5 Minutes and 42 Seconds (3 page)

D
ream crept in late
for the third day in a row. Again she peeked through the door to see if she had a client waiting. Again she heard her coworkers dragging her family name through the mud.

“I don't get it,” said Faye Jackson, who was sitting on one of the waiting chairs, raising her overtly broad nose in disgust. “What's so good about Fashad Douglass? I mean, he fine, but what's so good about him?”

“It ain't just about him being fine and rich,” said Xander.

“What is it, then?” asked Daryl. The whole shop stopped to listen.

“Do y'all know what love is?” he continued. “You don't fall in love with somebody's face, and you for damn sure don't fall in love with they wallet.”

“Whatever,” said Daryl.

“Y'all don't get it. Y'all just don't know what it's like. Loving a man is like a heartbeat. You can't stop it unless you die,” said Xander, the only true romantic of the bunch.

“What about a heart attack?” said Faye pessimistically.

Dream figured they'd wander away from the subject of her and her family long enough for her to enter the room without causing conflict, though she walked in with her head facing downward, as if they couldn't see her if she couldn't see them.

“It's nice of you to show up,” said Daryl. Dream neither looked at him nor responded.

“Xander,” said Daryl in a way Dream knew was intended to make her feel she wasn't worth the time it took to curse her. “Why you all sad and shit? Just yesterday you said you had a man you was going to leave Detroit with. Now you talking about heart attacks and death.”

Xander, wondering what he could tell them without betraying confidence, paused. His lover of eleven months, ten days, and approximately three hours was a jealous God of iron fist whose love and punishment were equally passionate. Still sifting through what was allowable and what was forbidden to say, he recalled the night before.

 

X
ander slung his arm
around the bed with his eyes closed, hoping to feel his lover's hard body. He'd learned it was easier to just feel around than to open his eyes and see that empty space. Not looking toward the space his hand had just rubbed, he opened his eyes to search the
room. Xander saw him naked, and dressing in the bedroom doorway.

“What you doin'?” asked Xander.

“What it look like?”

“You leavin'?”

“I been here for three days.”

“I ain't ask how long you been here, I asked if you was leaving,” mumbled Xander.

“What?”

“Nothing,” said Xander timidly. “When you comin' back?”

“I don't know.”

“You goin' back to her?”

“I never left.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“It means we're not gay.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“We fuck and then we go home to separate places. No trips to amusement parks on Gay Day. No cooking each other's dinners. We're not fags, Xander. We're two niggas who enjoy each other's company, and nothing more.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“What it always means.”

They both spoke in unison: “Good-bye.”

Fashad slammed the door shut on his way out. Xander rolled into the space left by his lover. He grabbed the pillow, hugged it, took in his lover's scent, fully expecting to go back to sleep and settle for dreams of him, as he always had. Thirty minutes later he still lay wide awake; something in
side of him wouldn't let it go this time—the five-hundredth time they'd made love. He knew better, but his hand drifted to the cell phone on the desk beside his bed. He flinched as he pressed one on the speed dial.

“You gonna come back later, aren't you?”

“If I got time and I feel like it. What I tell you 'bout callin' me during the day and shit. What do you want?”

 

A
fter replaying the story
in his mind, for both his own and his lover's privacy, Xander figured his story was okay to share with the shop.

“I called him after we made love and told him I just needed to hear his voice.”

“Ewwww…that's a no-no,” explained Daryl. “These MSMs don't like to hear none of the sentimental shit. They just want to hit it quick and forget they did it.”

“What's an MSM?” asked Faye.

“A man who sleeps with men,” said Daryl, sounding like an expert. “What did you do after that, Xander?”

“I just held my breath and waited for him to say something. Then he finally said: ‘What you mean you need to hear my voice?' I thought about it for a second, then I just decided to come out to him.”

“What?” asked Faye, looking around the salon to see if anyone else was as confused and repulsed as she was. “What do you mean you came out to him. He was fucking you yesterday, he should know you're gay.”

“Well, not necessarily,” said Daryl. “His man is on the
down low, so he probably thought Xander was too. There's a big difference between what you do in the bedroom and what you do in the rest of your home.”

“Wait a minute…So, he sticks his dick up your ass and doesn't consider himself gay?” asked Faye.

“Exactly,” said Daryl.

“I told him I was gay for the first time yesterday, and that I was tired of us sleeping together without being awake together.”

“He hung up, didn't he?” said Daryl.

“Yeah,” said Xander.

“You be laying it on them too thick,” said Daryl. “These niggas got wives and kids. They ain't trying to have no nigga on the side that's going to threaten that.”

“What?” asked Xander's client Rochelle, who'd been pretending she wasn't listening. She swerved her heavy weave away from his clutches and threw her hand in the air as if she were stopping traffic. “He got a wife and kids?”

“They all do,” said Daryl.

“I saw this on Oprah,” said Yolanda. “They wives don't even be knowing and they be out just doin' it to every nigga they see. They be going to clubs and shit to meet up.”

“Girl, I heard about that too. But I ain't think it was like that here in Detroit. It seem like word would spread if somebody was on the down low here,” said Faye.

“Well, word can't spread if nobody tells,” said Xander.

“Xander won't even tell
me
who the man is,” said Daryl.

“Well, if it was my husband I would want somebody to tell me,” said Rochelle, adjusting her faux Chanel suit that
spoke of her ambition to move up the ranks at the local savings-and-loan.

Xander said nothing.

“Is it my husband?” she asked again.

Xander grimaced playfully and the shop fell into a chorus of laughter.

S
mokey, bring your ass
over here,” said Fashad.

“Shut the fuck up,” muttered Smokey.

“What?” yelled Fashad from the other room like an angry parent.

“I said all right,” agreed Smokey, struggling to keep his gray eyes open. He'd hardly slept since meeting Bill. He walked in the room with his eyes closed, opening them just in time to see the back of Fashad's red-and-white-striped leather jacket moving from the office to the garage. He followed his boss and saw a junked-out red Cadillac with the paint peeled enough for it to pass for pink.

“Take this car over to Thirty-fourth and Jackson,” commanded Fashad from behind the lone desk in the car garage, the heels of his leather Diesels propped up where paperwork and clutter should have been.

“Why?” asked Smokey. He had planned on laying low
until the trumpet sounded, that way he could make a clean break, but now he realized Fashad wasn't going to let him.

Fashad ignored him. “Park it on the corner in front of the green house Apples Morgan stay in.”

“Can't you get somebody else to do it!” yelled Smokey, fearing he revealed himself.

“You do this shit all the time, Smokey.”

“But I can't today…I got to practice my music.”

“Go inside the house and give her these keys,” said Fashad, and he handed Smokey a keychain with a thick metal band on it, ignoring his protest.

“Why can't you get somebody else?”

“She gonna give the keys to a boy,” Fashad continued. “A white boy. You change clothes with him, and walk on home.”

Smokey smacked his tongue when he realized Fashad was only giving him the job because he could pass for white. He considered slamming the keys down on the desk and telling Fashad to fuck himself. But he took a deep breath and clasped them instead. He had been feeling guilty about not telling Fashad what was really about to go down after the trumpet sounded, but not anymore. Fashad was going to get what he deserved.

 

A
s Smokey drove
from Fashad's suburb of Grosse Pointe to Apples' run-down neighborhood of Brewster-Douglass, he kept looking back to make sure Bill was nowhere to be seen. He pulled the car over to the side of the road in the middle of a posh neighborhood on the upside of town to let a car that had been behind him for a little too
long pass. When he got a few evil eyes from the residents, it made him think of how imbalanced life was. How come some people had so much and others had so little? Why did everyone he knew have to live in old broken-down shacks and project-esque apartments occupied by rats—of both the rodent and human variety? How come there wasn't some place, just one place, on the good side of town for people like him? He'd seen a rapper on television showing off his home earlier, and wondered:
If he cares so much about the hood, why doesn't he build us some apartments out here with that money he wasted on a platinum goblet?
He had to stop himself from tearing up when he passed a particularly dilapidated home with four or five biracial children in the yard and remembered what it was like.

He composed himself as he entered Apples' driveway. “Man up, Smokey!” he commanded himself aloud. The way Smokey saw it, any real man could help himself, and that was exactly what he planned on doing. He didn't just have a plan—he had a blueprint. Plans could go awry. This was foolproof; it just had to be executed to perfection.

He crept around to the back of the house slowly, because there had to be a pit bull. Everyone in that neighborhood had a pit bull. They always said it was for safety, but Smokey knew it was because they just wanted something powerful they could treat like shit. Sure enough, the dog came out of nowhere and barked three inches from Smokey's leg. Smokey knew not to run.

“Bastard!” yelled a woman from inside.

Smokey slowly pointed to himself as if asking if she were
talking to him. Not wanting to make any sudden movements, he didn't look back.

“Bastard!” she said again. “Get the fuck away from him.”

“Bitch, I would if I could,” Smokey responded.

“Nigga, ain't nobody talkin' to you,” said the woman. Smokey glanced to his side and saw a redheaded black woman with an almost sickly thin frame, wearing a long white T-shirt and seemingly nothing else. From Fashad's description he knew she must have been Apples. She kicked the dog in the belly. “Gone.” The dog ran away.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“Smokey.”

She looked behind Smokey to the left, then behind him and to the right. “Where is Fashad?” asked Apples before Smokey could step through the back door.

“Don't worry about it,” said Smokey pushing past her, searching for the inevitable baby daddy of the house.

“Oh nigga, I'm gonna be worried about it,” said Apples, reentering his personal space. “When I told Fashad I would do this, I thought I was going to be dealing with him directly, not some scared-looking nigga I ain't never seen before. How I'm sposed to know you ain't federal. I can't get locked up—I got kids.” She continued speaking with the authority of a man twice her size, her red weave bouncing back and forth, in sync with her thin neck and finger.

“Naw. Chill, Ma. He cool. This Smokey. He work for Fashad,” said the dark-skinned man whom Smokey didn't recognize. Smokey was pleased to be known by those whom he didn't. What he hated was only being known as Fashad's
lackey. The man condescendingly put his hand on Apples' shoulder and moved her aside, absorbing her spunk in the process.

Apples looked at Smokey, then back at the dark man. She pushed Smokey aside to stand right in front of the man as she spoke. “I'm glad you know him and whatever, but that still don't mean he ain't turned bitch. I don't trust all these white people up in our process. I don't know why we had to have a white dealer in the first place. That's asking for too much trouble,” said Apples, gesturing to a scared-looking white boy in the other room. Smokey hadn't noticed him until she pointed him out. He was scrawny, with dyed black hair and braids that looked embarrassed to be on top of his head.

“It's too crowded out here,” said Apples' boyfriend. “Everybody and they cousin out here slanging shit. There ain't but so many crackheads, and these days those muthafuckas got options with all the niggas slanging rocks around here. It ain't safe for a nigga like me to be out there where Fashad and the white folks live trying to hustle—and that's where all the money is.”

“What's so bad about what we're doing now? We make ends meet. Why you gotta push it?” she asked.

“This is our chance to be something more, baby. We ain't gonna have too many more. Niggas would kill for Fashad to give them that territory, and you sittin' up here complaining.”

“They'll probably sell us all out too,” said Apples, ignoring her man with her words but her lowered tone of voice indicating subservience. She moved from in between
the man and Smokey. “You know how they are. We'll get twenty-five to life, these two will get a deal and probation.” She continued mumbling from the sideline.

“I ain't white!” said Smokey, giving her a murderous look. He could understand why she was paranoid; she had reason. Passing to a new dealer was stressful; he was stressed out too. Nevertheless, his race was off limits. Smokey decided she had one more time to call him white before she got a diamond implant in her eye.

Apples began to walk toward Smokey like she wanted to fight. The man restrained her. “I said chill! He ain't no snitch. That's Smokey Cloud right there. He'll ride, or take a life sentence before he snitch. Ain't that right, Smokey?” The man extended his fist, for Smokey to touch.

“You damn right,” said Smokey in strong agreement. He glared at Apples to let her know she just had one more chance. Calling him a snitch was one thing, but he wasn't white. He finally saw the fist and gently met it with his own.

“You sure?” she asked “'Cause I can make him do a line of coke just to make sure,” she continued before he could respond.

“I don't take no yayo,” Smokey stated firmly.

“Your white ass gonna take whatever I—” began Apples.

Smokey's hand shot up and the man jumped between the two of them. The white boy curled up on the couch like a five-year-old watching his parents fight. Apples stood there, toe to toe with Smokey, who figured she'd seen a man's fist coming toward her face on more than a few occasions.

“Come on, white boy. You faggot. What you wanna do?” she taunted.

“I said chill!” the man demanded, forcefully cutting her off, then pushing her to the ground, relieving any doubts Smokey had of him being her baby daddy.

Apples looked at the man in terror. Him she was afraid of. “Delroy, you gonna fuck up and get us put away!”

“Shut the fuck up, Apples. You can't go around disrespecting niggas; calling them federal faggots and crackers and shit. You don't come at a nigga like that. That shit is rude. Damn, you ain't got no home training.”

She put her hands atop her head, calmly adjusted her weave, got up off the ground, then nervously paced the room, her arms folded in defeat.

Delroy nudged his head at Smokey, who was still fuming. “What the fuck you want?” Smokey responded.

“Is you gonna take your clothes off, or did you just come to have my girl whoop your ass?” said Delroy.

Smokey switched his Hawks throwback jersey and baggy Pelle Pelle jeans for the white boy's plain, white T-shirt, too-short jeans shorts, and dog collar before heading toward the front door.

“I don't know where you're heading” said Apples with a hint of her former bad attitude, “but you betta go the opposite way of them sidewalk workers to your left—they don't
really
fix no sidewalks out here.” She pushed past him and opened the door.

“Suck my dick, bitch!” he said as violently as he would have had he told her to drop dead. Still, he walked to the right.

As soon as Smokey got out of the “workers'” line of sight, he ran in order to catch his ride.

He saw her in the parking lot four blocks away in front of the beauty shop. She was about the height of her red Mercedes, but her blue beehive shot up above her, and her Mercedes like a pointer in the “Sims.” He saw some yellow flowers in the small garden that hedged the parking lot and grabbed three.

“Boo,” said Smokey half-sensually and half-violently grabbing her by her broad hips.

“Boy!” she screamed. “You scared the shit out of me,” said Dream, playfully hitting him on the shoulder in protest.

“My bad.” He smirked and handed her the flowers.

“You so sweet. Thank you, baby.” She tried kissing him but he zigged when she thought he would zag and her lips only grazed his cheek.

The way she thanked him was more obligatory than her usual fawning. She didn't even beg him to stay put so she could have her kiss.

“What's wrong with you?” asked Smokey, hoping she wasn't growing complacent, or thinking she was worthy. If she was, he'd have to bring her back down to size. It would set him back a little, but he'd have to do it. He had to make sure she would belong to him when the time came.

“What you mean?” she asked.

Smokey could tell she wanted to bother him with her problems but didn't know if she was allowed.

“You seem all mad and shit like you 'bout to put your Manolos through somebody's forehead,” said Smokey, massaging her shoulders, giving her permission to vent.

“It's Momma. She had us practicing again today. Talkin'
'bout: ‘We don't know when the feds is gonna come and shit.'”

“That's true, though.”

“I know, but she ain't the one that got to get up and go to work in the morning. I been late I don't know how many times 'cause of this bullshit. If her lazy ass had a real job she'd move these goddamn practices twelve hours back.”

Smokey laughed. Dream didn't. Smokey stopped.

“So you fuck somebody up today?” said Smokey, looking back at the shop fully expecting to see some woman walking out with her hair half blue and half red.

“Hell no! You know I can do some hair. But still…”

“Still what?”

“She can't be getting me involved with all this shit, Smokey. I can't live my life like this no more. Something ain't right about all this mess. I'm legit. Pretty soon I'll have enough saved to open up my own shop. She can do whatever she want. Mess around and get locked up. Shit, I hope somebody
does
ask me something, 'cause I will testify against her black ass so quick—”

“You ain't gonna say nothin',” said Smokey, skeptically interrupting her rant. He was repelled by her disloyalty—until he remembered his own. “Well, you ain't 'bout to say nothin' 'bout Fashad, is you?”

“No! Baby, I would never do that to you! I know my stepdaddy's your boss, and I ain't 'bout to get y'all caught up. My mom, now that's a different story. Ain't no telling what she gonna do when that trumpet sounds.”

“Well, that's why you need to get on up out of there, baby.”

“I'm trying, baby. You see where I'm at right now.” She gestured back toward the shop.

“I know, but I don't want you to have to struggle.”

“I ain't go no other choice,” said Dream. She paused.
“Do
I?”

Smokey smiled. “I'm coming up on some money here in a minute, and me and you can get away. We can have a life together and shit. You can open up your business, and I can do my thang.”

“What's your thang, Smokey, and why are you dressed like a white boy? Do that got something to do with your thang?”

Smokey looked down and cursed. He hadn't realized he'd run four blocks around the way looking like a fool, until she mentioned it. He was surprised no one tried to mug him, or whoop his ass just for the hell of it.