indestructibility; she who stared straight ahead and wrung her hands in her lap while tears as large as dimes skated down her cheeks and dripped from her chin; she who never once blinked while Pastor Ramsey pounded his fist on the lectern or while Jeremiah, an effeminate version of his pious father, held the microphone inches from his mouth, closed his eyes, swayed, and, with a voice like sustained notes of fragile bells, sung of an amazing grace, a savior who couldnât save us from Ever.
Â
One week later, we visited Nice in the city jail. He talked on a phone on one side of the glass; we took turns talking on the phone on the other.He had met with his Legal Aid lawyer and decided to plead guilty. It was simple. He did it was all he said. He didnât cry or apologize for what heâd done. He didnât excuse himself or offer reasons and justifications. He dropped his eyes when Luscious cried and told him she loved him with all of her heart. He dropped his eyes when my grandma said heâd lost weight. He thanked Eric for the picture he drew him. He told Donnel that he was in charge now, that he was the man of the house, that Eric and I were his responsibility. He wore the orange jumpsuit the prison issued him and one by one he told us to forget him, not to write to him, to never send mail or money. I was the last to speak to him.
âImagine,â he said. âAbraham, imagine Iâm dead.â
He raised his eyes and let them rest on each of us, on my mother, my Aunt Rhonda, on Donnel and Eric, on me, and finally on Luscious. Then he nodded once as if to bid us farewell and looked straight ahead, acted as if no one, nothing, not even he was there anymore. He put the phone down on the table, rose from the seat, and balletically turning around he put his hands in his pockets and slowly walked away. Luscious wept and wailed into my grandmotherâs chest. My aunt and mother cursed and wiped tears from their cheeks. Eric and Donnel were silent. I kept the phone pressed to my ear and listening to the fading drumbeat of Niceâs footsteps on the concrete, I tried to shout his name, but instead I swallowed it, felt it lodge in the back of my throat like a sticky round stone until Nice was out of sight and his sound was gone and his name dropped into my gut, echoing, emanating until it became marrow.
III
S aturday morning. Crackheads were starving for breakfast outside. My cousins and I were watching cartoons in our apartment. No adults were home. Nice was to spend the next seven to ten years of his life in prison. My grandma had found work on the weekends in a Laundromat sweeping up, wiping spilled detergent, and using a butter knife to free jammed quarters from coin slots. My Aunt Rhonda had gone out the night before in a black miniskirt and with red lipstick thick on her lips and she had not made it back, which meant sheâd return sometime in the afternoon with her high heels in her hands and her eyes puffed and muddy. She was still dating Beany. But she was still searching, still desperate for that holy, transporting, nonexistent type of love, so she was dating other men too. I had not seen my mother the previous day, so I didnât know where she was. She had picked up a habit of disappearing, of saying she would be right back and not following through. I worried but said nothing. Since my uncle had been locked up, I had assumed a steely disposition. I imagined not that he was dead, but that I was tougher than I was; fearless, untouchable. I was ten years old and already I wore the mask of a man in a mug shot. Donnel and Eric sat on the couch and I sat on the folding metal chair next to it. Donnel was fourteen and growing into the face that was going to make him a good-looking man. Eric was twelve and his two front teeth were too big for his mouth. On the couch next to him was one of the tattered spiral-bound notebooks he drew in and cherished and carried around until he either filled the
Â
One week later, we visited Nice in the city jail. He talked on a phone on one side of the glass; we took turns talking on the phone on the other.He had met with his Legal Aid lawyer and decided to plead guilty. It was simple. He did it was all he said. He didnât cry or apologize for what heâd done. He didnât excuse himself or offer reasons and justifications. He dropped his eyes when Luscious cried and told him she loved him with all of her heart. He dropped his eyes when my grandma said heâd lost weight. He thanked Eric for the picture he drew him. He told Donnel that he was in charge now, that he was the man of the house, that Eric and I were his responsibility. He wore the orange jumpsuit the prison issued him and one by one he told us to forget him, not to write to him, to never send mail or money. I was the last to speak to him.
âImagine,â he said. âAbraham, imagine Iâm dead.â
He raised his eyes and let them rest on each of us, on my mother, my Aunt Rhonda, on Donnel and Eric, on me, and finally on Luscious. Then he nodded once as if to bid us farewell and looked straight ahead, acted as if no one, nothing, not even he was there anymore. He put the phone down on the table, rose from the seat, and balletically turning around he put his hands in his pockets and slowly walked away. Luscious wept and wailed into my grandmotherâs chest. My aunt and mother cursed and wiped tears from their cheeks. Eric and Donnel were silent. I kept the phone pressed to my ear and listening to the fading drumbeat of Niceâs footsteps on the concrete, I tried to shout his name, but instead I swallowed it, felt it lodge in the back of my throat like a sticky round stone until Nice was out of sight and his sound was gone and his name dropped into my gut, echoing, emanating until it became marrow.
III
S aturday morning. Crackheads were starving for breakfast outside. My cousins and I were watching cartoons in our apartment. No adults were home. Nice was to spend the next seven to ten years of his life in prison. My grandma had found work on the weekends in a Laundromat sweeping up, wiping spilled detergent, and using a butter knife to free jammed quarters from coin slots. My Aunt Rhonda had gone out the night before in a black miniskirt and with red lipstick thick on her lips and she had not made it back, which meant sheâd return sometime in the afternoon with her high heels in her hands and her eyes puffed and muddy. She was still dating Beany. But she was still searching, still desperate for that holy, transporting, nonexistent type of love, so she was dating other men too. I had not seen my mother the previous day, so I didnât know where she was. She had picked up a habit of disappearing, of saying she would be right back and not following through. I worried but said nothing. Since my uncle had been locked up, I had assumed a steely disposition. I imagined not that he was dead, but that I was tougher than I was; fearless, untouchable. I was ten years old and already I wore the mask of a man in a mug shot. Donnel and Eric sat on the couch and I sat on the folding metal chair next to it. Donnel was fourteen and growing into the face that was going to make him a good-looking man. Eric was twelve and his two front teeth were too big for his mouth. On the couch next to him was one of the tattered spiral-bound notebooks he drew in and cherished and carried around until he either filled the
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