The Black Kids(57)

“You know, if I was younger, I could’ve taken every last one of those punks,” he says.

I imagine poor Ronnie sprawled out on the floor as the looters rushed past him, taking everything he’d worked so hard to get.

“I held on to that Dyson for as long as I could, though, I’ll tell you that,” Uncle Ronnie says. “I grabbed ahold of that motherfucker’s leg and didn’t let go… Well, at least not until he kicked me in the face.”

“He could’ve killed you.” My dad’s voice wobbles like he could cry. I didn’t even know he was in the room.

Uncle Ronnie looks as though he wants to argue with him, but maybe it’s something about the way Daddy says it, like a declaration of love instead of a punch to the face, that makes Uncle Ronnie instead say softly, “I suppose he could’ve.”

“I’ma get you new peas,” Morgan says, and runs toward the kitchen.

On the news, the anchor announces that troops are coming into the city to help the National Guard—thousands of soldiers, army and Marines, with their armored vehicles that scream war. It’s the first time the military’s been sent to a city to quell disorder since the 1968 MLK assassination riots. The last time the military was in Los Angeles like this was in 1894 for the Pullman Strike, which started in Chicago and spread countrywide to involve almost a quarter of a million railway workers. For months, they shut down railroads across the country and crippled businesses, including the US Postal Service. Then the government sent in the army, and thirty people ended up getting killed.

The news shows the troops tumbling out of their Humvees, ready and green like plastic toy soldiers.

“Well, will you look at that,” Uncle Ronnie scoffs.



* * *




While Morgan and Uncle Ronnie talk about the store, I feel guilty that my personal crisis is that it’s a few hours before prom and there’s nobody available to do my hair. Patrice, my hairdresser, is six feet tall and pecan-colored, with Flo-Jo nails that she’ll dig into your scalp like a rake as she washes your hair. It hurts, but it also feels like she’s scratching the bad away. There aren’t many black hairdressers near us, so to find Patrice my mother and father went through the entire phone book calling places in the area and asking almost apologetically, “Do you do black hair?”

Patrice is always late and never apologizes for it, but she’s very good at what she does, so I don’t complain to her face. When the relaxer starts to burn away my kinks and I cry out, “It’s burning!” Patrice screams like a coach, “Just hold on, we’re almost there, girl!”

Earlier this morning, when I tried to call the shop to confirm the appointment, it went straight to voice mail. So I tried again, and again. There’s a slight chance the store is gone, burned down, looted, and disappeared. I tried calling Patrice’s home number, but I got the dull beep of a disconnected line. The power’s out in large portions of South Central, according to the news.

My mother tries calling several other black hair salons in the phone book, but the story’s the same: answering-machine messages saying they’re closed until further notice.

“I’ll do it,” Morgan says.

She sits me down in the kitchen and parts my hair into thin lines with a rattail comb. Her hands are impatient, and I try not to scream as she jams the weight of the blow-dryer comb into my head like it’s a dive bomber.

“You’re hurting me,” I say.

“Sorry,” she says, and tugs a little softer.

She sticks the hot comb atop our kitchen stove. It’s the only hot comb we have in the house, old and slightly rusted, with a green wooden handle that my dad recovered from his mother’s stuff when she died. With the hum of the dryer gone, it’s me and Morgan alone together.

“Pops used to say the store was my inheritance. And I was like, whatever, because vacuums are fucking vacuums, you know? They’re not exactly glamorous. But I did love that store. I grew up in it.”

“I’m really sorry,” I say.

“Me too.” She sighs.

“The Parkers asked my mom about the car,” I say.

Morgan presses my head into her stomach. As she runs the comb over my edges, I can feel her stomach gurgle in my skull.

“What she say?” Morgan blows on the comb.

“I think she knew we did it,” I say. “But she told them we would never do such a thing.”

“Yo momma ain’t no snitch!” Morgan says, and we laugh hard until she accidentally burns the top of my ear.



* * *




Lucia enters the kitchen and begins to straighten up to the beat of the yellow Walkman on her hip. She carries around a spray bottle of bleach like it’s a six-shooter and this is the Old West.

“You smell like bleach,” I say.

She points the bottle right at me, and I stagger back like I’ve been shot.

She sings a song by this Tejana and moves around the kitchen shaking her butt. Her date with Jose from Western Union is tonight.

“Maybe you two will get married after all,” I say. If he marries her, maybe she’ll stay nearby.

“I’ve already been married,” Lucia says. “I don’t need to get married again. But love? Love is good.”

“If you stay here and move in with him, I can come visit you,” I say.