Ghetto Cowboy (6 page)

I
turn the corner. The street is dark. I take a few steps and realize I got no idea where I am. I look each way, but it all looks the same.

When I was small, Mama told me if I ever got lost to just close my eyes and listen and I would hear her calling. But I ain’t looking for her now. I’m looking for a main street. I close my eyes. What I hear is . . . music . . . yelling . . . a helicopter . . . but then I hear it — traffic.

I open my eyes, and it seem brighter down the way I’m looking, like maybe there’s a big street down there. So I take off running.

A car passes me then slows up ahead, its red taillights feeling like some kinda warning. I think about what Smush said earlier about this neighborhood, and I turn at the corner, ’cause right now I don’t wanna talk to no ’bangers.

I see people on their stoops, staring at me, but I keep my head down and keep moving. A few blocks later, I see a big street ahead. When I hit the corner, I smell something that reminds me of home — the Golden Arches.

I’m thinking I ain’t eaten nothing since that old guy fed me. I feel in my pocket and my hand touches that twenty-dollar bill. I need fuel so I can get my head straight.

I stuff my face on the dollar menu — three double cheeseburgers, a apple pie, a Coke. I pound that stuff down, and I start to realize I only got fourteen dollars left.

How’m I gonna get back to Detroit on that?

Take a bus? That’s gotta cost at least a hundred.

Hitchhike? Who gonna pick up a punk like me?

Walk? That’d take me a month.

Unless I can get my hands on the rest of that money Harper got, I’ll be stuck here for good.
Why didn’t I just grab it when the grabbin’ was good?

I sit in that McDonald’s for a coupla hours. Every time the manager starts looking at me, I get something else to eat. I know I can’t stay here all night, but where I’m gonna go? I don’t wanna go back to Harper’s. I know he don’t want me, just like Mama don’t want me, and this manager chump ain’t no different.

Maybe I could find my cousin Smush, but I got no idea where he lives. No, I got to find a place to lay low. Then in the morning, when Harper leaves the house, I can snag the rest of the money Mama left behind.

I hop a fence and I’m in the back area by the stables, the only place I can think of where nobody will be at tonight. But then I see a light on in the clubhouse.

I sneak up to the window, which is so clouded with dirt, I don’t think it’s ever been washed. I peek inside and see Tex, all by himself on a cot watching a little TV set. I wonder if he lives here or if he just like a night guard or something. I think maybe Harper’ll end up like this too, all alone with them horses.

I sneak over to the Ritz-Carlton and open the door a crack. It’s a full moon, so it lights up enough for me to see. I hear the horses shuffle a little. Then I see the horse I petted today. He perks up, looking at me like he was all lonely before I walked in. He leans forward, expecting me to feed him too. I pull out the apple pie I got in my pocket. I was gonna save it for later, but what the heck. He takes it, chomps it down in one bite. So much for dessert.

This seem as good a place as any to hole up in till morning. There’s a few things of hay around, so I arrange it like a bed across from the stalls and throw a horse blanket over it. If nobody wants me, I’ll sleep with the horses. Least they appreciate me.

But sleeping in a barn ain’t like sleeping in your bed. There’s lots of noise going on all around you, and the horses sometime get skittish. They all looking at me, like,
Why’s he here?

Why not?
I think. Can’t be any worse than sleeping in a closet.

But it still takes me a long time to fall asleep.

S
omething brushes by me, and my eye opens. The sun is up, but I can barely move, my body’s so stiff. I look down, and somebody left me a pack of Pop-Tarts and a orange juice.

“Breakfast of champions.”

I look up and see Tex standing there. “What time is it?”

“’Bout seven thirty,” he answers. “I hope you aren’t gonna make a habit of sleeping here. Your daddy called looking for you, and I told him I saw you come in last night. Told him maybe you thought this really
was
the Ritz-Carlton.”

Funny. For a old blind guy, he got eyes in the back of his head. “Sorry,” I say, but I don’t really feel like explaining nothing.

“Well, eat up. Harp’s gonna be here in a few, then you’ll get your first peek at the Speedway. Saturday’s race day.”

I tell him I ain’t interested in racing. Never seen a race and don’t care to. He just laughs.

Tex wanders over to my horse friend and opens up his stall. I grab the OJ and Pop-Tarts, thinking he gonna start bucking.

The old man chuckles. “He’s okay. I think he’s taking a liking to you. Go over there and call him.”

I think the old man is joking, but he ain’t. I walk over by the door, but I don’t know what to say. The dog thing seem stupid now.

“Just call his name,” Tex says.

“What’s his name?” I ask.

Tex scratches his chin. “Hmm, I guess we haven’t come up with one yet. Tell you what — why don’t you name him?”

I look around. “Who, me?”

“Why not? You both strays. Who better?”

The horse stands there looking at me, his hair sticking up all over the place, like he just woke up too, but his eyes is wide open. For some reason, I think of Boo, ’cause he looks like someone just scared him.

“What about Boo?” I say, and the old man gives him the once-over.

“Looks like someone just gave him a good fright, don’t it?” He smiles. “Let’s give it a try. Call him over.”

I take a few steps back. “Here, Boo. Come here, boy. . . .”

The horse tilts his head.

The old man reaches into his jacket and pulls out a carrot. “Try this.”

He tosses it to me, and I hold it out.

“Here, Boo.”

Boo takes a step and then another. Next thing I know, he right in front of me, munching on that thing. Just like a dog.

“Well, ain’t that a picture.”

I turn around, and Harper’s sitting on top of Lightning, shaking his head. “Maybe you got horse blood in you after all.”

I
don’t know if Harper’s joking or if he serious, but I ain’t in no mood to ask. I drop the carrot, walk back to my hay bed, and sit down. “Horse blood? Don’t you remember? I’m the drug-dealin’ gangbanger who hits his mom.”

He watches me closely but don’t dish nothing back. “Maybe you want to come with me to the Speedway. Might be better than sitting around in an old barn.”

I wouldn’t mind getting out of this stinky place. But I don’t gotta be happy about it. “Whatever.”

He reaches into a saddlebag and pulls something out. “Then you better wear these.”

A pair of cowboy boots plop on the ground next to my feet. I give him a look.

“You think I’m gonna wear those?”

The old man picks them up and whistles. “Ain’t these the boots I gave you when you was a little punk who showed up here acting all street?” He turns to me. “He didn’t wear them either. But it’s better getting these boots dirty than your white sneakers. See?” He holds up the boots and slides his fingers along the smooth bottom. “Crap just slides off, not like what’s sticking in the nooks and crannies of your shoes.”

I look at the bottom of my Nikes and see they ain’t never gonna get clean again. He holds out the boots, but I ain’t wearing them.

Tex shrugs. “Too bad. I wish I had a pair this nice.”

Harper hops off of Lightning and ties him to a post. “Tex, help Coltrane get that horse saddled up. He’s going riding today.”

Tex shakes his head. “You do it. Least you can do is teach your own boy.”

Harper scowls. “I don’t think this boy wants to hear what I got to say.”

But Tex is gone out the back way.

Harper smirks. “Look, you want to stay here at the Ritz, fine. But you might as well learn a thing or two about horses while you’re living with ’em, all right?”

I don’t say nothing, just stand there. He claps his hands, like I just agreed with him. “All right! First we gonna need that blanket you slept on last night.”

I get up. “You can have the blanket. But I ain’t gettin’ up on Boo.”

“Boo?” he says. “Who named him Boo?”

I look around for Tex. “I guess I did.”

He thinks about it, nods. “You named him; you ride him.”

“Uh, I don’t know if you noticed, but I ain’t no cowboy.”

But he just ignores me. Grabs a saddle off of a barrel. Then stands by the horse, waiting. “Come on, throw that blanket up here.”

I think about just walking away. Then he starts laughing. At me.

“What, you aren’t afraid, are you?”

I grab the blanket. “I’m from Detroit. I ain’t afraid of nobody. People ’fraid of me.”

The horse takes a dump right in front of us, and Harper laughs again.

“I guess that’s why you called him Boo. You done scared that right out of him!”

I shake my head and throw the blanket up over Boo.

“Yeah, maybe I did, old man.”

He tosses the saddle up on Boo’s back, straightens everything out. “Look, I don’t expect you to call me Daddy. But an old man I ain’t. I’m thirty-seven.”

He reaches under and grabs the strap from the other side of the saddle. He grunts.

Like I said — old man,
I think.

He buckles it together and makes sure it’s tight but not too tight. “That all right for you, Boo?” he asks.

Boo don’t seem to mind.

“Hand me them stirrup straps.”

I look around and see some things that look about right. He takes them and attaches ’em to the saddle.

“This is where you put your feet.”

I shrug, like,
Why you telling me that? I still ain’t going up there.

He grabs some rope-and-steel thing off the wall and walks up to Boo’s face. “Smile, Boo!”

He puts the steel up to Boo’s mouth, and he opens. Boo chomps on it a bit, like he ain’t had one in his mouth for a while.

Harper pats him on the neck. “He don’t mind. He’s used one his whole life, I bet.”

Harp strings the rope back to the saddle, double-checks all the straps, and then nods. “That’ll do, Boo.” He turns and looks at me. “Ready, Freddy?”

He must think I look worried or something.

“It’s no sweat, man,” he says. “I take little kids for rides all the time. You ain’t a little kid, are you?”

I push him out the way. “What you think?”

He shakes his head. “More like a punk if you ask me.”

I
grab the knob on top of the saddle and start to climb, but Boo starts moving around.

“Sit, Boo!” I yell.

Harper starts laughing his head off, then apologizes when I glare at him.

“Sorry, man. It’s just . . .” He grabs the rope and steadies Boo, then points. “See that? Your foot goes in there, then you grab here, then you swing yourself up.”

“I know what to do,” I say, knowing I don’t.

He sees me struggling to get my foot high enough into that thing. “Maybe you be better off on a pony,” he says.

“I can do it,” I say. I bring my foot
waaay
up and use my other hand to get it in there, then I reach way over to grab the saddle. It takes me two or three tries before I can climb up, but when I do . . . whoa.