Cowboys rushed in on horses trying to side the bull so that the trapped man could grab a saddle and escape, but it was impossible because the bull was turning violently, scaring the horses away. Some clowns, the unsung heroes of bull riding, danced and gallivanted around the bull while others attempted to reach the strap to free the man, only to be gored by the animal, which still had sharp horns. One clown took a horn in the thigh and was thrown into the stands. A young girl screamed. Another clown took a horn to the back and quickly decided to permanently commit to a life in the church, jumping quickly out of the arena and dashing for his sister’s rusted LTD along the dirt road. Better to be in church on Sunday, he thought as he headed back to Acres Homes while staining the faux velour seats with his bloody wound and singing spirituals.
Yet Harold’s father tried desperately to be freed from the animal until he was dangling on its side, arm hyperextended like that of a rag doll. Cowboys on horses quickened their pace. Arthur Duncan jumped into the arena on foot to save his fraternity brother, but it was no use.
The bull tossed Harold’s father into the air about eight feet, sending the man crashing onto his back. The crowd, boisterous only seconds ago, now hushed. And rather than embrace the distractions of the sidemen and clowns who fought for its attention to get Harold’s father out of harm’s way, the bull stopped and looked at Harold, who was basically in a state of shock. For one, maybe two seconds, the bull and Harold made eye contact, a knowing contact. I quickly turned to Harold, whose eyes were locked on the animal, and heard him whisper, “Kill him.”
The bull was obedient to a wounded child’s plea and sent its horns into the man’s guts at a vengeful speed, opening him up like a watermelon, entrails and blood flying to and fro. What horror.
A careful ear could hear the punctures and churning by the horns. The bull huffed and snarled like it was blowing its nose. The crowd gasped. Some cried, mostly women. Others screamed and yelled. Get him outta there! Somebody save him! Call the police! Yet none of them were willing to step one foot into that arena besides the cowboys and clowns.
The catfish woman grabbed Harold and pushed his face into her supple breast. He wasn’t crying.
“Lil’ Frenchy, turn yer head,” she instructed me, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. My eyes were fixated on the brilliant, fresh red fount from the man’s belly. It didn’t look real. It looked like cherry Kool-Aid—the flavor used to make red cool cups.
Then two cutting rifle reports cracked the air. The bull stopped abruptly and fell on its side. All heads turned to Father, who was sitting on the fence, chambering another round into a rifle to kill the vengeful beast.
Now there was silence but for the click of Father’s bolt action. He jumped into the arena with the rifle aimed at the snarling beast, which remained on its side, breathing heavy, white froth dangling from its nose, eyes half opened—big eyes, big brown eyes. Cowboys and clowns alike moved back as Father cautiously approached with the rifle trained on the animal’s head.
“He dead, John,” Arthur Duncan assured Father as the men rushed to the dying man’s aid. Arthur Duncan was correct, both man and beast were dead. Harold finally started to cry as someone quickly swept him away so that he wouldn’t have to witness the mess. Kill him.
Suddenly my feet started to itch, both of them, on the soles. I had on clean socks, Mother had made sure of that. Then I smelled something burning.
“You smell something burning?” I asked the catfish woman as I took off my boots and scratched, but she was too busy praying to Jesus.
Dr. Poindexter rushed into the arena and took a knee at the body, yelling for hot water and clean rags. He felt for a pulse at the neck and wrist even though there was a huge, gaping hole in the man’s stomach that no longer spouted blood. Harold’s father was dead and there wasn’t a damn thing the good doctor could do about it but cover the body.
You could hear a mouse piss on cotton as everyone reverently took off their hats and placed them over their hearts while the announcer led them in the Lord’s Prayer.
And while Father argued with other men about who’d get pieces of the bull’s butchered parts, I put my boots back on and joined him in the arena.
I tugged at Father’s shirt and told him, “I don’t wanna eat none of that bull.”
He laughed and picked me up, then turned to the testy men with “Well, I don’t want none of that cursed bull either. Yawl niggas eat up. But you step in one of them arenas with that bull in your belly and you can bet that this here bull’s kinfolk gonna tear your ass up.”
Louisiana black people, like most black people, are superstitious. Maybe because we are so aware of the real world, having been denied so much of it for so long, that we accept what’s just past it, the other side of reality. That understanding gives us access to magic. Father meant what he said. Half of those rough and tough cowboys swore off beef after that night.
Maybe it was the Wild Turkey or the fact that he flipped his winnings three times with the dice or that he got to shoot the bull in front of everybody, but Father was talkative on the way back home. Hero status reaffirmed.
“You all right?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said, a bit remorseful.
“You gotta remember not to be by the fence when they ridin’ them bulls. Them niggas be half drunk and not payin’ attention and anything can happen. You understand?” he asked.
“Yeah, Daddy.”
He popped open another Schlitz and handed it to me.
“Here. That one’s for you. Don’t tell your momma. Matter fact, don’t tell her about none of this tonight ’cause you know how she likes to worry,” he said.
“I know, Daddy,” I said and took a sip of my very first beer.
That night I lay in bed, tipsy, listening to the distant train on Mykawa Road and the busy mouse gnawing on the Sheetrock wall trying to get me. He was determined and steady, chipping away inside the wall, plotting his meal. My toes, then my legs to prevent me from running away. He sounded small, innocuous, but his gnawing reverberated, hummed and vibrated the worn wooden floor. I could feel it from my metal trundle bed. The mouse was coming for me. And my only solace was the reluctant glimmer of light peeking from the Star Wars curtains. Use the Force, Ti’ John. Not enough to muster courage. Not enough to foster hope that the avid mouse would retire for the evening or get lockjaw. Maybe if I could look into his eyes and make contact, like Harold with the bull, he could be convinced.
• • •
Despite three killings in one week, I was holding up pretty well. School continued the next morning without a word about Cookie or her father. Adelai had been in psychiatric custody of some sort and there was no blood in the church, but we all knew what happened at Station 6. Gunshots and buzzers and screeching tires, alarms signaling danger, yet I managed to stay safe. And for that I felt stronger, more able to handle what the world was preparing to throw my way. I was gaining a sense of daring. Maybe I could go on Ricky Street now without fear. Maybe. Mother had to be busy or gone. I had no idea what awaited me on Ricky Street, but those other incidents didn’t offer warning either. I committed to disobeying Mother. I committed to daring. I’d have to pick a good day for play, because if I got caught there was a good chance that I wouldn’t be leaving the house for a while. I needed a day when everybody, young and old, would be outside. I didn’t want to miss a thing or person. I wanted to know everything happening on Ricky Street, which could only mean one day out of all seven. Saturday. The official weekly holiday for all black folks in good standing. With God’s blessing, Mother would have to be properly distracted for a good eight hours. I had a day appointed. Now I had to wait.
The next day, Saturday, Mother decided that she’d spend the entire day cooking a pot of gumbo. Have mercy! Making gumbo is an event that requires the cook to stay on the pot for most of the day, a sacrifice with the promise of a worthy meal. It requires commitment, attention to detail, and very limited distractions. Excellent. Thank you, God.
&nbs
p; I grabbed a few toys and headed for the door.
“I’m gonna play out in the front,” I told Mother.
“Be careful. Come in and use the bathroom. Ms. Johnson say she saw you peein’ on the side of the house,” Mother responded.
“Okay, Momma.”
I didn’t bother to take up the accusation because it was true and Ms. Johnson didn’t have any business looking at an eight-year-old pee anyway. She lived next door and I did pee. On her house. Right under the bathroom window. She saw me peeing and I saw her slamming a syringe in her arm. We made eye contact and she looked surprised. I guess she was doing something bad. If she was a kid she wouldn’t have said anything, let bygones be bygones. Fuckin’ adults.
Before I opened the front door, I smelled it again—burning wood. But the house could burn down for all I cared. I was headed to Ricky Street to see what all the damn noise was about.
five
red now and laters
I stepped out my front door just about the time Mother poured the roux into the stock water. I didn’t run nor pussyfoot but walked steady like a postman, not daring to turn around and see if Mother was watching or else be turned to salt. I had accepted her eventual discovery and the consequences involved. It was the longest fifty yards of my eight years, and no sooner had I turned onto Ricky Street than Raymond Earl yelled, “Ti’ John! Catch!”
He was halfway up the block and threw a bomb. A large group of boys watched as the football soared in the air in a perfect spiral, above the tree line, holy and ordained with the blessings of Apollo, Chango, and Dan Pastorini. It was a beautiful throw, but now it was making its descent toward me. I had to catch this ball, but I knew the minute he threw it that I was going to drop it. Oh God, please let me catch the ball. It can hurt, I won’t mind. This was my litmus test among the guys.
I dropped it.
The boys burst into laughter.
“That lil’ nigga cain’t catch,” spat an older kid called Pork Chop. The others agreed.
I grudgingly picked up the ball and started walking toward them while taking stock of this famed street. Very similar to my street, but I noticed there were more cars, some on the street, some in driveways, and even some in yards. Nobody parked their car in the yard on Clearway. Old Man Price sat on his porch drinking a bottle of wine and listening to the Astros game on a small transistor. He waved.
As I got closer to the guys, I noticed they were having an argument. Their ages ranged from the youngest, Lil’ Ant, all of six, to Charles Henry’s sixteen-year-old ass who was too big to be playing with young kids.
Raymond Earl spotted me with a smile and motioned for the ball. I launched a pathetic throw that caused more humor. Damn, this was not how I’d pictured my Ricky Street excursion.
“Them light-skinned niggas cain’t throw. Told ya. You ain’t never seen no light-skinned quarterback,” Pork Chop continued while digging his drawers out of his butt then sniffing his fingers. Nobody said a thing—guess that was Pork Chop’s thing.
“What about in baseball? They got all kinda yella niggas playin’ outfield and throwin’ the ball,” offered Booger with his big Frankenstein’s monster head and snotty nose. His name was no accident nor misnomer. Dried snot remained around his nostrils at all times, but he never picked his nose. Nor cleaned it.
“Them wetbacks. Mexicans and Puerto Ricans and Dominicans. Them ain’t niggas,” Charles Henry blurted while rubbing his hairy belly and goatee at the same time. He had taken a recent liking to the popular tight-fitting net shirts cut off at the midriff. Charles Henry grabbed the ball from Raymond Earl and drilled it into my chest. I coughed.
“See. He might be a wetback ’cause they can’t catch a football,” said Charles Henry, proud of himself for further humiliating me.
“He just a white boy. Ain’t you?” spat Pork Chop, walking near as I tried to catch my breath.
“Leave him alone, Pork Chop. He live around the corner,” said Raymond Earl.
“I don’t give a fuck. Fuck him and his momma.”
“Ooooh,” the boys sang.
The gauntlet had been thrown and I hadn’t been there more than five minutes. I was old enough to know that momma talk had to get answered, but I wasn’t sure what to do. All eyes on me. The only way to avoid physical confrontation was a well-placed comeback.
“At least my momma don’t be stealin’ grocery carts at Rice, talkin’ ’bout she wanna be a truck driver.”
That was the best I could come up with, but something was very wrong. All the boys hushed. Pork Chop started breathing heavy. He headed toward me quickly, then punched me in the mouth. I fell backward, hitting the hard cement of Ricky Street.
Charles Henry started laughing. “Shouldna’ been talkin’ ’bout his momma, white boy.”
Pork Chop moved closer and pulled his leg back to kick me until Raymond Earl swiped his foot, sending him to the ground next to me. The boys burst into laughter. Both Pork Chop and I were on the ground staring at each other.
Maurice, Charles Henry’s younger brother, was more amped to see the fight and chided Raymond Earl. “Why you stop him? That nigga shouldna’ been talkin’ ’bout that boy’s momma.”
“Fuck him. He always pickin’ on niggas smaller than him,” Raymond Earl responded, then took off his shirt.
“Awh, shit. Here this nigga go. Say, Raymond, that lil’ red nigga yo’ wife or something?” continued Charles Henry.
Raymond Earl ignored him and started bouncing around like a boxer, challenging Pork Chop to get up and fight. But Pork Chop just stayed on the ground, conflicted between anger and fear. He knew he couldn’t beat Raymond Earl in anything. Then Raymond Earl started singing—
“Ain’t yo’ momma pretty / She got meatballs on her titties.”
“Shut up an’ quit talkin’ ’bout my momma,” said Pork Chop.
“Here,” said Raymond Earl, handing me a red Now and Later candy.
He had a whole pack of them. Red. Or “cherry” as the label said, but we all knew it as “red” like many little black boys around the country. Red. Our flavor. Sometimes called “strawberry” or “raspberry” or “fruit punch.” Yet none of those labels mattered with us; the flavor was red. Red. The official color and flavor of all little black boys. Red made that noise. Red the sweetest. Red the king. Red the blood. Red as black. Red as the black savior. Red as truth; truth that a red shag carpet leads the way to Little Black Boy Heaven, where red angels answer the promise and keep the secrets. If God ain’t black, then He’s red, brother. Red the Danger. Red the Death, bleeding out on concrete, asphalt, and dirt roads where little black boys learn the mysteries of niggadom, whether they want to or not. Red the Life that pumps through our little veins, flowing through the body of He-Who-Will-Make-A-Choice or assume niggadom until Red the Life calls it quits. Sure, there was apple and grape, but none of those flavors ever mattered. The choice would always be red, not cherry, strawberry, raspberry, or fruit punch. Just red.
“You need to quit pickin’ on people,” Raymond Earl advised as he leaned over and helped me up.
Then he looked at Pork Chop. This wasn’t the first time Raymond Earl had intervened on another’s behalf because of Pork Chop’s aggression. But they were friends. He extended a hand to Pork Chop and pulled him up with “You gonna fuck around and mess with the wrong nigga one day.”
Silence agreed.
Hours passed with an intense game of touch in the street/tackle in the grass, stopping play only to allow passing cars by and occasional water breaks at Mr. Price’s water hose. I have to admit that my presence on Ricky Street was pretty bold. My neighbors drove by and waved to me. They knew my parents. It would only take one phone call or passing conversation to say that they saw me playing with the hoodlums. But like I said, I had already accepted the consequences, and for all that Mother had said about Ricky Street, it seemed pretty cool and safe. Mother was wrong. There was absolutely nothing to worry about on Ricky Street, I thought. Yet hubris is a reckless and da
ngerous attitude to develop at eight years old, and just after we huddled up and Raymond Earl decided to send me on a short route for a few yards, I heard his truck. Absolutely could not mistake the sound of his brown Chevy, particularly as it pushed up Ricky Street headed my way. Damn. Father. But we had a secret together; maybe this could be another one.
He spotted me with no expression, slowed down, and motioned for me to come to the truck.
“Your momma know you out here?” he asked sotto voce.
I kept my head low. “No.”
“Well, you better not stay out here too long or she gonna have a fit.”
Then he drove off. That simple. I mean, he gave me five dollars to survive around a village of criminals and risk takers; playing football on Ricky Street was minor league compared to the rodeo. At least I hoped he had made the same deduction.
“You Mr. Frenchy’s son?” Charles Henry asked, a little excited.
I nodded.
“Shiiited, Mr. Frenchy’s crazy. He got all them horses and shit. You be ridin’ horses?” Charles Henry furthered.
I found my opening. I shared with them the death of Harold’s father and the general atmosphere of the rodeo. They had never been, so were intrigued by the wantonness and danger of the rodeo circuit, hanging on to my words as I described every detail. The rodeo had everything they were looking for. Danger. Sex. Alcohol. Gambling. An AstroWorld for adults.
At dusk, I excused myself to head home. I took a look at the guys. I had made a few friends and allies, but I had also made a few enemies. Pork Chop was still pissed that Raymond Earl came to my aid, but probably more pissed that his mother had left him. Joe Boy was his normal, disagreeable self. He was quiet the whole day. He lived across the street from me, but he didn’t have anything to say and nobody asked him.
Red Now And Laters Page 6
