Samaritan (10 page)

Narcissistic, self-aggrandizing—yeah, yes, guilty as charged; but, in his defense, he knew that he would have done anything for them: paid their college tuition, paid their family’s rent, hooked up their older sibs with jobs; responded to any financial or spiritual 911 they could have possibly sent his way, although none of them had ever sought him out for anything above and beyond his continued presence in class. Nor did any of them become writers, as far as he knew—but that was OK too.

“So how’d you come to read
Spoon River Anthology
?” Ray asked Myra, as the kids gathered their books.

“Mr. Barkeley said I would like it,” she answered, zipping up her backpack.

“Do you?”

“Yeah,” her voice so small, “I like olden-days stuff.”

“Like what else?”

“Charles Dickens?”

“What did you read of his?”

“Nothing yet. But I have his book at home. I’m going to read it next.”

“Who’s Mr. Barkeley?”

“He was the guidance counselor.”

“Was?”

“He left.”

“You know your story was excellent,” Ray said, Myra looking off, fighting down a smile. True to type, she had yet to look him in the eye.

“If I’d read it in a book . . .” he faltered, then, “I’d never have guessed it was written by a teenager. How old are you?”

“Fourteen.”

“Fourteen. What do you want to be in life?”

“I don’t know,” she said in a shrugging singsong.

“You keep it up like this, you’re going to be a monster writer someday,” he said, gassing her head unconscionably now. “And I’d be able to say I knew you when.”

Myra swallowed another grin; he could see the physical struggle in her face; Ray begging himself to stop.

When he finally turned away from her, he saw that the entire class save for Rashaad was still in the room although the change bell had rung over a minute ago. They were lingering, eavesdropping; their expressions hungry, disturbed and alert.

Tromping down to the school’s lobby, Ray saw that the other security guard was on duty now, the young lean unsmiling one who was under the illusion of being a corrections officer, and he faltered before getting in line to sign out, waiting his turn behind a dumpy older woman hunched over the visitors’ log, a five-year-old boy at her side.

One of the main doors to the street banged open and a tall overweight girl came splay-footed into the school. Ignoring the security desk, she hung a leisurely right toward the stairs.

“Where you goin’.” The guard’s voice whip-cracked across the hall.

The girl, snapping gum, turned dead-eyed, sizing up this hawk-faced bitch.

“Bafroom.”

“You coming from outside?”

“Yeah. I was outside.”

The guard just stared her down, Ray noticing the five-year-old hypnotized by the lean unsmiling lady behind the desk.

He took another look at the older woman holding the kid’s hand, standing there openmouthed, as sucked into this showdown as the boy. She seemed faintly familiar to him; a face just out of memory’s range.

“So can I go?” the big kid finally said.

“No, you cannot
go
.”

Ray became entranced too, thinking, She’s got to be kidding. But she wasn’t.

He could tell that the big girl wanted to mouth off, register some face-saving gesture, but she was too intimidated and left the building without even a cluck of irritation.

Ray took another look at the older woman with the child, convinced he knew her but . . . More like he recognized the essence of her, the set of her mouth or something, the rest a papier-mâché swaddle, a thickening of years.

She caught him staring at her, Ray thinking, Can’t be . . . But he saw that she was doing the same visual stutter-step on him.

“Ray?”

“Oh shit. Carla . . .” seeing her full on now, stripping her back down to seventeen.

“Oh my God . . .” Carla said, and they embraced in the epicenter of the school, the moment not lost on Ray who barely had the nerve to even look at her back when they were students here.

“Oh my God.” Carla’s voice rasped like boots on gravel, her eyes, eyebrows all that was really left.

“Yeah, wow . . .” Ray stepped back to take her in, then quickly looked away, afraid his disorientation at her physical decline was all over his face.

“You look just like you did. You look just like you,” she said, her lower teeth now sepia-toned and quarter-twisted at the bottom of her mouth.

“Jesus . . .” He didn’t know where to rest his eyes. The last time he had seen her, maybe thirty years ago, Carla Powell was exiting their building in Hopewell strapped into an upright gurney, drying blood on her skirt and both forearms, her wrists thick with tape. Her face, as always, even on that day, was makeup precise, brows plucked to a whip-line of black, eyes, despite their tranked-out glassiness, still somehow managing to project a fierce and angry sexuality. There had been rumors about her and her father.

“How
are
you,” he said, beaming mechanically, but really wanting to know.

“I’m just . . . They got a preschool program here.” She jerked on the little boy’s arm. “I’m trying to get him squared away.”

The boy was still fixated on the security guard, still staring at her wide-eyed.

“Your son?”

“Grandson,” she said, and Ray got lost in the math.

“So how
are
you,” he repeated mindlessly, and this time Carla seemed to take the question seriously, her face suddenly buckling from forehead to chin.

“Not so good,” she said hoarsely, let go of her grandson’s hand, fished out a cigarette and fired up.

“What’s wrong.”

“No smoking, Ma’am,” the guard blared flatly as if they were at the far end of the lobby.

Carla blinked, said “Sorry,” then absently stubbed out the freshly lit butt into the palm of her hand, Ray getting a cold whoosh off that.

“No, I’m not so good,” she repeated, pocketing the broken cigarette.

“How so . . .”

“So how are you?” Carla ignored the probe. “You married? You happy?” saying it like it was an either/or proposition.

“I’m over in Little Venice for now,” he said, leaving it at that.

“You know, Ray, I swear . . .” Her voice dropped to a rusty mutter. “I can’t believe I’m in this goddamn building again. I hated this school.”

“Then maybe you should leave,” the guard said coolly.

“
Excuse
me?” Carla cocked her head in astonishment, Ray equally startled, almost thrilled, not so much by the comment itself but by the fact that he was sure the guard had said it just to see what would happen.

“You save that mouth for the
hoodies.
” Carla leaned forward, flashing fire, but despite the words her voice was more distraught than pugnacious, and her hands were shaking. “I am a
grand
mother . . .”

Ray went hollow with dread, with epiphany. This whole home-from-the-hills fantasy that he had engineered for himself here was all wrong; retreating into the past like this just another way of advancing to the grave.

He quickly scribbled his name in the log and started backtracking toward the main door.

“Carla,” calling out to her as he became a silhouette in the blinding afternoon sun. “Be well.”

Chapter 8

Hospital—February 13

Already in tears, Nerese pulled up in front of her sister-in-law’s swaybacked clapboard house, where her nephew Eric was sitting on the steps waiting for her, a Raven .25 semi-automatic in a see-through sandwich bag resting across his knees.

She had intended to go over to New York today and interview Ray’s daughter about the assault, but that was before the hysterical predawn phone call from Butchie’s ex-wife that had jump-started her morning. Nerese sat there now in her gargling Chevy, thinking of her mother’s favorite saying: “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”

Checking the empty street both ways before rising to his feet, Eric slowly walked around to the passenger side of the car, slid in front and handed the Raven over to his aunt.

“What the fuck is
this
,” Nerese said through her tears.

“What,” Eric more sulky than anything else.

“I said for you to put it in a
bag.
”

“It’s in a bag.”

“Not a
see
-through bag, Eric. Where’s your brain at?”

The kid shrugged, looking away from her, his kneecaps pumping like jackhammers.

Nerese put the Raven in her purse, then shoved the whole thing deep beneath her seat.

The two of them sat there in the mid-morning silence of the ramshackle street, Nerese sniffing and periodically palming the wetness from her cheeks.

“What my sup
posed
to do,” her nephew finally said, his voice an explosive whine. “He hit my brother in the back a the head with a
bat.
”

“
When,
” Nerese snapped.

“What?”

“
When
did he hit your brother in the back a the head with a
bat.
What
day.
”

“Sunday.”

“Sunday, huh? And you shot him on
Tues
day? That’s premeditated murder, Eric.”

“I was scared.” The kid looked away again. “I had to work myself up.”

“Premeditated . . .” Nerese looked at her hands, the world a blur. “I used to push your stroller.”

“Yo, Aunt Neesy, you bring me in all crying like this, you gonna make me look guilty.”

Nerese bounced a slap off her nephew’s near-side temple so fast that it seemed as if her palm was stinging before she had even acted.

“You
are
guilty, you dumb shit!”

Eric stared straight ahead, a bright red bloom marring his profile.

Nerese gulped air, put a hand to her own forehead, regrouped.

“Where’s your mother.”

“She went to work.”

“She
what
?” Nerese shocked, not shocked. “Jesus.”

“I need to go back inside,” Eric said, still staring straight ahead.

“No you don’t.” No way would she let him out of her sight now.

“I need to change my clothes before we go.”

“Why?”

“These are like brand-new,” plucking at his baggy jeans and ENYCE sweatshirt. “I got to give them up down there, I don’t know what they’re gonna do with them.”

“My God,” Nerese’s voice was high and faint with marvel. “Do you have any idea how much jail time . . .” She stopped herself, not really wanting him to think about that right now.

They sat in silence again, Nerese deciding that he could change his clothes if that would make him feel better; she wouldn’t even follow him into the house, but Eric, starting to look a little gut-sick, made no move to leave the car.

“OK, look. I’m going to take you in over at the South Precinct. The reason we’re going there is that my old partner is in South Detectives now. He knows we’re coming, and he’ll make sure everything goes smooth, no bullshit, no head games, OK?”

“You get me a lawyer?” he asked, eyes on the street.

Nerese stared at him, his self-centeredness, his lack of gratitude a little breathtaking.

“All right, listen to me. I put a call in to the supervising attorney over at the public defender’s office? She promised me that come the arraignment, the right PD’s gonna grab your file from the basket.”

“Aunt Neesy, I can’t go up in there with a PD!” Eric finally looked at her, his eyes glistening with panic. “I need a
pay
lawyer!”

“Eric. A pay lawyer needs to get paid. I don’t have it and I know your mother doesn’t either. Now, this woman I talked to? She’s always been as good as her word. I promise you, whoever you get is gonna be rock-solid, and it’s gonna be on the house.”

“OK.” Eric abruptly turned submissive, and again they just sat there, Nerese trying to drum up the heart to put the car in motion.

“So how’s Darren doing,” asking after his cousin with strained formality, his voice near to breaking.

“I don’t even want to hear his name on your lips, today,” she said, then after a beat, grudgingly added, “Darren’s fine.”

The silence came back down again, Nerese able to hear the tick of her wristwatch.

“You want something to eat before we go?”

Eric shrugged, palmed his gut.

“How about McDonald’s?”

“OK.”

And with a nonjail destination, Nerese finally pulled away from the curb.

Two blocks from the McDonald’s off Highway 440 in Jersey City, Eric turned to her. “Can we go to Burger King instead? I don’t like McDonald’s.”

The nearest Burger King was ten minutes away on a demoralized stretch of John F. Kennedy Boulevard, Nerese driving past block after block of boarded-up storefronts, homemade shop signs and clots of Eric-aged dopeslingers lounging on every corner, a few of them still able to read her as police despite her civilian dress, sex and personal car.

The Burger King was boarded up.

“There’s one on the city line in Gannon,” Eric said. “Near the Armstrong Houses?”

Nerese dutifully took off, only to find herself bumper to bumper on the New Jersey Turnpike, a jackknifed sixteen-wheeler closing down every lane but one, and after twenty minutes of inching along, the absurdity of what they were doing finally became too much for her and she drove the shoulder to the next exit, whipped around a jug-handle and pulled in to a Wendy’s.

They ordered via the drive-through window, Eric letting Nerese choose his last civilian meal, then parked in the lot, neither one of them making a move to open the humid greasy bags that heated up their laps.

“When did you turn eighteen, Eric.” Nerese had started crying again.

“I’m nineteen,” he said.

“Shit.” She blew her nose. “You’re still working at Caldor’s, though, right?”

“I quit.”

Nerese tossed her food bag out the driver’s window.

“I have to go to the bathroom,” he said.

“Hang on.” Nerese held up a staying hand, fearful that if he left the car now he’d bolt, although a good part of her would be rooting for him to do just that. But if he took off he’d risk the dangers of an armed arrest, and even if he escaped harm, being hauled into court as a fugitive would kick his bail sky-high.

“All right, let’s go.”

Nerese walked him into the Wendy’s, walked him into the men’s room, Eric squawking, “Aunt Neesy, what the hell . . . ,” but not until she could reassure herself there was no way out but through the door that they had entered did she leave him to his business, standing directly outside in the vestibule in order to escort him back to the car.

With the flat of her hand resting lightly against the small of her nephew’s back, Nerese steered him into the lobby of the Southern District precinct house, the Raven, still in its sandwich bag, now stuffed into the zippered side pocket of her North Face coat.

Eric faltered only once, between the two sets of double doors that would put him directly inside the house, but Nerese kept nudging him forward.

There were three uniforms standing behind the chest-high receiving desk, not one of these cops reacting to Eric’s presence despite his at-large status and the freshness of the murder.

“Ammons, how’re they hangin’?” one of the cops drawled without looking at her. Nerese ignored this asshole and addressed the oldest of the three.

“Is Willy Soto back there?” She tilted her chin to the squad room around the bend.

“I’m not sure, hang on . . .” The cop disappeared into a short narrow corridor.

With her hand still lightly pressed against Eric’s back she could feel him trembling right through his winter coat as he gawked at the dozens of wanted posters taped to the glazed-tile walls.

“Why the
fuck
did you wait for Tuesday,” Nerese hissed in his ear, making him jump; the kid breathing through his mouth now, suddenly two heartbeats away from a full-blown panic attack.

The uniform returned to the desk followed by a bull-necked black detective whom Nerese straight-out loathed: Aaron Kirkland, an old-timer with no use for women on the Job, and with a reputation from back in his squad-car days as a sleeper-hold freak; a cop who, if given the option, always preferred bringing in his suspects unconscious.

“Soto had a family emergency,” Kirkland said in a slow rich voice as he gave them a languid once-over that started with the feet and ended just short of the eyes.

Even though Eric had set up house in her from the day he was born, was as blood close to her as family could get, Nerese powerfully resented Kirkland’s group X ray, as if she and her nephew were two peas in a pod.

For a blind moment she contemplated taking her nephew out of there and restrategizing the surrender, but then Kirkland deigned to make eye contact, first with Eric, then with Nerese.

“Anything I can help you with?,” this twenty-six-years-on-the-Job prick knowing exactly who Eric was and what the both of them were doing here.

For the next hour and a half, Nerese lingered outside the precinct holding cell, keeping Eric company until two Dempsy County homicide detectives came to bring him back to their own squad room across town in the basement of the municipal building.

Re-cuffing her nephew, they told her, as respectfully as possible but with no mistaking the message, that it was time for her to step off on this one, promising that the kid would receive every courtesy and consideration they could give him short of not doing their jobs.

Nerese sat in her car in the small ruptured-asphalt South Precinct parking lot overlooking fogged-in marshland and an urban creek so polluted you could set it on fire. She made three attempts to reach Eric’s mother at work only to be told time after time that the woman was still on her lunch break, and recalling the frantic wee-hours phone call that had set all this in motion, Nerese was left musing on the fact that after two decades of dealing with all kinds of behavioral extremity out here, there were no people in the city of Dempsy whose mind-set and logic systems left her more straight-up bewildered and exasperated than those of her own tragically erratic family.

Heart-sore, physically exhausted, she fell asleep where she sat, slept for nearly an hour, then awoke with a start to the vibrating cell phone bouncing around in her lap.

“Nikki?” Nerese trying to come alive for Eric’s mother.

“Guess again,” Bobby Sugar said. “OK, I got into that First Dempsy account.”

“The what?” Nerese not even sure who was calling.

“First Dempsy. The checking account.”

“Bobby?”

“Yes. It’s Bobby.”

“What are you talking about?” Nerese rooted around in her purse for breath mints, came up with Eric’s now empty sandwich bag.

“Your guy Mitchell. I told you I needed to get the check disbursement on his First Dempsy account. I got it.”

“Yeah, so . . .” Her eyes felt puffed and sandy.

“There’s two checks he wrote that you might want to ask him about.”

After taking down the information from Sugar, Nerese peered across the creek again. Somewhere out there in the muck and mist was the Dempsy County Correctional Center, like a massive cement wagon wheel lying on its side: Eric’s new home for the foreseeable future. And once he set up house in there, she could see him only with the written permission of the police commissioner, cops otherwise barred from jailhouse visits, even to family.

And with that thought in mind, Nerese, despite the courteously delivered warning to stay away, drove across town to the Homicide office, determined to see her nephew one last time before they took him to the Bureau of Criminal Identification and then to the Intake Center. But traffic was bad and she got there too late; both Eric and the detectives who had picked him up were already gone.

Standing alone in the large, windowless squad room, she could hear the buzzing of the overhead fluorescents, the place deserted right now save for the receptionist out of sight in the vestibule, who at the moment was busy transcribing a taped confession via headphones. And with no one around to bust her, Nerese impulsively slipped into the Homicide evidence room—basically, a converted storage closet filled with stapled shopping bags holding worn-at-the-time blood-stained clothing and a coat rack hung with death-tagged outerwear, and finally, finally, after six months of trying to work up the nerve, boosted a beautiful leather-and-wool FUBU jacket, the objective of a year-old robbery-homicide that had already been prosecuted, the near mint coat just hanging there, keeping no one warm in this shit-ass February weather.

Roughly an hour later, in an effort to avoid being alone with her black-dog thoughts, Nerese exited the oversized and geologically slow hospital elevator on six and headed down a building-length corridor to visit Ray in the monitored-care ward.

Halfway there she saw a cluster of kids, maybe thirteen, fourteen years old, huddled at the entrance, their collective gaze fixed on something or someone inside. Even at some distance from them, Nerese was struck by the fact that she had never seen a crew of young-side teenagers so silently fearful as this group before her.

Coming abreast of them, she saw that one by one they were tentatively entering the ward and heading for Ray’s bed, where, propped upright, he received them like dazed and damaged royalty, shaking their hands while trying to avert his garish face, each kid coming off somewhere between seasick and frightened, backtracking to the safety of the hall as soon as they pressed the flesh.