Christopher Paul Curtis (2 page)

I said, “And eight, the fact that … wait a minute, you're trying to say I've
never
had a woman?”

Sparky looped his thumb and pointing finger in a circle and said, “N'e'en one,
nada
, baby.”

I said, “So you mean to tell me your momma had a sex-change operation? I knew there was something strange about her.”

Sparky laughed and said, “I know
you
don't want to start panning on folks' mothers, do you?”

He had me there. When it comes to having your mother talked about I'm wide open to being abused. I changed the subject.

“What about you, Sparky? You're the one who's got it made and doesn't know it.”

“Wha-a-at?”

“Let me break one of my patented Luther T. Farrell lists down for you. Number one, you don't have someone standing over you all the time telling you what to do—”

Sparky interrupted, “Two, I got no funds, I got no job.”

I said, “Three, you can come and go anytime you want to—”

“Four, I got no clothes, I got no shoes.”

I said, “Five, you come to school only if you feel like it—”

Sparky said, “Six, half my meals are at your place and I'm eating that same garbage you serve them people you look after —”

I said, “Seven, you got me as your best friend.”

Sparky trumped the whole conversation: “Eight through two hundred forty-seven thousand, I live in Flint.”

I don't mean to say my boy is obsessed, but Sparky blames all our problems on the fact that we live in Flint. Yeah, I'm looking to get out someday myself, but this is one of those things that me and Sparky don't think alike on. But that's not his fault. My mind is trained in a different way than his.

I like to look at everything philosophically, and he doesn't. I've known since I was about six that thinking that way will get you what you need in life so I've been studying philosophical junk since then.

It gets a laugh every time I tell someone but by the time I'm twenty-one I plan on being America's best-known, best-loved, best-paid philosopher. And that's a job that there's gotta be a big demand for 'cause how many full-time, famous, professional American philosophers can you think of?

I rest my case.

It's because of the way my mind is trained that I don't join everybody else coming down on Flint so tough. Flint ain't nothing but a place or a state of mind, and I think a place or a state of mind is all about what you make it to be.

But not Sparky, he
knows
that if he lived somewhere flashy like Gary, Indiana, or New Orleans or New York City he'd be sitting pretty.

I pulled into the parking lot of the Genesee County Adult Rehabilitation Center and hit the horn.

My crew was standing just inside the front door. They picked up their lunch pails, hooked arms, and started walking to where me and Sparky were parked. There are only four men in my crew right now. We're down from the usual eight. The Sarge was having trouble filling spots because the other group homes in the area didn't have the amount of rejects and last-chance cases they usually send to us.

I opened the door and Mr. Foster was the first to get in. He's the leader of the pack. Before he got sick he was a top dog with some insurance company. Now he spends his days dogging the rest of the Crew, watching television and reminding me how bad my life is.

He said, “Gentlemen, good to see you both.” We had finally got his medications tuned so that he didn't have the big mood swings.

Mr. Baker was next. He's the official Happy Neighbor Group Home for Men grumpy old man, nicotine addict and pyromaniac. Medications don't do a thing to him.

He'd been holding his breath since I pulled up and now that he was in he let out a lungful of cigarette smoke all over me.

He put his hand over his mouth and said, “Was that me?”

He knew how much I hated breathing in smoke. He wasn't supposed to be smoking but someone at the center
would give him cigarettes if he promised not to cause any trouble.

One of the rehab center's aides helped in the last two of my crew, Mr. Keller and Mr. Hart, and buckled their belts.

Mr. Keller has to be kept loaded up on a ton of meds, it's the only way we can keep him from going off on folks. He's so far out of it that Mr. Foster calls him Dial Tone.

Mr. Hart is helpless. He should've been in the Sarge's chronic care home but his people had enough cash to pay the Sarge a little extra something and have him stay with me. They told the Sarge it was worth it 'cause they liked the care I gave the men.

And I do take pride in the way I look after my crew. It's a lot of responsibility and I've been pretty much in charge of the Happy Neighbor Group Home for Men since I was thirteen, but I gotta tell you, ever since I'd had that first good feeling and excitement about being in charge of something it's been a two-and-a-half-year downhill slide.

“Everybody buckled?”

Sparky said, “Hold on.”

He snapped his fingers one more time and the last thing that was missing from my wallet appeared.

Sparky looked at it and said, “The Methuselah condom says ‘sad,’ but I gotta tell you, bruh, this is even worse. You need to stand in line and get you your capital ‘P,’ which stands for ‘pathetic,’ 'cause that's what this is shouting. How long you been carrying this thing around?”

He handed it to me.

It was a picture of the woman I'm doomed to love and
hate for the rest of my life, Shayla Dawn of the Dead Patrick.

Sparky was right, this was pathetic. It was Shayla's fourth-grade school picture. I'd wanted a more recent one but fourth grade was the last time me and the love of my life had had a conversation that didn't end with us wanting to scratch each other's eyes out.

What could I say? I asked Sparky, “Where you say they're passing out them capital ‘P's?”

He shook his head and said, “Like a brother like me would know.”

He scrambled into the back, sat next to Mr. Foster and said, “Go 'head, everyone's buckled.”

I put the DVD in and the first notes from
The Lion King
echoed around as I pulled out onto Atherton Road.

Welcome to the life and times of Luther T. Farrell. A lot of unphilosophical minds think just like Sparky, they think I'm sitting fat, but what do they know? Sometimes you don't know the true story until you've lived it. I've lived it. And believe me, some of the time the truth ain't pretty.

The next day the phone rang.

I checked the caller ID.

“What's up, Sparky?”

He said, “You in the dayroom?”

“Yeah.”

“Quick, turn them cartoons off and switch over to channel five, that commercial is 'bout to come on!”

“Hold on.”

I picked up the remote and changed to channel 5. The credits for one of the stories were just rolling by.

Mr. Baker said, “Hey!”

I told him, “Just a minute, Mr. Baker, Sparky's been telling me about this commercial for weeks and after I see it we'll go back.”

Mr. Baker said, “Well, it better be a quick one.”

I told Sparky, “I got it.”

“OK, check him out and see if I was lying,” Sparky said. “This brother is going to be my one-way ticket out of Flint.”

The commercial started with a shot of this old woman walking in front of a camera shop on a windy, wintry day. She hit a patch of ice, and before you could blink, she was five feet up in the air. She landed, making a cracking noise, and began moaning. Her left leg was twisted up so bad it looked like part of it had broke off. Next you could see some guy in a big old 'fro peek out from the curtains of the camera store right before his hand stuck a Out of Business sign on the window.

The next shot was of Sparky's “dog,” a brother sitting on the edge of a desk with a shelf full of thick, serious-looking books behind him. I'd seen the suit he was wearing at Sleet-Sterling, it was a Versace with a three-and-a-half-G price tag.

He said, “Tired of them doing something negligent, then laughing in your face when all you ask is to be treated fairly?”

The next scene was of a man working in a factory screwing bolts into something with his face all twisted up like he was constipated. He took his gloves off and began rubbing his wrist. Then a white man in a shirt and tie was standing over his shoulder foaming at the mouth and yelling for the brother to get back at the bolts.

The camera came in close as a tiny tear dripped out of the worker's eye while the boss kept yelling, “You're slowing things down—move! Move! Moooove!”

Sparky's dog, looking as sad and serious as ever, was
back on. The camera moved a little closer to him as he jabbed a finger at us and said, “Tired of them ignoring your pain and putting unbearable, unfair stress on you?”

The next shot showed a woman sitting in a restaurant talking to a man while she ate a bowl of soup. The man dropped his fork, bugged his eyes out of his head and pointed at the woman's spoon. There, kicking away like it was doing the backstroke, was the front end of a roach that must've been the size of a paperback novel. It was hard to tell, though, because where the back half of the roach was supposed to have been you couldn't see nothing but the woman's teeth marks.

The camera moved in closer and closer on the roach while the woman looked like … well, like anyone would look if they just found out they were chewing on a giant cockroach's booty.

Sparky's dog was back on. He said, “Tired of them not giving you the respect you deserve? Tired of those jackasses having the last laugh when it comes down to justice being served? Well, so am I.”

He got up off the desk and crossed his arms and stood like he was Superman. He picked up a long black strap and dangled it from his right hand.

“My name's attorney Dontay Orlando Gaddy and my initials spell ‘D.O.G.’ and you call me and tell me what happened and I promise you I will be on them like an American Staffordshire terrier, which is just a fancy name for a pit bull. And remember, big or small…”

The camera jumped closer to Dontay Orlando Gaddy.

He said, “… I will…”

A drum banged as the camera jerked in closer.

“… sue …”

The drum banged again. Whoever was filming this must've just learned how to use the zoom lens—they were wearing it out.

“… 'em …”

Another boom and Dontay's face took up the whole screen:

“… all!”

The camera pulled back as Dontay Orlando Gaddy slapped the strap he was holding against his desk. It sounded like a roll of thunder.

The next shot was of the camera shop dude in the big old 'fro, the boss in the shirt and tie and some brother in a white jacket and a cook's hat standing together wearing handcuffs. All their pockets had been turned inside out like they'd been jacked and they were scowling with their lips stuck out. Then the commercial showed the old lady with bad balance, the worker with weak wrists and the roach-eating woman standing together counting big rolls of cash while the American flag waved in the wind and a band played “God Bless America.”

An announcer said, “Attorney Dontay Orlando Gaddy is on our side, and remember, big or small, he will sue 'em all! Call 1-800-SUE-EM-ALL for a no-charge consultation! Get everything you deserve!”

The announcer repeated the number four more times.

Sparky was screaming into the phone, “What'd I tell you? Is he bad or what?”

I said, “Yeah, your boy is something else.”

“I told you! I'ma get him on my side, I'ma find me someone to sue!”

“Good luck.”

“All right then, I'll catch you later.”

“Cool. Peace.”

I hung up.

I could tell that Mr. Baker was starting to fiend for a cigarette. His eyes were glued to the television and his hands were bouncing to the same beat as the drum in Dontay Orlando Gaddy's commercial.

He said, “Sue 'em all! Sue 'em all! Sue 'em all!”

Just like that the room was filled with four men all waving their arms and chanting the Dontay Gaddy theme, “Sue 'em all! Sue 'em all! Sue 'em all!” Even Mr. Foster was joining in, trying to get everyone worked up.

I picked up the phone to call Sparky so he could listen to what he'd started but I heard a car pull up into the driveway.

I looked out the window and saw the Sarge and Darnell Dixon getting out of his white-on-white-in-white with white leather, fully loaded, three-month-old Buick Riviera with the personalized license plates that said
HI BABY.

Uh-oh! This was all I needed, for the Sarge to walk in here and find the Crew chanting about taking someone to court. As much trouble as she used to have with lawsuits, she'd kill me for putting ideas in her clients' heads.

I hung up, grabbed the remote and punched the cartoon channel back on.
Scooby-Doo!'s
theme music was playing and I jumped in front of the television and yelled, “Scoo-Bee-Doo! Scoo-Bee-Doo! Scoo-Bee-Doo!”

By the time the Sarge and Darnell Dixon came into the dayroom to see what the ruckus was about I was back in my chair and the Crew was locked in chanting, “Scoo-Bee-Doo! Scoo-Bee-Doo! Scoo-Bee-Doo!”

The Sarge saw the four of them, then looked at me and said, “After you unload the supplies come into my office, looks like it's time we reviewed everyone's medication again.”