"Checkmate." I was definitely on the ropes this time. Usually by halfway through the match I could stage some sort of comeback, but at this point I was short on pieces and long past a game-plan. "Happy hour starts in fifteen minutes if you guys want to wait on this one," said the man behind the bar. Lenny passed him a bill to even the rounds. "You’re a losing bastard this time," he grinned at me. Considering he looked to be right, this seemed a golden moment to broach the topic at hand: "So Lenny, how’d you end up becoming a dealer anyway?"
"Changing the subject is a sad tactic, but since you asked, I just sort of fell into it like anything else. It’s not like I set out to go into business, but one day I was hookin-up my man and the next I had a dozen people asking for something. In New York the clientele grows by itself, the trick is knowing where to stop."
"And you make some good money doing it, right?" I asked.
"Shit, let me tell you something. First off, the money ain’t as great as everyone assumes. If it was, do you think I’d be available every time someone pages me? Keep in mind I’ve got to pay my supplier too. And I can’t just charge whatever the hell I want or customers walk. The whole game is give and take — you bring big money in, but you put bigger money out first."
About the time Lenny was hitting his stride his beeper cut him off. It was the fourth time it had interrupted us in the last 20 minutes. He checked his watch and looked to be guessing who’d called. "Well, it looks like you’ll make out alright tonight," I said. "This is happy-hour, it’s always strong when everyone ‘s getting off work. I don’t start meeting people until 2pm and I go until the calls stop. Sometimes that’s ten at night, sometimes it’s four in the morning. Later trumps earlier, but you play the hand you’re dealt." One of the guys that had paged sauntered into the bar and plopped down next to Lenny. They slapped hands and Lenny slipped the cash into his jacket pocket. "What’s up man, you havin’ a drink?" Lenny asked. "Not now, I gotta take care of some other stuff but I’ll catch you next time," his guy said. With that, Lenny dropped a rectangular plastic container into the guy’s hand. They bumped fists, and he was gone.
"There’s no need to bullshit if clients want to keep it clean," he explained. "The problem is, if six people roll in and out in two drink’s time, some bartenders get pissed. And actually, this guy has given me shit before so we better bounce ‘cause things look to be picking up." Lenny scanned the game-board and claimed a win; I argued for the draw, and with a swoop of his arm the pieces cascaded into his backpack.
Two minutes later the music is pounding and we’re on our way to the Lower East Side in a cab. The ride was basically the same exercise four times over. Lenny dials: "You paged?" Recognition. His reply: "I’ll be at such-and-such place in fifteen minutes." His calls take less than one minute each. He made a fifth call, asked a few questions, and gave the same info. I’d first met him at the bar we were heading to, so I assumed the others probably knew it too. "Don’t you worry about the cops?" I asked. "Yes and no I guess. Obviously if the law and I cross paths it ain’t good, but there are a million other things more important and more noticeable they should be worrying about and everyone knows it. I’m not throwing anything in anybody’s face, and the people that page me are grown-ups that make their own decisions. Honestly, unless I go out of my way to be an asshole, there should be nothing to worry about. Still, just the possibility of meeting New York’s finest can keep you up at night sometimes. The job ain’t stress-free even when the green is coming in."
As we entered the bar, a very attractive woman greeted us with a smile. She was wearing a business suit but seemed at ease in the dingy hole-in-the-wall. "Late as usual I see," she shot. We took seats by her and the bartender greeted Lenny with familiarity. She and Lenny chatted it up while our margaritas were made. Neither of them seemed concerned with an exchange, but when her glass of white wine was a swallow shy of empty she unsnapped a red snakeskin purse and he nonchalantly tossed in two containers. She gave him a kiss on the cheek, said "bye babe," and walked out without a second look back. "Do you get paid for that in other ways?" I asked. "I wish. I owed her from last time."
The cast of characters that strolled in over the next few hours ranged from the comical to the shady. Among them was a big dude wearing a Richard Petty Racing hat that spoke to everyone in an aggressive freestyle rap; the guy living in Brooklyn that "needed smoke to work through the ongoing slide of the Arsenal Football Team"; and the burner that explained "planning is way overrated, but there’s no point in going snowboarding without weed." There was also the hot Latin-American girl who said she had a thing for razors, which was a conversation starter. Lenny bounced from client to client ensuring everyone had received what they came for, and collecting $50 a pop if they hadn’t.
"You never know who’s going to page, so it’s key to have a few spots where you can do business without looking over your shoulder," he said. "I know we’re straight here because I hook-up the bartender." Not only were we not looking over our shoulder much, we were essentially running the bar. It turned out that the extra call in the cab was to one of Lenny’s buddies, who brought along a nice mix of partiers. With friends around and drinks aplenty, Lenny redirected anyone that paged to our locale for a little quid pro quo.
How the night ended is somewhat of a blur — a fairly common occurrence according to Lenny. "You can’t get so bombed that you forget shit around the bar, but someone getting ripped with a bunch of friends in a New York bar is about the most inconspicuous profile I can adopt. And besides, we’re probably the last people in the bar looking for trouble, we’re just trying to pay the rent and have a good time like everyone else. I just happen to be rolling the dice a bit more than others to get it done."
•
