Talk is Cheap

morning was warm and sunny with the promise of spring, and the street bustled with the activity of happy prople free of the shackles of winter. It was so warm, I considered leaving my jacket at home. But the main reason I even wear a jacket these days is because of the extra pockets in it. With my pants pockets and my shirt pocket, I have five main pockets, but I usually have those pockets full with one thing or another, so my jacket provides a wealth of places to put things, and I hate to go anywhere without it.
Some of my friends call me Pockets, which is better than being called Bag, which is what they call Martha, the little , old lady who used to manage my building back in the days when it was a hotel--because she lugs around a large, black bag that is practically bigger than she is. No one really knows what she carries in it, but I once saw her take a flask out of it and surreptitiously take a slug from it in the parking lot of Pizza Hut. Martha sometimes walks into street lamps, and I have a fairly good idea it's not because her bifocals need to be cleaned.
I put my hands in my jacket pockets and headed down the street toward Starbuck's. Not that I can afford Starbuck's, but the aroma of Starbuck's coffee is enough to give me a pleasant, caffeine buzz for a better part of the day. I stepped into Coney Island to see if any of the gang was there--we generally all gather on the flowerbeds out front, but it still isn't as warm out as it looks, so sometimes some of us fill a booth or sit at the counter in Coney Island, hungrily sniffing the delicious smell of gyros and Coney Island chili. I didn't see any of the regulars, so I checked myself and pushed back out through the door to the street.
Whump! I looked to see someone staggering backward on the sidewalk with a look of befuddlement on their face. It was Martha. She had walked into the door. I hurried outside to make sure she was all right. "Martha!" I cried, "I'm so sorry! I wasn't paying any attention! Are you okay?"
"That's a lousy place to put a door!" Martha said in annoyance. She hoisted her bag up and peered anxiously inside it. "Oh, Good. Everything's all right. I'm fine--" Her eyes widened and she clapped a pale, bony hand over her mouth. I frowned, puzzled, and she reached into her bag and extracted a fistful of pennies, which she extended toward me. Then I understood what she was doing.
"It's all right, Martha. My fault, don't worry about it."
She smiled that crooked smile of hers, a thin crease of bright red lipstick, and proffered one penney."No, no," she said plaintively. "At least a penny for your thoughts, you silly man!" I sighed and took the penney, thanking her. We both glanced about to see if there were any officers nearby who might have witnessed our exchange. One was coming out of the European Bakery, but he was absorbed with the contents of a white sack he was carrying. Martha smiled and waved, careful not to say anything, and the officer nearly dropped a powdered donut he had extracted from the sack. He held it in his mouth long enough to wave back, then turned on his heel and strode down the street toward Pizza Hut.
I nodded at Martha and started away toward Starbuck's again. I don't care for the monetary restrictions imposed by the government,
but the police are not derelict in their duties and Martha and I were lucky no other officers had been patrolling in that area just then. I still don't know how these absurd financial laws were legislated in the first place, whether it was a religious thing, or political, or whatever, but you can't fight city hall, as they used to say.
When I was a kid, people could say hi and talk about the weather or anything they wanted, without worrying about whether they were wasting anyone's time. I no sooner had that thought when my eye caught that big sign up by the Y.M.C.A., the one that reads, TIME IS MONEY. A sign just across the street from that one said, SILENCE IS GOLDEN. They had us coming or going. I frowned and sat down on the bench on the corner by Holiday Inn downtown. A man huddled on the other end of the bench was smoking a cigarette and the smoke wafted my way and made my mouth water. I sized him up, caught his eye and asked if he could spare a smoke. He scowled and withdrew a battered package of Pall Malls from his shirt pocket and shook one out and handed it to me.
"Thanks."I said,"You got a light?"
He handed me a grubby looking book of matches and said,"If you're going to keep talking to me, it's going to cost you a nickel."
"Sorry," I mumbled, lighting my cigarette and handing the matches back to him. He waved his hand as if he were shooing a fly.Just then I saw Valerie standing at the bus stop just up the street. A pretty girl, with shoulder length, blond hair, she looked terrific in a brown-and-yellow blouse and skirt outfit. Not for the first time, I noticed what great legs she had. I jumped up and hurried over to her, fishing in my pocket for spare change. "Hi, Valerie!"I said, handing her a dime I found. She almost snatched it from me,then shook her hair back and smiled, "Hello, Todd."
A pretty girl like Valerie, with my name on her lips, was worth a dime, I thought. "Say, Valerie,I was wondering if I could have your phone number?"
She looked startled, and then giggled. "I'm worth $500 on the open market, you D.a.d.!"
D.a.d. meant 'dime-a-dozen' on the street. This was not going well.
"Come on, Val. It's not like I'm proposing or anything!. I just thought we could chat on the phone sometime."
"You couldn't afford it," Val said matter-of-factly.
"I've got a dollar," I protested. "They haven't raised the phone rates again, have they?"
"No," she laughed. "I meant my phone number. It's going for twenty bucks this week."
I was speechless. "Heck," I replied sourly, "I can talk to that guy on the bench back there for a nickel!"
"All right," she pouted. She reached into her purse and rummaged about for a minute, found what she wanted, and put it in my hand.
I opened my hand to see what it was, because it didn't feel like a scrap of paper with a phone number on it. It was a nickel!
"Go talk to that guy," she smiled coyly. "Here's my bus."
The bus pulled over to the curb and the doors wheezed open. Valerie bounded onto the bus, her skirt swirling about her pretty knees.
"Yeah, right," I muttered. "And we're going to talk about how stuck-up women are these days!" Valerie ignored me and the bus lurched away with a hiss of air and the whine of the motor. I threw the nickel after it.
Poor slob like me doesn't stand a chance with a girl like her.