Chapter 3The Upper East Side always felt like another world for a street-wise kid who grew up in a place called Hell’s Kitchen, as though by traveling uptown the canyons of New York opened up and showed off more of the sky’s lustrous heavens. As Jimmy disembarked the subway at 77th Street and Lexington, he felt like the sun was shining more brightly, growing in intensity the further he went toward 5th Avenue. Large, pre-war apartment buildings lined the exclusive strip, as did the eastern edge of Central Park; the picture of money gleamed like polished gold, the glint off BMW windshields like sparkling diamonds.
Sometimes Jimmy was surprised the only difference was a zip code.
Otherwise, his hood and here were both considered New York, New York.
At 5th and 84th, he walked under an awnin
