Stateway's Garden Page 18

  True, the moat didn’t stop many residents from trying to leave the buildings—they’d swim from Cuba to do that—but it definitely kept the outside world and the police, especially, from risking drowning their dingy blue-and-white in attempts to stifle the only economy Stateway Gardens people understood.

  It was automatic that the one prediction I could muster each time there was a tornado warning, as I watched water overflowing the parking lot like a clogged toilet, was that Savanna Brice would soon be unlocking her door. We lived on the same floor with our apartments in direct view of each other, and from the outside her door sounded heavier than a vault.

  “What’s up, Trace?” She always said my name like that. Had a weird thing for names. I usually didn’t reply right away. Still was amazed at how accurately tornadoes predicted her appearances. “You going to class today?”

  “Nah.”

  “I don’t like rain much either.”

  “You never go to school anyway, Savanna.”

  “I told you only my ma calls me that.”

  “Sorry. Van.”

  “Yeah, you say it just right.”

  “I guess so.”

  “They say first and second year don’t count that much anyways,” she said. “I’ll go when I need to.”

  “They?”

  “Yeah, they.”

  “Well, I didn’t go that much last year and still got a lot of my credits. Just ’cause I passed some finals.”

  “See, that’s what I mean. I’ll do that.”

  Savanna would come around the corner to the other side of the ramp and stand a few feet from me. That time, I think she accidentally moved too close because the veins on the backs of our hands touched. We made certain to remain facing forward, though, me looking down to the parking lot, her off into the dreary clouds.

  “Sorry,” I said.

  She was dressed in black jeans tighter than Janet Jackson’s from “The Pleasure Principle” video, the one where she did that crazy-ass chair walkover. Savanna wore a white Hanes T-shirt with the tag hanging out. Should have been a medium instead of small. The girl never wore a bra—never ever ever—and trying not to look at her tits was like holding your pee after finally making it to the front door. The tornado would tell me each time not to look. I never listened.

  “I think I’m getting hungry,” I said.

  “Not me. Just bored.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Wanna go for a walk?”

  “It’s flooding, Van. We’d have a hard time getting past the second floor.”

  “That don’t matter.” She pinched a small piece of my shirt, making certain to touch no skin, and turned me toward the hall. We began power-walking the fourteenth floor, back and forth in rotations like senior citizens in a mall. I still didn’t listen to the tornado as it told me not to gaze at her; don’t view those shoulders that made me think she practiced gymnastics when no one was around, or how the skin on her face looked as shiny and glazed as baked ham.

  “What you got to eat at your place anyway?” she asked.

  “Eggs.”

  “Not too bad.”

  “Every time there’s no school we end up eating at my place, Van.”

  “I like the way your mom decorated.”

  “She decorated? I guess.”

  “It’s really coming down out here.” She shifted. “Let’s go upstairs then.”

  “For what?”

  “I wanna get closer.”

  “Closer to what?”

  “Just come on.”

  She snatched my wrist at the sleeve like Mother did when I was a boy and began pulling me toward the back hallway heading to the second floor.

  Everyone in the projects knew to stay away from “back hallways.” On any given floor, there were no banisters to guide and no lights above, addicts supposedly left needles harboring every letter after the word hepatitis, so-called prostitutes not using condoms entered and exited wiping themselves with tissue and adjusting dresses that didn’t fit, and there was always some rumor that the body of a person nobody knew was hidden on the eighth, ninth, tenth, or eleventh floor. Maybe the twelfth too. I forgot exactly how the stories went. But there was never any evidence of that stuff. Project citizens only shunned those back hallways because the graffiti on walls wasn’t as well done, familiar smells of spoiling garbage were faint, and maybe, just maybe, it was only because they’d been told since the day they moved to the buildings that they weren’t supposed to. I guess Savanna liked the snootiness of that.

  “Listen,” Savanna said as we stood in the dark hall. I could tell she wanted to yank my ear.

  “Listen to what?” But I knew exactly what she was referring to.

  “To that rain hitting the roof. Listen.”

  “I am.”

  “Sounds like someone throwing rocks at the building.”

  I laughed at her as we stood on the seventeenth floor and inched a tad bit closer so the backs of our hands could tickle again. This time Savanna stared at me for a moment. She then turned her head and began looking from the ramp to the first floor. I barely heard the rain destroying the building, considering how loudly my stomach was growling.

  “You sure you’re not hungry?”

  “I guess a little,” she replied and began walking to the stairs.

  “Did you want the eggs? There’s cheese.” I followed her while speaking. “I could make us some toast in the oven.”

  For some reason she didn’t answer. But when we arrived back on the fourteenth floor I saw her pulling keys from space she didn’t have in the jeans and unlocking that heavy door. She took a deep breath before entering. I continued heading to my apartment.

  “Come on,” she said. As I closed the distance between us she released another of those deep breaths.

  “I was just kidding, Van. We can go to my place.”

  Savanna left me standing there with the door open.

  The first thing I noticed after entering was that her family’s apartment was spacious. The concrete on the walls was painted beige like at the free clinic on Roosevelt and Central Park, floor tiles were clean and brown with dividers visible, and the baseboards had no stains either, making it difficult to know where one area ended and another began. There was no furniture. Not one couch. Or chair. No table. Or even a stool for changing a lightbulb. Funny how rooms seem so much larger when there’s nothing in them.

  “You want me to stand here and wait for you?” I asked. I kept the hefty door open using my fingers, hoping not to lose one in the process.

  “Come on in, Trace.” I heard that deep breath again.

  “But—”

  “Shut the door.”

  The dense sound of the latch tripled from the inside. I didn’t move from the spot. Don’t know if I was afraid of her mother appearing from around the corner—I’d heard the stories—or just terribly nervous about the fact I’d known Savanna since we were nine and had never seen the inside of her apartment. Not even once.

  She seemed to be in the kitchen gathering herself. She unbuttoned her jeans, pulled the white T-shirt that was tucked, and took another breath after re-buttoning.

  “Van, I can just go.” I was saying it more for myself than her. Those rocks continued crashing against the walls of the building as I stood invisibly handcuffed to the doorknob.

  “It’s all right,” she replied.

  “Your mom home?”

  “Work.”

  “Mine too. We’re here alone?”

  “Nope.”

  My huge eyes bumped each other. “I should go then.”

  “No, it’s okay.”

  “Who’s here?” My efforts to predict what was happening were failing. The tornado told me to relax. Nah. Didn’t listen.

  “No one’s here but my father.” She s
aid that like it was irrelevant. May as well have told me Doberman pinschers were waiting down the hall.

  “I didn’t know your father lived with you.” I clenched and turned the doorknob before finishing the sentence.

  “Guess you can call it that.” Savanna opened the refrigerator and began grabbing items one at a time. She placed wheat bread on the counter by the sink and the off-brand salami we all bought from the A-rab deli. “You like mayo?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Mustard?”

  “All right.”

  “Pickles?

  “Won’t your dad have a problem with me being in here? It is a school day, Van.”

  She ignored me and slowly began paintbrushing condiments on bread.

  “This enough meat?” She turned and held the sandwich in the air, twisting it to show each side. Her nails were bitten to the cuticle. “Just have a seat, Trace.”

  I circled the two rooms with my eyes, wondering if there was a sofa I’d missed. “Ummm, where?”

  “On the floor somewhere.”

  “Come on.”

  “You never sat on a floor before?”

  “Course I have. But still.”

  “Well?”

  I dropped myself right in front of the door. It gave me a better view of the apartment. “Why you guys have no pictures up?”

  “My ma doesn’t like pictures.”

  “Everybody likes pictures.”

  “She says we don’t look that good together. And that pictures make her seem fat. So, no pictures.” She handed me the sandwich on a paper plate and motioned for me to lift myself from the surprisingly comfortable concrete floor. Savanna disappeared into the hallway on the right, but I remained at the door, waiting, petrified. “Come on,” I heard her yell. Her father had to wonder who the heck she was talking to. When I turned the corner she was in the long hall, tapping her bare foot. “What’re you so scared of?”

  “Your father’s here.”

  “I promise you, it’s okay.” There she went grabbing my wrist again. “This is the first bedroom,” she said. It was on the left and also void of furniture. “Long time ago, my ma used to say it was gonna be for a new baby. She changed her mind, though.”

  “Why?”

  “Had a miscarry some years back.”

  “My mother had one of those once.”

  “My ma said it’s no big deal. Babies aren’t supposed to be born in the projects.”

  We continued farther down the hall to another room on the right. I must’ve walked into a U-Haul moving truck. There was furniture everywhere: four dressers, one on each side, with clothes dangling everywhere from drawers like baby saliva. There were nightstands in each corner that held ugly antique lamps with no shades. They couldn’t have been plugged in because the rain coming through the window was washing two of them absolutely spotless. The bed was in between those two and there were three mattresses stacked on its frame. Would’ve needed a ladder to get up there. Boxes and boxes of clothes were scattered around. I swear it was an obstacle course in a Nintendo game.

  “He’s over there,” Savanna said.

  “Who, your dad?”

  “Over there.”

  “There’s no one in here.”

  She pointed to the left corner of the room by the window and lamp and pushed me farther. “You said you wanted to meet him, right?”

  “I don’t remember saying that.”

  Savanna pushed me even farther. The tornado said stay put. Stay. Put. But I allowed her to guide me past a collage of women’s underwear on the floor, the men’s slacks that probably were purchased during the dollar special at Goldblatt’s, and the rolled tube socks looking like they’d been dipped in moat water. As we approached, I finally saw the top of his head over a box. Her father was shaved bald as a pearl. Bald before bald was vogue. Bald when only bald men with perfect moustaches like Lou Gossett Jr. and James Earl Jones and even Ted Ross after he did The Wiz were able to walk in a room of women comfortably. He sat calmly at the side of the bed, with his head down, rainwater dripping from each side, reading some book with small-small print. The man was built like a welterweight boxer, long legs seeming to disappear under the mattresses.

  “Is he okay?” I asked Savanna. I guess I was hoping he’d acknowledge us standing there.

  “He’s fine. Probably just studying for some test in night school.” The two of us were talking above him like he was deaf.

  “Oh. Right.”

  “You don’t have to stand so far away,” she said. “Dad’s nice.” I then took a few steps closer. “Dad, my friend Tracy’s here,” she said to his wet scalp. “He just came in to say hi.” He didn’t move. Although the windows were wide open, strong gusts and crisp rocks of rain being carried into the bedroom, he seemed altogether unfazed. “You hear me, Dad? Tracy’s here. Remember, I told you about him?”

  “You told your father about me?” I mouthed silently.

  “Hi, Tracy,” he said, but continued facing the book. I realized where Savanna received that flat nose.

  “Dad.” She paused and took one of those deep breaths. “He’s been wanting to meet you for a while.”

  I began mouthing again, “I have?”

  He repeated, “Hi, Tracy.” But this time that long arm extended and he looked up at me like we were friends. “You seem like quite a nice boy.” His eyes quickly began searching for his last place in the book.

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “You guys gonna watch some TV?” he asked in a lowered voice.

  Savanna didn’t even answer before she’d grabbed the sleeve she loved so much and led me into the hall. “Come on.”

  “Is it okay?”

  “He gets like that sometimes. You gotta come back on a day he’s not studying. Always talking about the biggest mistake he ever made was not finishing high school.” Savanna’s eyes seemed to touch every part of the room but mine as she talked, but I had this odd urge to stay there with Mr. Brice. Maybe talk to him some more. Instead, I followed Savanna into what I assumed was her bedroom. She plopped down on a single mattress on the floor and folded her legs one into the other. “Come all the way in.”

  I wondered where I’d placed that nasty sandwich. Just needed something to hold on to. I barely made it to the window and began staring down at the parking lot. “It’s only drizzling now. We can go back out.”

  Savanna got up from the bed and walked toward me. I felt her chest press against my back. I’d seen many men do this with my mother when she assumed I was asleep. But Savanna’s body blended with mine in a different way and she used my shoulder as a resting spot for her chin. The pickles and mustard on her breath didn’t even bother me.

  “There’s so much water out there,” she began. “Almost looks like the building’s floating.”

  “Yeah. It does.”

  “Kinda even feels like it.”

  “My mother said they’re probably gonna knock them all down anyway.”

  “What you mean?”

  “I don’t know. That’s what she said.”

  “Oh.”

  “I don’t think it’s gonna happen, though. That was a long time ago when she told me.”

  We stood awkwardly at the window a few moments, silent, just staring down at the water.

  “Bad weather always makes me sleepy,” she said abruptly.

  “Should I leave? I’ll leave.”

  “Don’t.”

  “I’ll turn on the TV, then,” I replied. I really just wanted to look at Savanna. Somehow small crumbs of bread managed to remain in the corner of her mouth.

  “I ever tell you I like darker boys?”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “I do. Dark ones are nicer.” She dropped herself onto the bed and pushed her body to the wall, using it as a backres
t. She then reached her hand for mine.

  “Van, your father’s in the next room.”

  “So.”

  “I don’t want him to come in and see us like this.” My hands were numb as I stood above her.

  “He’s not moving from in there.”

  “How you know?”

  “Sit next to me.”

  “Van.”

  “I’ve had boys over before, Trace. But no one’s ever met my father, though.” As soon as I sat down, she kissed me on the cheek. Her body was so warm I could have fried those eggs on her arm.

  “Thanks for that.”

  “Kiss me back.” I did it looking at the door the entire time.

  We sat there a few moments in silence, pretending to pay attention to whatever was happening on television.

  “Would you like to see it?” Savanna asked.

  “See what?”

  “It.”

  “Huh?” I knew exactly what she was talking about.

  “It, Tracy. Stop playing dumb.” She moved her hands to the sides of her jeans and paused, waiting for my words. Funny how the dictionary leaves when you’re uncomfortable and you use words like “it.”

  “You’ve done this before,” I said.

  “Not with you.”

  “I don’t want us getting in trouble.”

  She laughed. “Trace, we haven’t even done anything yet.”

  I moved to the edge of the bed and began changing channels on the television. “Let’s just watch something.”

  “The girls at school talk about what they do with their boyfriends all the time.”

  “I’m not your boyfriend.”

  “You are now.”

  “You don’t even go to school.”

  “When I do go—girls talk.”

  Tornado advice simply wasn’t there and I think that was the second time I’d closed the distance between us on my own. My heart was beating abnormally; surely her father heard it in the next room. Our shoulders were aligned with backs against the wall and even the musty-breath smell of salami and condiments wasn’t affecting us. Savanna placed her hands into her jeans again, thumbs pressing prints to the sides of her waist. She began wiggling them to her knees. As she undressed I focused on her underwear; I think I studied the true properties of cotton, the stitching of lace as it formed an equator around her belly button; I smelled her neck wondering how salami and mustard could morph into something sweeter than a Chick-O-Stick. Savanna looked at me and believed we were in love, but all I believed was that her long-legged father with the hundred-push-ups-a-day muscles was going to enter the room and drown me in the lake surrounding our building.