Capital City

  I frown at him. “Are you crazy? Hell no!”

  “Well, how you gon’ just up and buy a car?”

  I shake my head and think about it. “I guess I can’t buy a car then, can I?”

  Marshall chuckles and kicks his feet up on the arm of his couch. He’s wearing gray shorts, a white T-shirt, and no socks. “Yo, you gon’ have to start makin’ up some good lies or somethin’, man. ’Cause you know you can’t hide that money from her forever.”

  “Well, how do other illegal guys hide their money?”

  “They don’t. Most of the time their parents just look the other way. And a lot of times they don’t have any money to begin with, so their parents are happy to see it, you know?”

  “Well, what about us struggling good boys, who need money so we can set up households, start up a business, and provide for our families? Or even go to graduate school like I’m about to do? I mean, how come there’s so little money for us? And after all that college loan stuff, we end up twenty and thirty thousand dollars in debt.”

  Marshall shrugs. “That’s the way it goes, man. I mean, you know that, Wes. You sound like you in here talkin’ jus’ t’ be talkin’.

  “You know damn well that’s how America works, you’n. And all them drug dealers eventually end up dead, in jail, or strung out on that shit themselves. I mean, it sounds like, to me, you been hangin’ out wit’ dat Butterman and he done messed ya thinkin’ up. What happened to the Wes that I used to know? The Wes that would make the whole world make sense in one damn paragraph?”

  Marshall lets his question hang in the air like a hot-air balloon. I guess he has a point. J’s fatalistic train of thought has weakened me. I guess I have lost my bearing on what my goal is and what strategy to follow as a young black man in America.

  “And that girl NeNe is comin’ from the same fast streets, man,” Marshall adds. “Girls like her never mature enough to stay with a guy like you. I mean, yeah, she was able to hang in the beginnin’ when you first met her, and then when you got a car and some money. But can she hang for the long walk up that lonely road called sacrifice? ’Cause you know, man, what my father always told me about women: If a woman is not willing to sacrifice for where you two eventually want to get to, then she ain’t worth the shoes she walkin’ in.”

  I smile. “Hmm. That sounds like a good one.”

  “Yeah. I’m tellin’ you, man. Ain’t no glorious, romantic relationships without no struggles in this life, Joe. That shit is for the movies. Everything in real life takes time.”

  I nod my head, still smiling. “I guess like they say, good things—”

  “Come to those who wait,” Marshall says, finishing the famous cliché used by us “regular guys” in America. I guess now is the time to shake off the elusive hold that the fast lanes have secured on me.

  By four o’clock, all of us are alive and watching the second NBA playoff game.

  Walt says enthusiastically, “Damn! Barkley strong like shit, Joe! That nigga throwin’ niggas.”

  I look to Derrick, who’s still bewildered about what to do with our friend Walt.

  “Oh, yeah, Wes? What’s up wit’ Farrakhan, man?” Marshall asks me out of the blue. He’s back in his favorite spot on the floor, directly in front of his television.

  “What? What about him?” I ask, confused.

  Walt sucks his teeth. “Ma’fucka playin’na violin and flutes and shit now,” he answers and frowns. He shakes his head in disgust. “White man even got Farrakhan goin’ soft, you’n. That’s fucked up!”

  “Wait a minute. That’s just the image the media is trying to portray. Because I read that Farrakhan ain’t changed his views on nothin’,” Derricks rebuts.

  I nod my head, agreeing with Derrick. “I know. Farrakhan plays the violin, and now every medium in America wants to showcase it.”

  “Well, he better not fuck around and do no ballet or no shit. ’Cause they’a really have his militant, hate-the-devil ass then.”

  We all laugh loudly. Walt has about as much sense as a peanut.

  Derrick looks to me and opens his right hand toward Walt. “This is black America, Wes. How can we fight against brothers like him?”

  Walt just laughs at it. “You can give me a fat-assed woman, some corn chips, and a forty-ounce, nigga. And I’ll be cool.”

  Marshall shakes his head from the floor. “You know who he reminds me of?”

  “Who?” I ask him.

  “Sweet-Dick Willie from Do the Right Thing.”

  We all start laughing.

  “Yeah, but Robin Harris tells it like it is, man. That’s why niggas liked him,” Walt comments.

  Marshall says, “I wonder how famous he would have been if he didn’t die.”

  “Yeah, ’cause niggas still on his dick now, you’n.” Walt nods with a big baby-faced grin. “Yeah, you can call me Sweet-Dick Willie. That shit’s aw’ight wit’ me.”

  After the game and the news, Marshall turns to MTV and Walt immediately starts to trip off of Beavis and Butthead.

  “Huh-huh, huh-huh, huh-huh. You guys suck. Huh-huh, huh-huh, huh-huh. They don’t get no ass. Huh-huh, huh-huh, huh-huh. Yeah. They’re jerk-offs.”

  We all laugh hilariously.

  Marshall looks to Derrick. “I mean, you gotta have a guy like him around, man. This nigga was born to lunch, Joe.”

  Derrick shakes his head, still grinning himself. “Anyway, I got two interviews comin’ up next week. But one of them is in Baltimore.”

  “So you might be relocating?” I ask him curiously.

  “Yeah, nigga! That’s what people do when they get good jobs,” Walt yells at me.

  “What about you, Walt?” Derrick challenges.

  “Oh, I’m thinkin’ ’bout hookin’ up wit’ ’em D.C. Service Corps niggas.”

  Marshall nods. “Yeah, I’ve seen them. Don’t they all wear blue jackets?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ve seen them before too. But what exactly do they do?” I ask Walt.

  Walt gives me a puzzled smiled. “Oh, I’on really know yet, you’n.”

  We die laughing for about the twentieth time at Walt’s craziness. He’s a true comic case. You have to love this guy!

  Derrick asks another question through his laughter. “How you gon’ go and get a job and you don’t even know what they do?”

  “Look here, you’n, if them ma’fuckas is gettin’ paid, I’on care what they do.”

  “See that? Walt’s the kind of nigga that white people love to put in movies. And the whole goddamn world’ll think we’re all like him,” Marshall says jokingly.

  “Well, that’s better than showin’ them a nigga like you, jerkin’ off in the bathroom,” Walt snaps back.

  “How do they perceive us in other countries, Wes? I mean, you were in Germany and all,” Derrick asks me seriously.

  “Well, the things they often have to go by are news reports, movies, TV shows, magazines, books, and music. I mean, it’s not like they can sit in here and hear black people having the type of conversations and doing the things that we do. They basically have a showbiz and a crime-and-poverty image of us.”

  “Oh, so, like, a black middle class doesn’t exist to them?” Derrick asks, trying his hardest to grasp it.

  “Yeah, something like that. But remember, we did have The Cosby Show and The Jeffersons for them to watch.”

  “Did you do any German girls when you were over there?” Marshall asks me.

  I look at Marshall humorously. “Marshall? How long have we known each other?”

  “Since we went to Banneker together,” he answers. Then he grimaces. “What was that, thirteen, fourteen?”

  “And did I live in Germany then?”

  “Naw.”

  “So, I mean, do you think I was sexing girls when I was a kid?”

  Marshall laughs at himself. “Oh, my bad. I wasn’t even thinkin’.”

  Walt shakes his head at him. “Yuuuuuuh, big dummy!”

  We
just can’t seem to stop laughing at Walt’s hilarious antics. He’s now imitating Redd Foxx from the Sanford & Son show. But I’m sitting here starting to think about NeNe again. I haven’t spoken to her since Wednesday afternoon.

  I sneak on the phone in Marshall’s kitchen while the guys are still bugging out and dial my C&P telephone mail service.

  NeNe has finally called. But not with any good news that I can tell through her whiny, stop-and-go, distraught speech.

  “Man, umm, my cousin Toya . . . You’n, she umm, was out wit’ . . . And . . .”

  Hell, I can’t understand this! I hang up on my phone mail service and call her aunt’s house.

  “You ain’t callin’ that bamma-ass young’un is you, Wes?” Walt walks into the kitchen asking me.

  I turn the phone away from him as it rings.

  “He better not. I already told that boy she ain’t worth it,” I hear Marshall yelling from the living room.

  “Hello,” NeNe answers with a cracked voice.

  I shove Walt away from me. He walks out of the kitchen, shaking his head at me.

  “Yeah, she done put da whip appeal on his ass, you’n. Like a ma’fucka!”

  I stretch the phone cord away from the living room entrance and deep into the kitchen, toward Marshall’s untidy sink.

  “What’s goin’ on?” I ask NeNe.

  She sniffs before she answers me. “My cousin got shot, man. She umm, was out wit’ Butterman and got hit in her back.”

  Okay, okay, okay. This shit is terrible! But what can I do?

  “Well, is she in the hospital or what?” I whisper. Lord knows I don’t want the guys to hear any of this. I’d get a bunch of “I told you so.”

  NeNe gets hysterical. “In’na fuckin’ hospital? She dead, you ’n! My fuckin’ cousin is dead!”

  Shit! I don’t need this at all. Not at all!

  “So where is J?”

  “I’on fuckin’ know, you’n.” NeNe whines this out in the painful drawl that people have when they’re extremely upset. “I mean, his ass ain’t call us back when we kept pagin’ him yesterday. And, umm, I think they went and did somethin’ crazy.”

  No, Shank! Damn! It won’t change shit, man! It won’t change a damn thing!

  “So–so, y–you want me to be there for you or what?” I ask her nervously, stuttering.

  “Yeah, man. I need’ju, Wes. I need’ju like shit. I can’t even think right.”

  “I’m coming, now. Okay?”

  She sniffs and answers, “Okay.”

  I hang up the phone. I walk back out of the kitchen, past the guys, and head to Marshall’s basement apartment entranceway.

  Derrick looks at me as if I’ve lost it. “Where you goin’, Wes? We got the Ritz tonight.”

  “I’ll be back,” I tell him, quickly opening the door.

  I hear Walt through the closed door when I reach the outside, “That boy ain’t comin’ back, Joe! You know exactly where he goin’!”

  I run down to Eleventh Street to see if a 64 bus is coming. Since it’s Sunday, I know that the buses are going to be running slow.

  No 64 bus is in sight, so I jog down to U Street to catch the Cardozo Metro. I jump on the Yellow Line and ride it to Chinatown at Seventh Street, where I transfer to the Blue Line toward Addison Road.

  I’m thinking about nothing but Toya, J, Shank, NeNe, and the terrible street violence of this nation’s capital city. I see no people, just images and colors as my mind races to my destination before I can actually get there. I can’t bring NeNe’s cousin back. Where the hell is J? And I’m hoping Shank hasn’t finally killed someone. God, I like him! We need more of his kind of bravery on our side and not on the devil’s side.

  I get off the Blue Line Metro at the Minnesota Avenue stop and run back to Benning Road Northeast, toward NeNe’s aunt’s house.

  Before I reach her short street along this dark, commercial area on Benning Road, I see groups of young black men, standing, profiling, and looking. And now I’m suddenly cautious. I’ve always been in a car when I’ve come to pick NeNe up or see her. I would pass these same tough faces again and again without actually having to be near them like I am now. It’s Sunday, the weather is warm, it’s past eight thirty and the sun has already set.

  I eye a few of them to my right and a few of them leaning on cars to my left. Up the street toward NeNe’s block are more of them. I feel guilty that I suspect them. But how would you feel in this situation when you never really had to pass through this type of shit? I mean, I’ve always been where these kind of brothers are not. And when I was with Shank, Steve, Otis, and Rudy, I knew that they were on my side.

  I slow down my walk and try to take it easy as I notice even more guys standing inside of an alleyway to my left, behind a corner store. Maybe it would be a good idea to speak and keep going as if everything is cool. I mean, why am I acting paranoid?

  “Hi y’all doin’?” I ask a few of them, breaking my English. But when I look into their skeptical brown faces only a couple of them even hint at a response. Out of nervousness, I find myself being driven inside of the corner store.

  “Who da fuck is he?” I hear one of them ask as I enter with a racing heart.

  The store has a stench of old, stale food. One thick-built Korean man is out walking the floor between two tightly-packed aisles of groceries, candies, cookies, and bags of chips and pretzels. Alongside the left wall are Coca-Cola freezers packing sodas, juices, milk, and alcohol.

  I grab a Tropicana orange juice from the freezer and a bag of fifty-cent corn chips from the front. The thickly built Korean man on the floor nods to me with a slight smile. I approach the elevated cash register situated behind a bullet-proof glass and put two dollars on the rotating counter for the middle-aged Korean woman.

  “One fifty-nine,” she says, bagging my food and returning my change.

  I pocket the forty-one cents and grab my bag from the rotating bullet-proof counter. I glance out the door to see if I can spot where these brothers are before I walk back out. Before I reach the door, a young sister appears to be shoved inside the store, giggling.

  “Stop, nigga! You play too damn much!” she hollers out of the open door to one of them.

  I get by her, hoping that her distraction will allow me to get around this last corner and up the street without them paying me any mind. My heart starts to thump as I receive a sudden silence from four black males, all dressed in dark, indescribable clothing. The only thing I would be able to say is, “They were all dressed in dark jeans and dark sweatshirts,” which many of these youths dress in today. I’d sound like a paranoid white man.

  “Yo, you’n, you got a couple dollars on you?” one of them asks me.

  Oh, God! Why me? Why me? I keep walking as if I didn’t hear it.

  “Fuck you can’t hear or somethin’, Joe?”

  I turn and face him. He’s slightly shorter than me and slightly browner, with a black bandana tied around his head, dressed in clothing that can camouflage him in the tinted darkness. But it’s only dark in this particular spot. I see more light up the street from us. And the cars riding down Benning Road give me a sense of security that this brother’s not going to do anything stupid. He’s not that crazy, I’m hoping.

  “Naw, man, I’m just trying to get to my girl’s house,” I tell him apologetically. Which is absurd! Why should I apologize? And now my jumping, burning heart and nerves have me answering questions not even asked. He didn’t ask me where I was going anyway.

  “What? Joe, I’on give a fuck who you know around here. You got some money or what?”

  I look past him at the other three guys, hoping that they don’t file in line to back him. Not to mention several more of them from around the opposite corner. I feel like I’m in a war zone. My mission is to make it to the end of this block and then scramble up the street to NeNe’s aunt’s.

  I slowly take out my wallet from my back blue jean pocket.

  Don’t give him anything! Make your
stand against this craziness! Now!

  No! Give him what he wants and secure your life. You’re only one man, Wes. Remember that.

  That’s right. I have a whole lot of living to do yet. I’m going to grad school next year. I hold my bag in my left arm and open up my wallet to hand him two dollars. He looks down at it and back into my face as if I’m being unreasonable.

  “Muthafucka, if you don’t give me ya money, I’ll silence ya life right here!” He draws inside his pants and pulls out a gun. Over his shoulder I can see the others starting to walk toward us. I don’t know if they’re going to help me or him. But I don’t have time to wait and find out!

  I chop down on his arm holding the gun as hard and as fast as I can with my free right hand. It’s a move my father taught me when I was eight and living in Germany. He taught it to me to disarm a stick or a knife. But it works with guns too.

  The gun flies from this brother’s hand as he jerks to grab his right arm. “Shit, nigga! Yo, fuck him up, you ’n! Fuck this nigga up!”

  I drop the orange juice and corn chip bag from my arm and run for my life with my wallet still in my left hand.

  “We got one!” I hear them yell as I break around the corner and reach the bottom of NeNe’s aunt’s block.

  I’m not foolish enough to run straight like in Boyz n the Hood. NeNe’s aunt lives on the left side of the street that I’m already on; however, safety tells me to zig-zag in and out of these parked cars and holler for help.

  “Heeeelp! Heeeeelp!”

  Bop! Bop!

  Glass flies from car windows as I continue running.

  Bap! Bap!

  Bop! Bop!

  Oh, shit! I’m hit! No-o-o!

  I’m still running and heading for NeNe’s aunt’s, hollering, “Heeeelp! Heeeelp!”

  I can’t feel my right arm! Oh, God! My chest is burning! Please, God! No-o-o! Let me live!

  “What da hell is goin’ on out here!” I hear a deep, booming voice yell.

  “Call da cops. They just shot that boy!” another voice hollers.

  I slam into NeNe’s aunt’s screen door and fall through it. NeNe opens it up with large eyes.

  “Oooow! Oh my God!”

  “Get him inside,” a male voice says, lifting me up from behind.