Ahgottahandleonit

by Donovan Mixon

  “Yeah, you know it. But, where you goin’? The door’s over this way. Come on, potato-head.”

  A SECRET NO MORE

  That evening—Sheila well into her third hour—blasted out tweets, emails and chat lines to six friends at once. When everything that could be said about the music fest had been covered, she closed her eyes and sprawled across her bed like a sated lioness.

  If it weren’t for the quiet of the afternoon, she wouldn’t have heard it at all—a whiny singsong chatter that repeated like a ringtone. It couldn’t have been Timmy’s phone—he would never leave it behind.

  She had to check this out.

  Pausing by the door, it occurred to her that this was Tim’s room that she was about to enter—stinky and full of boy’s stuff: games, comics, dirty socks and jock straps—ew. There might even be some porn buried somewhere—hmm…but there’s no time for that! If he caught her, there would be hell to pay. If she was going to find whatever it was, she had to move quickly. Its voice called out to her, like a secret.

  Fuck it.

  In the dark, an orange light glowed from the top drawer of the bureau that had been left open a crack for a power cord that was plugged into the wall. She could hear it clearly now.

  Chuck-keeee, Chuck-keee, pick-up swee-teee…

  Even though the ringtone had stopped just as she reached into the drawer, the voice, so familiar, replayed over and over in her head. Swallowing hard, she stared at the screen.

  MISSED CALL: SPANK

  She laughed when she saw Spank’s name, maybe the craziest of Tim’s friends—if you didn’t count that weirdo Lucy girl who always stood a little too close for her taste. At the music fest, way before Tim went off on Maurice, Lucy spent most of her time losing a bet: trying to hold a handstand on the grass for a full minute.

  Her hands shook as she searched through the contacts and text messages. Most were unknown to her. All of the texts were pretty straight ahead: Call me. Fidel. Lemme hear from you soon: Maria. Where are you homie? Spank. Etc. There were a lot of unknown callers. A couple messages from the mother of someone the person referred to as Charles? Something about the police?

  “Oh shit!” She watched her finger touch Photos as if it had a mind of its own. A dark image popped up. The subject’s hand, upturned and defensive, partially covered his face.

  Sheila sat on the bed in the dark room and considered the curtains that were completely drawn. She thought to open them, but then decided against it. She listened to water gurgle in their gimpy toilet. Outside, some kids argued about a basketball game. She stared at the photo. The hand wore a fingerless glove that dominated the frame. In the background, Darryl’s pained face stared into the camera.

  Her fingers swiped the screen to the right. Something broken and bloodied like a large doll, its legs in an impossible position, its head turned to the side, lay on the ground. Like Darryl in the previous photo, it appeared to stare into the lens.

  At that moment, two things went down at the same time: from her room a new chat message beeped in on the laptop and the damned phone slipped out of her hands. She caught it in mid-air.

  It was Darryl waiting for her online.

  saggindaddy: S’up?

  Im>U: S’up? That’s all you have to say?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, kind of… :)

  Im>U: So like, where have you been, dude? I thought maybe you’d forgotten about me. Have you?

  saggindaddy: Come on girl. Why u b bustin’ on me like that? I mean, ain’t like we b married or somethin’.

  Im>U: Stop with the bullshit, Darryl. I know and you know that you can speak and write. Ok?

  saggindaddy: Alright, alright. I hear you. Sorry to have disappeared like that on you. I’ve been like real busy lately.

  Im>U: Busy? What kind of busy? What do you mean? Are you still working at the library?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, yeah, I’m still there. S’all good.

  Im>U: So, if it’s all good, where you been?

  saggindaddy: Uh oh, who’s using substandard English now!

  Im>U: LOL Yeah, I’m a regular illiterate. Now stop fooling around. I’ve been hearing things.

  saggindaddy: Whoa, what have you been hearing?

  Im>U: Okay, so it’s going to be like that, huh?

  saggindaddy: What?

  Im>U: DARRYL!

  saggindaddy: WHAT? :))

  Im>U: I’m going to ask you a question. Promise me you’re going to tell the truth.

  saggindaddy: Well, that depends.

  Im>U: Promise me, boy!

  saggindaddy: Okay, I promise.

  Im>U: You ready?

  saggindaddy: Yes, I’m ready. Go ahead.

  Im>U: Did you have a fight with Chucky that didn’t turn out so good? FOR YOU?

  saggindaddy: Wait, isn’t he like, missing or something? What are you talking about?

  Im>U: You promised, Darryl! Ok? Before he was missing or something, did you fight with him?

  saggindaddy: No, I didn’t fight with Chucky. Anyway if I had, I would’ve stomped that little chump. Why you asking me this? What happened?

  Im>U: Are you sure?

  saggindaddy: Yeah girl. I would know if I had a fight with somebody! So what’s this about? Sheila? Are you still there?

  Im>U: It’s about a photo.

  saggindaddy: Oh. A photo huh?

  Im>U: Yeah, Saggin’ Daddy. A certain photo that features you on the ground looking like you were NOT having a good time. Darryl?? What’s this about?

  saggindaddy: Tim found out that I was there when Maurice jumped him in the park.

  Im>U: How? You didn’t tell him, did you?

  saggindaddy: Nah, I think he figured it out. He probably saw my glove that day, but didn’t exactly remember seeing me since I was just standing on the side. He’s been asking about it off and on for while.

  Im>U: So, he just guessed?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, I don’t know. Maybe. One minute we were cool, the next he’s slamming me against the wall, stepping on my chest and showing me a knife!

  Im>U: A knife! What kind of knife?

  saggindaddy: Who cares what kind of knife when it’s pointed at your dick?

  Im>U: Oh Shit! He did that?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, cut my jeans too.

  Im>U: Did he cut you?

  saggindaddy: Nah, but for a minute, I thought he might.

  Im>U: What then? He wanted you to confess or something?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, I guess so because when I said he was right, he got up off me. Hey, why did you think it was Chucky anyway?

  Im>U: Don’t know. The dude disappeared. There’s like, some serious mystery to it. You know?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, it’s blowing up on Twitter. When I told Tim that he probably did something to the punk, he got real mad and denied it of course. But I didn’t believe him.

  Im>U: DARRYL! Don’t go around spreading no rumors about Timmy!

  saggindaddy: Nah, baby. He’s a good dude. Can’t blame him for being mad at me. Deep down, I didn’t really think he was going to cut me.

  Im>U: HAAA! To me, you seemed a real believer in that photo!

  saggindaddy: Aw man! HE showed you that? What was that about? He’s going to put it on the net or what?

  Im>U: I don’t know, Darryl. Tim’s been acting a little crazy lately. Don’t think so though. I’ll ask him. Hey, are you alright? When am I going to see you?

  saggindaddy: Yeah, I hear that! Let me call you later. Something has got to be jumping off somewhere tonight.

  Im>U: Cool. C U.

  saggindaddy: Later.

  FRAYING AT THE SEAMS

  It had been a rough night at Les’ place. Sleeping on a bench press after a workout and a six-pack had turned out to be a bad idea. But then bunking on the basement floor in a funky Boy Scout sleeping bag would’ve been an even worse choice. Tim had spotted three spiders before lights out.

  But now…

  How in hell had he ended up sitting on the floor in the middle
of Sheila’s room? Where the fuck had she gone to? Had he dozed off?

  An upturned jewelry box lay next to his ankle, its contents strewn wide across the tan throw rug like abandoned homes of sea creatures on a beach. Sheila’s favorite antique doll, lynched by a string of beads, swung from a clothes hanger protruding from a half-opened drawer. In the corner, an empty cola can, having found a depression in the cheap linoleum, made two last undulations before settling into a trough. His heart stopped as his finger touched something metal—his sister’s beloved windup alarm clock. The large crack in its face rendered his memory perfect as he recalled throwing it against the wall, hearing the crunch-ding (cring?) of the impact and ducking out of the way of its rebound.

  He brushed away earrings, hair clamps, pins, mascara, lipsticks and beads, making space to stretch out onto the floor. His head ached.

  He told himself that he didn’t understand why Sheila was so mad at him. But he knew that was a lie. When he’d arrived home from Les’, she was chatting with somebody online. He’d paused at her doorway to say hi. Instead of waving him away as usual, she’d stopped writing, closed the laptop and started in on him about what’d happened at the music fest the day before.

  She should’ve been grateful. Maurice had been fuckin’ with them since the last week of school. Everybody there knew he had it coming.

  Darryl was another matter. When out of the blue, she’d asked if he had seen his tutor lately, as she’d put it, Tim figured she had found Chucky’s phone.

  She must have lost her balance.

  I just wanted the phone and to go the fuck to bed.

  I told her that I would talk to her later, but no—she had to have answers right then and there.

  I just wanted to go to my room and sleep.

  She knows I can’t stand somebody getting up in my face, talking shit.

  She should’ve backed off like I told her.

  They used to wrestle when they were little. Sheila was always on the big side and could take it like a lot of the boys.

  Yeah man, that’s it. She must have lost her balance.

  A chill hit him as he remembered the way she held her hand to her face, sat cross-legged on the floor to watch him tear up her room, looking for Chucky’s phone.

  He didn’t mean to slap her so fucking hard.

  BERETTA F81

  Tim hadn’t seen Sheila for two days. Sometimes from his room, he would hear her fussing with their uncle or talking on the phone. Other times, like in the morning, when he would expect to see her, she would be strangely absent. Asking Gentrale about her was of no use. The old codger would raise his hands and say something like, “I think you just missed her. Please leave me out of this mess,” before abandoning him to stew in his own juices.

  A part of him, the shamed part, was grateful for the break, but by the second night, he could barely stand it. By Friday night, he had hoped a good workout would clear his mind. It was after closing time—he had the gym to himself.

  As he performed curls, sweat poured off his body. It felt good. Finally the uneasy twinge in his arm had begun to subside—a constant reminder of the fall he’d taken while running from Chucky and his boys. As the discomfort faded, he could no longer pretend to himself that what had happened, didn’t happen. Yes, he’d finally done it—gotten into trouble, real trouble this time. Or had he? Sure as he was that he hadn’t dreamed the whole thing, he found it strange to not have heard a word about a body being found. Shit! When I’m done here tonight, I’ll get rid of Les somehow and then get my ass over to the park and fucking find Chucky—it—myself. Humph! Yeah—and then what?

  His arm began to ache again.

  As Tim stowed away equipment in the dead quiet of the gym, shapes and sounds came and went with every turn of his head, scrape of his foot. The darkness of the joint didn’t bother him. In a way he liked it. It suited his mood. Besides, the main light switch was all the way on the other side behind the juice bar.

  It was getting to be about time to hit the showers. They had been running for a good ten minutes—working up a nice hot steam. He figured Les wasn’t going to show up.

  Something large and furry ran across his foot.

  Damn! I left the door open for Les—hadn’t planned on dealing with any other kind of wildlife. He laughed when he saw the opossum scurry into the shadows like a mangy bandit—until something else moved.

  Fidel stepped through the door. His jacket had that new leather smell, his expression, strange—trouble with a smile veneer. Tim hated the snakelike deadness in his eyes. He didn’t wait for the dude to speak.

  “What the fuck are you do-doin’ here?”

  Fidel hunched his shoulders. Something black jutted from the inside pocket of his jacket. “Whoa–ho-ho, brother! I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to scare you. Hey, did I miss something? So, are you the owner of the joint now, the one who gets to say who comes and goes?”

  “I ain’t s-saying nothing, man. I’m asking you what the fuck you doing here?” Tim said, letting the dumbbell rest on the bench.

  Fidel took a step further into the space. “Yo, I think you should check your tone of voice, my brother.”

  Tim walked to the exit and held the door open. “How’s this for tone? I ain’t your brother. Got it? Now you need to leave. I’m closing up tonight.”

  “Oh, so it is true? You do have some official role in here. Maybe—the manager? Or is it the janitor?” he said, flipping through workout schedule cards.

  Tim glanced outside onto the street and slammed the door shut. Fidel smiled. “Are we expecting someone? Maybe your boy Les?” he said, still looking at the cards, chuckling to himself.

  “Oh, so you was listening to us at the park the other day. Man, it’s time for you to go now. I ain’t got time right now and I gotta—” Tim choked on his words as he watched Fidel slowly remove one hand from a pocket. “So-so, like, what do you want, Fidel? As fa-far as I’m concerned, we ain’t got no business.”

  “As fa-far as I’m concerned,” Fidel mocked. “Oh, on the contrary Tim, we have business. Oh yeah.”

  Like what? You still going on about your ass-wipe cousin?” Tim shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

  “Yeah, like where is my cousin?” Fidel sounded angry now. He paced back and forth in front of the entrance as he spoke. “And don’t tell me you have no idea, BITCH!” he said, fixing Tim’s eyes, pushing open his jacket. The black something was clearly a handle. Tim believed he knew what for.

  “You the BITCH coming up in here like this, trying to scare som-somebody. I don’t fucking know about your cousin. He-he’s probably hiding out from those Weequahic boys. You know he’s been toking up with them. I heard he owes money. Maybe they finally caught up with his ass.”

  Tim moved back towards the bench and picked up the dumbbell, removed the weights and held onto the bar. “I’m serious, Fidel. I don’t know what you’re talking about. But now, you gotta go. I’m serious.”

  They stared at each other without saying anything. The sound of open showerheads continued from the locker room.

  Fidel shrugged again and tipped his head towards the noise. “Never mind what I have to do. Maybe you should, like a good janitor, save some water and turn that shit off.”

  Tim watched Fidel’s body language, especially his hands. “Don’t worry about that, yo! You be gone when I’m done,” he said and turned towards the locker room. His body felt as if his blood had turned into glue. Even though the bar in his hand felt extra heavy, he couldn’t put it down. In his ears, the ache in his forearm pulsated in sync with his heartbeat. He listened to Fidel as he walked away, the sound of the boy’s voice receding with each step.

  “Alright, Timmy boy. But I’m sure you had something to do with Chucky—word’s on the street that you were with him the night before he disappeared—

  Tim never heard when Fidel stopped talking. The white noise of the open showerheads covered almost everything.

  Almost.

  At
the sound of footsteps running up behind him, Tim unlatched the first tall locker. Timing it just right, he turned and kicked open its door just as Fidel bolted through the doorway.

  The blunt impact of Fidel’s face crashing into the locker door reverberated from the shower tiles to the ceiling of the main room and back. The boy lurched backwards like a life-sized marionette whose strings had suddenly been cut. He hit the floor and skidded for about a foot back into the workout area and didn’t move. Tim ran out to him, checked his breathing, pulled his jacket open and took the gun, a Beretta f81.

  It was fucking beautiful.

  Fidel spoke like a drunk. “Awww man, Tim. Shit, I think you broooke my noooose.”

  Tim yelled at the semiconscious boy on the floor. “I don’t believe you. I told you to fucking leave. Why the fuck you had to come up on me like that?”

  Fidel’s whole body went limp. Tim prayed he was sleeping. Shit, another scarecrow, he thought. The Beretta was heavy. It wouldn’t stay put in his waistband as he’d seen it done in countless movies. He had to put it in his back pocket and hold onto it with one hand as he sprinted across the gym to the juice bar where he’d last seen the duct tape. As he ran through the darkness, his eyes burned with fresh tears. Les could show up at any minute. Then what?

  When he got back, Fidel lay where he’d left him on the floor, snoring. He dragged the boy inside the locker room and with the heavy tape, fastened his arms and legs to a metal chair that was bolted to the floor. Suddenly, someone started banging hard on the outside door and wouldn’t stop. Tim pressed a strip of the tape across Fidel’s mouth.

  Chuck-keeee, Chuck-keee, pick-up swee-teee…

  The thug’s eyes popped open at the sound of the ringtone. So busy was Tim fumbling with his pockets, he hadn’t yet realized that his secret was finally out. Chucky’s phone had popped out of his pocket, hit the floor and slid through the door, back into the gym.

  He dived after it.

  Got it.

  MISSED CALL: MOM

  Tim sat on the floor staring at the text message until he finally heard it—Fidel’s muted cries coming from the locker room. He wondered what the boy had seen, had heard. Then both the screams and knocking stopped at the same time.