Slapboxing with Jesus (Vintage Contemporaries Original)

by Victor Lavalle

  Mark, Frankie and I were angry to leave without having had some kimchee, jealous that Jung would be allowed to stay like always. As though it had been choreographed, we three bucked out our teeth and pulled our eyes narrow to slits, sang, —Me Chinese, me don’t care, me make shitty in my underwear!

  In exasperation and some kind of resignation, Tony cried, for him and Jung, —We’re not Chinese!

  I was laughing so hard that Jung turned to me, said, —I been to your house, Anthony. I don’t know what the fuck you’re laughing at. I heard your mother talk, she’s an African Bootie Scratcher anyway.

  I didn’t know what he was talking about, but I knew my mother had been insulted and it had to be corrected. —My mother is not some fucking African, she’s black.

  Mark shrugged. —What’s the difference?

  Once we were in the hallway, I realized we’d forgotten our bags, banged on Tony’s door; reluctantly it opened some, one by one they came out, like sandbags right before a big flood.

  We ate gum outside; Frankie had it and shared with me and Mark. I chewed it to hide the beer on my breath. We had a few more blocks to walk together. I saw Olisa before either of them and tried to lead them into the Lug-A-Jug with a promise to buy them Jawbreakers. Frankie peeped her, told me, —Go tell that bitch the facts.

  I walked up, the others close enough to hear. We were across the street from a bus stop. Olisa handed me something bright, a maroon paper used for art projects in school; written in orange marker it was hard to see the words ANTHONY-N-OLISA. She asked, —Would you go to a movie with me?

  Somewhere in school she’d have heard about my incident. I held that palm up to her face, close, like there was an odor left on it that she could inhale. Nancy Salvino was flat-chested; in her bra I’d felt all that tissue. I said, —Nobody loves your ugly black ass.

  She stared at me as I passed. Her mouth divested of words. Her cheeks were round and good, but no one noticed. Frankie and Mark told me to throw her gift away, but I waited until I got home, stuffed it in the garbage near chicken fat and an old wig. I wrapped up the whole bag and took it to the incinerator. Back in the apartment I lay on my bed, spent the rest of the afternoon looking at the hand that had, just that day, touched the thing we thought we’d wanted more than anything else in the world.

  how I lost my inheritance

  This lawyer was fucking my moms, right in the pocketbook. She was explaining the process to my grandmother as I was splayed out on the floor, staring into the television that was burning through my good eyesight, glasses getting thicker right there on my face. I turned, over my shoulder, shooshed them; they regarded me and laughed out my place in the matriarchy.

  My mother asked about school, did it lazily; not that she was uninterested, just so tired. Work produced exhaustion and minor paychecks. She was a secretary. Like many afternoons she’d left me enunciation exercises, not specific phrases for repetition, but a book and radio with a blank tape in the deck. The task was to read clearly into the speaker and she’d listen when evening came to see if I’d done it well. But, like always, she was too tired for her part; knowing this would happen, you’d have thought I could skip it, but Grandma would come to the bedroom door and watch me. One thing I guarantee, throughout Queens no one screamed, —Motherfucker! more clearly than I.

  We ate dinner in front of the television. Grandma cooked a meal rich with gravy; as she ate Mom muttered, —I shouldn’t be touching this stuff. She rubbed her thighs as though they were expanding right then; she kneaded them with her knuckles in what looked like a punishment. I thought she might take a pill, she seemed agitated enough; she ate some more. Mom touched me where I sat, beside her on the couch, asked, Tomorrow, you want to come with me?

  She didn’t need to give me a destination. My mother worked so many hours. —Where? I asked.

  —I have to see my lawyer. And Grandma needs a break from you.

  —You going to make me dress up? I acted indignant; she could have outfitted me in a clown suit if it meant we’d share some time. My mom was much prettier without the wig, her real hair pulled into braids that rose in differing directions when she scratched her scalp, looking to me like thirty-two separate strokes of genius.

  —You don’t have to dress up, she said. We’re meeting him at Burger King.

  On Wednesday (or, as I pronounced it, Wed-nes-day) we walked into the Burger King closest to our building. Fifteen blocks, less, five hundred yards from Woolworth’s, right next to the Wiz. Mom pulled open the door, said, —Be nice to his man. He has my money and might not give it back.

  Burger King was a divided city, two halves, one for teenagers—their bags piled under the tables, hands holding hands or swirling milkshakes, mouths full of curses—the other for adults and, this day, me.

  Mr. Law, Mr. Crook, formally known as Cleveland Morris, looked a lot like Lando Calrissian without the perm. He knew his smile worked, it made you forget his shortness, only one word entered my mind: trust. He shook hands correctly, the way my grandmother had already taught me, all firm.

  Me and Mom slid together into a booth with a cool orange tabletop. Mr. Morris sat across from us. My hands found the off-white salt shaker, the brown one for pepper; I brought them toward each other at high speed. Crash. And again.

  —Stop that. Mom dropped one arm over both of mine.

  —So, Miss J——, said her lawyer. What was so urgent?

  She dropped her shoulders. —What? I’ve told you on the phone, in letters, I wanted some kind of report. Progress. She was incredulous.

  —I told you it was a long process. These things have many channels. You can’t just tell the government to patent an invention and it’s done.

  My mother had made something worth selling. She had invented it. She was already almost yelling, —I’ve been working with you for eleven months. I’ve given you a lot of money. My money. She opened her purse.

  He put up his hands. —Now let’s try and keep our heads level here.

  Mom was not having it; she read to him from a spiral notepad: five hundred dollars on September 18 to retain his services; three hundred dollars on November 11 for a title search; one thousand dollars for a processing fee and hours worked, December 6; one week later, four hundred more for a draftsman to render the product in all its forms and applications, from all angles; just three weeks before this meeting three hundred more for hours logged. She read all this to him, though at each pause for breath he tried to interject an excuse. I listened and thought our family must be rich.

  She had a terrible memory; she took diet pills, pink amphetamines with medical names. They worked, so to her the damage they caused was negligible, anything was worth shaving off those pounds that curved out her hips and stomach in a way so American antithetical, like The Age of Reason would read to a pope. Her mind was left a mess. It had holes. She might remember a grade she got in school twenty years ago, but not the doctor’s appointment next week, not even the doctor’s name. It was good she was a secretary, trained to take notes. For appointments, technical things, the birthdays of her son and mother, she kept files, transcripts, memos—meticulous and copious. I often watched her, at night, transcribing the day’s jottings from a small notepad to a larger binder she kept beside the couch in the living room.

  Mr. Morris smiled. —Your list sounds right.

  —My list sounds expensive.

  I nodded. Tried to add the figures in my head, but kept losing my place as I enviously spied french fries. I was going to ask Mom for a few dollars but her face was a mixture of concentration and consternation so I made the smart move and kept shut.

  —So what did you want to do about things now?

  Mom said, —Well, you say you haven’t sent in the application yet, right?

  —Yes, there are a few more things I want to add. Unless we make it totally specific as to its uses and how it will be packaged, the Patent Office will probably reject it. They demand precision. I don’t want to charge you for reapplication,
so I’m making sure this one shot has everything they’ll need. Then we’ll be ready to go.

  —Well, that’s what I’m thinking about. You told me that if I was ever dissatisfied with how the process was going I could ask you to stop and you’d refund all my money minus the original consultation fee. One hundred forty dollars.

  —I said that? He laughed. Are you sure? He pointed at Mom, looked at me. Is your mother playing a joke on me?

  I shrugged. Mom leafed to another page in her notebook. —Yes, you said I’d get back all the money except the consultation fee. Would you like to know the date?

  —Miss J——, none of this is necessary. What have I done to make you unhappy?

  —You took my money and you haven’t done your job.

  He clicked his teeth, watched my mother, puffed out his cheeks, flickered his fingers over the tabletop. Smiled.

  Not working.

  —Well, obviously I don’t have the money for you now. I wouldn’t walk around with that kind of cash.

  She sighed. —I wasn’t expecting you to. You can mail me a company check or a money order.

  —Yes. We could handle the situation that way. But what if I told you I’d work overtime over the next few days and get your application out by the middle of next week and from there I’d have done my job?

  —If you could do that now, why couldn’t you do that months ago?

  —Well, I mean, I didn’t know I had such a dissatisfied customer (smile). It was still going to be ready soon, but now I’ll put all my other cases aside and work just for you. What do you think of that?

  I got to Mom’s bag and plugged my hands into it, found her money purse, clicked it open, dropped all the change on the table, started counting.

  —It’s too late for that. We’re going to have to end this business.

  He seemed unfazed; had this been me, I would have had the ache of losing all that money bursting from my forehead and over my eyes, down into my mouth, but he was showing none of that and I was thinking maybe this was why he was an adult. He agreed to meet us there again in a few days; my mother suggested we make it two. He slid out, left without looking backward.

  Mom gave me bills to replace the three dollars I’d amassed from her coin vault. I bought some fries, knew without being told to bring her a coffee and three packets of Sweet ’n Low, a spoon. I sat across from her. She looked around. —Do you come here sometimes?

  —Nah. Who comes in here?

  She shrugged. —There are teenagers right over there.

  —They’re like fourteen, fifteen. They’d kick my ass.

  —What was that?

  —Butt.

  —Right. She looked. Any of those boys over there?

  —What?

  —The ones who bother you.

  I laughed the way a native speaker does when a foreigner clumsily attempts his language. —They don’t do anything. I’m just saying, if I came in here they would.

  She nodded but had no idea. —You sure you’re not embarrassed to be seen out with your Mum?

  You can’t tell your parents when they’ve made you happy. I faked a weary tone. —I guess I don’t mind.

  She sipped her coffee after she had added the chemicals to make it palatable; she drank even with the steam rushing up. —I know you’re eleven and all, so I thought you might feel too grown for this. With me.

  Mom liked to put herself in a historical context, to teach me something. She felt awful being absent often and hoped in some way that knowledge might take her place. She compared having me to taming the Wild West. When she and my dad divorced (I was one)? The fight for separation of church and state. And now, battling this lawyer? The fight with the U.S. Government for control of the Black Hills. (I had to do the research myself each time, come home and try to explain my mother’s logic—the last, Black Hills, went like this: the money, her invention, they were hers by all natural rights but through chicanery and loopholes it was being kept somewhere just out of reach; she could see the distant mountain ranges, but it seemed impossible again to climb that glorious terrain.)

  A day after our Burger King excursion I came back from school to find my mother home early. I couldn’t even take off my coat before she pulled me to the bathroom, sat me on the toilet. The room was cluttered with a mop, two buckets, bottles of tile cleaners and sheets of plastic.

  —What stinks? I asked.

  She smiled broadly, pulled a scarf around her head. —I’ve been trying out all these cleaners, comparing which does the best job.

  —Why?

  —You’ve never seen my invention, have you? I mean noticed it.

  —Where would I see it?

  She touched the walls in the bathtub, behind a curtain of green. —Here it is.

  I laughed. —You invented walls?

  She rubbed her thumb over some of the peach-colored tiles. —These things collect dirt. If you had to clean them you’d notice that. But I haven’t cleaned them in a year. Because of this. She pulled at a corner above her head and peeled down a thin layer of plastic that had been invisible to me. She stopped after some of it stuck out like an enormous tongue.

  She said, —I came up with this idea over the years. Let me show you how I want the commercial to go! She was instantly joyous; she was a person who could really get into things, you know the kind, who can be so happy you swear they’re fucking with you, but they mean it.

  —Have you ever been in the bathroom, scrubbing and scrubbing at these tiles and cried, Can’t there be a better way? Used all the cleaners. Sprayed, scrubbed, sprayed, scrubbed, sprayed, scrubbed and sweated? Doesn’t do anything for the walls and oh! the way your fingers ache. But now! The brilliant minds of Moms Incorporated have created the Tile Defender! She paused. Guardian of your pristine walls. Simply apply the precut sheets, either in original Clear or decorated with tasteful designs to liven up your lavatory!

  —And what does it do, madam? Grandma asked from the hallway, in the semi-English she spoke, a little late for her part. They had been rehearsing that one line for a week, though until now I hadn’t known why. The first time my grandmother had tried to repeat the question, hard of hearing and language barriered, she’d asked my mom, And what does it do, madman?

  We worked well together: Mom gave the pitch, Grandma feigned the innocent bystander and I was the unsuspecting dupe. As Mom ran through her lines a second and third time, Grandma and I stayed in character. We laughed and I thought my mother’s only career should be inventing, it seemed to allow so much more joy than that office in Manhattan. As she wound down the last time, she spread her arms, breathing heavy from the acting. Grandma clapped and I joined in; my mother bowed and accepted the praise.

  Then Friday afternoon found Mom and I off to collect money. She was working only full-time while she handled this business, not the extra hours she was allowed many evenings.

  In front of the Wiz were friends of mine. The store blasted hits to tempt passersby, entice a purchaser inside. Instead they got kids like me leaning against the glass, chewing gum and learning all the words for free. They were respectful, my friends, when we reached them. Mom let me socialize while she spoke with a woman she’d run into, someone small whom I saw at the occasional family picnic.

  —Your mom making you get clothes? Cindac asked, his giant chin moving as he ground gum between the teeth.

  I told him, —We’re going to Burger King.

  —Yeah, he replied.

  Mom laughed with her friend. There were four boys watching the Walkmans on display, counting me. We were all eleven. They had a way, these store owners, of making the cheapest thing seem precious by virtue of a little gray stand and some colored paper behind an item. My mother’s words grew louder to fight the traffic, volume enough to reach us, for one kid to cock his head and ask, —What the fuck is she saying?

  I turned, assuming he was speaking of someone else, but then he had to point at my mother. —What do you mean? I asked, listening, hearing nothing I didn’t hear o
ften in our home.

  —It’s not Spanish, Cindac snapped. I tell you that. He laughed. They speaking some fucking Martian shit. He looked at me. Where the fuck is your family from?

  —Uganda.

  —What?

  —Uganda.

  —Where is that? one boy yelled, genuinely perplexed, angry at the confusion.

  I shrugged, went to my mother, interrupted and asked, returned, too stupefied by her answer to lie. —Africa, I said.

  They laughed so hard it sounded like bad coughs. My mother even turned. For my part, my head dropped with the shame; who cares what color your neighborhood, in 1983, New York, it was no good being an African. Black people were Americans, Africans were some other, weird shit. The only thing as bad was Haitian. It was a rule somewhere, kids knew this.

  —So your mother doesn’t take baths. They don’t wash, right?

  There was agreement, heads nodded, even mine.

  —And they eat shit raw. Hunt their food.

  I stopped agreeing with them, but I didn’t think they were actually wrong. Wasn’t that all Africans did? What we’d been told? Told one another? It was like, for some other kind of kid, realizing that first time that your father is not the Ruler, but the Ruled; it’s the first time you get those new eyes.

  My mother came for me, smiled at my friends, who waved. Cindac called out, —We’ll talk with you later. I anticipated the beatdown to come, but was not actually scared. When Mom held the door open for me I watched her callused fingertips, the uneven, bitten-down nails. Cleveland Morris had already taken a seat. In front of him was a folder, important looking and emerald green.

  Mom said hello and I nodded at the crook, she smacked my head lightly and I made a better greeting. This time I wasn’t waiting for the whole ceremony. I tapped Mom on the ear. Tapping. Finally she broke. —What?!

  —A shake.