Everybody's Looking For Something

Chapter 1

It was September 1976. The New York State Lottery had started up again and the “Sunshine Bill” was passed. The Senate gave approval to a bill that would make agencies conduct meetings in the sunshine. Go figure. J.D’s Revenge was playing at the movies and you could buy a 1973 Chevy Vega for $699. Ain’t that nice?

The sky was the color of dingy linen.and the air had the unmistakable warmth of “somebody-walked-over-your-grave” feeling. Nice day for a funeral. Reuben Harms’ funeral that is. He died from a heart attack while eating his favorite food. A hot sausage piled high with onions and saukekraut. Poor guy. He was fifty-five years old, balding and had a stomach the size of a baby whale but the guy’s dead and people say you shouldn’t talk ill of the dead.

There was one stretched black limousine parked out in front of Poppa’s Funeral Home. It was called Poppa’s because the guy’s last name was-yes, Poppa. Clyde Poppa served the black community with the utmost respect and made sure everyone was guided towards the expensive caskets with all the trimmings. He was really a nice guy. Well the limo took up the only parking spot available on the street. The funeral home had a parking lot as big as a shoebox and cars were nosing in and out, trying not to hit other cars or the people who walking around. The lot was busy. There were people crying and complaining about the parking spaces but pleasantries were exchanged since everybody knew everybody in Cameron County, New York. The turnout would’ve made Reuben proud. Reuben liked attention and people fussing over him. The spotlight was Reuben’s way of life and nobody did it better or bigger than Reuben. Ask anybody who went to the shows at his club called Hum Dingers. Why he named it that, who the hell knows. Reuben was crazy like that. Weird almost. Maybe it was the reefer he smoked all the time and the all-night parties he had. Ask anybody. They’d tell you there was a fight once a month at Hum Dinger's when the drinks were half-price and when Lola Falana was headlining the show. It wasn’t the real Lola Falana, but a dude who looked very much like Lola Falana. More about Lola later okay?