Triplines (9781936364107) (18 page)

“I forgot.”

“You forgot that you ruined your academic career?”

“I didn't ruin—”

“Give me the phone number on the letter.”

“Mom, it's no big deal—”

“Give me the number.”

Sheepishly, he does. She hangs up without saying anything else. A few minutes later she calls back and says, “I'm picking you up in twenty minutes. We're meeting the vice principal.”

“Now?”

“Twenty minutes.” She hangs up.

Twenty minutes later his mother picks him up, telling him that she had to take off from work, and this is something he should've told her about as soon as it happened. She says, “You understand what this means, don't you?”

“The tracking? Ed told me.”

“You told Ed, but you didn't tell me?”

“I forgot.”

She shakes her head angrily. “This is not a joke. This is your future.”

He rarely sees her this angry at him, and he sinks down into his seat. When they arrive at the school, which is open for summer school but mostly empty, they walk into the administration offices, where Mr. Jasper, the Vice Principal, is waiting for them.

Mr. Jasper, tall and lanky, has a full beard and mustache, and speaks calmly to Umee about this unnecessary visit, because, as he stated on the phone, there isn't much he can do.

Lenny's mother launches into a long explanation of what happened with her son, why his test scores are low, and, based on his grades, why he should be in the gifted program.

“I'm afraid the scores determine—”

“Then he should retake the test.”

“That's impossible. We don't make the tests. They're state-administered, and anyway, if everyone could retake the test it would be—”

“I am not talking about everyone. I am talking about my son.”

“He can start out in regular classes and his teachers can recommend his being bumped up to advanced—”

“But he will already be behind. This can't be. I will not let this happen. I will take him to private school if I have to. I will contact the newspapers and the ACLU and the Korean Legal Aid to let them know that this tracking is unfair and is a form of discrimination!” Her voice cracks and Lenny sees that her cheeks are red, her hands shaking.

Mr. Jasper says quickly, “That's not necessary. Your son
is obviously a good student. Look, I can arrange to have him in advanced classes, because those aren't just test-based, but he can't go into the gifted classes. And if his average falls below ninety at any point we can put him back in regular.”

She considers this, then nods her head. “Fine.”

They leave, and as they walk back to the car, she says, “You better not let me down, Lenny.”

“I won't. I promise.”

She gives him a hard look.

He says, “Really. I won't.” For the first time he understands how important she considers his schooling, and he vows that he will never let her down again.

Over the next two weeks Lenny manages to smuggle a half dozen more plants into his attic, hanging them to dry, while Sal prepares the rest. He tells Lenny the males are treated differently, especially the flowers, because they aren't as potent, and he makes small rolled sticks out of them. The females, especially their buds, once dried, will be the main source of potency.

He says he lined up buyers, using most of his original contacts. He tells Lenny this while pacing back and forth in his backyard, his fingers nervously tapping his leg. “This is stressful, man,” he says. “Some of them want to sample it, but it's not ready. But they trust me because I've dealt with them in the past. But now I've got a reputation to keep up, so this has got to be smooth stuff. It's not like I'm just a middleman. I'm a source.”

“How do you know them?”

“For a while I'd buy a quarter pound, maybe a half pound, and then dime bag it, sell it off and make a good profit. I got to know some dealers.” He sits down, tapping his feet, and then stands up and paces again. “It's this waiting that's driving me nuts.”

“You can use the oven again.”

“No, that makes it too harsh. Just another week or so, and it'll be ready. You're making sure your attic is ventilated, right? Checking for mold?”

“Every day.”

“Good. Good.” He turns to Lenny. “I don't think I can do this again. It's too much. I might just go back to regular dealing.”

“But the money.”

“I'm not a minor anymore. This is serious shit if I get caught.”

Lenny nods. Over the past few weeks he witnessed Sal get more and more nervous, and Sal confessed that he's having trouble sleeping with the plants drying in his crawlspace. He keeps the door padlocked, and his parents never go down there, but his younger sister is always snooping, and the smell is beginning to rise up into the house. “Maybe it's my imagination, but I keep smelling it everywhere. My parents aren't dumb. They're going to figure it out unless I bag and seal it soon.”

“Just a few more days,” Lenny says.

“Yeah. I know. I know.”

Lenny's mother tells him they're going to keep the house, take over the mortgage payments, and she will pay a lump sum of twenty thousand dollars to his father. When Lenny asks where she will get the money, she confides to him that she has been saving money in secret for years, and will also ask her mother and family for a loan. However, when Yul realizes how quickly Umee agrees to these terms, he adds a last-minute stipulation: if and when she sells the house she'll also pay him another lump sum of ten thousand. Umee just wants out and agrees. Yul will also pay two hundred a month for child support and alimony until Lenny and Mira turn eighteen. The details of the divorce seem straightforward, and are nothing like Lenny imagined. It's a business
deal. He's not sure why they didn't negotiate an end to the marriage much earlier.

His mother now works ten to twelve hours a day, not only to pay her family back for their loan, but also to pay the mortgage, now solely her responsibility. She is also taking classes and studying to be an appraiser. She tells Lenny that working as a real estate appraiser, especially for commercial property, means a steady and well-paying job regardless of the economy, unlike selling residential real estate.

One night she comes home, excited, and shows Lenny her first commission check for a house she just sold. The check, for over four thousand dollars, is wrinkled from her constantly pulling it out and reading it. She says, “My boss says he's never seen anyone take to this like me.”

“Wow,” Lenny says, but he thinks about how much Sal might make from selling his pot. One pound of pot can sell wholesale for over three thousand. If he dime bags it he'll get over four thousand, and this is just for growing a weed. Then again, Lenny's mother doesn't have to worry about getting arrested.

Sal, who grades and sorts the crop into quarter- and half-pound bags, warns Lenny again about telling anyone what's happening. They're now moving into the selling phase, and this makes Sal tense. The first of his deals is with his friend Tommy, who's curious to meet Lenny, the kid assistant who knows how to find information on growing techniques, so Lenny accompanies Sal to Tommy's house in East Meadow, near Eisenhower Park. They take the bus up Merrick Avenue, and look like any two kids heading to the park, though Sal has a backpack full of marijuana.

Tommy lives in a split-level white house with a lush
green lawn. Assorted flower windmills sit in the garden, though none of them spin in the stagnant heat. They walk up to the front door and ring the bell. A woman in her sixties, wearing a tank top, her shoulders freckled and brown, opens the door. Sal greets her, asking if her grandson is in. She calls upstairs to Tommy and lets them walk upstairs.

Tommy opens his bedroom door. It's a teen's room, with Pink Floyd, Queen and David Bowie posters covering the walls. Sal asks Tommy why he's not with his brother.

Tommy smiles. “Got kicked out. Now it's grandma time.”

He turns up the stereo and locks his door. He looks at Lenny and says, “So this is the kid.”

Sal introduces them.

Tommy studies Lenny and says, “Does he speak English?”

Sal and Lenny glance at each other, and Sal laughs. “Of course he does.”

“Of course I do,” Lenny says.

Tommy has long, messy hair, brown curls falling over his face, and a leather wrist band that slides up his arm when he pushes back his hair. He says, “Sal showed me the books you got. Nice. You getting more?”

“I'm trying.”

“Cool.” He turns to Sal. “The samples were good. You got the half?”

Sal reaches into his back pack and pulls out a large football-shaped bag of marijuana, clear plastic tape wrapped tightly around it. He hands it to Tommy.

“Hell, why'd you tape it up so much?”

“I was worried about the smell.”

Tommy weighs the package on a small spring-loaded postal scale on his desk. He nods and pulls out a wad of cash, counting out $900, laying the bills on the desk. Sal takes it, thanks him, and they talk for a while about a guy they know who bought a pound of pot to sell but ended up smoking all of it himself. They laugh. Tommy looks at Lenny and says, “Can you see out of those slanted eyes?”

Lenny, confused, says, “Yes.”

Sal says to Tommy, “Yo.”

Tommy asks Sal, “How do you blindfold a chink?”

“Come on, man,” Sal says.

“With dental floss.”

“Hey, hey,” Sal says. “That's not cool.”

“He knows I'm just kidding. Right, Bruce Lee?”

Lenny doesn't want to mess up Sal's deal, so he doesn't respond.

“Can you really speak English?” Tommy asks.

“Yes, I can.” Lenny turns to Sal and says, “I'll wait outside for you.”

As he walks downstairs he hears Sal tell Tommy, “That wasn't cool, man.”

“What's the big deal?”

Outside Lenny sits on the front steps and watches one of the neighbors washing his car. When Sal comes out he motions for Lenny to follow him, and they walk back to the bus stop. He says, “He can be kind of an asshole.”

“You only got nine hundred?”

“I cut him a deal because he got the seeds.”

Lenny nods, but doesn't say much else. His opinion of Sal has fallen because he's friends with Tommy. While waiting
for the bus, Sal counts out $300 and hands it to Lenny. “This is what I promised. There's another two hundred for you after the next deal.”

“I don't think I want to go with you.”

“Yeah.”

Lenny pockets the cash, and even though he knows it's a lot, more than he's ever had before, he finds this whole process disappointing. He thinks about buying a TV, about saving the money for more books, but all this has been tainted by Tommy's comments.

Lenny and Sal end up not talking for the rest of the way back to Merrick, and when the bus drops them off at the train station, Sal says he'll call in a couple days after the next sale, and he'll have the money.

Lenny thanks him. Sal says the next time they see each other Sal will be on his new motorcycle.

“I'll give you a ride.”

“Cool,” Lenny says, and walks away.

Over the next few day Lenny begins searching for a good color TV, visiting garage sales and the Sunrise mall. He also buys supplies from Radio Shack—coaxial cable, splitters, wire cutters—and studies the cable TV lines running along the telephone poles. His plan is to steal a tag from another pole and attach it to the illegal line he'll install to his house. He also mail-ordered the plans and parts for a descrambler, which will allow him to get all the premium pay channels. In order to build this, though, he needs more equipment, like a soldering iron, a volt- and ohmmeter, and various wire crimping tools. He studies the plans and realizes he needs a better understanding of circuit boards, and begins
spending hours in the library, teaching himself basic circuitry and soldering.

One afternoon as he walks back from Radio Shack he sees Sal on a large Kawasaki motorcycle speeding down Sunrise Highway. Lenny waves to him, and he pulls over, his hair windblown and tangled. “Check it out,” he says.

“Looks great.”

“Glad I ran into you.” He reaches into his jacket and counts out two hundred dollars. “This is for you. Thanks for everything.”

“You've been selling?”

“Almost all of it. I'm saving a half pound, but everything else is going for top dollar. I can finally sleep.” He smiles, his underbite jutting forward.

“Are you going to grow again?”

“I don't think so, at least not for the next season. I have all those seeds, but I think I can store them for a year. But thanks for your help.”

“Thanks for this.” Lenny holds up the cash.

Sal revs his bike, and says goodbye, speeding off into traffic.

Lenny walks home with the roll of twenties in his pocket, worried to have this and the $260 left in his room. He remembers what Sal said about joint bank accounts, and he doesn't trust his father to have access to the money, so he considers asking his mother to open an account for him.

When he walks into the house, he sees boxes stacked in the garage, and then hears his father's drunken voice say, “You ruined my family!”

He stops, turns around, and creeps quietly across the street to the church.

Yul is supposed to be moving out this weekend, and although he begins the process of loading his Cadillac, he starts drinking in the morning and is plastered by the afternoon. Lenny stays away from the house as long as he can, but gets hungry around dinnertime.

The kitchen, in shambles, has dishes, pots and pans strewn across the floor. Mira and his mother have locked themselves in Mira's room. His father is sprawled on the living room floor, and moans about how everything he worked for is disappearing. Lenny walks quietly to Mira's room, checking on them, and his mother unlocks the door. “Where were you?” she asks.