by Tiana Laveen
“I’ve heard about that, but I can’t smell you. I wonder why?”
“’Cause you ain’t old enough yet, that’s why. Your sense of smell will get stronger. In a few years, you’ll know. I don’t get to see people like me that often…at least not in school. It’s nice to run into one for a change.”
Hassani shoved his sneaker-covered foot back and forth as he got lost in the moment. He felt the pebbles under his foot and wondered if they felt bad because he was stomping them. Yeah, more pebbles, more stony fragments… He felt like a pebble, too…
Pebbles ain’t got no feelings, they only rocks. How do we know that though? Maybe a pebble is like the grass. Maybe they are alive. Maybe the science people got it all wrong… I sound dumb. Now I sound like Day-Day. That’s some lame mess he’d say…
“Why…why is everyone scared of you?” He broke out of his thoughts of kush, rocks and grass and met eyes with Angel, desperately wanting to know.
“They aren’t scared of me, Hassani.” Angel’s tone grew serious, and his eyes grew darker. “It’s called respect. I drew my line in the sand. Like you, I came to school and people tested me. A few broken bones later, none of which belonged to me, I set the record straight.” His face cracked in a satisfied smile as his jaw poked out from him running his tongue along his inner cheek. “I let them know that if anyone touched my baby brotha, they’d be in the damn grave yard…ashes to ashes, dust to mothafuckin’ dust, and I wasn’t playin’. And they knew it.”
“My father will kill me if I get in a fight. I can’t get into no fights. I promised him.”
Angel rolled his eyes. “So yo’ old man will just let you get beat up, huh? I bet he wanna those give ‘peace a chance’ mothafuckas, huh?” Angel cackled again, angering Hassani to the point he felt the burn in his eyes.
“Man, this the real world! Don’t nobody understand shit here in New York besides bloodshed and money. Hell, it’s probably like that everywhere ’cause that’s how mothafuckas roll. Yo’ Daddy don’t know what the fuck he talkin’ about… He must be a lame. That type of advice ’ill get your little pea-sized nutsack rammed up to ya damn throat, soundin’ like Mariah Carey’s ass hittin’ them high notes so good a record contract will come yo’ way.”
“…Don’t talk about my daddy. You take that back!” Hassani could feel the burn even stronger now as the tunnel glowed crimson from within. He was certain he wouldn’t be able to turn it off any time soon. He’d controlled it all week, but the hell with this. Angel knew what he was, so why keep pretending?
“You so young to be able to do that, man…” Angel’s pupils turned to slits as his voice demonstrated a mixture of astonishment and possibly envy. “I ain’t never seen a cat as young as you, eyes change colors, man… You a hot blooded mothafucka. I take it back…” Angel had a sneer on his face and his last statement didn’t sound sincere, but Hassani accepted it nevertheless. The glow in the tunnel began to subside.
“One of your parents must be an Angel Child, too… Must be your Daddy, the butler… since he was the one that told you not to fight.”
Hassani offered no information as he dropped to his knees to study the artwork on the ground.
“I did all of that…” Angel offered, taking a puff of his cigarette. The smoke gathered around Hassani’s nostrils, almost making him cough.
“The walls, too?” Hassani looked up, meeting his eyes.
“Everything. This is all mine.” He waved his hand around, gripping the cigarette as he pointed to the walls, claiming the drawings as if they were his children.
“You’re really good. I ain’t nowhere near this good.” Hassani wished he could draw as well as Angel. He was amazing.
“You good enough. You’ll get there. It takes practice… Shit, I ain’t have nothing else to do for the longest. I spent a lot of time drawing and writing rhymes. It was the only way to get my mind clear.”
Hassani fixed his gaze on one of the nude women on the wall. Her body curved like the letter, ‘S’ and long flowing dark brown hair waved behind her body. He noticed most of all how big her tits were and though he felt wrong for looking so deeply at them, he couldn’t help himself. The woman looked as if she were really standing there, giving him attention. She even had a sly grin on her face, as if to say she wanted to be his girl. He wanted to kiss her dead on the lips.
“You won any awards or anything like that?” Hassani questioned as he gulped down a bit of shame.
Angel looked down at the ground, his cigarette loosely dangling from his hand as if he’d fallen asleep.
“Yeah…a few teachers entered me in some. I won first prize more times than not. It may have been a medal, a trophy…got some money sometimes. Sometimes my foster parents would take the money. I stopped tellin’ them when I won because of that.”
“Yo Angel…” Hassani gripped his privates, feeling as if he may explode at any moment.
“What?”
“I gotta pee real bad!”
“Well piss then, lil’ nigga! You want me to hold ya dick, too?! Man up and handle ya business.” He pointed towards a blank space on the wall.
Hassani quickly got to his feet, raced a few feet away, turned his back and quickly unzipped his jeans. He positioned himself closer to the wall, careful to avoid spraying a scaly green dragon with orange fire coming out of his mouth as he felt the warm relief flood from his body.
“Ahhhh…” He closed his eyes, relishing in the moment until it was over. When he was done, he zipped his pants back up and turned back towards Angel who seemed to be caught between a daydream and a fantasy. His mouth twisted in a lopsided grin.
“You know what kills me about me and you?” he asked.
“What?” Hassani sat back down next to his book bag, feeling ten pounds lighter.
“If the kids at school really knew what we were capable of, they’d bow down to our asses. But,” he said, shrugging, “we can’t do that. It fuckin’ sucks. You can feel it in you, you know?” His eyes narrowed. “Just when you are on the brink of showin’ your ass, to get a mothafucka to back the fuck off, there is like a tickle in the back of your throat and you know your damn air will be cut off if you say the wrong shit. It’s checks ’nd balances…keeping us in line. Karma is a bitch!” He laughed mirthlessly. “We here to help otha worthless bastards out…but they don’t give a fuck about us. It’s a selfless job. Sometimes I wish I was just ordinary, man. That way, I could just beat somebody ass to near death and not have to worry about it.”
Though deeply disturbed by Angel’s confessions, Hassani could relate. Too many times he woke up wishing he was just an ordinary little boy and could do exactly as Angel admitted.
“But…at least I know my purpose now. It’s a damn start.”
“What’s your purpose?” Hassani questioned, his eyes wide open, wanting to hear every word the older boy had to say. Angel looked at him with complete confusion, as if he couldn’t believe his own ears.
“What?” Hassani asked, feeling on the spot and a tad bit stupid once again. It seemed to be the running theme. He had to figure out a way to stop looking so silly in front of the guy. He racked his brain, unable to figure out what he’d done incorrectly. Had he said something wrong?
“You really don’t know?”
“No…how could I? I don’t know you, not like that, anyway.”
“Man, I have to watch over you.” Angel spat, graveness in his tone.
“What are you talkin’ about? I can watch over myself!” Hassani got to his feet, feeling like his father had sent this punk to him as some sort of babysitter.
Wait a minute. What if Daddy is behind all of this?! I’d never live this down!
“Bullshit!” Angel screamed, getting to his feet and tossing his cigarette butt across the tunnel in a huff. “Once a little more time passes and people get a whiff of you, they are gonna really try you, then! This shit you go through ain’t nothin’ compared to what you’ll get when you get older. Everywhere you look, everywhere y
ou go, they will be comin’! New York is the Angel Child metropolis! We stay outta sight until someone like you comes around. Everybody wants to be close to a superstar, including me, but at least I got the balls to admit it and more importantly, I wanna help.”
“What the hell are you talkin’ about?!” Hassani couldn’t believe he was now cursing, too. Angel had a horrible mouth, almost worse than his daddy’s. The shit was contagious…oops, there he went again.
“What you mean, what the hell am I talking about, little man?! Are you brain dead? How can you be so psychically strong and so fuckin’ naive?! Look, you attract people to you, Hassani. Have you not noticed that, this entire goddamn week?!”
“Yeah, I noticed, but it ain’t like that and you don’t make any sense.” Hassani’s heart beat out of his chest.
The boy began to count off his fingers. “As soon as your father dropped your ass off, a crowd gathered around you. You had to push your way through. I was walking past but didn’t give it much thought until I had to bring my brother his lunch. Regardless of that, I guess that just went right the fuck over your head, didn’t it? The next moment, you were in the school hall and the same damn thing happened. Some of those people weren’t gathered around because there was a fight, it was because of you! They see fights all damn day, big deal! Next, Frederick’s bitch ass was trying to shake you down, that happens to the best of us though. But because of that situation, I caught your scent real strong because you were amped up. You were fucking glowing man, but no one could see the shit but me! You glow from the inside out. You are powerful, strong. You’re multi-tiered!”
Hassani had heard that term several times before. The last time, Daddy was talking to Uncle Jagger on the phone…
“Then, all this week, crowds keep coming around you. You can’t even eat in peace.”
A terrifying truth hit Hassani like a subway train. While in L.A., he did notice people always seemed to hang around him, no matter where he went. Yes, he’d noticed but dismissed it, figuring it may have just been all in his mind. After all, Manhattan was crowded. But that didn’t account for the other incidents. An area on the playground would be practically empty, so he’d go to it, hoping to get a moment to himself. Then suddenly, teachers and students alike would be talking to each other close by him…almost following him. It wouldn’t take long before he was swallowing air, claustrophobic, wishing and praying everyone would just go away.
“It’s because you’re so young, so fresh, so unaware. It will pass, little man, don’t worry.” Angel seemed to sense his fear. “You said you had a little sister, right?”
“…Yeah.”
“Maybe you can remember when she was born. People like little babies; they come around, want to hold ’em. That’s how multi-tiered little kids are, man. People wanna hang around y’all, but they don’t know why. Sometimes people want to hurt you, too. You have a light in you and evil people have darkness. They want to snuff your little ass out. Something in them knows, each damn day that passes, the stronger your little ass will get. Once you get about my age, it will lessen quite a bit. You won’t have that newborn smell on you no more, but your powers will still be growing.”
Hassani was once again riddled with fear. Daddy had sat him down and explained in detail what was going on, but hearing it from Angel sounded so much different, as if it were something to run away from.
“Well, thanks for telling me. I can handle it though. I’ll be alright,” he lied, repeating his rehearsed, stand-by line. Hassani sat back down with a sudden urge to try out a cigarette. Things were out of control. He wanted to be like Angel—carefree, and loose. He didn’t want caution to rule his every move anymore. He hated how Daddy had put restrictions on him. If he didn’t do as told, some boogie man would come get ’im. Even Angel spoke of such things. You do the wrong thing, your butt was in deep trouble… Maybe being scared wasn’t a little kid thing after all. Angel had said he’d been scared before, and look how cool he was? He bet Angel had already tongue kissed a girl, maybe even gone to second or third base.
“Most multi-tiered Angel Children have to have a guardian, Hassani. It’s just expected. And…it can’t be your parents,” the boy said out of the blue, making him pay attention.
“Is that a rule?”
“Nah.” Angel grinned. “It ain’t no rule, little man, but it will help you a hell of a lot.”
“Are you mult…multi…”
“Tiered. The word is ‘multi-tiered’ and the answer is no. I only have three gifts that I’m aware of, and that’s all I have and ever will have, but it works for me.”
“What can you do?”
“I can see through shit…behind walls. It’s weak right now though. Once I get older, I can do it clearly. I can spot other Angel Children a mile away. I knew you were an Angel Child as soon as you got to school, just didn’t know how powerful you were until later in the day. Not all of us can do that, you know, spot someone from a distance. Some of us have to be up close on one another… Also, I can move shit without touching it.”
“I can do that too! Tha last one!” Hassani said excitedly. “Maybe you’re wrong. Maybe you are multi-tiered and just don’t know yet. It could happen,” he said excitedly, wanting Angel to be just like him.
“Nah, I ain’t gonna change, even after I get older though, Hassani. You can just kinda tell, you can feel it. I’ve accepted that. You have to have four or more to be considered multi-tiered. Plus, I smell different than you. Hassani, that’s your first lesson, son. You have to start inhaling, hard. You need to start knowing who is around you. You bastards are pungent!” He grinned wide. “The more powerful you are, the sweeter you smell…like a blooming rose, but only to the trained nose.” He pointed to his and grinned. “When a multi-tiered Angel Child is an adult, they can hide it, turn it down or off for short intervals if they want to, though. Sometimes you don’t want to be discovered, but you’re not at that stage yet.”
They were quiet for a while.
“Don’t you have to get home? I do.” Hassani suddenly took notice of the time as he peered at Angel’s digital watch but couldn’t quite make it out.
“School’s almost out,” Angel offered. “It’s almost 2:30.”
They’d been there for hours, but it sure hadn’t seemed like it. He hadn’t even had any hunger pangs, nothing. It felt as if it had been just one long dream, and he had been awakened by an alarm. The conversation was so interesting, he’d completely lost track of time and now he very well may pay for it.
“Oh no! My Daddy will be up at the school to pick me up soon!” Panic struck Hassani deep within as he turned to and fro, looking around as if a rescue team would suddenly show up and cart him away—saving him from a man named Saint. If Daddy knew he’d played hooky, he’d be in a big ol’ world of trouble and worse yet, it may even be painful.
“I know you gotta go, too! Come on.”
“Don’t nobody give uh fuck about me, man. Ain’t nobody checkin’ for me like that.” Angel smirked as he kicked a stone away from him. “That’s why I’m glad you came along. You give me a reason to worry about tomorrow. Like, I used to only worry about today, you know?” He leisurely got to his feet and slipped the book bag over his shoulder. “Ain’t no sense in worrying about a future you sure you don’t even fuckin’ have or want no part of, no way. But, when I saw you, and helped you, I knew I was to protect your ass, help you make it through this shit. I could feel it in my damn soul. It made me happy, because…I had a purpose again. I was born to watch over you, protect you until you get to where you need to go.”
Hassani swallowed a wad of nervous spit that had formed in his mouth when he got surrounded by the boy’s loneliness and the sadness of his confessions. It overwhelmed him, made him hurt deep inside.
“But…you protect your little brother, Julio, Angel. That’s purpose, right?” Hassani slid on his backpack and looked towards the exit of the tunnel, anxious to get away but still wanting to talk to the boy a bit more.
He reached into his other pocket, gripped a small, skinny cigarette and lit it as they made their way out of the tunnel, back into the light. The rain had passed, leaving puddles in its wake. Hassani looked down in them, seeing his twisted reflection, and at that moment, he questioned if what he saw was really what he was on the inside, too.
“You said you in foster care. Ain’t that like where kids go who don’t have no parents?”
“Sometimes.”
“What about you? Where are your parents at, Angel?”
“Dead.”
Hassani felt a lump form in his throat and tears well up in his eyes. That empathic mess Daddy talked about was taking its toll on his body. He suddenly got a pang in his heart—he felt for Angel, he felt for him deeply.
“Don’t be sad, man.” Angel gave a light laugh as he pulled his jacket a bit tighter around his neck, hiding the gold chain dangling from it. “They been dead since I was seven. I live in a foster home with my brother, Julio. Right now, we with a different family than before. The Johnsons are aiight.” He shrugged. “They feed and clothe us, but they more concerned about gettin’ that check. All these foster homes are the same, man. Some of the people nicer than others, but it all comes down to that money. Whatever, man. They at least got me into this school like my old teacher begged ’em. Maybe, if I earn my stripes with you, you know, you could be my ticket out and I could go to an art school or some shit?” He laughed, sadness in the tone.
“Yeah, I bet you could, Angel.”
“Yeah man, that would be dope. I could go to art school and be some fancy animator or something, for video games. Some of them mothafuckas make a lotta damn dough, man. If I make sure you okay, yeah…I could do that.” Angel seemed to be working the scenario through his mind, hard and heavy, mulling it over, tasting it and liking the flavor. Truth of the matter was, Hassani liked him even more now. Angel was special, but didn’t seem to know it. He lit the little cigarette and took a hearty puff, feeling his eyes immediately growing small. A strange odor filled his nostrils.