The Sweet Forever

  “That’s right,” said Monroe.

  “Just tryin’ to put all this together. Go ahead, Short.”

  “I was talkin’ to this kid hangs out around the way, boy named Anthony Taylor. Had to get kind of rough with him till he told me what I wanted. All the sudden, this Vietnam mothafucker, Clay, comes runnin’ at me, surprises me on the blind side.”

  “Look like Vietnam did more than surprise you, man,” said Linney.

  “Nigga did a Billy Jack on your ass,” said Bennet.

  “Schooled you,” said Linney.

  Linney and Bennet laughed and touched hands. Antony Ray smiled.

  Monroe quieted Linney and Bennet with a look. “I got your information for you, Tyrell. Taylor talked before I got blindsided. It’s how I got on to this one right here.”

  “You did good.”

  “Yeah, I know I did. Far as that Clay goes, I ain’t done with him yet. Just gettin’ started.”

  “Maybe you ought to leave things alone. We’re runnin’ a quiet business. Don’t need a lot of drama down there.”

  “Was Clay who made the noise,” said Monroe. “Shoutin’ out for everyone to hear ’bout how he didn’t want to see our kind in the neighborhood no more. Even had these old niggas livin’ down there joinin’ in. Next thing you know, you gonna have one of those orange-hat squads walkin’ around at night.”

  Tyrell touched the hairs on his chin. “That’s not good.”

  “Damn right it ain’t no good, Ty,” said Monroe. “Thought Tutt and Murphy was supposed to keep that kind of shit under control.”

  “So did I.” He looked down at Eddie. “You enjoying this conversation?”

  “No,” said Eddie. “I’m not listening.”

  “You haven’t heard a thing we’ve said.”

  “I can’t concentrate. My arm is broken. It hurts. I need a doctor—”

  “I can see that. But first we need to talk.”

  “I’m… I’m sorry.”

  “Oh, I know you’re sorry now. Kind of late to be apologizin’ and all that. But you did take my money, right?”

  “I didn’t know it was yours.”

  “You knew it belonged to somebody, right?”

  “I wasn’t thinking. I went to help that boy in the car. I saw the money and—”

  “You stole it.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But,” said Tyrell.

  “Chicken butt,” said Linney. “Watch it strut.”

  Bennet laughed. “Damn, Jumbo, you always be talkin’ that grade school shit.”

  “Y’all are some dumb-ass bitches,” said Ray, picking a .38 Bulldog up off the table and locking back the hammer. “Y’all gonna talk shit all night? ’Cause I’ll find out where Golden Boy here got the money stashed right quick.”

  Ray pointed the gun at Eddie. Eddie made a choking sound.

  “Wait up,” said Alan Rogers, raising his hand. “Tyrell, you ain’t even asked him nothin’ yet, for real.”

  Tyrell looked at Rogers and then at Ray. “He’s right, cuz. Put it away.” Tyrell turned to Eddie. “Where’s my money at, boy? Say it and be quick.”

  Eddie Golden said, “My apartment. In the pillowcase… in my bedroom closet.”

  “Where’s that?”

  Eddie gave Tyrell the address.

  “I got his keys,” said Monroe.

  “They open your place?” said Tyrell.

  Eddie nodded, and Tyrell gave instructions to his men.

  Monroe led Eddie Golden back to one of the two bedrooms set off the hall. The room contained a sheeted mattress and box spring on the floor, with a radiator next to the bed. Monroe stood by the door. He left when Rogers arrived with a glass of water, which Eddie drank hungrily. Eddie lay back.

  Rogers didn’t bother to tie him up. He wasn’t strong enough to go anywhere, way he was.

  “You be still.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You better not be tellin’ lies,” said Rogers.

  “I’m not,” said Eddie. “Listen—”

  Rogers walked away. He closed the door behind him and left Eddie in darkness.

  Eddie listened to their voices from the other room. He breathed out very slowly in relief. It was that same feeling he had once when he’d woken up in the recovery room, after this operation he’d had. The feeling that he’d dodged a bullet. That he’d bought time.

  And he hadn’t said a word about Donna. Even with the gun pointed at his face, he hadn’t thought once of mentioning her.

  Despite the rain and clouds, light filtered in through the windows, and as Eddie’s eyes adjusted he could make out the angles of the room. His arm throbbed less, but the fear and codeine had made him dizzy and sick.

  Eddie stared at the ceiling and tried to forget the pain. He had to think of what he could give them next. He needed to come up with a story, something to tell them when they came back empty-handed. Something that would keep him alive.

  Short Man Monroe slid his Glock barrel-down into the waistband of his Lees. He sloppily dumped some cocaine into paper, folded the paper, and put it in his jacket. He put his finger in what remained on the table and rubbed some freeze on his gums.

  “Y’all ready?” said Monroe.

  “We ready,” said Linney.

  “Let’s go.”

  “We gone, Ty,” said Rogers.

  “Call me,” said Tyrell, “and let me know.”

  Out in the yard, Monroe and Rogers got into the Z. Linney and Bennet climbed into the Supra.

  “Those two know to follow us?” said Rogers.

  “Yeah,” said Monroe. “Turn this bitch over, man.”

  Rogers cooked the ignition while Monroe fingered the cup between the seats.

  “Where go my pills, man?”

  “You took ’em all,” said Rogers.

  “Damn, I must be lunchin’.”

  “You swallowed four back there at the hospital.”

  “Sure you didn’t give the rest of my medicine to your girlfriend, so he could feel better?”

  “What you talkin’ about, man?”

  “Saw the way you brought him water and shit, like you was sweet on him or somethin’.”

  “Go ahead, Short.”

  Rogers turned the Z around and headed for the road.

  “You gettin’ soft on me, Alan.”

  “No I ain’t.”

  “Yeah you are,” said Monroe. “I got eyes, man. And my eyes can see.”

  Antony Ray cut a fat line out and spread it the length of the mirror. He picked up a rolled fifty-dollar bill.

  “Careful with that,” said Tyrell. “It’s early yet.”

  “Got a lot of catchin’ up to do.”

  “That you do.”

  Ray did half the line. He threw his head back and shook it. He bent down and did the other half. He dropped the bill on the mirror and lit a Newport from his deck.

  Tyrell sat in his chair, facing the window. He watched the cars drive away.

  “You know, those two shouldn’t have brought that thief back with ’em, Tyrell.”

  “I know it.”

  “What you gonna do about it?”

  “Have to wait and see.”

  “You think he’s tellin’ the truth about the money?”

  “Gonna find out, I guess.”

  “I’ll find out right now, you want me to.”

  “For now, let’s just do things my way.”

  “All right. You gotta admit, though, them bringin’ him back here, it does complicate the fuck out of things.”

  “Yes.”

  “They didn’t even think about how we couldn’t let that white boy walk away once he done been in this house.”

  “No, they didn’t think.”

  “You don’t mind my sayin’ so, those are some simple mothafuckers you got on your payroll.”

  “What you expect, cuz?” said Tyrell. “They ain’t nothin’ but kids.”

  EIGHTEEN

  Anthony Taylor was bored just
sitting in his room with no one to talk to, so he put his Raiders jacket on and walked quietly down the stairs. Not that Granmom or that hustler friend of hers could hear him, the way they had their music up so loud. Sounded like some church thing they were dancing to, but with more of a rockin’ band behind it than the stuff Granmom listened to on that AM gospel station. The singers in the background talkin’ about “I’ll take you there,” over and over again. Whatever it was, Anthony couldn’t get into it, but Granmom and her friend, they were back there in the living room kickin’ up a storm.

  Anthony slipped out the front door.

  He turned his collar up against the rain. Cloudy as it was, it seemed awful dark out tonight. Anthony avoided Clifton Terrace, where a whole world of bad things could happen. He walked over to nth and cut south.

  On U Street he saw one of Tyrell’s runners using a pay phone, and another standing on the corner near an idling import with limo-tint windows. Anthony went down by Real Right, saw that all the lights ’cept for one or two fluorescents in the back were turned off. Then he remembered that Mr. Clay closed his shop early on Saturday nights.

  Anthony crossed the street, stood outside of Medger’s for a few minutes, said hello to an old-timer he knew. But the old-timer had to be on his way, with the rain and all. Anthony got tired of getting rained on his own self, so he found a bus shelter and stayed there until a couple of boys who had Trouble stamped on their foreheads came in with him. They started talking to him kind of smart like, askin’ him if he had any cash money on him, so he walked out of the shelter, not too fast so they’d take him for bad, and kept going down the street.

  He was cold and wet and a little bit afraid, but at least things were going on out here. It was better than being at home.

  Marcus Clay and Dimitri Karras met at the Dupont store, as they always did at closing time on Saturday nights, and had a beer with the store’s longtime manager, Cheek. Dupont had been Clay’s first store, and it would always be his favorite. It only stood to reason that he had his favorite manager in there, too. Cheek had been with Clay for more than ten years, and for every year of service he had put on five pounds.

  After the other stores had called in their figures, Cheek closed Dupont and went to make the deposit. Clay and Karras walked the two blocks back to the Trauma Arms, where they both showered and changed clothes.

  Karras defrosted a ham bone he had been saving and made a pot of split pea soup. He grilled a couple of tomato-and-cheese sandwiches, put them together with the soup, and he and Clay had dinner.

  They watched North Carolina slaughter Alabama-Birmingham as they ate. The food improved Karras’s condition considerably, though he was annoyed at the outcome of the game. As a Maryland fan, Karras hated Dean Smith the way most Greeks hated Turks.

  “You got to admit, though,” said Clay, “whatever they do during the season, Coach Smith does get them through those first two rounds.”

  “Ah,” said Karras, waving his hand at the set. “It’s the conference. The ACC just attracts the quality players, Marcus. Look how many go on to play in the NBA. Georgia Tech and Duke both advanced today. The Tar Heels are in, and NC State will crush Arkansas-Little Rock tomorrow. And you know Maryland’s gotta go into the Sweet Sixteen.”

  “UNLV? We’ll see. The Terps are gonna need five men to show up, not just Bias.”

  The phone rang, and Karras picked it up. He talked for a while, wrote something on a message pad, and replaced the receiver in its cradle. He rubbed his face.

  “Who was that?”

  “Donna. She’s worried about her boyfriend, Eddie.”

  “She should be.”

  “It’s more than that. He hasn’t shown up from work yet.”

  “Maybe he’s out havin’ a few.”

  “She doesn’t think so. They had definite plans. And she claims he’s the puppy-dog type when it comes to her.”

  “What’s she want from you?”

  “Guy’s a dishwasher installer. I’m gonna run over to where he switches his truck with his car, see if he’s knocked off for the night.”

  “Then you’re gonna go see Donna.”

  “It’s not like that, Marcus.”

  “It’s always like that with you.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “The shoe fits, man—”

  “I know.”

  “Mitri?”

  “Now you’re gonna remind me not to get involved. Like you hung back today?”

  “All right. But show some sense.”

  Karras went back to his bedroom and slipped the snow-seal holding the rest of his half into his jean jacket. He left the Trauma Arms.

  Short Man Monroe searched Eddie Golden’s apartment and found nothing. He phoned Tyrell. He opened the front door a crack, looked out into the stairwell, and left the place, locking the door behind him before jogging down to the lot. Monroe slid in beside Alan Rogers, who was sitting behind the wheel of the idling Z.

  “Boy lied,” said Monroe, slipping his gloves off and tossing them on the dash.

  “Damn. Tyrell and Ray gonna fuck him up.”

  “He shouldn’t of lied.”

  “What we gonna do now?”

  “Get outta here quick, for one. Makes me nervous bein’ out here, all these Maryland farmers walkin’ around and shit. Go on down to U, do our job. Want to have me a look around anyway, see if Vietnam is still out.”

  “Listen, Short… I got somethin’ I got to do.”

  “I know what you gotta do.”

  Rogers said, “You mind?”

  “Nah. I better go down in the Supra with Chink and Jumbo, though. ’Cause you know Jumbo can’t fit in this here car.”

  “All right, black. I’ll check in with you later, hear?”

  “Right.”

  Monroe reached under the seat, retrieved his other gun, put it up under his shirt before leaving the Z and running to the Supra. The Supra pulled out and headed south toward the District line. Rogers followed them all the way into D.C., turning off of 13th four blocks before the drop-off at Cardoza. He downshifted and slowed the car, pulling over to the curb and cutting the engine a few doors down from Denice’s house. He didn’t see the old man’s car out on the street.

  Alan Rogers sat back in the bucket. He pictured Denice in that skirt of hers and, for a little while, anyway, pushed business to the back of his mind. Rogers tried not to think too much about that white boy. He knew what they’d do to him now.

  Clarence and Denice Tate discussed the movie on the ride back across town. Denice had enjoyed the romance of it, but for the most part, Tate had been bored to tears. With a title like Out of Africa, you’d think they’d have put more into it, but as in most Hollywood pictures he’d seen on the subject, they’d gone and concentrated on how the continent and its people had affected the white folks who had come to live there. Faithful native servants, dewy eyed and head bowed to their Caucasian movie-star masters. All that. The Ward 3 audience had lapped it up. And Denice seemed like she’d had a good time, which was the purpose of the outing, after all. Tate had gotten through it on the music and scenery alone.

  Walking up to their house, Tate heard the low rumble of an engine idling down the block. He turned his head, saw exhaust coming from the dual pipes of a black sports car parked along the curb a few houses away. Denice’s face brightened, but when Tate glanced over, she tried to bury the look. He hurried Denice up the steps.

  With the door locked behind them, Denice said, “I’m gonna go up to bed now, okay? I’m kinda tired and all.”

  “Okay, honeygirl. I’ll be up in a minute to say good night.”

  “Thanks for the show, Daddy.”

  “My pleasure.”

  He watched her go up the stairs.

  Tate went down to the basement, found a small key he kept on his ring, put it to the lock of a file cabinet pushed beneath the steps. He retrieved a hot .22 he had bought in the alley behind Real Right just a few months back, and a box of shel
ls. He broke the cylinder open and took some rounds from the box. He clumsily thumbed shells into the chambers and snapped the cylinder shut.

  Tate dropped the pistol into his jacket pocket and took the two flights of stairs up to Denice’s bedroom. He walked inside. Denice stood by the window in the dark, looking down to the street.

  “Come away from the window, girl.”

  Denice turned, startled. “Daddy.”

  “Step on back.”

  Tate moved to the window. The Rogers boy stood on the sidewalk out front of their house. As Tate’s figure filled the frame, the Rogers boy took a step back. He buried his hands in his pockets and began to swagger away.

  “Daddy, where you goin’?”

  Tate pointed at Denice on his way out of the room. “Stay away from that window.”

  Tate took the stairs, opened the front door, and bolted down the walkway to the street. The Rogers boy was still swaggering, trying real hard not to run, but he had picked up his pace considerably and was closing in on his car.

  Tate pulled the .22 from his jacket. He broke into a jog, the cold rain cutting at his face.

  “You see this, boy?” he yelled, waving the pistol in the air. “You see this?!”

  Rogers looked over his shoulder, ducked into the Z, cranked the engine. Tate heard a window on the second floor of his house open, heard his daughter shout “Daddy” in a pleading kind of way.

  “Don’t come around here no more, you hear me, Rogers? I’m not playin’, you understand?”

  Tate’s voice, strained and strange to his own ears, was muted by the cry of rubber on asphalt. The black Z shot off the curb and sped away.

  Tate stood alone in the street. He looked down at his hand and abruptly dropped the pistol back in his jacket. He glanced around at the houses of his neighbors, turned, and walked back toward his house. He heard the second-story window shut, saw Denice back away and retreat into the shadows of her room.

  In his whole life, Tate had never fired a gun in anger. When he was a young man coming up in the District, it was how you went with your hands that made or didn’t make your reputation. He knew the playing field was no longer level, which was why he’d bought the .22. But to pull a gun on a kid… damn, what was he thinking to go and do something like that?