Jeffery Allen - Rails Under My Back

YEAH. THERE WAS THIS LADY WIT NO HANDS AND NO FEET DRIVIN A CAR.

Nigga, you lyin, Abu said.

Straight up. One foot on the gas pedal. One foot on the steering wheel.

You lyin.

On the TV. In West Memphis.

No way.

They can do shit like that down South. On this other show, this man wit no hands and no arms was playin the drums.

Impossible.

That’s cause you ain’t never been down South.

Sure. Anything you say.

A trickle of water rolled down the train window. A second trickle staggered down as the train sped through the black tunnel.

You’ll be back, Abu said. Hatch turned to see the other studying him with true concern in his eyes. Abu leaned over his stomach, leaned in close. You’ll be back, he said. He lifted an invisible glass into the air, toasting to many more talented days.

Hatch allowed his eyes to travel the car. Look at that old motherfucker, he said, nodding at a white jackal who sat across the aisle intent on his newspaper.

Abu said nothing, clearly shocked at the swift shift in subject.

Man, jus look at him!

Ah, he’s old.

Yeah, but I bet he’s done a lot of damage.

At the next station, more jackals boarded the train, a pack, foul with the bowels of hell. Hatch pinched his nose.

What’s up with that? Abu said. Why you pinchin your nose?

I can’t breathe with all these jackals, Hatch said, nasal. He continued to pinch his nose.

Many of the jackals exited the train at the next station.

Good, Hatch said. He released his nose. Now we can breathe.

You too much, Abu said. Too much.

A nigga bopped onto the train. He walked stiffly on bowed legs, a cardboard skeleton, hinged limbs moving limply from side to side. He sat down and immediately fell asleep. The train pulled into squealing shaking speed.

That’s No Face the Thief! Hatch said.

Where?

Over there.

That ain’t him.

That’s him.

Hatch recognized the black eye patch. Pin-striped like his tailored pinstriped suit.

He sure is funny-lookin, Abu said.

Yeah, Hatch said. He studied the sleeping No Face, nervous inside with secret knowledge.

The train slowed to a stop. Union Station. The doors ripped open.

This our stop, Abu said. He bounded to his feet.

Hatch remained in his seat, studying the snoring No Face — the eye patch a target, a map destination — between open spaces of the detraining commuters.

Come on! Abu said.

Hatch was still watching No Face, thinking, weighing.

Come on!

Abu’s command pulled Hatch to his feet. A sea of arms pushed them onto the subway platform, their legs hardly moving. Hatch rooted himself on the crowded platform while Abu continued. The train began to pull away. No Face the Thief opened his one sleeping eye and winked at him. He shuddered, shocked. Watched the speeding train disappear into the curving tunnel.

A CLUSTER OF BRIGHT SHOPS branched about them. The Underground. Their rubber heels made dull bouncing sounds on the escalator’s steel stairs. Hatch looked with hatred at the happy shoppers. Look at them, he said.

There you go again, Abu said.

I bet you they all Jews.

Now you gon start that Jew stuff.

They like mushrooms. Wherever you piss, they sprout up.

Abu shook his head.

Many jackals paraded outside the shops of Circle Square, spears rising like spokes from their snapped briefcases. Calling him. Mocking him. Defying him. Challenging him. Bums begged on the concrete sidewalks in the open heat, like lizards baking on a rock.

Kind sir, could you—

Not today, Hatch said.

Light breaks, red and pure. Night comes quickly. The sun falls like a cannonball and a red moon takes its place.

I knew we came the long way, Abu said.

Suspended on iron stilts, the elevated train led its passengers through the promised land of perspective.

I told you, Abu said. See, I told you. We should have taken the El.

So what, Hatch said. Stop bitchin.

You jus hate to be wrong.

Sabine Hall stuck up above the horizon like a needle point, downtown behind it. Buildings stacked up and arrowing toward the sky like chevrons. And Red Hook in the far distance, both splendid and monstrous, red bones glowing beneath its transparent skin.

A haze moved slowly in toward the horizon. Glazed it over, white sight.

Let’s go.

I told you.

Hatch and Abu moved on through the shape-shifting night. A block or two later angry words came pouncing up the street to greet them.

What’s going on? Abu said.

I don’t know.

They continued.

Holy shit!

Abu and Hatch stopped, stood, and surveyed the scene before them.

Blue wood horses shaped the street into a massive boxing ring with demonstrators boxed off inside it. Cops in beetlelike armor crawled about the perimeter.

Come on, Hatch said. In one swift clean movement, he ducked under a horse. He would not be denied. He had paid an honest price.

Wait, Abu said. Wait.

Come on. Don’t be a punk.

Hatch and Abu waded into the wet mob. Hatch left off thinking and let his body do the work. He tried to push forward — Excuse me. Excuse me. Coming through. Excuse me — push through the mob, push on to Sabine Hall.

Wait, Abu said, following behind him. Wait. Where are you going?

Faces turned to watch them with angry curiosity. Bodies closed around them. They could go no further.

Damn! Hatch said. Fuck! He stood sorting the city and Sabine Hall from his eyes, from the air, the night.

Dressed in colored spangles, the demonstrators knock him about, unbalanced, unsteady, left right, bell, pendulum. Their commands and demands on walls, windows, hands, backs, faces, bobbing in the air, spit into ghostly acts on the night.

The cops open their mouths to say, Come on, come through me. Their teeth are gates.

Hatch feels air damp with anticipatory sweat.

God cannot lie, Abu says. He stands trembling like a terrified tourist in a big, notorious city. God has no reason to lie.

Moonlight falls with a tarnish. The moon (or the fallen sun) holds like a red bull’s-eye. Patterned stars dangle weblike in shafts of moonlight. Clothe bodies in subtle threads.

The demonstrators open their lungs to dark fire. One short rebel runs forward, throws a burning something, then darts back. The cops do not move or react, their foundation built of fire-resistant materials. Hatch wonders at the beauty of their blue bodies in the black night. Blue bodies proudly bearing new uniforms with blue crossed suspenders.

The demonstrators move forward without fear. The days cannot touch them. Hatch hears anger and repeats its sound. He absorbs the beautiful scent of standing, belonging, purpose. A light goes on in him, somewhere, inside. His call of discovery.

The lead officer shouts health-giving words through a bullhorn, voice crackling with feedback. The demonstration leader answers in words seasoned with salt. Hatch follows it all, enjoying himself, chuckling, taken from high moment to high moment.

Cops red-stain faces with straight-beamed flashlights. Blinded, Hatch brings language rightly to his tongue. You fucking pig!

The blue wood horses gallop off into shadows. The blue cops scuttle forward. The square street breaks into shapeless chance. Hatch stands silent and even, breathing in and out, staring at waves of cops. Uncertain. Possibilities flying apart at the speed of thought.

Butcher-fashion, a cop chops downward at Hatch with his billy club. Hatch meets the hatchet with Mr. Pulliam’s old army bag. The nightstick recalls its circle and sets out again. Hatch can see the cop clearly before him, gnats crashing into his glass face mask. His eyes turn into stars. Hatch keeps his shield high and searches about him, searches, needing, hoping, wishing for more invisible darkness.