South Berkeley is a short story starring Gust, a supporting character of many of my novels and gutter punk extraordinaire. In this story, Gust makes an extra special edible purchase for her roommate and friends as she walked through the heavily gentrified South Berkeley, a city in the San Francisco Bay Area.

This story is featured in my collection of short stories entitled Short Songs, featuring characters from The Rise and Fall of Skye Wright series.

     She leaned back, letting her heavy head sink into her pillow.
     Her eyes fluttered as a calming, warm wave went through her neck and shoulders.
     Her half-opened eyes blanked out on the white ceiling as she let herself enjoy her fatigue.
     She brought her head back up as her laptop chimed loudly, letting her know she had received another tip.
     Gust looked towards her webcam. She flexed her legs as the vibrator started to thrum, having been activated by one of her online viewers who had the ability to activate her pink and bulbous vibrator with the right amount of tips.
     She glanced at the camera and then looked at the feed as she lightly rubbed her nipples, which had been getting sore from all the work she had been putting in.
     She spent a few extra hours on her cam portal because she wanted to make an extra special shopping trip. She wanted to surprise her roommate Shake as well as her neighbor and de facto landlord Skye with a chocolate cream pie from Sweet Adeline’s, a bakery not too far from where they lived.
     Shake had been working a lot, always busy with her dog walking job as well as spending extra time at Butt Fork Studios, helping out their lead studio tech Larry as well as helping out Colleen, the extra-hyper studio hand whose job description had escaped Gust. She was not sure what Colleen’s official job duties were and what exactly her title was, she only knew that the tall, skinny, and bespectacled Colleen was always working, darting around the studio with papers or iPads or various inventory items such as liquor or band shirts.
     Once her vibrator stopped buzzing, she reached down and slowly pulled it out. She sat up and looked into the webcam.
     “Goodbye my lovelies,” she said into the screen as seductively as she could. “I’ll see you all tomorrow!”
     She blew a kiss at the webcam and exited the feed. She slumped onto the bed and looked at her cam show numbers which had been steadily climbing. She wondered what it would take to really go viral and start raking in more money.
     She spent a long time in the shower, soaping herself up repeatedly to peel off all of the lube and oils she had used on herself. She quickly dried herself off and got dressed.
     Feeling refreshed, she walked out onto the landing and heard Skye’s pugs barking. She looked through her backpack, trying her best not to look towards the door where the yipping pugs were pawing at the glass, making sure she had her wallet and her cell phone with her.
     As she stepped towards the stairs the barking became more frantic as Juan and Juanita kept scratching at Skye’s door.
     Gust let out a long sigh and went back into her apartment to retrieve their leashes. She opened Skye’s door and the pugs hopped and scurried around her in excitement.
     “Taking the puggles for a quick walk,” texted Gust to Shake and Skye as Juan and Juanita stopped to sniff the base of a little library.
     Gust poked around the little library, telling herself she needed to get in more reading. It was not uncommon for her to see Skye or Shake with their noses in a book. Once she even found them sitting outside on a sunny day, sitting in chairs and reading books on the landing.
     She thumbed through a few mystery and fantasy novels, but none of them looked interesting enough to take along. She found a large, flat book full of poems, and she only needed to read one of them before she knew she had to take home a collection of Simon Warick Beresford poems.
     She brought the pugs and the book back to the apartments and set out once again.
     Tired from her cam session, she stopped at a nearby liquor store for a bag of chips and a candy bar, as she had forgotten, once again, to eat anything before she left her place. The walk to Sweet Adeline’s was not so far or particularly close by, but she had plenty of time to kill before Shake or Skye got home, so she decided to take her time walking to and from the bakery.
     She was not only trying to get more reading in, she was working on being more zen, trying not to let her ingrained urban angst get to her so much. She realized that whenever she walked, she worked a quick pace, that just about every part of her body was tense. She impressed herself with such self-reflection, coming to realize the grinding urban landscape with whizzing cars and non-stop urban background noise was fueling her near non-stop tension.
     Her mind floated to her main line of work. She had toyed with the idea of expanding her erotic career, possibly by bringing in a partner to play with, or maybe even trying to break into more lucrative work, such as performing in films.
     She wondered if she would even be able to land a role in an erotic film. She knew she was attractive enough for cam work, but she was not sure if she had what it took to get into films. She even wondered if she would be able to find a gig that paid well enough, as she had to admit to herself that she did not know very much about that particular industry.
     She thought about cornering Miranda the next time she ran into her at Butt Fork Studios and asking her for any advice she might have about moving into other areas of erotic work.
     The idea of working in a club only passed through her mind briefly. She knew herself well enough to know that she did not have the temperament to work directly with clients. Her temper would not allow her to handle overly aggressive or problematic clients, and she easily imagined herself getting fired soon after getting such a job because of a customer altercation, most likely involving her punching someone in the nose.
     She avoided the main street of Alcatraz to walk the quieter residential side streets. Not that the side streets were necessarily stress-free or quiet. One still had to pay attention to whizzing cars, bicycles, and other potential urban hazards, but they were not nearly as grating as the main thoroughfares.
     Walking slowly along as she chewed on her sour cream and onion potato chips, she looked around the Berkeley houses.
     It had been a working-class neighborhood at one point, populated by regular people who worked regular jobs. Even college students used to live in South Berkeley. The spiraling out-of-control cost of rent and the rocketing price of houses drove them all out. She knew the people living there were either long-time Berkeley residents who had hung onto their houses through the drastic increase in the cost of living, or they were tech workers with six-figure salaries.
     As she looked over the primed and primped houses, she imagined what the people who lived there were like, how they spent their time hunched over computers, making more money than she could ever imagine making. She speculated that they were the kind of people who spent more time thinking about what kind of wine they were going to have with whatever gourmet fish they were going to devour than anything else.
     She noted that some houses had been split off into separate living dwellings. A large house that looked as if it could have been a single family home would have a row of mailboxes, or the downstairs doors would have apartment numbers on them, reminding Gust that they were not all techie scum, that some people were slicing up their houses in order to survive.
     Other houses had all the looks of being a single home. They usually had fresh paint, new fences, and an air about them that reeked of money.
     She slowed down as she passed up a two-story house on a corner. It was quite large and elaborate, with dark plum paint and even darker trimmings. It had the feel of an older house, with a witch’s hat on the corner. It was such a grandiose and elaborate looking place that she wondered what the inside looked like.
     Then she saw the flat metal mailboxes on the porch. The place had been partitioned into different living spaces, rather than remaining its own stately manor.
     She kept observing houses as she walked along, noting things people did with their gardens such as bushes of roses or carefully placed collections of cacti arranged in such a way as to accentuate a stairway or a walkway. Some front yards had trellis entrances. Occasionally there were pieces of artwork such as statuettes or pieces of hanging ceramic art such as suns with faces or animals like frogs or fish.
     She took some time to look at a pristine three-story house that had a wide staircase leading up to the front door. It had smooth concrete paths around the front yard that was surrounded by an elegant picket-type fence. The lawn and garden were carefully crafted and manicured. Bright and starry lights shone through the fine-paneled window panes.
     She noted someone glaring at her through one of the windows, from the second floor. He was an older man with a receding hairline. No doubt he was someone who was worried she was casing the place, or he was just being suspicious. She fought the urge to flip him off, choosing instead to slow her pace, just to irritate him further.
     She kicked a few leaves as she shuffled along the sidewalk, determined to keep her casual pace. A few squirrels ran across her path as she admired an actual white picket fence in the front yard of another house.
     Her thoughts turned to her own living situation. Gust was glad that she had a place to live, even if she had to share it with a friend. Most of her life she had lived in too small apartments, usually crammed with roommates who occupied nearly every spot that could be converted into a living space. She almost found living on the street or living in rent-free squats to be less stressful, not having to constantly worry about how she was going to come up with rent or keep up such places with such limited funds.
     Her childhood was the same. Gust and her mother along with her little brother were constantly moving when she was a child, from one small studio to another tiny apartment to another house full of people. More than a few times they all ended up having to share a room, her sleeping on the right side of her mother while her little brother was on her left. There was no way on heaven or Earth that Gust could ever forget the cascade of emotions that ran through her when she finally ran away at the age of fourteen, taking off to hang out with a gang of homeless punks. Her mind had been a torrent of near constant fear and elation, among other stormy emotions during that time of her life.
     She realized she was stress walking again, with her tight shoulders and her balled up fists. She could even feel herself straining her calves. She forced herself to lighten her pace.
     Her mood became anxious when she saw Sweet Adeline’s up the street. She skittered quickly up to the bakery in anticipation of her purchase.
     Gust nearly flinched when she saw a thin woman with long, ragged light brown hair sitting on the large roundabout planter just outside of the bakery, her head down in a book with a cup of coffee sitting next to her. She was dressed in her traditional all-black clothes with her knees pressed together and her shoulders slumped as she hung onto the book as if it were a heavy weight.
     Even though her scraggly and wild hair covered her face, Gust immediately recognized her pale and thin friend.
     Gust walked up to her. “Bootskie! What’s the haps?”
     Bootskie looked up suddenly, as if she were startled.
     “Holy crap! What’s up, Gust?” smiled Bootskie. “I haven’t seen you since Menschen Park.”
     “No shit? It’s been that long?” asked Gust as she wracked her memory, trying to remember the last time she had seen her.
     “Have a sit. Tell me what’s up.”
Gust unshouldered he    r backpack and sat down. “Whatchoo doin’ in this part a’ town?”
     “I’m stayin’ in a warehouse, just offa Sacramento. Got a bed in a studio.”
     Gust remembered that Bootskie was one of those people who always bounced between homelessness and housed. Bootskie was always finding places to stay, but always in less than ideal circumstances. Occasionally she would stay at a squat, but she frequently sweet talked people into letting her dwell in their basement or sleep on an extra bed or couch for a short stretch of time.
     “What‘re you doing around here?” asked Bootskie as she set her book aside. “You live here now?”
     “Got a place down on San Pablo. My friend Skye is lettin’ me crash there.”
     “Skye?”
     “Skye Wright.”
     “You mean the shredder for The Dynamite Chicks?”
     “Yeah.”
     Bootksie shook her head around. “You’re friends with her?”
     “Ain’t everyone?”
     “I mean, you know her well enough that she’s givin’ you a place to crash?”
     Gust leaned back. “Not me so much. She’s friends with Shake. Me an’ her share a place.”
     “Got it,” said Bootskie with a slow nod as if she didn’t quite believe what Gust had told her. “So, you workin’? Whatcha doin’ for money?”
     Gust tossed her head towards the bay. “Got some work in San Francisco, doin’ work at Butt Fork Studios.”
     ”No shit?”
     “No big deal. Just office work kinda crap, an’ scoutin’ bands.”
     Bootskie turned to face Gust. “You’re a scout for Butt Fork?”
     “Yeah.”
     “Holy shit! How the hell did you get that gig?”
     Gust could have sworn that a couple of people sitting at the tables next to the bakery had glanced in her direction when Bootskie mentioned Butt Fork.
     She looked back at her friend. Bootskie had always been thin. Even her eyes, nose, and lips looked thin. But Gust thought she looked even thinner and more pale than she had ever looked.
     “It’s not really that big a deal,” said Gust. “Skye wanted someone in the scene to check out new talent. Y’know, everyone in the scene knows who she is. She wanted some people who were still down in the dirt to scope bands for the label.”
     “You get paid for that?”
     “Kinda. It’s not a lot a’ money.”
     “But you split the rent?”
     “Yeah. Shake walks dogs. She makes some pretty good cabbage from that.” Gust narrowed her eyes at Bootskie. “What about you? Where you livin’?”
     “I got a little place in an art commune. It’s like, down by the Oakland border. I got a little loft I stay in. It’s… Well it’s in a studio. I gotta walk aroun’ to get to the kitchen an’ the bathroom, but it works.”
     “Sounds kinda weird.”
     Bootskie pursed her lips and dropped her head. “It’ll do for now. I can’t stay there forever though. Especially because a’ alla those paint fumes.”
     “You got work? You makin’ any money?”
     Bootskie suddenly lifted her head. Gust thought she had shuddered a bit.
     “Just… I got… I’m looking for a new job. I was doin’ that inventory thing, over at that collection of restaurants? Over by the gourmet ghetto?”
     “What?”
     Bootskie waved a hand. “It was just some kinda part-time temporary thing.”
     “Sure.”
     Gust eyed the bakery. There were only a few people in line. “Hey, I gotta grab something for my house.”
     “Sure.”
     “You still got the same number?”
     “Naw. It’s a new one.”
     Bootskie gave Gust her new number and dropped her nose back into her book as Gust went into the bakery. She was not sure why she did not tell Bootskie about her webcam job. Back during her runaway days, she would talk to Bootskie about everything, even the sordid details of her wild sex life. For now she could not decide why she was keeping so many of her life details from her.
     Gust glanced back at Bootskie.
     She shuddered as she felt a cold wave go through her.
     Gust searched the cake and pie case. A young woman with tied-back light brown hair walked up behind the case. “Can I help you?”
     “No more chocolate creams?”
     “I’m sorry,” said the young woman, “we sold the last one this afternoon.”
     “Hmm… What’s that one?” asked Gust as she pointed to a pie topped with white cream.
     “That’s a coconut cream.”
     Gust settled her eyes on the white cream of the pie as she lamented having missed out on a chocolate cream pie.
     “I think I’ll take that one.”
     “Okay. A slice?”
     “Naw. The whole thing.”
     The woman paused for a moment as if she were surprised. “Certainly.”
     After carefully removing the pie and preparing it, she handed the box to Gust.
     “Can I get a bag? I gotta carry it some ways back.”
     “Sure.”
     At the last minute Gust bought an almond croissant. She was going to give it to Bootskie, but when she came back out Bootskie was nowhere to be found.
     She carefully walked back to the apartments, balancing the pie bag so that she would not mar her purchase if it tilted too much.
     She decided to eat the almond croissant as she walked.
     Passing by the house with the wide porch once more, she slowed down and looked at all of the fine detail. Looking down the side of the house, she saw how far back it went, covering a wide swath.
     She wondered how many rooms the house had. She surmised that it had to have at least three bedrooms.
     Her mind drifted inside the house, wondering what it would be like to live there, imagining how it would feel to actually own such a place. She would go from room to room, once she had acquired the place, and decide where her bedroom would be and what she would do with the other rooms. She would designate one to be a guest room, and another to be a library and study of sorts where she would start collecting books. She would get a big easy chair to sit in while she read.
     The house looked as if it had a decently large basement. She imagined turning it into a party room, with couches and a huge television set and video games, or maybe she could convert it into a small music studio so she could invite friends over for jams, maybe even get Skye or Miranda to teach her a few things so she could be a better musician.
     She imagined it would be large enough to turn it into a party room and a musician’s studio.
     Her mind drifted to filling the place up, choosing what kind of furniture would go into the living room, and what kind of things she would get for the kitchen. She knew there was no way she could have such a large and elaborate place without finding enough art for the walls, buying paintings and installations from all of her crazed and twisted art friends, as well as putting up show bills and club flyers throughout the house.
     Her mind cycled through the possibilities: a large wall of records covering one wall in the living room, rescue cats sleeping and skulking all through the house, with her falling asleep to a pile of cats every night.
     Her mind whirled with ideas, how she could be drunk with living space, and what she would have to do to fill such a large house to make it her own and have it come alive.
     She felt her heart twist up and drop as the sharp eyes of the receding hairline appeared in the window once again. She glared back at him with narrow eyes, trying her best not to scowl so he wouldn’t have the satisfaction of knowing he got to her.
     A jolt went through Gust. She stopped in front of the house and looked right at the man. She lifted up her hand and stuck her tongue between two fingers, waggling her tongue at him
     The man scowled and disappeared from the window. Gust resisted the urge to wait and see if he came out, as she did not want anything to happen to the pie.
     She kept walking, trying as much as possible to push her house daydreams out of her mind. She had never lived in such a place, and she could not even imagine being able to ever afford such a place, so she wondered why she was torturing herself with such thoughts.
     She let her mind rumble as her shoulders got tight. She walked faster.
     Getting back to the apartments, she was finally able to let her mind go blank as she trudged up the stairs.
     She started when she realized someone was on the landing.
     “Hey Gust. What’s up?”
     “Skye, You’re back early.”
     “I can’t spend all my time at that studio,” said Skye as she opened her door and the pugs trotted out. “Thanks for walking my doggos.”
     “Eh. They kinda guilt tripped me into it.”
     “No doubt. What’s in the bag?”
     Gust set down the bag and took out the box. “I bought us all a pie.”
     “Really? A whole pie?”
     “From Sweet Adeline’s. I wanted the chocolate cream, but they only had coconut.”
     Skye looked at the box. “Damn! Sweet Adeline’s? Fuck yeah!”
     “I wanted to treat you guys.”
     “You didn’t need to get us a whole pie.”
     “I wanted to,” said Gust, looking down at the pie. “I made plenty a’ cam money this week, so I wanted to splurge.”
     “You know when Shake’s comin’ back?”
     Gust shrugged. “She should be back soon. Maybe in like, an hour.”
     Skye looked down at the pie. “Fuck it. I got some cod I was gonna cook up tomorrow, but I’ll make it tonight. We can pig out.”
     “Fuck them diets,” smiled Gust. “Let’s get fat!”
     “Hell yeah!” smiled Skye as the skittering pugs started sniffing the pie box.