“Jimmy, how much is two D batteries?” a woman dressed in business clothes and sneakers asked.
“Two-fitty.”
“Two-fifty! That’s ridiculous. For two damn batteries. A’ight, well forget the batteries. Just give me two Wheel of Fortune scratch-offs.” She tapped the thick plastic case to make sure he knew which scratch-offs she wanted.
“Five dollars.”
“Five dollars! Jimmy, these are two-fifty a piece now too?”
Jimmy noticed me come in.
“Matty, what’s good, my man?”
The lady slapped a five-dollar bill down and slid it across the counter. Whatever she needed those batteries for wasn’t as important as her trying to win more money. Maybe to buy more batteries. Or more scratch-offs.
“Jimmy, wassup. Just wanted to come give you what I owe you,” I said, reaching down into my pocket.
“Naw, it’s good man,” Jimmy said. “Your pops came in here and took care of it earlier.”
“Really?” I was confused. “Was he with somebody?”
Jimmy gave the sneaker lady her two scratch-offs.
“Yeah, man. It was weird. He bought a few beers and some loosies for that drunk that always hangs on Albany. The one with all the nasty holes in his face.”
My stomach tightened up.
“Around what time?”
“I don’t know. A little before ten,” he said shaking his head. “That’s how I knew he was copping for that drunk dude, because Mr. Miller don’t seem like he drink in the morning.”
Jimmy was right, my father didn’t seem like the type. He was always so on point. So together. But he also always had his wife around to keep him that way. I thought about my prayer—that he would get a handle on this whole drinking thing. Guess God or whoever is up there didn’t hear me.
“A’ight man, later.”
I flung the door open.
“Yo, nice suit, Matty!” he called after me in his throaty accent.
Outside, Chris was leaning up against the wall playing a game on his cell phone.
“You ready?” I said.
“Yo, what’s the most you ever got”—he paused—“on Temple Run?” he asked without looking up, his fingers flying across the screen of his phone. His umbrella hung from his wrist.
I didn’t answer.
Now he looked up.
“What’s wrong with you? Jimmy charge you interest?” Chris smiled. Then, when I didn’t answer, he shut the game down and slipped the phone in his pocket.
“What?” he asked again.
“I ain’t have to pay him. He said my dad came in earlier and took care of it.”
“So. What’s wrong with that?”
“Jimmy said Dad was with Cork.”
Chris frowned, but he didn’t say anything and neither did I.
We walked a few more blocks. The silence was thick between us. At Albany I thought about heading down the block to check on my father. But I didn’t want to do that with Chris with me. I mean, all right, I felt embarrassed enough—I didn’t want Chris to see my old man not being the Mr. Miller he knew growing up. I didn’t want to see it either. My mom always said you can’t run from reality. But I wanted to. Man, I wanted to.
Chris decided to break the awkward silence.
“How was work, suit boy?” He dragged the tip of the umbrella over a drain. It rang out like a church bell.
I thought for a moment about how the only things I had to talk about was my dad tripping, or how I spent the day at some teenage girl’s funeral. Maybe Mr. Ray and Robbie had it right when they were my age. I should’ve been thinking about girls. About skirts, as Mr. Ray called them. And maybe they were right about me. Maybe I was different, different in a weird way.
Chris was waiting for an answer though, so I said, “Cool.” That was dumb. I caught myself. “Well, not really. But you know what I mean. I went to a funeral and had to carry a casket.”
“What?”
“Yeah, man, I was one of the guys who had to carry the casket. A pallbearer. Crazy.”
“Sounds like it.”
“And the wild part was, the funeral was for a girl only a little bit older than us.”
Chris looked over at me. His eyes were wondering why she died.
I explained. “Died of asthma. She didn’t even know she had it.”
Chris shook his head. I could tell he was thinking something, but just didn’t know how to say it.
“What?”
“Nothing. I just don’t know how you can just . . . go to funerals every day? Like it’s nothing?”
I thought for a moment.
“They won’t be every day, man. Plus, you don’t make money like this at Cluck Bucket,” I joked, pulling the wad of cash from my pocket again.
Of course, I couldn’t tell him the truth. The truth that I was having a hard time telling myself. I liked the funerals. And in thinking about how I couldn’t tell Chris that, I started thinking about why I was actually so into them in the first place. I wasn’t just being a creep. Well, I sorta was, but it wasn’t for no reason. I know that now. I liked watching other people deal with the loss of someone, not because I enjoyed seeing them in pain, but because, somehow, it made me feel better knowing that my pain isn’t only mine. That my life isn’t the only one that’s missing something it will never have back. See? Reasons. I couldn’t explain that to Chris. I mean, he didn’t have a father, but he never had one. It’s not like having one and then losing him. At least I don’t think it is. And his mom was fine, so he wouldn’t understand. But Ms. Jameson . . . she understood. And Ms. Knight did too.
“Yeah, and you won’t keep money like that if you keep treating me to food!” Chris popped me back into reality. And the guy was right. At Cluck Bucket he ordered a Cluck Deluxe, which was basically a huge chicken sandwich on a hero, with mayo, lettuce, tomato, onion rings, some kind of special sauce, and pickles on it, with a large fry and a large chocolate shake. Then he asked me if he could get a banana pudding, too. All I got was a three-piece, dark, and a biscuit. His: $8.50. Mine: $3.35.
And guess who took our order?
“Your total is eleven eighty-five,” Renee said, turning around to scoop the fries. She looked just like she had the first time I saw her, wearing that ridiculous net on her head, and that greasy purple shirt. She looked funny, but she probably thought I did too, with the suit on. At least she looked silly in a cute way. I thought about saying something to her. Maybe mentioning how the way she embarrassed that dude that day was hilarious. I don’t know, just something to spark conversation. But now that I was right in front of her, that seemed like a stupid idea. My mother used to say to simply start with “Hello, how are you?” but my mom ain’t grow up in this neighborhood. She grew up in the South where everybody’s nice. But, who knows? Maybe it would work.
Just say it. Hello, how are you? Say it. It was on the tip of my tongue. Just. Say. It.
Nothing.
“Eleven eighty-five,” she repeated, now holding her hand out.
I didn’t say a word. I just pulled out my wad of money, like I was some kind of hustler—not a good look—and paid.
We walked back to our block, stuffed. Chris looked ridiculous as he tried to get the last bit of chocolate shake up through the straw. His face was all sucked in and his eyes looked like they were going to pop out of his head. He made drinking a milkshake look painful. I saved some chicken for my father—the breast, and half the biscuit. I didn’t have much of an appetite anyway, and figured that he would need to put some food in his stomach whenever he got in. I was pissed at him, but what can I say, he’s my dad.
In front of my house I asked Chris what he thought of Renee.
“Who?”
“Renee, man. The girl who took our order.”
“You know her?”
“No, not yet. But I want to know her.”
“So you stalking her.” He grinned.
“No, man,” I said, frustrated. “Look, I just wanna know what you think of her.”
“Oh.” He thought it over for a second. “She a’ight.”
“A’ight?” I asked, shocked. To me she was way better than a’ight.
Chris replied with a shrug. Damn.
I wanted to ask what he thought I should do to get her, but the conversation pretty much ended because the sudden sound of sirens on another block drowned out everything we were saying. Plus, the rain that started the day off came back to end it, dripping softly at first but picking up speed. And to top it all off, the street lights started to glow, so Chris popped his gigantic umbrella open—like a parachute—and called it a night.
Inside, I dropped my backpack at the door. Then, I picked it back up and plopped it down on one of the kitchen chairs, worried that if I left it by the door, Dad would come stumbling in, trip over it, and we’d have a repeat of the night before. I set the Cluck Bucket box on the counter, the grease seeping through, making the bottom of the box soggy. I washed my hands. Then, as carefully as possible, I took my suit coat off and inspected it. It was the only one I had and I was wearing it a lot now because of this new job, which, come to think of it, was really more like a weird new hobby. Working funerals, crashing funerals. Same thing.
No dirt on the collar. No stains. No snags. And only a few wrinkles up on the shoulders. I took the jacket into the living room and laid it lightly across the arm of the couch, a big burgundy thing my mother used to call “the spaceship” when I was kid. I slipped off my slacks, which was much easier than pulling off jeans, and laid them on the other arm of the couch. Then, just like when I was a kid, I flopped down on the spaceship, except now I was really hoping it would take me away. I sunk into the cushions, took a deep breath, and listened to my empty house, wearing nothing but underwear and socks. It was noisier than you’d think an empty house would be. The sink was dripping. The fridge was buzzing. Things cracking and creaking as, like my mother used to say, the house settled. The rain came down hard, sounded like television static. And the sirens still wailed. So annoying. But the noise I wanted to hear—the sound of someone else—wasn’t there.
I reached for the remote. I wasn’t about to go all sensitive and whatnot. Click. News. Click. Basketball game. Wish I was more into sports. Click. Cop show. Click. News. Click. Reality TV. One of those shows where the rich parents try to plan their daughter’s sixteenth birthday. This girl was telling her mother that she wanted to take a private jet from Los Angeles to New York with all of her friends, party on the jet, then, when they got to New York, have dinner with Jay-Z and Beyoncé. Wow. My sixteenth birthday I had dinner with my folks at the restaurant they met at. Well, it’s not the exact same restaurant anymore—no soul food—but it was good. I remember Mom did her French accent the whole time as a joke, and when she ordered a side of French fries, gave the young waitress a whole story about how French fries were created in France by her great-great-grandfather. The poor waitress asked for her autograph and everything, and probably still tells that story to customers. Ouch. While all that’s going on, Dad inspected every fork, knife, plate, and glass, since he used to be a dishwasher in that place. Nothing was clean enough.
“Everything is spotty and streaky, Daisy. They can’t even wash dishes right no more.”
“Ohhhh, calm down.” She blew him a kiss across the table. “Not everyone can bust a sud like you.” She winked at me.
“It’s machines. Machines can’t do everything. They can’t replace elbow grease,” my dad said, his elbows on the table.
“I know, babe. Why don’t you go on back there and show them how it’s done. That way you can feel better about it, and we won’t have to pay for this meal.” She laughed. We all did. Happy sixteenth birthday.
I settled into the old couch and figured this show would at least be entertaining, because as far as I was concerned, it was the furthest thing from reality. At least, my reality. And that’s what I needed, a spaceship and a TV to take me away. And they did just that. Next thing I know, I woke up with a string of drool connected from the corner of my mouth down to my chest, and some other show was on. I didn’t even know I had fallen asleep. The last thing I remembered was the young girl throwing a fit because the mother refused to let her get breast implants for the party. Yikes.
I turned the TV off. The sink was still dripping. The fridge was still buzzing. The house was still settling. The rain was still pouring. But the sirens were gone. At least there was that.
Even though the DVD player flashed 9:26 across the screen, I decided to go to bed. I was exhausted. It’s not like I’d done a bunch of work, or anything like that, but I think my mind was just tired and ready to shut down for the night.
I climbed into bed, pulled the covers up to my chin, and thought for a moment about Nancy. Then about the way her mother heaved and cried. Her sister’s poem. Nancy and her sister having snowball fights. Or water fights in the summer. Was Nancy’s boyfriend there at the funeral? What did that feel like for him? Maybe what it felt like for Dad. Maybe Nancy’s boyfriend is somewhere getting drunk right now too.
Then I put it all out of my mind and reached for my earbuds. Tupac. “Dear Mama.” And there’s no way I can pay ya back, but my plan is to show ya that I understand. You are appreciated. Halfway through the song I blinked—at least it felt like a blink—and when I opened my eyes, I was back in the church. Back with the old ladies, the white stockings, the white shoes, the fans, sitting next to my mother at her own funeral again. The casket was empty like it was before. She was sitting next to me, with her arm around me again, hugging me tight. I wasn’t crying and neither was she, but she was holding me so close. Everyone else was mourning. Ms. Jameson was there, and Nancy’s mother, and Alicia, her sister. But my father wasn’t there this time. I wondered where he was. Did he choose not to come to his wife’s funeral? He wouldn’t do that.
A knock came from the back of the church. A bang. Someone was pounding on the door. That had to be him. But the ushers wouldn’t let him in. He banged again.
I stood up. “Let him in!” I shouted at the top of my lungs.
They didn’t move. The pounding continued. Louder. Louder.
“Let him in!” I shouted again, now stepping into the aisle. “Let him in!” I started walking toward the door. The pounding. Harder. Harder.
Pounding. I woke up. Pounding. Someone was banging on the door downstairs. Banging and banging and banging. I popped up in the bed, realizing the dream was over and I was back to my life. The earbuds had fallen out of my ears and Tupac was whispering. My heart felt like it was trying to break free from my chest.
More banging. I jumped out of bed and ran down the steps, ready to let my father in. He must’ve left his keys. Or he lost them. Yeah, he probably lost them. He’s banging so hard because he’s drunk. Probably already pissed himself. Here we go again.
I looked through the peephole. A dark figure stood at the door. No, two dark figures, one slumped behind the first guy. A shadow, long and thin, like death itself with its awkward assistant, trying to bang my door down. And neither figure was my dad.
“Matthew!” a voice yelled from the other side of the door. “Matthew!”
I cracked the door. The rain, thick sheets of it, was still coming down. I could barely keep my eyes open it was pouring so hard, bouncing off everything, splashing me in the face.
“Matthew, it’s me! Mr. Ray!”
Mr. Ray? What was he doing here? I know he didn’t come by to talk about work. Not in this weather. That could’ve waited until tomorrow. Or he could’ve just called. And who was the other guy? Then I thought about how my mother had been begging my dad to put a light out there. This could’ve gone smoother if I could see.
“Mr. Ray?” I stepped back from the door. An
d there I was . . . in my underwear. Didn’t think to put on pants because I thought it was my father at the door.
Mr. Ray pushed the door open and sloshed his way inside, the man behind him still hidden. It was almost as if the guy was purposely trying to hide from me.
“Matthew,” Mr. Ray said, sliding the wet hat from his head. “I’m sorry for popping up on you like this. I tried calling, but the phone rang and rang.”
Tupac, the rain, everything was so loud.
Mr. Ray stepped to the side and yanked Quasimodo from behind him. The man lifted his head. You know when a person has a unique feature on their face, it’s always the first thing you see. Like if someone has a mole or a birthmark or scar on their face, that’s always what your eyes go to. This person had a special thing. Well, maybe not special, but something you’d always recognize. Holes. Like tiny spoons had dug tiny spoonfuls out of his cheeks. Cork.
“But listen, we gotta get you to the hospital,” Mr. Ray said, straight to the point.
“What?”
“Your father. He’s in the hospital . . .” Mr. Ray paused, his face dripping, his eyes sad. “He’s been hit by a car.”
I felt like I suddenly couldn’t breathe. My eyes started to blur. I was having another one of those moments, just like when I walked into my parents’ room months ago and saw them sitting on the bed, holding each other, my mother trying to keep it together, asking me about those stupid senior pictures right before she told me she had breast cancer. I remember asking God to not let it be what I thought—knew—it was. And here I was again, asking for the same thing. Not again, God. Not again.
“Is he okay? Is he hurt?” I pleaded, my voice high and shaky.
“I don’t know, but we have to go,” Mr. Ray replied. He looked at me with the same face he gives people who’ve come to him for funeral service. The “sorry for your loss” face.
I don’t even remember getting dressed. I just remember, in a flash, being in Mr. Ray’s big black car. Cork sat behind me. The leather made a weird sound, almost like a fart, every time he shifted positions. The smell of damp, and liquor, sifted through the space left between the three of us.
The Boy in the Black Suit Page 7