Friday Black

by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

  “Sheesh,” Deirdra says, looking at Porter. “He doesn’t even care anymore.”

  “Show him bad.”

  “Will that help?”

  “I think it could,” Fuckton says, biting his lip.

  “Okay.” Then Deirdra disappears into Porter’s mind.

  “I used to hate when they noticed me. I get it,” says Fuckton while looking at Porter. “Then you think, if they’d just leave me alone, it’d get better. But then when they leave you alone, they leave you all the way alone. It’s just as bad. Worse. It’s like you’re nothing. Nobody. I hated that. I waited until I got to college. One more chance. I gave them one more chance to fix it, but still nothing. Not one friend. No girls looked at me. No one even tried. And I—I gave them so many chances. Order of the Stingray. I’ve touched one before. A real stingray. They’d debarbed it, so it wouldn’t kill everyone. I felt bad for it. But it’s not a real thing. The order isn’t real. We aren’t wizards. I know you think they deserve it. What do you deserve, though? You think you’re already dead. But you’re not.”

  “He can’t hear you. And they don’t deserve anything! You killed Deirdra Hayes, and look at you now,” Deirdra says as she appears back above the two boys. Her wings swing hard and fast. Her voice feels like it’s coming from every direction.

  “It’s just that I know the feeling,” Fuckton says, looking down. “I’m remembering more. I’m trying to do what you are. I wanna help.”

  “Now you want to help people.”

  “I needed help before.” Fuckton runs his hand through his hair twice. Then he speaks again. “Did it work?”

  “No, it didn’t. It wasn’t a good idea.”

  “Dang, okay.”

  “Yeah,” Deirdra says.

  “Well, I was thinking, anyway. I probably used you because you seemed like a good person. You looked nice. Like people would care about you. The news and stuff. I remember feeling like that.”

  “Is that an apology? Never mind. I’m an angel now. Those of my station look forward, not backward.”

  “Okay, but you said Deirdra; that was your name?”

  “Deirdra was her name.”

  “Right.”

  Porter stands up and walks off the bus. The students swarm toward the school’s doors. They laugh and joke as they walk and shove all around him. His fingers strangle his backpack’s straps.

  “I’m going to remind him that it can be better. I have to try it again.”

  “Don’t do that,” Fuckton says as children walk through him. “People will die if you do that.”

  “People are about to die anyway. It’s going to be soon. I have to try.”

  Fuckton looks up at the angel. “I think, maybe—I think if he knew what I know. Can you show him that?”

  “What?”

  “That he won’t be the great culling, or the changeover, or the beginning of a new era, or whatever. That he’ll just be dead in a bathroom. That the Order of the Stingray isn’t a real thing. And it won’t feel like he thinks. It won’t feel good.”

  “I don’t know if I can show him all that. I don’t know what killing is like.”

  “I can show him, maybe. I’ll do what you do but with what I know. With this feeling I have. Will you let me?”

  Deirdra looks at Fuckton, and then at Porter, who is at his locker, twisting a dial. “I think that all you are is that feeling now. I think that if you give it to him, show it to him, you’ll really be nothing,” she says, pointing to the hole in his chest.

  “Do you think I was always a bad person?” Fuckton asks.

  “I don’t know. We don’t have a lot of time.”

  “This is the most anyone has ever really talked to me. You know me more than anyone already. Do you think I was always like that?”

  “I don’t know, probably not,” Deirdra says as she floats down to the floor. “I know you’ve been through a lot. But we don’t have time.”

  “I know.” Fuckton opens a hand, releasing Deirdra’s feather. It glows and rides the air before settling into her wing. “I wish it was different. I’m sorry. I wasn’t always like that.”

  “I think I can help you show him,” Deirdra says. “You probably won’t last through it. Okay?”

  Porter opens his locker. He puts the bag in his locker and unzips it.

  “Let me do it. Before though, do you still hate me?”

  “I’m an angel now,” she says as she takes Fuckton’s hand.

  Then the two of them are living through Porter Lanks. They see the halls of Wetmoss High covered in photos of his awkward, naked body. They see Porter standing up to a taller, stronger boy. They feel a fist on their ribs, their nose shattering.

  And then they are Porter. They feel him as he pulls a trigger. They are Porter as he watches the people running from him. They watch as he sees himself being the only thing anyone can think or talk about for years to come. They see the glorious moment when, like a warlock, Porter will end the ingrate of his choosing on this day of glorious judgment. His name will burn eternally. Children will cry when they hear his name. He will rule their nightmares. Porter sees them running. Porter sees them bleeding. He was the one who should have been worshipped. He was the one!

  And then Porter Lanks sees himself dying. He feels the wondrous glory bleed out of him. Was it ever even there? He sees himself in the bathroom near the tech hall, alone as ever in his stall. The stall that still says, PORTER LANKS IS A FROG. It used to say, PORTER LANKS IS A FAG, but he spent a study hall period trying to carve something else—something that would still satisfy them, but something he could look at every day and not feel like he was already dead. He can see that when he’s in the bathroom stall he won’t be the king of a great carnage but something much lower, stupider than even a frog. People will remember his name—until they don’t.

  In the crowded halls of Wetmoss High, Porter reaches into his backpack and pulls out a slim notebook and pen and a biology textbook. Deirdra floats beside him as he walks to the bathroom near the tech hall. He goes into his stall, and he begins to cry, silently, the way he used to. For fun, he uses his pen to carve a small arrow pointing down between the words “a” and “frog” and writes “flying.”

  How to Sell a Jacket as Told by IceKing

  A mother and father and their two kids. Mother’s eyes are on the PoleFace™ sign. There’s a small smirk on my face, and I say, kind of to everyone but mostly to Mother, “What are we looking for today?” like I’ve been waiting for them my whole life. They look at me. And, because I saw how they came in, how their eyes pushed toward the back of the store, I already know what’s coming when Mother says, “Well, um—” So I beat her there. “The best sale we have in the store right now is on our winter coats and jackets.” She says, “That’s what I like to hear.” And we might as well mark up the sale right there.

  “Seventh and tenth in the entire nation, so clap it up for that,” Angela, the store manager, announced. The whole store flapped their hands at us. I watched them clap.

  I’ve been top ten in the nation for two years straight. There’s a good chance this year I’ll crack top three in company history. Total sales. Still, it’s a strange thing when a bunch of people—some you like, some you hate all over again every shift—are clapping for you. And you have to kind of smile a little bit but not too much, as if to say, Yes, I am, in fact, the shit.

  While they clapped, Florence smiled her perfect smile. I watched her, too.

  Her second week in the store, Florence made a girl who came in for a hat for her boyfriend leave with a new fall wardrobe. Florence started not even a year ago. She’s what some might call a natural, but really, I taught her a lot. Now when girls come in looking for jeans, they ask, “Is Florence in today?” like only Florence can divine the necessary denim for their begging hips.

  Still, it’s me Angela uses when she needs an example of what to do right. Even though, when she’s talking about how to be a good employee, everybody knows I don’t do any of th
e things she’s talking about—except sell. In the mall the only truths that matter are the kinds you can count. Sales goals, register tills, inventory. Numbers are it. Everything else is mostly bullshit.

  I’m lead sales associate because of my numbers. When managers step out to grab food, or smoke, or fuck in the shipment bay, they point to me, and say, “Hold the floor down.” Sometimes they’ll hand me a clipboard with everybody’s break times and daily goals. Whenever I’m on the clock, my daily goal is the highest. They think it motivates me.

  The family follows me to the PoleFace™ section. I walk so quickly they have to work a little to keep up. “So, who are we trying to keep warm this winter?” I’m walking fast because, one, I don’t want any distractions keeping us from where we need to be and, two, I don’t want Florence to come around making suggestions and, three, I want the family to get used to living life at my pace. The youngest child is a small girl; you can’t even imagine her as a teenager. The other kid is a pimply boy, maybe fourteen. I smile at the kids quickly. I set my jaw and keep a thoughtful look on when I make eye contact with Father. When I look at Mother, I imagine my own mother; I smile with all the love of the world in my eyes.

  Our store is basically a big warehouse with hangers and racks. We have clothes popularized by rappers and skateboarders. Families like this one are why I’m ranked nationally: two kids, still happy enough to shop together, white. Very American dream–ish.

  “We’re thinking about a coat for me and maybe this one,” Father says out of the side of his mouth while gesturing toward the son who’s drifting off toward the graphic tees.

  “Something that will last,” Mother says definitively.

  “Look at this!” the young girl says. She pulls a blue shirt off a table. The shirt has a green moose on it. We stop to turn to the small child. I smile at her, then wait.

  “Put that down,” Mother says.

  “But—”

  “Leah,” Mother says in that tone doctors must gift to new parents right after they have their first kid.

  Leah’s smile melts. She starts to toss the shirt back.

  “A bunch of our best outerwear comes with a gift card as part of our winter sale,” I say. Leah stops in her tracks. She smiles. She whips her look to Dad’s eyes, then Mom’s, and then back to Dad’s, waiting for a face that says yes.

  “Oh really?” Mother says.

  “Yup,” I say.

  We’re back on track to PoleFace™. Leah is throttling the blue shirt, then wearing it like a boa. When her parents aren’t looking, I wink at her and we share a big smile. We pass the front register where Angela is standing guard and working backup. I feel her eyes as I lead the pack to the winter section. My section. It’s my break time, but Angela knows to let me work.

  I take extra time on my breaks. When I’m not on break, I’ll go to the bathroom and I’ll sit on the toilet doing nothing for fifteen minutes sometimes. Every few minutes I flush the toilet so I can listen to the water escaping. The district manager treats me to pizza when he visits. He doesn’t have to ask what I like anymore: two pepperoni slices and an iced tea. Most people get all nervous when they hear Richard is coming in—me, my mouth waters. That’s his name, Richard. Nobody calls him anything else to his face. I can’t remember the last time Richard called me by my name. He calls me IceKing. Every time he sees me, it’s “There he is, the mighty IceKing.” He started calling me that after my second Black Friday, a particularly gruesome one, where I doubled my expected total. He said I was IceKing because I was the lord of the winter sale season. I don’t call Richard anything, even though over one of our lunches, he said, “Call me Rich. I’m not there yet, but a guy can dream, right?” He laughed, and I made myself laugh the same way he did.

  “So this is everything.” I motion with my arms, like, Welcome to my humble abode. There are thin jackets and fleeces on floor racks. Ski jackets and heavy coats hang like limp bodies from face-outs in the walls. There are even tiny jackets for infants. “What do we need?” I say to the family. Reminding them they need something.

  “Thanks, buddy, I think we’re okay to just browse around,” Father says.

  “He needs something for when we go skiing,” Mother says with a sigh. “In Denver,” she adds, like she’s letting some big secret out. I keep my smile low.

  “That’s great. This whole section here”—I walk a few steps; they follow—“is designed specifically for skiers and snowboarders.” I stop in front of these jackets that have bright colors accented by reflective silver. They look like speed. They are thinner than a lot of our other stuff, and they are some of the most expensive pieces in the store. But this family can afford to see. I know what a desperate mother sounds like. This mother doesn’t need a sale, but she considers herself a smart shopper. They are a happy family. I am IceKing.

  If anybody has what I have, it’s Florence. She is like me. Angela says Florence practically filled out her application while in labor. That’s why she’s so good. She’s a mom even though we’re both young enough that working here isn’t automatically depressing—you have to think you’re stuck for it to be. Also, Florence is pretty. Me, I got words and a smile. I wear clothes that show kids I know what’s up. I hook a snapback hat so it hangs through the loops of my jeans. Florence can do all that and she’s pretty. She has deep dimples. Her hair is always doing something amazing. When the cashiers ask, “Did anyone help you out today?” customers say, “The one with the nice hair,” when they mean Florence. When they mean me, they say, “The tall one,” if they’re white. If they’re black, they say, “The black guy.”

  A family like this one, it doesn’t matter who actually needs anything. Mom is the mark.

  “Hmm,” Mother says, looking to me for a second opinion. The jacket Father has on is a credibility jacket. They need to see me not like something. Father is frowning, looking at his arms in the material. It’s black and blue, and it happens to have the ability to completely transform into a backpack. I say this several times.

  “I don’t need anything fancy. It’s just skiing,” Father says. He didn’t even want to come to the mall today.

  “Yeah, now that it’s on you, I’m not so sure about it,” I say. Father looks at me and tries not to smile. “You have a bunch to choose from. This one might be better for your son, maybe.”

  “He can get whatever he wants.” Father starts peeling himself free. “But I don’t need a jacket that turns into a purse.”

  “Yeah,” I say, chuckling like he does.

  The wife folds her arms and waits for something to happen. While her husband wrestles out of the jacket, I look at Mother. She rolls her eyes. I do the same. Without words, together we say, Men make everything so difficult. Then, as I’m taking the jacket from a still-grumbling Father, I look at him like Women, am I right?

  “What about me?” the little girl with the blue shirt says. Mother and Father both slam looks at her. Leah frowns silently. I flash her a smile, and she flashes a bigger one back.

  “I think . . . ” I look around and settle on the coat. It’s thick and olive green. It is heavy, but I’ll say this explicitly, it’s got vents that keep the material breathable. “Yeah, I think this one is the one.” I know it’s the one. I saw Father’s eyes linger on it as he tried on the first jacket. I know Mother will like it because it looks expensive. It is expensive, though slightly cheaper than the credibility jacket. I can upsell. I can downsell. I can do it all.

  “I’ll try that one,” Father mumbles. They don’t have to tell me the size. With the first coat, I grabbed a large because they run a little bit bigger. This time I grab an extra large. Instead of just handing him the coat like before, I hold it open for him and drape him in it, so his first memory of wearing it will be one of ease. “Thanks,” he says. He zips it, unzips it, shrugs his shoulders once, twice. Then he looks at his wife. Working here, I’ve learned that married men use their wives as mirrors.

  Florence has sold three winter coats today already. Fl
orence is currently seventh in the nation in sales. She’s the real deal, but I’m me. I carve ICEKING in the walls of the shipping halls. That way, even when I’m done with the mall, my legend will live forever.

  Father is waiting for Mother to say yes, but then he sees she’s looking at me. I smile and nod, then circle Father once, pretending to be inspecting closely for some minor detail we might have overlooked. They’re both watching me as I orbit. “I think this is the one,” I finally say.

  “I do, too,” Mother says immediately. Father goes to look at himself in a mirror. Leah tugs at a jacket on a hanger. The young boy, he’s just drifting back to the group.

  “You think it’s okay?” Father asks.

  “Yeah, it’s simple but clean looking, and it definitely looks solid,” I say. I’ve said the same thing, the same way, to so many different faces.

  “Mmhmm, you can tell it’s quality,” Mother says.

  “How much is this thing going to run me?” Father says as he grabs the red tag dangling from the front zipper. He frowns deeply.

  If it’s a family that won’t pay for the PoleFace™ after I show them the price, they’ll say something like, “You’re shitting me, right?” or “Okay, but what’s the real price?” Right away, I say, “I know. Crazy, right?” Like it was a big joke. I’ll rush to the cheaper stuff. I have about thirty seconds before they disappear. But before they’re gone, I’ll show them—“This here,” another jacket of equal quality and half the price, “is what I wear when I’m upstate, in Albany.”

  “Albany?”

  “Yeah, I visit a lot. I’m going to school up there.” A wish. A lie. I don’t know. “It’s freezing,” I’ll say.

  “You don’t say,” they’ll say back.

  “That’s a whole lot to ask for one jacket,” Father says.

  “Well, part of it is the lifetime warranty,” I say. “And—” Then, of course, Florence appears. “And right now,” she says, “we’re doing a new sale where for purchases of more than two hundred dollars on any combination of coats or jackets, you get a gift card back.” She’s holding a clipboard. She stands there, and you can feel the family deciding who they want as master. “Want me to toss that one behind the register for you while you look for another?” Then Florence turns to me. She says, “Angela told me to tell you to go on break.” Her voice is sweet and acid. I stand for a second. Today they officially promoted Florence. Her name tag, where it used to say SALES ASSOCIATE, says ASSISTANT MANAGER.