Tuff

  “I have one,” said Spencer. “In the equation E = mc2, what does c represent?”

  Clifford waved his hand in disgust. “Forget that. Ask him what’s physics.”

  Winston said nothing and returned to the board. Embarrassed, he read one of the campaign flyers aloud, as if to prove a point. “Collette Cox—City Councilwoman for the 8th District. Vote Social Democrat for Justice. September 9th.” He looked back at the poster of Debs, then ripped the handbill from the wall and sat back down. “You all would back me in anything I do, long as it’s positive, right?”

  “Of course,” said the collective.

  He slid the campaign flyer across the table and announced, “I’m going to run for City Council.” The assuredness in his voice surprised him. Everyone but Inez scooted away from the table like tapped-out poker players. Winston had a satisfied smirk on his face. Politician. Don’t need to know physics to run for some bullshit office. Jordy scrambled up his father’s face, using Winston’s ears, lips, and eye sockets for toe- and handholds.

  “You stupid?” asked Fariq. “This is a waste of time, this boy is hopeless.” Clifford added, “This shit isn’t funny.”

  “I’m serious. Ever since I can remember, you, Moms, Yolanda, my counselors been going on about how I need to meet the challenges of life. That I need to stop taking the easy way out. Well, here go my challenge.”

  “Tuffy, leave me out of this.”

  “Didn’t nobody say nothing about you, Smush.”

  “I just challenge you to pay me back my money. Anyway, I don’t know why you talking this nonsense about running for City Council when you don’t even vote.”

  Having reached the top of Winston’s head, Jordy planted a flag of saliva on the bristly peak. “I vote,” Winston said, wiping the top of his head with a napkin.

  “Who you voted for?”

  “Voted for president.”

  “The one we got now?”

  “Fuck I look like? I walked in the booth, looked at the bullshit candidates, and said to the lady at the desk, ‘What if I don’t like none of these motherfuckers runnin’?’ She gave me a big ol’ ballot and said I could write in whoever I wanted.”

  “And?”

  “Nigger.”

  “What?”

  “I wrote your crippled ass in. ‘I, Winston Foshay, vote for my man, Fariq Cole, for president. If you don’t know, you better ask somebody. And in case you still don’t know, he lives at 154 East 109th Street, first floor. When he walks his knees bend backwards like a flamingo’s.’ ”

  “Damn, yo—you voted for me for president?”

  “Yeah, bro. Swear on my mother.”

  Flattered, Fariq looked away, blinking his eyes. “Damn, yo. That’s lovely, kid.” Winston, already assuming victory at the polls, began doling out political patronage. “Don’t sweat that, dude. When I win, you going to be chief of the fire department, Armello going to be chief of police, Whitey chief of white people. Ms. Nomura, you my chief of education. No, scratch that—chief of fair play. Somebody should be in charge of fair play, don’t you think?”

  Swinging a leg over Winston’s shoulder, Jordy used his father’s arm like a fireman’s pole and slid down to the floor, where he untied Winston’s shoelaces.

  “You showing your ass, son.”

  “That’s all right, I got a lot of ass to show.”

  “Get real and get this thought of running for City Council out of your head, because you’re unqualified, boy.”

  Yolanda bunny-hopped her chair closer to her man. “Now, Clifford, I’m not saying Winston should run, but think about it—who’s qualified? That black man they always talking running for president in the next election? Because he gives a good press conference he’s qualified? If he ever does decide to run, you know what the first thing he’s going to be—unqualified.”

  Although he didn’t know what black man Yolanda was talking about, Winston nodded his head. Ms. Nomura, her hands clasped together like a nun administering to a bedridden child, said, “Winston, maybe you should get involved in politics at a more basic level.” Tuffy shook his head. “I already tried that. Every time you ask me to go to one of your demonstrations I go. I picket the army recruiting station when you tell me the U.S. fixing to bomb some defenseless country for no reason. What happens? The fuckers get bombed anyway. Remember, I went hunger-striking with you for them goddamn refugees?”

  “What refugees?”

  “Some dirty jungle motherfuckers in some country I never heard of was getting mistreated. We were in front of the UN Building.”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “The time I was the only one who got arrested, because that man was heckling me. ‘That’s not fair, hunger-striking with the fat kid. It’ll take him a whole year to die.’ I had to beat that man’s ass.”

  Spencer, who’d been quiet since Winston had announced his candidacy, finally spoke. “I feel that we must admit to ourselves that we’ve laid out some stipulations and guidelines for Winston to follow: his vocation should pay a decent living wage, contribute to the social good, be an exemplar to his son, and be racially, I don’t know—righteous. I think Winston has chosen to pursue a course of action that while on the surface is infeasible and bullheaded does meet the agreed-upon exigencies. I have only one question. Winston, are you certain this is what you really want to do?”

  “No, but it’s what I’m going to do. The only people who want to become politicians are the third-grade snitch-ass hall-monitor types. Why can’t I do it? You just put up some posters in the neighborhood and people vote for you. All I need to know is how much does the job pay.”

  “I’d say about seventy-five thousand dollars a year,” Ms. Nomura said.

  He stamped his feet and pumped his fist in the air. “Oh, that’s crazy money. After I win I’ll be making more than all y’all combined.”

  “You won’t be making more than me, believe that shit, motherfucker.”

  “But you can’t win. Winston, listen to me for one second.” Clifford stood up and pointed a finger in his son’s face. “Be practical. I know I’ve always told you pursue your dreams, but you got to understand the difference between fantasy and reality.”

  Winston slapped away his father’s hand. The loud, stinging crack caused those at ringside to cringe. “Man, I’m tired of you getting up in my face.” Clifford backed off but continued preaching about the costs of running a campaign and the number of votes needed to win. Winston ignored him and stared at the poster of Debs. He tried to imagine what the old Socialist was saying. Used the buildings in the background to figure out where in New York City he was speaking. Lower East Side? He counted the number of blacks in the crowd. Two. I bet those niggers had it hard. Calling everybody “boss.” “Daddy, how many times have we met face-to-face?”

  “I don’t know—”

  “I’m going to tell you: thirty-three times in twenty-two years. Eight in the last eleven. That’s counting today, and the last time I seen you, you was sleeping on the A train at four in the morning, snoring your ass off, your head banging against the window, an empty bottle of Wild Irish Rose rolling between your feet.”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “I bet you in at least thirty-two out of those thirty-three times we’ve had the same conversation: ‘Why you fucking up in school? Why don’t you stay out of trouble?’ And I always said, ‘Because I can’t do the work,’ or ‘I can’t stop hanging out with my friends.’ You would tell me I can do anything I set out to do. And what I’m setting out to do is run for City Council. Why can’t you just say, ‘Son, I’m proud of you, I know you can do it.’ ”

  “Because you can’t.”

  “Ms. Nomura, how many votes it take to win?”

  “Four thousand votes in the primary, you’d win for sure.”

  “That’s it?”

  “I know it doesn’t sound like a lot, but the primary is in September, that’s right around the corner—and besides, not many people in this ne
ighborhood vote.”

  “That’s because I never ran. Look, I know more than four thousand people in this place. I know at least half of every project. Woodrow Wilson Houses, first floor: Gilbert Osorio raising six cousins by his dammy—Monica, Dolores, Pepón, Jessie, Suzette, and Pharaoh, jam-packed in a one-bedroom crib. Next to them, Cynda Alfaro and her moms, who works at the hospital—she’s real cool, always puts my triage form on top. Two doors from the Alfaros on the right, them crackhead brothers Erwin, Erving, and Ernest. Plus, those fucking dykes Jocelyn and Lourdes on the left-hand side, with, for some unknown fucking reason, a rainbow flag on their door and in every damn window. Down from the lesbos, Genise Norris and her twin sons, Unique and Unique. Don’t let me have to tell you who’s on the second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth floors because we’ll be here all day. Shit, much drug running, breaking and entering, hiding out as I’ve done? I been on every block, in every apartment, Wilson Houses, Taft Projects, Jefferson Houses, George Washington. Wilson, Taft, Jefferson, Washington—ain’t that a bitch? I never realized all the projects were named after presidents—what kind of twisted message is that? Anyway, I see these little flyers various candidates got up now. Wilfredo Cienfuegos, that motherfucker be selling illegal cellular phones in the back of Estrella’s Restaurant. Any of y’all know that fool?”

  “Naw.”

  “Course not. I know him because I know everybody.”

  Jordy opened Winston’s thighs and clawed his way through the mass of flesh and muscle to his father’s crotch. He lifted Tuffy’s sagging stomach and was about to land a punch to the bulge before him when Winston punched him in the chest, knocking him to the seat of his diapers. Jordy just giggled and charged in again.

  “Who else running?” Fariq asked, his interest piqued.

  “Margo Tellos. She live over on one-eighteen. Got a big, fat, juicy ass and a little boy who goes to private school on the West Side.” Winston held up Collette Cox’s campaign flyer. “I know Ms. Nomura knows her. This one used to teach here at the school. I remember one day she was subbing for Ms. Dunleavy, we fucking around not doing the assignment, throwing shit out the windows, woman could’ve died and no one would’ve noticed or cared. Out of nowhere she starts crying, mascara all down by her chin, talking about, ‘When I look at you people, I see failures. Wasted talent. The ghosts of students who could’ve become lawyers, doctors. It’s like you people are zombies.’ ”

  Winston looked cockeyed at Yolanda and Fariq to see if they’d shared his umbrage. Smush asked Inez for another cigarette and Yolanda just sat there, studying Tuffy for signs of bipolar disorder. “You two might not give a fuck, but I ain’t no zombie. Damn if you see me walking in a straight line, arms stretched all out in front of me, hands choking the shit out of the air, going ‘uuurrggghhhh, uuurraaaagggghh,’ waiting for some teen hero to bash my head in and put me out of my misery. Fuck that. I’m sick of being …”

  “Disenfranchised,” volunteered Spencer.

  “I was going to say ‘left out.’ But your word sound better.”

  “You flipping,” said Smush.

  “You’re still my campaign manager.”

  “And Landa, you don’t got no choice, because our thing is till death do us part.”

  “Don’t tempt me.”

  “Ms. Nomura, Daddy, I know you with me, since you two are so supportive of everything I do.”

  “I raised a fool.”

  “Nigger, you didn’t raise nobody.” Angrily Winston pushed the tin of food scraps away from him. His chin dipped into his chest. His eyes closed. He squeezed them tighter, then covered his face with his hands.

  “You all right, son?” Fariq asked.

  Winston didn’t move. Yolanda couldn’t tell if he was about to cry or snap the neck of the person closest to him, which unfortunately was her.

  Just contemplating the absurdity of a nigger like him running for political office was making Winston’s head hurt. He knew there was no point in talking about his future. He shut his eyes and patted the gun in his pocket. Fuck am I doing? he thought. If it’d been winter and the flyer said, “Macy’s—Extra Christmas Help Needed,” I’d have said, “That’s it—I want to be a department-store Santa!” He slowly ripped Collette Cox’s campaign flyer into four squares. Almost instinctively he whispered a verse from an old rap song:

  … Bullet with my name on it

  Knife with my bloodstain on it

  Coffee table with my brain on it

  Pallbearer grab a coffin latch

  Another nigger snatched

  In the ghetto it’s Catch-

  22 slug to the mug …

  Inez winced. It wasn’t hard to envision a bullet-riddled Winston sprawled underneath the White Park monkey bars, gargling his blood, his head lolling in her lap, while his friends tried to coax his soul back into his body. She was determined not to be too late to save Tuffy, like she was too late to save Malcolm.

  Winston slowly lifted his head and opened his eyes. “I ain’t serious with this election bullshit. I’m not running for a damn thing. Fuck it.”

  Inez raised an index finger in the air like a committeeperson making a point of order. “Fifteen thousand dollars, Winston,” she said. “I’ll pay you fifteen thousand dollars if you run. Maybe a little more after I look into how much it costs for posters and things. It doesn’t matter if you win or lose. It’ll be like a summer job.” Winston immediately flashed to the restitution check hanging on Inez’s bedroom wall. “Come on, Ms. Nomura, don’t joke.”

  “Inez, don’t encourage the boy,” pleaded Clifford. “He’s going to think you mean it.”

  “The election is a little over three months away. Let’s see—that’s five thousand dollars a month.”

  Inez’s eyes locked with his. She was serious. “It might be fun.” Winston stole a glance at Yolanda. She looked skeptical. She don’t like Ms. Nomura nohow. He shifted his gaze to Fariq. Smush would eventually come up with some nefarious plan to make money this summer. It depended upon the riskiness of the venture, but at best Winston’s end would be between four and five thousand a month. Ain’t that a bitch, crime and politics pay about the same. “Ms. Nomura, I want all the money up front.”

  “Done.”

  Inez sighed. No one else said anything as they waited for her to come to her senses and renege on the offer. The phone rang. Winston pressed the Speaker button and snapped, “Who this?”

  “Winston, is that how you answer the phone?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “Okay, then. What did you decide to do?”

  “I’m running for Congress.”

  “City Council,” hissed Yolanda.

  “That’s nice, son, you have my blessing. Take care.”

  “Thanks, Mama, you always there for a nigger. I mean, you wasn’t really there for me, but yeah, thanks. I’ll call you soon. Bye. Love you.” Winston picked Jordy up off the floor and dangled him over the phone with one hand and tickled his stomach with the other. “Say goodbye to Grams, Jordy.” Jordy purred a slobbering gurgle into the phone.

  Clifford backed away from the table. “Inez, is the auditorium ready?”

  “Ms. Dunleavy is taking care of everything, but we should get going. I’ll be there in a minute.” While Clifford gathered his books and strode into the hall, Inez walked up to Winston and gave him a long hug. “You know what we haven’t done lately?”

  “Naw.”

  “Gone to the top of the Empire State Building. Let’s meet next Sunday. Spencer, you come too.”

  “Sure.”

  “Winston, you mind?”

  “Naw.”

  “Coming to listen to your father read?”

  “Maybe.”

  Winston rose from the table, began cleaning up his mess. He crumpled Collette Cox’s campaign flyer and tossed it with the food scraps into a wastebasket. “Ms. Nomura?”

  “What?”

  “You think my pops would’ve come to this meeting if he didn’t have this readi
ng scheduled for today?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You better vote for me.”

  “You have to earn votes, Winston. You can’t strong-arm folks into voting for you,” Inez said, scooting out into the corridor.

  As he buckled Jordy into his stroller, Yolanda eased up to him and rolled his T-shirt over his beach-ball paunch. “You look hot, baby. You bring an extra shirt?”

  “I forgot.”

  Yolanda hiked the shirt to Winston’s underarms, exposing his chest. “I don’t like how Ms. Nomura looks at you.”

  “Now who paranoid? You notice my father didn’t even say goodbye?”

  “I noticed.”

  With two fingers Yolanda skied a path down Tuffy’s breastbone, jumping moguls of fat, slaloming in and out of his carbuncles and assorted battle scars, leaving wavy tracks on his sweaty skin. Winston’s stomach quivered as her fingers schussed around the rim of his navel. “What did you mean when you said I don’t have a choice—that I have to support you if you run for office?”

  “You my girl—if I do something, you follow. And vicey-versey.”

  “It’s much easier following a nigger who got fifteen grand, I know that much.”

  “Ain’t that a bitch. But no te preocupes, I’m just going to take the money and run.”

  “Thought you said you wasn’t going to run?”

  “You know what I mean. Ms. Nomura wanna play social worker, I don’t care.”

  Fariq grabbed Spencer by the elbow and guided him out of the room. “We be right out here, all right?”

  “All right,” answered Winston.

  Yolanda cleared the layer of perspiration off Tuffy’s chest with her hands, then blow-dried each nipple, watching his skin fill with goose bumps. “Yolanda, what are you doing?”

  “You ever think we married too young?” she asked, driving an index finger into the abyss that was his navel. Her finger two knuckles deep into his belly button, she probed for the pressure points in her husband’s soul. She wanted to arouse the real nigger within, hear him scream, and beg her, and only her, for mercy. Winston clenched his abdominal muscles, causing the walls of his belly button to clamp down on her finger like a set of fleshy Chinese handcuffs. “Landa, you not going nowhere, so stop fronting.” Yolanda tugged violently, trying to extract her finger from Winston’s suction hold. “Tuffy, stop playing!” Winston exhaled and released her finger. It was moist. She smelled it before wiping it dry on Winston’s pants. Yolanda lifted her shirt and they hugged, their sweaty bellies stuck together like wet tissue paper.