The Old Neighborhood

by Bill Hillmann

  •

  IT WAS A SMOOTH OPERATION. A lot of the business was done over the phone, but we made most of the exchanges down at the sills. We set an old Folgers coffee can under a dumpster in the arterial alley across Hollywood—that way, we could see it from the sills. When a customer would show up, we’d chill and talk for a minute while one of us went to the can for the bag, and then we’d make the exchange. We knew that none of the potheads were crazy enough to try to rob us, and if they did, we’d see ’em doing it and rain down on them like the worst fucking nightmare they’d ever had, so it didn’t matter. We moved the entire ounce by early Saturday night.

  At about eleven, Mickey’s old, boxy Lincoln Town Car floated slowly in front of the sills and eased to a creaky halt. Mickey hung his muscular cube of a head out the window. Mickey’s freckles were similar to Ryan’s but lighter, smaller, and denser—like close-range shotgun spray. His stubble always sickened me because it didn’t grow down like normal facial hair; it sprouted straight out like porcupine quills.

  “Look at youse t’ree; you look like choir boys,” he said smiling. “Well… get on in here for the sermon.”

  We got in. Ryan sat in the front passenger seat, and I got in the seat behind Mickey—hiding from him. Mickey’s fierce, protruding brow made him seem bigger than he was. He always led with his forehead in conversation, as if he couldn’t understand you unless his Cro-Magnon brow was just inches from you. It cast a shadow on those beady eyes like you were looking into two caves with dark-green lanterns lurking deep within.

  “Aren’t you boys forgetting something?” he asked.

  “What, Mickey?” Ryan looked at him confused.

  “You did everything like I told you, didn’t’chu?” Mickey barked.

  “Yeah, Mickey,” Ryan implored.

  “Well, isn’t anybody gonna grab the stash?” Mickey slapped Ryan on the back of the neck.

  “Naw, Mickey. Shit. It’s empty.”

  “Empty?”

  “Yeah.” Ryan reached in his pants pocket, pulled out the thick green wad, and handed Mickey the hundred dollars in tens, fives, and singles.

  “No shit?” Mickey’s eyebrows raised as he unfolded the roll and thumbed through it. “Well… you keep this up, I’ll bumps ya’s ta two ounces.” Mickey slid the money in his jeans pocket, put the car in gear, and we rolled up to Ashland.

  “Yeah, Mickey, we were talking,” Ryan said as he relaxed and slouched in his bucket seat. “We think we could probably move three a week.”

  Mickey giggled. “We’ll see… I’ll front you two, and we’ll go from there.” He rubbed his hand through Ryan’s buzz-cut. “Fuckin’ kids.” His eyes flashed at me in the rearview mirror.

  “Aye, how’s Patty?” Mickey said. “You hear from him lately?”

  “He’s OK,” I answered. I looked out the window as we turned left on Ashland, away from Mickey’s disturbed eyes. “He calls sometimes.”

  “Dat’s one down brother,” Mickey said. A smirk slid over his lips. “Just couldn’t handle dat brown running through his veins… You gotta be strong if you’re gonna mess with dat shit.” He tapped his fist against his chest. The Lincoln came to a stop at a red light where Clark slashes across Ashland and overtakes it. Rain pattered the windshield and mixed with the built-up grime. The glass clouded as the rain slowly streaked down in gray, finger-like globs.

  “Aye, pass dem beers around,” Mickey said as he accelerated. Ryan looked at him mystified. “At your feet, stupid.”

  Ryan reached down and pulled the Budweiser Tall Boys out and passed them back to us. We cruised on.

  “Well, boys, dis is a special night. Dere’s reason to celebrate.” A grin spread over Mickey’s face. “I’ve decided to bring youse t’ree under my wing.”

  Mickey took us north on Clark, and we caught a red light at Ridge. A statue of Abraham Lincoln sat across the street in the park.

  “Ole honest Abe… If he woulda only knew what setting them animals free would do to this country,” Mickey sneered. “Never woulda done it.”

  We crossed Ridge, and Senn High School burst up from the darkness of the park—bold-white, wide, and tall like a Greek pavilion.

  “Dat’s gonna be home to you boys next fall, ain’t it?” Mickey nodded towards Senn. “Wit’ all de niggas and de spicks and de chinks...,” Mickey sighed. “It’s gonna be tough. You three’re gonna have to stick together, tight.”

  “Now, see, the TJOs,” he said as he leaned back in his seat. A sly smile appeared on his cracked lips. “Hell, we got some thirty brothers going to school dere right now... Now dey ain’t all there every single day... but if you need ’em, they’ll be there for ya.” He turned and looked each of us in the eyes, twisting his neck to stare at me in his periphery. The Lincoln magically maintained its lane. Then, he broke eyes with me and drove on. “But see… if dey’re dere for you, you gotsta be dere for dem.”

  “What I’m saying is… is this little crew you three got going, it’s under consideration… Now sometimes it takes a couple years, and sometimes it takes five minutes.” We slipped deeper and deeper into Rogers Park as the rain stopped; it’d been off and on all day. The wipers screeched lazily across the windshield and smeared the dirt so it built up thick on the glass at the limit of the wipers’ wingspans.

  I’d never heard Mickey speak more than a few spittle-spouting bursts of hatred. Things were changing for him, too—in his mid-twenties now, the leader. He had more responsibilities than just being a whack-job lunatic. You can only get away with so many murders and handle so much weight in hard drugs before you sink. He’d already tasted hard time, met all the heavies, all the guys from the 70s. He realized his job was to pass some of the responsibilities on to the next generation—to spread it out and let the street start to work for him.

  He eased a right onto Howard Street, a.k.a. the Juneway/Jonquil Jungle, the North Pole—take your pick. The rain-slicked street glowed, and the dark neon from the shop signs, stoplights, and the yellow streetlamps splashed the entirety of the lumpy blacktop. The L jutted across Howard on a sharp angle—its underbelly steel-ribbed, dark, and ominous. Even with the rain, the action was thick and frantic. Bum junkies lined the underpass in trench coats and rags, begging with foam cups. A skinny, pregnant mutt lay on its belly and trembled next to a shopping cart filled with black garbage bags that bulged with empty pop cans. Children—wild-eyed, skinny little boys and girls, no older than nine—ran in the light traffic; they dashed across Howard near Hermitage, squealing between taillights and headlights playing tag. A brown four-door Buick coasted slowly alongside three prostitutes in short, tight skirts. Their hooker heels clicked along the sidewalk. Then, one in an imitation fur coat stopped and bent abruptly like there was a hinge at her hips. She peered in through the Buick’s passenger window. Her bulbous buttocks jutted high and pointed right at us. The vertical slit of her black panties peeked out from her green skirt. Murmurs floated as they bartered their deal.

  A tall black man in a gray hoodie darted across the street and was swallowed by dark blocks to the north; the place known as Jonquil Gardens—a fortress of red-brick Section Eights.

  We passed under the L tracks. Across the way there were five black dudes staked out in front of a Dunkin’ Donuts. The dreary, brown and orange light from the electric sign saturated the damp sidewalk at their feet. A twitchy crackhead in a tattered pea coat stepped up to a big thug that wore a Georgetown jacket and held a black umbrella pitched over his head. An exchange was made, quick and wordless. I cracked my window, and the stench of rain and sewer drudge filled the air. The sound of roaring water bellowed up through the curb grates.

  “You boys know what dis place is?” Mickey asked.

  “The Jungle,” I replied coldly.

  “Very good,” Mickey said as he pulled a lazy U-turn and parked so that the car was pointed at the Dunkin’ Donuts about a half-block down.

  Pigeons
slowly swooped in and out of the exposed iron beams of the elevated tracks—securing their way in life. The pulsing bulbs of an all-night diner percolated atop the rain-glossed walkway. Four of the bored thugs slouched against the donut shop’s windows, waiting. A skinny one stood across the sidewalk from them; his bright eyes scanned slowly down Howard, north on Paulina, then up Howard, steady like a radar beam.

  “Now dere’s two gangs in the Jungle: one’s de GDs, and the other is de Vice Lords,” Mickey said. “Now dey’re both a bunch a niggers, so neither are worth a damn, but see the Vice Lords are Nation, so we can’t really go out and start warring with ’em unless they cross us and we get the nod from above.” He wiped the saliva from his lips. “But dem Gangster Disciples, now dey ain’t shit. Dey ain’t Nation, and dey ain’t nothing but a bunch of crooked-ass niggers.” He slammed his fist into the steering wheel as he stared at the group on the corner.

  Angel leaned his elbow on the door ledge, cupped his head in his palm, and watched the group. They hadn’t noticed the Lincoln—too busy with the endemic flow of nocturnal souls at the corner.

  “In fact, dem niggers shot us up de udder night…,” Mickey continued. He leaned back in his seat again. “De house… over on Bryn Mawr… shot all de damned windows out… Fuckin’ porch monkeys think they invented drive-by shootings; it was Bugs Moran invented it. The North Side Irish Mob pulled a ten-car drive-by on Capone back in the twenties, and these jungle bunnies think they’re onto somethin’ new.”

  Mickey leaned over the center console and removed the false vent. He reached in and pulled out a nickel-plated, snub-nosed .38 revolver.

  “Now, like I said, dere’s two roads ta becoming a Brother… One starts right here.” He held the pistol low, then twisted and looked all three of us in the eyes. “And it takes about one whole second.” He slowly pointed the pistol at the four black guys in front of the Dunkin’ Donuts. He made a small ‘pshhh’ sound and mimicked backfire.

  “The other road, boys…” He put the gun on his lap, turned back face-forward, and laughed. “Well, from the looks of those knots on your faces, you know all about dat road… And dat road might take ya a couple years.”

  Just then, a flock of black girls swept up to the Dunkin’ Donuts and chatted with the young men. Their voices squawked loudly over the traffic easing past on Howard.

  Angel leaned over and patted my shoulder. I looked at him. His eyes urged me with a nod toward the corner. I looked again and saw my sister Rose’s mound of puffy, brown, frizzy hair. A sharp needle of rage pierced my temple and unleashed a scream in my mind. What the fuck are you doing here! Rose stood in her Duke jacket in front of the big one with the umbrella and smiled at him. His teeth flashed, and then she leaned in and hugged him. My heart palpitated, as if something squeezed around it. Of all people, Rose! Of all places! What the fuck are you doing hugging some piece of shit in the Jungle for?! Then, Jan was there, too, in her North Carolina jacket with the hood up. Her round face sulked in the rain as she spoke with one of the other girls. The point dug and twisted deeper. Jan! You’re going to fucking college next year, for Christ’s sake! And you’re about to be dodging bullets on some gangster shit? WHY?

  “Now, which road’s it gonna be, boys?” Mickey said as he turned in his reclined bucket seat. He placed the pistol in his wide, stubby palm and held it low in the center of the cab. The neon lights played on the smudgy nickel finish and created a multi-colored, laser-like sheen along the chambers. He let it hover there. The invitation was clear. Ryan gazed down at the pistol in awe—like it was some mystical instrument.

  We stared at it in silence. Brotherhood meant girls, money, drugs, respect, and even power in the neighborhood. I remembered this one day, years back, outside of St. Greg’s after school let out. There was a thick mob of high school kids down at the corner, and suddenly Lil Pat appeared. He walked with his chest puffed out, his chin high, and the entire crowd of high school kids parted like the Red Sea. He stomped straight through the opened-up canal like he’d expected nothing less. Being a TJO in Edgewater was like being royalty; it was all Ryan had ever talked about as far back as I could remember. My heart raced, and these wires constricted around my lungs. I could see Ryan’s face. He swigged his Budweiser. A sick grin loomed on his mug. Ryan looked up at me. I shook my head slowly—’No.’ Ryan’s eyes pulsed deep, emerald-green. I imagined him snatching the revolver, twisting, and blindly firing into the corner with Rose caught in the crossfire. Lightning bolts shot down my legs. I readied to just lunge at him, grab him in a bear hug, squeeze him tight, and not let him fucking move. His upturned hand unfurled on his knee, and the thick fingers gesticulated like he was crumbling something. No. Fuck no. Don’t you fucking do it. I almost said it. He twitched his hand toward it. I leaned in close. Then, he caught himself and giggled. His smile eased, relaxed, and evaporated. He turned and glanced out of his window, then took another swig off his Tall Boy.

  Mickey sighed and put the pistol back in the stash, then re-fit the vents over it.

  “Well, boys, if you ever get tired of rock ’em sock ’em over dere at Senn, you just pay me a little visit. Hell, I’ll even let ya shoot a chink if ya want,” he sighed. “Dem are the ones dat got you boys, right?”

  “Yeah, Mickey. Dey’re the ones,” Ryan lied quickly.

  “Kung Fu motherfuckers… Don’t go fightin’ with dem… What de hell you t’ree tinking? You gotta break dere fuckin’ legs with ball bats,” he said laughing. “Patty had one, made it in woodshop. We used dat thing all the time. Called her Big Bertha.” He adjusted the rearview mirror to see me. “You still got Big Bertha lying around the garage?”

  “I’ll check,” I said, still breathing hard, though the wires slackened. Mickey grinned sadistically in the small mirror.

  “You do dat,” he said as he put the Lincoln in gear, and we glided away from the curb.

  As we passed the corner, they spotted us. One of the slouchy GDs threw up the pitchforks. Jan’n’Rose peered into the Lincoln, too. Their mouths hung open, eyes wide with recognition.

  Ryan pointed out the window with his thumb, then he turned slowly to look at me. His eyes bugged out.

  ‘What the fuck?!’ he mouthed. I looked back and shook my head. My heart finally slowed, and I took a large chug from the Tall Boy. The horrors swirled in the cab. What’d Mickey a said if he recognized Jan’n’Rose? How the fuck could they be hanging out there anyway? Rage, fear, and anxiety swiftly coursed through my mind. It all churned slowly in my chest like it was inside a steadily cranking meat grinder.

  •

  IT WAS A COMPLEX DYNAMIC that brought the girls to the Jungle, one as complicated as their bloodline. The girls fearlessly delving into the most violent neighborhood in the area made sense on a few levels. They came across as black girls to most strangers; only Caribbean people could really identify them as Dominican. To white guys, they were pudgy black girls. To black guys, they were thick, exotic, light-skinned girls. Then, when they found out they were islanders, they became even more exotic and coveted. It was only natural they’d be attracted to black guys, too; ethnically speaking, it makes sense. Growing up with roughnecks for older brothers and a fierce father, the Juneway Jungle was a prime locale to find a boyfriend. It just woulda made it a whole lot easier on me if they hadn’t had a thing for GD’s.

  We’d head up to the U.P. of Michigan in the summer to hunt quail and whitetail, but mostly to fish for giant tiger muskie. The lake was named Lac Vieux Desert, and like Lac Ness, it was deep as fuck—two hundred feet in some spots. The muskies would just hover down there in the deep like logs at different depths. Dad had one of those sonar monitors, and we’d sit there and watch it between hour-long bouts with casting these woolly, long lures; they had five sets of three-prong hooks and four different-colored furs. It was exhausting. It’d have been fun if we were hooking into musky, but at Lac Vieux Desert, we spent ninety-five percent of the time beating the water. The girl
s would be done by the sixth hour of the first day, and they’d spend the rest of the time pouting in the cabin. I really had to feel bad for them. In the same way Dad was only capable of creating male offspring, he didn’t have a clue how to engage the girls in a family outing.

  There was other crap to do up there, but pretty much nothing for girls, so we’d go canoeing on this river. They have these giant black flies up there that’d bite the crap out of you! And maybe Jan’n’Rose had sweeter blood or something, ’cause those flies bit the hell out of them every year. The sun’d just be blazing down on us, and the girls would be swatting each other and squealing, “Get it off! Get it off!” every five minutes. There were rapids, too—these swift little rapids that’d kick your ass—and the girls were too busy swatting flies to really handle ’em. Inevitably, the girls would capsize and fall into the frigid water. It’s amazing how different those two were. Ma always made note of Jan’s fiery Spanish blood, but it was Rose, with her much lighter complexion, who carried more of the Spanish genes. Rose was the calm and easy-going one. Jan was always trying to control everything—shouting out orders even though she had no sense of direction and no real ability in a canoe. Dad would try to coach them, but it was hopeless. I remember that summer we eased down a peaceful, quiet stretch of river. Just downstream before the bend, a white heron stood frozen in the shallows watching the water for prey. Jan made some bonehead decision on how to negotiate a rapid and their canoe began to drift and twist sideways, eventually sweeping into one of the large boulders perpendicularly.

  “Ohh, God!!!” Rose yelled, gripping the gunwales. There was a splash, and her paddle floated down stream. With their inertia, the canoe slid up atop the boulder and rose until the canoe’s bottom hovered momentarily above the water’s surface.