by Joseph Wallace
"I see trouble before it sees me,"
says one of Matthew Scudder's friends in a novel by
Lawrence Block.
Of course, this doesn't always work. Not when trouble comes
looking for you.
When I was growing up in Brooklyn in the 1960s, I lived on a
block with about a dozen kids my own age. There was a family
around the corner whose father worked as a garbageman. His son
was younger than we were, a timid eight-year-old who barely ever
spoke a word. Because of what his father did for a living, he was
the butt of endless jokes. "Hey, Timmy!" we used to yell. "How
does supper taste when you've gotten it out of a garbage can?
What's it like sleeping on a bed someone else threw out?" Stuff
like that.
Though my best friend Chris was the loudest of the group, I
didn't do much of the ranking on Timmy. I think I got picked on
enough myself to drain away any joy in making someone else feel
miserable. And I did see Timmy cry a couple of times, though
usually he pretended he didn't hear us. He never said anything
back. What could he say?
Flash forward a dozen years. I'd long since left the old
neighborhood, and my friend Chris had moved to Mexico. But there
we were one spring evening, home from college and visiting old
friends on our old turf on Avenue M, when trouble found us. It
had been looking a long time.
I didn't even see them coming. The first thing I felt was a hand
shoving me against the brick wall of an apartment building. Then
the hand was replaced by the point of a long stick...a point that
had been carefully carved and sharpened. As I looked down at it,
I saw the knifelike tip split the fabric of my shirt and pierce
the skin above my breastbone. Blood started to well around the
edges.
I looked up, and my eyes met those of a guy with a shaved head
and a tattoo of a dragon wrapping around his neck, its mouth
breathing fire across his forehead. I moved to knock his spear
away, but he leaned against it and said, "Uh-uh." It hurt. I
dropped my hands.
The guy's eyes shifted, and my gaze followed his. There, standing
beside Chris, was Timmy. Little Timmy, the garbageman's son, who
now weighed two hundred and fifty pounds. His arms and legs were
knotted with muscles, and the hand he rested on Chris's shoulder
looked as big as both of mine together. As I watched, I saw him
squeeze Chris's shoulder, just slightly. Chris's knees buckled.
"Hey, Tim," the guy with the tattoo said, flicking his gaze at
me. "Want me to kill this one?"
Tim focused on me, and after a moment I could see recognition in
his dark expressionless eyes. "No," he said. "I remember you. You
were okay." He looked up. "Let him alone." I felt the pressure of
the spear point ease slightly. Just slightly. My warm blood ran
down my chest and across my belly.
"But you...." Tim said, turning back to Chris. "I also remember
you. I remember what you did." And then he shifted his grip and
with his left hand, as easily as I'd pick up my young son, he
lifted Chris off the ground.
Oh god, I thought. He's going to kill him.
But Tim had a master's degree in humiliation, perfect pitch for
payback. "Look at you," he said to Chris. "You're so little."
Then he dropped my friend back to the ground, and before Chris
could take a step away Tim slapped him across the face. Just
once, so quickly that I barely saw the flick of his wrist.
Chris took a staggering step backward and fell into the street.
As he struggled to his feet I could clearly see the marks of
Tim's huge fingers imprinted on his cheek.
"Get out of here," said the garbageman's son. "I don't want to
see you on this street again."
And he walked away from us without a backward glance. 