Bronxwood (5 page)

It don’t stop neither. They talk for another couple minutes and I gotta say, it sound like they both real happy. Probably happier than they was before he went away.
Finally, my pops tell her he gotta go ’cause his food getting cold. But before he hang up, he go, “Lisa, you know I ain’t forget ’bout that. I’ma work hard too.” More laughing. Then he hang up.

No way I’ma ask what him and my moms is talking ’bout, what he working hard for. I ain’t sure I even wanna know. ’Cause I know him and the only kinda work I ever seen him doing was illegal shit.

Anyway, I shoulda knew he wasn’t gonna be no different this time. This the third time he been to prison, and it’s always for the same shit. The thing that piss me off is, every time he sitting in a jail cell chillin’, his family be going through some hard times. But he don’t never get to see that part.

When me and Regg went down south, he tried to talk to me ’bout my pops. He said he knew how I felt but that I should try not to be too hard on him. He was like, give the man another chance. Regg made it sound easy, but now that me and my pops is face-to-face, I know for a fact me and him can’t start over. Too much shit happened in the past.

So I get through the rest of breakfast, not really talking to him, not really listening. Least the food is good.

Before my pops pay the bill, he lean ’cross the table closer to me and go, “Let me ask you a question, Ty.”

I take a deep breath, trying to figure out what he want from me now.

“You got my gold chain? Your moms say she don’t got it.”

Damn. “Um, I, I don’t know. I mighta put it someplace, to keep it safe.”

“Good. Good. Find it and bring it to the party tonight.”

I nod. “I’ma look for it.” Now I’ma hafta try and get that chain back from Adonna. Hope she ain’t get too attached to it.

My pops still doing all the talking on the way to the
storage place, telling me who he invited to the party tonight, like I care. “All I know is this party better make me a lot of money,” he say, pulling the van into a parking spot and cutting the engine. “I got some things I’m working on.”

He open the van door, but it take him a couple seconds to move. “Man,” he go. “My body ain’t used to that much food no more. I need to go to sleep.
Itis
is setting in hard and fast.”

Finally, he get out and so do I. We go ’round to the back of the van and take out the hand truck and a dolly and some rope and shit. When we get to our storage room and unlock it, my pops look ’round and go, “Shit.” Only, the way he drag out the word, it sound more like “sheeeeet.”

I know what he thinking ’cause every time I come here I’m thinking the same thing, that it’s messed up all our stuff is here. When we got evicted, the marshals brung
everything we had in our apartment here. Our furniture is here, my pops clothes, and all Troy toys. Everything. This place always make me feel mad, ’cause we been living without none of this stuff for a long time, and it ain’t right.

At the same time, I’m feeling good that my pops is seeing all this now. He need to start understanding the changes we had to go through for the past year, see how we been living. I don’t think he get it.

Inside the room, my pops go over to the big-screen TV first and start talking ’bout remember this movie we watched and remember that video game we used to play, but he might as well be talking to hisself. ’Cause I’m shitting bricks, hoping he don’t notice that I been using his DJ equipment without asking him first. He ain’t gonna stand for that, ’specially from me.

The equipment is up against the wall, right by the door where I put it ’cause I had to get it in and out easy. Truth is, I been using it every three, four weeks. The way I see it, I ain’t had no choice. We was living in a shelter and his equipment was just sitting here. So I used it, threw my own kinda parties, and made some decent cash doing it. I ain’t gonna apologize to no one for that.

Still, the man uptight ’bout his shit. He had them Technics turntables, I think, since before I was born. He always talking ’bout how good they made shit back then, so you never had to buy them again. I know I ain’t break none
of it, but something tell me he gonna have some way of knowing I been using it.

And it don’t take him more than a minute neither. “What’s this?” he ask. I turn ’round and see him holding this little stash of my own vinyl I kept right in the front of one of the crates, just so it won’t get mixed up with his shit. I’m so fucking stupid it ain’t even real. I knew his ass was getting out. I shoulda moved them records before I went away with Regg. “You been using my equipment?”

“A couple times,” I say. “To make money to take care of everybody.”

He stare at me, cold.

“We ain’t had no money. We was in a shelter.”

Still staring. The man looking at me like he wanna kill me or something.

“Look, I know how you feel ’bout your shit, but what you expect me to do? You ain’t leave no money or nothing for us to—”

I barely get them words out my mouth before he on me, grabbing me by the throat and slamming the back of my head against the wall hard. For a couple seconds I don’t see nothing. Then I see my pops face all up in mines. “I ain’t gonna say this again,” he say, so close he spitting in my face. “You need to remember who is the father here. Do you need help?” His eyes is hard and mad. I can’t even talk my head hurt so much, so I just kinda nod so he can let me go,
and he do. Then he say, “Help me get this equipment outta here. I need to go home and take a shit.”

It take me a second to move, but then I do and, man, I’m way past pissed off. So pissed, I can’t even hardly think straight. I help him lift one of the speakers on the dolly and stack some of the crates of records on the hand truck.

It take us three trips to get what we need outta there, and we don’t say nothing to each other the whole time. When we done and back outside, I ain’t looking for him to drive me home or nothing so I just start walking away, ’cross the parking lot.

“Get in the van,” my pops say. He don’t yell or nothing, but the way he say it, I know he don’t like me walking away from him.

I keep walking though. I don’t gotta listen to his ass. I don’t look back, but I hear him start up the engine and drive up on the side of me. I know he gonna try and get me in that van, but I don’t care. I don’t need him to get back home.

He drive real slow and yell out the window, “Be in front of your building by eight.” Then he just take off like I’m s’posed to care.

I keep walking, out the parking lot and down the street to the train station, but I can’t even lie to myself. My head hurt. I could kill that man. For real.

When I get back to Bronxwood, all I wanna do is get upstairs
and lay down. Not only is my head killing me, but now the Beast is startin’ to feel like I got a wet towel sitting in my stomach. I’m walking all slow into the building, probably looking like I’m fifty years old or something.

It’s early and Cal probably still ’sleep. For a second I think ’bout knocking on his door and waking him up to tell him that I seen my pops and what he did, but, nah, it’s too early to get into that with him. I don’t know where the fuck Greg at. He must got a new girl or something ’cause he ain’t hardly ever here no more. It’s like me and Cal is living by ourself.

I go in my room and close the door. All I wanna do is sleep, but I can’t even calm myself down. I can’t believe that man went and slammed me like that. He only been out a day and already he putting his hands on people. Treating me like I’m still a child, not a man.

My pops wasn’t never like that. He wasn’t never the type to go ’round really beating me or Troy or nothing like that,
but he definitely used to hit us when he thought we was outta line ’bout something. That’s the way he always been, demanding respect, ’specially from his kids. That ain’t never gonna change. But I’m sixteen. Why he think he still got that kinda right?

Actually, only person I ever seen him give a real beat-down to was my moms. It only happened a couple times that I know ’bout, and the fact that I was standing right there when it happened ain’t stop him from beating the shit outta her neither. The whole thing was mad violent too.

I take my sneakers and jeans off and get in bed. All I wanna do is go back to sleep, but it ain’t easy trying to stop myself from thinking. It don’t take me long to figure out why my pops hit me. He trying to get me in line and get his control back. He probably know I’m my own man now and he don’t like it.

But what really fuck with my head is that I took that shit from him. Why I ain’t hit him back or something? Kick his ass? I mean, what the fuck is wrong with me?

I don’t come outside ’til, like, ten after eight, and my pops is already down there waiting. Not that I care. Only reason I’m even doing this is for whatever cash he gonna pay me.

I’m looking good though, wearing jeans and this shirt I got down in Atlanta. The shirt is all black with a design that make it look like somebody that be wearing, like, a size 14 sneaker stepped in red paint and walked ’cross the
bottom of it. It was mad expensive, I ain’t gonna lie, but nobody got no shirt like it ’round here. And course I got my headphones hooked ’round the straps of my backpack ’cause I don’t be using nobody headphones but mines.

I get in the van, waiting for him to say something ’bout me being late, but he don’t. Actually, I was taking my time getting my music together. My friend Patrick that live on the twelfth floor was putting some new songs on a flash drive for me so I could load it in my pops deck when we get to the party. My pops don’t know it, but I got most of my music already stored on his deck. And I don’t only play the new music Patrick downloaded for me. I play a lot of old shit too.

I used to help my pops DJ all the time, so I know ’bout all kinds of music that kids my age ain’t up on. When I play some of them old songs at my parties, they be like, “Damn. Where you get that shit from?” They don’t know. I been listening to that music my whole life. Some of that music been ’round since my moms and pops was my age.

When I play, I like to mix some of my pops old music with some new beats and raps. New mixed with old. That’s kinda my style. And my DJ skills is tight now. I’m better than my pops is. He gonna see.

I’m still pissed at him for what he did, so I don’t say nothing in the van. Not a word the whole way. He got the radio on again, so it don’t matter. Back in the day when I used to go to his parties with him, shit used to be mad fun.
I started going with him when I was, like, thirteen and it used to feel good getting to leave home with him at night ’specially ’cause my moms and Troy had to stay home by theyself. I felt like I was grown, getting to stay up late, helping my pops set up the parties and all that. Them parties was wild too, probably not the kinda thing a kid shoulda even been at, but back then, I ain’t really see everything that was going on, or least I ain’t understand what was really going on ’round me. Everything. The drug dealing, gambling, pimping hos. All that. Took me a while, but now I get it.

So, yeah, I’ma go and help him make this party dope, but I’m only here for one thing. Money. So I can buy my own equipment and not need his shit no more. Or him.

The party is gonna be in the basement of a pool hall. Regg know the guy that own the place and got him to rent out the basement. The space kinda small for one of my pops parties, but this ain’t gonna be like all the other ones he throw.

Regg is already there, going over the room, making sure all the windows and doors is locked and the only way folks can get in is through the side door off the alley, the one where they gotta pay to get in.

And they got some other guys there too, my pops friends that always be working his parties. This dude Bones is setting up the bar, but I know he be selling drugs on the side
too. In another corner, this guy Jay is setting up the poker tables. Then there’s this dude Leon by this door that must go to a back room or something. Leon a straight-up pimp that probably brung a bunch of hot girls with him to work the guys at the party for every dollar they got.

Thing is, my pops get a piece of all they action.

This how my pops parties go. Folks pay to get in, but they don’t only come out to hear the music. They come for everything.

Me and my pops go straight to where the DJ table need to be set up. The way we work, it’s like ain’t no time went by from the last time he threw a party to now. We both know what we gotta do and we just go through it, no problem, which is good ’cause it mean we don’t gotta say nothing to each other. While my pops set up the turntables and mixer, it always been my job to run the speaker wires, burn the ends, and make sure they connected right. Then I gotta tape them wires down to the floor with duct tape.

When I get all that done and everything’s hooked up, my pops put on one of his old-skool records to test out the sound, and he just let it play while we stand next to each other, not saying nothing, just stacking the crates of records and making sure everything in the right order, ’cause with my pops there’s definitely a order, and I know in the back of his mind he checking to make sure I ain’t fuck up his system while he was gone, which I ain’t. Matter of fact, when I DJ, I keep everything in the same order he use.

The way he plan his parties is always the same. First, he start out with whatever R&B dance music that’s hot right now, just to get folks in the door and let them know what kinda party they gonna be havin’. Then, when the place get full, he crank the party up to high and put on old shit like the Fatback Band, which always get folks they age up on the floor dancing and getting theyself thirsty so they hafta buy drinks. After a long time, he bring the beat down and throw on some slow reggae, get people in the mood for slow dancing and grinding. Sometimes he even pick out a girl to dance with hisself, a girl that ain’t got no guy with her, make her feel good even if she ain’t the best-looking girl there. When he dancing, I play a couple more reggae jams and, when we done with the slow music, that’s when I really take over and play some new stuff, so the folks in they twenties can hear something they into too, keep them coming to the parties and maybe bring new people with them. Then, when my pops take back over, he end off the night by playing some more old music from back in the day, stuff like Shalamar and The Whispers, and while some of the younger people start leaving, most of the people stay and dance ’til the end of the party. My pops always end his parties with the same song, “Before I Let Go” by Frankie Beverly and Maze. Folks lose they mind with that song. And they leave happy. All the time.

“You see this,” my pops say. He holding up a Brothers Johnson record in my face.

“What?” I go, even though I know I was playing “Strawberry Letter 23” at my last party.

“This ain’t supposed to be here. This look like rap to you?”

Damn. Fuck.

“I ask a question, I want a answer.” He staring at me now.

“I don’t know. You musta put that in the wrong place ’fore you — ’fore you went on your trip, ’cause I don’t even play that kinda music at my parties.” I’m lying out the left side of my neck, and me and him both know it. But damn, it’s only one fuckin’ album. Why he gotta make a big deal ’bout everything?

He stare at me for a couple more seconds. “Where my chain at?” he ask me.

“I forgot it.” Fuck him. Like he in a rush to get that chain back.

I don’t wait for him to say nothing back. I just walk away and go over to the other side of the room to the bar. No doubt I’ma need something to get me through the night with that man.

I ask Bones for a couple beers and he like, “You old enough to drink, man?”

“Yeah,” I go.

Dude used to give me beers when I was still in middle school.

He hand me the bottles. “Something wrong, Ty? Your pops is back, man.” He say it like that’s s’posed to mean something to me.

“Yeah, I see that.”

“You lucky. Some men, they go in and never get out.”

I nod my head, take my beers, and walk away. I ain’t in the mood tonight. I just wanna get this party over with.

After we done setting up, it’s, like, practically ten o’clock and folks is gonna start showing up in a while. I plug in the microphone and turn the lights on over the DJ table, and we good.

“Tyrone!” Regg call out from the other side of the room. Even though he calling my pops, for a second I think he callin’ my name. “You ready to open the doors?” He in charge of the money, and keeping out anybody who he think gonna start something.

“Born ready,” my pops say, and him and Regg laugh. Then my pops crank the music up.

Me, when I throw my parties, this is when my mind start running, thinking maybe nobody gonna show up and I ain’t gonna make no money. It never happened like that for me, but still. My pops though, he chillin’, drinking a beer, and moving his head to the beat of the music, just knowing the word is out that he outta prison and people is gonna pay to come and see him.

And they do. The second Regg open the door, there’s, like, ten, twelve people coming in, like they was standing out there waiting. My pops don’t say nothing to me, but he line up a couple more records for me to play, then he leave the DJ table and go over to where everyone standing at. All
the females is giving him hugs, and all the dudes is smiling and shaking his hand. I put on the records and try to get into the music, feel it.

My pops come back and start DJing, and I step to the side and let him try and show off for his friends. I hand him the records he need and keep drinking. It’s after two o’clock when my pops finally let me play some of my music. I’m up there jamming, feeling good. The music pumping in my headphones and in my body, and I got a buzz from the beers I been drinking. I got everybody out there dancing, young people and even them forty-year-olds like my pops. He out there looking like a old fool, dancing with two young girls. But with the way I’m playing and the way everybody happy, everything is good ’til I look up and see this dude Dante coming into the party and walking ’cross the floor toward my pops.

Dante one of my pops friends, but he ain’t cool like Regg. I don’t even know why my pops even deal with that asshole. Dante walk over to my pops and they hug like they best friends. Course I can’t hear nothing they saying, but he cheesing in my pops face, telling him something and both of them is laughing and shit. And I ain’t even hardly hearing the music no more ’cause I’m just watching him, pissed that he treating my pops like a chump or something.

A second later, I’m like, fuck my pops. Let his ass get played by his friend.

After a while my pops come over to the DJ table and just take back over. He don’t say nothing ’bout how good I was doing, probably ’cause he know I’m better than him now. The little bit of skills he used to have is gone. He lost it in jail. Knowing him, he probably don’t want me playing too long ’cause his guests gonna know they don’t need to be coming to his parties when mines is probably better.

I walk away and out the corner of my eye I see Dante looking at me. I stop walking and stare back, just to let him know I know what he doing, trying to fuck with me, and I ain’t scared to say nothing to my pops ’cause both us know what would happen to Dante if I did say something.

After a couple seconds of me and him staring at each other, he the first one to take his eyes off mines. Asshole. I keep walking ’cross the room, over by Regg to see if he need anything from the bar.

Regg is standing in the doorway, and he so big he just ’bout fill the whole thing up. When I get there, he lean over close to me so I can hear him and go, “What up? You look like you ’bout to choke that nigga.”

Regg is cool. I can tell him everything. When we was driving down south, I told him ’bout me and Novisha and all that bullshit that happened between us, but for some reason I ain’t never told him ’bout Dante. And now, I ain’t sure I wanna get into it. So I just go, “Nah, it ain’t nothing. Don’t worry ’bout it.”

But Regg just stand there like he waiting for me to say more, fill him in. It ain’t easy to get nothing past him.

So I ask him to come outside with me for a second, and when we out there, I say, “A’ight. I’ma tell you. In the winter, back when we was living in that shelter, Dante was coming ’round all the time and buying my moms food and clothes for Troy and shit. Actin’ like he was lookin’ out for us, just ’cause.”

I look over my shoulder and make sure nobody coming up behind me. In a way I wish someone was, so I wouldn’t hafta even talk ’bout none of this.

“One night,” I say, “the same night ACS came and snatched up Troy, my moms ain’t come home at all. And that’s when I found out that her and Dante …” I don’t even gotta say it.

“Damn,” Regg say, shaking his head. “I thought something like that mighta went down. That’s some fucked-up shit.”