What We Can Do Without
by Jake Winn
Night came early that day, and not for the first time that week. Owen Smith woke from an inebriated sleep to discover his wallet missing. He checked underneath the bed, behind the dresser and around the toilet. He was wearing his pants still, and they smelt like cheap booze and bile. Out his window some kids were shoving each other into the street. Some cars passed by and sounded their horns at them. Breakfast sat heavy in his stomach and his head started to ache as he started to remember the things that had happened the night before. There were indistinguishable voices coming from the stairwell and, when they passed, the echo of a door closing. Owen laid back down. He turned on the TV, but there wasn’t anything on, so he turned off the TV and closed his eyes. His head was starting to feel better some, and the taste of coffee that lingered in his mouth made him feel awake again. The weed was stored in a tin underneath the table, and he rolled out a joint and smoked it. He went and got a beer from the kitchen. When he got a message back, he put the beer down on the table and got into the shower. The beer sweated a small puddle and was warm by the time he was dressed. He drank it anyway. Then he rolled himself a joint. At the train station he jumped over the turnstile just as the train was arriving and lurked in a corner and watched the young postman with his arm around a lady, and the construction worker nodding off. The doors opened and closed at two stops, and some people got on but not many, and Owen transferred at the next stop.
Michael Pennicock lived in a loft on Wythe by the bridge with some roommates that were never there. When Owen got there, he rang the buzzer and Michael came out in his coat and his sandals, off to get more beer, and Owen went along with him, to the bodega at the corner. They had only a few types of beer there and Michael grabbed two of the cheapest. Owen told him about the wallet, and Michael said, “Don’t worry, man, you’ll get me later.” They talked about the night before and about the plan for the coming one, and Owen held the case of beer while they crossed Wythe again. Cassie was sitting on the floor, picking at her fingernails, up against the window, and a street lamp was glowing in on her and lit up the side of her face and she swirled around a glass of vodka and ice and she smirked and stretched and spilled a bit of the vodka and giggled and stood when they came in. “I thought you weren’t coming back ever.” She kissed Owen on the cheek. “We haven’t got any ice.”
“You could’ve called,” Michael said. “Anyway, we’re leaving soon, we can make do.” He tossed his coat onto the chair and kicked his sandals off, and cracked a beer for himself and tossed one to Owen.
“I can go,” Owen said. “But somebody’d have to spot me.” She smelled of vodka and fresh lime and also perfume. Owen lingered a second in the scent.
“It’s fine,” Cassie said, “if he wants us all to have warm drinks, we’ll have warm drinks.”
Michael put back on his coat, and went. Cassie walked over to the kitchen. “Can I fix you something, Owen?” She put the rest of the beer in the fridge.
“I’m good with the beer.”
“Let me make you something, I love making things.”
She started around the kitchen, sliced him a lime and poured him out a heavy pour. He thumbed through the record collection and said something about the one that was already playing and she nodded and asked him who it was that was playing and he said who and she nodded, as if she had forgotten. Then he took a seat over on the couch while he watched her finish the cocktail.
“Of course, without the ice,” she handed him the drink, “it’ll be warm until Michael gets back,” and clinked hers up against it.
He tasted it.
“Isn’t it delicious?”
“It tastes just like vodka.”
She nudged him and he kept on sipping it and it made his lips burn so he put it down half-empty on the floor next to the couch and she started scrolling on her phone.
Then Michael came back with the bag of ice that he threw on the ground so to break it up and Cassie jumped. “You could warn a person,” she said, and he tossed it on the ground again, smiling.
She put her feet up on the couch, her toes nearly touching Owen where he sat and he took another sip of the vodka. She didn’t look up at all but shook her glass out and Michael came over and dropped some cubes in and the vodka splashed out on her hand and she didn’t say anything about that but put it to her lips and sucked it up. “Owen could use some of that, couldn’t you? I had to make him a warm drink.”
“I’m alright,” he said, taking another sip. But she snatched up his glass and she went clawed some ice into it. She brought it back to him and he thanked her again and then she opened a window and laid back down on the couch. Her feet inching closer to Owen, he stared at them for a minute until Michael came around the couch and Owen jumped up to offer him his seat and Michael said, “sit sit,” and he took a seat on the armchair across from them and pulled out some papers and started rolling some weed and some tobacco into a spliff. He rolled the thing back over itself several times to get it right, and licked along then edge to seal it. Then he handed the crisp spliff and a lighter over to Owen, and he took the first hit. The tobacco caught in his throat and he started to cough and Cassie put her hand on his shoulder. “Are you alright?” she asked, and put her other hand on his hand that was holding the drink. “Drink some,” she said, and he did, but the thick syrupy vodka drink did nothing but make him gag a bit and Michael went and got him another beer from the fridge. That helped, though it did make him feel an ache in his stomach. He leaned back on the couch and pressed the cold bottle up to his gut and pushed his belt down to alleviate it.
“Where do you think your wallet is?” Michael asked.
“No clue,” Owen said. “Maybe on a street corner, or at that last bar we went to.”
“Could you have left it in a cab or something?”
“It was before that, because I ended up walking home.”
“That’s terrible,” Cassie said. “You should’ve said something. We would’ve called you one.”
“It’s alright. You were gone already by the time I realized.”
“Well I’m just glad you made it home alright.”
“I’ll tell you where it is,” Michael said. “It’s at that last place, with that bartender, the one with the red hair, Owen couldn’t take his eyes off her the whole night.”
The record stopped and Cassie went and flipped it and a few more songs came and went and with them more beers and another vodka drink, and another spliff. Then Michael asked if anyone might want some coffee or anything. Owen did, and Michael made him a cup and he drank most of it and the coffee warmed him somehow and pulled him back some. Then Michael put on shoes and Cassie collected the cans and the glasses and they set out.
On the train, Cassie put some make-up on around the eyes while the train moved through the tunnel. Michael watched her, from across the train car. Owen watched too. And another guy, standing near the door, also watched.
“She can do this too while driving,” Michael said. “But that’s not the only reason I wouldn’t get in the car with her.”
“Thank you very much, but I happen to think I’m a very good driver,” she said, and started on the lipstick.
The others were waiting outside for them. There was a line and they waited in it until the bouncer waved them in. Connor spotted a table near the back and Owen went up to the bar with Michael to get the drinks. The place was crowded and the music was loud. The people were lined up at the bar three deep. Michael found an in and he slid in sideways between two stools, with his back pressed up against the woman who was sitting there. She turned around and made eye contact with Michael and they said something to one another but it was too loud and Owen was standing too far away to hear what they said. Then the bartender came around and Michael ordered for the group of them. Owen took a couple of glasses in hand, and Michael took the rest. “What was she saying?” Owen asked. Michael asked, “Who?”
Connor passed around a small bag filled with little pink pills. Everyone gave him money except Owen. Michael did not offer to spot him for it and Owen did not want to ask, so he acted as if he didn’t want to trip anyway. “I drink to my annihilation!” Michael said, and knocked the pill back with his drink. Cassie took hers too, and Owen asked, “How does it feel?” “Fine,” she said, “I don’t really feel anything.” She asked him if he wasn’t having one too, and he said he’d forgotten his wallet. “Michael will spot you,” she said. “It’s alright,” Owen said, “really.” She reached across for Connor’s bag and opened Owen’s jaw with the one hand and put the pink pill on Owen’s tongue and she closed it. “There,” she said, “now, Michael, please pay the man.” Michael coughed up the money and Owen thanked him for it, and Cassie asked, “Who’s ready for another drink?”
The lights strobed in a blinding monotony, cycling rhythmically through all the primary colors. Many people were dancing toward the middle of the room, thrusting and nodding to the powerful bass line. Owen made his way through to find a restroom and nearly spilt his drink when some guy backed up right into him. Owen apologized to the guy, because the guy was annoyed because the girl the guy was dancing with disappeared while the guy was looking away. Cassie was dancing too, back at the table, and Michael was sitting in one of the arm chairs, his head resting on the tips of his fingers, and he was watching her. The others were on a couch. Lisa and Connor were talking about something and Michael got up for another drink. Cassie grabbed Owen’s hand. His glass shook apprehensively and the drink splashed out in spurts and some onto her arm. He apologized and she smiled and she reached for it and she finished it in a single sip and wrapped her arms around his neck and she was very warm and moist from all the dancing. He could smell her make-up, mixed with the vodka and sweat, when she rested her head on his chest.
Then the song ended and Cassie laid down on the couch among the other boys and she put her arms around two of them and kissed one of them on the cheek and the other put his hand on her lap.
“Michael,” she said, “couldn’t you also get me another drink?”
He did, and she drank it, and then they all left that club in search of another. The music was dull and stale and the drinks, Michael said, were too expensive to keep up with at the rate they were going, especially now that they could no longer really taste them. Connor knew of another spot nearby and the group followed him along through the cold brisk night, down the long stretches of dimly lit city blocks, with the few remaining window lights twinkling across the hollow gray sky.
Owen walked along with Connor at the front. “How far are we going?” Owen asked. “Just a few more blocks,” Connor said, “it’s a very good place, with good music, and a lot of people usually.” Owen asked if there would be any sort of cover.
Cassie was back listening to Justin talk about a recent trip to the Maldives. Owen fell back and listened too. He realized she hadn’t brought along a coat with her, and she had her arms crossed tight and she was taking short stiff hurried steps. He focused on the concrete passing beneath them, and they carried on another few blocks, until Justin’s story ended and he made his way to the front to see, he said, if they knew where they were going. The footsteps grew louder, echoing down the hollow empty streets. Michael was way up nearly half a block ahead already.
“Are you alright?”
“Fine. I’ve had a few drinks.”
“So have I.”
“And the weed, too.”
“It’s just that you’re shivering.”
“Yeah, well I’m cold.”
“It’s cold out. Do you want my jacket?”
“That’s alright.”
He took it off and wrapped her in it. “We’re almost there anyway.”
“Are you sure?” she asked. “Because I’ll be fine without it.”
The group crossed through an intersection at a green light and turned up the avenue a few more blocks as the stretches of silence got longer and the buildings darker and the city diminished behind them. There were only warehouses now, with large fogged up windows and dented steel doors and dirt, and decay, and spray paint hieroglyphs. Connor stopped in front of one of them, read the piece of paper taped to the door and he opened it. The rest followed him in.
The door led to a stairwell that was crammed with mops and brooms and pieces of wood and metal and then to a big, open, stretched-out floor and a DJ in the corner and a coat rack nearby and some people crowded around a small table and some beers lined along an uneven one. Then the empty dance floor, the blacked out windows, and a chair where a bald man sat with a big beard and another man sprawled out across him. Connor hung his coat and Owen offered to take his back from Cassie but she thought she might keep it on for a bit and then they got some beer, off that uneven table in the corner. The beer was free, but it was awful, some homebrew, and Owen took only two sips before resolving to hold on to it as a prop only.
The music picked up and Cassie made straight for the dance floor. Michael followed her on. They danced to a beat that warped as it stretched on, one song into another. She closed her eyes while she moved, crafted the air around her with her scooping swimming hands and languid arm movements. She tossed the coat over on the floor, off to the side. The sprawled-out man got up off the bald man, locked eyes with Cassie and, for awhile, they moved together. Michael watched them. Owen stepped out and picked up his coat. Connor came up beside him. “It’s his dad’s building,” Connor said, “but it’s basically been abandoned for years. As long as it wasn’t being used, his dad lets him use it for his art.” “That’s nice,” Owen said, “I expected there to be more people here.” Connor said, “What do you mean, it’s early still.” Connor took a big sip of the awful beer, and Owen took one too.
A few more people joined the dance from the group around the little table and then the man whispered something into Cassie’s ear, and she nodded, and he walked off the dance floor. She grabbed Michael by the arm and whispered into his ear too and they left after him. Connor followed and Owen followed him and they all squeezed into the bathroom at the far end of the hall. The powdery contents of a small glass vile were poured out onto the lid of a toilet seat and the others crowded around.
“The place is amazing,” Cassie said, bending over his shoulder to take the first hit through a rolled-up bill with a long and labored inhale, and then she vacuumed up around it.
“Yeah,” Michael said, taking the bill from her, “it’s a good place.”
Owen took another sip of his beer. Then the bill came for him and he took a hit. The light in the bathroom was loud and aggressive and the shadows in the crammed-up stall warped and came into focus.
Cassie said, “I want to dance.”
The man said, “Okay.”
Michael said, “I want another, Richard.”
“Anyone else?”
“I’ll have one, sure,” Owen said, and the man named Richard cut them each another. Then they danced. The beat, harsh and bright, and the volume vibrating so that the windows shook and the floor and their bodies and Owen wondered at the people passing by but there weren’t any and was there anybody nearby sleeping. Michael brought him another beer and he finished his and he started to drink it and he danced some more, with Richard and with Connor and then with Cassie and then Michael and Cassie and then the lights flickered and a fuse was blown and some people laughed and Richard flitted off with the bald one to check it out and some of the others lit candles and others still disappeared to the bathroom. Owen took a seat on the floor near the little table. He was nauseous and hot and his feet were sweaty in his boots. A kid offered him a cigarette but he declined.
“How do you know Richard?” The kid asked.
“I don’t really,” Owen said, “But I know Connor and Michael.”
“Which one’s Michael?”
Owen pointed him out. “His girlfriend and I know each other from college.”
The kid told Owen the story of how they’d met in some far-off place somewhere once, like Bali, and then told about how Richard was trying hard to get into the party scene. “And,” he said, “well, it’s not any of my business but, if he wanted a big party, he probably should’ve invited more people.”
“Maybe this is just the size he wants,” Owen said, “you don’t know, do you?”
The girl sitting next to him laughed at that and she took a long drag of this kid’s cigarette and exhaled a cloud of thick smoke out into the candlelight that enshrouded the table and dispersed into the strobing darkness.
Sometime later, Cassie and Michael came back over.
“I’m ready to go,” Cassie said. “There isn’t any music anymore.”
Looking on his phone, Michael found a place nearby that they could go to and he grabbed his coat and called a car. Connor called another. Owen wrapped Cassie in his coat and followed them out.
“You can ride with us,” Cassie whispered into Owen’s ear.
The night was crisper then and the streets just as empty as before, but the quietness echoed louder in still ringing ears, and Owen decided to break off from them there and, he said, head home.
“Are you sure?” Cassie asked, kissing his cheek and wrapping his coat back around him.
Michael climbed into the car after her. “Maybe we’ll catch you tomorrow night, or something.” He reached a hand out the window and Owen thanked him again for all of it and said again how he’d pay him back, just as soon as he found his wallet.
There was a subway station a few blocks east, but some cops were lingering around so he kept walking toward the next stop. He wandered through a park where a man was sprawled across a bench, his body breathing in tune with the rhythm of the traffic on the overpass. A woman slumped against a light post asked him if he could spare change. Owen looked down instead. Her feet were bare and her ankles large and chalky and swollen.
He thought back to the night before and saw it clearly again, more clearly than before. He remembered the bartender with the red hair and wondered if it was true, what Michael had said about her and how he couldn’t keep his eyes off her. He realized soon enough which part of town he was passing through and thought how that bar was only a few blocks due West and so he set out towards it. It was in a long strip of them that bustled beneath the beer brand neons just as if the night before had never ended. And he waited in the line and, when he came to the door, he told the bouncer about his wallet and his ID that was inside of it. The bouncer studied his face and waved him in and watched him walk through the crowd and up to the bar.
“I was here last night,” he said, when a bartender came around. “Did you by any chance find my wallet?”
The bartender scowled, finished pouring a drink, shook it, and delivered it; then he told Owen that he would go and check on it. Owen looked around. There was another bartender working. She was short and quick but made no eye contact with the patrons as she served them. Then the male bartender came back. “Owen Smith?” he asked. Owen nodded, and the bartender studied the picture on his driver’s license. “You’re lucky,” the bartender said, “somebody found this out in the gutter.” “Thanks, man,” Own said, and he handed the bartender ten dollars from his wallet. The bartender nodded, slipped the bill into his back pocket, and started in making another cocktail. He might have asked was the red-haired one working, or when she was working again, or if he could have her number, but he didn’t know her name even. And anyway, he thought, in flirting with me, she was probably only doing her job.
The cab ride home from there was long and he dozed off briefly at a red light. Once upstairs, he poured himself a glass of water. He kicked off his shoes and packed a bowl and standing up he smoked it, took off his pants and checked his pockets again and thought, for a moment, he might have left his wallet in the cab. He turned the lights on, though, and found it lying on the bed. He lay down beside it and fell back asleep with all the lights still on.
Jake Winn‘s work has been featured by Barely South Review, Rhizo Magazine, and The Inner Loop reading series. He was selected as a finalist for The Florida Review’s 2025 Annual Editor’s Prize. Originally from South Florida, he earned a BFA from NYU Tisch School of the Arts, and currently lives in Los Angeles, with his wife, Campbell, and their hound dog, Hadley.