Deacon King Kong(71)
He slowly walked along the back of the church, his right hand skimming the wall, moving with the slow, unsteady gait of a man who had just witnessed a building collapse.
Sister Gee watched him drift slowly down the back of the building and felt her heart pirouette toward her feet. She felt an ache. She couldn’t help herself.
“I’m not saying you personally,” she called after him.
He stopped but didn’t turn around. “I was hoping to bring you better news,” he said. “About the case.”
Her eyes dropped to the ground and she swiped at a stray weed with her foot. She was afraid to look up. She wanted him to leave. It was too much. She wanted him to stay. It was not enough. Her emotions felt like two big waves crashing against one another. She could not ever remember being in this place before.
Finally she glanced up. He had moved to the edge of the building and was about to turn the corner toward his squad car and the side of the chuch where his partner, Miss Izi, Bum-Bum, and Dominic awaited, all of them part of the foolish world who’d never see him clearly. He was a man they were blind to, the man beyond the uniform, beyond the skin. Why she saw the man inside and others could not, she was not sure. She had thought about it after he left the church and decided that she and this officer were not the same, no matter what she’d said to him when they first met. She cleaned dirt. He chased bad people. She was a cleaning woman. He was a cop. They were both spoken for in matters of love. But that indefinable spirit, that special thing, that special song had not been heard by either of them. She was sure of that. As she watched his back slowly drift away, she saw her future and his, and knew she’d blame herself for not at least attempting to open the envelope to read whatever news the letter inside might contain. How many times had she done that, swallowed the gunk for the sake of a car, a home, a marriage, a school for her children, for her mother, for her church? For what? What about my own heart, Lord? How many years do I have left?
He had reached the corner of the church when she called out, “When you get some more news, come on back.”
He stopped. He didn’t turn but rather spoke over his shoulder. “It’s only going to be bad news.”
She saw his profile, and it was beautiful, framed by the Statue of Liberty and the harbor, with several gulls flying overhead and beyond. And because he hadn’t uttered a desire to not return, her heart grew tiny wings again.
“Even if it’s bad news,” she said, “there’s good news bound up in it—if you’re the one bringing it.”
She saw his hunched shoulders relax a little. He leaned on the church wall and gave his heart a moment to catch itself. He was afraid if he turned around, his face would give him away and he’d cause more trouble for both of them than the moment was worth. But more than that, for the first time in his fifty-nine years, despite all the poetry he read, and the wonderful Irish stories he could spin off at the drop of a hat, stories full of lyric and rhyme and hope and laughter and joy and pain, all wrapped like Christmas presents, he was suddenly, inexplicably unable to find the words to express himself.
“I’ll be happy,” he said, more to the ground than to her, “to come back and bring what news I can.”
“I’ll be waiting,” Sister Gee said.
But she might as well have been speaking to the wind. He had slipped around the corner of the church toward his squad car and was gone.
16
MAY GOD HOLD YOU . . .
Nine days after Soup Lopez’s homecoming party and two weeks after he blasted Deems in the face, Sportcoat, still very much alive, arrived bright and early for work at the old Italian lady’s brownstone. He had to work in her garden. It was just another normal Wednesday.
She was waiting for him and came right outside the gate when he walked up, moving in a hurry. She was wearing a man’s jacket over her housedress, her kitchen apron still tied around her waist, and men’s oversized concrete walking boots on her feet.
“Deacon,” she said, “we’ve got to find pokeweed.”
“What for? It’s poisonous.”
“No it’s not.”
“Well alrighty then,” he said.
They set off, moving down the block toward the empty lots that stretched toward the harbor. He walked behind her as she stomped forward. When they reached the first weeded lot, just two blocks away, she waded in and he followed. They both searched with their heads down. They passed several fine specimens. “There’s sandspur, beggar’s-lice, partridge weed,” Sportcoat said, “but no pokeweed.”
“It’s here,” Mrs. Elefante said. She fanned through the weeds, several feet ahead of him, swatting the plants with her hands. “My doctor would hate for me to find a bunch of it. That would put him out of business.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Sportcoat chuckled. He felt good this morning. In fact, he felt good every morning he wandered the lots of the Cause looking for plants with the old lady whose name he could never remember. It was the only job he had that he didn’t need to take a drink for. Normally, ever since Hettie died, he needed a booster in the mornings. But Wednesdays working with the old lady always left him feeling goosed. She was eighteen years older than him—close to eighty-nine, she said, but one of the few old folks in the Cause who preferred to be outdoors all day. Four months into the job and he’d never managed to remember her name, but she was a good white person, and that’s what counted. He had always been terrible with names, and that was a problem, especially after he got soused. Most folks he called “Hey, brother man,” or “ma’am,” and if they had a name of any type, they’d simply respond. But after four months it didn’t seem appropriate for him to ask her name again, so he’d taken to calling her Miss Four Pie, which she didn’t mind, a point that amused Hot Sausage to no end when he told him.