It was a muggy, hot September day in the neighborhood. We sat in the garage with the box fan on in the doorway and the sliding door half-up as we worked on the bikes as usual.
“You smell that?” Ryan asked.
“What?” Angel answered, looking up from where he shined his chrome rims with Windex and a gray dishrag. There was the smell of smoke, like from a campfire. It slipped in over the scent of rust, grease, and cleaning fluids.
“Smells like something’s burning,” I said, inhaling deeply through my nostrils.
Everybody got silent, like we were listening with our noses.
“It’s a fire,” I said.
“It ain’t no fuckin’ fire,” Angel whined.
I got up and lifted the garage door the rest of the way and stepped out into the afternoon heat. I looked west down the empty alley—nothing. An orange alley cat snaked down along the white coach house with its bushy tail up. I turned and looked east down at the T in the alley where Fat Bubba’s yellow-sided house jutted up to its sharp-pitched peak. Beyond it, a thin trail of smoke snaked up into the blue sky.
We waited as the Ashland bus surged past before we jogged across. There was already a crowd forming down on the sidewalk in front of the red-bricked apartment building. Everyone’s heads were upturned with their jaws dropped, awestruck. The smoke now gushed thick and lifted fast out of the third-floor window like an upside-down waterfall.
“That’s fucked up. I don’t even hear a fuckin’ siren,” Ryan said, turning around to face the street. He cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, “Hayyoo, call 911!!!”
A fat Assyrian lady next to us looked up with her mouth creased in terror below her thin blonde mustache.
“Das-Kees-in-deh!” she screamed, grabbing my wrist. Then, she looked at me with her eyes bugged out, pleading. “Das Kees in Deh!”
“What the fuck you sayin’?” Ryan spat at her.
My heart leapt up in my throat. “There’s kids in there!” I said, and I sprinted toward the entrance.
“Motherfucker!” Ryan shouted.
“Shit! Joe! Joe, don’t go in there! Ah, fuck!” Angel said, then followed.
I ripped the outer door open, and an old lady with a red wig and a walker had just unlocked the inner door. I waited and held the wooden, glass-paned door as she creaked out. Ryan and Angel bunched up at my back.
“Thank you. That’s very nice of you, boys,” she said in a shaky but ridiculously calm voice as she passed.
We dashed up into the hallway, then found the stairs. They were quick-turning, and we pounded ’em. The smoke stench grew as we ascended.
“This three?” I shouted.
“Yeah, this three, man. This is it,” Ryan urged.
I pushed the door open and coughed instantly. Thick smoke hung from the ceiling of the hall at head level. An older black man in a Dago T, sweats, and house slippers stood a little down the hall and banged on a wooden door. He had the shape of a guy who used to be muscular but had sagged with time. He banged on the door with the bottom of his thick fist. It was hollow and steady like a pile-driver. As I got close, I saw he was barefoot.
“This the one?” I asked.
He tilted his head to look at me, and his eyes were all pink with thick red veins flecked in them. “Those little motherfuckers start a fire in dere,” he said.
I grabbed the brass knob—it was hot and singed my palm.
“They leave ’em in there all alone. They keep me up all day with this kinda shit,” the man said, catching a line of drool sliding down his chin with his palm.
“They start fires all day?” Angel said with ironic disgust.
“Come on, man, just kick the motherfucker down!” I said.
I centered myself in front of the door, pulled my knee up to my chest, and slammed my new Nike low-top into the door. It boomed and rattled but didn’t give an inch.
Ryan dove in and slammed his shoulder into it and got the same—the top and bottom just wobbled slightly.
We all coughed now and were heaving for breath. The smoke was thickening. It oozed out of all four creases of the door.
I pushed forward and kicked the door lower. The wobble increased. I ground my molars and stomped my foot into the wood. On the third kick, it gave, and my foot slid right through to the ankle. The wood cracked, and a slice from the puncture stretched up toward the center. I tried to pull my foot out, but it’d gotten stuck. I immediately panicked and started to scream. Images of me burning alive flashed in my head, and I suddenly didn’t give a fuck about those little kids in there. The smoke traced up my thigh into my face and burned my eyes. I screamed for help. Tears gushed down my cheeks from the smoke as I yakked and swallowed mouthfuls of it. Angel grabbed hold of my thigh and yanked hard. We both fell against the far wall.
The old man turned abruptly towards the door and threw a straight punch. His fist burst through the wood and sank in all the way to his forearm. Then, he ripped it right out. Splinters of wood sprayed out after it. Ryan drove his shoulder high into the door, and it broke near the top. Angel and I got our shit together and kicked the door low. It broke the lower hole bigger, and flames crackled inside. Sirens slowly built all around us.
“Wait! Wait!” Ryan said as he bent down on a knee.
He took a deep breath then held it. He reached his arm in through the lower hole, and his head disappeared into the billowing smoke. He struggled there for a second. Then, a board banged to the ground inside the apartment, and the busted door folded inward and pushed open.
Three little Mexican kids from about two years old to six ran out in a tight line—one after the other like they were playing Follow the Leader. All of ’em in footsie pajamas, covered in soot. They coughed as they ran right past us like we weren’t even there. As they got to the end of the hall, the oldest one yelled, “Sorry!” and ran down the stairwell.
“Sorry? Sorry? Little motherfucker, you sorry?” the old black guy muttered. He walked away from us further down the hall and said, “You done burn my house down, an’ you SORRY?” He swung his apartment door open.
“That’s all of ’em?” I yelled to him.
“That’s all of ’em,” the old man said without looking back. Then, he stepped in and slammed his door shut.
“Let’s get the fuck outta here,” Angel said.
“Fuck that!” Ryan replied, then pulled his shirt up over his mouth and nose before running inside the smoke-blanketed apartment.
“What the fuck you doing, Ryan?” I said, sticking my head in through the door. Then, I reeled back, my eyes burning.
“We gotta get outta here, man!” I yelled.
“I’m gone,” Angel said, then he turned and ran down the hall, disappearing down the steps.
“Ryan!” I screamed into the grayness. I got low, below the curtain of smoke, then breathed some good air and readied. Suddenly, Ryan emerged with an Atari and a stack of games on top. He burst past me, and we ran down the hall. As we turned into the stairwell, it sounded like Darth Vader breathing, and a giant fireman emerged, fully geared.
I could just make out his eyes behind the plastic goggles of the mask. He looked at us then looked down at the Atari. “Get the fuck out of here!!!” he blared through the mask. We dashed down the stairs past a whole line of ’em.
In a few seconds, we were back in the garage. We sat, huffin’ and puffin’, and patted out tufts of soot from our clothes. Angel was inconsolable. He sat sunken into himself and refused to even look at either one of us.
“An Atari?” I said, looking over at Ryan. He sat on a little kid’s chair and fondled the game console. “You risk our fucking lives like that for an Atari?”
“Your ass is the one who got us into dat shit!” Ryan shot back, disgusted. He flipped through the games with his brow all furrowed. “I was gonna get somethin’ out of it. Ain’t my fault their poor asses could only afford an Atari.”
>
I cracked up and sat back on the fuzzy couch. I laughed hard until it turned into a rattling, deep-lunged cough.
We coughed for a week, but whenever a parent or an adult asked us about it, we played dumb. We didn’t even talk much about it with the other hoods—didn’t want to be called heroes or nothing. But we told the Good Girls about it, and the hood rats, too. Ryan and Angel had unlimited blow job passes with the hood rats and a couple select Good Girls. It went well for a few weeks before they started bragging too much and got their unlimited passes pulled. I didn’t take any dibs on that mess, but when I told Hyacinth, I could see it in her eyes—everything went deeper. Her gaze: the saturated almond brown. Her touch: the cocoa-buttered fingertips. She grinned when I told her about getting my foot stuck. I even told her the truth about being so scared I didn’t care about them kids no more for a few seconds before we finally broke that door. She paid me extra-special attention after that—said how it scared her that I might have gotten burnt up. Then, she started to tell me all kinds of things, too—secrets she never told anyone before. Silly little things that were more sweet than embarrassing. I ate it all up with laughs, and I never told a soul to this very day.
•
RYAN LOST HIS VIRGINITY FIRST.
I approached the sills where Ryan and Angel sat. Ryan squinted in the late afternoon sunlight with his freckles red as chicken pox. Angel laughed and both rows of his large teeth showed.
“What up, dog?” Ryan greeted me.
“What up?” I replied.
“Man, you ain’t gonna believe dis shit!” Angel said, dropping his head and slowly shaking it.
“What?” I asked.
“Tell him, Ry,” Angel urged.
I sat down in a sill, and the sunshine slowly burned into my skin. Ryan smiled at me.
“Tell me, fucker,” I said, shoving him.
“Well, I told you Vicky’s been hangin’ around de block, right?” he started.
“Yeah,” I answered.
“Well, I thought she was fuckin’ around wit’ T-Money. Well, I was wrong.”
“Ah, shit. What is this fucker sayin’?” I said, looking at Angel.
“Listen!” Angel urged with his eyes.
“So we were fuckin’ around, shootin’ hoops in the alley, when T-Money comes out. He’s leaning against his gate with his shirt off, all sweatin’ and shit. Well, he calls us over and tells us he’s got somethin’ to show us up in his apartment, right?”
“OK,” I said, eagerly.
“So we head up to the apartment, and he’s got Snoop blaring, right? But when we walk in, we can hear some bitch moanin’. She’s yellin’, ya know? Somebody’s fuckin’, right?”
“HAHAHA!” Angel and I hooted.
“So, he opens the door to his ma’s room, and there she is: Vicky’s gettin’ it doggy style from Twon, and BB’s in dere gettin’ his little dick sucked by her at the same time!”
“Ohh shit!” I said, shocked. “HAHAHA!”
“Then, T-money says, ’Dis bitch gettin’ banged into da Crew.’”
“What? There ain’t a Crew no more!!!” I said.
“No shit, bro,” Ryan said, looking at me seriously.
“So what happened next?”
“Man, we all get in, like, and pulled a train on dat bitch,” he said with prideful disdain.
“Oh my God!” I yelled.
“It was crazy, bro. We were all bustin’ nuts on her face and ass and tits. She was loving it,” Ryan added.
“You got in on dat shit?” I asked. “You sick fuck.”
“Man, hell yeah, I did. I ain’t passin’ up on no pussy. I ain’t a faggot!” he said, disgusted.
“Oh my God, bro,” I said. “You’re gonna get AIDS, man.”
“Dat’s what I said,” Angel piped in.
“Man, fuck dat. AIDS is for fags and junkies,” Ryan retorted.
“Ryan, man, you are an idiot!” I said.
“Fuck you, man,” he shot back.
“Dis fuckin’ guy,” I admonished to Angel.
“It gets worse, man. Dey called up Tamika and Tara!” Angel added.
“Big Tara?” I said.
“Big Tara,” Angel said, nodding.
“Ryan?” I pleaded—I didn’t want to believe my boy fucked a giant fat girl.
“What? Man, forgetchu guys,” he said, then took a pull off his cigarette.
“He fucked ’em both,” Angel added.
“Oh my God,” I said as I jumped up and pointed at Ryan. “You sick fucker!”
“Whatever, man. Whateva,” Ryan dismissed us.
“Hey, it’s OK. He’s just on dat interracial, obese orgy tip,” Angel joked.
“HAHAHAHAH!” I laughed.
I couldn’t believe it—Vicky going that far, and Ryan with Tara. I couldn’t get the nasty visions out of my head. There was the slight pang of jealousy that I was still a virgin, but I knew I didn’t want to lose it like that—in a room full of sweaty dudes with girls that meant nothing. As much as I couldn’t tell anyone, I wanted it to be special, beautiful even. And I knew I wanted it to be with Hyacinth. Just holding her hand made my heart ache. I wanted to tell her something, but I didn’t know what. I knew what I felt was important and that I’d do anything for her.
•
TEETEE WAS AS GAY AS THEY COME. If there are really people that are born gay—if it’s genetic—then TeeTee is definitely one of ’em. As far back as Hyacinth could remember, they’d been playing dress up, and as they got older, nothing changed except that they added heels and makeup. When he got to be about twelve, his father tried to put an end to it. He’d caught TeeTee in his mother’s white evening gown with dark-red lipstick smeared across his lips, so he grabbed him and gave him a crack to the side of the head that fractured his eye socket but did nothing to stop his dressing; it just sent it underground: backpacks with school books neatly placed atop high heels, skirts, and makeup kits. Hyacinth’s bedroom was a kind of safe zone for him. Every once in a while, when he was feeling brave, he’d go out with a few of the approving Good Girls in half-drag. He’d wear tight, bleached blue jeans with high heels, or a tight, girly t-shirt and eyeliner. Sometimes, they’d come by the sills. Ryan was so disgusted by TeeTee that he’d usually disappear when he saw him approaching. When Ryan did stick around, he was a fierce red ball of sneering silence.
TeeTee didn’t bother me much. I’d known him since we was little. A year older than me, he used to run around with my sisters. He was a nice-enough guy in his strange, flamboyant way, and Hyacinth really loved him dearly. They were probably best friends on top of being cousins. So, I fought my instinctive urge to run him off with rocks and names like I used to with the other little boys in the neighborhood. But once in a while, my discomfort would show through. He liked to slap people’s arms in his limp-wristed way when they said something smart-assed or playfully adversarial. One night, he slapped my arm that way, and an uncontrollable sneer slithered up onto my face. I turned away, but he saw it, and he never touched me again. With Angel, it was different though. Angel didn’t mind the slaps and the playful banter. Usually, after Ryan had slipped off on some imaginary task, Angel and TeeTee would chat it up. TeeTee batted his dark mascara’d eyelashes at Angel as he made his ridiculous jokes in his high-pitched, whiney voice. Every once in a while, they’d sit in the same sill together, and the Good Girls’d giggle and clatter as they watched. I tried to ignore it—told myself, Hey, they’re just friends, pals, or something, but all of that began to fall flat and false at my feet.
A large, silent void rose up between Ryan and Angel. Whenever Angel wasn’t around, Ryan referred to him as the ’faggot.’ I was always after him to quit dat shit. I said that Angel wasn’t no faggot, and that he was our boy and a down one; that he’d fucked around with three hood rats already that I knew of, but Ryan wasn’t hearing none of it.
Then, one day
I walked home from school after getting off the bus, and there was Ryan. He sat on my front porch steps with his green eyes alight and his elbows propped up on his knees. Both of his thick fists were wedged under his chin.
“What’s up?” I said.
“I caught the motherfucker,” he answered.
“What?”
“I saw the faggot kissing that sissy.”
“Come on, man.” I brushed past him.
“I seen it with my own eyes.” A sadistic grin stretched across his face. “Don’t believe me? He’s over there right now at Angel’s house.” He got up and glared at me. “Go see for yourself.”
“You’re fucking crazy,” I said, walking up the steps.
I went to my room and changed into my street clothes, then I just sat there on my bed pondering it—the possibility that Angel was gay or bisexual or whatever the fuck—until I couldn’t take it anymore and found myself walking over to his house. I cut down his gangway, and the narrow passage between the two buildings was dark and cool. MTV Countdown blared out of his open kitchen window. I was quiet with the chain-link gate, and I cut across his lawn and up to his front door. I was about to knock when I heard giggles through his open bedroom window. His yellow drapes swayed slowly with the breeze, opening as they blew backward into the room. High heels clicked on his old hardwood floorboards. Giggling—two voices. I stepped closer and crouched down. I peered into the crease until my eyes adjusted. I saw the two of them. Angel sat on his bed while TeeTee danced and pranced before him in heels and pink satin panties. Then, Angel took him by the hand, and TeeTee got down on his knees between Angel’s legs. Angel undid his belt and his blue Dickies. I stepped back slowly from the window. The porch planks creaked and sighed below my sneakers. Then, I turned and went back home the way I’d come.
I never told Angel or Ryan what I saw—never even told Hyacinth—but I started to find things to do whenever TeeTee came by. Imaginary things after Ryan had stepped off. Eventually, TeeTee stopped coming by. It wasn’t that I couldn’t be around TeeTee no more—he didn’t bother me; it was just seeing him and Angel together. I just didn’t know how to deal with it right then. At that age, nobody really does, I guess.
The Old Neighborhood Page 24