Photographer: Michael Clifford at Michaelcliffordphoto.com
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Tenants
Written by Larry Fondation Photographed by Michael Clifford
She lives downstairs.
I notice her.
Rents come due.
It’s a big building; lots of us live here.
Most of us do not know each other.
I follow her around.
In our laundry room, I know her underwear:
Some pink, some black, some striped;
I ask her out.
Her color is coffee;
Her feet have high arches.
I am surprised she agrees.
We all bear eviction notices.
I have six tattoos;
I know nothing about her.
She may be Lebanese;
Or maybe not.
Perhaps she is Spanish.
Always she wears flip-flops;
Her toenails are red.
\*\*
The bar is in the basement;
She orders tequila and she takes my hand.
I ask for beer,
She squeezes hard;
Her fingernails break my flesh:
Small lines of blood, apropos of nothing, roll down my wrist;
I didn’t care before:
I want her now.
Her chocolate skin has me captive;
We owe a thousand dollars.
I could say goodnight,
Go upstairs to my apartment,
But I do not even consider the option;
She takes my hand,
I take hers;
We leave into the night.
We head to the next whiskey bar;
He follows us.
I want Sonia;
I want her badly.
I don’t know how much she wants me.
Our landlord follows us;
Amounts are due.
Late fees begin to accrue.
We leave surreptitiously—
To no avail.
\*\*
Blank Bar has no atmosphere,
But we order drinks.
Sonia stays with tequila;
I order another beer.
Dissonant music plays full blast;
The women wear few clothes;
Men pay to dance.
Our landlord is a player here:
He ties up all the Single Malt.
I have him figured out.
The Cramps blast on the jukebox,
Sonia and I exit by the bathrooms;
He is not stupid;
He follows us outside.
We have one more place we want to go—
Before we fall in love.
He does not understand;
He only wants his money;
I get it, but I do not agree.
I have owned a gun for years,
But I’ve never fired it once;
Merely saved it for just such an occasion,
One such as this.
Sonia smiles when I pull out the pistol.
I shoot our landlord in the throat.
I state at his face as he dies;
I use the flashlight app on my phone–
I get a better look:
He looks just like me.
Careful to remain bloodless,
I steal his wallet and his keys.
The wallet holds 500 cash–
About the keys I have a hunch.
Loot in hand, Sonia and I rush down the dark alley,
Just as gang gunfire bursts behind us.
\*\*
Back at our building,
My intuition proves correct:
The keys open the door of the top-floor apartment;
Of course, we’d never seen the place;
Sonia scratches my neck as I fumble with the lock:
I love the feeling,
But emotions lag impressions
Despite our instant times:
The remains of the last Plantagenet King,
Buried under a parking lot in Leicestershire,
Three cheers for the War of the Roses.
Inside my dead landlord’s apartment,
The place is full of wine –
Reds and whites, chilled and not;
We find the glasses, open a bottle and drink to his soul.
Sonia and I fuck on his king-sized waterbed,
Held over from a cooler time:
Celluloid-stricken,
Obsolete like coins,
The Face of God.
We stay up all of that first night,
Sonia and me,
Drinking and fucking,
Watching his movies.
It’s the first of the month –
In the morning,
A dead-ringer for the dead man,
I collect all the rents:
24 units,
Almost two thousand a pop,
A Tudor victory;
All is well.
