“But how can they fire you, Rhett? Don’t you and Chris own a majority of Sumwun?”
Rhett tried to muster a smile. “Sometimes I forget you’re still so young. Of course we don’t own a majority of the company. All of those millions we raised came at a cost. The more money we needed, the bigger the piece of the pie we gave away until we were left with less than them. Plus,” he said, sinking deeper into the couch, “Chris is on their side.”
I reflexively took a sip of my coffee and spit it out. “Hold on, Rhett. So why don’t we say fuck them? After all of the cash we’ve closed over the past few months, can’t we just survive off that?”
“No, Buck.” He shook his head. “That’s not how it works. Plus, we don’t have any cash. We’ve been living from hand-to-mouth for the past quarter.”
“Hand-to-mouth? We’ve closed over a million dollars a month since I started. We’ve been hitting the numbers.”
Rhett threw his head back, letting out something between a sigh and a growl. His ceiling was a graffitied version of the Sistine Chapel’s, coincidentally spray-painted by an artist who also went by the name Michelangelo. He said it was cheap, but I don’t see how it could’ve been.
“Rhett.”
He just lay there staring at the multicolored men and women wearing tight-fitting skirts, baggy jeans, basketball jerseys, Timberlands, and other “urban” clothing you’d see in a nineties rap video.
“Rhett,” I repeated, standing over him now, blocking his view.
“What, Buck? What the fuck do you want to know? That we were never really closing as much cash as I said we were? That whenever we just made it at the last minute, the last fucking second of the month, we actually didn’t? That I spent a good chunk of the money we raised on all of this?” he said, stretching his arms around the room. “Tell me, Buck, what do you want to know? Just tell me.” He rolled off the couch onto the floor, sobbing again.
“Rhett,” I whispered. “You can’t be serious.”
“As serious as lung cancer, Buck.”
I sat on the floor next to him and closed my eyes. The room was spinning, and all I could do was rock back and forth, breathing in and out. Trying to figure out what Rhett had just said. Because it sounded like he said that we’d been living a lie. That everything I believed in was nothing more than a myth.
“Do you have any ideas?”
“No, Rhett,” I said in disbelief. “How could I have any ideas?”
“I don’t know, Buck.” He sighed, smaller now. “It’s what I hired you for. When you pitched me that drink, I swore I saw a purer, smarter, more courageous version of myself.”
“And what do you see now, Rhett?” I asked, afraid of his answer.
“Well, Buck,” he said, getting up and walking to his bedroom. “Frankly, I don’t know. Everything is a blur.”
18
Not much had changed by Wednesday. The media was still replaying clips of the FBI raid; everyone at Sumwun was tense, making calls into the abyss to keep the floor humming; and Rhett was looking worse with each passing day.
It was still early, but I decided to head home and see Ma. She had gotten upset when she realized I’d left church in the middle of the sermon, so I was doing all I could to make it up to her. I figured heading home and ordering pizza before she got there would be a good move.
But when I got home and opened the door, something felt off, like the house was heavier. Muffled masculine voices came from the kitchen. And with each step I took, the voices got louder. There was laughter, a thick smell of Javanese coffee, and the click-clack of hard rubber heels. What the fuck is going on?
I swung the door open and found Ma at the kitchen table, pieces of paper spread out in front of her, and two men dressed in the same shit-colored brown suits leaning over her shoulders like mini angels in cartoons. Except they were both devils.
“Oh, hello,” the blonder one with a wrinkled, tanned face said, looking up. He smiled as he walked over with an outstretched hand. “You must be Darren.”
I just looked at it, noticing the gold watch hanging off his wrist before seeing the shock on Ma’s face. She was wearing a white T-shirt tucked into a blue denim jean skirt, which made her look twenty years younger.
“Dar,” she said, quickly shuffling the papers. “I didn’ know you’d be home so early, baby. Why didn’ you let me know?”
I looked from the man’s hand to Ma, then to the other blond man pouring himself a fresh cup of coffee like he owned the place.
“Who are these people?” I asked, ignoring the men.
Ma looked over her shoulder, and said, “This is—”
“Richard Lawson,” the blonder man said, taking the papers out of Ma’s hands, flipping through them. “And this is Harry Richards.” He nodded at his associate.
“So many dicks,” I said, still stuck in place.
“Darren!” Ma shouted.
It hit me. Richard Lawson was someone I’d spoken to months ago; the real estate agent from Next Chance Management who sent that letter to Ma and kept calling about buying the brownstone.
“Ma,” I said, slowly walking toward her, shoving both Richard Lawson and Harry Richards away from the table. “What are they doing here?”
“Calm down, Darren.”
I snatched the papers from one of the dicks’ hands and leafed through them. One was the deed to the house. The others were copies of the floor plans. Another was a contract to sell.
I slammed the contract on the table, sending a coffee mug crashing to the floor, drenching the dicks’ leather shoes.
“Answer me, Ma!”
“We need to get things in order, Dar. Nothin’ is finalized. But jus’ gettin’ things in order, you know?”
“No,” I said. “I don’t know.”
My heart was pounding and I could feel my veins bulging, threatening to tear and leave me bleeding out on the floor. The room was spinning worse than during a bad hangover, and all of it—Ma, the dicks, the smell of coffee, the sun slowly disappearing over the horizon—turned into some unidentifiable Picasso-like painting.
“Do we need the money, Ma? Are you sick? Is this what all the coughin’ and missed days have been about?”
“No.” She wrapped her hand around my clenched fist. “I jus’ wanna know how much everything is worth. That’s all.”
“You promised,” I said, ripping my fist out of her weak grasp. “You promised that you wouldn’ reply to these, these fuckin’ parasites.”
“Darren, please.” She feebly stood up and reached for my arm.
I ran up to my room, stuffed clothes in my bag, and headed for the door.
“Baby, don’ leave me,” she begged, blocking the doorway. “Not now, baby. Please, not now. You don’ understand.” Thin streams of tears traveled down her cheeks, filling the dry wrinkles around her mouth.
“I do understand, Ma,” I said, moving her out of the way. “I understand that we made a deal, and you broke it. I understand that you’re a fuckin’ liar.”
Down the stairs. Scream my lungs out. Turn the corner. Shatter my phone. Hit the subway. Wipe my tears.
* * *
On Friday, I woke up suffocating. Not in some metaphorical way. I mean I slept on Rhett’s couch the wrong way, and folds of its soft leather covered my face so I literally couldn’t breathe.
“Ahh!” I shouted, clawing my way out. I rolled onto the floor, gasping for air, thinking that Rhett would run out to help. But it was just me, a fresh pot of coffee, and broad waves of sunlight pouring into the living room. Without a phone, I was disconnected from everything I wanted to avoid: Ma, Soraya, the news. It felt good.
I took my time getting dressed, grabbing one of Rhett’s expensive button-ups, denim joggers, and even a pair of his calfskin Maison Margiela high-tops. I devoured the plate of blueberry pancakes, eggs, and sausage that Rhett had left out for me, tossed his wretched excuse for coffee, and found a cab.
When I got to Sumwun, the sales floor wasn’t its nor
mal, chaotic, in-need-of-a-large-animal-tranquilizer self. Instead, everyone quietly fiddled on their keyboards, rearranged their desks, and occasionally looked around before gluing their eyes back to their monitors. Even Clifford the pig looked like someone had died.
“Yo,” I whispered to Charlie, quietly putting my bag down. “What’s going on?”
He leaned in closer, his voice barely audible. “You didn’t see the video? Shit, where have you been?”
“I don’t have my phone, man. What’s going on?”
Charlie grabbed his phone, handed me earbuds, and pressed play on a video. It was of a shirtless Rhett at a club, probably from a month ago, standing on some couches. He was rapping along to Ja Rule and spraying bottles of Dom P everywhere like a madman.
“Fuck,” I whispered.
Charlie shook his head. “Yeah, he could’ve at least picked a better song than ‘Mesmerize.’”
I played it again. Rhett had two attractive women sucking his nipples as he sprayed champagne all over them, exposing their own hard nipples through tight white shirts. Rhett’s eyes were barely open, and the neon lights exposed the outline of a large hard-on.
“Who?”
“A fucking bottle girl, dude. Supposedly she tried blackmailing him, but when he didn’t budge, she sold the video to fucking Bonnie Sauren, and PSST News uploaded it to YouTube.”
“So why is it so quiet in here? Shouldn’t everyone be on the phones?”
Charlie shrugged. “Rhett’s in Qur’an with the board. The windows are all covered.”
I turned toward the frosted doors.
“Lucien and all of them flew in on a red-eye. They’re in there right now, tearing him apart.”
The elevator bell rang. Two figures with bulky silhouettes stepped out and paused in the elevator bay before heading through the transparent doors.
“Not this again,” Charlie said, pushing his seat out and walking over to Clyde.
Porschia and the two men, definitely cops, emerged from the far corner of the floor and walked in our direction. They were staring at us. Then I realized they weren’t staring at us, they were staring at me.
“Um, Buck,” Porschia whispered.
“Yeah?” My heart was beating so loudly, I could hardly hear; it felt like I was underwater. What is this? Did Jason tell them something? Do they think I was somehow responsible for Donesha Clark’s murder?
“These two men want to speak with you,” she said, avoiding eye contact.
I followed the three of them to Bhagavad Gita, my stomach full of wasps.
“I’ll leave you all to it,” Porschia said, closing the door.
“Take a seat, son,” the tall Italian-looking one with a strong jaw said.
“I didn’t do anything.” I slowly lowered myself into the seat while maintaining eye contact with him.
“Why haven’t you picked up your phone?” the other, red-haired, blue-eyed copper asked.
Fuck. They’re going to beat me down like Rodney King. This is how it happens.
“I broke it,” I said, shifting in my seat. When it came to cops, Ma always said to “cooperate, but don’t incriminate.”
“We’ve tried calling you all morning, son,” the Italian one said. “Even your neighbor, Mr. Rawlings, said he couldn’t get in touch with you.”
“For what? Like I told you, I didn’t do anything. And unless you’re going to charge me”—I stood up—“I’m leaving.”
“Son,” the Italian one said. “Your mother died this morning.”
I was suddenly standing outside Bhagavad Gita looking through the glass wall at the scene inside—me, laughing in disbelief. The red-headed cop leaned against a window, biting his nails. The Italian one stared at me sympathetically.
I heard the Italian cop say, “I’m sorry, son. So, so sorry,” as he kneaded his chin with his hairy knuckles.
I saw myself shaking my head, saying, “No, man. My mom isn’t dead. Can’t be. I just saw her the other day. Stop fucking lying to me.”
I saw the red-headed one walking toward me and placing a hand on my shoulder, saying, “Everyone has been trying to get in touch with you all morning, Darren. She had lung cancer, didn’t you know?”
Lung cancer? “No,” I heard myself say through the glass. “My mom didn’t have lung cancer. She just had a little cough, felt a little tired, but she didn’t have lung cancer.”
“I know it’s hard to believe, son,” I heard the Italian one say. “I’ve been through it too. It may be hard now, but—”
I saw myself push the cops. “Get the fuck off of me!” I heard myself shout. “You fucking pigs come here and start telling lies. You’re the enemy, trying to get in our heads and make us lose the war!”
And then I saw myself with my back against the dry-erase wall, sliding down, taking whatever grand plans were written on it along with me down to the floor. I saw my head drop into my hands; saw tears, snot, and spit cover my face; heard a deep, guttural, desperate sound emerge from my throat.
“Ma isn’ dead,” I heard myself whisper. “Ma can’t be dead.”
* * *
The cops drove me to Woodhull, where Ma’s body was. After I confirmed her identity, the staff left me alone to process. But when I looked down at her, already cold and stiff, I felt like I was going crazy. This couldn’t be real.
“Hey, Ma,” I said, stroking her hair. “I—I came as fast as I could, but I guess it wasn’ soon enough.”
I traced her wrinkles, which had been slick with tears the last time I’d seen her. “Ma. I’m sorry about—” I laid my head on her cold stomach, wishing there was some way she could hold me and say that everything would be all right, that we’d still have tomorrow.
I cleared my throat and stared into her gray face, seeing no light. Her eyes would never open again. Her mouth would never smile again. Those hands, the hands that took care of me all my life, would never hold mine again.
“You lied to me, Ma,” I said, my tears leaving dark stains on her clothing. “Why was it so easy for you to lie to me, Ma?”
I saw the signs: the weight loss, how her hands couldn’t grip a mug, the blood-covered napkins in the trash, how she inhaled before she lied about being fine. But she told me it was nothing.
“How could you leave me, Ma?” My voice shook uncontrollably. “You said you would be there, to root for me when I made it, Ma. Didn’ you see that I only did all of this for you? You lied!” I realized I was yelling when an attendant entered and put a hand on my shoulder. “Calm down, please. I know it’s tough, but we have a room where you can sit and gather yourself.”
“Get the fuck off me!” I shouted, shoving him backward.
I’d done everything she asked. The future you spoke of always had both of us in it, Ma. Why’d you leave me? As the questions multiplied, so did my anger. At her. At the world. And most of all, at myself, because I was helpless. I’d never felt more alone in my life.
When I got outside, I saw Mr. Rawlings sitting on a bench outside, wearing green slacks and suspenders.
“Where you been, boy?” he said, looking up, covering his eyes from the sun. “Been lookin’ for you for days. Your momma went to the hospital Wednesday night, but no one could reach you. I tried callin’, but your phone was off.”
I didn’t sit. I just stared at him sitting there with a wrinkled hand over his eyes. “Did you know?”
He lowered his hand, rubbing it on his pants before grabbing his rosewood cane.
“Did you know?” I repeated.
Mr. Rawlings gripped his cane tighter, rocking back and forth. He let out a lungful of air and nodded. “She tol’ me not to say anythin’. I tol’ her you needed to know, but she made me promise.”
I tried to swallow but felt my throat catch like I was choking. Once the air was able to pass, I looked at him, but he couldn’t look at me. “After the funeral,” I said, “on Sunday, I want you to take your things and go.”
He looked up at me for a long while, sucked his tee
th, then waved me off. “Boy, I know it’s a tough time, but stop playin’.”
“Who’s playin’?”
“What, you mad because I didn’ say anythin’? Maybe if you wasn’ runnin’ ’round day and night, gettin’ into trouble with those white folk in Manhattan, you woulda seen that she was losin’ weight, havin’ trouble breathin’, and forgettin’ things. Don’ put none of that on me. Be a man and accept responsibility.”
I gritted my teeth, shoving my fist into my pocket instead of crashing it into his face. “I am a man,” I spat.
“Then act like one.” He got up and leaned onto his cane, coming face-to-face with me. “I been livin’ at that house from before you was born, boy. From way before you was even a glint in your daddy’s eye. I ain’ goin’ nowhere.”
“You will,” I said, anger taking hold of me.
He reached out for my hand, but I pulled away as if he were diseased. “Please, boy. I got no people, nowhere to go. I been good to you your whole life, was friends with your momma and your daddy and your momma’s people before they passed.”
I didn’t say anything, didn’t move. Just stared at his face, his trembling lips.
“I’m an old man,” he begged, leaning toward me. “I can’ jus’ get up and move my life somewhere from the place it’s always been. I been like a grandfather to you. Please don’ do this to me.”
“I’m not doin’ this to you,” I said. “You did it to yourself. And I expect you and all of your things to be gone by Monday.”
“But where will I go?” He brought a crumpled napkin to his eye. “I have nowhere to go, boy.”
“Figure it out,” I said, walking away from him, from the hospital where Ma’s frozen body was, from everyone who had ever hurt me.
* * *
I made arrangements with the church on Saturday, then spent the rest of the day in bed with the shades drawn, replaying the last few months in my head, but this time, the truth was superimposed on every scene. Ma telling me she was okay when she knew she wasn’t. Mr. Rawlings asking me about Ma when he knew she was dying. Soraya telling me she’d always be there for me only to turn into someone else once I tried to better myself. Jason claiming he was looking out for me when he was actually trying to bring me down the minute I began to succeed.
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