5 1 Jimmy came from Buf falo, New York, and he had the ac ro nym with him on the train plat form the day I met him. Along with every thing else: the bi cy cle he’d named Chief Jo seph, the pan nier bags, the tat too of the Chi nese char ac ter for “good” etched where his right side burn should have been and the lit tle bull’s-eye tat too smack dab between his eyes (he’d later tell me it was his third), the four thou sand dol lars in cash tucked in side that book, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, and his made-up mind. Made me close shut what I’d been read ing: Use less Facts & Other Fauna. He looked cute and inter est ing, and I stared at him and stud ied him, wait ing to see if he’d look back my way for too long or not. His hair was a grown-out dye-blond, black as en gine grease under neath, and he was wear ing old green army fa tigue cut offs that hung loose around his in sub stan tial waist. He had a waif’s long bony chest and knobby shoul ders under his black long-sleeved T-shirt with the big red aste risk/ man dala sym bol of the Red Hot Chili Pep pers on it. I’d been wal low ing for hours in one of my dark moods, mean der ing around Oak land so as to avoid see ing any one I knew, tak ing a break from San Fran cisco, mak ing my rounds of the sa cred places of my own lesser my thol ogy—the mu seum, the lake, cof fee shops under the for lorn, all-is-vanity flash ing of the big neon sign at the Grand Lake movie the a ter—and won der ing and plead ing with each for a sign, a fin ger point ing to where I should go with my stalled-out lit tle life, as if these 6 land marks were great crom lechs or Easter Is land stone heads im bued with wis dom. And then Jimmy: a hand some stranger from far away, and with a mys ti cal steed too be cause there were strings tied all over his bike—so many, you couldn’t even tell what color it was under neath. And, sure enough, when I raised my eyes, his were look ing back at me. And for the brief est of mo ments we stared. His per fect chin and scruff, his wide mouth, his cheek bones. Then he looked away, and there fol lowed the non cha lant slow re turn—and me doing the same—and round in cir cles it goes: the time less dance of the sugar plum faer ies. A lit match. And I was tow. Be cause de spon dency al ways made me feel ep i cally horny. Maybe it was just my low-intensity sui ci dal thoughts—the last stand of my gon ads? One last state ment be fore obliv ion? Or per haps my body just knew it was the only way to get me to stick around and thus roused me from my stu por with that old standby lust, prom is ing con nec tion and re mind ing me there were things here other worldly and transcen dent al ready—that “lit tle death” that beat all swan dives off the Golden Gate. Con se quently, any boy who ap peared at such a time was bound to carry a cer tain weight, a sort of sav ing grace, a fate ful kind of grav ity. Which perked me up like no monthly five-minute ap point ment with yawn ing, obese Dr. Pin ski at County Men tal Health ever could. Pin ski, who couldn’t have spot ted a sui cide if the malcontent’s er rant bul let ric o cheted off his desk and grazed him with a flesh wound. And chances are it would be a flesh wound, be cause he was pack ing. Flesh. Lots of it, too. Pin ski, who, just last week, after cur sor ily pok ing around my psyche, quickly wrote me a pre scrip tion for the lat est anti de press ant, in the mid dle of which he pulled back his sleeve...