by Brian Selfon
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Table of Contents
A Note About the Author
Copyright Page
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for my family
part one
the almost family
chapter 1
The first time he meets Emil Scott, he falls in love.
They’re at an art opening in Bushwick, the latest neighborhood in Brooklyn to burst with creatives and almosts. For over an hour Henry Vek and Emil Scott have circled each other without realizing it. Then it’s like an old rom-com. Their eyes lock across the room. They look away. (They’re straight-ish for 2014, and the rule is you have to look away.) Then, oh so casually, they find their way to the same painting. And it’s here, standing close to the painting, close to each other, that Emil taps his back left pocket and asks if Henry wants to buy some heroin.
“Jesus fuck, no. Not here.” He puts a warning hand to Emil’s chest—already they’re touching. “Outside. Now.”
Five minutes later they’re stepping out onto the roof. “Hold the door,” Henry says. He walks off, comes back with a loose brick, and props open the door. Light comes up at them from the stairwell. Henry breaks out rolling papers, a bag of kush, and a bottle of Jim Beam and paper cups he swiped from the opening. Then they blaze, and when they exchange names, Henry chokes on his smoke. Emil Scott? Jesus, this guy’s got art up at half the coffee shops on Metropolitan. Another detail: he’s good.
Henry feels within himself a tremor that could grow into a life-quake.
Emil is tall and long-limbed, like Henry, but without the muscle, and his rounding stomach suggests a habit of late-night pizzas. He’s handsome, with his bold nose and his bedroom smile, but what catches Henry’s attention now are the paint stains. The yellow on the hands, the purple on his pants—this is a worker. A tickle in Henry tells him this is something he can use.
“You’ve got that big canvas up at the Thirsty Bear,” Henry says, handing the joint to Emil. “That purple octopus? With the baby octopus? Blew my fucking mind.”
Emil shrugs.
“Nuh-uh. Don’t piss on your gift.” Henry lowers his voice, leans in. “I paint too, okay? Or I’m trying. Doing it since … since my mom died. She was an artist. And she was pretty good, and I fucking suck. But you’ve got something. Don’t act like it doesn’t matter. ’Cause let me tell you. It fucking matters.”
Henry brings his hands in front of him. Long fingers, flat tips, calloused skin. There are scars on his knuckles, and there’s a long, fresh scab on his left palm, as if from a blade badly deflected. And yes, there’s paint, just like on Emil’s hands.
“I don’t know,” Henry says. His voice low and fragile. “There’s something … I can’t get it out.” A deep sigh, and then a hardening comes over him. He raises his eyes and looks at Emil. “But you’re getting it out. And you’re connecting to people. Your work sells, right?”
Emil drains his cup, makes a whiskey face. “Sometimes.”
“Don’t piss on sometimes. You’re a real artist.” Henry refills Emil’s cup. “So the fuck you doing selling heroin?”
Emil has, until this moment, been somewhere between cool and snarky. Now he wilts. “It’s fentanyl,” he says. “Cut with lactose. It’s rent—that’s all it is.”
“Shit. I get it.” Henry is nodding. Side schemes, queasy compromises, backroom handoffs. We all got to eat. Henry’s mouth plays a smile as he thinks about the strange kinship he and Emil somehow sniffed out downstairs. If Emil is maybe 90 percent artist and 10 percent criminal, Henry is the same, only with the proportions reversed. And this completes the detail Henry picked up before: Emil’s work is up everywhere because he hustles—and he hustles because he needs the money. We can be useful to each other, Henry thinks, and if that’s not the basis for a connection … Henry looks the artist over, confirming to himself that this isn’t some specter born of hard liquor and GMO’d weed. No hooves, Henry sees, and no horns. He shakes his head and grins. “My uncle was right.”
Emil looks up. “About what?”
“You never know someone till you get your nose up their money.”
Henry feels Emil’s gaze moving over him, feels the terror and pleasure of being seen. Emil says, “Your uncle?”
“He’s got these little gems,” Henry says. “He can drop some heavy shit. Sometimes it takes me a week to get my head around it.”
Emil puts down his whiskey and takes out a short pencil, a pocket sketchbook. “Tell me about him.” His pencil dances all over the page, his gaze returning again and again to Henry.
Who leans back into a shadow. “Whoa. You’re not drawing me.”
“But you looked so perfect.” He smiles at Henry’s hesitation. “The way your face changed when you mentioned your uncle.” He puts his hands together. “Please? This is just for my sketchbook.”
Henry shakes his head no, but then slides out from his shadow. “Are you for real?”
“Of course,” Emil says, putting down his pencil at last. “But I’m my kind of real.”
A profound feeling moves through Henry. It’s desire, it’s gratitude, it’s fear—it’s one of those in-between somethings he has in him and can’t figure out. “Okay, my uncle.” Deep breath, a roll of the shoulders. “He’s my family. I mean … he’s all that’s left.”
Emil takes up his pencil. “Your folks?”
“Gone. Both of them. My mom was an artist, like I said. I mean not paid, like you. She was a cashier at Union Market over in Park Slope. And then the car crash.” Henry’s looking out at the night now, his voice low. “And my dad went a few years later. Aneurysm. I was ten.” More whiskey. He’s feeling too much, not getting it right. Emil’s attention, though, seems to be on Henry’s hands. Detail one, Henry himself notices: they have closed into fists. Detail two: the scars on his knuckles.
Fuck the whiskey. He puts down the drink, lights the joint, pulls hard, and hands it to Emil. A tight moment, then he says, “So Uncle Shecky takes me in, and he teaches me the business. And it doesn’t matter that I’m ten, that I’m fifteen, that I’m twenty-two now. It’s always the same. He’s teaching me.”
“Like?”
“Like adjustable-interest loans, interest-only home loans.”
“He does mortgages?”
“And LLCs, and PACs, and profitable nonprofits.” Henry smiles, picking up steam. “And pass-through accounts, and offshore accounts—all kinds of shit. Whatever the client needs. My uncle’s like a secret genius.” Henry takes the joint back from Emil. Pinches it out and says, “Uncle Shecky’s got this amazing, twisty mind. And there’s no show with him. Like he’s great and he’s different, and he doesn’t even know it.”
“And I was just thinking the same thing about you,” Emil says.
Their eyes meet, then Henry looks away. When he raises his eyes again, there’s no break in his voice, and his hands open. “Your turn. Heroin, fentanyl—what’s the fucking deal?”
Emil’s smile is pained, as if telling a doctor about an embarrassing itch. “Was kind of hoping we’d let that d
rop.” His hand goes into his skinny jeans, and out comes a ziplock bag. Inside: teeny baggies, maybe a dozen. “I buy for ten, sell for twenty.” A shrug, like it’s no biggie, but his embarrassment is obvious. “Just a supplement.”
“Hey, glass houses,” Henry says.
“But?”
“Opioids are bad business. They went suburban, and now the courts are coming down hard. ODs are everywhere—fucking Scarsdale, places where judges live. Hitting home for them. So they’re laying down these crazy sentences. Bottom line?” He leans in and puts a heavy hand on Emil’s shoulder. Feels a warm charge move into him, spread down through his body. “Not. Fucking. Worth it.” He releases his grip. “There’s a better way.”
Emil’s voice goes soft: “I’m open to suggestions.”
A predator’s smile as Henry gives Emil a soft elbow to the side. “You’re going to come work for me.”
* * *
Next day, a construction site. Henry shields his eyes from the sun. Emil takes out his sketchbook, which, by this light, Henry can see has a floral print cover.
Emil asks, “What am I looking at?”
“A client.” Henry waves at one of the workers, who waves back—but slowly, as if confused by Henry’s visit. Wary. He watches Henry for some time before getting back to his tools.
“Most of our clients are decent people,” Henry says. He takes out a baggie, rolls a joint. “Two-thirds are mom-and-pop shops. Just regular Brooklynites who don’t want the IRS in their pockets. So we take their cash and help them load up on Amex cards. Or we pay their bills—big ones, like college tuition—through generous relatives.”
“You work with their relatives?”
“They’re overseas,” Henry says. “Also, they don’t exist.”
Emil, who has stopped sketching, shakes his head admiringly and gets back to work.
“So that’s scenario A, the tax dodge. But sometimes it’s the opposite.” Henry flicks the lighter, but the wind knocks it out. “They’re not avoiding taxes.” He flicks it again and gets the joint going. “They want them.”
Emil again lowers his sketchbook. “They want to pay taxes?”
“Let’s pretend we’re talking about Mel.” Henry indicates the construction worker he waved at before. “Let’s say he’s a subcontractor, unlicensed, unofficial. And he’s been getting paid under the table. So he’s living the dream, right? No taxes, no problems. But then he gets shackled.” Henry points to his ring finger. “Wife, baby. And they need space. Bank is like, you want a home loan? How about you get some reportable income.”
Emil gives up on his sketchbook, puts it in his pocket. Accepts the joint from Henry. “How does that work?”
“Step one is the same. We take the cash. But then we create a big old paper trail.” Henry relights the joint for Emil. “Articles of incorporation, certificate of this and that.” Pockets the lighter. “Now Mel’s got legitimate income. We can print up some pretty-looking tax returns if Mel wants that. And now Mel can go back to the bank and get a loan. Wife’s happy, Mel’s happy. And that’s all we want for our clients.”
Nearby: the loud beeps of a truck backing up. They wait it out.
“Okay, so two-thirds of your clients are Mel,” Emil says.
“And the mom-and-pop shops.”
“Right.” Emil’s eyes flash mischief. “What about the other third?”
Henry takes the joint back, his face a cold mask now. “Not your problem. Not your business.” He’s quiet a moment and then says, more gently, “Ignorance is deniability. Uncle Shecky says that. What we’re doing here—right now, at this site—you’ll never do this again. You’ll never see a client. Ignorance is safety. For them, for you. Listen.” He pinches out the joint, pockets it. He takes Emil by the arm and leads him away from the site. “Darkness is your friend. I run the mules in my family, and this is my promise to you.” He leans in—his mouth, Emil’s ear—and says, “I will keep you in the dark.”
* * *
The alley is cool and shadowed. Henry brings Emil in deep and stops him at a dumpster. Here is an unexpectedly fresh smell, sawdust, and poking out from the dumpster are broken boards and cracked sheets of plywood.
Emil takes out his sketchbook. “What am I looking at?”
Henry spreads his arms. “Your first workspace.”
Emil gives Henry a look—are you fucking with me?—and Henry’s smiling as he goes to the dumpster, picks up a loose board, uses it to stir what’s inside. “Your pickup spots won’t usually be this clean, but this is the first part of your job. This is exactly what you’ll be doing.” He bends over, reaches into the dumpster, and pulls out a garbage bag. Holds it up for Emil. “This is your pickup.”
Emil stares at Henry: the fuck?
Henry, for the first time with Emil—for the first time in forever, it feels like—bursts out laughing.
A walk, a train, a bus later, they step into a Western Union.
“And this is your drop-off,” Henry says, getting in line with Emil. “It’s this simple. You pick up, you drop off, and I’ll pay you. Easy money. Maybe an hour’s work, and you’ll get fifty for your everyday bag. A hundred for a big one. You’ll work up to that.” The line snakes past a table with stacks of wire-transfer slips. Henry takes one, shows it to Emil. “You’ll fill this out. You’ll have the account number in advance. Same with the routing number. Sometimes you’ll have to split it up—multiple accounts. Or you might have to go to different branches, different banks. The post office, drugstores—they all do money orders now. I’ll tell you where to go. You’ll get very clear, specific instructions.”
Emil is, of course, sketching. He hardly glances up long enough to say, “So we’re giving clients back their money—”
“So they can actually spend it,” Henry says. “Sometimes it goes overseas and back again. Sometimes it’s a straight deposit. Like this one.” He gives the bag a shake. “This is going into my account. This is my bag. My own money. I put it there. For your lesson.”
“Your bag?” Emil lowers his sketchbook. “So that construction worker…”
“Random dude.” Henry shrugs. “Never seen him before in my life.”
Emil looks a little hurt. “You were fucking with me.”
“Teaching you.”
“But how will I know what’s real or not?”
There’s a smile and a dare in Henry’s eyes. “You’ll just have to trust me.”
* * *
Over the following weeks, Henry teaches Emil code words and best practices for anonymized calls and self-destructing texts. When to use drop boxes or hand-to-hands; how to spot a tail, or lose one. The art of patience. The locations of fallbacks—places you can disappear into, when Plan A goes up in flames.
“I never expected this,” Emil says one afternoon, “but I’m having fun.” It’s May, and Brooklyn is at its most beautiful. Emil is now officially a runner. The work, he tells Henry, has fired up his art: “I’m walking with my eyes open now.” Maples and sycamores, plastic bags flapping like flags from their branches. Weeds pushing up full blossom from the broken sidewalk. Girls in skirts, babushkas with blue hair. “I’m starting a new series. Paint here and there, but a lot of charcoal. And no angles. Everything’s fluid and dynamic—and everything’s from Bushwick.”
Henry can’t wait to see it. He loves this, the shop talk, being connected to—supporting, in a way—a working artist. He’s seen his own work improving under Emil’s eye.
In June, Emil is commissioned to complete a mural at the Thirsty Bear, and he takes a hiatus from his work for Henry. He comes back as a runner the next month, though, and from then on it’s steady. Weekly meetings. Whiskey. Late-night talk of Twombly, talk of Haring.
“I’m working on something new,” Emil announces one night.
“That charcoal series?”
“It evolved.” There’s a strange gravity in Emil’s voice. Shadows under his eyes, a haunted expression. “I’m calling it ‘Origins.’”
; “Whose?”
No answer.
“You don’t know?”
Emil lets this question hang too, and when the meeting ends Henry feels unsettled.
The following day Emil goes out for a cash bag, his first big carry. He doesn’t make his checkpoint at the MoneyGram on Jay Street, and by the time Henry gets to him, his body is already cold.
chapter 2
“Now let’s see here,” says the wig, “you’re going to be living with your parents. Is that right?”
It’s June, a month before the murder, and Kerasha Brown is sitting across from her probation officer. If this is freedom, Kerasha thinks, I was better off at Franklin. Six dull years there, a quarter of her life, but never once—and this consolation comes too late, as consolation does—never once in the cage did she have to look at this stringy wig. Yuck. The woman fumbles through multicolor folders. Licks her fingers between every turn of the page. “Now let’s see here,” her verbal tic. This woman won’t ever see here, Kerasha knows. The highlights, the folders—this wretched creature is blind.
A stray bullet took her father twenty years ago, and Kerasha had hardly set foot in Franklin when Mama put a needle into her last vein. So no, Ms. Wig, you aren’t seeing, and that’s not right. But Kerasha says nothing. Silence, she’s found, and an idiot’s smile, are her best defense against bureaucrats. But her mind rarely slows and never stops, and now she’s remembering a line from Paul Laurence Dunbar: We wear the mask that grins and lies.
“Now let’s—wait, here’s your file.” The woman flourishes it and beams. Kerasha envies the ease with which stupid people take pride. Hopes the opposite is true, that the misery of her own life signifies intelligence. A paltry compensation, but she’s an orphaned ex-con at the mercy of a wig. Paltry will do.
“You’re going to stay with your uncle, that’s right. And he signed for you as…” She mumble-reads her way through the whole file. Kerasha’s eyes wander. A born thief, she spots a half-dozen places she could peek into, if she were in the mood. The wig’s purse, huge and pink. Unzipped, half open, and within arm’s reach. The cream-colored file cabinet behind her, pocked with stickers, most of them fairies or frogs. The lock on this cabinet wouldn’t withstand a toothpick. Inside, she knows, are probate files; she watched as her own battered file—her battered fate, more like—was taken out from the second-to-bottom drawer. Probate files mean names, dates of birth, and social security numbers. Not only the probates’, but those of anyone who paid their bail bonds. The street value of an unredacted probate file is $150. Oh, the things you learn at Franklin.