Visitation Street (15 page)

“You want it or not?” Fadi says.

“I’m not complaining. Just observing.” He shovels a forkful of bright yellow rice into his mouth. Still eating, he wanders over to the bulletin board near the door. He zeros in on the photo of June. “Missing, bullshit. This girl’s dead.”

“How do you know?”

“They’ll frame some black kid for it. Just wait. I could fish that girl’s body out of the water at the end of a line and they’d tell me I killed her. Come on, man, you know the score.” He scans Fadi’s clippings again, squinting at the newsprint. “You live at the crossroads. This is ground zero, where the front meets the back. But don’t waste your time trying to negotiate a truce.”

The kid’s right. Fadi’s bodega is one of the only places patronized by both sides of Red Hook—people from the Houses on their way to and from the bus stop and folks from the waterside looking for early-morning or late-night essentials.

“Do you want my advice? Focus on your own shit. You got a bodega. That’s your thing. Your avocation. Leave the dead white girls to the white guys.” He saunters out the door, still working on the remains of Fadi’s lunch.

Fadi follows the kid outside. He looks up and down the street. The strand of Christmas lights sway in the breeze. Two guys with shaggy haircuts and paint-splattered jeans walk past. They don’t return Fadi’s nod. A few of Paulie Marino’s friends are coming down Visitation. Across the street the door of Dockyard is propped open. Every once in a while the bristles of a broom pop out, sending dust and dirt into the street.

In the last week, Fadi has helped two people from the bar find apartments and helped a kid from the projects get a dog-walking job. From where he stands he can see the water, the polite three-story houses on Visitation, the projects beyond them. He can see the bar and those who hang out there. So it’s not too far-fetched to imagine that what happened to June is discoverable right here, under his nose.

Van Brunt smells of turpentine. For the last couple of hours the wino has been on his hands and knees rubbing the painted square of sidewalk with rags soaked in paint thinner. Oily orange liquid is running into the sewer. When Fadi looks over at the Greek’s, the wino springs from the sidewalk and rushes across the street. He wraps a hand around Fadi’s wrist. His palm is tough, not calloused, but hardened like bark.

“You give him the
recompensa
? The
pandillero
, the homeboy, he come for the
recompensa
?” The corners of the wino’s mouth are purple, and his breath smells of Night Train.

“No.”

“He tell you about the
muchacha
?”

“No.” The wino’s digging his thick nails into Fadi’s skin.

The Greek pokes his head out from the door of his restaurant to yell at the wino. The wino lets go of Fadi. “The
recompensa es mio
!” he shouts, running back across the street to his scrubbing.

Throughout the afternoon, Fadi listens to the wino shouting about the reward from outside the Greek’s. Finally, he closes the door. The usual rush of kids buying afternoon snacks ebbs and flows. The first wave of twentysomethings stocking up on beer and supplies for the night starts trickling in. Across the street, the wino and the Greek are sitting down to dinner. The orange paint has been stripped from the sidewalk. The sawhorses have been put away. The bus pulls up and drives off. The neon signs in the Dockyard’s window flicker. The wino’s jagged laugh tangles with the Greek’s. Fadi returns to his post behind the counter and waits until closing.

In the last few days, Fadi’s store has become the target of small acts of vandalism and petty crime. Twice he’s arrived at work to find that all his newspapers have been stolen.

If the newspapers continue to be stolen from the Hafiz Superette, the police will be involved. This is an important intersection of our neighborhood and news must be available to all
.

The other night a messy tag—more handwriting than graffiti—appeared on one of Fadi’s roll gates.

Vandalism to the Hafiz Superette will not be tolerated. The Hafiz Superette will not serve the needs of the community if it continues to be a target of such attacks
.

He wonders if the criminals read his edition.

In his latest newsletter, Fadi included an editorial urging the neighborhood to band together to welcome the cruise ships. “For the first time since the golden age of shipping, Red Hook is going to be a gateway to our city,” he wrote. “We have no more time for petty crime and vandalism. We have no room for neighborly discord. We need to show the world the beauty of our colorful community.”

But because he wanted to be fair to his contributors, Fadi was forced to print contrary complaints in the same newsletter.

Screw the cruise ships, the mayor, and the antienvironmentalist councilmen who are going to allow these polluting hunks of junk to befoul our waters with their idling engines and pompous smoke
.

Keep Red Hook beautiful for the shuffleboarders and smorgasborders who will soon walk among us
.

How come the cruise terminal isn’t interested in hiring anyone who comes from the Houses? Only the white boys good enough for the waterfront?

Vandalism and thievery are not the only changes that Fadi has noticed. Since June disappeared Paulie Marino and his buddies have made it a point to buy their beer and cigarettes from his Puerto Rican rivals.

It’s not even five
A.M.
when Fadi steps off the subway on the elevated platform of Smith and Ninth Street. The stop is a twenty-minute walk from his store. But since Red Hook doesn’t merit its own subway, Smith and Ninth is as close as Fadi can get.

The sun hasn’t begun its daily battle with the Houses—its struggle to overcome the bleak fortress of rooftops. The day will be warm, but the dark morning is chilly. Fadi shivers in his T-shirt as he walks down the abandoned platform to the long escalator that leads to the street.

He lets the train roar down into the tunnel before making his own descent. Soon the station is silent. He looks across the platform toward Red Hook barricaded behind the expressway. Like Smith and Ninth, the expressway is crumbling. It’s cobbled and patched from parts that rumble and shake when cars hit the fault lines. Between the subway and the expressway is a large sign advertising Kentile tiling, through which the sun, when it rises, will cast a spiderweb of light onto the cars below.

Fadi knows better than to expect the 75—the bus that services the projects—to come. It’s simpler to walk through the barren lots, underneath the exhaust-blackened highway, and approach Red Hook through the Houses.

Two weary hookers are strolling on Hamilton Avenue, pausing in the glow of the Pathmark sign to repaint their faces. They call out to Fadi halfheartedly, then heckle him as he crosses beneath the expressway.

He follows the bus route along a desolate stretch of Smith Street on which the only occupied building is a confectionery manufacturer that Fadi’s never seen open. Eight columns jut from the building’s façade. At the far end of the block a single streetlamp is struggling to stay alight. The street is silent. Then Fadi hears a rattle and hiss. A young man is standing in front of one of the columns, hitting it with a blast of spray paint. His arm arcs, making the spray rise and fall. There’s another rattle, and he switches to another can of paint.

Fadi crosses the street, giving the artist wide berth. The streetlight buzzes out. When the streetlight comes back on, he is standing under its yellow spill. The painter is directly across from him, shaking his can, ready to hit the column again.

Even in the dismal glow of the streetlamp, Fadi recognizes the kid who stole the Wise from his store the other day. The kid sees him too. He lowers his can. “Hey, my man.”

They stare at each other across the street. Fadi looks at the wall behind the kid. All eight columns are covered in abstract white and black designs.

“Guess I’m caught. First shoplifting and now tagging.” The kid smiles—
what can you do?
—and rattles his can. “You going to rat me out?”

“It’s none of my business what you do on an abandoned street.”

“Abandoned street? This is an important thoroughfare.” The kid shakes his head. “The bus route man. The only way people from Smith and Ninth get into the hood. It’s not abandoned. It’s essential.”

“If you’re trying to get somewhere else.”

“So what happens between point A and point B doesn’t matter? I thought you were into this hood.”

“I am,” Fadi says. “Just not this part.”

“Hold up,” the kid says. “Haven’t you ever heard of neighborhood beautification?” He rattles his can, adds a splash of paint, then drops the paint. “I bet you didn’t even notice me working here until this morning.” The kid raises the hood of his sweatshirt, hiding the tufts of his hair. “My man, you are just in time. Step back with me.”

There’s excitement in the kid’s gaunt face. His thin, dry lips are quivering. Even the yellowed whites of his eyes gleam. Fadi doesn’t want to disappoint, so he follows the kid back down the block. The kid pushes open the door to an abandoned building. Fadi hesitates.

The kid pulls out a flashlight. “It’s copacetic. I’ve checked it out. You coming?” They climb to the second floor and enter a small railroad apartment. Fadi follows the kid to the window, which is nothing more than an empty frame. “Check it,” the kid says pointing across the street.

Fadi looks out. The façade of the confectionery factory is dark, the kid’s artwork barely visible. “What?”

“You don’t see anything, right?”

“No.” Fadi turns to leave but the kid grabs his arm. “I’ve got to get to work.”

“What’s the rush? Your corner doesn’t get going before six. You’re getting a jump start on nothing.” He looks down the block in the direction of the expressway. “Hold up, here we go.” He pushes Fadi back toward the window. The bus has rounded the corner and is coming down the street. “Watch.”

Fadi leans out the window, careful not to touch the nails protruding from its frame. As the bus draws closer, its headlights hit the first of the columns and the wall comes to life. A silhouette of a boy leaping into the air—one leg kicking out front, the other bent back behind—each column showing his progression as he flies farther. It’s a flipbook, a perfect moving image, taking the jumper higher off the ground. At the end of the building the bus halts before rounding the corner. Its headlights linger on a large tag: RunDown.

Fadi peers toward the expressway, hoping for another bus so he can see the jumper again. “RunDown,” he says. “What’s RunDown?”

“RunDown is me, Renton Davis. RunDown is also this place, this hood. It’s run-down. It’s run me down.”

Fadi’s staring out the window, trying to bring the wall back to life.

“Pretty good, right?” The kid narrows his eyes, trying to read Fadi’s expression. “That’s what I thought.”

Fadi reaches for the flashlight and runs it over the wall. The painting on the columns looks fragmented. He looks down the block again.

“Man, you know the bus isn’t coming for another half hour at least.”

Fadi looks at his watch. In half an hour it will still be dark enough that he’ll be able to see the jumper on the wall. “I’ll buy you breakfast.”

“You got yourself a deal,” Renton says.

They walk to the twenty-four-hour fast-food joints below the expressway and pick up breakfast sandwiches. Ren devours his on the way out the door, so Fadi grabs him two more, which he finishes on the way back to Smith Street.

They wait in the railroad apartment, drinking burnt coffee. Soon they can hear the bus’s arthritic groan as it approaches. The headlights swing into view, bumping over the buildings at the far end of the block. Fadi leans out the window. The jumper begins his leap, kicking out and up, away from the ground, transforming the street with a flash of momentary energy, exhilarating the desolation.

As the bus vanishes, leaving the street dark, Fadi half expects to hear the jumper crash to the ground. The sky is softening. He checks his watch. He’s late. He’ll walk home along this route tonight, watch Renton’s drawing leap clear of the neighborhood.

Fadi rushes through the projects. The first lights are coming on in the towers. A few elderly women are pushing shopping carts out of the courtyards and over to Lorraine Street where they will sit in front of the Laundromat until it opens.

On Van Brunt the Puerto Ricans are already open. Fadi lifts his gate, replaying the image of the jumper over in his head, remembering the boy’s fluid ascent, the magic of his movement as the bus brought him to life. It’s only when he’s stationed behind his counter that he realizes his newspapers have been stolen.

W
here is Cree? Since he had jumped the pier after her Val has been looking for him. She needs him to fill the hole left by June, to be the person who completes her sentences, answers her pointless messages, agrees with her silly observations—makes her feel as if she is not cut loose, unmoored, dangling. Because when she opens her mouth, picks up her phone, signs into her e-mail to report a million little things to June, it takes her a moment to remember no one will respond.

When she jumped into the water, Val imagined that if she held her breath and stayed down long enough, she might black out and wake up back on the raft with June at her side. But Cree had pulled her to the surface, kissing her, distracting her from her missing friend, hinting that maybe he’d take her place. Then the music teacher arrived, summoning Val to shore, reminding her, just by appearing on the pier, that she had survived and June was gone. And June was right, Val realized; Val
is
a baby, crying there in the arms of Mr. Sprouse for everyone to see.

But now she must find Cree. So she invents reasons to spend time in Coffey Park, in the gloomy shadow of the Red Hook Houses. She sits on a bench, reading or trying to read—but not reading at all. She ignores the hollers of the boys smoking blunts. She ignores the sideways glance Monique throws her way when she passes with her colorful crew of girls. Instead, she concentrates on summoning Cree. If Cree shows up, seeks her out—if she is no longer alone—people will forgive her for what happened to June.
If Cree likes her—deems her worthy of affection—she will be more than the girl whose friend is missing, more than the girl who lost that friend during a childish adventure
.