MY MOTHER TOLD ME TWO STORIES ABOUT UNCLE MARK.
NO. 1
He filmed everything with the camera his mother—my grandmother—gave him for his eighteenth birthday: dance battles, gang fights, block parties. But what he really wanted was to make a movie.
SCRIPT IDEA:
BOY: Mickey. No game. No girls. Meets GIRL: Jesse, the young girlfriend of BOY: Mickey’s landlord.
GIRL: Jesse teaches BOY: Mickey everything he needs to know about GIRL: How to impress them. How to treat them. But BOY: Mickey uses what he learns to make GIRL: Jesse fall in love with him. When her boyfriend, BOY: Mickey’s landlord, finds out, he kicks them both out of the building.
So, they’re in love and homeless, but they’re happy. Right?
CASTING OF THE WORST, STUPIDEST MOVIE EVER
BOY: Mickey to be played by Uncle Mark’s little brother, my father,
Mikey.
GIRL: Jesse to be played by the younger sister of a girl Uncle Mark used to date,
Shari,
my mother.
UNCLE MARK PULLED ME IN
for a hug, but how you
hug what’s haunting you?
AND YOU KNOW
it’s weird to know
a person you don’t know and at the same time
not know
a person you know, you know?
WHY YOU HERE?
I asked Uncle Mark,
taking my turn, my time, looking him up and down.
Sadness split his face
like cold breeze on chapped lip after attempting to smile.
I guess he expected me to be excited to see him. And I was, sorta,
but still.
WITH HIS HAND
he brushed down the front of his shirt,
smoothing out wrinkles, straightening himself out.
Pants stopped
just at the top of his dress shoes,
dress shoes tied in perfect bows, leather shiny, uncreased
like he ain’t been walking.
Brushed and brushed down his chest
to stomach, down his thighs,
then squatting, dipped a finger in
his mouth and scrubbed the toe of his shoe,
a smudge not there.
he said,
eyes up at me
is, why are you here?
RANDOM THOUGHT NO. 2
Always always always
be skeptical of a person who answers a question by asking a question.
Usually usually usually
it’s a setup.
ANAGRAM NO. 3
COOL = LOCO
I asked,
trying to avoid having to talk about the coldness
in my heart and the heater in my waist.
He stood up.
What do I mean?
he repeated, putting
hands together, fingertips touching, cracking what sounded like all the knuckles
in the world.
Listen, kid,
don’t play me and don’t play with me.
It’s best you
turn it loose before I tighten you up.
I begged,
trying to hold him off, trying to avoid being knotted up again.
Look,
they killed Shawn
last night, Uncle Mark. And . . .
And today
you woke up ready to make things right, right?
I nodded.
And the reason why is because for the first time in your life,
you realize, or at least you think you could kill someone,
right?
I nodded.
RIGHT?
he said, louder.
Right.
BUT TO EXPLAIN MYSELF
I said,
The Rules are the rules.
UNCLE MARK HUFFED
closed his eyes.
I wondered if he was thinking
about The Rules.
He knew them like I knew them.
Passed to him.
Passed them to his little brother. Passed to my older brother.
Passed to me.
The Rules
have always ruled.
Past present future forever.
UNCLE MARK SQUEEZED HIS LIPS
like he was trying to rip them off.
Then opened his eyes.
Okay, Will,
he said,
all serious.
Let’s set the scene.
What you mean, set the scene?
I mean, let’s play it out, how this whole thing is gon’ go down. Play it out
like a movie,
Uncle Mark explained.
We’ll go back and forth. I’ll start, from the top.
THE SCENE
Will stands over dead brother, Shawn. Two holes in his chest. Blood all over the ground.
Will takes his mother inside.
She cries. He looks for his brother’s gun.
Will finds the gun. Lies down and thinks about The Rules. No crying. No snitching. And always get revenge.
The next day, he decides to find who he knows killed his brother. A guy named Riggs.
Will gets in the elevator. Goes down to the lobby. Walks outside, past his brother’s blood on the concrete.
He continues for nine blocks, gets to Riggs’s house, sees Riggs, pulls the gun out, and . . .
I GOT STUCK
Couldn’t say nothing else. Couldn’t say
it. Hoped Uncle Mark would say,
cut.
BUT HE DIDN’T (the scene, continued)
Go ’head. Finish it.
Up until that point things were running smoothly, but this stupid last part
got me caught up.
Finish it!
Uncle Mark demanded. Dani whimpered.
Buck razzed.
Okay, okay,
I said,
trying to calm Uncle Mark down.
Will pulls the gun out, and . . .
I stalled.
And . . . and . . .
MY MOUTH
dried out, words phlegm
trapped in my throat, like an allergic reaction to the thought
of it all.
THE SCENE (completed)
And . . .
And shoots.
Uncle Buck finished it for me, said it slowly, dragging out the shhhhhhhhhhhh.
Then I could finally painfully hack it up.
And shoots.
FOR THE RECORD,
this movie
would’ve been better than that stupid one he was trying to make when he was alive
that’s for sure.
Maybe not as happy. But definitely better.
STORY NO. 2 ABOUT UNCLE MARK
Uncle Mark lost the camera his mother got him,
the one he recorded dance battles,
and gang fights, and block parties,
and the beginning of his corny-ass movie on.
Couldn’t afford another one. OPTIONS:
Could’ve asked Grandma again,
but that would’ve been pointless.
Could’ve stolen one,
but he wasn’t ’bout to be sweating, so he wasn’t ’bout to be running.
Could’ve gotten a job,
but working was another one of those things Uncle Mark just wasn’t ’bout to be doing.
So he did
what a lot of people do around here.
HIS PLAN
To sell for one day. One day.
Uncle Mark took a corner, pockets full of rocks to become rolls,
future finance,
and in an hour had enough money to buy a new camera.
But decided to stick at it
just through
the end of the day. That’s all.
Just through the end
of the day.
I’M SURE
you know where this
is going.
HE HELD THAT CORNER
for a day, for a week, for a month,
full-out pusher,
money-making pretty boy,
target
for a ruthless young hustler whose name
Mom can never remember.
THAT GUY TOOK THE CORNER
from Uncle Mark. Snatched it right from under him.
And it wasn’t peaceful.
Everybody
ran ducked hid tucked themselves tight
blew their own eardrums gouged their own eyes.
Did what they’d all been trained to.
Pretended like yellow tape was some kind of neighborhood flag
that don’t nobody wave but always be flapping in the wind.
UNCLE MARK SHOULD’VE
just bought his camera and shot his stupid movie after the first day.
Unfortunately,
he never shot nothing ever again.
But my father did.
ANAGRAM NO. 4
CINEMA = ICEMAN
RANDOM THOUGHT NO. 3
Not sure
what an iceman is, but it makes me think of bad dudes.
Cold-blooded.
SO ANYWAY, AFTER I SAID IT,
and shoots,
it was like the words came out and at the same time went in.
Went down into me and
chewed on everything inside as if
I had somehow swallowed
my own teeth and they were sharper than I’d ever known.
MEANWHILE,
Uncle Mark reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out two cigarettes.
Great.
More smoke.
I hoped
the second one wasn’t for me.
I don’t smoke. Shit is gross.
Plus, people who living, who real,
like me ain’t allowed to smoke
in elevators.
AND WHAT HAPPENS NEXT IN THIS MOVIE?
Uncle Mark asked, tucking one cig behind his ear,
booger-rolling the other between his fingers.
Nothing.
That’s it. The end.
I shrugged.
He positioned the cig
in the corner of his mouth, patted his pockets
for fire.
The end?
he murmured, looking at Buck, motioning for a light.
It’s never the end,
Uncle Mark said,
all chuckle, chuckle.
He leaned toward Buck.
Never.
Buck struck a match.
And the elevator came to a stop, again.
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THIS TIME
there was no smoke blocking the door, even though there were three people—
I guess, people—
in the elevator, smoking.
I know
it don’t make sense, but stay with me.
AND THERE HE WAS,
clear as day as the door slid open.
Recognized him instantly.
Been waiting for him since I was three.
Mikey Holloman.
My father.
MY POP
stepped in the elevator, stood right in front of me, stared
as if looking
at his own reflection, as if he’d stepped into a time machine.
Moments
later spread his arms, welcomed me into
a lifetime’s worth of squeeze.
IS IT POSSIBLE
for a hug
to peel back skin of time,
the toughened and raw bits, the irritated and irritating dry spots,
the parts that bleed?
POP PULLED AWAY,
noticed his brother, gave Uncle Mark
a firm handshake, yanked him in for a half hug
just like on
all the pictures.
No sound in the elevator except hands popping together and the muted thud of pats on backs.
I HAVE NO MEMORIES
of my father.
Shawn always tried to get me to remember things like
Pop dressing up as Michael Jackson
for Halloween and, after trick-or-treating, riding us up and down on this elevator, doing his best moonwalk but
not enough space to go nowhere, slamming into walls.
Shawn swore I laughed so hard I farted,
stunk up the whole elevator, even peed myself.
I was only three.
And I don’t remember that. I’ve always wanted to,
but I don’t.
I so don’t.
A BROKEN HEART
killed my dad.
That’s what my mother always said.
And as a kid
I always figured his heart
was forreal broken like an arm
or a toy
or the middle drawer.
BUT THAT’S NOT WHAT SHAWN SAID.
Shawn always said our dad was killed for killing the man who killed our uncle.
Said he was at a pay phone, probably talking to Mom, when a guy walked up on him,
put pistol to head, asked him if he knew a guy who went by Gee.
Don’t know what Pop said.
But that was the end of that story.
I ALWAYS USED TO ASK
Shawn how he knew that. Especially the whole
Gee thing.
He said
Buck told him. Said that was Buck’s corner.
It was then that Buck started looking out for Shawn, who at the time
was only seven. Buck was sixteen.
But I don’t remember none of this
either.
My father’s voice brand-new to me.
Deep.
Some scratch
on the tail of each word.
How I figured Shawn’s would’ve sounded
someday.
Weird talking to my dad like he was a stranger even though we hugged like family.
A’ight, I guess,
I said,
unsure of what else to say.
How do you small-talk your father when “dad” is a language so foreign that whenever you try to say it,
it feels like you got a third lip and a second tongue?
I WANTED TO UNLOAD,
just tell him about Shawn, and how Mom cried and drank and scratched herself to sleep, how I was feeling, The Rules,
all that.
Wanted to
tell him everything
in that stuffy elevator, but held back because
Buck, Dani, and Uncle Mark
were watching with warm, weird faces.
Pop said, taking a deep breath.
I know, I know, I know.
Sadness and love
in his voice.
I replied, choking down me choking up,
I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know
what to do.
I WIPED MY FACE
with the back of my hand, knuckles rolling over my eyes to catch water before it
came down. No crying.
Not in front of Pop. Not in front of Dani. Not in front of none
of these people.
Not in front of no one. Never.
WHAT YOU THINK YOU SHOULD DO?
he asked.
Follow The Rules,
I said
just like I told everybody else.
Just like you did.
POP GAVE UNCLE MARK
a look when Uncle Mark asked if I had ever heard my father’s story.
Of course,
I said.
He was killed at a pay phone.
Worry washed over Pop’s face. Opened his mouth to speak but changed his mind,
then changed his mind again.
That’s not the story we talking about.
What you know
is how I was killed,
Pop explained.
But you don’t know . . . You just don’t know . . .
WHEN MARK WAS SHOT
I was shattered. Shifted. Never the same again.
Like shards of my own heart shivving me on the inside, just like your mama told you.
You and Shawn were little and I couldn’t just come home
and be a daddy and a husband when I couldn’t be a brother no more.
Not after what happened. And how it happened.
But I didn’t cry. Didn’t snitch. Knew exactly who killed Mark. Knew I could get him.
The Rules.
Taught to me by Mark.
Taught to him by our pop.
That night
I walked two blocks to where Mark used to move,
where dirt was done. And waited and waited until finally a dude came from a building,
stepped to his corner
Mark’s corner slapped a pack in
a customer’s clutch.
Money was exchanged
and I knew that was my guy, the guy that shot my brother dead in the street.
I made my move. Hood over my head.
Gun from my waist
and by the time he saw me I was already squeezing.
POP! POP! POP!
By the third he was down,
but I gave him one more just because I was angry.
So angry.
Like something had gotten into me.
THAT SOMETHING
that my pop said had gotten into him
must be
what my mom meant by
the nighttime.
POP SAID
he took off running so fast his sneakers barely touched
concrete.
Said he took the long way,
turned pistol into poof,
turned bang-bang into hush-hush.
I took a hot shower, hot enough
to burn the skin off my body,
he said.
Couldn’t kiss your mother, couldn’t kiss you boys good night.
Just lay naked
in the scummy bathtub, the cold porcelain keeping me from sleep
from nightmares.
BUT YOU DID WHAT YOU HAD TO DO,
I said,
after listening to my father admit what I had already known,
The Rules are the rules.
UNCLE MARK AND MY FATHER
looked at me with hollow eyes dancing somewhere between guilt and grief,
which I couldn’t make sense of until my father admitted
that he had killed
the wrong guy.
I asked, confused.
No, I did,
Pop confirmed,
his voice crumbling.
But Gee didn’t kill Mark. Gee was just some young kid trying to be tough,
trying to make a few friends, a few bucks,
a flunky
for the guy who killed Mark,
he explained.
Then Then why
Then why you kill him?
I asked.
I didn’t know
he wasn’t the right guy,
Pop said,
a tremble in his throat.
I was sure that was Mark’s killer.
Had to be.
I LEANED
against the wall
next to Dani, thinking, staring at my father who wasn’t my father at all.
At least not like I had imagined him. A man who moved with precision, patience, purpose,
not no willy-nilly buck-bucking off at randoms
at random.
Spent my whole damn life missing a misser.
That disappointed me.
And he stood on the other side of the elevator staring back at me, wasn’t sure what he
was thinking.
Maybe that I was exactly how he had imagined. Maybe that disappointed him.
RANDOM THOUGHT NO. 4
There’s this thing I used to see kids at the playground do with their dads.
They’d stand on their father’s feet,
the dads holding the kids by the arms, walking stiff-legged like zombies.
The kids had to trust the fathers to guide them because the fathers could see what was coming
but the kids,
holding tight to their dads, moved blindly
backward.
THEN POP MADE THE FIRST MOVE.
A step forward. I made the next.
Then he took another. We met in the middle.
Again,
dove into each other. This time the hug,
a mix of I miss you and who are you and I’m confused and I’m cracking
and I don’t know what the hell to do
or where the hell to go.
My father’s hand gripped my back as I did my best to bury myself in his armpit,
to get lost in the new
and strangely familiar feeling of fatherhood.
AND THAT’S WHEN IT HAPPENED.
He pulled the gun from my waistband.
And put it to my head.
I FREAKED OUT.
What you doin’?
I shrilled, in shock.
What the hell you doin’!
Eye-to-eye,
a tear streaming down his face.
Just one, so it ain’t
really count.
Chest aching like a weight crushing me, biscuit tight
against my temple.
He cocked it. Sounded like a door closing.
I CALLED OUT
for help
but couldn’t see no one.
Not Uncle Mark, or Dani,
or Buck,
or hear them, or even smell the dank
of tobacco turning to tar.
Like it was suddenly just the two of us, me and my dad,
both of us apparently losing
our minds.
POP STOOD OVER ME,
the gun pressed against the side of my face.
Was the first time I had ever had one to my head. First time I had been that close to death. To the end.
And at the hand of Pop. Pop? Pop!
YOU WOULD THINK
I would be thinking about whether or not he could actually do it since he wasn’t real.
But the hugs were real. And the gun was real.
Weren’t no ghost bullets in that clip.
Those were real bullets.
Fifteen total.
One for every year of my life.
MY STOMACH
was aching,
the quaking world in the bottom of it, and it wasn’t long before I could feel
myself splitting apart.
A WARM SENSATION
ran through the lower half of my body, seeping
down my leg
into my sneakers.
Cigarette smoke cut once again,
this time by the smell of my own piss.
THEN POP UNCOCKED THE GUN,
wrapped his arms around me again,
squeezed tight like I was some rag doll, stuffed
the gun back into my waistband.
I SCREAMED,
pushed him away, yelled until my throat stripped,
until my words became sizzle.
Weak. Wet.
Worried
about looking like a punk-ass kid.
And my father
leaned against the wall, staring,
chin up, cocky, quiet,
while I exploded.
AND LIKE OLD TIMES
Uncle Mark came to his side like a brother,
pulled the extra cig, the one tucked behind his ear,
handed it to my father, chest heaving.
Eyes on me,
he threw the cig in his mouth.
Buck took his cue.
I backed into a corner,
wished this stupid elevator would get to L ,
for this whole thing to hurry up and be done.
Buck struck
a match and the elevator came
to a stop.
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A STRANGER,
chubby, light skin,
almost white, the type that turns red, that burns,
dirty brown hair curled up
on his head,
got in the elevator like a normal guy.
Didn’t acknowledge nobody.
No dead body. No live body. No smoke.
Normal.
SO I FIGURED
he was real.
Which
made me real
embarrassed about the pee
but
made me real
happy
I wasn’t all the way gone.
THE THICK PALE DUDE
Yo,
stood staring at his blurry reflection in the metal door
when Buck started trying to get his attention.
Buck said.
Psst.
The guy didn’t budge.
Yo, dude,
Buck called, reaching for his shoulder.
THE MAN TURNED AROUND.
I know you.
Buck flashed his big choppy grin.
Your name Frick, right?
Only to people who know me
know me,
the guy said, reluctantly reaching for Buck’s hand.
Remember me?
Buck said, like a distant relative at a reunion.
Buck,
he said,
showing the back of his T-shirt again.
Oh shit, Buck?
Head cocked.
Buck?
Arms wide.
What’s good, man?
Nothing. Is good. At all.
Dani, Mark, Mikey, and
you remember Shawn?
This his little brother, Will.
BEFORE FRICK COULD ANSWER,
I asked Buck how he knew him,
what his connection was to me,
what he was doing in this spooky-ass
elevator.
HOW DO I KNOW HIM?
Buck scoffed, shaking his head.
This is the man who murdered me.
WAIT.
Wait.
Wait . . . wait.
Hold up.
Hold
up.
Hold the hell
on.
On my brother,
on Shawn’s name,
You serious?
Wait . . . Wha?
Wait, wait, wait.
. . .
What?
See, Frick here—
Buck paused.
Why they call you that, anyway?
he asked, sidetracked.
It’s really Frank. Twin sister, Frances. Frick and Frack came from my uncle.
Stupid shit old men call you stick in the hood,
Frick explained.
Who you tellin’. Matter fact because of you—
Buck paused again, turned back to me.
Because
of him, Will,
the only reason people ’round here
know my government name is from reading it on
my damn tombstone.
BUCK’S REAL NAME
was James.
I’ve only heard it one time.
Buck better than James.
Buck short
for young-buck.
Nickname given
by stepfather as a joke
because Buck
couldn’t grow no facial hair.
Smooth baby face, nothing rough
about it.
BUCK WAS TWO-SIDED.
Two dads, step and real.
Step raised him:
a preacher,
a real preacher,
not scared of no one, praying for anyone, helping everyone.
Real run through him:
a bank robber,
would steal air from the world if he could get his hands on it.
PEOPLE ALWAYS SAID
he was taught to do good but doing bad
was in his blood.
And there’s that nighttime Mom always be talking about.
It’ll snatch your teaching from you,
put a gun in your hand, a grumble in your gut,
and some sharp in your teeth.
BUT HE DIDN’T START THAT WAY.
At first Buck was
a small-time hustler, dime bags on the corner.
Same old story
until my pop got popped
at the pay phone that night.
Then he became a big brother to Shawn
and a robber to a bunch of suburban neighborhoods every morning
(he knew better than to jack people around here)
and come back with money (the most) sneakers (the best)
and jewelry (which he loved to show off).
BACK TO FRICK.
I was shocked when I heard that
this dude killed Buck.
Yeah,
Buck said, hand on
Frick’s shoulder all buddy-buddy.
This the guy.
He glanced at me.
Shawn never
told you that story?
HE NEVER REALLY TALKED ABOUT IT,
I said.
Shawn just said you were shot and that he knew who did it,
I explained, remembering that time. Shawn’s face a candle, melted wax,
flame flickering out.
I remember the cops banging on our door to question him,
to tell him they heard he was close to James—
that was the one time
I heard Buck’s real name—
and to ask him
if he knew who might’ve
done it, killed him, shot him twice
in the stomach, in the street.
SHAWN AIN’T SAY NOTHING
to the cops, to no one,
just locked himself
in his room for hours
and the next
day I caught him
sitting on his bed pushing
bullets into gun clip.
WELL, LET ME TELL YOU,
Buck said.
We were hanging out at the court sharing a bottle of something cheap and strong just before it went down,
Buck said.
Shawn was telling me how he had gotten into a little scuffle, nothing major, with one of the dudes from the Dark Suns,
Buck said.
Said he had to get your mother some kind of soap she uses that he could only get from the store down by where they hang out.
A DUMB THING TO SAY
would’ve been to
tell Buck how important that soap was
that it stopped Mom from scraping loose a river
of wounds.
But instead I just said,
Riggs.
I’M NOT SURE WHAT HIS NAME IS,
Buck said.
Said Shawn said he was going to the store when
the dude Riggs
ran up on him talking all this shit.
Said it was nothing serious, just poppin’ off at the mouth about how he
was a Dark Sun and how Shawn ain’t belong around there.
Said Shawn was in his feelings
all huff-huff explaining to Buck how he had grown up
with the kid Riggs
and how the
kid was brand-new.
Buck said
he told Shawn
to let it roll off, but he couldn’t because that’s just how he was.
All emotional all the time,
Buck said.
WHILE HE’S GOING ON ABOUT THIS DUDE,
I’m trying to show him this chain I just got from some kid out in the burbs. Didn’t even snatch it.
I just growled a little bit and asked for it and the sucka just took it right off and handed it to me.
Ain’t even snatch it,
Buck said,
thinking back on that day like he still couldn’t believe it.
But what does that have to with my brother and this guy?
I said,
pointing to Frick.
Hold on.
I’m gettin’ to that.
tripping so hard about this dude, I gave him the gold chain,
Buck said, proud.
A gift.
His first one.
Then Shawn left
the basketball court.
And that’s when I came,
Frick chimed in, a big smile
on his face
like he had just won some kind of award.
HOW TO BECOME A DARK SUN
- TURF:
nine blocks from where I live.
- THE SHINING:
a cigarette burn under the right eye.
- DARK DEED:
robbing someone, beating someone
or the worst, killing someone.
Note: Apparently, you also gotta be corny.
my Dark Deed for initiation,
Frick explained.
And it was to kill Buck?
No,
he said.
Funny thing is,
I was just supposed to rob him.
I didn’t think it was a funny thing at all.
Everybody knew
Buck was always flossin’, always flashy. But nobody would touch him because of his pops. Both of them.
Real and step.
GANGSTAS
always respect older
(original) gangstas
(OGs)
and preachers who act like
gangstas.
FRICK SAID
his plan was to jack the jack-boy.
Said he knew Buck would be at the court
so he ran up on him, pulled the hammer,
and got laughed at.
BUCK SAID
he couldn’t get got
by a dude who he could tell was as soft as the suburban joker he’d just jacked.
Everybody in the elevator laughed.
Except me.
WHATEVER, MAN,
Frick said.
I was just trying to earn my stripes.
Can’t knock me for that.
He turned around, caught eyes with
Pop and Uncle Mark.
They nodded in agreement.
No judgment over here,
Uncle Mark said, throwing his hands up.
Anyway, this crazy fool, Buck, swings at me.
Just tries to take me
even though I had a boom stick!
Frick looked at Buck, shook
his head, then cut his eyes to me.
I got scared.
So I pulled the trigger.
BUCK BENT
his pinky and ring finger back, turned his
hand into a gun.
Bang- bang.
AGAIN
What does this have to do with Shawn?
I asked.
Shawn stuck to The Rules,
Frick replied.
You mean.
I swallowed.
You mean he . . . he . . .
I struggled to get it out.
Now Buck put the finger gun against Frick’s
chest and repeated,
Bang-bang.
he only pulled the trigger once, so it was more like, Bang,
Frick corrected.
Fifteen bullets.
before I ever even got my Shining,
Frick said.
Rubbed just under his right eye
like it still rubbed him the wrong way.
FRICK YANKED HIS COLLAR DOWN.
See this?
he asked, exposing a hole in his chest, dime-sized, disgusting, bloody
but not bleeding.
Your brother’s fingerprints are in there somewhere.
Buck Ha’d! Replied before I had a chance.
And I bet it’s his
middle finger!
WHEN THE JOKE WAS OVER
I asked how Shawn could’ve known Frick
was the guy who killed Buck.
Buck said there was only one other person at the court that night,
always there all the time,
a young kid
running back and forth trying to dunk.
Not shoot.
Said he thinks
I might’ve known him. Tony.
And he wasn’t trying to dunk.
He was trying to
fly.
TONY TALKING
ain’t the same as snitching.
Snitching is bumping gums to badges, but
Tony ain’t run to no cops or cry to no cameras, nothing like that.
Tony talking was laying claim, loyalty,
an allegiance to the asphalt around here, an attempt to grow taller
get bigger
one way or another.
NOW LET ME ASK YOU
how you know
this kid Riggs got your brother?
Buck fired back.
Because he clearly got revenge for Shawn taking out this guy,
I pointed to Frick.
Frick, you know
a kid named Riggs?
Dani asked
out of nowhere, her voice floating over my shoulder.
Little dude. Big mouth. Dark Sun.
I figured
the description might help.
Frick looked at me, confused.
Who?
ANAGRAM NO. 6
I wish I knew an anagram
for POSER.
FRICK LOOKED
at me like I was crazy, shrugged his shoulders, and turned around
and faced the door.
Couldn’t see his reflection.
Couldn’t see any of their reflections.
Just mine, blurred.
FRICK HAD
his own cigarettes and
his own matches.
Finally Finally Finally
the elevator came to a stop.
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WHEN THE ELEVATOR DOOR OPENED
no one was there.
So I reached over and pushed the L button
again and again and
again and again.
Because that’s what you do when you want the door
to close faster.
Another one of those elevator rules.
I huffed
under my breath,
impatient, pissy, pissed off, scared, scarred,
and straight-up uncomfortable being crammed in this stupid
steel box,
this vertical coffin, another second.
UNCLE MARK CHUCKLED.
You would never survive in prison, nephew.
FINALLY
the elevator door began closing.
I exhaled, happy we were almost there.
One floor to go.
And just before it was shut,
before the door clicked in place,
four fingers slipped in just barely catching it.
The elevator door began opening
again.
HIM.
Shawn.
Stepped into the smoky box wearing exactly what he wore the night before:
blue jeans, T-shirt, gold chain.
But not his alive outfit. His dead one.
The one that came with bloodstains.
EVERYBODY
was so happy to see him.
Shawn!
Buck yelped, reaching out for him.
They slapped hands.
Buck fiddled with
the gold chain around Shawn’s neck.
Moved the clasp to the back.
Shawn looked at Dani.
Look at you!
he said,
taking her hand, spinning her around.
Uncle Mark gave him a light tap in the ribs.
Big man!
he said proudly.
Shawn turned, gave him a hug, caught a glimpse
of our father.
Pop!
he said, natural, his face beaming.
Our father wrapped his arms around Shawn, cocooning him.
Then pulled away, shook hands
like men, like partners.
ALL
the un-alive/un-dead lined up along the wall puffing their cigs, smiling
as Shawn finally
finally faced me.
WHEN WE WERE KIDS
I would follow Shawn around the apartment making the strangest noise with my mouth.
Hard to explain the sound. Burpy but not a burp.
Like burp mixed with yawn mixed with hum.
Something like that.
For twenty minutes straight.
From bedroom to kitchen
to living room back to bedroom.
To punish me,
he would wait for me to finish, to run out of steam,
to let it go, to get tired
of being immature.
And then,
to my surprise,
he wouldn’t say a word to me for the rest
of the day.
I LOOKED AT SHAWN.
He looked at me.
Shawn,
I said.
But he said nothing.
I repeated,
Shawn?
Nothing.
I STEPPED TOWARD HIM,
hugged him.
He didn’t hug back.
Just stood there, awkward,
a middle drawer of a man.
I ASKED HIM
why he wouldn’t say nothing, why he was ignoring me,
but still, nothing, not a word,
not even a smile.
I TOLD HIM
about the drawer, the gun,
that I did
like he told me, like Buck told him,
like our grandfather told our uncle, like our uncle told our dad.
I followed The Rules. At least the first two.
I hadn’t cried.
I hadn’t snitched.
EXPLAINED
that I was on my way to take care of his killer,
follow through
with Rule Number Three.
Told him I knew it was Riggs. Told him I thought it was Riggs, then told him I knew it was Riggs again.
CONFESSED
that I was scared, that I needed
to know I was
doing the right thing.
THE RULES ARE THE RULES
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I WAS BREAKING DOWN.
The tears were coming and I did what I could to hold them back.
Took my eyes off Shawn, hoping to fight the crying feeling by not looking.
But everywhere else was everyone else, cigarettes glowing
like a bunch of
L buttons.
I LOOKED BACK AT SHAWN,
tears now pouring from his eyes as he softly snotted and hiccuped like a little kid,
tears pouring from his eyes tears pouring from his eyes
tears pouring from his eyes.
I thought you said no crying,
Shawn,
I said,
voice cracking, one of my tears bursting
free.
But only one
so it didn’t count.
No crying.
No crying. No crying. No crying.
AND EVEN THOUGH
his face was wet with tears he wasn’t supposed to cry when he was alive,
I couldn’t see him as anything less than my brother,
my favorite, my only.
AND THERE WAS A SOUND
like whatever makes elevators work,
cables and cogs, or whatever,
grinding,
rubbing metal on metal
like a machine moaning but coming
from the mouth from the belly
of Shawn.
He never said nothing to me.
Just made that painful piercing sound,
as suddenly the elevator came to a stop.
RANDOM THOUGHT NO. 5
The sound you hear in your head,
the one people call ears ringing,
sounds less like a bell, and more like a flatline.
THERE WAS A MOMENT
before the door opened when we all just stood there, sickening
smoke thickening, crowded in
this cell this coffin
this elevator quiet.
I LOOKED AROUND
only seeing the orange glow
of five cigarettes puncturing the sheet of smoke
like headlights in heavy fog.
Only five cigarettes.
Shawn hadn’t lit one, became invisible
in the cloud.
And I felt like
the cigarette meant for him was burning in
my stomach,
filling me with stinging fire.
I WANT OUT.
The door opened slowly, the cloud of smoke rushing out of the elevator, rushing out of me
like an angry wave.
I caught my breath as
Buck, Dani,
Uncle Mark, Pop,
Frick, and Shawn
chased behind it.
The L button no longer lit.
I stood alone
in the empty box, face tight from dried tears,
jeans soggy, a loaded gun
still tucked in my waistband.
Shawn
turned back toward me, eyes dull from death but shining from tears,
finally spoke to me.
Just two words, like a joke he’d been saving.
YOU COMING?
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