Charlie punches staples into thin wood pieces until they fit into a frame. His calloused hands are rough and fast and numb to the rough biting grain. Except for the sudden staple through his nail bed. And a single crimson bubble . . .
When he is finished getting the toilet in 2A to flush right, Charlie doesn’t go to sleep. He puts out the paint-splattered canvas all over his room so that the whole floor, the furniture, and the bed, looks like a Pollock. Alone in the room painting with Merle Haggard on the brassy sounding radio, he continues painting. When he finishes, he steps back — looking a long time.
There is drama upstairs again; Linda knocks on his door to come fast about some shouting up there. A strange call for a handyman, Charlie thinks but Linda is also trying to get a look into his room — at his series on the Whistle Wood Blackout. Charlie presses the door shut to get dressed quick and by the time he gets up to 2A the police are involved, chatting and laughing but mostly asking around about what is clearly some dirty between two guests. The fight is about the thermostat that doesn’t work. A rattling keeping them up. Charlie opens up the vents in the room. And finds a ring.
He keeps it. And tells them the rattling is fixed.
Charlie takes up another set of wood pieces. With a bandage on and the ring fit over his thumb, he begins to trace the outline of his underpainting again. Beneath his pencil — a dozen discarded shoes. It is almost morning again.
El Golpe Avisa 