Marlon James - A Brief History of Seven Killings

— What? Why wouldn’t I?… I don’t take orders from… wait a minute. What did you say?

— Don’t go over there.

— No. You said don’t go over there tonight. You’re up to something, Barry Diflorio.

— I said I don’t know what you’re talking about.

— I wasn’t asking a question. As for the part where you get all spooky again to make me mind my own business, let me save you the trouble by not caring. Barry—

— What? What now, Claire? What the fuck now?

— You missed the left turn for the hairdresser.

The wife thinks she’s the only one who wants to go home. I want that too. I want it so fucking bad I can taste it. The difference is I already know that there’s no place we can go back to, no home in that sense anymore. Neither of us remembers that little Aiden is still in the car.

T he weird thing is, you try to sleep, you try so hard that you realize soon enough that you’re actually working at falling asleep, and will never really fall asleep because then it’s not sleep anymore, it’s work. Pretty soon you need a break from work.

I open the slide door and let traffic in. The problem with New Kingston is that reggae is too far away. I never had this problem when I stayed downtown where music, some jam session or some concert, always bubbled up. But damn brother, this is 1976, almost 1977. People from the embassy who I don’t even know started telling me to not go below Crossroads after a certain time, people who’ve lived here for five years, and yet still sweat before noon. You can’t trust somebody who tells you how much they loved your column about The Moody Blues. I’ve never written any column about The Moody fucking Blues. And even if I did, it would never be something some asshole getting fucked by the man would like.

Couldn’t sleep so I put my jeans and t-shirt on and went downstairs. I need to blow this joint. The woman at the front desk was snoring so I slipped by before she gave the customary heads-up to all white people leaving locked doors at night. Outside the heat is fucking dancing around me. The curfew is still on so all you get is the feeling that trouble might want to hang out, but no real trouble at all. Here’s the skinny on the rest of the night: I see a taxi driver, reading the Star in his car parked in the parking lot and ask if he could take me to somewhere that’s still jumping. He looks at me like he sorta knew the type, but maybe the jeans were too tight, hair too long or legs too skinny, and I wasn’t some fat fucker in a Jamaican Me Crazy t-shirt who came down here to ball with his little dick.

— I think, Mayfair Hotel lock up, pardner, the taxi driver says and I don’t blame him.

— Wasn’t thinking of somewhere white folks go to run away from the black folks, buddy. Hook me up with some real action?

He looks at me good and even folds the newspaper. I’d be a liar if I said this isn’t one of the greatest feelings in the world — when the normally unflappable Jamaican just got his ass flapped. He looks at me like it’s the first time he’s seeing me tonight. Of course this is the point where 99.9 percent of Americans fuck it up by getting too excited that a Jamdowner thinks they’re cool without passing the can-you-bubble-to-the-reggae-riddim test first.

— What make you think anywhere open? Curfew, me brother, everywhere under heavy manners.

— Come on. In Funky Kingston? Not even curfew puts this city on lockdown.

— You looking for trouble.

— Nah, running away from it most likely.

— Wasn’t asking no question.

— Ha. So come on, somewhere must be jumping, curfew or no curfew. You’re telling me all of this city is locked up tight? On a Friday night? That’s some crazy jive, mister.

— Friday morning.

He looks me down again. I’m tempted to say yeah, bud, I only look like a stupid tourist.

— Jump in and let see what we can find, he said. We going to have to stay off main road so Babylon don’t stop we.

— Rock ’n’ roll.

— That’s what you going say when you see these roads, he says.

I want to say buddy, I’ve been to Rose Town but that’s just white people mistake number ten: being proud about visiting somewhere Jamaicans would never be proud to visit. He took me to the Turntable Club up Red Hills Road, another one of those streets that the hotel concierge gives a strict time limit on how long a person of caucasoid extraction (her words, not mine, swear to God) should consider himself safe. We passed a line of boys roasting chicken in oil drums with the smoke hazing straight across the road. Men and women sitting in cars, standing by the roadside, eating pan chicken and soft white bread, closing their eyes with big grins, as if nobody should be getting this kind of bliss at three in the morning. Seems nobody here heard there’s a curfew. Funny that we should end up at the Turntable Club because the last time I was here I was trailing Mick Jagger. Dude was going batshit crazy over all the stone-ass foxes in the club and all his favourite colour, black. The driver asks me if I’ve ever been to Turntable and as much as I don’t want to be a smartass, I hate when they think I’m just some ignorant cracker.

— Breezed through a couple times. Hey, whatever happened to Top Hat? And didn’t Tit For Tat used to be just down the street? Saw some dude get fucking clobbered for hitting up some pot in the bathroom. Bud, just between me and you? I always liked Neptune better. Turntable gets too mellow, man. And they play too much fucking disco.

He spent so much time staring me down in the rearview mirror that it’s a wonder we didn’t crash.

— You know your Kingston, he says.

And it weirds me out. I never even liked Neptune and was only guessing at Top Hat, I could have sworn it was called Tip-Top. Without Mick or Keith to tail, the Turntable Club became just any other club with too much red light. Thick with people like this curfew was somebody else’s business, not theirs. I got a beer and somebody tapped my shoulder.

— I goin’ keep talking to you while you try your hardest to remember my name, she said.

— You always such a smartass?

— No, just making it easy for you. Whole heap of black women in here.

— Give yourself some more credit.

— I give myself plenty credit. You, on the other hand. You buying me a Heineken or what?

And so it goes, I wake up before the sun comes out and she’s in the bed beside me, not snoring but breathing heavy. I wonder if this how every Jamaican breathes, you know, just out of pressure or necessity. Can’t remember when she wrapped herself into the covers tight, like I did something that she doesn’t want me to do again. I want to wake her up and go sweetie I know the deal with Jamaican women, hell with any foreign women. They have to take the lead and it’s cool city, really. Pete from Creem landed in jail two years back when a Bermuda groupie started screaming rape, because according to him, he only suggested they French fuck. I remembered her. Jamaican girl who said she went to Brooklyn whenever she wanted to experience ghetto life. I remember that made me laugh out loud. Dark, dark skin, straight, straight hair and voice that’s never tender, ever. Of course we slept together that night, both of us were at the Supersoul concert being bored by the Temptations trying to phone it in, and neither of us was having any fun. Truth be told I was happy to see her at the Turntable. It had been a year. Figured out the name yet? she said as we went back to the taxi that I didn’t know waited for me. The driver nodded but I couldn’t tell if it was in approval.

— Me say if you remember my name yet?

— No, but you look an awful lot like a girl I know named Aisha.