Mat Johnson - Drop

Because I was alone, ladies began to orbit. When one came close I would turn my head and look past them. Reggie sat like the Lincoln Memorial while the woman on top of him bounced, her small pancake breasts flapping in front of his eyes. Over to their left, a couple stood, her leaning against the wall, panties pulled down to her thighs. She was looking over her shoulder, telling him to hurry up. His hands were on her waist, his ass vibrating like humming bird wings.

‘Hey baby, let me get on there,’ a voice said as she began to straddle me. Fingernails on my neck, weight bearing down on my thighs.

‘I don’t have any money,’ I told her. It didn’t come out as loud as I wanted.

‘It ain’t all about money, baby,’ she told me, pushing her crotch into mine. I could feel it reaching down into me, searching, looking for something to take hold of. A thick arm brushed by my face on its way to the chair and covered my cheek in cold liquid that stunk of spray deodorant and pointless masturbation. The next song had a fast beat, and she leaned forward trying to shake her breasts across my face, showering me in the dead liquid that coated her body. It slipped between my lips and tasted of nail polish remover.

‘Come on, baby, how you feeling?’ My rider reached down at my lap and was greeted only with the empty loose material of my pants. She pushed her hand deeper, farther, eventually locating the flaccid thing that avoided her. She walked off without looking at me.

‘Wow, she did that shit for free?’ Clive asked.

‘Yeah,’ I told him.

‘You the man,’ Clive said. But I was not a man. I was a thing in a hole. Shivering, wondering why I dug myself down in the first place.

I got up to leave. Nobody said anything, so I didn’t offer an explanation. I just concentrated on not touching anyone. I walked by the bar on the way to the stairs; there was a light beneath it that guided me. When I got to the steps the bouncer stopped me and flashed the light downstairs once to clear my departure. While I stood waiting, I saw the woman who had ridden me crouched beneath the bar. She was still naked, looking older in the light. She kneeled like a squirrel, in her hand a large yellow bag of peanut M&M’s that she dug into, throwing the candy up to her mouth. One after the other, tiny mortars, all caught and crunched with joy. She didn’t look at what she was doing, she didn’t even care what color they were. Just staring down at the floor like there was a book there and she could read it.

There was a bar about four blocks away, a place of old men. I sat on my stool, watching the Sixers get knocked out of the playoffs again. Around me, they talked about the past as if it was the one true world, as if the present was a shard of a broken destiny. I felt at home. Within the mix of their words, between the overlapping conversations of this small place, I heard a collage of David’s voice calling. Buy me a drink, you bastard, he said, and when all my bills had evaporated into change, Come to me, David was saying.

It was hotter outside than when I came in. I focused on walking a straight line. I was going somewhere, it just couldn’t be back to that apartment, its filth and clutter, or the life it was the home of. There was someone in front of me at the street light, hiding underneath the shadows of the el tracks. Yam-man, don’t come at me now, because I will kill you. I’ll kick you in the head so hard, I’ll use your skull as a sneaker. But the form was too tall for the yam-skinned man, and it was another shape. When I got closer, it wasn’t him all. Just another brother walking in the dark, coming from trouble or moving towards it like I was.

He was dressed like a child. High-top sneakers and brightly colored sports paraphernalia. A quilt of logos. His jeans were so large his legs looked like an elephant’s. Through his earphones and five feet of Philly space, I could hear his music’s rapid vibrations, see his head nod to its beat in forward circles. If you wanted to hear what the music said, you would be happy, because when he saw me standing next to him, waiting for the light to change and the few cars exploring the night to pull off, he started rapping along with it. It’s amazing how loud some people can talk without fully screaming. Isn’t that pleasant, him giving that gift to us? Out here on this hot spring night, going on three o’clock in the morning. So charitable of him, freeing all the open apartment windows above us from the tyranny of silence. The lyrics delivered proudly, his lips snarling in defiance as he gave his rhymes of power: people he was going to shoot, women he was going to bone, products he was going to acquire. As if power had anything to do with guns any more. As if it had something to do with the amount of weaklings you took advantage of, pussies your dick touched, or brand names you draped yourself in. As if power meant being free of empathy, compassion, self-control, or any other distinctly human emotion. As if power meant personifying everything the people who hated you were afraid of.

‘Nigger, what the fuck you looking at?’ He turned to me, prison haircut showing underneath his baseball cap.

‘A living archetype of black mediocrity.’

Redefinition. Power was a punch from a ring laden hand to an unprotected jaw (gold ain’t that soft). Power was a foot kicking into the stomach of a man already on the floor. Power was, on this street right now, hitting someone in the head with a trash can lid, slamming again until the metal was dented and the target had stopped trying to get up from the ground. Power was spitting on a man’s face that was already covered in blood, then continuing to wield that lid some more. Power was not a broken fool, lying at the corner of 51st and Market, giggling because he doubted his assailant even knew what ‘archetype’ meant. Rejoicing in his pain because it meant his life might soon be over.

A busted lip, a goldfish eye, ribs that felt barbecued and a pinkie too swollen for bending. For no reason, I was still living. I sat at my desk, listening to a British voice named Suzanne Patel, making me feel for a second as if I weren’t back in Philly answering phones for the electric company. At the end of Ms Patel’s application process I started asking made-up questions just to keep her on the line. Trying to fall into her voice while Reggie tapped against the aching that was my body’s side.

‘What the fuck is wrong with you, can’t you see I’m sore?’ I asked, hitting mute as Ms Patel kept talking. Reggie was the gray of frozen meat. ‘Trash,’ he said, reaching frantically under the desk by my knees.

‘Reg, why are you bugging?’ But Reggie was silent, bent over, staring into the bin.

‘Yo, Reg, what—’ A wave of slop exploded from his mouth, the stench immediate. Hot bile hit my lap. On my thigh, a partially digested tomato. Lynol jumped from his seat to place his hand on Reggie’s back. I plucked the red clump of tomato off me, watching it stick to the wall.

‘That’s it, boy, let it out.’ Lynol made circles with his palm on Reggie’s spine as Reggie breathed hard until again, sudden movement, the sound of liquid splashing against the trashcan’s plastic walls.

‘That’s it, boy, Lynol said. ‘That’s the Lord our God pushing Satan out you.’ From inside the can, Reggie said, ‘Blaaaaah.’ ‘That’s it, Reggie. Devil be gone!’

Everyone came from their desks. Reggie pulled his head up, waving Lynol off, and we all stood there watching him. The front of his shirt looked as if he’d been bobbing for pizza.

‘Goddamn!’ Cindy came over and the only thing she saw was me. ‘Damn, you look fucked up! Fucked up .’

‘Then go fuck me down again.’ I waved her off. ‘Excuse me’ came through my earphones. Ms Patel, still holding the line.