Thomas Adcock - New Orleans Noir

“And here, ladies and gentlemen,” he announced, “is a rising star in the Quarter poetry scene. A man of the law who will grace us with his debut reading. He came to bust us, and now he’s one of us. Put your hands together to welcome Lieutenant Girlfriend.”

Everyone clapped like crazy as I stepped onto the stage feeling like a horse’s ass. Pogo was jumping up and down, waving his arms like a cheerleader. I shuffled through the pages to get them in order. My voice caught as I started to speak.

Miss Ping plinked an ice cube into a glass. The air conditioner coughed.

Then a huge gray rat scurried across the room, stopped in the middle of the floor to take in the audience, and disappeared under the stage I was standing on.

Everyone jumped to their feet.

“Okay, you assholes, sit down,” I said, adjusting the mike. “That rat has to wait its turn just like all us other poets. This is called ‘Janice and Eva Swap Lipsticks in the Changing Room to Hell.’ I bet you lunkheads aren’t going to get it, but here goes.”

Lower Ninth Ward

Even though her mouth was empty, Rita savored the crunchy flavor of animal cookies, old-time animal cookies made with real vanilla. Her son laid out in a casket and here she was thinking about snacks. But that was because animal cookies were Sammy’s favorite.

When he was small, Rita would gallop the shapes up Sammy’s little round stomach, moving the crisply baked dough in bounding leaps. Usually the miniature animals ended up between Sammy’s laughing lips.

His fat cheeks dimpled with a grin, Sammy would squirm in Rita’s lap, turn and clap his small hands in glee as he chomped down on the golden tan figures. Sometimes he’d cry out in mock pain when a bear would take a really hard jump and end up bounding over his head into Rita’s mouth. Animal crackers and funerals.

Now little Gloria, twenty-three-and-a-half months old, sat in Rita’s lap. Tyronne sat silently next to her. Gloria squirmed briefly. Without really hearing a word he said, Rita patiently endured Pastor White droning on and on. Out of the corner of her eye, Rita stole a glance at Sammy’s corpse laying in the coffin. Absorbing that awful stillness, Rita’s instinct took over: She protectively hugged Gloria, bowed her dark face into the well-oiled coiffure of her daughter’s carefully cornrowed hair, and planted a silent kiss deep between the black, thick, kinky rows.

Rita was beginning to doubt life was worth living, worth sacrificing and saving... for what, to have children who get shot down? What sense did it make to be a mother and outlive your children?

Two deacons moved forward and flanked the coffin. Like passing through a room where the television is on but no one is watching and the sound is off, Rita was aware the men were there to lower the coffin lid, but she really paid no attention to the dark-suited sentinels. Rita had long ago said goodbye and there was no need to drag this out. The elder of the church-appointed guardians efficiently closed the blue velvet — trimmed coffin lid. Someone two rows to the rear of Rita uttered a soft but audible, “Oh, my Lord.” The lamentation cut clearly through the reverent silence that had settled on the small congregation. This was the end of the wake but only the beginning of a very long and sleepless night.

Friends and acquaintances shuffled slowly, very slowly, out of the sanctuary into the small vestibule where people lined up to script their condolences in one of Sammy’s school notebooks that had been set out on a podium. There was a pencil sitting in the middle of the book. A few people had signed in ballpoint pen, but most signatures (some were written in large block letters, others in an indecipherable cursive) were scripted with the pencil’s soft lead and seemed to fade immediately upon writing.

Rita looked up. No, that couldn’t be, she thought to herself. That couldn’t be Paul “Snowflake” Moore darkening the sanctity of her sorrow. Rita instantly shifted the sleeping weight of Gloria from her shoulder. Wordlessly, she handed Gloria to Tyronne. Tyronne had already seen Snowflake and knew a confrontation was in the making. In one seamless motion, as soon as Tyronne received Gloria into his large hands, he spun on his heels and handed Gloria to the first older woman he saw. By the time he turned back to Rita, she was already in Snowflake’s face.

“Get out of here!” Rita hissed between tightly clenched teeth. “You the—”

“I just come to pay my respects. I ain’t come to cause no trouble.”

“You don’t respect nobody.”

By now the packed anteroom crackled with dread. The woman who had taken Gloria scurried back into the sanctuary; just a few months ago she had witnessed a fight break out at a funeral.

Tyronne rushed behind Rita, who was oblivious to her backup towering above her. With the arrogance of power, Snowflake stoically stood his ground and impassively peered at Rita and Tyronne. The tension increased.

“Get out!” Rita screamed, and pushed Snowflake hard in his chest. Snowflake glowered. She was fortunate that this was a wake, that Sammy was her son and might even be related to him, fortunate that a lot of people were standing there watching, but most of all, fortunate that none of Snowflake’s usual retinue was surrounding him, because then Snowflake would have been bound, at the very least, to slap her down. As it was, Snowflake’s hand instinctively went to his.38 derringer, snug but ready in the waist-pocket of his vest.

The confrontation escalated so fast the onlookers barely had time to breathe in and out; a few of the younger men were in fact holding their breath. Surely Snowflake wasn’t going to accept being pushed around without doing something in retaliation.

Tyronne quickly stepped between the antagonists. “She’s upset, you understand. Please, leave her be. We appreciate your concern but it would be better, man, if you would leave.” Tyronne stared unflinchingly into the depths of Snowflake’s emotionless eyes. Snowflake stared back and pulled an empty hand out of his vest pocket.

Everybody except Tyronne, Snowflake, and Rita prematurely relaxed and let out a relieved breath.

“I said get out!” Rita screamed a second time. The deacon who had closed the coffin lid ran to the phone to dial 911. Half the people who had been standing around now quickly moved out, some exiting the front door, others retreating back into the sanctuary. Rita reached around Tyronne in another attempt to shove Snowflake toward the door.

The rest happened so quickly only Tyronne and Snowflake saw it all. Tyronne took a swift half-step to his right to cut off Rita, who was charging around him. He leaned backward briefly, pushing against her with his shoulders.

Snowflake’s left hand leapt with lizard rapidity to knock away Rita’s outstretched right arm, and in the process was detained by Tyronne’s right hand that gripped with a viselike strength and was surprisingly unyielding.

An onlooker moaned, “Oh, Lordy, no!”

“Get out!” Rita’s vehement command overpowered the onlooker’s exclamation.

Snowflake’s right hand had already come up with his gun at the ready. Tyronne stepped in so close to Snowflake that if he pulled the trigger there was no telling what direction the slug would travel: upward into the ceiling, upward into Tyronne’s chest, or upward into Snowflake’s jaw.

“He got a gun,” some young male voice blurted at the same time Rita was reaching to get around Tyronne so she could sink her nails into Snowflake’s smoothly groomed face. Snowflake pushed his right forearm against Tyronne’s chest, attempting to back him up and simultaneously free his left arm, which Tyronne held secure at the wrist. As is often the case in impromptu street fights, the peacemaker in the middle was the person in the most danger.