Drop City TC Boyle

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.They’d even sing along to Buffalo 25Springfield tunes or Judy Collins or Dylan, if anybody could remem-26ber the words.Just like summer camp.Then they got in their Fords 27and Chevys and VW Bugs and Volvos and went home.28The spades were different.They didn’t so much emerge from the 29car as uncoil from it, all that lubricious menacing supercool spade en-30ergy—and Ronnie wasn’t a racist, not at all, he was just maybe a bit 31more experienced than the rest of his brothers and sisters here at Drop 32City, who, after all, were maybe just a wee bit starry-eyed and lame—33 Shorand they came across the dirt lot in formation, like a football team.34 Regu272ND PASS PAGES14110_01_001-498_r6ek.qxd 11/10/03 8:26 AM Page 281Lester was the name of the one in charge.He was soft-looking, small, 2with a face made out of putty, and he was wearing a red silk scarf and 3high-heeled boots.“Peace, brother,” he said, spreading wide his mid-4dle and index fingers and looking Ronnie in the eye.Ronnie didn’t 5say anything, but Sky Dog and the rest flashed the peace sign and 6made the usual noises of greeting in return.A heartbeat later Lester 7was sitting on the steps of the porch, taking a hit from the pipe that 8was going round, his black bells hiked up to show off red socks and 9the elastic tops of his Beatle boots, while the others milled around in 10the dirt, looking needful.11“So this is the famous Drop City,” Lester said, exhaling.His voice 12was so soft you had to strain to hear it, and that was a kind of trick, 13not so much an affectation as a device to make you pay attention.14Verbie, who never shut up for long, said, “Yes it is.”15“We, uh—me and my amigos here—we heard all sorts of out of 16sight things about this place, like from the Diggers’ soup kitchen?17You know, in the Fillmore?” Lester gave a quick glance around the 18porch, then handed the pipe to one of his amigos, and then it went 19around to all of them and back again up onto the porch, and it was 20exactly like two tribes meeting on the high plains, peace, brother, and 21circulate the pipe.“Is it really as cool as they say it is? Like all broth-22ers are welcome?”23The hippies on the porch fell all over themselves assuring him 24that that was the case, and everybody was thinking Hendrix, Buddy 25Miles, Free Huey, except Lester, because he just stretched out his 26legs and settled in.27Now, though—now Ronnie was crashed by the pool, just taking 28the day off from everything and everybody, never mellower, the 29smallest little hit of mescaline wearing down the sharp edges of 30things.Reba’s kids—Che and Sunshine—were making a racket with 31one of those plastic trikes, humping it up and down the strip of con-32crete on the far side of the pool, and the communal horse—they Short 33called him Charley, Charley Horse, what else?—was stomping and egular 34snorting up a storm because some head from Daly City whose name 282ND PASS PAGES14110_01_001-498_r6ek.qxd 11/10/03 8:26 AM Page 29escaped Ronnie at the moment was trying to get him to jump a 1shrunken sun-blasted strip of oleander at the base of the lawn, but 2that was all right, that was nothing.Ronnie drank it all in, feeling 3magnanimous.He was Pan.He was stoned.The sun was in the sky 4and the earth was a good place, a groovy place, a place designed by 5some higher power— higher power—for the sensory awakening and 6spiritual uplift of every one of his brothers and sisters.7J89Until nightfall, that is.The night came seething and festering up out 10of the shadows that bunched themselves in circus shapes at the feet of 11the trees and in the clotted scrub that chased the hillside round and 12round.He was feeling a little—well, a little jittery.There’d been an 13interlude there where he’d let things slide, a second hit of the mesc, 14a bottle of red wine and a couple of hits of something somebody had 15been smoking after dinner, and he hadn’t even made dinner, had he?16Dinner.Big pots full of mush, women with their tits hanging, health 17and simplicity and the good rural life.The pool glistened like oil, like 18blood, in the fading light.He wasn’t hungry.19He had a sudden urge to see Star, to just sit with her someplace 20quiet and talk about home, the little routines and reminiscences that 21had kept them going all the way across the flat shag of the Midwest 22and into the Rockies and beyond—Mr.Boscovich and tenth grade 23biology and how he would call everything material, as in these cells are 24constructed of cellular material, the way the books in the school library 25smelled of soap and burning leaves, the afternoon Robert Stellner, 26the straightest kid in the school, stuck his head in a bag of model air-27plane glue and carved the mysterious message Yahweh into his chest 28with a penknife while standing in front of the mirror in the boys’ room, 29all of that—but Star was up in the tree with the new guy all the time, 30and that rankled, it did, all the shit about Free Love and the Keristan 31Society notwithstanding.He pushed himself up off the pavement, 32but that was a bit much, so he sat back down again.The pavement 33 Shorwas warm still, and that made him think of the rattlesnake somebody 34 Regu292ND PASS PAGES14110_01_001-498_r6ek.qxd 11/10/03 8:26 AM Page 301had seen out here just two nights ago.“They come for the warmth,”2that’s how Norm had put it, “—and you can deal with that or you 3can kill ’em, skin ’em and eat ’em, but then you’ll have bad snake 4karma your whole life and maybe into the next one, and do you really 5want that?”6From the main house, the sounds of laughter, conversation, mu-7sic, all blended in a murmur that was like some sort of undercurrent, 8as if that was where the real life was, the only life, and this out here, 9this nature and this crepitating dark, was for losers—losers and 10snakes.Lydia was in there, and Merry, Verbie and the rest of them.11Maybe he’d get up and go inside, just for the human warmth and 12companionship, because that’s what Drop City was all about, com-13panionship, a game of cards maybe, or Monopoly—but then the im-14age of Alfredo clawed its way into the forefront of his brain, and he 15thought maybe he wouldn’t.16Alfredo was one of the founding members of the commune, one 17of Norm Sender’s inner circle, one of those sour-faced ascetic types, 18twenty-eight, twenty-nine, Reba’s old man [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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