last time heâd had a customer.
The sky was still that cold gray, the color of a slow death, but at least it had stopped snowing for a beat. I lit another cigarette just as Harry Connick Jr., Jr., reappeared, floating the other way now. âYou taking shortcuts, Junior?â
âWho are you talking to?â
âShit!â I dropped my lighter in a narrow gap between two beams of the bridge, heard it plop into the stream below. â
Dude
.â
âSorry,â said Vic, sitting next to me, his bloody jeans wadded in his lap. âYou shouldnât smoke anyway. It gives you cancer.â
I smoke-glared at him as I took the next drag. Hold, exhale, keep up the glare. âLots of things give you cancer.â
âTrue. But some things do so with a much higher rate of efficiency than others.â
âWhat would you know about it?â
He looked down at the stream when I noticed what heâd changed into: blue sweatpants. They had a Mets logo on the right thigh and elastic bands around his ankles that made the fabric bunch up like a bouquet around his lace-up boots.
âTheyâre my Metpants,â he said.
I laughed a little puff of smoke. âYour what?â
âMetpants.â
There was just something so patently awesome about Vic wearing these pants, as if heâd glimpsed the worldâs stockpile of ammunition against him, shrugged, and tossed an extra crossbow onto the heap for good measure.
Metpants
. Vicâs double-bird to the world. I loved it.
And just then I wished Iâd given each of those kids on the bridge a swift kick in the junk.
He rolled his eyes around for a second, but only up and down, not side to side. Iâd seen him do this a few times now, but it still took me off guard.
âWhoâs
Junior
?â he asked.
As if summoned by the god of goldfish himself, Harry Connick Jr., Jr., appeared below our feet.
â
That
,â I said, âis Junior. Heâs our goldfish. I named him Harry Connick Jr., Jr.â
âAfter the singer?â
âYep. And actor. That guy does not quit. Heâs everywhere, especially during the holidays. Anyway, this summer there were dozens of goldfish, now this is the only one. Here, look.â I pointed about twenty feet upstream to a red object that resembled an upside-down salad bowl floating in the water. âThatâs a de-icer. It keeps the water at a high enough temperature to not freeze over. The thing is Gunther only put in one de-icer this year, which isnât nearly enough. So one by one the fish started dying until it was less Channel à la Goldfish and more Plague à la Goldfish. They just couldnât survive.â
âExcept Harry Connick Jr., Jr.â
I nodded. âThe fish who does not quit.â
Drag.
Blow.
Calm.
âI like your greenhouse,â said Vic.
âItâs weird, I know.â
âNot that weird.â
I gave him a classic
Are you kidding me?
look.
âOkay.â He nodded. âItâs pretty weird. But cool.â
âAnyway, itâs not permanentâjust until we can afford better.â
Drag.
Blow.
Calm.
âI used to stare at this place,â whispered Vic. He pointed across the street. âI sat right there on that stone wall and stared at this orchard.â
âReally? You ever see us?â
He shook his head. âIt was a while back. My grandparents used to live in this neighborhood, but theyâreââ He stopped abruptly, looked down at the stream. âAnyway. I thought it was kind of a weird bump.â
âBump?â
âCoincidence.â
Vic pulled out his handkerchief, wiped the bottom corner of his mouth, and that was when I saw the scabs on his right wrist. There were five or six, varying in length, but all very thin. They werenât scars like the one on my head. And I had a friend in high school who cut herself regularlyâthis wasnât that either. These