Bed-Stuy Is Burning Read online

  “Sure,” she had said. “If it will make you happy.”

  “It’s not about making me happy.”

  “It’s not about making you happy? Of course it is! What else could it be about? You’ve been doing so well. I thought we were doing so well.”

  Amelia wiped away tears.

  He’d thought right then about getting on his knees over dinner and proposing marriage again.

  He needed her, and they loved each other. He was trying to be less damaged. He was trying. She’d saved him, he reminded himself on that subway into Manhattan.

  Chapter 12

  Throwstrikes Lanes

  Twisted clown faces. Garish blaring electronic dance music. Long tubes of orange and green fluorescent lights. Aaron downed a double Dewar’s at the Throwstrikes bar before joining the group. A girl had just arrived, too. A woman. Pretty—like a precocious girl grown up.

  “Finally!” she said. “Let’s start a game! Those guys are too serious, and I’ve been waiting for someone new to show up because I’ve rented the shoes and I want to try them out!”

  “I’m Aaron,” he said.

  “Pleased to meet you,” she said. “I kind of want to drop a ball on my foot just to see if it hurts. That’s the point of these things, right? Otherwise why would we need to rent shoes? What year is it? Renting shoes?”

  Amelia was wearing a short red summer dress with her bowling shoes.

  “I haven’t gone bowling since I was a little girl,” she said. Her face lit up, as though she was just at that moment remembering all the pleasures of being a little girl. “I went alone with my mom—the only thing I remember our ever having actually done together—and I was beating her the whole time, but she got two strikes at the end and beat me and I cried all the way home. She must have won thirty-five to thirty! I even sat in the backseat because I didn’t want to be next to her I was so angry!”

  Amelia’s two hands were holding Aaron’s right hand. She was looking at Aaron, who was suddenly embarrassed to be wearing khaki pants. Though he was initially taken aback by all this storytelling and the intensity with which she looked him in the eye, it was the first time he’d felt warmth and honesty in months. And the way she was dressed took him back in time to a place before losing his job, before rabbinical school, and before the first time he placed a bet (in high school, the Knicks lost, but it was at the buzzer!). He asked her questions about her absent mother, and she asked about his melancholic father, and miraculously, no one else arrived, and the other people already there were all competitive bowlers who wanted to maintain their game of five.

  Their knees touched under the table at a cowboy beer bar on St. Mark’s Place between Second and Third avenues. They’d ordered a pitcher and Amelia was drunk. “There’s so much I want to tell you!” she said. “I don’t get it! I’ve never wanted to tell someone so much before. I feel like I’m running out of time. You seem like you’re in no rush, like you’re finished doing whatever you wanted to do and now you can just sit here and talk. But then there’s also something else about you. I don’t know what I’m saying!”

  “We have all the time in the world,” he said, feeling just the opposite of her appraisal of him. He had to hold himself back from giggling stupidly or jumping up and down in his seat like a little kid. Years later, when Simon was asleep and Aaron and Amelia were exhausted on the couch in the TV room and talking about those first days, they’d agreed that it was like their lives had somehow shifted or recalibrated and made room for the possibility of someone they’d want to tell everything that’d ever happened to them.

  They were rubbing knees and holding hands under the table at the cowboy bar. Amelia was struggling to keep herself sitting upright with all that beer in her, so he was surprised when she stood up to leave. They’d already friended each other on Facebook so he wasn’t worried about getting back in touch—but it was early for a Saturday, not even eleven, and he was surprised she didn’t want the evening to continue. After walking her out, he returned to finish the pitcher of beer and wonder if he could allow himself to put this much hope into a single person. He’d told her he was a financial manager and she’d seemed fine with it. It was a job, she seemed to feel. It wasn’t anything more than that.

  He found out later that night on Facebook that she was married. He laughed at first, but then he drank. He drank the four beers in his fridge, then he drank the half bottle of whisky he had in the cabinet, and then he opened the good bottle of champagne he was saving for when his father got off enough meds to have a drink or two again. This allowed Aaron to open four separate poker sites and play. He played through the night, through the next day, through the day after that, and he was down eighteen grand when he woke up in the chair three days later. It was a month before he built up the nerve to contact her again.

  Chapter 13

  Just after Aaron left for work, Mr. Jupiter came over to visit. Antoinette knew it was him, because she feared it was him at the same time she wanted it to be. It couldn’t have been more than a half hour after Amelia made it clear she disapproved of his coming over. But Jupiter was Aaron and Amelia’s neighbor. How could she turn him away? Even if she had wanted to?

  The first time Mr. Jupiter had come over, he’d said he needed to check something on the fuse box. Antoinette kept him outside while she texted Aaron, and Aaron texted back saying to let Mr. Jupiter into the basement, but afterward, when Mr. Jupiter asked to give Simon a kiss on the forehead, she told him no way, her boss didn’t say anything about anything other than the basement, and she needed this job.

  Things got slightly more complicated when, same time the following Monday, Mr. Jupiter came over with a freshly baked dark chocolate, milk chocolate marshmallow cake, like he could tell that kind of thing was Antoinette’s favorite. Antoinette would have preferred dark chocolate all the way through, but anything chocolate was fine by her, and the way he’d asked to kiss baby Simon on the forehead the first time made her think he was okay, so she invited him in and they sat at the dining room table and talked. Mr. Jupiter cut two big pieces of the dark chocolate, milk chocolate marshmallow cake, and Simon sat like a good boy in Antoinette’s lap. Antoinette’s aunt always said there was no better test of a man’s character than how a baby responded to him, and Simon seemed at ease around Mr. Jupiter.

  The first time—two months ago—Mr. Jupiter had come over he’d been wearing his work clothes and he’d had soot on his hands, or oil maybe, which was also one of the reasons Antoinette didn’t feel bad about refusing to invite him inside, but the second time he’d dressed up nicely with clean jeans and a Brooklyn Nets jersey. He asked her if she liked working for Aaron, and she told him she did so far, though it had only been a couple of months. She told him her last job had gone on years, and the first six months were always difficult to tell. She told him the truth, though even if she’d hated the job she wouldn’t have said so. There was always a chance that Mr. Jupiter and Aaron drank together, and when men drank together, they talked about what they knew might be of interest to the other.

  That second time, Antoinette asked Mr. Jupiter how long he’d lived in the neighborhood and he said going on fifteen years. Simon was napping in the Pack ’n Play, so they hunched over the dining room table together speaking in whispers. She asked where before that, and he started telling her all about his life, about how he was born in Georgia, but his people down there just didn’t want enough for themselves.

  Her mother had always said the same for their people in Jamaica, but Mr. Jupiter didn’t really listen; instead he just started talking about New York like he was a politician.

  “Well, there are two New Yorks,” he said.

  She asked him what he meant, assuming he meant rich and poor like the mayor liked to say, but Mr. Jupiter meant something else:

  “I read that over forty percent of New York City residents were born in another country. Three million foreign-born immigrants live in New York City, more than any other city in the world. More fore
ign-born immigrants live in New York than there are people in Chicago. And that’s not even including people like me who come up from the South. And there are tons of us. Just look around. My family down south—and don’t get me wrong, I like to visit when it gets cold up here—they’re a bunch of fucking hicks.”

  He had a funny way of talking where if he began to sound too smart he’d say something at the end of what he was saying to make himself sound ignorant again. “Fuck me up the goat ass,” he said.

  “Don’t talk like that in front of the baby,” Antoinette said. “Even if he is sleeping.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” Antoinette said.

  Antoinette made it a point not to let Teddy talk like this. Teddy was going to grow up smart like Mr. Jupiter, but he wasn’t going to feel the need to apologize for it. If he wanted to say something smart, he could just say it without following it up by calling his family a bunch of fucking hicks.

  “If you ever need to go anywhere,” Mr. Jupiter said, “ever need a break or anything like that, just let me know, and I can watch the baby. I’ve raised my own boy, you know. And I’ve got a few guys working for me now. So they can take care of business and I can come over and look out for the baby.”

  “Thanks,” Antoinette said, “but that won’t be necessary.”

  “I just mean if you need to go the bank or the hardware store or anything, or if you need to take your own boy to the doctor. With the hours you work, I know how hard it must be for you. And I’ve raised my own boy. When I was nineteen, twenty, I had a baby with an island girl like you. The DR. Not Jamaica. I like Jamaicans more. They’ve got more rhythm, more kindness, usually. But I fell hard for this girl.”

  “Yeah?” Antoinette said. This story didn’t concern her, and she didn’t want to encourage him talking too much and asking too many questions, especially if it meant he’d feel it was acceptable to keep on coming over to the house while she was working, but she was interested in what kind of life he lived. She liked that he’d raised a son. He kept on making sure his Nets Jersey was tucked into his jeans. There was something cute about how careful he was with his clothing. And though she’d never trust the baby to someone else when he was supposed to be in her care, it was generous of him to offer.

  “I’d been up here living with an uncle and aunt and they wanted to kill me when they found out I got a girl pregnant,” he said. “Even though I cared for the girl and I was willing to marry her. Shit. I wanted to marry her. Who’d ever heard of a pregnant girl unwilling to marry the father? I was living in East Brooklyn for a piece. Her parents wanted to kill me, too. Turned out she was seeing another guy the whole time. That was why she wouldn’t marry me. Impossible to tell whose boy it was without paternity, and I’m not going to take the test after sixteen years raising him as my own. He’s even got my name.”

  “Jupiter?” Antoinette said.

  “Ha! That’s a good one. That’s a good one! No! I mean, yes, of course, Jupiter. But his name’s Derek, too. Like mine. We’re both Derek. You can call me that if you’d like.”

  “I like Jupiter,” she said. “It’s uncommon.”

  “Then I do, too. So. So. After nine months of doc appointments and my working my ass off to get us set up in my aunt and uncle’s place and promising we’re going to move out—no drink, waking up early, no gambling, nothing, and then a year more of hardly seeing either of them—the girl or my baby—because of how much I’m working and putting money away, weekends, everything, she ups and moves back home to the DR one day without saying anything.

  “Haven’t heard from her since. Been sixteen years.” He scraped his plate with his fork. “I used to tell Derek his mom died, but I think he knows the truth by now. There wasn’t a funeral or anything like that. He could have asked around and found that out. But he never brought it up with me. I used to spend time fearing that conversation where he’d find out she was living and I’d have to come clean with him, but I think he must know that I know that he knows by now . . .”

  By this point the plates were empty. They’d both eaten two large slices and pushed the plates forward toward each other. The story he was telling was too much. It was too much to be true. A mother abandoning her son. Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. A father raising a son alone she’d heard of, but a son not knowing that his mother was still alive and a four-hour plane ride away?

  “Do you want some milk? A cup of coffee?” Antoinette asked.

  “I mean what I said,” Jupiter said. “I’m a friend and neighbor, and it’s nothing to me taking care of a little boy if you ever need to step out. I promise I no longer need to take revenge on island girls. Ha! I’ve still got a soft spot for y’all.”

  That was all on the second visit. Since then, he would come over with cakes, and the two of them would talk. About his ideas. About the city. About how crammed her life was with work and Teddy. It was always his past, his ideas, or her current life. Never about her past or the potential of their life together. But in talking about Teddy with him and spending time the two of them with the baby, she couldn’t help but imagine what their life could be like together. Teddy having a man to ask questions. Antoinette having Jupiter nearby all the time. He had this big house two doors down from where she worked. She wasn’t really imagining anything for herself, like it actually would happen. But in the same way she was transitioning into Islam, she was easing into these thoughts. She was still going to church where some of the power was wearing off, while starting at the mosque, which was full of possibility, and in six months or so, she’d be a true Muslim. She imagined she might experience a similar kind of new acceptance with Jupiter.

  But on this morning, he showed up earlier than he ever had before, and he didn’t bring cake initially or show any of the softness or personal vulnerability that Antoinette had liked so much on his previous visits. He wore a clean white T-shirt and cargo pants, stood in the doorway, and then asked to sit. Even when they were seated, he seemed a bit shaken. Like he wasn’t as suave as before. Like he needed someone to ground him.

  Maybe it was because he had a sense that Amelia had said something disparaging about him earlier that morning.

  But when a truck backfired around the block, Jupiter jumped up and put his hand on Antoinette’s arm in a nice way that made her feel that although his words might be colder, more barren, his tone not as affectionate as it had been the last time he’d come over, this wasn’t due to any change of desire or personal warmth.

  He jumped up and said, “I’ve got to go grab something from my place—be back! I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere. Okay?”

  Chapter 14

  On the subway between Utica and Nostrand, he could feel the lightness and excitement already start to permeate his brain. He fought it. He didn’t want to succumb. He didn’t want to let Amelia down. Let down was a fake way of saying it to himself. The real way was lie. He hated lying to her, even if she’d never find out. Her life was his life, and he was letting her down. He was lying to her. He didn’t want to. But it had already been decided. He wasn’t the one in control of his body. Of his mind. His pulse wasn’t his. It controlled itself. He hated his body when it was like this. And he never felt as good.

  The scene at the subway station had merged with the fight over dinner, and he could feel the tension spreading through his legs. And on Rosh Hashanah, he shouldn’t need to work. He had too much to think about, to take stock of. Amelia, his baby laughing in a stranger’s arms, and now this, the fact that his neighborhood felt like a bomb whose fuse had already been lit. . . . He would take the day for introspection, to refresh himself and start the new year off correctly. Even if he wasn’t a rabbi—if he wasn’t at synagogue—he could observe the day. He wouldn’t go to work!

  He started to get what he cringingly referred to once (and the psychologist insisted on forever afte
r embarrassingly repeating back to him) as the “happy feeling.” The feeling like he was outside himself and his work and his problems. Like suddenly his desk and computer and meetings didn’t matter. The closest he ever felt anything similar to it before that first night on the poker site was during his senior year of high school on the tennis court. When his backhand was as strong and reliable as his forehand and he could place his serve with kick on either side of the box. When he’d choose to serve first because he knew the other guy couldn’t touch it. He walked onto the court with an impatience to get the match started because he knew he’d either win or play someone who’d make him work. That was when he felt it first, the “happy feeling.” When a popular girl at a summer camp told him that another girl he’d never even heard of liked him—and he could tell she wasn’t making fun of him—he felt it again. Then maybe something like it again on the bimah during the couple of years when he’d settled in and felt good leading the congregation in the main synagogue. In front of all the stained-glass windows and hundred-year-old wood and hanging chandeliers, with the senior rabbi sitting behind him, proud. Then he felt it at the cowboy bar. And the first time he saw his son’s face. When the generic baby inside Amelia turned into his specific, individual Simon. It was the opposite of anxiety—it was a flow, a loosening in his muscles—an ability to breathe deeply and happily throughout his body. It was about things unfolding as they should because of who he was and in spite of him.

  And this was something like how he felt as he exited the subway at Nostrand and walked the block to the LIRR Hempstead line. It was how he felt when he texted his boss to apologize for not confirming earlier that he was going to be late because of Rosh Hashanah services.

  An hour later, Aaron sat in section J at the finish line between the box seats below and the restaurant above, twenty grand in one pocket, a racing form in the other, and as focused as he’d been anytime since he’d sat alone in this same section when Amelia was barely in her second trimester.