Saving Room for Dessert

by K. C. Constantine

  “Wouldn’t be the first.”

  “Huh? Say what?”

  “Never mind.”

  “Wouldn’t be the first? Man, what the fuck are you talkin’ ’bout now?”

  “Never mind, I said.”

  “Damn, James. Sometimes, I swear on my momma, if I knew where she was, if you ain’t the complicatedest motherfucker I ever met, I don’t know who is. Don’t talk that shit to me if you ain’t goin’ explain it.”

  “You’re the one wanted me to talk. I don’t talk, you get pissed. I talk, you get pissed. Sorry I said anything. C’mon, lets go. Time to go to work.”

  “Oh yeah, now we just s’posed to go to work like nothin’ happen. Right. Shit. Your man eats his gun, you dreamin’ and schemin’ you wanna dust the motherfucker that caused the problem from the git, then you tell me wouldn’t be the first, and I’m just s’posed to go to work. Hi-ho, hi-ho, off to motherfuckin’ work I go, like Grumpy, Sneezy and all the rest of them dwarfy motherfuckers. Got-damn, James, you call in sick from now on, I’m goin’ come by your place every day you off, man, and your dago ass better be in bed. Better never come by your place after you call in sick and find you and your ride gone. ’Cause I’ll know where you’ll be, man, and you can’t put that shit on me, you hear?”

  “Don’t worry. I won’t be puttin’ anything on you. Fact, from now on, we’ll go back to the way we used to be. You tell me all about your problems, and I’ll help you solve ’em. Whether you want me to or not.”

  “Aw, see there? There you go, mockin’ me again.”

  “No I’m not. It’s just it was a lot less of a hassle when you were talkin’ and I was listenin’.”

  “You a motherfuckin’ mockin’bird, James. I swear, man, sometimes you could piss Jesus off….”

  SWOMETIMES FOR a cop compassion is a terrible thing—when did James say that? Why’s that important? Why’d I think of that? ’Cause of the Scavellis or ’cause of those got-damn tests he’s always tryin’ to get me to take. No it’s not, it’s the got-damn Scavellis. Question is, were they fucked-up before their kids died? Or are they fucked-up because their kids died? And how the fuck am I supposed to know that? And what difference does it make anyway? If it slows you down when you have to bust a move, then James is right, compassion is a terrible thing for a cop. ’Cause when Scavelli got a shovel full of dog shit and is heading for the Hlebecs’ house, what does it matter his kids died in a fire he started? Then is then, now is now, and no matter how bad I feel for him, I still got to stop his ass.

  Oh man, I got to stop thinking ’bout the Scavellis. Hear that shit about that fire, their kids, all I see is my kid. Now how can your mind get so fucked-up so fast you hear about somebody else’s kids dyin’ in a fire and what you see is your kid fallin’ out the smoke and flames—how the fuck does that happen? What shit goes on in your mind to make that picture? There was no fire when my kid … no fire when he fell. Just my ignorant-ass, ugly-ass, voodoo-believin’ MIL. James tell me how he wanna go down the old country run over that cracker, he thinks I can’t appreciate that shit. He don’t know how many times I wanna throw my motherfuckin’ MIL out the window. Aw, fuck he don’t, told him enough times. Why else he always be tryin’ to get me to take those McGraw tests?

  McGraw. Help McGraw take a bite outta your mind. Oughta make a commercial outta that shit. Hi. McGraw here. And I need your help to take a bite outta yo’ mind. All y’all needs to do is read my book, life’s little strategies, doin’ what works, doin’ what matters. And be sure’n catch me on Oprah every Tuesday where I take a bite outta her mind and anybody else’s mind wantsa sit there and be humiliated on national TV, tell the world how fucked-up they are. I’m humiliated when there’s just me, Charmane, and the marriage counselor in the room. Let thirty million people in on how many pieces my shit is in? Not in this life….

  Rayford reached into his briefcase and found the steno notebook he’d bought for just this purpose, to take McGraw’s tests and “be surprised,” according to Reseta, “what you can learn about yourself.”

  Rayford had read just far enough into the book to get to the second test. He ran into a wall on that one, so he backed up to the first test and said maybe he really did have to write the answers down to see whether he was bullshitting himself or not. He wrote the test down first and studied it for a while to make sure he understood what the assignment really was. “Your first assignment is to challenge your beliefs right now, by listing in order of significance the top five things in your life you have simply failed to fully and completely admit or acknowledge to yourself.”

  Yeah, right. Like there’s five things in my life I have not fully and completely admitted or acknowledged to myself. Let’s see now, what would they be? Oh, I know, how’s this for number one? I am an orphan. I don’t know who my daddy was and my momma’s been gone since I was seventeen.

  Number two. I am a nigger. I have been told this in one way or another by every motherfuckin’ honky I ever met. Not only am I a nigger, I am a schizophrenic nigger. I speak and think two languages. I speak and think nigger. And I speak and think honky. I can speak and think nigger with the best niggers. And I can speak and think honky with the best honkies—if there is such a thing as a best honky. Well, shit, there are some. Two at least. Balzic is one. And so is James. If they got bigotry in their bones, they hide it better than any honky I ever met. Course Balzic got two daughters now. Wonder how he’d be actin’ if I asked one of them for a date. Assuming they looked good enough to take out in public. Though if they look anything like their mother, they should be awright. On the other hand, if they look like him, Lord have mercy, shame on their ass.

  Number three. I have a boy child. I had a boy child. I hold my boy child in my heart every day of my life. I told James he couldn’t be talkin’ murder in Mississippi, but if I thought dropping my MIL on her head from the second floor would bring William Junior back, I would’ve dropped the bitch on her motherfugly head four years ago.

  Number four. My wife wants to be with her mother more than she wants to be with me. If I murdered my MIL, would my wife come be with me? If God murdered my MIL, would my wife come be with me? When you die, you dyin’ ’cause you dyin’? Or is God murderin’ your ass? People murder one another, we lock ’em up, put needles in their arm—why don’t we get pissed at God ’cause people we love die? Why don’t we put God in jail? Why don’t we put him on a table, belt his ass down, stick a needle in his arm, ask him if he got a statement he wanna make ’bout all the people he kills every motherfuckin’ day. If I coulda got my hands on God the day I found that ambulance in front of my place I woulda said, motherfucker, pick—you or her. One of you motherfuckers goin’ die today for this shit. And what do we hear from God’s salesmen? Preacher say this be all part of God’s plan, God got plans for William Junior. Ours not to question why, ours but to do and die. Yeah, right. Some motherfuckin’ plan. Give me the child for nineteen months, take him back in one motherfugly second. That’s a plan?

  Not a sparrow falls that God don’t see it, Momma told me that every day of her life. I said if he sees it fall why don’t he be catchin’ it? Why he wanna make it fall in the first place? Smart-ass. Little boy big mouth. Jivin’ my momma about what she believe. Tell you true, Momma, I saw you tomorrow I’d fall down on my knees and beg you to forgive me for talkin’ shit on what you believed. Shoulda slapped my face, what you shoulda done. Every time I got smart with you, shoulda slapped me upside my head. Last person on this earth I got a right to trash what they believe was you. But when you fell, Momma, what was God doin’, huh? Standin’ there watchin’? Sayin’ whoops, what’d she fall over there for, I had the net over here. Was that what the motherfucker was sayin’? Is that a bird? Is that a woman? Is that a sparrow? Or is that Miss Rayford? And what little William goin’ do now without his momma? Who goin’ tell him when he come home from walkin’ through Diablos’ turf with his lip split and his shirt bloody that it goin’ be awright, you just have to find another wa
y home, little sparrow? Who goin’ tell him that now, God? Motherfucker? Hey?! You listening?! Who goin’ tell him where she buried, motherfucker? You seen her fall, you know why she fell, you know where she fell at, I guess that also part of your big plan, motherfucker—you goin’ tell me someday so I can maybe go put a flower on her grave? Pauper. Indigent. Busted-out nigger woman and her teenage boy don’t have the first dime’s wortha no insurance, no nothin’. City of Pittsburgh buried her someplace. God knows where. ’Cause those motherfuckers won’t tell me ’cause either they forgot where or else they never bothered to write it down. But God knows where, ’cause not a sparrow falls. Oh yeah, William, it’s all part of the plan. Motherfucker just won’t let me in on it.

  Stop your monkey mind, William, and get back to the test. Number five. Last part of McGraw assignment number one. “What is it that you know in your heart is a problem not acknowledged or at least so painful that you avoid it?” Well now tell me, McGraw, what I need number five for? Ain’t the first four enough? I need another some-motherfuckin’-thing to add to my list? I don’t think so. I think the first four is about two more than I can carry as it is.

  Rayford took McGraw’s book out of his briefcase and turned to dog-eared page 19. Oh listen to this, he said, I love this part, reading it in a whisper. “I would wager that whatever made your list is at least in part a product of your own behavior. I also suspect that the main difference between your problems and the more terribly tragic situations we hear or read about is the result, not the behaviors that led up to it. For aren’t the patterns in your life, and those present in the more tragic stories, very likely the same? You’ve driven a little too fast down a neighborhood street; you’ve left the kids unattended while you ran next door ‘for a minute’; blah blah blah. The ‘shocking stories’ are often about people who have done the very same things. But only because of a tragically different outcome, they wound up in jail, or burying a child, or dealing with HIV.”

  No, motherfucker, it ain’t them “burying a child,” it was me. And I don’t care what you or Oprah say, chat shit was not a product of my behavior. I did not leave my child unattended. I begged Charmane, I begged her ass, don’t be leavin’ our child with that woman! That woman don’t be watchin’ him! She be watchin’ them motherfuckin’ freak shows. I ain’t goin’ take the rap for this, no motherfuckin’ way. William Junior’s life is a product of my behavior. William Junior’s death is a product of the behavior of a stupid-ass, ugly-ass, voodoo-believin’ bitch think it more important to watch idiots screamin’, hittin’, and spittin’ on one another than to watch the child her daughter put in her care, and if I’m lyin’ I deserve to be dyin’!

  And what part of my behavior made me a nigger orphan, huh? What part of this does Reseta think I don’t know about me? What part of my answer is goin’ light up my mind so I can know me better, huh? And how the fuck is knowin’ me better goin’ get Charmane back?

  Uh-huh! There it is. There’s number five. That’s the one I refuse to admit or acknowledge. Finally got to it. Sittin’ here in the MU, thinkin ’bout the Scavellis. That’s the one belongs to me. How long am I goin’ bullshit myself she goin’ come back? ’Cause she ain’t goin’ come back. Woman told me every way she know how. Say it in words, say it with every move she don’t make. She picked. Got two choices. Her momma or me. And she sure as fuck ain’t picked me.

  Six years I been waitin’ for her to show up. And six years she still ain’t showed up. When that shitty little fact goin’ sink in my burry head? I can piss and moan, bitch and groan all I want ’bout bein’ a nigger orphan but the only thing really upset me about that is I don’t know where my mommas buried. I know what cemetery, that’s easy. But they don’t mark the graves of indigents. Don’t even know why that itches my mind, but it does and it’s a motherfuckin’ itch I can’t scratch and I wanna scratch it so bad, it just won’t leave me be. Can’t do nothin’ ’bout that ’cept get over it. ’Cept it just ain’t right that nobody know where they buried her. Somebody oughta have a chart or a diagram or something somewhere, got-damn. That ain’t right. And that ain’t a result of my pattern of behavior either, you McGraw motherfucker you.

  But Charmane stayin’ with her momma? That’s mine. I’ll take that. Thing is, now that I take it, now that I admit it, now that I acknowledge it, what the fuck do I do about it?

  He turned to the next page in McGraw’s book that he’d dog-eared, the one where the second test was, the one that asked him to write a story entitled “The Story I’ll Tell Myself If I Don’t Create Meaningful and Lasting Change After Reading and Studying This Book,” the test that had stopped him cold. Couldn’t even read that test.

  He looked down at the bottom of the page where McGraw had listed the excuses people used for not changing. Every place there had been the word he in the list, Rayford had crossed it out and printed she above it.

  It was just too hard.

  She doesn’t really understand me.

  That’s all for other people.

  I couldn’t focus because of the kids and my job.

  She’s just too harsh; I need a more gentle approach.

  My problems are different.

  I need to read it again.

  Until my spouse reads it, I’m just spinning my wheels.

  I’m right and she’s wrong.

  At the end of the next paragraph was this sentence: “Instead of asking whether the way you are living, behaving, and thinking is ‘right,’ I want you to ask whether the way you are living, behaving, and thinking is working or not working.”

  Got me there, McGraw. ’Cause sure as God made niggers what I’m doin’ ain’t workin’, and everybody can say amen from now till everybody wake up the same color, she still ain’t goin’ leave her momma to be with me. Why in the motherfuck didn’t I see that when I married her? Whole time we were in Alabama she didn’t talk to nobody but her momma that I could see. Never once tried to talk to anybody else, never once struck up a conversation with anybody else’s wife live on that base. What the fuck is wrong with me—I need a B-52 fall on my head? Wake up in the mornin’ those two be talkin’ like they ain’t seen each other in twenty years, and keep that talkin’ shit up all day. Damn near have to make an appointment to get some pussy, and this come as a surprise to me? That she don’t wan’ be with me?

  What the fuck they be talkin’ ’bout all the time? I don’t know. Didn’t never know. Ten years of this shit, may as well had my eyes fulla pepper spray, my ears fulla chain saws, I looked and I didn’t see nothin’, I listened and I didn’t hear nothin’. How in the fuck could I’ve lived in that same trailer with those two women and not know that I was nothin’ but a ticket to the commissary and the PX? That’s all they did, talk and shop, shop and talk. They could try on more clothes and talk about tryin’ on those clothes and what they bought and what they shoulda bought and why they didn’t buy what they didn’t buy than anybody I ever heard.

  And why the fuck didn’t I get that? Didn’t talk to me about that shit. Charmane buy clothes, she didn’t show ’em to me, didn’t ask me how I liked ’em, how she looked in ’em. She put ’em on for her momma, asked her momma how she liked ’em, how she look. Fool! You didn’t need a B-52 fall on your head, you needed a whole squadron of them motherfuckers fall on your head. Got-damn. Was I that stupid? Am I that stupid? Moth-ah-fuck-ah, I am that stupid. You don’t see somethin’ right under your nose for ten years, you one stupid motherfucker. So okay, McGraw, gotta give it to you, you done took a bite outta my mind.

  And what excuse am I goin’ use? How this story goin’ end? What am I goin’ be tellin’ myself ’cause I didn’t make any meaningful or lasting change? Ain’t but one change I got to make. I got to divorce that woman, that’s all there is to it. Payin’ rent for those two? That’s bullshit. I need proof I’m a fool, there it is. What was the name of that song? I’m a fool for love, was that it? Who sang that? You a fool for love, William. Double fool. You a fool for a pussy you ain’t touched in s
ix years, and you a fool for payin’ rent on two places. Stop payin’ her rent, see how fast she grab the yellow pages, find a got-damn shyster her own self.

  “Thirty-one?”

  Oh shit. “Thirty-one here.”

  “Thirty-one 10–91.”

  “Roger that.” Oh shit. How long I been fuckin’ the dog here?

  “Thirty-one, you writin’ a report or a book, what?”

  “I’m 10–24 on that.”

  “What, the book or the report?”

  “I’m 10–8, base.”

  “No kiddin’, are ya? Think you could find some time to go cool out the mopes on Jefferson Street?”

  Rayford sighed, squeezed his eyes shut, and rolled his head from shoulder to shoulder. Not those motherfuckers again. “What’s the 10–20?”

  “I tell you Jefferson Street and you have to ask? Where you think? It’s the all-American boys.”

  “One of the wives call or somebody else?”

  “The old lady across the street thinks they’re gonna kill each other. They’re on the sidewalk.”

  “I want backup from the go. Who’s available?”

  “That’s a problem. Reseta’s transporting a juvey. Canoza’s, uh, he’s gotta go pick somethin’ up. So you’re flyin’ solo for a while. Just cool ’em out, that’s all.”

  “Oh is that all? Yes sir, Mr. Dispatcher sir. I will 10–17 immediately and cool them out, yes sir. Thirty-one out.”

  “Watch your back, thirty-one. Base out.”

  I always do, Rayford thought as he pulled off the parking brake, put it in drive, and headed onto Miles Avenue and backtracked to within one block of where he’d been—how long ago? He checked his watch. Oh shit. An hour ago.

  This time he was heading for Jefferson Street and the properties that abutted the Scavellis and the Hlebecs: the Hornyaks’ backyard, which abutted the Hlebecs’, and the Buczyks’ backyard, which abutted the Scavellis’.