CHUCK

After the World War II victory celebrations that ensued after VE Day and V-J Day in 1945, New York had to quickly address the issue of housing many of the veterans whose return had exposed a shortage of homes across the city and which prompted plans to accelerate new constructions to accommodate them.

Reporter Chuck Tatum of the New York Times had been assigned to investigate the immediate impact of the crisis on the veterans and deploy his typically emotive 'flesh and blood' approach that had become his trademark and which the newspaper hoped would bolster their planned campaigns to put pressure on local and federal authorities and gain the support of their readers. Tatum was good at delivering the newsprint equivalent of a body blow when weaponised to do so by his managing editor, Catledge, though less so when it came to the more anaemic news stories he was routinely assigned for punishment, which often led him in his boredom to go for early drinks at P.J. Clarke's and later, if he got a 'tip off' or 'scoop' about a celebrity, the 21 Club.

"Chuck. You're my dog of war who I keep on a tight leash and for good reason. Whenever I require your unique brand of hard-boiled I order myself up a 'Tatum Special' and everyone starts to look busy. You have the zealotry of a firebrand but the decorum of a playground bully. Just remember though, don't drink before you run this time; you might just trip up and fall flat on your face."

Feeling reinvigorated and empowered with responsibility for a news story that matched his abilities as a journalist, Tatum decided he would take heed of Catledge's advice and resist the temptation of a 'nooner' at P.J. Clarke's in order to get started on his new assignment. He drew up a short list of flop houses and shelters where veterans waiting for new homes might temporarily be living and set to work on recording their individual stories.

It didn't take long for the veteran testimonies to flow like cheap booze, or 'rotgut' as Chuck often referred to his preferred choice of 'legal poison'. At one dive on 42nd Street, Chuck immediately got stuck into an intense discussion with an amputee called Ozzie from the 69th Infantry Regiment who had been promised physical rehabilitation, help with psychological readjustment and re-housing but hadn't heard a word since providing all his relevant personal information and official paperwork to the demobilisation centre in Fort Hamilton, Brooklyn.

"You fight for your country and then your country gives you the 'cold shoulder' is what it seems like, Chuck. I lost an arm for this country, the least they could do is give me a hand out when I need it most."

"I hear you Ozzie. I hear you. There's an awful lot of silence amongst all the noise in this city."

Gifting the traumatised veteran his very own heavily scratched hip flask filled with booze and inscribed with a loving message from his first wife, Patricia, before their acrimonious divorce, Chuck assured the veteran he would see him right, somehow.

"I won't forget you Ozzie, I promise."

Back out on the street, Chuck felt genuine rage for Ozzie's predicament, the type of righteous anger he would feel when he first started out as a cub reporter back in the early 30s, but his outrage was soon replaced by his terrible thirst for a drink. He shouldn't have given away his hip flask so casually like that, good intentioned though it may have been. It wasn't that he was going to drink from his 'flattie' right away but just knowing it was there tucked inside his inner breast pocket would get him through the long day whilst out pounding the streets, working his newshawk beat. It was a chicken and egg type of thing with booze for Chuck. He needed a little taste just to light the fire in his belly but knew that too much of that same fire and he would burn himself bad with the stuff.

Ducking out of a sudden torrential downpour, Chuck took shelter close to a hobo jungle by the docks in Hell's Kitchen where he found a whole bunch of homeless veterans warming themselves by a crackling brazier and chewing over their tales of war.

"Any you guys want to give me your names and I'll write you up good so people know how badly the authorities screwed you over."

Some did, some preferred to keep anonymous. An hour or two later, a veteran called Charlie with a gaunt, hollowed out face handed out a couple of bottles of muscatel amongst the group claiming they had been gifted by a 'secret donor', a dockyard worker who had an abundance of the stuff he'd picked up on the cheap from a supplier in California. The sweet honey scent of the booze, warmed on the air by the red orange flames of the nearby fire, distracted Tatum momentarily as he kept thinking back to Catledge's warning in his office about his drinking.

Chuck wanted a Pulitzer Prize for journalism far more than another stint in the drunk tank. God knows he'd wasted too many nights sobering up amongst leery, toothless soaks, thinking they were actual demons from nightmares he dreamt up in his alcohol fuelled slumber. Where exactly did he get this self loathing, self destructive alcoholic streak from? His late father, probably. Always wanting more from life but getting increasingly less and less until he'd snapped one day and ended up in a Bellevue Hospital's Psychiatric Ward. He, too, had been a reporter back in the day, and some part of Chuck wanted to redeem the part of his late father's career that went off the rails and make it good. Of course, now his father was dead it was probably too late to mean what it might have earlier when he was still alive. But Tatum had now made his own professional success a point of pride and one that he would see through to the bitter end, even if it meant a few broken hearts along the way, including several ex-wives and multiple law suits.

Proud of himself for turning down the wine shared amongst the veterans, Chuck went on his way in search of more testimonies. Walking away from the damp dockyards, he could hear them all singing a chorus in a sort of slurring unison.

"Hut-Sut Rawlson on the rillerah and a brawla, brawla sooit."

A mission in the bowery in lower Manhattan was Chuck's next port of call and he figured if he got this far without a drink he could go the whole day through and roll over sober to the next. The sense of doing something noble with his work assignment seemed to be helping him stave off the devil inside his head that constantly demanded a whiskey.

Arriving at the mission, Chuck could hear the sound of a choir singing and headed toward the music with his press camera at the ready where a headline was already formulating in his mind, 'Salvation for Army Vets'.

So I'll cherish the old rugged cross (rugged cross)
Till my trophies at last I lay down
I will cling to the old rugged cross
And exchange it some day for a crown

Looking in on the scene where the smiling choir sang before a group of emaciated looking homeless men sat in rows on rickety chairs, Chuck began to feel uncomfortable suddenly as his throat tightened and his mouth became dry. There was something about the hymn that brought to mind a memory from childhood where he remembered his father had told him to wait inside St Patrick's Cathedral while he attended a meeting at the Daily News on 220 East 42nd Street. Waiting for his father's return, which seemed interminable, the young Chuck had begun to feel a knotted feeling in his gut, increasingly concerned that his pop wasn't ever coming back. As he'd watched various members of the public praying before the high altar, young Chuck clasped his own young hands together. He'd never prayed much before except when his mother would make him do so as she put him to bed. That was before she tragically died of influenza when he was five years old. Young Chuck's hand clenched prayer in the cathedral hadn't been answered as his father hadn't returned and it wasn't until much later that he was approached by a concerned chaplain who accompanied Chuck to the police station where they attempted to track down his whereabouts. As it turned out, Tatum Sr had gotten waylaid at a bar on his way to a meeting and had drank himself to oblivion. Forgetting all about his son left back at the cathedral, he was only reunited with his boy after returning to his apartment where Chuck and several police officers were waiting on the stairwell.

To the old rugged cross I will ever be true
It's shame and reproach gladly bear
Then he'll call me some day to my home far away
Where his glory forever I'll share

Chuck left the mission feeling anxious and starved for air. He was going to need a drink urgently to recover himself otherwise who knew where his memories would lead him - further down a rabbit hole of despair, probably. He was determined to fill that black hole inside him with booze so he could drown out the ghosts which still haunted him from time to time and threatened to send him, like his father, to the asylum.

Besides, he could write just as well drunk as sober and how the hell would old Catledge know or care he’d succumbed to temptation just so long as the copy was gold. Chuck made a beeline to McSorley's Old Ale House on East 7th Street and ordered a double of Old Forester just to settle his nerves.

Stood at the bar after downing his first shot and still feeling jittery, Chuck remembered an expression his late father would shout at the wardens at Bellevue when he was being manhandled during one of his 'episodes'.

"God may forgive you, but your nervous system won't!"

Chuck felt his heart palpitating as if he had a jazz drummer inside his chest and ordered another double shot to further calm him down.

Slowly, sedated by the whiskey, Chuck began to feel disconnected from his anxiety, his limbs becoming relaxed and heavy. Sliding onto a bar stool, he lit up a cigarette and gestured for another refill of his glass to the bartender.

As he watched the golden liquor pour from the neck of the bottle into his shot glass, he muttered to himself.

"I won't forgive God. But I'll forgive my nervous system."

And with that he made the sign of the cross over his glass and made peace with himself for returning to old habits. Bad habits.

"I can't print this Chuck. It's sentimental nonsense. Where's the blood and guts? If I wanted a Charles Dickens novel I would have got one of our short story writers to submit something. You got til tomorrow morning to re-write this crap or I'm re-assigning it to Elborough."

Chuck took the hit, knowing he hadn't properly re-read the draft article since he first wrote it the morning after his blow out at McSorley's just forty eight hours prior.

"Alright, Mr Catledge. You'll have the blood and guts version tomorrow and I'll make sure to leave out the sugar."

Catledge scrutinised Tatum as he headed to leave.

"You couldn't help yourself could you, Chuck."

"Say what?"

"You know what I'm talking about. I told you what would happen and you didn't listen.

"I didn't do anything Mr Catledge. Now who's the fiction writer?"

Catledge smiled knowingly as a riposte to Chuck's obvious denial of his habitual drink problem.

" Alright. But I'm telling you if you don't get a handle on it one way or another, it'll define the rest of your career and most likely bury you."

"Wanna put a bet I'm still at the top of my game in ten years from now?"

"Make it five. And yeah, sure. Why not. On the proviso it may not be my newspaper you're working for at the time."

Chuck smiled in wry fashion.

"Of course. Otherwise you'd kick me out today and take your winnings right away."

And with that, Tatum closed Catledge's office door and left the building, finding the piercing white sunlight outside blinding him on the sidewalk and forcing him momentarily to retreat back inside the lobby.

Seizing the opportunity to buy a brand new pack of 'Lucky Strike' from the vending machine, Chuck broke the cellophane seal and placed a single fresh tube between his lips as he prepared to exit the building once more. But just as he was about to leave for the second time, he saw Robert Elborough passing through the glass door entrance and stride purposefully toward the newsroom on the third floor.

Tatum watched his adversary with keen eyes. He had often mocked him as the 'belt and suspenders' type of journalist and muttered softly under his breath.

"You don't stand a chance Elborough. Tatum's going to smash this feature out of the bullpen."

And with that, Chuck exited through the glass doors of the building and embraced his sober day ahead, refusing to let the drink get the better of him, determined to prove that he was the best journalist of his era, and grateful that his ego and professional pride were stronger than his addiction.

At least for now.