wanted to have with his father. 'Friendly'. Something that took the onus of responsibility off his father having to try to be a father. And Prez having to live up (or down) to it. Maybe that's why he took off. To be his own man; find his own way. And he fucked it up. Charting his own course ended him where he began: fragile and tired and no better than his old man.
'Another player done got caught up,' Prez said, hoping his father had grown some. 'All that 'he said/she said' stuff.'
'The DA dropped the charges. Bet he won't see the inside of another court room for a while,' Earl said.
'She'll probably see some cash though. Nuisance change to make that civil suit go away.' Prez baited him. 'That's all she was ever after.'
'The cost of doing business. They all the same, only the rates ever change.'
'They all alike, huh?' Prez's face grew hot, but he didn't know why. Maybe King's judgmental tone haunted him. Something close to rage mixed with resentment threatened to bubble up. Big Momma put her hand on his knee.
'Most of them.' Earl turned to him as if annoyed by the interruption.
'Even Mom?'
'I said 'most'.'
'I need a glass of water.' Big Momma stood up as if hearing her mother call her from the kitchen. 'Either of you need anything?'
'Help yourself. I'm good,' Earl said. 'You look like you got something on your mind.'
'It's just that… you don't have that much time left.'
'Uh huh.'
'And I feel… I don't know… damn it, Dad, it's like you're a stranger to me.'
'I'm your father, boy.'
'I don't know what that means.'
'It means watch your tone.'
Prez knew that his father never respected him, or, at best, considered him as a soft punk. The only time that his father seemed to like him, to really talk to him, was when Prez was keeping one of his secrets. Prez studied the man. This old man. He'd never seen his father look weak… so old. The epiphany struck him: he was a boy. Not a boy in a man's body, a boy masquerading as a man. They both were. Boys who had gotten older, only the toys changed. The thought of playing at the role of being a father never sat well with him.
Prez never knew his father. Because he was little more than a man who left sperm in his mother. Prez knew the man who offered to smoke pot with him on occasion in lieu of actually bonding with or parenting him. But he didn't know anything about him. His childhood, how he was raised, events that shaped him, how he saw the world.
Sperm donor. Bill payer. Big brother. Protector.
My daddy's dying.
'I am who I am. Who do you want me to be?' Earl asked.
Real. 'I don't know.'
Fathers and sons. Everything kept coming back to that. He knew, whether being taught directly or simply absorbing it from the culture around him, that he was supposed to complete the work his father began. Follow in his father's footsteps, even if it wasn't a path he'd have chosen for himself. He was a son wanting to please his parent, to hear his father say that he was proud of him. Some part of him, some tiny voice, wanted his father's approval. Just like part of him wanted to prove his own worth, if only in his mind, by doing a superior job of being a parent. A husband. A man. It occurred to him that in order to grow, a son had to reject his father sooner or later. What he feared was, if faced with the possibility of rejection or disappointment in his offspring, his father would reject him first.
Shit. This was like breaking up with a woman. It didn't matter if both knew the relationship wasn't going to work, what mattered was who did the actual breaking-up.
Fathers and sons. That was some shit.
Garlan's mother was a nurse. That woman knew how to work a system. An opportunity which presented itself, she played it for maximum advantage. The way she put together her work schedule, she could hit overtime by a Wednesday, which meant by Saturday, working doubles, she was deep into the man's pocket. She wasn't married to the dude they lived with, so with everything in his nonworking-ass's name, they qualified for welfare and other benefits. The name of the game was getting over. His whole life was training for a doctorate in the art of getting over.
'Who's that young nigga that likes to run with you?' Dred asked. Everything was a system, from school to a job, or the street. Teachers, bosses, ballers, cops. His job was to run game on them. That was the life.
'Who? The Boars?' Garlan asked, knowing who Dred meant.
'Yeah, that's him. He got promise?'
'Yeah, he tight. Got some game to him.' Keep your eyes open. Don't trust anyone. Keep the count straight. Make sure folks respect your name. The Boars had the makings for a good soldier. He internalized that shit. Garlan had his eye on him for a minute.
'Whatever, man. Put him on.'
'What's with the change-up?'
'I gotta explain myself to you now?'
'Nah, man.' Garlan took his cue to be quiet. He loathed meetings with Dred. It was worse than being called down to the principal's office. He'd call for a meet someplace random, like today they were just two niggas kicking it at Mr Dan's burger joint. But Dred had a way about him. The way he looked at you, through you most of the time, like you weren't there. Garlan tugged at his ring. It was, who was that crazy white dude always up in Batman's grill? The Joker? Yeah, how if you were part of the Joker's crew, you never knew when he'd turn on you and cap your ass.
'Naptown Red stepped to me wanting points on a package.'
'That nigga is scandalous. Would run a game on his momma to turn a few ends.'
'That's why I decided against it. But keep your eye on him. Too much side action will bring FiveO down on us. Keep him close.'
'What about Mulysa?'
'What about him?'
'You always quick to bring up his name. You kin or something?'
'Naw, man, it ain't like that. Just making sure the crew's taken care of.'
'I got him out. But he's too hot right now. He needs to cool out for a minute.'
'So he on his own.'
'He a survivor. He be all right.'
Naptown Red considered himself a ghetto griot: soothsayer, truth-teller, keeper of the neighborhood history. He grew up hearing tales of the great shot-callers. Green. Speedbump. Bird. Bama. Luther. Night. Dred. Dred had consolidated various crews under him. Bardigora Street. Estonce Posse. A hundred Knights. And that was how he imagined himself. As a player, a man with secret agendas, moving people about like pieces. A man of style and influence. Today, he held court.
Having assumed that he had some Indian in his blood, his straight hair had been pulled back, which accentuated the blotchiness of his skin. It pissed him off that no one saw him as a threat, that no one took him seriously. In his capacity as evolving historian, he knew about most of the various tendrils of the crew: extortion, fencing, prostitution, drug-dealing. His father carried a bullet in his back, which kept him from doing most kinds of physical labor. As a result, he rarely kept a job. Red asked him whether he'd received the wound in a war like Vietnam. Close, he said, a street war. Vice lords. Gangster Disciples. Whatever. All Red knew was that he was meant to follow in his footsteps: drinking, smoking weed, breaking into houses. Even absent parents taught and passed along lessons. From early on, Red's folks would go into one of the back bedrooms with their friends, drinking, and carrying on. He could smell the pot from the other end of their house.
'You gotta girl?' Naptown Red asked, trying to school some of these young brothers coming up.
'Rhianna,' Fathead said.
'How y'all doing?'
