Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.
FIVE
Walking the downtown streets one afternoon, headed over to see one of my many employers, fellow by the name of Tony, and I realize I've got my eyes peeled for Jay. It's been more than a month since I saw him last, walking out of my apartment parking lot, wearing my old coat.
I keep remembering that startled feeling I had when he came into the living room after his shower. Blonde and baby faced under all that grunge, not just a 'kid' but a child, alone on the street since he was twelve or thirteen. My biggest concern at that age was accumulating the ultimate comic book collection while trying to keep my parents from finding out I was failing biology. Well, that, and avoiding the bullies at school.
Weather hasn't improved much. There've been plenty more nights when the temp fell below 30 degrees. The police have found five homeless folk frozen to death so far. Apparently they don't rate the same kind of attention we taxpayers do, a few seconds on the five o'clock news, crammed between the sports scores and the political scandals. No details about their age or appearance. Why bother? No one cares about them, right?
So I'm scanning the crowds as I walk, checking out the individuals sheltering themselves in doorways or under newspapers in the alleys, listening for a familiar voice. Nothing so far.
I gave him my fucking phone number, I try reminding myself. He wouldn't have taken anything more, I was up against a line with the coat and I knew it. Next move, if there's going to be one, is up to him.
Tony's waiting impatiently when I enter the pub where we've agreed to meet. He's stuffing himself with peanuts, drinking a beer and glaring at me for being – I check my watch – twenty minutes late.
"You think I don't have anything better to do than sit around some dive all day?" he says by way of greeting. He's a big guy, Italian, swears he's not connected, which I hope to God is true. In bed with the mob, that's the last place I need to be. I make myself comfortable and light up a cigarette. Waitress zooms in the moment I'm settled. "He'll have what I'm having." Tony says. When I've got a bottle in my hand, he starts in with a list of 'clients' he'd like me to visit.
It's the same people every damn time he talks to me, and I wonder why the fuck he doesn't just cut them off. They always pay up eventually, but is the interest he charges them really enough to make up for the time and energy he wastes in the pursuit of it? But I don't complain. It bankrolls my luxurious lifestyle, after all.
Just as I'm getting ready to leave, standing up, putting my coat back on, he says, almost as an afterthought, "Oh yeah, there's one more. You probably don't even want to bother with this kid, I'll probably have to send somebody else. There's not much dough in it for you, and he's a real obnoxious little punk."
For some reason, without hearing another word, I stop. I sit back down. I wave at Tony to continue.
"You remember Angela?" I nod. Angela is one of his ex's. He stays in contact with her because she brings him lots of business. "She showed up a few weeks ago with this scrawny kid, long blonde hair, a real smart ass, mouth like a sailor. I fronted him a little weed to sell, on her word, and he made good on it, brought the money on time." Tony stops long enough to order himself another beer and I try to conceal my agitation.
Finally, he continues. "When he knocks on the door a week later, I front him some more product, figure he's good for it, you know, he obviously had some customers first time around and he didn't stiff me. But nothing. I called Angela. She kicked him to the curb. Has some idea where he might be, though. Owes me five bills now, being late. You wanna give it a shot?"
"What's his name?"
"Jay." Could there be more than one obnoxious, foul mouthed, skinny blonde kid named Jay in this city? I enjoy a split second of relief before I sort out the implications of all this. He might be delinquent because he's occupying a drawer in the morgue. If not, he's into a drug dealer for $500. And I'm responsible for bailing him out. If I take a pass, Tony will send someone else, someone who'll rough him up.
"I'll take care of it." I tell him.
A condemned house, that's where Angela told Tony to look, and when I get there, I wince and hope they're wrong. Three stories high, scorch marks arching out of most of the upper floor windows, plastered all over with signs that say DANGER in bright red. Fucking thing looks like it could cave in at any moment. I move around to the back of the building, where boards have been pried away from a door and the caution tape's been torn loose.
It's not nearly as hideous on the inside, if you ignore the smell of charred wood and mildew, and watch your step on the floorboards, half rotted in places by standing water. Judging by the food wrappers, thin, torn blankets and other evidence scattered about not quite randomly, it's a refuge for several people. None of them seems to be around at the moment.
Going room by room, discouraged by the lack of noise, I'm about to leave when I spot an unopened closet. I think of Jay on my couch, sleeping in a fetal position with his back jammed into the armrest. Unlikely he's sleeping, it's not even dark out yet. But he might be hiding in there.
Fully prepared for someone or something to jump out at me, I turn the doorknob. Seeing him is almost anticlimactic. He's sitting up, hugging his knees against his chest, and he's snoring. Must be damned exhausted, I'm invading his sanctuary and he hasn't moved a muscle. Still has the coat, but no gloves.
I feel like I'm about to rouse a wild animal so I take appropriate precautions, moving back a few feet and kneeling so as not to be too large or too threatening. "Jay?" I say it evenly and not too loudly. Nothing. "Hey, Jay? Wake up." I raise my voice a bit.
That did the trick, a little too well. He jumps, scrambles, tries to scuttle backward. Since he's already against the wall, all he manages to do is smack his head. "Fuck! Back off, back the fuck off!" He's trembling, breathing hard. I don't move or speak, just wait for him to focus his bleary eyes in the dim light.
"Silent Bob?" he asks. Then he smiles. "What the fuck you doing here? How'd you find me?" He adds it up quickly, my silence, my blank expression, my presence. That cynical, suspicious look he's so good at hardens his features. "You fucker. You're on the job, aren't you? That fucking no neck drug dealer sent you."
He sounds awful, more hoarse than I remember, and I want to blow my nose just listening to him. No wonder he was sleeping, and so soundly. He's sick.
"Might as well go ahead, fat ass," he continues, "Do what you gotta do, cause I ain't got the cash. Think I'd be holding out if I did? Think I'd be squatting in a shit pit like this?" He starts coughing and it's a few minutes before he can stop. While he's still out of breath, I ask what happened.
He shrugs, pulls a handful of fast food napkins out of his pocket, blows and wipes his nose.
"First time it was easy, I had this chick I was staying with and she took me to a party, sold it all in one night. Fucking bitch kicks me out a few days later. Now all of a sudden I can't give it away. Her friends don't want nothing to do with me and I can't find a corner that ain't already taken. Believe me, I tried."
He turns his head and points to a huge bruise along his jawline. "One of those fuckers put me in a chokehold, thought he'd pop my head right off at the neck, threatened to do it, too, if I showed my face on his turf again." He sighs, shudders, and coughs again. "What is it now, four or five hundred? What's that worth, Silent Bob? You wanna break a couple of my fingers? Let's get it over with. I ain't gonna try to run, you got me trapped like a fucking rat."
"I'm not gonna kick your ass, Jay." I say. He tilts his head, confused, while I think through our options. I don't have a spare five hundred bucks to pay off his debt. He wouldn't let me if I did. And there's no negotiating with Tony, I've got no leverage. Then it hits me. "You have any of the stuff left, or did you smoke it all yourself?"
Jay rolls his eyes dramatically. "Sure, I took a little off the top, you show me somebody's got a better reason to get high than I do. But I'm a businessman. Weed may be magic, tubby, but it don't turn into a warm bed or hot food till you sell it. I got plenty left."
"You got it on you?"
"What, you think I left it up in the penthouse, with the Playboy bunnies?" he asks, gesturing toward the ceiling. "Course I got it on me." Perfect. I head toward the back door, wave at him to come with me. "What? Where we going? You gonna convince your friend Tony to take back the goods?" I shake my head.
"I have a place." Jay wrinkles up his nose.
"What the fuck are you talking about, a place?" I sigh, frustrated, waving again for him to get off his ass.
"To sell it, dickhead." He raises his eyebrows and his face softens.
"Oh." He nods his head slowly. "Okay."
Last of my pocket change gets us across town on the bus. I watch him as we ride, sniffing and coughing and blowing his nose. I'm no salesman, and I don't know if he can pull this off in the shape he's in. Would I buy anything from a dirty street kid who looks like he might sneeze or barf all over me? Perhaps that's a tad ironic, considering I'm willing to sit next to him on the bus, allow him to sleep on my couch and eat my food. Then again, I'm nuts.
Most people who buy drugs are slightly nuts.
We walk about two blocks from the bus stop, Jay trailing behind me obediently if a little slowly, head down, running into me when I pull up short at our destination. He looks up. He snorts, sneers and shakes his head.
"What the fuck is this place?" I point. Quick Stop Groceries, RST Video and a couple of other small businesses sharing space in a strip mall. I used to work in the Quick Stop when I was sixteen, seventeen years old, after my parents kicked me out. It's a block from my apartment, and it gets a lot of traffic. I've seen a few dealers come and go.
"You want me to sell the shit here? In front of a fucking convenience store? And a video store? You're fucking retarded, Silent Bob." He moves toward the Quick Stop, peers through the windows at the clerk and the two customers inside. "This place is too fucking clean. Nobody's gonna come to a place like this looking for drugs."
"People in the suburbs get high, too." I inform him, lighting up a cigarette and leaning against the length of wall separating the Quick Stop from the video store. Jay stares at me for a bit, then goes to pacing. He sings, hums under his breath, checks out the other businesses, circles the building a couple of times, nervously assessing the territory.
"You sure ain't no cops gonna bother us?" he says, coming to rest beside me. I nod. He keeps glancing around. "If this is such a good spot, then somebody else must already be dealing here." I shrug. I don't know for sure. "What happens if they show up?" he demands. I take a drag off my cigarette, scowl, crack my knuckles. Jay raises his eyebrows and looks me up and down. "Really?" I nod. "Fuck yeah." he says approvingly, nodding, before going into motion again.
It's beginning to get dark but the flow of customers picks up, people getting off work, dropping in for cigarettes or a carton of milk on their way home. Jay seems to handle himself pretty well. He nods at folks as they go by, something shady yet inviting in his manner, in the tilt of his eyes and the set of his mouth. He watches them all, speaks occasionally. After a while he starts asking the odd person if they want to get high.
First sale goes to a guy with curly black hair and a moustache. Jay indicates me when the money comes out. I take it, count it and put it in my inside coat pocket, then Jay produces the weed. Customer goes away happy and we're a few dollars closer to paying off Tony.
A few hours pass, a few more transactions take place. I can see he's worn out, despite his hyperactive bursts of energy. Reminds me of a kid who doesn't want to go to bed, struggling against sleep by bouncing off the walls.
He follows me inside the convenience store where I grab a cup of coffee for myself, a can of pop for him, a couple of wrapped sandwiches and a bottle of cold medicine. He mouths at the clerk a mile a minute while I pay. He watches the guy, eyes darting around, and stuffs candy into his pockets when he's sure no one's looking. I clear my throat and he stops, shooting me a dirty look.
Once we get back outside, I hand him his sandwich and drink and start walking toward home. Jay eats, comes along without argument. I don't assume I've gained his trust. Fatigue and sickness have just knocked the fight out of him temporarily.
He throws away his trash and washes up when we get to the apartment, drinks some of the cold syrup and sits down on the couch, all without a word. I turn on the TV and then go into the bedroom to get some covers for him. When I get back, he's leaning over sideways, fast asleep. I put a blanket over him and kick back in the recliner.
I take off my coat and pull the money out. Nowhere near $500 yet, but it's a start.