If I Should Die Read online

  “Yeah, I know. All those good things. And me, left here in the city to sweat it out.”

  We tried to make small talk, but when the bell rang at 5:45, we fell silent and stared at the door. No one moved until it rang a third time and Dad stepped forward to open it.

  Tad’s car was double-parked and he moved quickly to place the bags in the trunk. Something rose in my throat and I struggled to get the right words out and to hold the wrong ones in.

  I thought of Alvin’s swim trunks and flippers packed among his jeans and tees. At least I had taught him how to swim. At least I had done that. He could handle himself. He would not die in some faraway place.

  “Don’t go out too far,” I said, hugging him, not wanting to let go. My throat was about to close and my voice was barely above a whisper.

  They looked at me, and Dad was the first to laugh. “Don’t go out too far? The boy’ll be diving from the rigging of a schooner.”

  I looked from one to the other. Diving from a schooner? No! Wait! His mother—!

  Just as my panic mounted, Tad put Alvin in the front seat and came around the car to me.

  “Listen, I can see it in your face. Don’t get upset. I’ll call you as soon as we get there. Everything’ll be all right. I love you, baby.”

  He kissed me and I stood in the rainy street watching the blinking taillight grow smaller, then it turned at the corner of Eighth Avenue and disappeared.

  chapter twenty-two

  Back in the house, I moved through the silent living room and into the dining room to sit at the table with my head in my hands. Downstairs, Dad was preparing for a special gig. I listened to the small noises and knew that when he left, I would be truly alone. The emptiness of the rooms was already closing around me, and if I listened hard enough, I could hear those peculiar echoes that tend to float on the dead air of unoccupied space.

  Let Alvin be safe. Please. Bring him back to us …

  I jumped when Dad touched my shoulder.

  “Everything’s gonna be okay, sweetheart.”

  I shrugged, unconvinced, and he pulled out a chair to sit beside me. “Now listen, you can’t become paralyzed every time the boy leaves your sight. What happened to Benin was a one-in-a-million accident. One in a million.”

  “I know, but—”

  “But nuthin’. You gonna think yourself into a nervous breakdown if you keep this up.”

  Think myself into a breakdown. The wonder is that it hasn’t happened already. If I could only describe to him the bits and pieces of memory that won’t remain buried, that keep bobbing to the surface when I least expect it. I’m surprised. Nothing had prepared me to deal with that one-in-a-million thing. Everything I ever learned in training went right out of me that day. Everything.

  I insisted on identifying her. I didn’t want you to do it, Dad. You never would have survived it. You could not have stood in that cold room without flinching when they rolled that steel drawer out. But I did. I had to. I looked at a body with so little skin left that the only recognizable area was the crescent-shaped birthmark on the inside of her left ankle.

  I looked but I had not been prepared. The training academy had only prepared me for certain emergencies. And certainly not for that time on my midnight tour when my partner and I had retrieved a broken little body from a trash-filled alley and then talked our way into a roach-infested room to arrest the mother. A woman who could not remember the last time food was on her table. Or the last time she washed her hair.

  In the cold room with the steel drawer, I was not prepared but I looked at Benin’s hair. She had streaked it with that funny-looking orangy highlight to make the dark part look darker. I recognized her hair. Her face had been … left clinging to the sides of that crevasse. I never blinked but absorbed it all—hair, birthmark, and wedding band—took it all inside me to remember. You could not have done that, Dad. I would have lost you too.

  “Mali. Are you listening?”

  “What?”

  “I don’t want you to stay in this house alone. You think too much when you’re alone. Come to the club. There’s something special happening tonight. I’ll reserve a table.”

  “No. I want to wait for Tad’s call.”

  “But they’re drivin’ to Maryland, not New Jersey. They won’t be calling for a couple of hours, at least.”

  Outside, a horn sounded twice. The club had sent a car for him and he rose to slip his jacket on. “Will I see you later?”

  When I didn’t answer, he said again, “Don’t stick in the house. I’ll hold your table.”

  He kissed me and I watched him head for the door, envying the way he was able to step into his music so easily, the way people stepped into another room.

  I turned the lock and leaned against the door. He was right, as usual. Get out of the house.

  The club was crowded for a Tuesday night and the rush of excitement seemed to push my anxious feeling aside for a time. I persuaded the waiter to switch me to a table in the corner several rows away from the bandstand, which gave me a less than perfect view of Dad but a far better view of the crowd.

  Most of the tables were occupied, and although April had come and gone, many minks, lynx, and foxes had not yet found their way into storage. They were draped over shoulders and chairs in such abundance I began to wonder if I’d missed the warning of a cold front heading our way.

  Still, I admired the sisters for looking good.

  The set had not started and small talk floated around the tables, talk that stopped completely when the door opened and Johnnie Harding walked in with Maizie Nicholas on his arm. Judging from the fur draped on her shoulders, a serious blizzard was kicking up right around the corner. Her floor-length red-dyed, sheared mink literally flowed over her black satin gown as Johnnie led her down the inclining aisle. They moved slowly, completely absorbed in their entrance. Johnnie waved to someone here and another there as the manager, smiling and obsequious, led the way.

  At their table, the manager bowed and whipped out his handkerchief to flick invisible dust from the linen cloth before pulling Maizie’s chair out. Then he hovered nearby, ready, it seemed, to drop to one knee on command.

  Maizie detached herself from her coat and yawned slightly, covering her mouth with fingers so diamond-heavy I wondered how she was able to raise her hand. The stone on the engagement finger stood out from the rest, for its sheer size alone.

  I glanced around to see everyone else gazing—if not at the fingers, then surely at the coat. Johnnie leaned back in his chair scanning the watching crowd, then beckoned to the manager, who bowed again and left. Seconds later a bucket of champagne was at their table just as the lights were dimming. I couldn’t see their faces, but when the two glasses touched, the diamonds on Maizie’s hand sent a small sparkling shower into the darkness.

  The ensemble gathered and a brown woman with a full figure and throaty voice joined them. Her delivery was cool and relaxed and forty-five minutes and several songs later the crowd would not let her go. Two hours later, after much applause, the stage went dark and Dad sat facing me.

  “Glad you decided to come out. The boy’s gonna be okay.”

  “I know he will but it bothers me that he had to leave at all.”

  “Well, your friend said whatever’s gonna happen’ll happen soon. And speaking of happenin’s …” He turned and nodded in the general direction of Johnnie’s table. A platoon of waiters was wafting down the aisles with towel-wrapped bottles of champagne and pouring at every table. “They finally gonna do the thing.”

  I followed his gaze. Johnnie was lifting his glass to the crowd and they hung onto his every gesture.

  “What thing?”

  “You know. Tie the knot. Jump that broom.”

  So that explained the grand gown-and-fur entrance.

  “They’re getting married? When?”

  “Don’t know exactly. Rumor has it that the whole happenin’s gonna take place right here. Maybe sometime in December. Soon as he gets so
me details straight.”

  I leaned forward and folded my arms on the table. “What details?”

  He did not answer but slid me a look that said I should know better than to ask. I glanced away and finished my drink in silence. Then I yawned, covering my mouth with my unadorned fingers and pulled my zebra-print faux-silk shawl around my shoulders.

  “You tired?”

  “A little.”

  He leaned over and touched my hand. “You had a tough day, sweetie. I won’t be mad if you want to head on out. I’ll see you around four. The next set’s about to start.”

  He made his way down the aisle, passing Johnnie’s table, and Johnnie reached out to shake his hand. I could not see Dad’s expression and a minute later I walked to the door.

  The phone rang somewhere and I stood straight up in the dark wondering where I was. I stumbled toward the sound, remembering that I’d fallen asleep on the sofa.

  “Yes? Hello?”

  “Hey.”

  Tad’s voice sounded as if it was being squeezed through a long hollow tube. “I called earlier but didn’t leave a message. We’re here. All in one piece. He’s getting settled in. Talk to you later.”

  “But—”

  Aside from the bad connection, it was like receiving one of those quick-short-and-to-the-point telegrams. Before I could ask to speak to Alvin, he had disconnected, leaving me to listen to the drone of a dead phone. I settled back on the sofa, fully awake now, with my feelings shifting somewhere between relief and anger. We had had to send Alvin away. I wondered about people in the witness protection program. I knew how it worked but never understood how it affected the person who had to move or how that person was able to shed his old life. Just like a snake.

  chapter twenty-three

  I spent the next several days in my room with my head buried in The Theory of Modern Social Work and nearly succeeded in putting my other thoughts where they belonged—in the back of my mind. At least temporarily.

  I was making some progress until the phone rang and Miss Bert came on the line.

  “Mali. You got to drop by.”

  “But today is Monday. You’re usually closed on Mondays.”

  “I’m open.”

  She sounded too subdued. Fifteen minutes later, when I walked into the shop, Bert was there but it was Miss Vivian who invited me to have a seat at her manicure table.

  “I know who you are. That’s why I’m gonna tell you all this,” Viv said as she examined my nails.

  “I’m not in law enforcement any longer, Viv. I was, but now I’m an ex. As in ex-cop. My only interest now is social work.”

  We sat face-to-face and knee-to-knee at the table in the rear of the shop. Up front, the drama of other people’s lives poured out at high decibel from the 25-inch screen, and, after waving to me when I walked in, Bert had turned back to the television, completely absorbed. Viv and I were the only other people in the shop and Bert was oblivious to us, even during the commercials.

  “Yeah, Bert told me you was a cop,” she said. “So what happened? You quit to go into social work. Everybody know that kinda job don’t pay diddly.”

  “I didn’t quit,” I said, knowing that Bertha had told her the whole story, word for word, just as I had cried it to her two years earlier.

  “Mmh-hmph. So you was fired for hittin’ that other cop. Well, I guess you the right one to tell.”

  “But why me?”

  She did not answer immediately and I wondered if I had asked the right question. Finally, she said, “ ’Cause Bert thinks you might be able to help me.”

  “Help you how?”

  “Well,” Viv said, “maybe you carry this to a real cop and get somethin’ done. Clean up this mess once and for all.”

  I looked at her, trying to read her face and figure out why she had Bertha call me. I was surprised when Bert had said Viv wanted to talk, but why to me?

  This mess—as she called it—was Johnnie Harding’s drug dealership and I wondered how willing she would have been to talk had she and Johnnie still been together.

  “Did you try contacting anyone else?” I asked.

  “Contact who? Lemme tell you, everybody and they mama know the real deal. That precinct is tied up like a Christmas present, bow and all.”

  “By whom?”

  “By Johnnie Harding, that’s who.”

  She leaned back in the chair and glared at me for not knowing just how important Johnnie was supposed to be. She removed my hand from the bowl of soapy water and selected an orange stick. I braced myself, expecting her in her anger to push my cuticles back to my knuckles. But she knew her job well enough to not allow her emotions to interfere.

  “I was on the force less than two years,” I said.

  “Two years? A smart cop woulda learned what was goin’ down in two days. Everybody know they don’t call Harlem the Gold Coast for nuthin’. Least that’s what cops used to call it in the old days when they fought to work up here. This beat practically guaranteed they’d retire rich. Scene ain’t changed that much. Just went from bootleg booze to numbers to drugs. Still plenty money here. Plenty. And Johnnie’s right in the middle of it. I hope he gets his ass smoked.”

  She swiveled around and picked up a container of yogurt, took a spoonful, then threw it down. “I need me some real food. I’m strung too damn tight for this yogurt diet shit.” I said nothing as she wiped her hands and threw the napkin and what remained of the yogurt into the wastebasket.

  She rubbed more oil around the edge of my nails and then leaned forward. “Listen. When the wire came that Johnnie was gettin’ hooked up and gettin’ out the life, just walkin’ off with that money—some of which shoulda been mine—I got my pistol and waited in my car all night outside his place. Just waitin’ for him. Or her. Whichever one showed their ass up was gonna get six pieces of Mr. Smith in it. Six bullets. Close as I was, I didn’t even have to aim straight. I’d a got ’em. But they never came home. Neither one. Probably out partyin’ at one a their other pads. And I sat there till the sun come up. Only reason I left was ’cause the sun did come up and the street got busy.”

  She applied a thin coat of strengthener to my nails and sat back to allow it to dry. No need to hold it under the tiny blower since I wasn’t going anywhere.

  “And I know what you sayin’ to yourself. Here’s this fat-ass fool makin’ a bigger fool of herself over a no-good nigger. Ready to do time ’cause a him. Well, maybe a couple a days ago, I was. I mean, what go through your head on Monday ain’t necessarily there, come next Sunday. Know what I’m sayin’? I walk in here last week and if it wasn’t for Bert talkin’ to me, I probably woulda put that pistol down my own throat, but Bert said shit, that wasn’t how it was supposed to be. Me gone and Johnnie still ridin’ high. Hell no.”

  My nails were dry but the operation wasn’t over. She opened another bottle of colorless polish and began to apply it in neat, even strokes.

  “Who was Johnnie paying off at the precinct?” I asked.

  She continued to apply the polish and didn’t look up. Her hands were remarkably steady.

  “He wasn’t payin’ off nobody. They was all equal partners. They paid themselves.”

  “Who?”

  “Ahhh, now wait a minute, Miss Blue Eyes—”

  “They’re gray. And they’re mine,” I said, pointedly staring at her blond weave. She didn’t miss a beat, just shook the mass of hair and continued as if I hadn’t spoken.

  “Whatever. Here’s where the shit gits sticky. Before I give somethin’ up, I gotta know what I’m gonna get.”

  “What is it you want?”

  “My shop back.” She tightened the cap on the small bottle so hard I thought it would break in her hand. “I want my business back. It may’ve been his cash but it was my sweat, the sweat from my fuckin’ ass that built the place up. It was goin’ so good, Johnnie got his money back less than a year and a half later. Bragged how it was better than the stock market.

  “You know it’
s one thing to open a business, it’s another to keep it goin’. Not only did I keep it goin’, I made it pay. I got those customers in there. I was the first one uptown to start paintin’ gold fingernails and pink nails with rainbow tips. And I can put a head of hair together in no time flat.

  “Many nights I slept on that couch in the back to be there for a six A.M. customer who had to be to work by nine and lookin’ good. I worked, honey. Then for that bastard to tell me to git my fat funky ass out. Those was his very words. I didn’t mind so much gittin’ out his face, but not out my place. Now he got that skinny no-behind piece a sparerib warmin’ my stool, sweet-talkin’ the trade I brought in? Well, every dog has its day, and when mine come up, I’m gonna step.

  “Now, I’m tellin’ you all this so you could see where I’m comin’ from. I’m willin’ to name it if I can claim it. I need a guarantee I can claim that place when the deal go down.”

  I interrupted her. “I don’t know if it’s that simple, Viv. Once a dealer’s assets are seized, they’re sold to the highest bidder, who—”

  “Who’s damn sure gonna be me. Don’t think I been diddlin’ in the dark while he and Miss Stringbean been carryin’ on. I got somethin’ set aside and I mean to use it. The only guarantee I want is that there be no other bidders on the scene.”

  “How can they do that?”

  “Come on. You ain’t as innocent as you look. They do it the same way they do everything else. With money. Money talks and bullshit walks.”

  “But suppose they determine that the money you use to pay for this deal is drug money you used to set up the business in the first place?”

  “Look, I got my ducks all in a row. They can’t prove none a that start-up cash was mine. I got a loan on the side and books Johnnie ain’t never seen. I paid my taxes and got a record of every nap and nail that ever needed doin’.”

  She stood up abruptly, bumping against the small table. “Look at me. You think I piled these pounds on overnight? Unh-unh. It was slow but it was steady. And seem like nuthin’ I could do about it. But I saw him lookin’ at me, felt him easin’ on ’round the way, but the business was so good, I thought we’d remain, you know, partners. Then he started to talkin’ about his image ’n’ shit. The image of the business. So, for every dollar he collected, I made sure I took my fifty cents. Plus the tips wasn’t nuthin’ to play with. Those sisters outdid themselves tryin’ to see who could leave the largest bill.”