Dominion (68 page)

Raymond Taylor, a.k.a. Gangster Cool, took out a bag of crack cocaine, already packaged for the next day’s deliveries. He picked up one of the crusty rocks, smelled it, touched it with his tongue, debated whether to smoke it. Maybe it could make him forget what he could never tell his homeboys.

“They played me. Fools got it all wrong. Ain’t their hood. Ain’t their set. Can’t tell my little homie, that’s sure. What’m I gonna do now?”

He pointed the gun toward the pictures on the wall, setting his sights on people in the newspaper clippings, on one in particular. Then he slowly rotated his wrist, brushing the muzzle against the bridge of his nose, then pulled it back three inches. He peered deep into the seductive barrel, holding it so the light shone just far enough into the darkness to make him wonder what lay beyond. His trembling index finger fondled the trigger.

He felt a twinge of guilt as he looked at the double-action revolver from the front end, seeing the head of the bullet three chambers left of the barrel. He’d learned this trick on his own years ago. Because he always knew where the bullet was and which way the cylinder turned, whenever he’d played Russian roulette in front of the homeboys he’d always known he wasn’t in danger. If, when he spun the cylinder, the bullet faced him from the only deadly spot—one chamber left of the barrel—he simply spun it again. None of the homeboys ever suspected. They were always amazed at how calm he was, impressed that he was the Iceman when facing death. It had built his rep. Unfortunately, that kid Jason and some others had followed his example and started spinning cylinders themselves—without knowing GC’s little trick. Too bad for them.

Gangster Cool pulled the trigger, watching the chamber with the bullet move toward the barrel and hearing the click. It now sat two chambers away. He pulled the trigger again, the bullet falling into position one chamber from the barrel. He wondered if he pulled the trigger once more if he would hear the sound. His finger tensed. He’d been distressed but not suicidal when he began this little ritual. But now a voice from somewhere, whether inside or outside he wasn’t sure, a distinct voice told him to do it, told him to pull the trigger, told him to do it now.

Raymond’s hand jerked at the last moment, just before the explosion. The .357 round hit his forehead at an angle, breaking skin an inch above his right eye. The lead punctured his flesh and cracked his front skull, exploding bone shards into his brain. The missile hit the top of his skull with a jar that knocked him backward onto the floor. The bullet exited the top of his head, pierced the ceiling, and lodged in a rafter.

Raymond’s mother heard the explosion in her son’s bedroom. She ran and threw open the door, believing he’d been shot through the window by a rival gangster. She screamed at the sight of splattered blood. She saw her boy, lying in a heap, a crimson pool surrounding his head and claiming more of the hardwood floor with every second.

“My baby, my baby.” She turned his head and saw his eyes open. He whispered something to her, something she didn’t understand. She rushed to the phone to punch 9-1-1.

“It’s my Raymond, my little boy! He’s been shot!”

“Where are you, ma’am? What’s your address?”

She gave the address and went running back to Raymond’s bedroom, her arms flailing. She picked up his blood-bathed head again. This time the eyes didn’t open. She screamed and wailed and cried out, “Oh, no. No, God, no. Not my little boy!”

Gangster Cool no longer existed. Raymond Taylor, on the other hand, merely relocated, leaving one place and arriving at another.

The woman who’d raised the boy and prayed for him, who’d invested her life in him, sobbed and held all he had left behind.

Clarence drove north on Grand, looking for the restaurant. All he saw on Grand and Estep was an old run-down bar. He looked at the undersized neon sign, faded red.
Miller’s
, it said, as if anyone cared.

They probably serve burgers and chicken. To Gracie that must qualify as a restaurant.

He looked at his watch—6:15 P.M. He got out and walked in the front door, looking warily into the bar as men looked into old west saloons before pushing open the swinging doors. This wasn’t really the black part of town yet. It was on the fringe—maybe 30 percent black—but sometimes that made the 70 percent white cling all the more tenaciously to their remaining turf. He saw twenty or thirty men and a few women, all white.

Clarence looked at the man tending bar. “You the owner?”

“Yeah. Who are you?”

“Clarence Abernathy. Your niece asked me to meet her here.”

“Gracie?”

“Yeah. Didn’t she call you?”

“But she didn’t say you were …”

“What? Black?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I am.”

“Yeah.” He gestured for Clarence to follow to the back of the restaurant. When the owner opened the door to a private room on the right, Gracie got up immediately and grabbed Clarence’s arm. He stepped back, embarrassed.

“Thanks, Uncle Willie,” she said. “We need some privacy.”

Uncle Willie looked suspiciously at Clarence. “You call me if you have any problems,” he said to Gracie. She nodded. He shook his head in obvious disgust and shut the door.

“Hey, Clarence. You’re lookin’ sharp tonight. Nice suit.” She touched his lapel. He backed away.

“Tell me what’s up, Gracie. That’s what I’m here for.”

“Okay. This guy I talked to says it was a couple of Bloods.”

“Bloods? What about the Hispanics that were seen driving away from the shooting?”

She shrugged. “This guy says it was Bloods.”

“Which Bloods?”

“He doesn’t know for sure.”

“Look,” Clarence said, sighing. “It’s a Crip neighborhood, and the guys you talked with are probably Crips, right? Crips always blame Bloods. What else do you have?”

“What else? Isn’t this a lot? I read it was two Latino bangers, maybe from the west side. Isn’t that what the paper said?”

“Yeah. Anyway, what more do you have?”

“This guy knows more for sure, but he wouldn’t tell me. I told him you were giving like a hundred bucks to anybody with good information. He said he could meet you after seven tonight. I told him we’d be just two miles away and you could probably meet him then. If you want to.”

“Where?” Clarence looked at his watch. Six-thirty.

“At the corner of MLK and Evans, just past the Minit Mart.”

“What’s his name?”

“Can’t tell you. That’s up to him.”

“What does he look like?”

“Black. Kind of short and heavy. Usually wears a dark blue stocking cap.”

“What’s he got for me?”

“I’m not sure. But it’s about the hit on your sister, I know that. Plus,” she added, “I’ve got another guy who knows everything that happens on the street. Everything. He’s taking me out Friday night. I’ll fish around. I’ll call you if he knows anything.”

“Uh, okay. Call me at the
Trib
if you can, all right? Not at home. You can leave a message on my machine.”

She nodded and batted her eyes at him. “Look, tomorrow’s my mother’s birthday and I’m short on cash. So, does the hundred-dollar reward apply to me too?”

Clarence wanted to say no, but he knew Gracie’s help could end up being critical. He reached into his wallet and grabbed one of the two hundred dollar bills he had left. He handed it to her and turned to head out the door.

“Thanks, Clarence. You’re a sweetie. Oh, my uncle told me to have you go out the back door.” She pointed to a door from the office leading directly outside. “It’s the door I always use, but I forgot to tell you. He said it’s better for privacy, if you don’t want people to see you coming and going.”

Clarence left by the back door, then drove to the corner of MLK and Evans. Seven o’clock—no one there. Seven-thirty—no one there. Eight—no one there. He waited until eight-thirty and finally gave up, hungry and exasperated. He stopped at Kim’s store to get a couple of corn dogs and headed home.

Clarence and Jake sat at Lou’s Diner the next day, having just polished off cheeseburgers and fries. Rory poured each of them a complimentary steaming mocha, while the jukebox played “A Bridge over Troubled Waters.”

“That’s a fascinating analysis,” Jake said to Clarence. “Tell me more.”

“Ever have a logic class?” Clarence asked. “The major premise is that all blacks who fail do so because of white racism. Of course, that doesn’t explain why so many whites fail, but that’s beside the point. Then comes the observation that some blacks are failing very badly. Therefore, there must be an
enormous
amount of white racism. And that means whites must transform themselves before blacks can ever succeed. So, some blacks trade on their victim status and appeal to white guilt feelings, which were far too long in coming but now are here in abundance. A lot of whites buy into this, don’t challenge this faulty logic, so they can feel better about themselves, get all righteous, and strut around thinking
other
whites are racists, but not them, no sir, not them. They think they’re really helping blacks, but the truth is they’re just thinking about themselves—trying to shed their guilt.”

“And you’re saying this whole way of operating isn’t solving the problem, it’s making it worse?”

“Sure. Our biggest problems in the black community aren’t external, they’re internal. Once whites routinely did terrible things against blacks, yet despite this many blacks succeeded against the worst odds. But even though there’s still plenty of racism, it isn’t nearly as powerful or restrictive—whites aren’t doing
nearly
as many terrible things to us now. Yet a higher percentage of blacks are failing than when racism was far worse. The opportunities and odds blacks face are much better, but for many the outcome is much worse.”

“But why? I still don’t really understand it,” Jake said.

“In the post-civil-rights race establishment,” Clarence said, “the equation is always the same. It’s very simple. As Shelby Steele explains it, Black Failure equals White Guilt. So blacks who fail cannot be blamed for their failure, therefore have no responsibility for their failure, therefore have no responsibility to change or to succeed. In fact, if they believe the equation—and millions do—they’re convinced they
cannot
succeed. The power over their lives doesn’t belong to them. It belongs to the white racists behind every bush. It teaches irresponsibility. One day I saw a couple of black kids break a store window, and the white store owner pointed a finger at them. One of the kids said, ‘You’re just accusing us ’cause we’re black.’ See, he’d learned the game. The victim, the store owner, was now the criminal, the racist. The true criminal, the window breaker, was now the victim. Of course, boys of every race will break windows—but those that don’t have the excuse of always being the victim are more likely to own up to their responsibility.

“All this leads to the dilemma of the middle-class black. On the one hand, despite his success, he may believe he’s still a victim. Say he’s a police sergeant—if he was white he’d be a lieutenant. Say he’s a company vice president—if it wasn’t for being black he’d be president. And whether or not he feels like a victim, he knows that his very success makes people see him as a traitor to the poor black. Because if some blacks are succeeding it means blacks
can
succeed despite racism, and if
that’s
true, then the philosophical cornerstone has been destroyed—the supposed victim status and helplessness of blacks. So instead of being an inspiration, white-collar blacks who succeed in business—in almost any career besides entertainment, athletics, or politics—are looked at with suspicion or even disdain.”

Clarence pushed back his empty mocha cup. He sighed. “Well, so much for analyzing the world’s problems. I’ve got another funeral to attend.”

Ty stared at GC’s closed coffin. He couldn’t believe his mentor was gone. Different emotions swirled within him, each taking turns gripping his heart. One was fear, dread, a sense he had to get away from the set. The other was a thirst for justice, a desire for revenge, a thought that he should do something to get even. But get even with whom? There was no one to take revenge on. Bloods hadn’t done this. GC had done it to himself.

GC’s mother was surrounded by three women—two sisters and their mother, GC’s grandma. They sobbed and wailed inconsolably.

Taleisha, GC’s girl, was dressed out fine. Her makeup was heavy, her diamond-studded fingernails looked like the talons of some exotic bird. Her fingers sported a cluster of gold rings, a half dozen of them on each hand, some doubled up on the same finger. Her gold earrings were miniature Cadillac emblems inlaid with precious stones. GC had bought them for her, or so she told herself. She had the look of a girl who used her appearance to get her way as GC used his street smarts to get his. Taleisha cried. Ty felt sorry for her, until he looked over and saw her in a corner looking into a mirror and putting on lip gloss.

Shadow, GC’s lieutenant, stood fast, talking with no one, his granite face pierced only by two smoky gray eyes. With GC gone, he was the Rollin’ 60s heir apparent. Ty looked at him in awe.

Pastor Clancy stood up front. “On days like this, you want to look for the best. But it’s hard to find, real hard. If Raymond could come back here today, just for a moment, I know what he’d tell us. He’d say wake up. He’d say life is a mist, a puff of smoke. You’re going to live forever somewhere, but not here. If you hang with the gangs, you may think you’ll survive, but you won’t. You’ll end up in a casket like Raymond, dying at somebody else’s hand or your own. Life is short enough. Don’t make it shorter. The gangs are your enemy, not your friend. You have only today to get your life straight, and maybe not the whole day either. So better make your peace with God now. I’ll help you any way I can. Ebenezer Church will help you any way we can. Come to us. Come while you still can, before it’s too late.”

Many of the adults cried and moaned. Most of the kids sat still, numb. The Abernathys sat together, except Keisha and Celeste, who were home with Hattie Burns. Geneva sat by Jonah; Clarence by Tyrone. Clarence put his arm around Ty, surprised to sense no resistance. Jonah whispered to Geneva, “Mama, I don’t want to die like GC. I want to die normal.”