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Richie joined the end of the line, and soon, like most of
the others ahead of him, he began to squirm, feeling uncomfortable,
his crotch itching as if he’d picked up a case of crabs along with
the camera. Ahead in line, a few others were even further gone than
Richie, hopping back and forth on their feet, smoking one cigarette
after another; some were even popping pills and swallowing them
dryly. Richie wished he had some codeine or
Valium to keep his jones at bay. Like some of the
ot hers in line, he hadn’t fixed since the
night before.
    After forty-five minutes or
so, it was finally his turn.
    “ Fif-teen dol-lars,”
announced the heavyset Russian in the wire cage after examining the
Fujiko and looking up with his steely grey eyes.
    “ Ah, man,” Richie
complained, his heart sinking, but he knew it was no use arguing.
The Russian never negotiated with his early customers. He’d just shrug when one
indignantly demanded more money, push the item back, and gesture
for the next one in line to bypass the disgruntled customer. Richie
snatched up the receipt and money, hustling out of the pawnshop
past half a dozen people still in line. Some of them looked pretty
strung out.
    On the sidewalk, Richie bit
the knuckle of his right forefinger, thinking hard. He still needed
ten bucks to score a quarter gram of Mexican Tar.
    “ Yeah!” he shouted to
himself, remembering the fake Muni fast passes Rudy Sanchez had
given him the previous weekend. Rudy, Richie’s boyhood friend who
worked in a print shop on Castro, always had some scheme for
turning a quick buck and usually included Richie in his plots.
Right after high school, Richie had taken a fall when a Sanchez
scheme turned sour, getting himself ninety days but not ratting out
on his friend. During the ten years since, Rudy had often
demonstrated his gratitude.
    Richie dug out his wallet,
unwrapping the cellophane from the ten fast passes. He’d sell two,
and he’d be in business. Grinning, he took off for Market Street,
deciding on the stop at Tenth.
    On the Muni Island, he
looked over the four people standing on the median, waiting for a
bus. Richie decided to hit up the guy in the plaid sport jacket
reading the green section of the Chronicle. Just before he flashed
the phony pass, Richie saw a cop waiting to cross Market, looking
in their direction. He decided to move back a stop uptown before
trying to make a sale.
    Richie hit up a dozen or so
people before he finally sold two passes. Guess I gotta work on my sales technique, he told himself, shrugging off the lack of immediate success
as he headed north.
    By the time he reached the
Cajun’s flat off Eddy and Jones in the Tenderloin, Richie was still
in pretty good shape. His nose was running a little and he felt the
hint of a cramp in the pit of his stomach, but he would be okay
after he did some business with his connection.
    No one answered the knock
at the second floor door. Strange. The Cajun was always home, or
his lady, Sweet Jane, was—even holidays. They were both carrying
major joneses and needed to take regular care of a large number of
customers daily to feed their own habits. But even though he was a
heavy user, the Cajun was a good connection; he always gave fair weight, and he and Sweet Jane
never cut the tar. Not like those dope fiend assholes over on
Sixteenth who worked the street, selling four balloons for one free
one from their connections. Those balloons never weighed out to a quarter gram,
and were sometimes cut with who knew what. You always had to be
alert that you were actually getting good shit and not being ripped
off. Besides the hassle, it was really easy to get busted doing
business out on the street.
    No, Richie knew he was
lucky to have the Cajun for a safe connection.
    He waited, sitting on the
top step of the landing, noticing the faint but unmistakable odor
of urine in the hallway, and getting edgier and edgier as the
afternoon waned. Funny no one else had shown up to score