The Everlasting Home of the Heart(Charles E.J. Moulton) The Everlasting Home of the Heart

A Short Story by Charles E.J. Moulton

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“Where ya goin’ with this, Al?”
Buddy shouted at his brother as he saw him walking down Broadway, hoping to reach the Hudson River before long. Al wasn’t listening. He was simply walking down the street, passing closed down shops and theatres that had not hosted shows now for quite a while.
Buddy knew he had to speak to his brother. Who knew what the guy would do if he didn’t? So Buddy picked up his paper bag with the left-over food he had found in a trash can and ran to catch up with his bro.
“Hey, hey, hey,” he said, finally reaching up with him. “We gotta stick together, man. Where ya goin’?”
Al turned to his brother, snot and blood running down his chin. Al’s bad-ass gaze didn’t look at Buddy, it looked through him. There was no there there anymore. The whole world had turned into a playground for the rich and famous for Al and these two brothers were at the lowest end of the spectrum. Well, according to Al, they would die first.
“Talk to me, Al.”
Al looked down, picked up the half-eaten sandwich that he had found in the alleyway and sneered: “You gullible MF.”
Buddy took a step back, stretched out his hands and cackled. “What? Because I say there’s friggin’ way out? Cuz I don’ wanna go hang myself? What are you made of? What happened to the jackass snotty liitle bro’ that used to chase chicks down in da Bronx?”
Al laughed. “Da Bronx?”
This was a very cynical laugh. One that Buddy knew all too well. This was the laugh of a guy that felt enough like a victim to be a victim.
“Get lost.”
Al headed for the stoplights, bumped into some old lady that loafed down the pedestrian crossing, snapping at him to watch where he was goin.
Buddy chased his brother across the street, catching up with him next to the closed down café.
He forced his brother to turn around, grabbing him by the shoulder and swinging him around.
“You really think the world will end?”
Al now gazed at Buddy, not with emptiness, but at least with depression. How weird that seemed that depression could be seen as something good. Well, Buddy thought, at least some feeling was in there.
“How long have we been homeless, Al?”
“What’s that gotta do with anything, man?” Al snapped.
“That’s unimportant,” Buddy snapped. “How long?”
Al shrugged. “Don’ know.” He thought for a minute. “What? Eleven years?”
“Twelve and a half,” Buddy croaked. “Ever since the company got bancrupt and that chick ... what was her name?”
“Louise,” Al whispered. “The big boobed babe from Hoboken.”
“Yeah,” Buddy smirked. “The one that embezzled your cash and slept with your best friend.”
Al now remembered the whole story, Buddy could see that. There was a half-smile. A cynical one, mind you, but at least a smile. “She was good in the sack.”
Buddy shook his head. “She ruined our lives, man. But that is not what it’s about. We’ve done what since then?”
Al shifted and scratched his beard. “We’ve lived pretty much in the same homeless centre since then.”
Buddy stretched put his arms and waited for a continuation. “And what else?”
Al shrugged. “Learned to play guitar.”
“You even had the shot at a real job.”
Al sneered. “Yeah, big deal.”
“Well, at least you had a shot at it. And, hot damn, we are still here.”
Broadway was still here, there were still cars going back and forth, people were still criss-crossing the streets screaming at each other, wearing masks, of course. But it was still New York City. Still obnoxious. Still loud. Still bad-ass rude.
“And you wanna go throw yourself in the river?”
“Look, Buddy,” Al snapped. “If you wanna accept everything that’s going on in the world, then go ahead. But I’m leaving this shit.”
“Hey,” Buddy screamed. This time, the scream was so loud that Al jumped a step back, bumping in to the glass door of that boarded up café. “Shut up.”
“What?” Al said, wincing. “You on Biden’s side?”
“Screw yourself,” Buddy croaked, taking a step away from his kid brother, just for the effect, quickly turning back to make sure he hadn’t left to head for the Hudson River. “This ain’t about Biden or Trump or Rothchild or Gates or any damn shitty politician.”
“You bet your ass it is.”
“No, it’s not,” Buddy screamed, pointing at Al. “You realize that three times as many people have died from Covid as with a normal flu the last years.”
“Are these frigging masks normal to you, Buddy?” Al shouted, pushing his brother so hard that he almost tripped. “Heck, the WHO doesn’t even recommend these damn things.”
Al took one of his masks, provided by the homeless centre and threw it on the ground.
“Go to hell, Buddy,” Al shouted.
Buddy ran three steps toward his brother, catching up with him again, and blocked his way. “I get it. You are scared. But you know what, I am, too. Okay?”
Buddy embraced his brother.
For a moment, the homeless brothers stood there close to Broadway amongst criss-crossing pedestrians close to sundown, just holding each other. Buddy picked out one of his left over sanwiches from the paper bag and handed it over to Al. “Hey, have a sandwich.”
Al took it, turned it upside down, looked at a few times, shrugged and nodded. “Okay. I’ll throw myself in the river tomorrow.”
Buddy slapped his brother on the shoulder.
“Let’s go down the next street here and sit the big front stoop and talk, okay?” Buddy crooned. “Maybe there’ll be some Sinatra coming out of the 5th floor window.”
The brothers loafed down the side street in silence. Buddy was happy he had a convinced his brother not to throw himself in the river. Again. For the third time this year. It had gotten worse. He got it. He really did. But easy? No shit.
Soon, the front stoop usually for a half hour, until somebody told them to scram. But it was comfy for a bit. They could usually eat some left overs and Buddy often had collected enough coins to buy a big bottle of water that they shared. This time, he had bought a beer from the vendor up-town.
“Here,” Buddy sing-songed. “This one’s on me. A Bud.”
“Bud,” Al croaked. “Thanks.”
Al took the bottle in silence, sipped and gave it back to his brother. Snot-nosed brats passed them, making faces, Puerto-Rican moms gave them dirty looks and a nun gave them a dollar.
The boys smiled, Buddy putting it in his pocket.
“Buying you a slice of pizza for this tomorrow.”
Al nodded, apprehensively. “Or another Bud.”
There was something on Al’s mind now. Buddy could feel that. Al held his breath. Finally, Buddy spoke.
“What? If there’s somethin’ ya wanna say, say it. This holding ya breath-thing drives me bananas.”
Al waited, still holding his breath.
“Talk, damn it!”
“How do ya know it ain’t a conspiracy?”
“Cause the whole New World Order thing started with a spontaneous addition to George Bush’s speech back in the 1990’s.”
“How da heck ya know that?”
“I keep in touch with reality,” Buddy said. “Look, there’s whole lotta strange shit going on. The politician say one thing, they do another. They lie like shit, but ya know, everyone does. We dunno what’s goin’ on. The news lie about stuff and we start thinking, hey, it’s gotta be the politicians, but we just start speculating because we dunno. So, we say, it’s gotta be Bill Gates and his plan to take over da world, ‘cause, hey, he wanna have some place for his alien friends, right? So, people start making this shit up about frigging slave plans to turn the whole world into a damn concentration camp. And people ain’t gonna give up that belief for nothin’ in the friggin’ world. And that’s the problem. We all believe in opposite things and we believe in these opposite things so much that what we believe becomes the truth. And people do not accept diversity? You know what that fancy word means?”
“What?” Al responded, taking a bite off his sandwich.
“People decide on stuff and they will not accept that it could be different.”
“Different?”
“To some people, it’s obvious that this bullshit Corona horseshit is the worst sickness since the damn plague. To others, it’s obvious that this is the biggest friggin’ conspiracy since Napoleon managed to sleep with his mistress in front of his wife.”
“How the hell do you know about friggin’ Napoleon?”
“Shut up, Al. This is about speculation, man. We dunno. We just pretend we know. We say, hell, it has to be that way. You know Marie Antoinette?”
“Buddy, I don’ know nobody in that homeless centre.”
“Al, Marie Antoinette was a princess in old France, died in 1793. Be-frigging-headed. She was rich as shit, and a pretty fancy bimbo, but she was dead unhappy, because no one cared for her needs. They followed her arround everywhere, even to the bathroom. So she broke loose, did her own shit, and they made up stories about what a bitch she was. Someone believed these stories, the people got mad at Marie and started a frigging revolution and beheaded the chick.”
“Say whaaaaat?” Al snapped. “That’s bullshit.”
“No bullshit! True, Al!”
“I would’ve kicked them in da balls.”
“Do you really know that Bill Gates and dose rich dudes are planning to enslave us all?”
Al shrugged. “I believe so.”
“Yeah, but do you knooooww fo’ sure?” Buddy asked his brother, waving his eyebrows. “Are you sure? I mean, you think these things going on are weird, sure. Don’t we all. But do you know what them reasons are. The extremes are always wrong, right?”
Al nodded, remembering how they had grown up back in Queens. “Mama used to say that, right?”
“And you wanna throw yourself in the river?”
Al took a bit of his sandwich. “Gimme another sandwich.”
Buddy looked in his bag. “Cheese or salami.”
“Cheese.”
“It’s old cheese.”
“My belly’s shit, anyway. Just hand it over.”
“Enjoy,” Buddy smiled. “And live in the now. You can’t change tomorrow.”
As they sat there in that side street, munching on thrown away sandwiches and sharing a beer, a feeling of hope entered their souls. Al nodded. “Y’know what?”
“What?” Buddy nodded, elbowing his bro.
“Maybe we listen too little to hearts and a little too much to what people are saying.”
Buddy nodded. “You right about that.”
“I’m going to shower, get some clothes, shave, walk down to the pier and ...”
“Kill yourself?” Buddy mused.
Al shook his head. “That weird guy that worked in the docks. Gonna see if he still works there. Might give me a few bucks for carrying boxes.”
Buddy nodded. “Good idea.”
“It’s da wrong time to kill yourself, anyway.”
“Why?” Buddy asked.
“Better do it when there’s no hope at all.”
“When’s that?”
“Never.”
Buddy winced again. “You have hope?”
Al nodded. “I just realized that I believe the word on the streets. But I gotta believe my heart.”
Buddy sighed, picking the dollar out of his pocket.
Al looked at it. “Whatcha wanna do with dat?”
Buddy sniggered. “Another beer?”
Al smiled. “Sounds good. Don’t like pizza, anyway.”
“I like pizza.”
“I prefer tacos.”
The two brothers walked toward the corner store, arm in arm, now realizing that they had helped each other feel good about themselves simply by being there for one another.
With the full moon now visible in the sky, the two brothers waffled toward their beer, laughing, happier than most people with much more money in their pocket than they ever would have. Their bodies were homeless, but their hearts? Well, I guess you could say their hearts had everlasting homes.

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