Ken DeStefano

Prologue

“Poetry is the art of using the wrong words to say the right thing.”

Paula

May 1969

When you’re 18 years old in the late 1960’s, and practically live on the beach, every night is Saturday night.

That late August night just last summer seemed so long ago as Paula Manto sat upright in the hospital bed, staring at a corner of the ceiling, rubbing her hands. A steady stream of footfalls – from nurses, doctors, patients and visitors – echoed outside the nineteen year old’s door in the hallway. She studied the footsteps. Confident doctors and nurses providing good news and delivering joy. Excited and rushed visitors, walk-running to visit their loved ones. Occasionally, very occasionally, the steeled walk of a doctor preparing to deliver bad news. But the rarest walk, the walk reserved just for her, was that of the case worker carrying the clipboard with papers to be signed. Or not signed. She heard those steps now, and not for the first time.

Paula had been at the hospital for nine days. Her first two days were spent in the delivery room and post-natal room, then the last seven in this shared room. Elenora was her first roommate. Elenora, a first-time mother who didn’t speak English, was already in the room when she was transferred in, and, even though Paula had felt anti-social from the first moment, she was too self-conscious to close the curtain between their beds. Elenora had at times tried to make conversation with her, and she politely responded. She soon realized that Paula had no interest in socializing.

After Elenora and her baby went home, Paula had three more roommates. First, there was Lillian, followed by Tiana, the friendliest one. Gina arrived this morning, and a steady stream of visitors had been here with her all day. When the last of Gina’s visitors left, there was silence…for a moment. Then a click and some static as a small transistor radio was brought to life. The static cleared, and Paula heard the disc jockey crooning through the speaker,

“Greetings, explorers and pioneers! Greetings, astronauts and cosmonauts! Greetings, unwashed and unabashed! Big Joe on the Radio, here at 660 on your AM dial, speaking truth, live from Asbury Park…” Big Joe continued his meaningless babble of a rhyme before transitioning into the opening rift from “The Age of Aquarius.” Paula heard the beautiful sounds with ears open and eyes closed.

Paula occasionally closed the curtain between the beds when sharing the room with Lillian, and, by the time Tiana was transferred in, it was almost always closed. It slowed, but didn’t stop, Tiana’s efforts to connect. Now the curtain was permanently up, and neither Gina nor her visitors had made any attempts to engage.

She came to the hospital alone and scared. Her only visitors had been Uncle Rob, a case-worker, and Father Tomasino from the Roman Catholic Parish of St. Rose. Her parents did not come to the hospital, and neither did any of her four siblings, even though they lived less than 10 miles from the hospital. It hadn’t always been that way for her.

Her family was close, but no doubt volatile. Better said, it was volatile, but no doubt close. Regular family meals, laughing, fighting, drinking, and more fighting. That had been changing for some time, as her father’s enjoyment of wine became less of a social lubricant and more of a source of combustion. It was hard to pinpoint exactly when it started, but Dad had started slipping into darkness. The family tried to pretend it wasn't happening, and in some ways grew closer at first. Eventually, a fracture formed into Team Dad and Team Not-Dad. The teams shifted slightly that fall and spring, into Team Paula (whose sole member was Paula), and Team Not-Paula (everybody else).

As Paula sat alone in her hospital room, it was clear who was on her team. Nobody. She lay thinking about her options, as the case worker’s footsteps again approached the door. She navigated around the curtain, stood next to Paula's bed, and took her hand. Paula couldn’t look up at the case worker. Staring down, scared, afraid and uncertain.

The case worker knew what she had to do, what she had to talk about, what she had to ask. But looking at this poor, wounded girl, her heart broke. Still, she had to ask, because things could not keep going like this. A decision had to be made.

The case worker bent down and whispered, “Do you know what you want to do? Are you going to keep the baby?”

* * * * *

Carson

2023

Carson Pepe took the envelope from Margeret and slid it under his notepad in one smooth motion. He was fifty four years old, dark-skinned with dark eyes, a black beard and eyebrows, but completely white hair. Just under six feet, and weighing two cannolis over two hundred and ten pounds, he was thick but athletic. Not muscular, but years of playing sports had kept the flab off his body. Margeret had worked for him for the past three years, and, even though she was only four years older, she definitely was from a different generation. Fifty-eight with grown children and grandchildren, she worked at home until her youngest left the nest, and gravitated towards maternal protection whenever she was with somebody younger than her – even her fifty four year-old boss. As she placed the Number 10 white envelope in his hand, she gently touched him on the shoulder. She was the only person other than himself who knew what was in the bulging envelope. Carson trusted nobody with this secret–he only told Margeret because she screened his mail and would know about it, whether he wanted her to or not.

He knew who it was from without examination. Its return address was from the State of New Jersey Department of Health. It was supposed to arrive at his office after the first of the year, but never thought it would arrive the first Tuesday after the calendar turned. Government tends to not be that efficient. Carson permitted himself a quick look at the letter. On the bottom right, handwritten in blue ink, two simple words: “Good luck!” Not the type of thing you typically see in a government mailing. But he understood. He knew what it was, but not what it said. He wanted to open it, but he dreaded opening it. He focused every cell of his being to speed time so that he could read the envelope’s contents. He focused every cell of his being to stop time so that he would never have to read the envelope’s contents.

Part I

1.

Paula

Summer 1968

The final bell at St. Rose High School rang at 2:37 p.m. After four years of sitting in ninth period, waiting for the daily announcement of her freedom, Paula’s body knew exactly when it was 2:37. Her body’s internal clock measured the time, and she was sure that each day at 2:37 p.m., her pulse slowed, her blood pressure dipped, and her lungs breathed their first unencumbered breath of the day. Every school morning, her alarm was set for 6:14. Every school day, she woke up at 6:13 a.m. – exactly one minute before the alarm went off. Usually, she was able to turn it off before the God-awful ringing. Her body told her it was time to start the day, just like at 2:37 pm, her body told her it was time to end the day.

Today, at the ringing bell 1,125 students stood and started their walk to the school exits. She sipped her Cuba Libre, looked out at the ocean from a bench on the boardwalk, and smiled. In that moment, tension released from her body, from her shoulders, and from her neck. The weight was taken off her chest, and the air smelled just a little bit saltier. Summer was coming and school was behind her. She would graduate in nineteen days even if she didn’t attend another day or didn’t go to another class. So today she had skipped.

Dozens of beach towns dotted the coastline that is the Jersey Shore. Some supported local factories, some the Monmouth County Race Track. One, Ocean Grove, was owned by the Methodist Church. It was impossible to buy land, or houses, in Ocean Grove–the most you could get was a ninety nine year lease. However, the lifeblood and central feature of many of these towns was “The Boardwalk.” In some places, it was nothing more than a walkway of wood parallel to the beach. Most of the “The Boardwalks” had some shops or restaurants. A few, like Point Pleasant, Seaside Heights and Wildwood, had enormous carnivals permanently integrated into them. Shops, restaurants, pizza places, rides, attractions, and bars, bars, bars. In the late 1960’s, the stars aligned and these bars became havens for up and coming musicians dreaming of putting their sound to vinyl. The odds against them were enormous, but a surprisingly high proportion of them did make it, to one extent or another, suggesting that something in the air and water created and nurtured a special talent.

In less than half an hour, the boardwalk would start to fill, and within an hour it would be crowded with high school students, broken into cliques, but nonetheless together on the boardwalk. Paula was smart, and also athletic. She was friendly with the honor students as well as members of the track and basketball teams. But her true love was music – live music, music that oozed from one Jersey Shore bar to another. Every bar had a band, and every doorman knew her. The Student Prince, The Graduate, The Block-Aid, The Finnish, Jack’s and dozens of others put music out every night. The amateur customers loved to show up on the weekends to hear the polished bands, but those like her loved the Mondays and the Tuesdays. It was the only time when the new bands could get stage time, or when the reliable weekend bands could work on new material.

She loved seeing the bands and the songs evolve. There was a lot of garbage. Too many thought they could play, and the Monday/Tuesday scene would show them that they couldn’t. Too many songs dreamed of a beautiful future, only to be reduced to unimpressive droning. But, for every dreadful Winks Brothers Band, there was a Goring Horns.

To spy talent when it was still invisible to the masses, that was her joy and gift. Her spine was a tuning fork set to a Fender guitar, her mind tuned to a Gretsch drum set. She knew when the notes worked, and when they didn’t. She knew when they clicked, and when the rhythm was broken–whether by bad composition or bad execution.

At 16, she had first felt her gift, but did not yet trust it. Two years later, after showing up and showing up and showing up, and watching and observing, and then talking, she learned not only to trust it, but so did a long string of bar owners and bookers. They watched her. Was she sitting, or dancing, or tapping? What she did determined their future. Even if they weren’t good that night, or were still too immature, her body could sense if there was going to be something there. Or if they were better off finding another line of work, or another line for girls.

The Bardogs–a group of self-named teenagers at St. Rose whose entire identity was tied to the local music scene–knew her and tried to pull them into their circle. She was polite, and friendly, but she could never be of them. They wanted what she had, and worked so hard to get it, but they could never feel the music like she did. They were jealous, and she felt sorry for them. They could never be equals, so she could never be of them. They knew who she was, and how the bookers and bands tracked her, so they tried to impress her with encyclopedic knowledge of the bands and songs and history. None of it mattered, because none of it could substitute for her feel for the music.

Sitting on the boardwalk next to the beach, alone with her Cuba Libre, looking into the ocean, she waited for the horde of her classmates. She was tuned to the sounds of the ocean, to the waves, and to the gulls. It was a different kind of music, maybe the kind that all the other music tried to imitate, to replicate, and encapsulate. And that’s when she heard it. Down the boardwalk, at least 100 yards away, the painful sound of a saxophone. The pitch was wrong, the notes stumbled, and the decibels varied erratically. The player was a relative novice–but it was unmistakable. A football field south on a rotty boardwalk one half mile from St. Rose High School, a young man with a special talent played the saxophone. And, damn, even though it sounded terrible, it sounded good, good because even then she could feel the raw potential.

* * * * *

Carson

Six months before Margeret handed Carson that envelope, he stood in George’s Deli. He never bought the Bergen Record or any other newspaper. Generally, he ignored the news, unless something of interest on Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn caught his attention. Today, after ordering his egg sandwich and pouring himself a cup of coffee, he looked down at the stack of papers. Above the fold in the Bergen Record: “Governor Signs Law Unsealing Adoption Records.”

George was on a roll today. He had come over from a former Eastern Bloc country – no one seemed to know which country, or even when he arrived – since anyone who asked got a different answer. His wife Angie was full-on, born and bred in New York, and had been hearing him talk for almost 25 years. She had stopped actually listening a decade ago. She worked the back counter, coordinating with the short-order cook and put simple orders together, while George continued his never-ending barrage of spontaneous thoughts like an emcee at an open mike. Taking the orders, giving the change, and being the little deli’s host, he never lost his smile. Carson wondered if he had note cards that he kept by his bed at home to help decide what the topic, complaint, or dream of the day would be.

Carson was running early this morning. It was crowded, and George was holding court to a packed audience. He had a special place in his heart for Carson. Carson came from one of the suburbs of northern New Jersey, but truly seemed to understand what it was like for George to have been raised in a former Soviet satellite. What it really was like to never know if your parents, or other family or friends, would just disappear off the street at the whisper of a party official. George thought that Carson knew what it was like to be hungry, and what it was like to have to be hard. Truly hard. George had a million friends in his circle, but appreciated Carson in a different way. They were brothers. Carson seemed to understand George, understand his past, and why he had to be the way he had to be. George only had one Carson in his life.

Carson had begun drinking his coffee, and was waiting for the egg sandwich, while George explained the intricacies of hiring cocktail waitresses at casinos. Lots of thoughts, most of them just tangentially close enough to reality to not be totally insane, but all clearly from the mind of an affable madman. George had said something ridiculous–about how the length of the calf showed how a young woman would age. He claimed it was wisdom from the old country, but Carson was pretty sure he just made it up. Laughing, he had glanced at the newspaper rack. He had seen the headline, and had felt a frozen hiccup as it registered. His mind had started racing, his blood started pumping, as he realized the headline might have something to do with him. George handed him his sandwich, Carson left the Deli, and walked to his car in the small parking lot.

George was good people. A good friend.

Carson stood by his car. Fifty four years old. Alone. His father had died some years ago. His mother was wonderful, but something was missing. Same with his brother and sister, Lincoln and Sandra. Wonderful people. Good people. But something was off. With all of his relationships. Friends. Girlfriends. Fiancees. Except Cristobol, his oldest friend. Cristobol Higgins had been the sole exception–the one person whose mind worked like his, the one person whose heart worked like his. His mother. What did she want from him as a son? Brother? Friend? Lover? Cooperation? Cheerfulness? Affection? He rooted out what was expected, what was wanted, from him.

What are they looking for? A funny guy? He told jokes and made people laugh. A sympathetic ear? He listened and counseled. A teacher? He taught. A fixer? He fixed. A distraction? He distracted.

Carson became the mirror, the two-dimensional image that was sought. He kept track of who needed what, of when they needed it, and how much they needed. Carson’s skill and ability to reflect was unmatched. But those skills and abilities were exhausting, because they were not real. Eventually, playing the false game led to distrust, then resentment, then condescension, then disdain until, ultimately, separation. Each and every relationship–the same cycle. Short-lived bursts of perfection, followed by a slow simmering resentment until an explosive separation. Over and over again, moving on to the next person, persons, or jobs.