Nightcrawling(18)

Dee wailed and squeezed and trembled until my mama’s hums drowned it all out and then the tribe of us saw the hair, saw the tiny round that crawled from her body, turning her inside out. The squeals began and the humming turned to chants and we all watched that child swim out his mama, head poking out more blood than hair, and my mama took him into her arms and laid him on Dee’s breast and this was the sweetest, most whole thing to ever take place in our building, and the rain poured and poured and poured until Dee began to beg again and her birthmarked baby squirmed and Ronda gave up, passed Dee the pipe, and she faded into sky like she didn’t hear her own baby crying. And Trevor cried and she smiled and we all hummed again.



* * *



—

Trevor splashes down below, looking up at me.

“Lost my ball,” he calls.

“What you talkin’ about? Why you not at school?”

“Mama not here and I woke up late and then I was gonna go but I dropped my keychain in the pool and if I don’t got it, then the boys don’t win the game and I lose my money.”

I ask him, “What money?” but he simply dips back down into the water until the only thing distinctly him is that circular mark on his head, roaming. His pile of clothes is now wet from the splashing and when he emerges, small metal basketball keychain in hand, his boxers are slipping off him. I see the outline of his ribs like they been carved out of him and the rest of my day fades like a dream.

I walk toward the stairwell down to the pool and Trevor starts climbing up, pile of clothes a lump in his arms. We meet at the halfway point of the stairwell, Trevor a head shorter than me at age nine, with arms and legs that seem to stretch farther than he can control, but his face is still childlike.

“Go on and put some new clothes on,” I tell him, beginning to guide him up the stairs.

“We goin’ somewhere?” Trevor’s teeth flash, always eager for the escape.

I grab the keychain out of his hand and look at it, taking in the way it shines like somebody been scrubbing it clean and tucking it into bed every night. “You wanna play ball so bad, let’s go on and do it.”

At that, little boy limbs fly straight up the stairs and into the apartment, just like they always have. His legs are longer and he knows more about what kind of life he has than he did when he was three and racing around the building, knocking on everyone’s door, but he is still the same buoyant little man.

Dee tried to be his mother for the first few years of Trevor’s life, at least enough that she was home half the time and she bought formula and bothered to make sure somebody was watching him when she went off to go get high in some other apartment. She used to leave Trevor with one of the women, sometimes Mama, any of the aunties who inherited all the Regal-Hi’s children once theirs grew up. Then, between Daddy’s death and Mama’s arrest, all the aunties left. It was like something had come over the building and they all scattered, women disintegrating into nothing. Some chose to go and some got evicted, some passed away and some remarried, but all the women who had helped raise Marcus and me were gone by the time Trevor turned seven and then it was just us, motherless.

Trevor started to come around more often after that and then I was walking him to the bus, finding him some extra Doritos for after school. I was determined not to let nobody toss him away. So when the rent notice got posted, when Polka Dot came up to me and showed me what my body was worth, I thought maybe this was a ticket out for the both of us. Maybe this was how we got free.

I head back into my apartment and Marcus is awake, rubbing his eyes on the couch.

“Mornin’,” he says.

I sit down next to him, thinking about how it felt to be in the second man’s car last night, about Tony’s back as he walked away. It was different when I was alone, the fear escalating and the grit so profound that when I got home last night I showered longer than I ever have before, didn’t even worry about the water bill. I don’t know if I can do it again, but I also don’t know how to keep us alive if I don’t.

“Marcus, I gotta ask you something.”

He looks at me, rests his cheek in his hand, waits.

“I know I said I’d give you a month to work on the album, but I need you to get a job.”

Marcus starts to nod slowly, looking at the carpet and then back up at me.

“Aight, Ki. I’ll start looking.”

I didn’t expect him to say yes, so when he does, it’s like there’s suddenly more air in the room, his nod a solace that might make up for everything.

“I actually got a lead for you. I ran into Lacy a few days ago. She works at a strip club downtown and I bet she’d help you get a job there if you asked.”

“You know Lacy and I ain’t tight like that no more.”

“You know you ain’t gonna be able to get no other job.” I pick at a scab forming on my knee. “Please.”

Marcus nods again and I lean forward, wrap my arms around him like I’ve been wanting to since Polka Dot. He kisses the top of my head, murmurs something about needing to piss, and I think for the first time in months, we might just be okay.

Marcus leaves to go piss at the liquor store and I pull on a jacket and head back to the patio strip where all the apartments connect in a circle around the shit pool. Trevor still hasn’t come out from his door and I decide to just head in anyways, opening the door to a scene of little boy blues, Trevor in his boxers dancing. Swing step, head bob.