Ode to the Starving Artists

            by Rebecca Lee

 

Daniel deleted the whole line he had typed minutes before on his outdated iBook.  He sat for a while staring blankly at the simple white document until the kettle began to whistle in the kitchen, breaking his trance.  He rose slowly and made his way over to the stove to stop the obnoxious sound. 

            Daniel made himself a cup of tea, placing three measured teaspoons of brown sugar in the white mug before pouring in the water and finally adding the bag. 

            The few people that knew Daniel wondered how he managed to afford his apartment on the Upper West Side with no work and no further progress on his novel.  The truth was that he didn’t.  The woman who owned the brownstone building he lived in had been in his situation once and let him stay mostly out of pity.  Still, he didn’t appreciate her generosity enough to get off his lazy ass and try to make something of himself.

            As he sat down to stare at the blank document once again, he noticed a small speck of dust next to the computer.  His compulsive tendencies would normally have driven him to clean the whole desk but this time he forced himself to stare at the tiny gray particle.  In his sleep-deprived state, the dust began to separate and spin.  Dust he typed into his blank document.  In search of further inspiration, he rolled a joint making sure to use the beautiful green herb sparingly because he was, once again, completely out of money.  Daniel took a long, slow hit.  He pushed the smoke deep into his lungs for maximum retention.

            No further inspiration came from his high state and he debated rolling another joint but decided against it.  “Shit,” he whispered as he closed his laptop.  He got up slowly and made his way over to the bed.  Daniel noticed the stench on his white sheets as he got in.  Maybe it’s laundry time.  When was my last shower?  What day is it?  How long has it been since I left this room?  Shit.  How should I know?  He stared at the red numbers on his digital alarm clock.  3:45.  Am or Pm?  He kept his curtains shut tight at all times, allowing no natural light to enter the room.  It doesn’t really matter.  He lay silently, wrapped tightly in his smelly sheets, staring at the clock.  3:47, 4:18, 6:21, 8:42.

Daniel was a self-diagnosed insomniac.  In reality he was capable of sleeping well but subconsciously, or consciously, he felt the need to be troubled in order to become a brilliant writer.  He stared at the clock whenever he felt it was time for him to pretend to try to sleep and during the hours he deemed time to be awake he functioned minimally and solely on the caffeine from black tea—coffee had never agreed with his bowels.

 

***

 

It was exactly three years after Daniel had made his New Year’s resolution to write a novel that Phoebe, the landlady, stopped by to inform him that she wanted to see some rent because she had, after all, given him years to “get his shit together.”

“How should I do that?” he asked.  “I have no money.”

“Make some.”  She turned and walked briskly down the stairs leaving Daniel standing alone in the doorway.

He glanced at his alarm clock.  4:08.  Pm, he decided; nobody would have come at the other ungodly hour.  His marijuana stash was running low but he didn’t care to use it sparingly; he had no energy to worry about that.

He sat down on his bed with a generous joint and lit up.  Shit.  Daniel had never in his life had a steady job; rather he had several small ones, most of which were somewhat unethical.  His specialty was writing essays—the long, boring ones teachers assigned and expected their students to complete.  Teenagers on the Upper West Side had no time for papers between parties but they did have enough money to get other people to write them for them.  His last job had been in November when a girl had paid him three hundred and forty dollars to write three essays to be sent in seven different college applications.  He had immediately spent two hundred and thirteen dollars on canned food, black tea, and brown sugar.  The remaining one hundred and twenty seven dollars he spent little by little on weed to get him through his days and nights.  The new semester was about to start.  Surely there would be assignments for him to complete.

Weeks later no “business” had come.  Phoebe dropped in daily asking for the rent.

“I’m working on it,” was Daniel’s usual response.  The truth was that he wasn’t.  He had no intention of trying to find other work and he had given up on writing his novel. 

 

***

           

In the beginning of March, Daniel received an eviction notice.  Is she serious?  She wouldn’t.  Would she?  Phoebe was getting older and living expenses were getting higher.  She needed the rent money.  Daniel was going to have to either find charity elsewhere or get a job.  He had two weeks to make up his mind.  Real work would be difficult but living on the streets was only slightly worse.  They were dirty.  He didn’t like dirt or mess.

 

***

 

            Daniel squinted at the sunlight as he stepped out of the brownstone building for the first time since the end of January.  The last time he had seen natural light was even before that.  He had forgotten how bright it was during the day.  He walked hesitantly to Broadway in search of a job opening even though he hadn’t picked employment over the streets yet.

            He had never really appreciated the wonders of the city because he had been too busy being forcibly depressed.  Certain people walked around quickly and entirely in black.  They were the professionals who always had somewhere to go and something to do; the people that could never take breaks.  This is what my parents wanted me to become? 

            Daniel walked down Broadway and then continued on Amsterdam Avenue until Fifty-first Street where the caffeine began to wear off.  He searched his pockets for money to see if he could go into the little café he noticed on the corner across the street only to find three dollars in an assortment of coins.  I can get something small.  It’s better than nothing.  Right?

            The room was small and there were round tables evenly spaced in front of beautiful wooden benches under a full wall of windows.  On the opposite side there was a bar over which was a shelf that contained the largest assortment of teas and coffees Daniel had ever seen.  He made his way over to one of the high, three-legged bar stools and stared at all the different types of caffeine he had to choose from.  In the end, he settled for his normal English Breakfast tea—he decided not to be in an experimental mood.  It was the best cup of tea he had ever had.  When he was done he pulled out his pile of coins and began to count out money on the counter.

            “Tough times?” the cashier asked.

            “Maybe,” he responded.

            “It’s the way everybody is in this city.  I was once a starving actor trying to get my big break.  It never happened.  I ended up opening my own café in the Village and then this one a couple of years ago.  What do you do?”

            That was a question Daniel didn’t really know how to answer.  He didn’t do anything.  “I was supposed to be a lawyer.”

            “What happened?”

            “I didn’t want to be.  My parents were so delighted when I told them I was going to be a writer instead that they cut me off completely.  I had to drop out of college in the middle of my sophomore year.  I came here for a fresh start but five years later I know that I had had the same high hopes that everybody has when the migrate here.  I always try to blame my parents—insisting that I would’ve been a brilliant author with a little more education.  I could have gotten the education if I had really tried but I couldn’t work and the novel I had planned on writing is still just a blank document.”  The only time Daniel had ever told anybody that story had been first time Phoebe had threatened to evict him.  Who was this stranger he had just told his life to?

            “You’re not the only one.”  The man seemed to genuinely care about Daniel and what he had to say.  It was unbelievable.  “I’m Tom, by the way,” he added, extending an unusually clean hand.

            Daniel reached out hesitantly.  He had not touched another person in years.  “Daniel.”  He shook Tom’s hand.

            “You work?”  Tom asked.

            “Not officially.”

            “You looking?”

            “I don’t know yet.”

            “Well you’re welcome here.  All my waiters are like you—still trying to find their ways in the creative world with no money and nobody else to help them out.”

            “That’s good to know.  Thank you.”  He continued counting out his coins.

            “Don’t worry about the bill.  You need the money more than I do.  It’s on the house.”

            “That’s kind.  Thanks again.”

 

***

 

It was around eight when Daniel returned to his apartment.  He opened up a can of beans, poured the contents into a bowl, and set the microwave for three minutes.  I don’t want a job.  Working defeated the purpose of being a writer.  He was supposed to write not do common work. 

This Tom character was intriguing.  It could have been that Daniel had been so far from human communication for so many years.  Or it could have really been something about him.  Whatever it was, it was genius.

            Daniel was restless that night.  He couldn’t even force himself to lie in bed and stare at the small red numbers that had gotten him through many nights in the past.  His mind raced with thoughts of newfound creativity.  He wanted to write, type endlessly into the keyboard but every time he got near his closed iBook he turned away from it and found other ways to pass the time.  In the past three hours he had made himself four cups of tea, changed his bed sheets once, and showered twice.  He was running out of excuses not to write except for his underlying fear that nothing would come to him the second he sat down to do so.

            After he had postponed the writing for long enough, Daniel slowly made his way over to his desk and opened his laptop.  After a few seconds, the screen lit up—revealing the blank document that had haunted him for years.  His instincts told him to get up and clean, run, cook, do anything but what he was about to do.  Still, but he forced himself to sit there for a long while staring at the white page and imagining the words that could be there.  When he gathered up his strength, Daniel lifted his hands and placed his fingers delicately on the keyboard.  They typed slowly, one letter at a time, but as Daniel’s thoughts raced, they did the same to keep up with him.  Half a page, four pages, six, nine, ten, twenty-four pages.  The words were pouring from his mind to his fingertips and landing on the computer screen.

            Hours were going by but neither his hands nor his mind were growing weak.  At 7:52 AM, the writing stopped.  Daniel saved his document, closed the computer, and got up from his desk to make himself some tea.  His novel was far from finished but he had to pay a visit to Tom for more research before he could continue.