“That’s okay,” Willie says with a short laugh. “I had…to get up to…open the door anyway.”
It slides over Lacey’s head. Willie stands waiting while Lacey stares from the doorway. “You coming in?” he asks finally.
Lacey snaps to; stumbles through the door. Willie hasn’t seen him this drunk. “Gone get me a beer,” Lacey says, heading for the refrigerator.
Willie says, “That’s…what you need,” mostly to himself.
From the kitchen comes an anguished cry followed by something crashing against the sink. Usually when Lacey gets crazy, Willie makes himself invisible, but this time he walks to the kitchen door to check. Lacey doesn’t seem mean tonight, just vulnerable. Willie sees the chalkboard lying on the floor, its message staring face up at them.
“Bitch!” Lacey screams. “Fat, nasty bitch! She tryin’ kill me from inside!”
Willie slides back toward the living room to bed; let Lacey do whatever it takes to get this out of his system. He’s told Willie enough times it’s none of his “damn binnis” and Willie knows how fast Lacey turns mean.
“Wait,” Lacey says before Willie can move even a few steps. “Time you know what all this shit about. Lacey gonna purge his soul. You be puttin’ on your clothes, Chief. You an’ me goin’ for a ride.” He grabs a half-full fifth of I. W. Harper whiskey from the cupboard and heads for the front door.
“I beat my boy,” Lacey says in the car headed up Park Bóulevard. “Beat ’im bad.” He’s sweating and continually wiping his eyes.
Willie’s quiet. He looks to Lacey, then back to the bright white lines gliding under the Chrysler.
“Near to kill him,” Lacey says. “Sometime I wish I had.”
“You mean…like a son? You…have a son?”
“He barely a son now.” Lacey’s eyes cloud over and he grips the wheel hard. “Start on beatin’ him. Couldn’t stop. Beat my boy numb.”
“You talking about your own kid?” For some reason, Willie’s not comprehending. “You got a kid, Lacey?”
Lacey takes a long pull from the fifth. “Hell, yes, I’m talkin’ ’bout a kid. What you think I’m talkin’ about?”
Willie’s quiet again, staring out at the street as they take the ramp to the freeway. Then, “Where’re we going?”
“See my kid,” Lacey says. “Gonna show you my kid.”
“Where is he?”
“You jus’ hold on. He still be there.” Lacey grips the wheel even tighter. “He always be there.”
By the time they reach Highland Hospital, Lacey is tight as a drum, sweat pouring off his forehead and down his temples, mixing with tears on his chin. Willie is afraid to speak, not so much for fear of making Lacey mad as because Lacey looks as if he might just blow apart. He doesn’t think Lacey can talk—it’s like he’s spending his last ounce of energy just getting them there. Willie hasn’t felt this uneasy since the night he tried to find his way to BART through the Oakland war zone.
Lacey pulls the Chrysler close to the curb about a block from the huge, dark institution and shuts down the lights. “Can’t go in the front,” he says. “Ain’t allowed.” He slams the car door. “Ain’t allowed to see my boy; see what I done. Bitch had it made that way so she torture me res’ of my life.”
They turn up the side street next to the hospital, walk several yards along the ten-foot-high chain-link fence. In the blind spot between streetlights, Lacey stops and bends down, hands cupped, fingers interlaced.
“We…going over the fence?” Willie asks. “Won’t we…get in trouble?”
“Could be,” Lacey says, moving back and forth in his alcoholic sway. “Don’ much matter.”
Willie’s been around Lacey long enough to know you don’t argue when his mind’s made up, which it always is, especially when he’s drunk; so Willie drops his cane and steps into Lacey’s makeshift sling, attempting to place his weight away from the arm with the wrist brace; the only visible remnant of that awful night with Lacey and Angel. Lacey pushes him high enough that Willie can grab the top frame of the fence and, with a little more shoving from below, pull himself over, dropping to the dark lawn on the other side. His cane lands beside him; then Lacey, stumbling as he hits the grass, pitching forward.
Lacey stands and brushes himself off, seemingly reaching down inside somewhere for dignity that may not be there, then marches straight toward the square brick building, Willie in tow.
They stop beneath a window too high to see into and Lacey grabs the steel drainpipe beside it like a gym rope, pulling himself up hand over hand until he’s even with the window. Whatever pain he feels from the wrist is not evident. Willie hears a high moan, looks up to see Lacey’s face go soft, his mouth and eyes fallen. Lacey stares a few more seconds through what looks to Willie to be bottomless despair, then drops back to the ground. “Go look,” Lacey says in a voice so empty it wants to collapse. “He standin’ direct across the room, lookin’ right at the window. Don’ worry, he don’ see you.”
“I can’t get up that,” Willie says, pointing to the pipe. “Only got…one good arm.”
Lacey leans forward, placing his hands firmly just above his knees. “Stan’ on my back.”
Willie looks at Lacey’s wrist brace, hesitates.
“Stan’ on my goddam back!” Lacey hisses. He’s wavering, but Willie walks around behind him, slips out of his shoes, placing his hands on Lacey’s buttocks, and hops up on his back as if he were a circus rider mounting a horse. Carefully he moves his hands to Lacey’s shoulderblades, attempting to stand. After a couple of slips, he’s up, holding onto the window ledge for support. The room is dimly lit, and directly across from the window, exactly where Lacey said he’d be, stands a tall, extremely thin black boy; he could be anywhere from fifteen to forty. His long arms hang out of his plain white state-issue shirt like useless ebony twigs, their outstanding features the gnarled, twisted elbows and knuckles. Inside his head, Willie hears a voice: “Find your center” and realizes this boy doesn’t have a center. He’s staring at the window, but Willie can tell he doesn’t see him. A narrow thread of spittle hangs from one side of his mouth, and as it lengthens, finally dropping to the floor, the boy makes no attempt to stop it. He’s vacant; gone.
Willie is absolutely fixed on Lacey’s son. He knows only the skeleton of the story behind all this, but, from his core, knows instantly this is family gone crazy. It comes in a flash: the boy before him is wrecked; the man beneath his feet, desperately holding on with everything he’s got to stay just above the quicksand. This is what happens when we astonish ourselves with our capacity to be vicious; when we realize so late how our expectations have betrayed us. Suddenly he sees his father’s face, and the hurt in his chest nearly drowns him.
The door next to the boy opens and Willie ducks, then peeks back over the ledge. The boy’s body turns slowly, in a series of starts, to look at the nurse standing in the doorway, then back at the window. Below him, Willie feels through the soles of his feet the slow vibration of Lacey’s sobs. Lacey wavers, steadies himself, then falls forward; Willie tumbling onto him. He lands with a hard thud, barely missing Lacey’s head, and Lacey lies there, crying, pounding the grass weakly with one fist. Willie pulls himself up, reaches down to help Lacey, but Lacey tenses, holds tightly to the ground, face buried in the lawn. Willie stands staring down at him for nearly a full minute before saying, “Come on…Lacey. Let’s go. I…saw him. I get it now.”
With an audible sigh, almost a moan, Lacey pulls himself to his hands and knees. “He jus’ there hauntin’ me. He there an’ I can’t see him; they won’t let me go close. But that bitch Coreen, she call me leas’ once a day; tell me how I murder him. All she want be money. Long time I pay; but I never get to see him. Never get to make it right. She jus’ call an’ haunt me; tell me he a vegetable an’ me a killer.”
“And…you took me in to take his place.”
Lacey’s quiet a second, then says, “Yeah, you a cripple kid. I get this idea to get me out of
Hell. Raise me a white cripple kid. Can’t fix all the bad shit, but maybe I make up some.”
“Let’s…go back home,” Willie says.
Lacey stands, the effects of the alcohol washed out of his body by a dynamite blast of anguish.
Willie’s perched on the edge of the concrete wall bordering the patio next to the school, surrounded by schoolmates and feeling somewhat lost. He doesn’t know what to say; how to get in. The day is warm, even hot for March; the bay fog burned off early. Most of the boys have removed their shirts; some are just coming from a lunchtime game on the court, and Willie looks around in envy. He’s not even sure he knows what he looks like anymore, it’s been so long since he’s been willing to look. He used to like his body; be proud of his hard, natural, well-muscled build. But now he’s lopsided; his left arm and leg are noticeably smaller, and he’s very self-conscious about letting anyone see him. He catches a glimpse of Angel sitting on the grass talking to some other girls, and his envy of these guys intensifies. He wants to take off his shirt and show off some of his old moves on the court. He looks behind him to see Warren Hawkins lighting up a joint. Immediately Willie feels self-conscious; like he’s in for trouble. Warren is big time at OMLC; everybody’s hero. He’s a tall, fast, strong black kid; real smart—though that isn’t borne out on his report card—with the build of a racehorse and these lightning-quick eyes that miss nothing. Everyone knows he’s a fighter and everyone knows his temper is like quicksilver. He’s easygoing most of the time, with a good sense of humor; really appealing; a natural leader. It’s a bad idea to get on Warren’s bad side.
Warren takes the joint and passes it on, and Willie fidgets a little. “You be watchin’ right around that corner there,” Warren says to Willie. “That be where André my man comin’ from if he comin’. You give me a signal, I be havin’ this roach for lunch.”
Willie nods uneasily, knowing he’d be off the face of the earth if he refused, but feeling an allegiance to André. He hopes the joint will be smoked before it gets to him, but it isn’t and he nonchalantly passes it on. Warren glances up. “You passin’ up some good shit,” he says and there’s an undertone of suspicion.
Willie smiles and says, “Yeah. Can’t…do any dope since I…got hurt.”
Warren nods. “You ain’t no narc.” It’s a question.
Willie shakes his head. “Nope. Just can’t do dope.”
“Narc last this long,” Warren says, snapping his fingers. “One second he awake, then he asleep.”
“I’m…not a narc,” Willie says again, calmly, his heart thundering in his throat.
“Awake. Asleep,” Warren says again, snapping his fingers.
A short, stocky black kid who hangs with Warren all the time—Willie knows him only as Kato—lights up another joint and hands it to Warren. “Come on, man, he ain’t no narc. You jus’ smokin’ too much this good weed, make you crazy with par-a-noia. Tha’s a brain disease you get when you become a drug addict like you is, Hawk.”
“Shee. I ain’t no addict. You the addict. You ain’t been down since Jimmy Carter runnin’ things.”
“Who Jimmy Carter?”
“So, Willie Weaver,” Hawk says. “André the Terrible say you about ready to shoot some hoops with the big boys, that right?”
Willie shrugs. “Sometime,” he says. “Been working at getting it back.”
“André say you pretty hot shit where you come from, up there in Montana.”
“Where men be men,” Kato says, “an’ sheep be nervous.”
“Whooo. Tha’s a good one,” Hawk laughs. “Tha’s cold, Kato. Make fun of a man’s homeland.”
Willie laughs. He hasn’t heard that one.
“Anyway,” Hawk says. “You come on out when you ready. Old Hawk show you some moves.”
“I’ve…been watching,” Willie says. “You’ve already shown me some moves.”
“Shee,” Kato says. “Easy to have moves when you six-five an’ built swift. Come out an’ see some of my moves. Show you some rollin’, bowlin’ moves Hawk only dream of.” He turns to Hawk. “I done what I said. Checked my wheels out against BART.”
Hawk looks puzzled. “What you talkin’ ’bout?”
“Tryin’ to see what’s the fastest way to school. Rode my bike one day, took BART the next. Bike one day, BART the next. Get down, Ka-to. Alternate. Did that for a week.”
Everyone looks at Kato like So The Hell What?
“Know what I fin’ out?”
“What you fin’ out, Kato?”
“Take me less time to ride my bike. Every day. Really. Fin’ out BART be worse than my bike.” Kato convulses into a high laughter, as Willie’s head snaps up. “Get it?” Kato chokes. “BART be worse than my bike. Like a dog.”
Hawk slips Kato into a headlock and makes him promise “no more them jive-ass things. Pigs come get you for that,” he says.
Willie relaxes and laughs. Awful as it seems, this may be the connection between his worlds.
CHAPTER 17
For a time following the night outside Lacey’s battered son’s room, things seem to quiet down a bit for Willie. He becomes more a part of the group that hangs around Hawk and Kato, though he doesn’t find real closeness, and concentrates hard in school and harder at regaining his physical self.
Lisa is great. “Tell Lacey we need a hundred and forty dollars for a special class that isn’t covered by your scholarship,” she says as they finish their workout on the court, ripping the Velcro fastener off her small wrist weight and flipping it into the backseat of her car. They’ve worked eight weeks, and she’s removed a lot of the extra weights to match Willie’s improvement; only these small ones remain.
“A hundred and forty dollars,” Willie says. “For what?”
Lisa smiles. “I won’t tell you, then you won’t have to tell him. Tell him it’s a hell of a deal, though. Normal cost would be about two hundred and fifty dollars. Tell him all the kids taking the class have to pay extra. Don’t tell him you’re the only one taking it.” She walks around to the driver’s side, opens the door, leans her elbows easily on the roof. “And get ready to clear out some early-morning time, say around six. It’s time for Phase Two.”
Willie doesn’t question her; he’s come to trust her completely, knowing she keeps her little secrets and surprises to spring on him so he won’t have time to figure out reasons and excuses.
He stays on the court after she drives away, working on a move to his left that requires only one dribble with his left hand and a long step; designed to keep honest any defenders cheating to his right because he is so obviously right-sided. He dribbles several times with his right hand, visualizing a defender in his path to the basket, cross-dribbles to his left, taking a long step around, then back to his right hand, moving in under the hoop, protecting the ball with his body, flipping it up for a reverse layup. He attempts the move ten times, scores eight.
“Not bad for a man be earthbound.”
Willie turns to see Hawk and Kato and a guy he doesn’t know walking through the gate toward the court, and waves. The edge is off his relationship with Hawk—Hawk knows now he isn’t a narc—but Willie’s still pretty careful; partly because when he watches Hawk play he wishes desperately he could match skills with him back when he was healthy. If only Hawk knew, if he had seen him at the Crazy Horse Electric game, Willie would get the respect he deserves.
“Little two-on-two?” Kato says, popping a jumper from the free-throw line.
“Naw, I…gotta go.”
Hawk says, “Let it wait. Time you see what you can do. Time to take all you new guns to the war. See if they shoot. See if you got ammo.”
Willie starts to protest, but Hawk says, “Me an’ you, Crazy Horse. You take my man Kato. I take Ernie. Do or die.” He swishes one from the top of the key, turning to walk to the half line even before the ball snaps through the net, waiting patiently there while Ernie removes his sweats. Ernie is about an inch taller and a bit stockier than Hawk. They loo
k to be a good match. Ernie doesn’t speak, just bends down, grabbing his toes to stretch, then walks toward the basket, taking two long, quick strides, and leaps easily to the rim, hanging there a few seconds before dropping to the ground.
“Ernie think he bust up the rim, won’ have to suffer no humiliation,” Hawk laughs, flipping the ball to Willie, signaling the start of action. Kato crowds him and Willie dribbles to his right, protecting the ball with his body. Kato’s hand flicks around Willie like a snake’s tongue, but Willie’s long arm keeps it away. With precision timing, as the snake’s tongue retracts, he flips the ball around behind Kato’s back into the key, just as Hawk breaks around Ernie, and Hawk scoops it up at full speed, faking once, then sliding behind Ernie, who has overplayed him. He lays it up easily for the point. They score four more before turning the ball over; one of them on Willie’s short jumper and another on a sort of jump-hook he developed to keep leapers away.
Kato and Ernie catch up on Ernie’s sweet outside baseline jumper and a couple of lightning-quick moves to the hoop that leave Hawk a step behind. Kato gets around Willie for two easy ones, but Willie adjusts and eventually is able to keep him outside most of the time. Excitement floods through him at being able to stay with these guys, though most of his contribution comes through pinpoint passes to Hawk, working the inside against Ernie. His old anticipation is coming back—he almost always knows where Hawk is going to be. Occasionally he gets excited and throws the ball away, but each time that happens he slows down, closing his eyes; centering himself, remembering the miles of tape Lisa has shown him of Larry Bird “taking whatever time he needs to make his move,” no matter what the skills of his opponent. And Willie gets back in control. He wishes Lisa had stayed to watch.