Drama City

'How you know to do that?' said Butler.

'Wasn't no thing,' said Green, getting low in the bucket, his wrist resting casually over the steering wheel, proud despite the nagging feeling that he'd pushed it and done wrong. 'Alls you had to do was look in his eyes. His heart was pumpin' Kool-Aid.'

'What you mean?'

'Melvin was scared. I could tell just by lookin' at him, 'cause I been knowin' him a long time. He used to run with my brother, James, back when.' Green blinked away the image of his brother, playing basketball down by the courts, imitating MJ with his tongue out the side of his mouth, laughing about it, having fun. 'Melvin don't belong out here no more.'

'You punked him,' said Butler with admiration.

'Wasn't me,' said Green, a touch of regret in his voice. 'Boy got his ass broke in the cut.'

As the Cadillac went up Otis, it passed the home of Edwina Rollins, Joe Carver's aunt. Joe sat on the dark porch and nursed a beer. He had watched the conflict involving the occupants of the Cadillac and the BMW, and had listened to the muffled threats with only mild interest. He had been involved in countless confrontations just like that one in his old life. They bored him now.

Joe would have gone inside and caught a little ESPN, but it was all baseball this time of year, a sport that he had played growing up but that did not interest him on television, and anyway, he was waiting on his friend. Lorenzo would be out walking his dog right about now. Joe would just sit out here and wait for Renzo. Wouldn't be too long before his boy would be stopping by.

Jasmine moved jauntily along, leading Lorenzo down Princeton Place. She had done her business in the ball field up by Park View Elementary and had the bounce of the unburdened in her step. Coming upon his grandmother's house, Lorenzo noticed candlelight on the concrete porch of the row house to the south and the outline of a female figure sitting on a glider there. As he went up the sidewalk to his grandmother's, he heard a little girl's voice call out and saw her braided head, in silhouette, come up over the rails of the neighboring porch.

'That Jazz Man?' said the voice.

'Depends on who's asking,' said Lorenzo, stopping, holding the leash and Jasmine fast. 'Is that Lakeisha?'

'How you know my name?'

'Santa Claus told me.'

'Santa?' said Lakeisha with delight.

'Yeah, he called me up,' said Lorenzo, walking across the grass toward the house so that he didn't have to shout. 'Told me about this pretty little girl named Lakeisha, lived in my neighborhood? He didn't have her phone number, so he asked me to find out what that little girl wanted for Christmas.'

'I want Cinderella Dream Trunk!'

'Settle down, girl,' said Rayne, Lakeisha's mother, getting up off the glider and coming to the edge of the covered porch. Lorenzo stopped at the foot of the stairs and looked up at her. Her face was barely lit by the votive candles she had placed about. There was music playing softly, probably from a portable stereo she had put somewhere up there. Lorenzo recognized the song.

'Evening,' said Lorenzo.

'Evening to you,' said Rayne.

'Can I pet Jazz Man, Mommy?' said Lakeisha.

'If Mr Lorenzo says it's all right.'

'She'd love you to pet her,' said Lorenzo.

Lakeisha descended the steps and crouched down. Jasmine rubbed her snout in Lakeisha's outstretched hand and wagged her tail as Lakeisha patted her belly and then ran her fingers down her coat. Lorenzo leaned, with deliberate cool, against a brick post. Rayne had a seat on the top step, a glass of white wine in her hand. Now that she was out from under the roof of the porch and in the moonlight, Lorenzo could see her face and figure more clearly. Lorenzo thinking, as he always did when he ran into her, She is fine. Realizing that he was staring, he looked down at Lakeisha and Jasmine.

'She's a natural with my dog,' said Lorenzo. 'She'd be a good candidate—'

'Don't say it,' said Rayne, smiling a little. 'I got enough mouths to feed. Anyway, you off the clock, right? You don't need to be working that pet adoption thing all the time.'

'What, you don't think about cutting hair when you're out the shop?'

'Please. After standing up for eight hours straight? I try to forget it when I'm not there. Trouble is, my feet won't let me.' She looked him over. 'How'd you know I was a stylist?'

'How'd you know I was dog police?'

Lorenzo and Rayne chuckled. She had a nice smile. Rayne was the first to look away. He liked the shyness of her too.

'This is pretty right here,' said Lorenzo.

'What is?'

'This song.'

''Miss Black America'?' said Rayne. 'Lakeisha likes it. It takes me back myself. My mother had the album when I was a little girl. She used to play it for me, right here in this house.'

'That was the one with Mayfield on the cover, wearing that lemon yellow suit.'

'You remember it?'