Rails Under My Back (5 page)

Jack looks him in the face.

He smiles.
Can’t break me.
Smiles.
Gravity.
Or frowns. His face is so cold he isn’t sure. His red eyes shove two fossilized apples into Jack’s teeth. Jack yanks down on the cuffs.
Get in.
He ducks his head under the siren roof and squeezes into the low ride. The engine squeals into life like a slaughtered pig. A thin rapid shimmer of exhaust and the cool wind of motion. Sweat cools out of him. His wrists itch raw with the rub of the handcuffs. He gazes through the wedges of mesh partition that separates him from Jack and Jill. Studies the back of their two capped heads. Then he sees a face in the rearview mirror.
Bitten by sin, Gracie said. Bitten by sin.
Two wild eyes burning in the darkness.
Yet, man is born into trouble, as the sparks fly upward.
The car takes a heavy curve. He shuts his eyes. Circular momentum.

He flutters up through the roof into the domed siren, red light spiraling through his veins. Springs out into wet darkness. Flares, flame to sky. Shines. Settles.

A particle of light enters his cell. Spreads like spilled ink on paper. He feels a flutter in his spine, his back, his shoulder blades. Peels away from the floor and starts to rise. White. Cold. Weightless.

Distance steadily shortens between himself and the light’s point of origin. He discovers that he is actually part of the light, caught, a red worm on a bright line.

THE SKY MOVED IN WINDOWS. Windows without screens. Lean forward and look out and feel you are peeking over a mountain’s edge. Jesus was thankful they were shut on this hot day. He stood very still. Here, one might stand forever and watch the world go by. Cars zooming across the highway. Birds circling above boats bobbing on the river (one of twelve). And the river itself reaching away into the horizon’s gaze.

I said Buildin One.

No, you didn’t. You said first building.

Same thing.

No. Big difference. Jesus turned and surveyed the cramped, narrow room. Ancient walls that had seen no paint for decades. Mushroom-shaped water stains. Exposed heating pipes dripping like a runny nose. He suddenly felt he was submerged, in a submarine.

Make yourself comfortable. No Face was kicked back against the couch, his feet on the coffee table, his shoe heels run-over, completely flat. His one eye followed Jesus’s every move like a surveillance camera. He was as tall as Jesus—Jesus hadn’t noticed this the night before—but all muscle, the legs and arms of his red jumpsuit swelling like pressurized pipes. He had groomed the previous night’s mustache into a fine streak of soot.

Jesus flopped down on the love seat.

Where you park?

I didn’t.

What?

I took the train.

You ain’t drive?

Jesus looked at him, hard.

Yeah, No Face said. What am I thinking about? Fine car like that. Round here.

A single stream of sunlight, bothered by flecks of dust, flooded the room. Spread a bright patch like a tablecloth in the middle of the floor. Jesus squinted at the stark whiteness. Shadows spotted the walls.

Nice earring.

Jesus fingered his diamond stud.

Where you cop?

Downtown. At the Underground.

My nigga. No cheap stuff.

Word. You’ll get one too. Look in the Cracker Jack box. Save your prizes.

What?

A woman entered the room from a box-sized kitchen. Like his cousin Porsha in age—late twenties—but not in appearance. Black and skinny. Legs thin as wineglass stems.
I can’t dick nothing skinny.
Ah, No Face’s mamma. A legend. Word had it, she once coldcocked a Disciple with her Bible and saved No Face from getting smoked.

This is Jesus.

The woman looked at him.

Boy, where yo manners? Lula Mae said. Can’t you speak? Cat got yo tongue?

No, ma’m.

Lower yo eyes. Don’t look at me like that. I’ll slap that frown off yo face. Gracie may stand fo some sass but I won’t.

We bout to handle our business, No Face said. Take them over to Mamma Henry or Mamma Carrie. No Face talked with a nervous, jerky flow of words. Take yoself too.

She looked at him for a moment. Soon as I get them ready.

Well, don’t take all damn day. Stay in the kitchen til yall ready. Me and Jesus need some privacy.

She sailed out of the room and, once in the kitchen, shuffled across the linoleum in red cloth slippers, moving cautiously as if she didn’t know her way around.

Who those mammas you mentioned?

Just these two old bitches that babysit them crumb snatchers sometimes.

Jesus could see No Face’s mother through the kitchen door, washing the face of a little boy. Several breadboxes lined up like shoes along the counter.

Yeah, these BDs ran a train on her daughter and threw her off the roof.

Jesus looked at No Face.

Mamma Henry. Threw her daughter off Buildin Three. I sexed with her.

Who, Mamma Henry?

No Face looked at Jesus. Funny. Real funny. It’s all good though. No Face grinned.

Jesus watched the woman. Where yo daddy?

Something flitted across No Face’s mouth, jaws. He handlin his business.

In the kitchen, the mother extended a white plastic teacup to the boy. Go see if Mr. Lipton can put me a lil dish soap in this cup.

The boy headed out the door without a word.

Damn, that’s how yall do it in the jets? Give and borrow soap?

It’s cool. See—

Yall that po?

No Face’s one eye widened, shocked, trying to see if Jesus had truly insulted him. You don’t know me from Adam.

Yall some real country niggas—Jesus shook his head. Country. Thinking: Country like Lula Mae, who always buy that thick nasty syrup. Mole asses. He and Hatch wouldn’t touch it. Too thick. Mud. So Lula Mae would give Jesus a coffee cup. Go ask Miss Bee for some syrup. Say please. And he’d go get a cup of thin buttery Log Cabin syrup and share it with Hatch.

A knock on the door. The mother hurried from the kitchen to answer it. A little girl, about six or seven. My mamma, she say can you give her some sugar.

I’ll bring some. I’m fin to come see her.

Who that? Jesus said.

My sister.

Yo sister?

My
play
sister.

The mother stepped back into the room, one hand on the shoulder of each child. She looked at Jesus. Looked at No Face, expectant.

Go now, No Face said. Later, I make you straight.

She opened the door with no change of expression.

Nice mamma you got, Jesus said.

No Face looked at him, face working, as if trying to decipher Jesus’s statement.

The doings of No Face’s life circulated all over the city like the sewers. Everybody knew how No Face the Thief ran with a Stonewall unit, Keylo and Freeze, way way on the wild west side of South Lincoln. A coupla ole niggas—well, not
real
ole, late twenties—two jacks who always kept an inch beyond reach of the law’s long arms. When they got high or bored, they would flip on him, take turns beating his ass, further damage to his already ruinous anatomy.

Where yo
play
daddy?

No Face looked at Jesus. He at work.

What bout yo smoked-out sister who suck dicks?

Ain’t my sister. A slender thread of something in his voice.

I heard—

I don’t care what you heard.

Jesus saw something in No Face’s one good eye.

I ain’t got no sister like that. You don’t know me from Adam.

Whatever. Anyway, a blow job don’t mean blow.

No Face tried to adjust his eye patch, fingers thick with anger. Tell you who my daddy is. My
real
daddy.

Who?

No Face was blank.

Where yo
real
daddy?

I already told you.

Tell me again.

Where yours?

Nigga, I ain’t the one who frontin.

Who say I’m frontin?

Then what you doin hangin out in Stonewall?

Another stretch of silence. Aw, man. You don’t know me from Adam. Those my peeps. Where you come from?

From out my mamma’s ass.

What?

A round smelly hole.

No Face chuckled. You got to be somebody. Ain’t nobody born naked. People.

People? We all People round here.

Jesus watched No Face hard. Nigga, you ain’t no—

Why you always be wearin red? Who you represent?

Myself.

Yourself?

Jesus nodded.

It’s like this. If you stand for something, you should show it.

Jesus said nothing.

You got to represent something.

The words sounded across the entire length of Jesus’s mind. Jesus red-rolled up one sleeve and revealed two lines of scars running up his forearm.

No Face cleared his throat with a scratch of sound. How’d you—

A Roman shanked me.

Man! No Face’s eyes traveled the length of the scar. Look like a railroad.

Check it. Jesus nodded. See, you up here doin all this frontin at Stonewall, but I learned from the source.

What source?

You know.

Tell me about it.

Jesus thought hard and fast, brain working. Bright wings fluttered in his dark mind. Birdleg, he said. I used to roll with Birdleg.

Birdleg?

That’s right.

Who—

Birdleg.

No Face thought a moment. Jesus’s bald head gleamed in the room like a bright egg. What he learn you?

Listen and learn. Jesus repeated the words from memory. Learn to listen. More will be revealed in the end.

What?

Birdleg. The source.

Then, you got to represent something.

I told you—Jesus rolled down his sleeve and covered the scars—myself.

You selfish.

It ain’t like that.

How it like then?

See—

Even T-Bone represent.

That crippled motherfucka, Jesus said. He pictured T-Bone. Wide bodybuilder torso and slim ballerina legs, riding a wheelchair like a Cadillac in Union Station, patrolling the platform, digging in the scene, racing the subway trains. Word, everybody knew T-Bone. Kickin up dust in his wheelchair, crippled but still kickin it.

Yeah, but he got more heart than some niggas wit three good legs. He ain’t sorry bout what happened to him. I was there when it happened, No Face said, proudly, chest puffed out. See, it’s like this. We had jus jacked that Jew, Fineberg.

You was in on that?

Yeah.

Jesus looked at him.
I see. He tryin to bullshit the bullshitter.
And once I caught one this big—Jesus held a fabled fish in his parted hands.

No, straight up. You don’t know me from Adam. We had just changed that Jew, Goldberg—

Thought you said Fineberg?

Naw. You said that.

Nigga—

Like I said, we change that Goldfine Jew, then we get on the train and this crazy white man, this other Jew-lookin muddafudda, pull out his gat and start shootin at us. Jus like that. So I pull out my shit. I’m like—No Face rises to demonstrate—Boom boom boom. No mercy. And—

Nigga, you weren’t even there.

No Face retakes his seat. How you know?

I
know.

See, that how I lost my eye. I had the long demonstration like this. No Face took a sniper’s pose. Then I went Boom boom boom and hot oil popped in my eye. No Face raised the patch and used two fingers to open the eye socket like a clam.

Jesus peered into the gray-pink insides. Nigga, that’s disgustin. Why don’t you get a glass eye or somephun.

No Face laughed. Stick yo finger in.

Make a nigga wanna throw up.

Go head. Stick yo finger in.

Jesus shook his head.

See, I’m down fo the hood.

Nigga, the only hood you down fo is the one I’m gon put over yo ugly face.

See, you don’t know me from Adam. No Face closed his cavernous socket. I put in work. When I see a number three, my enemy. That’s it. Devastation take over.

Nigga, stop dreamin.

But I don’t use no street sweeper, mowin fools down on the run. No innocent bystanders and all that. See, me, I’m like this. If I want somebody, I park in fronta they house, camp out all night, drink me a little Everclear, smoke me some Buddha and jus wait fo em. Soon as they leave they house, I be like bam! Peel they cap. Staple a navel if I jus wanna fuck em up fo life. You know, make em carry one of those plastic pee bags. Make em wear diapers.

Like that, huh? A mission.

Hard-core. No Face patted his heart.

Then how come you ain’t got no rep?

He looked at Jesus for a long moment. You don’t know me from Adam. I got a rep. You jus ain’t heard about it.

Yeah. I heard you a busterpunklyinmotherfucka.

Now why you come at me like that?

Jus stop frontin. I got proof. Real proof.

Man, you don’t know me from Adam. I got proof too. I—

Jus fire up the Buddha.

No Face grinned at the words. Aw ight. Stroked his bare chin. You already sampled my fine products.

I can tell you something. Jesus thought about it. He approached the words slowly. I got plenty enemies. Last Christmas. No, last Thanksgiving. No, Christmas. Yeah, Christmas. My family—But he didn’t say any more.

No Face sucked his teeth. Can’t trust nobody these days.

Jesus said nothing.

Can’t get no respect.

Jesus nodded.

Tell me about it.

PORSHA MOVES like a mule. Slow and strong. A young, shapely woman in a tight black dress, bright red belt boasting her slim waist. She drapes a white cloth shroudlike over Gracie’s long supper table. Sets the table. Lace doilies, cloth napkins (folded and ironed), silver utensils, gold-edged plates, and glass goblets. She positions two crystal decanters of dark dinner wine—Mogen David by the looks of it, tasty Jew wine that Sheila, her mother,
my aunt,
had stolen from the Shipco liquor cabinet or that Gracie, her aunt,
my mother,
had lifted from the Sterns—at each strategic end of the table. And two pitchers of minty eggnog. Balances steaming serving dishes on her raised palms. Carefully sets them down. Everything where it should be. The table creaks, sags from the weight.