100 25 Back in San Fran cisco, we’d go up to Do lores Park to amble, sit some- where, amble some more under the big date palms, amid the shiny-eyed Gua te ma lan boys deal ing weed and grin ning—be cause long be fore the can na bis club, we had to buy Jimmy pot for his ap pe tite on the street or in the parks. There were chil dren there, ev i dent from the un at tended multi col ored balls that would bounce by, and off into the street. A small brown kid would in ev i ta bly ap pear and give chase right to the curb, at which point he’d stop as if hav ing reached a river. Some times I’d go after the ball then, re mind ing the kid to never go into the street, as his mother came hob bling along thirty yards be hind, two other tykes in tow. I’d have left Jimmy back at the cor ner, and there he waited for me in his army coat, all bun dled up now even though it was sum mer, and look ing very alone. We walked on to where the tan ning queens staked out the upper reaches of the park, near where the J Church trol ley stopped after com ing out of the trees where the green par rots lived—leg end had it that they’d begun as one or two es cap ees and had now bur geoned into a squawk ing col ony. They weren’t the talk ing kind, but we im a gined if they were: cruisy come-ons and drug mar ket ing would erupt from their screech ing beaks: “suck my cock, yeah boy; weed, weed; fuck me, fuck me; dime bag?” “San Fran cisco, Jimmy.” “Yeah.” His dead pan. 101 With Jimmy I tried might ily to be agree able, even when he wasn’t. Usu ally, I’d go out for walks when Jimmy was sleep ing or in dif fi cult moods. I felt guilty leav ing him of course, but I was also freaked out con sid er ably, and besides I felt jus tified in that he was tak ing out all his frus tra tions on me of late. But I tried to keep my head up. He was dying after all. Still I got pissed off at him, lost my pa tience. “Fuck off, Jimmy,” I barked when he chas tised me about for get ting to go to the food bank. His ha rangue had begun with my un em ploy ment (I’d started giv ing deep dis counts at Java Bak lava one day be cause it felt good to do so, but soon was caught in the act and dis missed), moved on to my for get ful ness, my gen eral un re li abil ity, and my utter lack of focus. All true, sure, but still de serv ing of a “fuck off” for one as stretched thin as my self dur ing those times. “Didn’t you mean to add and die to that, Sea mus?” I glared. “’Cause you’re kill ing me.” His lit tle smile. “Bitch,” I said with dis dain. “Pull, Shame.” I walked out and slammed the door, run ning into Mi chael (one of the twins) in the stair well. The part of me that wanted to kick his sevenyear -old good cheer and in no cence down the stairs was quickly sub sumed by his look of con cern. “Is di ar rhea boy sick?” It was a harsh nick name, but Jimmy’d had a bad after noon in the stair well two months be fore that the twins and their mother, Mrs. Hsieh, had wit nessed. We’d all tried to joke through it as I got him up stairs—to save face, re tain human dig nity, all that. Noth ing could wipe a smile off Mrs. Hsieh’s face of course. She’d have smiled as an earth quake brought the build ing down, all in the ser vice of not freak ing out the twins. “Di ar rhea Boy is okay,” I an swered, of fer ing him a cur sory smile as I stepped past him and pro ceeded down the stairs. I’d have liked to sit down and ex plain it all as a re...