"Tomatoes in Chicago"
Inspired by "Woke Up This Morning"- theme song to The Sopranos
Michigan Street glittered with Hershey advertisements, prostitute offerings, and sixteen year old Haight-Ashbury wannabes. It was three in the morning. A slight wind was blowing as taxi drivers who didn't give a damn were weaving through the heavy tourist traffic.
Near the intersection of East Pearson Street and North Michigan stood the Old Watertower. On the top of this building was a raven who spoke like Mr. Poe.
A small castle of water transportation, the Old Watertower was surrounded by a moat of lazy Americans in their gas guzzling vehicles who had nothing better to do than to eat a tuna sub sandwich with mustard and a bad, unappealing, and rather frustrating inducing tomato.
Tomatoes are the one thing people blame for making their sandwiches bad. The tomato is just a tomato, and tomatoes, as everyone knows, cannot converse back with you and are defenseless against criticism. The people who made the sandwich were simply careless to consider the ripeness of the fruit (or is it a vegetable, it is difficult to remember), but then again, consider the farmer as well. It was the farmer's lack of experience (or pure laziness) for not picking the tomato too soon, or taking care of the plant correctly, or planting the seeds at the right time of year. Whatever the case, people always blame tomatoes for their troubles whenever they order a disappointing sandwich. These people also most likely bought a 24 oz. beverage to drown their bowels with after consuming (or during consumption) of this sandwich with the poor tomato. Why anyone would need a 24 oz. Coke is astonishing, for it appears to me that the person is unaware of the effects of too much carbonated drink and not enough pure water. Overall health is apparently not a priority for these unhappy people in their cars. Along with good decent behavior.
I was at the corner, watching a taxi at a red light with a portly man sitting in the back seat. He was eating a Subway tuna fish sandwich (that he most likely got from North State Street) with the tomato falling out along with the lettuce.
It was rather appalling to see this man eat this relatively healthy sandwich. For starters he wasn't too presentable. How this person goes outside at all is a mystery. His shirt was three sizes too small, so I could see his protruding stomach that was straining to keep itself together. This man's face was pudgy, like that of a gluttonous pig. He just kept stuffing his face as if the tuna sandwich, which was a relatively healthy sandwich could magically make him less fat. When he was finished, he lifted his drink which was large and dripping with water droplets as if it were sweating from a long exercise. He pressed his lips against the straw and drank. It was agonizing. Almost as if a murder was being committed, this man drank it rather slowly, as if taunting it, that is, if beverages had minds of their own. He didn't stop to breathe, he just continued until the drink was expired and he had no use for the cup anymore. He threw it on the floor of the backseat rather loudly, as if to let the driver know that there was going to be a mess for him to clean up later.
I looked down, examining myself. To my right side was a pistol, to my left side was a pistol. Both Colt .45's securely fastened with the safety off in their holsters. In my right pocket I carried a wallet with my driver's license, my Pátzcuaro sheriff badge (for I finally took the position after careful consideration), seventeen American dollars, along with a small burlap sack of Mexican pasos. My left pocket carried a small switchblade and my cell phone. I noticed that my red charro pants were a bit dirty, as if I had just gotten out of a dust storm in the Sahara Desert. My belt buckle was a bit loose. I tightened it.
A prostitute who was a forty-something trying to pay rent and provide child support came up to me from behind. She tapped me on the shoulder, her long fingernails and my rather cold shoulder suggested that she was a vixen from a Les Miserables production who was in the middle of singing Lovely Ladies, she was screaming it really. Her makeup, which was a runny blue eyeliner and black mascara (which was also runny), reminded me of Lady Gaga's Applause music video. She was a spitting image in terms of costume.
"So," she said standing behind me and seductively trying to score some points by walking her index and pointer finger from my right shoulder to the back of my neck to my left shoulder. She pulled up to me a little closer. "how big is your cock?" She asked.
I sighed, hating this question. "Well," I replied, not looking her in the eye, keeping my focus on the grotesque man in the taxi, "since you practically have your face in it, why don't you tell me?" I knew what she meant but she didn't know what I meant. Slowly she started to move her hand flat against my shoulder and started to remove my short bolero jacket, which was really more like my daily business shirt. I never wore an undershirt, I prefer to breathe (which is why you'll never see me in a tuxedo at weddings, I'll go as far to remove my Colts and spurs, wear a nice cummerbund, white shirt and clip on bowtie, but that's about all the formal wear you'll get me in). As my shoulder began to be exposed, I placed my hand on this woman's and noticed how dry her hand was compared to mine. It was the type of dry that you get during the winter where the skin gets chapped and cracks a bit making you look like a slab of clay. Only it was August and the temperature was in the mid-seventies. I carefully removed the woman's hand and re-situated my shirt.
"What's the matter?" The woman said, "Not interested?" She walked towards my front, obstructing my view of the portly gentleman and the taxi. She bent down to my eye level and smiled the best she could. I saw the mother in her and smiled in sympathy.
"I think you better go home Señora," I said to her with a smile, "now if you don't mind, I'm busy."
The woman took this the wrong way of course, like all people do when I try and give them advice. She must've smelt my breath, for I did have a pizza earlier and I noticed there was a bit of garlic and pepperoni still on my breath, this was even after I had two breath mints and a stick of Spearmint gum. Nonetheless she walked down the street behaving like a bitchy Project Runway contest with each step, which was militant, purposeful, and rather sexy. I have to admit, I did smile a bit.
I quickly looked back towards the street and noticed that the taxi was gone, I looked down the street towards the Hershey Store building that looked like Times Square and had the obvious revelation that every single taxi in Chicago looks precisely the same. However, I was paying attention to the taxi driver too.
He was a middle aged man I figured, a small beard with a point at the end. He would be the human version of Jafar who just decided that today, he was going to wear ketchup on his face for no reason (this was most likely due to a hot dog he had earlier for lunch, appearing to have the motor skills of a one year old when it comes to food) to give you a better visualization. His shirt was Hawaiian, blue with flowers. A gold chain was around his neck with a peace sign on it. An obvious 1960's prodigy. His eyes were very wolf like, as if he were hunting his prey while waiting at the red light. I didn't know his name but I knew his destination, and why I was following him.
I started walking down East Pearson towards Lake Michigan which was in the opposite direction of the Hershey light show. On the sidewalk, there was a kid in not too shabby clothes, in other words, an American Eagle shirt, a nice pair of jeans, a pair of signature classic Chuck Taylor's, and a cigarette in his mouth. He looked at me as if he knew who I was and was afraid to know that information.
"So," the kid said to me, "what are you supposed to be?" He asked as he took a drag of his cigarette.
"You know," I replied stopping my walk and turning towards him. "You really shouldn't be smoking cigarettes, bad for the lungs and all."
The kid laughed, "Yes Mom." I rolled my eyes and walked away, leaving the poor soul to himself. If wants to ruin his life fine, I'm not his keeper. He was probably one of those kids who grew up in a Christian home with God-fearing parents and strict rules so in order to escape from it all, he turned to drugs at thirteen, got himself stuck in prison at sixteen, was disowned at seventeen, tried to get a job but was naive and stupid and got gages locked into his ears and was rejected by every major corporation that hires people like him because of his record. Now he's homeless, trying to live in the San Franciscan Height-Ashbury Summer of Love 1967, wearing rose tinted glasses of sex, lies, videotapes, wine, beer and the music of Simon and Garfunkel. I picture Mrs. Robinson and The Sounds of Silence being popular with him and the people he runs with.
Before I was out of earshot, the kid was singing the beginning to Times They are a Changing. A Bob Dylan tune. Okay, so it's not Simon and Garfunkel, but the period is right.
I got to Seneca Playlot Park, which was essentially a garden for the Chicago Fire Department at the other end who were full of firemen in their fifties close to retirement who needed the space to fill their rather boring day and to give them a reason to escape their nagging wives, who have the even more boring, tedious job of working at the Chicago Police Department. These were the kind of men who watched daytime television and pretended that the best writing in the world was still done by Rod Sterling and Dick van Dyke. Old souls with nothing better to do. These are the guys I feel sorry for. The guys who just sat around tending to flowers, trees, and bushes when they know they could be doing their actual job of community service.
One of these firemen, George was tending to a bush along the meager, rather useless fence line that was supposed to make the park look more sophisticated when really it made it look pathetic and constructed by an elementary school class of second graders who claimed to know the precise and difficult procedure of metal welding, fence designing, placement of said fence, etc. etc.
George smiled at me, "Hey Panchito, how you doing?"
I told him I was fine.
"What are you doing out here at this time of night?" He asked.
I told him I was doing business. He knew what that meant and wished me luck. I continued down the street.
About a block later was the Hawthorne Department. It looked like a rejected set from a Fast and Furious film. It seemed that any moment now, a window with Vin Diesel going through it along with the person responsible for the madness would come crashing towards the ground. The taxi with the portly man stopped in front of this building. I quickly ran towards the crosswalk and crossed it just as the man walked out. As soon as he was out of the way of the door I got into the backseat of the taxi.
The taxi was a mess thanks to this gentlemen. At least he paid the fare. The taxi driver, who was not appear I was in the back seat but aware that someone was, asked the robotic question he was required by his employer to ask.
"Where are you going sir?" He asked.
"The Morgue." I answered, paying the driver in advance and he drove to the Cook County Morgue which was across the Chicago River on West Harrison Street, not too far from the highway.
The place was a tan-brown mixture, but looked like a something out of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, I was half expecting Nurse Ratchet or at least Jack Nicholson to appear out of the hospital like doorway. I was secretly hoping for the first.
The driver pulled up into the parking lot. I quickly got out and pulled my pistol on him, aiming it right in between the eyes. "Get out Señor." I said.
The driver, who was confused about why I was doing this, as anyone would be, he got out of the taxi with no objections. "What is this about?" He asked as I pinned him up against the vehicle as if performing a search and was about to put on handcuffs. Unfortunately, I was banned from using those.
"Señor Hannibal," I said, "you are accused for the rape and murder of Virginia Allan."
"Virginia was my wife." Hannibal said.
I nodded, "I know, which is why you are hereby being sentenced."
"What are you a sheriff?" He said.
I smiled, "Just a Good Samaritan who's going to kill you."
"Why, because I murdered my wife?" Hannibal said, incriminating himself but not caring.
"I don't care about that Señor Hannibal," I said, pressing my pistol barrel against the back of his head, "all I care about is why you were driving a drug dealer."
"That guy was a drug dealer?" Hannibal said as if surprised.
I nodded, "Yeah, he was, you're the new protégé aren't you? Posing as a taxi driver was pretty clever of you, but it's hard to run away from me when I recognize your superior. Now tell me," I said, reading my pistol, "where is the cocaine?"
"Cocaine?" Hannibal asked.
"Yes, the crack! Where is the crack!" I screamed.
"Why? Are you an addict?" He said with a smile, hoping that I was.
"If I were an addict," I said, "I would've already killed you by now for stalling, now tell me where the cocaine is."
Hannibal sighed, "You're a cop aren't you?"
I shook my head, "Guess again prick," I said, "you have three seconds." I started counting. Uno. Dos. Tres.
"It's in the trunk." Hannibal answered.
I figured as much. I shot him. The blood reminiscent of his ketchup.
I walked to the back of the taxi, noticing the trunk and how bullet holed it was. The taxi was a subject of drive-bys and abuse that spanned about thirty years. The only time I ever really felt sorry for a trunk.
I opened it, the empowering smell and scent of the drug made me close to taking a whiff, but I had been clean for years and wasn't about to start that up again. Six gallon ziploc bags of the stuff where in the back. The bags were one of those recycling, and ironically 'Save the Earth' Earth Day bags from a local Brightside group that was in the city.
I closed the trunk and pulled out my cell phone, which had in truth seen better days. It was a flip phone, call me old fashioned (don't, I have self esteem issues). One of those failures that Motorola came out with to try and be 'edgy' but then again, that's every Motorola phone. I guess I'm hooked to shiny buttons and chrome. Call it a weakness. I dialed a number. The keypad was worn and well used, particularly the numbers I pushed.
I had a short conversation with the caller and hung up, placing the phone in my pocket. I then put Hannibal's body in the front seat of the taxi, walked up to the Morgue front door, knocked and told the worker who answered that there was a dead pocket in a taxi cab out front. He said he would take care of it.
I took another taxi back to the Old Watchtower. I walked down East Chicago Avenue a block and entered Streeter's Tavern. It was a place that the drunkards and prostitutes go when the shift was over. A place that had dark tinted lights for a reason along with wooden tables, that each had a classic finish to make it look fancier than it actually was. I walked over to the bar and sat next to the one person I thought I never would see again. The man in the taxi with the tuna sandwich. He was unmoving, passed out on the counter. It was about six thirty in the morning. The sun was beginning to rise.
The bartender looked at me, recognized me, and poured my usual, a Budweiser (shaken not stirred) poured very specifically into a martini glass (complete with olive). It made me feel like a big shot when I was really drinking cheap beer. I gulped down the beverage, placed the glass on the counter.
"So," I said to the bartender whose name was John, who had a friend named Bill who played piano.
Yes, John wanted to be a movie star and hated his job (and gets me my drinks for free, he's quick with a joke, and always has a lighter). He was one of the nice fellows in town who would tell you everything and keep secrets for you (within reason, if criminal charges were involved he would tell the authorities, he was just like that). He work the signature blue button shirt, white apron and black bowtie that his establishment requested of him.
"What's with him?" I asked.
"He died of binge eating." John said.
"Oh really," I said with a 'I told you so' smile that John didn't get and thought that I was being a bit of an asshole. "what did he die of?"
"Well, he told me that he eat a Subway sandwich before he came here." John said.
"That's an understatement." I replied under my breath.
"What?" John asked apparently hearing that I said something but not really sure of what it is I said.
"Nothing." I answered.
"Then he ordered a glass of water and just passed out. I walked over and checked his pulse just before you came in here and he was dead." John said.
"Did you call the Morgue?" I asked.
"Yeah, I just did, but they said they were busy with another body, some guy in a taxi with blood all over him."
"Oh," I said with interesting and another hinting smile, "and how did they describe it?"
"Like ketchup, as if he had the motor skills of a one year old or something like that." John said.
I smiled, nodded, "Well, I best be getting on home, night owls like me have to sleep to." John smiled and nodded back, "Alright Panchito, I'll see you later."
I yawned as I walked to the bus stop across the street, took a bus to the Field Museum where my car was parked and drove on home. As I was driving I turned up my radio, switched it to my CD player, and put in a CD with one track on it- Woke Up This Morning.
I pressed the loop button.