George Pelecanos - Right as Rain

'Allen's doin' it again,' said Strange, well into the first round. 'He's headlockin' him, man; he doesn't want to fight.'

Allen seemed to fake an injury, claiming himself the victim of a low blow. The spectators became angry, calling Allen a punk and a bitch. As they grew more boisterous, they moved en masse toward the ring. The fight continued, with round after round the same. The crowd's taunts became louder and more threatening.

'These people want blood,' said Strange.

'Let's get out of here,' said Quinn. 'This fight stinks anyway, and you know Hopkins is gonna win.'

The four of them moved through the dense crowd. The young women in the crowd were mostly attractive, with shoulder-length, relaxed hairstyles that Juana called Brandy cuts. The oversized look was out for the young men. Many wore baseball jackets with leather sleeves and colorful sayings embroidered on the back. Someone bumped Quinn and he kept on, not knowing and trying not to care if it was intentional or not. But he felt his face flush as he walked away.

Out in the auditorium, as they walked down the carpeted lobby, a young man in a group of three made a comment directed at Juana, saying how he'd like to 'kick that shit deep.' Quinn felt his face grow hot and the tug of Juana's hand on his leather. He kept walking, and the movement calmed him.

Once outside, they walked down 10th. Strange and Quinn followed Janine and Juana, who were stepping quickly, talking to one another up ahead. A young black man was standing on the median, yelling at passing cars. 'I hate cracker motherfuckers!' he screamed. 'I swear to God, I'm gonna kill the next white motherfucker I see!'

'Sounds like the man's got some kind of hang-up,' said Strange, a playful light in his eyes. 'Doesn't he know, Terry, that the world is changing?'

'Think I ought to go tell him?' said Quinn.

'Go ahead,' said Strange, with a small grin. 'I'll make sure your lady gets home safe.'

Juana and Quinn followed Strange and Janine over to Stan's, where they had a round, and then another, before last call. By now they were all a little bit drunk, and Juana and Janine didn't seem to want the evening to end, so they agreed to meet up at Strange's row house for 'one more.'

Strange bought a twelve-pack at a market and drove up Georgia. Janine sat beside him on the bench, her thigh touching his, while Strange messed with the stereo, popping in War Live and fast-forwarding the tape to a song he liked.

'What you lookin' for?' asked Janine.

'"Get Down." Here it is.' Strange turned the bass dial and put more bottom into the mix. 'What's Ron doin' on Monday, you know?'

'He's workin' a couple of jumpers, I think.'

'I could use his help.'

'We need the money he's gonna bring into the business, Derek. Don't tell me this Wilson thing is going to result in a big payday, 'cause I know you're not gonna end up charging his mother enough. Let Ron do his thing and go on and do yours.'

'Yeah, you're right.' Strange turned up the volume and sang,' "The po-lice… We're talkin' 'bout the po-lice."'

Janine laughed. 'You're in rare form tonight, honey.'

'Havin' a good time, I guess.'

'Me, too. I like Juana. That's a together young lady right there. Going to law school down at GW, you know that? Might have her talk to Lionel about it, let him know in a backdoor kind of way that anybody can do anything, they set their mind to it. You know she didn't come from any kind of privilege or nothin' like that.'

'What about Terry? You think he's good for her?'

'They stay together, they're gonna have problems they don't even know about yet. Not to mention, all you've got to do is look in his eyes and see, that's an intense young man. He's got a lot of things to work out his own self before he can take on the responsibilities of a real relationship. But I do like him.'

Strange nodded, looking in the rearview mirror at the black VW following his car. 'So do I.'

In the Bug, Quinn shifted the stick while Juana worked the clutch and steered with her left hand. Her right hand was going through a box of tapes that sat in her lap.

'How about Lucinda Williams?' said Juana.

'The chick on Laverne and Shirley ?'

'You're thinkin' of Cindy Williams.'

'I'm fuckin' with you, girl.'

'Here, put this in, you'll like it.'

Quinn slipped the tape into the deck. 'Metal Firecracker' came through the system, filling the interior of the car.

'This rocks,' said Quinn.

'Yeah, Lucinda is bad.'

Quinn chuckled, looking through the windshield. 'Derek's got that Caddy all waxed up. I bet he really loves that car.'

'What's wrong with that?'

'Nothin'. I'm sayin' he's proud of it, is all. His age group, the symbol of success is a Cadillac. You know what I mean.'

'I guess I do.'

When Juana was a kid, she heard a white boy in her elementary school class call a Cadillac a 'nigger boat.' She had told herself from the start that Terry wasn't 'like that' in any kind of way. But how could you know what was really in a person's heart? He had downed more than a few beers tonight, and maybe this was him for real, loose and talking truly for the first time. Maybe what he believed was out of his control, that everything he had learned had been taught to him, and had been ingrained in him irreversibly, long ago. And maybe she was just being too sensitive. Once you started going in that direction, you could drive yourself crazy over something that was probably nothing at all.

'What's wrong?' said Quinn, looking at her face.

'Nothing, Tuh-ree,' said Juana, finding his hand and giving it a gentle squeeze. 'I was just thinking of you, that's all.'

Strange was doing something he called 'the chicken leg,' Janine dancing beside him, as 'Night Train' blared through his living room stereo. Quinn was nearby, shouting out encouragement between hits from a can of beer. Juana sat on the couch, twisting up a number from some herb and papers she had found in her purse. Greco lay on the floor with his head between his paws, his tail slowly thumping the carpet.

'Sonny Liston used to train to that one,' said Strange, as the song ended.

'Like you were doin' right there?' asked Quinn.

'Naw, man, that was a dance we used to do. Check this out.' Strange held up a CD with a photograph of a sixties-looking white girl on its cover. 'Mr Otis Redding. Otis Blue.'

'You already played that Solomon Burke. What, are we working our way up to modern times here?'

'This is the man right here,' Strange said, as Steve Cropper's bluesy guitar kicked it off on 'Ole Man Trouble,' the horns and then Otis's vocal coming behind it.

'Got any Motown?'

'Shoot, Terry, Motown ain't nothin' but soul music for white people, man.'

'How do I know? I wasn't even alive when this shit was playin' on the radio.'

'And I was still gettin' press-and-curls,' added Janine. 'Barely a child.'

'I was there,' said Strange. 'And it was right.'

Juana walked over with a joint in her hand. 'You guys want some of this?'

'I do,' said Quinn.

'Been a while for me,' said Strange.

'Come on,' said Juana.

'You all aren't gonna start acting funny now, are you?' asked Janine.

'What's this "you all" stuff?' said Strange.

The four of them stood in the middle of the living room floor and smoked the joint. Strange took Quinn's shotgun, but Juana refused it. Janine just waved her hand and laughed. By the time the joint was a roach, they were all alternately giggling and arguing over the next piece of music to be played.

Strange put Motor Booty Affair on the CD player and turned up the volume. 'The power of Parliament. Now we're gonna roll with it, y'all.'