Ever since Greenville was founded as an independent township in 1863, it had money problems—mainly over an inability to improve its streets. That was the primary reason why in 1873 township residents voted overwhelmingly 261 to 45 to officially become a part of Jersey City, even as it maintained its townie gravitations. At that time, the problems with Greenville’s streets were a public works issue. And 138 years later, Greenville still has problems with its streets, only “streets” is now code for “urban drama played out on an asphalt stage.” Particularly the part of the neighborhood that grew darker over the years: east of Kennedy Boulevard, south of Communipaw Avenue—save for a scattering of exceptional blocks—to the Bayonne border.
As Greenville browned, its chocolate-colored souls functioned as one body, complete with eyes and ears that saw and heard, and that made everyone responsible for each other as a matter of survival. After all, big northern cities could be as viperous as small southern towns. Nevertheless, hopes and dreams were the heartbeat of this body, and common decency flowed through it like a life-giving fluid.
Now as Clops bops into Vittas Haberdashery, purveyor of quality men’s fashion since 1923, a nattily clad white salesman looks up and seems to be alarmed at the sight of a black man less than half his age rolling in with all the pimp and bravado of a rap star. The salesman appears to expertly mask his alarm with what he knows best—the finest customer service in northern New Jersey.
“Sir, how may I help you?”
“I’m trying to get one of these suits.”
The salesman sizes up Clops and says, “Forty-two Long.”
Clops looks down at himself and smiles, showing two platinum-crowned incisors. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
The salesman apparently takes that as an affront to his aptitude. “I’m certain of it,” he snaps as he unstrings a measuring tape from around his skinny neck. “Remove your coat.”
He helps Clops peel off his North Face, moves behind him, and presses each end of the tape to a shoulder. He then measures from the top of Clops’s shoulder blade to his wrist and faces him.
“Chin up.”
Clops does as he’s told as the salesman measures his neck.
“Is this suit for the office, job interviews—a funeral?”
“Just looking for something nice.”
The salesman’s eyes narrow. He probes his pointy chin with a slender index finger and studies several suits. He grabs one and displays it as proudly as if he had tailored it himself.
“Brioni. Three-button. Notch lapel,” the salesman says. He flips it around. “Center vents. Masterfully crafted. This is both modern and traditional. You can’t go wrong with this one.”
Clops studies the suit as if he has been buying them for years. “That’s hot, but how much you want for it?”
“Eight ninety-five.”
“Eight ninety-five? What you got in the hundred-dollar range?”
“With all due respect, sir, you’ll find that at the Walmart in Secaucus. Is this your first suit?”
“Yeah, first one. What about two hundred? You got anything in here for that?”
The salesman furrows his brow, turns on the heels of his shiny Stamford Oxfords, and heads to the back of the store.
Clops takes in the space as Mozart’s Menuetto Trio wafts lightly from hidden speakers. He feels like he’s being watched and the culprits are everywhere. He looks out onto the street. No cops. He whirls around, and a host of mannequins in custom-tailored suits stare at him with vacuous indifference.
He smiles. What am I tripping for?
To the mannequins, “And what y’all dead-face fools looking at?”
The salesman returns. “Did you say something?”
“Just talking to myself.”
The salesman holds up a two-button suit with no vents and a peak lapel. “Two ninety-five and I’ll throw in a nice shirt and tie.”
Clops pulls out a wad of large bills and thumbs through them. “A’ight, bet.”
“Do you have shoes?”
Clops looks down at his brand-new black Timberlands. “Nah, I’m good.”
“Surely you don’t plan to wear those with this suit?”
“Why not? I’m only gonna wear it once.”
“You must at least buy a coat. North Face and Burberry can’t be spoken in the same sentence, much less worn on the same body.”
“I got a coat. My grandpop left it for me. It’s a classic.”
Andre stands naked in the middle of Bergen Avenue. A wrecked, snarling bus speeds toward him. He struggles to get out of the way, but he’s powerless to move. When he looks down, he sees that his feet are melded into the asphalt. The skin and muscle tendons around his ankles pull away from the bone each time he attempts to lift them. It’s the worst pain he’s ever felt. He screams in agony, but no sound ekes out.
The bus accelerates and is almost upon him. Andre closes his eyes and braces for impact. When he opens his eyes again, the weasel-eyed gunman is behind the wheel, his mouth stretched into an awful, evil smirk. Andre’s parents are in the first two seats of the bus, their eyes closed.
Andre awakes, choking on his own fear. Even as he realizes that it was just a dream, anxiety pulses behind his temples. He had heard about people waking in a cold sweat, but he had always thought that was hyperbole. Now jots of ice drip from his pores and dampen his bedsheets.
Andre sits up and checks the time on his phone. Nine thirty p.m. He turns on the light.
His tiny one-room apartment features everything in miniature—a kitchenette with a mini microwave, a two-burner gas stove, and a sliver of a refrigerator. The only other thing that can fit is Andre’s full-size air mattress and the plastic milk crate that he uses as a nightstand. The apartment is in the basement of an elegant nineteenth-century brownstone in a trendy neighborhood near downtown Jersey City. It has hardwood floors and exposed brick walls but is only three hundred square feet. It costs the same to rent as Sandra’s apartment, which is three times the size. But that’s Jersey City. The closer you get to Manhattan, the higher the uptick in rent.
Andre dials.
“Hello?” a voice says.
“Mr. Dominick?”
“Yeah, it’s Dominick.”
“Hey, it’s Andre. I’m not going to be able to make it in tonight. I’m not feeling well.”
“You sure you can’t make it in? It’s kinda short notice.”
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
“What, that you can’t make it in, or that it’s kinda short notice?”
“That I can’t make it in.”
“You’re putting me in a tough spot here, Bolden. Now I gotta find a fill-in an hour before your shift.”
“Sorry about that.”
“You’ll be in tomorrow night?”
“Definitely.”
“Okay.”
“Alright, bye.”
Andre flops onto the air mattress and buries his face in his pillow.
Clops stands at the bus stop at the corner of Bergen Avenue and Wegman Parkway. His brand-new, tailored, $295 suit shows nicely through the opening in his tan, camel-hair topcoat. His black Timberlands may as well be Stamford Oxfords under the cover of night. Clops looks more like a businessman than a drug dealer with a record longer than the shadow cast by the streetlight overhead.
He looks at his watch—12:03 a.m. Same time I stepped to Dante.
Clops remembers because he looked at his watch just before he spotted him bopping up the block. If he hadn’t showed up when he did, we wouldn’t have crossed paths that night.
Clops didn’t know how much longer he could wait because of the bitter cold. He reminds himself that he didn’t intend to kill Dante. But I had to let him know that the streets knew he was snitching.
He also had to warn Dante to keep OGC out of his mouth unless he wanted to catch a piece of hot steel. Clops brought his gun along for no other reason than to punctuate the threat.
Then he had to go and catch me in the eye and run like a punk.
After that, Clops felt he had no other choice but to blast.
He looks up the block and chafes inwardly at the sight of the approaching bus.
Big Deaks and Brother K talk about murkin’ like it’s as easy as making a baloney sandwich. Clops shakes his head. Killing ain’t supposed to be that easy.
The hair on his neck raises and a hint of sickness tickles his stomach when the bus brakes. He cuddles the olive drab Glock tucked in his belt.
A leather-faced white man with an eye patch opens the door.
“You getting on?”
“Nah. Wrong bus.”
“This is the only one that stops here.”
“Yeah, I know.”
The driver slams the door shut.