Light Man

By Larry Strauss

New York City, 1973 and the city is falling apart under the weight of crime and degradation. Al loves Trudy but doesn't understand her or how to be a man in this world. He hopes that angry Mike, a courageous and selfless father to a mentally crippled son, can enlighten and inspire him.

But Mike, who spends his nights manning a spotlight outside Broadway theaters, has a dark side. He can keep those beams licking the dark heavens and he can fix any broken appliance you hand him, but he can't fix his broken son and it is killing him.

The two men forge a friendship and try to work out their frustrations, paranoia, and rage as they grope for some standing in a city buried in uncollected garbage and uncontrolled vermin. Meanwhile, Mike's wife, Arlene, a classically trained actress, becomes a New York City folk hero portraying a distraught housewife in a television commercial trying to battle an onslaught of cockroaches.

With passion, authenticity, and insight," along with wild humor and relentless humanity, Light Man digs into the psyche of a city on the edge and two men whose lopsided versions of heroism take them to the brink of catastrophe and their own contorted versions of redemption.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9780983818045

Book preview

A Guy and His Kids

It’s the hottest damn day of the year and midtown is the worst. All that asphalt, all that brick, and all those people, and nobody’s really interested in half-off developing or thirty percent off on prints so I dump my coupons on one of the punks I’m supposed to supervise with the handing out. For all I know he’ll dump them all in the sewer and go to the arcade, but by now, I don’t give a fat one.

I ride the 104 uptown and walk into Riverside Park. All the benches are taken, so I go inside the basketball court and lean on the chain-link that faces the West Side Highway and the river, and I catch enough breeze to make the trip worth it. I normally don’t pay much mind to the kids playing ball or the kiddie playground, but this time, something catches my attention. It starts with the sound of the ice cream cart playing one of those ice cream songs. I know those are real songs with words, but to me, they just mean an ice cream sandwich or a sidewalk sundae. I’ve got a little change in my pocket and figure on a Big Dipper. What the hell. Just to cool off.

My ears must be playing tricks on me because for a second, I can’t see where that ice cream song is coming from. I think the wind and all the yakking from the basketball games is throwing me off. I keep looking all over the place. I can still hear the tune. I think the words to that one, if somebody was to sing it, have something to do with baby chickens.

Then I notice all the kids right at the edge of the playground. It’s a small ice cream cart, and you can hardly see it with all the kids in front. The guy selling the ice cream, I’m guessing he’s Puerto Rican. I don’t think you’re supposed to call them that, but I don’t know what else to call him. I get on the line and wait. I mostly look at the picture on the side of the cart to see if he’s got the Big Dipper in his small cart, but once I notice the two boys in front of me I can’t stop looking at them.

The bigger one of the two boys, something doesn’t look right about him. It’s the way he turns his body and moves his head from side to side like he’s trying to dance, and the way he keeps looking at his hands like he just figured out he’s got hands and looks up at the sky like he forgot he’s on the Earth. I’m not the only one who notices. The whole line of children is just staring at him. Some of the kids are pointing at him. One kid behind me asks someone, Why does such a big kid wear a diaper?

It’s true. He’s got this white cloth coming up out of his shorts and a safety-pin holding it together. The other boy, who’s smaller and looks at least a couple years younger, is acting like he’s the older brother. He keeps asking the bigger boy what he wants from the ice cream cart even though the bigger boy never says anything. Then the bigger boy just runs off and the smaller boy goes after him.

I watch them a while, thinking I’ll hold their spot till it’s my turn. The smaller boy keeps following the bigger one around, first to the sprinkler for a look-see. Other kids run through the water, but this kid—the big one, the slow one—he just looks at it. He keeps opening his mouth and trying to drink, but he won’t go close enough. The smaller boy pulls on him and says something, then pulls him to the sandbox and tries to get him to dig in the sand. The little guy’s got a shovel from somewhere and digs for a sec and then hands the shovel to the bigger boy, but the bigger boy just keeps smiling at the sky and rocking in the sand. Then, out of nowhere, just like that, the bigger one starts pulling his own hair and biting his wrists and screaming like he’s on fire.

It’s a full-blown conniption, and right away his brother is trying to calm him down, but it’s not working. Everyone else just watches. I mean no one steps in to help—myself included. I just keep thinking how I am glad it’s not any son of mine. I’ll bet that’s what most of the other people are thinking. Along with thinking where the hell is the mother or father? That’s when I see a guy running over there. He’s a guy with a beard all over his face and funny-looking hair that flops around on his head while he runs. He’s over there with those two boys in a few seconds, kneeling next to them and talking to the older boy and putting his own fingers in the boy’s mouth and pushing away the boy’s arm so he won’t bite himself. This guy would rather let the boy bite his fingers instead. The smaller boy is getting in on it too. He’s saying things to the bigger boy and helping the father get something out of a paper bag.

It’s my turn for ice cream, but I can’t take my eyes off the man and the two boys. Neither can the rest of the crowd. We’re all standing around taking it in. I think because seeing someone worse off or who you think is worse off, it helps you get to the end of the day, it’s something to sleep on. Especially in heat like this. Nobody steps over and says what can I do or anything. But what could any of us really do for a kid having a conniption? Nothing I know of. I used to have conniptions. I’d get so mad sometimes, I couldn’t see right in front of me and just wanted to kill everyone. All anyone ever did was beat the hell out of me to try to make me stop. And that doesn’t really work. Except one time, it worked when my brother Rusty knocked me the hell out with a leg from a broken chair. But this is different. The man’s got something in the bag.

What he’s got is a baseball cap with a red B for Boston Red Sox on the front. That cap is all rigged with colored plastic, like stained glass hanging down from the bill and mirrors stuck together with paper clips or something. I don’t know how in the hell all that stuff stays together, but it does, even when the smaller boy drops it on the ground while he’s handing it to the father. The bigger boy keeps thrashing around while they try to get the thing on his head, and he’s screaming so loud I swear they can hear it in Jersey. But then they get the thing on his head. This weird hat. It looks like something a crazy man would wear on the subway. In the small pieces of mirror, you can see colored light, little rainbows like the colors of a dream you never had but wish you could. I’ve seen it like that one time when I looked inside a gimmick they sell at Lamston’s, what they call a kaleidoscope.

It works. You can’t see the boy’s face, but his body, you can see it relax. At this point, just about everyone in the park is watching. Even the ice cream man is watching. Like maybe we just saw the secret to how the human race could calm hate and stop murders, end the war in Vietnam and every other stupid war, and get people to stop bashing each other over the head and cutting each other and everything else. The way that kid gets suddenly calm makes it seem like anything could be possible.

I turn away, though. I don’t want to see anymore. I’ve seen it, and now I just want my ice cream and the breeze on my face and forget what I’ve seen and forget my whole stupid life. It’s a lot to ask from an ice cream cone with nuts and chocolate. I pay my two bits and unwrap the cone, and I don’t look back at the man or his two sons, but I don’t know how to forget them. I don’t know how to stop wanting to meet the guy and talk to him about that hat and how he thought it up and how he made it.

When I Can’t Sleep

When I get home Trudy’s working in the bed. She keeps the books for Fun City Camera & Audio, which is who I work for, and she also keeps the books for a newsstand down the street and a guy who cleans carpet. She’s sitting against the headboard with a ledger book on one knee. Her other knee is flat, and the dog’s got his chin on it. She used to work at the table next to the stove, but it kind of wobbles now, and anyway, Trudy’s got a bad back lately and says it’s more comfortable in the bed.

She doesn’t look up when I come in, but she nods so I know she knows I’m there. It’s a small apartment. One room and a bathroom and a kitchen area, so mostly we’re in the same room. I empty the change out of my pockets and put it on the table next to my side of the bed, then I set my keys down in the same pile. I go into the bathroom and splash water on my face, then wash my hands. The soap is so small I keep rubbing till it disappears and then rinse the suds down into the drain. We always keep the stopper on the drain ever since a couple roaches crawled up out of it one night while Trudy was brushing her teeth. She was pretty shook up about it. Now we just let the water stand until we’re finished and then drain it quick and cover it again.

When I can’t sleep I think about those roaches. The ones that scared Trudy and the millions and billions behind them. I start thinking they are going to figure out how to put their tiny legs together and get enough momentum to pop off that drain stopper and charge into the apartment and try to eat us alive. They’d do it if they could, I know they would.

Trudy’s really concentrating on those numbers in the boxes. She puts the pencil in her mouth, then writes more numbers in more boxes. She’s really good at concentrating. I guess you have to be for that stuff. She’s tried to explain it to me a few times, and I kind of understand. It’s what you’ve got and what it cost you. It’s what’s in your pocket and what you owe. Add it up and subtract. I never really like to figure things out like that but I guess for a business, it has to be done.

I seen something pretty interesting just now, I say. In Riverside Park.

She tilts her eyes above the tops of her glasses. Her eyes are a color you can’t really ever see. If you think they’re blue then you realize they’re green but if you think they’re green they start to look blue. When the light changes she looks like a whole different person, more beautiful than you thought. It’ll get you. Right out of nowhere, she looks so damn pretty that it hurts. You was in Riverside Park? she says.

There was this boy, I say. Two boys. Brothers, I think. And their father. One of the boys had something wrong with him. I don’t know what you call it. Retarded or mental in some way. He was really having a time out there trying to be a kid on the playground, but he had his brother looking after him and the father, like I said, he was nearby, too, and so when he gets a conniption fit, they’re on it like it’s the usual.

All the time I’m telling Trudy, I’m watching her to see what she thinks, but I can tell I’m just not doing a good job of telling her. I guess maybe you had to be there to appreciate, but the father, he’s got this hat. A special hat. Not for him. It’s for the boy having a conniption. It’s got all these tiny pieces of glass hanging off the sides, so when the boy looks at it, he sees little pieces of sunlight and sky and I don’t know what, but all I know is when the father put it on that kid’s head, the kid calms down. Not right away but soon enough, and the father and the other boy just kept saying things to make him calm till it all kicked in. I mean, the crazy thing about it was we was all—I mean everyone else in the park—at first we was all just staring at this, thinkin’ where’s the lousy father of this kid? But by the end of it, we’re all of us watching something really beautiful. You don’t just see love like that every day. Not in Riverside Park or anywhere else in this damn city. A lot of guys out there thinkin’ if that was me, could I do what that guy was doing? People all over this city have conniptions all the time, and nobody ever gives a shit. And all of those people having conniptions got mothers and fathers somewhere. But this guy—this guy, now he was doing it like you’re supposed to do it.

Trudy’s nodding now like maybe she gets it, and I’m nodding with her like I get it even more now because she gets it. I mean it was really beautiful, I say, how the father took care of things and had the little brother helping too.

It must have been really something, she says, but I can’t tell if I’m really getting through to her about this.

Every father oughta be like that with his kids, I say, and she reaches over with her hand and pulls me onto the bed and kisses me, and now I know I’m not getting through. Not saying I don’t appreciate the kiss. She can kiss me any time any place. But this isn’t about me and my pop. Then she gets sad, and I realize she could also think I’m talking about her and her pop. I can’t believe I did that and just ruined everything, but that’s how it is for me. I don’t know what I’m saying. I think I know what I’m saying and then come to find out, I have no idea. That’s the kind of father I want to be, I say, still trying to make her understand I wasn’t trying to make her sad, but I think what I just said makes her even sadder.

She nods. That’s nice, she says.

What? I say. Did I say something wrong?

No, she says and takes a deep breath and pets the dog.

I’m thinking what it would be like if we had a kid. I know it’s stupid to think that. What do I know about being a father? And Trudy, I don’t think she’s thinking about being a mother. We never talk about stuff like that. Mostly, we just try to get through each day to the next. But I don’t know. Maybe having a kid is something she thinks about too. Maybe she even thinks about us having a kid. The thing is I’m still not used to having someone care about me. A woman especially. I’m what you call funny looking. My eyes are too close together, and sometimes if I’m looking in the wrong direction, it’s like I have no chin. I’m short too. I know Trudy wouldn’t be with me if it wasn’t for how we met and how I helped her. I don’t mean to say she’s not a good person. I don’t mean she only cares about the looks of a person. I don’t mean that at all. But still, I just know it. Not her fault. She can’t help it I’m ugly.

That mutt’s looking up at me like he knows I’m ugly as hell, too, and like I must be the biggest idiot in the world for getting her sad, which he can tell she is. I can tell it too. I think talking about fathers makes her sad. Me too, come to think of it. The dog is half growling at me. And shaking. He gets the shakes, and sometimes he seems to be growling at ghosts in his head, but I think he might be faking it. He’s getting old, which could explain some of it but I think he’s faking it too. I’ll take him for a walk, I say.

Trudy says No, I’ll do it.

I think she feels bad that I take him for all the nighttime walks, and he doesn’t even seem to like me but I like that I walk him at night. She shouldn’t be walking at night. Not in this damn city. Not even with a dog. So it’s something she needs me for regardless. Mostly, I think she doesn’t need anyone except Percy, that’s the dog’s name.

Trudy’s little sister named him when she was alive. I don’t know what she died of. All Trudy ever told me is she died, and she doesn’t like to talk about it. She named him that, the sister I mean, because he was a pup, and their mom brought him home in her purse. It’s kind of funny.

Percy doesn’t get up when I call him. He never does. His ears don’t even move. I’ve got his leash in my back pocket and reach down for him. He makes me put my left hand under his ass and lift him right off of Trudy. He jerks his paw and scratches her arm, leaves a long red mark along the skin, then looks at me like I’m the one just scratched her.

I’ve got the dog cradled in both arms. It’s how you’re supposed to carry a dog so you don’t hurt him—even if you hurt yourself doing it.

Sometimes, when I’ve got him all gathered up like this, he goes right ahead and shits on my forearm. It’s three flights down, so he’s got time for revenge. See, the shits are his revenge for Trudy loving me too. He hasn’t shit on me for a while. Maybe he figures he’s made his point.

Must have rained while I was upstairs. Everything looks shiny, and the humidity mixes all the odors together, every dirty ass and foul mouth and clump of rotten garbage and dead rat, it’s all one New York smell. Percy’s loving it. His nose is having a party and his eyes are already chasing after the best spot to make his mark.

I set him down and clip the leash onto his collar, and now he’s hunting for his spot. He doesn’t care that I know what a faker he is—acting the cripple upstairs so he can lay on Trudy day and night. I don’t blame him. I think I would do that, too, if I could. There was a time when that’s what we did, Trudy and me. Lie around and screw and say nice things to each other. Percy had his own bed then. It was on the floor. Then he started getting the shakes. But that wasn’t why Trudy and I stopped lying around together. I wish I could blame it on the dog, but it wasn’t him. It just happened. I guess it couldn’t be like that forever.

Percy takes his time finding the perfect place to dump. He’s already peed about six times—two parking meters, a raggedy-looking tree, two hub caps, and a hydrant. He’s sniffed the asses of four or five other mutts and felt their noses under his tail. He’s tried to sniff a couple hookers. One kicked him in the neck to get him away, the other one told me she thought we could have something real special—me and her and the dog—and Percy also growled at a bum or two. One thing I’m also noticing tonight is when we pass by all the people dressed up on their way to Broadway shows, Percy doesn’t stick out his nose or his ears. He doesn’t tug me in their direction. They’re invisible to him. Like he sees so many deranged people all the time, he doesn’t know what to make of regular people.

Maybe I’m the one who’s that way.

It starts to rain again. Light rain. Invisible rain. It makes some people move faster on the sidewalk, and it makes some people stop and stand there like the rain is the water in their shower. And then some of us don’t care one way or the other. Percy pulls me next to a parked car because there’s a cat on the hood. He growls at the cat, but the cat’s not scared. The cat just stares down at Percy, and after a while Percy gets scared and backs away and starts barking at a trash can, then at the sky. At first, I’m thinking he’s really gone loony and decided to try and scare the raindrops, but then I see that he’s looking at what you might call a ray of light. It’s a few blocks away, shooting up into the sky from somewhere, most likely one of those spotlights they run in front of a theater on opening night or just to make it feel like opening night. He’s pulling me toward it, but I don’t want to go.

Just be glad you’re alive, I tell Percy. I don’t really say it. I think it, but if I spoke dog it’s what I’d tell him. Quit thinking there’s something better out there.

I walk him back to Broadway, then up a few streets to the small door that goes to our stairs. Percy goes down on the wet sidewalk like he always does, and I lift him up and carry him up to the apartment. Four damn flights to the fifth floor. I’ve got the key in my hand already, but I have to balance him on both elbows while I open the door. It’s dark inside the apartment. The only light is coming through the window. Street lamps and half a moon and that cloud of light from the spotlights that Percy was trying to pull me toward.

I lower him onto the bed next to Trudy, and he moves right up against her and closes his eyes, but his ears stand halfway up. He probably wants to make sure he can hear if Moon Man starts howling. Moon Man is what everyone calls the guy who howls late at night sometimes. Percy always gets excited when he hears it. He’ll start wagging like crazy, slapping his tail against my shoulder or my face. He hardly ever wakes up Trudy. I think she’d more likely wake up if she didn’t feel him in the bed next to her. Not saying I mind her waking up. When she wakes up she reaches for me, and then Percy’s got to get out of the way and go to the foot of the bed. We used to have to shove him down there, but now I think he respects. Like he can tell Trudy needs it too. Maybe not as much as me but still. I know that son of a bitch knows I’m desperate because sometimes, when I’ve got to go rub it out in the bathroom, I can see his eyes following me and I know he hears everything. I think I’m demented or something because when I used to only dream about a woman, before Trudy I mean, I figured once I could be with one, I wouldn’t be so desperate. But I’m just as desperate. Maybe more now because Trudy’s taken my body places I didn’t know about. But I’m good at hiding it, the desperation. I think a man has to be, and I’m an expert at being desperate so I’m an expert at hiding it.

When I’m lying in bed with Trudy, and she stays asleep like tonight, I just dream about it instead. I mean I just remember the last time we screwed and the time before that. It makes me feel like I’ve lived, like if an air conditioner slipped off a ninth floor ledge and crowned me on the sidewalk one night, I would die having lived because I made love to Trudy. I don’t need anything else from life. Except to rub it out, which feels stupid with Trudy right there. Sometimes, I’m afraid Trudy will find out and think I’m a degenerate and maybe want a guy who’s normal, whatever the fuck that is.

I think Trudy thinks she knows me, but I kind of hope not. I wish I knew more about her, but I don’t want to ask too many questions. I know bad things happened to her, and I get the feeling she’d rather not talk about it. Or maybe she’s afraid like me—that if I know too much, I won’t want her—but I could never not want her. Sometimes I think I’d die without her, but at the same time, I’m pretty sure she’ll figure out what an ugly little degenerate I am and get the hell away from me fast as she can.

Maybe that’s why I keep thinking about that guy I saw at Riverside Park with the two boys and the special hat. Seems like he knows how to be a man in the world and not be desperate. He’d be shaking his head if he saw how many nights I go in the bathroom, put a dirty towel on the floor, kneel down, and work it out like that. The hard linoleum under my knees and the smell of Tidy Bowl makes it tough, so mostly I lie in bed next to Trudy and Percy and I lean against Trudy’s warm body. I listen to her pouting in her sleep, and I smell her breath and the soapy clean skin of her arms and neck and the smell of her hand lotion. Spring flowers. She puts it on her knees and elbows before she turns in, and then I put it on Mr. Happy. Those smells—even with that stinking dog a few feet away—go right to my heart. Gets me hard as a rock. Sometimes, in her sleep, she moves her arms, and sometimes one of them will fall across my chest or knock me in the head.

Tonight, it’s her elbow in my neck. I feel the skin of that elbow and smell the lotion she put on it, and I think about her eyes when they sparkle at me from above the tops of her glasses, and I think back to the first time we made love,