Enhanced

by Cosca, Paul

  Ok, so you got a pot of water, right? See, if I touch the pot, or the water, and I really think about it, I can make the water boil. But it’s different dependin’ on what I touch. If I touch your head, you might get dizzy. If I touch your stomach, you might throw up, ya know? I can’t always figure out what it’s gonna do beforehand, but it always does something.

  Anyway, most of what we did back then was just hang out. We all had Enhancements, yeah, but we didn’t go around being superheroes or nothin’. Sometimes we’d help folks if they was in trouble, but I never saw myself in a cape or anything. We were just kickin’ it, man. We was all in our twenties. Just havin’ a good time.

  But shit all over started changing around ‘67. I mean, of course I knew about civil rights and all that. I was with it, but I wasn’t all militant about it. I knew cats from my neighborhood who was all...you know, “Black

  Power” and that shit. But that never felt right to me. I’d seen Dr. King and the “Dream” speech, and that was all about folks just getting along. And I liked that! It wasn’t all...you know, fuck you white people ‘cause you ain’t shit. Or fuck all y’all ‘cause we better. It was just...hey man, let’s just quit fighting and get together.

  Anyway, like I said, I wasn’t too into it all. I didn’t even watch the news or nothin’. But T watched the news all the time, and he’s the one who told us about Detroit. There was a lot of black folks up there who got hurt and even killed. And some of ‘em weren’t even the ones who was fighting the cops. They was women and children and shit. We all got kinda spooked about it. Even more spooked when they started talkin’ about the Cadillac Boys. The news was talkin’ about ‘em like they was heroes. But man, they didn’t sound like heroes to me. What, these white boys roll into a black ‘hood and start hurtin’ people? There was plenty of cats, the Malcolm X types, who was already up in arms about it. They wanted to go up there and start huntin’ Cadillacs. I didn’t want no part of that, but it still made me nervous.

  After that, we all sat down and talked some shit out. If something happened in Chicago like what had happened in Detroit, what were we gonna do? Even though we knew we wasn’t superheroes or nothin’, we decided that if some bad shit happened, we’d do what we had to to help.

  And man...it didn’t take too long at all.

  Jackson takes out a pack of cigarettes and offers me one. I decline. He puts one between his lips and takes off one of his gloves. He lays his fingertips on the tip of the cigarette and I watch as the cigarette starts to smolder. When he takes his fingers away, the tip of the cigarette is bright red and glowing. It’s a hell of a trick. He breathes the smoke in deep.

  It was real early April in ‘68, and I was down at a pool hall. Shootin’ a little, and just hanging with some cats I knew. Sally comes runnin’ in, throws the door open, which damn near knocks the thing off the hinges, and she just

  grabs me up. She takes off runnin’ out of the place, draggin’ me along. Man, I don’t even know if my feet was touchin’ the ground for two blocks. Finally I get her to stop a second to tell me what the hell was goin’ on. She looks around, makin’ sure nobody was listening, and she says “Someone killed Dr. King.” We got to T’s as fast as we could.

  The news didn’t take too long to get around, but by the time any real shit got started, we was all back at T’s place. Stronger if you’re all together, ya know? There was speeches on the TV askin’ folks to keep calm and not get violent. But man, people was angry even before that happened. This was just gonna make everything worse.

  We could smell the fires before we saw nothin’. Just a little smoke on the breeze, ya know? Then sirens comin’ from real far away. We got up to the roof and there was already at least two fires we could see, one of ‘em pretty big. We all wanted to get out there and help, but it was gonna be way too dangerous at night. So we hunkered down and tried to get a little sleep. It was gonna be a hell of a day.

  Next mornin’, we got a little breakfast, said a prayer together, then got goin’. First thing first, we had to figure out what that big fire was all about. And man, right away the whole damn thing was just a mess. Trash everywhere. There was folks out there, bustin’ windows and...you know, lootin’ shit. The building that burned was just some warehouse, so no big deal. We started trying to put cars back up right.

  There was one guy real early that wanted to pick a fight. He dropped this big TV he was stealin’ and tried to punch T in the face. T didn’t even have to duck or nothin’, ‘cause Sally hit that fool right in his face. Knocked that fucker ass over end, man. He didn’t even stop to pick up his TV.

  There was some guys around, but if I’m real honest, it wasn’t as bad as you might think. Yeah, there was cars tipped over and a couple buildings that looked like they was thinkin’ about being on fire. But It’s not like there

  was fistfights everywhere. I think, and maybe this isn’t right, but I think that we could have gotten shit under control pretty quick. And then the Cadillacs rolled in.

  We backed up a bit, just watchin’ to see what they’d do. In Detroit, it seemed like they was trying to help. Even if some folks got knocked around, it looked like they was trying to be good. But there wasn’t no good in ‘em that day. They weren’t there to help, They were there for blood.

  This big guy they had with ‘em...and I mean real big, he walks up to the first kid he finds. I mean, this kid might have been fourteen. Maybe. This big guy takes him by the shoulders...ugh. He takes him and bends him backwards. Just folds him right in half, man. That shit was awful. And from there the whole thing went right to shit.

  We watched ‘em breakin’ windows and throwin’ people around. We was trying to figure out what to do, ‘cause they was way more prepared than us. Man, they had guns. Fuck, man. We didn’t have guns. And the guys they was fighting didn’t have guns neither. Some of ‘em had rocks or pipes and shit, but they had no way of defendin’ themselves when the guns started goin’ off.

  There was seven of ‘em, and we figured if we split up we might be able to take a few of ‘em down quick. End it before it got too bad. We went our ways, and that was real tough because I knew I might not see all of ‘em again. These were my best friends...but that wasn’t important. We had people to protect.

  I was followin’ this one cat. They all dressed kinda the same...but they looked a little different too. This guy was all twitchy, like some of the guys I seen all hopped up on crack. I was watchin’ him from the second story of this old warehouse, seein’ if I could get him somehow. And...man, I should have done something sooner. I didn’t know what to expect, but I should have been faster.

  I saw him drag this girl into the warehouse, and I wasn’t fast enough. He was hittin’ her and laugin’ the whole time. Then I saw the light catch somethin’ he was holding in his hand. And before I could get to him, He’d cut her wide open. She didn’t even scream, man. She was just gone.

  I ran as fast as I could and tackled him, which probably wasn’t the smartest thing. We was both hurting after that. I rolled over and saw he still had that glass or whatever he was holdin’, and I looked around for somethin’ I could hit him with. The only thing I could find was some old Coke bottle with some still in it...and you know what my hands do. When I grabbed it, I could feel it boilin’, and I threw it right at his face. Bam. Oh he was howlin’ and grabbin’ his face. I knew if I was gonna do somethin’, I had to do it right then.

  Man...there was a lot of crazy shit that went down that day. I’m not completely proud of everything I did. But I also know that if we hadn’t done it, a lot more people might’ve died. It would have been a hell of a lot worse without us. ...but that doesn’t really make feel better about it. Not really.

  I got on top of him. He was trying to push me off, but he was also grabbin’ his face. Some of the skin was bubbled up from where he’d got hit. I’d got him real good, but I also knew that if I let him get back up, shit was gonna get way worse. So I couldn’t just let him up, ya know? I coudn’t...man, you
gotta know that. I had to do it. So I put my hands on his head and gave it everything I could.

  I could feel my hands gettin’ hot. That doesn’t happen all the time, but it happens when I’m really goin’ for it. Everything was gettin’ real hot and he started screamin’. He tried to knock my hands away, but he didn’t have the strength for it. He was crying and shakin’...blood and foam was comin’ out of his mouth, but I kept goin’. I had to.

  Fuck, man. Thinkin’ about this makes me feel so bad. I didn’t never want to hurt nobody. But he didn’t give me no choice. I kept goin’ and some

  clear stuff was runnin’ down his cheeks. I thought he was cryin’ or something. But man, those was his eyes. His fuckin’ eyes. That was his eyeballs boilin’ right out of his head. Man...I hate thinking about that shit. I hate it, but I gotta do it. I gotta make sure I ain’t one of those folks who can just do somethin’ bad and just walk away from it. He was a person. Yeah, he was a crazy person who killed some girl in cold blood. But still a person. And I boiled him alive, man. I gotta live with that.

  I wanted to get back into the fight, but I just couldn’t. I threw up. And then again. And again. Man, I threw up everything I had in me. Gotta get rid of the poison, ya know? I found some dark corner of the warehouse and I curled up in a ball. Maybe I was in shock? Whatever it was, I wasn’t goin’ nowhere for awhile.

  When I finally got back up, it was almost dark, and the worst of it was done. I was out there helpin’ folks when I finally found one of my friends. Johnny J was sittin’ on the curb, his head all up in a bandage. I guess he’d shouted one of those Cadillac Boys right through the front window of a store before someone hit him with a brick. He’d done real good.

  I found Emilio doin’ what that cat did best. He’d set up this whole system to separate people who was hurt real bad from folks who wasn’t hurt as bad. What do they call it...triage? He’d put himself in charge of getting the ambulances to the people who needed ‘em, loading people out every way he could. That cat saved a lot of lives. He was a hero without ever throwin’ a punch.

  When I found T, someone had gone and made him look even weirder. See, he had these ears that stuck out real far, but someone had cut one of ‘em off. I guess the guy snuck up behind him with a knife. He meant to stab him in the back, but T was quick enough to get out of the way. And so fast that he grabbed that knife and stuck it in that boy’s throat. So we got at least two of those fuckers.

  We searched through the night for Sally, but couldn’t find her. Lots of folks we talked to said they’d seen her trading punches with the really big guy. They was throwing shit at each other like it was Clash of the Titans. Finally, right before sunrise, they moved a bus from where it had been pushed in front of an apartment building, and there she was. Goddammit, that shit still makes me feel mad. Sally was such a cool chick...she fought hard. She played hard. Man, she always had your back. She deserved a hell of a lot better than how she ended up.

  There was a lot to clean up over the next year...but I’ll be honest, man. We didn’t help with that too much. We had shit to take care of. We had to bury Sally. And after that we couldn’t really be around each other. It hurt too much, ya know? We’d tried to be heroes...but we weren’t shit, man. That’s how it felt. Yeah, we saved a few folks, but we’d lost Sally. So did we really do any good?

  It was almost a year before we could really be around each other. I’d see the guys, around the ‘hood, you know. But I started runnin’ into Johnny J more and more. And then it wasn’t too long before we were hanging’ at T’s again. I think T was real happy to have us back, ‘cause he didn’t have a whole lot of friends. Emilio came back too, but he was real nervous at first. I didn’t get it right away, but then I saw he was hanging around this other dude. It was his boyfriend, ya know? And I guess he was real nervous about how we were gonna feel about it. Personally, I didn’t give a shit. I know Johnny J wasn’t too happy about it, but we all liked Emilio, so nobody said nothin’.

  Besides, it turned out that Emilio’s guy was a real cool cat. His name was Kenny, and he was like us. Enhanced, ya know? He had this...mind thing. Ya know, I never really understood the whole mental thing. I’m not no scientist, man. I don’t get how it works. But Kenny had somethin’ real interesting.

  Ok, so how do I explain this...you ever been sittin’ in a room like on

  your couch or whatever, and you see something out of the corner of your eye? Then you look over and there ain’t nothin’ there? Well that’s what Kenny was. When he thought real hard about it, he could pretty much disappear. I mean, if you knew he was there and you was really lookin’ at him, you could see him. He was a little fuzzy, but still there. But if you didn’t know he was there, he was just some little fuzzy thing out of the corner of your eye. You’d get the feeling that someone was in the room...but you’d never know.

  So there was five of us again. And we hung out like before. And like before, we weren’t heroes or nothin’. We’d had a taste of it, and we didn’t want to go finding any more fights. But goddamn wouldn’t you know it...it wasn’t too long before the fight found us.

  NOTHING BUT JUNK

  October 11th, 2000

  Today I’m in Las Vegas, which is somehow still rather warm. I was able to ditch the coat in the hotel room and walk around in short sleeves and thin slacks. The desert air feels good compared to the chill I’ve been dealing with for the past couple months. There’s no doubt that Vegas is still “Sin City”, a moniker it has tried both to embrace and move past, occasionally at the same time. It is certainly more family friendly than it used to be, with more places to take the kids than just Circus Circus (though I remember once winning a great multitude of stuffed animals at Circus Circus and being rather happy with it). But as much as Las Vegas tries to clean up its act, the skirts are still short, the heels are still long, and if you look closely you can easily see the darkness that creeps in where the neon doesn’t touch.

  She calls herself Dakota, and I’m sure that’s not her real name. But that’s not really important, either to me or to her. I care about her story, and as she puts it, “This is who I am right now. What’s to say this name is any less real than another?” As I soon learn, Dakota changes identities as often as the wind shifts. Were her eyes that blue five minutes ago? I suspect they weren’t.

  We meet at a bar in a smaller casino, further off the strip than most tourists care to venture. This isn’t where she usually hangs out, and that’s why she picked it. The person she is right now isn’t the same one that will go out working later. Right now, she’s a person who wants to be honest, or so she says. My own slightly conservative upbringing rears its head a little bit. Though I don’t say anything, I can hear my grandmother’s voice in my head: “Are you really talking to a prostitute in a casino?” Yes, grandma. Yes I am. We step out into the night and walk down the streets together, skirting the strip and its harsh glare. She walks in the darkness. And tonight, so do I.

  DAKOTA: You nervous? Your momma ever tell you not to walk down dark roads with strangers? Well don’t you worry. So many people come through this city. Millions. Tourists stretching out as far as the eye can see, like the houses in all the suburbs that surround this place. But they all stay on

  one little patch of ground. They’re like cattle, you know? It comes in handy when I’m working. I never have to walk far to find my money for the night.

  But I hate it, too. The closer you get to it all, the more you can feel it crawling in your pores. All those people. All that sweat. The fear. People losing money. Cheating on their wives or husbands. Leaving their families, even for just one night. They are buried up to the neck in that...ugly neon horror, trying so desperately to be someone different. They want to step outside of themselves.

  ...And I guess that’s the whole point of this town. That’s the city in a nutshell. You get some boring, white collar guy from Des Moines. He’s a middle manager or an accountant or something. He makes his money. Feeds his family. Bores himse
lf to death. Then he picks one weekend to come here. Gambles with money he doesn’t have. Fucks some girl, some girl who hates him. Someone who looks nothing like his wife, and he feels awful about it in the morning. Then he goes back, thinking he feels so much better. Not even aware that he feels worse than before. That is Vegas. My Vegas, anyway. Maybe for some people it’s...Siegfried and Roy or some shit. But that’s not what I see. I’ve never even been to Siegfried and Roy. I mean, I’d go...but that shit’s expensive.

  Don’t they all know that being someone else isn’t any better than being themselves? Didn’t anyone ever tell them?

  My dad had the virus, but I don’t really remember him much. He died when I was little, and for a while it was just my mom and me, and that really wasn’t so bad. She was a little overprotective back then, but I knew why. I know she and my dad had tried a long time to get pregnant. The virus makes it really tough. So I was all she had left of my dad. She really was good to me, before she got into so much bad stuff. Then she started dating again, when I was like seven or eight.

  I remember a little bit with my dad, and she talked about him all the

  time. From what I know, he was a pretty great guy. So how she ended up with such shitty taste in men after that, I really don’t know. I guess...losing her husband, being a single mother. That can fuck someone up. Maybe she didn’t feel like she deserved anybody good. I don’t know, but there was a bunch of men who came through, and all of them were pretty awful. Most of them were just awful to her. They didn’t even pay attention to me, or just wished I wasn’t around. All of them brought their own bad habits, and she picked up every single one. She started smoking. Cigarettes, then pot. One boyfriend was into some serious shit, and she got into heroin pretty bad for a while.