Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned (Socrates Fortlow 1) by Walter Mosley

out at the sapling-thin woman.
    “Who’s this, Socrates?” she asked.
    “My friend. Ex-chicken thief. He’s a boy lookin’ for a good deed to commit.”
    “Well let me tell you, boy,” she said. “You wanna do somethin’ good then you should get away from this man here. He anything but good.”
    “That’s okay, Luvia. You don’t have to like me. But Darryl here might be comin’ ’round sometimes. Just ’cause you hate all men I hope you still got a little heart for a man-child.”
    Right Burke laughed and Luvia slapped his shoulder.
    “Get offa my property, Socrates Fortlow! Git!” she yelled.
    “See ya later, Right,” Socrates said. He and Darryl went down the stairs and back the way they had come.
    {3.}
    “Why she hate you?” Darryl asked when they were down the block.
    Socrates grinned and said, “That’s a good woman, boy. Good woman. She run that house for poor black folks when half the time she broke at the end of the month. If it wasn’t for donations from her church you know the county marshal woulda repossessed by now.”
    “But why do she hate you?” Darryl asked again.
    “’Cause she’s a good woman.” There was a wistful note in Socrates’ voice. “And I’m anything but good. Luvia could smell the bad on me. All she had to do was to see me once an’ she knew what I was. An’ you know she’s a Christian woman too.”
    “But if she religious don’t that mean she should forgive you?”
    “Christians believe in redemption, that’s true. But usually you have to die in order t’get it. I guess Luvia would say a few nice words if I died. But it would take somethin’ like that. It sure would.”
    T hey stopped for popsicles at a little store on Central and then went on toward Socrates’ home.
    “You have a good time, Darryl?” Socrates asked the boy. It was getting late in the afternoon. The sky toward the ocean was changing from dusty blue to a light coral color.
    “Yeah,” the boy said tentatively. “But I still don’t know what I have to do. I cain’t see nuthin’ ’bout that crack house and the Africans. An’ you know I ain’t gonna get close to them cops. I’m just little. I need sumpin’ little t’do.”
    Socrates smiled. His legs were beginning to ache from the walk. “What you think about them Young Africans? I mean, how come you don’t like ’em?”
    “You know. They always talkin’ like they know shit an’ we stupid ’cause of our music or whatever, you know. I mean they up in their house tryin’ t’tell us how t’live an’ they ain’t no better. They ain’t got no money or no nice car.”
    “So? At least they’re trying to make somethin’ better. Right?”
    “Maybe so. But I still don’t have to like’em.”
    “Let’s stop a minute, little brother. My legs ain’t young like yours is.” Socrates halted and leaned up against the wall of a boarded-over hardware store. He took a deep breath and smiled at the multicolored sky. “I don’t like’em neither,” he said. “I mean I like what they say but words ain’t deeds. They don’t know how to deal wit’ people.”
    “What you mean?” Darryl asked.
    Socrates saw in the boy an honest question. He saw that Darryl really respected him, really wanted to know what he thought. The idea that Darryl wanted to hear what he had to say scared Socrates.
    “You don’t teach people, you love’em. You don’t get a house and a printin’ press and put up a fence. You do like Luvia. You open up your arms and your pocketbook. You don’t have to worry ’bout no cops. Cops don’t mean shit. But you don’t let no crack house be on your street neither. Uh-uh.
    “You got to love your brother. An’ if you love’im then you wanna make sure he’s safe.”
    “That’s like in a gang,” Darryl said.
    “Yeah.” Socrates nodded. “In a way it is. But in a way it ain’t neither. The Young Africans like a gang. They got their code an’ their colors. They ready to go to war. An’ that’s