?Ooooooh.? The word made the white man's lips pucker. That combined with his eyes, magnified by the lenses, made him look like some sort of albino bottom fish. ?Something for your yard??
?Ebony tree,? Socrates said. He decided to keep the talk to a minimum, do his business and get out of there before something made him mad.
?Very rare, tropical.? The nursery man became excited. He took off his glasses and wiped them on the dirty green apron. ?Not indigenous. From India and Africa and Ceylon. Can't grow here at all. It's the heartwood you know. The heartwood's what they want.? He shook his head. ?No we don't have that. Can't grow it.?
?Ain't there some kinda American ebony trees?? Socrates splayed out his fingers to inhibit his fist-forming reflex.
Again the lumpy faced fish stare. ?Why yes. Not true ebony but almost the same thing. Comes from somewhere in the Caribbean I believe. Trinidad ??
?Jamaica,? Socrates said. ?I called you yesterday evening an' you said that there's ebony in Jamaica that might could grow here in L.A.?
The fish smiled at Socrates.
?I want a Jamaican ebony tree,? the ex-con said.
The smile remained but no words or gestures accompanied it.
?I want to buy a Jamaican ebony tree.?
?We don't have any.?
?I thought that you could get any plant from anywhere in the world. Ain't that what your ad say??
?It's very difficult to find a plant like that and it can be very expensive. Maybe a shrub palm or a rosebush ??
?I got a rosebush already. I want what I said.?
The fish slowly became a man. Lips relaxed, eyes narrowing down to some kind of reasonable size. As the gardener became human so, it seemed, did Socrates in the gardener's eyes.
?My name is Antoine,? he said.
?Socrates. Socrates Fortlow. I don't wanna cause no problem, Antoine. I just want what I want. You know I live on the other side of town but this was the only place seem to know how to get it.?
?You probably talked to Joseph,? Antoine said. ?He knows about exotic plants. I can have him look up this Jamaican ebony of yours and call you.?
?Um. Well you know my phone line is out. Phone company said that the lines is all busted up and they'd have to give me a new number. But I could come back in a couple'a days. When's this Joseph gonna be in??
?On Friday.? The nursery man's face had changed again. This time he was trying to read the story behind Socrates' eyes.
?I'll see ya then,? Socrates said. ?Tell'im I'll come on Friday.
It was Tuesday, meat loaf day at Iula's diner on Slauson.
Socrates got there late, about nine. He climbed the rickety aluminum stairs to the restaurant, which was constructed from two old-time yellow school buses welded together side by side and hoisted above Tony's Mechanical Repair Yard.
Socrates liked to eat his meat loaf alone, but after seven Iula's was always full of people. She cooked soul food like in the old days. Collard greens and fried fish, corn bread and hog maws. She made black-eyed peas and blue crab gumbo every Friday. And there were always three kinds of homemade pie: lemon, apple and mince; sweet potato, pecan and pineapple. She had pumpkin pie and strawberry-rhubarb, even green tomato pie sometimes in the summer.
Iula could cook.
She had broad hips and smiling lips, freckles and orange-brown skin. Gold on her teeth and no rings on her fingers. She was Socrates' girlfriend?sometimes. And sometimes just his friend.
?Hey, Socco,? Bernard Williams hailed.
