Courageous (21 page)

A rough-looking, leather-skinned black man, multiple scars on his face and neck, knocked on the door.

Derrick’s gramma answered. “Come in. He’s gettin’ ready to go.”

“Derrick!” he yelled. “Get out here.”

Derrick appeared from the back room. It had been a year since he’d seen the unexpected visitor. “Uncle Reggie? What are you . . . ?”

“We’re takin’ a walk.”

“No way, I got some friends expectin’ me.”

“Then they’ll be disappointed.” He pulled Derrick out the front door.

They walked briskly down the street; Reggie’s grip felt like a vice on Derrick’s arm. “You been messin’ with drugs and hangin’ with ’bangers.”

“Gramma don’t know nothin’.”

“She’s forgotten twice what you’ll ever know, punk.”

“Where we goin’?”

“A little tour. Gonna show you what gangs and drugs will do to you.”

Three blocks away they came to a back alley Derrick had stayed away from. Three addicts lay on the ground against the wall. Reggie stopped. “Look.”

Reluctantly Derrick complied. Half their teeth were missing. They appeared like zombies, the living dead.

The smell overwhelmed Derrick. He gagged. He’d walked past dudes like this but never this close. They sat scratching themselves, trying to get rid of whatever was crawling under their skin.

“You see the scars on them?”

Derrick said nothing.

Reggie pushed his shoulder hard. “I said,
see the scars
?”

“Yeah, I see ’em!”

“It’s not just the drugs. They’ve been beaten up and robbed again and again. See their skin?”

“Yeah.” It looked ashen and sickly. How could black men be so pale?

Reggie gestured at a man with vacant eyes and a face as expressionless as a mask. They walked farther to a pair of cocaine addicts, united by their drug of choice and their utter ruin. These two appeared to converse except neither could understand the other. They were oblivious to Reggie and Derrick. A couple of times they glanced Derrick’s way but looked through him as if he existed on another plane.

“See those men, Derrick? What do they look, seventy? They’re probably no more than forty. They’re not old, just ruined.

“You doin’ crack yet? That’ll take you out. You’ll be just like them—dead or wishin’ you were. Maybe make somebody else dead. Is that what you want? Rot in prison? The livin’ death?”

“Just want to hang with my homies. That’s all.”

Near the corner liquor store, one of a dozen in a two-mile radius, two old men and a young one sat with hands extended, looking like beggars on the streets of Delhi.

“See these guys? They started by just hangin’ with their homies too. Most of them don’t have a life three blocks away from this liquor store. They were nickel-and-dime ’bangers and dealers and hustlers. Now they beg for money. They eat rock and breathe liquor; that’s all they do. Take a good look, boy. That’s what you’re gonna be.”

This guy thinks he knows me? He ain’t even talked to me for a year.
“Never gonna be that.”

“That’s what they thought. Some of them were honor students too.”

Reggie stopped again and pointed. “That’s Kenny. Doesn’t know how old he is. He just hustles for chump change, begging off little old ladies. He’s still trying to be hip, shirttails out, hat on backward. Permanent adolescence. Ugly, ain’t it? Like a twelve-year-old still wearin’ diapers. Anybody offer you so much as a toke, this is where they sending you. Remember that, boy.”

Derrick stared at the concrete.

“Last week I asked Kenny what he thought of his life. Know what he told me? ‘I may not be in hell yet, but I can see it and smell it.’ That what you want, boy? Answer me now.”

“No. But you don’t know what I got with the Gangster Nation.”

“I
don’t know
?” He pulled up his sleeve to reveal a prominent Gangster Nation tattoo. He pushed Derrick against the wall. “I was GN on the street before you were born and for seven years in a federal pen. Feds don’t mess around. I oughta bust you up for tellin’ me what I don’t know. Outta respect for yo mama, I won’t knock your teeth out.”

“You been outta the gang a long time. You don’t know TJ.”

“Don’t have to know him. I was number two in Albany’s biggest gang, and look where it got me.” He grabbed Derrick by the shirt and yanked him into another alley. It smelled like a latrine.

“Take a good look, Derrick. Breathe deep and smell it. If this is the life you want, here it is. If you’re lucky. Wake up, boy. Our ancestors were slaves. Their hands and feet were chained, but they learned to use their heads. Your hands and feet are free. God blessed you with a good mind, but you’re makin’ yo’self a slave.”

“I ain’t no slave.”

“Drugs take you to jail. Gangs take you to jail. You don’t know nothin’ about that world; I do. Seven years in prison. Know what it’s like? No privacy, always noisy, television and radio blasts till you just stick your fingers in your ears and wanna scream. Threats and fights and hits. Ain’t no life. You got jumped in, didn’t you?”

Derrick started to lie, but why should he hide it? He was proud to be Gangster Nation. “Yeah.”

“Well, I told you I was number two, an OG. Had the rep. Then they send me out on a drug deal and a get-back. I go to jail and then what? You do the time alone; nobody there to help you. You think they yo friends, but they ghost on you.”

“Not goin’ to any jail.”

“Listen to you. You tryin’ to be the ultimate cool, but you the ultimate fool. I been down the road you’re just startin’ on, and I know where it leads. Only one way to make it back. I’ll tell you if you wanna know. But as long as you keep lyin’ to yo’self, the truth’s wasted on you.”

“It’s my life.”

“You got that right. Your life to waste, to throw away, or to turn around now. I’ll tell you now—I ain’t gonna tell you again: get out while you still can.”

They turned and walked home another way, through another maze of broken lives.

They were quiet until they got back to Derrick’s front door. “Your mother’s gone, D. I was never a good brother to her. For a while I thought you was makin’ yo mama proud. Not anymore, boy. But it’s not too late.”

Derrick looked at his uncle Reggie. His face reminded him of a picture of his mother. For a moment he felt a connection, like maybe the man knew what he was talking about. But Derrick’s thoughts drifted back to what it meant to belong to the Gangster Nation.

Reggie saw the moment pass, saw in Derrick’s eyes that nothing he’d said would make a difference. “I want better for you, son. With yo mama gone, somebody’s got to hammer on you. But you don’t wanna hear it from me; fine, I won’t come back. Some people want help. Can’t waste time on somebody choosin’ to throw his life away.”

Reggie looked like an attorney finishing a closing argument to a jury who’d already made up its mind.

“Your choice, D. If you run with the ’bangers, then only three things can happen: you end up burned-out on the street, wasted in prison, or lyin’ in the chalk circle. No other options.”

As always, the legendary Pearly’s on Slappey Boulevard, the mother of all country-style kitchens, was crowded and loud. It was
the
place for breakfast. And lunch. Finicky food critics would never admit to eating at Pearly’s; they just came here undercover whenever they wanted real food.

Pearly’s had the market-tested efficiency of a New York stand-up counter that maximized every square foot, combined with the down-home collegial feel of an old South barbershop. The master menu hung on the wall, and Adam looked at it the way a marksman eyes a target. With the long lines at Pearly’s, Adam intuitively expected a lengthy wait to order and be served, but it never happened. Even with ten people in front of him, he didn’t have enough time to decide what would accompany his perennial link-sausage biscuit.

Five minutes later, the server magically appeared with a golden biscuit cooked to perfection, mouthwatering sausage hanging out both ends. Adam’s very short prayer contained the words “Thank You” repeated three times.

“How’s yours?” Adam asked Shane between bites.

“Heart attack on a plate and worth every mouthful.” He swallowed a forkload of steak and eggs and sighed. “There’s just nothin’ bad about this place.”

“I disagree,” Adam said. “They’re not open twenty-four hours.”

Adam’s attention was diverted to the parking lot, where an early-twenties white guy with a backpack approached a kid who looked seventeen. Both parties did the look-all-around routine to be sure no one watched. If Adam had been on the street, nothing would have happened. But given the sun’s reflection on the window, he was invisible to the dealer and the buyer.

The guy thinks if he can’t see anyone, then they can’t see him.
It occurred to Adam that he’d sometimes lived that way himself.

The dealer looked like a college student. He swung his backpack around to hang against his chest. He unzipped it and took out a rolled sandwich bag with a greenish cigar-size substance, then a couple of miniature ziplock baggies, one clear, one transparent green. The large baggie was marijuana and the smaller ones methamphetamines and cocaine. Adam sighed. He knew these deals occurred everywhere, all the time.

Shane looked too. “I saw that dealer in Hilsman Park a week ago when I was there with Tyler. What’s he doing at Pearly’s? Sheesh. If you’re looking for a hundred witnesses . . .”

Just then, as the buyer reached in his pocket for his money, Adam saw his face.

“Jeremy.”

“You know him?”

“Jeremy Rivers. He’s a friend of Dylan’s. On the track team. Okay, this just got personal. Let’s go, partner.” Adam pulled Shane’s arm.

Shane stuffed his last chunk of steak in his mouth, saying good-bye to the remnants of biscuit on his plate, which, in a perfect world, he would have licked clean.

“693c reporting a drug deal with a minor at North Slappey and . . . What am I saying? We’re at Pearly’s. Parking lot. Corporal Mitchell and I are approaching.”

Adam stepped toward the suspects. “Hands out where I can see them.”

Adam took the drugs from the young kid’s hand and the money out of the dealer’s hand. He said to Shane, “You take care of this guy while I talk with Jeremy.”

When the kid heard his name, he raised his eyes from the asphalt and looked into the officer’s face, where he recognized Dylan’s dad.

This just got personal for him too.

Chapter Twenty-three

The shift gathered in the muster room, Shane on Adam’s left, Bronson across the aisle on their right, Nathan and David in front of them, as usual.

The sergeant gave way to the sheriff, who stood at the podium with a memo in hand.

“Men, starting today, I am implementing a new code of conduct for the entire sheriff’s department. This is awkward, but we need to address it, so hear me out.”

He had Adam’s attention.
What’s this?

“No matter how you feel about another employee, I want you to keep your personal feelings to yourself. I don’t want to hear about how much you love me or any other staff member. It’s inappropriate. It’s awkward. And it’s unacceptable!”

Adam lowered his head. He couldn’t remember ever feeling so embarrassed. The silence was interminable.

“And, Corporal Mitchell . . .”

The sheriff pointed at Adam, who looked up, horrified.

“I gotcha!”

The room exploded with laughter. Those near Adam slapped him on the back. Adam blushed and shook his head. He turned and his eyes fell, as was statistically probable, upon Brad Bronson.

The planetoid put his palm to his lips and blew Adam a kiss.

Javier Martinez laid his new suit and tie, still covered in plastic, across his bed. It was the first suit he’d ever owned.

“Javy! It’s perfect!”

“I don’t know, Carmen. It was a great sale, and Adam insisted on helping, but I still paid for two-thirds of it. I can take it back.”

“You’re not taking it back. Put it on.”

“Now?”

“Right now. I want to see you in it.”

She picked it up and took the plastic off. Javier put on the slacks and shirt, then the jacket. He picked up the tie and put it under his collar, then stopped.