Cocaine Blues With Nelson Algren’s The Man With The Golden Arm In Mind

From The Pen Of Frank Jackman

The whole set-up reeked of cop, of a cop ambush, just like before, the time several years before when he, Jason Sloan, got caught up in a cop dragnet when they were hassling street people, drug-involved street people, his people, in one of their periodic “make the citizens happy” busts and he had fallen down on a thirty day clinker rap for possession since he had “forgotten” to get rid of a couple of fine ass joints that he was carrying in his shirt pocket in time. Fortunately he had just an hour before handed off a kilo of grass, ganja, herb or whatever you call marijuana in your neighborhood and had parked the dough in a safe place. Yes, it had the look, the same look, the dreaded look of a planned cop ambush although this time Jason had moved “uptown” (as had the drug brotherhood) and he was now dealing “cousin,” cocaine (girl, sister, snow or whatever you call it in your neighborhood), dealing and using, lately more using than dealing, a lot more.

The “meet”had been set-up by Jimmy James, a guy he only slightly knew, knew from the streets around the Common, Boston Common for anyone asking, for this back alley near Beacon Street (nobody wanted to make a meet to far from his or her base, he lived up a few blocks on Joy Street, for a lot of reasons, mainly some form of laziness, some form of turf protection).That part wasn’t so bad. Jason had done more than one dead of night back alley deal but the times were now out of sort for that type arrangement. What was bad, bad medicine, was there were no lights showing from the windows of the apartment that abutted the alley, there were no cars either, and worse, worse on a Saturday night no foot traffic, no bustling to cover the transaction. So, desperate as he was to make this deal, to make this connection, not for the money so much but to get well, to get a little something for his head, he was going to walk away, walk away without a score.

Jason had to laugh to himself as he went walking back onto Beacon Street that there were going to be some angry cops, city, state and feds, the way things had been going on the streets of late in their frenzy for high profile street busts, and that the “snitch” Jimmy James was going to be taking his own sad ass tumble over this one, this busted bust, for whatever deal he had made to get out from under whatever they had on him. Yah, he had to laugh.

That though would be the last laugh Jason had for a while, although he did not know that hard fact, that hard street fact, while he was walking up Beacon Street to Joy and his rooming house, his lonely rooming house room, alone now since Shana had fled the scene a few months back when he had started to dip into the coke for his head more than for selling it. Had left when he had stopped giving her and her baby (not his, but some guy back in stupid unprotected sex high school, Jesus) some money to keep them together. Hell, before she left, he had borrowed dough off of her (or took dough from her pocketbook, just like when he was just a snot-nosed sneaky kid out his own mother’s purse).

Worse he took the dough after Shana had gone out on those mean streets downtown, down in“the zone,” and done a number of quick tricks to bring in some dough for the baby when he was feeling low, he Jason, not the baby. She had soon tired of it, had from what he heard got herself a new walking daddy (a guy from what he had also heard who was the king of the midnight sifters, and so bringing in steady dough, and no hassles). As he made the turn on Joy he knew he was in for a couple of tough days if he could not score before then, and the chances of him scoring now with no dough (he was fronted the dough for that Beacon Street back alley deal and knew, knew for a certainty, that he would be found dead early some morning the next week if he dipped into that stash to get himself well). He would rather face the withdrawal symptoms , tough as they were as he knew from the previous two episodes he had endured than be found face down somewhere, unclaimed and unidentified, although as he walked up Joy he could already feel those first running nose blues flashing through his system.

He stopped for some cigarettes and a quart of cheap jack Southern Comfort (the only liquor he could stomach as a kid, cheap or not, and he had kept up that habit occasionally when some choicer drug was not around) at Joe’s Liquor Store. Fortunately Joe, who had run the place by himself for the past forty years serving winos, yuppies and Mayfair swells alike and knew the lore of the hill like no one else, would let him cuff his purchases since he had put Joe onto a few good drug scores for those self- same swells and yuppies a while back. So package in hand he entered the front door of his rooming house, hell, his flop, just about the last one left on that side of the hill, populated with the dregs of the earth, you know winos, old age guys, a few broken down midnight sifters, a grafter or two, a couple of guys on the lam for this and that, a couple of low-profile whores on the first floor (and not bad, not bad at all, especially the younger one who knew all the tricks and knew how to use them, back before he dug cousin more than sex).He could smell, as always the strong smell of disinfectant, of spilled wine, of misplaced urine, of land’s end, and all who enter here give up hope, as he walked up the stairs to his fly-by-night third floor room.

He was short of breath as he hit his landing and after turning the key to his door he immediately flopped down on the unmade bed, unmake for the past several days as he had been scrambling like crazy to put a score together and had no time for the niceties of good housekeeping. He pulled out a cigarette, a Camel, unfiltered, and lit it up thinking how funny it was that he took up smoking back in the early 1960s just when every doctor in the universe, including the long time lungers among them, was telling every teenager who would listen to stop the damn habit. Even funnier as he coughed the inevitable cough after that first drag was how tobacco addiction was kid’s stuff, kid’s stuff at least to him, when old cousin was calling, screaming really. He took the first of a long line of swigs from the Southern Comfort bottle and felt better for a minute, for about a minute each time.

Maybe he could sleep through it this time as he pushed his pillow, his slip- less pillow, under his head to try to catch a few nods. As he did so he thought about how back in the days, back in those halcyon hippie days about a decade or so back how everybody made big deal about pot, you know marijuana, and how it was worse than tobacco and would get you all addicted. What a joke, what a crying out loud joke, that was. What they, he, didn’t know was how sweet cousin could be and while he had heard that horse, h, or whatever you call heroin in your neighborhood was really bad that coke was just fine, just fine to keep the edge off. To keep your dreams clean.

Just that moment he craved just one little snort, one thin line and so he got up and frantically looked for any residue that might be around. Finding none he took another swig of that rotgut and fell back down on the pillow and tried, tried like seven devil to put some sleep between him and his desire. Yah, the night was starting out rough, rougher than the previous two times. And as he finally nodded off he swore, swore on seven sealed bibles, if they had been around that this time he was done, he was going to sober up.

A few hours later, still dark out as he awoke, he got up to make himself a cup of coffee on his hot plate. And while he was waiting for the coffee to boil he began to think about how the Be-Bop Kid over on Shawmut Avenue would be holding some stuff and that he would use just a few of those fronted dollars to get himself well and then he really would forget this cousin stuff…