Grant Park

by Leonard Pitts, Jr.

  Willie swallowed and took a breath to steady himself. He wished he had a weapon. He wished he had a drink. Then he wouldn’t care that he didn’t have a weapon. He took a step. After a moment, he took another, moving as cautiously as if one of the stairs might be rigged. He felt sweat drooling down his temple.

  Then the voice exploded.

  “We’re not niggers!” it cried.

  In the dark stairwell, three steps above the floor, Willie froze like January. Movement stopped. Breathing stopped. Blinking stopped.

  He waited, but he couldn’t hear anything else. After a moment, the muted burr of voices resumed. Had he actually heard that? “We’re not niggers?” It didn’t sound like either one of his voices. Why would they say something like that?

  Willie stood there frozen, contemplating his options. He decided he couldn’t go down there without some kind of weapon. That white boy was a monster. What could Willie do against him, frail and old as he was? He had to find something he could hurt that big man with. But Willie had no idea what he could use.

  And then, he did. He turned around and headed back up the stairs.

  “‘What’s happened to this country?’” Pym asked, repeating Malcolm’s question. “Hell, people like you are what happened to this country. You niggers are ruining—”

  “Oh, shut the fuck up.”

  Malcolm was surprised by his own words. Apparently, Pym was, too. He fell silent. Malcolm regarded him for a moment, then shook his head. “You’re too young,” he said. “What are you, in your 20s? Twenty-five, maybe?”

  “Twenty-six,” said Pym.

  “Twenty-six, then. So you’ve never really known a world without Fox News and Pat Buchanan and Sean Hannity and all these other right-wing lunatics telling you all day what a victim you are because you’re a white man.”

  “The white man is a victim. You hear that Jeremiah Wright, that so-called preacher who said goddamn the white man? Hell, you niggers are the biggest racists in this country.”

  Malcolm surprised himself by laughing. It broke out of him like water breaching a dam and he couldn’t make it stop. After a moment, he had to lean his head down to his manacled hands to wipe away tears.

  Perplexity squinted Pym’s eyes. “What’s so fuckin’ funny?” he demanded.

  Malcolm regarded the big man for a moment. “You are,” he said, finally. “You. Have you any idea of the sheer cognitive dissonance of accusing me of racism while calling me a nigger?”

  “I told you about making fun of me,” said Pym, stepping toward Malcolm, fisting his massive hands. But somehow, thought Malcolm, he suddenly seemed like a man playing a role. Malcolm had the distinct sense he was making the threat only because he had to.

  “Yeah, yeah,” said Malcolm as the last of the chuckles rattled in his throat. “I remember. I make fun of you, you’ll treat me like one of those chicken bones.”

  He fell into a stillness then, remembering. Clenched fists. And sit-ins. And pot smoke wafting on the breeze. And power to the people. And the hope—the abiding expectation—that things could be made better: that you could, if you wanted it bad enough, if you worked for it hard enough, force this old world to change. Where did it all go, he wondered? When did it all change? “When did we get so small?” Malcolm heard himself ask. “That’s what I think of when I look at you. When did everything get so goddamned small?”

  “I still don’t get what you’re talking about.”

  Malcolm glanced up. Pym seemed honestly confused. “It wasn’t so long ago,” explained Malcolm, “that you and I would not have been here arguing over who was the bigger victim. It wasn’t so long ago that white guys just like you were putting themselves on the line and even dying because they knew that unless everybody was free, nobody was. I just wonder sometimes, how we got from people like that to people like you.”

  Pym’s eyes narrowed even further. “What do you mean, ‘people like me?’”

  Malcolm met his eyes, but did not answer.

  “What do you mean, ‘people like me?’” This time, he shouted it.

  The edge of Malcolm’s mouth hooked into a tiny smile. “Small-minded people,” he said. “Hateful, closed-minded, self-righteous, damned ignorant and proud of it. We were not like that—and white people were not like that—when I was your age.”

  Pym’s faced twisted as if he had just smelled an odor. “You mean, back in the ’60s when all you liberals were taking drugs and spitting on soldiers and refusing to bathe? Back with all that free love and no respect for authority and burning down the cities? That what you’re talking about?”

  Malcolm’s smile opened. “Yeah,” he said, “there was drugs and there was sex. But there was also vision. We had ambition. Not for making money, but for making a difference.”

  Pym swallowed. “You aren’t the only ones with dreams,” he said. “We dream, too. We dream of taking our country back from the faggots and niggers and Islamofascists and freeloaders.”

  “Do you really believe half the crap that comes out of your mouth?” asked Malcolm. “I really don’t think—”

  His voice caught. Through an open door 25 feet behind Clarence Pym, he saw feet descending a stairwell.

  Damn.

  The brother couldn’t have been more obvious. He had stopped talking at the sight of Willie. Now Willie stood, still as a lamppost, tense as a guitar string, waiting for the inevitable discovery. He mapped escape routes in his head.

  The brother turned back toward the big man, trying to cover his lapse. “I really don’t think you do,” he resumed.

  Still Willie waited for the white boy to turn around, waited for him to see Willie there, and come lumbering after him with murder on his mind. It was so obvious. The white boy could hardly fail to see what was going on, could he? There was a moment. Then the big man leaned close to his captive. “I believe every damn thing I say, hoss. I guarantee you that.”

  “Then you’re an idiot,” said the brother. He was provoking the big man, trying to hold his attention. Willie breathed. He put his weight on the last stair. It didn’t creak. In the movies, they always creaked. He gave thanks for small favors and stepped off onto the floor.

  “If I’m such an idiot,” said the big man, “why are you the one chained up to the chair?”

  That is one big motherfucker.

  Got that straight, thought Willie.

  Anh có chc không ó?

  No, he told the voice silently, he wasn’t sure about any of this. Not in the least. He almost said this out loud. He bit his bottom lip instead to keep the words inside. He crept forward.

  It struck him that he was living through an absurd parody of his own life. Forty years before, he had crept just like this, crouched low and moving on mouse feet, through a South Vietnamese jungle, lugging that damn M60. Forty years later here he was, creeping through an abandoned Chicago warehouse, lugging a damn broken toilet tank lid.

  Life played strange tricks sometimes.

  I’m telling you, that’s one big motherfucker.

  Willie wanted to scream at the voice. Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! He needed to concentrate. He needed a drink. He crept forward.

  The drunk came slowly, his eyes round and white with terror. In his hands, he clutched a toilet tank lid, broken off at the end.

  Malcolm reminded himself not to look. Above him, Pym smirked in satisfaction. “Can’t answer that one, can you?”

  “Huh?” Malcolm couldn’t even remember the question. Then he could.

  “You being an idiot has nothing to do with who’s in the chair,” he said. “It has to do with you believing a bunch of bullshit. It has to do with thinking you can be better than somebody else just because you were born a different color. Do you have any idea how stupid that is? Why do you let that other fool make you believe something so stupid?”

  His words sounded thin and uncompelling even to his own ear. He couldn’t concentrate on this stupid argument with this stupid man. Not while he was busy watching out of the corn
er of his eye, willing the homeless man forward.

  “You know why you think it’s stupid?” Pym was bent so low over him Malcolm could smell the chicken on his breath. “Because you never had a country stolen from you. But that’s okay, because we’re going to take our country back.”

  Malcolm tried to think of something to say. He could not improve on what he had already said. “You’re an idiot,” he said.

  “You’ll change your tune,” said Pym, straightening up.

  “I doubt it,” said Malcolm, shooting another surreptitious glance at the homeless man. He was maybe nine feet behind.

  “You will,” said Pym and an easy confidence had entered his voice, “when me and Dwayne kill Obama tonight.”

  “What?” Malcolm wasn’t sure he had heard correctly. Even the drunk was stunned. To Malcolm’s consternation, he stopped creeping forward and simply stared.

  “Oh yeah,” said Pym, and his grin was cool as water. “We’re going to get him at Grant Park when he comes on to make his speech. That van we got parked outside? It’s a bomb with armor plating. We’re going to drive it right into the park tonight and blow his black ass straight to hell.”

  Even the voice that hated Willie was stunned.

  That motherfucker is crazier than you are.

  “You got that right,” Willie said.

  It was only when the big man turned that he realized he had said it aloud.

  Oh shit!

  The broad face registered more surprise than alarm. “Who the fuck are you?” he demanded. “How’d you get in here?”

  Run!

  And this wasn’t one of the voices of his undiagnosed mental illness speaking. No, this was the sweet, reasonable voice of self-preservation and basic common sense telling him to get the hell out of there before that big man smashed him to pieces.

  Willie ran.

  He ran straight toward Clarence Pym, who simply stood there in utter befuddlement. He ran like the soldier he once had been, some long-forgotten war whoop ripping from his mouth, the toilet tank lid raised high in both hands like a club. He ran.

  Pym’s forearm came up. Too slowly.

  Willie brought the toilet tank lid down. Pym flinched backwards at the last instant, so he didn’t catch the full brunt, but he caught enough. The jagged porcelain raked his face, laying open his left cheek. Blood squirted out.

  The giant screamed. He grabbed for his wounded face.

  Corporal William Lincoln Washington never stopped moving. It was as if he was 22 again, fighting his way through some godforsaken jungle hell. He pivoted, shifted his weight, brought the toilet tank lid down again, and this time the blow was solid, landing on the crown of the giant’s head with a thunk so emphatic Willie was sure it had broken his skull. It certainly broke the porcelain, a slab of which fell to the floor, leaving Willie with just a stub in his hands.

  He didn’t need it. The big man staggered, his feet crossing one another. His eyes rolled. Then he fell backwards, crashing heavily to the floor. His head bounced off the concrete and he was still.

  Willie could hardly believe it. He stared. He gaped. The big man did not move. He lay there flat on his back, blood flowing, eyes closed, dead to the world. Maybe dead, period.

  I don’t believe it. You did it.

  “Me neither,” said Willie. He dropped the stub of porcelain. He still didn’t move.

  “The keys,” hissed the brother, still chained to his chair. “Find the keys.”

  The keys? Willie couldn’t stop staring

  “Come on!” the brother told him, his voice low but urgent.

  The keys! Of course. The keys. “Okay,” Willie said. “Okay, okay.”

  Hãy bình tĩnh đi.

  “I am calm,” Willie said. But of course, he was anything but. For years, he had failed at everything he did, failed so badly so often that failure had come to feel like home. Now, in this singular moment, he had succeeded, he had done the impossible thing he set out to do. It was like cold air in a sauna bath. The rush of it was intoxicating.

  But you ain’t finished yet, you stupid motherfucker.

  “Got to find the keys,” said Willie.

  That’s right. You got to find the keys.

  Finally, he moved. He went to the table where the computer and the chicken bucket sat with some papers, the backpack, a Styrofoam chest, and two boxes of computer discs. Willie searched it all thoroughly. No keys.

  “They’re probably in his pocket,” said the brother.

  They probably in his pocket.

  “Yeah,” said Willie, agreeing with them both. “Probably in his pocket.”

  The big man was wearing jeans. Willie went to him on tiptoe. He reached out gingerly, as if toward a live explosive, and patted the left front pocket. Nothing. An ink pen, some change. Nothing. He patted the right front. Nothing.

  “Got to be in the back pocket,” said the brother.

  Check the back, you stupid motherfucker.

  “I don’t want to.”

  “You have to,” said the brother.

  You got no choice.

  Willie sighed. Failure was so much easier.

  He went to one side of the giant, knelt down, wedged his hands under one massive buttock and lifted. There was a wallet. Willie pulled it out, tossed it aside without looking at it. Nothing else in the pocket.

  Try the other side, you stupid motherfucker.

  “Shut up,” said Willie. “I know.” The brother’s eyes tightened in confusion when he heard that. Willie hunched his shoulders and grinned an apologetic grin.

  Made bold by adrenaline, Willie crossed to the other side of the big man. He crouched down and lifted his right butt cheek, ran his hand beneath and patted. And there it was.

  Willie reached into the big man’s hip pocket and pulled out the key. He held it up.

  “What you got to say about that?” he asked the voice that had been calling him a stupid motherfucker for almost 40 years.

  That voice did not reply. The other did.

  Ông làm tt lm, Willie.

  Good work.

  “Thank you,” said Willie.

  He climbed to his feet and went to the brother, holding the key out before him. “I am so glad to see you,” said the brother, whispering. “I thought you were going to leave me here.”

  “Went for help,” said Willie, “but nobody would believe me. So what’s this all about? Why they got you in here?” He stuck the key into the lock and turned. With a click, the cuff sprang open.

  “They’re crazy, that’s why. You heard ’em. They want to kill Obama!”

  Willie shook his head. “Crazier than me,” he said, reaching for the left manacle. “And that’s saying something.”

  He put the key in the lock. Then the brother said, “Oh, shit.”

  Willie glanced at him. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  The brother didn’t answer. His face had gone slack, his eyes wider than the Interstate. Willie turned, slowly. Behind him, the white boy was rising like a harvest moon. His face was a fright mask crimsoned with fury and blood.

  He got you now, you stupid motherfucker.

  Willie cast about for something he could use as a weapon. There was nothing.

  Run!

  This was the voice of self-preservation and common sense again. But it was no use. Willie felt as if an electric current ran through him. He was rooted to the spot. He was pinned.

  The white boy wasn’t fast. Willie had time to follow the massive fist on the upswing, to see it sweeping toward him on the backswing. It hit him like a wrecking ball hits a derelict building. The blow smashed him to the floor. The key flew. He heard the brother cry out something, but he didn’t know what it was.

  Oh, shit. You stupid motherfucker, you done it now.

  “I know,” said Willie. His arms and legs spasmed uselessly as he tried to climb to his feet. It was no use. They would not work in coordination. “I know,” said Willie again.

  “Stupid, son of a bitching, mot
herfucker!” The white boy’s voice roared from above, hoarse, garbled and furious. “You hurt me! You actually hurt me!”

  Willie moved. That is, his foot finally found some traction and he felt himself inching across the floor.

  “Get back here!” the giant cried. And his hands closed on Willie’s throat.

  “Leave him alone!” the brother cried.

  The white boy didn’t even hear him. Malcolm could see it in his eyes: he was someplace else. He tightened his grip on Willie’s windpipe and bore down with all his mammoth, terrible weight. Willie’s body went into a panic. He tried to pry the grip loose, but it was like trying to pry a rusted lugnut by hand. The massive fist forbade him air. Willie felt the bones give. He felt darkness. It edged in like twilight.

  “Stop it,” the brother cried, “you’re killing him!”

  Willie swung at the big man and actually managed to hit him, but the blow seemed to land harmlessly as summer rain. The big man snarled. Willie’s feet scrabbled uselessly against the floor. The darkness came on more swiftly. No air! No air!

  Ah, you poor, stupid motherfucker.

  It was the last thing William Lincoln Washington ever heard.

  ten

  Bob opened his door and almost walked into Amy Landingham, who stood on his porch with her fist lifted, about to knock.

  “Oh,” he said, startled.

  “Oh,” she said.

  There was a moment, neither of them sure what came next. Amy recovered first, hooking a thumb toward a green minivan, parked at the curb behind Bob’s Camry. “Hey, Bob,” she said. “Listen, I’ve uh…I’ve got your stuff. From the office, I mean.”

  Bob glanced at the van without interest. “I know you didn’t come by to bring me my stuff,” he said.

  She smiled. “Well yeah,” she said, “there was another reason, too.”

  “They’ve got you working on the story?”

  “Yeah,” she said again.

  “Congratulations,” he told her. “That’s going to be front page for sure. Good exposure for you.”