They were on Baldwin walking home from McClarin Park. They’d just played two-on-two with Carlos and Corey and got their butts kicked, Isaiah hardly getting off a shot.
“Corey’s too big,” Isaiah said, “he’s a grown man.”
“So why were you trying to muscle him?” Marcus said. “You’ve got to stay aware of yourself, keep your emotions in check, see the big picture, see the situation. Instead, you got all macho and played Corey’s game instead of your own. You’re quicker than he is, you should have made him chase you. And your defense, if you could call it that. Corey was scoring like you weren’t even there.”
“He kept taking me down low.”
“You should have picked him up higher, made him put the ball on the floor, kept him off his spot. He was catching the entry pass too easy.”
“You couldn’t tell me this during the game?”
“I was waiting for you to tell yourself.”
Isaiah didn’t much care for basketball but Marcus did. That was reason enough to play.
“You gotta get off first,” Marcus said. “Take the initiative, dictate the action. You can’t just react. That’s letting the other guy call the shots. You see the difference?”
A lot of kids would have rolled their eyes at all the advice and admonitions but Isaiah didn’t mind. He liked to watch Marcus talk; flashing that big sunny smile or frowning with urgency, one hand judo-chopping the other.
“You won’t be a basketball star,” Marcus said, “but you will be a star-at what is up to you. Most of us have to play the hand we’re dealt but you and that mind of yours? You can deal your own hand, play whatever game you want to play, and there’s nothing out there can stop you but yourself.”
Isaiah felt bad when Marcus talked like that, like his life was cast in stone, like nothing new could happen for him. He was only twenty-five and the smartest person Isaiah knew. Smarter than Sarita, who was in law school. Smarter than Mr. Galindo, who coached the academic decathlon team, and smarter than Dante’s parents, who were both psychiatrists.
“You go where God calls you,” Marcus said. “Teacher, doctor, scientist, book writer. I don’t really care as long as you do some good out there. You could make a difference, Isaiah. A big difference. I’m talking about raising people up, easing their suffering, bringing some justice to the world. Money don’t enter into it, you understand what I’m telling you? God didn’t give you a gift so you could be a hedge fund manager. You take that road, disappoint me like that, buy a Bentley or put a golf course in your backyard? I will kick-your-ass.”
“Yeah, you told me that before,” Isaiah said.
“I know I’m on you a lot but you’re my little brother, my blood, my pride and joy. I want everything for you. Everything.”
“You told me that too.”
They stayed on Baldwin all the way to Anaheim and waited for the light to change. It was rush hour, heavy traffic in both directions. It was hard to believe there could be so many cars. They just kept coming like they were on a loop; like in a hundred years they’d still be going by if climate change hadn’t put the city underwater.
“What do you want for dinner?” Marcus said.
“I don’t care,” Isaiah said.
The number nine bus went by, gusting hot air and stopping at the bus stop, people lined up there ready to board.
“I’m going to the store. You go on home, get that homework done. You only got a ninety-six on that calculus test.”
“Only?”
“Those Korean kids get a ninety-six with one hand and play the violin with the other. You want to get into Harvard you’re gonna have to do better than that.”
“Oh I’m going to Harvard now?”
“You will if I have anything to do with it. You feel like meat loaf?”
“Yeah, meat loaf is good.”
“What about stew? We’ve got that top round in the fridge.”
“Whatever’s easiest.”
The light turned green and Marcus backed into the crosswalk. “I don’t care about easy,” he said, “just tell me what you want.”
It happened so fast. The growl of the engine, the flash of chrome, the awful moment of impact, metal and velocity crushing flesh and bone; Marcus bent in half, cartwheeling through the air and slamming down on the pavement so hard he bounced, a swirling wake of exhaust and dust as the car sped away. There were screams and shouts but Isaiah didn’t hear them. He was stumbling toward his brother, falling on his knees beside him, and screaming help, help, somebody help.
Marcus looked like a marionette thrown out of a car window, too still to be a living thing, his arms and legs splayed at unnatural angles. The paramedics were hovering over him, getting things from orange equipment boxes, and talking to each other. One of them cut Marcus’s backpack off with a scissor. There was blood on it and blood on the paramedic’s gloves. Isaiah couldn’t watch anymore and turned his head. He wanted to ask if Marcus was okay but was afraid of what the answer might be.
The paramedics wouldn’t let Isaiah ride in the ambulance so a cop took him to Long Beach Memorial. In the waiting room he couldn’t sit down, pestering anyone who went in or out of the authorized personnel doors. Is Marcus okay? He’s still in surgery? When’s the doctor coming out? Could I go talk to him? Isaiah called Marcus’s friend Carlos, who was there in ten minutes. “Marcus is gonna be all right, he’s a tough guy,” Carlos said. “He’s going to be fine, wait and see.”
After a three-hour wait, a doctor came out. He had a Jamaican accent and looked young even with the receding hairline and rimless glasses. He said they’d done everything they could but Marcus had suffered massive internal injuries and had passed.
Isaiah shook his head and smiled like he knew the doctor was messing with him. “No, forget it,” he said. “Marcus is in there, I know he is, just let me talk to him-just let me-” A sound erupted out of him; raw, searing, and so sorrowful he could have been a conduit for a prisoner in hell. Carlos tried to hug him but Isaiah pushed him away and sobbed into his hands.
Carlos said Isaiah could stay at his house. His daughters could double up and Isaiah’d have a bedroom to himself. Lucy had dinner waiting for them. Isaiah told Carlos his grandmother was coming in from El Segundo and that she’d meet him at the apartment. Carlos didn’t know there was no grandmother and Isaiah’s only other relatives, whom he’d never met or talked to, were in North Carolina.
Isaiah got up from the sofa, went to the bathroom, and threw up in the toilet. He stayed there a long time, his head resting on the cool edge of the bowl, freeze-frames blinking behind his eyes. Blink. The car coming. Blink. Marcus hit. Blink. Marcus folded in half. Blink. Marcus tumbling through the air. Blink. Marcus on the pavement, crushed and broken, his head pressed against the curb.
How could you do that, Marcus? Why didn’t you look? You’re so stupid, man, why didn’t you look?
Marcus’s girlfriend, Sarita, showed up. She banged on the door and called Isaiah’s name but he didn’t answer. What were they going to do, hug each other and cry and say how much they missed Marcus? He couldn’t deal with that.
The afternoon sun was blazing through the windows. Isaiah shut the drapes, unplugged the phone, turned off his cell, and sat in the corner under the spider plant. He kept still, hugging his knees, trying to make himself small but the pain found him anyway, hitting him as hard as that car hit Marcus, demolishing thought, reason, spirit, everything. He rocked back and forth and said Marcus Marcus until it was dark outside and his throat was sore. He’d almost nodded off when he heard that impact sound, sickening and final. He lurched and threw up again but nothing came out. He was empty. A birdcage without a bird.