The Queen of the Junkies holds Court

Yes.
It was clear from her determined reserve and the equally determined grip she somehow maintained on her resolved poise- a poise that had doubtless endured hundreds of hits from all sides- that she was the final, street regal trophy this dilapidated drug crew desperately clung to with no small amount of battered if not quite beaten pride.
Like so many a dedicated junkie she had a certain ageless, vampiric quality to her pale, peaked yet still taut flesh that was pulled tight across her Vogue cover cheekbones, making it more than somewhat difficult to guess her age.

She could've been 21-going-on-41 or 41-going-on-forever but she had somehow managed to remain a chic presence still undoubtedly ready for her close-up, if not perhaps at that exact moment of her illustrious career.

Her legs were long, toned and very easy to appreciate wrapped snugly, as they were, in a pair of grey perfectly fitted denims and tucked into stylish, smart and just-this-side-of-cute rainboots that didn't look discount and didn't give a fuck if they did. The hips were more women than model and as She crossed those long denimed stems and took her reserved seat I, for one, was grateful for the display.

On top she'd chosen a black, scooped tee, covered by a grey hoodie that was unzipped more than halfway with the hood snapped smartly over her self-induced blondeness to discourage, of course, any undue attention from the paparazzi should the gauntlet of her addled entourage fail to sufficiently beat them back.
The bulge of her peachy bosom was clearly visible and clearly the reason she'd let her zipper stray south.

Her face, however, was her real prize and it was her one real treasure that she still somehow, someway guarded jealously even if she herself seemed fully aware that it had suffered through a bad measure of plunder and privation.

The sharpness of her pale flesh seemed to reveal the sharpness of her mind with the hardened if hollow emptiness of her grey/blue cat's eyes carefully concealed behind an oversize pair of knock-off Chanel's so popular with Brooklyn girls of a certain age. The lips were her only nod to the world of men. A world in which she'd surely logged an extensive history.
The femme fatale mouth was a petite delight of a tease with the lips only slightly plump and only slightly pouty but she'd accented both with a slash of blood red that pulled your eyes to the very closed opening, making you dream dreams of storming her castle. The blast of this one splash of color against her facade of grey/black camouflage was echoed only by her matching manicure, trimmed talons that she nervously clicked along her thigh, the only hint of the turmoil roiling inside her druggy volcano.
The collection of her facial features was a perfection of symmetry and feminine grace topped off by her straight, shoulder-length suicide blonde tendrils slithering out from the hoodie, shot through with bolts of black that framed the perfection with a polished perversity that promised something much better and much more real than any painted pose.
It was a scorched blackened blondeness that purred-

"I'm bad, bad news and I'm working really easy to stay that way..."

All in all, she was certainly not in the mood, but her cleverly arranged look- that undoubtedly had taken some effort to achieve- very subtly advertised that she just might be open to certain negotiations if some generous offer happened to come along at the right time.

But an addict's life is very strictly regulated by their own junkie clock- that runs 24/7/365- and hers looked like it had just begun a slow clicking tick down to alarm time.

See around Bergen there's a methadone clinic that's received a bit of community attention due to the occasional proliferation of drug vultures that tend to circle its doors waiting to pick off the near dead corpses of the dopesick fiends huddled within and without. The Stooges and their Queen gave every outward indication that they'd just gotten a good dose of the clown-wig orange juice that junkies so desperately crave/despise in equal measure (the neon liquid saves them from the throes of their most desperate sickness yet offers no real solace and absolutely no stairway to the heroin heaven that they truly desire).
They, and She, were OK. Just ok, just barely ok...
For now.

But that clock was ticking and her rapidly draining grey/blue cat's eyes were grimly staring into a very near future that was on the tracks to a certain cliff edge drop into a much too familiar abyss.
And she understood that somehow, someway she'd have to jump off that barreling train before it hit the end of the line.
A good, soft landing was what she really needed and her junkie crew gave every indication that they would be of little real help finding one for themselves, let alone her.
For me, my own stop was next and it was leisure time all day, all the way.

But I hovered next to her, peering down, as I stationed myself at the doors then the "G" jerked to a stop as I indulged myself in a hungry peek.
The tops of a frilly pink bra underneath her scooped black tee were barely but plainly visible from my hawk-eyed perch and the generous scoops of her creamy breasts were poking through the barriers, still ripe and inviting, even if they'd doubtless seen better days. So she was properly dressed for soft landings if not hard falls.
What she had might not have been what it once was, but she definitely still knew how to wrap it for presentation and that meant she'd surely remembered how to use it.
The doors popped and I headed straight for the stairways up and out of the stale underground and straight for whatever sunlight might be remaining in my day.

I hoped she might get a little bit too as she rolled on into the darkness.
She sure looked ready for it.

The Junkie Queen and her "G" Train Court

Like most men I have a weakness for scarred souls.

And like most good men this weakness does not always take into account the circumstances of the scars. 

Some wounds of course are the gruesome evidence, however temporary, of the very worst trick of luck that can occur to our instantly frail flesh, yet these fresh and visibly grisly tokens of our common human frailty hold a grim fascination to even the most casual of observers.
Some wounds have been buried so long ago that even a keen observer may only ever be able to sense their latent effects in a frightened glint of the eyes, a nervous tick of the limbs, a halting catch in the speech that releases just a drop of their deep reservoir of still fresh pain.

 Other wounds are self-inflicted and because of this absolute fact, these are the very scars that the victim most jealously conceals from an ever suspicious world that, for them, is a treacherous daily obstacle course filled with trap doors dropping straight into their own darkness.

And don't we all have our own little dings and dents, scratches and nicks, inside and out?

On a cloudy August day that was promising rain and squeezing all its fetid humidity into the dank subway tunnel system I hopped on the "G" for what would be my first stop in a hopefully productive schedule of Brooklyn gear and grocery shopping. I was primed for action and open to visual adventure as is my usual subway/shopping outlook. It was late morning, after the rush, and everything was ahead of me on the just about three-quarters full train slowly winding its way toward the City. 

At Bergen there was a brief delay as a trio of fixed junkies stumbled through the doors just as they were closing, causing the conductor to loudly and pointedly announce over the PA-

"PLEASE DO NOT HOLD THE DOORS OPEN...AND PLEASE STAND CLEAR OF THE CLOSING DOORS!"

To which the final straggler/door holder, who resembled a dessicated, dead-eyed Joey Ramone without the leather jacket promptly, loudly and eloquently replied to no one and everyone-

"Yea, go fuck yer Mutha..."
 before he lurched through the aisle, banging his fellow passengers with a shoulder-strapped, overstuffed, beat-up soft leather satchel, doubtlessly containing all the vital paraphernalia that his desperate lifestyle required.

His apologies upon his missteps, however, were a product of the genuine compassion shared by lifetime straphangers who understand the daily, teeth-gritting indignities they all have to endure together-

"I'm sorry Sir..."

"Excuse me, Ma'm...I'm sorry..."

"I'm so sorry..."

And so on, each one positively dripping with an almost comic amount of concern for his startled but tolerant victims.
His two male companions, both equally drawn and disheveled but without luggage, quickly wormed through the aisle and cadged seats opposite me across the doorway then immediately flipped open the free local newspapers they were both seriously clutching and dove in, blankly studying the giveaway pages with all the remaining conviction they could muster as if on their way to a test or just cramming in all the important facts in the few minutes they could spare before their arrival at their busy Manhattan offices. Their Ramone brother hovered over them in a wobbly state of turmoil, fumbling with his bulging satchel along with an uncooperative umbrella that stubbornly threatened to overwhelm him.                                                
 The Three Stooges themselves could not have done it any better.

Then She emerged from behind the shabby wall of their well-rehearsed front and Joey gallantly steered her to the only remaining seat available.

Taken on the hoof, the Stooges were a painfully wasted account of the toll of heroin commitment and as a collection of potential male potency, their ravaged attractions were such that only a Mother could possibly love. They all of them maintained a uniform yet mish-mash street fashion sense that suggested unplanned dumpster diving embellished with occasional laundromat snatches.

But, although she was most definitely a member of their doomed cadre, she stood apart if not obviously above them as she carefully accepted the seat they were holding for her, a seat she surely expected to be waiting for her unhurried arrival no matter the destination.


NEXT TIME- The Queen Holds Court