SERIES:
PART: 1 of 5
RATING: PG (Adult thematic material)
PAIRING(s): LK/LDF; Past LDF/CR; SF/WM
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CATEGORY: Romance/Drama
FEEDBACK: PLEASE?!
SETTING IN TIMELINE: Alternate post-show canon.
SPOILLER/SUMMARY: Lenny moves to
NOTES: A spin-off of adrabble
started for Bethy’s Fingertips challenge.
****
The wedding picture is stained with pink frosting and grease
but it stands proudly between the tv
and a plaster Virgin Mary, a centerpiece in Lenny Kosnowski's
bedroom.
This picture's not much to look at - looking at it while
walking quickly away causes the faces of the captured to blur into chalky
blobs. Two years of moving and
examination were not kind to such cheap photo stock. Now, you have to kneel on the floor and
squint through the smeared photo glass or carry it into the light to
distinguish each feature on these blurry heads.
Lenny's never needed to do that - he knows them all by heart.
On the extreme right is Frank DeFazio - may
he rest in peace - staring darkly into the middle distance, his hand closed
around the arm of his ex-wife, Edna Babbish. Edna's smile is photogenic but rehearsed -
her right hand rests on the expanded waist of Shirley Meeney. Shirley's dark-ringed eyes speak of a red-eye
flight from
The scene sits on a dictionary, framed in sterling silver -
an engraved wedding favor imprinted with cherubs and butterflies and the
scrolled words "Andrew and Rhonda:
10-12-69".
Three years have passed since he's seen them all - so the calendar
says. Lenny doesn't feel three years
older than the mugging fool in the picture - until he remembers the way he
left. Then the old ache of loneliness
opens up.
Oh, they write to each other - he receives postcards from
Laverne crammed to the margins with her unintelligible handwriting once a
week. And Squiggy
calls every weekend between shows with increasingly outrageous and unbelievable
stories. But it's not the same as
bursting through the door of the girl's apartment, meeting Carmine for poker at
Vinny's, or even rolling out of his bunk and
accidentally -he swears it was an accident - stepping onto his roommate’s
head. It amazes Lenny to remember
driving cross-country with the girls.
Would they do that for one another now?
Would they sacrifice so happily?
Or would they do what they're doing now - move away and keep a polite,
unsocial distance?
It hasn't always been this way. No, for years his life was a happy adventure
- grounded in the security of Squiggy and the
girls. Even moving across the country
and changing professions hadn't changed life much - the girls still couldn't
get decent dates. The boys kept banging
through their unlocked front door. Life
went on as it always did. Then the world
turned upside down with such swiftness that Lenny could find no comfort, no constant - not when they
were being taken away almost daily.
Shirley married, become pregnant, and moved overseas in two months'
time. Laverne had changed jobs and
brought home Chuck, an irritating character with strange quirks and manner that
made Lenny think he had been badly photocopied from Squiggy. Then Edna had left Frank, and Frank ran for
and won a seat on the
Lenny handled those transitions with cool grace - he had
always assumed Shirley would marry first, had a feeling that Edna never really
liked any of them, knew Carmine would never make it in LA without lifts, and
Laverne's new job meant she had nicer stuff to mooch. It was, then, like a fist in his face when he
arrived home from a round of pool at Dusty's Bar to
find a sock on his door. Squiggy's
moth-eaten sock.
Which stank of Rhonda's perfume.
In one night, Lenny's ground had shifted violently. Rhonda and Squiggy
became an exclusive, hot and heavy item within a matter of days - since Rhonda
was leaving
Within it a small diamond glittered. Squiggy then told
his roommate that he knew Lenny would take a good care of the business, and it
was too bad that he couldn't come to
Lenny went into immediate denial as an enthralled Rhonda
accepted the tiny diamond and wedding plans kicked into gear around him. Squiggy fell in
love every day of the week, and none of those girls had lasted more than a
day. What was so special about Rhonda?
For old time's sake, the entire gang had gathered at
A numbing, lonely month later, Lenny found himself driving
down the Ventura highway, trying to sell a truckload of unwanted ice cream
before his supplier cut Squignowski's off. Squiggy had sent
along a bit of money every week from what Rhonda was making, but it wasn't
enough to ward off a dip in business brought on by a cold freeze. As Lenny approached his designated off ramp,
something that day - divine providence or sheer disgust - kept him from turning
off. Instead he stayed on the highway,
surviving on Nutty Buddies and Drumsticks, pausing only to sleep and fill his
tank. He found himself broke in Boston
and that, he supposed, was as good a city as any to start over again.
Lenny lived out of the truck for awhile - then, tired of
being harassed, he took a bed in a youth hostel. He gave himself a week to find a job and,
with a will he never knew he possessed, found one in two days - with the Samuel
Adams Brewing Company. Thankfully, his
trucking license hadn't expired in five years, and they needed someone to take
the five-to-nine shift. He found a
one-room apartment in Roxbury, situated into a neighborhood that was so
dangerous and seedy that he started sleeping on park benches to avoid coming
'home'. After a shooting in the
neighboring apartment, Lenny broke his lease and the landlord took it out on
his deposit. Lenny slept in his truck
for a week, barely eating, waiting for his next paycheck.
For a month, he lived with a folk musician named Darnell M'Tabu, and jammed with his way into the young man's
band. This is a semi-permanently gig -
together they landed a weekday slot at a
When Darnell found a girlfriend, Lenny moved in with a girl
named Chance. A tall redhead in cut-offs
and a bikini top, Chance seemed to have friends all over the Back Bay - all of
whom she knew on an intimate basis.
Being around her was painfully reminiscent of his past - of
Laverne. When she kicked him out in
favor of a girlfriend's company, he considered it a blessing. None of the band's other members wanted him
on their couches, and his small salary from Sam Adams wasn't enough to make
rent an apartment in any but the most dangerous of neighborhoods.
Left homeless in a brutally cold October, Lenny reluctantly
took a cot at the YMCA. He felt
groundless, without center - in his Boston half-year, Lenny had moved so many
times that he kept a post office box instead of a permanent address. Wind, the band's drummer, finally got sick of
his hangdog look at practice and showed Lenny an article he'd clipped from the
Boston Pheonix's classified section. After trying several prospective places, he
took up residency in what he hoped would be a permanent place - a sixth-floor
four-room apartment in the theatre district, living with a drag queen named
Cinnamon Toast.
Lenny hadn't known that Cinnamon was a guy living as a girl
until he met Winifred Rain, Cinnamon's girlfriend. At first, he assumed they were lesbians -
which would explain why Cinnamon had responded with amusement but not disgust
at Lenny's occasional off-color jokes or references to past girlfriends. When Winifred asked 'Myron' to pass the pork chops over
dinner, Lenny looked over his shoulder in search of a phantom companion. When he turned around, Cinnamon was laughing.
"Guess the cat's out of the bag."
Lenny had been somewhat astonished, but overcame his own
sensitivity with aplomb - Cinnamon had been very nice to him, a courteous,
sympathetic roommate, and if he wanted to be a girl who was Lenny to say he
shouldn't?
When Lenny explained to Squiggy
that he was living with a drag queen, Squiggy
instantly asked his friend if he had turned 'fruity or somethin'.' Lenny had to explain patiently that Cinnamon
was a nice gal who had a girlfriend, and she was absolutely not attracted to
Lenny.
Then Squiggy asked for Poloroids.
Cinnamon is an artist - or she wants to be. She sings nightly at a club named Eros Pique
and auditions with minor theatre troops during the day - her odd hours are
somewhat disturbing, but she never fails to bring her half of the rent and
utilities and behave pleasantly around Lenny.
He's impressed with her drive - outside of his furtive notebook scribbling
and playing covers with Mystic Fudgecake, he hasn't
written anything in a long, long time.
He spends his days driving from Jamaica Plain to midtown and back again,
delivering Sam Adams to pubs and restaurants.
There isn't enough time to write.
There's barely time to pray.
But Lenny can't complain about his life - he has friends, a
decent job, a nice apartment. For what he doesn’t - can't - have, he tries
to soldier along without.
Leaving the frame on his TV, he tunes the guitar up a
step. Darnell gave him sheet music after
rehearsal the week before- songs to learn for the next gig. It's already past
"Lenny? Lenny, honey!"
Cinnamon's trilling voice disturbs his transitional
chord. "Yeah?"
"There's someone for you at the door."
He groans. "If
it's Darnell, tell him I'm not even done learnin' the
first one."
"No - it's a girl."
Lenny's hand falls limp against the strings - he wracks his
mind, trying to remember who he gave his address to, and when, but the faces
dancing before his eyes are neither feminine nor kind. He unstraps his
guitar and leaves the bedroom - when he catches his face in the hall mirror he
notices he's five pounds thinner, his hair is longer, and there's life in his
eyes. Lenny tugs at his stained white
tunic and tries to make his sloppy bowl cut look more presentable.
"She's a very nice girl, Lenny - better get here before
I scoop her up!" Cinnamon calls.
Lenny enters the room laughing. "Aww, Cin - " He trails off, his
sluggish blood speeding to a heated thud, his jaw falling open.
Cinnamon retrieves her coffee mug from their high board,
humor in her green eyes. She saunters
back to her room, the feathers stapled onto her robe vibrating below Lenny's
frame of vision. She winks at Lenny as
she passes. "Close your mouth, hon - the flies'll get in."
The face in the hallway is haunted - thinner. Her face is tan, her lips are white, her
green eyes never sharper. And while he's
watching her, she's watching Cinnamon.
"Who was that?"
His voice buckles from the effort of keeping himself
together. "Laverne - how'd you find
me?"
"The question is," Laverne DeFazio said, crossing
the threshold. "Where the hell've YOU been?"
Her eyes glittered with unshed tears.
"Where did you go, Len? I
needed you."