Mark Chiusano - Marine Park - Stories

As Javi walked back Andrew stuck his head out the window. Hey, Ed, he called. Hey. Ed Monahan looked up from where he was counting bills, startled. It’s Andrew. Andrew Dempsey, Andrew said. Ed squinted, his dirty ponytail shaking, like he wasn’t sure if Andrew was supposed to be an undercover cop or something — Marine Park had those too. Government employees popping up like McCain signs. How ya doing? Andrew asked, and Ed nodded. You know, fine, fine, all is good. Still playing ball? Andrew asked. Ed peered at him like he was crazy, and then pressed the button to pull his window up.

Javi opened the passenger-side door, putting the ziplock bag in his jeans pocket. Sorry, my friend, he said. Just quick, no problem. Andrew grinned at him. Javi smiled back. Do you want? he asked. Andrew considered. He hadn’t smoked since college, when there were weeks he remembered being high even on the basketball court. Playing pickup, only being able to play one game, because of the kick to the lungs, feeling glorious. But he was expecting to get the new consulting job. It was the type of thing that came with a drug test. They’d probably still be interviewing for the position, and he needed to give his two weeks’ notice. Come on, Javi said. I have one of these, he said, and pulled a one-hitter from his pocket, shaped like a cigarette, where the red glow of the ember could hang on the nether end.

• • •

There came a time when they were driving again, Andrew driving. He was upset to find that he didn’t feel much of anything, though he was relaxed. He couldn’t remember a time he was as relaxed as he was now. He hadn’t been back to Marine Park in a month, the last time he’d seen his parents. When will you have a girlfriend, Drew? his mother asked. Isn’t it time for that yet? You’re at work too much. His father sat at the kitchen counter, his undershirt tucked into his pants, reading the Daily News . Why don’t you consult for this government? he said. They’re shit out of luck. Might as well waste money another way. Isn’t it? his mother asked, still on the girlfriend.

A right here, Javi was saying. They were driving along the water, where the nature center was, a plot of open land. Andrew opened the window to let it out. Straight now, Javi said. They were on Gerritsen Avenue, going down.

Andrew found himself saying it as he was saying it. What do you talk to my father about, Javi, when you cut his hair? Javi looked at him strangely. Talk? he asked. We don’t talk. I cut. He sits. What talking? Andrew nodded sagely. It’s true, Andrew said.

They were next to the old public library. It was the end of the road. If you went farther, you hit the water. To the right there were stores and houses, and the library. And to the left there was a basketball court. I need to get one thing here, Javi said. For going home. He left and walked to the right. Andrew sat and watched the road in front of him. Then he got out of the car.

It was a basketball court that he hadn’t remembered ever being there before. Once he’d prided himself on knowing all the basketball courts in the neighborhood. They all had their character, like different positions. The Marine Park main courts, showcase courts — when the Times wrote a piece about basketball in the city, they mentioned it. The old men putting up tents between the courts and playing dominos. Read: black, but the newspaper didn’t say it. The newspaper didn’t mention Orthodox Jewish point guards reaching for their yarmulkes; the black men, polite, pausing the game if the yarmulkes fell off. You had to kiss them first, even Andrew knew that. It was the only thing a game stopped for. After, everyone went off in their own cars, to their own neighborhoods.

This basketball court, it didn’t have anything like that, just a couple kids, a guy and his girlfriend, playing Horse on the far court closer to the water. Some other kids hanging on the benches, drinking something. Not a court near the water like Manhattan, where the water was a character in itself — not like a vacation home. The water was an accident here. It was rough grass and overgrown baseball fields until Gerritsen Creek, Dead Horse Bay.

Andrew watched the guy and girlfriend taking turns shooting, his fingers in the chain-link fence. He had never been the type of kid who dribbled a basketball wherever he went; it was too showy. He took one with him, held against his side, to the park on off times, to practice his shot. There was a certain symmetry to it, the shot and the rebound, alone, the plodding along. The way you could continue to do the same thing over and over again, the only difference being the angle, the force of the shot off your fingers.

Behind him, he heard a car drive up and slow. Andrew turned. It was a white car, clean and overwaxed. Andrew squinted at the window and he thought it was Ed Monahan’s car, Ed’s squirrel face behind the half-tinted glass. The car stopped. It seemed like there was a face turned to watch, scowling. Then the car started again, and fled, and Andrew turned around.

He heard the last bounce of the ball. The girlfriend stood with the ball against her stomach, the boyfriend in front of her. A girl from the crowd of drinkers was yelling at them.

Want to see ghetto? the girl was saying. Want to see ghetto? I’ll show you ghetto. And she stomped, in the way of earth-shattering steps, to where the girlfriend was standing. She grabbed her hair, and started to pull her down.

Things got complicated then. Andrew would read about it in the Gazette some days later, but he could never tell if it was right in its entirety. The boyfriend pushed the hair-puller away; another boy came up to him with a box cutter. Andrew didn’t see a slash, more just two forward motions, and the boy moaned. The girlfriend was on the ground and someone was stomping on her chest. People were running by Andrew from the shops across the street, onto the court like a full-court press, trying to break the thing up, but Andrew couldn’t move. The baseline, painted white, was streaked with blood. A mob of people was on the court. And Andrew, Andrew walked slowly away, back to his car. Slowly he crossed the street and left the basketball court behind him.

Some moments later, a hand knocked on the passenger-side window. Javi was standing there, smiling, holding a bouquet of flowers. Andrew leaned over to open the door. For the daughter, Javi said.

• • •

Andrew drove slowly, as if he could no longer afford speed. He didn’t think Javi had seen anything. He didn’t think he would have to explain — the girl stomping forward, extending her arms. They did not speak in the car, with the sun starting to go down, the arch-necked streetlights coming on. Javi kept twirling the top of his hair. He hummed softly, even though the radio was on.

Javi had told Andrew once about where he came from, a Mexican valley somewhere. His family, father and sons, mother and daughters, all were haircutters. They had been to school for it. Only Javi had come to America. It was colder here, Javi said, but often cold there in the winter. Being near the water made it temperate. In the winter, some months, Javi took up and left, went with his daughter back to Mexico, closed the shop. Andrew remembered looking at the sign, the lights off.

At the train they shook hands, hard clasps, fingers tight. OK, my friend, Javi said. All finished. He took his bouquet and left. Andrew watched as he put the flowers in his teeth to use the MetroCard, to swipe himself through.

Andrew began to drive, aimlessly. He needed to go back to his apartment in the city, park the car in the parking garage below the building, which he paid good money for. He had to be at work at eight thirty, something that didn’t seem likely to change, at the new job if he got it or anytime in the future. He imagined waking up to get to work at eight thirty for an unimaginable stretch ahead, the long days passing like opposite-lane cars.