86'd: A Novel - By Dan Fante Page 0,8

you to meet Francisco, my lover. He’s from Guatemala. Say hola, Francisco.”

There was the kid across the room waving shyly and mouthing the word “hi,” now with his shirt on. About twenty-five. Black hair combed straight back and copper skin with the miniature body of a gymnast. Nice even teeth too.

But, as promised, I went to AA. My first meeting the next day was at a place called Architects of Adversity in West Hollywood. I looked it up on Google.

Five minutes into the deal while the leader is reading from the meeting format, two guys started screaming at each other. Guy #1 was mad. He appeared to be about eighteen minutes off crack and the leader made the mistake of read something about God in the format. #1 stood up and stopped the leader to protest.

Then Guy #2 told Guy #1 that if he didn’t like what he was hearing then he should find another meeting. So naturally now Guy #1 loses it. He picks up his folding chair and begins screaming fuck this and fuck that and knocks his coffee cup over on the table soaking some woman’s purse. Turns out this is her best I. Magnin purse or some shit and now she’s pissed too because of the coffee stain.

Enough was enough. I decided to leave.

Outside, in front of the meeting hall, there’s a guy just lighting up a cigarette. He’s wearing a wool cap and a heavy black suede coat in the eighty-degree heat. I asked him for a light.

“That was pretty crazy in there,” I said. “Are all the meetings around here like this one?”

“Whatever, man. It’s cool with me,” he says back. “I’m just here to get my card signed.”

“So,” I ask, “what do you do when it gets like that? How do you handle it?”

The question amuses him. “Timing is the key,” he snickers. “I do the same thing every day. I come out here and smoke right after they read chapter five at the beginning. Then the speaker starts. I wait about half an hour and when I hear people clapping I know he’s done. I go back in. Then, after they sign the court cards and pass them out, I’m gone.”

“You don’t stay to hear what’s going on?”

“Yo, sixteen more meetings and I’m done. Free. My AA sentence is completed.”

“Okay. But what if someone like me shows up and doesn’t like what’s going on in the meeting?”

The guy scratched the top of his cap with the shiny end of his Bic lighter. “The key is, do you have a court card?”

“No. I’m just here.”

“Whoa! Don’t waste your time, bro. If I were you I’d go to the movies. Higher Power this and Higher Power that. It’s a group therapy circle jerk with Jesus in the middle.”

“C’mon, really?”

“No shit, dude. I’ve been to a hundred meetings. It’s always the same. Nothing changes. Go to therapy or whatever but don’t waste your time here. I promise you.”

I tried one more meeting the next day. It wasn’t any better. I decided the guy was right. I took his advice. Every morning after that at eleven o’clock I’d tell David Koffman I was going to a meeting. I didn’t say that the meeting was being held at one of the local movie theaters or a bookstore or at a Starbucks.

four

It took three full carloads in my Pontiac to get my books and my computer and TV and boxed-up belongings from Uncle Bill’s house on Twenty-seventh Place in Venice to Dav-Ko’s new home on Selma Avenue in Hollywood. But I’d gone the entire day without a pill or a drink. Not easy because as it turned out eighty-year-old Uncle-fuckin’-Bill had a curveball to throw my way.

I was passing the living room hauling a heavy box of books out to my car on my shoulder when Uncle Bill clicked the sound down on his TV remote and stopped me by using a cop-like hand signal. He motioned for me to set my box down. “Step in here for half a second, will ya, busta?” he hissed. I set the box down.

Uncle Bill is a fat, wrinkled old shit with an arthritic back. Uncle Bill has elected to spend his golden years in a filthy, battered recliner watching cop show reruns. And judging from his odor, apparently the use of soap and water is an alien idea to Uncle Bill.

So I waited and watched while he finished chewing his last bite of Pop-Tart and wiped his mouth with a