Brad Parks - Eyes of the Innocent

“Hey,” I said. “I’m sorry to bother you guys. I’m a reporter with the Eagle-Examiner. I’m looking for…”

They walked down the stairs just as I was approaching them, brushing past me wordlessly, staring straight ahead like I didn’t exist.

“Look, I’m not a cop,” I said, following them. “I’m just a newspaper reporter working on a story.”

“Nah” was all the one with the braids could say. And even that was muffled.

“Guys, I just need a little help here,” I said.

“Ain’t no snitch,” the one with the hoodie said.

The no-snitch mentality-which had long been the rule for dealing with law enforcement in the projects-had been expanded in recent years to encompass all outsiders. And reporters were most certainly included. It was, quite frankly, a huge pain in the ass. My intentions were almost always benign-in this case, I was trying to track down a lender who may have preyed on poor people-but convincing a hardened no-snitcher of this could be impossible.

More than anything, it just pissed me off. It wasn’t because it made my job harder. Okay, it was partly that. But it was mostly because the no-snitch mentality-and the decline of law and order it brought-had been almost as destructive to the community as the drug trade.

“You’re a moron,” I said once they were out of earshot.

Or at least I thought they were. Apparently, not all of today’s youth have ruined their hearing with loud music.

“What you say?” Braids said, turning around and stopping.

He looked more surprised than anything. I hadn’t really intended to create a confrontation with this kid-especially when I didn’t know how many friends he might have nearby-but there was no backing off now. By himself, he wasn’t much to be afraid of. It helped that I outweighed him by about thirty pounds.

“You’re a moron,” I repeated, walking toward him. “I’m trying to do a story that will help shine light on a scumbag who preys on people from the projects. But you’re such an ignorant moron all you’re worried about is snitching.”

Braids and Hoodie were momentarily speechless. They clearly had not expected anything resembling aggression out of the mild-mannered newspaper reporter.

“Damn, yo, he just called you ignorant, ” Hoodie said.

“Oh, you’re ignorant, too,” I said, drawing in even closer. “Because you know where all this no-snitch crap has gotten you? As a black man in this country, you’re six times more likely to be murdered. But, wait, it gets even better, because as a young black man living in an urban area, you’re thirty times more likely to be murdered. Congratulations.”

I knew the first factoid to be true. I made up the second one. But I didn’t think there was much chance these guys were going to call me on it. At the moment, they were just gawking at the strange white man who came into the projects to spout numbers from the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

“So go ahead,” I finished. “Keep not snitching. I just want both of you to remember this conversation so that when I write a story about one of your funerals someday, I can find the other one and say I told you so.”

* * *

From an outsider’s perspective, I’m sure what I was doing would not seem particularly wise: picking a verbal fight with two young men who were quite possibly involved in the local drug trade, quite possibly armed, and quite possibly ready to call in reinforcements who could quite possibly separate me from my face.

But I had a hunch that wasn’t going to happen. You really only got yourself in trouble in the projects if you were so strong as to be a threat or so weak as to be a target. As long as you existed somewhere in the murky middle, you were okay.

Besides, Braids and Hoodie were basically kids. And it’s not hard to keep kids a little off balance, especially if you’re telling them something they’ve never heard before. People don’t turn off that natural curiosity until they’re further into adulthood.

I glared at them a little bit, just to let my last statement sink in, and finally Hoodie broke the standoff. By laughing.

“Damn,” he said. “You one crazy nigga, you know that?”

I chuckled.

“That has to be the first time anyone has called me that, ” I said.

They both laughed.

“What’s your story about anyway?” Braids asked. “You said someone is messing with people in the projects?”

“Yeah, a Puerto Rican guy who sells people crooked mortgages.”

Braids and Hoodie just looked at each other blankly, then at me.

“He’s sort of short and squat,” I continued. “Shaved head. Wears a goatee. Probably drives a nice car-an Audi, maybe a Mercedes.”

“I ain’t never seen nobody like that,” Hoodie said.

“Only people who drive cars like that around here are…” Braids paused, not wanting to say too much.

Hoodie filled in the blank: “They’re people you already know. You know?”

In other words, they were pushing something with a little more kick than subprime mortgages.

“You ever see people around here selling mortgages?” I asked.

“Depends. What’s a mortgage?” Hoodie asked.

I suppose I shouldn’t have been shocked by the question. Why would a black kid raised in public housing-a kid reared in a family that had probably been in America for ten generations without owning a stick of property-know what a mortgage was?

“It’s…” I didn’t know where to begin. “Never mind. Okay, forget the Puerto Rican guy. You know someone named Akilah Harris?”

Braids and Hoodie exchanged glances again. But this time they were a lot more knowing.

“Maybe,” Hoodie said. And suddenly I realized they were both smirking.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” Braids said.

They stood there, grins widening. Obviously, Akilah was known in these parts. That was hardly surprising. Akilah was only a little older than these two. They had probably grown up with her.

“C’mon,” I said. “Spill.”

“I ain’t saying nothing,” Braids said, holding his hands in the air.

“Why you want to know?” Hoodie asked, obviously curious. “You making a story about her?”

“Her house burned down,” I said. “There were two kids inside.”

“Damn!” Braids said.

“Yeah, I heard about that,” Hoodie said. “Someone was saying it was on the news.”

Despite the tragedy of the situation, they were still smiling. Something about Akilah Harris was humorous to these guys, though I couldn’t imagine what. I tried to think like a teenaged boy. What made them laugh? Toilet humor. Fart jokes. But how would that be connected with Akilah? It just wasn’t coming to me.

“What’s so funny?” I said.

More smirking.

Finally, Hoodie couldn’t help himself. “You sure there were only two kids?” he said. “I figured she would have had, like, six by now.”

Braids busted up laughing. “With, like, eighteen different daddies,” he added, which made them both laugh harder.

Of course. The only thing teenaged boys found funnier than fart jokes was sex. And apparently Akilah Harris was known to be generous in that department.

“So she’s a ho,” I said.

“She’s like the biggest ho out here,” Braids confirmed.

“Is she sleeping with someone in particular?” I asked.

“Akilah? Shoot, who hasn’t she slept with?” Hoodie said. The boys yukked it up again and I laughed along with them, even though-if I started thinking like a mature adult for a moment-none of this was really all that amusing. I let them giggle themselves out, then tried to push the conversation away from the topic of Akilah’s promiscuity.

“From what I’m told, she moved out of here about three years ago,” I said.