Charlie Dean's Great Fall, October 6, 1981

Wesley claimed to have done every drug under the sun at least once but never talked about any addiction or problems with drugs. However, given the amount of talk about drugs in his stories, I can only assume they played a role in his plight. Certainly alcohol played a prominent role, but that's pretty much par for the course with anyone growing up in the Western world.

In this next piece, Wesley tells the story of a man named Charlie Dean, a drug addict that lived on the Bowery. As with many of Dumont's characters, Charlie Dean comes up from time to time. Whether Charlie Dean was a real person or just a figment of Dumont's imagination remains a mystery.

October 6, 1981
Charlie Dean was a fruit with a taste for the white stuff. I first met him on the Bowery in the summer of '77 at an illegal nightclub in a warehouse on Bowery and Prince or somewheres like that. I had been looking to score for me and my girlfriend, a runaway named Donna from Pittsburgh, PA that I met at the shelter the night before. She was a cute little thing with a desperate loathing of the real world. She wanted to score even worse than I did and waited impatiently outside as a I ventured in looking for Charlie Dean, a man I was certain not to miss.

On this particular night Charlie looked like sausage meat stuffed into a bright pink casing, flitting around with a power-white mustache and a wild-eyed grin. The awful catchy beat of disco music filled every crevice of the room. I had a headache the size of St. Petersburg and was restless to score and be done with the pain and all feelings of angst. The long summer had been hard on my good nature and I needed to feel good if only for a night.

I tapped Charlie on the shoulder and motioned him away from the hideous action taking place on the dance floor. I told him that Manny Gun from the Bowery House had sent me and that he'd have something for me. He looked me up and down with a queer grin and motioned me to a room at the other end of the dance floor. He unlocked the room and we entered what was a seedy little office space with a dirty mattress in the corner.

"Champagne?" he says to me.

"Champagne?" I replied. I was a little confused. I wasn't used to such hospitality when trying to score illegal narcotics. He motioned for me to sit in one of the two folding chairs which I did while accepting his champaign offer.

The queer look got even queerer. "What's on your mind, big boy?" says Charlie.

I told him again that Manny had sent me, told me I could score some white at a reasonable price and that my girlfriend was downstairs and I really couldn't stay long because she was an impatient little minx and difficult to please. I was nervous. I'd been straight for too long and the desperate sweats were creeping up on me. But Charlie took his time.

"How much money you got? By the looks a you, prolly na much, no?"

"I got plenty. Enough for tonight at least."

"How about we make a deal you and me, no?" With his eyes he motioned in a knowing way towards the mattress in the corner.

Almost immediately I had Charlie Dean by the back of his hair and a belt loop. I took him into the club, across the dance floor and down the stairs he went. I followed him to the bottom and fished out a good-sized bag of the good stuff and stuffed some bills in his pocket.

Donna and I had a strange evening that night, another story entirely. But I felt bad about what I had done to Charlie Dean and would apologize later. Thankfully he wasn't hurt that bad, no more than normal. He and I remained friends until he died in early 1991.