CHAPTER 01 You’ll also find a table of contents below. And now without further ado here’s...
Dorian stood at the takeout window at the side of El Sombrero. The busy bartender finally came to take his order.
Dorian gave her a knowing little nod, a signal of their history together, the solidarity of years sharing the same street. "Yeah, three frozen lime, please."
The bartender shook her head. Dorian could feel their fraternity slipping.
"We don’t do that no more."
"Come on. I'm not one of these fucking interlopers. You know me. How long have I been coming here? I ain't police."
The bartender hesitated, squinting at him, then disappeared back towards the kitchen. He talked the talk. He was old school. While he waited Dorian surveyed the carousing droves milling about Ludlow. What used to be arguably the coolest neighborhood in Manhattan was now overrun with a plethora of dooshbagery: neocons, theocons, pluto-cons, grab-assing models, spending countless piles on booze and cocaine.
These days Dorian's fantasy life had narrowed to a thin scope of mental amusements. Of course there was always the imaginary pleasures of tightly cropped pubic regions between his sheets to do with as he pleased, or the envisioned gratification of finishing a painting (when had that last happened?), but what really colored his rainbow was the fantasy of unleashing a pack of mythological three-headed Cerberean dogs on lower Manhattan, guards of the infernal regions, able to kill with their breath and a dirty look, their teeth gnarling down Ludlow, ripping into the moneyed scumery cramming up his once beloved streets.
Maybe he should paint that.
The El Sombrero bartender shoved a trifecta of frozen green slushies through the window. He took a slurp, pleased to find his maw filled with sugary lime and cheap tequila. With or without the mythic beasties, he could always count on El Hat to lighten the late afternoon doldrums.
“thirty six dollars.”
“Are you fucking serious? It’s me.”
“To-go price.”
Dorian shelled forty, and waited for change.
Althea and her curly haired business partner, Dwyer, sat on the front bench outside their boutique garment shop, 'A&D Dress Co'.
Dwyer perked up when she saw Dorian walking up.
"Boozy desserts! Sweet."
Dorian had to close Althea's fingers in around her margarita.
"This supposed to be a peace offering?" Althea asked.
Dorian shrugged, he couldn't even fully remember the offense. He took a seat on the bench between them. Snatching a cigarette from Althea's pack, he lit up. He knew he was slipping, but he didn't care.
Dorian peered inside the shop, "How's biz?"
"The bitches want their dresses."
He liked Dwyer's style. Always had. Even the self-congratulatory note in her blasé report. He wondered if trying to get them both in the sack tonight would be too firm a twist of the knife for her already wounded counterpart. He let himself drift for a moment with the image of them ripping his pants off with their teeth in perfect synchronicity, and wondered what it was exactly that had made him gravitate to the one pretty girl over the other that first time he'd ducked his head into their shop five years before.
Dorian's beautiful erotic vision vanished as an intoxicated yuppy branched from his Saturday night crew and veered in their direction.
"Hey, can I buy a cigarette off you guys?"
The yuppie was trying for casual but only managing mild abrasiveness. Dorian greeted the stiff's handful of change with a huge phony grin, then took a slow, satisfying drag.
"Let me ask you something, friend," Dorian said, "If you walked out your front door every Friday night and found droves of guys dressed just like me crowding your picket fence, or picking fights with your doorman, would you sell me a cigarette?"
"What's your problem, pal?"
He wasn't trying for casual anymore.
"That I used to like my neighborhood," Dorian said.
Dwyer smirked. The yuppy shook his head and moved off to rejoin his crew, but not before yelling “FUCKING HIPSTER, FAGGOT!” back in Dorian's direction.
“There you go!” Dorian called right back after him. “Let your true colors shine bright!”
He was hit with a dense twinge of satisfaction, delighted to have forced the dooche's hand, eliciting the urban professional's shadowy inner truth within moments of making contact.
"You sure do know how to make new friends, hon," Althea said.
Dorian flashed her a devilish grin. She clearly hadn't meant it as a compliment, but he would take what he could get.
His levity was short lived though, as he spotted Morris walking past with a bag of takeout. Dorian sucked at his margarita, his eyes fixed on his neighbor.
"Isn't that your ogre below the floorboards?" Dwyer said, her eyes lighting up.
She loved it when he told tales of the man downstairs who slammed his broomstick into the ceiling at all hours. Who walked the streets with a box cutter. Who yelled anti-Semitic hate at the hoarder next door. The beast who tossed glasses of piss in his neighbor's faces unprovoked. But Dorian wasn't in the mood for story time.
"Look at that guy," Dwyer said, rubbernecking with what almost resembled a sexual charge. "I find him fascinating."
Dorian’s boner was gone for good now.
"He's all yours."
CHAPTER 02
CHAPTER 03
CHAPTER 04
CHAPTER 05
CHAPTER 06
CHAPTER 07
CHAPTER 08
CHAPTER 09
CHAPTER 10
UPDATE - LOOKING FORWARD: CHAPTER 11
BEHIND THE KEYBOARD
Territoriality. It’s something I’ve had issues with my whole adult life, and I’m sure as a child too. The novel as therapy likely dates back to handwritten parchment. Recently I’ve been trying to identify what my wants and needs are when they concern others, especially when it comes to issues of turf and territory. Dorian’s beloved neighborhood is a hill on which he’s willing to die, and introspection like a hand grenade.
I can relate to that, but as I’ve grown I’ve tried to soften.
Things change. It’s the deal.
And a little tequila helps.
A YASHICA 124-G medium format picture I took at the top of the Rivington Hotel... the new neighborhood taking over the old.
Yours In The Chain,
Doug Karr
SPECIAL THANKS to my wife @zenmommas for years of support during the writing process, @ericvancewalton for his trailblazing, inspired collaboration and incredible guidance, @andrarchy for his mind blowing insight and friendship, @bakerchristopher for being an inspiration as a human artist and bro, @complexring for his brilliance and enthusiasm, Masie Cochran, Taylor Rankin and @elenamoore for their skillful help in editing the manuscript, and to @opheliafu for the fantastic illustrations she created exclusively for the novel's launch on Steemit and to Elena Megalos for her wonderful character illustrations. I’d also like to thank Eddie Boyce, Jamie Proctor, Katie Mustard, Alan Cumming, Danai Gurira, Stephan Nowecki, Ron Simons, Dave Scott, Alden Karr, Missy Chimovitz, my dad Andy Karr and late mother Wendy, and everyone else who helped lead me to this moment.
I am a Brooklyn based writer, film & commercial director, and crypto-enthusiast, my projects include @HardFork-series an upcoming narrative crypto-noir and my novel Dwelling will soon be premiering exclusively on Steemit, and you can check out more of my work at dougkarr.com, piefacepictures.com, and www.imdb.com/name/nm1512347
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