by Tim O'Mara
There was a look in Jerome’s eyes that I had seen more times than I could count. The look of someone whose fear is ready to take him places he doesn’t understand. Another time, I might have found myself feeling sorry for the kid. Right now, I didn’t want an angry, wannabe gangbanger in my school. It was time to play hardball.
“What’s that in your sock, Jerome?”
He took a step around his mother. A step closer to me. I remained seated.
“Ain’t got nothin’ in my sock, man.”
I eased my chair a few inches away from the table.
“Guy like you. Just waiting for someone to ‘bring it on.’ You got something in your sock right now. The left one. I heard it when your leg hit the chair.”
“You’re crazy.” He put his hand on his mother’s shoulder. “Let’s get outta this punk-ass school, Ma.”
Mrs. Dexter reached up and put her hand on her son’s. She closed her eyes.
“Go ahead and show your mom how you came prepared for school, Jerome.” I pushed my chair back a little more. “Roll up your pant leg. Show her what you got.”
He locked his eyes on mine. “You pushin’ it, man.”
I stood slowly and looked around the office. “Bit different than the schoolyard, huh? Not quite that many people around who are scared of you.”
“Don’t need nobody scared a me. And I ain’t scared a you.”
“Then go ahead and show your mom.”
He took a step toward me. “Listen, mister—”
“Do what the man says, Jerome,” Mrs. Dexter said, her eyes still closed.
Jerome looked down at his mother. “Ma. You gonna listen to this—”
“Do it, boy.” Her eyes were wide open now.
Jerome looked down at his mom again and then back to me. After about thirty seconds, he lifted his leg and put his foot up onto the table. He rolled up his pant leg, removed a yellow box cutter from his sock, and slammed it down on the table.
“There,” he said. “Happy?”
“Thrilled.” I grabbed the box cutter and put it in my pocket. I stepped over to the door, pulled it open, and kicked the wooden doorstop into place. “Mrs. Dexter,” I said. “Find your son another school.”
“Excuse me?” she asked.
“Jerome will not be attending school here. Go back to the district office. Tell them anything you want. The school wasn’t to your liking, it’s too far from home, whatever. I don’t care what you tell them.”
“You can’t do that. The district told us—”
“That’s because the district didn’t know Jerome would be showing up on his first day at his new school with a weapon in his sock and gang beads around his neck.”
As she stared at me, Jerome stood at the table, silently going over his options.
“You lucky we in school, man.”
I stared back. “I think we’re probably both lucky, Jerome. Does Tio know you’re sporting Royal Family colors?”
“Who the fuck’s Tio?”
“That’s what I thought. You wear the colors, you best know the players.”
He had no answer for that. He waited a few seconds, thinking maybe I’d challenge him. When I didn’t, he mumbled the word “pussy” under his breath and stormed past me out of the room. Jerome’s mother slowly got up from her seat. I walked her out into the hallway.
“You’re going to have to do something about your boy, Mrs. Dexter. He’s going to have more problems than getting out of the eighth grade.”
She gave me one last blank look, shook her head, and followed the path her son had taken out of the building.
Chapter 19
AS THE LAST OF THE KIDS STARTED to make their way home, I decided it was time for me to do the same. But first, I had a phone call to make. I checked the Yellow Pages in the office and got the number for Tio’s pizza place. Someone picked up after two rings.
“Pizza.”
“Yeah, hey. This is Raymond Donne. Is Tio around?”
“Who this?”
“Raymond Donne,” I repeated.
“Who Tio?”
I thought I recognized the voice. “Boo?”
“Who’s askin’?”
This was turning into an Abbot and Costello routine.
“Boo, this is Raymond Donne. I met with Tio Saturday morning.”
Silence from the other end and then, “The white guy from the paper?”
“That’s the one, Boo. Can I talk with Tio?”
“He ain’t here.”
“When do you expect him?”
“Not my job to expect him,” he said. “You gonna be at that phone a while?”
“Yeah.”
Boo said, “Okay,” then hung up.
I put the phone back down, and less than half a minute later it rang.
“Mr. Donne,” I said.
“Teacher Man,” Tio said. “What’s the haps?”
“Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. I want to tell you something, but I need you to promise me you won’t take what I say and react with violence.”
“Now you sound like a cop, Teacher Man.”
“Do I have your word, Tio? No violence?”
He was silent as he thought about it. Probably thinking, who the hell was I to tell him how to react to something?
“Yeah, okay,” Tio said. “Talk to me.”
I told Tio about Jerome Dexter, the box cutter, and his beads and jersey. Again he was silent as he thought about what I’d just said. I heard him let out a long sigh.
“You know where this Jerome lives?” he asked.
“I do.”
“You wanna tell me?”
“I have your word, right? No violence?”
“I don’t promise things twice.”
“Okay.” I opened the file and read off Jerome Dexter’s address. “It’s near the subway.”
“I know where it is,” Tio said. “Good lookin’ out, Teacher Man. Me and one of my boys’ll go have a face-to-face with young Jerome. Can’t have no wannabes going around rockin’ our colors and makin’ us look bad. Cause us all sorts of trouble.”
“That’s why I called, Tio. I appreciated our conversation the other day,” I explained. “Just talk to the kid, all right?”
“Oh, we talk to him, all right. Scare the boy straight, know what I’m sayin’?”
“I think I do.”
“Okay. Good lookin’ out. See ya ’round.”
After we hung up, I had my doubts about having made the call. I eased them by telling myself Jerome Dexter was an act of violence waiting to happen. Someone had to stop him, and it wasn’t going to be a teacher, and certainly not his mother. If Tio kept his word, and I believed he would, maybe Jerome would be scared straight. At least enough to cut the shit with the jersey and beads.
I looked at the clock. I had some paperwork up in my office that I thought about knocking off, but I was too damned tired and could think of little else except lying on my couch, watching TV while I ate some dinner, and then dozing off. So I left for the day.
I had barely made it to the corner, when a black town car flashed its red grill lights, whooped its siren, and pulled over to where I stood. I first thought maybe Dougie’s uncle was dropping by to read me the riot act again. That thought quickly disappeared as the rear passenger window rolled down, revealing Uncle Ray. He looked too large for the back of the car.
“Nephew,” he said, removing the ever-present cigar from his mouth and blowing the smoke out the window. “Surprised?”
“Yeah, Uncle Ray. A little.” I placed my hand on the top of the car to lean into the window. “Twice in one week? You got business at the nine-oh?”
“Nah. Just wanted to cross the river and pay another little visit to my favorite nephew.” He paused for effect. “The schoolteacher.”
The way he said those words, I knew someone had reached out to him. The only question was whether it was Dennis Murcer or Dougie’s uncle. I chose to play dumb for the moment and just say, “Cool.
You got time for a beer?”
He looked at his watch. “Some of us are still on the clock, Raymond. Not every employee of the great City of New York gets to go home at three thirty. But I guess with all your after-school activities these past few days, you might not be going home just yet. What’s it going to be this afternoon? Back to the private school? Maybe a home visit to a family in crisis? Huh? Whatcha got in mind, Nephew?”
I took a deep breath, let it out, and watched as it disappeared into the chilled air. Uncle Ray did not invite me to have a seat inside the car, and I knew damn well he wasn’t going to come out in the cold just to chew on my ass. No, he could do that just fine from the back of his warm and cozy town car.
“Who called you, Uncle Ray?”
“Who didn’t call? First, I hear from Dennis Murcer. Said—real respectfully—he appreciated your help the other day, but would I please suggest to my nephew that he allow the investigation to proceed without his assistance from this point.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I got the message. I was only trying to—”
“Then,” he interrupted me, “I get a call from a lawyer. Douglas Lee, Esquire. He said—again, with all due respect to me—my nephew would do well to stay away from a certain family.” He paused to flick some cigar ashes out the window. “Quinn, I believe the name was.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I can explain that.”
“I knew you could, Raymond. You’ve always been so good at explaining things.” He turned away from me and spoke to his driver. “Didn’t I tell you, Smitty, my nephew would be able to explain the situation?”
“Yes, sir,” Smitty said, without turning around. “I believe you did.”
For the first time, I noticed the driver. From the way he barely fit behind the steering wheel, Smitty appeared to be quite large himself.
“It’s okay, Raymond,” my uncle said. “I don’t need to hear your explanation. I just need to hear you’re through messing around. Both of those phone calls were a courtesy to me. If we didn’t have the same name, you might very well be in a lot of trouble at this point.”
“I understand that, Uncle Ray. I just—”
“Good,” he said. “Then I don’t need to remind you of what happened last time you went down this road.” He turned back to Smitty. “My nephew here is one of the few teachers in the New York City public schools who ever needed police protection.”
“What else did Dennis tell you?”
Uncle Ray took another drag from his cigar and blew the smoke out the window. He rubbed his eyes before speaking.
“That you were very helpful. Up to a point. Said you also handled the press thing well, too. Shame about that situation.”
“Yeah,” I said. “It is.”
“Good kid gone bad. How many times we seen that?”
“Dougie was not a good kid gone bad, Uncle Ray. He was a good kid who got involved in something that…” I realized I didn’t know how to finish the sentence.
“Come on, Raymond. Good kids don’t end up under the Williamsburg Bridge after midnight. A good kid wouldn’t put himself in that position. You know that. You work with these kids.”
“Which is why I know Dougie … why we think he was meeting somebody there. His mother said he was already in bed for the night. He must have gotten a phone call and then snuck out without her knowing.”
“You’re making my argument for me,” Uncle Ray said. “What did Murcer say when he checked the kid’s phone records?”
“The last call Dougie received was from a disposable, so they have no number to go with it. Dougie’s phone can’t be found. The working theory is the killer took it.”
Uncle Ray smirked. “Oh, is that the working theory? Listen to him, Smitty. Sounds like he’s still wearing the uniform.” Back to me. “Let Dennis do his job, Raymond. He’s a good investigator.”
“I never said he wasn’t.”
“Now,” Uncle Ray said, “about the Quinn family.”
“Yeah, I know. I realized my mistake when I got to the hospital and before I could get out of there, I got into a conversation with the sister.”
“Just couldn’t help it, huh? Couldn’t just walk away?”
“I guess I could have, but we got to talking and I noticed she was high on something and needed help, so I used her phone to call her father.”
“Who’s also the father of the kid in the hospital?”
“Yeah. And a client of Douglas Lee, Dougie’s uncle.”
“So let me guess,” he said, holding his cigar so the smoke streamed out the car window. “All this is too much of a coincidence to you.”
“Yes,” I said, accenting the point by gently slapping the top of the car. “And we’ve also got Paulie Sherman, the kid killed by the bus. That’s three kids—three friends—all from the same school. Two are dead and the other’s … who knows?”
Uncle Ray stuck the cigar in his mouth and shut his eyes. I knew this was his way of processing what I’d just said, so I stayed quiet.
“And Murcer knows all this?” he said after a half minute of silence.
“He does now that I’ve told him.”
“Careful with the sarcasm, Ray.” He opened his eyes. “Murcer’s right. You’ve done good, but that’s as far as your involvement in this case goes. Understand me?”
“Yes, Uncle Ray. I understand.”
“Good.” He graced me with a smile, and then it was gone. “What’s this other story about? The school safety officer. Paper said the kid goes to your school?”
“He’s one of ours, yeah. I spoke with the dad. Told him to get his supervisor or the cops involved, but he thought he could handle it himself. He was wrong.”
“Big-time,” Uncle Ray said. He closed his eyes again. When he reopened them, he said, “You know where the bus stop is?”
“The one where Angel was having trouble?”
“That’s the one I’m thinking of.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Why?”
“I’m just thinking—since I’m out this way—we might want to take a ride over there. See if we get lucky. Talk a little sense into the kid pressing charges. Maybe convince him to give Officer What’s-his-name a break.”
“Rosario,” I said, slightly wary of my uncle’s definition of “a little sense.” “You okay with doing that?”
“Hey,” Uncle Ray said, as if he were offended by the question. “School Safety’s a division of the NYPD, and we gotta look after our own, right?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then get in.” He opened the back passenger door and slid over to make room for me. “Let’s go for a ride.”
*
About five minutes later, we pulled in front of the bus stop where Angel and his dad had their problems. It was empty, which shouldn’t have come as a big surprise. School had been out for almost an hour, and there were no businesses open in the area. This was one of those Williamsburg blocks that used to be busy with small factories and a couple of tiny restaurants serving breakfast and lunch to the workers. That seemed like a long time ago. Right now, it looked like an urban ghost town.
“Not much going on,” Uncle Ray said, getting a firm grip on the obvious.
“Nope.” I looked over at the whitewashed wall behind the bus stop, where some local artist had spray-painted a penis with something dripping out of its tip. Below the drawing were the words IT’LL COME WHEN IT COMES. Brilliant. “I guess we should have had this idea half an hour ago.”
“Give it time, Nephew.” He slapped my left leg twice. Hard. “You seem to have forgotten one of the first lessons of law enforcement.”
“And what is that, Uncle Ray?” I could hear the pain in my voice.
Uncle Ray now slapped the back of his driver’s seat. “Tell him, Smitty.”
Smitty cleared his throat, but again did not turn around. “Half of this job is waiting around for shit to happen.”
“And the other half?” Uncle Ray prompted.
“The other half is cleaning up the
shit,” Smitty concluded. “Sir.”
“And so we wait.” Uncle Ray lowered his window and let some of the cigar smoke out. “Tell me about this kid of yours, Raymond.”
“Which one?”
“The one who was getting harassed. Why didn’t he just get off at the next stop?”
“He told me he tried that for a while, and after a few weeks he thought the problem was over.”
“Why’d he think that?”
“He’d stay on the bus and not get off here. For a couple of days he didn’t see the guys who were bothering him. He figured they moved on to some other location. The day he got his iPod jacked, there was no one at the stop when he got off.”
“And…”
“Soon as he got off, they turned the corner and he ran right into them.”
“Wrong place,” Uncle Ray said. “Wrong time.” He turned to the window and again let out a long stream of cigar smoke. “Common theme here, wouldn’t you say, Raymond?”
It took me a few seconds. “You’re talking about Dougie now?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Uncle Ray,” I started, but then I realized he was right. No matter what sent Dougie to those tennis courts after midnight, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. And obviously with the wrong person. “I think we’d do well to focus on the ‘who’ and not the ‘why’ at this point.”
“There you go again,” Uncle Ray said, tapping about an inch of his cigar ash out the window. “Using the word ‘we.’ There is no we here. There is Dennis Murcer, and there is the New York Police Department of which you are no longer a member.”
There are times I think my uncle just waits for moments like this to remind me of my current job. I know it’s partly because he wants to keep me from getting myself in trouble, but the other part is because he’s still smarting over my decision to leave the force after my accident. If he’d had his way, I’d be sitting behind a desk, telling other cops how to do their jobs. It’s not all that rare for cops who’ve been injured on the job to be given promotions and higher paychecks. It wasn’t how I pictured my career path, so I left. A lot of people—my uncle included—didn’t get that.
“Sir,” Officer Smitty said from the front seat.
Uncle Ray and I both answered, “Yes?”