Brad Parks - Eyes of the Innocent

My assignment would involve a visit to Reginald Jamison, one of my best sources for all things hood related. He made a surprisingly good living selling silk-screened T-shirts out of a storefront on Clinton Avenue. Everyone called him “T-shirt Man,” which was then shortened to “Tee.” I was probably one of the few people who came into his store who knew his real name was Reginald.

Tee and I had gotten to know each other a few years back when I did a story that cast him in a favorable light as an entrepreneur. We had been buddies ever since. I liked having a guy plugged into the streets. He liked the novelty of having a white friend-in some parts of Newark, it was almost like keeping an exotic pet.

Tee was about 250 pounds of muscle, tattoo ink, and braids, all of which gave off the impression he was one tough gangsta, a front he maintained when it served him. In reality, the dude was about as hard as a roll of Charmin. He had a wife he doted on (mostly because she’d kick his ass if he didn’t). And he had a sentimental streak that was even wider than his biceps. I once caught him watching a bootleg DVD of Love Actually in the back of his store.

As a businessman, he was strictly legit. Still, he grew up with most of the illegitimate businessmen in the area, so he was well acquainted with the city’s informal economic infrastructure and didn’t mind sharing his contacts now and then.

By the time I made it to Tee’s place, it was about ten o’clock.

“Aw shoot, Whitey’s here, hide the weed!” Tee crowed when he saw me.

“C’mon,” I said, “since when does white man need to actually see the weed before he makes an arrest? You know I’ll just plant it on you later if I have to.”

“Good point,” he said as we shook hands, then slipped into his exaggerated white man’s voice: “To what do I owe the pleasure of your appearance, Mr. Ross?”

“I got a hypothetical question for you,” I said.

“Yeah, but it probably ain’t all that hypothetical, right?” he said, switching back to his normal voice.

“Well, let’s just say you’re a citizen of Newark who has recently come into a substantial amount of jewelry and you want to liquidate your holdings,” I said. “Is there a merchant in the city who provides such a service without probing too deeply into the origin of the items in question?”

“Now, why you think I know something like that?” he said in a fake rage. “Why is it anytime Whitey needs to know about stealing stuff, he come see his black friend, huh? Because that’s all the black man is good for, huh? How come you’re not coming here to ask me my thoughts on municipal bonds?”

“Because I’m not in a high enough tax bracket to take advantage of the benefits of munies,” I answered.

“Oh,” Tee said. “Well, in that case, yeah, I know the guy you gotta see.”

“Who?”

“This is off the record, right?”

“Of course.”

“Well, allegedly”-“allegedly” is one of Tee’s favorite words-“you go see Maury.”

“Maury?”

“Yeah, that’s the name of the pawnshop. The dude who own it ain’t named Maury-it’s named after some Jewish dude who owned it a thousand years ago. But people still call him ‘Maury’ anyway. Everyone in the hood knows: you got some stuff, you need some cash, you go to Maury.”

“And he’s, uh, not known to ask many questions?”

“Most of the rest of the pawnshops make you fill out all kinds of paperwork, do this ninety-day waiting period thing, all that. Maury is known to be a little less strict with his bookkeeping,” Tee said, then added, “allegedly.”

“And if I strolled in, asked for Maury, and inquired about some particular jewelry?”

Tee laughed.

“He’d assume you’re a cop and suddenly get real hard of hearing, you know what I’m sayin’?”

“I do. So what’s my plan?”

“Well, break it down for me here. What are we dealing with?”

I told Tee the whole sordid tale of Akilah and Sweet Thang, finishing with my frantic 6:14 A.M. wake-up call and the small amount of culpability I felt in the whole mess.

“So you got yourself some tasty little honey and you’re trying to get her stuff back?” he cooed. “Oh, that’s sweeeet.”

“Yeah, I’m just made of cotton candy. Do you think you can introduce me to this Maury character?”

“Oh, I don’t actually know him,” Tee said. “I just know him by reputation.”

“So you know someone who knows him?”

“Let me make some calls,” Tee said. “I’ll holler at you later?”

I was about to answer when I was interrupted by the sound of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony coming from my pocket.

“That’s my editor,” I said. “Like the ringtone?”

“Remind me to download you some LL Cool J.”

“That’s, what, a drink or something?”

Tee just shook his head and muttered, “White people.”

* * *

I waved at Tee as I left his store and went into the street to answer the call.

“Good morning, sunshine!” I said.

“Tell me you got something,” Szanto barked.

“Tell me what you’re talking about.”

“Windy Byers,” Szanto said, exasperated. “Brodie somehow thinks there’s a Pulitzer somewhere in this. He’s got a boner that could win him the county pole vault championships.”

Wendell A. Byers Jr.-nickname: Windy-was a Newark councilman. He was a bit of an idiot and lot of a blowhard, the kind of guy who had the habit of talking when he should have been listening. I had met him enough times that a picture of him appeared in my mind. He was African-American, but he straightened his salt-and-pepper hair, which was brushed back across his head. He was in his fifties, but the weight he carried made him look older. And he had one of those meticulously groomed, pencil-thin mustaches, and it was etched across his fleshy, flaccid face.

His father, Wendell senior, had also been a Newark councilman. And that, apparently, was enough for the citizens of the Central Ward, who had been sending someone with that name to represent them for the last forty years or so. As a result of this honor, Windy Byers spent a long and thoroughly undistinguished political career being driven around in a city SUV, pretending he was important. It was unclear what the citizens got out of the deal.

“Uh, I’m sorry, what’s happening with Windy Byers?” I said.

“He’s missing. Didn’t you read the paper this morning?”

I cursed my lousy karma: of all the mornings to not glance at the paper before I left. I thought about offering any number of creative excuses-most of which would have required knowledge of viruses that cause temporary blindness-but decided on the truth instead: “No. I kind of had a little emergency this morning.”

“You want to tell me what’s more important than a kidnapped city councilman?”

This was not going to be easy.

“Sweet Thang’s charm bracelet,” I answered. I was glad Szanto couldn’t see me, because I was grinning like an idiot and it would have driven him berserk.

“Come again?”

“You know the story Sweet Thang and I wrote yesterday?”

“Yeah. It got bumped off A1 by the Byers story and buried on the county news page-not that you would know because you didn’t read the paper. Anyway, what about it?”

“Well, you may or may not be aware, but Sweet Thang is a rather kindhearted young woman and she, uhhh…” I paused, groping for the right words. I had hoped to have this little mess cleaned up before anyone needed to learn about it. Sweet Thang was going to have a hard time living this down. And I was going to have a hard time explaining it in a way that wouldn’t have Szanto shotgunning Tums.

“Have I not made it clear I’m in a hurry this morning?” Szanto barked.