In Time I Dream About You

by Gene Gant

  Apache leaned forward and peered past Crazy E at me. “Problem?”

  I looked him square in the mirrors. “I never had a gun before—”

  Apache plucked the gun from my hands, cutting me off. “This bitch has a laser sight,” he said, flicking at something on the side of the handle. A pencil-thin beam of crimson light appeared, stabbing upward above the barrel. “All you have to do is put the red dot where you want the bullet to go and pull the trigger.” He leveled the gun before him, focusing a bright red dot on the back of the driver’s head. Stone, staring out the window at a passing bunch of laughing young ladies, didn’t seem to mind. “Clip’s empty. In a minute I’ll show you how to eject the clip and load bullets.” Apache tossed the gun back to me.

  He went on to explain where and when I was to meet Crazy E and what my responsibilities to the Cold Bloods entailed. I listened with a growing sense of doom.

  How the hell was I going to hide all this from Dad?

  FOUR DAYS into my career as a Cold Blood, it was already taking a toll.

  My dad was pretty sharp. He paid attention to detail, and he was especially good at spotting something that was off or unusual. Mom died from cancer when I was three, which caused Dad to latch on to me and become overprotective. After fifteen years he knew me pretty well, and I had to be very careful around him. I kept the gun hidden in a box under my bed, beneath a stack of gay porn mags. Dad had run across the box of mags two years before—thereby discovering my gayness—and he’d diligently avoided touching it since. To explain the evening hours I was devoting to the gang, I told Dad I’d joined a study group. I knew I’d have to stick with football practice and keep my grades up while taking care of gang business to avoid making Dad suspicious.

  Even so, that Thursday when Dad came home from work and found me sprawled on the living room sofa watching television, he’d barely unbuckled his holster when he froze and said, “What’s wrong, Gavin?”

  I was genuinely puzzled because I felt pretty certain I wasn’t giving off any signals that would prompt such a question. “Nothing’s wrong.”

  “No, something’s bothering you,” he insisted. We were roughly the same height, but his body was lanky compared to mine. His hair and beard were slowly going gray, but with his boyish face, he still managed to look a lot younger than a man of fifty-one.

  “I’m fine, Dad. What makes you think something’s wrong?”

  “I can see it in your face. You look worried.”

  “I’m not worried.”

  Holding his holster and gun in one hand, he stepped closer, looking me over. “Is something going on at school? Are you in some kind of trouble?”

  I could feel myself growing both afraid and angry. Every evening I was hanging out with a guy carrying enough drugs to get us both sent away for life while concealing a loaded bazooka in the waistband of my jeans. Yeah, I was in deep shit, but I didn’t know how to get out of it. As badly as I wanted help, I couldn’t let my dad know.

  “No, I’m not in any trouble. I keep telling you I’m okay.”

  He went on studying my face. I turned back to the television, afraid of what else he might see in me. “You’re not getting sick, are you?”

  “Seriously, Dad, I’m fine.”

  He hovered over me for another moment, and I could tell he wasn’t convinced. With his free hand, he started unbuttoning the shirt of his gray and black security guard uniform. “Have you had dinner?”

  “Yeah. I made myself a couple of hamburgers. You want me to cook something for you?”

  “No. I’m meeting a few friends at the bar to watch the football game. I’ll grab a bite there.”

  He headed for his room to shower. I watched him go, wishing I could tell him everything, wishing he could save me.

  CRAZY E dealt herb and coke in a row of abandoned houses barely two miles from where I lived. He had gotten beaten and robbed about a month prior after being set up by a couple of guys who’d said they wanted to buy dope. Apache expected me to make sure that didn’t happen again.

  Crazy E was a slender guy, seventeen years old and just a bit shorter than me. He was a senior at a charter school in Indian Village. I couldn’t figure where he’d gotten his nickname. He had a soft, almost scholarly demeanor, and he never ranted or cursed, even when he had reason to. Someone must’ve tagged him “crazy” as an ironic twist on his actual personality.

  The Friday after my recruitment, Crazy E and I were sitting on the concrete steps of a burned-out hulk that had once been a two-flat brick residence. It was a warm, sunny late afternoon, the sky filled with fluffy white clouds floating high overhead, which were tinged orange along their edges from the setting sun. Down the street, a bunch of little kids were chasing each other across lawns and screaming their heads off. I liked Crazy E from the start. Although he was two years older, I thought he was—as my friend Melinda would say—adorable. He had tan skin, big, quiet brown eyes that almost got lost beneath his shaggy ’fro, a scattering of freckles across his nose, and a shy little smile. At that time my sexual experience had been limited to feeling up a couple of guys behind the bushes at the park near my school. They’d been too skittish about getting caught to go any further with me. As Crazy E’s bodyguard, I got to spend a lot of blissful time sneaking glances at him and thinking nasty thoughts.

  Crazy E conducted business at varying hours on weekdays after school and throughout Saturdays and Sundays. He spent a lot of that business time on his cell phone, taking calls from and making arrangements with his customers, most of whom were men of various ages, some white, some black, a few Latino. Since I never had to conduct any sales, and Crazy E had little opportunity to actually talk with me, I used my hours with him to catch up on homework.

  I was finishing up a series of geometry problems in the waning daylight when Crazy E ended a particularly long call, put his phone aside, hung his head, and sighed. I thought something was wrong but just as I started to ask if he was okay, he turned and looked at me.

  “So. Triple X,” he said. “You don’t look like a gangsta.”

  “Funny. I’ve been thinking the same thing about you.”

  “Why’d you join up?”

  “Apache made me an offer I couldn’t turn down.”

  A sad little grin tugged at the corner of Crazy E’s mouth. “Oh.”

  “What about you? Why are you here?”

  “Apache’s my cousin. I sorta owe him. He took me in a couple of years ago after my mom ran off with this old dude she met.” He glanced at the book in my lap. “What’s that?”

  I briefly held up my geometry textbook so he could see the cover. “I’m working numbers. Got a test coming up on Monday.”

  “Yeah. I got tests next week too. I have to do my studying late at night. I hardly ever get to sleep before midnight.” He looked me over. “You graduating this year?”

  “Nah. I’m a sophomore.”

  His eyes widened a bit. “You’re kinda big for a sophomore, huh?”

  “Maybe you’re just kinda little.” I was looking at him the way a kid would gaze at a brightly wrapped birthday present. It took a moment for me to realize I was flirting. I broke eye contact immediately, looking down at my book. “Didn’t you say you’re graduating this year?”

  “Yeah. Apache doesn’t know it, but I’ve already applied to seven colleges, all of ’em out of state. I want to get out of here and be a psychiatrist.”

  “You don’t think Apache will let you leave?”

  “I don’t know. Probably not. I sell a lot of product, and I don’t steal dope or money from him. Most likely, he wants to keep me around for a while. But I’m gonna keep my grades up and get my ass accepted to a college on the other side of the country, and I’m gonna take off without even letting my cuz know I’m gone.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  “What about you?” Crazy E asked.

  “I’m going into the Army after I graduate. Work my way up the ranks.”

  “Good. That’
s good. You gotta have a way out, or the Cold Bloods will get you killed.”

  He stared at me for a while, and there was nothing shy about that gaze. He grinned again. “You like me, don’t you?”

  I scowled. “What?”

  He laughed, a soft huff of sound. “I see those little looks you keep sneaking my way.”

  My whole face burned with embarrassment and fear. “Hey, man, I’m not gay.”

  “Well, I am. I don’t want my cuz to know because the way he hates gays is pathological, but I think my secret’s safe with you. And yours is safe with me.”

  Silence fell between us again, and we simply looked at each other. Metaphorically speaking, a door had opened, and I wanted to jump through it. Just as I started to move over and kiss Crazy E, he smiled and said in a low voice, “Customer’s coming.”

  I hadn’t even noticed the lanky middle-aged white man who was making his way across the overgrown lawn toward us. He went directly to Crazy E, ignoring me completely, and I watched as they completed their transaction. The man stuffed his purchase into the pocket of his jeans, hurried to a dark-colored sedan parked at the curb, climbed in, and sped away along the darkening street.

  Crazy E stood up and brushed off the back of his jeans. “I’m not expecting any more customers for a while.” He grinned at me.

  I followed him around to the back of the burned-out house where we started a fire of a very different sort.

  SEX WITH Crazy E was like an addiction. He took my virginity, and I couldn’t get enough of him. I thought of him all day while I was in school. I drank in the sight of him while he conducted business, barely able to contain myself until he was finished. For almost two weeks, we did it every chance we got, hidden in the overgrowth behind the abandoned houses where he plied his trade. I picked up a number of itchy mosquito bites on my back and butt, and red welts flared across my knees in an allergic reaction to something in the grassy terrain, but the sex was definitely worth it.

  I never knew how Apache found out about us.

  On a Thursday evening three weeks after Crazy E and I started working together, the red Grand Prix pulled up to the curb in front of the old, empty house where we sat waiting on the porch. The left rear window rolled down and Apache waved us over. He was wearing black gardening gloves, an oddity that alarmed me.

  “Give me the gun,” he said to me, his voice low and clipped. I pulled the weapon from my waistband and handed it over. He popped the clip, checking to make sure it was loaded. After locking the clip back in place, he scowled at us and said, “Get in.”

  Anger burned in his face, but neither Crazy E nor I dared ask what had him pissed. We walked around to the other side of the car and slid into the backseat. I’d never seen the two guys in the front seat before. No one said anything. The driver took us across town into an old, dilapidated manufacturing district. It felt like the longest ride of my life, and I believed it would be my last.

  The driver stopped the car behind a small crumbling warehouse, an area that was quiet and thick with shadows. Apache climbed out of the car along with the two guys in the front seat, and they stood together a short distance from the passenger side. Apache motioned for Crazy E and me to join them. We got out of the car slowly. As we faced Apache, the other guys flanked us, cutting off any avenue of escape.

  My memory of what came next is hazy. Apache said something to the effect that there was no place for fags among the Cold Bloods. The goon behind Crazy E grabbed him by the neck and started punching him in the face. I could see droplets of blood spray in the air, black against the pale moonlight. The guy behind me probably tried to grab my neck, but I was moving, ducking out of his reach. My heart pounded, wild with fear, sinking with hopelessness. I went after the guy who was beating Crazy E, ramming my fist against his mouth again and again. Light flashed with a blast of sound, something slammed into the back of my head, and I was gone.

  When I woke up, the night was flickering with blue-white lights and buzzing with staticky radio voices. I was sitting with my back against the warehouse wall and my hands cuffed behind me. My head felt as if it were stuffed with broken glass. I looked around slowly. Everything was blurry, mixed with shadows. After a few seconds, my eyes focused, and I got a good look at Crazy E. He lay motionless on his back several feet away, his eyes staring up sightlessly at the stars, a black, bloody hole in his chest.

  That couldn’t be. I had to be asleep still. The gun Apache had taken from me lay on the cracked concrete near Crazy E’s body. There were cops everywhere. The sight of Crazy E’s body suddenly rocked my insides. I cried out and tried to get up. An officer seemed to come out of nowhere, grabbed me, and pulled me to my feet. He yanked me back when I stepped toward Crazy E, his thick fingers digging painfully into my arm as he spun me around and slammed me face-first against the gritty wall of the warehouse. A detective in blue jeans and a black blazer stepped up and started reading me my rights. None of this made sense to me.

  “What happened?” I yelled at the cops. “Somebody tell me what the hell happened!”

  The detective went on reciting my rights to me, and when he was done, he shoved me into the backseat of an unmarked car. He slid behind the wheel as another detective, a middle-aged woman in black slacks and a gray jacket, climbed into the front passenger seat. They drove me to the police precinct where I was fingerprinted, photographed, and pushed into a cell. Later I would learn that only my prints were found on the gun. Given the drugs in Crazy E’s pockets and the signs of struggle at the crime scene, the detectives decided I’d shot Crazy E in the midst of a drug deal gone sour. The DA charged me with second degree murder, unlawful possession of a handgun, and conspiracy to possess and distribute controlled substances.

  After that I made a decision even worse than the one that got me into the Cold Bloods.

  I snitched on Apache.

  Chapter 4

  BACK ON my little cot in my dark, damp little cell in solitary, I curled into a ball and tried to turn myself off.

  It didn’t work at first. I couldn’t stop thinking about Dad, lying in some hospital room, alone and practically dead. He filled my mind so completely I couldn’t even find relief in sleep. There was no tossing and turning, no pacing back and forth across the cold, narrow concrete floor. My body felt empty, my spirit hollow and weak, like a dried-out stalk in a winter field. Hour after hour I lay like the dead.

  Sometime way into the night, sleep finally came. Dad was there in my dreams. He was lying on his back on open, rocky ground beneath a black sky boiling with dark clouds. He wore his all-purpose navy blue suit, the one he pulled out for the occasional wedding, funeral, and church visit. His arms and legs were there, but he didn’t seem to have the strength to get up. He was sliding away from me as if being carried on a slow but powerful current, heading for a wall of dense, gray, poisonous-looking fog.

  Lifting his head, he saw me. “Gavin!”

  I ran to save him, but something sprang out of the darkness and blocked my way. It was human in configuration, but its body was shadowy, its limbs were too long, and it had claws. The thing flailed at me, driving me back. I broke into a run and tried to dash around it. Other shadows appeared in my path, their arms snapping at me like whips. I screamed, terrified of the demonic figures surrounding me, agonized that my dad was slipping farther away every moment.

  The dark shapes rained blows down on me. I threw up my arms and ducked my head as I charged ahead, fighting my way through them. I had to get to Dad.

  With every step forward I made, he receded farther and faster. “Gavin!”

  Several heavy blows to my back sent me stumbling to my knees. I stopped protecting my head and swung my fists, trying to drive away the horrible things. Dad yelled again, a sound that trailed off and stopped abruptly when his distant, receding body vanished into the fog. He was gone forever from me, and that instinctive knowledge sent a blade of anguish slashing through my chest. As I opened my mouth to yell for my dad, one of the shadow forms plung
ed its claws deep into my back. Another slashed its claws across my neck at the same time more claws were stabbed into my chest.

  I awakened bolting upright on my cot, a scream caught in my throat.

  My body was drenched with sweat, and my face felt hot, but I was shivering violently. I sat on the edge of the cot for several minutes, my arms wrapped around my abdomen, until the shaking stopped. More than anything I wanted to talk to my dad. I needed to hear his voice, something that would be impossible even if I were able to get access to a phone and call the hospital.

  I lay down again, feeling abandoned and bitter. The crying came on gradually, and I didn’t try to stop it. No one was there to see or hear me. Tears trickled down the side of my face and dripped onto my pillow. I kept my eyes closed. The silence of my cell was broken only by my loud sniffling and my quiet, shaky sighs.

  I dreamed again. There was a soft rustle in the darkness. The rustling grew louder as someone moved across my cell, slid onto the cot, and lay down behind me. A warm, spicy scent, like cinnamon or nutmeg, suddenly drifted on the air. It was a guy. I felt the muscles in his chest and thighs as he pressed his body against my back. He slipped his arm around my waist and held me close.

  In my dream, I stopped crying and settled into a comfortable sleep.

  IT WAS morning. I knew that when the door clanked open, the guard removed the tray with my uneaten dinner and replaced it with a tray that carried the aroma of bacon and eggs. Facing the wall, I didn’t even open my eyes. The cell door clanked shut, the guard’s footsteps receded up the hall, and then followed the distant boom of the thick metal door to the solitary wing swinging shut.

  I wasn’t exactly sure how much time had passed since Dad was shot. In the last call I got from the hospital, I was told he was still comatose and his condition was unchanged. My body felt weak, emptier than ever. I had no appetite, and I drank water only when thirst became unbearable. In a few days, my medical quarantine would be over and I’d begin serving the time the warden had given me. Maybe I was already serving the warden’s time. After that I would be released back to E block.