The Bitter Angels

By John Paul Halicki

Meet Stanley Kosinski, a struggling Los Angeles musician
preparing to visit his Dionysian friend, Alex, who is now
ensconced as the manager of a residential hotel in San
Francisco. Comedy and brittle social cynicism are
combined into one, as the tenants who live in
the X Hotel insinuate their broken lives into
the protagonists psyches. A wild ride
brimming with potential ecstasies
and bitter disappointment
are the catalysts, delivering
up the stor y of
the most disastrous
v a c a t i o n i n
literary history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 8, 2010
• ISBN: 9781462824762

John Paul Halicki

In the opening pages of The Bitter Angels, the first person narrator, Stanley Kosinski, reminisces of his friend Alex; “We had the heebie-jeebie cold frost humor that resembles a New York grin. I watched him and I’m telling you, we laughed at one another and I believe the laughter saved me.” We presently find Alex working as manager of a San Francisco weekly rate hotel. Stanley, after “yet another failed music project” has reunited with Alex to “air out.” These opening chapters hypnotize the unprepared reader for the wretched events to come. Any joy or optimism is shattered in Part 2, when Stan’s second visit reveals that Alex’s personality has completely mutated into madness, due to the presence of copious amounts of crack cocaine and his vile amorally endowed girlfriend, Sena, who manipulates the dynamic of the X Hotel like a dominatrix with a whip. Underpinning this is the love that exists between Stan and Alex, albeit great forces at work to tear them asunder, thus creating the bitterest of all angels and the story of the most disastrous vacation in literary history.

Book preview

The

Bitter

Angels

John Paul Halicki

Copyright © 2009 by John Paul Halicki.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This novel’s story and characters are generally fictitious. Some established institutions and public offices are mentioned; but the characters involved in them are wholly imaginary. Any resemblance to actual events and the names of living persons is regrettable and should be expected.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

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57405

Contents

Part I

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

VII

Part II

VIII

IX

X

XI

XII

XIII

XIV

Afterword

For Andrea Lynn  . . .

PART I

I

San Francisco wind whipped through the room with such fury it woke me. I was about to close the thing when my eye became caught on the shadowy street five stories down. Two men were chasing each other over dimly lit sidewalks and around illegally parked cars. They were both shirtless and one could hear the sound of their intoxicated laughter drifting up as they reveled in their dance. The wind whistled, it couldn’t have been more than fifty degrees. I stood transfixed, watching from my secret perch; and after the duo sauntered up the street past the blinking red traffic light, I crawled back into bed without closing the window. Their playful display down there had brought me to my senses. On vacation and staying in a rent-free room, due to the fact that my old friend and occasional partner in crime, Alexi, had somehow become manager and Iron-Fisted Tyrant of a weekly rate hotel. I didn’t close the window because something inside of me told me not to cheat myself out of such a simple pleasure as retreating under warm sheets while the wind howled. I could smell life in that crazy air and I was drawn to it. Nine-to-five drudgery and yet another failed music project had brought me here from Los Angeles to do just this. Air out! Forget. Relax.

As I lay there, now very awake, I began to wonder about what had gone on in this frozen cell since it was built in the late twenties. Whose misfortune and hard luck, decadence and grace were its structure? This room, this hotel, this place. It made me feel small somehow. I was accustomed to large cities, however, on this street at this time, in this frame of mind, Frisco suddenly had the effect of nine cups of coffee. I don’t know why. Anyway, I was very awake. What time is it? More wind. Furious. Too early for food or to buy booze. Alex sleeps until seven.

Pulling on a sweatshirt and sweatpants, I positioned myself at the window. The gusts were blowing paper bags, aluminum cans, discarded lottery tickets and small coins in dirty swirling cyclones of trash along the street like forced, helpless ghosts. The blinds, half-drawn, were bouncing around so much I pulled them all the way up so they wouldn’t be dashed to pieces. Incredible bursts, thirty-five or forty miles an hour. Sitting, daydreaming, musing about strange things, I heard a very loud noise like the slam of an angry door; sounds like it came from the main corridor. Perhaps the wind had caught someone’s door as they were coming or going. Some of the doors had a hydraulic lever which enabled them to close in a measured way although mine did not and a few times it slammed so hard from the wind catching it that it resembled a small-caliber gunshot. My room was located down a smaller hallway and all of the sounds were strange and unfamiliar. Now there were shouts and angry, muffled voices.

Suddenly the undeniable boom of Alexi’s voice was heard as he yelled orders and direction. Although possessed by the impulse to rush out, in case he needed help, I instead sat there, listening, straining to hear. Then there was a deliberate and belligerent shout, I’m gonna come back here ‘n’ kill you! Before I knew it I was putting on my shoes—couldn’t sit still any longer.

Opening the door while arming myself with my paltry pocketknife, I heard the garbled gibberish of a police radio cutting through the commotion. Well, that’s good enough. The cops are with Alex, so I know he’s not in trouble and alone. Backing up through the threshold and into the room I closed the door, tumblers and lock smooth and noiseless.

Safe and secure despite the disturbance.

After fifteen minutes it dawned on me that Alex was without a doubt awake for the day due to the brouhaha. So I finished my toilet and proceeded to his apartment downstairs by the lobby.

Now only here two days, I was still finding the easiest way around. The elevator was a 1940s model where if you opened the gate between floors the elevator would stop dead, leaving one to stare at the dirty brick elevator shaft. An empty canyon wall. This kind of lift is an article of bygone days when consumer protection meant you shouldn’t get your fingers chopped off while you use the damned thing.

Almost took the stairs, and then wished I had. After getting in and closing the gate, making my selection and beginning the descent, I noticed some beastly, soiled sheets from someone’s bedding thrown in the corner of the ugly interior of this cable relic. They were drenched with piss and stained with greasy, ominous streaks. After exiting I was too aware of my hands after grabbing the handle one must use to pull the gate open. AIDS, germs, and pestilence—evil by-products of man’s endless lust.

Alex had almost fallen back to sleep by the time I knocked on his door. This after having his life threatened! He answered the door in a nonchalant manner as if I was one more distraction to deal with. I washed my hands, took his beer and left. He said everything was okay and that he was feeling very tranquil—one of his favorite words. Details later. Fine.

I avoided using the elevator thereafter and took to washing my hands with the almost-boiling water that spewed into the pipes from the huge water tank on the roof. Somehow, they never did feel clean enough.

I drank the morning refreshment and went back down, past the now-deserted front desk and out into the street, confirming first that I could feel the lobby door key in my pocket. You either had to have that key or get buzzed in from the desk.

The wind had died down and the workaday folk were beginning to catch the BART. Kids hurried to school listlessly clinging to their inaccurate history books and bottles of soda. Bums shuffled, looking at the sidewalk for any small fortune that would change their morning. The sky was as clear and blue as cellophane wrap covering a fresh can of paint turned upside down. Some queers strolled casually by. No hurry there.

I walked for a time getting my bearings since there’d been no time to do it since I arrived. The first night we went out, I was so tired I almost fell asleep at the table, plunging into my Kung Pao chicken. The entire second day was spent with book in bed, window open and the omnipresent tempest bursting through. Right now, this could have been day two or three. I didn’t know or care. Screw time—I was on vacation. On and on I walked—a voyeur, an invisible spy. Kentucky Chicken. Al’s Liquor. Atherton Hotel. Coffee. Swan Fish Depot. Julia Child and Chiang Kai-shek spewing balderdash on chiffon sheets soaked with the sweat of the long, lustful Amerikan debauch. Gargoyles everywhere, menacing, cold, forlorn and pretending to sleep.

Hunger set in. This, the city of perpetual restaurants, bistros, and markets, stuffed to the brink with every food imaginable—ouch, but almost nothing open. I reluctantly slinked into the sleazy café next to the X Hotel, ordered two breakfasts to go and in the interim, popped over to Alexi’s to make sure he was finally awake. He was and in fine spirits to talk. Alex loves to eat and after I told him of the impending breakfast he was delighted at the prospect of not cooking his own. This in turn made him eager and energetic to relate the previous hour’s events.

As soon as the meal was in front of him, he began his haranguing.

See, Kosinski, I spoke to that guy, Kyle or no… it’s a nickname; but whatever his name is, he kept calling me at the front desk to ask me to forward the bail information to Kim. Right? He’s been in jail three months and they reduce the bail. And five, six times, he calls; so I tell Kim, and she laughs a little and says, ‘Oh, he can wait a while longer.’ And I know Kosinski she had a different guy up there the last ten days. He feeds her drugs and she’ll do anything, right? Nasty little whore of unstable brain chemicals, see? A bit of toast flew from his mouth when he said chemicals.

"So Coil—ya, that’s his name, I remember now. He gets bail without her help and comes home. But she already decided to throw him out and he shows up and she puts his clothes in the hallway in a paper bag—right? And the sugar daddy, he already split or else what, Kosinski? Most likely a murder—eh? Now Coil, he freaked out, very upset of course, and smashes his head against the door while they argue—to attract her attention. How do you like that, Kosinski? Against the door! Ok? Lucky for dat other guy, he had the urge to leave, Kosinski. And then she wouldn’t let Coil in as the sweat dripped from her thighs and scalp, and then—fuck, Kosinski—he kicked in the door!" I believe this is when I heard the loud noise, which was Coil kicking the door in. Alex reclined and sighed. Although a slow and deliberate eater he had managed to devour half of his meal while delivering this tattooed screed.

Cops arrived immediately afterward and threatened to arrest both of them if either intended to press charges. This prevented a complicated escalation for everyone involved and Coil slumped out, beat. Alex shared some jokes with the cops as they left. The door cost her eighty-five bucks which Alex made payable before installation.

The threat of murder I heard was Coil yelling at Kimi girl, not at him. For the remainder of my time there, I expected Coil to reappear and finish her off but he never did.

That afternoon at lunchtime we went out to gorge on Indonesian food. On that beautiful crisp day the clarity was incredible, perhaps a thirty-mile visibility from Coit Tower, crystalline perfection. The air and breeze soared into our conversation, which is always a constant with Alex. Perhaps the depth of his experiences has, in effect, filled his head to such a degree that it needs to be kinetically purged so his mind doesn’t explode, spreading words, letters, stories and theories everywhere, hanging from an unbelieving listener like an accident at the Alphabet Soup Factory. Special Intelligence. Able to kill with his hands in an instant. Short, barrel-chested, and generous of belly, yet quick on his feet when he’s up to snuff.

And of course, the loud baritone voice, which when properly fueled is sometimes impossible to understand. Four or five languages and again three accents while ten simultaneous theories race around inside that crazy noodle of his, competing for attention before they can escape from his mouth at a rapid pace, sometimes bordering on hysteria due to that drop of Russian blood in him. Each paragraph and sentence ends with Eh? or Right? or Do you see what I mean, Kosinski? It’s com-plet-ely impossible! or I don’t know, everything is fucked!

This constant dialogue propels him along as he walks, like an invisible outboard motor. He walks with the deliberate stride of a military man but constantly stops on the sidewalk or in the middle of the crosswalk as cars honk and people curse while he makes a point or makes sure the point at hand sinks in. He won’t be ignored or suffer any inattentiveness. This goes on and on and all the while, he’s stopping to speak to women with dogs or to dogs with women in the hope that it will lead to conversation with the lovely lady. The dogs are always bright and happy to see him and their instinct tells them that Alex loves them, although they are unaware that he would like to have sexual intercourse with Mommy. Or are they?

Ya, Kosinski, I always had bloodhounds and I loved them so much because we are so alike! Ha? You see? When they see or smell something new and interesting, they forget what they are doing and chase down the new scent.

He says this in his faux, not-so-faux European intellectual voice and is accompanied by his impersonation of getting off track, which is accurate enough.

Afhh. Afhh ral ruf.

He makes a funny face and follows his nose along, just as the above-mentioned canine might do when interested in something else. He’s insatiable. If your mind happens to drift it’s possible to realize that Alex is ten yards behind you, affectionately patting the head of a well-groomed owner’s dog. You have to go back and retrieve him. The conversation may be interesting or the lady most exciting and of course, the conversation must end in a polite manner with salutations issued before moving on. The pace becomes very sporadic, very social and soon he begins to recognize people from his neighborhood and sputtering to and fro, says hello and inquires about their health, mutual acquaintances, and business prospects.

Alex has no car now since he abandoned his old BMW to practicality and the simple fact that if he’s on a sidewalk, in a bus or on the train, he can always find someone to talk to about something. He is never alone but then again, there is always himself to talk to in the event another warm body can’t be found. Besides, there are so many markets, restaurants and shops within walking distance, that a car would be a nuisance, if anything.

He and I met years ago while I was working in one of those awful jobs that have pockmarked my life like unexplained tropical diseases. Such a strange circumstance and place to meet a man such as Alex as I’ll soon explain. As far as I’m concerned, 99 percent of the people I’ve worked with are dreadful, boorish dolts, without a clue regarding the things I’m interested in and have studied. Doesn’t everyone feel that way though?

The thing that sticks in my mind was the funny way he introduced himself the first time. Because I was so dissatisfied with my dreary life, I tended to be very aloof in those days, especially at work where the personalities around me tended to depress me further. My coworkers were people I had nothing in common with and, as I’ve said, would normally have nothing to do with; so it was to my advantage that I worked all night and was, in effect, alone anyway. One predictably boring and inane night, a strange older guy with a big belly and tremendous voice came barreling up the hall toward me just as I was punching in.

You must be Stanley Kosinski! I have heard about you. I am happy to meet you. I understand you are about to start your shift, so I will take my leave. Good-by.

All of this was said in a big throaty voice with gusto and energy, accompanied by a strange accent from some place I was sure I’d never been. Of course the little speech busted my gut. Is this guy for real? And the fact that he made such a to-do about his introduction and first impression… what did it mean? The crazies are always attracted to me! I would in future years become a sort of translator for this man who had introduced himself as Alexis Zosimov, because for some reason I was the only person who could understand the flurry of contradictory pronunciations, jumbled semantics and mingled origins of accents he had acquired while living all over the world. This was combined with the blinding speed in which he sometimes talked while mixing so many experiences, locations, multiple periods of collegiate education and varying degrees of bullshit into incredible, breathless diatribes. Hell! Someone had to translate.

His short stature seemed to amplify his energy, which at times percolated up from strange volcanoes of vigor and adrenaline. He could talk a mile a minute while simultaneously making a meal, filling out paperwork or running to fetch books to show a point, all in that crazy way he had in those days. We could talk for hours and wonder where the time went…

It was apparent that he had heard of me through the few people who had trained me on day shift and had become dubious friends, attending a few shows I had played while in various bands in the Los Angeles area. All a failure of course but still small notches in my belt that might bear fruit later on in my struggling musical existence. So through them, he knew of me, thinking perhaps I was a person involved in some type of art working at this place and he therefore pursued me to see if I was the real article. There were artistic endeavors in his background and it was rare for him to find a like-minded person to discuss the various remnants of his education and experiences.

You see, he had worked here several years ago before he was to make, then lose a small fortune. So he limps back to this tiny piece of the mundane world after seeing things and experiencing libations and having adventures that most people will never fathom in their head; and discovers those guys I mentioned before still working here, living out their incredibly predictable lives but telling him of a strange new guy who works nights and plays guitar in a band that gigs around LA.

I see now how this made him curious to meet me and to investigate the possibility of finding someone in this place that could talk his strange language.

He found me and I found him. In our coffee reveries we explored the ends of this sad world and all of the fantastic possibilities between. This was, again, no small ice he cracked with me. I mention coffee because it all started with coffee. Alex had an insatiable taste for the black water and I was fond of it too. After he had succeeded in dissolving my desire to be alone he started in with the mud. He brought a French press to work that looked like some sort of vacuum device from Dr. Frankenstein’s laboratory to me, with its long stout glass tube capped with brass fittings and a plunger-fixture inside that gave the whole contraption a clinical, efficient, medicinal appearance. Alex produced gallons of the black stuff and after he taught me how, I was even worse. He was scheduled to be off by midnight but often stayed until six. It was an unstoppable orgy of verbiage and head butting, long sessions into the night when the hand of fate gripped us ever closer together through our constant rapport, two souls wandering in the dark and rank Los Angeles night without flashlights.

So, Kosinski, how are you, eh? You look tired but don’t worry because I have brought you a present. Look! This is a Brazilian Highlands coffee. Smell it! Ya, ya… You can smell the rich soil in the coffee. Look, I will take this and process it, then I’ll show you.

Want me to do it?

No, Kosinski, you must work and answer the phone. I have no work and no phone to answer. I be right back.

He hurries out, and I don’t know anything until he returns with a big smile and the steaming cups.

Tonight, Kosinski, we drink coffee like conquistadors. Tonight, ya ya! He’d perform a little dance to show me his enthusiasm. You see, Kosinski, the Spanish was so proud of his stimulants and the Aztecs the coca, almost like a sacred and wonderful sacrament to them, ya; and so you see, the quality from which this bean comes, the—what you say—ahhh, theeeee… heritage! Ya ya! With this explanation, he’d take a deep draw from the cup.

So, Alexi, how can we get out of this shit hole?

I was prone to such flippant and unanswerable questions. I could see no way out so I asked my friend. He would look at me through his titanium-framed glasses, or when making a point, he would look over them, his eyebrows flashing. He was so proud of those frames, always taking them off and twisting them in his hands like a dishrag to show me the tensile strength; then he’d respond to my question with a great flourish.

Kosinski, don’t be so serious. Man, you have all of life ahead and the time to be so deep in thought is not now! Ya ya… Think of it, Kosinski, the possibilities and the lust, the lust for life you must acknowledge. The future is endless! and so forth.

I never could turn him off. Once he got started, the potency lurking in his summations and ruminations was downright infectious. I got the bug from him, the oversized desire to live, all else be damned. It’s not that I didn’t value life; but rather it was becoming so predictable and boring to me, a slave to the job, a slave in order to maintain an existence. And this was only the start of our friendship and our troubles. On the weekends the fun would really start. After confirming our plans at work on our last night together the meeting would take place later that day. Oh the weird voices we would hear; silly propositions that were put forth; the plans for procuring drugs, meeting girls, hanging out, or going to concerts. The energy and desire for life. Alexi Zosimov cracked open the reinforced concrete beer can of my soul, the bitter liquid spit out, brown and flat, ready to blind gawking children. There was a dangling energy that hung from our hapless endeavors, ready to drop the tears out of our