Pipe Dream (7 page)

“When we finished tying him up, Frank pulled a gun out of his waistband and gave it to Leroy. Then he told Leroy to kill the guy. I still remember the way he said it: ‘Do it for Porkchop, ’cause Porkchop can’t do it for hisself.’

“Leroy took the gun, cocked the hammer, and held it tightly in his right hand, aiming right at the boy’s chest. Then Frank made everyone leave the room. The only ones who stayed were me and Leroy. My job was going to be to help drag the body to the window and throw it into the alley. And I would’ve done it, too, without the slightest reservation. But just as I was trying to brace myself for the blast, something strange happened. Leroy uncocked the hammer, handed Frank the gun, and told him he wasn’t going to do it.

“I couldn’t believe it. This little thirteen-year-old boy stood there and told Frank, knowing the consequences of what he was saying, that he could never just stand there and kill someone who wasn’t trying to kill him. Leroy stood there and gave up what could have been his life, because Frank could have shot him right there for disobeying an order. He stood there and he did that because, even then, Leroy would do anything except take someone’s life for nothing. He did it because he had something that I hadn’t discovered in myself yet—the courage to stand up for what he believed in.

“Frank let Leroy walk out of there that day. But Leroy could never walk with his head up in the neighborhood again. Frank made him leave the gang the same way he came in; by going through the roo. We lined up in this little open space out in Fairmount Park. And then we made Leroy come through. Only it wasn’t just about fists and feet that time. Oh no, when he came through that time, he wasn’t supposed to come out alive. And he almost didn’t. We beat that boy so bad that when we were finished, we ran away, thinking he was going to die in that lot. But he didn’t. He got up and he walked away. And every time we saw him after that, we beat him down again.

“After a while, it was like he was immune to it. He would stand there and take it, day after day, time after time, like it didn’t even hurt him anymore. But when you looked at him real close, you could see that he wasn’t the same. The light in his eyes—the one he’d use to see into your soul—it died one day. And when the light died, he died. I guess he couldn’t go on knowing that he didn’t belong anymore. I guess it became too tempting to give up on life. So that’s what he did.

“He started shooting heroin, and even though his body grew, you could see that his spirit was shrinking. He was withering away to nothing. The man he became was nowhere near the boy he had been. And everyone could see it. We started seeing him sitting on people’s steps nodding, or walking up the street scratching the side of his face. His hands were as big as baseball mitts and his body started to look bloated. It got to the point where we didn’t even bother him anymore. We just stood by and watched him killing himself.

“After I moved out of the neighborhood, I got into the church, went to school. I guess Leroy kept going in the opposite direction. When cocaine came out, he started using that. And I guess when crack came out, that was the next logical thing for him to do. Because when you’re born to be a leader, and someone snatches all that away from you, sometimes you end up thinking that you don’t have anything left to live for.”

John shook his head sadly. Then he looked over at Ramirez.

“That’s why I know Leroy couldn’t have killed anybody,” he said earnestly. “Because I know that the man cared too much about life to take it, even if it meant giving up his own.”

When Ramirez and Hillman left the house and headed back to the crime scene, they weren’t any closer to finding Leroy. But Leroy had become more than just words on a printout. He had become real to them. And Ramirez hated that.

He didn’t want to know anything about a suspect’s past that he couldn’t read on a rap sheet. He saved his compassion for his family, for other cops, for people whose lives intersected with his own. But never for suspects. It was easier that way. He didn’t have to feel.

Hillman had seen a thousand cops like that. Their every action was about detachment. But Hillman was going to make sure that Ramirez looked below the surface. He knew that there was more to North Philly than desolation. The people in the streets he patrolled were his family. Not other cops. Not his ex-wife. Not even his children. Perhaps that was why his life was in a shambles. He cared too much.

“What are you thinking so hard about, Reds?” Ramirez said.

Hillman started to tell the truth: that he was wondering how it felt to be detached, like Ramirez. But he just steered the conversation back around to the subject at hand.

“I was thinking about Leroy,” Hillman said.

“What about him?”

“You heard what the man said. Leroy doesn’t shoot people.”

“Yeah, I heard him. But people change. Twenty years is a long time.”

“Maybe, but doesn’t this whole thing just seem a little odd to you?”

“Does what seem odd?”

“The commissioner and the captain wanting to be so close to the investigation. Focusing on one or two suspects without any real evidence.”

“I do what I’m told, Reds,” Ramirez said. “When the commissioner tells me to find somebody, I do it. I don’t ask why. I get less grief that way.”

The radio crackled to life. “Dan 25, meet two complainants at Northwest Detectives in reference to a carjacking at Roberts and Wayne Avenue. Please expedite. It may be related to the founded shooting on Park Avenue.”

“Dan 25 received,” Ramirez said, looking over at Hillman. “Hold me out on the scene at Park Avenue. Dan 50 will meet the complainants at Northwest.”

“Okay, Dan 25.”

Hillman smiled to himself and looked down at his lap. “You sure you want to send an old man to check that out?”

“Contact me if it turns out to be a solid lead,” Ramirez said, ignoring Hillman’s question as he got out of the car and walked back over to the house on Park Avenue.

Hillman was almost beginning to like Ramirez. He reminded Hillman of himself as a young detective. But as he shook his head and smiled at the young lieutenant’s cocky attitude, Hillman couldn’t help wondering about Leroy.

If he knew that he was wanted, he could probably elude the police for days without ever leaving the neighborhood.

But Hillman knew all too well that Leroy could never escape from his real enemy—himself. And that, more than anything, would be his weakness. That is, unless he had a lot of help.

Chapter 7

C
larisse looked at Black like he was crazy.

It wasn’t as if he had asked her to kill herself or anything. But they needed her, and he didn’t think the request was all that unreasonable.

“You want me to do what?” Clarisse asked in disbelief.

“I want you to let us hold your car,” Black said. “And maybe some of your clothes, so we can make it out of the city.”

Leroy and Pookie, fully dressed now, stood next to them in the dining room and listened, knowing they could only make matters worse if they interfered.

“Well, y’all might as well kill me now,” Clarisse said. “Because there is no way I’m letting you and him and this bitch go anywhere in my new car.”

“I got your bitch,” Pookie said.

“Shut up, Pookie,” Leroy said, and she immediately fell silent.

“Clarisse,” Black said, pausing for a moment. “The only way we can get out of here is in a car. And we can only do that while it’s still dark. Now, I know you think we killers, or whatever you think. But I ain’t kill nobody, and neither did Leroy. Five-o ain’t tryin’ to hear that, though. You heard what they said, right? Two black males wanted for a shooting and an assault on a police officer.

“Assault on a police officer,” he repeated, emphasizing each word. “You know what that mean to a cop? That mean shoot a nigger now, ask questions later. If we walk out that door, we won’t live five minutes and you know it.”

Clarisse looked at him hard and said, “So what.”

“Oh, so what we did tonight ain’t mean nothin’ to you?”

“Nigger, please. You know just like I know that it didn’t mean anything. And even if it did, you don’t have a job or a place to live. Plus you’re smoking. What can you do for me, Everett, or Black, or whatever your name is? So why don’t you do me, and you, and all of us, a favor. Save the drama for your mama, ’cause I ain’t tryin’ to hear that shit.”

“That’s what they teach y’all in nursing school?” Black said. “How to cuss people out?”

“That’s what they teach you in real life, Everett. How to survive.”

“So what I got to do to get you to help us?”

“Nothing,” she said. “Because I’m not going to help you.”

“Look. Don’t even let us hold the car. Just give us some coats and hats to put on over our clothes and drive us somewhere—anywhere. You can drop us off and drive yourself back home.”

“You’re going to ride around wearing women’s coats and hats?” she said, stifling a grin.

“That’s right. Not unless you got a better idea.”

“And what about her?” she said, nodding toward Pookie.

“They ain’t lookin’ for her.”

“They’re not looking for her
yet,
” she said.

“They lookin’ for two guys walkin’. Not four sisters in a ride. How they gon’ recognize us if we shave and take showers and put on some of your clothes?”

“They probably wouldn’t. Too bad I’m not going to let you shave and take showers and put on some of my clothes.”

“I’ll pay you,” Leroy said.

“This isn’t about money,” Clarisse said, folding her arms and turning her head.

“Clarisse,” Black said. “If we was killers you woulda been slumped by now. We woulda just took whatever we needed and left you up in here dead.

“Now, I like you. If things was just a little bit different, I could probably love you. But this here is life or death. And if you think I’m lettin’ you stop me from gettin’ outta here ’cause you don’t wanna be involved, you wrong.”

“No, Everett,” she said. “You’re wrong. I’m not involved. I’ve never been involved. I’ll never be involved. I’m not the one who—”

“Shut up!” Black said, raising his voice for the first time. “You are involved. So stop tryin’ to act like you so far above all this, ’cause you ain’t. You smokin’ just like I’m smokin’. And you want some more dope just like I want some more dope. So stop frontin’ like you so shocked, ’cause you ain’t no better than nobody in here. Now, take the money, girl, and don’t make me do nothin’ I don’t wanna do. ’Cause I’ll take your car, lock you in the trunk, and leave yo’ ass out the airport till the dogs catch the scent.”

For a moment, there was near silence. The only sound in the room was the chatter of the radio and the hiss of Black’s breathing. Everyone else, it seemed, was holding their breath. No one blinked, or shifted position, or spoke. Nothing, in fact, moved—until Pookie laughed.

Clarisse reacted before anyone could stop her. By the time Black looked up, her fist was flying past him in a blur, and Pookie’s feet were leaving the floor. When he looked again, Pookie had banged into the far wall and was sliding down, her eyeballs rolled back in the sockets like marbles.

She crumpled to the floor in a heap, and Leroy rushed over to help her.

“How much money are you talking about?” Clarisse said, ignoring Pookie while she rubbed her knuckles and breathed heavily.

“Huh?” Leroy said, looking up from Pookie. “Oh, three hundred.”

“Six hundred,” she said.

“What?” Leroy said, acting as if she had asked for his right arm.

“I’ll give her the other three,” Black said. “Let’s just get outta here.”

“All right,” Leroy said, looking at Pookie with glazed eyes.

“The shower’s upstairs,” Clarisse said. “There are new razors and toothbrushes in the bathroom cabinet, and some men’s clothes in the closet in the master bedroom. They might be too big for you and Leroy, but you’ll be wearing coats, so I guess it won’t matter.”

“What you doin’ with men’s clothes?” Black said.

“None of your business. And wake that bitch up. I don’t allow any sleeping in here.”

Leroy splashed water in Pookie’s face while Black went upstairs to shower, stripping off his clothes as he climbed the stairs and hoping that Clarisse and Pookie could stop themselves from killing each other for the next five minutes or so.

“Throw your clothes in the trash can up there!” Clarisse yelled up the steps.

Black didn’t respond. He was too busy hiding his thousand dollars between some towels and rummaging through the bathroom cabinet for a toothbrush. Finding one, he unwrapped it and hastily squirted toothpaste across its bristles before stepping into the shower.

“Everett?” Clarisse said, and he ignored her again as he turned on the water, watching the steam rise slowly against the glass shower doors as he scrubbed the toothbrush feverishly against his teeth.

Black could hear Leroy talking, and then the sound of someone coming upstairs, but it sounded like it was only one person, so he knew it wasn’t five-o. Not that he cared. This was a shower, and nothing was going to stop him from getting it, because showers were special, particularly since he had begun living in the street.

Most of the time, he would just go into a McDonald’s bathroom and wash up in the sink. Other times, he would spend the night at Ridge Avenue Shelter and shower there, or he’d go to 802—the place for the homeless on Broad Street—and sign the shower list. But a real shower in a real home? Black hadn’t had one of those since his family had stopped letting him in the house. Maybe that’s why he didn’t hear Clarisse come in and slide the shower door back.

“Everett,” she said, her mouth almost next to his ear.

Startled, he jumped and turned around to see her naked body draped in a cloud of steam.

“Don’t be sneakin’ up on me, Clarisse.”

“How else would I get to see you in the shower?” she said, moving closer and stroking him gently as the water dripped down between them.

“Clarisse, we ain’t got time for this.”

“I know. I just wanted to ask you something.”

“What?”

“I wanted to ask you if you meant what you said about loving me if things were different. I mean, how do you know you don’t love me now?”

“How you know I ain’t love you the first time I saw you? When you walked in Miss Shaw class in sixth grade wearin’ that yellow sundress and those black Mary Janes.”

She tried to respond, but Black put his fingers to her lips and kissed her. Then he lathered his washcloth and bathed her. When he finished, he quickly washed himself and stepped out of the shower.

“I gotta shave. Go get Pookie and Leroy and tell them to get in the shower. Then we can find us something nice to put on.”

“How about a nice yellow sundress?” she said, smiling flirtatiously.

“Stop playin’. You got two sets of men’s clothes in the closet?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Shoes, too?”

“Yup.”

“I guess we probably need some hats and sunglasses, too,” Black said as an afterthought. “You got men’s coats, too?”

“One. But I’ve got a trench coat that looks like it could belong to a man or a woman.”

“We probably be better off wearin’ all women’s clothes anyway,” he said. “Then they really won’t recognize us.”

“You might be right. I have a blue rayon skirt set that is definitely you, honey.”

Clarisse chuckled as she walked out of the bathroom wrapped in a terry-cloth robe. When she went downstairs, though, the laughing stopped. Pookie was still unconscious—and going into convulsions.

“Oh my God,” Clarisse said quietly. “Oh my God!” she said again, almost screaming.

Because the row house on one side of her home had been demolished, Clarisse only had one set of next-door neighbors. The Scotts, an elderly couple who had known Clarisse’s parents, had watched Clarisse grow from a skinny little girl to a beautiful young woman, so they knew her better than anyone in the world. And since her parents’ death in a car accident ten years before, the Scotts had tried to fill the void for her, gladly becoming more like family than neighbors.

They had taken on the role of surrogate grandparents. They had watched Clarisse graduate from high school, go on to nursing school, and struggle to become a registered nurse. They had encouraged her as she built a career and a life on the tail end of a tragedy that would have destroyed a lesser young woman. They had watched her socialize, and date, and laugh and cry. And now, they thought, they were watching her kill herself.

She was losing weight, disappearing before their very eyes. Her hours were becoming erratic, even for a nurse. She was speaking to them less and less. Truth be told, she was starting to avoid them. Even so, they convinced themselves that her strange behavior was due to the stress of a demanding nursing career. And for a while, that explanation worked for them. But when they noticed the young man who had started to visit her from time to time—the one they’d seen coming out of the drug house at Broad and Pike—they knew it was something more than stress.

But knowing Clarisse’s problem and approaching her about it were two different things. They wanted to help her. They just didn’t know how to begin. So, like so many families held captive by their loved ones’ addictions, they ended up stuck between their desire to be there for Clarisse and their desire to distance themselves from the violence and depravity that had invaded their neighborhood along with crack.

It was only after much contemplation that they decided there was nothing they could do for Clarisse except to continue to pray for her and leave it in the hands of the Lord. That decision, they hoped, would allow them to sleep easier. And it did, until that night.

“Did you hear that?” Eldridge Scott turned over and asked his wife, Mildred.

“Hear what?” she said from beneath the covers.

“It sounded like a man said, ‘Shut up!’ real loud like.”

“Eldridge, you know them boys always walking ’round here talkin’ loud. Now, go to sleep.”

“It sounded like it was next door,” he said, reaching over and turning on the bedside lamp.

They both listened.

“You sure it was next door?” Mildred asked.

“Well, you know she be havin’ that boy over there smokin’ that stuff.”

“You don’t know that for sure.”

“What else she doin’ makin’ all that noise five minutes to two?”

“Maybe she watchin’ television. Don’t she have one o’ them big-screen televisions?”

“If she ain’t sold it to the dope man yet.”

“Eldridge,” she said in an admonishing tone.

“Well, Mildred, you know what she doin’ just like I do. Now, we already talked about that, so don’t act like it’s somethin’ brand-new.”

He paused for a moment, realizing, not for the first time, how much it hurt him to see Clarisse hurting herself.

“I love her as much as you do,” he said finally. “But we got to face the truth.”

They both fell silent, listening for the next sound, but they didn’t hear anything. After a full five minutes, they began to breathe easier.

“Eldridge, can you turn off the light and go to sleep now?”

“I coulda swore somethin’ was wrong over there,” he said after listening a moment longer. “But I guess it was just the television.”

“I tried to tell you that,” Mildred said, clearly relieved.

But as Eldridge reached for the light, he heard a woman yell, “Oh my God!”

It sounded like Clarisse.

“That’s the television, too?” Eldridge said, picking up the phone on the nightstand. “I’m callin’ over there.”

Mildred sat up in bed, hoping her husband would turn to her in a few minutes and tell her that everything was all right, that the sounds they heard were nothing.

“Fast busy signal. Phone must be off the hook.”

“Eldridge,” she said, biting her lip. “Call the police.”

“You think I wasn’t?” Eldridge said. Then he cleared the line and dialed 911.

“I think she may have a concussion,” Clarisse said, “But she’s . . .”

Pookie convulsed, her eyes opening wide in a look of pure terror. Clarisse took off her robe and covered Pookie with it, mumbling something about Pookie going into shock.

“Man, she ain’t in shock,” Black said. “She be shakin’ all the time. Leroy, take her upstairs and put her in the shower with you.”

“No, you can’t move her,” Clarisse said. “We have to keep her still and warm.”

“We ain’t got time for all that,” Black said. “We gotta roll.”

“We can’t go anywhere until she’s stabilized,” Clarisse said, checking Pookie’s pulse.

“Well, I guess we just gotta leave her.”

“I-I ain’t leavin’ her,” Leroy said. “And you ain’t, either.”