Bad Boy Brawly Brown (13 page)

that cotton brown couch, it felt as if the floor might collapse. As it 14

was, the whole house shook. I imagined that people were jumping 15

out of their beds, worried that another L.A. earthquake was shaking 16

down the building.

17

“Beat to death?”

18

“Yeah,” I said. “And when I went to talk to Isolda the only story 19

she had was that you and Aldridge had a fight and you left sayin’ that 20

you’d kill him if he ever said your mother’s name again.”

21

“That bitch,” Clarissa hissed.

22

“It’s not true,” Brawly said. “I was with . . . I wasn’t even in town 23

yesterday morning.”

24

He shot a guilty glance at Clarissa, but she was too upset to notice.

25

“You didn’t see Aldridge at Isolda’s house?”

26

“Not yesterday.”

27

“Did you two get drunk and argue a couple’a weeks ago at her 28

house?” I asked.

29

“Couple’a months, yeah. We had a drink or two. The conversa-S 30

tion got a little hot but we ain’t had no fight. If we did, he’d be . . .”

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Brawly didn’t need to finish that sentence. “I didn’t kill ’im, man. I 2

swear.”

3

“Somebody did,” I said.

4

Brawly sat back, looking more than ever like the child in his 5

mother’s photograph.

6

“He’s dead?” Brawly asked again. “Dead?”

7

“That’s right.”

8

“My father?” he asked of no one in particular.

9

Clarissa perched herself on the armrest of the sofa. She put her 10

arm around his head.

11

“My father, my dad . . .”

12

It was a moving performance. It might have even been real re-13

morse, but I had seen people cry over loved ones they had murdered 14

just hours before. The feelings of pain were there whether or not 15

their hand had delivered the final stroke.

16

I lit up another cigarette.

17

“You don’t know anything about it?” I asked when the tears had 18

passed. “I mean, you didn’t even read about it or hear it on the 19

news?”

20

“Brawly’s been busy,” Clarissa told me.

21

“Shut your mouth,” Brawly warned.

22

I wouldn’t have been suspicious if he followed his own advice.

23

“Busy doin’ what?”

24

“Who are you, man?” Brawly asked me.

25

“Friend’a Alva Torres doin’ a good deed by her boy.”

26

“I ain’t got nuthin’ to do with her,” Brawly told me.

27

“That’s your mother, honey,” Clarissa said. “That’s blood.”

28

“And just about the only drop left,” I added. “She’s concerned 29

about you. When she asked me to find you, I told her she probably 30 S

didn’t need to worry. But now that I seen the mess your life is in, I 31 R

understand why she wants you to come home.”

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“I don’t have no home. They kicked me out.”

1

“I don’t believe that for one second, son. Your mama loves you 2

even if you don’t care for yourself.”

3

“He’s right, baby,” Clarissa said.

4

“You don’t know shit, Clarissa. So don’t be tryin’ to tell me 5

nuthin’.”

6

“The cops gonna look hard at you if they think you were fighting 7

with him,” I said.

8

“That was almost two months ago,” Brawly said. “We made up 9

since then.”

10

“Where were you Saturday morning?” I asked.

11

“Up north,” Brawly said. “I left Friday night.”

12

“Can you prove that?”

13

A guilty look flashed on the boy’s face. He seemed to hold him-14

self back from looking at Clarissa.

15

“People saw me,” he said evasively.

16

“Who?”

17

“Why I got to answer to you? Who the fuck are you to come in 18

here in the middle’a the night and question me?” Brawly said.

19

When he rose up from the couch my heart did a double thump 20

to get enough blood into action in case I needed to fight.

21

“I don’t have to talk to you.”

22

“I’m just tryin’ to help you, boy,” I said.

23

I made the mistake of putting my hand on his shoulder.

24

Brawly shoved both arms out at me and I went backward. My 25

feet actually left the ground. I felt the wall hit my back and my left 26

ankle twist as my foot touched down.

27

Clarissa said, “Baby.”

28

The front door slammed open.

29

When I looked up I saw Brawly storming out into the street, leav-S 30

ing his girlfriend with a strange man in the middle of the night.

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14
/ CLARISSA RAN TO THE DOOR
but she didn’t try to stop Brawly. She must have gone through this

3

with him before, his childish anger overruling his common sense, 4

even his common decency.

5

I considered going after the boy but doubted that either my 6

words or my fists would have made much of an impression. I could 7

have shot him but didn’t think that John or Alva would have taken 8

kindly to that.

9

“I’m sorry,” I said, wanting to somehow make up for the boy.

10

“It’s okay. Brawly don’t mean it. It’s just that he get so mad some-11

times. It ain’t his fault.”

12

“I told Alva that I’d make sure that he was okay. I guess he is. I 13

mean, you say this is normal for him, right?”

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I was at a loss with Clarissa. She didn’t have anything to do with 15 R

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my job but there I was, intruding on her private life in the middle of 1

the night. I took a step toward the door.

2

“Is that stuff about Brawly’s father true?” she asked me.

3

“Yeah. Somebody killed him right there in Isolda’s house. She 4

thinks it must have been Brawly.”

5

“Is that what she told the police?”

6

“I don’t think she’s seen the cops yet. She was out of town when 7

he was killed, at least that’s what she said. She never went back to her 8

house.”

9

“Damn,” Clarissa said. “Brawly got the worst luck in blood. If 10

they alive or dead, with him or not with him, they still bring him 11

grief.”

12

“His mother, too, you think?” I asked.

13

“She love him and all, but she don’t understand him. She wanna 14

be tellin’ him what to do and don’t wanna hear ’bout the ideas he got 15

for himself.”

16

“Like what?” I asked.

17

“Like what he believe in,” she said. “Like what he think people 18

oughtta be doin’.”

19

“Like with the Urban Revolutionary Party?”

20

“Maybe.”

21

Clarissa was a slight girl with knotty features. Her hair was frosted 22

gold. Her eyes were so light a brown that you might have called them 23

gold, too. She was at an age when the clothes accented rather than 24

covered her figure, and her skin seemed to glow. I felt a flush of em-25

barrassment just looking at her.

26

“John and Alva think that the First Men is just a gang,” I said.

27

“That’s why they got me lookin’ for Brawly.”

28

“Older black folks is just scared’a what groups like the First Men 29

stand for. They’re scared to stand up and demand what the white S 30

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man owes them. They just don’t understand that the only way to get 2

somethin’ is to fight for it.”

3

“They plannin’ a war?” I asked.

4

“Only if there’s no other way. What they want is better schools 5

and jobs, history books that tell the truth, and people who look like 6

us in government.”

7

“Sounds like a tall order.”

8

“It’s only fair. And Xavier knows that we got to take it slow. He 9

wanted us to turn that storefront into a place where the community 10

could come and talk about our problems. But now the cops busted 11

in, the people will be too scared to trust in it.”

12

“So now what?” I really wanted to know.

13

“We got to find another way. That’s all.”

14

There was something that she wasn’t saying, something that 15

lurked behind her resolute words.

16

“So they’re into the revolution and not protection?” I asked.

17

“Protection from what?” she replied.

18

I laughed then. Maybe I was getting old.

19

“You got a pencil, Clarissa?”

20

“Uh-huh, why?”

21

“Because I’m going to write down my phone numbers — day and 22

night. I don’t wanna mess with Brawly. If he’s happy with what he’s 23

doin’, then that’s okay with me. But if he gets in trouble or if you see 24

that the Party’s not what they say — then you call on me. All right?”

25

She didn’t answer the question but she did give me pencil and 26

paper. I put down my numbers at work and at home.

27

Before I left I asked her, “Why do you sound so mad at Isolda?

28

Do you know her?”

29

“I know what she did to Brawly,” Clarissa said with a sneer.

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“What?”

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“That ain’t for me to say.”

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2

I
T WAS AFTER
one in the morning. If I were living the life that I 3

had promised myself, I would have gone home and tucked the 4

kids into their beds. But the fever was still in me and there was 5

someone I needed to talk to who I knew never went to sleep before 6

sunrise.

7

He lived in a rented house on a street called Ozone Court, only 8

half a block from the beach. It was just a tiny tar-roofed structure, but 9

he was the only black man I knew who had managed to get a place 10

in that neighborhood. While pressing the buzzer I planned to ask 11

him how he got away with living in an exclusively white neighbor-12

hood. But the way he answered the door threw that question right 13

out of my head.

14

“Who’s there?” he asked in a gruff voice that he tried to make 15

sound deep. “What the fuck you want this time’a night?”

16

Instead of answering, I pressed the buzzer again.

17

“What?” he said, giving up the deep voice. If that tone were in 18

his hands, they would have been up over his head.

19

“Jackson Blue?” I said in a commanding voice that was not ex-20

actly my own.

21

“Who is it?”

22

I laughed then. Cowardly Jackson Blue certainly deserved a 23

prank or two. Ever since he’d stolen Jesus’s money I figured that I 24

had the right to needle him.

25

He flung the door open and glared at me.

26

I laughed even harder. Jackson was short and slight, almost as 27

dark as the sky above our heads, with eyes that were both bright and 28

brilliant. Those shining, perpetually bloodshot orbs glared at me.

29

“What the fuck you think is so funny, niggah?”

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“Lemme in, Jackson,” I said. “It’s cold out here.”

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He looked around to see if I had anyone with me and then 2

leaned away from the door, allowing me to enter.

3

Jackson’s house was wedged in between two larger but equally 4

nondescript homes. From the outside his place looked small but it 5

was much more spacious on the inside. That was because the single 6

room that made it up was half a flight of stairs below the front door.

7

The ceiling was at least twenty feet high.

8

Jackson had a big bed, a table that doubled as a hot-plate 9

kitchen, a table desk like high school kids use, and three walls of 10

bookshelves that ran the full height of the wall. Every inch of shelf 11

space was packed with books. The room smelled of moldering paper.

12

There was a wooden painter’s ladder set up so that little Jackson 13

could reach the higher shelves.

14

The back door was a sliding glass window that looked out on a 15

vegetable garden.

16

“Where’d you get all those books, Jackson?”

17

“Bought ’em, mostly. A lot of ’em I been havin’ for years stored in 18