Jupiter
by Marina Rubin
He stood
on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland,
a young man of thirty or thirty-five, in this
town already middle-aged. He had a train of
earrings in his eyebrows, nostrils and lips, a
bushy beard, a shaved head and a rusted chain
around his neck that could have come from a
fighting dog, or someone's bicycle. A Gothic hobo.
He was holding a large cardboard sign, Shitty
Advice $1.
“Give
it to me," I said.
“Pay
up first," he grunted.
“Come
on, I just landed, I don't have any local
currency.”
“Where
did you come from?” he asked.
“New
York.”
“That's
still in America and they pay with dollars, too.”
“Oh
shucks,” I hissed, fumbling through my bag,
“here is a quarter for you and another
quarter, two dimes, one nickel, oh a marble. Will
that work?”
“Keep
looking,” he commanded.
I fished
out a handful of pennies and trickled them into
his palm.
“Alright,starlet,
what do you want to know? Will you be famous,
will you be rich, is there an Oscar in your
future?” he recited like Simon Says.
“Just
because I arrived in LA doesn’t make me some
actress-wanna-be. I am a writer.”
“Same
shit,” he chuckled rubbing clumpy sunscreen
on his face that looked like homemade oatmeal.
“What’s your question?”
“Oh,
you know,” I stared dreamily into the
distance. “This love thing…what the
hell?”
“Love?”
The way
he said love, rolling the ‘l’
and prolonging the ‘o’ like
a yawn, made it seem like I asked about some
mystical, out-of-this-world occurrence, Jupiter
descending upon us, traveling at a speed of a
million miles per second, a giant plate looming
over the horizon then splashing into some kid's
aquarium, as diminutive and smooth as a glass
marble.
“Love,
pfff.”
"Yes
love. Should I look for it?” I asked. “Make
it my God when I find it and carry it around like
a flag, or should I give it up completely, like
sugar?”
"Hmm,"
he tapped his forehead with his fingers as if he
was playing the piano.
“Well?”
I held my breath.
“Run
away with me…and become my street wife.”
“What?
That's terrible advice.”
He
shrugged his shoulders and pointed to his sign Shitty
Advice $1, a proud vendor on the street of
stars and handprints, a businessman who always
stands by the quality of his product.
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