Why am I here? This is crazy, an audience of usedta be People sitting in rows of desks. Once I could count Gangsters and Ladies, now, they just be hypnotized by Teacher Tommy layin’ out lines on the chalkboard. More white dust, Teacher Tommy’s glittering GED lies stream from the rock in his hand. Is that chalk exhaust or ’caine?
This ain’t no classroom, it’s a MADHOUSE!!!
And that Teacher Tommy acts like the warden.
My jaw aches. I grind my molars smooth. Everybody else is jacked up on eager beaver, top-o-the mornin’ to you speed and I’m winding down like the plug just got pulled on my turntable.
Teacher Tommy scratches two more equations on the board. The Quadratic Derby, Mariza and Flaco go to the head of the class and wait for Teacher Tommy to say ready, set, go! Annnnnd they’re off … My punky brother and my fat, tricky lady race to solve the problem. Winner gets a shiny star on they forehead for totin’ Teacher Tommy’s mind load around the track faster than the other. Git up little dogies!
How long must I allow this joke to go on? Flaco gets the checkered flag. The two good sports smile at each other. My lady, smilin’ at Flaco. Flaco always wins the mind games. Equations, they can’t even keep numbers straight. Got to poison everything with tricky words so math don’t mean nice clean amounts. No, now they read in sentences until the numbers and letters get jumbled up like some kind of half-breed.
What’s wrong with subtraction? Why can’t we go back to something I understand? Teacher Tommy’s gonna call on me. He will attempt to break my will …
I can’t even hold a pencil. Razor blade cuts on the back of my hands ooze puss, some are still bleeding.
Mariza, that bitch be ancient history. So I forgot my key last night, so what? Mariza wouldn’t open up. Everywhere to hide, but no place to go. It was an experiment. And then something went very, very wrong. Mariza been actin’ like I’m the enemy instead of her man. She’s runnin’ outta chances, and how.
Down a dark alley in Westtown last night … All I had were some spray paint cans on the back porch. I’ll tell them, I thought. Straight, they can see it all in my Crown. But when I got to the wall my mind was blank. Too many word worries in my head so that I couldn’t even lay down a tag because my mind was too busy with her draggin’ me down, schools and clinics and … That ain’t no life for a man in the prime of gangsterhood. And everything felt like I’m seventeen and it’s just the beginning of the end.
I took up those spray paint cans, but I wanted Colors! All the colors of the spectrum, hot and bold, jumping off the brick like a hand slap to the face. Then everybody would know Mano. Is it my fault that nobody sees pride, a Nation of Amor, in the Black and Gold Crown no more? I’m ahead of my time, or behind. This audience ain’t appreciatin’ my genius.
I took a razor blade and opened my skin. Ahhh, red! Crisscrosses of fine lines over the back of my hands, where everybody can see my pain, my Pride. I rubbed the tic into my skin and waited for the colors and pictures of my People to flow like a fountain in my mind. Thinkin’, yeah, gonna see why they call it Angel Dust. But all I saw was Husky.
They think they got me beaten. I was cold. Alone. Spray paint cans dead and empty on the ground, the tag half-finished because nobody would see it and understand.
Then Husky got out of the car, he cruised up so slow and careful I didn’t even see him. Me! Mano Matos, too weak to sense approaching danger … Husky got next to me so nice and easy, like Jiminy Cricket sitting on my shoulder, chirping at my blown-out mind.
Husky said, “The sky is falling Chicken Little. Your world ends on June 17. Better enjoy yourself while you still got time.”
Husky hopped away and I was alone again. Alone …
Look out! Teacher Tommy’s tappin’ the flesh, gunnin’ for me. Wants some horse meat for the next race. Whip those steeds. Faster! Faster!
Teacher Tommy says, “Mano, up and at ’em. Your turn.”
And this guy wants me to do math problems. I got more important things on my mind. I’m tired. I can’t think that way right now. Folks be after me. People won’t back me up. Mariza’s gonna have a baby soon.
“C’mon Mano. I don’t have time for any prima donna routines today.”
June 17 is my eighteenth birthday. The sky is falling down.
“… you don’t seem to understand Mr. Matos that this happens to be a classroom. Meaning, this particular space, regardless of how you may perceive it, is dedicated to learning. At least, that’s the general idea. I must hasten to add that your fellow students, to a man, are fully conscribed to this concept …”
Drone, drone, and drone he goes, Pop!! goes the weasel … My head feels like it’s between the jack and the front bumper. He won’t stop until he’s taught a lesson.
“… you may not care. What you’ve also failed to comprehend, sir, is that not a soul here is in accord with your actions. You are depriving your peers of their education by diverting my efforts from teaching to conflict resolution …”
Mariza looks out the window. Flaco writes something in his notebook. Probably, he’s already solved the problem. And Richie, even he waits at the blackboard with a piece of chalk in his hand. Waiting for me, to beat me, just ’cuz I don’t know how to factor a polynomial. Whatever a polynomial is.
Teacher Tommy opens the classroom door. The guard unlocks the gates.
“Let’s make a deal Mano. You don’t like my yard? Then don’t swing on my gate, pal. The door’s open. You either solve the problem or walk through the doorway.”
I clench my fist, feeling all those little tic cuts on my hand open up again, red and fresh. But I’m feelin’ no pain. I walk to the head of the class and step to Teacher Tommy. But the jawbone of an ass never seems to stop.
“… as per the disciplinary procedures of El Cuarto Año School. If you feel the need to appeal to a higher authority, I suggest you take up your grievance with Rey. He should be in his office, or if you choose to …”
BAM!! Teacher Tommy goes down in a pile of dry cleaning. My knuckles are on fire.
And I’m back! A drowning man has been saved, by himself. I’m gonna be the baddest, craziest, thievinest, blownest, ape shitinest gangster any motherfucker in this hood ever seen. How you like me now, punk, I’m gettin’ dizzier …
Sheeit, I hope Uncle Rey don’t tell my PO. I need some of that little bit of time left to leave a mark on this hood. Something bold, to make sure whenever somebody sees one of my Black and Gold Crowns they know Mano Matos been here. And I’m the man for the job.
Lock me up? Hasta la vista, baby. I’d rather be a proud memory than half a gangster. I can still have a dream.
THOMAS STOLARZ
April 15, a cocktail party
Make a wish! It’s my lucky day, an unclaimed penny awaits me on the sidewalk right before the iron gates to my house. How can money, evan a penny, lay unpocketed in Westtown?
Despite his millions, grandfather was the personal champion of every hard-luck penny that, through no fault of its own of course, was unemployed and on the streets. My memory is riddled with images of the portly, pink-faced codger, foregirth trussed by the vest of a dour, worsted wool suit, goitery flesh spilling over a starched collar to obscure the double Windsor knot of his tie. His eyes would alight at the detection of encrusted bronze, he would tug his trouser legs up and stoop to the pavement, miraculously defying the physical laws dictating that he should have toppled forward like an imbalanced bowling pin. Then, age defiantly rising, he would guardedly cup the penny in joined palms, his expression akin to a resolute but impoverished forty-niner plucking the first nugget from his pan, some twenty years after the rush. Distinct from any of the other morally repugnant actions of his grandson’s life, I am certain that my disregard for this potentially exploitable bit of capital must be the arm pulling a whipcord which finally sets grandfather a spin in his grave.
Perversely compelled, I leave the penny behind me and approach the steps to my now fully rehabilitated abode. Grandfather maintai
ned a Franklinesque belief that any moneys, or human beings for that matter, possess irrefutable and unimagined value if properly invested. So, like people, he discovered, collected, and stockpiled pennies, unconcerned as to how they dirtied his hands, stooped his back, ensured inherently speculative and severely limited dividends.
Grandfather trawled the taverns of Westtown for his labor force, answered every brotherly request for a spare zloty with a letter of introduction to one of his foremen, considered black eyes and hangovers as solid references on the physical vitae of any potential worker. But back then, beer sold for five a pail, Woolworth’s vended nothing for more than ten, pennies in ajar could be referred to as something for a rainy day. Now, the unemployed no longer pitch them, children pass them by on the sidewalk. I suppose the accumulation of pennies no longer amounts to dollars.
A swift inspection of the first floor confirms the execution of my directives. A spatial paradox has been created by denying the clutter demanding rooms of my Victorian-inspired mansion of curio, momento, bric-a-brac, or keepsake. Recently painted, brilliant white walls contrast with the darkly varnished skirting, wainscoting, picture rails, and floor boards. The polished fireplace mantle gleams naked and profound, like a Christmas tree divested of its seasonal finery. Likewise, the unencumbered marble slab of buffed hearth projects its simple, solemn presence to quietly dominate the room. Aside from a white dressed table, bottles and glasses in neat rows upon linen, the drawing room and adjoining dining room glow like the inner walls of a mother-of-pearl shell, cleansed of all the organically predisposed tissue of its previous inhabitant.
My catering director, James, coordinates the black-and-white-clad staff as they scurry to mend loose seams on costumes, apply dabs of overlooked color to the backdrops, sweep rehearsal debris in preparation for the opening night of my production, the cocktail party. As if submitting a visual thesis for my impresario’s degree, I canter self-absorbedly through drawing and dining rooms, overcoat billowing, scarf rakishly flapping over my shoulder, Trilby casting a shadow over my eyes, the muddy traces of a waxing Chicago April left in my wake. James admonishes a harried waitress to obliterate my trail.
“Christ Tom! Can’t you wipe your feet?”
“Alcohol my good chap, and be quick about it. More than a nod in the direction of the vermouth and I’ll have you horsewhipped.”
James rattles a canister of gin and crushed ice, deposits the slightly clouded product in a martini glass, garnishes with a single green olive skewered by a miniature plastic epee.
“If you’re finished with the Noel Coward impersonation …,” James chides.
“Food and beverages are your gamut James. My toilette awaits. A glass of champagne for Sara, please.”
Mounting the servants stairway, I tread upon the hem of my coat and fall to my knees, but with unexpected agility and admirable prioritization, I maintain enough balance to keep both glasses brimming and intact. I traverse the corridor of bedrooms and baths to my room at the front of the house. After tapping my shoe against the door, Sara grants me entrance.
Returning to a corner of the bed, she sits half-clothed, applying make-up with the aid of a hand-held mirror. She takes a sip of champagne and sets the glass on the floor near the foot of the bed.
“Reynaldo Matos has confirmed attendance for tonight,” I announce.
Her hand pauses in mid-eyeline and her pupils address me via the reflection in the mirror. Her back to me, the mirror image avails an abbreviated version of her face, merely eyes, nose, and brow. I can’t fully gauge her reaction.
“Was that really necessary, Tom?”
I peel my teaching clothes off and clap an accumulation of chalk dust from my wide-wale cords. Sara tosses her paintbrush aside, and like a lady bug, gathers the extensions of her body defensively into her trunk; arms cross tightly about her diaphragm, knees draw to chin, legs lock at the ankle.
“Something the matter?” I ask.
“I respect him, that’s all,” she peevishly answers.
“You don’t even know him,” I reply. “Rey will bring intrigue! If I hadn’t invited him, this evening would be nothing but a ribbon-cutting ceremony.”
“So this is how you get your jollies?” she asks.
I pause. “Doesn’t everyone?” Nonplused, Sara returns to the lines of her eyes.
I suppose that like any only child, inertia has always been my stalwart, make-believe companion. My winter of contented Sara gazing was rewarded by father’s mounting impatience. The lamb of March 1 heralded platoons of contractors to my doorstep; work was completed to the lion’s last defiant roar. Once again, without the attention-diluting presence of siblings, my capacity for evading responsibility spurned father’s cavalry of parental cash. Was it a sign of my maturation? My capacity to wait out months of remonstration was impressive, but, most likely, after twenty-two years father and I have exhausted each other to the point where this season of shoulder to chip conflict was reduced to a hackneyed revival of the original Broadway hit.
Rental revenues should total $1,800 per month for the now completed garden level and third floor apartments, with any luck, $2,400 per month in a year’s time. Leaving me with an El Cuarto Año free income and roughly 3,000 square feet of drawing, dining, kitchen, bed, and bath rooms. I’ll terminate my teaching career as of June 17. The end is nigh, after this party Westtown will never look the same.
Fully attired, Sara poses at the window, peering at the 30 yards of empty curbside I had Flaco reserve by cordoning with day-glo orange pylons. Years of fashion taste sculpted by a Latin hand had congealed Sara’s weakness for the shiny and revealing. Confusedly, she submitted to my purchase of a light gray silk and wool suit, hemline displaying a tasteful glimpse of thigh. She emerged from the changing room at Bonwit Teller in bewilderment. Why would a man purchase her an outfit which suggested anything but a spontaneous mounting? Unable to comprehensively disregard her conditioning, she drew the line at a buttoned to the neck silk blouse. In retrospect, a wise choice, for the twice looped strand of pearls cascade over the contours of her collarbone and in between her breasts to broker the rich gray fabric with the amber luster of her skin.
“You must be very, very careful this evening,” I coach her.
“I heard you the first fifty times!”
With disgust, she hastily tamps her cigarette in an ashtray on the window seat, tiny embers still alive at the mashed tip; stale smoke curls through the air. A caravan of cars, led by my father’s Mercedes, second in line Alderman Matos’s used BMW, veer through a gap in the barrier of tiny pylons. Sara, shifting her weight to the left high heel, grasps her thin hips with her palms.
“Hecho de Hecho,” she mumbles.
“Huh?”
“It’s Spanish Tom, it mea-”
“I realize it’s Spanish.”
“It means, what’s done is done.”
Once rallied, father leads the group through the gates and up my limestone steps like a silver-haired mother duck with her brood in tow.
“Sara? I don’t think you realize how important this evening is to me.”
“To us?” She questions.
A case of opening night jitters? Sara’s safety valve for nervous energy seems to be releasing a steam puff of doubt during the overture. Then, consummately, she capitulates to character, shoulders back, chin up, fingers loosely interlock at her back, an image of confident, innocent ease. She rises on her toes to lay an open-mouthed kiss upon my lips.
“Don’t you worry about me sir,” she reassures as her moist fingers trap specks of dust from the lapel of my suit jacket. “… Oh shit. You’re covered in lipstick.” Backhandedly, she wipes my mouth clean. Then a smile, tense, anxious, and expectant, she rolls her tongue across her teeth, giggles, and click-clacks her high heels down the hall toward the servant’s staircase. Forty feet separate us as we pause before descending our respective steps.
“No playing grab ass with me tonight. Right?”
“Daddy might see
your weakness for Latin ladies!”
“Sara!” She salutes me, blows a kiss, and descends.
Flaunting his trademark of agitated enthusiasm, Flaco idles near the front door. He assured me he owned a proper suit, but the oversized, shoulder-padded, white windowpane pattern on black rayon, quasi-zoot, only affirms that our commonalties are limited to the classroom. His tie is a black leather strip, undoubtedly knotted once in the expectation of being loosened and retightened intermittently over its half-life. On his feet, sharp-pointed, tasseled, white patent leather dancing shoes, a visual definition of what is meant by a pair of Puerto Rican fence climbers. With his mesh of wiry, ginger curls brilliantined to the contours of his scalp, he could be a misplaced extra searching for a production of Guys and Dolls.
Flaco flits from self-inspection to self-inspection, linty shoulders, smudged shoes, halitosis, fingernails, eyebrows. I optimistically attribute this compulsive behavior to the quandary of one’s hands’ occupation while wearing a double-breasted suit, rather than to an insecure obsession with physical appearance spawned by a dubious value system. To reassure me, he has removed the goatee, the Latin King signifying crop of peroxide yellow hair has grown out, and his cheeks are flushed with pink, youthful exuberance.
“Who’s the man, Flaco?” I demand.
“Mr. David Loomis,” he crisply answers.
“His job?”
“Assistant Minorities Admissions Officer for St. Francis University.”
“What does he look like?”
“Like you Teach, but older. White, preppy, about 28.”
“When David arrives?”
“Bring him straight to you. Don’t let’im talk to Uncle Rey or Uncle Bobo.”
“When I give you the high sign?”
“Introduce myself and close that sale!”
Flaco gives me five, I return the change.
Upon entering the drawing room my aspirations suddenly seem to rely heavily on scores of tenuous circumstances over which I have too little control. Two dozen people are engaged in cocktail chatter, their indiscriminate voices forming a backdrop of sound over which the painstakingly chosen words of my script will be spoken.
A Nation of Amor Page 12