New Neighbors

Since you asked, yes, he moved to New York City for me  and no, like most stories that begin this way,it did not end well, just as the alligator wandering the flooded streets  of Galveston won’t end well—partly we ended in disasterbecause he isn’t too bright, and partly because I disappoint easily  when someone cannot act relaxed around my rich friends,but he helped with the rent and worked nights at the bar  so we rarely saw each other, and when we did we were drunkand lonely—little flecks floating in a garden-level studio,  then a fifth-floor walkup, always clanging because the old womanbelow banged her pipes with a broom—and that loneliness  was a lot to bear alone, so we just kept going, as that alligator,the news says, is still searching for something familiar, some landmark  to discern where it is and how to get home,because those neighbors aren’t going to build an alligator shelter  out back (no, they are grabbing their baseball bats),though it might be worse, like it was with us, until eventually  we slammed enough doors and drank enough gin and beganto hate ourselves just the right amount to sell our furniture, and he moved  back home, and I tried a new city.