Chameleon (16 page)

The truth is I love playing ball and my skills are close to Andre’s. I’m just not sure how good I am compared to everybody else; I would hate to make the team only to ride the pine.

“That’s if I made the same team as you. If you make JV and I make the freshman squad, then . . .”

“Listen to you, talking like you a scrub or something. You know you can play, Shawn. I know you can play. You the only one that can check me on D, and I noticed you been splashing more and more J’s every time we play,” he said, bouncing the ball again.

I can’t see myself play, so I don’t know; it felt like my J was getting better, but . . .

“I don’t know. I might,” I said.

“You know, Shawn, if you play ball, you’ll get cheerleaders cheering for you,” Trent said, nudging me in the ribs from the other side.

That yanked Lorenzo’s head around. “Somebody say cheerleaders?”

“Nothing. Nobody said nothing,” I said.

I wonder if Marisol would be a cheerleader. She doesn’t seem like the cheerleading type, but hey, you never know.

Lorenzo stopped at the end of the block and pointed right. “This way.”

These houses were smaller than the ones we’d just passed. Rusted cars sat in front of most of them, and many of the lawns, small as they were, were taken over by tall weeds.

Nothing looked familiar. I don’t remember the last time I’ve been on Lorenzo’s block. Everything looked worn-out and old.

Auntie’s block has nice houses, nice lawns, nice people — mostly old people but nice. But you can walk to the end of her block, cross over to the next block, and the houses are older and more worn-out, with not-so-nice lawns and not-so-nice people.

I remember walking that direction for a change of scenery one time to meet the fellas, and a bunch of the houses had pit bulls in the front yard. Not all of them, but it seemed like it. All of them were chained up, but they could still run from the porch to the sidewalk and snap their teeth and bark at you. I saw plenty of pooches but no masters and no bodies. No Miss Johnston waving from the porch. No Mr. and Mrs. Wright talking to another neighbor. Not even a sourpussed Miss Bricknell snipping rosebushes. Matter of fact, the only flowers I did see were those white, willowy weeds that you blow on to make a wish.

Compton was like that — one block well kept with old folks waving at you, another block broken down with pit bulls snapping at you.

Bass beats bounced with us as we approached the middle of the block. A pair of speakers sat in a house window across the street, sending out the sound. The house had a porch. The porch was filled with guys all dressed in black passing around a few forties. Weed smoke puffed from the porch and danced through the air.

No red? No blue?

Lorenzo led the way, with each of us in a line close behind. “Awww, shoot!” he said, stopping dead in his tracks, making our train bump into each other and knock him forward.

Trent, the caboose, stepped out of the wreck and asked, “What’s up, ’Zo?”

Lorenzo focused on a telephone company van parked in the driveway of what must have been his house.

“Ay, ’Zo, don’t your pops work for the phone company?” Andre asked, stepping out of the line.

“Yeah and he’s here. He usually comes home for lunch. What time is it, Shawn?”

“One twenty-two.”

“Dang, he’s usually done and outta here by one.”

“What’s the big deal, ’Zo? It ain’t like you did something wrong; you just going in to get something to drink,” I said.

Does he have the same problem I have with Auntie?

He rubbed his belly and said, “The big deal is that my father is always getting on my case about getting a job. And I don’t feel like hearing that right now.”

“Don’t even sweat it, ’Zo. We just going in to cool off. He should understand that,” Trent said.

“I hope so. Let me see what kind of mood he’s in. Hopefully he’ll be out of here soon,” he said, stepping onto his walk. “You guys follow me but hang back.”

With that he fixed his sweatshirt, dusted himself off, and headed toward his porch. I caught the guys in black across the street checking us out. They knew ’Zo lived here, so hopefully everything was cool. Hopefully.

The gated door slammed shut as we stepped inside, making Lorenzo’s father call out from the kitchen, “Who’s there?”

The three of us grabbed a seat on the couch while ’Zo headed toward the voice.

“It’s me, Pop.”

We looked at each other and leaned our ears in toward the kitchen.

“Lorenzo? Boy, didn’t I tell your fat, lazy behind to take out the trash this morning? I told you we gone get maggots and flies up in here.”

“Yeah, Pop. Sorry. So what you still doing home?”

“Whatchu mean ‘What you still doing home’? This is
my
house last time I checked. I can do whatever I want.”

“I meant, don’t you have work today?”

“Of course I do — what’s wrong with you? I gotta work every day — something you know nothing about, boy. My lunch hour started late because one of the guys was sick. Pissed me off, my boss giving
me
more work this morning. It ain’t like I don’t work my behind off as it is. Shooooot . . . I wish I had time to be sick, but no . . . I gotta feed your hungry behind.” Cabinets creaked open and slammed shut to emphasize his emotions.

“Boy . . . you eat the leftover neck bones?” The refrigerator squeaked open. “Ain’t nothing in this fridge.”
Slam!

Creak.
“Ain’t nothing in these cabinets. We ain’t got no leftovers . . . no sweet rolls . . . nothing! There ain’t nothing to eat in this house . . . DAMN!”

We raised our eyebrows at each other and leaned in closer.

“I’m out there working my butt off every day to feed your fat behind,
and
your lazy-ass brother, and y’all eating me out of house and home! I come home for lunch and what do I find?
Nothing!
You and that knucklehead brother of yours are gonna start earning your way in this house, you hear?”

“Yes, sir.”

Trent mimicked ’Zo’s “Yes, sir” with a whisper that broke into a snicker. Andre shushed him from his spot on the couch sandwiched between me and Trent, then grabbed a
Jet
magazine from the coffee table. He almost jumped out of his skin when ’Zo’s dad boomed again: “Look here, Lorenzo, pretty soon you’ll be old enough to earn your own money, and when that day comes, that’s exactly what you gonna do. . . . Matter of fact, what are you doing here?”

The louder he got, the more we hunched into the small couch, our bodies already squeezed together.

“Umm. I’m with my friends. . . . We was thirsty.”

A cabinet door slammed with the reply, “Thirsty? You was THIRSTY? What . . . you think this house is your own personal filling station, boy? Huh? You think you can just bring your friends all up in here to eat or drink whatever you please, whenever you please? HUH? Boy, I swear . . .”

The voice trailed off and the house grew silent — too silent. Andre held up the
Jet
beauty for inspection. Me and Trent leaned in to check it out.

“Miss Jacqueline Price — Virgo,” Andre read.

“Just like me,” Trent said.

“Loves horror movies, jazz, and making quilts,” Andre continued.

“I’d love to lay on a quilt with her,” Trent chirped.

The conversation in the kitchen bubbled back up.

“So where are your little hoodlum friends?”

“They in the living room. But they ain’t hoodlums, Pop.”

“Don’t you back-sass me, boy!”

Andre dropped Miss Jacqueline Price — Virgo, and the three of us sat up straight, thinking ’Zo’s dad was about to come in. The coast seemed clear, so we picked up where we left off.

So did ’Zo’s dad: “How many of you is it?”

“Four, counting me.”

“And not one job between the four of you?”

Silence.

“No, sir.”

Trent mimicked him again. And snickered again.

“I told you, Lorenzo. You hang out with three losers and you’ll be the fourth.”

Andre mouthed the question “Loser?” and raised his eyebrows. We answered by doing the same.

“But, Pop, we aren’t —”

“I know your hungry mouth is not talking back to me.”

“Sorry, Pop.”

“There’s gonna be some changes around here, you hear me, boy? I don’t work hard to not be able to eat lunch in my own damn house!”

“Sorry, Pop.”

Slam!

“Boy . . . sorry don’t feed me. Look at this. A grown man eating a sorry peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich with the butt parts of the bread!”

The word “butt” triggered snickers from Trent and ’Dre and popped a green picture of Marisol into my head.

Rough work boots rattled the linoleum floor and our nerves, making our snickers disappear.

“I’ll deal with you later. . . . Right now I gotta get back to work.”

’Zo’s father rumbled out of the kitchen and into the living room, a tiny sandwich jammed in his fat paw. The speed of his breeze almost knocked us over as we stood to acknowledge him with our best teeth-baring smiles.

He replied with a grunt, paused, then turned back to his son. “What you need to do is look for a job. Your ‘hanging out’ days are numbered. You hear me? Numbered. I ain’t coming home to no peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich again. No sir! Things gonna change around here, Lorenzo . . . OH, YEAH . . . THINGS GONNA CHANGE!”

He thrust the sandwich in Lorenzo’s face, smearing a spot of peanut butter near his mouth. ’Zo licked it off as quickly as it went on.

The door opened fast and slammed faster, and the hurricane was gone.

Lorenzo stood in his living room, numb, and mumbled, “It’s some Kool-Aid in the fridge. Help yourselves,” before heading back into the kitchen.

Trent got up to follow. Me and Andre looked at each other, shrugged, and did the same. Three cups clapped on the counter, interrupting the silence. The clear cups became red as we poured ourselves cool drinks.

Lorenzo stepped outside for the trash when Trent asked: “’Zo, you got any ice?”

Lorenzo gave his reply as he stepped back through the door. “First I’m the garbage man, now I’m the ice man?”

“I’m just asking . . .”

Lorenzo’s arms crossed and he exhaled. “Where is ice usually, Trent?”

Me and Andre shook our heads at Trent as he went for the fridge. ’Zo huffed toward the living room, then returned a minute later, sitting down to pour himself some Kool-Aid.

We joined him at the table. Ice clinked in Trent’s glass as he took a sip.

“You put ice in there?” Lorenzo accused Trent.

“Well . . . yeah . . . I . . .” Trent said, putting his glass down and pushing it away like he’d gotten caught trying to steal.

Lorenzo shook his head and remained silent. His father just threw a blanket of clouds over the sunshine of our day, making his son, our friend, silent — painfully silent. No talking about girls. No talking about food. No jokes. No “Oh, God’s.” And no bags.

“What should we do now?” I asked.

Andre swallowed the rest of his drink, stood up, and said, “Let’s go play some ball. I haven’t whopped up on you in a while, so let’s go,” he added, shaking Lorenzo’s shoulder.

“Yeah, MLK ain’t too far,” I said.

Trent stood and the three of us hovered over ’Zo, waiting to go. He just sat there swirling his empty glass in a slow, rhythmic circle.

Trent stepped closer to him, folded his arms, and said in his strongest voice, “Ya Mama so black, her blood type is gravy.”

Me and Andre raised our eyebrows to each other, then burst into laughter. Trent’s attempt at stealing Lorenzo’s bag came out so wrong, it was hard not to.

Lorenzo stared at Trent in silence. His once-swirling glass was now still. An unreadable look covered his face. Then he shook the look away and slowly smiled. The smile bubbled into a laugh as he sniff-sniffed the air, stood tall, and said, “I don’t know
what
that was, Trent, but it sounds like somebody wants to get bagged up.”

WE STEPPED OUT of the calm of Lorenzo’s house onto a chaos-filled block. Taunting shouts replaced the once-bumping music and hovered over a mix of old men in feathered fedoras, young women with babies on their hips, old women in housedresses and stocking caps, and young men in stocking caps sipping forties.

“What’s going on?” Andre asked.

Face after face popped out of the shadows, asking the same thing. When we got here earlier, the guys across the street were the only ones hanging out. They were still there, but they weren’t hanging out on the porch anymore; they stood in the center of the storm, and one of them was exploding full force.

He was the biggest and oldest brutha by far: thick arms swung on his wide torso, creased black Dickies covered his tree-trunk legs, while his black sweatshirt stretched across his basketball-shaped belly. Black Stars on his feet completed the package. All black? In the summer?

A shower cap on his head reflected the sun into my eyes, making it hard to see. Through all the bodies and noise and commotion, I saw him swinging a baseball bat and heard him shout something. Part of me wanted to get closer to hear, but mostly I wanted to run the other way.

“What’s he saying?” Trent asked.