Cracker
The bus, the number fifteen, dropped Darryl Williams off at the corner, about a mile from where he lived, as it had for the past six years. It had begun to storm a little, enough to make you zip up your jacket if you had one on, turn up your collar maybe, and made the much-in-need-of-repair sidewalk all the more necessitate a wary eye. He'd just gotten off of work; his last day at the garage. Next week he would begin his new job, on a counter at Sinclair Auto Parts. Three locations in the tri-city area. Darryl would work at the main location which was only a short walk- less than half a mile- from his house. Darryl knew cars.
His uncle, who was also named Daryl but with only one 'R', used to fix all the cars in the neighborhood from a little two-car garage behind his house, and young Darryl spent almost all of his free time there, listening to the chatter between his uncle and his uncle's friends, watching while his uncle did every kind of repair to every kind of car, young Darryl's job to repair flat tires when they were simple punctures. The area where he lived, in Clemmons, South Carolina meant a lot of 'beaters'; vehicles that had their best days far off in their rear-view mirrors. Daryl often got paid in barter. For some pretty girls and single mothers who struggled, Darryl knew his uncle often worked for free. His uncle wouldn't say anything, wouldn't want to bring shame to anyone, so he would say things loud like: I'll catch up with you later on that- if someone was around. "Little D," his uncle used to call him, "never do you no harm, 'be nice to people. Most people, anyhow."
Daryl was his Ma's brother. Darryl hadn't known his father. Uncle Daryl took care of his family and was the only man that Darryl knew who owned his own home. "You get older, you start up with a woman," his uncle told him more than once, "you do right by her. Don't need more kids like you and your cousins runnin' around without no daddy. Be plain too hard on their moms. You keep your place clean, whatever it is, even if you livin' in a box. Your shop too, you ever have one for yourself. Then you look out for your wife; look out for your kids; nieces, nephews, folks in your neighborhood, whoever needs you to. That's what you do. That's what you do, in this life."
Darryl worked as a mechanic until he got married but could only get hired on at service stations and quick lube places because he had no formal certification. When he finally got married to his girl Charlene he started working on getting his G.E.D., his high school equivalency diploma. He'd dropped out; not because he wasn't smart enough, he was nearly a 'B' student, but he dropped out because he had steady work with a wrench and his Ma needed his paychecks. He had two of his cousins who stayed in the duplex apartment with him and his two sisters, and just his Ma looking after all of them. They didn't talk about his father. Then after Charlene got pregnant with his first boy Darryl Jr., and then William Henry the very next year, Darryl knew he needed to earn a bigger paycheck than a wrench could provide. Charlene was real proud of him and this mattered. He only had a couple of friends and they would have ridden him pretty good about even getting the GED to begin with, then even more for caring what his wife thought about something so foolish, especially at his age.
Forsythe County was mostly black and Hispanic, and while firmly nestled in the Mid-Atlantic a lot of the townships had a big city, back-east-like aura of cold dread, of generations of poverty, of violence and crumbling infrastructure. Darryl credited his uncle with keeping him off the streets, and away from the local punks and fledgling gangs.
Darryl checked the mailbox then climbed the small rise of stairs. He loved his family but was glad that Charlene had taken the boys somewhere and the house was quiet when he got home. He'd received a holiday bonus just before he left the garage, his first ever. Two hundred dollars- nearly a week's pay. Four crisp fifty-dollar bills. And a handshake and pat on the back for doing his job well for six years.
Sitting on his bed, he recalled one afternoon, years back, in mid-summer. Darryl knew it had been summer because he had been over at his uncle's shop early when he otherwise would have been at school; and mid-summer because it was near ninety degrees before ten a.m. There were two fans in the shop, a big, industrial, standing unit his uncle had received in barter that Darryl suspected might have been stolen from some office building or the like, and a small unit that sat and rotated on his uncle's neatly organized desk, pointed carefully away from the papers stacked on the desk's other side. When he wasn't fixing simple flat tires, his main duty, Darryl generally sat on an old metal stool that stood in front of his uncle's desk along side a chair that usually had one of his uncle's friends parked in it as it was placed strategically in line with the smaller fan. From atop the stool, Darryl could see down into the engine compartment when a hood was open.
'Fat' Freddy Wilson was sitting in the chair and prattling on about some barbeque he'd eaten on a trip to Kansas City, full of: Lord have mercy- and other hyperbole, and Uncle Daryl kept talking about a place he'd eaten at in North Carolina that would put it to shame. Both places that seemed worlds away from Clemmons, South Carolina, the only place young Darryl had ever been. For some reason the argument got a little heated; maybe it was the ninety-plus degree morning, and Daryl began waving the wrench he was using emphatically and pointing it right at Fat Freddy, arguing whether it was ribs or brisket that defined whether a place warranted acclaim, what roles chicken and sausage played, and, well, what role actual rolls played too. Uncle Daryl was just a normal sized man with a bit of a paunch, some muscle from always working with his hands, but he wasn't scared of anyone that Darryl had ever seen, and was even known to venture into the neighborhood to break up a fight when necessary.
There was a loud clap, a gunshot, Darryl had heard them before, and his Uncle hit his head on the hood when he started from the noise.
"Goddammit," Uncle Daryl was not one to cuss much (but accepted it in shop banter) nor inclined to use the Lord's name at all, except in church on Sundays.
"Who's shootin'? Someone shootin'?" Fat Freddy forgot about the barbeque argument and with effort got up from the chair.
By the third, echoing clap Uncle Daryl was rubbing the back of his head and moving with Fat Freddy toward the street, Darryl close behind. "Backfire's all, I suspect," Daryl said.
A white sedan, might have been a Cadillac, sat steaming. Cars like it were few in Clemmons, and none were in the condition of this white one. Darryl wasn't certain that it was a Cadillac and not some other type, just certain that it looked brand new.
"Kind 'a car's that?" Fat Freddy asked, nearly out of breath after just walking across the garage.
Daryl scratched his cheek. "I believe it's an 'LTD'. Definitely a Ford." They watched as the car rolled to a stop on the far side of the corner heading away from the shop.
"Should we go an' help 'em?" Darryl asked.
His Uncle was still rubbing the growing knot on his head when a man climbed out of the car wearing a dress shirt and tie, then he drew a white handkerchief from his back pocket to mop his brow.
Uncle Daryl turned around and went back inside. Darryl took one last look toward the broken down car and turned to follow.
"Man can find hisself help somewhere else," Fat Freddy muttered, taking up the rear.
"Why you mean?" Darryl asked. "Nobody knows how to fix cars better'n Uncle Daryl."
"Not for no honkey-ass motherfucker."
Uncle Daryl, who was back under the hood, poked his head up carefully and flashed a stern look. "Whyn't you shut your mouth, Freddy."
Darryl retreated quietly to the stool but listened in, really having to pay attention to hear over the music from radio that was always on in the corner. He knew the man in the street was white; he'd seen him. He had one white teacher at school. He knew the word 'honkey' meant 'nigger' but for white people; he'd heard that and 'cracker ' used a lot at school and in his neighborhood but never from his Uncle who often assisted the minister at church and was a man people often came to with their problems. But Darryl had never seen a white man in his neighborhood before, except for the police, maybe a fill-in mailman. There were few white kids at his school but there were some that were Mexican who were more like brown white people and spoke kind of funny and Darryl knew there were bad names sometimes used for these people too but he didn't see why.
"Why didn't you help fix his car?" Darryl pressed.
His Uncle came around the car to get another tool. "He can come see me, he needs my help. That door over there is open, ain't it?"
"How he know you fix cars? You ain't got a sign out front?"
"'Little D', you so hell-bent on helping that white man whyn't you walk yourself 'cross the street and see if he want any first? Maybe he just overheated."
Darryl wasn't real sure about that but now Fat Freddy with his big fat mouth was looking on so Darryl hopped down off the stool and trotted out the door.
The wall of extra heat slammed into him and he raised his arm to shield his eyes, focusing again on the man with the white car who despite the steaming hadn't even bothered to raise his hood and paced with somewhat of a panicked look to him. He spotted Darryl.
"Young man! You there!"
"Uh, yeah. What?"
The man waited while a couple of cars rolled past then came closer. "Can you tell me where there might be a payphone?"
"Piggly-Wiggly got one, down that way over there." Darryl pointed down the street.
The man shielded his eyes. "I see. Do you know how far it is from here? Can you walk there?"
"Can if I want to. Take maybe twenty minute'."
This prospect in this heat seemed to agitate the man. "Well, what about you? You live around here, could I borrow your phone?"
"Don't have one. Don't have no TV neither." The man looked at him angrily and Darryl shirked slightly, the man trying to determine if Darryl was being disrespectful and purposely troublesome. "My Uncle. He got one." Darryl motioned back behind him.
"Well good then. Let's go see," the man came all the way across the street and followed Darryl back to the garage.
"Well, perhaps I don't need to borrow the phone at all. I seem to have a bit of trouble with my car," the man said, looking at Fat Freddy who jerked his thumb toward Uncle Daryl then crossed his thick arms across his massive torso and leaned back into the chair, keeping his eyes on the stranger.
Uncle Daryl barely looked up, which young Darryl thought was kind of rude. "'Seem's to be the trouble?"
"Not sure I could tell you. Cars aren't my thing. Can you have a look at it for me? I really need to be somewhere."
"After I finish with this we can have a look. My nephew will let you sit on that stool while you wait."
"Can't you just stop what you're doing for five minutes? I'll pay you. I don't know -it might just be a simple wire or something. I know nothing about cars."
"Heard you the first time." Uncle Daryl went back to work and it was clear the discussion was over. The man started to say something but saw Fat Freddy looking at him cross-wise and let his mouth close.
"Could I use your phone to call for a tow truck then?"
"Local?" Uncle Daryl asked in more of a statement. "Suit yourself. Phonebook's on the cabinet over there."
The man went to the cabinet for the greasy phonebook then picked up the filthy shop phone with two fingers and used the end of a pen he had in his shirt pocket to dial. "Yes, hello, I need a tow. My car is having some sort of malfunction." Darryl wasn't sure what this meant but he knew the man's car wasn't running. The man held the phone away from his head with his fingers as if it was radioactive. "I'm sorry, what's the address here?"
"At the shop?" Darryl asked but Uncle Daryl quickly said:"Tell 'em go Third and Chestnut, in Clemmons."
The man spoke into the phone some more and then hung up. He strode from the garage without another word which Darryl thought was also rude after the man had used his uncle's telephone for free.
Later, Darryl patched another tire, wiped his hands on a dirty rag and got himself a drink. Once a week, or maybe twice, he splurged and bought a bottle of Coke. Cold, slippery and glistening, from the loud, humming cooler, a small, upright one with the word "Coke" written vertically on both sides where you dropped your coins through the slot and then pulled a bottle free toward you through those rubber roller grippers, where you think the bottle might break but it never does. Darryl loved that: aaah - sound the soda pop made when he popped off the cap with the bottle opener that hung from a filthy, knotted string, then that first gulp, so cold and bubbly that sometimes it hurt up behind his eyes and made him pinch his nose but by the second drink he didn't mind. Then he would sip it slowly, savoring as many drinks as he could, and it made him feel kind of grown-up as more often than not the men who sat around the shop drank beer or Cokes themselves, except for Fat Freddy who was always bugging Uncle Daryl to borrow the thirty-five cents required by the machine. Some of the men smoked cigarettes, and one guy named Ricky, Darryl thought Ricky might be smoking marijuana because he had funny cigarettes that didn't look or smell at all like the others. His uncle didn't smoke and barely drank more than a beer or two that Darryl had ever seen. Darryl wasn't too interested in smoking, but the thought of a beer or two definitely piqued his young interest.
"Why you don't like white people?" he asked his Uncle while they were closing up, Darryl leaning on a big push broom that was as tall as he was.
His Uncle, who today was having a beer, took a swig and set the bottle on his desk, wiped his mouth on his arm. "Who says that?"
"That guy whose car broke. Who borrowed your telephone."
"Don't bother none with Freddy, with what Fat Freddy says."
"Wasn't that. I know them words. Just seemed like you didn't like him, but then you didn't even know him."
"Didn't like the way the man spoke to me is all. Ain't I got rights…ain't I got the right to refuse service to someone? I don't feel like working on their car?"
"Yeah," Darryl shrugged his bony shoulders.
Uncle Daryl finished some paperwork and stood. "C'mere for a minute." He led him to the garage door which had already been shut. He lifted it back up and took the boy outside. "What you see here? Look around?"
"I dunno."
"Trash. Lots of trash, and garbage. Half these folks don't bother even mowing their grass if they got any. Refrigerator breaks they just throw it out in their yard. That man, that white man, wear a suit and tie during the day like that, drive a new car like that, he don't live around here. Prob'ly 'round from Charleston maybe, something like that. Then I'm supposed to stop what I'm doing, what I get paid to do, how I earn my living to go look and see what's wrong with his car right now, right this very minute 'cause his white ass said so? You see any white people out here? You know any? You friends with any? No, didn't think so." He steered the boy back around and drew the door closed again. "White man ain't no friend of yours, ain't no friend of mine. Places you go…" He scratched his head. "Matter of fact, I'd bet you right now I take that old Chevy over there drive it over into Lockwood maybe, something like that, I'll bet you your whole week's pay I get pulled over first cop I see just 'cause I'm driving that Chevy and my skin is black. No other reason. By a black cop too, they work over there. Damn 'Toms', enslaved by the white man and they don't even know it 'cause they has theyselves a badge and be carryin' a gun."
"I ain't bettin'," Darryl wanted to be sure he didn't get his Uncle heated on something that wound up costing him any of his pay.
His Uncle seemed momentarily lost in his thoughts, then said: "Yeah, it's Friday too. Payday for you," he reached into his pocket and took out his wallet, carefully counting out six dollars and handing them neatly to his nephew. "Hey, so what's that make now? How much you got saved?"
"Fifty. Fifty-two after today. And then I got some more, some change too."
"Fifty-two dollars," his uncle whistled. "A tidy fortune, a man your age."
Darryl beamed at being casually referred to as a man. "All right I go now? Try to get by the bank 'fore it closes."
"Sure can. See you Sunday then, at church."
Darryl said goodbye and took off, running the four blocks toward his Ma's apartment then cutting through an alleyway that was a shortcut. He skipped up the stairs into the room he shared with two of his cousins who thankfully were off somewhere so he could get to the old cigar tin where he kept his money and a key that he'd seen a mailman drop downtown that he kept but didn't know what it was for. He slid the tin out from behind the dresser and spilled the money out onto his bed, counting it twice to confirm that he did indeed possess fifty-two dollars (and some change) then put fifty very carefully into his front pocket leaving the rest in the tin and placed the tin back behind the dresser. He'd been waiting for this day for a long time. He always spent some money on candy and baseball cards, or maybe a comic book so the thought of saving fifty dollars had been very consuming.
He got to the bank just before closing, grateful that none of the neighborhood kids had noticed how furtively he was moving, ever cautious of being confronted and in one bad moment losing what he'd worked so hard to save to a group of kids or a bully. He waited patiently for the teller to free and the lady looked down at him with a bit of contempt but then he forgot that he just came from work so he was still plenty dirty and probably didn't smell too good either. He said: "Could I have a fifty dollar bill please?" He had his money out so that she could see it and know that he was serious.
"Let's see now," the woman warmed slightly. "What do you have? Do you have fifty?"
"Yes," Darryl said and began counting the money in front of her. She took it and recounted it herself very quickly, then opened the drawer next to her and set his precious savings carefully into each slot then reached in and removed a fifty dollar bill. An old one. Series 1933-C.
"Here you are."
"Thanks…thank you," he took the bill and folded it carefully then looking around dipped quickly down and slid the folded bill into his sock. He stood and nodded somewhat sheepishly at the woman who had warmed and offered a smile.
"Be careful with that much money. What are you going to do with it?"
"Save it."
"You could open a savings account here. We would issue you your own savings book and you would get some interest."
Young Darryl wasn't sure about a savings book but he knew he didn't want anyone to know about his money or have any interest in it at all so he said: "Uh, okay," but then he quickly left the bank anyway and hurried home.
Darryl took his dirty work shirt off, dropped it into the hamper, then took the stepstool his youngest son Willie still used on occasion to access things in the medicine chest and went to his closet, still having to reach his full length to fish his hand around blindly, removing first a small, fire-proof lockbox and then a loaded handgun wrapped between two oily, blue shop rags. He thought soon his oldest Darryl Jr. might be tall enough, come snooping around, a gun was a powerful draw, but then he'd raised him right, respectful, and when the time came Darryl would simply talk to him about it as he did with most other things. Darryl noted and chuckled a little that he still even owned one- he couldn't imagine ever shooting anyone, but there was plenty of crime in the neighborhood and Darryl knew that he could shoot it if someone tried to harm his family. Nevertheless, he always took the gun out when he took the box down, using the key from the retractable chain on his waist to open the sturdy lock. There was a smell to it when it opened, probably, he figured, the cash being locked up airtight because money, especially worn bills, did have a nasty smell to them. Who knew what was rubbed into them? These most recent additions, the four fifties, were fresh from the bank, sequential serial numbers he noted before taking the gold colored, heavy-duty business envelope from the back of the box, and unwrapping the thick rubber band with his left hand so he could spread the growing pile apart with his right until he came to the fifties, carefully snugging the sharp new ones in between. He was about to set the envelope back in its spot in front of some legal papers and some jewelry (most of which did not need to be in a secure place but it made Charlene feel better to have them under lock) when he took the fat and heavy envelope back out, removed the rubber band and opened the top flap. Tucked back in the corner, folded as it had been the first day back when he was nine was that first fifty-dollar bill he'd ever saved, managing to make it here into his thirties without ever having been spent. It was for his boys' college educations, as was the now more than six thousand dollars that was nestled in the envelope along with it. Only an issue of extreme nature would ever get him to spend any of it ahead of time, if someone's health required it and even then probably only a serious, life-or-death type concern. In his mind college represented life and death for his boys, a real life anyway. His boys would know a different life than he had, would have limitless futures; college educations or trade school; and a skill like auto repair to fall back on. The lockbox also held his copy of his ASE certificate (National Institute for Automotive Service Excellence) which had gotten him his counter job. He reached into the envelope and took the folded fifty. He thought he'd have a talk with his boys.
They sat at the supper table while Charlene was finishing something on the stove. "This was the first fifty dollars I ever saved, from mowing lawns, and fixing flat tires at your Uncle Daryl's after school, when I was a little younger than you," he pointed to Darryl Jr., "and a little older than you," to William Henry who they'd taken to calling 'Willie'.
"I could go and work," Willie said.
"I know you could," he squeezed the tiny boy's protruding shoulders. "But I want you to go to school. Next year you will. And you'll do good too, just like your brother. You're both good boys."
Charlene called in: "The best. All three of my men."
"See then? Always listen to your Moms."
"What's that there?" Charlene motioned to the folded bill while she set two large bowls of food on the table.
"I'll tell you. Come on, let's say grace," they took each others' hands.
They served the food and had some daily banter before Charlene gingerly lifted the folded bill and moved it aside so she could set something down. "This for me? A tip for all of my fine service?"
"You know can't put no price on that," Darryl said.
"Aw, you're sweet," she leaned over and kissed his cheek. Darryl ate some more food then wiped his mouth on his arm and leaned back with the bill, unfolding it and holding it to the light. "This was the first fifty-bucks I ever made. -Ever saved. Been saving it for the boys."
"You saved it all this time?"
"Yup. Matter-of-fact it was the first thing I put into their college fund. Why I brought it out was I wanted the boys to see it, see how important it is to save your money, not spend it on any damn thing."
"I got fifty dollars," Darryl Jr. said.
"You do. And what will you do with it?" Charlene asked.
"Saved it," Willie chirped in.
"Probably I'll save it," Darryl Jr. said. "But I might want to buy…maybe I'd buy me a skateboard or a new bike sometime.
"I want fifty dollars. Can I have it, Daddy?"
"This one's special, not for spending. Bet I'll keep this one forever. Give it to my first grandson maybe."
"You don't have no grandson, Daddy," Darryl Jr. said.
"Of course not. Not yet. One day you boys will get married and then I might." He turned to Willie and lifted the tiny boy onto his lap. "You can get your own fifty dollars by working and saving, just like I did. Maybe your Uncle Daryl would teach you boys how to change tires."
"Not now, honey. I wouldn't want them walking over there. This neighborhood ain't like it was when you were a boy."
"Ain't that bad," Darryl had worked really hard to be able to buy his own home, their home. "Guess there's a few bad dudes."
"You ain't asking around then 'cause I heard about some people getting robbed in broad daylight. 'Specially near that old field you always go to. Don't you see those gang boys sometimes on that court?"
"I tell the boys who to stay clear of. And they don't mess with me none. They know I ain't got no money and I don't do no drugs."
It was a busy day at the parts store, his third month on the job. Darryl ate his lunch at the desk behind the counter; he knew by the looks from some of the long-time guys that it made them look bad but he didn't care. He was grateful for the job and knew the owner appreciated a hard day's work. Most of the customers were from surrounding neighborhoods, mostly black, some Hispanic, most of whom he didn't mind but some, maybe gang-members, came with an attitude he could do without. He wasn't about to be openly disrespected, but he didn't need to endanger himself or his family either, and a lot of those bangers were indifferent to life, death and the penitentiary. Sometimes as part of customer service, but usually reserved for old dude and women, they would come out from behind the counter and maybe check something out on someone's car, help them install something simple, be sure they were asking about the right part, something like that. Darryl wasn't much of a flirt but on rare occasions such as this afternoon when an honest to goodness knock-out came in asking about wiper blades he was quick to give a glance through the front window and grabbed what he was pretty sure would fit her make and model and led her outside. Darryl could see a couple of the other guys stealing looks through the glass, busting on him, making faces at him which he tried his best to ignore. He finished installing the new wipers and led the woman back inside, holding the door for her proper-like, motioning her toward the register, wishing her a nice day.
Later that afternoon, when it was slow and Darryl's shift was almost done a white pick-up pulling a large, covered trailer pulled into the lot. Darryl watched lazily as the driver tried to park without blocking too many spaces.
"He gonna hit the curb," one of the other counter guys said.
"Gonna block the whole damn lot," Darryl said. "Watch -he wanna wrench on his transmission out there, something, I'll bet." Despite the signs indicating customers were not to work on their cars in the lot they never made a fuss about little things, changing a spark plug, a bulb or a wire.
Wiper blades.
Finally parking where other cars could move around him, the man climbed out of the truck, a pretty good-sized guy with blond hair cut in a crew-cut, dressed in a tie and shirtsleeves. Wiping his brow, he entered the store. Definitely not from the neighborhood. The man bought a wiring harness for taillights on a trailer, then a small toolkit, the kind you leave in your car for emergencies.
"He gonna wrench," the counter man repeated and Darryl snorted in agreement but really he didn't care.
After a few minutes the man came back inside, rubbing dirt and a little bit of grease from his hands onto a paper towel. Looking around and seeing that Darryl was free he approached the counter.
"Help you?" Darryl asked.
"Yeah, was wondering if you could come out for a sec and connect the harness while I hold up the tongue. Damn thing's pinched underneath it. Otherwise I'd need a floor jack."
"Not supposed to do repairs in the lot." Darryl said, looking down as if he was busy with something.
"Just for a minute. I'll give you a couple of bucks."
"Sorry. Can't do it. Beside's," Darryl looked at the big clock above the door, "I'm off now."
The man stared at him for a second and Darryl stared back, then the man looked around to see if anyone else was free before muttering under his breath and walking to the aisle that had floor jacks for sale. "Shoulda bought wipers I guess," he said, just loud enough.
Darryl scoffed at the comment, maybe a little louder than he should have, loud enough for the man to hear. They exchanged a hard look then Darryl relented. Last thing Darryl needed was some white asshole complaining about him to the owner.
The man bought a cheap floor jack and exited without further fanfare.
"He right, you know," said the other counterman. "I'd 'a helped him out he had tits on him like that dime." Darryl chuckled at this.
They watched as the man tried to jack up the trailer without getting his clothes dirty, then laughed out loud when the idiot did something to his foot and hopped around cussing, in obvious pain. "Dumb ass," Darryl quipped. He turned to the manager. "I'll see you tomorrow, Hoss."
Darryl took the small cooler he used to carry his lunch, punched out at the time clock and headed out the side door for the ten-minute walk home, ignoring the man with the trailer.
Darryl took the small run of stairs at his house two at a time. He was feeling fine. There was still enough daylight for an hour or so outside with his sons, probably his favorite time of day, any day. Most often they would walk a few blocks to the park, to the old ball field that wasn't used for formal games any more but still had a home plate and pitcher's mound. He had four or five old baseballs and a bat; each boy had their own glove. Along the way he'd talk to them about their days, teach them things about the neighborhood, who to watch out for, where to steer clear. Clemmons and the surrounding towns were typical lower-class neighborhoods but Darryl and Charlene made a nice little home in the middle of it; their immediate neighbors' all long-timers who kept up their own yards. There was a small store on the corner toward the highway where Black and Latino mixed and Darryl was pretty sure was the place to go to get your illicit drugs, maybe even a gun or something, whatever. Heading west led to a wooded area through which a shallow brook ran, water of questionable purity given the presence of heavy industry in the area, Darryl thought always a peculiar smell. Both north and south saw nothing but small houses, track homes, duplexes and then four-plexes as far as you could see, tiny yards or none at all, the old park which abutted the odorous wooded area the only break in the patterns.
They played for about thirty minutes with Darryl hitting grounders then flies then pitching to each boy until they got solid hits, for Darryl Jr. until he hit a home run. Then they picked up their gear and headed home, first through a tight alley then a side street. Willie was tossing the ball up and catching it in his glove, like he always did, then losing one while he wasn't paying attention and having it roll under a car, as it often did. Usually it would roll to the curb but this section of street was pretty flat. Darryl took the bat from Darryl Jr. and got down onto the pavement, the irony of crawling under yet another car despite being free from the garage was not lost on him.
"Over there. Behind the wheel," Willie instructed.
Wiping dirt from his knees, Darryl handed the boy the ball and they started off again.
As they walked along the main street Darryl saw the white pick-up truck from the auto parts lot pulling the large, covered trailer stopped at a light. As they walked by he glanced at the man through the window. The man looked hot and really pissed off, and recognized Darryl and made a flippant little wave and muttered something Darryl couldn't hear because the window was closed. He sensed a racial overtone.
"Huh? You say something?' Darryl barked and the window started to go down but then the light changed and horns started honking. The truck and trailer pulled slowly away before any words were exchanged. Or worse.
"What's wrong, Daddy?" Willie stopped tossing the ball.
"Nothing, boy. Just some cracker asshole," Darryl was worked up. He rarely cussed in front of his sons.
"What's 'cracker' mean?"
"Means 'white boy', stupid," Darryl Jr. said.
Willie didn't like being called names. Usually his Dad would put a stop to it. "Why you mad, Daddy?" Willie asked.
"Ain't nothing." They started walking again and turned off the busy road. "Saw that man earlier. Before. At work, is all."
They turned down a side-street then another. Darryl looked around, Charlene's fears about bad dudes in the neighborhood running through the back of his mind. It was run-down but most of the people who lived here were older, some younger guys who looked wrong, probably were dealing or robbing but they'd never paid Darryl any mind. His boys though…he was very protective, he didn't think overly so. Tough with them when he had to be. Damn, sometimes the crap Charlene spit out of her mouth could be downright annoying. He started looking more cautiously down the alleys and driveways as they went.
Willie lost control of the ball again. Because he was still hot, Darryl was getting a little annoyed with Willie, and something felt wrong…damn, Charlene, why don't you just shut the hell up? He went to kneel and was about to tell Willie to stop tossing the damn ball when suddenly there movement from the corner of his eye, someone big moving furtively, dangerously. Then a crashing sound, not loud enough to be a car wreck but much too loud to be nothing. Darryl was alert but lying on the ground, extending his arm with the bat and trying to nudge the ball into an opening when he heard a second noise, followed by the strangest sound he'd ever heard, a kind of mewing laced with terror from Darryl Jr., followed by a deep, throaty growl, deep and guttural, somehow damp and nasal too, at the same time.
Loud.
Righting himself, flicking tiny pebbles and sand that had embedded into his hand and forearm, he stood, expecting to see a really big dog.
Darryl was suddenly face to face with a wild animal. A black bear. A really big one, better than four hundred pounds. Darryl stopped breathing. The silken, jet-black, rolling mass of fur was maybe thirty feet away apparently having been rummaging in some nearby trash bins. Wild animals like this were extremely rare in this part of 'The Carolinas', not that having them around more often would have made Darryl or anyone else better equipped for an altercation, at least not without a gun, a very big gun, and even then…still. Darryl was holding the baseball bat and unconsciously transferred it slowly to his right hand, motioning strangely for the boys to move away with his left, young Willie now fully aware of the situation and making different, odd, terrified, mewing sounds as he and his brother hugged one another trying to become invisible and meld into the street with the inanimate parked cars, straining against their instinct to run to their father, hug him with all of their might and close their eyes until he made the nightmare go away.
"All right then. Easy," Darryl tried to talk soothingly but the massive animal began snorting, drool dropping from its lip and swinging its head from side-to-side, agitated, alternately focusing on the boys as they slinked away and the man with the bat who while very nervous still stood his ground. Darryl didn't realize the bear had been foraging down a dead-end alleyway and that they were now inadvertently in its path to freedom. None of it mattered when the bear charged.
"Daddy!" One of the boys, he didn't know which, screamed in impossibly even greater terror.
Time, for Darryl, slowed to a near-halt. He was aware that he brought the bat up with both hands and swung it with every bit of violence he could muster, connecting solidly with the side of the bear's head as it was on him. There was a sickening, cracking sound, of the wood as the bat splinted.
The bear did not slow, not even a little.
"Daddy -Daddy!" Willie shrieked, a blood-sharpened wail.
Oof…
Darryl had been hit before but never like this. Not even the car wreck he'd been in felt like this.
Time stopped completely in a surreal flash, an ice-cold slice of reality that impossibly included a rampaging black bear.
Oof…
The air flew from Darryl's chest in solid mass, leaving behind only terror-filled void. He was aware that he was flailing his arms, doing his best to fight, to protect his boys, and felt one of his hands make contact with the animal, probably in the chest given the animal's size, then the bones in his hand shattered but he didn't recognize it because another utterly powerful and stunning blow sent him straight down on his back, his wind now completely gone, stars like thick gnats buzzing his face and ears. He felt blood running freely from his mouth and thickly down his neck but only because it was warm. Beaten, he waited, almost calmly, for the finish. But it did not come. Only the knifelike-sharp, wailing, whimpering pleas from his sons reminding him that he was still breathing at all, still alive. Trying to stand he got to one knee before falling brutally on the side of his head, his face pressed to the cool, hard pavement, head like a thousand pounds of lead, his skin embedded with sand, his eyes now pointed directly toward his sons who were clearly exposed in a pathetic and frivolous attempt to disappear near a wrecked car that sat propped up on blocks in someone's driveway. Darryl Jr. had the tiny Willie grabbing onto his leg and he tried to act bravely but then humiliating wetness spread through his crotch as it had Willie's minutes earlier and Darryl Jr. shook so hard that his bones hurt.
Darryl simply couldn't move. His mouth flapped weakly, lips dry and also coated with road sand as he tried to summon the strength to call out, to try desperately to distract the animal back onto him and away from his boys for a precious moment but all he did was spit up bloody phlegm and make pathetic gurgling sounds heard by no one.
Then, from the edge of Darryl's periphery there was movement. He rolled one eyeball then the other toward it, all that he could muster finding it hard to even breathe.
A man moved, unsteadily but with great purpose, into the chaos, coming right at him, a face that Darryl knew but at first could not place, a white face that Darryl figured could only turn the worst situation imaginable into something beyond any description. Some white neighbor probably out to holler about the racket. The man's foot was dragging a little- that's right, now Darryl's electrified memory momentarily cleared, he'd seen him drop something on his foot at the auto part store parking lot, hard enough that Darryl figured he'd probably broken something at the time. Darryl and his co-workers had shared a laugh. Why the hell was he here? Come now to dress Darryl down for almost having words in traffic minutes ago? Not me! My boys!- Darryl tried desperately to shout, to motion any way, to point!- but the white man wasn't paying attention and was in some crazy, foot-dragging way now moving toward the massive, jittering animal as it was was down on all fours circling in front of the wrecked car and closing on his cowering boys.
What the hell is he doing here?!
With a flick of an eye the bear noticed the new man moving along the side of the road. First growling its displeasure the animal then pushed a heavy steel trash bin out of its way and in the direction of the newcomer with such force that the iron box flew off of its rollers and crashed onto its side with an earsplitting clang, spilling green and white bags fat with trash all over the sidewalk.
Ungodly, impossible strength.
The man kept moving though, almost robotically, kept looking at the bear but then looking at the frightened boys too, edging closer, noticeably grimacing with each negligible drag of his injured foot. He stopped before the boys and the wrecked car where Darryl Jr. was bravely trying to shield his little brother the best he could.
Lifting his head, Darryl tried in vain again to scream: My boys! Please! Get them to safety! Please! God, help me! The white man was probably from the city, here about the bear, maybe had it in that trailer with him: maybe let it loose- Darryl thought crazily, with disgust as he simply could not keep his head from dropping and slapping into the sidewalk again, hard. Stars started to swirl everywhere again in his periphery. Paralyzed and about to lose consciousness, Darryl could only barely watch in horror as the bear was about to kill his children.
The air was pounding, the street alive with adrenaline. The white man somehow calmly turned and looked at Darryl Jr. and Willie. Willie was utterly spent and slumped in his brother's arms. Then, without warning, the man turned his back on them and motioned his arm in a manner trying to squeeze the boys in behind him. He tried to stand tall. Just then the bear stood all the way on its hind legs, maybe eight feet tall and released a curdling roar, air blasting from its massive chest on fetid breath with continued otherworldly power behind it. It was at least a foot and half taller than the blond haired man and so heavily fractured with dense fur and thick muscle that the man and the two boys now hidden by him from Darryl's view seemed to be swallowed up, dwarfed in a dark, terrifying shadow cast by the beast. Darryl, and anyone else who was watching the horror unfold, assuredly including the blond haired man himself knew that he was about to die. Straightening even more, in sheer defiance the man squared his body, raising shaky fists in front of his now quivering frame. He would die with dignity. The man stood proud, almost asking for death, his lips cake-dry, skin greased in anticipation, his eyes locked on the pale-yellow, flickering orbs of the giant and nothing else, ignoring the sight of the bared teeth, the massive paws and four-inch long, inch-thick, sharp tapered nails.
Without warning, the bear dropped lightning-quick to its forepaws and came at them. If the twenty second scene was a surreal flash for Darryl then the final killing charge was a snap-shot of hell. The heavy, leaden mass of brute muscular strength, deadly nails and sharp teeth moved like an alley cat and was on the man in less than a second. The man managed to throw one viscous overhand right that might as well have been a passing breeze before he was hit.
Oof…
Stunned, he fell dumbly to the ground.
Oof…the bear was on him hard.
He instinctively tried to curl into a ball while the bear bit and tore repeatedly at his head and back and then hit the man so hard with a swiping blow that it lifted him up and knocked him three times over like a blood-soaked rag cast to the ground in a frantic operating theater.
Fully ignoring the boys now, the bear moved again and bit into the man's lame foot, whipping the man's entire body back and forth through the air like he was a child's rag doll, the nauseating sound of cartilage separating and bones breaking mixing in with the sweet smell and sickness everywhere of blood-soaked clothes pressed against pavement. Darryl knew that the rampaging wouldn't stop; he knew that in a moment he was going to have to live the worst possible nightmare of all: watching your children die in front of you.
Then just like that it was done.
Its face ringed savage red with blood and its dead yellow eyes rolling the bear simply snorted twice as if emphasizing its case then slowly ambled off as if nothing had happened. For a brief moment there was utter stillness, silence, as if the street itself didn't know what to do, then the whimpering and crying from the boys began to join with the wet, bloody gurgling from their father. The blonde haired man made no sounds or moved at all.
House doors opened and closed; sirens rang far in the distance; some neighbors came timidly from their homes. Darryl was all the way up to his hands and knees, panting heavily, erratically, trying to figure things out when the first police car raced up, followed by another, and then the first ambulance. The white man lay in a motionless lump, blood oozing freely, seemingly from everywhere, most of it red, some of it so dark that from the distance it looked almost black.
The last thing Darryl remembered was a lady cop rushing to his boys, hugging them safely, lifting Willie up and carrying the boy while two EMTs tended to him and tried to stop his bleeding.
He saw two more working on the lifeless form of the other man as Darryl's stretcher was loaded into the ambulance. Then everything went dark.
The first thing Darryl recognized was his youngest, Willie, curled up on a chair beside his bed, the dim hospital room blinking into clarity, darkness around the blinds indicating the 2:37 he saw in LED blue coming from the clock on the sideboard meant a.m. not p.m., which explained the relative quiet and the dimness of the hospital room.
Very slowly piecing things together he tried to sit; propped on an elbow. Charlene and Darryl Jr. were asleep on the next bed over. Thank the Lord!- his boys seemed fine. Lying back with a deep sigh he stirred Charlene who managed to move over to the bed without waking Darryl Jr.
"Hey baby," she whispered and held the side of his bandaged face gently, kissing him lightly on the un-bandaged cheek. His lips were dry, cracking.
"Water," he mumbled and she reached for a cup with a straw protruding from it and helped so he could drink. He took a few sips and moaned.
"Let me go find he nurse. Tell her you're awake. You're going to be fine. You got two broke ribs and then lots of cuts is all. Some of 'em's deep. They kept you here 'cause you also got concussion which was why you been passed out." She moved silently from the room.
Darryl groaned again as he tried to shift his body.
"Daddy?" Willie stirred in the chair. Darryl held his hand out best he could and the boy stood and took it then nearly jumped up and began hugging him hard. Despite the pain in his ribs, which was great, he held the tiny boy close.
"You alright, Daddy?" Darryl Jr. asked and swung his legs over, rubbed at his eyes then came to his father's other outstretched hand.
Willie said: "Watch it, he got broke ribs."
"It's okay son," Darryl whispered hoarsely, but then coughing made the pain too great so the boys instinctively stood back. Charlene came in with the nurse. Both moved quickly to the bedside.
"Don't try to sit up for a while," The nurse said. "You've got a lot of stitches."
"Boys…boys all okay? Alright?" He rasped.
Charlene said: "Boys are fine. Just plenty scared is all. They seen the whole thing."
Flashes of the attack started coming back to him, the overwhelming sense of helplessness; the incredibly powerful blows, and the repeated deep, lashing cuts. Then the image from street level, the side of his face so impossibly heavy as he lay hopeless and beaten, the white man who put himself between unimaginable horror and Darryl's boys, who placed himself willingly in front of an unbelievably gruesome death to only maybe save the boys, buy them enough time to run. Did he even know that the boys were okay? That he'd saved them? Could he tell that he had saved them before he died?
"The man…white man…"
"They got him here too, down the hall," Charlene said as the nurse finished reading some gauges and fluffed the pillow behind Darryl so he could halfway sit up. "He's in a bad way, tho. Lot worse off than you. They say probably he gonna die."
"Saved them…saved the boys…I wasn't…couldn't…"
"Shh," Charlene came and took his hand as the nurse left the room. The boys moved tentatively close. "Baby, that shit was crazy. You lucky to be alive. You did all you could. Wasn't no stopping that thing. Even the man from the paper, he said so. And the boys, they're fine. We can all just pray for that man. "
Darryl nodded, and again despite the intense pain he hugged his boys and his wife to him. Then, for the first time in his life he prayed for someone other than his family.
A week later, Darryl went to knock even though the door was open. Inside looked similar to what he'd awoken to last week: a hospital room with family hovering heavily around a man covered in bandages and attached with myriad tubes to humming equipment. Balancing his weight with a cane, Darryl went to knock again when a woman who seemed to be the man's wife saw him and motioned him to enter. Darryl waited for a moment, somewhat unsure of himself, his good leg not feeling too sturdy itself.
There was a silent exchange. The woman gathered a young boy and girl and shepherded them from the room. Darryl made direct eye contact with the man for the second time in his life but only to the man's un-bandaged eye which was rheumy and splotched with red. He really didn't know what to say so he just stood for a minute thinking maybe the man was tired, maybe he would drift off to sleep, Darryl could come back later. But then the man seemed to be motioning him over with the un-bandaged fingers on one hand, just a tiny flicking. Darryl moved closer. The man was pointing to the water so Darryl reached for it then realizing the man could not lift his arm Darryl offered him the straw. After a few sips Darryl set the cup back onto the tray.
Somberly, Darryl mumbled: "You…I need…I need to thank you. You saved them. Saved my boys' life."
The man nodded, best he could, mostly with one eyelid.
"Bravest thing I ever seen. Don't really know what to say about it." They were still for a moment, only the rhythmic sounds of the equipment and occasional release of pressured air breaking their peace. "Can't ever repay it, never. Never could. Could fix your car for you, free of charge, your pick-up, you ever have a problem with it. 'Bout all I could offer."
Again the man made the slightest nod of recognition, then suddenly did seem to drift off to sleep.
Darryl stood for a minute. He leaned over and squeezed the unconscious man's hand, feeling suddenly very self-conscious himself, checking to be sure the man's wife and children had not returned to the room. He stood for another minute, then went to leave, paused and turned back. Taking his wallet from his back pocket, he removed a carefully folded bill from the back of it; a fifty; the old one, series 1933-C. Darryl placed one corner of the tight-pressed bill carefully under a vase of flowers beside the man's bed and quietly walked from the room.