When I Was the Greatest

by Jason Reynolds

I pushed the wobbly cart up the block. By now it was dark, and the streetlights were like spotlights highlighting fire hydrants, and kids out after curfew. Noodles walked a few feet away from me. I could tell he didn’t want to be doing this, but no way was he saying no to Doris. We didn’t say nothing to each other until we got to the top of the block, and we waited for the light to change.

  “Stupid wheel,” I said, giving the cart a shake. I had to say something.

  “Yeah, Manu should go ahead and trash this one,” Noodles agreed.

  “Right.”

  The light changed.

  We headed for the supermarket and didn’t say another word to each other until we started walking back.

  “So, Needles is good?”

  “Huh?”

  “You told my dad Needles is good. Is he?” I asked, trying to sound somewhere in the middle.

  “Yeah, he’s good,” Noodles said, shoving his hands in his pockets. “It’s just, y’know, tough.”

  I played dumb, mainly because I knew he wanted to talk about it. I wanted to talk about it too. “What’s tough?”

  “Everything. I mean, he won’t even talk to me. Won’t even look at me if he can help it. I really did it this time, Ali. You mad at me, he mad at me, I’m mad at me.” He ripped a fistful of leaves off a scraggly tree we were walking by. “Man, I don’t know what to do.”

  “Yeah,” I said, preparing myself for what I was about to say, because I had decided right then and there to swallow my pride. “But I gotta apologize to you too, for my part in all this mess. I pushed for him going to the stupid party in the first place. You didn’t want him to go. I did.”

  “Yeah, but he should’ve been able to go anyway. I mean, he ain’t really no different from us. He just got a syndrome, but man, the way I been feeling, and when I think about the way I act sometimes, shoot, I probably got some kind of syndrome too.”

  A laugh snorted out of me. “Me too!”

  “And I know this wrong, man, but the way you hit them fools the other night, they probably got a couple syndromes too now!”

  We both snort-laughed, and then Noodles’s laughter drifted off.

  “Speaking of all that, I heard they looking for us.” Noodles’s voice went from joking to real worried, in a snap.

  “My dad took care of all that. Nothing to trip about.”

  “Dad? You mean John?” He nodded, almost to himself. “Hey, that’s cool. But what about me and Needles?”

  “He took care of it for y’all, too. We all together in this.”

  Noodles didn’t say nothing.

  “Nood, I gotta ask you something. Did you apologize to your brother yet?” That question had been rattling around my mind for a while now, because even though I hoped that Noodles had made some changes, I wasn’t so sure that he had come square with Needles.

  “Yeah, man, but he ain’t say nothing. I don’t think he believes me.” Noodles started folding up those pitiful leaves like he folded up his comic book pages. Clearly, he had a syndrome too—a folding syndrome.

  We were waiting for the light to change again.

  “Honestly, he probably don’t. Gotta show him. Not trying to be soft, but that’s the way things go. Shoot, man, I been learning that a lot lately over at my place.”

  The light changed.

  Once we got back to my stoop, we sat at the top, side by side, and watched nothing and everything. The smell of barbecue sauce was seeping from the window upstairs, seducing the whole hood. Ms. Brenda was walking up the block, stopping every few steps to chat with someone else. Black had his cab at the end of the block and was looking under the hood. Kim was in the driver’s seat, starting the car every time he gave her the signal. The radio was up loud, but it wasn’t no music coming out of the speakers. Instead it was some mess about medical stuff. Like a book on tape or something. Must’ve been Kim’s, but when it comes to Black, you just never know. It might’ve been his. Old man Malloy was being wheeled down the sidewalk by little Joe. Malloy glanced over at me, at us, and just nodded his head. I don’t know what that meant exactly, but I took it as something good.

  Then all of a sudden, out of the blue, Noodles decided to break down how, over the last few days, with all the time to himself, he figured out why he loved comics so much. He was holding those folded leaves like they were pages from his actual comics.

  “It’s because the main dude is always like some guy who really wants to do good but always messes up. He’s like . . . like . . .” Noodles couldn’t find the word.

  “Misunderstood?”

  “Yeah! They always misunderstood.”

  “Uh-huh. So now you think you Incredible Hulk, huh?”

  “Naw, you saw me the other night. I’m Mr. Invisible!”

  We both laughed, and just like that, we were cool again. Noodles continued to dissect all the stuff he thought was deep about comics, and how when he draws them, he adds tattoos and jewelry and stuff like that to make them more current. I was just listening and trying not to clown him, and even told him that I still had the one he gave me when we first met, when all of a sudden a door slammed.

  Noodles and I both jumped up and looked over at their apartment, thinking that maybe it was Needles coming out to join us. But it wasn’t. Actually, it was his mother, Ms. Janice, dressed in a mini skirt and a mini-er shirt, trotting down the steps, holding an overnight bag.

  “Hi, Ms. Janice,” I said, to be respectful.

  “Hi, baby,” she said, like it was a reflex to respond that way.

  Noodles just sat back down on the stoop, flicking those folded leaves down the steps.

  As usual, a car pulled up. This time a Benz the color of wet sidewalk. Ms. Janice pulled her skirt down as she slipped into the car, everyone on the block watching her. I purposely didn’t look at Noodles. I could tell he was uncomfortable, and it instantly reminded me of the first day I met him on that stoop, and how embarrassed he was that he lived in a slum house, a place everybody knew junkies and hookers hung out at. Most of our neighbors still felt that way about that house, and I think now the reason why is mainly because of Ms. Janice. And even though I thought it was messed up that his mother didn’t say nothing to him when she was leaving, I think, in a weird way, Noodles was cool with it. I don’t think he wanted her to.

  A few moments after the car pulled off, we heard another door open. Well, the same door as before. Just again. We jumped up, waiting to see who was coming out. We heard grunting, and slow feet dragging, until finally Needles stepped out. He looked good in the sense that he was standing up and walking on his own, but he looked bad in the sense that he just seemed wiped out. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days. His face was kinda gray, his lips cracked and rough.

  He stood at the top of the stoop and stared out into the busy street, but not at anything or anyone in particular. He didn’t even notice me and Noodles sitting on my stoop next door. One of Needles’s eyes twitched slightly. It was like he was possessed or in some kind of trance. He stood there like an exhausted climber who had just made it to the peak of a mountain. He wobbled like he could pass out at any given moment.

  “Needles!” I shouted, jumping to my feet and charging down the steps in front of my house.

  “Needles!” Noodles repeated, following behind me.

  All I could think about was that I didn’t want Needles to fall. I wouldn’t be able to deal with the sight of him tumbling down the concrete stoop.

  I was just going to take him by the hand and help him down. But before we could start up the steps toward him, Needles began to scream.

  Oh, damn. Damn! He was making a sound that I had never heard before. I don’t even really know how to describe it. Maybe like a police siren, and a baby cry, and screeching tires all mixed up. He held it as long as he could, and when he ran out of breath, he did it again. In between screams he would shout a cuss word or something strange, but then he’d go right back to the screaming.

  Everyone—the whole block—froze. The kids st
opped splashing in the hydrant, stuck, not sure if they should laugh or cry. Little Joe stopped pushing his grandfather, Malloy, who snatched his sunglasses from his face. Kim turned the radio down in the car, and Black popped his head out from under the hood. And me and Noodles stood there, like our feet were melting into the concrete. We didn’t know what to do.

  Kim began to run toward us. Black chased behind her, yelling for her to stay away just in case Needles was dangerous. But Kim said she knew he wouldn’t hurt her. They started up the steps, and the closer they got, the more Needles stepped back.

  “We’re not gonna hurt you, Needles,” Kim said in her usual sweet way, but Needles kept screaming, now pressed against that door, screaming, screaming.

  Kim and Black backed down a few steps, confused.

  “I don’t know what to do. It’s like he’s scared of us,” Kim said, her face pale.

  “This happened before,” I told her, my brain finally working again.

  “Knitting stuff!” Noodles cried. “I’ll go ask your mom—maybe she got some more.” He ran into my building, almost knocking my dad over as he was racing out.

  “What is that?” John asked, gaping at Needles.

  “He’s having some kind of meltdown!” I told him.

  Another thing I learned that day is that parents always have more than one of everything. Even random stuff like yarn and knitting needles. Just like that, my mother came flying out the front door, another ball or roll or whatever you call it of yarn in her hand and two more needles. Noodles came running out behind her.

  By now, everybody was in on it. Ms. Brenda stood on the third step speaking sweet things to Needles, but I’m sure he couldn’t even hear her over his own screams. And Malloy, well, being Malloy, he just sat at the bottom of the stoop yelling his head off too. He was hollering at Needles, telling him to relax while he got more and more worked up himself. I didn’t see how yelling at someone to calm down would actually get them to calm down. Shoot, if my mother didn’t come back out there, Malloy probably would’ve resorted to his old faithful and offered Needles a drink.

  Once Doris started up the stoop, Needles stopped yelling. He watched her warily as she slowly stepped closer, the yarn and needles in her hand. This time the yarn was pink. Once she got all the way up, she held out the yarn like an offering. He looked at her, twitching, tears running down his cheeks.

  “Ms . . . Ms. Doris,” he stuttered.

  My mother got closer to him. Needles said something to her, but he was talking so low, we couldn’t hear. My mother nodded and leaned in even closer. Jazz was peeking out from behind my father, who was standing on the first step, ready to protect my mom just in case something went down. I told him that it was okay—that Needles wasn’t violent. But something was definitely wrong.

  A few moments later my mother calmly turned around and started back down the steps, still holding the yarn. She looked from me to Noodles. Needles started shouting again from the top.

  She cleared her throat. “He said . . .” She got choked up and tried again. “He said . . . it hurts. It hurts him, son.” She stared down Noodles, frowning. “That’s all he said. It hurts.” And then she held the yarn and the needles out in front of Noodles, who looked at them the same way he glared at my hand the first day we met, like he wasn’t sure.

  It hurts. I could tell almost everyone else around us assumed that he meant his injuries. Like Malloy said, the streets had been talking, and the whole block knew, or at least thought they knew, about Needles being beaten up. But me and Noodles knew what he really meant, what this was really about, and now it was Noodles’s turn to earn his brother back.

  Noodles took the pink yarn and the needles like taking a baton in a relay race, and started up the steps, two at a time. Now tears were leaking from his eyes. For the first time since I had known him, he didn’t try to be tough or hard. He didn’t even wipe them away.

  Everybody moved away from the stoop and drifted back onto the sidewalk.

  Needles was pressed flat against the door as Noodles reached the top and extended his hand, offering the yarn and needles to his brother. Needles swore and cursed, saliva building in the corners of his mouth, tears raining down his face, but his eyes were fixed on his brother. Noodles said something, but we couldn’t make it out.

  Then he said it again.

  Then again, but louder, still holding the yarn and needles out in front of him.

  “I’m sorry.”

  Needles’s arms went twitching every which way, and he dropped about seventeen F-bombs in a row. But Noodles stayed right there, right up there with Needles, and said it again, matching every F-bomb with “I’m sorry!” Then he repeated, “I’m sorry! I’m sorry, man!” Noodles now screamed, begged, cried out, “Please forgive me!”

  The twitch in Needles’s arms started to die down.

  Noodles continued, “I’m so, so, sorry,” his words turning into a mess of tears and whimpers. He stood all hunched over in front of his brother, holding yarn and needles, his whole body heaving.

  Needles, on the other hand, had gone totally still. Silent. The twitching had stopped. The screaming was done. And he was no longer cursing. It was like a weird calm had suddenly come over him. He just stood there in front of his bawling brother, face-to-face.

  Then he reached out for the yarn.

  • • •

  I wish I could tell you that after all that, everything was like a sweet “happily ever after.” But that ain’t how life goes. First of all, we never had barbecue chicken that night. Because of all the ruckus outside, Doris forgot all about it and damn near burned the whole house down. But she made up for it by letting my dad stay with us until he gets back on his feet. And he’s trying. Hard. Can you believe he’s even gonna try working in the stockroom at the store she works at? He’s definitely not too hype about nine-to-fiving, and Doris knows better than to quit her day job, but at least they’re giving it a shot, which me and Jazz are both superhappy about.

  Needles and Noodles are better now. Not perfect, but what is? Needles still sits on the stoop freestyling and knitting his heart out. He tried to teach Noodles how to knit—thought it’d be good for him—but as soon as Noodles realized how hard it was, he quit and said knitting was only for chicks and sissies. Right. But he did draw a picture of a new superhero—his own original character called Knit Man, which Needles and I both thought was corny, but we told Noodles it was cool. Knitting as a superpower—ridiculous!

  And whenever I’m not laughing at those fools, I’m boxing. I’ve even had some real matches! Like in a ring. Against other people! I get crushed most of the time, but I have won a few. One thing’s for sure, it’s different when you’re boxing someone who also knows how. But whenever I get beat, I just think about that night at the party. That night when I did my thing. And that definitely keeps me going. Doris and Jazz never come to my fights because they’re scared to see me get punched in the face. I can understand that, and it’s cool. But John and my boys are always there, screaming in the crowd.

  Photograph © Kia Chenelle

  JASON REYNOLDS IS CRAZY.

  ABOUT STORIES.

  After earning a BA in English from the University of Maryland, College Park, he moved to Brooklyn, New York. You can often find him walking the four blocks from the train to his apartment, talking to himself. Well, not really talking to himself but just repeating character names and plot lines he thought of on the train, over and over again, because he’s afraid he’ll forget it all before he gets home.

  You can find his ramblings at iamjasonreynolds.com.

  Atheneum Books for Young Readers

  Simon & Schuster, New York

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  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2014 by Jason Reynolds

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  The text for this book is set in Arno.

  Jacket photograph by Michael Frost

  Sculpture of knitted gun by Magda Sayeg

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Reynolds, Jason.

  When I was the greatest / Jason Reynolds. — First edition.

  pages cm

  Summary: Ali lives in Bed-Stuy, a Brooklyn neighborhood known for guns and drugs, but he and his sister, Jazz, and their neighbors, Needles and Noodles, stay out of trouble until they go to the wrong party, where one gets badly hurt and another leaves with a target on his back.

  ISBN 978-1-4424-5947-2 (hardcover)

  ISBN 978-1-4424-5949-6 (eBook)

  [1. Conduct of life—Fiction. 2. Family life—New York (State)—Brooklyn—Fiction. 3. Brothers and sisters—Fiction. 4. Neighborhood—Fiction. 5. Violence—Fiction. 6. African Americans—Fiction. 7. Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.)—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.R33593Jer 2014

  [Fic]—dc23 2012045734