dressed younger woman, younger than me I mean, coming out of the tavern.
She said, oh excuse me, and began chasing after the Styrofoam cups that tumbled out of my arms onto the street.
They were scuttling around the sidewalk as she went after them with her bum in the air, but they would not be caught. One of them rolled under the hissing tire of the #10 bus. Sorry, she said again, they just keep getting away!
I was just standing still, as I do, looking at the space between my elbows, where there used to be things but now was nothing.
I remembered my manners, said its okay, they were nothing, which was a lie, because they were less than that, and besides she didn’t ask about them yet.
Come inside, I’ll buy you a cup of something in it, she said.
And I followed her inside the light dark and humming neon flicker. The game was on. I couldn’t hear her order over the cheering or groaning, which are noises people like to make for others so they feel a part of things.
The woman who knocked over my cups slid me a can. She was kind of severe now. What’s your story, pops? She said.
I didn’t correct her. I’m no one’s pop, but she could have it.
I misted up and she rushed to me, saying come on now, none of that. Everyone tells me their stories. I’m a good listener. Why’re you so sad? And what’s with carrying all those cups around? Are they for begging change? I got some here.
No, I said, stopping her, they’re for collecting tears.
She said, why you got so many tears, pops?
She was excited and talking loudly like it wasn’t just for me but for everyone else to feel a part of things.
I stared into the amber foam in my glass and said my sister died today. As I knew it would, that got her all excited. She was suddenly a true expert. She started telling me about grief. You know it’s healthy, it’ll pass, this too, and about the Bible and so forth.
I said, no, it won’t pass. This doesn’t pass.
She couldn’t accept that, started telling me I’ve got more life ahead of me, that it’s paved with angel crap and a child’s kisses.
I listened to her for a while, watching her lips move and her hands make circles in the air. Her eyes rolled and her lashes twitched like spider legs.
I started back up with the tears because no one’s been so nice, and besides booze will make a stone leak.
She told me about a bad man she was married to for a while. She told me that he called her fat and no good. I said hurt people hurt people.
She said, you’re right, his daddy beat him. How’d you get so wise? On the streets?
I said I’m not from the streets. She drew back and said only, oh.
I always remember my manners, and all these questions were about me, so I asked her, are you from the streets?
I look like I’m from the street to you?
She had one mean eyebrow raised. I looked her up and down as per her request. I told her she was much too beautiful to know anything about the streets.
How dare you size me up and down and try to tell me about what I know. I don’t mind telling YOU I’ve been down some dark roads, you know, you’re not the only suffering soul out there.
And she muttered to nobody, tell ME what I know and don’t know. I bet you don’t know nothing bout nothing except what you don’t got in those cups. Bet your sister didn’t even die.
She didn’t, I admitted.
She shoved my arm off the bar, stood up mumbling again, he gonna tell me his sister died, for what, a free drink and a cheap pickup line? Not THIS sister…
Before I could swallow I was being lifted from the stool and sent sailing out the door. Then there was a man, maybe her man, yelling at me in a crumple, How you gonna pick up a sister with a fake sister, you downright cruel sonofabitch, you HEAR ME?
I heard, but what could I say? I have a sister. I have a hell of a sister, but only she’s not dead, but not so alive either. She’s out in Switzerland, if you want to know, at a special place for confused girls. They’ve got the best programs out there, the most expensive, don’t I know. If it were up to our folks she’d maybe be in the streets begging drinks.
I don’t have a job, but I’m no tramp. I used to work plenty, not so many expenses because I don’t want for much. One day I realized I had something better than a good job, I had a good cause.
Then I began to want, but not for cars or those marshmallow beds, for my sister, poor and lifeless just like me collecting tears in Styrofoam cups, and worse.
Much, much worse.
I don’t ask for much. I’ve got a place to set my head. I’ve got the sun in the sky and the moon at night, and my sister sees the same ones, only differently because she’s so confused. And in Switzerland, where the stars are probably different.
The only thing I’m wanting is because I lost all my cups, and I won’t tell you a phony story about a dead sister or anything because your face and I can tell it is smarter than the average face. You have a face that can tell a true story, or at least listen to one. So if you won’t judge me too harshly, I’ll keep the story about those cups the way it is, to myself. After all an honest scoundrel is better than a lying scoundrel and if it is nothing to you, then it is everything to me.
