by K'wan
“Dad?” Jonas called out. Zeke ignored him and continued plucking the strings. Frustrated by his father ignoring him, Jonas gripped him by the shoulder and forced him to turn around. He recoiled in horror when instead of the inviting brown eyes he remembered, he was confronted with two milky-white orbs. Jonas didn’t remember seeing him move, but suddenly, he was standing directly in front of him. Jonas made to step back, but Zeke had grabbed a handful of Jonas’s testicles and began to squeeze. His hand felt as if it were made of ice. Zeke’s touch was as cold as a December morning, and it sent a numbing sensation through Jonas’s face. For a minute, he thought the ghost of his father meant to kill him, and then it spoke.
“The devil is a liar,” Zeke said in a whispery tone. His breath stank of whisky and death. Jonas had no idea what he meant, and before he could ask him, the dream was over.
When Jonas awoke, he was lying on his bedroom floor. His nuts were throbbing, and one leg of his pajamas was wet. Apparently, he had overloaded his bladder with that extra glass of soda he’d snuck during dinner and pissed himself. He sat there for a minute reflecting on his dad’s message from the dream, The devil is a liar. What had he meant? Whatever it was, he wouldn’t figure it out sitting on the floor in a puddle of his own urine.
Jonas pushed himself up and made his way toward the bathroom. The house was dark and quiet. He poked his head into his sisters’ room to check on them. Anette was nestled into the top bunk fast asleep, while Yvette occupied the bottom. He wasn’t sure what time she had crept back into the house, but he was glad she was safe. It seemed like the older Yvette got, she tested more boundaries. Janette had always given her too much rope, and soon, she wouldn’t be able to do anything with her. Sharing a twin bed on the other side of the room were Sweets and Josette. Jo-Jo was stretched out, snoring with her leg thrown over her big sister. In a few hours, she would be the first one awake and in the living room tearing open the toys he and his sisters had spent all night wrapping.
All of the sisters seemed to be sleeping soundly except Sweets. Her night was a fitful one, as he imagined most were. She tossed and turned in the corner of the bed that Josette had forced her into, and he could hear her whimpering. Worry lines had begun to take up permanent residence on her face. She was a young girl carrying the weight of a grown woman, and it was beginning to weigh on her.
Next, he went to his mother’s room. There was no sign of Janette or Slick, but the dress that she had worn to church earlier was in a crumpled heap on the floor. She must’ve slipped back into the apartment at some point to change her clothes before heading back out into the streets. He hoped she would at least make it back to watch Josette open her gifts, but that would all depend on the level of the bender she was on. Unlike his siblings, who resented their mother for the life she chose to lead, Jonas had begun to just accept her for who she was. Still, he worried when she went missing like this. Having an addict for a parent was like being married to a cop; every time they left the house, all you could do was pray that they came back.
Turning his attention from his dysfunctional family and back to his soggy pants, he continued to the bathroom. He needed to get himself cleaned up and change his sheets before his sisters woke up. If Yvette and Anette found out he had peed the bed, they would never let him hear the end of it. He flicked on the light and damn near pissed himself a second time when he found a body on the floor. It was his mother! She was dressed in torn stockings, a short skirt, and nothing but her bra. She was leaning in the small space between the toilet and the bathtub with a needle hanging from her arm. His first thought was that she had finally overdosed until she reached up to scratch her neck.
“Mommy!” Jonas rushed to her. She stank of beer and cigarettes. When he knelt to check on her, his knee landed in something wet. Jonas hadn’t been the only one to have an accident that night.
Janette’s head lolled on her shoulders as he tried to help her up. She managed to force her eyes open enough to look at him. “Zeke, what you doing in my house?” she asked in a sleepy tone.
“It’s me, Jonas,” he told her while trying to help her up. He wanted to get her out of the bathroom before Josette woke up and saw her in that state.
“Get your damn hands off me, Zeke!” She yanked away from him. “You got the stink of evil on you, and I don’t want no parts of it!”
Jonas had no idea what she was talking about. She was clearly out of her head and convinced that he was his father. “Mom, you gotta get up.” He continued to try to help her, and she continued to try to fight him.
“What’s going on in here?” Sweets appeared in the bathroom doorway. When she noticed her mother on the bathroom floor, all she could do was shake her head. She didn’t complain or make a fuss of any kind; she simply helped her brother get their mother off the floor and into the tub. The siblings held their mother under the cold spray of the shower before getting her into some dry clothes and helping her to bed. They did this all in complete silence. What was already understood didn’t need to be said.
Chapter Four
Jonas felt like he had just gone back to sleep when he was jarred awake again by squeals of excitement coming from the living room. It was Christmas morning. Reluctantly, he got out of bed and went to join in the festivities.
When he got into the living room, he found his whole family up, including his mother, which was a shock. With the condition she had been in the night before, it was a miracle that she had survived the night, let alone was awake at that hour. Yvette and Anette were sitting on the couch comparing the matching Nautica jackets that were under the tree for them. Sweets stood near the window, sipping a cup of coffee, beaming at her siblings as they went through their gifts. The center of attention was Josette, who was in the middle of the living room doing her happy dance. She had discovered her doll house.
“Jonas, look! Santa finally listened to me!” Josette pointed at her doll house excitedly. “Isn’t it cool?”
“Very cool,” he smiled at her.
“Merry Christmas, baby.” Janette broke the tension between mother and son. The look on her face said that she remembered the events of the previous night, at least in part.
“Is it?” he asked. He hadn’t meant to be mean. It was just how it came out.
“Jonas, not today. It’s Christmas,” Sweets checked him. She was right—no sense in ruining things for Josette.
“There’s something special under the tree for you too,” Janette told him. Instead of waiting for him to find it, she retrieved the oval-shaped, hastily wrapped gift and held it out to him.
“Thanks,” Jonas said, not sure what to make of it. He curiously peeled the wrapping paper off and was taken aback by what was inside. It was a football that had been signed by three members of the New York Giants. “Are these real signatures?” His eyes were wide.
“Shit, they better be,” Janette said, thinking about what she had to go through to get the signatures. She spent half the night letting the three football players defile her only for Slick to blow most of the money on smack.
“It’s the best! Thank you, Mommy!” Jonas jumped into her arms and hugged her.
Janette’s heart swelled. The hug alone was enough to make what she had gone through to get the football well worth it. Of course, it didn’t take long for Slick to make an appearance and ruin the moment.
He shambled into the living room wearing only his boxers and a tank top. His processed hair was wrapped in a scarf, Aunt Jemima style. His eyes were red, and his mouth twisted. “Hell is with all the noise? Don’t y’all know a nigga is trying to sleep?”
“It’s Christmas morning. The kids are just excited about their stuff, is all.” Janette tried to smooth it over.
“Well, let them do it quietly!” he barked and stormed back into the bedroom. He had been out hustling and getting high all night, so he needed his beauty rest to do it all over again.
Janette gave her kids an apologetic look before going off after Slick. Yvette and Anette we
nt back into their room, and Sweets disappeared into the kitchen. Josette sat on the floor looking up at Jonas with sad eyes. Just as quickly as the spirit of Christmas had come . . . It had gone.
* * *
The rest of the morning had been relatively uneventful. Janette hadn’t been seen since she disappeared into the bedroom with Slick. At least, she was still in the house and hadn’t gone running back into the streets . . . well, not yet. Sweets cooked breakfast for the kids; oatmeal, boiled eggs, and toast. It wasn’t a five-star breakfast, but they were good and full. After everyone had eaten, the kids all retreated to their respective corners of the house and left her to clean the kitchen alone.
Wanting to ease some of his sister’s burden, Jonas went and started straightening up the living room. He stuffed all discarded wrapping paper into plastic bags and broke the boxes down. He was about to sweep the floor when he heard a familiar voice coming from the window.
“Raf! Ayo, Raf!” Raf was short for Rafferty. It was a moniker his friends had given him. He opened the window and stuck his head out to find his buddies Ace and Cal in front of his building.
“Chill with all that noise outside my window!” he shushed them. The last thing he wanted was for Slick to come out and start beefing again.
“You coming out?” Ace shouted up, ignoring the warning.
“Yeah, I’ll be down in a few. Now, stop yelling!” Jonas slammed the window closed. He turned around and bumped right into Sweets. She had been hovering the whole time.
“And where are you off to?” she asked.
“Nowhere. Just going to check my friends real quick.” He went to grab his coat and hat from his bedroom.
“Jonas, don’t you be out there getting into nothing with Ace and that Cal. You know those boys love trouble.” Sweets was on his heels.
“Why you sweating me? I’m just going to show them my new football.” He snatched his gift and darted for the door.
“And don’t leave the block!” Sweets called after him, but Jonas was already gone.
As soon as he was out of his sister’s line of vision, he transformed from Jonas to Raf. He rolled his winter cap up along one side and cocked it on his head like he saw dudes wear them in rap videos and then sagged his pants enough to show off the new Tommy Hilfiger boxers he had gotten for Christmas. He ambled out of the building like he was the coolest kid on the block and greeted his boys. “Sup?” he dapped Ace, then Calico.
“Took your ass long enough,” Ace started right in. He was a thickly built young man with coco skin who wore his hair in a nappy Afro back in those days. He was the young mastermind of their crew, the one who would come up with most of the crazy things they did for kicks. Ace and Jonas had been down the longest, having always lived two buildings away from each other and gone to the same schools since babies.
“Why you sweating me like we in a relationship?” Jonas went right back at him. “I had to make sure I grabbed my fly new ball before I came outside.” He brandished the signed ball.
“Yooo, you got the autographed joint!” Cal pointed out. He was the only Puerto Rican kid Jonas had ever met named Calvin. They all called him Cal or Calico for short. Calico came from the time he had stolen a Calico and was showing it off on the block. Had the police caught Cal with the high-powered Luger, he’d have gotten an asshole full of time. Thankfully, Hector, Cal’s older brother, caught him before the cops did, and Cal received a beat-down instead of a jail sentence. Cal sported two black eyes for the next few weeks, but the stunt with the gun boosted his credibility in the hood.
“Hands off. I don’t want you smudging the signatures.” Jonas snatched the ball out of their reach.
“They probably ain’t even real,” Ace challenged.
“Are too,” Jonas insisted. “My mom got it for me.”
“That still don’t make it real,” Ace shot back.
“You trying to call my mother a liar?” Jonas asked, ready to defend her honor. He stood with his fist balled and at the ready. The whole crew knew how much Jonas enjoyed a good fistfight. Ace did not.
“Forget that ball,” Ace waved him off. He dug in his pocket and came out with a loose cigarette that he had gotten from Juan’s. His was the only store in the neighborhood where even underage kids could purchase tobacco. He placed the cigarette between his lips and was about to light it until Jonas snatched it from him. “What you doing?”
“You can’t light that right here. One of my sisters might see you.” Jonas looked up at his window and could’ve sworn he saw the curtain flutter. “Let’s go around the corner.”
When they made it around the corner to where his sisters could no longer watch him, he gave Ace the cigarette. The young boy fired it up and inhaled with the skill of someone who had been smoking for years. He took two pulls before handing the cigarette off to Cal. “You wanna roll with us to Central Park?” He exhaled the smoke through his nose.
“What’s in Central Park?” Jonas asked.
“Pussy!” Cal informed him. “I know some white chicks from 109th Street that wanna hook up. They live in the building across the street from the park,” Cal told him.
“Why can’t they come up here?”
“How we look bringing some girls from Central Park West to the ghetto to hang out?” Cal asked as if it were the stupidest question in the world. “We gonna go meet Doug on his block, then jump on the train to go see the chicks. You down or not?”
Jonas was hesitant. Sweets had told him not to leave the block, but he didn’t want to miss out on whatever shenanigans Ace, Cal, and Doug were surely about to get into.
“Man, you know Raf’s sisters will kick his ass if he moves too far from the stoop,” Ace teased him. It was all the prodding Jonas needed to defy his sister.
“Fuck it; I’m in.”
* * *
It was a nine-block walk to Doug’s new hood. He and his family used to live around the corner from Jonas’s building but had moved to the St. Nicholas Projects a few years ago. Even though Doug didn’t still live on the old block, he and the boys remained tight. They found him standing in front of the Bodega talking to a fiend. From the hushed tones they were speaking, it looked like they were bartering for something. That was Doug’s game: buy and sell.
Doug was a year older than the rest of them and a bit more seasoned in the inner workings of the streets. He was the first dude out of their little crew to start getting a little illegal money. Doug had gotten hooked in with some older dudes who had a team of crackheads they used to steal stuff they could resell at a discount. They often used Doug as a go-between because nobody would expect a kid like him to be up to no good. Doug was very bookish looking; always clean-cut with new clothes and sneakers. He came from a two-parent home with a mother and father who both worked to make sure he and his sister were good, which is what made the fact that he still chose to hustle so baffling. It wasn’t out of necessity. Doug just loved the thrill of the game.
When Doug spotted the trio walking up, he dismissed the fiend and went to meet them. “What’s goodie?” he gave everybody dap.
“Ready to bust this move. You still down?” Ace got right to it.
“Yeah, but I got a small problem,” Doug said. Before he could elaborate, his “problem” came walking out of the bodega carrying a Snapple and a bag of chips.
“I know you ain’t trying to leave me, Doug. Mom said wherever you go, I go,” Doug’s sister Alex said. She was a sassy young girl with high yellow skin and hair she wore in neat cornrows.
Jonas felt his heart skip a little when he saw her. He’d had the biggest crush on her since he was old enough to understand the difference between boys and girls. When they still lived in the neighborhood, she and Jonas would often go to the park and shoot hoops together. Ever since she was young, Alex had always been just as good as anyone in the park. When she and her family moved away, Jonas felt like he had lost his best friend. He and Alex still saw each other in school because they had classes together, but they weren
’t as close as they used to be.
“Oh, hell no! How we gonna go meet up with these chicks with your sister hanging around?” Ace threw his hands up in frustration.
“It was the only way my mother would let me out of the house,” Doug explained.
“All I know is she better not start cockblocking my action,” Ace warned.
“Ace, you ain’t got no action. Patrice told me you showed her your ‘thing,’ and it was super little!” Alex shot back with a roll of her eyes for good measure.
“Patrice is a damn liar!” Ace tried to hide his embarrassment. It had been cold on the day he whipped it out in front of her. “Doug, it’s bad you gotta drag her with us. The least you can do is control that smart-ass mouth of hers.”
“Alex, be cool, or I’m gonna say to hell with what Mom made me promise and leave you on the block, understand?” Doug was serious.
“Okay, I’ll be cool,” Alex promised, but really didn’t mean it. She didn’t like Ace because he was always trying to feel her up when he thought Doug wasn’t looking. The only reason she was even making a big deal about going was that she knew Jonas would be there.
Chapter Five
Ace led his gang of teenagers to 125th Street, where they hopped the local C-train and rode the two stops to 110th Street. During the ride, the boys made mischief, writing on the subway posters and talking trash, as boys do. Every so often, Jonas would catch Alex eying him, or she would catch him doing the same. They hadn’t said much to each other but had been carrying on a whole dialogue through a series of looks.
By the time they had emerged from the train station, it had started snowing again. It was now coming down in heavy flakes and sticking. Jonas had lived in New York all his life and had never visited Central Park before that. He looked on in admiration at the snow-covered trees and ground that was absent of grass. It was like he had stepped into a winter wonderland that had been hiding just slightly over a mile from him. He couldn’t wait until he got home so that he could share what he had discovered with Sweets and Jo-Jo. Then he remembered that he wasn’t supposed to have left the block. Knowing Sweets, she had probably already gone outside and made a circuit of the neighborhood and realized that he hadn’t listened. She would surely be pissed, but Jonas would cross that bridge when he came to it. He was living in the moment.