Victor LaValle - Ecstatic

— There’s a great one where Godzilla fights a robot Godzilla and at first you can’t figure out how there could be two, but it’s aliens who created the fake, I said. Some others aliens show up in another Godzilla film controlling Monster Zero, also known as King Ghidrah.

— Anthony. No need to convince me. I believe in your dreams and I can help you finance them. It’s already underway. That’s my business.

The next day Mom rented a Dodge Neon for our trip to Maryland.

Brand new. It was a thing. New York was settling into winter so a trip five states south was exciting. I didn’t know my geography as well as I should, so anyplace below New Jersey was Alabama to me.

The trunk of the Dodge was bigger than our Oldsmobile Firenza’s; even when we’d stowed every suitcase there was room for more. This astonished us.

— What else could we bring? Grandma asked as we stood together looking in.

— Let’s pack more clothes, Mom offered.

This makes us sound idiotic, I know, and maybe we were acting like senseless early hominids, but really it was no different than cooing over a baby; we enjoyed a wonderful invention.

A telephone ring woke us from our daze as we stood with hands on varied parts of the car. Just touching. Nabisase went inside as Mom showed Grandma and I the demure — mumm- of the engine even when her foot was pressed to the gas. Nabisase called my name four times. But when I went inside she was talking on the phone and I was angry she called me away from the demonstration. I watched Mom pull out the driveway to take Grandma once around.

Nabisase said to the phone. — I just told you my name. Now tell me yours.

— Who is it? I whispered.

— You just heard me ask didn’t you? No, she told the caller. That was Anthony.

— He wants to talk to you, she said.

— Ishkabibble?

— If you don’t tell me your name I won’t let you talk to him.

I tried to grab the receiver out of her hand. — Is it Lorraine? She has a deep voice, I said.

My sister ignored me. — That’s a stupid name, she said to the caller. Ledric is just not normal.

— No, she corrected him a moment later. Nabisase isn’t crazy, it’s African.

After giving me the device I waited until she’d gone to her own room to finish packing.

— Why didn’t you just ask for me?

He heaved and sighed and spoke. — I heard a girl so I had to know who she was.

— She’s my sister. She’s thirteen, too.

— I only got her name.

— That’s more than you needed.

Mom and Grandma returned; the sound of the Neon’s doors shutting once they stepped out was a soft-shoe routine compared to our Oldsmobile, that rattletrap.

— Is it working? I asked.

— You sound more desperate than me! Ledric laughed.

— Is it?

— No.

— How do you know?

— I had a pizza yesterday and I’m still feeling stuffed today so I know them tapeworms didn’t eat the whole pie inside me.

— That’s not how it works, I said.

— You going to tell me about what you haven’t done?

— You don’t sound good, I told him. He really didn’t, but even before the tapeworms Ledric had to be a heavy breather.

— I got another jar of that fish so I’m going to try one more time, but you got to come over here if something happens to me.

— We’re going away for the weekend though. Wait till we get back.

He cleared his throat. — Where you going? He sounded bewildered. As if he’d never realized I lived a life independent of his own.

— Maryland, I said. A beauty pageant.

— For your mother?

— My sister, I whispered, because I didn’t want to admit this to him.

— Your sister looks that good?

— Don’t ask me that question again, I said.

He forced a laugh, but I wasn’t convinced. — You’re nineteen and she’s thirteen, I reminded him.

— Hey, come on. You’re my boy. I’m not thinking about her. By the time you get back Sunday I’ma be ready for my own modeling show, forget anyone else.

Packing was easy for me; I just folded three suits, changes of underwear into a duffel bag. Moving my mother’s things into the car was even easier for me because she had a manservant.

He walked through the front door as I got off the phone with Ledric. That skinny guy who lived next door.

— Who’s this? I said when he walked inside.

A second man walked in. Much bigger, overwhelmed by muscles. An upper-body so big it looked inconvenient.

The slim one said, — I’m a friend of your mother’s.

— You’re my age.

— She’s young at heart.

This could have been a big fight; what the skinny one said was already enough for me to break his jaw. Theoretically. The last thing I’d snapped was a KitKat bar. Worse than letting him sully my mother’s name though would’ve been to get beat down in my own living room.

— How come you didn’t invite no men to your party last month? the big one asked.

— I don’t even know your names.

But I did know now and had then, it was Pinch. That’s what he was called, but fuck this third-rate Tony Atlas. He was the king of security guards at a high school in Brooklyn; drove an amplified Honda CrX. Sure, I recognized him.

— I didn’t see you, I explained.

My mother’s friend said, — You looked right at us! I waved at you from my stoop.

The skinny guy, Candan, lived in the brick one-story house just to the right of ours. He stayed there with his mother and father. He did air-conditioner repair. Domestic and industrial. Finding a couple of generations at one address was normal; for Rosedale, as for much of the world, the worst thing a child could do was move away.

— When did you meet my mother? I asked. Candan, Pinch and I were the only people here.

Candan said, — We’ve been talking on and off since last year.

— Talking about what?

— We’ve talked about you, he said.

Candan’s ears were as small as quarters. So little I bet he couldn’t wear sunglasses in the summertime. When I noticed them his dominance was subdivided. I even smiled.

Pinch said, — I bet it’s going to be a long ride. You driving, Anthony?

— Yeah. My mother can’t stay awake more than a couple hours at night.

— Oh yes she does, Candan said.

— That’s all! Pinch yelled.

I was relieved to see the man could be tamed. Maybe not by me, but someone.

Candan pointed beyond me, down the hall, to the back. — Anyway, she asked me to get her bags from her room.

— She’s got a lock on the door.

It was my first response; not why you? Or why did she ask you? Or even why the fuck did she fucking ask fucking you, fuck?

— Your mother gave me the key.

He walked by me. Pinch asked for a glass of water. I took him into the kitchen.

Pinch wore a sweatshirt, but the fabric was stretched at the shoulders, along the arms, his back, oh everywhere. I wondered if he was one of those guys who had nothing else, no brains within, or maybe he’d been bullied as a child. I disparaged all physical discipline as the pastime of the witless. I certainly wasn’t going to admit that he looked nice.

— Do you know what my mother told Candan about me? Anything?

Pinch stared earnestly at the bottom of the glass as he drank.

I heard the door to my mother’s room open. As soon as Pinch was done I washed his cup three times, until I heard Candan come out of Mom’s bedroom.

I stepped into the hall and turned on the light so it’d be less gloomy. He locked the door. I heard him. When he turned around, with a small bag in his hand, I asked, — Can I see what she’s hiding in there?

— Tell me why I should?