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She was getting weepy. Lainie had a kind heart. But I 1
wasn’t in any mood to worry about her crocodile tears.
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What about me? Here I had waited until I was down to 3
my last dollar, thinking that I could always pick up a job 4
somewhere. But nobody in the Harbor would hire a thief.
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And even if I went out of town, people would still ask for 6
references.
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What I wanted to do was yell at Lainie until she felt the 8
pain that I was feeling on the inside. I would have yelled 9
if I were innocent.
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“I’m sorry, Lainie. It’s not your fault. It’s just that bank.
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I probably made some mistake and they decided that I 12
was a thief. That’s all.”
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“What are you going to do?”
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I considered her question for a moment, and then I 15
thought a little more. I opened my mouth, but there was 16
no answer forthcoming.
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“I got to go,” I said. “Thanks for tellin’ me.”
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I did go fishing — in a small river not two miles from 15
my house. I caught three good-size trout, not for pleasure 16
but to eat that night. I wanted to cook dinner but couldn’t 17
bear the idea of counting out pennies to some high school 18
cashier at the IGA.
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It was after 6:00 when I got home. There was a little day-20
light left in the distance, but it was dusk. My plans were all 21
set by the time I got in, so I went right to the phone.
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A woman answered after seven rings. “Hello?”
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“Mona?”
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“Hey, Charles. Hold on.” She put the phone down 25
with a loud knock and yelled, “It’s Charles!”
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A few moments passed and then the phone hissed as it 27 S
was being picked up.
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“What?” a man’s angry voice said.
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“Hey, Clarance. Listen, man, I got to borrow a hundred 1
bucks fast.”
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“So?”
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“This is no joke, Clarance —”
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“Naw. That’s right. This ain’t no joke at all. This is dead 5
serious. I been thinkin’ about you and how you act since 6
last night. And it burns me up. Here I am tryin’ to be 7
your friend and all you wanna do is dis me. Well that’s it.
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I’m through with you, man. I called Ricky and told him. I 9
said no more Thursday-night blackjack, no more Saturday-10
night bar hoppin’, no more nuthin’. We’re through.”
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Clarance was sputtering. I almost made a joke but then 12
thought better of it.
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“Hey,” I said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean nuthin’. You 14
know it was the whiskey —”
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“You sorry all right. Unemployed, drunk loudmouth is 16
what you is.” Clarance usually tried to articulate in the 17
ways of school learning. That kind of language was pro-18
moted among the older colored families of the Harbor.
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But when he got angry, he talked street.
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“I said I was sorry, man. What more do you want?”
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“I don’t want nuthin’ from you. I don’t want you to call 22
or ask me for money or nuthin’ else. Just stay away from 23
me, you hear?” And with that he hung up the phone in 24
my ear.
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I realized then that I didn’t have any kind of plan. All I 26
was going to do was borrow a hundred dollars from S 27
Clarance to put some cheap food in my refrigerator.
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I washed out a griddle and a saucepan, a glass and a 2
plate and utensils to cook and eat with. Then I cleaned 3
my fish and dredged the fillets in cornmeal. Fried fish 4
with hot sauce and a side of turnips was my dinner. I 5
laughed because it was better food than I would have had 6
if I had the money to go to the diner.
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There were two shots’ worth left in the whiskey bottle, 8
just enough to keep me between self-pity and drunken 9
tears.
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The house was a mess. There were piles of clothes and 11
dirty dishes in every room. Junk mail and bills were 12
thrown into corners, and every chair had something piled 13
on the seat.
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I went upstairs to my bedroom and threw the blankets —
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along with a notebook, two dirty dinner plates, and a 16
dozen loose stones that I had picked up — from the bed.
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I lay with arms and legs dangling over the sides of the 18
small mattress. On the windowsill next to my head was a 19
book I had been reading. Neglect’s Glasses. It was a science-20
fiction novel about a kid in the ghetto who had found a 21
pair of sunglasses somehow imbued with the intelligence 22
of an alien race. The ghetto child, just days away from his 23
initiation into a youth gang, is drawn into a swirl of 24
knowledge that takes him places that he never knew were 25
possible.
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I laid there on my bed, reading, for well over an hour.
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The boy, whose name was Tyler, was transformed into the 28 R
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the glasses always made him feel the emotions of those 1
lives he touched. And so when he hurt people, he experi-2
enced their pain. Helping others made Tyler feel good 3
about himself.
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I would have read the whole book that night if it wasn’t 5
for chapter twelve. That’s where Tyler looked closely at his 6
parents and in a flash of divination realized that his father 7
would soon be dead. I couldn’t take the revelation and 8
threw the slender hardback into the tin trash can, deco-9
rated with astronauts, that had sat in the same corner for 10
more than thirty years. The book hitting the can set off a 11
burble of beer bottles jostling together.
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There were five empties in the can under a holey T-shirt 13
and a few wads of paper. I found four more under the 14
bed. On the outside of the windowsill, there was one 15
dead soldier, as Clarance called them. That started my 16
journey back through the house. There were bottles 17
everywhere. Some were only half empty. One or two al-18
most full. There were bottles on the front porch, in the 19
backyard, on the patio chairs. On the roof there were a 20
few left over from friendly spring nights when Laura and 21
I made love in my sleeping bag up under the stars.
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They were behind the couch and on the inside ledge of 23
the fireplace. By the time I finished, there were fifty-one 24
bottles on the old dining-room table. Those empties 25
would make me two paper dollars. And with them I 26
could keep my pride.
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I remembered what I was doing and who I was with for R 28
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almost every bottle found. The ones in the backyard were 2
from a party the summer before last. It was Ricky and 3
Clarance with some other guys and girls. The police had 4
to come over to tell us to turn the music down.
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It was the only time in my life that I had sex with two 6
women in one night. The first was my girlfriend at that 7
time, China Browne. We’d been dancing and got to get 8
kind of amorous. I took her up to my mother’s old room.
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It was over pretty quickly because I was so excited. China 10
fell asleep and I went back downstairs. There were lots of 11
people there dancing and talking loud. I felt a sweet sense 12
of calm and started putting beer bottles back in a wooden 13
crate. China’s friend Jane Sadler started picking up with me.
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We were just talking and laughing about what a good 15
time everybody was having. We filled two crates and were 16
carrying them out to the backyard. Then we heard this 17
noise, a moaning out behind the garage. I winked at Jane 18
and we snuck around the corner.
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It was Clarance and this white girl who had come with 20
somebody, I didn’t know who. But she was with Clarance 21
right then. They were kissing furiously in the faint light 22
that shone over the back of the garage. He was moaning 23
in a deep bass and she squealed between their soul kisses.
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Jane put her hand on my forearm. At first I thought 25
that she wanted to give the newfound lovers some pri-26
vacy, but when I looked I could see that she was just 27 S
steadying herself. Jane had skin my color and bright eyes 28 R
and long curly hair.
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Suddenly Clarance spun the white girl around. She 1
lifted her miniskirt while he pulled down her panties.
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Jane’s grip on my forearm tightened. Clarance started 3
fumbling with his zipper then. The white girl was waving 4
her butt around and moaning. Clarance kept fumbling.
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“Hurry up!” The white girl’s hushed cry was exactly 6
what I wanted to shout.
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“I got it now,” Clarance said, throwing down some-8
thing. The next morning I realized that it was the wrap-9
per from a condom.
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He bent his knees and took a long slow slide into his 11
new friend. Her welcoming moan made my heart skip so 12
hard that I thought I might be having a seizure.
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Clarance started slamming hard against her backside.
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The smacking flesh and high-pitched barks from the girl 15
made me sweat.
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“I cain’t hold it, baby,” Clarance barked. “I cain’t hold it.”
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“Come come come come come,” she answered.
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And then they were both silent and rigid. After a mo-19
ment Clarance made a grunting sound that was no more 20
than the crack of a dry leaf and the girl exhaled through 21
her open mouth.
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Jane pulled me by the arm. When we got around to the 23
other side, she kissed me. I led her straight to the basement.
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There was no inside connection from the house. You 25
had to go outside and through a heavy trapdoor to get 26
down there. I suppose that it was called a basement be-S 27
cause it was under the house, but it was more like a crypt.
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I snapped on the light and Jane kissed me again.
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“Don’t say a word,” she told me as she lifted her skirt and 3
I dropped my pants. She sat back on my great-grandfather’s 4
oversize traveling trunk.
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It should have been safe sex but it wasn’t. I was happy 6
that I just made love to China because I didn’t want those 7
moments with Jane to ever end. I rocked back and forth 8
on the balls of my feet while she stroked my other balls 9
and scratched both of my nipples with the long, press-on 10
fingernails of one hand. We were looking into each other’s 11
eyes. Every once in a while she’d lean forward to kiss me, 12
but when I returned the gesture she moved her head back 13
and sneered.
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The trunk rocked precariously, but we had the balance 15
of cats in heat. She undulated on her hips and quivered 16
while I pushed and pulled, feeling the veins standing out 17
all over my body. I started to move faster but Jane said, 18
“Slow it down, baby. Slow it down.”
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When I finally came I moved back in one small show of 20
responsibility. The emotion on her face while she watched 21
my ejaculation was the deep satisfaction that comes from 22
victory.
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China stopped seeing me after that night, and Jane 24
never returned one phone call. Maybe they compared 25
notes; I didn’t care. That night was a highlight for me.
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Two women and a chance to see the Master — that’s 27 S
what we called Clarance when it came to women — in 28 R
action. I was at peace for a whole week. I didn’t do any-38
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thing except pack the trash into bags and put the crates of 1
empty beers in the basement.
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That’s why I thought about the basement. It was Jane 3
and China Browne that jarred my memory.
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It was a large, dark room crowded with stuff from the 7
Dodd and Blakey families. A little something was there 8
from every generation. I had one great-auntie, Blythe, 9
who considered herself a painter. There were fifty or more 10
of her awful canvases leaned up against the walls and be-11
hind a useless coal-burning stove. Her trees and houses 12
and people looked like a child’s pitiful attempts. There 13
was my great-grandfather’s traveling trunk and stacks of 14
old newspapers that were yellow and brittle from fifty 15
years or more before. We had old furniture and rugs and 16
straw baskets filled with two hundred Christmases of 17
toys. The cobwebs looked like they belonged on a movie 18
set, and it was cold down there too.
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Eighteen wooden crates of empty beer bottles were 20
stacked in the middle of the cobblestone floor. They were 21
all I was interested in. It meant twenty-four dollars at the 22
beer-and-soda store at the Corners. I dragged the boxes 23
out into the light, rubbing my face now and then to get 24
off the tickle of cobwebs. When I got all the crates, I 25
looked around some more to see if there might have been 26
something else of value there.
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It was a big basement. Thirty feet in either direction.
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The ceiling must have been ten feet from the floor. An-2
niston Bennet was right: it would have made a nice apart-3
ment without all that junk. It was a well-built hole. Dry 4
as a bone and cool year round because it was deep in the 5
rocky earth. I used to think that ghosts lived in that cel-6
lar, that the spirits of my dead ancestors came from out of 7
the graveyard behind my house and played cards or talked 8
all night long in the solitude of that room. I left them 9
Kool-Aid and lemon cookies in the summer. When the 10
food was still there the next day, my father would tell me 11
that the spirits had eaten the ghost food that lives inside 12
the food for the living. He told me that it was like a bless-13
ing and now the food left over had to be buried in the 14
trash like the dead.
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