Brambleman

by Jonathan Grant

  Redeemer’s death reminded Charlie of something, and the next day, he started work in his home office on his long-delayed article about unrepentant racist Clint Brimmer. It was just after lunch, and he was by himself. The kids were at school, and Susan was also at Gresham, doing PTA work. As he picked up the phone to call Brimmer, Charlie heard the familiar rumble of a MARTA bus—odd, since Thornbriar had no service. With a sense of foreboding, he put the phone down and went to the front door, opening it just as the vehicle stopped directly in front of the house.

  An emaciated old fellow stumbled down the steps, tripping on the curb and stepping awkwardly on the grass. It was Trouble, looking much more haggard and worn than Charlie had ever seen him before. As the bus pulled away, he shuffled slowly toward Charlie with tiny steps, then detoured to a concrete bench by the Japanese maple in the middle of the yard, where he collapsed. “Thirsty,” Trouble croaked.

  Instead of fear or anger, Charlie felt pity for the avenging angel. He ran inside and returned with a bottle of water. Trouble was slumped over on the bench. Fighting his aversion to the odor, Charlie gently grabbed Trouble’s shoulder and pulled him up into a sitting position, then sat beside him to brace the old guy. He realized that Trouble’s power was gone; not even a static charge was left. He opened the bottle and held it to the old being’s lips. After a few sips, Trouble said, “Enough.”

  Charlie capped the container and set it on the bench.

  “I always liked water,” Trouble said. “Next to fire, it’s my favorite element. How about you?”

  “Earth,” Charlie said.

  “Ha. With you, I figured it would be wind.”

  They sat in silence for a while. A blue jay squawked. White butterflies flitted around the petunias the kids had planted in the flowerbed. Charlie smelled a neighbor’s fresh-cut grass mingled with Trouble’s stench. Finally, Trouble spoke. “It’s over.”

  “Is it? I never know.”

  “That’s your problem.” Trouble wheezed a weak laugh, showing a few blackened teeth. Most were gone. “I meant for me, not you. Your trouble is just beginning.”

  “Why should I listen to you?” Charlie said. “Face it. You’re not very nice.”

  “Niceness is overrated. Give me thunder and lightning any time.”

  “All you know to do is tear up and destroy.”

  Trouble twisted his neck until it popped. He grimaced and shook his head. “You got me good with those rat traps. I knew something weird was going on then. I figured it was revenge for what happened to Raccoon boy. Your brother.”

  “My brother-in—yeah, my brother.”

  “The fact that he didn’t die was a tip-off that this wasn’t going to end well. From my perspective.”

  “I don’t get it. Why kill him?”

  “For the prevention of breeding more … what do you call them? Varmints?”

  Charlie looked at him in disgust. “Birth control? Sheila’s forty-five years old.”

  Trouble shrugged. “They were talking.”

  “I don’t believe this. I’m only sitting here because you’ve got connections. So what have you got to say? Spit it out.”

  Trouble appeared irked at Charlie’s impudence. “I’ve got connections? You are a fool. But I knew that ever since the fakey suicide attempt you made just to get their attention. World’s worst prayer,” he muttered in distaste.

  “I’m not proud of that,” Charlie admitted. “But it wasn’t a prayer.”

  “Was too.”

  “Was—”

  Charlie was interrupted by the cawing of a crow overhead.

  “Look, I’m doing better.”

  “That’s what I hear,” Trouble said. “And you … you’re too stupid to know this, but it’s not just the little one. It’s you. You must know you’ve been marked. That’s how life on earth gets to us.”

  Caw!

  Trouble winced. Looking to the sky, he said, “He’s going to know in just a minute, anyway!” He leveled his gaze at Charlie. “Crows. Biggest assholes in the universe. This or any other.”

  Charlie looked up and saw the black birds approaching from all sides. Trouble waved a hand weakly. “You managed to save the Cutchins seed from extinction. Congratulations,” he said sarcastically.

  “It’s my seed, too,” Charlie reminded him.

  “If you say so. Just don’t let them compound—”

  “Don’t go there.”

  “I’m just sayin’. Recessive genes, you know. We don’t need a comeback.”

  “They’re not the only ones.”

  “You’re talking about the carjacker’s baby girl. Shaundra Talton-Hughes. Little kryptonite saved her, too. Umbrella effect.” Trouble squinted at the early afternoon sun. Meanwhile, hundreds of crows circled in the sky. “This is where it ends for me.”

  Birds were landing in the surrounding trees, filling the air with raucous cawing.

  “Don’t have much time left. Just came to grant your prayer. As required.”

  Charlie stood up. “No more miracles. You’ve done enough already.”

  Trouble broke out laughing, then started coughing. Charlie slapped him on the back and felt the welts he’d seen under Trouble’s T-shirt that night in the Pancake Hut. He had a few of his own from the chain beating he’d taken that night in the church parking lot, though his wounds weren’t as prominent as the old timer’s. They really knew how to lay on a whupping back in the day.

  When he caught his breath, Trouble said, “You are a miracle. You are life after death. But you’re more than that, you are—eh, I can’t even say it. The new thing. But you’re not indestructible, just lucky.”

  “That’s funny,” Charlie said. “But I’m leery of miracles you have to pray for. I prefer the everyday kind. You know, where the poor kid goes to med school and pulls the bullet out of a woman’s back. Three-minute response times. Hookers with guns. That sort of thing.”

  “Your own reckless foolishness,” Trouble added.

  “Talk about reckless. Why’d you give the smite power to Kathleen?”

  “That wasn’t me. I just passed along the request … with a recommendation of approval,” he added.

  “OK. Why’d you pass along the request … with a recommendation of approval, then?”

  Trouble shrugged. “Self-defense. She was worried, and I sure as hell didn’t trust you to take care of her.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Didn’t work out. They took it away.”

  “I know. I was there. She could have used it later.”

  Trouble shook his head knowingly. “Timing is everything.”

  “So what kind of prayer were you going to grant me? World peace? A million dollars?”

  “World peace is impossible, and you got the money, although it’s probably gone.”

  “I got some left,” Charlie said defensively.

  “Your real prayer,” Trouble said. “The first one. Your best one. They think you deserve it.”

  “Somebody up there likes me?” Charlie asked in amazement.

  “I’d say out there.” Trouble gave him a sly smile. “And I wouldn’t go so far as to say they like you. Let’s just say it was the kind of prayer they couldn’t turn down—one of those ninety-eight foot shots at the buzzer they find so interesting. But you had to prove yourself. And somehow, in some stupid, dumbass way, you did. So—”

  “I think it’s selfish and greedy to pray for things. I’ve already got what I need. So, if you don’t mind …”

  Charlie started to get up. Trouble grabbed his arm. The angel’s eyes lit up with angry fire, and his voice trembled with rage. “Shut up and listen, fool! Did you think we’d let you see all the things you saw and allow you to just walk away a free man when you’re no longer either? What you thought was the curse is the miracle! Talk about making the blind see. Sheesh. With you, it’s impossible.”

  Charlie gave him a glum look. “Great. Tell me what I won.”

  “What you won.” Trouble snorted. Again he
looked to the skies, holding out his palms, as if to say See what I got to work with here?

  “All right. What I prayed for.”

  Trouble addressed the sky. “He doesn’t remember. That’s how important it was to him.” He shook his head and turned to Charlie. “When you were seven, you were outside your house, running up and down the sidewalk, flapping your arms, praying that you could be an angel so that you could find your father. We were never quite sure what you meant, but in any case, like I said, it was an interesting prayer. And the fact that we didn’t know what you meant made it—and you—even more interesting. There are very few humans who are a mystery to us. By the way, your wife is the same way. We weren’t sure what she meant by ‘no woman would have you’ so we treated it as ‘no woman could have you.’ I think.” He shook his head in bewilderment. “Varmints. Varmints and fools. That’s what they give me to work with.”

  Charlie thought for the moment. “Actually, I do remember what I prayed for. To be a bird.”

  “Nope. Angel.”

  “Pretty sure I wanted to be a bird.”

  “Too late now. Well, you’ll be different, I’ll say that much.” Trouble glanced down at the water bottle. “Don’t need that anymore.” He stood and brushed back his stringy, greasy hair with both hands. Charlie heard a bus in the distance and stood, too.

  “One last thing. I remembered what I was going to tell you.”

  “What’s that?” Charlie asked.

  “The night we met. I said I was going to tell you two things. I only told you one.”

  “What’s the other?”

  “Hell is overrated.”

  “That’s good to know.”

  “Alrighty then. Time for the elaborate ceremony, replacement part,” Trouble said, looking Charlie in the eye. “Here’s to knowing who you are. You’re it.”

  He touched Charlie’s chest and disintegrated, clothes and all, falling into a neat, cone-shaped pile of grayish-black dust. In an instant, the huge flock of crows descended and began devouring Trouble’s remains. Acting on instinct, Charlie reached into their midst and grabbed a handful of Trouble. Out of professional courtesy, not a single bird pecked him. The birds kept coming, and Charlie backed away, his expression a mixture of wonder and horror. In less than a minute, they had finished and flown off in all different directions. The only thing left was a shiny piece of metal in the center of a bare ring of red earth pecked clean of grass. Charlie bent down and picked up the key. He reached into his pocket and felt the key Redeemer had refused to take from him that day he fixed the church door. It was warm to his touch. The one he’d just plucked from the ground, Trouble’s key, was cold.

  A horn honked. He turned and saw the MARTA bus in front of his house. With his fist clenched, he ran back to the house and locked the door. As he crossed the lawn, he looked up to the sun, which smiled down on his ravaged face.

  The bus doors opened as he approached. The driver, a familiar-looking middle-aged black woman, wore a short wig and sunglasses. “Hey,” Charlie said. “You got your job back!”

  “I was only at Family and Children Services for a day,” she said.

  “Ah. Cool. So I need to go—”

  “I know where you’re going.”

  Charlie climbed aboard. The bus was full of passengers, all of them like him in one way or another. A man with long white hair was also missing an eye. A woman whose face had been badly burned smiled at him. A man’s artificial leg stuck into the aisle. These were a bunch of hard cases—wingless, untrustworthy, scarred by life on earth, forced to ride the bus. And now he was one, marked by shotgun blasts, clubs, nails, and chains: Brambleman, born of Trouble, and as different from the other as day from night, new from old. He stood in the aisle, since he was the youngest one of all, this being his birthday. Now both a Thursday and a Tuesday child, he braced himself for the ride ahead.

  The bus lurched forward. The others stared at their newest colleague expectantly as he stepped toward the rear. He held up his fist. “This is what’s left of Trouble,” he shouted above the diesel’s roar. “I’m taking him with me to the holy place.”

  “You’ll need to transfer to the Memorial Drive bus,” the driver shouted back.

  * * *

  Trouble’s key didn’t work, but Charlie’s did. After all, it was his door.

  Redeemer Wilson once told Charlie, “It’s not just what they did that matters. What you do matters more.” Finally, he was ready to take those words to heart and act on them. With the money he’d earned from his books, he bought both the Holy Way House and the Hunger Palace from Redeemer’s widow with the stipulation that the buildings’ names and purpose would not change. He hired a social gospel preacher, since that’s what the Holy Way House required, and persuaded Lucinda Persons, Redeemer’s fierce black kitchen manager, to return to her old job.

  Then he set about making repairs.

  Early one summer morning—a Monday, just as Redeemer would have liked—Charlie was working alone, replacing the church’s broken windows. He turned to his tool chest to get a pry bar, and when he looked up and squinted into the dawn, he saw someone hobbling toward him with the aid of a cane. Charlie stood and watched as a woman approached across the weedy, graveled lot, carrying a black garbage bag over her shoulder. She wore a dirty old tan coat and shapeless blue pants along with an oversized yellow sweater. She winced as she stepped on the rocks, for there were holes in her shoes. He realized that he had seen her before. Attached to the front of her coat was a name tag that said Lil Bit.

  She started begging as she drew near. “Please, sir. I ain’t got a place to stay and nuthin’ to eat. I heard you was the one to come to. I lost my job.”

  “Where’d you work?” Charlie asked, already knowing the answer.

  “Pancake Hut.”

  “What happened?”

  “They got sued and went bankrupt. They didn’t treat people right.”

  “Is that so,” he said, pursing his lips.

  “Yup. I came down here because I heard Redeemer had this place and maybe—”

  “Redeemer passed on. Maybe I can help you get back on your feet.”

  “I was hopin’ I could get off my feet. I been walkin’ all night.”

  “Tell you what. I’m setting up the food kitchen, and I need people to work it.”

  Lil Bit brightened. “I been cooking and waitressin’ for people all my life.”

  “Not all of them.” He wagged a finger at her. “This time, you serve everyone.”

  “Yes sir.” She looked up at him in surprise. “Do you know me?”

  “Of course.”

  She stared at him like he’d performed a miracle.

  “Meanwhile,” he said, “you can have my brown-bag lunch and take a bed in the big building until you find a place of your own. You’ll report to a lady named Lucinda. And if you have a problem with that, it will be your problem. I assure you.”

  “Thank you so much.” She grabbed his right hand and kissed it. “You’re an angel.”

  “Shhh. Don’t tell anybody. I’ve got a reputation to uphold.”

  * * *

  It took half of Charlie’s earnings from both Flight from Forsyth and American Monster to get Redeemer’s operation up and running again. Which was, he figured, as it should be, since a deal is, after all, a deal.

  On Thanksgiving Day, the Hunger Palace was filled with people enjoying the bounty that Charlie and Susan had coerced and cajoled from Atlanta’s wealthiest percentiles. Under Lucinda’s watchful (and sometimes baleful) gaze, Lil Bit and the everyday people on the serving line dished out turkey and dressing, sweet potatoes, beans, pumpkin pie, and other hearty fare. Susan helped keep the line of hungry people moving, and Beck, Ben, and Wyatt wiped down tables. Romy did what she did best, moving through the crowd of homeless and poor, blessing everyone with her tattered old wand. All the news anchors had already finished work for the day, since Charlie had told them they could come in to volunteer at dawn or they’d be tur
ned away at the door.

  After conducting a contentious interview outside with a pack of reporters who wanted to rehash his sordid past of drug-dealing, international espionage, and footnote faking (Redeemer would have been so proud of him), the man in the shipping department uniform returned to the serving line. He leaned against the wall and watched with satisfaction as Lil Bit spooned a healthy dollop of mashed potatoes on a black man’s plate.

  Romy swung by, tapping him on his leg for the third time that day, singing a song about her daddy: “There was a man in my home town, and he was wondrous wise …”

  There came a tapping on his left shoulder. He turned to see Lucinda giving him her storm’s a comin’ look.

  “We got some attitude back there in the kitchen,” she said. “And you better get a new dish machine by Christmas.”

  “OK,” Charlie said. “I’ll take care of it.”

  He entered the kitchen, passing through the double doors Trouble had once electrified against him. He heard groaning coming from behind a mountain of pots and pans. The new dishwasher, a one-armed man hired last week, was overwhelmed by his work.

  “How’s it going back there?” Charlie shouted out.

  The fellow—slight and ponytailed, wearing faded and frayed jeans—looked up at him through thick glasses. Without saying a word, he gestured helplessly with his arm at the six-foot-tall stack of cooking utensils. “I’ll never be finished.”

  “True. But we can get these done.”

  And so Brambleman rolled up his sleeves past the scars, pushed the faucet to stop the drip, and started scrubbing pans alongside the poor fellow, having learned what Trouble could never admit: There is such a thing as Grace.

  Acknowledgments

  In more than one way, Brambleman is an outgrowth of my work on The Way It Was in the South: The Black Experience in Georgia, my father’s award-winning magnum opus. Tragically, Donald L. Grant died without seeing his life’s great work published. That task fell to me, his youngest son, due to the urging and assistance of my mother Mildred B. “Jeanne” Grant. (As it turned out, a history professor and a librarian make a pretty good combination.) Working on Dad’s book was a life-changing experience for me, and I certainly wouldn’t have written this book if I hadn’t been involved with his. While both my parents are gone now, I think of this as their book, too. Thanks, Mom and Dad.