Birth of a Dark Nation (25 page)

I kissed Justin on the cheek.

"Another story for another day,
mon
chéri
. Rest up. You'll need it."

Justin rested his head on his pillow but
never closed his eyes. I began to leave.

"Wait!" he said, sitting upright once
more.

"Yes?" I said.

"Ariori survived the shooting…a bullet to the
head. That means…you know what that means, right? The Razadi who
got shot in Africa might still be alive!"

I smiled and nodded.

"They could be, indeed…if they had the time
to heal. But we'll never know. Those days are long gone."

Justin nodded, rested his head again, and
closed his eyes. As I walked away, I shed a tear for the memory of
Dominique Bellanger and the years I'd spent with her, loving her as
my sister. And I shed a tear for the dozen Africans that the white
men had probably killed with their bullets on the coast of Africa.
I had far less hope than Justin that they could still be alive.

"Come with me," Victor said as we entered
Justin's room a few days later.

"I'm tired," Justin said. "When do I get to
go back to work? It's been too long."

"You're always tired," Victor taunted. "You
want to know why? Because you're fat and lazy."

"Fuck you."

"No. Fuck
you
."

Victor grabbed the edge of the mattress and
flipped it upside down, dumping Justin to the floor.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Justin
asked. Victor leaped over the bed frame and landed at Justin's
side.

"No work for you. Today, you learn how to
fight!" Victor beamed.

Then he backhanded the shit out of
Justin.

"What the fuck, man! Dante, are you just
gonna stand there?"

"Yes," I said. Victor slapped Justin again.
His brown face was turning red.

"Dude! Stop! Dante!"

"Fight back," I said calmly.

"I can't beat him," Justin said as he tried
to protect his face.

"Stand up and fight back!" I barked.

Justin stood up in the corner while Victor
got in the defensive stance. He tried to charge through Victor, but
Victor moved to the left and Justin careened into the floor.

I couldn't help but to laugh.

"You laughing at me now?" Justin asked.

"Well, you gotta admit it was kinda
funny."

"Fuck you," Justin said. As he tried to walk
away, Victor bent his arm backwards. Justin yelped.

"Fight back!" Victor said, smashing Justin's
face into the door.

Justin groaned.

"Stop whining!" Victor yelled, pushing Justin
with such force that he flew out of the room and tumbled all the
way down the stairs.

At the bottom of the stairs lay Justin's
broken body. His arm was clearly out of socket and his knee was
bent the wrong way. His head was face down in the shag carpet.

"Ouch," said Victor.

"Justin?" I called.

"Yes," he responded.

"Get up."

"I can't."

"Get up right now!" I shouted.

Slowly, he slid his thigh across the carpet.
He lifted his leg up and popped it leg back into a straight line.
He bent it a few times to make sure it worked and then he stood up.
As he did, he popped his arm back into its socket.

There was terrible rug burn on his face, but
even as he looked in the hallway mirror, it healed on its own.

"Wow," he said. I smiled.

Victor launched himself at Justin again. This
time, Justin was ready for him, socking Victor one good time in the
jaw and knocking him off balance.

"Good one!" Victor said, while caressing his
jaw. Justin came at him harder, hitting him in the chest and arms,
faster and faster each time until his fists were a blur. He was
getting stronger every day, every moment.

"See…that Martin Luther King, peaceful hippie
shit ain't gonna work when those vampires are trying to attack you
again," Victor said, getting in a few choice punches where he
could, pushing Justin back into the open space of the living
room.

"You leave MLK's name out your mouth, bitch,"
Justin retorted, kicking Victor in the gut, forcing him
backward.

"Come on…that all you got?"

"Oh, I got some more, bitch. Ole uppity blood
sucker."

"Uppity?"

"Mmm-hmm. Ole pale face hyena."

"Hyena?" Victor said angrily. "I got your
hyena!"

Victor did a flip from a standing position
and kicked Justin in the chest with both feet. Both of them crashed
to the floor.

"Oh, so motherfuckers want to do flips now!"
Justin said from the floor. He scrambled up, prepared to continue
the fight.

"Okay, that's enough for now. I said that's
enough," I said, standing between them as they tried to get at each
other.

"Let me at him," Justin said while Victor
smirked.

"You'll get your chance," I said. "Your
training will be long and complicated and bloody. But yes, you will
learn how to fight just like we do. No ordinary human will ever be
able to stop you."

Victor sneered and walked away.

"When I'm gonna fight you?" Justin asked
me.

"I'm not going to fight you," I said.

"Yeah, you are," Justin said. "And on that
day, I'ma fuck you up."

I laughed.

"We'll see about that."

We trained with Justin for as much as twelve
hours a day over the next few days. As it turned out, Justin really
was a lover, not a fighter, so he came to the table with even less
knowledge of how to fight than the average man might.

He was in terrible shape, but his Razadi
blood as well as our vegetarian diet made him stronger and leaner.
He spent hours at the recreation center lifting, took a break for
lunch, then spent more hours at a top of the line boxing gym. He
built muscles he didn't know he had.

I was going to miss the old Justin with the
soft chest I could rest my head in, the bear-like arms that would
embrace me, and the thick thighs and ass that crashed into my body
when we were intimate. But I knew that the old Justin was human,
with human habits and sensibilities. The new Justin was emerging as
the old Justin fell away with the fat and sweat.

He still called his mom regularly to convince
her he was doing okay. He also called his coworkers and stuck with
the flu story. They knew not to question it.

After a long evening at the boxing gym,
Justin approached me earnestly.

"I'd like to shower and sleep at my place
tonight," he said.

"I don't know about that, Justin. We gotta
protect you."

"You can come with me. I just really want to
sleep between my own sheets tonight, you feel me?"

"Okay," I said. "We can do that."

We went back to Kennedy Street, a place I
hadn't seen in weeks, and walked up several flights of stairs to
Justin's apartment. I sat on the edge of the futon in his living
room while he went back into his room to disrobe and shower.

I was tired. I had never successfully made
anyone a daywalker before, but it was an awful lot of work. The
cooking, the fighting, the planning—it was all so much. Whenever
Justin was awake, I had to be awake. And when he was asleep, I had
to be awake, planning for the next day.

I lay back and soon fell asleep on the couch
while Justin showered.

~

I was awakened by loud pounding on Justin's
door. I sat up and looked around, still groggy, and walked toward
the door. I looked through the peephole, saw Victor, and opened the
door.

"Where is he?" Victor demanded, pushing past
me.

"He's taking a shower," I said.

"I told your dumb ass not to let him leave
the house!" Victor yelled at me.

"Don't call me a dumb ass!" I shouted back.
"He wanted to sleep in his own bed for a change. I thought he
deserved that."

"Deserved that? He's one of us now, Dante! He
can't
leave. We stick together."

"Just like we stuck together when you left?
When John Irons left? When Orlando left? Are you kidding me?"

"That's not the same."

"But you couldn't wait to leave, could you?
You
made the cell weak.
You
left me here by myself.
Razadi stick together when it's convenient."

"Nightwalkers leave us alone when we don't
seem threatening. You were always safe."

"Fuck you, Victor."

"Hey, stop it. I'm not going to apologize
over and over again for doing what Babarinde allowed us to do."

"You haven't apologized at all."

"Listen. Aren't you even worried about where
Justin is right now?"

I paused. I listened. No water running. No
movement from the back of the apartment. I ran to Justin's room. He
was gone.

"Fuck!" I shouted.

"Didn't Babarinde say you were supposed to
keep him safe?"

"Shit." I nodded, in disbelief that I had
somehow lost him.

"Then fucking focus so we can find him. Close
your eyes."

I shut my eyes tight, seeing fireworks
beneath my dark lids. I stood still. I smelled.

"He only left like five minutes ago, maybe
ten."

"Dig deeper," Victor insisted. I inhaled and
tried to visualize Dante.

"A street. Dark. Streetlight is busted above.
He's…he sees a family. Aw, fuck, we gotta go."

We ran out of Justin's apartment, following
his scent down Kennedy Street. He foolishly hadn't even taken the
alleys, but he didn't know better. I knew he was looking for a
meal.

At Fifth and Kennedy, we ran to the right for
another block. We paused in front of one of the quiet homes and
stared.

"This idiot is in their house!" Victor
hissed.

"Wait…is this a crack house?" I asked.

"Hard to say," he responded.

I looked to both sides of me then sprinted to
the back door of the house. Justin had left it wide open. Of
course. Victor appeared next to me.

"He's in here," I said. "Let's go."

The house was pitch black except for the dim
light from the street spilling in. We entered through the barren
kitchen and felt our way upstairs. We could smell Justin's trail
leading up there.

"Sweet Olódùmarè, please give him restraint,"
I prayed silently.

In the master bedroom slept a white man and a
black woman, half naked, looking like life had chewed them up and
spit them out. They were oblivious to our presence.

"Crackheads," Victor said.

"I've seen them around before when I visited
Justin on his block. The man…he's always unfriendly. Never a smile.
Surly. The woman has her good days and bad days. But when she's
with her baby, she's fine."

Victor turned to me.

"There's a baby?" he asked.

"Shit."

We hurried to the next room, where we saw
Justin crouched in the dirty corner, holding the cooing, sandy
colored infant. The baby instinctively wrapped his little hand
around Justin's finger. Justin's fangs were elongated. His nose was
millimeters away from the child's scalp and he inhaled. Not at all
startled by our presence, he glanced up at me and spoke.

"Hi."

"Hi," I replied. "What are you doing
here?"

"Nothin'," he said, caressing the baby's
cheek with his nose.

"You can't drink the baby, Justin."

"Yes, he can," Victor said with a laugh.
"Babies are a 'sometimes treat.'"

"Victor! No, Justin."

"He smells so good…"

We heard shuffling coming from the other
room. Footsteps came toward us, slowly but intently. The white dude
who lived in the house entered the room and turned on the light.
Roaches scrambled across the floor and up the dry, chalky walls
covered in ancient wallpaper that practically fell off if you
stared at it too hard.

The man was pale as a zombie and out of
shape, that sort of skinny-fat that white dudes in America seemed
to get into in the last century or so. He had dark circles under
his eyes; patches of his brown hair were missing. He barely lifted
his head up or opened his eyes when he talked.

"Oh," he said nonchalantly. "How y'all
doin'?"

"We good," Victor said. "'Sup with you?"

"Chillin'," he said. He opened his eyes
slightly to observe Justin in the corner, still holding the
baby.

"That's my son," the man said.

"Yeah, we know," I said. "We're just leaving
man."

"You want him?" the man asked.

"Yes!" Justin answered excitedly.

"No," I said.

"I mean, three stacks and you can have
him."

The already quiet room seemed to drop ten
decibels below the threshold of silence. Even the roaches on the
walls seemed to be still in horror.

"What?" I asked.

"You can have him for three thousand." He
scratched his stomach.

"Are you trying to sell us your son?" Victor
asked. His caramel skin seemed to glow red under his collar and he
inched toward the man.

"Aight, two thou. But that's as low as I can
go," he said matter-of-factly.

Victor walked slowly toward the man. He
inhaled deeply. He then walked over to Justin.

"Give me the boy, please," he asked, reaching
for the baby. Justin hesitated for a second, and then handed over
the child. Victor then smelled the baby.

"Are they really related?" I asked. Victor
nodded.

"Sicko," he muttered under his breath.

"So how 'bout it?" the man asked. Victor
cradled the child against his chest and walked toward me.

"No HIV. Either of them," Victor whispered. I
nodded.

"We'll take him," Victor said, handing me the
baby.

"How you wanna pay?" he asked.

"Justin will take care of that," Victor said.
We hurried into the hallway.

"Justin," Victor called out. Justin looked up
hopefully.

"Dinner is served."