without thought, but they hung in the air like the empty echo of gunshot. The two little words stilled the laughter. Mrs Crider's eyes narrowed into an unforgiving glare and she sent him to the principal's office.
He never walked as a safety patrol member again.
Actually, he didn't walk as much of anything again. Whether he realized it or not, that was when the educational system lost him. He went through the motions of school for another four years or so, but he was already done. There was no reaching him after that. He had turned his back on the institution knowing that whatever path for his life he was to chart, it wouldn't be through any hallowed halls of higher learning.
And on quiet days in what passed for reflection for one Juneteenth Walker, he wondered how many Mrs Criders shut down countless Junies each day.
He retreated into the house.
'Any problems?' Parker asked.
'Just some nonsense,' Junie said. 'Nothing I couldn't handle.'
Octavia Burke never lamented her quick rise in the ranks. She didn't have time for political games nor did she buy into either affirmative action or workplace racism. Either were self-defeating traps of a game she refused to play. Like her mother, she was nobody's victim. 'You kiss butt, then you kick it.' her mother always said, not one to pay attention to firsts either. First black nurse hired at Wishard Hospital. First black nurse promoted to department head. First black nurse elected to serve on the board. Strong and vital, nothing got in her way. Her fierce determination came at a cost. There was always a sadness about her, like she were missing out on something. She was always closed off, a cool aloofness she never intended with her children. Passed onto her children.
So when Octavia's first husband told her that she had trouble letting folks in, it came as no surprise. Nor was she surprised when he left.
She kicked her shoes off at the front door and hung her coat up. The house, silent and dark. A residual flow from upstairs, probably her second husband in bed watching television. Home was her oasis. Away from the madness of the office away from the detritus of the streets who took up so much of her time. She was happy to be home. It centered her and it saddened her that she spent so little time here. She continued her after-work ritual. Shoes, coat, then food. The microwave and oven were bereft of a plate of food. Whatever they had done for dinner didn't include her. The checkin calls of 'when will you be home' were fewer and further between, tired of 'I'll grab a bite on the way home' or 'don't wait up, it's a long one'.
Then the boys. Long asleep, she made a point of peeking in on them if only to reassure herself that they were still alive and that she could pick them out of a line-up. To each boy, she'd sit on the edge of his bed and stroke their hair. To let them know she was present and loved them, even if they weren't awake to know. The simple gesture allowed the day to drain out of her, all of the misery and hopelessness and futility of her work. And it was the only time they'd let her love on them anyway. They were getting so damn big.
Their marriage had hit a bad patch. Her long hours, the Job, were worse than having a man on the side. She suspected he filled the void of her absence with… someone. No, that wasn't fair. It wasn't in him. The only thing he filled himself with was quiet, festering resentment. Never going to bed at the same time. Letting the gulf between them fallow.
The television played coolly in the background. He watched an episode of that new medical drama she liked so much where all the oversexed doctors looked barely old enough to drive. It was a show they decided to watch together. Or so she thought.
Without betraying any hurt feelings, she walked into their bathroom to brush her teeth and closed the door. His passive-aggressive point having been made, he turned off the television. She came out wearing an old T-shirt. She slipped into her side of the bed. The same old night-time dance.
Percy watched the whole scene go down. The three men who confronted those soldiers, unarmed except for their bravery and determination. How the other man came out — another soldier, he could tell, but terrified of the men. Firing wildly because the men were true.
His heart soared.
Dred stood in the littered living room of the aban doned house the crew squatted in and used as a stash house. One hand in his pants pocket, he checked his watch on the other, a bored spectator with more pressing concerns. Griff loomed over the dope dealer they'd caught unawares. The man sat up in the ruined couch, its cushions missing and he in his boxers startled from the nap he was taking along its box springs.
At the other end of the room, the cushions were spread as a makeshift mattress, stained in blood, piss, and come, yet ready for business again. Baylon guarded the door, a careful eye on the streets.
'I don't think you hear me. B, are you having trouble understanding me?'
'I hear you just fine, Dred,' Baylon said.
'Griff, am I not using the King's English correctly?'
'Like you was born to it.'
'Then why is this group of fools operating in my neighborhood? Why do I have to come down here and see to some petty bullshit?'
'Some niggas are hard of skull. Maybe need their ears cleaned out,' Griff said.
Truth was, Dred was in a mood to make his presence felt. Sometimes he couldn't resist a little knucklehead stuff. It was the life. He had several stops to make that required his personal touch. And he'd heard some disturbing whispers about Night. Word on the street was that he was setting up his own shop, had crews working on his watch and was lining up his own distribution. That was the only reason Dred's interest was alerted. He had the distribution into Indianapolis locked up. Even the Hispanic gangs came through him. He had tied things up nicely to where, though still new to the scene, lit tle more than a name whispered among the operators — he doubted even the police had gotten onto him yet — he could step away from handling the product, short of major deals. Like the meeting he was soon to be late for. But before he became a com plete ghost, he needed to personally rattle a few cages.
'Rent's due, motherfucker. That plain enough for you?'
'I'm just a wrong time, wrong place brother. This ain't even my joint.' The man cupped his crotch and draped his chest with his other arm. 'I hear you, Dred. I didn't mean no disrespect.'
'Is that a glamour working?' Dred asked, suddenly suspicious. He studied the man, searching for a flaw or telltale giveaway. 'You the one been having women coming in and out of here at all times, like that ain't going to draw no notice. What you call yourself doing? Maximizing your resources? Running dope and girls? Hope you ain't fool enough to run guns, too. Griff?'
'I believe we have the night's proceeds.' Griff held a paper bag loosely filled with cash. Not enough for Dred's notice, but enough for him to justify the diver sion.
'What? We got a problem?'
'Nah,' the man said.
'I think we got a problem.'
With a strength and ferocity that surprised them all, Dred upended the couch and spilled the man onto the floor. Before the man could struggle to his feet, Dred straddled him, his hot breath steaming the man's face. Dred headbutted him into senselessness, then slapped him like he was a hooker short with his money. The man's nose exploded and covered his face with blood.
'Don't you ever,' Dred said between subsequent slaps, 'let me see you' slap 'up in my territory' slap 'without my explicit say so.' Slap. 'Explicit, mother fucker.'
The man fell backward in a pool of his own blood. His heart unmoved, Baylon wondered how many women the man had similarly beaten. The man crawled, a dog in cowering retreat, taking a foot to his side from Dred.
'Dred, man, we got what we came for. If we're going to make that other thing…' Griff trailed off in half a singsong voice. Griff had leapfrogged Baylon in the hierarchy. Nothing had been openly said but Baylon knew the deal.
The rituals and things he'd seen — things that were never explained nor even talked about — didn't bother Griff. He considered himself a needtoknow soldier. His brutally efficient fearlessness, and lack of questions, caused Dred to favor him in subtle ways. Tended to go to him first when something needed to be done. Seemed to favor his company outside of conducting business. Spoke of him quite favorably when he wasn't around. Things Baylon was certain was never done or said about him. The Ndibu led, it was still business as usual. Folks scurried to curry favor or step on the back of even their brother to get to the next level. There was no such thing as enough: not enough women, not enough money, not enough rep, not enough power. Discontent was its own raison d'etre.