Black Buck(86)

“How old is she?”

“She just turned seven, sir.”

“What’s her name?”

“Amina. It means ‘trustworthy.’ My wife and I hope that this means she will be a lawyer or a big executive like you, sir,” he said, turning to me, laughing.

“Wife? You’re married, Chauncey?”

“Yes, sir. Ten years now. I brought her and Amina over four years ago.”

“From where?”

“Senegal, sir. It is where I am from.”

I fell back and rested my head on the seat, breathless at the fact that Chauncey had driven me for six months, yet I didn’t know anything about him. I’d never cared to ask. “Pull over.”

“Sir? We are almost home.”

“Pull over,” I repeated. “Please.”

He crossed Fourteenth and pulled to the side of the empty avenue.

“Now out.”

“Sir?”

“Out,” I ordered.

He slowly opened the door and stood to the side. I hopped out, grabbed his driver’s cap, and took his place. “In the back,” I said, pointing behind me.

His eyes went white in the cold orange light of the night, as if he’d seen a ghost. “No, sir. I cannot do that. It is not proper. Please, sir, please step out.”

Without a word, I closed my door, reached back, pushed open the one behind me, and adjusted the seat. Chauncey was a few inches taller than me.

He reluctantly grabbed the door handle, looked around the street, then quickly stepped inside, shutting the door.

“Where to, Chauncey?” I asked, looking at his tense face in the rearview mirror.

“Please, sir, you cannot—”

“Where to?”

He leaned forward, gripping the collar of his shirt and holding it there for a while; but he eventually loosened his tie and sat back. “Harlem, sir. One Hundred Thirty-Fourth Street and Malcolm X Boulevard.”

I drove the car at a snail’s pace all the way up to Harlem. Chauncey told me about life in Senegal, about the famous people from his land, like the father of African cinema, Ousmane Sembene, and about ceebu j?n, also known as thieboudienne, which is basically their version of paella. Before moving to America, Chauncey had completed his PhD in renewable energy, but when he arrived here, no university would offer him a professorship, so he got a job as a driver through his cousin.

Thirty minutes later, we were there. I handed him the keys. He kissed his hand and raised it to the sky. Damn, is my driving that atrocious?

“Tell Amina I said happy birthday and that I’m sorry for keeping you away from her.”

“I will, sir, but no apologies necessary.”

I started walking down the street, hoping I could catch a cab all the way up there.

“Sir?” he called, holding the Tesla’s open door.

“Yeah?”

“I do not know what you are doing with all of these new people, but whatever it is, I know it is good. You are a good person, sir.”

I quietly saluted him, turning back down the street. I already knew what I was doing with ‘all of these new people.’ One of them would be the ticket to getting Barry off my back. After that, Sensei Buck would cut the rest loose.





25





“Where’s Rose?” I asked, looking around the Time Warner Center’s lobby. It was seven. “I said 6:45 p.m., didn’t I?”

Earlier in the day, I’d met with Barry, who finally explained why getting this SDR was so important. He said that the CEO of the hip-hop sponsorship company, X-Ploit, was the son of a wealthy Arab who could use his connections to help Barry get closer to a minority stake in the Giants. It was stupid as shit, but Barry wasn’t the type of person I’d want as an enemy, so I told the troops to meet at the Time Warner Center that night.

“You did,” Brian said.

Jake pointed toward the glass doors as Rose walked in. “Ova there.”

“Why are you late?” I asked, as she strolled over wearing black leather from head to toe.

She patted my shoulder, unconcerned. “Because I’m late. Is there anything I can say that’ll really make you feel better?”

“No.”

“Exactly. So what’s the plan?”

I scanned my motley crew. “Tonight is a celebration of all of your hard work over the past couple days. I want to thank you for making this an exciting week and for trusting me to lead the way.”

“This jus’ the beginnin’, Mr. Buck,” Jake said, slapping my shoulder with his oversize hands.

“Yeah, so we’re going to go up to the fourth floor to enjoy a delicious and expensive meal at Per Se,” I said. “But before we do, I want all of your wallets.”

“For what?” Rose asked, hesitantly reaching into her back pocket.

“Because Sensei Buck says so, that’s why.”

They each threw their penny-thin wallets into my bag and we entered the elevator. Four floors later, we reached a pair of royal-blue wooden doors. The four of them, wearing nothing even reminiscent of fine-dining attire, stood speechless before I pushed them inside.

Tables full of people lined the windows overlooking Columbus Circle, Central Park, and the skyline. A pretentious, likely hazardous, fireplace crackled behind glass. Six or seven white-clothed, candle-lit tables stood on a level higher than the others. After a little trouble, we were shown to one of them.