Black Water Rising

remembers. But she’s forgotten the amount of hair spray her groomer encased her in. Her fingers get stuck a few inches above her ear. “This is a goddamned mess. If the city council would go my way in terms of who we seat on the port commission, then maybe I can push this strike situation in the right direction.”

“What about Cummings?” Jay can’t help asking.

“He’s part of the problem, you ask me. It’s the port commis­ sion that started this trouble in the first place.” She goes on to tell Jay that the labor crisis actually started several months back when the port commission cut deals with some of the major shipping companies, allowing them to berth, or dock, their ships several hours earlier than has been customary for twenty years. Starting earlier means more ships docked in a day, more goods unloaded and loaded, more business. It also means extra hours of work for the dockworkers, most of whom don’t get overtime, a point on which the stevedoring companies refuse to budge. They’re already paying plenty of overtime to their fore­ men, who get compensated for the extra responsibility they take on. To management, this pay scale is based on a time-honored hierarchy. The problem, Jay knows, is that the hierarchy falls along racial lines. The foremen, the men supervising, holding clipboards, dipping into air-conditioned trailers for doughnuts and coffee anytime they want to, are disproportionately white. The ones doing all the manual labor, the lifting and loading, are almost all brown. And the stevedoring companies are slow to promote blacks, and especially Latinos, to the more lucrative positions.

“I’m all for equal rights and equal pay,” the mayor says. “But now is just not the time for this kind of fight. There’s a time and place for everything, Jay.”

“Ten years ago you and I would have laughed if somebody told us we ought to wait patiently for our civil rights. Wait is just another word for no, and you know it.”

“Look, Jay,” she says firmly, almost like a schoolteacher scold­ ing a mouthy pupil. “There’s not a goddamned one of us can afford a strike right now. This is the second-biggest international port in the country. You know that? You got any idea how much money floats on that water? Not to mention the oil. The oil, Jay. Those petrochemical workers go on strike too, and this whole country’s going to feel the effects of it. I got people calling me left and right. Business leaders, oil and gas folks, the unions. People are starting to panic, Jay,” she says, shaking her head gravely. “This just isn’t the time.”

“They’re talking about suing the city, Cynthia. The kid’s family.”

“For what?”

“Their position: the Houston Police Department and the city that funds and manages said department both failed in their duties to protect a law-abiding citizen and to carry out the law to the fullest extent of their abilities.”

Cynthia stands perfectly still, her high heels dug in the blue carpet, staring at him with those pale blue-gray eyes, hot pink flushing across her cheeks. For the first time, she actually looks angry. “You’re not taking the case, are you?”

“They asked me to talk to you, that’s all I’m doing.”

“Because you can’t.” Then, catching herself, she says, “Not that I’m in a position to tell you what to do—”

“So long as we’re clear about that,” he says.

“I’m just saying, you don’t have to do this, Jay, just to punish me.”

She waits for him to say that’s not what this is, not the reason he came all this way. “Why would I want to punish you, Cyn­ thia?” he asks pointedly.

“Don’t do this to me, Jay.”

“I’m not doing anything to you, Cynthia.”

“That’s not true,” she says warmly. “You’re here, aren’t you?”

She gives him a wistful smile. It betrays a weakness he didn’t know was there, an acknowledgment that his presence holds some power for her as well. “You telling me you came all this way to talk to me about a union? Really, Jay?”

He looks into her eyes and tells the truth. “I don’t know why I’m here.”

The answer seems to irritate her in some way, and she makes a quick, rather graceless switch from sly courting to an outright plea for mercy. “Look, I’m in a struggle with this police depart­ ment as it is, and everybody in this goddamned city knows it. I’m only eight months in. I cannot have a lawsuit against the police department. It’ll be an indictment against me, proof that I can’t control those men. They’ll hang me, Jay.”

“The Brotherhood just wants protection,” he says. “In the very likely event there’s a strike, they want to know that they’ll be safe on the picket line.”

“You sure sound like you’re representing them.”

“Just doing a favor, that’s all. The only outsider they’re taking any real cues from is Reverend Al Boykins, the minister over at First Love Antioch.”

“Your father-in-law?”

This stops him, completely unnerves him. He had no idea she knew he was married, that she knew anything about his life anymore. “Just talk to the chief, okay,” he says. “They’re going to strike. It’ll be a hell of a lot better if no one gets hurt, and it ends quickly. For them and for you.”

He turns and starts for the door.

He hears her voice behind him, his name landing softly at his back. “Jay.”

He turns to look at her, wondering if she’ll finally say it, here and now.

“If you get me the names of the men who hurt that boy,” she says, her voice cool and businesslike. “I swear I’ll do everything I can.”

“’Preciate that.”