Little Boy Blue (25 page)

Distorted word of the assault got to most of
the counselors, too, despite the lack of a report. A boy officer in Roosevelt
Cottage gossiped to the night man (who smuggled cigarettes in at a dollar a
pack when they cost fifteen cents), and the night man told his morning relief,
who told others at lunch. When Lavalino was approached, he disparaged the
seriousness; he couldn’t admit running scared from a twelve-year-old. The
counselors never got the whole story, but they got enough to recognize that
Alex, although certainly no match in a fight against many of Whittier’s
youths, was one of the more unpredictably explosive. Some men would simply
watch him closer, others would be cautious, and a few would take it as a
personal challenge and decide to come down hard if he showed any temper toward
them.

Thus, within a few weeks of leaving the
receiving cottage, Alex Hammond had gained high visibility—was known by
the majority of the boys and counselors. He noticed it on the detail grounds.
The cottages marched there at work call twice a day. They were dismissed to go
to specified areas according to their assignment. For a few minutes all could
mingle. The only other time it was allowed was at church. Otherwise the
inhabitants of one cottage were kept away from those in different cottages. After
the shovel chase, Alex got occasional nods of recognition at work call. Boys he
didn’t know would nod or wink on meeting his eyes and say, “All
right, Hammond.” Or, “Easy does it, Hammond.” It happened
four times in two weeks. It made him feel good.

It also got him in a brief fight. While
joining the school line one afternoon (the largest single group, some hundred
and fifty boys), the officer ordered: “Right dress!” The arm that
came up didn’t just extend for spacing; it shoved him violently.

“Hey, man!” he said, regaining
balance, looking at the boy who had shoved him. He was smaller than Alex but he
was in Lincoln, the toughest cottage, where his size made him stand out. Alex
had noticed him before. His name was Fargo.

“You don’t like it?” The
challenge was thrown.

“Naw, I don’t like it from a
fuck. Don’t shove.”

“Aww, you might tell Topo what to do,
but you’re just another punk from Scouts, so don’t tell me nuthin’.”

Punk! Punk!
The word of
words in the reform-school lexicon.
A fight was inevitable. That thought
was in Alex’s mind when Fargo kicked him in the ankle; a hard kick with
steel-capped toes. While the pain shot through Alex, his fist shot out into
Fargo’s nose. Blood poured instantly and profusely. Alex stepped back and
out of line to get room to fight. The ranks broke up for the combatants.

Fargo, however, was leaning forward, holding
his head extended so the blood wouldn’t drip on his clothes. He was
muttering obscenities.

The teacher supervising the march to classes
saw the bleeding boy and called a halt. He ordered Fargo aside and had
them
form into ranks. Alex watched Fargo being led toward
the hospital by a counselor, and then he was marching on to school. Throughout
the afternoon, Alex couldn’t concentrate—not that anyone else even
tried to concentrate, or any teacher cared. Reform-school youths have no
concern about education, and teachers who wanted to teach resigned to work
elsewhere. Whittier had school classes because the state law required it.
Everyone did what they wanted short of rebellion and riot. But where most
others drew pictures, played games, or leafed through magazines and cut out
lingerie ads, Alex tried to learn some things because they interested him:
history, geography, social studies. He refused even to try to learn mathematics
or science, but the teacher was happy to have a boy desirous of learning
anything—most couldn’t read and didn’t care to learn
how—so she let him decide, helping him. It really came down to reading;
he liked what he could learn simply by reading.

This afternoon, however, the printed pages
became sheets of squiggles. At evening recall on the detail grounds he would
have to continue the fight. He wasn’t afraid. Rather, the fear was
controlled and he was ready to fight—but the wait had his mind running
repeatedly over the situation. His brain was stuck like a gramophone record.
Once more he wondered why he had to fight continually. Other people
didn’t have to; he knew that from books. Momentarily, he considered
“turning the other cheek,” but it made him chuckle. If he turned
the other cheek they’d have him bent over spreading both cheeks of his
ass while making a toy-girl of him—a punk…

Alex was quickly out of the classroom door
when the whistle sounded. He waited on the walk while the line of classrooms
emptied. He knew an aggressive demeanor might give him an advantage, especially
if he started swinging first.

Fargo wasn’t at school. He hadn’t
returned following the bloody nose.

When the school formation marched onto the
detail grounds and was dismissed, Alex didn’t go to the area where Scouts
formed. Instead he stayed in the center, visible and available, while work
crews and shop crews arrived and dispersed to the various cottage formation
areas.

Fargo was still absent. Was it fear? That was
hard to believe, both from how he’d acted and because he lived in
Lincoln, the toughest cottage. The smallest guy in Lincoln, too. Yet where was
he?

Alex could wait no longer. Cottages were
forming ranks. He started toward his own and saw Lulu Cisneros, his first acquaintance
in Juvenile Hall, coming toward him. Weeks before, when Alex had gotten out of
Receiving, Lulu had given him half a pack of Camels. (Lulu’s visitors
made him reform-school rich by smuggling him two packs every Sunday; Alex
carried them in from the visiting grounds for five cigarettes.) Later, from the
shoe shop, Alex pilfered him a pair of capped-toe brogans, a shoe much favored
by the boys. Having a pair was a status symbol.

“I was lookin’ for
you—where you line up?” Lulu said.

“I’ve been waitin’ here for
another guy.”

“Little Fargo?”

The surprise on Alex’s face was
sufficient reply.

“He’s at the cottage,” Lulu
continued, “and maybe has a broken nose. It’s swollen up and both
eyes are black. That’s why I’m here. Do you wanna forget it?”

“He fucked with me. I didn’t fuck
with him.”

“Man, man, fuck all that. We
ain’t got all day. We gotta line up… remember.”

“Yeah, okay. What’s happenin’?”

“I talked to Fargo and he copped out
that he started it. He’s salty about his nose, but he can laugh at it, too.
He didn’t expect it. Somebody told him you were a punk or something. But
he’ll let it drop if you will… unless you start talking shit and
bragging.”

“Afraid of getting his ass
kicked.” Alex said it without reflection; it was the standard conclusion
by the routine values of the reformatory. Anyone who avoided any fight by
so much as “excuse me” or one step backward was deemed afraid.

“Naw, uh-uh, that little cat
ain’t afraid of a grizzly bear. He’s a fightin’
motherfucker… an’ probably can kick your ass. In fact, ‘cause
he is a tough little cat and everybody knows it, he can let it slide without
anybody thinkin’ he punked out. He knows he was dead wrong and respects
you for having guts.”

The detail
grounds was
now virtually empty. A few stragglers were running toward their formations.
Cottages were straightening ranks while a counselor took a head count.

A supervising counselor was bearing down on
Alex and Lulu, waving an arm for them to move on. They started to move, angling
away from each other while going in the same general direction.

“So what’ll I tell him?”
Lulu called from ten feet away.

“It’s over as far as I’m
concerned. I’ll shake his hand when I see him.”

“Man, don’t get fuckin’ sickening.”
Lulu turned and began sprinting for Lincoln, which was the farthest formation.
Alex half- walked, half-trotted toward where he belonged, a sudden elation
filling him. He’d been ready to fight but was happy that it was
unnecessary. It was the sudden removal of the tension, however, that made him
glow inwardly.

“Where the
fuck have
you been?” Constantine snapped when Alex reached the cottage and slipped
into his position.

“Just late, man, just late.”
The smile went, the elation died. As he marched in
step, able to do so without thinking about it, he rankled at the way
Constantine had spoken. Sooner or later I’m gonna have trouble with him,
Alex thought. Then he remembered the cigarette hidden in his pants cuff. The
cottage would fall out at the recreation area for half an hour, then wash
up and march to supper. It was summer, with long evenings, so after supper
there’d be a soft- ball game. He would be the center of three or four
boys because of the cigarette He’d have to share it to get a match, but
he didn’t mind. He liked sharing. They would lie on the grass as far away
from the counselor as possible and pass the butt around surreptitiously.
He felt good looking forward to it…

The houseparents were a couple in their early
fifties named Hoffman. They had twin daughters who were
married,
and a third in the WACs. Although one counselor worked from midnight to eight
a.m., and a second counselor worked from eight a.m. to five p.m., the Hoffmans
were in charge. Living in a small apartment in the cottage, they were nearly as
available as real parents. Any boy could knock on their door except,
infrequently, when a do not disturb sign dangled from the doorknob. When it was
there the boys speculated on what was happening within. Roosevelt and Lincoln
cottages, with older boys, didn’t have housemothers, but all the others
had the same staff setup as Scouts. The Hoffmans, however, were more involved
with their boys, and did all they could to make institutional living as
homelike as possible. They used their own money for a record player, and to
have ice-cream-and-cake birthday parties once a week for every boy having a
birthday in that period. The Hoffmans tried to break down the
“codes” of the underworld that these teenagers were making their
personal ethics. When it became obvious that a boy was no longer malleable, he
was transferred to another cottage, unless he was under the care of the
institution psychiatrist, who was also the only physician. Scouts Cottage was
deliberately more lax than the other cottages. Alex sometimes felt that he
didn’t belong there, but he was nonetheless grateful—except for
Constantine.

Two boys were assigned to the cottage as a
work assignment. Called “housecats,” they cleaned and did light
maintenance. Every boy had some small cleanup duty in addition to his own room,
for Mrs. Hoffman kept the cottage immaculate, despite fifty delinquents, many
of whom knew nothing except slovenliness and dirt, which go with poverty.

The Hoffmans showed a special interest in
Alex. They were interested in all the boys, but even real parents have
favorites, albeit secretly, and the Hoffmans were more interested in some boys
than others. When a housecat went home, Mrs. Hoffman offered Alex the job. It
was better than digging ditches, raking leaves, or pushing a lawnmower, and
Alex had no desire to learn a trade—shoe shop, paint shop, sheet
metal…

Constantine, without doubt, was Mr.
Hoffman’s most favored boy. Tall, well-built, and good-looking, with
curly black hair and a seductive smile, it was easy to see why he was a
monitor, especially when so many others were unattractive—unattractive in
both looks and manner. Many were grossly ignorant and angry, illiterate black
boys from the rural South, brought to Watts as sharecropping diminished in
favor of mechanized farming; their parents searched for factory work and they
took to the streets of the city. The Chicanos, many of them, had similar
stories, except that their parents came across the border. And Okie accents
were common among the whites, children of the Dust Bowl—or of broken
homes and alcoholics.
Youths of all races unable to respond
to affection except with suspicion, unable to handle any problem except with
rage, children disturbed by an endless list of family and social ills.
Scouts Cottage had more boys with severe emotional problems than did the other
cottages. Though the Hoffrnans were fair, or tried to be, it was impossible not
to prefer one who seemed near the All-American ideal. Constantine knew the
value of his handsomeness. He hid his rage better than the others, and he also
hid his background; his mother was a call girl, and he was a mistake. Nobody
knew who his father was.

From the beginning Constantine saw Alex as a
potential rival with the Hoffmans. The newcomer’s education also
rankled
Constantine, for Alex occasionally, and
unintentionally, used some word that the ill-educated boys didn’t know.
The second day that Alex was in the cottage, Constantine chalked an
announcement on the bulletin board. Without thinking, Alex spoke up to correct
a misspelling. The correction flushed Constantine’s cheeks and planted
the seed of hostility.

Many of the
authority-hating boys disliked Constantine, whispering, “He’s just
a kiss-ass snitch.” But they were also afraid of him. When they saw how
he felt about Alex, they kept their distance from the latter. It wasn’t
“silence,” and he could always find someone to help him smoke the
cigarettes Lulu gave him, but he couldn’t make any close friendships, and
oftentimes he ached with loneliness, although he didn’t see anyone in
Scouts whom he really liked and wanted for a buddy. He doubted that he could
whip Constantine, though he wasn’t afraid to try—except he knew
that it would turn Mr. Hoffman against him. He was careful to give Constantine
no excuse to start anything. Getting out of step, making a marching mistake, or
talking in ranks would bring a foot in the ass, the standard summary punishment
approved by Mr. Hoffman and the superintendent. Alex was among those, and they
were many, who never accepted a kick without a fight. That would bring Mr.
Hoffman down on him, win or lose. Ergo, he made no mistakes. His quarters were
immaculate. The anxiety would have been too great, and he would have gone at
Constantine no matter what, except that he could relax completely in the mornings
when he worked for Mrs. Hoffman. All the boys were gone in the mornings except
for the other housecat, a thin Chicano nicknamed Hava. They usually worked for
an hour or two, waxing the dayroom, pruning weeds from the shrubbery outside
the cottage, washing windows… Even then his mind could relax. Then,
invariably, Mrs. Hoffman would call them into the apartment for donuts or cake
or some other sweet delicacy. Whenever he thought of Mrs. Hoffman in the later
years, he always thought of brownies; she gave him the first one he could ever
remember. He dreaded noon when he and Hava joined the rest of the cottage on
the grounds detail. Even though he didn’t see Constantine at school in
the afternoon, he had to stay ready. Seldom did an afternoon pass without at
least one fist fight.