No Time to Die (17 page)

The large bowl was placed before him, navy bean, thick and fragrant. And heavy enough to hold him until he could figure out his next move. He brought the spoon to his mouth and thought of the homeless man who’d held the door open for him when he’d entered the restaurant. He’d ignored the filthy outstretched palm but saw it now as he stirred the soup.

Bullshit! Ain’t gonna happen. Out on the street. Unh-unh, not me
.

He thought of the vendors outside cluttering the sidewalk, waiting for the stream of potential buyers to emerge from the subway.

Now, sellin’ stuff. That’d be all right. Be my own boss. In business for myself. Don’t have to think about kissin’ nobody’s ass. Just hi and good-bye. You don’t like what I’m sellin’, keep steppin’ … Yeah, that be kinda nice
.

He tasted the soup, imagining his booming business: scarves, socks, batteries, Krazy Glue, barrettes. Stuff people needed. And when he got hungry, he could leave someone else in charge—an assistant maybe—somebody who knew better than to steal if they knew what was good for them—leave him outside raking up dollars while he strolled in where it was nice and warm and everybody smiling, calling him “sir.” And he’d treat himself to a full dinner including dessert, then leave a tip so large they’d talk about it for days …

He felt better and the soup tasted pretty good when he swallowed.

But where the guys cop their stuff from? How much it cost? What if I can’t get a spot on the corner? Crowded as it is, they might run me off. “No more room, dammit. Find someplace else to squat.”

“Aw no! You steppin’ on toes now! Steppin’ on toes!… The fuck you comin’ off at? This corner’s free! You ain’t paid for shit. That’s right! Fuck you and your mama too. One a these days I’m a have all a y’all kissin’ my black ass!”

He looked up. The waitress had turned, her pad and pencil frozen in midair. The clerk at the takeout counter and several customers were staring. One of the cooks—a man with fists like southern hams—had stepped from behind the high counter in back of him. Even the homeless man had cupped his hand against the glass and was peering inside. All staring.

He looked down. The bowl was empty and the biscuits were gone from the saucer.

“Somebody stole ’em! I don’t remember eatin’ ’em! Everybody lookin’, goddammit, and nobody seen who stole my stuff? What the fuck’s goin’ on?”

He rose abruptly and snatched up the check lying beside his glass.

Who put it there? How long was it there?
Fuck it, he didn’t care. He was leaving anyway. And someday when he returned, he’d be rolling in dollars and they’d be damn glad to see him. Glad to see the biggest goddamn tip ever laid on this counter.

Once outside, the cool air hit him in the face and the rage ebbed as quickly as it had come. The beat above his eyebrow slowed and the pounding fist in his chest eased. He lingered, taking in the hum of activity as people emerged from the subway. He watched a teenager selling umbrellas and another vendor who had a low flatbed of packaged strawberries, oranges, and tomatoes which seemed to sell themselves.

That’s easy. I could do that
.

He moved around the crowd and waited at the corner for the light to change.

I could do that. First, I got to take care a some business on Strivers’ Row. Ain’t seen not even her shadow for nearly three weeks now. Maybe she away. (Maybe she ain’t real.) Ha! Like that last one, like Mercy Anne. Look right through me like I was nuthin’. Invisible. Well, she gonna be nuthin’ when I get to her neck. She be nuthin’
.

He jammed his hands in his pockets and walked across Malcolm X Boulevard, past the open courtyard near the Y where the sign against the back wall announced in faded letters: “Harlem Plays the Best Ball in the Country.” On the corner of Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard, he gazed at the sealed windows of the old Smalls Paradise, then he quickened his steps and headed uptown.

Maybe she ain’t even real
.

What you sayin’ she ain’t real? She make you lose your job. That’s real, ain’t it?

He walked past a knot of children laughing over a hopscotch game, past two women sitting on a stoop near the Pretty City Cocktail Lounge, one rocking a baby stroller to rap lyrics flowing from a parked Lincoln Navigator where a man was cleaning the interior.

The jingle of a Mister Softee truck drifted on the breeze but he did not see or hear or feel any of this. He walked in the fading light fingering in his pocket an old-fashioned single-edge barber’s instrument honed on a bluestone to a fine edge.

No wire this time. This time I wanna see her face. Ring that bell and watch her eyes. She open the door, bring the blade across those goddamn eyes. No wire this time. The last thing she gonna see is me
.

I always wondered what it felt like to be in lockdown and now I knew. I was housebound, although my hip, knee, and arm were almost functional thanks to the every-other-day visits by the physical therapist. The first few days of exercise had been a test, but lately, though the pain was still there, I wasn’t gritting my teeth so audibly.

I was still wearing the brace but I wanted to feel the pavement under my feet, take in a movie, dine at a restaurant, walk Ruffin, watch Alvin and Clarence and Morris play ball. Sit in on Dad’s jazz sessions at the Club Harlem. Most of all, I wanted to curl up with Tad on his terrace and watch the moon light up the Harlem River.

But before I did any of that, I wanted to find James and kick his sorry butt from here to Jersey and then stomp his remains into the mud of the Meadowlands.

Even if I couldn’t raise my foot without groveling in pain, even if I wound up breaking my leg again, I wanted to do it.

But Dad had put his own foot down. “You refused
police protection, so stay in. At least till James is caught.”

“It might take a year to find him,” I’d said.

He had looked at me then and shrugged. “So that means you’ll live a year longer.”

The upside to my imprisonment was the chance to sift through a mountain of accumulated paperwork and start on my reading list for classes that would begin in the fall. I piled all that stuff around me and lay on the sofa, busily staring at the ceiling when the phone rang.

“Mali? I’m coming right over.”

“Elizabeth? What’s up, girl?”

“Be there in a minute. I want to see your face when I tell you.”

She hung up, leaving me to quickly gather all of the books and papers in a neat pile so she’d have someplace to sit and also to wonder if she’d gotten engaged and, if so, what was the size of the rock on her finger and eventually what color my maid of honor’s gown was likely to be.

She must have had a cab waiting in her lobby because I barely finished fluffing the pillows when the bell rang.

I made my way to the door and she stood there smiling.

“Are congrats in order?” I asked.

“Depends on you,” she said, stepping into the foyer and bringing with her a rush of air, fresh and free and summery and making me more aware than ever of my incarceration.

Her pale blue linen suit set off the navy silk blouse, and her auburn shoulder-length locks were bundled at the back of her neck, held there by a thin strip of blue and white kente cloth. She made her way into the living room balancing perfectly on three-inch black patent
heels. I stomped behind her in my brace, executing a credible imitation of Captain Ahab.

She settled onto the sofa and rested her attaché case on the coffee table. “Studying?” she asked, looking at the pile of material.

“Thinking about it,” I sighed.

“Well, think about this. The department has finally made an offer I think you can live with.”

“What kind?”

“Reinstatement at the rank of detective first grade, back pay at that level for the time you were off the job, and immediate retirement on ninety percent disability.”

“I’m not disabled,” I said, hobbling to the chair to sit down. “What are they basing the disability on?”

“Post-traumatic stress stuff. I emphasized the fact that you’d been held hostage in that crack den by two of New York’s Finest, that they’d intended to kill you to cover their tracks. They do not want the memory of that incident resurrected under any circumstances.”

“Which is exactly what’ll happen if the case goes to trial,” I said. “They know I’ll open my big mouth and it’ll be a media circus.”

Elizabeth rose from the sofa to fix herself a drink. I sipped soda.

“Right now, Mali, they’re under the gun, what with Johnnie Cochran taking over the Abner Louima case in Brooklyn. And Mrs. Baez in the Bronx crusading in memory of her son. And there’s also the incident where a young man was handcuffed and held naked in the hallway while the boys in blue wrecked his apartment, even though it was the wrong apartment. And before they took him down to the precinct, they forced him to dress in women’s clothing …”

I shook my head, listening to this litany of abuse and
wondering when and if things would ever change. The department was slapped with a lawsuit every other week and no one seemed interested in reining these officers in—the few bad apples, as they liked to say.

The apples were infecting the entire system, rotting it away, and the administration seemed only interested in damage control after the damage had been done. Millions were draining from the city treasury when the hole could’ve been plugged by weeding out the misfits early on.

The problem was that the ones doing the hiring favored those who looked and acted just like them. Protect and serve. Protect your ass and serve yourself with the largest helping of drug dollars on the planet.

I was drowning in the well of memory, falling deeper into the ugliness of the past, when Elizabeth interrupted.

“If you’re not disabled, you damn sure will be soon,” she said quietly. “You should see your face, girl. You ’re going to develop an ulcer the size of Manhattan if you go on like ths. You say you’re not disabled but I think you are, in some way. You’re hauling memory around like a two-ton weight. Anger is like acid. It’ll eat you alive. You gotta let it go. Please, Mali.”

She leaned over to tap my hand. “Listen, we’ve already lost one of our crowd, and Deborah in Washington, for all intents and purposes, is practically a borderline basket case. I don’t want to see you in a padded cell or have to bring flowers up to Woodlawn if you …”

I glanced at her and saw that her normally clear eyes had darkened and her finely shaped brows were gathered almost in the center of her forehead. Her voice, which could sound so formidable on cross-examination, now seemed to falter.

I closed off my own feelings: my anger at the department, the anger I felt toward James, the smothering sense of loss that overwhelmed me when I thought of Claudine, Marie, and Felicia. And the vague feeling that whoever was doing this probably had someone else already targeted.

Elizabeth was right. Somehow I had to let go of everything. Settling the suit was the first step.

“Let me talk it over with Dad when he comes in. See what he thinks. A detective first grade draws a pretty decent salary. Right now it sounds like a pretty good offer.”

That brought a smile to Elizabeth’s face and her brows relaxed. “Well, you stood your ground and didn’t back down. I’m damn proud of you. When this is over, we’re gonna pop a whole case of bubbly.”

“Speaking of which, how about another cocktail?”

“Can’t. Expecting a client in an hour. How’s the therapist working out?”

“Fine. Straightening out knots and kinks I didn’t know I had, except I don’t know when I’ll be free of this brace.”

“Mali, be thankful it wasn’t any worse. That first day in the hospital, I looked at you and …” She shifted on the edge of the sofa and her voice changed again. “You know I’m no good at prayer, but I prayed that night until morning and then every night afterward.”

“Knowing that means a lot to me,” I said, reaching for her hand. “Thank you.” I had planned to tell her finally that it was James who had nearly killed me, but changed my mind. She was upset enough.

“How’s David?” I asked, changing the subject.

Now her eyes regained their color and she was smiling broadly. “He’s getting better by the day, but that’s another story for another day.”

She glanced at her watch and took a sheaf of papers out of her case. “Gotta go but I’ll stop by tomorrow. I’ve outlined everything. Cross out whatever you disagree with and we can discuss it. They want an answer within ten days.”

I glanced up from the thick packet she handed me. “Ten days? After three years, they now want an answer in ten days?”

“Mali, you know how the system works,” Elizabeth sighed, gathering her bag. “It’s held together by Krazy Glue and run by folks who’re inhaling it.”