“He needs to do his math,” said Kendall.
“I will, Mom.”
“You promise your mother you’re gonna do your homework later?” said Monroe.
“Yes.”
“Let’s go, then.”
Kendall gave Monroe an approving glance as he crossed the room with the boy. They went out the back door, down wood stairs to a cracked sidewalk bordered by two small patches of dirt, weeds, and a little grass, and entered a small detached garage next to the alley.
Kendall had bought the house for fifty thousand and change ten years back, and now it was worth several hundred thousand dollars. She had endured the drug dealing, break-ins, and violent crime in the neighborhood, and though the problems had not been completely eradicated, her vision of a Park View transformed was beginning to take hold.
Many of the homes on her street had been turned over to new-generation ownership and were being reconditioned. Though she had made no major improvements, Kendall kept her place in clean good shape. Monroe handled the basic maintenance, which was often no more than throwing a fresh coat of paint on a wall, drilling new screw holes for those that had been stripped, caulking the bathtub and shower stall, and replacing broken windows, a skill his father had taught him and James when they were boys.
Monroe had also organized the garage. His parents had not had one in Heathrow, and it was a luxury for him. He had screws, nuts, bolts, washers, and nails in clear film canisters, labeled by Sharpies on tape, aligned on a wooden shelf. Motor oil, transmission fluid, brake fluid, rags, cleaning supplies, windshield washer fluid, and antifreeze were lined up in a row against one cinder-block wall. He had brought his toolbox down here and took it back to his mother’s as needed. He supposed he was slowly moving in.
“I don’t know how the tire got flat,” said Marcus, as Monroe upended his bike, a Dyno 2000 with rear pegs, and set it on its saddle and bars.
“You ran over something, I expect. Go get me those tire levers off the shelf.” When Marcus did not move, Monroe said, “Those blue things, thick plastic, a few inches long. Got hooks on the end.”
Raymond showed the boy how to insert the thick end of the tire lever between the tire and the rim, and how to hook it onto the spoke. He instructed him to use the second lever the same way, hooking it two spokes down. By working it around in this fashion, the tire could be removed from the rim.
“Now run your hand real careful inside that tire. You’re gonna find a bit of glass or a sharp twig, something like that in there. Whatever it was punctured that tube.”
“It was this,” said Marcus, holding a small triangle of forest green glass carefully between his fingers.
Monroe gave the new inner tube a couple of pumps of air and fitted it into the empty tire. He pulled the valve through the hole in the rim and seated one side of the tire into the rim’s edge. He turned the bike around and used his thumbs and muscle to fit the other side. He completed the replacement by inflating the tire to its suggested pressure. All the while he talked to the boy, describing the process with simple language.
Marcus watched him as he worked. He noticed the veins jump on the back of Mr. Raymond’s hands and how they stood out like wire on his forearms. The tight way he wore his knit watch cap cocked a little sideways on his head. His thin, neat mustache. Marcus was going to grow one just like it someday.
“You should be good now,” said Monroe.
“Can I ride it down to the Avenue and back?”
“It’s too dark. I’m worried about the cars seein you. But you can walk with me to the market if you want. I noticed your mother needed some milk.”
On the way to Georgia, Monroe talked to Marcus about body language. “Chin up, and keep your shoulders square, like you’re balancing a broom handle on there. Make eye contact, but not too long, hear? You don’t want to be challenging anyone for no good reason. On the other hand, you don’t want to look like a potential victim, either.”
“How’s a victim look?” said Marcus.
“Like someone you could rob or steal in the face,” said Monroe. He had said these things to Kenji when he was a little boy. Raymond’s father, Ernest Monroe, had said them to him.
Down on the Avenue, as the foot traffic increased, Marcus reached out and held Monroe’s hand.
Charles Baker sat in the passenger seat of Cody Kruger’s Honda, looking through the windshield at a gray four-square colonial at the corner of 39th and Livingston. Deon Brown was in the backseat, shifting his considerable weight. They were parked down the block, near Legation Street. Two blacks and a white, sitting in a beat-up car in one of the city’s wealthier neighborhoods. Anyone who came up on them would know they were wrong.
“These houses are nice,” said Cody.
“Big trees, too,” said Baker. “This here’s a burglar’s paradise during the day.”
They were in Friendship Heights. Baker had done some break-ins in neighborhoods just like this one. Two men in, one lookout in the car. Go directly to the master bedroom and toss it. People liked to keep their jewelry, furs, and cash close to where they slept. But he and his crew had been retired from that game by the law. He wasn’t about to go back to prison for a fur coat. If he was going to fall, it would be for something worthwhile.
“All this money,” said Cody. “Why they not drivin nicer whips?”
“Look careful,” said Baker. “They’re showing that they got it in a quiet way, but they’re sayin something else, too.”
This was not the new-money, look-what’s-in-my-driveway lifestyle of a Potomac or a McLean. The residents here had it, but they did not care to advertise it. Their cars weren’t flashy, even when they were fast, but they were fairly new and environmentally correct. All-wheel-drive Volvos, Saab sedans, SUV hybrids, Infiniti Gs, and Acuras lined the streets.
“They sayin, ‘Look at me,’ ” said Baker. “ ‘I can afford a Mercedes, but I choose not to own one.’ They gonna spend fifty thousand dollars on a Lexus hybrid so they can save a few miles per gallon on gas and boast about it at their next dinner party. But ask one of these motherfuckers to give a thousand dollars to a school on the other side of town, so a poor black kid can have a computer and a chance? You gonna see the door slam right in your face.”
How do you know? thought Deon, tiring of the cynical drawl in Baker’s voice. When have you ever done anything for any kind of kid, poor or otherwise?
“Ain’t that right, Deon?”
Deon adjusted his body. He had big legs and was uncomfortable in the small backseat. “Right, Mr. Charles.”
“I can’t stand these people,” said Baker, and Cody nodded his head.
“Can we go?” said Deon.
“In a minute,” said Baker.
Deon wasn’t comfortable in this part of the city. Even when he dressed right, even when he was straight, he got looks. It wasn’t just his color, though that was a large part of the reaction. The locals could sense he didn’t belong here. Once he bought a shirt from one of those stores over on Wisconsin Avenue, on what they called the Rodeo Drive of Chevy Chase, and when he took it to the register, they asked for his ID, even though he was paying cash. His mother told him he should have asked why, but he had been too humiliated to question the clerk. He never went shopping on that fancy strip of stores again.
The side door to the four-square colonial opened. A tall, thin man in a sport jacket and slacks stepped out of the house. His hair was thick, gray, and on the long side, falling a little over his ears. He held a leash, and on the end of it was a fat dachshund. The man stopped to light a cigar, then walked north.
“Every night,” said Baker.
Cody touched the handle of the door.
“Not yet,” said Baker. “Let him go some.”
“How you know he’s not gonna be right back?”
“He’s off to that nice little rec center and ball field they got, just a block or so away. Takes a little while for him to get there ’cause his poor excuse for a dog got them short little legs.”