The Lantern Festival

The Trouble With Apartment One — Chapter 10

I was driven out of the city almost twenty years ago. This latest chapter reminds me how much I miss Chinatown — among many other things. I used to walk there all the time, down the Bowery…

— B.F. SPÄTH

Chapter 10—THE LANTERN FESTIVAL

It may have been during The Lantern Festival—I’m not entirely certain—as I walked the streets of Chinatown, trying to lose myself in nameless restaurants and hypothetical parks:
I passed the time in tea emporiums.
I examined paper dragons.
I gazed in apothecary windows—perusing herbs and ibex horns.

I stared at tanks of gulping fish on Pell Street.
I savored spring rolls in Columbus Park.
I walked back and forth on Bayard Street eleven times a day.

But when darkness overtook Division Street, underneath Manhattan Bridge, I climbed the stairs to Apartment Four—went to bed—and dreamed of Apartment Seven:
I was heckled by the television.
I breathed diesel fumes at dawn.
The cats defiled my bedding—and Thalia wanted me gone.

It was in the last hours of The Lunar Cycle, after the lights went dim, that the fragile arrangement of Apartment Four was shattered:
With a bristling fibrous mustache and barrel-house aplomb, a colossal fireman introduced himself by pounding on our door.
Before us stood an intimidating civil servant known to all as Fiadh.
I perceived that his arrival had not been prompted by combustion or alarm. What wicked sorcery is this? I asked myself.
This seems a most unlikely coupling…

It has been suggested that New York City fire departments—in their earliest incarnations—were little more than street gangs equipped with hoses. I mentioned this to Fiadh, in the hopes of impressing him with my knowledge, but was taken aback when he took offense and threatened to settle the matter himself.
From then on, I sought out only the most remote sections of the floor—concealed myself in rubble—and kept my views on civil servants to myself.

The days unspooled in a sing-song manner, all along Division Street and elsewhere:
I chewed exotic Ginseng.
I reclined in Kimlau Square.
I marveled at a rising moon in Confucius Plaza Park.

I was hypnotized by neon signage.
I consulted the menu at Mr. Tang’s.
I lost myself in speculation daily—up and down the length of Doyers Street…

Somewhere along the ragged edge of the calendar, as The Dragon Boat Festival reached its zenith, Leonora appeared and delivered an ultimatum:
Fiadh’s sleeping over! You’ve got to leave immediately!
I dressed in haste, seized my bag, and hurried down the stairs.

I emerged into a dense fog on Division Street and drifted north toward Chatham Square—where I took a seat and resigned myself to whatever apparitions might materialize in front of me…
A haggard moon arose, muttered something to itself, and wandered off behind the buildings…

I walked the streets of Chinatown all night, beneath the unflattering light of Neptune—
There’s a mark on me, I said.
I’m under observation—
Somewhere south of Mosco Street…