Skin Folk (19 page)

Lennie shake my hand off he wrist. It look like he cool down little bit, so I let he. He try to stare down Mary Anne. Jackobennie
never move away from he the whole time, that big, heavy hand resting like a threat on Lennie shoulder. From behind the two
of them I hear Two-Tone say, “The woman right you know, Lennie. You have to have some manners inside she establishment. And
all these years K.C. been doing everything else we men does do, you think she ain’t go do this, too?”

“It not right!” Lennie spit, glaring at Mary Anne.

I barely hear what Jackobennie whisper to Lennie, grinning the whole while: “And what you pay me and Mary Anne to do to you
that time? That wrong too?”

Lennie glance over he shoulder like is the devil heself latch on there. He go still. It get quiet in the place again. I see
he shoulders sag. “All right,” he mutter. “Let me go. I ain’t go hurt nobody.”

Jackobennie release him. Lennie dust heself off and sit back down to table. He growl to Two-Tone, “Let we finish we game and
go home, yes.”

I glance at the whore with the deep voice and the broad shoulders and the tiny, tiny skirt. She? smile and roll she eyes at
me.

Mary Anne throw she arms round my waist. I smile at she. “Thanks.”

“Only the best for the best customers.”

I hug she back, this armful of woman. I think the perfume smell and woman smell of she going stay with me whole week.

But I know Lennie and me story ain’t done yet. I have to stand up to he now, in the light, else I go be looking over my shoulder
every time it get dark from now on. “Just now,” I excuse myself to Mary Anne.

“All right, darling.”

Lennie and Two-Tone look up when I reach to their table. I pull a chair, I turn it backwards. I throw my leg over it (poonani
still feeling warm and nice under my clothes) and I sit down. “Lennie,” I say. He ain’t say nothing.

Mary Anne and Jackobennie come to the table with three beers. “On the house,” Jackobennie tell we. “To thank everybody for
being gentlemen.” He look hard at Lennie as he and Mary Anne put down the beers. Two-Tone thank them, but Lennie just pick
up his and start guzzling it down. Mary Anne wink at me as they walk away.

I take a sip from my beer. Cold and nice, just so I like it. I swallow two more times, think about what I going to say. “Lennie,
you is a man, right?”

“Blasted right!” He slam the empty bottle down onto the table.

“Big, hard-back, long-pants-wearing man?”

“Yes.” He look at me with suspicion.

“Work and sweat for your living? Try to treat everybody fair?”

“I never cheat you, K.C.!”

“Is true. You wish if I never try to work with allyou neither, but once you see I could pull my weight, you treat me like
all the rest.”

“So long as you know your place!” He scowl and shake the beer bottle at me. “But coming in here brazen like this!”

“You is a man, yes.”

He look at me, confused. I see Two-Tone frowning too. I nod my head, sip some more beer. “Work hard in the hot sun, don’t
do nobody wrong. Have a right to fuck any way you want.”

“But not you! You is a woman!”

To rass. Time to done with this. “Lennie, you is a man. And I? I is a fisherman.”

And I swear all the glasses in the place ring like the fishing bell, the way Two-Tone start to make noise in the place. “Oh
God, K.C., in all my born days, I never meet no one like you!” He put down he cards and he hold he belly and he laugh.

“What, you taking the bullah woman side now?” Lennie sulk.

“Man, Lennie, hold some strain,” Two-Tone say. “K.C. not judging you for what you like to do. I not judging you, and you know
Mary Anne not judging you, for you bringing you good good dollars and give she. K.C. work hard beside you every day, she never
ask no man to look after she. She have a right to play hard too.”

Is not only me does work hard, neither. Mary Anne. All the whores. I realise is not only man have a right to fuck how he want.
When a truth come to you simple like that, it does full you up and make you feel warm, make you want to tell everybody. I
must ask Mary Anne sometime if she think I right. But for now I just smile and look down at my nice clean shine shoes. I drink
some more beer and look Lennie right in he eye, friendly. He scowl at me, but I ain’t look away. Is he glance down finally.

He pick up he cards. “You playing or what?” he say to Two-Tone.

“Deal me in next hand,” I say. God, he go do it?

Lennie glance sideways at me over he cards. Look down at the cards. Then quiet, “You have money after you done spending everything
on Mary Anne?”

“Yes, man.” I done being careful. “I have enough to whip both of allyou behind.”

“Oh, yes?” Lennie say. “Well, don’t get too attached to it. I bet you I leave this place tonight with you money and my own.”

He throw down he cards. Two-Tone inspect them, make a face, drop he cards on the table, and pull out two bills and lay them
down. Lennie pocket the bills. He pick up the whole deck of cards and hand them to me. “Deal. Fisherman.”

I feel the grin lighting up my face as I take the cards from he. “I could do that.”

T
he Caribbean folktale about what happens to the greedy spider man Anansi when he encounters Dry Bone is one of the eeriest,
most sinister I’ve ever read. In my novel
Midnight Robber,
the heroine Tan-Tan discovers that her deeds are becoming so legendary that they’re passing into folklore. Tan-Tan hears a
tale about herself that refers to incidents in her life, but which casts them as fable. People are beginning to confuse her
in their minds with Anansi.

I
f you only see Dry Bone: one meager man, with arms and legs thin so like matches stick, and what a way the man face just a-hang
down till it favour jackass when him sick!

Duppy Dead Town is where people go when life boof them, when hope left them and happiness cut she eye ’pon them and strut
away. Duppy Dead people drag them foot when them walk. The food them cook taste like burial ground ashes. Duppy Dead people
have one foot in the world and the next one already crossing the threshold to where the real duppy-them living. In Duppy Dead
Town them will tell you how it ain’t have no way to get away from Dry Bone the skin-and-bone man, for even if you lock you
door on him, him body so fine him could slide through the crack and all to pass inside your house.

Dry Bone sit down there on one little wooden crate in the open market in Duppy Dead Town. Him a-think about food. Him hungry
so till him belly a-burn him, till it just a-prowl round inside him rib cage like angry bush cat, till it clamp on to him
backbone, and a-sit there so and a-growl.

And all the time Dry Bone sitting down there in the market, him just a-watch the open sky above him, for Dry Bone nah like
that endless blue. Him ’fraid him will just fall up into it and keep falling.

Dry Bone feel say him could eat two-three of that market woman skinny little fowl-them, feathers and all, then wash them down
with a dry-up breadfruit from the farmer cart across the way, raw and hard just so, and five-six of them wrinkle-up string
mango from the fruit stand over there. Dry Bone coulda never get enough food, and right now, all like how him ain’t eat for
days, even Duppy Dead people food looking good. But him nah have no money. The market people wouldn’t even prekkay ’pon him,
only a-watch him like stray dog so him wouldn’t fast himself and thief away any of them goods. In Duppy Dead Town them had
a way to say if you only start to feed Dry Bone, you can’t stop, and you pickney-them go starve, for him will eat up all your
provisions. And then them would shrug and purse-up them mouth, for them know say hunger is only one of the crosses Duppy Dead
pickney go have to bear.

Duppy Dead Town ain’t know it waiting; waiting for the one name Tan-Tan.

So—it had Dry Bone sitting there, listening to he belly bawl. And is so Tan-Tan find he, cotch-up on the wooden crate like
one big black anansi-spider.

Dry Bone watch the young woman dragging she sad self into the market like monkey riding she back. She nah have no right to
look downpressed so; she body tall and straight like young cane, and she legs strong. But the look on she pretty face favour
puppy what lose it mother, and she carrying she hand on she machäte handle the way you does put your hand on your friend shoulder.
Dry Bone sit up straight. He lick he lips. A stranger in Duppy Dead Town, one who ain’t know to avoid he. One who can’t see
she joy for she sorrow; the favourite meat of the one name Dry Bone. He know she good. Dry Bone know all the souls that feed
he. He recognize she so well, he discern she name in the curve of she spine. So Dry Bone laugh, a sound like the dust blowin’
down in the dry gully. “Girl pickney Tan-Tan,” he whisper, “I go make you take me on this day. And when you pick me up, you
pick up trouble.”

He call out to Tan-Tan, “My beautiful one; you enjoying the day?”

Tan-Tan look at the little fine-foot man, so meager you could nearly see through he. “What you want, Grandpa?” she ask.

Dry Bone smile when she say “Grandpa.” True, Duppy Dead townspeople have a way to say that Dry Bone older than Death it own
self. “Well doux-doux darlin’, me wasn’t going to say nothing; but since you ask, beg you a copper to buy something to eat,
nuh? I ain’t eat from mornin’.”

Now, Tan-Tan heart soft. Too besides, she figure maybe if she help out this old man who look to be on he last legs, she go
ease up the curse on she a little. For you must know the story ’bout she, how she kill she only family on New Half Way Tree.
Guilt nearly breaking she heart in two, but to make it worse, the douen people nah put a curse on she when she do the deed?
Yes, man: She couldn’t rest until she save two people life to make up for the one she did kill. Everywhere she go, she could
hear the douen chant following she:

It ain’t have no magic in do-feh-do.

If you take one, you mus’ give back two.

Tan-Tan reach into she pocket to fling the old man couple-three coppers. But she find it strange that he own people wasn’t
feeding he. So she raise she voice to everyone in the market place: “How oonuh could let this old man sit here hungry so?
Oonuh not shame?”

“Lawd, Missus,” say the woman selling the fowl, “you ain’t want to mix up with he. That is Dry Bone, and when you pick he
up, you pick up trouble!”

“What stupidness you talking, woman? Hot sun make you bassourdie, or what? How much trouble so one little old man could give
you?”

A man frying some hard johnny cake on a rusty piece of galvanized iron look up from he wares. “You should listen when people
talk to you, girl pickney. Make I tell you: You even self touch Dry Bone, is like you touch Death. Don’t say nobody ain’t
tell you!”

Tan-Tan look down at the little old man, just holding he belly and waiting for somebody to take pity on he. Tan-Tan kiss she
teeth
steuups.
“Oonuh too craven, you hear? Come, Daddy. I go buy you a meal, and I go take you where I staying and cook it up nice for
you. All right?”

Dry Bone get excited one time; he almost have she now! “Thank you, my darlin’. Granny Nanny bless you, doux-doux. I ain’t
go be plenty trouble. Beg you though, sweetheart: Pick me up. Me old bones so weak with hunger, I ain’t think I could make
the walk back to your place. I is only a little man, halfway a duppy meself. You could lift me easy.”

“You mean to say these people make you stay here and get hungry so till you can’t walk?” Tan-Tan know say she could pick he
up; after he the smallest man she ever see.

The market go quiet all of a sudden. Everybody only waiting to see what she go do. Tan-Tan bend down to take the old man in
she arms. Dry Bone reach out and hold on to she. As he touch she, she feel a coldness wrap round she heart. She pick up the
old man, and is like she pick up all the cares of the world. She make a joke of it, though: “Eh-eh, Pappy, you heavier than
you look, you know!”

That is when she hear Dry Bone voice good, whispering inside she head,
sht-sht-sht,
like dead leaf on a dead tree. And she realise that all this time she been talking to he, she never see he lips move. “I
name Dry Bone,” the old man say, “I old like Death, and when you pick me up, you pick up trouble. You ain’t go shake me loose
until I suck out all your substance. Feed me, Tan-Tan.”

And Tan-Tan feel Dry Bone getting heavier and heavier, but she couldn’t let he go. She feel the weight of all the burdens
she carrying: alone, stranded on New Half Way Tree with a curse on she head, a spiteful woman so ungrateful she kill she own
family.

“Feed me, Tan-Tan, or I go choke you.” He wrap he arms tight round she neck and cut off she wind. She stumble over to the
closest market stall. The lady selling the fowl back away, she eyes rolling with fright. Gasping for air, Tan-Tan stretch
out she hand and feel two dead fowl. She pick them up off the woman stand. Dry Bone chuckle. He loosen up he arms just enough
to let she get some air. He grab one fowl and stuff it into he mouth, feathers and all. He chew, then he swallow. “More, Tan-Tan.
Feed me.” He choke she again.

She body crying for breath, Tan-Tan stagger from one market stall to the next. All the higglers fill up a market basket for
she. Them had warn she, but she never listen. None of them would take she money. Dry Bone let she breathe again. “Now take
me home, Tan-Tan.”

Tan-Tan grab the little man round he waist and try to dash he off, but she hand stick to he like he was tar baby. He laugh
in she mind, the way ground puppy does giggle when it see carrion. “You pick me up by your own free will. You can’t put me
down. Take me home, Tan-Tan.”

Tan-Tan turn she feet towards she little hut in the bush, and with every step she take along the narrow gravel path into the
bush, Dry Bone only getting heavier. Tan-Tan mother did never want she; Ione make Antonio kidnap she away to New Half Way
Tree. Even she daddy who did say he love she used to beat she, and worse things too besides. Tan-Tan never see the singing
tree she always pass by on she way home, with the wind playing like harp in the leaves, or the bright blue furry butterflies
that always used to sweet she, flitting through the bush carrying the flowers they gather in their little hands. With Dry
Bone on her back and the full market basket in her arms, Tan-Tan had was to use she shoulders to shove aside the branches
to make she way to she hut. Branches reach out bony fingers to pull at she dreads, but she ain’t feel that pain. She only
feel the pain of knowing what she is, a worthless, wicked woman that only good to feed a duppy like Dry Bone. How anybody
could love she? She don’t deserve no better.