Waking Up

4 - Evicted

It's been seven days now. 

Blackie licks my hand as we both sit at the edge of the bridge's upper level deck gazing out towards the Jersey side of the river. The temperature dropped considerably the last two nights. I had to pull off shirts from a few corpses to keep me warm. That van at the end of the top level of the bridge had bags of kids clothing that I tore through to get the dogs some makeshift sweaters. 

Blackie burrows his wet nose in my stomach. "Alright, Blackie, but I'm not feeling too happy at the moment." I stroke his head and back several times. He lets out a hard breath through his nose when I stop, and leans his head against his ear on my lap. 

I thought there'd be some sign of life by now. A plane. A boat. People. Something. I thought, that by staying in one place, help would come and find me.  I lit a large canister on fire, with enough garbage inside to keep it burning for hours. If anyone was looking these past two nights, they would have seen my fire on the bridge.  

The clouds have mercifully parted this morning, revealing a fall sun that warms my face. 

The sun...

I haven't seen the sun in days, and, although I've seen it a ton of times in my life, I've never seen it so... so... majestic as it seems today. The sun's heat feels like a long-time distant friend giving me a warm hug. My cheeks feel as if they are tanning. It's warm enough to jump in a pool.

I look down upon my dirty shirt and then I stand up abruptly. Blackie barks at me. With an itch of fear that the weather will drastically change at any moment, I run to the base of an upper deck ramp and head down towards the street level. The sun's rays feel warm against my shirt, and, somehow, the stench of not showering for days and laying down with dogs hits my nostrils. It's as if the sun is telling me I should rinse it today, now, while it's warm, before it gets unbearable. 

With the dogs at my side, we find a dip in the mounds of building rubble where a brilliant red fire hydrant shines in its gray background. I can almost hear sopranos and altos, somewhere, singing "Hallelujah!".

From my backpack, which I took from one of the cars on the bridge, which I have been filling with anything I find that might come in handy, I pull out a large wrench with rubber handles. That PSE&G truck we found on the bridge was a pot of gold.

When water spurts out of the hydrant's spout, the dogs go nuts. Blackie jumps right in front of the water, spins a few times before hopping out of the spray's trajectory. He barks, as if telling Brownie and Goldie it's their turn. The other two jump in and out of the small pool already collecting in front of the hydrant, barking and splashing, rolling on their backs and then bouncing back to their feet. 

I can't help but smile. They look like little children splashing about in a wading pool. They look like Luke did in the video Marissa took when they went to Florida to visit her mother when he was only 18 months old. He was fascinated by his grandmother's blow-up pool, with the fish pictures drawn into the plastic shell in such a way as to make the pool seem full of colorful, exotic fish. In the video, he'd jump in, see a fish move, and then jump out of the pool and scramble away onto the grassy part of his grandmother's backyard. Giggling, pointing, and babbling something about the fish, he'd tiptoe back to the pool and jump back in. Each and every jump was an exciting moment. 

I can't even remember the business trip I was on. Thank goodness Marissa took that video. Thank goodness Marissa took all of Luke's videos.

After giving my clothes a good rub down, I wring them as dry as possible and we start heading back up the ramp. The temperature has risen considerably, and I hang my shirt over a pile of mangled car parts and I sit down on the ground, bare chested, and lean back against the pile, welcoming the sun's warmth onto my body. The dogs lay next to me, and soon we all fall asleep under the fall sun.

An hour or so later, I wake up to a burning sensation on the top of my head. The sun had scorched down upon the ridiculously tender skin of my bald spot. When it appeared a few years ago, Marissa started putting sunscreen on my head every morning before work. I hate creams, anything with a fragrance, and anything that would leave a greasy feel on my skin. She would sneak up behind me as I read the news while drinking my morning coffee and she would rub that sandy-scented lotion into my bald spot. 

We'd argue sometimes, but after a few months of struggling, I just let her do it and then rub off the cream on my drive to work. Her obsession with my bald spot annoyed me. I never understood it. 

Until now. My scalp is on fire from the blaring sun. I take my damp shirt and whip it around my head like a turban. 

Blackie cocks her head at me and barks. 

"What? It's hot. What do you want me to do?"

She barks again. Brownie and Goldie bark with her, wagging their tails, all three facing in my direction. 

"What's the matter with you guys?" 

As if a switch was flipped, the three of them bark violently at something behind me. Their menacing growls produce goose bumps all over my body. When I turn around to see what is making them react in such a way, I see a white polar bear at the top of the ramp looking down at us. 

"Holy shit!" I shout. The dogs pause for a second and resume their battle cry. "Are polar bears carnivorous? Of course not. They eat fish, right? They don't eat people, right? What do I do? Climb up a tree? A tree? Here in the city? What the fuck is a polar bear doing in the city?"

The dogs jerk forward inch by inch, their symphony growing more vicious with each step. The polar bear takes a step back and releases a low-pitched roar, as if it's trying to communicate with us instead of scare us. The dogs keep pressing up the ramp, pouncing back and fourth, baring their teeth like savages about to attack. The polar bear takes a few more steps backwards, and soon turns around and heads towards our camp on the lower deck. 

Blackie, Brownie and Goldie whine, lick their lips, and turn back to face me. They sit at the base of my feet and look up to me with begging eyes, checking over their shoulders every few seconds. I rub their heads and stoke their backs while my heart rate returns to a normal pace. 

"You did good, boys. You did real good. It was time for us to get out of here anyway. It doesn't seem anyone is coming for us." I bend down and hold Blackie's head in both my hands. "How about we head north? Tapenzee bridge?"

He whines first, and then barks, wagging his tail. I rub his head.

"Alright, let's go."

I head north along the Henry Hudson Parkway with the trio following my lead. Blackie is at my side and Brownie and Goldie flanking us. I've got to keep my eyes and ears alert for other animals from the Bronx Zoo, and trust the triumvirate when something catches their attention. 

If we're lucky, the polar bear is the zoo's only survivor.