City On A Snowy Night

City On A Snowy Night

by Mick Hale


Tina walked. The city on a night like this was icy walls, no cars or buses or trucks, just snowballs flying through the air. The cops broke up a big snowball fight on 12th that got out of hand. The bars were packed. Kento the Ethiopian guy gave away free meals to shivering bums on the down and out. Hans the Swede took out his snow shoes and tromped around Thompson Park like he was in the Yukon.

Nothing stopped the big town, except snow, lots of snow; the city hum and drum replaced by Bing Crosby crooning little ditties that floated on the air while the fluffy stuff piled up.

A lot of people wandering, a lot of play going on too, but Tina was on a mission, which meant she missed the point. Everybody in New York was on a mission 24/7, but not tonight; hustle suspended until further notice; let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

Three years and counting in the city and the first thing she learned was this: If you're not on a mission move to Boise. (Boise's in Idaho. That's somewhere west of Hoboken.) A lot of what rattled round Tina's skull revolved around a guy named Kevin. He was always saying things like:

"It ain't nose to the grind, it's sit on the damn grinding wheel until it hits bone."

"You walk slow, you get mugged."

"New York is a one-way street. One way to the top, one way to the gutter."

That was Kevin, the love of Tina's life, except he didn't know he was the love of Tina's life.

The first place she looked for him was a bar called 'Tankers.' Bartender, guy named Henry, had a soft spot for Tina. If it was vodka it was a triple. If it was a burger it came with extra fries. If it was some guy trying to flirt with her, Henry hung around and annoyed everybody until the guy left. Henry didn't help things, and he didn't know where Kevin was either.

"I think I saw him earlier," he said. "He left with a blonde."

(Take out knife, insert in heart.)

So, Tina went back to the street, the snow and the urban fairyland. A snowball, one part snow, three parts ice, smacked her on the shoulders. That worked tears across the eyeballs, but she kept walking. There was some kind of reverse formula at work in the city. If you walked fast you were trying to get somewhere, and trying to get somewhere made you a clay pigeon. Two more snowballs whizzed by her head and smacked a frayed poster hyping a DJ called K RU. 'K RU at Club Rivington!' Tina knew the guy. He had dreads below the waist.

A fourth snowball made her turn. Kevin stood there.

Now let's spend a moment talking about Tina.

Any cat stepping across Tina's path was a lucky cat. She'd pick it up and find it a home. She always kept a couple of apples in her pockets to toss to homeless guys. She'd listen all night long, especially to weepy tales about broken hearts. Tina was everybody's friend, but without a clue how to be a friend to herself.

Take this guy Kevin. He was what we call in the city a 'floor guy,' patrolling the pine at the stock exchange waving slips of dreams in a manic trance. There was a direct feed from Starbucks into his nervous system; stock exchange symbols for pupils and a Dow Jones mouth; tracking the day's trading average like a leopard scenting prey; living for the opening bell and passing out in a bar at day's end; a good-looking guy, never with any woman longer than ninety days.

Tina was positive the right dress, the right hair, the right workout resulting in the right legs, and Bingo! Kevin would notice her. No ninety-day return policy with a woman like Tina. She'd make any man happy. She was sure of it. Now to convince Kevin.

Kevin was convinced of this: he was going to be rich, drive something fast and red, and live in the Hamptons. He was also convinced Tina wasn't the woman for him. She didn't buy it. Kevin didn't see it yet. Maybe tonight.

Remember that poster for DJ K RU? That guy's real name was Roland. He lived across the hall from Tina. She thought he looked like a pirate because he kept his dreads tied up in a tight scarf most of time. She also thought he was gay because she never saw him with a woman. She never saw him with a woman because he had a thing for Tina, but was too shy to talk to her about it. The guy could get up in front of a club and spin discs all night long, but he couldn't bring himself to talk to the woman across the hall.

So, let's review. Tina liked Kevin, Kevin liked himself and Roland liked Tina. This is how it worked out.

Block by block the city shut down; plow guys in 'golden' mode, but Mother Nature in a perverse mood. The snow piled up at about four inches an hour. No amount of steel blades and salt made a difference. Parked cars disappeared under mounds, pavement vanished, and fire hydrants, garbage cans, dog poop, litter and parking meters were buried in a mountain of snow. This big buzzy universe of concrete and glass became a winter wonderland. It became the kind of night you walked forever and every street corner was a new place.

Tina wanted to slip her arm through Kevin's, but contented herself with picking up fists of snow and dumping them on his head. Kevin was sure this made him look like a dork. He brushed the snow off. He tried to re-assert order on his new thirty buck haircut. He didn't understand why Tina wouldn't leave him groomed.

They turned a corner. Music pumped out of a basement.

"Let's go in," said Kevin.

"To the club? I'd rather stay outside."

"Come on." He grabbed her arm and dragged her down the icy steps.

As soon as they were inside, the thumping bass wrapped Tina's head in a low-end cocoon. The packed club, the high energy, the mix produced a gravity that sucked people onto the dance floor. It also sucked Kevin away from Tina, toward something approximately 5'8", graced with baby blues and a long trailing fall of highlighted blonde. Tina knew her. Her name was Monica, a seductive mass of swiveling hips and teasing steps. Within seconds Kevin was next to Monica on the dance floor, waving his arms in some sort of ecstatic rooster ritual. Tina went and stood by the bar.

That's when she noticed Roland spinning discs in the DJ booth. He noticed her right back and a broad smile planted on his face. She looked away, ordered a vodka tonic and was taking her first sip when the groove changed; re-mixed show tunes slowing the club down. She looked back across the floor. Roland still stared at her.

She thought: A gay guy spinning me show tunes mixed to a hip-hop beat.

She swallowed the drink in a single gulp and went to find Kevin.

Kevin was wrapped around Monica.

"Do you want to go?" she asked. There was no response.

"I'm going to go," she said. Still no response.

"See you," she said and left the club, back up the icy steps into the snow.

She passed a store with a TV on. The bright blue screen flashed 'Blizzard of 2005.' She watched a bus lumber up 2nd. Its rear slid all the way left and then all the way right struggling for traction. She looked up at the sky. The towers were lost in a metallic sky.

She wandered streets, walked down the center of the avenues. A growing sense of freedom gained pace as the defeated city gathered it's new identity around every corner. A snow bound landscape, transformed and silent.

Ahead was a park, a vast field of snow, and a single light spreading a blue-white cone over drifting mounds. An old woman walked along a trace of a path, pushing a shopping cart. Tina walked by and then stopped.

"Are you alright?" she asked.

The woman looked up. "I was thinking of Florida just now. Why did you bring me back?"

The woman's gentle smile was a counterpoint to the whisper of madness dancing in her eyes.

"It's too cold," Tina said. "Do you have a place to go?"

They stood in the falling snow and talked about the cold, and the streets, no streets on which to spend the night.

"The shelter will be full," the old woman said, and Tina took her arm and started for home.

It wasn't easy pushing the cart through the snow, but the woman insisted, and Tina dragged it through deep banks, across streets rutted with tire tracks. The city became less a wonderland now and more an icy threat, the romance of the scene dampened by the old woman's unsteady tread.

When they reached her brownstone Tina said, "What's your name?"

"Annie," the woman replied.

"Well, Annie, we have to leave the cart here. I live on the fifth floor."

"Then I'll stay on the street with my cart. Don't worry dear, I'll be fine."

Frozen in a minute, Tina thought. She stood there wondering if indeed she could lift the cart up five flights.

From behind her another voice said, "I can help with that."

It was Roland, his dreads loose, covered in snow, a small smile on his face. "I saw you at the club tonight," he said.

"You look like a nice strong man," said Annie.

Why aren't you Kevin? It was the first thought that entered Tina's head. She watched him lift the cart and carry it up to her apartment. Annie took a long time following on the stairs. Finally, Roland went back down and helped. From her landing Tina watched the man gently guide the old woman.

Roland went back to his apartment. Tina made Annie tea.

"Is he your boyfriend, dear?" Annie asked, taking small sips from a cup sweetened with four spoons of sugar.

"No, my boyfriend is . . ." she stopped.

Annie adjusted a pillow behind her back and finished the sentence. " . . .is not here."

"Yes, that's right. My boyfriend is not here."

Within minutes Annie fell asleep in the chair. Tina turned off the light and went to stand by the window. The plane trees were outlined in thick ropes of ice, the brownstone stoops covered in a rolling wave of white. In the center of the street Roland stood making a snowman. He looked up at Tina and waved. He shouted, but with the window closed she couldn't hear his words.

She grabbed the frame and tugged it up an inch. Through the crack she heard, "Have you got a carrot? I need something for a nose."

No edges to the city now. A different world fell from the sky. Things changed on a snowy night. Tina wrapped her scarf around her neck, pulled her wool cap over her ears and went downstairs again to where Roland waited in the street.