Xavier nodded his head.
“Well, she’s pregnant and she’s due to pop in a couple of months. Ain’t no denying the baby because it’s mine.”
“You’re so old, do I still congratulate you?”
Billy didn’t even crack a smile at Xavier’s joke. He looked worried. Xavier had come over here to talk over his problems, but instead, it looked like he would be trying to talk Billy off the ledge.
Billy said, “I don’t know how I feel about it either. Hell, I’m in my mid-sixties. When the rug rat turns seventeen, somebody will be pushing around this Depend-wearing, shriveled-up, drooling, dried-up vegetable of a Vietnam vet in a wheelchair at the child’s high school graduation.”
Xavier had a stunned look on his face. “Okay. You’ve managed to seriously depress me now.”
“Youngster, I’m not trying to depress you. What I’m trying to say is that we have to deal with the consequences of our actions. If the baby is yours then you have to step up and take care of it. I know that’s not what you want to hear, but in this life the same experience that teaches us is costly. Unfortunately for me and you, the cost of not wearing protection—well, for you is an unwanted teen pregnancy. Me, I’m too old and set in my ways to be having babies—”
“Don’t forget a senile old combat goat.”
Billy laughed until he launched into a barrage of wet coughs. He cleared his throat and asked, “Have you told your father and Samantha yet?”
Xavier lowered his head as if he were giving last rites to the idea of telling his Bible-thumping father. “Samantha was there in the lunchroom when the chick stormed up to us and started kicking the claim.”
Billy adjusted the blanket around his neck and had that look on his face like he was waiting to be entertained by some intense drama. “What happened?”
Xavier quickly placed a hand on his jaw where Samantha had smacked him. “That junk still stings.”
Billy almost hocked up mucus, he was laughing so hard.
“After I told Brenda to beat it, I tried explaining myself, but Sam hauled off. She hit me so hard, the girl almost knocked my shoes off.”
Billy had a tissue up to his mouth, cracking up.
“Been texting and calling the girl since it happened. No response.”
“Well, that’s one of those consequences I was telling you about. But how did Noah take it?”
Xavier let his gaze drift to the television screen. The onscreen war was heating up. German bodies were being blown to smithereens by grenades that had just been tossed, compliments of the US troops.
Billy read Xavier’s face right away. “Wait a minute. You did tell your father, right?”
Xavier looked down at his hands in his lap. “The old dude is different since he came back home from prison. I mean, I was a shortie when he went in, but I remember enough to know what he was like before he left.”
“What do you mean by ‘acting different’?”
“Praying before sunrise different, quoting Bible scriptures like there is nothing else to talk about different, and now telling us that we have to go to church at least two Sundays a month—that kind of different.”
Billy looked confused. “Youngster, you been holding out. When did all of this start?”
“Gradually.”
Billy rubbed the whiskers on his chin, like he was about to go deep with wisdom. “Your dad means well. You told me that he used to be heavily involved in the trafficking of narcotics. He was ‘the man,’ as you put it. There’s nothing wrong with a man going to prison and finding God. It shows that he’s been doing something constructive with his time while paying his debt to society. Yes, I’ll admit that some of those jailhouse preachers can be a little fanatical, but it’s better—way better—than what you had before. No disrespect to your mother, but Ne Ne wasn’t right in the head. She didn’t do right by you and Alfonso. But your dad is, along with trying to make up for all the bad choices in his life that took him away from his sons. So all I’m saying, youngster, is to be patient with him.”
Xavier felt like he had gotten a lot off of his chest. And as usual his friend and mentor, Billy Hawkins, had provided the outlet. He just wished he could open up and talk about the growing danger he’d been experiencing at school. But it would lead Xavier to having to explain the whole story to Billy. The entire Zulu story. And that wasn’t gonna happen.
Billy asked, “So what are you gonna do about this baby?”
Xavier pursed his lips and furled his brow. “Wait till it gets here. And then have a paternity test done.”
“You’re not gonna be on the Maury show, are you?” Billy laughed.
“Jokes. And your old butt will be right beside me with your baby-mama drama.”
“Serious though. Make sure you find that out before you start taking care of it. How far along is she?”
“Told me seven months.”
“I suggest you call that girl right now and make sure you tell her your plans about getting the test done.”
Xavier had a silly look on his face. “You mean now, as of this moment, right now?”
“No time like the present.”
Xavier removed his cell phone from his pocket and found Brenda’s number on his list of contacts. He pushed Call and got an instant busy signal.
“Oops. Uh-oh,” Xavier said, looking goofy.
Billy asked, “What do you mean, ‘oops uh-oh’?”
“Uh-oh like Metro PCS has cut off my service because I couldn’t pay the bill uh-oh.”
“I swear, you youngsters and your cell phones. It’s called getting a job and being responsible.”
Billy held on to the blanket as he stood up and wrapped it around his torso. He walked in the direction of the staircase to the upstairs bedrooms.
Xavier wasn’t going to trip. The baby couldn’t be his. His mind shifted to Samantha. The look on her face when she stormed out of the lunchroom. He’d let her down one too many times. And if he ever got another opportunity, Xavier would make it right by her. He promised.
The old man coughed harshly from upstairs somewhere. Xavier could hear him moving around up there, like he was going from room to room searching for something.
Xavier still couldn’t believe that Felix Hoover had been taken out. No arrest had been made. No leads. No witnesses. Xavier heard Billy walking down the stairs. He was sniffling as he walked back into the front room with the blanket over his shoulders cascading down his back and hitting the floor like it was a royal robe belonging to a king. The old dude walked over to Xavier and handed him a white business envelope.
Billy turned his back and walked back over to the couch. “There’s some money there.” He sneezed and grabbed a few tissues. “Should be enough, if you manage it right. Enough to keep you going for a while.”
Xavier wanted to feel grateful, but taking handouts wasn’t his thing. Having had a taste of independence, taking charity had him feeling some kind of way.
Billy recognized Xavier’s struggle. “Don’t worry, you can pay it back if you wish. I know that it’s hard for you youngsters in today’s world. I guess what I’m trying to say is that I don’t want you to be another statistic, Xavier. So you might have a baby on the way. I can tell you that you’re in for some struggle, but always do what’s right, youngster, and right will follow.”
Xavier was trying to keep his emotions bottled up, but one lousy tear dropped from his right eye. He went to approach Billy to thank him with a handshake but grabbed and playfully hugged him instead.
Billy’s grouchy butt said, “I don’t need all that. Get off me.”
Xavier took his place back on the armchair. “So what are you gonna do about being a senior-citizen baby daddy?”
Billy cracked a smile. “I guess you will be pushing that shriveled up, diaper-wearing, dried-up vegetable of a Vietnam War veteran around in a wheelchair at the kid’s high school graduation.”
They both laughed—or at least until the old man nearly coughed himself into a fit.<
br />
4
SUNDAY, AUGUST 31
8:00 A.M.
“It’s Sunday morning. Can I sleep in instead of going to church?” Xavier asked his father.
“No, son. It’s the Lord’s day. Time to go to the house of worship and praise Him.” Noah carried a garment bag with a dress suit on a wire hanger inside. “Oh, when I was going through your closet of Satan wear, I noticed that you didn’t have a dress suit. I took the liberty of purchasing you one. Hurry up and get dressed.”
“I don’t know about this going to church every Sunday thing.” Xavier pulled the covers up over his head.
Noah was quick with a reply. “As long as you live in my house, you will abide by my rules. Besides, you need the Lord in your life. God knows you’ve been through enough while living with your mother.”
“I’m just saying that it’s too much.”
“It’s good that you have some resistance. That way when God breaks you, He’ll get the glory,” Noah said while hanging Xavier’s suit in the closet. “You can’t keep avoiding your mother. When are you planning on seeing her?”
“When I forgive her for the foul stuff she’s done.”
“The Lord is all about forgiveness, son. If He can forgive you, you surely can forgive your mother.”
“Whatever,” Xavier hissed.
“Well, son, I see I’m just gonna have to pray that God removes that rebellious spirit from you.” Noah left the room.
Xavier removed the covers and rolled out of bed.
He stood in front of the closet in his boxers, then grabbed the garment bag and laid it on the bed. He wasn’t into dress suits. But he knew enough about material to know when one was old and outdated. Plus, a receipt from the Salvation Army fell to the floor when he unzipped the bag and lifted the hideous-looking thing out.
Noah is snorting hair-spray products if he thinks I’m flexin’ in this, Xavier thought, holding up the suit. The black old-school double-breasted would make him look like a friggin’ funeral director.
Xavier was standing there holding up the suit when his father walked back into his bedroom. Noah brushed right by his son without saying a word and headed to the closet.
“What are you doing?” Xavier asked.
Noah didn’t respond. He just kept going on about his business, like he was taking inventory of his son’s many high-priced articles.
Xavier tried to play it off by offering some humor in an awkward situation. “What does Jesus have to say in that Bible about a father invading his son’s privacy?”
Xavier was smiling until Noah started spontaneously ripping high-priced items of clothing from hangers and throwing them to the floor.
“What are you doing?” Xavier asked anxiously, as he watched clothes fly through the air. “What is wrong with you?”
Noah shook his son’s leather Pelle Pelle jacket in the boy’s face. “This right here is the very reason why you can’t humble yourself and wear what I buy you. It’s this designer junk right here that’s gonna keep you from inheriting God’s kingdom. You cannot serve two masters, son.”
Xavier was trying everything in his power to not go off on Noah.
“All right.” Xavier submitted to his dad. “You’re right. First thing after church I’ll get rid of them. I was thinking about changing my image at school anyway,” he lied. He had to buy time some kind of way. At least until he could come up with a plan to move his clothes.
The corners of Noah’s lips turned up into a smile. “I knew you would understand, son. Honor thy father and thy mother, Xavier.” He handed Xavier the jacket. “Get washed up and dressed and I’ll see you and Alfonso at breakfast.”
Xavier watched Noah as he walked out. His father must’ve been out of his mind if he thought for one second Xavier would ditch the only stitches of clothing that were accepted by his peers at school. No way on God’s green earth was anything but designer brands touching Xavier’s skin. Noah was straight tripping. He’d been locked up for a good part of Xavier’s life and now the cat wanted to come in and start laying down the Ten Commandments. His father could miss him with that madness. Getting rid of clothes he didn’t spend one slug on. Uh-uh—wasn’t going to happen!
But when Alfonso entered Xavier’s bedroom Xavier almost fell out laughing at his little brother. Alfonso’s condition had the youngster ultrasensitive. Besides, homeboy didn’t look too comfortable with his body stuffed into the secondhand suit that fit him more like a Salvation Army straitjacket. Outside of it all, the frown on the boy’s face was priceless. Several different shades of misery.
Alfonso gently closed the bedroom door and pulled the tight pants out of his booty before plopping down angrily on Xavier’s bed.
Xavier offered his little brother a sneaky grin. “Alfonso, you know I’m not trying to be funny, but those pants look like they got your little coconuts feeling some kind of way.”
“Big brah, I don’t know how much more I can take of Dad going Jesus on us every second he’s around. I know I told you back in the day that I was missing him, but I kinda wish for the old days, even with Ne Ne’s trifling foolishness.” Alfonso yanked at his black necktie like the thing was alive and trying to choke him.
Xavier sat silently smiling.
Alfonso nodded at Xavier’s closet. Empty hangers were still swinging on the closet rod long after Noah had left.
“Let me take a guess: Dad was in here trying to exorcise the demons out of your closet?”
Xavier was still mulling over places to hide his junk. “How’d you guess?”
“They were the same words he used when I was seeing True Religion, Mecca, and Levi’s jeans fly through the air out of my closet.” Alfonso was dental-floss thin, not much bigger than a leg on a dining room table. The top two buttons on his jacket seemed to be stressed, though. Like any sharp movement would pop them right off his jacket. “I already caught a hard time making friends, but wearing stuff from Salvation Army and Kmart isn’t gonna be a good look. Xavier, I don’t think I can do it. Kids are already laughing at me.”
“You’re funny, but I feel you. Same here, little brah. It definitely would be a challenge to maintain my rep at Coleman High dressed cheesy.”
“I wanted to bite Dad’s kneecaps when he started throwing all of my Scarface figures in a black garbage bag. Wanted to make him say ‘Say hello to my little friend’ for snatching down my Scarface posters and curtains, and taking up my Al Pacino comforter with ‘The world is mine’ printed on the sheets and pillow cases.”
“That’s what that noise coming out of your bedroom last night was about?”
“Yep. He said that those kinds of toys in my room were inviting in Satan.”
“Thank God he’s been gone for so long and is not up on technology. Otherwise your—”
“That’s what you think. He found my Scarface: The World Is Yours video game and with his gorilla hands, snapped it in half. The last time I saw my PS3 was last night when he was carrying it out. Then he returned and started nailing up crosses on my walls. No kidding, Xavier, there is a huge Bible sitting in the place where my PS3 used to sit. Dad is out of control.
“Last night before you came home he was telling me that me and you were gonna be baptized and would join the choir or usher board at church. I’m serious, big brah, when I say that I don’t know how much more of this man I can take.”
Xavier’s heart bled heavy for the kid, but this was a battle that the little crumb-snatcher would have to endure by himself. Right now it was every man for himself. One problem at a time. And of course Xavier’s were first.
“I still wish you had your old job back. At least I would have money to buy my ice cream sandwiches again at lunchtime. Dad says there is no room in the house. No budget for ‘luxury items,’ ” Alfonso said with a sad face.
The details about Xavier’s old gig had never been shared with Alfonso. He wanted his younger brother to look at him as a provider and not some thug. But this was too much. Xavier almost cried for his
brother. He missed those times, too. Moments where he’d spoiled his kid brother rotten. Got the boy anything he wanted. Alfonso’s happiness meant everything in the world to Xavier. But Xavier could give Alfonso a little sump’n sump’n from the loot Billy gave him, to ease the kid’s pain.
Xavier hadn’t been able to believe his eyes as he’d sat at the back of the bus last night on his way home from Billy’s. Since there hadn’t been many passengers aboard, Xavier decided to check out how much was inside, but he kept the white envelope low when he examined its contents. He hadn’t realized the thickness of the thing until he’d pulled it out.
Three thousand dollars—all big-faced Benjamins.
Of course this was a mere handful of sunflower seeds compared to the grip that had once flowed through Xavier’s hands. But Billy’s generosity almost brought tears to his eyes.
Xavier walked over to his closet, kicked a few clothing items out of his way, and stooped down. He had stuffed the money inside the right sneaker in a box containing a pair of burgundy suede Pumas. He was careful not to pull all of it out. If his father saw the bankroll he would arrive at the logical conclusion that the money was Satan-earned and would douse his oldest son with holy water while waving a cross in front of Xavier’s face.
Xavier had trust in Alfonso. He knew from past experience that the kid would manage the money properly. So he had no problem breaking his kid brother off with a hundred bucks.
Xavier warned, “Buy your ice cream sandwiches, homeboy, but don’t let your dad catch you with the ends.”
It was almost comical to see Alfonso trying to stuff the bill inside pants so tight that Xavier could see the imprint of the bill in his little brother’s right pocket.
“Xavier, why don’t you call Dad ‘Dad’?” Alfonso asked.
Xavier was putting away the money when he looked over his left shoulder. “No need to worry about that, little homie.”
The truth was that he couldn’t bring himself to explain it to the little dude. Xavier just left it at that, but so far he believed that Noah hadn’t done enough to earn the title. Xavier had given him credit; Noah had stepped in and picked up where Ne Ne had left off, like he was supposed to. But the old dude was seriously acting like a lunatic with this religion stuff. Noah had to do more than that for Xavier to crown him “dad.”
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