Marlon James - A Brief History of Seven Killings

— I… I…

— You h’is going walk?

— I don’t know.

— Miss, you better get h’in the car.

— I can reach home, I say. I want to say that neither in, any, or is, is spelt with an H, but they can probably pick up when a woman is being rude.

— Where h’is ’ome, the next block?

— Havendale.

— Ha ha ha ha.

Police and their police laugh.

— No bus coming pass ’ere for the rest of the night. You going walk?

— Yes.

— With one ’eel?

— Yes.

— H’in a curfew? You know what sort of man h’on the street with you this time of night, lady? You the only woman who don’t watch news come nighttime? Scum of the earth deh ’pon the street. Which one of them word you can’t spell?

— I was just—

— You was just being a damn idiot. Better you did stay at the work till morning when bus start run. Get in the car.

— I don’t need—

— Lady, go inna the bloodcloth car. You breaking the law. Either you going ’ome or you going to lockup.

I get in the car. Two policemen get in the front, leaving the two cars and four policemen behind. At the stoplight a right turn takes you to Havendale. They turn left.

— Shortcut, they both say.

T his is the house by the sea. It only have one room and is not a house, but it used to be a home. The man who close the road to let the train pass, me no know him name but he dead in 1972 and nobody take him place. The train stop passing when West Kingston turn into the Wild West and every man turn into cowboy. I wanted to be Jim West, but him pants too tight. The TV in the chiney shop black and white but I guess that him pants is blue, a girl blue. This is the house that is one room and the man who used to live here sleep on a sponge and shit in a bucket that he wash out in the sea. Nobody remember him name. When they find him body all the water boil out of him but he wasn’t a skeleton yet. This house have two window. One look out at the sea and one look out at the tracks. When the train stop running, ghetto people try to steal the tracks, but don’t have no tool to break up something that heavy.

This is the colour of the room. The room paint in five colour that cut short. Red from floor to the bottom of the window. Green from the bottom of the window to the ceiling. Blue on the next wall reach the ceiling, but run out before it reach the corner. Pink that start the third wall and cover it. Green at the bottom of the fourth wall stopping in the middle with hard brushstroke, like he was begging and pleading and forcing the paint to stretch further. This is what it must be like for a man to grow old without a woman. Do he forget him parts and sad every time he have to piss for that remind him, or do he play with himself like some pervert? This is the one chair in the room, a red chair with dainty legs. Dainty is a word from a poem we learn in school. Love dainty Spanish needle with your yellow flower and white. Dew bedecked and softly sleeping, do you think of me tonight?

This is the first mistake God make. Time. God was a fool to create time. It’s the one thing that even he run out of. But me beyond time. Me in the now, which is now which is also then. Then is also soon and soon might as well be if. Two man just come in the house, making seven nine. One from Rema, two from Trench Town, three from Jungle, three from Copenhagen City.

This is the list of the men in the room.

Josey Wales, also known as Franklin Aloysius, also known as Ba-bye, who just come in with

Bam-Bam, who love to hold the gun but don’t know where to shoot.

Weeper, the police killer who have Babylon on the run. When he talk like a Jamaican he talk all coarse and evil. When he talk like a white man, he sound like he reading a book with big word. There is one thing about Weeper that no man who want to live talk about.

Heckle, who used to move with Jeckle until a bullet from PNP turn Jeckle from is to was.

Renton from Trench Town.

Matic from Trench Town.

Funky Chicken, who have the heroin shakes before they give him cocaine.

Two man from Jungle, one fat, one skinny, that I don’t know. The skinny one not even a man, not even a boy that much, him shirt open wide but no chest hair growing.

And me.

This is how ten man turn into nine. Three night ago. Matic from Trench Town try to light the C the way the Weeper show him, but he forget how and Weeper wasn’t there. A night with no moon and we with no flashlight to show the way to and from the house. Matic thinking he know the freebase and that a spoon full of C, is a spoon full of C, is a spoon full of C. Matic think that Weeper would leave C just anywhere and so he search the floor, in the corner, inside two cupboard near the window and in the ash of the coal stove near the door. He look and look and the other boys start looking too, feeling the C itch even though C don’t leave an itch, that is H. Matic find some white and when the other try to move in for him to share it, he pull out him gun. He use him own lighter and cook powder. He remember to heat the C in water and adding the baking soda he see in the cupboard. He smile like a pro while the other men look at him like a hungry tiger. But Matic forget the rest. He forget the other liquid that Weeper use, the ether. He was also stupid enough to think that Weeper would leave a stash in the house. The C wouldn’t burn, it wouldn’t change. No smoke was coming for him to smoke it, so he lick it. Lick the fire-hot spoon so hard that we hear him tongue sizzle. Freebase hit with a quick kick and the kick takes eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Nothing. Fuckery this, Matic, then fall frontway him face slamming into the floor with a bam and him mouth start to froth. Nobody touch him until Weeper come and laugh and ask if we didn’t think it funny that a dirty, nasty shack like this don’t have no rat.

This is how nine man become eight. Last night Josey Wales tell we what we going do. Renton from Trench Town say him cut a hit tune and he not pulling no gun like that boy in the Heptones who in prison when white man put him song in a movie. He say that him baby mother go to the Singer record studio and they give her money for the baby and her mother and her whole family. And he know that she is just one of more than hundred people that get help from the Singer and what goin’ happen if that stop? Josey Wales say that don’t make him better that make him worse because all him doing is giving poor people fish to eat because now that he reach he don’t want nobody else learn how to catch fish for himself. Some of we receive that reasoning but not Renton from Trench Town. Weeper take out him gun to shoot the bitch right deh so. Josey Wales say no, man, listen to the man and understand him reasoning. Then Josey Wales say that one has to know the factors. We don’t know what he mean, so he say kinetic energy: KE = mv 2/2 (where m is mass and v is velocity). Yaw. Deformation. Fragmentation. Bleeding. Hypovolemic shock. Exsanguination. Hypoxia. Pneumothorax, heart failure and brain damage. Bang. Him skull stopped the bullet but blood still splash on Weeper chest. Not me Starsky and Hutch t-shirt! Weeper say as the man body fall and he wipe brains off him chest. Josey Wales put the gun back in him holster.

This is how the white man teach we how to load an M16A1, an M16A2 and an M16A4.

Point the rifle muzzle in a safe direction.

Cock the rifle and open the bolt.

Return the charging handle to the forward position.

Place the selector lever on SAFE.

Check the chamber to ensure it is clear.

Insert the magazine, pushing it upward until the magazine catch engages and holds the magazine.

Tap upward on the bottom of the magazine to ensure it is seated.