If I Grow Up

by Todd Strasser

  “Have some,” he offered.

  “Where’d you get ’em?” I cracked open a shell.

  “Cousins in Georgia. They got their own farm.”

  “Ever been there?”

  Terrell shook his head. “What do I want to go to some farm for?”

  From outside, above the whir of the fan, came yelling and laughter. I went to the window. Someone had opened a fire hydrant on Abernathy, and bare-chested boys, and girls in T-shirts, were playing in the spray.

  “Want to get wet?” I asked.

  “And play with shorties?” Terrell asked derisively, his hands working the controller feverishly, his forehead glistening with sweat.

  “Who cares?” I said. “Long as we cool off.”

  Terrell didn’t answer. He was busy mowing down bad guys. “I’m gonna get that new PlayStation soon as it comes out.”

  “Oh, yeah? What bank are you gonna rob?” I asked.

  Terrell glanced at the closed door to his room, then pulled a thick wad of bills out of his pocket and fanned them. Mostly fives and tens, and more money than I’d ever seen in one place.

  “Where’d you get that?” I whispered.

  “Smash ’n’ grabs,” he answered.

  I gave him an uncertain look. Smashing car windows at red lights and grabbing chains off drivers’ necks, or pocketbooks from seats, was a serious hustle. But it was hard to imagine how else he could have come up with that much gwap.

  There was a knock on the door, and Terrell quickly slid the money back into his pocket. “Who’s there?”

  The door opened and Laqueta looked in. Her skin was all ashy, her hair nappy, and she was wearing a long, yellow T-shirt with stains on the front. It was hard to believe that she’d once been the prettiest girl in the projects. But that was before Darnell fell.

  “Go get me a bottle of Cisco,” she said.

  “Get lost,” Terrell shot back, hunched over his game controller.

  “Get me that bottle, or I’ll tell your momma how much money you got,” Laqueta threatened.

  Terrell grit his teeth. Women were not allowed to boss gangbangers—even pretend gangbangers—around.

  “Come on,” I said. “I want to get out of here anyway.”

  Passing the stairwell on the fourth floor, we came across a bent old man gripping a walker with bony hands. His hair was white, his yellow eyes were bloodshot, and his skin hung from his face like baggy clothes.

  “I need some food.” When he spoke, you saw more pink gum than teeth. Tied to the front of the walker was a basket with a few wrinkled dollar bills and some change inside.

  “Give me the money,” Terrell said. “I’ll get you something.”

  “Not you. Him.” The old man pointed a shaky finger at me. “You Shanice’s grandson, right? They say you a good boy. I ain’t eat in two days. Get me some sardines and a loaf.”

  “Okay.” I reached into the basket and took the money. “What apartment you in?”

  “Don’t matter,” he said. “I’ll wait for you here.”

  “You can’t stand here and wait,” I said. “Tell me what apartment you’re in, and I’ll bring it to you.”

  The old man turned to Terrell. “Go away.”

  Terrell gave him a contemptuous look, then headed down the stairwell to the next floor. With his shaky, wrinkled hand, the old man grabbed my shirtsleeve and tugged me close so he could whisper into my ear. His breath smelled god-awful. “Four-G. But don’t go tellin’ that other boy. He’ll break in, steal everything I have.”

  It was hard to imagine the old man had anything worth stealing, but I agreed just the same.

  The closest food store was Wally’s. The front was boarded up and covered with colorful graffiti and tags. You wouldn’t have thought it was even a place of business unless you knew it was there. Inside, the light was dim and a ceiling fan whirred. The sweet scent of ripe fruit hung in the air. Wally was a big, fat walrus of a man who sat all day by the cash register. People said he kept a sawed-off shotgun under the counter.

  “Don’t be coming in here to steal,” he warned when we entered. He had a green dish towel draped around his fat neck, and his shirt was dark with sweat stains.

  “You got sardines and a loaf?” I asked.

  “Sardines over there.” Wally pointed a fat finger. “Bread over here. Be quick.”

  We’d hardly taken a step when Wally held out his hand at Terrell. “You buyin’ something?”

  My friend shook his head.

  “Then wait outside,” Wally said.

  Terrell gave Wally his best narrow-eyed, menacing, hard-hitta look, then left. I got the food and joined him out under the glaring yellow sun. Terrell muttered, I’m gonna come back with my boys and bust that place up.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “You see how he dissed me? Like I was gonna rob the place.”

  “He treated you like a gangbanger,” I said. “I thought that’s what you wanted.”

  We walked a block to the liquor store. The door was always locked. Terrell pushed the buzzer, and we looked up at the security camera so the owner could see our faces. The door buzzed open. Inside was a narrow aisle with walls of thick, scuffed Plexiglas rising to the ceiling. Everything—the cash registers, counters, and shelves of bottles—was behind the Plexiglas.

  “What do you boys want?” A woman with red lips and a big head of dyed, reddish orange hair asked through some holes in the thick plastic.

  “My cousin Laqueta wants some Cisco,” Terrell said.

  Recognition softened the woman’s expression. “The momma of that little boy who went off the roof last Christmas?”

  Terrell nodded and slid some money through a slot. The woman opened a small door in the Plexiglas and pushed through a dark red bottle with a strawberry-colored label.

  “Police ask where you got this bottle, what you gonna say?”

  “Someone gave it to me,” Terrell answered.

  “Who?” the woman asked.

  “I dunno, some old man,” Terrell answered.

  The woman made a face. “Now, why would some old man do that?”

  “My momma gave it to us,” I volunteered. “To bring to his momma.”

  The woman nodded. “That’s right. That’s what you say.”

  Back at Douglass, Terrell took the wine to Laqueta, and I took the food to the old man in 4-G. He asked me if I wanted to come in, but I said no. I knew he was lonely. With the elevator broken, he probably hadn’t been downstairs in days or maybe even weeks. I felt bad for him.

  When I got to my apartment, LaRue was sitting in the living room with Nia. He was wearing Disciples black.

  “Let’s bounce,” he said.

  “Where?” I glanced at Nia, who returned a tight, concerned look.

  “Upstairs,” LaRue said.

  BAIL MONEY

  On the fifteenth floor, LaRue stopped outside a door across the hall from the apartments I’d snuck into the previous winter. I could hear a TV inside. LaRue knocked three times, then paused and knocked twice.

  Locks clinked, and Marcus opened the door. His broad, flat forehead glistened with sweat, and his T-shirt had dark, wet spots. A white towel hung over his shoulders. Behind him were weights and a bench, and the room was pungent with the scent of sweat. The leader of the Disciples gestured for me to come in and told LaRue he could go. Then he bolted the door shut. I’d lost my nervousness while climbing the stairs, but now it came back. My heart was beating rapidly and my breaths came short and fast. What did Marcus want with me?

  “Thirsty?” he asked.

  I wasn’t, but I was afraid to offend him, so I nodded.

  “Check the fridge.” He pointed toward the kitchen. “And get me a beer.”

  The kitchen was clean and neat, the counter lined with bottles of vitamins and nutrition powders. The refrigerator was filled with malt liquor, wine, six-packs of soda, and energy drinks. I got a beer for Marcus and a Coke for myself. Back in the living room, Marcus was doing cur
ls with the biggest dumbbell I’d ever seen. The skin around his eyes creased, and his jaw clenched. The veins in his forehead and right arm swelled as he lifted the weight over and over, the biceps bulging and relaxing again and again until he let the dumbbell fall to the floor with a thud.

  He sat there breathing hard for a few moments, opening and closing the hand that had just held the weight, as if trying to get the blood to flow again. Then he cracked the beer, took a gulp, and nodded at the weight. “Give it a try.”

  I grabbed the handle with both hands where he had used one, and managed to lift it an inch off the ground before it pulled me back down. I tried again, pulling with all my might, my arms and body trembling under the strain, and got the dumbbell up to my knees.

  “Okay,” Marcus said.

  Thump! The dumbbell hit the floor harder than I’d wanted, and I felt embarrassed. I sat down, clutching the cold soda in my hands, my trembling arms so drained I wasn’t sure I could even pop the top off the can.

  “When’s those babies due?” Marcus asked.

  “Two months, I think.”

  “Nia gonna go live with LaRue, or he gonna move in with you?”

  The question caught me off guard. I’d heard no talk of either of those possibilities. But it made sense that something like that might happen.

  Marcus took another gulp. “How old are you?”

  “Thirteen.”

  “Ever tell anyone about that window guard?”

  I shook my head.

  “Think that had anything to do with Darnell?”

  I realized he’d probably never bothered to investigate the window frame in Darnell’s room the way I had. Then again, I had only a feeling about who might have kicked out that window guard but no actual proof. “Maybe.”

  Marcus studied me silently. “You got a lot of sense for your age, DeShawn. More than most cats twice your age. Your momma was that way.”

  I looked up, surprised. “You knew her?”

  Marcus nodded. “She used to babysit me and my brother and sister sometimes.”

  “You have a brother?”

  “Had one.”

  “How—,” I began, and then caught myself. Even at the age of thirteen, I knew he’d probably been shot, OD’d, or maybe died from AIDS.

  For a moment Marcus’s eyes were soft and sad, and I wondered how many people had ever seen that look from him. Then he got up and took a white envelope from a pair of black pants hanging over the back of a chair. He held the envelope open to me. Inside were bills. I thought I saw a hundred and a fifty. Marcus closed the envelope and sealed it with his tongue.

  “Know what bail is, DeShawn?” he asked.

  I shook my head.

  “Say I get arrested,” Marcus said. “My trial may not get scheduled for six months. The police can keep me in jail till then unless I post bail.” He handed me the envelope. “This is bail money. If I get arrested, I’ll send word about what to do with it.”

  “You’re gonna be arrested?” I asked.

  Marcus chuckled. “Sooner or later. If I ain’t killed first. You put that in a safe place. Don’t tell anyone. Not even your gramma.”

  “Why me?”

  “It can’t come from anyone in the Disciples, or the police’ll know it’s tainted. Gotta come from someone on the outside. Someone I can trust.”

  I looked down at the envelope, then thought of something and held it back toward him. “What if you tell someone? Word gets out I have this money, they’ll kill me if I don’t give it to them. Probably kill my sister and Gramma, too.”

  Marcus didn’t take the envelope. “You keep it.”

  “Can’t you find someone else?” I asked.

  He shook his head slowly. “It’s got to be you.”

  “Why?”

  “’Cause you’re the only one that don’t want it.”

  RANCE

  “Where’d you get that scrawny mutt, Bulb?” Bublz asked out in the yard. We were hanging around the bench. Felt like we’d spent the whole summer there. Bublz was eating Cracker Jacks. He was always eating something.

  “Found him,” Lightbulb said. The little brown dog tugged at the clothesline leash, mouth open, tongue hanging out. Its ribs showed through the short fur, and its paws looked too big for the rest of him.

  “How do you know he don’t belong to someone else?” I asked.

  “Anyone says he’s theirs, I’ll give him back,” said Lightbulb. “But so far no one’s said nothing.”

  Bublz shoved a handful of Cracker Jacks into his mouth. “He’s gonna choke himself if he keeps pulling like that. What’s his name?”

  “Snoop.”

  “Snoop Dog,” Bublz smirked. “He’s too dumb to know he’s choking himself.”

  Lightbulb looked down at his new pet with concern. “He ain’t dumb, is he, DeShawn?”

  “Nah, just young. He’ll learn.” I gazed around the yard. “Anyone seen Terrell?”

  “You want to go up to his place?” Lightbulb asked. “He can meet Snoop.”

  “What floor’s he on?” Bublz asked.

  “Sixth,” I said.

  Bublz shook his head. “Too far to climb.”

  Lightbulb and I started toward the building. Snoop squirmed against the leash, sniffing everything. He found an empty Twix wrapper and started to eat it.

  “No, Snoop! You don’t want that garbage.” Lightbulb worked the candy wrapper out of his mouth. The little dog immediately started sniffing around again.

  “When’s the last time you fed him?” I asked.

  “Ain’t fed him yet,” Lightbulb answered.

  “How long have you had him?”

  “Since yesterday.”

  “No wonder he’s so hungry.”

  “Got nothing to feed him,” Lightbulb said.

  “After we see Terrell, we’ll get him something to eat,” I said.

  Upstairs we knocked on Terrell’s door. It had been at least two days since I’d seen him. We could hear the TV on loud.

  “Who’s there?” Terrell yelled.

  “DeShawn and Lightbulb,” I answered.

  The door opened and Terrell stood there bare chested, wearing pajama bottoms. His eyes looked bleary and bloodshot. “S’up?”

  “You been sick?” I asked.

  “Who’s that?” Mrs. Blake came slapping out of the kitchen.

  “Can Terrell come out?” Lightbulb asked.

  “No, he can’t,” Mrs. Blake said. “He’s grounded. Can’t see no friends, neither. So say good-bye and git.”

  Lightbulb glanced at Terrell and dropped his voice. “You being punished?” But he didn’t drop his voice enough.

  “Darn right he is,” said Mrs. Blake. “One week in the house for stealin’ money outta my purse. And being real sneaky about it too. Five dollars here, ten dollars there, hopin’ I wouldn’t notice.”

  Terrell’s face colored, and he closed the door. So that was where his big wad of gwap had come from.

  Back outside, Lightbulb and I walked down Abernathy. The air was cooler and drier than the day before. Like fall was coming. King Chicken was near Washington Carver Middle School, on the border between Douglass and Gentry. There was a parking lot in the front. In the back, a dented, red Dumpster stood against a wall, and the asphalt around it was littered with paper cups and plates, straws, and other garbage. It smelled like rancid milk and rot, but Snoop started yelping and pawing at the ground, tugging as hard as he could.

  “Whoa, Snoop!” Lightbulb gasped. I found a milk crate to stand on and managed to reach into the Dumpster, grab some white paper bags, and toss them onto the ground. Snoop tore into them and started jawing on a piece of chicken.

  “Guess you were right,” Lightbulb said.

  The loud squeal of tires made us jump. A black Range Rover with dark windows and big, glittering rims screeched around the side of the building and skidded to a stop. Lightbulb and I ducked behind the Dumpster. Snoop stayed out in the open, chewing on a chicken leg. We could hear th
e bones cracking between his teeth.

  Three men got out of the Range Rover wearing green and yellow beads around their necks and green bandanas in their pockets—Gentry Gangstas. I put my hand on Lightbulb’s shoulder and slowly drew him farther back into the shadows behind the Dumpster to make sure we wouldn’t be seen.

  One of the Gangstas was medium height, with broad shoulders, and wore a baseball cap backward. Reaching into the car, he yanked out a skinny, old, crusty-looking man with a scruffy gray beard and dirty, torn ghetto clothes. He looked like an old hype or wino, and he was trembling, his yellow eyes wide with fear.

  The broad-shouldered Gangsta pushed the old guy down on his knees before the other two men. One was narrowly built with dark skin, sharp chiseled features, and long pointed sideburns. He stood with his arms crossed and an impassive expression on his face. Like a judge. The other was just plain big, like a football player, with a shaved head under a black do-rag. He grabbed the old guy by the collar and shook him like a floppy doll.

  “This is your last chance, Rodney,” the big guy threatened. “Tell him!”

  “I don’t know nothing!” The scruffy guy trembled and sounded like he was going to cry. “I swear!”

  The Gangsta with the broad shoulders pulled out a big black gun and stuck it against Rodney’s neck. My hand was still on Lightbulb’s shoulder, and I felt him shudder. He started to breathe hard and fast. I squeezed his shoulder reassuringly.

  “We don’t want to kill you,” the broad-shouldered one said.

  “But I swear,” Rodney stammered. “I didn’t see nothing. I didn’t hear nothing. I don’t know nothing. I swear it, Mr. Rance.”

  I caught my breath. Rance was the leader of the Gentry Gangstas. And that meant the big Gangsta was Big D, the second in command. Rodney’s eyes filled with tears, and he intertwined his fingers and pleaded for mercy. Rance stood over him, his arms still crossed, his face blank.