The Kid (12 page)

No one says anything to me anymore about dance class. It’s been three months now. Jaime still comes. At first it’s like he’s following me, then it’s like he’s in this too. He found some shit for himself here. I don’t know who we really are. Orphans, I guess, whatever all that means. I’m a regular nigger, I was born in Harlem, Jaime in the Bronx, but here we fucking Africans, everything we are
and
ain’t is cool. I don’t know about Jaime, but me, I’m going to be a dancer.

 

 

BROTHER SAMUEL
is standing in the light that comes in through the window above my bed. I look up at the clock under the exit sign over the door. Three o’clock.

“Get up, J.J. I have some gentlemen here who would like to talk to you,” Brother Samuel says. The blankets have come off my feet, which are touching the cold metal footrail of the bed. I shiver. I don’t know why, but I feel I’m dying, although I don’t know how that feels. My life doesn’t flash before my eyes, but the dream I had last night does.

In the dream I . . . I feel the light from the window in my eyes,
disturbing
me, the light is saying get up, get
up
. Get up for what, I wonder, and peel off the covers very carefully as if to toss or throw them would make a sound like pots and pans falling. I swing my legs out of the bed and my feet onto the cold linoleum floor and rise. Rise and fly down the center aisle past Malik Edwards, Omar Washington, Angel Hernandez, Richard Stein, and Bobby Jackson on one side, and Louie Hernandez, Billy Song, Etheridge Killdeer, Jaime, and Amir Smith on the other side. I fly slowly, majestically, a flying king I am. I fly under the exit sign and through the door. The lights in the hallway are bright as sun, summer, they make me not able to fly no more. In the dream my feet are on the cold linoleum again, but I’m lucky, I turn into a panther. Real graceful and black, making no noise as I creep stealthily down the hall. One two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven steps twelve thirteen fourteen fifteen sixteen steps, I push open the door. Slide up slowly, now I’m a trapeze artist flying through the air? A gymnast twirling down the beam? No? Yes! Beam! I’m a beam of light visiting the dark. A daddy to my boy. His teddy bear has fallen to the floor, I pick it up, sit it gentle next to me at the foot of the bed. I pull the sheets and the blankets out where they’re tucked in at the foot of the bed. I see his little brown feet white on the bottoms like the belly of a fish. I lean down kiss his toes, run my tongue under the arch of his foot, roll the covers back some more, kiss his calves, bite his calf muscle gently. I feel like the king! Rich instead of poor. I am here to give him something. Everything is like soft music, the low notes on the flute.

Then I don’t know what happens. I know I’m hard full of love, a good person, the king here to love him, and he starts to whimper. Whine. It makes me furious, in the dark I see blood red! I slap the shit out of him for being stupid! You know BAP! Like shut up, motherfucker! Then I climb on top of him and fuck him. Fuck him, pushing his little whiny mouth into the pillow, he wants it, I know it, I feel strong like a warrior king, umph, umph, UMPH! Planting my seeds, riding my horse! I throw the covers back over him and slide out the room to the blind light of the hallway. I am not seen in the presence of light, being light I am absorbed and the brightness of things increases and you can see more but you still can’t see God like I am. I float through the door, past the boys, bed by bed, to my bed. Now I lay me down to sleep I pray the Lord my soul to keep Bless us all at St Ailanthus Bless all the children of the world AAHHHHHhhhhMennn. And bless me.

Someone is shaking my shoulder. “Come on, get up, J.J.!” In dreamland there’s always some kinda crazy mistake. It’s not even time to get up! When it’s time to get up is 6:00 a.m. on weekdays, 7:00 on Saturdays, and 8:00 on Sundays; one of the brothers, usually Brother John or Brother Samuel, pushes open the door, throws on the overhead fluorescent lights, and starts ringing the bell DING DONG DING DONG! And we get up one by one all of us. But something is wrong now, the clock says 3:00, and Brother Samuel is saying, “J.J., I have some people here who want to talk to you.”

“Whaa . . . huh . . . say what?” I’m still all sleepy and shit.

“Say get up! That’s what, J.J.!” says this mean voice, then a stick bangs on the metal post at the head of my bed.

“Stop playing games, J.J.,” the voice says. “You heard us—
get up
!”

I open my eyes. Brother Samuel is standing with two men in suits and ties next to my bed. “Does he have a robe?” I don’t hear what Brother Samuel says, but I don’t have a robe. That’s extra, only kids who have family still on the set or have sponsors or Big Brothers and shit get extra.

“Get dressed,” one of the men in suits says. My blood gets chilly. This motherfucker is a cop. I reach in the trunk under my bed, pull out a pair of briefs, snatch my jeans and a T-shirt from a hook on the wall at the head of my bed.

“Got a jacket?” the cop asks.

“Does he have to go downtown, Officer?” Brother Samuel asks.

It’s two cops, one tall skinny don’t say nothing, one short meanlooking. The short one looks at Brother Samuel weird and says, “Downtown? No, Father, the station is around the corner.”

“I’d like to minimize any unnecessary, unnecessary . . . oh, I don’t know . . .” Brother Samuel’s voice trails off.

“We just want to ask him a few questions. Put your shoes on, J.J.”

“Is he under arrest?”

“No, but we can do it like that if you want.”

Brother Samuel doesn’t say anything. I look at the clock, 3:10. That’s two hours fifty minutes before wake-up time!

“May I come with him, Officer?”

“Yeah,” the short cop says. “Be our guest.”

 

 

AT THE POLICE STATION,
the cops walk one on each side of me, they hands on my elbows, not hard or hurting me but serious, like if I do move they’ll kill me.

Behind me Brother Samuel says, “Well, gentlemen, I don’t quite understand what’s going on here. I mean . . . ah, it does seem as if J.J. is . . . ah, I don’t know . . . under arrest or something.”

“We just want to ask him a few questions, Father.”

“Brother,” Brother Samuel corrects him.

“Should I seek legal counsel?” Brother Samuel asks. Why does this big Frankenstein motherfucker who been terrorizing me all these years all of a sudden sound like a pussy and even more confusing, like he’s in my corner?

“Well, that’s up to you, Brother.” The short cop seem like he does all the talking. “We’d like to keep this as simple as possible.” At the door of a room that looks like every room on TV I have ever seen where they slap the shit out of you and accidentally kill you, Brother Samuel rushes up to me. He puts his hand on my shoulder and looks in my eyes. I let him in, notice that his eyes are not really blue the way Brother John’s are but are some kind of deep purple, the color of the sky when the sun’s been gone an hour.

“J.J.” His eyes widen, he squeezes my shoulder. “You must tell the truth, do you hear?”

I nod my head. I know this big-ass freak is telling me to
lie
. Lie my motherfucking ass off. I feel old, real old, and real smart.

No, I went to bed at the same time I always go to bed. What time is that? Nine o’clock. Did you look at the clock? No. Then how do you know it was nine o’clock? ’Cause that’s the time we always go to bed. Did you get up at all during the night? No. Do you usually get up at night to go to the bathroom? Yes, I mean no. What do you mean, J.J.? No, I mean sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t. Did you get up tonight and walk down to Dorm One? No. You got up tonight and walked down to Dorm One, didn’t you, J.J.? No no no no! What are you getting so upset about, J.J.? You touched Richard Jackson, didn’t you? No. Was this the first time you touched him? No, I mean, no, I never touched him. You know what sexual intercourse is, J.J.? Did you have sexual intercourse with Richard Jackson tonight? NO no no I never had sexual intercourse with nobody! I start crying, I’m scared, but my middle name is
no
. Don’t be scared, I hear somebody say. I look up, it’s Brother Bill, but he’s not talking to me. He’s talking to Richie Jackson. Is that who hurt you, Richie? I don’t know. You said—The cop cuts Brother Bill off. He looks at Richie Jackson. Is that who touched you tonight? It was dark, I couldn’t see, Richie says. Get him outta here, the cop snaps like a pit bull. How old are you? he asks me. He just turned thirteen, Brother Samuel says. I didn’t even see him come in the room. He must have come in behind Brother Bill and Richie. Let me take the poor lad home, Officer. This is all some kind of terrible mistake. We run a tight ship at St Ailanthus. I’m sure J.J. didn’t do anything wrong. Alright, let’s call it a night, the cop snaps, then, looking at me, Get him outta here.

I know I’m a good boy. Ask Mrs Washington, ask Brother John. Richie Jackson is a liar. A big liar. If he wasn’t a liar, I’d be in jail. Brother Samuel and I walk down the hall when we get back home. His black skirts go
swish-swish
as we walk past the eyes of the photographs on the wall staring down on me. Brother John is waiting for us at the door of the dorm. The three of us walk to my bed. It’s stripped down, no sheets, no blanket. Just the black and white mattress covered in plastic even though I’m not a bed wetter. On top of the bed is a big brown suitcase, open and empty. Brother Samuel looks at Brother John, then he turns and walks out of the room. It’s still dark outside, but the light from the parking lot is coming in through the cracks in the curtains of the window over my bed. I can hear the breathing of the boys still asleep and the strained silence of the boys not asleep, laying still, trying to hear what the fuck is going on. Which is what I’m wondering myself, what the fuck is going on?

“Pack,” Brother John says.

“Huh?”

“Pack up your things and don’t be all day about it.”

I look at him, but he has turned his back and is facing the window. I pull out my trunk from underneath my bed. I got on my basketball shoes, reach for my loafers, which are right beside my trunk and next to my rubber shower thongs. I put them in the big suitcase. Next I put in my other two pairs of jeans, my sweat pants and NYU sweatshirt, and my Nike jogging suit. I’m trying to put everything in neat. I never knew I had so many socks. Put in my briefs, pajamas. “Get your suit,” Brother John says. I straighten up and walk over to get my suit from where it’s hanging on a hook on the wall near the window, then I reach for my school uniform, jacket, vest, and pants that’s hanging on the hanger behind my suit. We give Mr Lee’s wife our dirty uniform once a week, she give us back a clean one for a dirty one. She talk like Mrs Washington:
J.J., boy! If you get one inch taller, it’s gonna be all over! Ain’t gonna be a uniform in the house’ll fit you.

“Leave it!” Brother John says.

“Huh?”

“You don’t need to take the uniform. Get a move on! We don’t have all day for this nonsense!”

I put my blue suit in with the rest of my clothes and my miniature chess set in a box that opens out to be a chessboard. Mrs Washington gave it to me even though I don’t know how to play chess. I put my calculator that runs on solar energy, red purie boulder marble, and my toy clown Gonza in. Against the wall in my milk crate is all my books. You don’t have to lock books up, nobody steals them. I look at my
Norton Reader, Earth Science for the Intermediate School, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare,
which is loaned to me without me asking from Mrs Washington,
Twentieth Century Art
—

“Just”—Brother John’s voice sound funny now, less black, like, I don’t know—“just take
Hamlet
and your other paperbacks.”

I put
The Call of the Wild, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave. Written by Himself, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Crazy Horse, Black Boy, David Copperfield, Indian Chiefs,
Donald Goines’s
Dopefiend
, and
Hamlet
in my suitcase along with my loose-leaf binder. Brother John hands me the brown leather bomber jacket he got out the donation box for me.

“Do you have anything in the bathroom?”

The long glass shelf under the mirror appears in my head, the little section that’s mine with my name written on a piece of masking tape taped above the glass, with my toothbrush, toothpaste, and Mennen’s underarm deodorant and Vaseline lotion from Mrs Washington,
Don’t walk around all funky and ashy.

“Yeah, I got some stuff.”

“Well, go get it.”

When I push the door open into the hallway, I hear Brother Bill shouting, “How’d he end up here in the first place if he has family willing to take him!”

“Brother John liked him—”

“Brother John
liked
him! Brother John
liked
him! What the hell is that supposed to mean, Brother Samuel?”

“It started out as an emergency placement—”

“This kid is here
illegally
because someone liked him! Are you crazy? Do you know what could happen if this harassment thing gets in the air and they find out the perpetrator is illegally living on the premises because someone liked him? For God’s sake, there is a thing called the law!” Brother Bill is screaming like hysterical.

“Well, he
was
an orphan. Three years ago we had a different—”

“I don’t believe this—”

I open the door and step out into the light and walk down to the bathroom to get my stuff. I don’t believe nothin’, everybody’s a liar. I hate Brother Bill, he cares about everyone else, not me. I get my toothbrush and other things from the bathroom and head back to Dorm Three. I almost bump into Mr Lee, who’s coming through the door too. He looks over his shoulder at me, shakes his head like he’s sleepy, then walks up to Brother John and hands him a manila envelope and a plastic bag. Brother John hands me the envelope.