Finally I say, “Joe might be thinking like this. Eminent domain, buy-back, realistically, it can never happen. Something gets proposed, goes to court, court agrees, knocks it down, you get an appeal, goes back to the city, win, lose, buying time—not buy back, just buying time.”

“You mean, we’re just using stalling tactics.”

“You never know. We could win.”

“What kind of line is stalling tactics?”

“Line?”

“It’s like this, Felix, a line is . . .” Macario is looking for words.

I cut in, “You think I don’t know what you’re doing? I don’t know what your line is? How’s your party line gonna help me? You get a party, but what do I get?”
Abra and Macario poking around the bones on their plates.

“Felix is right,” Abra says. “Every group is using the hotel to test their line.”

I know the problem. How many old tenants we got left? Used to be fifty. Now, maybe thirty. Every support group attached to one or two tenants, hauling him around from rally to rally like the real thing. I don’t say nothing because what’s an old guy got besides this kind of family, this kind of attention? What does he know about party lines? But he is not stupid. Didn’t survive all these years without learning something.