Blueschild Baby

by George Cain

  “You up here trying to fuck and she’s dying. What kind of man are you? You ain’t shit, what did they do to you in the joint? Should’ve kept your ass in there.”

  Fear has cleared his head and made him alert. “I didn’t know.”

  “Yeah, you just got out the joint, you wouldn’t. You’re practically out yourself. Don’t stand there. Wet that washcloth and hand it to me. Georgie get the ice out the box.”

  Sun sits on the bed mumbling. “Oh shit, that bitch better not die in my room, all those fools in the hall. We’ll never get her out of here.” Moving from the bed, he hunts his works from their hiding place and prepares a salt shot. Flower mops Tracy’s brow then her breasts, she doesn’t stir. I feel for her pulse, there is none. “She is dead.” I say it and am thrilled by my pronouncement, how many of us can pronounce a person dead? She is the first person I’ve ever seen die. Sun shoots her up with salt, she doesn’t move, but there is an ugly hole where he gave the injection. He is beating and boxing her ears, but the head only rolls limply from side to side. Flower takes ice and puts it between her breasts till they freeze white, then strips her and lays the body on the bed. She isn’t proud or arrogant now, but rather childish and vulnerable. I do want her to live and silently I utter all the prayers I’ve ever heard. Flow jams ice between her thighs in the pubic hair, then pushes it up her pussy.

  “Georgie, massage her breasts.”

  “I’ll do it,” says Tommy.

  “No. You sit the fuck down and keep out the way.”

  We administer to her naked corpse for hours, till we are covered in sweat from fear and exertion, and still she’s just as when we started.

  “Let me try artificial respiration,” says Tommy.

  “You might as well have your way with her, she’ll never know,” says Flow, angry now, not so much at Tracy’s dying but the inconvenience it will cause. Dying is a common occurrence, it’s the name of the game.

  He put his lips on hers, his naked chest against her, and blew his breath in her, he did it for ten, twenty, thirty minutes, an hour or more and nothing. He kissed her as if she weren’t dead, strangling her with spit, rolling his body against hers and rousing himself to coming. His kisses were so strong, almost substance, the denial of five years fled his mouth to hers, seeming to warm the room. He made love, whispering, eliciting from himself some vestige of life to pass into her. Worded passion, a hymn he sang.

  “Baby come on out of it,” he chanted.

  “The greedy bitch, had to be first. Told her not to try and shoot it all.” Could hear Sun in the back, pacing. “Maybe we can take her out over the fire escapes?”

  “Baby come on, ain’t nothing wrong with you. You just want some attention. You ain’t no little kid no more baby, come on wake up.” He smacked her across the face and rode her up and down moving her body to suit his movements. Fucking her he began again the fervid chant. Riding her belly he prayed like a zealot at the cross.

  “Baby wake up. You know ain’t nothing wrong. Just want some attention, you ain’t no little shit ass are you. You ain’t no little shit ass baby, wake up. You’re a big girl now. I’m your old man, ain’t I your old man. Baby don’t do this to me. Wake up baby. Please wake up,” he begged. “Baby don’t do me this way. I need you. This is your man talking to you baby. You’re my woman, ain’t you my woman.” His voice was soft and caressing, “Baby we got too many things to do together, you can’t cut out on me like this.”

  Sun and Flower stood conferring in the corner how they could best dispose of the body and I sat in the chair paralyzed by what went on.

  She hiccupped and rolled, protesting his rape and we ran to the bed, Flower pulled him off and began beating Tracy about the breasts. She hiccupped some more, bringing up bile and began moaning softly. Flower got the ice and administered it to the vital areas and she began breathing. He’d loved her into life, Tommy had, with my eyes I saw him do it. He sat in the chair, overcome, spent, there was nothing in him, he looked drained of life and dead.

  Flow threw a sheet over Tracy and put her in the tub, we could hear the cold water running through the pipes. When they came back into the room Flower supported Tracy. She shivered and still blue in the lips, sat on the bed. “Anyone got a smoke?”

  I lit one and handed it to her.

  “How long have I been out?”

  “About four hours,” Sun said.

  Then Tommy began. “We had a hell of a time bringing you back, ice, salt shot, artificial respiration, took your clothes off . . .”

  She cut him short. “You finally got what you wanted. Uh. You bastard.”

  A COCK CROWING IN THE CHICKEN HOUSE downstairs wakes me. So strange this rural outburst in the midst of the city it seems a fragment of dreams. A clothesline squeaks being drawn in, cans rattle somewhere, someone putting garbage out, a child screams at withheld breasts. The sounds travel in the lazy morning through the airshaft. Picture families sitting politely to breakfast. Moving from my chair, I walk to the window. Picture in black and white a frozen time and place, the city wrapped in morning haze. An early morning street strange in desertion, naked gray asphalt, unpeopled, running its length to the dirty green river which I cannot see but know is at all pavements’ end.

  I’m sick. My stomach sucks the body juices to a point below the navel where they gurgle merrily. My stomach contracting draws into a knot squeezing the eyeballs from my head and air from my ass, feel the cramps that will kick the bile from my guts coming on. I try to wake Sun.

  “Sun, Sun. Wake up man.”

  He moves slowly and I shake him harder. His protestations wake Flow and she watches warily.

  “Flow help me get him up.”

  “What for?”

  “I want a fix.”

  “You give me a taste if I get the stuff for you?”

  “I’ll give you something.”

  “Leave him alone before he wakes up, I got it.”

  Reaching into her bosom, she pulls out the packet of bags. I give her the money, cook the solution and draw it into the spike. Looking in the cooker, she says, “Ain’t nothing here. Thought you were going to leave me something.”

  “Look I’m sick Flow. You just got out the hospital, ain’t nothing wrong with you.”

  “Yeah but if Sun were awake, you’d have to give him a taste.”

  “But Sun ain’t awake.”

  She turns away for a moment, and while she isn’t looking, stick my finger in the water jar and shake the drops into the cooker then pretend to squeeze a few from the spike in and look at her with disgust.

  “Here. You’re too much. You ain’t got no habit.”

  She hits herself, waits for a rush then asks, “Do you feel it?”

  “It’s nice.”

  “I don’t feel it too tough.”

  “How long you been out the hospital Flow?”

  “Almost a month.”

  “Shit, you probably got a jones by now. I left you a nice taste. You should feel something.”

  “Feel it, but it just don’t feel like last night.”

  I’m high, but pretend to be higher and after watching me a while, she convinces herself.

  “Yeah, I feel it now, the stuff is nice. When Sun wakes, don’t tell him I sold you two bags. Don’t say you gave me a taste.”

  I feel myself returning to normal and watch her clean the works. We are straight now, filled with new energy, it’s impossible to go to sleep. Walk to the window while she cleans the room. Picking rags and clothes off the floor, she begins sweeping, filling the air with dust.

  “What the fuck you doing,” Sun mumbles, choking awake.

  “I’m cleaning,” she says, gagging on dust and TB.

  “Well sit down, you can do it later. What time is it Georgie?”

  “Don’t know.”

  Coming to the window, he looks upstreet to the clock in the check cashing place and mutters, “Nine o’clock.”

  “I gave you the stuff last night, didn’t I Flow? How m
any bags we got left?”

  Pulling the package from her blouse she counts carefully. “Four.”

  “Fix our shot while I wash,” and he crosses to the basin while she cooks up.

  “Who came by while I was out?”

  “Nobody.”

  “What happened to the two bags then?”

  “Oh, that’s right. Ray came by and got two.”

  “Put them all in there, going to turn Georgie on.” Turning to me he asks, “What you doing today Georgie?”

  “Nothing. Why?”

  “Feel like hanging out?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good, you can go uptown to re-up with me.”

  We are sitting around the table hitting ourselves when Tracy and Tommy wake. Watching us they tense with anticipation. Both are still high from last night but they begin sniffing and acting sick.

  “What’s the matter with you,” Sun asks Tommy. “You can’t be sick, you just got out here.”

  “Leave me a taste momma,” Tracy begs Flow.

  “I can’t baby.”

  “Just a cotton. Please.”

  “I can’t baby, got it in my arm already,” and she boots the blood smiling. We finish up and clean the joints.

  “Say Sun. Do me a favor? Let me cop two bags for a nickel, and I’ll give you the rest later?”

  “I would if I could Tommy, but I’m getting ready to go uptown to cop now. If you’re still here when we get back I’ll do it for you.”

  “How long you gonna be?”

  “Going up now. If I find my man, be back in less than an hour, if I don’t we’ll have to shop around a while.”

  “We’ll wait for you, but you’ll do that for me?”

  “I said I would. Give me the money Flow.”

  He stands counting it, eyes closed and lips moving computing something in his head. “Give me that nickel you got now Tommy.”

  “What for?”

  “You want me to do you that favor don’t you? Well I’m short and need cab fare.”

  He hands it over and Sun adds it to the rest. I hear Flow bolt and lock the door as we descend the stairs.

  Exiting into the day, we walk toward Amsterdam Avenue, the clock in the check cashing place says 9:30. Winos shivering in a doorway beg the needed pennies for their medicine, another pukes, some young kids stand watching. They are tearing up the street to lay pipe and the trench crossing the avenue is covered with steel plate. A group of junkies idle in a doorway. Saturday morning.

  There is nothing unusual about the car, but my eyes fix and watch it approach. A loud noise and its forward motion is abruptly reversed throwing the driver through the windshield. A woman screams. People come rushing forward. Two men struggle with the door and pretend to aid the victim. Sirens come wailing from downtown, the two break from the smoke carrying a woman’s handbag. The police arrive and pull the woman from the car and lay her in the street. Curious we walk past the body, its face is blood, there are two raw holes where eyes should be. I feel sick. A cop combing the crowd for witnesses asks, “Nobody see what happened here? How about you buddy, you see what happened?”

  Sun nods no. As we walk toward Broadway, he says, “Did you see that shit, fucken metal plate flipped up and cracked the axle, bitch went right through the window.”

  It is early and Broadway is just opening. Fruit vendors hosing down walks and store owners push steel gates from plate windows. We walk into the subway and stand on the platform. Scag runs in our veins and we feel it by bobbing and weaving. Squares stare, mistaking us for common drunks, we ignore them from the height of our state. Scag inflates you and you seem larger than life, above and outside it. The train comes. We enter and stand scratching and playing with our privates. People think us crude and dirty, in public, scratching our asses like low animals.

  Two more junkies sit across from us. I felt their presence the moment we entered. I can always recognize a junky, no matter how clean or well disguised he is. If the President was one I and every other junky would know immediately. It is that faculty which enables all outcast types and renegades to recognize themselves. Sun and I and the two across the aisle are joined in conspiracy against the world. Though we don’t know them, we are bound to them. Just as we are aware of them, they know and feel us in the same manner. Coming from a nod, one looks up and we gaze at each other emanating rays that inform us of the other. They’re probably going to score too, our route, the Seventh Avenue Express to 116th Street is a well known and traveled one. We come to our station and Sun elbows me awake.

  Coming from the pit, I’m blinded by the brilliant light of day. So bright it sears my eyes and I swoon, overcome. Cringing I clutch the banister.

  “Something wrong?” Unable to speak I nod no. We’ve arrived in Harlem, land of black people, dead people, my people. A million sensations assail the senses making me stupid as an idiot, want to scream and halt the madness but only silence issues forth. Lenox Avenue is jammed and there is the perpetual air of carnival and party. Looking about me and seeing nothing but black people I am filled with a passionate love for them all. Something inside me kindles and reawakens, feel alive for the first time in ages. My junky spirit walks the street recognizing and recognized by other kindred spirits. They hail Sun and me and walking past, hawk their wares in whispers. Double-O-Seven, Green Power, Goldfinger, Sherry’s Thing. One has bombidas for sale, another spikes, syringes and droppers, all the paraphernalia necessary to get straight. 117th Street and Lenox is an open air drug market. Two white bulls in plain-clothes sitting in a car are under surveillance by the crowds.

  Sun is an oldtime dealer and convict, well known in these parts. Acquaintances come up to him to make sales and ask favors. He turns them away by telling them he ain’t doing nothing. Sun spots someone half a block away and smiling taps me and points to him, it’s his son, Broadway. I haven’t seen him in years but heard he was in prison. Sun bounces up to him and delighted at seeing each other, they stand kissing and hugging unashamed.

  “When did you raise?”

  “Three weeks ago.”

  “Why didn’t you get in touch with Flower and me, she’d be glad to see you.”

  “I didn’t know where you lived, you changed your address, sent you a letter from the joint but it came back.”

  “Damn you look good. You know me and Flow back together. What you been doing since you got out? Fucking around again?”

  “Yeah, light weight though, ain’t got no jones yet.”

  Turning to me Sun says, “Broadway you remember Georgie, don’t you?”

  “Yeah you were a kid last time I saw you. Heard you’d got flagged. What you doing now?”

  “Same old, same old,” I reply.

  With the amenities over, Sun begins taking care of business, who has got what and the quality of the dope on the street.

  “Whose stuff you have today?” he asks Broadway.

  “Had Jericho’s thing.”

  “How is it?”

  “Garbage, hardly turned my stomach over.”

  “How’s the Fat Man’s bag, it was dynamite last time I copped.”

  “No, it fell off. Goldfinger’s got a boss bag out, only thing is he’s got imitators and you can’t be sure if it’s his stuff.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You know how he seals his bags with that gold tape to let you know it’s his thing? Well the minute cats got hip that he had the best thing on the street, they all started putting gold tape on their bags.”

  “How about Pee Wee, Sherry’s, or Double-O?”

  “All of them are boss, you can cop in the middle of the block off that chick. You know her name.”

  “You mean that fat black broad?”

  “Yeah, she got all their things.”

  Reaching for a cigarette, Broadway pushes his jacket back and I see the stock of a sawed-off shotgun stuck in his belt.

  “Dig Broadway, here’s our address,” and Sun scribbles it on a match cover. “Come down and see Flowe
r, she be glad to see you.”

  “Okay. Later Sun,” and he saunters away.

  “Let’s go into the block.” On the way, Sun greets and waves to a hundred people. The avenues in Harlem have a festive air, but it is the streets that reveal the true nature of the place. Turning off into one is like entering hell. In these valleys, even nature seems more harsh.

  A sun hung high makes soft tar and bakes the cement. Radiating heat waves shimmer on air, monkeys the children call them, they dance on air like the ten-cent string-controlled monkeys in the dime store. Light falls between the buildings, bright and stark, shadow forming, showing dirt encrusted brownstone, flaking fire escapes, piled scattered litter. Stray dogs, children, running and playing fill the streets with noise. But it is the air that lies over all hot and humid like some soft, giving casement that infects me and all those here. Air charged with a suppressed urgency, making you feel that at any moment all hell must break loose, a brawl, killing, anything. React by coiling myself, walking loose and almost dancing down street. Ready to flee or fight. Feel a strength and dignity unusual in me. I have no control or will but am prey to the capricious atmosphere, it is dynamic, having a presence of its own, apart from light or dark, still or moved. This isn’t the same air and light I breathe and see in downtown. Walk down a street lined with black faces bearing the common expression, anger mingled with despair and I feel comfortable as I never do downtown.

  Sun spots the woman across the street, she waves to us and we cross over.

  “How you doing Sun?”

  “Okay.”

  “How’s Flower?”

  “She just got out the hospital.”

  “Yeah, I know, she and I did time together.”

  “You straight?”

  “Yeah, what you want?”

  “Two halves.”

  “Walk into the hall.”

  We enter the dark hall and the stink of life overwhelms me, a stink of human waste and stale cooking, but over all this, the warm wonderful scent of sweated close-packed man.

  I was born in a place like this. Remember a lumpy basketball spinning crazily downstreet pursued by a young horde and retrieved by me. Racing upstreet, hurled it through the fire escape rungs for a score. Nana, my grandmother, called me from her windowed perch. Feigning deafness continued playing till someone tapped my shoulder and pointed to her. The game was up then and entering the hall, gave a whistle to let her know I was coming.