The Shooting

by James Boice

  Joseph came tearing down the stairs, baseball bat in hand, and beat the old man coming through the door.

  He was a sweet baby, rarely cried, became very happy when laid out on a blanket on the floor having his diaper changed. His mother was sixteen, his father was either sixteen too or forty-six, depending on which man it was, Spoon or Spoon’s father, James. Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. James denied responsibility, family could not afford to pursue the matter in court. When Spoon found out about his girl and his father, he went and stood on the Manhattan Bridge to jump off it. Looked down into the winter gray of the East River. Thought about how long it had been gray like that, how even a hundred years ago it was the exact same color, even two hundred years ago, even a thousand, even ten thousand. While all these buildings were going up and coming down and all these people were being born and suffering like how he was suffering right now and dying like how he was about to, this river had been gray.

  Did not jump, went home, and on the way saw her and the baby, she was pushing him in the stroller. It was a slushy winter, baby was bundled up and grinning out at Spoon; evening was coming on, the lights on the storefronts starting to glow, the block strangely deserted but for the three of them in that moment in time, and she said, —You know I didn’t want to, you know I love you, let’s be together, just the three of us. He could never tell any of his friends this or even say it out loud, but just the three of us sounded like poetry to him, it was perfect and right, and he chose to believe that she was telling the truth. —Just the three of us, he said, and leaned in and kissed his baby, Joseph, his son, no matter what anyone else said.

  The next day went around to get a job. He’d have to provide now. But no one in the neighborhood trusted him—used to run with these dudes who ripped people off and broke into cars and sold heroin, everyone thought he was still like that—and they knew about what his father did and don’t want anything to do with anyone whose own dad would do that to him. After being turned down at a grocery store, he saw his father on the corner playing dominoes with some old cracked-out islanders, and he decided he would kill him. He’d kill him. Couldn’t get a job but he could easily get a gun. So many guns here you were just about tripping over them in the street. Went into the city, to Central Park, walked up to a white lady, said, —Give me your purse. She did. He took out the cash, gave her back the rest. Went up to another white lady, did the same thing. Counted what he had now. Five hundred dollars.

  Went back to the neighborhood, by that evening he had a loaded semiautomatic nine-millimeter in his hand. Found his father coming out of a bodega scratching off lottery tickets. Followed him. Stayed a half block behind. Twice his father sensed something behind him and turned, but Spoon would duck into the shadows so he didn’t see him. Then on a long block, it was just the two of them. Just the two of us. Spoon sped up. Now he was close enough to slip the gun from his pocket and fire as many bullets he wanted into this motherfucker’s head.

  But then he thought of his son. He thought of how bundled Joseph was in his stroller when he saw him and her in the street, and Spoon felt her lips on his and heard how she laughs when it’s just the two of them being stupid. And he realized that it didn’t matter what his father says or what any tests might say: she loved him and that baby was his—these are facts that belonged not to the world but to him, they did not need the world, they were truth without it, all they needed was him—he, Spoon—to believe they were true and they became true and stayed true, and believing they were true was better than the world telling him they were true. This is something he would never even try to explain to anybody else, because if he were to have tried, if he were to have taken it out from inside himself like that and exposed it to the air, it would have died. But having it within himself made him better than his father, he realized, and killing the man was suddenly meaningless. So the same way he kept the truth inside himself, he kept the gun inside his pocket and he just said, —What up, Pop?

  His father jumped, terrified. —Shit! Sneaking up behind me. Gonna kill a nigga.

  —I wouldn’t do that, Spoon said.

  He went left, father went right. Spoon had no idea that up above a woman was watching from her window and she could see Spoon’s face clearly in the streetlights, had just gotten a fresh prescription on her eyeglasses, recognized him too, knew his name, where he lived, had called the cops on him before for loitering on her stoop with his friends playing music at all hours. She’d have called them again in a heartbeat. Testify as a witness in court. Put him away for life.

  Next morning Spoon went into the city—no one knew him there—got a job at Radio Shack near where he was robbing white ladies day before in the park. Saved every penny he made for Joseph, for just the three of us. He was not Spoon anymore at his job in the city, he was James, his real name, not James like his father but James like himself. Did the job well and boss liked him, promoted him to shift supervisor, then assistant manager. Soon he was making enough money to get a place for just the three of us out of the neighborhood. Got married, he went to night school, first GED, then work toward a bachelor’s in business. Baby grew. Suddenly he was a little boy.

  Spoon-James went in with his boss on a new Radio Shack franchise outside Union Square, it was successful, moved just the three of us to a white neighborhood with a great public school—Joseph could avoid the kind of people Spoon-James ran with at his age, instead ran with children of architects and writers and attorneys and entrepreneurs. The influence paid off, Joseph was second in his class at his high school, one of the best sprinters in the state, worked nights and weekends at his dad’s stores, of which there were now three in the city. Got into Boston University on a full scholarship for track.

  Few days before classes were to start, Joseph was at home packing when there was a bunch of noise downstairs. It was his grandfather at the front door arguing with his father. Joseph had never seen the man up close before, only at a distance when his dad pointed him out on the street to say, Stay away from him, that man’s a bad dude. Went down now to help his father with the bad dude. Brought a baseball bat. Stood on the stairs. His father was trying to close the door on the bad dude who was yelling, —Lemme see my muthafucking son ’fore he go, that my muthafucking child, that my baby! Joseph found himself jumping from halfway down the stairs and pushing his father out of the way, father saying, —No, no, no, and the bad dude coming through the door, which swung open so hard it put a hole in the wall. Joseph started swinging the bat and will never forget the look on that man’s face when those ribs cracked. Cops came, arrested Joseph, put him in the Tombs to await arraignment.

  Where he sits now looking at the floor, which is gray and ten thousand years ago it was also gray. Like a river, he thinks. Life is ruined. Trying not to cry. Scholarship gone. Should be on my way to Boston right now, meeting my roommate, meeting my teammates, meeting girls. There’s a white guy in here, one of the only ones, they’re saying he killed a kid tonight. Black kid. Guaranteed he’ll be out before I am. Fat white guy. They’re calling him Pillsbury Doughboy. Joseph hates him. He hopes somebody fucks him up, so when he walks out of here and gets off for what he did, at least he’ll be fucked up. It feels good to focus his hate on this motherfucker. They’re saying when he made his one phone call he had no one to call so he just called the time.

  Joseph doesn’t know what to do, there’s nothing to do here but sit and wait and hate yourself and feel guilty but try to think of ways you’re not, because even though you feel guilty, you know you aren’t. Freezing in here too. They’re trying to give everybody pneumonia, hoping they can kill some of them off so they don’t have to deal with them. Well, his father knows one of the COs, so Joseph gets him to bring a bunch of blankets and goes around handing them out, because he wants one for himself and figures if everybody has their own, then there’s less likelihood of them stealing his. He’s saving Pillsbury Doughboy for last, hoping he runs out before he gets to him. He hands them all out, and then he has one left, for himself,
but on his way back he walks by Pillsbury, almost steps on him as a matter of fact, dude’s curled up on the floor whimpering and shivering so bad his lips are purple and Joseph feels bad, can’t help it, he can even hear his teeth clacking.

  But fuck him. If he were a black dude who did what he did, you think anyone would feel bad for him or try to help him? Think they’d give him their blanket? Nope—they’d carry him off to the lethal injection chamber fast as they could, saying, What’s wrong with the black community and what should black leaders be doing about it?

  Joseph’s stepping over the man but then Pillsbury wakes up and looks Joseph right in the eyes. And Pillsbury’s eyes remind Joseph of a baby’s eyes looking up at you from the crib. And before he knows what he’s saying, Joseph goes, —Want a blanket? And he’s already regretting it. But Pillsbury says no, he tells Joseph to leave him alone, he looks at Joseph like he thinks Joseph is going to stomp him in the head. So Joseph leaves the man alone. Happy to. And he finds a spot to lay down.

  At least, he thinks, I am warm under this blanket. Everyone else in the cell is warm under theirs too—everyone but Pillsbury the Killer. Joseph lies there all night listening to the man’s teeth chattering. He gets curious about it, listening to the big man becoming a little animal, crazed with animal fear. Matter of fact, Joseph thinks, maybe I could be like him—I could be scared to death. It’s how I got here, isn’t it?

  From then on, when they get to Rikers, where he and Pillsbury are in the same place, everything Joseph does he does with the intent of being not like Pillsbury. What Would Pillsbury Not Do? Pillsbury would not run in the yard, so Joseph does run in the yard. Pillsbury does not talk to anyone, so Joseph talks to people. You have to talk to people in here, you have to be a little friendly, you might try to keep to yourself, but if you are too closed up they will notice it and take it the wrong way and pick on you. So Joseph tries to talk to people. His father always says you get what you give, so in times of sorrow, go help another’s sorrow. Joseph remembers that and tries it. It’s all he’s got. In talking to people he learns something: nobody’s a monster. Like anyone. Even the meanest, most fucked-up ones just want to be safe. And he tries to help, doesn’t know if he does or not, but he tries. And Joseph does okay there. He sees guys go in one of two directions: either they act like him and try to help people, try to find some kind of good to give, or else they go all interior and fall apart, get dark, go crazy.

  Pillsbury is one of the second kind—you can tell. He starts smelling real bad, he gets real skinny, he’s sick as a dog, because though Joseph can get blankets in Rikers too and does, Pillsbury refuses one because he decides Joseph’s trying to poison him with it. And during yard time he just stands against the wall staring into space. And the worst of it is, Joseph talks to him one day and it’s clear the man feels no kind of guilt for what he did. Just out of curiosity—call it an experiment—Joseph tries one last time giving him a damned blanket, but Pillsbury throws it away into a trash can. Fascinating—until the next day, when the man walks. He walks after just three or four days inside.

  Meanwhile Joseph is in there a year. A year. But the difference between guys like him and guys like Pillsbury is that once Joseph’s served his time he gets out, he’s not in prison anymore—but guys like Pillsbury never get out, even after they’ve served their time. They’re always in prison. But Joseph gets out. And when he does he goes right to Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, finds his grandfather.

  —Who are you? Joseph asks him.

  Grandfather tells him: a man who has done bad things he is sorry for.

  Joseph says, —Why don’t you apologize then?

  Grandfather says, —What I did was too bad for apologies.

  Joseph takes his grandfather to his father’s house, grandfather begs father for forgiveness. Decades of hurt all come out. Father forgives grandfather, mother forgives grandfather, grandfather forgives Joseph, Joseph forgives grandfather. Father and grandfather start talking every day, become very close. Joseph goes to college; it’s not Boston University, it’s one that advertises on the subway, but he meets a woman there, to be honest she is one of his professors, but they fall in love, and when the course is over they get married, have a child together, a girl, and the child is beautiful and is born into a beautiful family. Joseph’s daughter grows, comes of age in this beautiful family Grows up trusting and unafraid, lives with faith.

  9

  FAREWELL TO ARMS

  They meet Jenny Sanders in her suite at the hotel uptown. She tells them about who she is, what she has lost, and what she now does about it. On the wall above the television she has hung a picture of what she has lost: a little girl with missing teeth in a checkered dress. Says she travels with the picture, puts it up in every hotel room she stays in. All she does, she says, is travel and fight. He looks at the picture and all he sees is Clayton. She orders lunch from room service but they still cannot eat, cannot even think about eating. She expresses sympathy, vows justice. Second Amendment, she says. NRA. Gun culture. Says those are the things that slaughtered Michelle, the girl in the picture, as she sat in her classroom drawing in her journal. The topic was "My Plans for the Weekend." Michelle had just finished drawing the horse she was supposed to ride that Saturday when the young man armed with the assault rifle his lifetime-NRA-member father had taught him to shoot responsibly and safely stepped into her classroom and blew her brains out and tore the fingers off the hands she raised to her face to protect herself and then, in the ensuing fourteen seconds, killed all the other five-year-olds in the classroom and their teacher, Ms. Mary, a twenty-four-year-old girl in her first year of teaching. Then he moved on to the next classroom and the next, killing thirty-two children in just over three minutes. Three minutes. When the cops came he shot himself. His father was charged with nothing. He was within his rights in giving his deranged son the means of mass murder, we as a society decided. Nobody was ever arrested or charged with anything related to the massacre. And nothing legislative or political came of it either. Nothing. America decided to stay the same. It reaffirmed that the right to bear arms came before the right of children to be alive.

  Jenny is saying all of this calmly, almost sweetly, her voice maintaining a low volume. She says, —This has been the story, massacre after massacre: dead babies, politicians in the pocket of the NRA, more power and money for the NRA, no lasting changes, more dead babies. Nobody really cares until it happens to them. And then they say, Why isn’t anyone doing something about it? Well, I’m doing something about it. I’m here. I’m going nowhere. What happened to Clayton is not some tragedy—it is just what happens now, it is who we are. But who we have been is not who we have to be. It will take a war to change us. It’s already under way. I’m already fighting it. I’m fighting the war for Clayton.

  It is a relief to sit with someone who has clarity and answers. He is nothing he used to be—not the handyman, not the doctor, not the father, not someone who loves people and has faith in them. What he is now is flesh and hair and pain and hate. Pain and hate are holes. They are cold windy spaces inside you. He fills the holes, the spaces, with her. Here, he thinks, is our hero. He is crying. She puts a hand over his.

  His wife says, —Every day we call police, every day we say to police: What happen, do you know he was sleepwalking? You do not think he criminal, you do not think he rob, he sleepwalk, you know that, yes? Why did that man shoot him? We say, What does he say, how many times he shoot? We say, Tell us, did Clayton die quickly, did he suffer, did that man warn him, did he give him a chance? What. Happen? What? And every day police say, We investigate, we tell you when we tell you, sit down and shut up and go away. It is not fair. Do you understand?

  —I do, Jenny Sanders says.

  His wife says, —They take Clayton from us and say, Clayton ours now. Not yours. Police’s. Not son, not boy—police’s. He is evidence. Just evidence. And he is theirs. Theirs. They say, We decide what he do to get shot. We decide who your son was. We decide whether he
criminal. They think we have no right to know. We must sit and wonder and let them decide the truth when we know truth. He was sleepwalking. He was a good kid. Not a criminal. Not dangerous. It is not right.

  Jenny Sanders says, —I can get them to talk to us. I’ll get them to see the truth, that he was a good child, he was an unarmed sleepwalking boy, mowed down in cold blood by a gun nut who thinks his life is worth more than Clayton’s. I’ll get the world to understand. I have lawyers on it already. We’ll find out everything there is to know and get the police to understand the truth so justice is served.

  They visit Clayton every day at the city coroner’s office. He lies there in a freezer while Lee Fisher relaxes in bed in a cushy private cell, reading and eating food and tasting and showering and meeting visitors and breathing air and chatting and stretching and working with expensive attorneys to build his defense. Jenny goes with them to the city coroner. They will not let them inside beyond the lobby, so they stand in the lobby all day long until the office closes and security makes them leave. When security makes them leave, they stand outside on the sidewalk. In the morning, when the office opens again, there they are, waiting to go inside and stand in the lobby and be as near to Clayton as they can. A small group of reporters begins hovering around them. They bring coffee and bagels and film them for the news. They demand a statement, they demand an exclusive interview. Jenny tells the reporters, —In due time. Please. Privacy for now. They’ll talk soon, I promise.

  People begin showing up. They are fragile and quiet. Women, mostly, but some men too. They wear T-shirts that say JUSTICE FOR CLAYTON: REPEAL THE SECOND AMENDMENT. Stand in grim silence holding signs and candles. They seem like they have done this before, like they were ready for this; they seem to know Jenny. With them come more media.