The City Still Breathing by Matthew Heiti Page B

d’you work?’
    She points to Nibblers down the street, orange sign all lit up in bulbs. ‘Come by for a coffee sometime. I owe you one.’
    â€˜Sure. Maybe later. I’ve been stuck here all day with this crap.’
    â€˜All right then, officer.’
    â€˜My name’s Wally – Walter.’
    â€˜Walter?’ She hears her own laugh sneak out on her. ‘Then you owe me.’
    She pushes away but then his hand is on her arm, warm but shivering with something. ‘What was he like?’ And he’s looking at her, right at her, for the first time. Like what she says could really matter.
    â€˜He said nice things.’ And she leaves him with that.
    At the corner, she looks back. He’s still there by the van, all that snow coming down on him, salt-and-pepper hair going white and turning him old.
    Maybe she’ll stop by Black Cat to pick up another pack. Maybe she won’t. She’s quitting, tomorrow or one of these days soon. And she’ll call someone about that door because look at this snow. She doesn’t even bother trying to cover her hair.

8
    Normando goes behind the bar at the Sampo, rolling up sleeves to show the blue smear of some tattoo on his forearm. Two lifers are playing a hand of pinochle on a cracked formica tabletop, the leg propped with coasters. Gladys slides into a stool at the bar, accordion oozing across her lap, and Normando places a glass of sherry down which she sips through dentures. The whisk whisk of cards, one of the lifers farts and then the hall is dead again under the hum of the beer fridge.
    He gets the radio on to drown out all that damned quiet. Some broadcaster coming on about that body everyone’d been gabbing about. A man don’t need to be gossiped about when he can’t speak up for himself. No respect for the dead. He shuts the damned thing off.
    The sound of a door upstairs and Ernie comes clomping down, all bony joints and rumpled clothing. He mumbles something to the card players, who mumble back, and brings his big white beard up to the bar.
    â€˜Here early, Norm?’
    Normando shrugs and slides a bottle of Northern across. Gladys picks up her drink, moves off to the stage, starts plunking down music stands. Ernie peels pieces off his beer label, tears these into even smaller pieces.
    â€˜You heard? Union’s talking about another strike. Could be a long one.’ He looks up at Normando with quick eyes. ‘Gonna be tight times.’ Looking away.
    â€˜Tight fer who, Ernie?’
    â€˜Everyone.’
    The doors to the Sampo bang open – figures shuffling in, squinting in the dim light. They come in black vests, scuffed shoes, carrying violins and flutes. Some wave or nod at Normando as they keep shuffling off to the stage.
    â€˜Listen, Norm, Sampo’s been sold – the Ukrainians.’
    Normando looks down at his hands, spread on the stained surface of the bar – thumb missing a tip, couple of fingers bent, calluses slowly peeling away to something pink. Wedding band on one hand, twenty-five-year ring on the other – company logo etched and fading. He picks up a cloth and starts wiping, just to have something to do.
    â€˜Gonna take the bar out, turn this place into some kinda daycare or something. Maybe I can get you some work as caretaker – cleaning up – you want.’
    The unhappy sound of instruments tuning, some kind of march or dirge, as the folk ensemble warms up.
    â€˜Well, anyway, you got the popcorn cart, right? Not like you need two jobs, right?’
    So what if he’s only been working a coupla evenings a week. They know him here. It’s his place. It’s not about the damned job. But he doesn’t say it.
    Ernie drags a crumb out of his beard. ‘You hear about Ristimaki? He’s got it in the other lung now too.’
    Normando keeps on wiping the same spot, a stain that’ll never come out. Ristimaki, the poor damned sap.

9
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