“I’m Dr. Noble,” she said, extending a hand.
Alex blushed as he took it. Very few times had he shaken hands with an adult.
“Sit down,” she said, waiting until he’d done so before going behind her desk. “I hope you don’t mind answering some questions. It’s routine when a boy is accused of doing something violent.”
“Okay.”
“Do you know the date?”
“September twenty-third, 1943.”
“Who’s the President of the United States?”
“Franklin Delano Roosevelt.”
Dr. Noble marked something on a form, dropped the yellow pencil, and looked up. “All right, I’m going to tell you a saying. You tell me what it means. Okay?”
“Sure.”
“What does it mean when I say, ‘A rolling stone gathers no moss’?”
“I guess it means that if you want to go … get things like a family … a home … you’ve got to settle down. Wanderers don’t have things.”
“Good, Alex. Now what does it mean when I say, ‘People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones’?”
“It means you shouldn’t criticize people unless you’re so perfect that nobody can criticize you. I think it kind of means you should be kind to people if you want them to be kind to you.”
“That’s good, too. Next week we might have you take some tests. Probation is filing a petition with the juvenile court, and they want some reports. You’ll go to court when the petition and the reports are ready.”
“Is the man okay? I didn’t mean to—”
“He’ll be all right, but you could have killed him. How do you feel about that?”
Alex looked inside himself, at his feelings, a rare thing for an eleven-year-old, and tossed a shoulder. “I’m sorry I hurt him, I was scared … I think I tripped. I didn’t mean to shoot him, but it’s unreal, too. I didn’t know him … never even saw his face…”
“Do you ever feel really sorry just because you’ve done something, even something you’ve gotten away with?”
“Sometimes. In one foster home the lady had a parakeet, and I used to duck it under water because I liked to see it flap its feathers to get the water off. One day it drowned. They didn’t know I did it, but I cried for a long time. I prayed for the bird to come back, but it wouldn’t. Another time I hit a boy who had that sickness where he won’t stop bleeding if he gets cut—hemo something—and he bled inside under the skin, and they took him to the hospital. He didn’t tell on me, but I felt so bad that I went to the superintendent. I wanted him to punish me. That is crazy, isn’t it?”
“No, Alex, that’s more human than you think.”
“I’m sorry about shooting the man because of my dad.”
“How’s that?”
“He came to look for me and … got killed.” Tears welled up in the boy’s eyes. The ache had never left but somehow had been held below consciousness. He’d had no time to think, and his mind had resolutely looked away from so painful a sight. Now he sniffled but tried to stifle it.
“I didn’t know … you poor boy.” The professional distance was shattered. She wondered how the police report had missed such a thing. “If you don’t want to talk we can do it some other time.”
The words of warmth splintered the last of his control, and his eleven-year-old body suddenly quaked with the force of his sobbing. It was the first real purge of his pain. The cries in the darkness of the substation hole had been adulterated with fury, but this was pure pain. Dr. Noble leaned forward, as if she wanted to go around and gather him up in her arms, but her years of training in detachment held her back. She ached in silent sympathy, watching his ferocity expend itself. He was no longer just another boy in trouble. When the sobbing diminished she gave him Kleenex to blow his nose. Another appointment was waiting, but she stepped to the door and cancelled it.
“I didn’t know about your father or I wouldn’t have asked you those petty questions.”
Sniffling still, he nodded, not caring about the questions. Dr. Noble, whose job was handling distraught persons, was at a loss for words. She decided to talk to him as she would an adult in similar circumstances.
“What about the funeral?” she asked.
He hadn’t thought about the funeral. “I don’t know if there’ll be one. He always said he wanted to be cremated, and he’d already paid for all that … when the divorce…’cause there wasn’t nobody to take care of it. I heard him say it lots of times—he’d made arrangements so nobody would be bothered.”
“There’ll be some kind of service. I’ll find out.” She was thinking of where she’d telephone. “If you want to go, I’ll see about that, too.” She didn’t know how such trips were arranged, but she was sure it could be done.
“Yes, ma’am. I want to go.”
“I imagine someone will have to go with you, and the county will charge for their salary. Your mother should be willing to do that much.”
Before she could finish the sentence Alex shook his head. “They’re divorced and I don’t know where she is … don’t want to.”
“Oh,” Dr. Noble said, momentarily disconcerted. By itself the hostility wasn’t so strange, but it was unexpected with so much sadness. “What about an aunt or—”
Again he shook his head. “There’s nobody. It was me and my dad.” The tears welled again, and he choked them down, swallowing. “He had a sister in Louisville. Her name is Ava something … Swedish.… They had some kind of fight.… He stopped talking to her. He was sorry, but he couldn’t bring himself to apologize. I know he wanted to.”
“I’ll take you if that’s the only way,” she said.
Alex looked up, studying her face. “Is that a promise?”
“It’s a promise. But we’ll have to find out when it is and how to go about it.”
A lull ensued. The electric wall clock said that twenty minutes remained.
“Your father must have been stubborn sometimes. Are you like him?”
“Sometimes, I guess … when I know I’m right.”
“Do you hate it when someone tells you what to do?”
“I hate it when they think I should do what they say just because they say it. A social worker said I’ll always be in trouble as long as I hate authority.”
“Do you really hate authority?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes. It depends on…” He shrugged again.
“What do you think should be done with you now?”
Alex frowned. He was being carried along without having any idea where he was going.
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know. I want things to go back, but I—”
“What about when you grow up? What do you want?”
“I want to be somebody. I want people to respect me.”
“You’ll have to work to get that.”
“They have to give me a chance … and I wish they’d leave me alone.”
“You like to be alone?”
“Sometimes. I like to read a lot.”
“What do you like?”
“Tarzan, Zane Grey, and those books about collies by Albert Payson Terhune.”
“Have you ever had a dog?”
Alex shook his head.
A light knock on the door interrupted them. Dr. Noble glanced at her watch. “I’ve got to go, Alex. This afternoon I’ll see about taking you to the funeral. It’s probably tomorrow.”
Clem’s death had been forgotten for a few minutes. The reminder brought the pain and tears again, but they were quieter. He fought them back, not wanting his red eyes to be seen by the other boys. Dr. Noble waited until he had composed himself, wondering how she could possibly help him.
* * *
After supper it was still daylight, and the company went outdoors to the recreation yard until dark. Each company had its own area, and mingling was forbidden. Receiving company had a space where two basketball hoops were suspended over a dirt court. But this evening a monitor carried t
wo pairs of 12-ounce boxing gloves, the reddish leather scuffed from endless use, and instead of the basketball area, the company went to a patch of scrubby lawn in the shadow of a building. There they broke ranks to form a circle, squatting on the ground.
The supervisor was the tall man who’d been on duty when Alex came in. A boy had carried in the man’s own chair so he could prop it against a wall and watch the fight in comfort. He took the gloves and stood in the circle. “Any grudges to settle?” he asked.
For a moment there was silence; then a tall, yellow-skinned black with curly rather than kinky hair stood up. He was about fifteen years old. “Yeah, Ah wanna kick off in Miles’s ass. He think he’s somepin’ an’ he ain’t shit.”
Miles was the black monitor who fawned over the Man and was cruel to weaker boys. He’d kicked Chester for unfolding his arms in the line. Now he came to his feet, his flat nose distended even more than usual. He was shorter, huskier than the others.
“Remember, there’s no rounds in a grudge fight,” the Man said. “You go until somebody’s out or quits or I stop it.”
The two black youths glared at each other. Both had supporters, though the monitor had more. He’d been in Juvenile Hall longer and had power over the boys. They stripped to the waist, took off their shoes, and were helped into the gloves. Their faces were somber, and the jaw muscles of the light-skinned youth throbbed as he clenched his teeth.
The Man called them to the center. “No kicking. No hitting below the belt, no wrestling, and no hitting if someone goes down.” He motioned them to separate, and then he stepped clear. “Time,” he said, finding his chair to watch.
Alex sat cross-legged in the front row, fascinated. He expected the combatants to rush at each other and begin flailing, like the boys in military school. (Those who didn’t hide behind their gloves and quit at the first blow, that is.) But instead these boys came out slowly and circled each other. The taller boy seemed to dance, moving his long arms in a motion that vaguely resembled someone running—so strange a “guard” that Miles, who had one hand cocked by his chin and the other down low, was made nervous, jerking back his head at every motion. Suddenly the taller boy swung a punch like a whip, with much velocity but little power. It splatted loud on Miles’s body, and he charged to retaliate. Then the poor charade of “boxing” disintegrated. Miles pumped his punches up from the floor, most of them landing in the body. He was stronger than the taller boy, who was swinging with both hands at the head. Everything landed. For thirty seconds they beat each other up. Miles’s nose was bleeding. Without warning, he lowered his head and shoulders and drove in, pushing the taller boy back until they both crashed into the front rank of the crowd. Alex tried to scramble away but couldn’t. They tripped over him and went down grunting, still trying to pound each other but not getting much leverage.
The spectators broke from the seated circle and jammed in tight for a view of the fighters rolling on the ground. The boys yelped encouragement, their bodies jerking and jumping in spasms of empathy.
Alex had untangled his legs and scooted clear on his rump as the supervisor waded through the boys, yelling at them to sit down, shoving them aside. His already sunburned face was even darker with a flush of anger. “Get the hell up,” he snarled, looming over the black youths, who had frozen their struggle at his arrival. The taller boy was now on top, his arm headlocked around Miles’s neck. The supervisor had hands to match his great height. He leaned over, wrapped his fingers through the taller boy’s web belt, and hoisted him to his feet.
“You’re supposed to box, goddammit! Not roll around in the dirt like animals.”
“That motherfucker started it. Ah was kickin’ his ass.”
Miles had scrambled up again, blotches of dirt sticking to his sweaty ebony skin and a film of white foam under his armpits. Now blood trickled from his lip to join the blood from his nose. To Alex the fight had seemed even, but Miles had all the bruises, and he was breathing harder, exhausted.
“Ah’m gettin’ yo’ ass, you half-white nigger,” Miles said.
“Fuck you … you kiss-ass motherfucker.”
Miles suddenly spit at the taller boy, and even before it landed, the other youth kicked out, his toe hooking up into Miles’s crotch, bringing forth a yelp of pain. Miles froze momentarily, then doubled over, clutching his groin with gloved hands. At the same moment the supervisor swung the taller boy away by the belt, half-throwing and half-slapping him down. “Okay … you like to kick, huh? Like to kick, huh?”
“He spit on—”
The words ran together and ended as the man began kicking the boy in the legs, still muttering, “Like to kick, huh? Like to kick, huh?”
Alex watched with horror and fury. Even an eleven-year-old could see the injustice. Miles had started the wrestling; Miles had spit. But Miles was the man’s pet, and a monitor too.
The sixty boys watched with somber expressions that boys did not usually wear. The taller boy rolled away from the kicks, the man following—and in ten seconds the man stopped, his contorted face turning blank as he realized what he’d been doing. “Get up,” he said. “Get those gloves off. You too, Miles.” Then the man looked around defiantly, embarrassed by his loss of temper. “Anybody else have a grudge to settle?”
7
Half the company was being showered while the other half filled the dayroom with bodies and bedlam. This was the recreation hour before bedtime and lights-out. The supervisor was at the shower room, and the dayroom door was locked. A few boys lay on the floor writing letters (there were no tables), sharpening their pencils by rubbing them sideways on the cement. One group in a corner was playing Monopoly, complete with kibitzers, and beside them was a poker game in which ten markers had the value of one contraband cigarette. The biggest crowd was near the window where a radio sat on the ledge. Half a dozen youths, nearly all Chicano or black, stood as if at a street corner hot-dog stand. They were all in their mid-teens and ready to graduate from delinquency to crime. Their shirt collars were turned up, and so were their sleeves. Their shoes all had double soles and horseshoe taps on the heels; it was both style and a weapon. Finally, their pants were pulled precariously low on their hips and rolled up at the bottom, making their legs look ridiculous short and their torsos freakishly long. Some silently mimed the singers on the radio, dusky black voices doing rhythm and blues, backed by syrupy saxophones. Lulu was there, completely at ease, one hand braced inside the front of his waistband, his olive features haughty. Alex thought Lulu looked cool, that they all did, and now he, Alex, could start combing his hair in a ducktail and maybe get some double-soled shoes. He was stretched out on a bench, alone and friendless and feeling it. He wanted to go over to the crowd, but the boys there were older, and he was afraid of rebuff. It didn’t cross his mind that he was white and they were brown and black; he was still too young to think about race.
A shadow passed over him, and when he looked up it was Chester’s face. “What you doin’?” Chester asked.
“Nothing.”
“Wanna play some checkers?”
“No, thank you anyway.”
“Hey, how come you be saying’ ‘no thank you’? Can’ you say jes’ ‘no’ like everybody else? You say ‘yes, sir,’ and ‘excuse me’ like some kind of sissy. Or some rich white boy. You ain’ no rich white boy, are you?”
“No, I ain’ no rich white boy.”
“Don’t be makin’ fun of me, motherfucker!”
The quick threatening anger was unexpected. Alex hadn’t intended to make fun of Chester, certainly not maliciously, and the angry command was like an open-handed slap, stinging and igniting anger in response.
“Don’t call me a motherfucker,” he said. “I don’t call you names.”
“Fuck you, Paddy … scared-ass motherfucker.”
“I told you—”
“So what’re you gonna do about it? If you get mad, then you can scratch your ass and get glad.”
The freckled black boy was already
standing, leaning a little forward in readiness. At the first heated words Alex swung his feet down to the floor, but he was still seated and at a disadvantage. Chester could hit him the instant he moved. He was heavier than Chester, whose body was like a skeleton draped in clothes, but Chester was older, his reflexes more developed. Alex had no fear; he had known a fight was unavoidable the instant Chester cursed him. That had been a challenge. Maybe a fight would burn away his vague bad feelings of helplessness, futility, anxiety. It would not alter reality, but it would alter how he felt.
“What’re you gonna do, mo-ther-fuck-er?” The words were deliberately slow and exaggerated, a style that copied many challenges Chester had seen in his neighborhood, one that radiated contempt far beyond his twelve years.
“Let me up.”
“Sheeit!”
As Chester sneered, Alex ducked his head and dove forward, feeling a fist graze his cheek a moment before his forehead rammed into Chester’s chest. He clutched blindly at Chester’s clothes. A fist hit him in the kidney and Chester’s foot kicked up but landed no higher than his knee.
The two boys went down in a tangle, and Alex got an arm around Chester’s neck in a headlock. Alex was more or less on top and had control. Chester couldn’t break the hold.
At the first blow every head in the room had turned to see, and then everyone rushed to watch the fight, standing jammed up so close that the fight was at their feet.
“Lemme up an’ fight, motherfucker,” Chester demanded shrilly. “Fuck this wrestling bullshit.”
Though not really hurting Chester, Alex had an advantage. They stayed immobile for half a minute. The crowd was quiet; the action was too frozen to arouse them, though at the outset a couple of older black youths had encouraged Chester to “kick that Paddy’s ass.”
“Lemme up,” Chester demanded again.
Alex squeezed harder.
“Let him up, motherfucker,” said a fourteen-year-old black with red, processed hair, emphasizing the order with a kick to Alex’s hip. Alex looked up. The boy’s face was high above him, and he was frightened. Fighting Chester was one thing; fighting a fourteen-year-old was another.
Little Boy Blue Page 7
