Babylon Rolling

by Amanda Boyden

  Ed reminds himself to initiate a discussion with Miles about his gender issues, then questions yet again if Miles really has any. Miles loves his sister, after all. And Ariel, of course. It’s just the age, maybe. Miles is only seven. Or maybe his boys’ club list comes from the Catholic school they had very little choice about when they moved here. Ed’s found out that the school has assigned God a gender—although fortunately they don’t seem to be shoving religion down the kids’ throats.

  No matter how Ed tries, though (Ariel, too, when she has the time), the kids won’t warm up to New Orleans. Ella and Miles hate the Southern city, nearly all of the school and neighborhood kids, their backyard full of biting red ants. Ants that attack. Roaches that fly. Somehow it’s harder here to respect all the earth’s creatures. Without question. Ed watches rats run across the power lines at night when he sits on the front porch with his single Scotch after the kids have gone to bed. He feels for them, his good, sad kids, and sips at his Scotch.

  The cafeteria women at Miles’ school pick on their Yankee kid for not recognizing the food names, or even the food itself. Jambalaya is not goulash, of course, but he seems to have trouble differentiating. Miles claims mean hairnetted women call him a Yankee and laugh. To Ed, it sounds much more like a word his teacher would employ.

  Miles and Ella say New Orleans is sticky, and Ed agrees. Tonight, like every night, he listens to them pray.

  Ella implores God for a hurricane to give them a day or two away from it all. She says, “Dear Bood-ah. Please send a beastie so there’s not going to be any school yesterday and tomorrow and the next day and the next and the next.” She itches at the back of her head resting on her purple beaded princess pillow.

  “Is that it?”

  Ella nods.

  “Nothing else? No thank-yous?” They’re supposed to give thanks too. And acknowledge sorrow.

  Ed himself continues to pray for the survivors of the Beslan school. He can’t rid his brain of the Chechen terrorist attack on the Russian grade school children. Ella and Miles are too young to be told about it, but it thumps at his chest like a knocker. The thought of those people, the terrorists, repulses him. Little children sweating to death in their underwear only to be shot and exploded and burned. It unhinges him.

  His daughter shakes her head no, and Ed wonders how it is he got here, to fatherhood and New Orleans. To having children who summon a tooth-fairy Buddha: bring me something.

  Ella’s imitating Miles, of course. Ed really wishes their son would dig in his heels. Step up to the plate, all that. He’s a brave kid at home, funny, fun. He used to be the most popular kid in kindergarten in Minneapolis. What a difference a place makes. “I’m off to your brother’s room then,” Ed says. “’Night, Fitzy.” He leans over and kisses Ella, her hair already tangled in the beads of her princess pillow. She knows better than to sleep on it, so he won’t tell her again.

  “Goo’night, Daddy.”

  Same as always, Ed’s heart melts. Something about a daughter, they say, softens a man forever. Ed’s softened enough, he supposes, but he’d love another daughter. Or son. Ariel won’t think of it, though. “Don’t let the bedbugs bite,” he says.

  “The purple ones can, right?”

  Since she learned her colors, Ella has thought everything purple to be good. Purple bedbugs are allowed to bite; they only nibble and don’t have teeth. “Right. I love you, Ella.”

  “I love you.”

  In Miles’ room, Ariel wraps up a book about a boy who accidentally gets onto a subway car in Manhattan without his mother. It’s a happy ending, but Miles likes the adventurous middle part best.

  “The End,” Ariel says.

  “I wish I could ride on a subway,” Miles says.

  “There are subways all over the world, you know,” Ed tries.

  “Not in New Orleans,” Miles counters.

  “We have streetcars here,” Ariel says. Ed can hear the faux optimism in her voice. He can’t fault her. At least to himself, he can admit to having trouble with the brightly dressed tourists that often ride the streetcar through their Riverbend area. He can find little genuine about them. Many wear Mardi Gras beads no matter what the season. Some don kinked smokestack hats in purple and acid yellow velvet. They sweat alcohol. Their faces shine red. Pink Vs of needless sunburn point down from their throats. As hard as he tries, Ed cannot find a way to see the tourists sympathetically. Not even his usual tactic of looking to the youngest, the most innocent of a species helps in this instance. He used to find warthogs reprehensible creatures till he saw a documentary on them that concentrated on a single family on a reserve in South Africa. The youngsters trotted everywhere—never walked—tufts of head fur catching the breeze. He feels a mild affection for them now. But the tourists: the youngsters are loud, whiny, rude, often fat. Ed needs to work on his acceptance of overweight humans. All at once he feels compressed by his personal weaknesses. He has so much work to do yet to become good, to become a better man.

  “You choose,” Ed tells his son. “Where’s the first city you want to ride a subway?”

  “What are my choices?” Miles asks.

  Ed glimpses the teenager to come. Ed will need to be a very good man by then, he knows, to deal with this child. “Let’s see,” he says, thinking fast. “There’s London. They call it ‘the tube.’ Paris has their metro. And Chicago has the El. It’s short for ‘elevated.’ ”

  “Aw, come on,” Ariel says. “Besides those, Miles, you have choices all over the rest of the world.”

  Ed hates it when she does that. Undermines him. He breathes in slowly, breathes out. His mindfulness, the result of meditation, helps him recover. He chooses to give his nightly thanks right then. He’s glad he has a penis. He’s glad he has stomach muscles that show when he flexes them. He’s glad he can run a mile in under ten minutes. He’s glad he could cook his way out of a shipwreck. Ed tells Miles, “Actually, many cities and often whole countries don’t have the ability to construct subways due to the water—”

  “Do dead people float out of the ground here?” Miles has jerked away from subways, but Ed follows his son’s train of thought. Miles is thinking about digging underground.

  “Who told you that?” Ed asks.

  “Nobody.” Miles fiddles with some sort of latch on one of his converter plane-robot toys he’s chosen to take to bed. “They were teaching us about Louisiana.”

  Ed glances at Ariel. She seems not to be listening. “What about Louisiana?” Ed tries.

  Miles shrugs. “Do they float?”

  “Did you learn about water tables today?” Ed asks and watches Ariel yawn.

  “That’s dumb, Dad. There’s no such thing as a table made with water!”

  Ed wants his Scotch badly. He has little idea how to make this place more appealing for Ella and Miles, and right now his failure is exhausting him. “Why are you asking about corpses?”

  “Does it happen to dogs that people bury in the backyard?”

  Bingo. That’s where it’s coming from. Ed questioned whether or not he should let them watch the Animal Planet program, but he decided that they were ready for some reality. Another mistake to chalk up. What could he have been thinking? Especially Ella. But she seemed just fine a minute ago. “No, Miles,” he says. Ariel lies down next to Miles and closes her eyes. “Neither animal nor human corpses come out of the ground,” Ed says, “here or anywhere else.”

  “Tameera Michaels says they do. She says her uncle floated out of the ground.”

  “I don’t think that Tameera is telling the truth.”

  “Yah huh. After it rained for forty days and forty nights. She said so.”

  “I think Tameera is getting her stories mixed up.”

  “The uncle was covered in goo like a monster. And his pet dog that was in the, in the—what are they called?”

  “Crypts,” Ariel mumbles, her eyes closed.

  “And his dog in the crip was all, all hanging hair in strings and with sores all ov
er his body and a eyeball hanging out.”

  Ed can see Ariel quiver with silent laughter. “Ariel.”

  “What?” She opens just one eye.

  “Ariel,” Ed says again.

  “He’s just having fun,” his wife answers. “There aren’t any subways for him to ride here, Dad.”

  “Well, I’m sure if the water table weren’t so close, New Orleans would have a wonderful subway.”

  Ariel elbows Miles conspiratorially, and they both laugh out loud. Why does Ed even try?

  Miles, with his mother’s permission now, runs with it. “The uncle had a axe in his stomach, like, like halfway out.”

  Ariel laughs harder.

  “Good night, you two. Don’t forget prayers, okay?”

  They don’t answer as Ed flops his hand good bye. He leaves as Miles presses on, “And two swords. In both his legs.”

  It’s how he feels, Ed thinks. Two swords in both his legs.

  Time for Scotch.

  Fearius be knowin the chicken heads from the streetcar back when he still in school. They right where he know they gone be with their thick thighs and big backsides. It alright. Give Fearius more to push up on, ya heard. He know they all visit the Planned Parenthood over by Magazine. They all baby makers with protection, perfect for Fearius. They be sharing him, climbing all over him with they tongues, turn it into a juicy sandwich. A arm and leg and ass and pussy sandwich. They gone fight over Fearius he been away so long. And if they dont fight, they still know they cant say no, not when the peoples on his list include Alphonse, right at the top.

  Fearius walk up, casual like.

  “Wooooo, lookit here.” It hafta be that dark bitch Kenyata talk first. “Little Danny get out!”

  Why she say that? “It Fearius, bitch.”

  Every chicken head laugh. Cackle like they old and dried up.

  “How you get that name, Little Danny? You grow big inside juvey? You grow fearius?” Kenyata ugly. Ugly mouth. Ugly words. Fearius decide to look straight through her like Kenyata a window. Aint nothing there.

  “Hi, Danny,” Teesha say, but she say it nicer. Teesha have a floppy bottom lip and yellow tiger eyes. Teesha gone do just fine tonight.

  “Call me right, Teesha,” he say, serious.

  Teesha smile, and the others make noise. Fuck if they dont make Fearius hate they own all the easy free pussy he know about. “Alright, Fearius. Why not you tell us how you be Fearius now.”

  So it gone be Teesha. He gone talk the talk and she gone take him somewhere. Best be soon.

  Kenyata say, “You tell us, Fearius.” Kenyatas brother dead two years now. A dead brother earn rights or else Fearius smack her. Her brother just be dead one day in bed. A vein pop in his brain or some such.

  Fearius touching Teeshas shiny belt.

  “Ooooooh,” the hens say.

  It just gotta be easier than this, Fearius think.

  “I’m thinking of driving to work,” Ariel says from bed.

  Ed pulls off his dirty T shirt. Ariel checks him out with a measure of objectivity. He’s getting hairier, she concludes. Most men do. Her dad did. The two-night fling with her high school sweetheart revealed the same thing. She and Ed were only engaged at the time; still, she feels a tug of guilt at the memory. Ed never even suspected. Jesus, Charlie could kiss.

  “Hey, I thought we agreed, A,” Ed says, stepping out of his pants. Ariel can’t remember a time when she’s seen him step out of his underwear too before getting into bed. If and when the rare occasion arises for him to do away with his boxers, he snakes out of them under the covers.

  She’d like to see him standing in the light of the bedside lamp with a raging hard-on for her. See proof of his desire for her after all the years. “Yeah, I know. We agreed that we would be ‘environmentally responsible citizens,’ ” she says, “but I’m gonna kill somebody on the streetcar soon. Shit, Ed, these kids are awful.”

  “It’s cultural,” he says. “You know that.”

  “So? It’s a fucking ridiculous culture. The boys take off their belts and pull their uniform pants down past their asses. Their entire asses, I’m not kidding. I mean, I’m staring at full-blown asses in their fucking underwear. Inches from my face. I got bumped in the head by a fucking ass yesterday.” It’s a lie, but it could have happened.

  “You sound like a sailor, Wifey.”

  There’s the word. When he wants to irritate her under the guise of being sweet, he pulls out ‘Wifey.’ “We have two perfectly good cars that sit in the driveway all day,” Ariel counters. “You sure as shit don’t go anywhere. Hubby.”

  Ed crawls into bed, a look of mild amusement on his face. “Don’t be a racist, Ariel. Try imagining being one of those kids. Try to understand why they do what they do. Practice tolerance.” He leans over and kisses her cheek.

  “Your breath reeks.” She hates the smell of Scotch on Ed, though it doesn’t bother her on others, which says something, she supposes. Shit, he knows she’s no racist. She dated plenty of Ed’s people of color before they married. “Racial issues and cultural issues can be completely separate, and you know that. And you know full well what I’m bitching about is the cultural.”

  “Let’s make love. In the morning you’ll feel like helping the environment again.”

  “You’re going to fuck me into riding the streetcar?” Now she’s actually pissed. He doesn’t even mean it. They haven’t had sex in a month.

  “Where’s all this anger coming from?” Ed props himself up on his elbows.

  “Never mind.” Ariel rolls away to the edge of her side of the bed and turns out the light. Where is all her anger coming from? The streetcar, maybe. This slippery straw of a city they’ve drawn.

  Two minutes later she says into the dark, “I’m sorry.”

  Ed doesn’t answer.

  They kissin and Teesha making moaning noises, leaning against her real baby crib, against the rails. She so not be no virgin, not no how. But her tiger eyes way pretty. Fearius press up on her face, but he dont wanna turn her around. He dont wanna bend her over, look over her shoulder at her baby, her baby daddy proof, sleeping right there. Lookin at the future. Looking at a mess.

  She be wet, Teesha. His fingers say so. “Come on,” Fearius tell her.

  “Come on what,” Teesha say, not much asking in her voice.

  “Come on,” Fearius say and push her down on the ratty carpet smell like macaroni and cheese.

  “Danny, no,” she say, but it too late. It gone be too late now.

  She try bein a boxer, try to say she already drunk.

  He cant care now. Fearius take what he want.

  2

  Cerise Brown drinks her caramel latte nutritional shake on her porch and watches. She’s a watcher. Always been one, but now she can do it from her own property rather than from behind that tired register. She’s discovered she’s invisible to people who don’t know to look for her, sitting still. Like a bird, or a bug. Or a woman old as cane dirt. This morning she sits in her canvas director’s chair and watches the new neighbors. They’re darker than Cerise, but they got noses shaped like white people’s noses, and the mother wears a dot on her forehead and a sari the color of a cucumber’s insides, shiny in the morning sun. The new neighbor lady makes Cerise think of dew.

  Why people would come all the way from another country to New Orleans is beyond her. Crime and air-conditioning bills for newcomers, mostly. But it is her place. Move away from your people and you have exactly not much at all. You need family and friends around you. Circled. Like wagons, Cerise thinks and smiles.

  Orchid Street holds her wagons, although not so many anymore. She and Roy have lived here almost since they moved up from swamp country, moved up in money too. When they bought their first car, they went back to Bayou Blue once every month for lunch with her mother. Always the same duck gumbo, greens, sweet tea. The place still fitted like home, then, but by the time the sun melted towards the trees, Cerise missed the freedom of New Orleans. Missed
walking most anywhere she wanted.

  As a girl, she never imagined being able to live on a street with whites, never imagined that they could all be mixed up on the same block. But that’s what New Orleans gave her and Roy. Freedom. Freedom to just be human beings. Sure, their house was one of the smaller ones, and the big houses across the street all held white families, and if you looked at it a certain way it might seem that they worked for the white families, that they were their gardeners or help—like when Lenore Watts worked cleaning and leaving dinner in the oven for that bachelor Mr. Parker—but still, it amazed Cerise back then that nobody in the city looked at her as though she’d done something wrong just by being born in her skin. Now, of course, some of the houses on Orchid that need the most tending belong to white folks, renters, and some of the biggest, like the one the new family is moving into, they belong to dark people.

  Cerise has watched the city change. Some days she worries for it. Not enough money to go round, and the children boss the parents. The young people come up troubled, like the Harris kids next door. That gaggle of Nate and Sharon’s is all troubled, Klameisha and Debutanté with their own babies already, Angelique hanging out of boys’ cars night and day. But it’s the sons, Michael and Daniel, what with their ridiculous street names, Muzzle and Fearius, who are the hornet’s nest of pain for their parents. Those boys are part of nothing good. Guns, Cerise knows. Worse. Both in juvenile half the time running on three years now. Cerise has not one idea how to change young men but to send them to war. Too bad no draft can save Nate and Sharon from their own boys.

  Last month, Michael cracked his sister loud and clear then said she shouldn’t backtalk. Imagine. Hitting your own sister. Cerise heard him plain as day from her porch through the Harrises’ thin tarpaper wall. For two years since the water damage, Nate says he’s replacing the siding, but even when they had siding, Cerise could hear all of them fight. She’s happy her oleander bush hides the gap between their houses from the street. It hides the ugliness you can see, if not the kind you hear.