Cemetery Street, John Zunski [read any book TXT] 📗

I focused on looking into her eyes. It was an act of self-control, considering Genise’s cleavage was bound by a leopard skin bikini top. She wiggled and jiggled across the weekend. I knew she was screwing with me. I kept quiet and tried to keep my chin up.
“Hi James,” Genise extended her hand.
“Hi.” I enjoyed the feel of Genise’s hand in mine.
That’s how my weekend of sexual tension began. Imagine my torture: being in the company of two beauties and not being able to do anything about it. To escape I parked my ass on the sea wall across the street from Genise’s apartment. On one of these occasions, the lady with the dog came walking by.
I jumped off the wall and asked if I could pet her dog.
“Mr. Beau, stop it.” Her dog was licking my face.
“It’s cool. What is he?” I rubbed behind his ears.
“Golden Retriever.”
Shannie has her ‘friend’, Lucas has his sisters; I’ll get myself a dog. For the first time in months, life was worth living.
“Whatever you do, don’t get a pure-bred. They’re insane. All that inbreeding and shit. You’re better off with mutt,” Genise told that night.
Good advice from a half-breed, I thought flipping through the photos on Genise’s kitchen table. I didn’t want to be busted eying her tits. Eventually, I learned to wear sunglasses - then I could check her out with impunity.

“I’m worried about you,” Shannie said.
“Me?”
Shannie turned off the radio. She took a deep breath, keeping an eye on road. “You’re having a hard time. I think you need help.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“You slept all weekend.”
“I was tired.”
“We were at the shore.” Passing headlights silhouetted her profile.
“Sorry for not sleeping on the beach.”
“Geezus Pete Just James. You walk around like a zombie. All you do is work in Fernwood and sleep,” Shannie sighed. “No offense, you don’t have a life. If I don’t drag you somewhere you’ll sleep all day. You’re depressed. I’m worried about you, I think you might kill yourself or something.”
“I think of or something all the time.”
“I’m serious."
“I’m seriously tired.”
“Whatever,” Shannie said.
We drove in silence until I uttered: “Okay, maybe I don’t have a life, but I don’t sleep all day.”
“What were you doing on Genise’s floor until four this afternoon?”
“I was tired,” I protested.
“From what?” Shannie challenged.
“You want to help me?”
Shannie took my hand. “Of course I do.”
“This is what you can do. Be with me or stay out of my life!”
“I’m not going to stay out of your life. That’s not an option. I don’t care what you say! I love you too much to drop out of your life! Geezus Pete, look at all we’ve been through. We have to stay together.”
“If I’m so important, stop going to Atlantic City,” I said.
“Oh no you don’t! No one, No One, tells me how to live my life. Not you! Not Diane! Not No ONE!” Shannie’s voice rose.
“Ought oh, double negative.”
“FUCK YOU!” Shannie shouted.
We didn’t speak all the way home. Shannie broke our silence in the Ortolan’s driveway. “You think I’m a freak, don’t’ you?” The outline of her faced glimmered under the streetlight – the same light Count was known to kick out. I didn’t answer. I opened the door and slipped into the night. “I’m not a freak,” Shannie cried.
Too upset to sleep, I slithered down Cemetery Street, past Lucas’s funeral parlor, over the railroad tracks and across vacant lots that were once giant factories. I sat upon an uprooted tree hovering above the Schuylkill River. Watching the water ripple under a full moon, I promised myself better. It was time to move on. I was tired of atrophying into a spineless slug.

Weeks had passed since we spoke. It was the longest we’d ever gone without talking. God knows but not for the arrival of another female in my life, Shannie and I wouldn’t have spoken again. Her name was Eleanor Rigby, I called her Ellie. She was affectionate, a bit demanding, and sometimes trying. More than anybody, I credit her with snapping me out of my funk. Shannie fell in love with her and Ellie took a liking to Shannie. Ellie took a liking to anyone who offered her treats.
I can’t say I chose Ellie as much as she chose me. When our eyes met, she curled her ears and tilted her head. My heart snapped. I tried walking away, looking at other dogs, only to look over my shoulder at her. My father sensed the connection. He nudged me and said it was time to fall for another blonde.
That afternoon Dad, Diane and me fussed over Ellie; Shannie was in Atlantic City. That night, I fell asleep on the floor with my arm wrapped around Ellie. I set a dangerous precedent. The next night Ellie protested sleeping alone. She whined and whined. “ELLIE! Stop it,” I scolded. She did, for a minute, before repeating herself. “ELLIE! Knock it off!” On went this battle of wills. Luckily my father slept like the dead.
“Jesus Christ! Okay, okay, you win,” I patted my mattress. She leapt onto my bed, curling next to me and resting her snout on my pillow. I was too tired to argue. “If I was smart, I’d take you back to the pound,” I said petting her. I was in love.
The next day Ellie and I were playing in the yard when Shannie returned home. “Oh my God! She’s adorable,” Shannie fussed. “What’s her name? It’s a her? I didn’t see any equipment down there.”
“Eleanor Rigby; I call her Ellie.”
“Cute.” Shannie looked up at me. We locked eyes. “I’m sorry Just James.”
“Me too.”
Shannie scratched behind Ellie’s ears. “I hate when we don’t talk. It’s stupid.” She stood. “Wanna kiss and make up?”
“I’d rather make out,” I smiled.
“Don’t press your luck.”
We hugged. Shannie and I had an unspoken understanding. Don’t ask; don’t tell. As maddening as it seemed, it was better to lose part of Shannie than all of her.
I was telling Steve Lucas as much one afternoon in the embalming room when he said: “Be careful dude, Shannie and that bulldyke friend will convert your mutt.” Steve became the sounding board for my Shannie frustrations. He made their relationship his personal challenge. “If I ever meet this Comanche chick…”
“Shoshone.”
“I’ll give the Shoshone my bologna. I’d convert her; she never met a paleface from good stock; I’m pedigree.”
“You couldn’t convert a virgin in a whorehouse. I’m telling you dude, she’s Satan fucking incarnate!”
“Ye of little faith - give me a loaf of bread and watch me butter the slices. This is what you do. Get your wannabe woman to invite her squaw to Beyford. We take them out on a double date and let the rest to me.”

The weekend before Memorial day, 1992, Shannie duped me into a third trip to Atlantic City, this time with Ellie in tow. Traffic on the Atlantic City Expressway was heavy. “Goddamn Shoebees,” Shannie bitched.
“What’s a Shoebee?” I asked.
“Tourists,” Shannie snapped. Her hair fluttered in the wind. “Don’t you do it. Don’t do it. He did it, you asshole!” She flipped off the car who pulled in front of her. In the back, Ellie paced back and forth on the seat, occasionally nudging her nose against the windows.
“How long have you been seeing Genise?”
Shannie looked at me from behind her sunglasses. “A year next month. Why?”
“Why haven’t you brought her home?”
“What’s it to you?”
“Just curious.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, she doesn’t drive,” Shannie flipped through the radio pre-sets.
“She could take Greyhound,” I said.
Ignoring me, Shannie focused on the traffic. Her knuckles white against the black steering wheel. “I’m moving to Atlantic City for the summer,” she said.
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“I didn’t give you permission,” I cracked. My heart fell into the bucket seat; my ass throbbed in panic.
“Fuck you,” Shannie smiled.
“If you did, we wouldn’t have this problem.”
Shannie punched my arm: “You’re an ass.”
“JESUS CHRIST! WATCH OUT!” I braced myself against the back of the seat. Shannie slammed on the breaks; the nose of the GTI dipped and its rear end rose as it squealed to a stop. Ellie slammed into the back of my seat. The smell of burnt rubber drifted through the sunroof. The GTI rested inches from the blue Cadillac in front of us.
“What the fuck?” Shannie laid on the horn. “ASSHOLE!” Shannie yelled at the driver in front of us. “Why’s the asshole stopped in the middle of a highway?” Shannie questioned.
Around us drivers stared. In front of us cars weaved back and forth, queuing into lines. “It’s a tollbooth stupid.” I turned my attention to Ellie.
“Oh My God,” Shannie mumbled.
The driver of the blue Cadillac, a little old bald man, shook his head in his rear-view mirror. He kept a wary eye on Shannie until he was through the tollbooth, when he sped off.
Silence fell over us as we dodged stares. When we got through the tollbooth Shannie spoke. “I could have got us killed.”
“Look at the bright side, the three of us would be together forever.”
“That’s not funny.”
“I’m serious.”
Shannie kept her eyes on the road - her hands on the wheel. “That’s bullshit. How do you know we just don’t end up in a hole."
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“You brought it up. What makes you so cocksure there’s an afterlife?”
“What makes you so sure there ain’t?” I replied.
“Didn’t say there wasn’t, but I’m not betting there is. It doesn’t make any sense. It’s not like there’s a heaven out there. It’s not like you make a right turn at Pluto and there are gates. I don’t think it’s a place, it’s like it’s a state of being. When your dead how can you be?”
“You can be dead.”
“Yeah you can, but that’s it - you’re dead. Dead means dead.”
“What about your soul? It has to go somewhere.”
“Soul-smole. Who says there’s a soul?” Shannie answered.
“There has to be. How do you explain, like, the light at the end of the tunnel stuff?
Shannie shrugged. “If that does happen, it’s the body’s way of tricking us. Kinda like the ultimate survival instinct, you know, it tricks us, makes us think we’re going to survive when we’re dying.”
“That’s fucked up,” I said.
“No more fucked up than believing a higher being cares about your every thought.”
“I don’t like to think that Count is just in a hole, that Stan is scattered over Squaw Valley. It’s fucking cold - hopeless.”
“I hear you.” Shannie slowed as she approached the next toll plaza.

“You want me to do what?” I was sitting between Shannie and Genise on the seawall overlooking the Intracoastal Waterway.
“You heard us,” Shannie answered.
“It ain’t no big deal,” Genise said. “We need another set of eyes. You need to hold the money.” Genise was friendly. I’ve should have known she had an ulterior motive.
“Let me think about it.”
“What’s there to think about?” Shannie asked.
“Yeah, but,” I hesitated.
“It’s like you’re our stage manager. Nothing to it,” Shannie said.
“You’ll witness history in the making,” Genise chimed.
“I doubt that.” Behind us Ellie tugged on her leash. Kids rode past on their bikes. I looked from Shannie to Genise. “I guess I don’t have a choice.”
“You got a choice, you can sleep on the couch or on the street,” Genise said.

I was taking Ellie for a walk when I stumbled across three kids standing on a corner. Hey. Didn’t I see you earlier?” A black