Man Gone Down

by Michael Thomas

  And the leaders call to the dead. They call on the dead, and then say the dead call out for retribution. It all seems too convenient—that the chorus from a mass grave would rise up and sing for another and another and another. Genocide wrapped in some rationalization that someone is owed something. The continued body count, millennia old and miles long. My old friend Brian is ash. Fuck you.

  And then it was time to get past it—move on. I hadn’t gotten past the last slaughter or the one before it. And I knew I was wrong, because I crashed around, ranting and angry when I knew I was just sad, just a sad coward. Too scared to mourn, to deal with grief, so I took it out on my children. I made sure that they were okay. I made sure that they were healing, all the while knowing that my motives were flawed. Premeditated acts of heroism usually are.

  I turned off the radio and the television for a long time. I stopped reading the newspaper. I missed the war. When I thought it was safe to tune back in—back to those who’d moved on—I found that it wasn’t. It was back to the same old shit—bulldozers and human bombs, corporate scandals—people advancing what they thought they deserved. Racial ideology. One day I heard a man posit the same tired argument promoting black entrepreneurship: Money. Power. It’s always struck me as odd—turning one’s back on resistance. If you and yours have been exploited for capital, then why, in turn, would you covet that capital?

  I used to sit on the curb on hot summer days, music on the transistor radio hung on the cyclone fence. The singers would preach the gospel of love and redemption—like a sermon on the slab. Even the teenagers, the junior pimps and loan sharks, would stop and listen. And when the cops would cruise up looking for someone’s brother or someone’s daddy, or the owner of the fence, and would threaten to “smash that damn thing” if we didn’t shut it off and move, we’d all quietly stand and stare and turn off the radio and take it off the fence. I don’t know, but to me, even as a small boy, I thought we’d done something. I thought we’d won. And some of those boys are dead now, some are locked up and some made money and bought houses with fences to remind a new generation about property. But the caller on the radio, a doctor, successful, he claimed, was angry—his Hippocratic oath lost in some cellar box. He shouted that the last thing we needed to be was spiritual. Would that be changing the system from within—buying your freedom? As though freedom had a price that could be expressed monetarily. The man gives you a dollar and a title and everything’s cool, or on the way to being cool, or cool enough for you. But what would I know? My father is toothless and impotent. My mother died broke and alone, listening to yet another soul single. Looks like I will, too.

  There’s a noise on the bridge. There’s something up here with me and for an instant I let myself think it’s something evil, something after me. I jump and I run. I’m gone, downhill—as though Mrs. McDougal’s sicced her Doberman on me and I’m just trying to make it to my door, but I’m running the wrong way, into Manhattan and I don’t know what’s behind: dog, dog pack, bike gang. All I can hear is my breathing, my feet on the planks. There’s no cover downtown, nothing until Tribeca or Chinatown. I’m on the concrete. The descent flattens. I tear through the turn at the bottom and try to sneak a look. There’s something behind me, just far enough away to be a blob, but still menacing. The whole bridge seems to move. The air around it, the glossy, blue starless night separates from itself: great blue body, great blue sea. I search for another gear as I zig off Centre to Duane—it’s not there.

  I turn up Church. My spit tastes bitter and I’m beginning to feel my body, its limits. My legs will cover only so much ground. My feet will turn over only so fast and it doesn’t seem fast enough. Gavin’s father had always drilled us never to look back, that looking back robs you of your inertia. “Be like Lot.” I start seeing colors in the periphery at Spring Street. The streetlights blur and form permanent dots in the air. I’m going catabolic. Protein is shitty fuel but I suck on my bleeding lip anyway, trying to recycle something.

  It’s a strange thing to go through life as a social experiment. Mama never told me there’d be days like this, that the God she’d evoked would be gone, his disciples dead, mad, vanished, or corrupted, that those who were left would be running for their lives. I wonder if God stayed my mother’s hand above the toilet bowl. I see me swirling down. A sheet of lightning blows up Sixth Avenue. It’s outflanked me. I turn east on Houston. Two women at the corner clap as I go by. The blocks seem to elongate and then suddenly I’m at the end of them. More lightning over the river. I run south down Lafayette. There’s still a chance. Somewhere on a side street a truck runs over a steel plate. The thunder responds. Then the sky explodes with noise and light and water. The rain on my face mixes with my sweat and I taste brine and blood on my lips. The wind throws garbage at me. My heart thumps like a manic donkey’s hoof against my chest. It too will explode soon. I’m still three miles away from Marco’s.

  I make the bridge. I watch it rise, long and steadily and I realize I’ve been running downhill for the last mile. I make it halfway up the wood and the bile comes—an olive green blast that cuts through the wind. I stumble forward, still puking, and then I go down. My gagging is so loud and so external I can’t believe it’s me.

  Finally I stop. The rain may have stopped before, I don’t know. I’m on my knees, the last wave of heaves gone. The bridge cables rise and seem to bend over me like ribs. I’m inside a mile of skeleton. Inside. I’ve been inside all along. Swallowed long ago. I never knew. I never wanted to know. I’ve been dumb and wanting inside a giant sea belly. The sky is calm. The world has cooled because I’m inside—no weather. The city sprawls endlessly in every direction.

  There’s someone ahead of me on the bridge, not too far away. Close enough to see the bob-bob of her ponytail as she ascends. She runs like Claire. She looks as though she’s moving quickly, but she isn’t covering much ground at all. She must have been close when I went down. It’s too late for her to be alone on the bridge. It’s not safe. I stand up and start running again—just fast enough to close the gap a bit. Just close enough to keep an eye on her.

  I close on her quickly. She bounces up and down, going through the motions of running without really doing so. Black sport bra. Black short shorts. Blonde hair. She’s long legged, and as I close I see her hamstrings and calves contract and release.

  I’m on her hip and she turns. She doesn’t startle. She smiles and waves in time with her gait. She speeds up and tries to stay with me. We run together, make the plateau and wind around the center pillar, me every few steps pushing the pace just a hint. She breathes heavily and lengthens her stride—less bounce. She exhales through her mouth, pursing her lips as if to focus her overall effort. We hit the downhill. She shakes her head, whipping her hair across her face like a horsetail.

  “Go.”

  She waves toward Brooklyn. She pats her sternum and feigns a wheeze.

  “I’m okay. Go.”

  She waves again. I find a new gear, and then another. And I’m fast again. But now I feel solid, like one muscle exerting one effort with no memory of the effort before. I make a promise, out loud, to whoever may be listening. “I will do it. I will get the money. Then I will go. I swear it.”

  Tomorrow I will go to work and do whatever it is I need to do. The vertical iron rails flash by quickly, giving fleeting glimpses of the road below and the river beyond. I remember riding the streetcars with my mother after work and how the fences would start to blur as the train gathered speed. The metal would flicker with light and the images of the world beyond as though I was looking into the lens of some old, dimmed projector. She’d shift her legs and the grocery bags at her feet would complain. And not knowing I was watching her, she’d sigh, and her miles and her age would show in her face and sit on her shoulders. She’d involuntarily start to hum or even sing, “People get Ready.” The memory fades back to the black water, the rails—so real that I reach out for them. And it’s just me going fast and the bridge and the water, sleep
ing Brooklyn in front and tomorrow in my head. The dead are quiet now, soon they will be gone, for that is the price of empire.

  II

  Big Nig

  If you came this way,

  Taking any route, starting from anywhere,

  At any time or at any season,

  It would always be the same: you would have to put off

  Sense and notion. You are not here to verify,

  Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity

  Or carry report. You are here to kneel

  Where prayer has been valid. And prayer is more

  Than an order of words, the conscious occupation

  Of the praying mind, or the sound of the voice praying.

  And what the dead had no speech for, when living,

  They can tell you, being dead: the communication

  Of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living.

  —T. S. Eliot, “Little Gidding” I

  6

  C had looked at my knees one morning. We were staying at an inn and had gotten up early to watch the World Cup final from Korea. I was trying to walk quietly down the groaning steps. My legs were stiff, having danced with Claire the night before at her cousin’s wedding, and I had to use the rail. There’s not much worse, socially, than being a brown person on the dance floor at an otherwise all-white event. I don’t like dancing anywhere, certainly not sober. And to have them watch me shift my weight, conservatively on creaking knees and ankles, emulating the sexual act with their Brahmin jewel while flanked by my children, X every so often slamming into me like a blitzing linebacker. Claire thought it was fun.

  C watched me struggling and wondered aloud if Ronaldo’s injuries had been worse than mine.

  “Worse. Much worse.”

  “What did he do?”

  “One year a fractured tibia. Ruptured patellar tendon the next.”

  “That’s bad?”

  “Yes.”

  “But he’s better now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. They need him.”

  We were alone at the start—seven o’clock. It was a chilly New Hampshire mountain morning. And as the den began to fill with guests and the morning warmed, C left his sweater on, sensing from the crowd that they, for a reason he couldn’t understand, were rooting for Germany. It was tense going—more people entered, sat, voiced their opinions, and talked about their children’s teams or their own former athletic glory. And even when his hero broke the scoreless tie, he remained silent. He looked around nervously and pressed a bit closer to me on the couch—trying to read my expression. I patted his head. One woman kept looking from C to the television, trying to link him to the Brazilian players who celebrated. She wouldn’t look at me. When Ronaldo scored the second goal to seal the victory, C couldn’t help himself. He jumped up, tore his sweater off to reveal the homemade shirt. He pointed into the air, waving the index finger slightly—just like the man on the TV—and ran out of the room, triumphant.

  Still no sleep. It’s amazing what happens when the adrenaline tapers off, the endorphins disappear. I sit on the bed in the dark kiddie room and feel the pulsing, dull ache of twenty years of long distance running, hundreds of soccer games, hundreds of slides on hard-packed infields, fence jumping, sprints down alleys, nightsticks to the ribs and handcuffs, knees threatening to collapse while playing with the kids on a Brooklyn schoolyard’s asphalt top. They, unknowingly undercutting me, me not wanting to trample them. Then later, C watching me pop Motrin and sit on the floor strapped in ice.

  I get ready to leave before Claire can call to wish me a happy birthday—to ask me what I’m doing. I feed Thomas three pellets. He’s slow to react. They start to sink into the bowl. I want to give him more. The food instructions say that he should eat fresh pellets taken from the surface of the water, but they also warn against overfeeding. I’ll give him more later if those aren’t gone.

  Because of its southern exposure, the great window room is already bright. Marco is asleep on the couch. His laptop is next to him and the brief in question is spread across his knees. The television is on—Cool Hand Luke. He’s preaching his gospel to George Kennedy, just before they shoot him. I shut it off. He stirs, kicking the paper in the air. He gropes the couch for his glasses.

  “What time is it?”

  “Six thirty.”

  “You’re out early.”

  “Meeting.”

  “Right.”

  He closes his eyes again. I think that I should make sure he’s up for good, but he’s the boss. He can be late. I go down to the cellar to where my tools are stashed. I open the gang box and proceed to lay the items I want to take on the floor. I don’t know who I’m working for or what I’ll be doing so I take out my cordless and my half-inch drill. I take out my twenty-ounce hammer, five pencils, try square, twenty-five-foot tape, speed square, chalk line and extra chalk, grease pencil, Sharpie, utility knife, extra bits, #2, and #3 Phillips, #1 and #2 trim square, slot-head bits, hex head, channel locks, tin snips, needle-nose, small C-clamps, Besseys, speed-bore set, masonry and metal bits, plumb bob and line, torpedo level, wooden rule with depth gauge, five-in-one, battery charger and extra battery for the cordless. I leave the ratchet set, pipe wrench, and the remaining power tools behind. I look over the assemblage—call each tool out by name. I do it again, touching each one, as well. Then I put them, one by one, into my large canvas bag. I stuff my tool belt in last and sling the bag over my shoulder.

  Marco’s still on the couch, but he’s awake, sitting up, rubbing his eyes. He stops and looks my way. He’s too nearsighted to see me from across the house. He waves to the sounds of the street coming through the open door.

  I set off. It’s already hot outside. The air’s loaded with water. On the corner of Wyckoff and Court is a Chinese takeout booth. As I pass, someone turns on the exhaust fan and I get a blast of celery and ancient chicken in my face along with the rust tint of the fan blade and whatever greasy filth is trapped in the housing. I turn right—north—up the slight grade. I walk past the travel agent, the gourmet shop, past the coffee shop in which, ten years ago the kid at the counter checked to see if the ten I had given him was counterfeit. I walk past the realtor who never seemed to be able to find Claire and me an apartment when we first looked at the neighborhood. Past the closed Taqueria. I cross Bergen Street, looking down the hill to the F-train stop at the bottom.

  A kid from the bagel store is hosing down the concrete, washing the scum left behind from last night’s trash. He stops the water so I can pass. He’s used bleach. It burns my eyes and nostrils as I walk by, but it’s failed to kill all the stink. The milky, oily water collects in the gutter because there’s a slight depression in the road. The sun will have to dry it all up.

  I pass and hear him turn the spray on again. I walk past the vet and wait at the corner of Dean, where cars always make the illegal dogleg turn against the traffic on Court. They’ve finished the facade of the funeral home. Instead of stucco they used Styrofoam sheathing and epoxy paint. Down the hill is the gym I used to go to. A couple walks up past the little firehouse toward me. They’re both very tall and thin. I’ve seen them for years. They’re both graying. They walk with their squash racquets poking out from their bags. He, as always, is still wearing his safety goggles. He sees me and shoots a quick, high wave. She doesn’t. I wave back.

  A neighborhood mom I recognize from the playground passes them. She jogs slowly. She’s sweaty and heavy. She wears big shorts and a tentlike T-shirt. She nears, does a double take, and waves. She looks at my tool bag and nods as though it’s answered a question for her. She passes and I recall her face—little eyes, rodentine, lidless, and her pinched nose. I turn to look at her. I’ve overheard her talking about her battles with her weight with her pals. She’s been shuffling in the early morn for a half decade now. She’s dieted, fasted. Nothing’s changed. Now, she’s just older.

  There used to be a café—Roberto’s—owned by a screwball Puer
to Rican who passed himself off as Italian. He made the best coffee, nice little sandwiches, too. No cell phones allowed. No laptops. He had iron lawn chairs and an oak church pew and two long plywood tables. One day he got sick of breaking even, serving the privileged stroller brigade, and left the shutter down.

  It surprises some people that I go to a chain store for my coffee, but I won’t support the incompetent mom-and-pop operations that keep springing up around the neighborhood, subsidize half-wit entrepreneurial fantasies by agreeing to their criminal markups. Besides, black girls work in the Starbucks. Sometimes I even call them my girls. I don’t know if their personal stakes in the company are myth or fact, but they always brew a good strong cup and treat me well. Besides, my girls have taken over this outpost—shed the caps and shirts. Shed the greetings. I never have to order. They always slide my large black to me with six ice cubes dropped in on top so as to take the coffee out of the lawsuit temperature range.

  Kelly is short and round faced, with dark chocolate skin. She waves me off when I go for my money.

  “How are the babies?”

  “Babies are good—good. You?”

  “I’m good. It’s all good. You look tired.”