4
Irregular Bonds

BBUUZZZZ, BBUUZZZZZ. I grabbed my cell phone from the car’s console at the exact moment the light changed. Fumbling with the receiver, I proceeded through the intersection to the tune of frustrated motorists’ horns blaring. All because I’d taken longer than the allocated zero point five seconds to stand on the accelerator the very instant the traffic light turned green. I even had a silver BMW attempt to go around at the passenger’s side of my car, but he was surprised by an unaware driver exiting his SUV double-parked on the side of the street. I remember mumbling under my breath, “Damned tourist.”

“Hello, Moms. Yeah, I’m on my way up. Is Poppy there? No ma’am. That’s okay. Just tell him I’ll be by in a few minutes. Anything you need me to bring? Sure, not a problem. I’ll pick some up at the store across the street. See you in a bit. Later.”

As I turned the corner, the side of Amp’s truck could be seen in my rearview mirror, “Damned weasel.” Before realizing it, I was cursing aloud and almost jammed the brake but reconsidered at the thought of Moms and Poppy waiting for the potatoes she’d asked me to pick up. I really needed some tranquility. One of the few things I’d grown accustomed to was Sunday dinner with my adopted parents. I cursed at the mirror while accelerating into the flow of traffic, “There will be time for us to dance soon enough, mister man.”

Thoughts of a much anticipated run-in with Amp had me seeing red as I cruised up Frederick Douglass Blvd. on the way to see Moms and Poppy for our dinner appointment. Needing a little extra time to calm myself, I elected to take the scenic route to Broadway by crossing over at 125th. It always interested me to see the vendors peddling goods from their portable storefronts on the sidewalks at either side of the street. The attempt proved futile as I reasoned with my inner self concerning why I’d never seen more than the marquee when passing the famous Apollo Theater

I was having a debate with myself, “That’s a true piece of Black American history not many of us get a chance to see, and you pass the place at least three or four times a week without so much as getting out your damn car.” My conscience scolded me, “Come to think of it, where in the City have you been?”

“I’m not a damn tourist,” I said aloud, to no one in particular. Minutes later, I found myself engulfed in an intense debate with nobody, “There’s the Empire State Building…the Statue of Liberty…Central Park…let’s see…”

Before I realized it, I’d engaged in a full-fledged argument with me. “I told you, I’m not a damn tourist!” I yelled.

The entire situation was honestly a little unsettling. As if I expected to find someone, I looked over in the passenger’s seat, and turned to check the rear when my cell phone startled me. BBBRRRIIINNNNGGG, BBBRRRIIINNNGGG!

“Yeah! I mean, what’s up Moms? No ma’am, I thought you were somebody else. I was expecting a call. No ma’am, I don’t have an agent yet.”

An extensive period of time passed with Moms quizzing me about life’s happenings for more than forty-seven minutes while I made my way up toward their apartment building. The feeling of annoyance crept up my spine and smacked me in the back of the head.

I posed a question to interrupt the battery of inquiries, “Have you guys started dinner? Oh yeah, what was it that Poppy asked me to bring? Never mind, I just remembered. No, that’s not a problem; I’m pulling up at the store on the corner now. All right, I’ll be up in a minute.”

Double-parking to run inside the store, I reasoned it would only take me a quick second to pick up a couple cans of those biscuits Poppy had grown so fond of since I’d introduced him to them, and a small bag of Irish potatoes.

The clerk and I had become buddies, of sorts, because I was constantly in and out picking up knickknacks for Moms and Poppy, “What’s up Julio, you got what I need?”

“Hey Willie.Look ova in da cooler. Let me know if it ain’t none in der, ‘cause I keeps some extras fo ya in back,” he said.

“I appreciate that, because you know how Poppy gets when he hasn’t had his Butter-Me-Nots,” I joked.

“But I thought I be seein his wife buyin corn-muffin mix all da time?” Julio asked.

I explained to the exceptionally curious store attendant, “Well, I like Moms’ cornbread and Poppy has taken a liking to these biscuits, so they cook both when I’m over.”

“Fo e’ry meal?” he asked.

“Almost every meal,” I confirmed.

“Not my wife,” Julio stated.

I was playfully giving him grief about being almost sixty years old and already divorced six times, “Could be the reason you don’t have a wife, you think?” I asked.

“I can cook fo my damn self.” He said.

I decided it better to end our little verbal scrimmage, “All right you old cuss, I’m out,” I concluded.

Something in his tone told me more than the words he’d just spoken, and I had learned to listen to the things people don’t say but only wished they had the nerve to. Julio was a decent fellow, but nobody to play around with. A hard life has a tendency to do that to a guy.

When I exited the store, there was a traffic officer walking away from the Impala. I immediately noticed a slip of paper beneath the driver’s side wiper blade. That’s perfect, was my first thought, just what I need; to spend a whole day downtown in a damn courtroom with a bunch of folks agitated at the fact they had to take the day off work to be there. People who only become more annoyed when dealing with the complacent attitudes of the assholes benefiting from the wasted use of our tax dollars.

There was a little bitterness in my voice, “Excuse me, officer.” My attitude changed immediately upon noticing it was a female. A damn good-looking female officer from where I stood. “Excuse me, miss.”

She slowly turned toward the sound of my voice. “Yes, may I help you, sir?”

Damn, I thought to myself. The view from the front was almost as stirring as the landscape from the rear. “Now those are tax dollars well spent,” I commented.

She took a step in my direction before asking, “Excuse me?”

Realizing I’d mistakenly spoken the thought aloud, I quickly corrected. “I said, I’ve only been here for a minute.”

“Well, the sign says NO PARKING. Not even for a minute,” she said.

I then playfully questioned, “Why so hostile?”

She retorted, “Because, it’s a hostile-ass world. Is there a point you want to make?”

I was a little put off. “Damn lady, who done put you through…?”

“That’s Officer Lady to you, sir,” she said. “And who done put me through isn’t any of your business.”

I was somewhat shaken at her comment. But, tuning in to what she wasn’t saying, I thought to myself; what she’s voicing is, back off. Keep your distance, and don’t get any ideas. What she means is that she’s been hurt and is having a difficult time dealing with some unresolved issues.

I went out on a limb; “It may not be my business, but I am willing to listen, if you want to talk about it.”

With a little less of an edge in her voice, “What? I mean, what are you talking about?” she asked. “Listen to what?”

With the expression of a concerned therapist, “I’m talking about whatever it is you need to talk about,” I commented. “At least, that is, I am willing to allow an opportunity for getting it out.”

She questioned, from behind something that could’ve almost been misconstrued as a smile. By now, all abrasiveness was gone from her voice. The tone of the conversation had changed to one of compassion. “And just how do you know there’s anything I need to talk about?”

With the certainty of a long-time personal acquaintance, I said, “Because you just told me.”

Trying to reconstruct the defenses she’d unknowingly allowed to be dismantled, the officer said, “Maybe I did; maybe I didn’t.”

“How long did you guys date?” I asked.

She stiffened a little. “What?”

Becoming much more relaxed, I repeated myself. “How long did the two of you date?”

She took a step to my right. “How you know we not married?”

While removing the citation from beneath the wiper blade as I opened my car door, “No ring; no mark where a ring once was,” I replied before factually stating, “Listen, I’d love to stay and chat but I’ve already gotten a ticket for being double-parked.”

The officer walked over and gently took the citation from my hand. “Don’t worry about this one,” she said. Writing her number on the back of the slip of paper with AT 116th STREET NEAR CITY COLLEGE in parentheses and passing it to me again, “Keep an eye out for the signs.”

As I glanced at the phone number, I remarked, “I still don’t know your name.”

“Yes you do.” Looking me up and down with the most beautiful hazel eyes, she simply tapped her name tag, which read: OFFICER E. LADY, before gracefully turning and walking to her patrol car.

I stood with one foot on the ground and the other inside the floorboard of the car while looking back over my shoulder, watching as she proceeded down the hill, turned left on 125th Street, and drove out of sight.

Climbing in the car, there was nothing else I could say, “Damn!” I crossed Broadway and parked in the rear of Sam and Eunice’s huge horseshoe-shaped apartment building that consumed about ninety percent of the block, “Damn, damn, damn.”

Upon entering the building I passed the rear guard station and realized there was a security officer I didn’t recognize. I acknowledged him while hurrying to catch the security door before it closed behind the last person who’d entered. “What’s going on, man?” He interrupted my dash to the door, “Who ya comin to see?”

I remarked without realizing the scowl on my face at having missed the opportunity to enter, “Do what? My Moms and Poppy,” I said. “Can you buzz me in?”

With his voice full of sarcasm, he asked, “Don’t ya got a key?”

“No. I don’t.”

The make-believe police officer smarted back, “Well, I don’t know ya. Ne’er seen ya b’fore.”

A bit annoyed, I remarked, “Hell, I don’t know you either!”

The guy sitting next to him was on the phone with his back to the entrance. “Hold the line a minute,” I heard him say. He rolled the chair back a few feet to get a good look. “Hey, what’s up Willie?” Tapping the new guy on the shoulder, he said, “John, you can let him through, he’s cool.”

John looked straight at me and said, “I don’t know him, and he ain’t got no key. All residents o’ the buildin s’pose to have a key.”

Fortunately for him, I still had that big-booty badge-wearing beauty from a few minutes earlier on my mind, “Can you just call up…?”

About that time, dude on the phone wheeled his rolling chair across behind John and pressed the buzzer, “Have a good one, Will.”

As I pulled on the door and proceeded to stroll through, I was beaming straight at John, “Thanks Kenny, take it easy,” I said.

The new guy called after me, as I made my way down the corridor, “Next time, ya better have yo key or ya gotta sign in like the rest o’ the visitors.”

I yelled back at him without breaking stride, “I’ve been in and out of this place without a problem since before you thought about working that bitching desk. Take a hint: I’m not a damn visitor.”