How It Went Down (7 page)

Reverend Sloan came down from Washington, it looks like. There he is, on the TV, standing right down the block on Peach Street, in the middle of this vigil. Poaching some limelight off a poor dead black boy, and the hand of the white man who put him there. The nerve of some people. Politicians especially. Everything is about scoring polling points, even if the shots are cheap.

I’m about to turn it off and go outside to see it for myself, but what’s Sloan talking about now?

What the hell is this, about a Snickers bar being mistaken for a gun? I saw that gun plain as day. And it was pointed right at Jack Franklin.

JUNIOR

Guys on my cell block are all worked up over some shooting what happened down in Underhill. I try to keep to myself when there’s hoopla, but some of them know it’s my hood, so they’re coming by to find out my opinion.

I just tell them I don’t know. Stop short of telling them I don’t care, because they’re pretty upset. Best I can tell, some brother got smoked by some whitey, who’s gonna walk. So what else is new?

“Man, that’s your hood,” the guys say. “That’s your colors. Whatta you gotta say about it?”

I don’t care about much of anything to do with where I used to call home. Once a King, always a King, sure. I carry that, but this is home now. For life. Can’t waste time thinking about it any other way.

It’s interesting, though, because not that much from outside gets these guys riled up. Someone’s always getting shot somewhere. What makes this one so different? As if we don’t have enough problems with factions on the inside, we need to worry about what’s happening on the street?

I go out and look at the TV. It’s high in a box, behind mesh and wire in the corner of the rec room.

Great. It’s that preacher, Sloan.

That blowhard thinks he’s all that, because he threw a Molotov cocktail once, back in the nineties in some kind of race riot. Turned his life around after. Around to what? Wearing a nice suit and sucking up to reporters? I wear a suit too. I got people to suck up to.

I nod to one of the guards.

“Hey, Junior,” he says. “What do you think about all this?”

On the outside, I never woulda thought of myself as the kind of guy who everybody wants an opinion from. I always just kinda did what other people were doing.

I don’t care what’s going down outside. Why should I weigh in?

Except … that’s Tariq. That’s Tariq Johnson.

Now I’m pulling up a chair.

STEVE CONNERS

Will comes home forty-five minutes late, carrying a wilted white carnation. He slides in the door, real quiet-like. Sees me, and jumps about a mile.

Obviously, he wasn’t expecting me to be sitting right there in the foyer, waiting.

“You’re pretty late. Where have you been?” I ask him. Keep it conversational. I don’t see it as my place to discipline my stepson. And I’ve never had cause to. Will’s a pretty good kid. Exceptionally good, I’d say, based on the guys I used to know at his age and the things I see on TV. Will’s the kind of kid I was, always keeping his nose clean. Bright future ahead of him.

“Where’s Mom?” he says, instead of answering.

His mother isn’t home yet, because of a work emergency. Which is lucky, I suppose, because she’d be beside herself. The Tariq Johnson shooting has really gotten under her skin.

She called me at the office this afternoon, crying. She’d seen the mother on TV, being ushered out of the city mortuary where she’d gone to make arrangements for the burial of her son. I saw that coverage. The mother made no comments to the media, but an uncle had spoken: “
Tariq was a good student and an upstanding citizen. He was unaffiliated with any street gang, and we are confident he was unarmed and innocent of the charges being leveled against him. Jack Franklin shot an innocent child.
”

“Your mom’s stuck at work,” I tell Will. His eyes brighten a little. He knows he lucked out. “Where were you?”

He tucks the carnation behind his back, like a guilty secret. “Nowhere.”

Last place I saw carnations? On TV. Spread in a blurry mountain across the face of the makeshift shrine at Tariq Johnson’s murder site.

“Have you been down to Underhill?” I ask, though it seems inconceivable. It’s all the way across town. He’d have had to ride the bus for an hour.

“Don’t tell my mom,” he says. “You don’t have to tell her I was late. Please.”

“You shouldn’t be going down there.” My voice is harsh enough to make him flinch. “It’s dangerous. Especially at night.”

“Not for me,” Will says. “I’m from there.”

“So was the Johnson boy,” I retort. “It’s too dangerous.” It’s not my place to scold or discipline him. But the angry words keep coming. “What were you thinking? You stay away from there, you hear me?” The shaky fear that overtakes me makes no sense.

“I wanted to pay my respects,” he shouts. “Nothing wrong with that. Those are my friends.”

I take a breath. “Did you know the Johnson boy?” It’s hard to realize, but it’s possible. Will grew up in Underhill. They could have been friends, long ago. But Will should be putting that past behind him. He’s not stuck in a bad part of town any more. I’m giving him every opportunity he could ever imagine.

“I ain’t have to know him to know him,” Will says.

He uses that word on purpose, knowing it rubs me the wrong way. “Use your language properly,” I remind him. “You’re better than that.”

“I ain’t no better than Tariq,” he says, storming past me. “And neither are you.”

REVEREND ALABASTER SLOAN

After all the clamor at the vigil—the clicking of cameras, the flashes of light, the shouted questions—the hotel room is starkly quiet. Always a profound relief. The door whooshes shut behind me, DO NOT DISTURB. I drop to my knees, beg the forgiveness of the most high God.

I prayed for this.

I prayed for something to happen.

Politically, this can only help me, no matter which way anything goes. I couldn’t have dreamed up a scenario more perfect. This terrible ordeal answers my prayers.

It was easy, sitting in my office in Washington, to think of Tariq Johnson as a statistic. To think of his story as political fodder, and I’m ashamed of that to begin with, but when I stand down here, and hold his grandmother’s hand, the world inverts. When I join in the singing, listen to the crying. When people reach out to me to lead, it is no longer a story on paper. I can taste the tears behind every sound bite. I fall under the cloak of grief, as well. It is real to me now.

Who have I become, Lord, that I can find distance enough to pray for such tragedy?

I’ve been faulty.

I have learned my lesson.

Lord Jesus, I have learned my lesson.

SAMMY

The vigil is never gonna end, I think. Two blocks away, and I can hear the goddamn singing. Dumb-ass people. There’s no cause for a lullaby. Tariq’s already asleep.

The whole neighborhood’s quieter than usual. This street, Onerfin Avenue, is the line between between our territory and the start of Stinger turf. On our side of the O, we deal weed. On their side, you can get your coke. If you’re into that, which plenty of people are.

Onerfin’s usually humming, even late. On a good night, we’d be talking fifteen, twenty sales by now. I’ve turned over three packs of product so far, and that’s it.

Car-radio music thumps from about a block away. I live through a couple tense seconds before it turns the corner and I know if it’s Kings or Stingers rolling through. It’s them. On their own side, at least.

The O is a four-lane road, plus parking on both sides, which leaves a good amount of space between the Stingers and us, but we can see each other across the way.

On our side we run what we call a hydrant roll. I’m the money man, first stop. Someone drives up in their car, pulls to the hydrant and lowers the window. They tell me what they want, pay me, and I walkie-talkie it to the guy at the next hydrant, who supplies the product. Car pulls down there for pickup. It’s a lot of responsibility. I gotta be able to judge if someone might be a cop, and be able to refuse the sale. I gotta know all the prices cold, and do the math right. I’m accountable for all the cash of an evening. That’s why I carry a piece. If someone tries to roll me, or my product man, I’ll be all over it.

I got my piece in my pocket now. Keeping watch, as usual, on the line. It’s a different kind of vigil. One that ain’t gonna end when people start to forget about Tariq.

Not me, though. I won’t forget. We go too far back. T’s got fingers in my brain, gripping tight. Death grip, I guess. Too tight to ever let go.

We grew up together. We were tight like a knot in an old rope, me and Junior, Tyrell and Tariq. Four musketeers. Nothing beats that way-back history. Not even the Kings. I woulda lay down for T way before I would for Brick or any of those guys.

I let T down, though. I saw Jack Franklin coming. Saw his gun, and didn’t move fast enough. Didn’t get the gun in my hand in time. I coulda shot him dead. Coulda stopped the whole thing.

How come I froze, when it counted? I ain’t froze now. I’m steamed.

My blood heats easy tonight, each time the Stingers roll by. I wish Jack Franklin was a friggin’ yellow jacket. If they had killed Tariq, I could do anything I want, as retribution. But there’s no one to lash out at. If I step off my sidewalk and pull my piece, yeah it’ll feel good, but it’ll be war. A big mess, and T wasn’t about that.

I pull the piece into my hand anyway. Look upon its gleaming black skin. I guess I should get some polish for it. Some nice new bullets. Or maybe trade it in for a long gun. A rifle. Something with a scope. I’m in the mood to do a little hunting.

The guy, Jack Franklin—the cops just let him go. He’s out there somewhere. Probably thinks he’s untouchable.

DAY
THREE

6.
SNICKERS

EDWIN “ROCKY” FRY

By dawn, all that’s left of the vigil is a pile of flowers, some wrapped in bundles, some tossed alone. Their soft scent covers the hard truth of what has happened here.

I hurry past, skirting the sprawling mound. Wind rustles the flowers’ plastic wrapping. The strangest thing is knowing I wrapped many of those myself, right in my store a few days ago. Last night I sold out of carnation and wildflower bundles well before dark. I had to place a special order to replace them.

I sell these things, yet I almost never know where they end up. When a young man buys a five-dollar bouquet, is it for his girlfriend, a sick friend, his mother? It’s rarely worth my energy to wonder.

Bales of newspapers await me. As I lay them out on the racks, I peel the top one off each stack. It’s my morning routine, yet today it carries more weight than ever before. I start the coffee machines, then settle on my stool behind the counter to read.

REV. SLOAN ARRIVES IN UNDERHILL: CANDLELIGHT VIGIL HONORS MURDERED TEEN

Guilt settles over my shoulders. The story of Tariq’s death unfolds and unfolds, and with each new crease I can see my place in it.

Someone told the cops how I was yelling after Tariq. “
Stop thief
,” they thought I was saying.

That wasn’t it at all.

POLICE EVIDENCE LOG CONFIRMS: JOHNSON WAS UNARMED

I didn’t have to go out there. I could’ve stayed inside, minding my business. Tariq’s momma would’ve sent him back sooner or later.

I always try to mind my own business. People come in, they buy what they want. They pay, I make change. It’s very straightforward. Most people who bust out the door without waiting for change, I keep it. Their loss, right? I’ll set it aside for the day in case they come back, sure—beyond that it’s not my problem. But I knew Tariq; he’s been coming into my store since he was a kid. His momma’s good people. So I went after him. I was just trying to help.

A NEW CITIZEN POLICE FORCE?: EYEWITNESSES RECOUNT COURAGEOUS ACTION BY ARMED CITIZEN

Johnson had a gun
, this article insists. Another declares:
Actually, it was a Snickers bar.

Maybe he did have a gun, I just didn’t see it. Maybe that’s so. I can’t testify to it, but it’s what I want to believe. Better that than the alternative. An unimaginable mistake over some candy Tariq bought here, from me.

BRICK

Nowadays it’s all over the TV, how Tariq didn’t even have a gun.

Bullshit. I was there. I saw it go down. I saw the gun in Tariq’s hand. I remember it clear as day.

It was black. A .57 Magnum. Firepower like that’s no kind of a joke. I saw it. I saw it and I knew: T was finally coming around.

Where’s the gun now, they’re all asking. Talking about a Snickers bar, instead. Ain’t no one gonna confuse a Snickers bar for a .57 Magnum. I wouldn’t, anyway. I know a gun when I see one.

Where’s the gun now? I’ll tell you where. One of my boys musta picked it up and pocketed it. That’s a nice piece. You don’t let shit like that go to waste in some evidence locker. Hell no.

If I’d been the closest to Tariq, I’d have pocketed it. For sure. One of my boys musta got it, Sammy or Noodle or … I don’t know. When I figure out who, he’s gonna have to give it to me. And then I’m gonna cut him, for not giving it over to me right away.

VERNESHA

The tiny children line up to get on the school bus. They are barely as tall as the tires. Their backpacks hang off them like potato sacks, all lumpy and weird and jouncing on the backs of their knees.

Tariq was once small like that. He went off to school. I sent him out into the big bad world alone.

I didn’t worry enough.

That was my job; to worry, and to keep him safe. But Tariq was always so strong, and so easy.

I worry plenty about Tina. Half a dozen different doctors, all with a different story. Every test costs money and in the end I’m not looking for a cure—just a way to understand what’s going on in her head. Mom’s always saying,
some people are just simple. That baby’s gonna be fine.