Pipe Dream

by Solomon Jones

  “Did the complainant see which way they went?” Ramirez said after he’d written down the information.

  “They were traveling south on Broad from Hunting Park about an hour and a half ago.”

  “Did he mention anything about Black?”

  “He said that he heard Leroy say they had to find him.”

  “Anything else?”

  “No, that’s about it.”

  “Good job, Hillman,” Ramirez said. “I’m going to call this in to Radio.”

  “What are you going to say about Black?” Hillman said before Ramirez could disconnect the call.

  Ramirez didn’t like his subordinates questioning him. But he deferred to Hillman’s age and answered him anyway. “I’m going to include him in the description, just in case Leroy and Pookie found him.”

  “Even though Black wasn’t with them when they were last seen?”

  “If Leroy said they were going to try to find him, they must have known where to look,” Ramirez said, the irritation showing through in his voice. “Which leads me to believe that Black was with Leroy when they left the house on Park Avenue, and that he told Leroy to meet him someplace.”

  “Why would he do that?” Hillman pressed. “You’ve gotta figure, Leroy and the girl were in the getaway car that crashed on Roberts, right? After the crash, somebody happens along and they borrow their car for a midnight spin down to Roy Rogers. Even if Leroy and Black killed Podres and split up to meet later at a certain place and time, you think Black would have waited around while Leroy and Pookie were crashing getaway cars and carjacking people?”

  “I’ve seen stranger things,” Ramirez said.

  “So have I,” Hillman conceded. “But I don’t think this kid would be dumb enough to sit around and wait if he had been there when Podres was shot.”

  Ramirez was silent. He knew that Hillman had a point. But he also knew that drugs made people act irrationally. He’d seen it himself, in a time and place that he’d just as soon forget, but never could.

  In the late sixties, Ramirez had watched his father, an immigrant from Puerto Rico, build a mom-and-pop gas station into a thriving auto-repair shop, convenience store, and service station.

  His father took the profits from that business and bought his family a piece of the American dream. He moved them from a run-down row house at 11th and Cumberland to a single home in the exclusive Chestnut Hill area, sent his children to private school, lavished his wife with expensive jewelry, and bought two new cars. To Jorge Ramirez, he was a hero.

  But by the time Jorge reached the fifth grade, he had begun to see a change in his father. The hands that had built the business from the ground up—strong hands that had always held his family together—became red and swollen. His manner became jumpy and he was always covered with a thin film of sweat.

  One, then both, of the cars disappeared. Jorge and his three sisters were transferred to public school. When they were forced to give up the house and move back to a row house in North Philly, Jorge knew from the needles he found in the bathroom that his father was a drug addict.

  The business was gone; the expensive jewelry was gone. The hope, Jorge knew, was gone. It had all been shot into his father’s veins along with the methamphetamine that eventually caused him to die from an overdose.

  So when Jorge Ramirez grew up, he promised himself that he would always treasure his family above anything else. And when he became a cop, got married, and had a child, he did everything he could to keep that promise.

  He knew that Hillman could never understand that. No one could. But he also knew that Hillman could never truly know a drug addict. Just as Jorge had never truly known his father.

  “Thank you for your input, Detective,” Ramirez said after a long pause. “Since you’re so convinced that Black wasn’t there when this thing went down, do me a favor. Talk to his folks; anybody who might be able to give us something we don’t already know about him. After that, if the kid in Abbottsford Hospital wakes up, interrogate him. In the meantime, I’m going to call this in to Radio.”

  It was Hillman’s turn to remain silent. He knew that the mention of his rank meant Ramirez was going to do things his way. Not that it made that much of a difference. By the time Ramirez radioed in the information, the suspects were on the move again.

  Clarisse’s 1991 Honda Accord was parked directly in front of her door.

  It wasn’t like anybody messed with it, because Clarisse had a gun, and she’d used it once or twice when she heard her car alarm. Even so, she always breathed easier when she came outside and found it sitting where it was supposed to be, because you just never knew in North Philly.

  “Where to?” Clarisse asked as her passengers got in the car.

  “Off this block,” Black said sarcastically. “Turn left when you get to Broad Street, and we’ll figure it out from there.”

  “And turn on KYW,” Leroy said from the backseat, obviously getting over the shock of finding himself a murder suspect.

  She turned on the radio, and the KYW jingle played. The newscaster said something about the possibility of thunderstorms hitting the tristate area before morning. After that, he said something that no one expected to hear.

  “And in our top story this hour, police are looking for two men—Leroy Johnson and Samuel Everett Jackson—in connection with the shooting of a city official in a reputed crack house. The men are also wanted for an assault on police after they allegedly engaged police in a shoot-out from a moving vehicle, injuring one officer. The suspects’ vehicle later crashed, killing one occupant and critically wounding another. The wounded officer is in serious condition. The unidentified suspect, who has not regained consciousness, is in critical condition. . . . Police are withholding the names of the city official and the officer pending family notification, but several police sources have said the shooting victim was one of the most highly placed Hispanic officials in city government. . . .”

  “Y’all shot a politician?” Black said, talking over the descriptions they’d heard earlier.

  “Y’all ain’t do nothin’,” Leroy said angrily. “I keep tellin’ you that, Black. Butter and Rock shot him.”

  “Yeah, and your girl the one probably set him up.”

  “I ain’t tell ’em to kill him,” Pookie said earnestly. “I just wanted the money.”

  “Whatever. I just hope you ain’t touch nothin’ in his car.”

  “Why?”

  “ ’Cause if you did, you gon’ be on KYW, too.”

  They were all silent for a moment, thinking how much harder it would be if they were all wanted by the police.

  “And I thought you said Butter and Rock was dead,” Black said to Leroy, breaking the silence.

  “I thought they was.”

  “So which one still alive?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t see how either one of ’em made it outta that car.”

  “Yeah, well, you better hope whoever it is don’t wake up. ’Cause the first thing they gon’ do is cut a deal. And if they want him to say we did it, that’s just what he gon’ say.”

  Black glanced at Clarisse, who had started to look afraid for the first time. He thought how people are willing to do almost anything when they’re high. Then he thought about the way people will do almost anything for something they think is love. He wondered what motivated Clarisse. Did she even know? Or was she just another confused individual who was floating in that tiny space where sanity peeks through emotion and asks the age-old question: What the hell are you doing?

  “So where we goin’?” Leroy said.

  “The last place they would expect us to be,” Black said.

  “Where?” Pookie asked skeptically.

  “We ain’t gotta get into all that,” he said, turning to Clarisse. “ ’Cause everybody don’t need to know.”

  “No,” Pookie said. “You ain’t goin’ into all that ’cause you don’t know your damn self.”

  Black looked out the window, pretending t
o admire the scenery. Then he turned back to Pookie.

  “I see that little catnap back at Clarisse crib did you some good. Got your mouth good as new.”

  Pookie flipped her middle finger and tossed her head sideways, folding her arms across her chest as she stared quietly out the window.

  “Turn left when you get to Girard,” Black said to Clarisse.

  “Then what?” she asked nervously. “Do you even know where we’re going? Because I don’t know if . . .”

  “You don’t know what?” he said, his words sharp.

  “I don’t know if . . .” Clarisse let the words trail off again as her voice began to tremble. “Look, the truth is, I’m getting kind of scared. And I’m not sure I can do this.”

  “You drive until we tell you to stop,” Leroy said. “You took the money, so drive.”

  “I’ll give the money back.”

  “It’s not about the money,” Black said. “Ain’t that what you said? Now, when you get to I-95, go north. I’ll tell you what to do from there.”

  Clarisse looked over at Black. He looked back, and found himself staring into eyes that were lost somewhere between anger and fear.

  “Who are you?” she asked, as if she’d just realized she didn’t know.

  “That’s a stupid question,” he said.

  “No, really,” she said, persisting. “Who are you? A few minutes ago, you tell me you could love me. No, let me get it right. You asked me if I could be sure you weren’t in love with me. Isn’t that right, Everett?”

  He pointed at the red light they were approaching. “Stop.”

  Clarisse slammed on the brakes.

  “Girl, I know you better slow down,” Pookie said.

  “I know you better shut up,” Clarisse said, then turned her fury on Black.

  “Look at me, Everett,” she said, her words clipped and angry.

  He ignored her.

  “Look at me!” she screamed.

  He pointed to the light, which had turned green. “Go.”

  Clarisse pounded the accelerator into the floor, and they all grasped at door handles and the dashboard, reaching out in panic like people who were about to drown. Black looked up and saw another car approaching from Clarisse’s side. Clarisse saw it, too. But she barreled toward it anyway. She was smiling.

  As the cars came closer to each other, Black could almost make out the terrified expressions of the other car’s passengers. And he could definitely make out Clarisse’s.

  Black lunged for the steering wheel and Clarisse screamed—a battle cry of sorts. Then she hurled an elbow, barely missing his head as her face took on the grim expression of a person who has made peace with the inevitable. Black thought of how movies lie, making people believe that those moments slow down, when they actually flash by like so much lightning.

  On impulse, he pushed his arms against the dashboard to brace himself. But then, with a sneer playing on her lips, Clarisse stood on the brakes and the car screamed to a halt about a half foot from the other car. When Black looked up, expecting to see death, there was only the horrible, tearful grimace of the little girl in the backseat of the other car and the hammering thump of his heartbeat.

  Clarisse’s chest heaved up and down, and the sound of her breathing filled the car. Leroy and Pookie slowly unfolded their arms from around their heads, no doubt expecting to see death also. When they didn’t, Leroy began to look angry—almost disappointed. Pookie just looked pissed.

  “This bitch crazy,” Pookie said, fumbling with the lock to the back door. “So y’all can have all this here, okay? ’Cause I’m not gon’ be walkin’ away from a whole lotta these crashes and shit.”

  As Pookie continued to rave, the driver of the other car looked at them. He looked back at his little girl, pursed his lips as if to say something, thought better of it, and drove away. Black watched the man and wondered if the man had looked at them too closely.

  “How you open this door?” Pookie yelled.

  The only people outside were pipers, so Pookie’s screams fell on deaf ears. The gas station on the corner was closed and the neighbors didn’t bother to turn on their lights. Even the stray cats that rummaged through the trash can a few feet away barely looked twice. Two girls on the corner of Mascher Street gave a perfunctory glance, then went about their business.

  “I don’t know why y’all let this crazy bitch drive, anyway,” Pookie said, still fumbling with the lock on the back door.

  “Shut up, Pookie,” Leroy said.

  “No, you shut up. You went and got the money and broke everybody down but me. Now I’m supposed to sit here and take orders from you? Who the hell is you?”

  Leroy gave Pookie a look that demanded silence. She complied. When she’d stopped trying to open her door, he stormed out of the car and went around to the driver’s side. Then he opened Clarisse’s door and stared down at her with a murderous patience that was frightening in its stillness. Black almost told her to drive away.

  “Get out,” Leroy said. “I’m drivin’.”

  “No,” Black said, snatching the keys from the ignition. “I’m drivin’. You don’t even know where we goin’.”

  “You don’t know, either,” Leroy said.

  “So what you sayin’?” Black said, getting out of the car and walking around to the driver’s side.

  “What it sound like?”

  Leroy glared at him, beads of sweat glistening on his forehead as his hands tightened into fists. Black returned his stare full on, his feet apart and his left leg thrust forward in a boxing stance. Clarisse and Pookie sat silently watching them. Black could feel their eyes, begging them to fight, or not to fight, to do anything but stand there.

  For a moment, Black was frozen, wondering if he should be the first to swing. He could feel Clarisse willing him to look at her, but he dared not take his eyes off Leroy. He had seen people get seriously beat down for looking away. Still, he couldn’t bring himself to do anything but stand there, preparing himself for whatever was going to happen.

  As Black rolled his fingers into fists—with sweat rolling from his forehead to his chin—his gloved hand squeaked. And Leroy smiled.

  Black looked down at the slim fingers of the ladies’ leather gloves he was wearing. Then he looked over at Leroy.

  “We out here tryin’ to rumble in women’s clothes,” Leroy said, and burst out laughing.

  Black tried to be serious, but when he looked at the pink trench coat and the wide-brimmed ladies’ church hat Leroy was wearing, he began to laugh out loud, too.

  “I know,” Black said, focusing on the rhinestone-studded glasses Leroy wore under the brim of a black felt hat. “ ’Cause them Catwoman glasses you wearin’ got me trippin’.”

  “I know you ain’t talkin’ with your Lady Sings the Blues gloves on.”

  “They better than that Josie and the Pussycats trench.”

  Leroy looked soberly at Black, the laughter disappearing from his lips. “You want my arm to fall off?” he said, reaching toward him and doing a bad Billy Dee imitation.

  They both laughed.

  “Look, man,” Black said. “I’ll drive.”

  “Drive where?”

  “To this little hotel I know. It’s right behind the 7th District in the Northeast.”

  “The 7th Police District?” Leroy said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Man, you crazy.”

  “We gon’ have to be crazy to get outta this,” Black said, pulling on his sunglasses and easing himself into the driver’s seat as a police car approached from the opposite direction.

  Their smiles immediately disappeared. Black thought of the money and the dope they were carrying, then imagined being arrested as a drug dealer.

  “Everybody be calm,” he said. “Nine times outta ten, he don’t know us from a can o’ spray paint.”

  Leroy walked around to the other side of the car and got in next to Pookie. Clarisse slid over into the front passenger seat. Black looked into the brig
ht lights of the approaching car and fought the impulse to drive away.

  “Have you ladies seen an auto accident out here?” the officer said, pulling his car parallel to theirs and speaking through the driver’s side window. “Somebody called and said they heard a loud crash out here a few minutes ago.”

  They all shook their heads.

  “It was supposed to have happened five minutes ago at this intersection,” he said. “Are you sure you haven’t heard anything?”

  Again, they shook their heads. Black didn’t turn around to look at Clarisse. But he hoped that she would follow suit. From what he could see, she was having second thoughts. Common sense was starting to tell her that what she was doing was wrong, and emotion was telling her that she was being used.

  “Are you ladies having car trouble?” the cop asked.

  “No,” Clarisse said. “We were just trying to decide who should drive.”

  Black finally turned from the cop and looked over at her, trying to read something in her demeanor that would tell him what she was thinking. He didn’t like what he saw. It looked like she was trying to decide whether to tell the cop who they were. She started to say something, but Black couldn’t tell what she was saying or to whom she was speaking, because his imagination was in full swing.

  He could imagine Clarisse screaming out for help, then throwing herself out the passenger-side door as the cop pulled his gun and shot through the driver’s side window. He would miss, barely. Then Black would duck down and stomp hard on the gas, racing away as the cop hung a screeching U-turn, red and blue lights blazing in a cloud of blue-white smoke. That’s as far as Black’s imagination would go—probably because he knew in the back of his mind that if the police started to chase them, they wouldn’t survive the ordeal.

  “I didn’t hear you, ma’am,” the cop said.

  Black looked up and prayed that the cop wasn’t talking to him. He prayed that Clarisse wouldn’t bring his imagination to life. Then he did what he’d always seen women do when they were uncomfortable. He smiled.

  “I said, I was wondering if you could give us directions to . . .” Clarisse paused and looked at Black. “What was it, I-76? Yeah, that’s what it was.”