"Calling Sister Midnight," Baby said. One might assume that we called him Baby because he was the shortest, but that was just a coincidence.
"I'm here," Sister Midnight said. "I'm awake." She was black (although I guess I should say "African-American," although Midnight didn't care if we called her that), but, again, that wasn't why we called her Sister Midnight. She chose her name, like we all chose ours. "I call myself it because I reached for the moon and came up empty," she once said. We know what she's talking about.
"How about you, China Girl?" Baby likes to talk. We don't mind. Sometimes the chatter is all that keeps us awake, although there's also the coffee and the caffeine pills and the Big Gulps and the Five Hour Energy drinks. We stay up, because we can. (Although Sister Midnight might say she has another reason to stay up.)
"I'm fine," China Girl says. She was Asian, but not from China. She's actually from Korea; she had immigrated here when she was three along with her whole family. I told her we would be fine if she chose another name, but she insisted to go along with the theme. "I don't mind. If I'm China Girl, I'm China Girl." Tonight, she was chewing on a cigarette filter, the thin cigarette unlit in her mouth. "How about you, Funtime?"
"I'm good," I say. I have a Big Gulp in front of me, Mr Pibb running through my veins. It's a brisk February night, right after midnight, and here we all are.
There are four of us, but then, of course, there is the fifth member. The reason we are all together, the reason we stay up all night, the reason we walk in rags and have a beggar in our hearts. The reason we walk like a ghost through the empty, night-time streets.
"Let's go nightclubbing," Baby says and we break out into grins. Time to face the night and dance away our fears.
