level, past the “Seeing Is Deceiving” exhibit. He slowed a moment there, recognizing two M. C. Escher works: the hand drawing the hand, and the stairs that went around in a perpetual up-or-down circle. Prints of these works adorned the office of his boss, the special agent in charge of the New England DEA, was really all one needed to know about the current state of conventional drug enforcement.
At the far end of the wing was the entrance to a separate exhibit named “Butterfly Garden.” A bunch of little kids were attacking a coatrack there like locusts denuding a tree. Padded parkas of pastel vinyl, blues and reds and pinks, getting their last few wears of the season. Lash barely remembered his children from those days because he had barely been around. Rosey, his boy—Roseland Douglass Lash, named by his mother in a pregnancy-induced hormonal rush of heritage pride—was a junior at Tufts now. Lash had set up Windfall in Boston in order to be with Rosey, an engineering major and lacrosse midfielder, before the boy was out of his grasp for good. To that end, he had offered Rosey a deal with the devil: Lash had agreed to take on his full tuition if the boy agreed to share a house with his old man. They lived together on the bottom floor of an old triple on Rogers Avenue in Somerville, two bachelors at opposite ends of the spectrum. The tuition was breaking him, but this was Lash’s last chance to connect with Rosey, and he was not going to mess it up.
The “Butterfly Garden” was a narrow, glass-walled conservatory full of exotic plants, overlooking the greater basin of the Charles River: the wide, lakelike head of the Charles that fed off Boston Harbor, before it narrowed to the icy glut that had coughed up Vasco. A twenty-person occupancy limit meant they had to stagger entrances like in the VIP section in a club. A good, small room for monitoring ins and outs. No one could tail you inside without getting made.
Inside the door, a perfect monarch settled on Lash’s shoulder, fluttering its stained-glass wings. Butterflies were everywhere, drinking nectar out of feeders, courting among the exotic foliage, basking in the early-spring sun.
There was a bench for sitting, and on it, hunched forward from the back slats, hands folded over his splayed knees, was a black man in his late twenties. Oversize Phat Farm T, wide-legged, many-pocketed carps, thick chains visible around the back of his neck. He was pondering a tiny, purple-winged butterfly perched on the base knuckle of the top thumb of his folded hands.
Lash settled next to him and the butterfly lifted away.
The man gave Lash some skin, rough-palmed and hard-nailed, and said, “M.L.”
“Tricky-Trey,” said Lash. The man’s name was Patrique Molondre, but on the street he went by Tricky. “I’m digging the spot.”
“Bro of mine from the inside hipped me to it. I need more of this peace in my life.”
Some dudes get their minds shaped more by prison than by the chaos of their childhood. The Zen of the pen. The Tao of the dungeon. Time in isolation opens some up to concepts of harmony within a culture of violence. The hidden garden deep within the fortress under siege.
Lash picked at his collar, billowing out his sweatshirt. “Hothouse.”
“Yeah,” said Tricky. “They should be growing weed up in this mo-mo.”
Lash smiled, Tricky having him on. Nice and loose.
They watched two elderly women shuffle past, each with a death grip on her purse. A sign at the exit reminded visitors to check themselves for butterflies in the mirrors before leaving, and when the door opened, a blower came on, keeping the residents inside.
“Minimum security,” said Tricky. “Nobody trying to bust out of this paradise.” He reached over, plucking a reddish orange number off Lash’s shoulder. Held it pinched by its wings. “Brother here got six to ten for unlawful pollination.”
“Butterflies are the white-collar criminals of nature.”
“This boy, he
At the far end of the wing was the entrance to a separate exhibit named “Butterfly Garden.” A bunch of little kids were attacking a coatrack there like locusts denuding a tree. Padded parkas of pastel vinyl, blues and reds and pinks, getting their last few wears of the season. Lash barely remembered his children from those days because he had barely been around. Rosey, his boy—Roseland Douglass Lash, named by his mother in a pregnancy-induced hormonal rush of heritage pride—was a junior at Tufts now. Lash had set up Windfall in Boston in order to be with Rosey, an engineering major and lacrosse midfielder, before the boy was out of his grasp for good. To that end, he had offered Rosey a deal with the devil: Lash had agreed to take on his full tuition if the boy agreed to share a house with his old man. They lived together on the bottom floor of an old triple on Rogers Avenue in Somerville, two bachelors at opposite ends of the spectrum. The tuition was breaking him, but this was Lash’s last chance to connect with Rosey, and he was not going to mess it up.
The “Butterfly Garden” was a narrow, glass-walled conservatory full of exotic plants, overlooking the greater basin of the Charles River: the wide, lakelike head of the Charles that fed off Boston Harbor, before it narrowed to the icy glut that had coughed up Vasco. A twenty-person occupancy limit meant they had to stagger entrances like in the VIP section in a club. A good, small room for monitoring ins and outs. No one could tail you inside without getting made.
Inside the door, a perfect monarch settled on Lash’s shoulder, fluttering its stained-glass wings. Butterflies were everywhere, drinking nectar out of feeders, courting among the exotic foliage, basking in the early-spring sun.
There was a bench for sitting, and on it, hunched forward from the back slats, hands folded over his splayed knees, was a black man in his late twenties. Oversize Phat Farm T, wide-legged, many-pocketed carps, thick chains visible around the back of his neck. He was pondering a tiny, purple-winged butterfly perched on the base knuckle of the top thumb of his folded hands.
Lash settled next to him and the butterfly lifted away.
The man gave Lash some skin, rough-palmed and hard-nailed, and said, “M.L.”
“Tricky-Trey,” said Lash. The man’s name was Patrique Molondre, but on the street he went by Tricky. “I’m digging the spot.”
“Bro of mine from the inside hipped me to it. I need more of this peace in my life.”
Some dudes get their minds shaped more by prison than by the chaos of their childhood. The Zen of the pen. The Tao of the dungeon. Time in isolation opens some up to concepts of harmony within a culture of violence. The hidden garden deep within the fortress under siege.
Lash picked at his collar, billowing out his sweatshirt. “Hothouse.”
“Yeah,” said Tricky. “They should be growing weed up in this mo-mo.”
Lash smiled, Tricky having him on. Nice and loose.
They watched two elderly women shuffle past, each with a death grip on her purse. A sign at the exit reminded visitors to check themselves for butterflies in the mirrors before leaving, and when the door opened, a blower came on, keeping the residents inside.
“Minimum security,” said Tricky. “Nobody trying to bust out of this paradise.” He reached over, plucking a reddish orange number off Lash’s shoulder. Held it pinched by its wings. “Brother here got six to ten for unlawful pollination.”
“Butterflies are the white-collar criminals of nature.”
“This boy, he
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