This Is a Bust

by Ed Lin

  “He went straight to his car — he didn’t want to be in the same locker room as you.”

  “Those hoseboys are all cowards when it comes down to it. They’d rather face a fire than another man because fires don’t hit back.”

  “Hell of a game,” said Teeter, shaking his head. “Hey, you came on the train, right? You want a ride back to Manhattan? We still got room in the bus. I think the PAL kids would get a thrill out of riding with you.”

  “Yeah, that would be great.”

  We walked over to the bus, which was a half-sized job, the kind for disabled kids.

  Only one seat was left. I tossed in my bag and my stick and dropped next to the punk kid.

  “Since when have you been with the Police Athletic League?”

  “For about two years,” he said. “Nobody else I knew had bats and mitts for softball.”

  “Hey, speak English! This is America,” joked Teeter, but we ignored him.

  “I saw what that guy did,” said the kid.

  “Which guy?”

  “The guy who did the thing with his eyes.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m glad you hit him.”

  “Me, too. Sometimes it’s right to hit people.”

  “It wasn’t right for you to hit me.”

  “I never hit you! I just shook you.”

  “Maybe you hit me by accident, but you still hit me.”

  “Okay, I’m sorry if I hit you. But I didn’t, so. . .” I looked out the window. Long Island was a blur of highway lights and roadside garbage. “When I look at you, I see someone who’s throwing away their life.”

  “I’m not throwing anything away.”

  “Listen to me. I was hanging out with the wrong crowd when I was your age.” Then dropping my voice I asked, “You ever hear of the Continentals?”

  “No.”

  “Yeah? Well, we were the biggest gang in Chinatown.”

  “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “Anyway, we were a bunch of tough guys just like you and your friends. Back in those days we had to fight Spanish and Italian kids.”

  “Then you should know it’s easier to be in a gang than not to be in one. If you’re going to get beat up anyway, you might as well have some people on your side.”

  “That just means you’re going to be doing even more fighting. They’ll get two more guys and you’ll get three more. Someone gets popped. Then what?”

  He shrugged.

  “Listen,” I said. “You keep loitering around, the best thing that can happen is you ruin your posture. Just go home and stay there.”

  “I’m hanging out in the street because I don’t get along with my parents.”

  “What’s going on?” I asked, rubbing my calves and thinking I really should work out regularly. I was going to be hurting tomorrow.

  “They throw me out of the house.”

  “For what?”

  “Don’t know. They think they’re still in Hong Kong.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “They think that if I’m not studying 24 hours a day, that I’m not studying at all. I tell them school is easy for me, but they just yell at me and lock me out of the apartment.”

  “You must have done something to them. They wouldn’t kick you out for nothing.”

  “Look at this,” he said. He pulled down his shirt collar and showed me slashes on his shoulder. “That’s from a belt.”

  “I’m sorry it’s like this,” I told him. “You should see a counselor at school.”

  “I did. They told me I had to learn to communicate with my parents.”

  “That’s it?”

  “Yeah, you know, they only deal with more serious problems, like sex abuse or drugs.”

  Someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned and saw a little boy with dark blond hair.

  “What are you speaking?” he asked.

  “It’s Chinese.”

  “Are you from China?”

  “No.”

  There was an awkward moment before the kid spoke again.

  “Oh. I just wanted to say that you were really great tonight. You were my favorite player.”

  “Thanks, kid.”

  “Where did you learn to skate?”

  “I first learned right here through the PAL and then I skated at Wollman Rink when I was in the academy.”

  “You smell like beer,” the little boy said.

  “You get to drink beer when you’re a winner,” I said. Then I turned back to the punk kid.

  “I’m sorry, I never got your name.”

  “Paul.”

  “My name’s Robert.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “You have to look at it this way, Paul. The way you dress and the people you hang out with, everyone thinks you’re trying to be a hood. What kind of life are you going to have?”

  “I look like this because I’m tough and angry and I want everyone to know.”

  “If you were really tough and angry, you wouldn’t try so hard to look like it. No wonder you keep getting thrown out of the house. You know, if you ever came by my apartment, I’d frisk you before I’d let you in.”

  “I don’t carry weapons. My mind is my weapon.”

  “Bruce Lee tell you that? Because your mind didn’t help you when I gave you that bloody nose.”

  “You know my parents yelled at me when they saw me bloodied up? They thought that I’d done something wrong. My parents will never understand me.”

  “Well, that’s true, but it’s something you have to learn to live with.”

  “Do you talk to your parents?”

  “I don’t talk to my father because he’s dead,” I said. We slowed to get off an exit ramp and I slid slightly into Paul as we made the turn. “My mother, I talk to sometimes.”

  “That’s too bad about your dad.”

  “It is. But a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough.” I sat back in my seat and settled into my sore body.

  —

  I lifted the smoked-plastic lid to my turntable and put on Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On. I played it at least once a week. Every time I listened to that record, and I’ve had it for years, I would hear some lyrics I hadn’t known were there.

  Suddenly, the record skipped during “Mercy, Mercy Me.”

  I put a dime on the needle. Then I tried a penny, a nickel, a quarter, and then two quarters. The record still skipped. One little skip ruins an entire album in my book.

  I tried a hair dryer and a dry toothbrush. I even ran the sharp end of a thumbtack over it. Nothing worked. I played that groove over and over, just to see if I could get used to it, but hearing that skip physically hurt me.

  I turned off the stereo. Then I got a beer and sat on the couch. Then I got another. And another.

  I heard a door slam in the apartment building. Then nothing.

  I picked up the PBA newsletter and looked at the pictures. I folded it into a plane, then crumpled it up and threw it into the trash.

  I tried the record again and it skipped.

  I grabbed the basketball and rolled it around the coffee table with my feet.

  I opened up the freezer and looked at the ice-cream bar.

  I drank a glass of water.

  I tapped my fingers on the coffee table and scratched my face.

  I stretched my back and legs.

  I tried the record again. No dice.

  I turned the TV on and off.

  I went back to the freezer, got the ice-cream bar, and ate it.

  Then the buzzer rang.

  I stuck my head out the window and looked down. There was no one down there.

  “Hey!” I yelled. Someone backed out from the apartment doorway and looked up. It was Paul. “What are you

  doing here?”

  “You have to let me in,” he yelled up.

  “Kid, it’s late. Shouldn’t you be out s
omewhere, smoking and drinking?”

  “Let me in!”

  “I’ll let you in, but I’m going to frisk you.”

  “I’m not carrying anything! Buzz me in!”

  “The buzzer’s broken, just push it open!” I suddenly realized that that was the wrong thing to be shouting into the street after midnight.

  Soon there was a knock at my door.

  I looked through the keyhole and opened the door.

  “You got up those stairs pretty quick,” I said. “Must have strong legs. Now spread ’em.”

  “I don’t have anything,” he said, but complied.

  “If I knew you were coming,” I said, patting him down, “I would have told you to bring some beer.”

  “You’ve been drinking enough,” said Paul, brushing my dirty fingerprints off his jeans.

  “Now you wanna tell me what the hell you’re doing here?”

  “They threw me out of the house again.”

  “Surprise, surprise.”

  “At least I took the old man’s cigs.”

  “And what else?” He hooked both hands into his front pockets.

  “Nothing.”

  “How much did you take?”

  Paul rolled his eyes. “Twenty,” he said. “But it was my money! I won the winter science fair and they took it from me.”

  “What are you gonna do with 20 dollars, anyway?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. Keep my pockets warm.”

  “What’s this?” I asked, dangling a note with a sticker on it. Paul turned red and his eyes bulged. “Those jeans of yours leave a lot of room for pickpockets.”

  I read the note. It was from a girl named Lei. She said she liked him. Paul wasn’t talking. He was barely breathing.

  “Lose your tongue?” I asked.

  “Give it back!” he said.

  “Who’s Lei?” I asked, handing the note back to him.

  “She’s a girl.”

  “She’s not one of the girls running with you and your friends?”

  “I don’t have any friends anymore. Ever since they saw you beat me up, they don’t talk to me anymore.”

  “I didn’t beat you up.”

  “My nose was bleeding.”

  “That’s because you were too excited.”

  “I could sue you.”

  “For what?”

  “Assault and battery.”

  “You’d be a real credible witness, Paul.”

  “That doesn’t mean I don’t have civil rights.”

  “I’m gonna give you the right to remain silent and also the right to get the hell out of my apartment.”

  “I don’t have anywhere else to go.”

  “I’m sure there’s some nice park out in Brooklyn that ain’t too crowded. . .”

  “My sister Lonnie said I could stay with you.”

  “What! You’re Lonnie’s brother?”

  “She said you said I could stay here.”

  “I said you could stay here,” I said to myself. I suddenly felt tired. I went over to the apartment door and slid the door chain into place. I waved my hand at the couch. “You can sleep over there, Paul.”

  “Thank you. You’re not going to regret this.”

  “But I already do. Where’s your stuff?”

  “I’ll go get it when they’re gone in the daytime. I only need two dresser drawers.” I became a little suspicious of him.

  “Paul, what was that science project you did?”

  “It was about plasmids.” He looked into my unblinking face. “Do you know what a plasmid is?”

  “Sure, it’s when a star turns into a black hole.”

  Paul gave a short, smug chuckle.

  “Well,” I said, “good night. Get some rest.” I went down the hallway.

  “Um, do I have to go through the bedroom to get to the bathroom?”

  “Yeah.”

  Paul pushed past me. “Excuse me,” he said, “I have to brush my teeth.”

  —

  The next morning, I felt good when I saw Lonnie back at the counter at Martha’s.

  “They give you a hard time about coming back?” I asked her as she gathered up my two iced coffees. I didn’t eat in the mornings anymore. Two beers at home would fill me up.

  Lonnie smiled.

  “They gave me a raise. Paul is staying with you, right?”

  “Your brother.”

  “He’s actually my stepbrother. Did you know that after my mother went to San Francisco, other girls stopped playing with me because my parents had split?”

  “But it wasn’t too bad for your father.”

  “Is it ever bad for the father? He got married again and they had Paul.”

  “Your father beats Paul.”

  Lonnie shook her head. “It’s my stepmother who beats Paul. But you beat Paul, too. You gave him a bloody nose.”

  “I didn’t touch his damned nose. That kid’s got bad capillaries.”

  Lonnie sighed. “I guess everything’s okay, now. You know, he’s never had a strong male figure who really cared about him.”

  “So you figured he could just move in with me?”

  “You said he should!”

  I propped my arms up onto the counter. “Can you explain to me why he just got thrown out of the house?”

  “I told you already. He’s got a girlfriend. But my stepmother doesn’t want him to have a girlfriend until he goes to college.”

  “That kid’s bound for stripes, not college.”

  “He gets straight A’s in school.”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  “He’s really smart. Everything comes really easy to him.”

  “Then why is he hanging out with those delinquents?”

  “They’re not delinquents! They’re all really smart kids. I let them hang out here to keep them off the streets and away from the bad kids.”

  “Those kids are in a gang.”

  “You were in a gang.”

  “It was different back then. It was more like a club that didn’t have a tree house. Kids are getting killed these days.”

  “Paul and his friends are just trying to look tough so they don’t get picked on. You know kids.”

  “I know I don’t like them.”

  “Lonnie,” growled Dori, “when you keep talking to the customers, you leave more work for me.”

  “I’m not just a customer, I’m a regular,” I said.

  “A regular cradle robber,” said Dori.

  “Shut up, Dori! You can’t have kids so you won’t have to worry about cradle robbers!” yelled Lonnie. It was the first time Lonnie had ever snapped back, and the sharpness of it tore across the filthy and busted foam tiles of the ceiling all the way to the front door, where an old man was standing, uncertain if he should come in or run for it.

  Dori screwed her mouth up and pounded the counter once. “No respect!” she cried. Then she went into the back, kicked aside an empty plastic bucket, and went into the bathroom.

  Lonnie wiped her forehead and said, “Hey, come on!

  Who’s next?”

  —

  When my shift was over and I got back into street clothes, I went down to the park to see the midget. Some fool tourist was playing him at a board game I didn’t know.

  “Why are your hands all black?” the midget asked me.

  “I had to replace the ribbon in my typewriter. Stupid thing tried to eat my hand. What game is that?” I asked him.

  “The game’s called Sorry!” said the midget. “It was released by Parker Brothers in 1934, a year before they acquired the rights to Monopoly.”

  “I heard of Monopoly, but not Sorry!” I said. “How do you know so much about this game?”

  “I read it off the side of the box. Basically, you have to get these pieces around the board and into the space marked ‘Home.’”

  “Hey, no outside help!” said the tourist. He was a white male in his mid-30s, five-seven, 180, brown eyes and hair.

  “Calm d
own, he’s just explaining how to play to me. I haven’t seen this game before,” I said.

  “I’m a lifelong Sorry! player,” the tourist said. “I heard there was a little guy in the Chinatown park who’d never lost at any game, so I came down all the way from Boston to check him out.”

  “You ever lose at this game?” I asked the tourist.

  “A few times, but honestly, it’s hard just finding people to play with.”

  “You must’ve been a lonely kid,” I said. He gave me a dirty look. The midget fiddled with the pieces on the board.

  “Hey,” the tourist told the midget, “you’re supposed to say ‘Sorry’ when you do that!”

  “I’m not sorry,” mumbled the midget.

  “I’m reading these rules,” I said, “and it doesn’t say anywhere that you have to say, ‘Sorry.’”

  “Well, even if it isn’t a rule, it’s a common courtesy.”

  “This guy’s getting in a bad mood because he’s losing,” the midget said to me.

  “Hey, while we play I want to impose an English-only policy, okay?” said the tourist. “Just so you don’t cheat this white devil.”

  Okay, my friend, the midget said in English, I’m sorry. Then all of us laughed. Then the midget won, and went on to beat the guy two more times. Each game was shorter than the previous one.

  After we were alone, I asked the midget if he’d known that Paul was Lonnie’s brother.

  “Oh yeah, I knew.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I thought you knew, too.”

  “How could I know?”

  “How could everyone else know?”

  “You heard I had a run-in with Paul, right?”

  “Yeah, but I guess you guys patched it up. You’re living

  together now, right?”

  “I didn’t know the details of my life were public information.”

  “It’s not public,” said the midget. “Very few people know about it.”

  Chapter 12

  Willie Gee came up to me and flashed a wicked smile.

  “Thanks for taking care of that hunger striker the other day,” he said. “Maybe you can just pull out one protestor every day. That’s a good strategy. I really underestimated you. You’re the kind who likes to work with discretion.”

  We were standing on a corner around the block from the restaurant, out of view of the protest.

  “I didn’t pull her out of the strike for you or for Jade Palace,” I said in a way that cleared my throat at the same time. “I knew the girl and was concerned about her health. I didn’t think the hunger strike was good for her.”