Sleepers

'We can eat hot dogs or we can eat air,' Michael said. 'You guys choose.'

'Air's probably safer,' Tommy said.

'May even taste better,' John said.

'Whose turn is it?' I asked.

'Yours,' Michael said.

'You think he'll recognize me?' I asked.

'I hope so,' Tommy said. 'I'm really hungry.'

The scam was simple. We'd done it dozens of times before, with almost as many vendors. We picked it up from an Irish crew on 48th Street who used it every summer to score free Puerto Rican ices.

I was to walk up to the hot dog cart and order what I wanted. The vendor would then hand me my hot dog and watch as I ran off without paying. This left the vendor with two choices, neither very appealing. He could stand his ground and swallow his loss. Or he could give chase. This second choice forced him to abandon the cart, where my friends could feast in his absence.

The hot dog vendor at this corner was tall and slender and in his mid-twenties, with thick, dark hair and a round, bulbous nose. A recent addition to Hell's Kitchen, his English was as poor as his clothes, ragged blue shirts and jeans, front pockets frayed at the edges. He owned a Yankee warm-up jacket and soiled cap and wore them on colder days.

The vendor worked the far corner of 51st Street and 10th Avenue, standing under the partial shade of a red and yellow Sabrett umbrella, selling cold sodas, hot dogs and sausages to an array of passing customers – local merchants; longshoremen and truckers, school children.

Seven days a week, late morning to early evening, he was there, plying a trade that was all too easy for us to ridicule.

We never saw the vendor as a man, not the way we saw the other men of the neighborhood, and didn't care enough about him to grant him any respect. We gave little notice to how hard he worked for the few dollars he earned. We didn't know about the young wife and two kids he left in Greece and how he hoped to build for them a new foundation in a new country. We didn't pay attention to the tedious twelve-hour days he endured, slicing buns and sifting through chunks of ice through cold spells and heat waves. All the time stamping his feet on hard ground, to keep the blood flowing.

We never saw the tiny, airless fourth-floor room he lived in, a forty-minute walk from his station, its only comfort a tattered collection of pictures from home, crudely taped to the wall nearest the worn mattress of his bed. We never saw the hot stove, topped by empty cans of Campbell's Pork and Beans. Or the crumpled packs of Greek cigarettes, tossed in a corner trash bin, gifts from his wife, his only stateside pleasure.

We didn't see any of that.

We only saw a free lunch.

'Mustard and onions,' I said, avoiding the vendor's suspicious look. 'No soda.'

He nodded, wary, his eyes over my shoulders, looking for hidden shadows.

'I know you,' he said, accusation more than question.

I shrugged and smiled.

'Can I have two napkins?' I asked, reaching my hand out for the hot dog. 'Onions get messy.'

The vendor pulled a second napkin from its ca

I scooted past Tommy Mug's dry cleaners and Armond's shoe repair. The vendor, the anger behind his months of frustration broken beyond any reasonable point, gave chase, a wood-handled, prong fork in one hand.

As I ran, slivers of red onions flew off the top of the hot dog, dotting my cheek and the front of my white T-shirt. I cut past the P.A.L. entrance and turned the corner at 50th Street.

He was close on me, arms and legs moving in their own furied rhythm, the fork still gripped in one hand, his breath coming in measured spurts.

'Pay my money, thief!' he shouted after me. 'Pay my money now!

Michael, John and Tommy were on their second hot dogs, leaning casually against the side of the cart, faces turned to the sun.

'How long you think he'll be?' John asked, wiping brown mustard from his lower lip.

'Shakes or the hot dog guy?' Michael asked.

'You got one, you got the other,' Tommy said. 'That guy looked pissed enough to kill.'

'Gotta catch him to kill him,' John said. 'Don't worry.'

'These things are heavier than they look,' Michael said, standing now, hands gripping the cart's wooden handles.

'The heavy shit's underneath,' Tommy said. 'Where nobody can see it.'

'What heavy shit?' John asked.

'The gas tanks,' Tommy said. 'The stuff that keeps the food hot. Or maybe you thought the sun made the water boil.'

'Think we can push it?' Michael asked. 'The three of us?'

'Push it where?' John asked.

'Couple of blocks away,' Michael said. 'Be a nice surprise for the guy when he gets back from chasing Shakes not to find his cart.'

'What if somebody takes it?' Tommy said.

'You gotta be pretty dumb to steal a hot dog cart,' Michael said.

'Ain't we doin' that?' John asked.

'We're just moving it,' Michael said. 'Making sure nobody else steals it.'

'So, we're helpin' the guy out,' Tommy said.

'Now you're listening,' Michael said.

The vendor tired at 52nd Street and 12th Avenue.

He was bent over, hands on his knees, the fork long since discarded, face flushed, his mouth open and hungry for breath. I was on the other side of the street, against a tenement doorway, hair and body washed in sweat. My hands were still greasy from the hot dog I held for most of the run.

I looked over at the vendor and found him staring back at me, anger still visible, his hands now balled up and punching at his sides. He was beat but not beaten. He could go ten minutes more just on hate alone. I decided against a run toward the piers, choosing instead to double back and head for neighborhood safety. By now, I figured, the guys should have downed enough hot dogs and sodas to satisfy Babe Ruth's appetite.

I took three deep breaths and started ru

If I got to the cart fast enough I might even have time for a hot dog.

Michael, John and Tommy were standing at the corner of 50th Street and Ninth Avenue, tired from having pushed the cart up the one long block. They stopped in front of a florist, a short woman, her hair in a bun, clipping stems from a handful of roses, watching them with curiosity.

'Let's have a soda,' John said, sliding open the aluminum door and plunging a hand into dark, icy water. 'A Dr. Brown sounds about right.'

'I'll take a cream,' Tommy said.

John handed Tommy a sweaty can of soda. 'How about you, Mikey?'

'I don't want anything,' Michael said, looking down the street, arms across his chest.

'What's wrong?' Tommy asked, taking a slurp from his soda.

'Shakes is taking too long,' Michael said. 'He should've been back by now.'

I stopped at the light at 51st Street and 10th Avenue and looked for my friends and the hot dog cart.

The vendor was one avenue down, ru

'Give it up,' I whispered. 'Let it go.'

I stood and continued to run, this time toward Ninth Avenue. My sides hurt and my legs were starting to cramp. I was light-headed, my throat dry and my lungs heavy. I ran past Printing High School, the yard empty except for two rummies drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes, thinking of ways to score their first drink of the day. I dodged past a heavy-set woman tugging a shopping wagon piled with groceries and jumped two garbage can lids tossed to the side by a passing sanitation crew.