Roy lit a cigarette to chill out a bit; he could feel the swarm.
Then the late afternoon bells of St. Genesius's Chapel tolled
and reminded him it was time to get this one thing over and done
with. He remembered his childhood days of going to mass and feeling
tragic about a good many things and thought it was funny now how
he had ended updoing no good just a few blocks away from St. G's.
In Roy's part of Grace Quarter, people sometimes referred to
the chapel as the hut of redemption or simply, the hut. Roy never
felt redeemed and his sense of guilt led to a deep sadness which
drove him away from the hut. The dough of emotions could be kneaded,
flattened and twisted. He twisted shame into anger, and the anger
gave him a sense of invulnerability. He wondered if the same
pew where he had carved his initials still remained, and what
of the statue of Christ with the missing toes and fingers?
He cut down an alley, his scuffed black shoes crunching on gravel
and shattered glass. Windows never lasted long in this side of
Grace. Da Riva Boyz Gonna Float Yo Ass!...Zeno Reigns...Fruit
Punch Sucka... Graffiti on the walls rumored legends and fueled
feudal folklore. Often paranoid, the spirit of Grace Quarter
was one of seclusion from the rest of Aliento---attached but
missing like the folded corner of a page.
As he passed by crusted warehouses decaying where quaint but modest
homes once stood before the fires of '68, Roy remembered his father's
wispy voice, dry as summer cotton if all uh man's gotsa shack
with a broke toylet, he still be proud of it Be inna man's bones
to act proud when he ain't got no natural reason to 'cause he
so deeply scared everman else got them somethin betta.
In this side of Grace few homes remained. Most folks now had
only half-shacks with crap holes in the ground covered by plywood
when not in use, but they were proud and they wouldn't hesitate
to pop their switch blades if territorially testy people from
the other quarters came to Grace.
Roy was held in high regard because he was one of the few lapcats.
He knew how to purr his way into any neighborhood in any quarter.
In the stretched-out dying bones of Aliento, he was the only
living connective tissue.
He took a door leading to a garage. Inside he found Uncle Shoh,
his mute massive Samoan sideman, Rupert and Samtweena. An Ivy league graduate
and a CPA, she served as Uncle Shoh's private finance consultant.
"Yo, Roy Bubby, lapcattin' his way in just as easy as butta
on grits."
"Sup, Uncle Shoh." Roy's callused palm engulfed Uncle
Shoh's small, soft hand, gold rings on each finger. Roy looked
to the other two. "Hey now, Rupert." Rupert stared
with the daunting silence of a stubborn Easter Island stone. Roy then tipped his hat,
"Miss Samtweena." She smiled.
"Ain't long now till the ship come in." Uncle Shoh
stood a few inches shy of five feet, even on his heeled platform
shoes. He wore an impeccable cobalt blue double-breasted suit.
Uncle Shoh was Roy's half cousin, half Chinese and half Black,
half the size of the other kids where he and Roy and grew up and
more than half as likely to kill anyone he thought was mocking
him.
His birth name was Hung-lo Shoh Jackson; the last person smart
enough to know better but smartassed enough to call Uncle by his
birth name wound up in St. G's cemetery. Roy had to see to it
personally that not so much as an eyelash remained of the messy
smartass's corpse and had to call upon the assistance of Balthazar
Krebs, gravedigger with a past deeper than a grave, a man tortured
by demons and better left alone.
"Now what you got fo me? Come on now and show Uncle Shoh."
Roy reached into his jacket and from the inside pocket produced
a plastic bag taped and packed as tight as a sausage.
"That's my boy, Roy." Uncle Shoh smiled as he fondled
the sausage. He then handed it to Samtweena. "You know
where we like to put that, honey." Then his face darkened.
He stepped right up against Roy, looking like a boy wanting to
knock his father down. But Roy felt the swarm.
When people get angry, when they mistrust you, when they are right
on the edge of losing control, their bodies swarm from the insides.
Roy could not remember a time when he could not sense the swarm
in someone. He rarely lost fist fights because he knew when a
punch was in the oven and knew exactly when the timer would go
off. If he did lose, he was most likely outnumbered. But when
speed and timing determined the victor, Roy always came out on
top.
A harsh swarm arose from within Uncle Shoh; another swarm emerged
as Rupert moved behind Roy.
"There are problem, Uncle Shoh?"
"The devil's dust create a lust of longing and temptation.
It become something of a fine woman opening her legs wide fo
you; how could a natural man resist?"
"I ain't natural. I ain't copped none of your stink neither,"
Roy stepped into Uncle Shoh, forcing him to step aside. Roy faced
Shoh and Rupert; they looked like a bear and a weasel both hungry
and intent on the same kill. Samtweena calibrated the scale and
then poured the lumpy sand-colored powder onto the scale tray.
Uncle Shoh had the buzz going loud, rising to the penultimate
note of rage and discord. Roy lit a cigarette.
"Well?"
Samtweena tinkered with the sliding weights until the scale tray
ceased wavering. She looked at Uncle Shoh. "It's all here."
"Damn! I do believe Rupert was as ready as a bull in Pamplona."
Rupert stood back and assumed a stance less menacing.
"I swear this kind of tension makes me want to take a shit.
Don't mean to sweat you, cuz. But you know business come befo
family heaven hell and high-water. And the stink been messy business lately. Shit, if them Ruskies ever
popped their prick missiles on us in the middle of a deal, I be
telling them very bombs to wait a sec till I closed it down.
You know what I'm talkin' bout, cuz?"
"Yeah, well you ought to know that's over for me. Been three
years since I touched the stink. My word is double platinum anywhere
in Aliento. With you it's the bottom of the charts. Pigeon squat's
worth more. You ought to know better, Shoh."
The swarming again it's me
"Okay lapcat, okay. Business be business. Futherhencely,
I like to keep Rupert in training. You never know when things
gonna go off."
"I brought your score. That's done. But I ain't no man's
punching bag. I garunty you, I'll lay Rupert flat, so you take
care not to waste his talents on me."
Rupert bouldered towards Roy, who stood cool and exhaled a smoke
screen, then tossed his cigarette to the floor. Uncle Shoh shuffled
between them and held Rupert back.
"Easy bull, you can raise yo horns fo gouging soon nuff."
He turned to Roy. "Show some respect. No need to get nasty."
"You should talk."
Rupert eased back, and Uncle Shoh glanced at his gold watch.
"We coming up on my next matta a business. Got two chumps
come from across the rivah who think they GI Joe guns worth some
stink. We could use yo help, Roy. You can smooth talk
them white boys whilst Rupert and Uncle Shoh takes care of the
rest."
Down to double-crossing. In the days, used to be a man didn't
get taken out who didn't deserve it.
"I can't help you. I brought your score, and I brought something
more."
Uncle Shoh smiled and shook his head like he knew. "Don't
tell me. Zeno sent you to take me down. You ain't no Rivah Boy.
Them days overdone like a burnt chicken. That Daddy Zeno still
think he the man, think he can run the show from the upstate pin. He a
mighty man, but mighty far from here."
"It ain't like that. You really think I'm a cut-rate sucka.
You ought to know betta, Shoh. I come to say I'm out."
"What you mean?"
"I'm out. I ain't working no more. I want to be my own
cat. Dog need to be on a leash. Lapcat got to be petted. But
a natural cat got to go as he please. This is the last score
you get from me."
"You think you got another round a suckas? You been kicking
it in Harvest quartah with them bean-boys and think you gonna
run yo own business or something?"
The swarming nearly shook the walls down. Roy's ears were gorged
with blood and thunder.
"I told you, it ain't like that. I ain't working, ain't
no one working for me. That's it. The alpha and omega. I just
waiting for the Lamb to break open the seals and give the signs.
I got no message of my own. As for business, I'm out."
"Well...shoot." Uncle Shoh rolled his shoulders and
grabbed his lapels , straightening out his suit coat already void
of wrinkles and creases. "You ain't up to nothing funny?"
"Nothing funny."
"So you gonna be a chump now?"
"If that's what you want to call me."
"What people gonna think, Roy? This look funny."
"Most Aliento folks ain't up to much thinking. Won't make
no difference."
"Well, shoot...This side of Grace still be mine! You remember
to tell anyone that ask you, Uncle Shoh still run the show."
"You run what you like. Ain't my business no more. Never really was. I gotta
split."
Roy made for the door.
"Wait now, ain't you forgetting something?" Roy looked
at Uncle Shoh---the expectant swarm surrendered to a silent sad
humming.
"Samtweena, get Roy his dough."
Samtweena opened a little safe box against the wall and grabbed
a stack of green. She opened a leather book next to the scale,
counted the money, wrote in the leather book and closed it. She
walked over to Roy and handed him the money. Crisp bills used
to feel so alive in his hand, he used to love having to lick his
finger tips to separate the crisp bills, snapping like firecrackers
as he counted them, he once loved the joy of folding them into his
silver money clip, cool metallic magic in his pocket, a comforting
weight against his upper thigh.
"You can count it to make sure it's all there."
"That's alright, Sam. I trust you."
Roy threw the stack into the inside pocket of his jacket. He
tipped his hat to Samtweena and stepped for the door.
"Hey Roy, pick this butt up. You know I like things clean.
Don't be puttin' yo smokes out on my flo."
Without looking back, Roy said, "Let Rupert get it. He could
use the training."
By the time Roy had cut down the alley and hit the street in front
on the warehouse, he saw a truck approaching. The truck slowed
down, as though the driver were looking for an unfamiliar address.
Roy saw a block-faced stern looking man in the passenger's side
and at the wheel a boyish man with great broad shoulders. Roy
drew near the slow moving vehicle.
"You gentlemen lost?"
"No."
"You making a delivery? What you got in the back there,
furniture?"
"We've got nothing for you. Let's get moving Shifty."
"Now hold up. I think I know where you're headed. But it
ain't where you think."
"What are you, the Sphinx? Riddle boy here is nuts."
Roy leaned in close to the passenger. "You going to see
Uncle Shoh, ain't that right? You think you gonna do a little
free trade, then leave Aliento with guns for killing Grace folks
while you take the stink back across the river to seduce
straight dope folks in your otherwise clean neighborhoods. That
it?"
"What is this bullshit. Let's go Shifty. We don't have
time for gab from the ghetto."
The driver kept the truck idling.
"Wait Dibbs, I want to hear what this guy has to say. If
something funny--"
"Nothing's funny--" the passenger cut in. The swarm
bore down.
"Damn right nothing funny," Roy whispered, "Nothing
funny alright. If you got a wife and kids of some kind of life,
you ought to go back to it now. Uncle Shoh got a surprise for
you. See that Chapel cemetery back there before you turned up
this street? That's where you gonna wish you was buried by the
time Uncle Shoh finishes with you. But you won't get no natural
man's burial If you go to the garage like you plan, both you
gonna be fish food at the bottom of the river."
The passenger was silent for a moment.
"I don't know Dibbs," the driver started, "this
guy might be right."
You fool you fool, can't you feel it I'm trying to tell you...it's
swarming so loud...
"He's full of it. Let's go." The truck did not move.
"I said, let's go!"
The driver swore under his breath and threw the truck into gear.
Roy stepped back as the truck tore off like a shoebox on roller
skates. He watched as the truck slowed down in front of Shoh's
garage. Then the truck quickly pulled away, shooting down the
road, turning onto a side street beyond view.
Roy was now walking, almost running, his feet feeling light. St. G's came into view. He thought he heard a new sound, something calm and blue that would not last long.