The Gingerbread House

It was a sunny day in Key West, fall 1985. A day every boat in the harbor was rented, not to fishermen though, every boat was rented to treasure hunters searching the depths of the ocean for pirate booty. 

Henry and Lucia celebrate their 1st morning in Key West, sipping coffee mixed with Irish whiskey on the porch, he paged through The Key West Citizen, saying,

the temperature in Queens is in the low 30s! 

It was a sure bet he would announce the temperature in Queens every morning. Thoughts of New Yorkers freezing empowered them.  

The Chihuahuas, Che, and Mia are playing in the yard, running after one other, and the couple's baby woodpecker, Pedro, has found his beak, which he uses to peck holes in the palms trees.

Whiffs of Night Blooming Jasmine disseminating from the jasmine bush under their bedroom window reminds the couple they are living in the tropics. 

After breakfast Henry gets to work on a story for HEADBANGER Magazine, realizing he needs a fax machine he stops typing and says to Lucia,

baby, let's go for a ride, I need a fax machine and we need groceries.

The couple dresses casually in tank tops, shorts and rubber slippers. Lucia  looks like Sophia Loren and has bronze coloured curly hair. She would look sensational in a potato sack. Henry has long white hair he wears braided.

They go outside and get into their station wagon, After driving 20 minutes they realize there are only 4 main streets in Key West. 

He pulls into a shopping mall called Inland Center, which was built in the 60s, the shops are single story with plate glass window fronts. They walk into Key West Office Supply and a salesman approaches quick-time saying, 

welcome to Key West Office Supply folks, our motto is, we sell quality for less!

Henry smiles, the old hat salesman reminded him of the character Shelly Levine in the play Glengarry Glen Ross, he says, 

I need a fax machine, something durable whata-ya got? The salesman says, 

you're my first customer so let’s make a deal!

They follow him to a counter with 10 fax machines on it, he points to a fax machine saying, 

the Epson 350 X, portable, dependable, compact and fast, connect this little guy to your phone line and you’re be ready for business! It's yours for 285! Henry lying says, 

we saw the same model at Buddy’s Office Supply for 275! The salesman quickly says, 

270 out the door!

Henry agrees, pays and the couple is out the door, putting the machine in the back of the station wagon. On their way to Winn-Dixie Lucia says, 

you’re awful, lying to save 15 dollars, is that how gringos do business? He says, 

babe, come on,  you can't con a con, the salesman knows every trick in the book.

In Winn-Dixie they fill 2 shopping carts, one with booze and the other with food— cases of beer and Coca-cola, bottles of rum, whiskey, baguettes, dried black beans, pork, chicken, rice, biscuit mix, honey, olive oil, salt, pepper and 3 sweet potato pies. Basic kitchen stuff needed for the new house. They drive home, unloading the food and booze in the kitchen. 

Henry then moves furniture around making the den into his office, putting the fax machine on a small table and connecting it. He calls Dave Spleen his editor in New York. Dave speaking in a flash beats him to the punch, saying,

Henry baby, last week's story, Pedro the Lucky Bird was a home run, our readers loved it! Every magazine gone within a few hours! Jumping in quickly he says, 

Dave, jot my number down, 306 251 7867, Lucia and I love it here, our house is delightful, fly down with Goldy and visit us, Dave says, 

sweet, love to go, but, I’m busy, busy, busy— gotta go, gotta deadline to meet!

As Dave hangs up Lucia is in the living room dragging a large box, yelling for Henry to come and help, he asks, 

what’s that? An inflatable swan? She says, 

close but no cookie, it’s a kiddy pool for the Chihuahuas and Pedro the baby woodpecker. 

Sitting on the living room floor, Lucia inflates the pool with a bicycle pump— pushing and pulling, pushing and pulling. Then, carrying the small pool out the front door, placing it in the middle of the front lawn and filling it with water from a hose.  

The couple rock on the porch swing,  smoking a joint. The Chis, Che, and Mia approach the new pool with caution, smelling it, then jumping in and paddling about. Pedro does a nosedive from a palm tree, underlining a point to the Chis,

don’t leave me out! 

Pedro lands on the round rubber skirt of the pool, perching and taking a drink, because he couldn’t swim. Henry says, 

babe, we’re only 50 miles from Cuba, why don't you call your mother.  

Using the new fax phone she dials 011 and the number, her mother answers, 

hola? Lucia speaking Spanish says, 

mother como estas? We’re living in Key West, it’s just 37 kilometers from Havana, we want to get you out of Cuba, her mother says,

oh no, I’m scared to ride in the rickety boats, scared of the Cubano policia and scared of the criminales in the boats! My life is fine with your help bebe.

Lucia and Henry sent her 600 dollars a month, the mother and daughter talk for an hour, then saying good-bye. Lucia pouting says to Henry, 

Darling, let’s get loaded tonight, we can celebrate our first day in Key West! He says, 

we don’t have to invent reasons to get loaded, we’re loaded sun up till sundown,  she answers, 

Jesucristo bebe, picky, picky, don’t be so filosofico, que mierda? He says, 

gotta go, gotta deadline to meet! Lucia commenting cynically,

Henry, el dos-peso Dave Spleen! Laughing he says, 

oh, you noticed darling, I do have to work on a story though!

The opening scene is in Tennessee William’s vanilla colored gingerbread house on Duvall Street in Key West. 

The small house is filled with books and art. He is up by 5 AM every morning with a pitcher of Bloody Marys next to his typewriter, the booze summons up his courage.

He types as he peers out a window at the swimming pool in his backyard which is surrounded by dead weeds and thirsty wilted flowers. His mind traveling beyond the limits of the backyard to his literary world— a world where lies replace straight-forward speaking, strong-arm tactics suck love dry and being alone is the human condition. 

The subtotal of these anxieties and his own fear are the seeds that fuel his endeavor to heal a nefarious world with poetic vision.  

From 1939 to 1957, Williams wrote a string of masterpieces— The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, becoming America’s most celebrated playwright, earning 2 Pulitzer Prizes, 3 New York Drama Critics’ Circle awards and a Tony.

Some credit Williams with queering Broadway, but Broadway was born queer and didn’t need his help. 

He met and fell in love with Frank Merlo in 1947 while living in New Orleans. Merlo, a Sicilian who served in the U.S. Navy during World War 2 and was a steadying influence on William's booze and doped filled chaotic life. When Merlo died of lung cancer in 1961 it spun Tennessee into a deep funk. He had battled depression most of his life, living in constant fear, belieiving he was going insane. 

During the period after Merlo’s death, Williams used more than ever. One night while staying in the Hotel Elysee, he was deep into stupefaction. While reaching for a bottle of Oxycodone and trying to open it with his mouth he swallowed the bottle cap and choked to death—an inglorious way to die. 

In March 1983 he was buried in St. Louis at the insistence of his sister Rose. This ironic because Tennessee hated St. Louis and spent most of his life running away the city.

As the sun goes down, Henry raps up the bit on Tennessee Williams, the golden boy who wrote The Night of the Iguana. A play Henry was gone on, built on the Reverend T. Lawrence Shannon's right of passage as it transgresses through a life long cycle of passion playing on quilt.

Henry and Lucia drive their Vespa to Sloppy Joe’s, the most celebrated joint in the world, amongst tourists. The bar is on Duvall Street, not far from Tennessee William’s gingerbread house. 

They sit at the outside bar, surrounded by Earnest Hemingway look-a-likes—local guys who sat in Sloppy Joe's every night looking at each other and at their images in the mirror behind the bar. A bartender who doesn’t look like Hemingway asks, 

whata-ya have folks? Henry answers, 

a pitcher of Coors Light mixed with Clamato, a crab cake sandwich, a Cubano sandwich, Cajun fries, and a Greek Salad!

As they work on their 2nd pitcher of beer, the food comes, it’s unremarkable basic tavern fodder which Hemingway would be unable to stomach, regardless the Hemingway clones gobble it up. 

The couple asks for a doggy bag and waits for the bill. Dropping from the sky, like Superman, Pedro their baby woodpecker lands on Lucia’s shoulder, pecking at her hair and she says, 

I think our baby missed us!