Chapter 29

Friday, April 13, 2002

It's easy to get spoiled; I'd learned that a while ago. Even spending one night alone made me long to have someone else in bed with me. Having someone beside made me feel complete in a way I didn't really understand. JR complained I needed a bigger bed, but I wasn't sure. It was nice to feel the warmth of someone beside me. If I had a big bed, they could wander away... What would be the point of sleeping together then?

I heard a soft sound in my dream; I thought it was someone talking behind me. I tried to turn in my dream, but I was stiff, and I couldn't manage it. Frustrated, I tried harder, like I'd done in the upside down car. I still couldn't turn in the dream, but I woke up.

I heard JR say in a quiet voice, "Thanks, Jenny."

"Sister Joanna, you never have to say that to me."

JR giggled. "I don't think sisters are supposed to do what I want you to do to me. And vice versa."

I felt JR sit down on the bed, then move to lie down.

"We'll wake up Tom," Jenny whispered.

"He can watch if he likes. But it was you I missed more than Tom."

"Joanna, I love Katrina."

There was silence for a second; they were kissing.

"And I'm not sure who I have the hots for. Shannon is so confused, so desperate to have some guy to cling to for all time. She likes our love making, but it's not the same thing to her. Penny and I... we just plain like to do it. God, sex is good! Sue Ellen... that was a surprise! I was in the mood, but I never figured her to be. Wham! Bam! It was everything I've ever done with Penny, it sure wasn't her first time!"

Jenny's voice sounded nervous. "It makes me uncomfortable when you talk about other people."

JR put her arm around Jenny, and there was another moment of silence. "It upsets Tom, too. I don't understand why I do it. Once Mom and Kim found out about Penny and me, they had all this history they told us about. And when I wanted to do it with Tom, there was more history. They didn't mind talking about it, so neither did Penny or I. It was a really easy bad habit to pick up."

Jenny giggled, and I felt the two squirming around. Jenny giggled again. "How come such a small girl is so good at tickling?"

I mentally answered that. Because growing up our parents had tickled us; we'd tickled each other. For years, if either of us were slow getting up in the morning, the 'tickle bugs' would come for us. It took the sting out of being admonished for not getting up on your own, and provided a motivation down the line to take care of it yourself.

They were still kissing when the alarm went off, and I reached over and pushed it, without looking behind me.

"You got that awful fast, Tom," JR told me. "Were you awake?"

"Yes," I said economically.

"Would you mind taking the first shower?" JR asked.

"No, of course not." I got up, got my things and headed out the door. Behind me, JR said in a frustrated voice, "You could have at least looked!"

I stood at the door, still looking the other way. "Oh, think of this as a more adult version of tickle bugs."

She started giggling, and I made the short trip down the hall. When I went back to my room to dress, JR was resting in Jenny's arms.

"Morning, sleepy heads," I told them. "Someone else's turn to get wet."

"Tom, are you really cool with this?" JR asked, wrapping an arm around Jenny, and kissing Jenny on her cheek.

"Very cool with it, JR. I love the two of you. In different ways for each of you, but I love you. Maybe it's my male ego talking, but I think you love me. JR, I understand about wanting to be safe. Oh my gosh! Do I understand that! I understand waking up in the morning wanting to make love.

"I am not," I said emphatically, "going to be the one and only in either of your lives. I'm going to be there, now and then. I can deal with it. And you know why? Because if I can't make love to you right now, there's later."

I stopped, realizing something. I walked over to my desk and sat down, then put my head down.

"Tom?" Jenny asked, now sitting up on the bed.

"You know, I keep thinking I'm getting a handle on life. On being grown up. I said that about there's later. I don't know there's really going to be a later. Hope that there will be, faith that there will be; that's what sustains my belief. But it's not just faith in who I'll wake up next to, tomorrow, but in all sorts of things.

"You, Jenny. You knew a lot more despair than hope and faith. I thought I understood what drove you to Kim's, then here. But I think I have it backwards. I thought you had faith the adults could protect you; but it wasn't that, was it? It was just hope."

"You taught me faith," Jenny told me. "You laid between me and the door. I knew that if Sam wanted me, you'd be there. I knew that you'd stand up to him and win. With Kim, with your mom, that was hope that they'd keep me safe. You taught me faith. The promise of protection, not the hope of it. Am I making sense?"

"Oh yeah!"

"Too deep for me!" JR said.

I met Jenny's eyes. I willed her to understand that I never wanted JR to find out what the distinction was because in order to understand, she'd have to pay the price. I'd gotten off lucky; Jenny hadn't. Mary and her daughters hadn't been lucky. Or Gloria, or Janey. Even Sue Ellen and Tony had paid to learn about faith and hope. What else is it, I thought, when you can look a friend in the eye, and say, "Tomorrow we'll be back together again?"

And of course, prognosticating about the future brought me back to Elizabeth. It would be impossible to believe in the future, I thought, without faith and hope.

I was still quiet at breakfast; but Mom had questions. "You haven't really said what you are doing tonight. 'Going out.' Okay, that's fine. When might we expect you back? What are you going to be doing and where?"

It would be, I thought, easy to get on my 16-year-old high horse and say it was none of her business. Maybe I could have done that before I'd made love to my mom; I wasn't going to do it now.

"I don't know for sure when I'll be back, and I'm not sure exactly where I'm going to be. I'm going out with a fellow who does outreach for teens in trouble. Late, almost certainly. And wherever it is he takes me."

"And just what is it exactly, that you're going to be doing?" Mom asked.

"That I don't know. I went to an orientation Tuesday, but that didn't work out as well as I expected. Now, I'm going to be more humble, and more interested in learning what I need to know." I paused, and smiled at her. "If I'm going to be past two, I'll call."

Dad chimed in. "Thanks, but no thanks. Calls at that time of the night are too scary. Just call if you need help, okay?"

"Okay," I told him. I could see Mom was troubled, but I knew I had to shake it off.

Finally, it was van pool time. We picked up Penny, and then went to get Elizabeth and Shannon.

I was mildly disappointed to still see Mr. Miller in homeroom, but I didn't say anything. I just sat down.

First on the morning announcements was the message that Dr. Stone had retired 'for reasons of health' and that there was a search in progress for a new principal; in the meantime Mr. Jones had the job. Later in the day Uncle Craig called and told me that the school district had capitulated entirely.

April and May, I thought. It really was too much to hope that they'd find someone I liked and put them in the job for such a short time. That, and I wasn't exactly in charge; they, whoever 'they' were, had a job to do, and no doubt they'd do it. I hoped they found someone better than Dr. Stone.

At lunch, I talked to Tony, Sue Ellen, Elizabeth, Shannon and Gloria about starting a college search group. Tony just shrugged. "Man, next year the scouts come, Tom. I may or may not get offers, depending on how good a year I have. If I get offers, I can pick and choose. If I don't get any offers, or don't get any I like, then I have to decide if I really want to play. Because what I'll have to do is show up at a college, and tryout as a walk-on. That's really, really hard."

"I'm going to Cal Tech," Elizabeth said emphatically.

"Are you?" I asked. "Have you looked at their catalog? How likely are you to meet their requirements?"

Elizabeth met my eyes; her expression was a little smug. "I don't want to sound like I'm speaking out of turn," I told her, "but I think I'd want to make sure my 'i's' are dotted and 't's' are crossed before I made my own predictions."

I saw a sudden wilderness in Elizabeth's eyes. I felt insignificant; a tiny pimple on the ass end of human existence. I'd popped the bubble of my true love's fantasies, and I'd thought it was a joke; something she would have been sure to take care of.

Elizabeth drew herself up, a fraction from tears. "I'm only a freshman, but I think you're right. It's going to be a lot of work; I should get started now on getting the job done."

"I think," Sue Ellen interjected, "that was a yes. As for me, I'm eager to join in. Tom's right, if we go at this together, it will be a lot easier than everyone for themselves." She flashed me a grin. "Not to mention, more fun."

Everyone smiled, and I saw Elizabeth throw Sue Ellen a glance. The expression on her face said it all; Elizabeth had written Sue Ellen off as the brainless girlfriend of a jock, a cheerleader wannabe with big breasts. I smiled inwardly. You rely too much on what you think you know; I could tell you a lot about how wrong that is. But there are times to let even someone you love, find it out for themselves. But not about going to Cal Tech.

"Freshman and juniors, and everywhere in between."

Steve Jones was sitting at the table again, and he laughed. "And what about us seniors?"

"It's April," I said with a straight face. "If you haven't gotten something lined up, you are pretty much beyond hope. There's always a community college or Arizona State."

Everyone smiled at that, but I knew it was true. And if I'd kept on like I'd have been, come next April I'd be sitting at a cafeteria, wondering what the hell I could do to fix the mess I'd made. Better, I thought, to take care of messes when they are little.

All too soon, lunch was over. Elizabeth gave me a warm hug, albeit brief. I grinned at her, telling her I loved her in all ways.

The afternoon seemed to drag on interminably. The high point in the afternoon came when Tony stopped me on the way to our last class of the day. "You know what Mrs. Walcott did in study hall?"

I shook my head. What did you do in study hall? Pretty much what you pleased, so long as it didn't include talking, getting up or disturbing others.

"She announced a snap quiz."

I looked at Tony as if he just had to be pulling my leg. A snap quiz? In study hall? Talk about improbable!

"She told everyone that the class was pass/fail, and if we didn't pass the quiz, we failed study hall. So, when she handed out the test, I went to the last page, looking for the 'Write your name on the first page and don't do anything else," directions. Except she hadn't told us to read the directions, there weren't any, really. Just two hundred questions about virtually everything.

"About half the class was still working on it, when the bell rang."

"That's bizarre," I told him.

"I think Phil is right," Tony said. I remembered Phil from the orgy. "She's really a pod person, come to snatch bodies. Anyway, I didn't think it was a very hard test; I had lots of time."

I nodded, and he headed off for class, while I was left to wonder what else could possibly happen in high school this year.

The last bell rang, and I gathered up my friends, dropping them off at home. JR, Jenny and Penny went to our house; there was going to be a big dinner again. Shannon and Elizabeth to Shannon's music teacher's house, for Shannon's lesson. I hugged Elizabeth, and she clung for a second, communicating love silently.

I went inside when I was dropping off my sister and the others at home, and changed. I put on an old pair of jeans, not that they looked that old. I contemplated a t-shirt, and decided on my own that I wasn't going to do that. Instead, I had a long-sleeved tan turtleneck with North High on the back; I put that on.

I arrived at Marcus' office well ahead of when I was supposed to be there. He was sitting at his desk, talking on the phone. He waved me to a seat, and I sat down.

After a bit, he hung up. "A little early."

"I'm not supposed to be judgmental. Okay, I'll try to keep that in mind. I can't believe that's the only thing I need to concern myself about."

"I kept waiting to hear from Eleanor; you jumping up and down about how I was racist bigot.

"You sounded like one," I told him. "I have a friend who told me about what it's like for her being black. I decided I didn't know what a bigot was, so I kept my mouth shut.""

"African-American," he interjected.

"She's black," I told him, "but I think she just thinks of herself as a human being first, and lets the rest of it go."

"Well, have you ever put on a pair of rubber gloves?"

My eyes widened. Huh?

He reached into his desk, pulled out a box, and tossed me a pair. "Practice. On and off, on and off. See how quickly you can do it."

It was awkward the first time, and I didn't do it very well. It didn't stop Marcus from talking.

"On the street, you want to avoid fluids. You're not macho; if someone spits at you, treat it like she fired a bullet at you. Try to get out of the way. A lot of the girls spit. Everyone does, now and then, though. You'll want to think long and hard about touching someone who's bleeding."

"AIDS," I said, nodding.

He snickered. "AIDS, Hepatitis, mono, valley fever; there's a dozen things you can catch. Better not to."

I looked at him thinking it wasn't that important. Instead, he thumped his stomach. "I look pretty good, hey? Right?"

I shrugged. Six foot six black men didn't do much for me.

"I'm HIV positive, I have Hep A and C. You think I look like this because I work out? My idea of heaven, boy, was ribs, grits, fries; a baked potato slathered in butter and sour cream. A huge stack of pancakes, drowned in maple syrup and dripping more butter. Lobster? Love them! More butter. Crab legs and butter! Biscuits and butter! Butter and just about anything you name."

I swallowed.

"Still eager to go out tonight?"

"I was never eager," I told him honestly, "just curious. I have no idea what to expect. None. Gosh, I don't know what to say..." Just what do you say to a dead man walking?

Marcus laughed. "The retrovirals have the AIDS in check, I beat hepatitis, I beat mono and valley fever. The only way I check out is screaming and shouting, fighting all the way."

He waved around us, "Out there, what I care about are the kids. Kids who are lost, afraid. Fucked up by themselves, their parents, society and school. Doesn't matter; they are out there.

"You can talk to kids like that from now to forever; they've heard it all before. They wouldn't be out there on the streets, if they were willing to listen, if they understood. Nope, every last one is sure, no matter how screwed up their life is, that they are one of the ones that are going to beat the odds.

"And when it goes bad, I get them to the hospital. Twice now, twice in the last three years, someone lying in a hospital bed held my hand and told me that they were giving it up. They were fucked up, and wanted out. One of them actually did make it."

"I take it optimism isn't much more use than a whoopee cushion," I said, my voice bitter.

"You might get a laugh from one of those. When someone on the streets laughs, it usually means someone is about to get dead or already is."

"So what do you do?" I asked him.

"I'm there. They all know who I am; they all know I have little tickets in my pocket to a shelter, to the kitchens. I can get them a safe place to sleep, a couple of free meals. If they pick the right time of year, they can get clothes and other things. Seasonal, you know. Thanksgiving, Christmas, like that."

I nodded. Christmas wasn't a big deal at our house, Thanksgiving was the big holiday. Maybe more people should give thanks.

"I can refer them to treatment centers for drugs and alcohol; I can see that they get medical care for whatever ails them, and that can be a mind-blowing list. I routinely send kids to the hospital with nutritional diseases like scurvy and beriberi. Abscessed teeth, you name it. What can go wrong, does. Usually," he told me, "I find them before they die. Not always. It's a risk you'll face out there. This time of year, it's not too bad. A cold snap in the winter... a week later and there's a lot of kids in bad, bad trouble."

It would be easy, I thought, to believe he was making this all up. But I remembered Anna Jackson's comments.

"So, you will be careful out there," Marcus went on. "Try not to talk; if you do talk, be careful of what you say. They can detect phonies, do-gooders, cops, lies; you name it; all just by looking at you. They like to push until something breaks; that's what a lot of their home lives were like. If someone starts ragging on you, pushing at you... back off. Go sit in the van and ignore them. I'll deal with it.

"If someone has a weapon, back to the van. I'll call the cops. I don't want you to think with your usual white liberal goody-goody mindset; you see an African-American on the street, headed towards you, you back away. Let me know. The kids in trouble are mainly white, occasionally yellow. Rarely brown, virtually never black. Blacks, browns, and now Orientals, they're problems. You want to be careful of them."

"You only help white kids?" The thought was literally mind-boggling.

"Tom, African-Americans are the pimps, the drug dealers, the wheeler dealers. Hispanics are into drugs, not as many pimps. Asians are the coldest, least emotional people on the street. They do it all, and with no heart at all. You don't want to mess with any of them; hell, I don't want to mess with them. They tolerate me, because dead kids bring cops; I clean up the streets."

I sat silently, contemplating it. "I'm sorry about Tuesday."

He shook his head. "I pushed, boy. You didn't push back, but that's something that takes experience. You came today; that takes commitment. Eleanor said you had that. I just like to be sure."

I shook my head. "I'm not sure of anything."

He shrugged. "Some nights, it's a piece of cake. Nice weather, no one's screwed up. We have a few conversations, and come back. Nothing to it. Other nights; well, it can be hell. It seems to run in cycles, even after nearly ten years out there, I can't tell what it's going to be like on any particular night."

"And the bad nights?" I asked.

"People die," he said bluntly. "People get really badly messed up. Usually, kids start on the edges, slowly getting in deeper. It's like quicksand, pulling them in. Once they get trapped, the suction pulling them down gets immense. Not many can pull free. Almost no one can."

I contemplated that. "The solution would be not to let kids get out on the street."

Even as I said that, I saw his eyes flash and his head shake. "There is no solution. 'Let'?" Marcus asked rhetorically. "We don't 'let' kids get on the street, they go there of their own free will. And that's why they stay. Granted, drugs and booze cloud that, but that's what they think is true; you will never, ever, argue a kid off the street. Not unless it's their first day.

"Scared straight? Are you kidding? They live on the street. Every day in every way, life on the street is worse than any jail or boot camp. The bottom line is that they are out there by their own choice. Arguing just gets their backs up. They turn you off; start to mess with you."

"I want to learn what it's like," I told him. "I suppose that sounds stupid."

He shook his head. "Thinking you can stop it; that's stupid. Thinking you can save them all; that's stupid. Learning what it's like; that's not stupid. Wanting to help them isn't stupid. The problem is, they are basically stupid. The best thing that can happen for most of them would be their parents doing whatever they have to, to keep their kids safe at home."

A little after that we left in his van.

It was an interesting evening; I very carefully made as few assumptions as I could before it started. I tried very hard not to be judgmental, or least not to voice or show it. I asked Marcus at one point if he'd varied his route because I was with him.

"I go where the kids are," is what he said. That's not really an answer.

Our first destination was a camp near 35th Avenue and Buckeye Road. It was simply a cluster of various forms of shelters ranging from a few tents to plastics sheets to, literally, cardboard boxes.

"You can't put up anything substantial at a camp like this," Marcus told me. "Every now and then the City or the police or whoever decide to make them move. Then they have to pack up. There's some sort of coordination between the campers and the authorities, because almost always the campers show up the next day at a new site."

There were about fifty people in the camp, ranging in ages from infants to a number of older men, and one older woman. Age wasn't a factor in determining who was in charge, though. The leader was a large black man in his early thirties, named simply 'Mohammad'. He was a physical presence when you were close to him; instinctively you felt a strong urge not to mess with him. He had a number of assistants, all young, large and appearing tough; most of his assistants were black, but a couple were white as well. I didn't see any Hispanics or other races at the camp.

Marcus told me he was going to look around, but that I should ask Mohammad about life in the camp. That turned out to be a plan because Mohammad just plain liked to talk. He was glib, he didn't speak with any street accent; if he'd been dressed neatly he could have read the evening news and there wouldn't have been any raised eyebrows.

"We look out for each other," he said simply. "We don't allow anyone to beat someone else up. We don't let people steal; we catch a thief, we kick them out.

"We don't like drugs, much. Can't do a lot about that, but if someone gets wasted and starts bad-mouthing people, getting into hassles with other people, we kick them out. We just want to get along, you know?"

I nodded like I understood. I contemplated asking questions, but I couldn't think of a way not to make them sound judgmental.

He laughed at my expression. "You're asking yourself, why we choose to live like this."

"I guess," I said, trying to be noncommittal and nonjudgmental.

"Marcus, he's a good man; he used to live in a place like this, so he understands. Sometimes life is a bitch, you wake up one day with everything gone. You piss away your life; that or suck it up your nose, or shoot it in your arm, or drink it out of a bottle. We had one guy once who had been an executive in a computer company; he lost a fortune, and came here to try to forget, to drown in a bottle.

"Only way to really forget is to die; otherwise, you wake up mornings, sober or getting there, and the world is still there, what you did, what happened, it's still there too. Worse, you feel like shit.

"One day he looked around and laughed. That's all, he just laughed. 'Made a fortune once, it's not like I'm dead. Just go make me another.' I don't know if that was talk or what, but he walked away and I haven't seen him since. I like to think he's back living like he used to."

"Is that a good thing?" I asked.

Mohammad looked at me. "Sometimes. Sometimes, going back to what used to be is like being eaten by tigers and lions. No fun at all. Everyone here is different, everyone has an excuse for why they are here."

Eventually, Marcus returned and we moved on. "The seem well organized," I told him.

Marcus laughed. "A couple years ago, up in Oregon, Mohammad nearly got the City of Portland to give them 45 acres for a homeless camp. I think he still has dreams of doing that. Then I expect he'll promptly sell it, and live off the money for a couple of years."

That was, I thought, hard to square with a man who was such an obvious force. Marcus shook his head. "Tom, the people who live like that are like everyone else on the street. They are there by their own choice. For every person in a camp you just saw, we have ten or fifteen in local shelters. Everyone in that camp knows that if they want a roof over their head, a lock on the door and hot meals, all they have to do is hold out their hand to me, or someone like me, and we'll give it to them."

I thought about that. "For some people, being in that position must really hurt. Maybe enough not to be able to ask." I was thinking about Mary, right then.

He shrugged. "Usually after you get beaten or robbed, raped or whatever, you decide that pride is a luxury for better times."

The next place was even further away from the city; it was a migrant camp. That is, mainly Hispanic farm workers. There were a large number of unattached males, a lot of women and a lot of kids.

"Here, you just keep your mouth shut, try not to meet a woman's eyes. This camp is run by a local farmer; he's not the greatest human being in the world, but at least these people have a built outhouse, and a couple of water faucets with safe drinking water."

Obviously, even if I hadn't thought about it, the first camp had lacked those amenities.

We weren't there long; Marcus walked around, with me at his side. I don't think I heard a single word of English the entire time we were there.

Then we went to another field, north of Tolleson. Instead of a rag-tag camp like the first one we visited, this one consisted of a dozen vehicles, all of which, Marcus assured me, could run. Not often, not far, but as needed. These were almost all families, mostly white. Several of them had what I'd call 'Southern' accents. It turned out the Marcus also had some bus passes, and maps to the county hospital.

A number of the kids had health problems; at the first two camps I hadn't really noticed, but at the third camp I did notice. He talked to a few mothers, who listened to him explain that the County Hospital was a little slow if you were a walk-in, but if you got there early, they would see you before the day was done.

Then we were back downtown. He parked his van, a van much older and a lot more run down than mine, and we started walking. The kids we saw were white, more or less my age, more boys than girls. They were in small groups; some just two or three, some as many as seven or eight. Marcus would say hello, and ask if anyone wanted to spend the night in a shelter. Mostly the replies were obscene, but good-natured for all of that. Again, Marcus was well known to them, and it was more like a game. A game that no one wanted to play, though.

We spent several hours walking the streets of downtown. Odd, I lived not that many miles away from downtown, less than five miles. I'd been downtown often in the last few weeks, and had been there now and again before then. I'd never noticed these groups of kids. Of course, this was the first time I was there after dark.

It was after ten, Marcus and I were back to his van. "This next part is where life gets interesting," he told me. "I have a favor to ask."

"Sure," I told him.

"We're going to cruise down Van Buren, Washington and all that for the next little while. We're going to stop and chat with the working kids. They are going to walk up to your side of the van and ask if you want to party.

"What I want you to say is that you're with me, that you have shelter tickets if they are interested. I'll give you a couple; sometimes the girls come in pairs. The guys are usually singletons. If they nod, just hand them the ticket; try to do it carefully, because if their pimp sees it, they'll get beaten up. With a new face, we'll fool some of the pimps, at least for a while. Then they'll get on their cell phones and spread the word. We'll know that's happened because when we pull up next to them, the kids will walk away.

"Don't get out of the van, don't engage them in any conversation at all. Not all of them are kids, some are cops. In theory, the cops know me and leave me alone. In practice, if they feel like hassling us, they will. Say anything about a party, anything at all, and that gives them no legal reason to go after us, but they'll try to use it anyway.

"Just say you're with me, and ask them if they want the ticket. If they nod or hold out their hand, slip them the tickets. Okay?"

"Sure," I told him.

"Can I ask another question?" I went on.

"Keep it simple," he laughed when he said that. "Go ahead, sorry."

"I've noticed there are good cops and bad cops. Yet a lot of people I've met seem only to have met the bad ones."

He simply looked at me, and then made a face. "A good cop; I suppose they exist. I'm African-American. Which means I get rousted a lot. Stopped and questioned. How many times have you been stopped on the street and asked questions by the cops?"