Chasing girls replaced chasing pigeons. Abandoned tenements, lined up like they were bravely awaiting the firing squad, provided empty apartments that we made our clubhouses. We furnished the clubhouses with the couches and tables decorating the lobbies of the new high rise buildings in the neighborhoodthe kind that housed the "Moniques.”
Of course, it wasn't too long before chains and bolts were added to the decor of these lobbies. We changed the location of the parties frequently; the mob had floating crap games in their clubs and we had floating clubs for our lap games. The carpentry instructor in the Boys Club workshop, Hughie Knora, helped us build a portable bar that we moved to the different apartments. With a vast collection of "donated" 45-rpm records and an ol' phonograph, we were ready to do the dances of the day–
the slop, lindy, cha-cha, mashed potato, huly-guly and of course, the grind.
The Uptown girls and the West Side girls were the usual females we partied with and, like flying pigeons; we caught our share of strays. The parties became pretty popular, so when most of the tenements were torn down, we continued the parties in various friends' apartments.
One night we held a party in Frankie Sneaker's sister’s house and a different group of girls we'd just met came. One was a fine Spanish girl named Dolores, from 43rd Street and Tenth Avenue. I told my friend, Howie Storm, to keep putting fast records on the turntable because I was the only one dancing fast, and I wanted to keep the other "ghees" away, especially Joey LaScala, who was my main rival and was eyeing her.
Dolores was wearing shades, and I was sitting on the couch next to her after our last dance…when there was a commotion at the front door. All the guys went down the long hall of the railroad flat to see what was going on. It seems the boyfriend of one of the girls at the party found out where she was and was upset about it. He brought a few of his friends to say what he was gonna' say or do what he was gonna' do.
Just before I was about to get up to join my friends, I turned to Dolores and saw she wasn't moving. I asked her if I could see what her eyes looked like under those shades, lifted them up and started kissing her.
When the girl left with her boyfriend, everybody came back in the living-room to see that Dolores and I were now a pair. Taking her back to her building, we were sitting on the stoop about one in the morning when she looked past me and said, "Oh, no!" Without looking, I knew this can't be good - it wasn't! Her old boyfriend showed up with a couple of his friends, who by the looks of him, he didn't need–
and he didn't!
Despite both the explanation and objection of Dolores, he knocked the shit outta' me. The next night Dolores called me up and told me to take a cab, which she'd pay for, to the American Hotel on East 86th Street. She lived with her aunt, who was a hooker, and her aunt told the date she was on to rent a two-bedroom suite so Dolores and I could sleep together. I believe it was sympathy pussy for the beating. I accepted!
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