by James Boice
—Do what?
—Turn around, bro. He make a little swirly motion with his finger like he can control Raul with it, and he say again, —Turn around.
They talking in some bullshit fake voice, like they’re plumbers from Long Island or something, the way they must think real men talk. Clayton thinks, It’s because they scared, they want us to think they’re like us.
Raul is grinning broadly now, like he’s watching a magic trick. —You seriously trying to tell me to turn around?
—Turn around, bro.
—Would you like to discuss this further? Raul say.
Clayton panicking now. He panicking because Raul being formal. Discuss this further. When Raul start being formal to you, you know he about to start wailing at your head with them giant roast-beef fists of his. And if Raul fight, that means Kenny fighting, because Kenny think he can fight, and that means Clayton gotta fight, because Kenny can’t fight for shit, and if Clayton don’t help him Kenny gonna get hurt. Clayton don’t want to fight, especially not these dudes—he feel sorry for them, the way they think they have to talk like contractors from Long Island. He don’t want to fight nobody.
—Raul, he say, gently pushing Raul away from them. —Don’t worry about it. Fuck it.
—Don’t tell me not to worry about it, say Raul. —It ain’t fair. We been here hours. And these motherfuckas just show up? Raul is seething, big chest moving in and out, sweat on his fuzzy upper lip.
—Just chill, he say to Raul. —Chill.
One of them say something and the rest of them snicker. Raul tenses and Clayton puts his arms around him. —Chill, chill. Clayton can’t help but see them all as babies. Like, infants. A tick he has. Can’t help it. When he get anxious sometimes he calms himself down by looking at the people around him—even cops—and imagining them how they were when they were babies, which makes him think about how they were babies once, everyone was a baby once, and then he feels better about everyone, less anxious, less scared. Everyone a baby once. He cannot imagine hitting a baby, even a very old one, one so old it don’t look like a baby no more. Which is what adults are, if you think about it.
Raul mutters, —How they say they were here, man? How can they say that?
—I don’t know, Clayton say. —Don’t worry about it.
—Man, that’s bullshit, C. That’s a pussy point of view, yo. That some fucking subservient shit, man, and you know it is. You know it is.
—Maybe so.
—You a pussy, yo.
—No, I ain’t.
—You a pussy. That time in the park? I knew you weren’t gon stand up for me. I knew you didn’t have my back. I knew you were gon do what you did. I knew it. I knew it.
Someone stole twenty dollars from Raul and Raul was going to fight him, so of course Kenny and Clayton had to go with him to meet the kid in the park to fight, and the kid brought his friends and shit was about to get crazy. But Clayton couldn’t help but see them all as babies and convinced Raul to forget the twenty dollars and walk away.
Raul says, —You can’t let niggas do what they want to you. You gotta defend yourself. Protect yourself, man.
—I don’t want to fight.
—Ain’t your choice sometimes. Niggas jump you, what you gon do, you just gon shrug? Say, Wulp, that’s the way the cookie crumbles, I suppose? You gon tell me with a straight face that you not gon fight back?
—Raul, we fight those niggas and police come, we get locked up. Think they get locked up? Man, all I want is my damned shoes. I got a big night tomorrow.
—A pussy with nothing but pussy on the mind.
—Call me from jail tomorrow night. I ain’t gonna answer. Imma be with Stacey.
—Whatever you say, pussy.
At that moment, one of the Gossip Girl dudes break off the line, wander out in the street, flag down a cab by yelling at it, making his voice all deep, trying to be all assertive and commanding. The others all follow him into the cab and off they go into the night, to other worlds behind fortress walls. Clayton turn to Raul with a look on his face and Raul say without even looking at him, —Shut the fuck up.
—I didn’t even say nothing.
—I don’t want to hear it, Clayton. It don’t mean nothing.
—You’d be getting locked up right now if it weren’t for me.
—Yeah, well, you still a pussy.
Clayton smiles, reaches out, pinches Raul’s substantial nipple, twists it. —Ow! Quit it, yo!
—I want to kiss you sometimes, Raul, you know that?
—Try it, Raul say, smiling too but trying not to show it.
In the morning, sprawled on the floor of Kenny’s room, Raul’s rank-ass foot all up against his face, Clayton wake up early and dip out, stopping in the kitchen to say hi to Kenny’s mom and little sister, Gabriella. Kenny’s mom wearing a bathrobe and making pancakes. She work at Flashdancers, but she so pretty she could be an actress. He can tell from her glittery skin and her makeup that she ain’t been to bed yet after work. The TV blares cartoons, Gabriella lying on the floor in front of it watching them. —Good mornin’, baby, say Kenny mom, —sit down, have some breakfast.
Clayton both trying and trying not to look at her tattooed titty showing through where her robe don’t close all the way. —No thanks, I gotta be out. My pops need me at the building. We fixin’ one of the dryers today, the rotator blew out and—He cuts himself off, seeing her eyes glazing over. —Anyway, thanks for letting me stay over.
—You welcome, Clayton. You welcome any time. You such a good influence on him, I don’t know what his problems is. Idolizes his daddy, God help him.
—How his daddy doin’?
—That motherfucker.
—He out yet?
—He out. Again. Know how I know? Nigga show up drunk the other night banging on my door. Just like he say he gonna before he got locked up. Told me as soon as he get out he gonna come break my neck. He mean it too. He’s beat my ass black and blue all over this apartment. Gonna kill me one day. I know it. Not the other night though. She lowers her voice to a whisper so Gabriella doesn’t hear, leans in close to Clayton, very close, —My friend Tony got me something to keep under the mattress. She raises a finger with a crazy-long purple glittery nail to her lip to tell Clayton to keep that between the two of them. —I put that shit in his face and say, Get the fuck away from me and my babies. Poof! Dude gone like smoke. Without that, who know what woulda happen.
—Damn.
—Damn’s right. I shoulda fallen in love wit a nigga like you. Anyway, say hello to your momma for me, baby.
—I will.
—Roll by the club some night, she say.
His face burn up and he grinning and he say, —Okay. He go to Gabriella in front of the TV, bend down and kiss her on her head, say, —Bye, dweeb, and she say, lips stained with red drink, —Bye, dork, and he sneak one last shameless glimpse at Kenny’s mom’s titty then he out.
A cool summer Saturday morning. He skip the train in favor of a long walk, first down Tenth Avenue, then making his way over to Seventh, carrying his Jordans in their box under his arm. No way he gonna put them on now and get dirt all over them before tonight. Brown dudes stand in front of bodegas spraying down the sidewalks. Outdoor produce stands are filled with green and red and orange, all of it wet and shiny and alive. Sirens still echo out across the fresh new concrete of Chelsea. Rumpled white people in sunglasses and four-hundred-dollar T-shirts stand over squatting, quivering dogs, the dogs looking at Clayton, the white people scowling into space. White people with nice hair stand in hordes outside French cafes, taking photos of each other in the sun.
Fine women pass this way, that way, this way again, every which way there is. None compare with Stacey though, who he dreamed about last night after texting with her until almost five A.M., his grinning, stupid face glowing blue from the screen as Kenny and Raul snored and whimpered in their sleep. He feel her out there to his right, across that river. It’s a wide, wide river. It is
a river a thousand mile wide. New Jersey, with its driveways and front lawns and parking lots and big houses, might as well be eight rivers away, eight oceans. The wind coming from that direction is warm and sweet because it come from where she is. Every car coming from the right, from that direction, is a good car. Every person walking from that river is a person to know and to welcome. He want to stand on the corner shaking each of their hands. Then he want to slip past them and go to the river. He want to run to the river. He want to feel her pulling him into it, he want to feel her hips, her skinny soft upper arms, soft gentle cheeks. His heart speed up, his tongue salivate. He want her wet lips, her hot minty breath; he want to tear off his clothes and dive into that river and swim across it, climb ashore on the other side, sprint down the highway and across the parking lots and through the yards of the big houses all the way to her and never leave.
He duck off the avenue onto Twelfth Street, lean against a wall recently painted to cover up writing. Take out his phone. He text her: Can’t wait for tonight. Watch the nice town house across the street, the front door is closed but they left their keys in it. Flowers are in tree beds out front. The brick is bright and stoop is clean, heavy black iron railings painted recently. Stacey write back, Me too;). He lift the phone to his mouth and he kiss her text. Then he dash across the street and up the steps of the town house, ring the bell. No one come. He ring again. Still nothing. Ring a third time, knock too. He lean over and look in the window. Inside, someone standing at the top of the stairs. Seeing him looking in, they duck around the corner to hide.
—Yo, he call through the glass, tapping on it. —Your key in the door!
He tap again, ring the bell yet again. They keep hiding. He like, You for real? Maybe I’ll crack the door and toss the keys inside and close it, that’ll at least be better than just letting them dangle like this for anyone to take. He put his hand on the knob, turn it, it open. Before he push it all the way open he thinks, Hold up—the fuck you doing? This how you gonna get shot. Sometimes he forget what he is to them. It hard to always keep it in mind, to keep track of their perception of you, to consider how you are seen by them. That something he learning better and better: you can’t just live. They can, but you can’t. You can’t just behave naturally, as a human, and just do things you naturally do, like tell someone they motherfucking keys in the door. You always got to remember that you exist as two people—the you you and the they you, meaning the thing white people want to see when they look at you. You don’t get to just live. Not if you want to live. Okay, then. He remove his hand off they doorknob, he turn and hop down the steps.
Has a thought as he walks away, a sort of moment of clarity in which he see everything in ultrahigh definition, a million megapixels per inch: That sums a lot of people up right there, don’t it? Crouched inside they house, holding they breath, scared out their minds of whoever is knocking on their door and they don’t even know who it is.
Get home, Pops’s out front the building sweeping up other people’s trash off the sidewalk, just where Clayton expected him to be. He hate when his pops’s exactly where he expect him to be. And he’s always exactly where he expect him to be.
—How are the rugrats? Pops say.
For a minute Clayton has no idea what he talking about—rugrats?—but then he remember he told his parents he and the boys were volunteering last night as counselors at an overnight church camp for little kids.
—Oh, it was fine, he say, enjoying the image of Raul trying to chase after a bunch of little kids. —Those brats though, man, they exhausting, they never get tired.
—Don’t take nap yet.
—I know, I’ll be right there, I just need to change and wash up.
—Hurry up.
—I will. Damn, why you gotta tell me to hurry up? Do I ever not hurry?
—Don’t stop to use bathroom. You’ll be in there all day.
—What are you even talking about?
—We should take a look.
—At what?
—Your digestive system.
—Why?
—Something wrong with it maybe. Always in bathroom. Hours and hours and hours. Your mother is concerned.
—Oh my God, you need to stop. For real.
His dad’s grinning but trying not to, tip of his tongue sticking out from between his rows of teeth.
—Ain’t even funny, Clayton say.
—It start beginning of last summer, no? Your medical condition? The day we painted apartment. After you went to store to get new paint. Met Hector’s daughter.
—Ain’t even funny, Clayton say again.
—You caught stomach virus there maybe. His dad snickering, going back to his sweeping.
—Whatever you say, Clayton say, opening the door, going inside, mortified.
He go in, holding the door for Ms. Larson coming out, a tall pretty lady always dressed up and whose high heels always clack. She had cancer a few years ago, almost died. His pops had Clayton water her plants and take care of her cats and keep the place clean for her while she was in the hospital. Momma cooked for her. Ever since then on Clayton’s mom and dad anniversary, Ms. Larson make his mom a new dress to wear to dinner. It ain’t just a dress either—it’s a gown. Like Oscars shit. Mom look like Halle Berry in them. He tell her that too and she smile and you can tell she love it. Mom’s friends always telling her to turn around and sell them after she wear them. Custom-made, one-of-a-kind Elana Larson gown? She’d get thousands. She always say no way, my friend made me this, a gift from my friend. Nobody else knew Elana Larson had cancer, only Clayton and his folks. She told nobody else in the world, not even her assistants. As far as the fashion world knew she was off on some crazy-ass Buddhist retreat where she had to keep a vow of silence, so she couldn’t talk to or see anyone for months. It helped explain how skinny she was when she came home.
Always say she going to write Clayton a college recommendation when the day come he start applying, just let her know. He got three years to go still and it might as well be thirty, but she went to Yale and knows a lot of rich people who went to other schools like that and serve on advisory boards, and knowing she in his corner inspired him to boost his GPA last year from 3.1 to 3.6. She say, —Clayton, I encounter a lot of very successful, effective people in what I do and I see in you the same qualities that they have. You can be one of those people. You can live that kind of life. Just let me know if there’s anything I can do to help you get there.
She always seem lonely, Ms. Larson. Whenever he see her, like now, for a second before she see him, when she in her own world stepping off the elevator, rounding the corner, she look sad, like she a million miles inside herself, like she crouched down in a great big empty house with her fingers in her ears, praying no one looking in through her window ringing her bell to tell her her keys in the door. Then she see him and, whoosh, she light up, burst out of herself, smile, call to him in her rich loud voice, —Good morning, Clayton! He can’t imagine what it must be like to feel like you can’t tell nobody but your super that you dying. Why do people live like this? He always want to be like, Why you like that? All you adults, all you grown-ups: Why you like that? Why don’t you just stop?
The doorman Lucien standing behind the counter flirting with Frank the UPS guy again, Clayton say what up to them. Lucien got hair like Saturday Night Fever but it graying. When Clayton first met him when he started working here three years ago, Clayton assumed the man was an actor who couldn’t make a living at it or a recovering drug addict or an ex-drag queen or all the above, but his dad found out Lucien was in the Secret Service for twenty years, protecting President Bush, then Clinton, then the other Bush, that crazy one who fucked up all kinds of shit and nowadays just sit around all day painting pictures of cats. Lucien saved his money all his career and retired here to NYC, took this job to have something to do and a way to meet people. Chose NYC because, as Lucien say, it the greatest city in the world. —I never want to see a gun again, let alone carry one,
Lucien say. —I just want to live and love, baby. Spends his off nights at bars in Chelsea doing exactly that. Dude got game. For real. Clayton gotta hand it to the man.
Some odd creatures show up in that building lobby off the street sometimes, there are some scary cracked-out drunk people out there, but Clayton feel safe knowing Lucien down there keeping everything on lock. He a bad muthafucka. Clayton seen him wrestle a big ol’ drunk dude to the ground, must have been six-foot-six, 350 pounds, and keep him down until the cops come, and he also seen Lucien break up fights between girlfriend and boyfriend that look like they about to get violent, but charming them, talking to them and listening to what they say, keeping the peace.
Clayton take the stairs to the basement. Down in the basement he pass the laundry room where Art stands scowling in his underwear, no pants on, growling at the washing machine like an animal.
—What’s the matter, Art?
—Damn thing ate my money again, he say.
—Pssh, Art, man, I told you, it didn’t eat your money, it just don’t start till you put the lid down. See? Look. Clayton go to the washer trying not to look at Art’s nasty-ass dirty laundry in there, shuts the lid. It’s now supposed to switch on and start filling with water but it don’t.
—Damn thing, Art says. —Damned conmen running this place.
—No one’s a conman, Art. These buttons probably just aren’t pushed in all the way. You never push them in all the way.
—I push them.
—Not all the way though. Clayton push them, nothing happen.
—Classic con, say Art.
—Okay, what about your money, Art? You put money in it, right?
—Hell no, I didn’t.
—Art, you didn’t put any money in it?
—Why would I do that? It’s only gonna eat it.
—You crack me up, Art. Here. This one’s on the house. Clayton pull out his keys, there’s a special one that opens up the maintenance panel on the washers to get at the circuits. He pop the panel open, hits a button to turn on the machine. The washer comes to life, water comes pouring out.