Habibi: a Tenderloin Story

He saw her through the smeared window, walking down Geary Street but pretended to be busy when she neared the store. The evil eye trivet clanged against the glass as the door opened. All bells. The city-street-sound swhished-in. Car exhaust, buses, sirens. And her. Like a roach, Ramsey scurried into the back room, shuffling, kicking broken-down boxes, making noise. Sounding busy.

From the back he heard the click-clack of her kitten-heels echo on linoleum. Pills and keys jingled. He took a deep breath, puffed-up his chest and burst-out from the backroom, striding tall down the bodega aisle towards her dark, shining eyes.  

Mira was illuminated in a fluorescent, buzzing halo. She bursted thick in a clingy, strappy peach dress. She shimmered. It was always like this— like all the lights radiated to her. Bulbs flickered and popped, excited. Bored, she swayed against the counter, hypnotized in the sugarlight of the soda case. Her gaze, affixed somewhere else. On someone else? Last night’s makeup softened her eyes. Lazily, she shifted heels, smacking mango gum. 

Ramsey strode to the register like it was his throne. This was his shop after all, how he supported his family back home and parked a new Mercedes in Ahmed’s Garage on Leavenworth. So what if he sold crack pipes? It wasn’t like he was smoking them. No, that was their fault. He just sold glass. Tobacco. Sweets.

“Habibi!” he greeted her with voice like stale syrup. She glanced towards the door. They were alone. 

“You have any cloves?”

Ramsey grabbed two packs, smiling. Handing them to her, he scratched the inside of his wrist on a sharpened, burgundy nail.  A fresh set of acrylics, shaped like knives, extended like weapons on Mira’s small, child-like hand.  The burgundy-lacquered bite excited him. She had him— always. She shoved the cloves in her purse, no looking back. No thank-yous, no goodbyes. 

Click-clack. Like always. Click-clack.

Ramsey watched where her thighs met the melony-curve of her ass— leaving.  He loved to watch her leave, to see the movie theater of her body move and act and wow.  She was a real star in the T.L., velvet in a sea of polyester. A call girl, independent, a princess.  Too expensive for him, she said. You never know. 

Click-clack. Click-clack. His flesh prickled. What an animal he was! The door slammed.

Ramsey clutched his crotch, locked up and relieved himself in the stained bathroom. Staring at the crusty, grey mop, he summoned images of her thighs.

*

Oh, Mira. He knew she smoked just a few each day and bummed the rest to her friends. A princess and her smoky maidens, perched by the cafe on Taylor, huddled like doves in the scent of smoky cloves. Customers walked through the grey hazy smoke, down the block and then straight into his shop. Business had never been better, in spite of taxes and the 2008 crash. She lured them in, and he too was on her hook. 

Yet, he knew he was lucky. The Tenderloin was not for the tender-hearted, and he was a tough guy at that. The register never stopped slamming. Each day he saw wrecks on the cement: human life, shattered pipes. The streets were sour and shitty. Dog shit, human shit, all the shit. People passing through. The beggars, drunks, junkies and the whores. All high. 

His customers. His bank account.  

They disgusted him on the streets. But, in his store, he softened, smiled like a sultan and greeted them like little morsels, like candy on a platter. Polite to all who came in, charming them with stories of his motherland. Ramsey always made himself richer, stronger and more admirable— for who was he if he wasn’t a king of his own country?  

He wanted to be potent. Stronger than any sleepless high in the night, louder than the bass and hand drums of the Egyptian pop songs he played, blazing loud, celebrating. All day, he worked, taking deep swigs from the bottle under the counter. Dancing in daylight, sweating, snorting coke, he couldn’t get enough of life, but it crashed him. By the time he closed shop at 1:30am, Ramsey was drunk and gone. 

*

He locked the door and gates. Thick incense burned, trailing him. His drunkenness was like a foggy, heavy hat that he wore, as he walked a block or two to the hookah bar, hoping she would be there.  Habibi.  Or whoever was Habibi, for the night…

But, this time, tonight?

She was there.  And certainly not sitting like a lady.  No, she looked like she needed to get fucked.  Tonight would be the night he would taste her.  

She taunted him in her leather boots and short black dress.  He would make this happen.  She was about to leave—

“Habibi!” he called as she stepped into the night. Was tonight his chance? Which building was hers?  

“What is it, Ramsey?” she asked in a voice that sounded neither annoyed nor tired, though she most certainly was.

“Want to smoke the weeds with me, Habibi?” 

“Ooooh, I dunno… Ooooh…” Mira stumbled, bracing herself on the rough brick of the building to steady herself, eyes glazing out toward the clouded darkness. Tunnel vision. She blacked out; she came back. Light pollution resisted the fates. The stars were in a different sky, a different city. Her fake gold earring glimmered.

“What the fuck, may as well,” Mira slurred and fixed her eyes on him, charmed like serpents. “Give me a clove,” she ordered, in a language so rough and sexual it almost wasn’t human. Ramsey knew he had nothing but still did a mock search, scanning the thin pockets of his cheap pants from the Mission.

“No cloves, Habibi, but let me take you to my store!”

“I have to be somewhere!!!”

“Oh, but I take you! And, I have a clove for you!”  

At this point, Habibi fell on his shoulder. The buildings began to sway. 

“Where are the stars tonight? I never see the stars anymore! Fuck!!! I really need a clove!”  

Mira looked up again. Her eyes rested on the winged cherub above the doorway of the hookah bar. The marble was soft, weathered and smooth. She sighed.

He took her arm, and she fell in like an angel. Together they stumbled, like a bad ending, deep into the night.