Duty or Desire

by Patrick Jones

  8

  CHRISSIE

  “How was the first day of softball practice?” I ask Lacy. Lacy is team captain, like I was in basketball. I’m enjoying my senior spring being sports-free for once. She walks with a bat strapped on her back and a glove with the ball inside. She looks like a softball soldier.

  “Good. I came out swinging. Sunflower seeds?” she asks, offering me the bag, which I turn down. We start to walk, passing different colors of houses, both well-kept and not. But most houses we pass on the way home are decent, with kids playing and laughing in the yards.

  “My head still is sore.” I tell Lacy before she asks.

  Today is the last day on my medicine. The doctor said he’ll prescribe another refill if the pain comes back. The bright sunlight makes me feel alive and well, but two blocks of silence with Lacy darkens my mood.

  “What’s wrong?” Lacy finally asks.

  “I’m still upset with you. Why did you post Robin’s video?” I ask.

  We stop and look at each other. Except for the ball and glove, Lacy is my mirror. Light brown eyes with long black hair that curls in the rain. We’re two-toned, dark chocolate and peanut butter complexions. She wears her practice uniform; I’ve got on a short, strapless purple dress. To outsiders, we look different; to us, we’re one and the same.

  “We all thought that it would be best to share it with the world. To make sure the cops couldn’t erase it, because once it’s on the Internet it’s out there, permanently. Plus we were beyond the point of being mad about it; we wanted to do something about it, Chrissie, since you—”

  “I’m sorry I asked.”

  “Go ahead and ask! The more questions you ask the more it prepares me for that court room when I get older.”

  Courts. Law. Police. I want them all to melt away. “Listen Lacy, case closed.”

  She shakes her head, one hundred percent annoyed. “You thought any more about talking to that guy? Alejandro?” A smirk takes over her face as she smacks the ball into the glove.

  “No,” I hate lying to my cousin. Ever since she told me about that guy contacting her, it is all I’ve thought about, which is odd. Since things ended badly with my ex, Reese, I don’t obsess over guys. All that desire wasted on guys who aren’t loyal. “I don’t see what good it will do.”

  “Well, he wants to meet you. He sounds okay, a little intense, but he gets it.”

  “Gets it?”

  “What you’ve been through.” Lacy points at my head. Mom’s purple wool cap covers the scar. “How much longer you gonna cover that thing up? How much longer you going to do nothing? That’s not the Chrissie I know and admire. You’re a leader. You need to act like one.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Who knows, he might just turn out to be cute,” Lacy says. “Or better yet, sexy.” The way she says the word “sexy” cracks me up, which makes her laugh. She laughs so hard that the ball tumbles. I pick up the ball when it falls on the grass finally free of snow. I hold the ball in my hands fingering the stitches on it, like the ones I got in my head and Alejandro has in his.

  We get close to home, which means coming up at the intersection where the police beat me. Lacy gets deathly quiet. The space between us feels heavy and dense.

  “Chrissie.” Her voice is stern and low. “Me, Robin, and Angela have been so worried about you. You’ve been distant and different. We can’t imagine what you’re going through, but remember, you have God and people that care for you.”

  “God doesn’t care.” I point at the pavement and slam the ball hard into Lacy’s glove. “Why give God credit when he wasn’t here.”

  “You’re breathing. Those cops didn’t kill you. That speaks volumes. And you need to—”

  “Why is everyone telling me what I should do? I know you mean well. But I suggest everyone get beat by the cops and then come back to me with a step-by-step plan for revenge.”

  “I’m convinced that the law is still just, and we can right this.” Lacy says.

  “The law did this to me, Lacy. Really . . . how just is it all?” My question falls on particles in the air. Lacy closes the glove around the ball, gripping it tight, keeping it safe. She always likes to try and keep things safe. Is Alejandro that type as well?

  9

  ALEJANDRO

  “What are you doing up at this hour?” Ricardo asks. I glance at my watch. 5:30 a.m. I pause the Xbox and wait for an answer to arrive from the barrel of my video gun. Nothing.

  Not-dad repeats the question.

  “Don’t know,” I answer because, in truth, the reasons I would answer he wouldn’t understand. Maybe once, years ago, he obsessed over Mom like I’m obsessing over talking to this girl Chrissie. But I’m guessing he never had nightmares—well, flashbacks—of getting beat up, and knowing, dreading, fearing, somehow oddly wishing the chance would come again. This time, I tell myself, I’ll fight back. This time, I shout inside, I will be a man.

  “Get to bed, Alex!” Ricardo pulls the headphone from my ears. He’s wearing a T-shirt too small for his belly; sweatpants too big for his short legs. He looks like a clown.

  And so I let him have it. “Just leave me alone. I’m busy!”

  “Doing what? Playing a game? When I was your age—” and now it’s Ricardo’s story time, telling me about his hard life, like somehow I’ve had it easy.

  “Fine. I’ll go to be bed.”

  He slaps me hard, but not too hard on the back of the head. “Alejandro, you made some mistakes in the past, but that doesn’t mean . . .” and now he sounds like my probation officer rather than my pretend father. Whatever a father is supposed to sound like, I don’t really know. The COs at JDC and then later at Woodland Hills, they all had this tone of “I care about you,” but I never believed them. Those were paycheck-based emotions.

  “Are you listening to me?” Ricardo asks. I nod yes, an obvious lie.

  “Yes, sir.” I snap and salute.

  “Smart mouth.”

  “Sorry, that was rude,” I whisper.

  “Why don’t you try getting a job?”

  “How I’m supposed do that without a phone?”

  He scratches his head, dandruff falls like snow. “I’ll leave some money. Get one of those prepaid things so I don’t need to worry about it. Don’t make it my problem.”

  For a second I’m not sure what to do with his genuine offer. “Thanks, Ricardo.”

  He nods, yawns again, and heads off to the kitchen for coffee. I kept my word, shut down the game, and lay in bed. I do nothing other than stare at the ceiling, memorize each inch of it like I did at Woodland. But unlike there, I got something good to think about here: Chrissie.

  ***

  “You Alejandro?” It’s a girl’s voice, calling just after school would get out. She doesn’t sound scared like I am.

  “Yeah, is this Chrissie?”

  There’s a pause like she doesn’t want to admit to it. “Yeah. Lacy said I should call you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I didn’t want to, but Lacy’s my cousin and best friend, so . . .”

  Her voice is tiny; she doesn’t sound tough like I imagined. “You can’t let friends down.”

  “She tell you what I wanted to talk with you about?” I ask.

  “Yeah.”

  “Can I see you?”

  “No,” she says quick as a bullet. “How do I know you’re not a psycho?”

  I laugh, but not like a psycho, and for some reason that makes her laugh. “I like your laugh,” I say.

  “Thanks.”

  “After it happened to me, I didn’t think I’d ever laugh again. I mean it’s not just the pain, but the whole thing just felt like something so wrong in the world, that things would never be—”

  “Right again.”

  “But you get that, don’t you, Chrissie.” I like the sound of her name.

  “Yeah.”

  “You say ‘Yeah’ a lot.”

  “Yeah.” Another laugh from me, and that loos
ens one from her.

  And in less than a minute, I feel like I’ve known this girl my whole life, like a Mr. Perez chem experiment where two elements are joined. Boom! Instant compound! My heart’s racing like I’m being chased, but for once in my life, I’m running toward something instead of away.

  “So send me a picture so I know what you look like,” she requests. “I don’t like talking to people if I don’t know what they look like.”

  All I can think is how I’ll disappoint her. “I can’t.” I tell her about not having a phone except the house one. “But I’m going to get a phone today. Soon as I get it, I’ll do that. You gonna send me one too?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I like when you said ‘Yeah’ better.”

  She’s still laughing as she hangs up on me.

  ***

  “Alejandro, bed!” Ricardo says pounding on the door at the stroke of midnight.

  “Just a second, Chrissie,” I whisper into my new phone. “Ok, Ricardo.”

  “And stop playing that game all the time!” I’ve been behind my door since rushing through dinner like my dog Luchador used to with his food, but my hands have been on the phone, not the joy stick.

  “Who was that?” she asks. So I tell her about Ricardo, Mil, everything. I tell her, because she asks questions instead of what Olishia did, always talking about herself or telling me what to do or think. We talk about school, family, and Call of Duty. We talk about everything but the thing that connects us.

  “You gonna send me that photo?” she asks.

  I crawl off the bed and huddle in the corner far away from the door, take the photo and send it to her. It’s like most any other photos, except I make sure the hair’s out of the way so she can see the scar. “Not much to like, right?” I say. She’s silent, but answers with a photo of herself. She’s striking beyond words. Everything big and beautiful.

  “You’re fine,” I mumble. “Sorry, talking with girls isn’t my best thing.” She laughs. We keep on as the minutes on my cell click down, stars come out, and my heart aches in a way I never felt before. Has fate played the ultimate trick letting the worst day of my life lead to the best?

  10

  CHRISSIE

  The food on my plate makes me hungrier than I thought I was. Mashed sour-cream-and-onion potatoes, asparagus marinated in wine vinegar, the salad I made with tomatoes and sunflower seeds, and Mom’s specialties: chicken wings dipped in BBQ sauce and homemade egg rolls. I feel like I haven’t eaten this good in ages, but as I’m about to begin, Mom motions for my hand. I grasp hers and Dad’s, and we bow our heads. I play and pray along.

  After the prayer, I put a large forkful of the lettuce and bright red tomato in my mouth, and it crunches slowly. The tomato meat rips, and juice explodes in my mouth. My cheek throbs a little. I’ve just broken my egg roll in half when the doorbell rings.

  “I’ll get it,” Mom says. Dad stops eating; I don’t.

  “What’s up, uncle Ro! It smells good in here,” my cousin Lex says way too loud, which is how he always talks. “Hey Auntie Tonya, let me slide in for a minute. I know you have enough.” Lex marches inside like he owns this house, as if it was one of the corners he runs for BGD.

  “Boy, where are your manners?” Dad says. “We are having a family meal.”

  Lex stops and throws a hand over his heart, looking injured. “Wow! That hurt. Am I not family? Last time I checked, you married into this family. I share the same blood as Auntie over there.” Lex points at Mom, but his penetrating brown eyes fix on my face. The swelling’s down, but I take Tylenol as a supplement to meds my doc prescribed. Though sometimes it feels the pain won’t ever stop, like Alejandro said.

  “Watch your tone, Lex.” Mom says in a motherly order.

  “Ya’ll know I don’t mean disrespect. This is the first time I got the chance to see my young relative since she got out of the hospital.” Lex says. He is only three years older than me and Lacy, but he’s always acted older than his years. The streets age a person fast. With BGD tats on both arms and one across his neck, Lex looks and lives hard.

  He sits down right next to me and starts talking, mainly talking trash about the police, all the while staring me down and helping himself to food that no one offered him.

  Mom tries to derail him but doesn’t get far. “Lex, we were—”

  “Come on, Auntie. I apologize for storming in, but I took the first chance I got.” As I listen to his deep raspy voice, I bite into the chicken and his glare is locked on me every time his neck isn’t craned low over his plate. The doorbell rings again.

  “Who is that, now?” Dad sighs so loud, marching to the door. Lex chuckles and then when Dad opens the door, a female voice booms into our house.

  “Lex! You said two minutes. If you were going to chat up a storm, you should have told me! You act like you don’t have the sense I raised you with.” It’s Auntie Dana and behind her is Lacy. Dad invites them in. “Help yourself” must have been written on our front door.

  “We can’t always show up when we feel like it, Mama,” Lacy says. “I told you.”

  I laugh at the scene playing in front of me: Lacy being all law; Lex being all disorder.

  “Child, mind grown folks business. That’s my blood sitting in that chair. I can come and go as I please, right Tonya?” Dana says.

  “That’s right.” Mom raises her glass of sweet tea and drinks from it.

  “I told you to get money so we could go out to eat.” Lacy sounds like she’s embarrassed.

  “Oh, they’ll be alright,” Dana says. “We all need to catch up anyway. Fix your mama and yourself a plate. Lex! Get your wannabe muscle-bound butt up and sit on the other side. I have to check on my beautiful niece.” Dana gives me a hug and kiss on the cheek.

  “Ouch!” I cry. Lex laughs.

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” Dana sits down in Lex’s spot and Lex is across from me eating like he hasn’t ate in five days. Dad returns to the table and pulls up a chair for Lacy. Lacy sits and fills a plate for her mom, and one for herself. No doorbell rings.

  “How is school, Chrissie?” my auntie asks.

  “I can tolerate it now that I’ve been back for a couple of days. I got an extension on all of my assignments, so I should still graduate on the honor roll this June.”

  “I love hearing that, honey. ‘Me and Lacy, conquering the world!’ That’s what ya’ll used to say when you were little. Do you remember that?” Auntie asks me, grinning from ear to ear.

  “Yeah, I remember,” I say. Lacy gazes at me with this look that I haven’t seen in a long time. Like what I said sparked something in her. She doesn’t smile, but it’s all in her eyes.

  “So you gonna start by taking down the Minneapolis Police?” my auntie asks, no trace of a smile left.

  “I’m with you!” Lex says then fills his plate with seconds or maybe thirds.

  “Lacy ran home screaming and crying, then Robin showed me that clip! Whoa, I was hot and heated. I had to pray to find my core of peace.” Auntie says.

  “Me, too.” Mom’s got nothing but anger and cold in her voice. Dad just continues to eat and doesn’t say anything. My scars have become taboo in this house.

  “I can’t wait to sit in that courtroom and watch you testify,” Auntie says. I’m in the middle of drinking cold water when her statement catches me, and I start coughing.

  “Mama!” Lacy shouts. The table goes silent except for the sound of Lex chewing, until Lacy lets out a sigh and says, “I told you, Chrissie doesn’t want to take this to court.”

  My auntie turns her head to look at me. “Now, you can’t be serious. You got to speak about your story. Baby, you can’t run.” The fact that no investigators ever found me to get my side of the story told me everything I needed to know: there was no story, just grainy video from a phone on the ground.

  “I’m not running! People get beat up every day by the police. Why am I any different? It’s just going to be another case anyway.” I repeat more or le
ss what I’ve been saying since I woke up in that hospital, but my voice waivers. Alejandro wants to show me where it happened to him. I’m not sure why, but unlike how I’ve felt about any other boy ever, I want to see what he has to offer.

  Lex pounds his fists on the table. “Doing nothing sends a message that it’s alright. We don’t let this slide!” He tips over his chair and then storms out the front door, just like he stormed in a few minutes ago, leaving a path of damage. It fits: Lex is a human hurricane.

  “Chrissie, listen to me—” Auntie begins.

  “That’s enough, Dana,” Dad intervenes.

  “Chrissie, you go tell Lex to get back in here and apologize,” Mom instructs me.

  I look over at Lacy, hoping she’ll take on this task, but she turns away. I know she agrees with Lex that I should do something. It’s probably the only thing they agree on anymore.

  I leave the table and head toward the front door. Lex’s foot is tapping on the sidewalk fast and loud like a woodpecker working a tree. “Lex, I just want to live my life, which means letting this go. That’s how I can beat this.”

  He shows his face and blows out a smoke ring. “Lacy probably hasn’t told you this, and don’t mention it to her. She cried for two days after she left the hospital with y’all. Since then, she’s been reading law books. But I’d rather get my information the way the streets provide it. Then it’s authentic.”

  I think about the hard lessons that Alejandro said he learned on the streets. “But, Lex.”

  “Point is, Lacy hasn’t slept. When she does sleep, it’s only for an hour.” He shook his head and met my eyes again. “Stop being selfish. This doesn’t just affect you—it affects the people who love you. If you haven’t noticed already, in this country people are starting to understand a portion of what it’s like to be black. I’m tired of seeing cops act like a fake military with no one fighting back!”

  His brown eyes look cold, but I know he’s burning hot as the blackie he’s smoking. “I’ll do anything to send a message that they aren’t going to just rough you up and get away with it. And I’ll have my girlfriends with me.” He mentions his girlfriends sometimes when he talks about street business.