“My pops said if we go even one inch into the neighbor’s property, the neighbor could file a complaint and the city would investigate, then force the owner to knock the wall down.”
“We’ll be paid and long gone,” Ameer said calmly.
“Most def,” I said. “After we complete it, everything else is the owner’s problem to handle. It won’t happen, though. See these markers?” I pointed out the first of six iron stakes in the ground. I pulled out a thick white string and tied it securely onto the iron marker. I walked straight across and linked it tightly to the next marker, until the entire backyard perimeter was lined with a tight white string. “This string will be our most precise guide. Each block will be set evenly up against this line all the way around. With the iron markers from the land survey, and the indentation from the old fence, we’ll get it right,” I assured them.
“Damn, you sound like a real construction worker,” Ameer said.
“Let’s set this first block. Then we’ll all three be real construction workers,” I said, squatting to lift the first block and walk it right into position.
“My father said we are three underage, bootlegged, unlicensed, non-union laborers,” Chris said, smiling.
“Right, but Reverend Broadman liked the sound of that seven-hundred-dollar salary,” Ameer said, laughing. “So your ass is right here working with us at the crack of dawn. And this one-hundred-dollar deposit feels good in my pocket. So let’s get busy.” We all laughed.
“Word to mother,” Chris said.
* * *
“Butter the block, then shave it evenly. Line up the joints,” Ameer said, repeating what I had taught them earlier. “I like a lot of butter on my toast,” he joked as he spread the cement over the block. Chris laughed. We were all three working, stepping back and checking our work, helping each other out. The atmosphere was warming up. From when we first began making the cement, 150-kilogram bags, sixty shovels of sand, three buckets of water, we had become closer as friends, I thought. Converting pounds to kilos caused Ameer some difficulty. Yet Chris was swift with mathematics and quick to teach everything he knew. Carrying the blocks set off a competition of strength and as time moved on we messed around, each trying to carry more than one at a time to see who could lift the most. Seemed like we did more talking and working in that afternoon than we had done in all of our time together combined. And it was only day one, with possibly almost two weeks remaining.
“You ain’t ask me about the Hustler’s League yesterday,” Ameer said suddenly.
“You didn’t speak on it,” I said calmly, still looking at the blocks and filling the voids and checking the precision, then hammering them with the heavy rubber mallet. “So I know my team, ‘the blacks,’ stomped all over your red squad while I was away.” I smiled, after having a look that was dead serious. Chris laughed.
“One point only!” Ameer shouted, dropping the block in his hand into the soil and then holding up one finger and raising then placing his foot on the block he had just dropped. I didn’t react, just kept working.
“Losers always say it just like that,” I said, rubbing it in. “ ‘If we could’ve, if we would’ve,’ ” I said, straight-faced. Then I added the burn. “But the fact is you couldn’t.” Chris cracked up.
“What you laughing at?” Ameer barked at Chris. “You ain’t even in the league no more!” he reminded Chris.
“I still get one-third of the purse whether the red team or the black team wins the tournament. I ain’t mad at that,” Chris fired back, and he was right. When Chris’s father pulled him out of the Hustler’s Junior League as a form of punishment, me and Ameer both agreed that same as when we each joined up for the league, if any of our three teams won, or if either of us three got most valuable player money, we would divide it three ways.
“You were gone more than a month. Your boys had to hustle like hell to keep the black team undefeated. They probably threw your ass out the league too,” Ameer pushed back at me.
“We’ll see,” is all I said. I had called Coach Vega crazy long distance, using a phone card on a pay phone, while I was in Asia. As soon as I realized my trip was definitely going to take more than a week’s time, like I had told him at first, I let him know I would be “missing in action” for a while ’cause my situation had gotten “a little hectic.” That’s all I told him. I cut the call before giving him a chance to think and ask me any follow-up questions that I was not gonna answer. I cut the call knowing that Coach had no idea where I was, and no option to call me back. Now that I was home, I had scheduled a face-to-face with the coach. He accepted the meet-up eagerly, telling me, “Yeah, face-to-face, that’ll work. You’re a little brief on the phone.”
Chris, slathering the next cement block, looked up and smiled at Ameer, then said, “If both of us are kicked out of the league and you’re still in, we’ll need you to play real hard for us, brother. Get that cheddar and break both of us off our portion.” We all laughed, even Ameer.
* * *
Break time, because we had to let the blocks we laid dry. I had learned that if we heaped them up too high while wet, the weight and the pressure would cause a shift and the wall would be lopsided by the next day of work. We cleaned up, put all of our materials and tools neatly in the corner of the backyard, on the inside of the low wall that we had built so far, and left.
As we walked down the block to get something to eat, Chris said to me, “You messed up the negotiation on this deal. We should have got the owner to get us a Porta-Potty. How’s he going to have us working when we can’t use the bathroom in his house?”
“Just take your dragon out and pee in the woods on the side of the house. Don’t be so fucking spoiled,” Ameer told him.
“I’m just saying, if I was setting this up, I would’ve negotiated for use of the bathroom and a big water cooler, ’cause it’s damn sure hot. I would’ve even tried to get him for per diem,” Chris said.
“Per diem?” Ameer asked.
“Yeah, like a small daily fee to cover our lunch expenses while he got us out here,” Chris explained. “Hell, we ain’t from Queens. Apparently he couldn’t get any of these Queens cats to do the job for him. Still he’s treating us like we ex-cons, locking up his house and confining us to his yard!” Chris said. I smiled. I agreed with Chris, but mostly I liked his business mind. I knew he was already calculating how much lunch would cost for each of us and multiplying it by however many days he figured the whole job would take, and then subtracting it from the seven-hundred-dollar payment that we would each get in the end. That’s why he was tight.
“Fuck it, we can’t negotiate after the deal was made, the deposit was paid, and the work has already gotten started,” Ameer said. Tomorrow, I’ll bring my own lunch. Brown-bag it! Get one of my women to organize that for me!” Ameer emphasized, then looked toward me. I caught it. He was still uneasy because I’d corrected him to address my wives as women, not “girlies.” Now he would call his girlies women too. I didn’t say nothing back. He could call his girlies women if he wanted to, no problem. Yet we each knew that his were not wives, and that was the real big difference.
9. RIGHT TO AN ATTORNEY
Money-green eyes and pale skin, no cosmetics and nice lips, black lashes and black hair. No ring on her married finger and no jewels. A black embroidered bracelet on her left wrist almost completely covered a deep scar. She held her briefcase in her right hand. Slim, wearing a conservative well-tailored black suit, which she obviously spent good money on. She somehow chose to wear clogs on her feet confidently, but they didn’t match the rest of her fashion. Birkenstocks—the tiny metal label on her clogs was the only obvious branding on her. I had to look very closely or I would have missed it.
She walked slowly, strolling past each of the twelve of us all cuffed and chained. She inspected us carefully with those eyes. When she reached the end of the line where I stood, she stopped and stared. Then she did a 180 and slowly walked back to the beginning of the line,
opened her briefcase, fingered through some files, and pulled one out. She flipped through the few papers in the folder, held it open and started all over again walking back down the line. As she watched, I watched. She is after all, a woman in an evil space packed with evil men.
When she reached the end of the line the third time, she kept walking. Seconds later, she returned with a court officer. Approaching us again from the right side this time, she and the officer stopped where I stood.
“Unchain him, please,” she said politely to the officer and without any emotion as she pointed her eyes towards me. He signaled a second officer. When he arrived she said, “I need a private room to counsel my client before his arraignment.”
Unchained from the eleven, but hands and feet still cuffed and chained, I was only capable of small steps; still, I was grateful to be moving. One officer walked behind me and the other in front with her. Those two talked as though I had no ears to overhear them. But of course even with the commotion in the court corridor, I could hear clearly what they discussed.
“You should stop that guessing game you play,” the officer said to her. His casual tone of speech let me know that he was familiar with her.
“Not playing, Officer Foley,” she said dryly.
“I could’ve yanked that John Doe from the line, escorted him to the room, and had him chained to the chair and waiting for you while you enjoyed a nice cup of coffee,” he said as though he had an interest in charming her.
“Not necessary; I even want to take a look at my coffee beans before they roast or grind ’em,” she remarked.
“The pretty ones are always extra work,” he joked, giving a short laugh. After a pause, he turned his failed flirtation back to the business at hand. “This guy here is no victim. Don’t ask me to uncuff his hands in the counsel room. That’s not gonna happen,” he said sternly.
“Is that your decision or mine, Officer?” She pulled some type of rank on him.
“That’s me looking out for your own good. That’s me doing the same thing your father would want me to do.” He emphasized this by stopping his walk and turning towards her. But she kept walking, leaving him behind.
“No thanks, Daddy,” she said with calm sarcasm. “This troublesome, pretty little lawyer girl will make her own choices, and will take care of herself. That’s what I learned to do in four years of university, three years of law school, and after passing the bar on the first go-round.” She had shut him up and shut him down at the same time.
“Uncuff him,” she said when we reached the room.
“Please have a seat,” she said to me politely. I was reminding myself to not be off guard to her feminine manner. I sat down, hands uncuffed, unchained, but not my feet. It was a windowless, almost empty room with a solid door except for the slim rectangular glass, which revealed the court officer posted immediately outside it. There were no cameras visible. My eyes moved across the perimeter of the ceiling to check for small devices that I knew could easily have been planted there. I wasn’t worried, but I was cautious, and more thoughtful about surveillance than I had ever been in my young life.
She remained standing. I was seated. She approached my chair slowly and pulled her face in close to mine and then walked around my back slowly. I didn’t turn. I remained seated. She walked back to the front and squeezed herself in between the table and my seat, pushing the table back with only her backside. I did not know what she was doing. Neither did the officer on post who was now glaring through the glass on the door.
“Do you mind if I touch your face?” she asked me. I had one eye on him and one eye on her. I didn’t answer. Couldn’t call it. She stood up, still close in front of my chair. Him, still watching her back as she faced me.
“I like the whole silent thing. Brilliant,” she said softly and without emotion. “However, you’ll have to treat me differently than everyone outside of that door. Let’s develop a system. I’ll do my job my way. If you feel violated in any way, just tell me and I’ll stop immediately.” She was staring. “Let’s get started then,” she said touching my chin and the top of my head lightly with her fingers and moving it around gently. The door opened.
“What’s going on?” Officer Foley barked as though the attorney was his woman.
“Attorney-client privilege—please close the door,” she said calmly. He didn’t. “Since you’re still standing there, order me a car. I’ve got a hospital run. His head is injured.”
“I’m sure it’s nothing. Hard heads heal on their own,” he said, aggravated. “You’re just gonna make more work for yourself and more work for us. You know you have to get a court order to move him. Paperwork! You want to spend your whole day in the hospital?” he pressured her, but really he was telling her not to bother. She didn’t respond to his advice, his commands, his words.
“Order the car. I’ll run and get the judge’s signature from the clerk. Will you take care of it for me, or shall I take care of both things for myself?” She checked him without even looking his way. The door closed. He left and less than three seconds later, another officer was posted outside the door. He was less curious. Obviously watching over her was less personal to him than for the other officer. He wasn’t peering in, but he wasn’t moving from his position, either. I could see the back of his head directly through the glass.
“I’m going to lift your shirt for a moment. I’m going to touch you,” she said as she raised my T-shirt up. And placed her left hand over my heart and held it there to keep the shirt up. With her right hand she pressed her fingers lightly on my ribs, in addition to searching my stomach. “Turn around please if it’s okay,” she requested. I stood and turned as she dragged her hand from my heart to my back. Facing front again, she pressed my ribs again. “Does this hurt?” she asked me. I felt it, a slight pain that my mind had numbed a few days back. I didn’t react. “I think it does,” she said, disregarding my nonresponse and blank stare. “Please have a seat,” she said softly, yet without emotion. I sat down and placed my uncuffed hands on the table.
She opened her briefcase. I could see in. The insides were covered with stickers, white backgrounds and colorful letters and slogans. I thought it was bugged out to decorate the inside of any carrier. Most people, especially travelers, post tags, labels, and bumper stickers and all kinds of things on the outside of their luggage, so they can identify it as it’s being moved around the carousel after landing. But hers was reversed.
“Are you an adult?” she asked me casually, not like an interrogator. In a relaxed tone, she told me, “They have you listed as an adult and this courthouse is for adults. If you are not eighteen yet, it makes a difference in how you are handled, and a big difference in where you end up.” I didn’t respond. I was thinking. She was better than the rest of them. Just the fact that she was a woman lowered the volume of my hostility under these circumstances. I didn’t feel any aggression towards or against her. She removed seven-eighths of the energy I normally burned up to restrain myself and to appear blank or neutral in the presence of the male authorities and their bullshit. Still, I didn’t feel open or ready or at ease or certain yet that she was the one who would work my charges out with justice and to my benefit.
“It’s to your advantage if you are a juvenile. If you are, I can keep them from photographing you any further. If you are a juvenile, it will impact which judge you’re going to face, and in which court you are going to stand. I know you’re silent and thoughtful. However, you’ll need to present the facts so that you can be defended. I’ll need time to investigate the history and quirks of the judge you are going to possibly face during trial. Each judge is different. The law grants them some boundaries, but they are tremendously powerful,” she said calmly. I liked that she was planning to investigate the judge.
She leaned forward. “I represent you. So here’s what we are going to do right this minute. If you are an adult, eighteen years or older, raise your right hand or wink your right eye, or simply say so. I’ll give you ten sec
onds. Afterwards, I’m going to jot down in my file that you are a juvenile.” She checked her watch, had her eyes dead on the movement of the second hand. Then softly, she said, “Go!”
She sounded confident, but I could tell on the matter of my age, she wasn’t. She had seen and touched my body and it confused her. My body led her to believe that I’m an adult male, eighteen or older. Yet for some reason, she saw it to her legal benefit and mine for me to be underage. Or she had a hunch.
Clever, she was more skilled than any of the police and each of the detectives so far. She had gently turned my silence against me. Now, my not responding had become an actual response, according to how she twisted things. Maybe it was to my advantage to let her assume whatever she wanted to for a while. If I remained silent, whatever she wrote or reported about me was her assumption or her lucky or unlucky guess.
My silence so far had drawn out the demons that live in men. Each of them, the cops and the detectives, started off treating me with a certain stance and composure. The more silent I was, the less able they were to wear the masks they were wearing. In minutes for most, and even seconds for others, it became clear what kind of beasts they really were, whose side they were on, ’cause they were definitely not on the side of the law, and what exactly they were going after and what they were willing to do to carry out the threats they had made in the line of questioning me.
Because I did not cooperate with the good detective, his whole presentation flipped. I rejected his dirty offer with complete silence that night in the pizza shop. On the car ride back to his precinct, he threatened to kill me and call it self-defense if I discussed with anyone the content of the one-way conversation he’d had with me. The next morning, he reported that I had confessed to murder, despite me not opening my mouth and uttering one word to him. The following day, he had me transferred to the 73rd Precinct and the questioning began all over again. Everything I had already gone through with the narcotics detectives at the 77th Precinct somehow didn’t count. The homicide detectives started the clock all over again. Consequently, for another forty-eight hours, I was jailed, interrogated, and subjected to all of that extra shit that they do and get away with. The whole time, I remained absolutely silent whether they were talking to me, shouting, or beating me. They tried to draw a murder confession out from me, spoken and written, or to have me confirm what the good detective had reported. I didn’t. I knew he was trying to set me up for a twenty-five-years-to-life sentence. I definitely was going to do everything in my power to block that movement. That included not acknowledging anything to any of the cops, detectives, captains, or anyone on their team. I figured that the fact that I was now the main suspect for the murder, based only on the good detective’s word and zero other evidence other than the faceless photo, the heat had been taken off the others who were swept up on my Brooklyn block and falsely accused. I could tell that based on the good detective’s word, the blues and the homicide detectives felt sure that I was the murderer, although they couldn’t prove it yet. I had stood in several lineups, and whatever “witnesses” they had on the other side of their one-way glass didn’t pick me. Yet it seemed they didn’t point out anyone else either. My mind stretched to even consider that the ’hood wanted that snake dead and was grateful somebody finally had the heart to merk him. It was hard for me to believe, but it seemed somehow that not pointing me out in the lineups and not cooperating with the police questionings had become the ’hood’s way of looking out for me.