Chapter 3.

Someone shook his shoulder, rousing Frank from a sound slumber. He groaned, easing the hat from his eyes, amazed that he’d fallen asleep AGAIN. Umberto Fratino, a stocky crane operator, his round face topped by an unruly mass of salt and pepper curls, stood over Frank, who sprawled on a chrome and plastic chair beside the time clock.

“Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty,” Umberto said, chin-pointing at the payphone receiver that dangled from its stainless steel cord. “Art.” Umberto plunked next to Frank, removing the Friday edition of the Cleveland Plain Dealer from under his arm.

“Oh, crap, I need to talk to him.” Frank shot to his feet, walking towards the phone, fishing the tobacco from his pocket. “Surprised the ringing didn’t wake me, but I can’t keep my eyes open today.”

“Happens when you get old.”

Frank halted, peering over his shoulder, gnawing off a fresh chew. “Younger than you.”

Umberto shrugged, raising the newspaper. “Perhaps, but you was napping like an old man, old man.”

A roguish grin stretched Frank’s cheeks taut, and he said, “Pug a Mahone.” Which kinda-sorta meant ‘kiss my royal Irish arse’ in his rotten pidgin Gaelic that’d cause a real Irishman to cringe, which didn’t bother Frank. Because he took great pride in both his Irish roots and American heritage, and botching Old-World culture was an age-old mark of American pride.

Frank snagged the phone and greeted Art. After some small-talk, he pulled the tiny notepad where he’d recorded notes of his conversation with Howard from his flannel shirt pocket, detailing the meeting.

When Frank hit the Otto crap, Art scoffed. “This project’s four months behind, with winter about to put it in deep freeze, and yet he’s humping after a poor working stiff with his wife and kid in the hospital? The fuck’s the matter with him?”

“Hell if I know.” Frank spat tobacco juice into a smelly garbage can.

Art cleared his throat. “You know, ain’t no way this gets done before spring, right?”

Frank sneered, saying, “Not even Jumpin’ Jesus-In-A-Hardhat could raise this scraper before snow shuts us down.”

“No truer words, Frank, no truer words. Anyway, dock time’s up to the guys. And tell Rubin, new guys’ll be there, eight-sharp Monday.”

“Will do.”

“Good weekend.”

“You too, boss.”

Frank hung up, fishing change and jabbing a vending machine button for a strong coffee with cream and sugar. The machine hummed to life, and Frank waited, glancing out the window, his eyes drifting with the crows and seagulls. In the distance, Earl had opened the gate and directed the slow, steady arrival of the crew. The vending machine clicked off, and Frank took the burnt-smelling instant, snagging a second, empty cup for a spittoon. He spat tobacco juice and then sipped the pale, sugary drink, wincing. Crappy joe, but to hell with it. He needed the jolt.

Cups in hand, he again took his seat next to Umberto. “You’re early.”

Umberto nodded, lowering the paper. “Car’s in the shop, so my eldest dropped me off on his way to work.”

“That sucks.” Frank spat tobacco juice into the empty cup.

Umberto scrunched his face. “Disgusting. How the hell you drink coffee with that nasty crap in your lip, I’ll never know.”

Frank shrugged. “Acquired taste, I reckon. I’m just too tired to care. Plus, Howard got my Irish up, so I got a headache.”

Umberto relaxed the paper, leaning forward. “Anyone here can give you a headache, it’s Howie Doody.”

Frank shook his head. “Let’s just say, he’s no Manny. Oh, and guess what? CLV flubbed another order.”

“The fuck you say?”

“Yup. We’ll be out of material noon-ish. Means a long weekend for the topping crew, we want it.”

“Long weekend, of course, we’ll want it. Outstanding.”

Frank tapped Umberto’s arm, pointing at the paper. “Done with the sports page?”

Umberto nodded, handing it over.

“Thanks. Didn’t have time to read it this morning, on account of the meeting.”

Umberto nodded, lifting the paper. “Forget about it.”

Frank opened the paper and had a flash. “By the way, I’m dragging Maddy and Peggy to Muldoons, around six-thirty to catch the Series opener. You and Lucy want to come?”

A bemused look crossed Umberto’s face. “Ain’t this the weekend of Peggy’s swanky concert?”

Frank’s heart went splat. “Jaysus, you’re right.”

“You invited us. We’re taking our ten-year-old granddaughter Rosa tonight, get her some culture.”

Frank tsked, annoyed at himself. “Can’t believe I forgot.” And then, though he loved Peggy and supported her talents, the realization that he’d miss the Series, the Browns, and the Buckeyes to watch her play classical violin stung. He hated to admit it. It made him sound cold and self-absorbed, but damn it, he liked sports, and that University Heights world of museums and Beethoven and Mozart made him uncomfortable.

Still, it was Peg. he loved her, and family was family. He shrugged, picking up the sports page.

“Christ, Frankie.” Umberto leaned forward, and Frank shifted in his seat. “Remember them cops and ambulances on Prospect yesterday morning? Turns out some bum died in the alley.”

“That so?” His curiosity piqued, Frank reached for Umberto’s paper. “May I?”

Umberto nodded, handing the paper over, and Frank skimmed. The guy had been sleeping on the streets since July and had “died of exposure” during Wednesday’s cold snap. Frank handed the paper back to Umberto, sighing.

“Freezing to death, alone in an alley. Crappy way to die, no?”

“Gets worse,” said Nickie ‘Boots’ Bukovec, a lanky man with twig legs, ropey arms, and an enormous beer belly which seemed out-of-place on his scrawny frame. “My neighbor drives an ambulance. Word around the campfire is, rats ate his cheeks, tongue, and eyes.”

Frank’s belly tightened, lip curling, repulsed. “I freaking hate rats,” he said, turning towards Nickie. “Like I was telling Umberto, crappy way to go, no?”

“Got that right,” Boots said, patting his pockets. “Fuck, forgot my smokes, back in a flash.” He shot off towards the vending machine.

Umberto reached for the paper, and Frank handed it over, returning to the sports page. He tried reading, but couldn’t. Fucking Howard, he thought, shaking his head in disgust. Drags me here early, for nothing. What a putz.

Umberto snapped the newspaper taut, pointing to the report’s last paragraph. “Says here the dead guy was a black male named Odell Cornelius Wallace, thirty-two, Vietnam vet, two kids in Mississippi… Think it’s Bad Leg?”

“Bad who?”

“Bad Leg. You know, Cornelius. Crazy hot dog vendor who walks with a limp, got injured in Nam. Wears that ratty old straw hat.”

Frank chuckled, remembering. “Oh, you mean Corny?”

Umberto nodded. “They call him Bad Leg.”

“Didn’t know he had a nickname. Anyway, guy’s odd as a three-dollar bill, but I like him, always chatty, smiling, and honest with the change.” Frank grimaced, remembering. “But you ever let him corner you? Guy’s a world-class crank.”

Umberto wrinkled his brow. “How so?”

“Drove him home once during a transit strike, and the guy ranted for, like, twenty minutes. Pure nonsense about MK Ultra this and Tuskegee that, and alien abductions and some karate teacher in Kirtland killing a goat with his mind.”

Umberto laughed, his eyes twinkling. “All that, in a drive home?”

Frank nodded, a grin tightening his cheeks. “Yup. non-stop, guy never came up for air. I swear if I hadn’t kicked him out, he’d still be talking.”

Umberto’s round face grew rounder as he smiled. “Winding up a crank is better than TV, my opinion.

Frank spat. “I’ll second that.”

“Crank or not, seems a decent sort.” Umberto’s face hardened, his gaze sliding towards the parking lot. “Hope it wasn’t him, the dead guy.”

“Let’s check his corner during lunch," Frank said.

Umberto nodded his agreement, his gaze drifting skyward. “You think maybe it’s too cold to hawk dogs?”

Frank took stock. High, billowy clouds hung low and moved fast, pushed by the steady wind off the lake, promising a bitch of a day. “Good point, cold as hell.”

Frank's gaze landed on Eliot Ness, and Frank realized the lawman would have seen the bum die from that perch were he alive. His heart grew heavy as he imagined dying, alone and in an alley, with the rats gnawing at his eyes. His mind drifted with the seagulls swirling higher and higher in the current.

Umberto called him back to earth. “You know where the guy stays, then?”

Frank nodded. “Some roach motel, off Shaw near the bus depot... leastways, I think...” He sighed, trying to remember.

“Think you can find it?”

Frank shrugged. “I reckon. You know me, I’m like a homing pigeon.”

Boots returned, an unlit smoke dangling from his upper lip. “You mean, you got a bird brain, live in a coup, shit on cars, and are dumb enough to be hunted to extinction?”

They laughed a hardy laugh, and filled Boots in, how they wanted to check that the dead guy wasn’t the half-crazed black hotdog vendor, but seeing it was too cold to vend, he’d maybe have to swing by his place to check on him.

“Corny’s a fellow Army combat vet,” Frank said, “so I feel I owe him. And if it was him, maybe we old-timers can attend the service. Especially the vets, for a fellow soldier.”

“I’m down with that,” Korean War vet Boots said, plopping next to Frank.

Umberto, a World War II vet like Frank, cleared his throat, face solemn. “I’d like that if it was him died. All soldiers deserve twenty-one guns, homeless or not, and no one deserves to die unremembered.”

“Amen,” Boots said, lighting the cigarette with his Zippo. “I liked Bad Leg, good people.”

Frank nodded. “Indeed.”

By then, several dozen men huddled around the time clock, and Frank realized he had union business to conduct. So he rounded up the topping crew, starting with Boots and Umberto, informing them there’d be a quick meeting at eight.