How It Went Down (12 page)

I wipe down the tables. My head still aches from yesterday.

Noodle comes back early, an hour before the end of my shift. Says he’s checking up on me, but he’s still all on edge. I bring him pie and coffee. Got to be on the house, but if Cory is watching I’ll end up having to put it in out of my tips. I set the plate down.

He picks up my fingers. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

“You okay?”

Nothing is okay. When I close my eyes, even to blink, I see pools of red and white, like a blur that never goes away.

“I’m fine. Just tired.”

“Babe,” he says. “You’re acting weird.”

“We saw someone shot,” I remind him. “It’s not like business as usual.”

Noodle raises a shoulder. “Tariq had it coming,” he mutters. “It is what it is.”

I want to crack his smirk. Tariq died right in front of us. Noodle may not have liked him much, but doesn’t he care at all?

NOODLE

Jennica’s not herself anymore. Ever since Tariq. I try to tell her it’s part of the life, but she gets this closed-up look on her face, so I figure it’s best not to say anything. We can just get high and try to forget about it. That’s part of the life too.

She finishes her shift and gets her purse from the back room.

On the sidewalk, before we get to the car, I take her shoulders in my hands. I know now what it is I’m seeing in her eyes—a thing I’ve forgotten. Because I don’t let myself feel that way anymore.

“It scared you, right?”

“Of course it scared me,” she says. “You weren’t scared?”

“I ain’t scared of nothing.”

“Not even dying? Or being shot?” she whispers. “Everything just ending?”

“Naw.” I shrug. Maybe it’s in me somewhere, but I ain’t gonna try and look for it. I buried it good and deep. Back in juvie, with some big King telling me to kneel, or get cut. Back home, when Pop used to scream about something or other. Down on the street, when guys got cut down in front of me. The first time I cut a guy down. The second. The ones after. Not like I lost count or nothing, but it isn’t so big now. I know I’m going back inside someday. I know I’m gonna get cut down someday too. It’s the life, though. It’s just how it is. I ain’t scared of it, I’m just living it.

“You ain’t got to be scared,” I tell Jennica. “I’m here to look out for you.”

With my arm across her shoulders she seems small. Not like when I look at her across a room.

“Can you take me home?” she says.

“Naw. Brick’s waiting. We’re gonna go for a drive.”

“I don’t want to ride along anymore.”

“Aw, come on, sugar,” I kiss her. “You know I like you with me.”

“I don’t want to go tonight.” She shrugs away. “I don’t want to be out there with them, after the other day.”

I put her in front of me again. “Hey. It’s going to be okay. I promise.”

Her eyes fill with tears. “How can you say that so easy?”

“Don’t be upset.” I hate it when she cries.

“I’m not a fucking light switch,” she snaps. “It upsets me. I’d have to be a pretty cold bitch for it not to.”

I hate it more when she’s angry. Is that a roundabout way of calling me cold? “Why you so hung up on Tariq?” I say. “He was a stupid prick, like I been telling you. You got a thing for him? You got something you want to say to me?” I put out my arms.

“Oh, for God’s sake.” She swipes at her lash line, sweeps away the dam of tears.

“Answer me.” I wrap my hand up in her hair, hold her head back.

“Ow.”

“Answer me!”

“Fuck, that hurts,” she cries. The tears are real now. Flowing. “Let me go.”

“Don’t forget where you belong,” I whisper. “Tariq was nothing. Say it.”

“Tariq was nothing,” she whispers. “I belong with you.”

TYRELL

Good memories of Tariq come easy sometimes. Those thoughts get me through the day, going to school and back, past the block spilling over with vigil flowers, past Rocky’s store and past the steps of the church where tomorrow I have to go in and see T in a coffin.

The good memories are hard enough to carry, because they remind me: T won’t be smiling anymore.

We won’t be laughing together anymore.

We won’t be hanging together anymore.

T and I were friends forever. A lot of history. A lot of good times, and in our case, just as many bad times. Those memories come in the middle of the night, when I’m trying to sleep.

I sit on the kitchen floor, feeling the hum of the refrigerator on my back and eat six vanilla puddings, sucking them straight out of the containers, scraping the opaque plastic with my fingers to get every last drop.

Then I eat the snack-size bags of chips: Doritos, Fritos, Baked Lays.

Then the string cheese.

My mom packs these foods in brown bags for my dad to take to work for lunch. He’ll be angry tomorrow, when there’s nothing for him to eat. But it’s okay. He’s always angry with me.

Tariq knew why. He knew, because I told him. The thing I never told anyone else.

T was the only one who knew the truth about how I broke my wrist in seventh grade.

The only one who knew why my dad really hates me.

The truth hits me hard, right along with the sugar rush.

There’s no one alive who knows these things about me.

DAY
FIVE

9.
ASHES TO ASHES

TOM ARLEN

First thing when I wake up, I poke around online to catch the news. I do it quietly, still in my bedroom with the door shut. The rest of the house is a news-free zone.

Jack’s not interested in the coverage. He’s sure of what he saw, what he did.

I want to be so sure. Every time I get a chance, I sneak a peek. He’s not awake yet, so I hustle downstairs and fetch the paper off the front porch.

I can’t deny, I’m hooked on the story. It’s the closest I’ve ever come to having a foot in something important. It’s fascinating, to see the incident morph and fester.

The street is lined with news trucks. Local news, national news, all the major networks. Parked vans with big antennae mounted on top, stretching around the corner toward the church where the funeral will be held this afternoon.

Tariq Johnson will be buried today, but his death isn’t over. I doubt it will feel over even tomorrow. Look at what’s happening around town. A photo montage of angry protestors with placards outside police headquarters. Another crowd gathered on the steps of city hall. They’re even clustered outside Jack’s house in one image, which backs up what he’s been saying. Not that I ever doubted him.

But as I scroll through the pages, I suddenly feel less certain. When Underhill bands together like this, I should be a part of it. It’s my neighborhood, and I’ve been here long enough to know that guys like Tariq Johnson don’t always get a fair shake.

I don’t think Jack was wrong, or I wouldn’t have him in my house. But if I hadn’t been there, if I hadn’t seen, I’d surely be marching right along with them.

JENNICA

I enter the beauty salon wearing really big sunglasses, like one of those women on TV who’s just been given a black eye by her husband. I guess I get it now, the urge to hide yourself after something strange and hurtful happens.

“Hi,” says one of the stylists as I walk in the door. She’s beautiful and large, and though she looks only vaguely familiar, for some reason I want very badly to hug her. “What can I do for you?”

“Just a trim, and style.”

“Have a seat.” She lifts herself out of the chair where I’m to sit, where she was waiting for a customer, I guess. For me.

“Thanks.” The TV is on, some talk show. I’m relieved. I don’t want to see the same picture of Tariq. I’m stuck enough with the picture in my head.

“I’m Kimberly.”

“Jennica.”

“Nice to meet you.” She combs my hair with quick, smooth strokes.

“Ow.” My neck is still sore from where Noodle jerked my head last night.

“You okay?” Kimberly says.

“Yeah.” I don’t think Noodle knew he hurt me. I know he didn’t mean to. He loves me.

Kimberly gets out the scissors and starts trimming my ends. Just the slightest bit. Swiftly. She does a good job.

Usually my auntie cuts my hair, at home. I can’t remember the last time I was in a salon, if ever. Maybe when I was little. Auntie Anjelica does a pretty nice job, and my hair is good enough to not need much work. I always just wash it myself. So I can’t help the tears that leak out as Kimberly lays me back in the neck cradle and massages my head under the gentle flow of water. It feels amazing.

I don’t really have the money to pay for this haircut. Even with my new hundred dollars, I really should use it for something more practical. New work shoes, some savings, or a little something extra to help my auntie with rent. I’m desperate is all. I keep hoping something is going to lift me out of this feeling. That something will happen and I can start breathing again.

KIMBERLY

“I want to look good at Tariq’s funeral,” Jennica says as I’m washing her hair. “That’s so weird, right?”

“It’s not,” I can honestly tell her. “A lot of people do that.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. There’s nothing wrong with dressing for an occasion. Even a sad one.”

“I guess that makes me feel better,” she says, in a voice that doesn’t seem true to that.

“I knew Tariq, too. He wasn’t my favorite person.” I don’t know why I’m admitting this to her, of all people.

“I did CPR on him,” she whispers. “It didn’t work.”

“You were there?”

“Uh-huh.” Tears flow from her eyes, mingling with the spray of my shower hose.

“That’s intense.”

“I can’t deal with it,” she says. “I keep seeing it.”

What do I do with that? “Just relax,” I tell her. “Try to relax.” I massage creamy shampoo into her hair.

“That feels good.”

“You have really pretty hair.”

“Thanks.”

Over her head, I look at myself in the mirror. I wouldn’t have gone to the funeral, but now I’ll be there, helping out Reverend Sloan. Al.

I’ll probably do my hair up nicely, too.

NOODLE

I don’t know what you’re supposed to wear to this kind of thing. Seems only right to show a bit of respect at a funeral, maybe a step up from what I would wear down the street.

I’ve got a dark suit. Like I wore when my Pops got bit, or when my cousin came home from Iraq, messed up so bad they couldn’t even open the casket.

I think about the dark suit, but no. I can’t put that shit on. Not for Tariq.

It hangs at the back of my closet. All the way back, where I don’t have to look at it. I don’t want to think about the day it comes up useful again.

TINA

I am a big girl

I can stay home alone.

“No,” Mommy says. “I want you close to me.”

Too many people now, when we go outside.

“I know,” Mommy says. “But it’s just for a little while.”

“Let’s give away all the other people,” I say, “and get Tariq back.”

It’s a good idea, but it makes Mommy cry.

VERNESHA

If it wasn’t happening to me, I would be all over this. Mom and I would be glued to the TV, waiting for the mother of the poor slain boy to emerge. What would she say? Would she cry? Would she rail against the wrongness, would she call out for blood, or would she rise to the level of forgiveness, plead for the mercy of God?

It’s strange, thinking this. Like stepping outside of myself.

My son wasn’t perfect, but he was mine. The world isn’t perfect, but he should still be in it.

I wish I could hate Jack Franklin. I know how it feels to hate—hatred would be more bearable than this sorrow. Anger would be more bearable than this sorrow.

If it wasn’t happening to me, I’d be home, eating chips or something straight out of the bag, and hating Jack Franklin. Relishing how much I hated him, from afar, for putting out his hands and ending that poor black boy’s life.

If it wasn’t happening to me …

But it is. I have to remind myself. It
is
happening to me.

REVEREND SLOAN

The reporters shout questions. They swirl. A breeze like the devil around us.

“Vanessa! Vanessa!” They call out.

Vernesha’s blank gaze is interrupted by a series of blinks. “Vernesha,” she says automatically, as if she’s been correcting people’s pronunciation of her name all her life. She probably has. Cameras and mikes hover around us like flies. She stands stiffly, facing the flashes and the jostling cacophony of noise.

They clamor. “Vernesha! Vernesha!”

Questions like popcorn. Her gaze like ice.

“Give her some space,” I say, arcing my arm in front of her like a shield as we make our way to the church steps. Media vultures. She’s going to speak, I just want to get her in position.

Vernesha reaches up and clutches my protective hand. Her small fingers fold around my thumb. They film it. A mother’s desperate touch. I wonder what we will all think, seeing it on giant flat screens. Will it make people feel Tariq’s death a little harder? Will it be the tug on their heartstrings that makes it all too much, that makes them turn to a convenient comedy to take their minds off the harsh corners of the world?

Black mesh microphones jam into our faces.

Vernesha leans into them. “Thank you for coming,” she says. She releases my thumb, so I step back, far enough to give her space to speak, but not so far that I’m out of frame.

“It’s becoming clear to me that Tariq’s murder is no longer only a private tragedy for me and my family; it’s a public one, and suddenly the whole world is watching our little corner of Underhill. I wish it hadn’t taken my son’s death to wake you to the reality of violence in black communities,” she says. “I’ve been in this church plenty of times for other mothers’ sons. They and I all wish you’d gotten here sooner.”

I’m blown away. Inspired.

REDEEMA

Them Kings is here. Rows and rows of them. Them cameras, too. Rows and rows of them.