The Old Neighborhood (29 page)

They shook hands and spoke quietly, then walked toward us.

“You guys remember this place, don'tcha?” Chief said as he leaned against the Lincoln. He laughed, and veins pulsed in his long neck. We stood close to each other. I stuck my trembling hands in the pockets of my jeans, Angel crossed his arms over his stomach, and Ryan glowered back at Chief and scratched at the growth of red hair speckled at his Adam's apple.

Mickey and the black guy walked over. The black guy's scalp was a lined-up grid of tightly-bound dreadlock nubs that looked like a series of wilted baby tarantulas. He was all neck. His traps hung like two mounds of dough below his ears. They got within arm's reach and stopped. There was the stench of salty sweat and lime.

“So, Shorty,” Mickey said as he squinted at the black guy. “Word is some of your Stones got a beef with these boys. Well, that's gotta stop.”

“Yeah, I got word of the scuffle yesterday. Ya know, they put one of my Stones' little cousins in the hospital a few weeks back,” Shorty said, squinting. Perspiration glinted off his brow, and a trail of three inked teardrops dripped down his cheek from the corner of his left eye.

Mickey shot a scowl at Ryan, who glanced back, then dropped his eyes to the pavement.

“Now, Shorty, I'm coming here today as your brother in the Nation, and I'm coming to say, as far as you're concerned, these three are ridin' wit' the Five,” Mickey said, then raised his stubby hand toward the three of us. All our eyes shot up at him. “As far as their status with the TJOs is concerned… Well, that's my department.”

Shorty looked down and took the straw from his mouth—the end was all chewed up and twisted. He stared at us coldly with his head tilted to the side. “So y'all's in when dem Folks run up?” he asked.

We all nodded.

Shorty paused and scanned us; his eyes felt like X-ray beams boring through me.

“Aight den, peeps,” Shorty said, smiling wide. He reached out and shook Ryan's hand. First, they gripped, then they slowly slid the fingers away, and then they hooked thumbs and threw up the five. He shook with Angel, then he looked at me confused. “I ain't seen this one before,” he said, looking back at Mickey.

“Shit… he's a Cath-lic boy,” Mickey sighed. They both laughed. “This is Joe.” He put his heavy hand on my shoulder. “He's Pistol Pat's little brother.”

“No shit?” Shorty said and reached out for my hand. He tugged me to his heavy chest and gave me a sound pat on the back. “Now that's a down-ass motherfucker.”

His coarse fingers still gripped my hand, and we hooked thumbs and threw up the five. Then, he slapped his open palm against his chest twice.

“Thanks,” I said as Shorty took a large step back.

“Aight den, peeps,” Shorty said as he raised both arms out, palms open. “All that shit's squashed, on de fin.” He flapped his arms downward like they were wings. “From now on, we got youse, and youse got us.” He smirked as he popped the straw back into his mouth, then turned away from us. “Aight, C. Aight, Mickey.”

“Take it easy, Shorty,” Mickey said. Chief nodded.

“Ah, man…,” Shorty said as he turned and grabbed hold of the crotch of his saggy jeans. “I take it any way I can get it, brotha,” he shouted over his shoulder with a grin.

Once Shorty got across the street, Mickey turned. “Fuckin' niggers…,” he said low. “Back in the old days, we would have solved this with a couple ball bats. Now I've got to be a fuckin' politician with these porch monkeys.”

“We should just kill 'em all and get it over with,” Chief said as he stared at the row of Stones.

Mickey laughed and grabbed Chief in a headlock, then he ground his knuckles playfully into Chief's curly hair.

“See, Tommy, that's why I made you Chief,” Mickey said, smiling, then let him go. “But God help us all when you make General.”

“You boys all right?” Mickey asked as he got back into the Lincoln. “Come on, I'll take ya back to the house.”

Across the street, Shorty walked right up to T-Money, who sulked with his chin dropped. He still glowered at us. Shorty pointed toward us, then he plucked the straw from his mouth and shook his head 'no.'

“Fuck dat shit!” T-Money said as he pushed his back off the wall and took a step in our direction. Shorty grasped a handful of his t-shirt at the neck and slammed him back into the wall, then he brought his face close to T-Money's and explained the situation a little clearer. The TJOs across the street had taken silent notice. They chuckled and pointed at us, telling yesterday's story.

The side door opened and a heavy-set, uniformed police officer leaned his blue shoulder out. His pale fist gripped a dark Billy club, and he gazed both ways down the side street and disappeared inside. The door shut. There was the sound of heavy chains jostling and being pulled taut through a set of rings.

We got in, and the Lincoln rolled down the street. Mickey turned left at the corner, and the immense width of the building stretched like some ancient fortress in the shape of a squared-off “C,” which created a block-wide courtyard between the two wings. “There they are, boys,” Mickey said, nodding as he popped a Marlboro Red between his lips.

What must have been a hundred-fifty Gangster Disciples lounged against the far wall of the north wing. One in particular was a whole head taller than any of the rest. He was busting a sag in his blue Dickies; his orange and brown-striped boxers puffed out at the waist. Shirtless, he rubbed his bulbous belly with both hands. His arms were thick and undefined, and his shaved head was egg-shaped. He stood with his shoulders slouched, and his yellowish-brown skin looked faded in the sunlight. A navy-blue bandana waved in the breeze from his back pocket as he stared out across the courtyard at a group of about fifty Vice Lords sprinkled about on a series of concrete picnic tables near the inner rim of the south wing.

Things got better for Ryan and Angel after that, but now they had to worry about the PG3s (they'd now become a branch of the Spanish Cobras) and, of course, the GDs. It wasn't so bad for me. School over at Gordon was quiet. I didn't know anybody, but that kept me safe at the same time. Most of the kids at Gordon were good kids, but things had changed since my older brothers were there; there just weren't as many white families on the North Side anymore. Most of the white families had moved further west and had their kids in the Catholic schools like St. Patrick's and Holy Cross, or they had left the city completely for the suburbs.

I was a minority at Gordon, and now, the neighborhood that surrounded it was almost completely Hispanic. Mexicans and Puerto Ricans dominated. Some of the kids were screw-ups with good families, just like me, but most of 'em were good kids headed for blue collar jobs or even college.

•

I WROTE LIL PAT A LETTER
asking him why Mickey hated the GD's in the Jungle so much. Two weeks later, Mickey hands me an envelope with nothing but Joey written on it. It was typed on a typewriter:

I wanted to be the one to tell you this story, so I had to get you this letter special delivery, and you got to burn it once you read it. I couldn't put my name on it, but you know who it is 'cause you know who you asked.

We were way up in Rogers Park rolling around in the Lincoln looking for somebody. We cut down a one-way, and there was a car double-parked blocking the street in front of some crack house. My boy Sammy was driving. He beeped the horn to try an' get 'em to move. A shine jumped out the car with a pistol. He walked up and shot Sammy in the chest—just like that. He died in my arms on the way to the hospital. Over nothing. Over beeping a car horn.

We came back that night. We knew it was the right house 'cause of the smell. Crack smells real distinct where they cook it: burnt baking soda, and the coca plant. We set it on fire—the front and back doors. I don't need to say much more, but no one made it out of that house alive. We've been warring with the Juneway Jungle GD's ever since. They're evil motherfuckers, Joey. That's why Mickey hates 'em. They all deserve to die.

•

I REMEMBER
toward the end of our trip to the U.P. that year, we were out on Lac Vieux Desert near this point where a millionaire had a luxury duck blind set up with a TV, stove, and heaters. Suddenly, the light changed—the sky struck this purplish-green that reflected off the water, and the Lac began to swell and chop with a low, swift-moving storm.

Rich and Nancy motored past us. Dad looked at him,
frustrated.

“What? It's gonna rain,” Rich said.

“A few more casts,” Dad urged.

“I ain't stayin' out here no more.” Rich revved the motor. “We got skunked. Face it.”

The putter of their motor trailed off across the large lake. Dad didn't look at me, just kept his eyes on the water.

“I was out here once with Patrick,” he said, flinging a hard, long cast. “Just me and him. The wind changed all of a sudden, to a southern. It was cloudy, and they parted just then and lit the water up.”

I cast and began to reel it in. My callused fingers ached. The purple clouds rolled over the tall pine trees along the shore.

“We hooked into five muskies in a row. Five consecutive casts. He boated a five-footer and hooked into something must have been six, maybe more. I got a couple, too. It was really somethin'.”

Dad launched a cast out toward the point. The wind surged through the pines.

“He wasn't always…” He sputtered and coughed something back. “He wasn't always like that, ya know?”

The heavy lure splashed into a cresting wave and sunk quickly. He reeled it in hard and tugged on the pole with short jerks to imitate a wounded fish. I thought of Lil Pat—so far away, locked in a little cell in a place with people trying to hurt him any chance they got. I looked out across the wide horizon and saw the dark-green woods sloping up out of the lake. I concentrated and tried to send him that image telepathically, hoping it could somehow work, even if it was just in a dream. Maybe Da could bring it to him, so he could remember there were better places in the world. The rain began to sweep in from far off across the water, and a million tiny plucks spread along the surface with a foggy mist above. I hooked my lure into a line-guide and cranked it tight.

“Here we go!” Dad snarled.

There was a bright-brown flash in the water before the strike. Dad cranked down, gathered himself, heaved back, and set the hook with all his might. The small motorboat swayed, and sure enough, the full length of a five-foot tiger muskie emerged from the water. The fish tail-walked for ten yards, then it slapped hard on the surface and disappeared into the choppy water. The reel squealed. Dad's complexion went stone-white against the darkened sky. The muskie ran hard. The line cut across toward the bow out into deeper waters. Dad gathered himself. He leaned back and cranked hard on the reel. The muskie swept up to the surface and lofted out of the lake on a diagonal. Droplets of water cascaded off its underbelly, then it burst into a white splash and plunged again. Dad leaned, pulled the rod sideways, and turned him. Then, he spun the reel quickly and gained line on him.

“Get the net ready!” he shouted.

I stumbled over near the motor. The boat rocked with the struggle. I clutched the net, then got it tangled in my lure. I worked furiously to free it. A hook plucked into my palm, and I squealed at the sharp pain. Then, I dug it out. My fingers trembled. The barb left a fat gash that bled dark blood. Dad planted his feet into the floorboards and hauled on the sharply bent rod. There was a crisp snap, and the line went slack. And that was it. The muskie's tail fin softly crested the water some 20 yards out on the starboard and was gone—sunk into that dark lake. The only big fish we'd hooked into all trip.

Looking back, it must have been tough on the old man. He was working constantly to support our big family and only wanted to get out on the lake and get into some fish, spend some time with his kids. Having your kid locked in a cage can't be easy, either.

I remember motoring in as the big, cold rain droplets pelted us and the waves crested and gushed up spray on the bow. I remember a welling of tired emotion wrenching in my chest and not knowing if it was just water on my face. That was our last trip to Lac Vieux Desert.

•

JUST WHEN I THOUGHT EVERYTHING WOULD GET NICE
and calm down, I strolled down to the sills one day. I'd just gotten home from school and changed outta that jive-ass uniform. I was barely in earshot when Ryan started up.

“The Moes rolled some PG3 Cobra's today,” Ryan said.

“No shit?” strolled out of my mouth like nothin'—no weight to it, like a pigeon coasting to the ground.

“Hell yeah. It was crazy as hell,” Angel urged.

“Did you guys get in it?” I asked, restless at not being there.

“You know we did,” Ryan replied.

“Hell yeah, motherfucker,” I said, reaching out to grab Ryan's hand. We shook up.

“Man, nobody even talked about it, man… We were over by the courts. You know the Peoples own them courts by the side door.

“Some PG3s were walkin' through the field right there, and I thought shit would be cool, but, man, then they started throwing up the six-point star an' shit,” Ryan said. “And just got rushed.”

“How many of 'em?” I asked.

“Like four,” Angel said.

“Man, there was like ten of us just stompin' 'em,” Ryan said as he raised his foot and mimicked the stomping. The white sole of his Puma was caked with blood-brown splotches.

“So shit's cool now with the Stones, huh?” I asked.

“Real cool,” Ryan said. “In fact, Monteff's coming through in a little bit.”

“Yeah?” I confirmed.

“Yeah,” Angel piped in. “We're gonna smoke a blunt to celebrate; a 'stomped dem fools' blunt.”