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This is the Part Where You Laugh

Page 6

by Peter Brown Hoffmeister


  “Fuck you,” the gangbanger says, and takes it all the way to the rim at the other end, but one of the bigs blocks his shot.

  “Foul,” he says.

  “What?” Creature jogs up next to him.

  “I called a foul, motherfucker.”

  “Even though he blocked you clean and clear as day?”

  The big looks at the gangbanger, then back at Creature. “Whatever,” he says. “He can choose to call that.”

  “No,” Creature says. “Everyone and your mother”—he taps the gangbanger’s chest—“knows that wasn’t a foul.”

  “Keep talking,” the gangbanger says, “and I’ll cut your mouth out with a razor blade.”

  “Oooh,” Creature says, “talk dirty to me, baby. I like that,” and he winks. “I guess we’ll check you the ball, then.”

  I step over next to Creat as we set up on defense. I say, “Chill a little. Let’s roll these guys and get on to the next game.”

  “Really?” he says, and he says it loudly enough for everyone to hear, even the people on the sidelines waiting to take next. “You think this guy is getting tired of me dragging his limp dick up and down the court?”

  Someone courtside yells, “Boom, Creature! Damn!”

  And Creature smiles at me. “Sorry. I had to say that.”

  Everyone laughs but the gangbanger. When the next ball goes out of bounds, the gangbanger says, “Keep talking, I’ll wreck you. You’ll see.”

  Creature steps up eye to eye with him, right there on the baseline, and the game stops. Everyone can tell that Creature is as athletic in a fight as he is on the court. His hands are huge for his size and he leaves them open before he fights like he might do anything. Maybe rip a man’s arm off. Maybe break his teeth. Gouge out eyes with his thumbs.

  Creature says, “We could just squabble right here, P-Town boy. Right now. Is that what you want?”

  That gangbanger doesn’t know what to say. He isn’t in his hometown, on his home court. He can’t just call for backup, and I see his eyes flicker back and forth as he looks at Creature and considers his options.

  I step up next to both of them and say, “Hey, boys, can we just play some more ball, huh? Give this one up?” I try to allow them both a chance to step away. Then I use a phrase I saw my uncle Henry use once outside a bar. I say, “Y’all both look tough enough to me.”

  And that does it. It works.

  “All right,” Creature says, and nods. “I think we’re done here.”

  After that fourth game ends, we play the next game and win, but not like we should. Creature keeps looking over at the gangbanger, who’s on the sideline now. Creature keeps flexing his chest, winking at him, kissing the air when he hits a shot. And twice Creature gets beat on fast-break layins at the other end while he’s showboating to that sideline.

  “Creature,” I say, “the game’s right here, man. It’s right here.”

  This side of Creature annoys me. Even in league games, in games that count, he can get like this. And when he does, I spend all my time thinking about him. I can’t lose myself in the game the way I want to. There’s no flow. No rhythm. No pace. And we don’t dominate like we should.

  Creature says, “I got this, baby. I got this locked down.”

  “You better,” I say, “ ’cause this is garbage.”

  We win the fifth game 11 to 7—sad to me because the fifth opponent is the worst we’ve played yet. I have to use our three bigs over and over because Creature isn’t setting quality screens anymore, and we certainly aren’t killing anyone in the pick-and-roll.

  In the sixth game, my bigs are tired and we get run off the court. The gangbanger walks off somewhere near the end of the game, so Creature can’t talk trash to him on the sidelines anymore. Creature tries to step it up after that. He scores three baskets in a row, but it’s too late. We lose the game 11 to 8.

  On the sideline, Creature and I share a jug of SunnyD. I say, “You’ve got to focus better than that, man. You were trash out there.”

  “Focus for this?” he says. “This isn’t even real basketball. This isn’t a D-1 game or even a high school game. No, baby, I don’t have to focus for this. My mind’s full of poetry and that’s all that matters right now. I’m just too T. S. Eliot.”

  “Hey, T. S. Eliot,” I say, “remember the other day when you told me that some people aren’t worth the scars on the backs of our knuckles?”

  “Yeah,” he says. He takes the SunnyD from me and chugs three gulps. “But what I say and what I do are two totally separate things. I’m a hypocrite. I’m a complicated human being. It’s like my writing. I don’t even talk like that, you know?”

  IVY DREAMS

  More people have come to play and there’s a crowd, a long wait to get back in. We’re standing on the sideline, waiting for our turn at another game, and I’m pissed. I don’t like to wait to play basketball when we could’ve stayed in the whole time. Creature’s next to me, his arms crossed. He doesn’t joke around or say anything to me now because he knows I’m frustrated.

  We’re standing there, the crowd all around us, when I see, past Creature, someone coming through, pushing through, and it’s the gangbanger, and I see the flash of silver in his hand.

  “Run!” I yell. “Creat, run!”

  Creature breaks to my right and I follow him. We swim through people, other players warming up, stretching, people milling around, standing in circles, drinking. We bust through all of them, keeping our heads low, sprint past the first bridge pylon into the dark side, and I look back and see that the gangbanger’s there, coming through the last of the people.

  Years ago, under the north end of the bridge, someone shot out all of the lights, and whenever the city fixes them, someone shoots them out again. So it’s dark above us, and we run along the horseshoe pits in that gray dark, more careful now, slower, trying not to hit anything in the dark, knowing it’s hard to follow anyone there, past the old playground and the chained-up bathrooms. I look back again to see if there’s anyone following us. I could see an outline against the backlight if he was there, but he’s not.

  “We’re good, man. Let’s keep going a little farther, but we’re good now.”

  At the fourth pylon, we cut up and slide in behind the big cement pillar above the ivy slope. “Watch out for needles,” I say. “Don’t just sit down here.”

  Creature and I scrub our feet back and forth on the bare patch of ground beneath us, trying to kick syringes or shards of glass aside if there are any. It’s impossible to see, so we both edge our shoes back and forth, clear space until we’re sure there’s nothing on the ground there, then we sit down.

  Creature says, “So what did he go get?”

  “Some kind of silver pistol. I don’t know. I just saw it and booked.”

  Creature says, “Probably went back to his car and got it.”

  “Yeah, I guess he got fed up with somebody’s trash-talking.”

  “All I have to say is that it was his fault. He was a weak-ass little punk. Couldn’t play defense and was too scared to fight. So he had to go get himself a pistol to even things up.”

  “Creature, that’s how it is sometimes. You know that.”

  “True. But still…”

  In the dark, I can see the outline of Creature with his arms wrapped around his legs. We’re both leaning back against the cement. I’m still sweating from the basketball game and the running down here, but it’s colder against the cement, in the gap under the bridge. I rub my legs with my hands to keep warm.

  Creature says, “Sorry about tonight.”

  I’m still frustrated, annoyed that we lost games and had to run away, but I say, “It’s all right.”

  “I should’ve chilled out. You were right, baby.” He bumps my knee. “Huddling here isn’t as fun as playing ball, is it? Sorry about this.”

  I say, “Don’t worry about it,” and this time I mean it. Creature’s out of control sometimes, gets a little crazy, but it’s still fun.
He’s not boring, at least.

  —

  There’s a spark in front of us, down the slope, 30 feet. Another spark, but the lighter doesn’t catch. Someone gets out a butane, and it flames blue. There are three people down there, all of them wearing layered, heavy clothes. Two men and a woman. One of the men holds a straight glass pipe. He puts the butane flame to the end, clicks it, inhales on the other, and the rock bubbles. He hands the pipe to the man next to him, and that man takes a drag before handing it to the woman. The three of them pass the pipe and the lighter until the rock’s killed.

  Creature says, “Do you think about her a lot?”

  “Yeah,” I say.

  “Do you look for her?”

  “Sometimes. I can’t help it. But she might not even live here anymore.”

  I can’t see the three people clearly without the lighter going. I see the outlines of them. One of them sitting down. The other two walking away.

  Sometimes when I think I see her it’s like I’ve swallowed a piece of glass and I wonder where it’s going to cut me. I picture the glass going down my throat, through my esophagus, the sharp edges of it as it enters my stomach, and I wonder where it will lodge, or where it might cut through. Sometimes I feel that piece of glass in my intestines, working its way down, and I start to think that it’s really there, that I really swallowed a piece of glass.

  Creature says, “I’m not trying to be a dick, but that woman down there looks a little bit like her.”

  “A little,” I say, “but she’s not shaped right. Even in those clothes, I can tell. Something wrong about her shoulders, the way she holds her head.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah, but for a second, I thought so too.”

  ALTERNATIVES TO COLLEGE

  I walk through the automatic doors. Walmart’s the toughest because the workers are looking for people to take stuff, and there’s a man stationed by the carts. I look at him and smile. That’s always my strategy. Don’t try to be invisible, because ducking my head or hurrying by would seem shady. Better to seem friendly and casual. Like a regular customer.

  I walk through the aisles. Look at the electronics, but I don’t want to take something with a strip on it. I pass through the book aisle next, but none of the books seem very interesting, plus they’re all bulky. I go through the office supplies, put a mechanical pencil in my pocket, a glue stick, and an eraser. Then I walk up front.

  I wait in line for the self-checkout. When I see the worker look the other way, I slide by like I already purchased everything. And that’s when I grab a 12-pack of Coke, put it on my shoulder real obvious, look right at the cart man again, smile, and walk out.

  Even though I act relaxed and I probably look relaxed, it still gives me a rush. I know it’s weird that it doesn’t get old for me, but I don’t do it that often anymore, just every once in a while, and I guess that makes it better than doing it all the time. I don’t know, though. I guess it’s wrong too. I guess stealing, even little things, is wrong.

  THE LOVE SONG OF A SHADOWBOXER

  Trim the hedges. Rake. Weed-whack against the uprights. Edge the lines. Check the 2-in-1 level. Refill. Fill the mower with gas. Run it on full, not empty, so the engine isn’t gulping the bottom-of-the-pan silt.

  I look up and she’s in the window, looking down. I shade my eyes to see her better, but she’s gone. I blink and wonder if I imagined her being there in the first place. The window curtains never moved. There wasn’t any sure sign.

  I go back to work on the yard. Look up a few times, but I don’t see her after that.

  The Pervert’s Guide to Russian Princesses

  Princess #23 (Revised Draft)

  Princess Leonilla Bariatinskaya, I knew you first from the portraits painted by Franz Xaver Winterhalter. The one at the Getty Museum is my favorite, you in ivory and pink and purple. You lay back like you’re waiting for me. You finger those pearls around your neck, staring out of the canvas. There’s nothing proper about you, nothing reserved, nothing to remind me that you’re royal, but royal you are.

  I gave you Michael Jordan’s number because you’re known as both physical and cerebral. You’ve always been famous at the Russian court for your intelligence and your eyes, eyes that could pick apart a defense. I know that you can tell if the other team is set up in a 1-2-2 zone or a box-and-1, and if I was going to face-guard any one player, it would be you. But you’d anticipate that.

  You witnessed the pillaging of the Tuileries, the overthrowing of Louis Philippe in 1848. You wondered at the swallowing of jewels and the lack of violence on the part of the king. You moved with the seasons, making your way through Europe with children and tutors and expensive luggage. Ours was a strange love, always waiting for Ludwig to go away, for his business to separate the two of you. And I was always chasing you, you looking over your shoulder, hoping for a glimpse of me coming after you.

  I traveled with you that one time in the horse-drawn coach to Rome, the wagon wheels jolting over the Dolomites, another rhythm for our bodies, me too tall to lay out, but you improvising. And a year later, we were alone in the bathroom of the Sayn Castle, the stonework cold against our nakedness. I put you on the countertop, you sucking in breath at the shock of the stone, and me saying, “Ooh,” as my thighs hit the cold.

  I liked to count the pearls on your neck, one kiss for each pearl, refusing to touch you until all of the pearls had been accounted for. You undressed yourself while I kissed you, the layers of your clothing like the complications of royalty, all title with no power, and you saying over and over, “If only, if only…”

  THE BALLAD OF BASS AND CARP

  I grab my fishing pole and flip the canoe. Paddle south, down-lake, to one of the boggy ends. It’s dark down there, no streetlights or back-porch floodlights. The blackberry overgrowths on both sides are walls that no one crosses on land. The lake’s water is shallow 30 feet from the shore, and I drift the canoe, looking for eyes on top of the water. I scan with my headlamp, but I see nothing.

  I paddle a deeper channel, cut to the east toward the oldest house on the lake, an original farmhouse from the end of the 19th century. The old lady who lives there has never repainted the slat-board siding, and she lets her grass grow to two feet in the spring. She won’t hire me to mow even though I’ve offered her a deal a few times. But I kind of like the way her place looks.

  At night, the long grass of her backyard is deep and dark, blackish, and paddling up to it, I can see the trails and burrows animals have cut into the field from the water. When my canoe scrapes a gravel shoal, I spook a couple of deer in front of me. They pop up and run, two blacktail does bounding through the high grass and disappearing around the side of the farmhouse.

  I shine my headlamp along the lake’s shelf. The bank overhangs in a few spots and it’s difficult to tell what I’m seeing. I scan for caiman eyes, but don’t find any. Then I paddle back out into the middle of the lake and drop a silver spinner 20 feet off the stern of the canoe. I know I’m not going to get a strike without spotlighting, but I wedge the pole behind my leg anyway so I can grab it if anything sees the lure and bites.

  One lamp is lit to the north of me, up-lake on the east side, on a dock, and I paddle slowly, trolling the spinner, making my way toward the light.

  When I get a hundred feet out, I see that it’s Natalie reading a book. She has a Coleman lantern next to her, the light shining on the side of her face. She looks serious as she reads, her head bowed, and I paddle slower. It’s nice to see her without her phone, with a book instead, and I try to paddle up without getting her attention.

  When I’m 20 feet out and I think she hasn’t seen me yet, she says, “Don’t you ever wear a shirt?”

  I look down at my bare chest lit up by her lantern, wishing I’d brought a shirt with me. I say, “I guess not.” There’s no moon, and the full surface of the lake is black. Little ripples tap against the side of my canoe, making a psht-psht sound. I say, “What are you reading?”

&
nbsp; “Catcher in the Rye. Required summer reading for English class.”

  “What high school?”

  “Starting Taft in the fall.”

  “Starting? Then are you a freshman?”

  “What?” she says. “No, I’m not a freshman. I’m a transfer. A junior. Do I look like a freshman to you?”

  “No,” I say. “It was just how you said ‘starting.’ ” I paddle a J-stroke to bring my canoe closer to her dock. “Where are you transferring from?”

  “A better place,” she says.

  “Where’s that?”

  “Lake Oswego.”

  I laugh. We beat the Lake Oswego basketball team by 30 points in a preseason game last year.

  Natalie says, “What are you laughing at?”

  “Nothing.” I put my paddle in the water and pull the starboard side of my canoe a little closer. Then I reverse the stroke and slide the canoe back out.

  “You really love that boat, huh?”

  “This canoe?” I slap the hull with the flat of my hand. “Yeah, I do.”

  “Did you name it?”

  “Huh?”

  “You know,” she says. “Boys are always naming their cars. Giving them stripper names like Candy Baby. Shit like that.”

  “No,” I say. “I didn’t even think about that. Maybe I should, though. My grandma gave it to me, and she has cancer, so maybe I’d name it for her.”

  “Your grandma has cancer?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wow. That’s terrible. I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “It’s pretty sad.”

  Natalie looks down at her feet. She has her thumb in her book, holding her place, and I wait for her to set it down. I tell myself that if she sets her book down, I’m going to paddle the canoe to the dock and hop up next to her. But she doesn’t set her book down. She keeps her thumb marking her place. So I wait.

  I say, “You like to read outside?”

 

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