A Lunch-Time Conversation-With Prescott Breslin, Junior In Mind   

 

From The Pen Of Sam Lowell

 

Ben Webster, despite his creeping arthritis which has slowed him down a bit over the past several years and which had bothered him no end, not because he could not accept the aging process although he had tossed and turned more one night when in his forties he started to feel the first surges of kickback in his body and not because he had some notion of defying the death that await us all for he held no deep-seeded secular need to put a fine gloss on such thoughts, had other things on his mind just then. Things to try to reclaim the past a little, try to get some information about past events if for no other reason than to now that he had the time to do to reflect on what had happened along the way. If he could half-figure that out before he passed beyond all understanding he would greet death, the death that he had always, echoing the laconic poet-minister John Donne, claimed should not be proud. Should not have pride of place in the great scheme of things. Ben had always liked the way the Letts took on the matter letting the reindeer king decide the time and place of the passage, to make the sleep the equivalent of sweet amorphous death.  But truth to tell that affliction had make him feel older than he needed to feel, made him something of a cranky old man to his grandchildren at times, made his grumpy since otherwise after a lifetime of trying to keep himself reasonably in shape he could hold his own with his peers, maybe holding  better than his own. That pain had slowed him down even worse a while back when his left knee bones, verified for a candid world to see by progressively gathered doctor x-rays which had started rubbing together about fifteen years ago and he eventually needed to get the badge of the AARP-worthy knee replacement. Done, done and finished but as payment the aches gathered in other locales to take te wind out of his sails. 

Notwithstanding his own maladies Ben just then, waving off the thoughts of afflictions, of mother death was, as had become habit of late, of the past couple of years, committed to once again make the call, the call to his old friend Jason. Over the past several years, maybe closer to decade now, Ben made the monthly call, made it less frequently these days with his teeth grinding, over his cellphone to one Jason Darling to plan for their regular monthly luncheon which recently has been to some place in Walton, the town where they had both grown up, had met in elementary school, had hung around as sweet back corner boys.

That grinding his teeth fiercely had begun a decade or so back and had extended back maybe another decade before that was no turn of phrase but a real reaction every time he had to contact his old friend. As a result for years, the best years when it might have helped Jason, he had made it a practice to avoid seeing Jason except when he could not avoid the issue, could not truthfully back out or plead ignorance.   Like the time twelve or thirteen years before when Jason had had his stroke, had had to have some work done on his flukey poorly treated heart as well after a lifetime of sucking sodas and eating hellish Sally/U/U/Methodist/Roman Catholic/Baptist soup kitchen rotation foods as well. Jason had for years after his divorce from Lydia, Lydia who was from some Podunk town in Tennessee, some place out in the sticks whom he had met one night when she was working as a bar maid in some low-rent gin mill and had spun some tale that got him a three day shack-up and they had gotten married shortly after she thinking he would take care of her since he had shown her a bank roll as she blew him and she would no longer have to do an occasional professional trick or seven to keep body and soul together, who ran out on him with another guy, ran out as fast as she could when that guy after she had given him his blow job said they should pull up stakes and head west and get away from the bummer in Boston, lived in a skid row rooming house.

This is how the path of descent played out if anybody is interested. Jason had about a year before Lydia took that powder, took off with their last five dollars so maybe that new guy was showing a Missouri bankroll too, had stopped working, stopped trying to keep them together when he got into one of his periodic funks about how he had come up the hard way and the world really did owe the guy a living, and sat in their small messy apartment and watched television or read country music fan magazines to which he was addicted to forcing her to go out onto the streets again to keep body and soul and that is where she had met that John somebody who took her west, or wherever five bucks could take them maybe.

At some point later Jason had gotten himself on the dole, he had always been good at the con, had taught Ben a couple of tricks that he was able to use when he himself had had a short period of being out on the streets after he got out of the service when he couldn’t adjust to the “real” after Vietnam times, lived on welfare or social security disability, or both, it was always some combination at various times since Jason had been diagnosed as clinically depressed as a result of some ancient wounds, maybe childhood, more probably from his own checkered military service in Korea and Vietnam. He had been since Lydia fled living alone in that run down rooming house in skid row Boston like some moronic pack rat going out late at night on the day before trash day and grabbing whatever he could to “decorate” his room but like the messy Lydia-managed apartment all it was  pack rat messy and he hated to even go near the place and so they would meet in the street in front of Jason’s quarters,  had had some kind of stroke and had lain almost naked for three days on the floor of his room since he could not move before somebody had heard his cries. Since Ben was the only known contact he had been called to visit Jason in a rehab center after he had been released from the hospital. Another time earlier Ben had been in downtown Boston on some business and Jason had called out to him from across the street and he was stuck having to relate to him that day. Both times and a few more that he had half-forgotten about had been of a kind. They would meet under some flag of friendship truce, Jason would do some godawful thing, borrow money and not pay it back, steal checks from Ben’s house when he was invited over like Ben was some mother’ pocketbook to be hit mercilessly like when they were kids and forged his name, and other assorted tricks which left their relationship shaggy and on a razor’s edge most of the time after high school. Hence the long stretches of statutory neglect as Ben called the situation (and at least two of Ben’s three wives and a couple of live-in girlfriends threatened to leave if Jason came through their doors. See they would be “missing” dough after he left.

 

It had not always been that way, had not always been about Ben having to be niggardly about connecting with his old friend. Back in high school, back in the 1960s when they used to run together, run around town as buddies and literally run around on the track team despite their mutual lack of resources, despite their respective horrible home lives, they were tight, had each other’s backs and could depend on each other. Ben’s father long gone and his mother mentally ill, Jason’s father a drunk and mother running around with every guy in town, called the town pump by a couple of guys in school who had not known who she was tried to pick her up in a bar which they were in illegally but who was counting and she had on some come hither dress and it was only their fear of dealing with an older woman that had stopped the from having whatever they wanted from her. After high school though as Ben moved toward a professional career and Jason drifted into some trouble, small robberies, a jack-roll, stuff like that which got him before a judge who gave him the “choice”-three to five in county or enlist in the Army their relationship fell apart although never to the point where they totally broke off relations, or really Ben broke off his relationship with his longtime friend whom he had known since elementary school. So they had gone through a series of ups and downs for decades, mostly down until one day Ben realizing that they were on the short end of their lives and that the time for grinding his teeth had passed. Hence, through fits and starts, they had arrived at a place where they could meet once a month and rekindle their once virtuous relationship.                

At those lunched old time memories were guaranteed to be a serious part of whatever conversations they might have ever since Ben had decided several years ago to try and reconcile with his old town and with the guys whom he hung around with, his corner boys he called them and they were as much corner boys as any 1950s wacko sociologist could gather in their brains even if they did not exactly fit the wild boy Saturday  “chicken run” guys with grease and oil in their fingertips and nails for the simple reason they had no cars to work on, no money for parts if they had cars and, well you get the drift, and that list had started with Jason who he was not particularly close at the time had the virtue of never having left the area unlike Frankie Riley in big town New York, Jack Callahan up in New Hampshire and the rest in parts unknown, maybe a couple in jail like Red Radley, a genuine monster. So the call was made, the arrangements put in place and Ben would pick up Jason the next day for that lunch again in Walton by common agreement.

The reason that Ben was picking Jason up was that the past serval years had been unkind to Jason what with the stroke that he had suffered and the stint they had placed in his heart he had no capacity to pick Ben up. Moreover he had, in a cruel play on their corner boy days had no car, had no money for the upkeep of a car and, well you get the drift.   Ben arrived at the lobby Jason’s assisted living Senior Citizen Housing building, don’t forget Jason too was reaching four score and ten, at about noon once again prepared to help his friend into his automobile for the ten mile trip to Jimmy Jakes’ Diner a place that still had decent food and still played the old time country music that Jason was still fond of, no, which Jason was monomaniacal about, maybe pathologically so although Ben was a lawyer not a psychologist or mental health worker.

Ben could not could not abide country music, another subject which had and still did set his teeth grinding, had always chided Jason about it as a kid, and in high school too since what the hell did known about country ways, being a mill town boy just like Ben who could at least claim a father who was from Kentucky might have run back there for all anybody knew since when he ran out his mother was not keen on finding out his whereabouts, had said later good riddance before she started get those migraine headaches which broke her mental capacities. But remember all that teeth grinding stuff was kept in the background as he tried to keep up a good front about lots of matters which had caused Ben to forsake his hometown and forsake Jason as well once they had had their final falling out about thirty years before.

As Jason came down to the lobby from the elevator along with a nurse’s assistant Ben noticed that his old friend was stooped over more than the last time he had seen him and thought to himself that the ravishes of arthritis which has sidelined him were increasing taking over and in Jason’s case as well and that this day helping Jason would be more arduous than previously.

Before Ben could greet his old friend though Jason shouted out “What did you do come here to pick up the furniture?” Ben, startled, a not unusual occurrence when dealing with Jason even back in his best days in his youth, thought that not only had the arthritis taken its toll but living by himself all these years since his divorce about thirty years before had begun to weaken his brain but as he responded in a perplexed voice he only said “What are you talking about, old man?” Jason replied, pointing to a ratty heavily dented and scarred café table and a couple of equally ratty chairs which looked like they would fall apart at the touch that were obviously ready for the furnace and which probably belonged to somebody in the place who had “cashed his (or her) check” and the administration was mercifully getting rid of them and said, “That nice table and chairs which I wish I could have in my room but they only allow so much furniture so the residents don’t wind up tripping over themselves and fall.”

Ben thought that moment that once again he would be in for an afternoon of statements from Jason which had no particular connection to each other but that fate too he kept to himself. As the nurse’s aide help put on Jason’s coat against the November weathers Ben noticed that the outfit that Jason had decided to wear had come down a couple of steps from the previous month, baggy dragging stained jogging togs, a big flapping oversized flannel shirt that was in need of washing (too large even for a guy who was five feet seven inches and weighted about two hundred and thirty five pound so it must have been XXXL to start with), a nondescript shapeless jacket which might have come from the Sallys (Salvation Army) although about a year before he had bought the jacket for Jason for Christmas. He also noticed that Jason’s thinning balding white hair was in need of a minimum haircut and that he could use a shave of the stubble that was gathering on his face even if he had been shaved that morning since Ben remembered that dark-haired, black, Jason was a two times a day shave especially when he was going out on a date, a date which unlike Ben probably came to him easily since he had been a good-looking in the Elvis mode. Yeah between his clothes and his appearance almost seventy years of living a number that Ben himself would be facing as well soon had taken their toll on his old corner boy who in those long gone days in the throes of youth would have had had snarly comments for any such old man who came around Harry’s Variety to buy a newspaper or a package of cigarettes.

Not that Ben was himself some paragon of Esquire or some upscale men’ magazine but he had continued to make efforts to keep the weight off by running frequently  (jogging is really closer to what he was doing especially that first mile which was hell unlike the old days when he/they actually did run and had had a sort of successful time doing so and after a few quick warm-up exercises was ready to run quickly), keeping his now very grey and thinning hair and beard professionally trimmed (not as frequently as his long-time companion, Laura, Laura Perkins, would like claiming that when they kissed it scratched her face), and except for a knee replacement (and eyeglasses for reading, a hearing aid and full set of dentures) was physically in not bad shape for a man nearing seventy. That last thought as they exited the building after Jason had painstakingly signed himself out for the afternoon would be tested from the first time they walked to Ben’s car and unlike on previous occasions Jason had to be helped into the car (Ben always had to help with the seat belts so he was not concerned about that when he was asked to help with that task).

Both in the car and buckled up something they had laughed at as kids when the new seat belt law came into effect they headed to the diner when Jason turned to Ben and said “Did you hear that Elaine Ryder had died?” Ben replied that he did not who the woman was, was she from school, from the town or something. Jason said in an astonished tone, “No, she was the stuntwoman for Dale Evans on the Roy Rodger and Dale Evans Show you remember that show back in the fifties.” Ben answered yes but he made that reply in an even tone since it had been a long time now since he had been surprised when Jason mentioned some name from the distant past and it turned out to be not some mutual acquaintance, some fellow “townie” but some figure from out of fifties television night that Jason was addicted to, more so lately since via the marvels of modern Internet technology he could revisit those long lost times and their denizens. Still a reference to an obscure stuntwoman from a long gone television show did not bode well for the afternoon’s conversations. Lots of teeth grinding (okay dentures grinding) and silently raised eyebrows.    

Along Route 3, the route from the assisted living facility to Jimmy Jakes’ Jason talked a mile a minute about this and that but mainly about some old time landmarks since usually the only times he got out to see the old town these days was when Ben came to take him out somewhere. Ben usually drove mute until they arrived at their destination unless Jason forced an answer out of him. As they passed a heavily weeded chain link fence empty lot Jason shouted over the sound of the radio and the traffic noise, “Remember Billy Badger who used to work at Howdy’s Beef Burger when that place was on that weeded lot over there back when we were in high school in the early 1960s.” A quick no came from Ben. “Sure you do remember he used to give us whatever leftovers for free he had when he closed up at night and we stopped by when we had either been drinking all night and were hungry beasts or when we struck out with some hot date who turned out to be directly related to the Blessed Virgin Mary.” Ben laughed at that last reference since he had had plenty of red-headed, his favor color hair for girls then, Irish Catholic girls with great shapes but who keep the bible between their knees and rosary bead and novena books as extra protection to ward off the slightest attempt to go beyond some half-ass French kissing but he had to admit he did not remember Billy although he did remember that they got plenty of free burgers, fries and frappes at Howdy’s. Jason wouldn’t let the subject go, “Sure you do, remember he lived over on Walnut Street by the marshes, over on what did we call it when we lived over there ourselves?” Ben interrupted with a far-away and long gone blush every time he thought about the words even now “on the wrong side of the tracks.” Jason continued, “ you remember then he was friends with Max McGee the star football player of our class  and had a sister, Donna, a couple of years older, who gave guys blow jobs, great blow jobs and liked to swallow the cum, said she had heard it was a good protein source, unlike most girls on a date from what Max said. Said she would give guys “head” so she could stay a virgin, you know that old Catholic girl thing when they wouldn’t go all the way but still wanted guys to take them out for a good time and not stay at home by the midnight phone reading the Bible or something once they got the reputation for not putting out.” Ben laughed again and thought maybe Jason wasn’t failing quite as badly as he thought but still said no to knowing who Billy Badger was and would have certainly been interested in that sister Donna if he had known Billy, probably would have been practically living at his house on the off chance he was hungry for some protein, or wanted to stay a virgin, and Jason finally let it go.

As they passed the high school Ben mentioned to Jason that he was glad that he had not gone to their 50^th high school class reunion even when he had gotten in contact with Dora Kiley, who was the chairperson of the reunion committee as she had been ever since the fifth reunion, and told her he was interested in helping out since this would probably be the last chance to see the old gang that most members of the class would have and in line with his newfound feelings about the town since his mother had died a few years before he wanted to take that trip down  memory lane. As usual though things, old time hometown and family things had once again not worked out since once he got on the class website that Dora and her committee had established he got in contact with an old flame, Larissa Smart, and in the process got too close to her and Laura had read him the riot act forcing him to abandon those plans. Jason remained silent for the few seconds that Ben talked about the class of 1964 since he always did so when Ben spoke about the class or members of it like Denny, Hutchy, Danny, Steve or Boris who Jason used to hang around with for the simple reason that he had never graduated from high school, had dropped out in the eleventh grade to follow some girl from up in New Hampshire first and when that did not pan out  he drifted for a while out toward the prairies of Kansas got into trouble out there involving robbing a gas station, did some time and when he came back felt it was too late to go back to school and so enlisted in the Army after another robbery of a variety store and the judge’s choice can a-calling.

Ben could always tell when he made a faux pas by mentioning the Class of 1964 because not only would Jason not answer any remembrance questions like what had happened to Denny (he had passed away several years before Ben learned from Dora who was something like the class obituary writer as well as permanent chairperson of  every reunion since she had never left town, had married a dentist who practiced in the town although he had grown up in Hingham) but would jump quickly to another subject and he did so here. “Did you remember Marty Callahan?” When Ben answered no Jason as was his habit of late would say “You don’t, sure you do, the big kid who used to hang around the miniature golf course and had that ’59 Chevy who later married some money from up in Boston and grabbed a couple of taxi cabs and made some more money. I ran into him and he didn’t recognize me as much as I did for him back in the day getting him jobs, money, liquor and girls.” (That “running into Marty” upon further discussion turned out to have been thirty years later when he had seen Marty downtown after Lydia had fled and he was living in a broken down two-bit rooming house on Tappan Street and was “in his cups” after he had just finished up a six-month stretch for check-kiting in the county jail, Jesus, what a piece of work.).

Mercifully Jimmy Jakes’ came into view and to cut the conversation he asked Jason if he thought he would need help getting out of the car. He grumpily answered that he probably would need help, not a good sign, and in the case did so needing not only help getting out of the car, but Ben had to brace him up the three steps to the front door and then after being greeted by Helen the hostess and part-owner grabbed a booth close to the front door. Helen, an old flame, a heart-breaker, of Ben, Jason, Frankie and a couple of other corner boys who wouldn’t even come across with that Catholic chastity blow job to keep her virginity, said even thinking about doing that act then was nasty and would slap a guy in the face if he asked or tried to ease her face down to his groin to get her going, but still had guys, Ben, Jason, Frankie and that couple of other corner boys calling for dates and lying about what she did to them on those dates until one night in front of their high school hangout Frankie let the cat out of the bag and admitted she never did him, never did the nasty and everybody laughed and confessed their own failed tales. She thereafter sat by the midnight telephone whether reading her Bible or not nobody knew, or cared about. Whether she subsequently changed her mind, a lot of girls did for reasons other than chastity later, about doing those blow jobs her nobody knows since she got married out of high school had four kids and had been divorced a couple of times before becoming a part-owner after Jimmy Jakes passed away and his widow sold the place to Helen and her boyfriend. All those sex thoughts though about Helen now being beyond the pale since she too had not aged gracefully. )                           

“You know I like to use my Jet Blue American Express card whenever I can so I get points for flights since the points goes for that,” Ben said sitting in seat across the booth from Jason as they waited for the waitress to come and give them menus. Jason remarked “American Express, don’t leave home without it. You know Karl Malden made a fortune in the commercials off of saying that.” Ben tried to explain, fruitlessly tried to explain why he used American Express again, to no avail as Jason went on and on about what a lucky stiff Malden was to get that commercial that everybody would remember and that whoever had thought that long ago slogan up was pretty clever. Ben suffered through this monologue as he knew from previous experiences that saying he did not give a rat’s ass about the slogan, Karl Malden or anything else about American Express would only get him more jabbering talk (and a headache) so it was better to let it go, much better and wait for an opening to change the subject.  

Suddenly Jason switched up the subject out of the blue as happened a lot more at these luncheons and asked Ben whether he had heard that Carly Simon had disclosed who her famous song from the 1970s You’re So Vain was about. Ben answered that he had heard about it, had seen something about it on the Comcast homepage on his computer but did not know who the person was. “Was it James Taylor, Jack Nicholson somebody like that?” he asked out loud. “No, it was Warren Beatty,” chortled Jason adding “Old Warren got around.” “I suppose that is not surprising since he did seem to be a peacock in those days,” Ben said. Jason then mentioned that when he was married to Lydia in the 1970s he used to play the song every chance he got on various jukeboxes at joints Vera and he hung out at. Ben asked whether his ex-wife was vain and that was why they played it. “No, I was the vain one in those days, that’s what she said but we just liked the song really” Jason replied. Ben arched his eyebrows trying to picture the ravaged over-weight balding disheveled old man whom he just had to help slide into the booth seat across from him as some peacock worthy of such homage but failed to see it although like most things these days when the pair got together for an occasional lunch in their old growing up town he kept those thoughts to himself, let the past bury the past.

Then Ben asked if Warren Beatty was still alive and Jason said he thought so and added “He will have to wait until his sister tells him he can die.” Ben looked startled across the table and asked who Beatty’s sister was and why she had any say in the matter. “Oh Shirley McClain, the actress, you know she is into all this zodiac and New Age stuff.” “Oh” said Bart ready to leave the subject since he knew if he pursued the thing further he would get much more about McClain, about the New Age, about Beatty even than he had bargained for. Many conversations these days on both sides wound up like that Ben thought as the waitress came by with menus and asked if the pair wanted anything to drink. “Club Soda, no ice, no lemon and a glass of regular water, no ice, ” said Ben who had recently started drinking the club soda to help his stomach and help digest his food. Of course Jason as Jason had been doing since they first meet down at Johnny Slacks’ bowling alleys back in the early 1960s when Carver, the very town they were sitting in that moment was the cranberry capital of the world and the Finn-town section of town so called after all the Finnish people who worked the bogs , the “boggers” controlled the life, the political life of the town before the big industrial-sized operations took over and left the Finns as desperately poor as any other ethnic minority whose livelihood had been taken away chirped up, “Pepsi, ice please.”

The order taken they perused their respective menus looking for some light meal although  Ben knew once he made his own selection that would also be Jason’s although they had always liked different foods even when they hung out together but these days, the long days since Jason had a sense of what constituted proper meals since he had not been a restaurant regular for a long time before Ben came back on the scene Jason took Ben’s lead. And so it was, Chicken Marsala. Two orders. Easy for the waitress to remember Jason said snidely. Jason then looking away after stating his luncheon preference asked Ben if he remembered Hutchy, “You know Hutchy who caddied with us over at the Old Rochester Country Club, the guy who got me in good with the caddy-master, Kevin Walsh, and the pro, Dan Shea, whatever happened to him. Didn’t he graduate with our class.” Ben gave the obligatory “I don’t know” since he did not want to discuss anything to do with anything about that class reunion business and although he truly did not know the fate of Hutchy he did know that he had not graduated with the Class of 1964 since Jason had asked him that same question several times when he was interested in class reunions and had looked up Hutchy name William Hutchison and it had not been among the names in the yearbook.  

The food came, well prepared and savory as was, and is now. the case with Jimmy Jakes’ Dinner which is why fads may come and go but good solid if sometimes stolid food is why the Jimmy’s Dinner had survived through thick and thin. Then while eating Jason blurted out, “Remember Rick Phelan who lived over on Kendall Street who I used to hang with when I worked at Dunkin Donuts nights. He killed a guy, a big guy too, one night in a brawl and did some serious time for it.” Ben, getting slightly perturbed, but holding his tongue knowing this was going to be a tough day in the memory department just nodded and said that Phelan definitely had been a badass and let it go at that. Several more references to long gone don’t know where ghost riders from the past came Ben’s way, mainly those whom he did not know since these guys while they lived in the town were part of Jason’s subsequent career as a petty criminal and short end felon.        

After agreeing to have no dessert although Jimmy Jakes’ always had great pies a la mode and Ben grabbing the check, slipping the waitress his credit card and leaving a cash tip Ben once again although in reverse helped Jason out of the booth, out the Dinner door and into the car. As they rode the now long road back to Jason’s Jason suddenly asked Ben if he remembered Gabby Hayes, the old cowboy actor who played with Tom Mix in the old days. Ben suddenly realized after saying that he thought he remembered the old actor that Jason was adrift in the past even more he suspected, apparently nothing past about 1965. After handing off Jason to the nurse’s aide at the door of the assisted living home though Ben chirped out, “I’ll call you in a couple of weeks about next month’s dinner. Remember it will be your turn to pay.”