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Which Is Which
There is something I've been wanting to get out of the way for some time, can never really find the exact wording in example, so now I would just like to put it into so many words: I am an evil son-of-a-bitch.
Back when we had conversations, and I acted in ways that were playfully sinister, Mandy used to call me evil with a mirthlessness that would cause me to look a little harder and say, yeah, might have a point, I think I see what you mean.
Over the years, and especially during my years here in New Orleans (and then especially during the summer), when my fantasy life starts running darkly, and I imagine and whisper, and chant into that well-occupied dominion of maleficence all the dank thoughts of my secret self, I have for the most part not been challenged with a solitary object at which to direct my hatefulness.
But a bad hop at second base, a planetary misalignment, or a fluttering of wind during the coin toss has me now living with that child I agreed to abort twenty years ago, or one of the seeds accepted, not rejected, at that gate of tied tubes. My whipping boy, Shelton Ray Jackson, son of imprisoned Myrna, and imprisoned Shelton Sr; the boy quite literally no one wants. He is the bully you feared in school; the boy who's behavior helped you to understand first hand the term--bi-polar disorder; the boy who devours the helpful hand like a Lays potato chip; the boy segregated from decent children by concerned mothers.
He is the embodiment of tragedy and is too intelligent to trade that away cheaply.
He was a cool kid when he lived across the street and at night you could shut your door to the ghetto he came from and fly as far away as your mind would allow. He is now approaching sixteen and can bring home no (short term) friend who is scarier than he is. The neighborhood toughs are all wimps compared to him. His life has been one of few compliments, but many insults; a life whose daily hardships would fill up a treasure chest. His father is being a man in some cell in California, and does not communicate; his mother calls frequently from her cell (and the machine says, if you will pay for this call, press 3), in central Louisiana, asking for money. His happiness at her efforts to communicate are short lived when he hips up to the motivaton behind her calls. His self-image is a shattered piece of obscure glass, and to this last observation I can add--and I helped.
A little mouse of a boy outside my front door, up on my porch, and I am towering over him in all my freakish glory, asking him gently are you the boy she is talking about? He nods, and I look down to the sidewalk where his young mother is ranting loudly, and apparently, into the face of Big Mike (aka. Chicken). Mike has a great smile, and a sense of irony about him, and it doesn't fit anything I know to have him involved in the harming of a child.
Stink, and another gangster boy are loitering nearby, and it appears they have been sitting on this porch but are in the preparatory stages of high tailing it. And she has her cell-phone in hand and is calling 911 to inform them of an incident at 2646 Dumaine, and without missing a beat Mike (mis) corrects her, saying--St. Philip. And she says St.Philip into the phone right after him and I have to turn around and look into the house, and smile. I look back down at Mike and he is mouthing something to me but I can't read it so I just shake my head and look off down Dumaine to the corner of Dorgenois, where none of this is happening.
The little boy now interrupts my staring by saying, does a boy named Shelton live here? I answer affirmatively and the little (9-year-old) boy says, well he punched me in the nose, demonstrating by pushing his own index finger into the tip of his nose, just in case I was unsure of the area in question. This is the kind of accusation that none of us who know Shelton would doubt for a second, however, Shelton is not a little boy anymore and if he had punched someone in the nose, even half-heartedly, there would be more damage than the little boy is exhibiting. The young woman did see something (that Shelton is culpable of some wrongful act, I have no doubt), and it is this and a long list of other suppressed sins against herself and her son she is now relaying to the emergency operator.
I don't mean to be rude but as she has not addressed me personally, and her lament is one I have seen and heard many, many times on Dumaine, I turn around, go inside, and shut the door. The little boy will be safe for awhile as the Demon of Dumaine was last seen running off in the direction of Esplanade.
Mandy all this time is sitting at the front table reading, perhaps glancing out occasionally. When I come in we discuss the event, and the eventual arrival of police, as if we're talking about the weather.
The police who arrive are that fric and frac couple I have seen around here recently, first district rookies, no doubt, being given the ripest territories for domestic disturbance calls. Dumaine was a haven for it during the Mama D years, but not so much anymore. They ring the bell and then follow with two loud raps. (Man, stop that stupid shit, you want me bangin' on your door that way?). He's tall, white, red headed burr cut; she's short, white, and overweight, but you know those vests add a few pounds. She immediately looks down at my bare feet and John Schwarz says (whaddayou lookin at). I, however, have better sense than that and begin a polite discussion with Mr. Cop about my "son." I assure him, man to man, that Shelton will be punished, and briefly explain the circumstances which might contribute to his misbehavior. The cops leave out saying they will look for him off towards Esplanade. Do they think he's white or black or what, I don't know, but there's a Dunkin Donuts at Esplanade and Broad so...
I don't say anything to Shelton when he comes home that night, but yesterday as he comes in I glanced up from this high quality 900 page novel I'm reading, and make what appears to be direct eye contact with him standing there in the foyer. I am lost in a fictional world of schizophrenia and brotherly love and to be honest not really looking at Shelton at all. Shelton also is not quite connected to the world he has just entered and wearing that stupid looking Hulk Hogan do-rag he queries me thusly--"what are you looking at?" When my eyes focus on him all Rasputiny-like he starts back-stuttering, "no, I mean, I just..."
I've been trying lamely to accept the defeatist stance of if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all, because I don't like that dude who yells at Shelton when he fucks up, he's a scary, weird motherfucker, and I never signed on to share this body with him. Oh but look, there he is. Shelton sees him too.
"First thing, I look at any goddamned thing in front of me, which in this case is the BOY who brought the police to my front door, FOR HITTING A NINE-YEAR-OLD CHILD, congratulations son, you've made me real proud."
And I have been meaner to him than that. I can't forgive him for being a bully to others. I'm practicing the art of evil on someone who is for all practical purposes, mentally retarded. Congratulations Slim, I'm proud of you too.
Wrong again (JimB), I guess this wasn't one of the amusing ones.