The Grass is Always Greener on the Other Side of the Tobin Bridge (part two)
Boston Outsider / Humor
I talked to Paulie for a couple of minutes and returned to my stool. Duke, a WWII veteran, ex-boxer, and former bookmaker, was regaling Buddy with an anecdote.
“My division was sent to the Philippines after the Germans surrendered,” Duke said. “There were nationalist guerillas in the hills, so we got combat pay, but all we ever did was eat bananas and go bowling. One guy I knew made a pet of a monkey, and he cried his eyes out when he couldn’t bring the thing back to the States with him. I heard he ended up marrying a woman who looked like a chimp.”
Buddy squirted some beer out of a nostril as he laughed at this. Duke insisted on giving us one last round on the house, and after drinking it we took our leave. As we were walking back to my apartment, I asked Buddy what he thought of Whitman’s.
“I know the place is kind of a halfway house for unattached male nuts,” Buddy answered. “But it’s a panic!”
The next day, Sunday, at a little after 4:00 p.m., Buddy and I were watching a football game when my doorbell rang. I pushed the intercom button and asked who was at the door.
“Let me in, you philistine,” a familiar voice announced.
“Come on up,” I said, pushing the door release. “It’s my friend Paulie,” I said to Buddy. “He drops in once in a while.”
“That’s cool,” Buddy shrugged.
I met Paulie Gomes at the door of my third floor walk-up. He was accompanied by Sven, a tall man with a shaved head and an ugly scar on his left cheek; Daniel, a middle-aged guy in a rumpled suit; and Doris, a mature woman who dressed in ragged clothing and carried four shopping bags filled with books, papers and other bags. Sven and Daniel were fellow insomniacs I knew from an all-night diner. Doris was a familiar figure who had a regular begging station in front of the local Baskin Robbins.
“I bumped into some friends!” Paulie smiled. He was a tiny fellow, about a hundred and ten pounds soaking wet, and on this occasion he was wearing a butterfly costume, complete with antennae, wings, black tights, and little slippers.
“Is that your Sunday best you’re wearing?” I asked.
“I’m doing a children’s play at a little venue in Inman Square,” Paulie said. “I want to stay in character as long as possible. And since lepidopterans don't carry luggage, I left my street clothes at the theater after today's matinee. I'll pick them up on Tuesday."
“Oh, you’re a character all right,” I replied.
I asked everyone in and introduced them to Buddy, who didn’t seem overly fazed by Paulie’s manner of dress. Paulie and Sven sat on the futon-couch, Daniel and Doris sat on the loveseat facing them, and Buddy and I sat on metal folding chairs on either side of my stereo, along a wall that was perpendicular to the other furniture. Paulie had assembled quite a crew. Sven was a reputed deserter from the French Foreign Legion. Daniel belonged to a quasi-Catholic sect whose members believed that the true pope was a twenty-year-old short order cook who lived with his mother in a dilapidated house near the Forest Hills MBTA station. Doris the bag lady was actually quite well off, but sometimes I gave her a buck in the hopes that she’d leave me something in her will.
We talked about various subjects for an hour or so, over beer and wine. When the conversation got around to religion, Buddy informed our guests that he had been married in a Zaglavakian Orthodox ceremony.
“Zaglavakian Orthodox?” Daniel asked, looking surprised. “But they’re schismatic!”
“Who are you calling, ‘schismatic?’” Paulie interrupted. “You’re the one who thinks the pope is a kid in Jamaica Plain.”
“His Holiness Raoul the First lives in Roslindale!” Daniel shot back.
“Hey, don’t make fun of the man’s religion,” Sven said, turning to Paulie.
“I’ll make fun of anyone or anything I want,” Paulie sniffed. “I’m an artist, Scarface.”
“I got this scar in affair of honor, in a duel, you silly little insect!” Sven roared, bringing his face closer to Paulie. “If you weren’t so small I’d challenge you to fight with cutlasses on Cambridge Common.”
“And if you weren’t so much fun to ridicule, I’d call the French consulate to see if I could get a reward and have you sent back to Timbuktu or wherever you ran away from, you big, bald prick!” Paulie screeched.
“Oh, that language, Paulie,” Doris said.
“Yes, and on a Sunday,” Daniel interjected.
Someone banged on the other side of the wall where Buddy and I were sitting and asked us to quiet down. The room was silent for a minute, and Paulie was the first to speak, asking Buddy if he was interested in playing Evil Eye Fleagle in an avant-garde production of “Li'l Abner.”
“Er, I work nights,” Buddy stammered.
Things petered out over the next half hour. Daniel was late for an audience at Raoul’s “palace,” and Sven had to get to the club where he worked as a bouncer. Doris said that she had an appointment to meet her investment adviser at her house in Arlington, and Daniel chided her for conducting business on the sabbath.
“Paulie,” I said, as the other three got up to leave. “I don’t think you should be riding the T dressed like that. And I know you probably have less than a dollar in your pocket, if butterflies have pockets. How about if I pay for a cab?”
“Oh, that would cost a fortune, Jimmy,” Paulie said. “Does your friend Evil Eye have a car?”
“Ah, sure, I’ll give you a ride,” Buddy said. “Brookline isn’t too far.”
“I’ll stay here and clean up,” I said to Buddy. “After you get back we’ll talk about, you know,
your situation.”
(to be continued)
