The two older boys started jumping on the roof of the car, yelling, “Where’s Tony? Where’s Tony?” Tony, aka Wolverine, was on his back under the rusted-out car, and as it began to rock and wobble on the cinderblocks, he bit his lips to suppress a laugh.
“Are you fucking stupid?” yelled Achilles.
The kids froze, looking around for the source of the yelling. Achilles lifted the window higher and stuck his head out. “Get off the car, idiots.”
The kids shot him the finger and starting jumping again. Achilles started for the door, but Wexler stopped him, placing both hands on his chest and saying, “Breathe.”
“I’ll stick those fingers up their asses,” said Achilles.
“They’re kids. And I have to live here.”
After Wexler talked to the kids, he got a couple of beers. Achilles was breathing heavily, almost crying.
“What’s wrong with you?” asked Wexler.
“What do you mean?”
“The kids, the flowers. What the fuck?” asked Wexler.
“Flowers?”
“What flowers?” said Wexler in a mocking tone. He removed a bouquet from the trash and handed Achilles a card. “Who’s Ines Delesseppes?”
The card was printed on heavy paper with a seashell embossed on the cover. It read, To Naomi Wexler and Family, Our Deepest Sympathies for Your Loss. From Achilles Conroy and Ines Delesseppes.
“You can’t understand second chances. And what if Naomi was here? Are you trying to hurt her again?” Wexler pointed to the flowers.
“When I came up here, I mentioned a funeral.”
“Mine!” Wexler thumped his chest. “You can’t be serious. Don’t we know enough dead people? That’s some fucking high school shit.” Wexler stomped across the room, the pictures on the mantel rattling with each step. He slumped into the La-Z-Boy, holding his head in his hands. With his small frame and frown he looked like a child in time-out. All three of the kids next door were now jumping up and down on the roof of the car, yelling, “That’s some high school shit!”
“I had to come, but I couldn’t tell her why. What else could I do?” In hindsight, there was a lot he could have done. He could have said his friend was sick, or in rehab. He could have just said that he had to go because he was a man, and he had shit to do.
Wexler jumped back up. “There are things you don’t lie about. On second thought, I guess you wouldn’t know. It all makes sense.”
For someone reborn, Wexler was overreacting. Achilles wanted to say, Doesn’t Jesus have your back? Merri said it too, later adding, “And now he’s got my foot.” But Jackson used to say stuff like that too, and look where he ended up. Sometimes Achilles repeated these sayings to Ines, all these nifty little aphorisms his friends spouted at the most unexpected times. “No need to order Chinese,” she’d say. “Achilles the Fortune Cookie.” All the fortune, half the calories.
Wexler kicked the sofa. A bird cawed; the dogs across the street answered. Then it was silent except for the shuffling of Achilles’s feet. The kids next door yelled, “That’s some fly school shit!”
“How’d I die?” asked Wexler.
“That never came up.”
“How did you describe me?” asked Wexler.
“I said you were a good guy.”
“That’s all?” asked Wexler.
“You are,” said Achilles.
“Did you tell her I look like Prince?”
“No.”
“Buttcake.”
Achilles tried to explain that it wasn’t about Wexler. He hadn’t told Ines everything. As Wexler ranted, Achilles looked around the room, as tidy as if two women lived there. Unlike Wages’s place, there was no clutter. He wondered, not for the first time, if Wexler was gay, which would explain why he was so dramatic and sensitive. Wexler was still his friend, but he wondered.
“So what if she doesn’t get it, she could still forgive you,” said Wexler. “You’re not giving her the chance.”
“She wouldn’t understand. She has a fancy house, and family paintings, and butterflies mounted in the hallway, and waiters and cooks. She pretended to be white. Her family had slaves. It’s survivor guilt. They’re part of the talented tenth.”
“Like Special Forces?”
“No.” Achilles explained that the talented tenth were the blacks who were supposed to go out, make money, and come back to save their community.
“Whatever! You’re lying to her,” said Wexler.
“Her family had slaves. They were rich. She helps people because it’s easy. She can afford to volunteer. She says she doesn’t want to be like white people, but she is. That’s why she says it. That’s how she tricked me.”
“Tricked you?” asked Wexler. “She helps people. Who cares about motivation? And if it’s so bad, why are you with her?”
“She’s only with me because I’m dark enough to upset her mom.” Even as he said it, Achilles knew he was wrong, but he couldn’t stop himself from trying to save face. They had owned slaves. So what? Her wealth did frustrate him, though, because she didn’t care about money in that way that only rich people could. She never looked at prices. She didn’t even check the total before handing the cashier a credit card. Achilles sometimes found himself envying her family history, and her skin, lighter even than Troy’s, the passport that let her be what she wanted when she wanted. He thought then of how Ines complained about being mistaken for white and being teased by the darker-skinned kids growing up, and he felt guilt and confusion not only because what he’d said was not then true, but because of how often in his life he had suspected that it was true but hadn’t had the words to express it.
“I’m not surprised.” Something shifted in Wexler. “The way you grew up.”
“The way I grew up?”
“Troy told us that you didn’t go to church, that you were adopted by white people.”
“Us who? When?”
“After you shot Chief, he explained that you were reckless and angry. He mentioned it again toward the end, to explain why you volunteered so much and why he had to follow you. That’s why Wages looked after you. Well, he would anyway, he’s stand-up. That’s why Merriweather always gave you advice.”
“I was following Troy,” Achilles protested.
Wexler continued as if he hadn’t heard Achilles. “Troy mounted up like he wanted to, but he makes everything look easy and sound like your idea. I swore I’d never tell you. I’m only saying this because I want you to know I understand that it’s strange for you, but you need to find Jesus. Only he can help you.”
A loud crash shook their feet, followed by a scream as the car in the yard next door fell off the blocks. The kids circled it like it was a bonfire, skipping and cheering, the youngest one yelling, “Fly school shit!” Achilles counted the heads, holding his breath until he saw Spiderman and Wolverine clamber up the hood, and Batman, his cape trailing behind him, leap onto the back bumper, holding a stick to the sky like a sword, proud as a knight who had just slain a dragon.
It simply couldn’t be true. Had he missed the signs, like Ines’s race, and the doubts he felt about his own envy when Morse called? No. It wasn’t true. Troy was always first in line, and giving Wexler that bullshit excuse was his way of making it appear necessary, and therefore easy.
“You gotta tell her,” Wexler said. “You won’t get away with this, Keelies.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Don’t make that face. You know I got to tell you if you’re wrong. I don’t think you’re going to get away with this.”
“Are you cursing me like you cursed Merriweather? You know that’s the last thing you said to him.”