After enduring a long, crowded subway ride followed by a ride in a taxi driven by a man who apparently considered bathing a crime and armed with an address written down on the back of an old job sheet, Egon found the gallery, which was crammed between a coffee shop and a high-end junk emporium.
Egon pushed past the detritus of other people's discarded things for sale at top prices, (though there was a phrenological head that might be worth coming back for later) entered the gallery, and was instantly assaulted by the stench of patchouli and dragon's blood.
He also attracted the attention of a short, fat man with a pierced nose and spiked hair which accentuated the fact that not only was the man going bald, but that he would never see 50 again in ANYONE'S lifetime.
Rapidly patting his heavily ringed pudgy hands together, the little man waddled over, rubber spiders and plastic skulls swinging from the heavy chrome chains piled around his neck, nearly obscuring his leather bustier. Egon also couldn't help notice that the little man was wearing a kilt, garters, fishnet tights, and stiletto heels - Egon had trapped and cataloged weirder things than this… but not many.
Beating a hasty retreat from the claustrophobic space and its occupant, a painting caught his eye from where it hung on the stripped to the bricks wall among a mass of paintings of weeping vampires in torn lingerie and male dark-winged angels stripped to the waist.
"Ohhhhh yes," the little man trilled, nose ring bobbing up and down. Temporarily distracted, Egon stared, mesmerized by how it kept perfect time with what the wearer said. "I see you are a serious collector - pay no attention to all this drama, it used to be Punk was all the rage, now it's something called Goth," He rolled his heavily mascara-ringed eyes, "Goth uses most of the same aesthetics- I've simply SAVED a fortune on wardrobe – these days, if you want to sell twee disguised as art, you have GOT to keep ahead of the trends… oh how I miss Warhol and his Factory… oooooh! I see you've got an eye on an Erzulie Sappington, the only REAL art in this place – I discovered her sleeping in her car last October –in the back of that eyesore of a BMW she had a STACK, and I do mean a STACK of the most simply MARVELOUS paintings – and nowhere to sell them."
Egon walked past the man, nose ring forgotten.
It was the same painting.
The stream of ghosts over the skyline was there. The ones glaring out from behind the bare trees were dwarfed by the buildings which loomed threateningly over Central park – everything was there.
Including a pool of blood in the foreground.
Egon frowned at the sudden blast of music that sounded like someone was having a double mastectomy without the benefit of anesthesia to the scream of a chainsaw - a long wailing something or other about the sorrows of being a dark angel and the joys drinking Type O. from the original container; Ray Stanz getting his tongue stuck to a frozen doorknob last January had more musicality. Two more customers entered, tall thin creatures of indeterminate gender draped in black, plastic fangs jutting out over their black painted lower lips. Egon took out his PKE meter, gave them a cursory reading, and put it away – human. All but skipping to meet the newcomers, the gallery owner abandoned the sound system.
Ears ringing, Egon moved along the painting hung wall, searching for more Erzulie Simpsons before returning to the first painting, standing about five feet back while polishing his glasses.
"You sir, are a man of taste." the little man cooed, having seen the two out the door empty-handed and turning the sound system down to a background snarl of musical rip sawing, "You sir, are a man of taste, I can tell, I CAN TELL. Those two? Pfui! All tattoos and no dough, but you sir, are DECIDEDLY a man of taste. This, this one is the last – she asked me to hold this one back until this morning - you're the first to see it." The nose ring wobbled up and down, "Too bad I don't know where she is – should you buy this one, the best I assure you, of the entire portfolio AND original. If I ever find her again, she hasn't dropped by for a week, not even to claim her check, you know how artists are… If I ever find her again, I'll commission a series from her based off of just this one alone!"
"How much?" Egon would have preferred the phrenology head.
The man pointed at the tag in the lower left hand of the canvas and coyly named a slightly lower price, "Because I (giggle) like you, I've reduced the price somewhat."
An hour later Egon found himself with a bulky panting balanced across his knees and an invitation to "Come see me, ANY TIME handsome!" from a man wearing women's underwear, tire chains, old Halloween novelties, and a kilt, The phrenology head, now wrapped in old newspapers was clamped between his feet in the garishly lit subway car loaded down with Saturday evening party goers, street punks, and cleaning ladies on their way to and from work.
Snorting the last dregs of cheap incense from his nostrils but not his clothes into a tissue, Egon's head wobbled back and forth in time to the rocking of the car as he fought the urge to doze off, something he'd been doing a lot of lately – yes, influenza was definitely pursuing him... Egon's head fell forward just before his stop, glasses sliding down his nose as the gurgle and roar of water filled his head… the lights of the subway car flickering...
...it was wet and cold - light rippled off of the gray surface high above him. Around him he could feel the slight jostling of logs and trash against his body as the current that both supported and trapped him rushed by smelling of mud and diesel.
A flight of pigeons wheeled overhead as a barge chugged past, jostling the logs and trash and Egon's body so that his hand drifted past his milky eyes, Between the thumb and forefinger of the right hand was a tattooed 8 ball with a crack in it… his jaw dropped open in a silent scream.