Little Boy Blue (40 page)
Authors: Edward Bunker
Alex hitchhiked to half a mile from the
decrepit firetrap of a rooming house. Both rides took him in immediately after
he raised a thumb, but it was still nearly three hours until he was walking the
last few blocks of the journey. Los Angeles was already the sprawling bete noir
of public transportation, and traveling this route would have taken yet another
hour and four transfers; the miracle of the freeways was still in the
future. Thus he trudged the last half mile under the mellow hues of afternoon
sun, wishing he had an automobile. It was still warm enough to make him sweat,
but he bought a Pepsi, drank it on the move, and had the quiet affection of
familiarity with the area, which was blighted for living in while blooming for
business. He enjoyed passing the clusters of people around vending trucks
outside the garment factories—so many old women with seamed, strong faces
of several colors; children and the old had no race other than human. In the
empty lots littered with wine bottles and beer cans played mostly
olive-skinned, dark-eyed children with dirty faces. Toward them Alex felt like
an adult. He passed two Chicanos about his own age. They wore the khaki pants
and perfectly pressed Pendleton shirts that had become the newest uniform of
East Los Angeles barrios and gangs. They looked hard at him, a Paddy in a
non-Paddy neighborhood, and he looked away—not because he was afraid,
although locked stares would have led to words, and from there to a fight, but
because his mood was too good to spoil with anger and violence. He knew it
wasn’t their turf; theirs was two blocks away, around Clanton Street. This
lacked enough dwellings to spawn a gang claiming it.
When he reached the dismal second-floor
corridor of the rooming house, nobody answered his knock, nor did he see anyone
to ask if Wedo’s mother still lived there. Knocking on a neighbor’s
door to ask questions wasn’t done here. At best he would find a woman who
spoke no
English,
or someone who would glare
suspiciously from behind a door chain.
At a liquor store on the corner, he bought
gum, a newspaper, and another Pepsi, and then felt justified in asking to use a
pencil and a piece of paper. He left a note with Aunt Ava’s phone number
under the door.
As he walked away, looking at everything
with the same open hunger as a tourist, he felt something entirely new. It was
the first consciousness of
his own
strength.
Always before he’d been a frightened boy, helpless
before the whims of any adult.
This had been especially true in those
hours after midnight when children didn’t roam the city’s streets,
and anyone who saw him would know something was amiss; any adult might
play concerned citizen and grab him or call the police. In the last year
he’d grown and filled out. He would grow even bigger and stronger, but he
was already beyond where just anyone could grab his arm and take him along.
Although he would turn fifteen in six weeks, he could claim eighteen, albeit a
young-looking eighteen. He felt a surge of manhood as he walked through the
mellowing afternoon sun. It warmed his back. He bounced on the balls of his
feet, feeling the thigh muscles flex and harden. He rolled his shoulders and
twisted his torso. He felt good, really good, strong and quick.
As the bus whooshed to a stop, he saw it was
packed, standees bumping into each other with the sway. He hesitated while
others boarded. He loathed being pressed in like a sardine. Then he suddenly
realized that the jam meant the rush hour. It was an hour later than he’d
thought, and he already expected words from Aunt Ava for being late. He swung
up and on; the fare had
risen
a nickel during his last
incarceration.
While he held on and the bus crawled across
the sprawling city, the night came. Neon and street lights grew to brightness
as they had more darkness to feed upon. Although Alex disliked the press of
bodies and their inevitable smells, he enjoyed watching the faces and hearing
snatches of conversation. It was as different from what he was accustomed
to as a bus in Peking would be to the average citizen.
When he got off there was a warm wind,
endemic to southern California and called a Santa Ana. It rustled the palm
trees as he trudged the last block to his aunt’s house. He knew the late
hour would require a story. He would say that after signing up for school
he’d gone looking for a job. He would become indignant if they pressed to
have specifics. The bungalow’s lights were on when he turned in. Through
a partly raised window he could hear the radio and recognized the voice of
radio commentator H. V. Kaltenborn, who was analyzing why the country was in a
postwar inflation and recession.
The front door was unlocked, so Alex went in.
The front room was empty, but the radio voice and other noises came from the
kitchen. Alex went in and found his aunt with green ledgers, receipts, the cash
register tape, and a metal box of cash.
He rapped on the door frame.
“Hi,” he said.
“Oh!” She jerked upright; then a
narrower look came to her face, reflecting a new thought. “Where have you
been?”
“Looking for a
part-time job.”
“Did you sign up for school?”
“I went there and they told me to wait.
So I sat for a couple of hours, and then they said somebody was sick and
it’d be better if I came back on Monday.” His eyes told him that
his words weren’t having the desired mollifying effect. Her expression
was even
more sour
, and a knot of dread in his belly
became a balloon. Although something was obviously wrong, he had to play out
the hand as he’d started until he knew what was going on.
“I’m hungry,” he said.
“Anything to
eat around here?”
“You should’ve been here when the
cafe was open, instead of gallivanting around everywhere.” But she paused
in her accounts long enough to fix him a fat peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich
and a big glass of milk with Ovaltine. It tasted good, or maybe it seemed so
because he was hungry. Institutions fed three times a day, but the food was
nearly inedible, so now this was especially good, if simple. Moreover, today
he’d eaten nothing since breakfast, and his body was accustomed to a
routine of eating something three times a day. As he ate, he forgot his
aunt’s attitude when he came in.
The last of the sandwich was in Alex’s
mouth when the front door opened. Ava was already in the living room.
“Did he show up?” Ray’s
voice asked.
“In the
kitchen.”
“What’d he say about
school?”
Ava’s reply dropped below Alex’s
ability to hear the words, but moments later Ray’s footsteps sounded
louder and the boy readied himself for confrontation.
“So you went to the school?” the
man asked.
“Yes. I told Aunt Ava.”
“You’re a dirty little
liar!” Ray spat it out, dripping contempt, his face flushing with his
outrage. The fervency was like a physical blow, and although Alex had had
premonitions, he was still thrown into a temporary blankness of emotions and
thought, staring at the shirtfront of the husky man looming over him.
“Your parole officer came by just after
you left… not ten minutes. We sent him to the school. He went to find you
and came back two hours later. He didn’t find you, and they didn’t
know a goddamn thing about you. He wants you at his office tomorrow
morning.”
Ava was in the doorway behind her husband.
“We were so embarrassed.”
“You made fools and liars of us,”
Ray continued.
The first accusation had stunned Alex and
brought pangs of guilt. But when Ray kept standing over him with implied
threats and actual accusations, the guilt turned into a small flame of angry
rebelliousness that they inadvertently kept fanning.
“If it wasn’t for your
aunt,” Ray said, “you’d still be in Preston Reform
School.”
“I know that—”
“Shut up!” The man jerked forward
at the command, a move that made Alex flinch reflexively and then resent the
man even more. He smoldered because he’d flinched. His values already
equated fear with weakness and cowardice.
“Your parole officer told us to call
him when you don’t cooperate. He’ll send you back any
time… for your own good… before you get in real trouble
again… My wife cried with worry when you didn’t come back today.
I’m not going to let that happen again. If you wanna stay out here
you’re gonna play by the rules. You’re going to school every day.
You’ll stay home on school nights, and be in by midnight on weekends.
You’ll work in the cafe on Saturday—”
“Remember church,” interjected
Ava.
“Right!” said Ray.
“You’ll attend services with us on Sunday. It will do you good to
hear the Lord’s word. You’ll do what we tell you, and if I catch
you in another lie I’m gonna take a belt to you.” The man’s
voice was brittle with fervency if not actual hostility— and the words
lost meaning to Alex, became a buzz in his head drowned by his own growing
rebellious rage. This asshole uncle was the same as the men in institutions
who’d brutalized him. Alex forgot Ray’s words as his rage grew, but
it was a rage accompanied by fear (the parole office could send him back). Ray
was a powerful adult male, thick through the chest, shoulders, and arms, and
although Alex was already as tall, he was far less husky and muscular. Also he
was seated, jammed down between table and wall. Ray was standing above him.
Alex had had enough experience with violence to recognize his futile tactical
position. While on the edge of rage, he was half intimidated.
Meanwhile, Ray kept spitting out
ultimatums—though now Alex’s brain wasn’t deciphering the
messages. He was on fire within, seeing this as identical with cruel authority
in institutions. Ray might just as well have been a guard as an uncle. The
different factor was that here he, Alex, could leave, get away,
escape
. There were no bars, fences, and barbed wire; the
police revolvers and handcuffs were vague and unimportant here. So Alex seethed
silently, waiting, knowing he’d soon have space to rise and face the
powerful man on equal terms—if he had an equalizer.
The chance came within a few minutes. A knock
came on the front door. Aunt Ava called into the kitchen that it was the newspaper
boy. Ray stepped through the doorway, reaching into his pocket for change. Alex
was instantly on his feet, rifling through the drawers under the sink until he
found the kitchen knives. He removed two—the biggest and sharpest—one
razor-sharp boning knife, the other a butcher knife. He slid the butcher knife
to the other end of the sink, letting it lie there on the white tile. He held
the boning knife against his thigh, his palm instantly beginning to sweat, his
heartbeat racing.
When Ray came back his gaze went to where
Alex had been seated. He had to turn all the way around to face the youth, who
was standing next to the sink six feet away. The man started to pick up his
ultimatum-laden speech where it had been interrupted, but he instantly sensed
that something was amiss. Maybe it was Alex’s burning and unblinking
eyes.
“Come sit down,” Ray said,
instinctively trying to establish dominance.
Alex remained motionless, except for a twitch
of lip and cheek— and the narrowing of the blazing eyes.
“Did you hear me?” Ray said.
“I heard you. Fuck you!” As Alex
spoke, he blushed, for the words had an inadvertent croak.
“Whaa
… ?”
“I said fuck you!” Now the rage
took over, wiping off indecision. “Fuck you, motherfucker—and your
mother—and the horse both of you rode in on.” He clenched the
boning knife harder. It was still hidden. As he saw Ray’s face register
uncertainty, his brain sang with joyous rage—with the glorious feeling of
rebellion and revenge. The man who had been omnipotent minutes ago was
identical with Lavalino, The Jabber, and all the others. But they’d had
immediate numbers, clubs and tear gas and dark, solitary confinement cells. Ray
was
alone,
help too far away to really help until it
was over. Tears of fury came to Alex’s eyes.
“See that knife,” Alex said,
indicating the butcher knife. “Pick it up and let’s see how fuckin’
bad you are… dirty motherfucker! You’re too fuckin’ big for
me to fight—but we can get it on—and I’ll cut your
motherfuckin’ heart out and feed it to you.” Even in the middle of
rage, Alex was following a script some convict had told him—of offering
the enemy a knife while issuing a challenge. It was the behavior either of
ultimate machismo (a word still unheard of then) or of a
madman
.
When the truth seeped into the man, that this
slender juvenile delinquent was honestly ready to fight with a knife to the
death, the adult blanched. It was outside the realm of his understanding.
Alex wasn’t bluffing. His mind had
locked in, amputating any images of consequences or tomorrow.
“You’re crazy,” Ray said,
and the declaration wasn’t a full thought but a reflex, the initial
reaction. It dripped fear. He had no doubts that Alex was real.
“If I’m crazy… it’s
motherfuckers like you made me crazy.”
“You don’t know what you’re
doing.”
