Twelve and Nine: Part 2

Jun-Jun was nine years old.  His real name was Kenton.  His mother knew this.  It was also his father’s name, though his father was also called Junie.  Junie-K, to be exact, since there had to be something to distinguish him from Junie-B, Junie-C, Junie-J, and Junie-L.  The five Junies made up the head of the “Back-a-alley Gang”, and had, through a matter of technicalities, been born the day Junie-K was born, which, incidentally, was also the day his father, Kenton Wallace, died. 

While most people blamed the state of affairs in the back alleys on the gang, even Kenton Wallace, when he was alive, could tell you that things were always bad.  The families that lived there had been put there; set aside like a pen or a set of keys that were sure to be lost, by the government after a hurricane had destroyed their previous homes.  They’d built ‘temporary’ shelters; quick, piecemeal wooden bungalows that would keep the rain and other elements out, until they could properly rebuild their old neighborhood.  Years later, their old neighborhoods were memorial parks dedicated to those lost in that devastating storm.  Their temporary shelters had become permanent homes.  They all shared the same square plot of low, swampy land, which soon became a city block even though the swamp was still there, in the back yard that all these houses shared. 

When it rained water invaded the bungalow houses, barging in off the streets right in through their front doors, then settling in a little too comfortably among the rest of the muck at the back.  Inevitably, flies did the same, spawning mere feet away from the kitchens, sucking the life right out of them at night, spreading disease.  if the flies were bad, then the people who acted like flies were even worse.  Just like the mosquitoes, they rutted in full view of kitchen windows, and at night they preyed on the people who lived there.  Kenton Wallace could simply wave his hands over his wife’s swollen belly in the evenings and swatted them when they landed on her thighs.  In fact he took great pleasure in doing so.   He tried swatting a man one night.  The experience was considerably less satisfying.

He’d come into the kitchen for something cold to drink and as he stood naked in his own house he spotted a curtain move without breeze to blow it.  The curtain took off running, bursting through the broken back door it had come in through, and Kenton Wallace chased after it.  So great was his rage that he couldn’t be bothered to make a fist.  He swatted at the man with a heavy, flat palm.  The first time Kenton Wallace swatted him, the thief dropped a toaster oven.  The second time, it was a blender.  The third time that Kenton Wallace’s palm, tough as tree bark from his job at the saw mill, came down on the back of the burglar’s head the thief swung round and dropped a knife deep into the naked chest of his pursuer.  Kenton’s wife found him dead and, dropping to her knees, felt a warm water draining over her legs and puddle in a rut in the yard.  Junie-J, the oldest of the Back-a-alley gang, was twelve years old when Junie-K, the youngest, was born. 

The Junies grew older, and, tired of mosquitoes and men who acted like mosquitoes, they began filling the yards.  They brought dirt by the wheelbarrow full, from schoolyards, from river beds, from most places that were none of your damn business.  One day, Junie-L and Junie-C came bursting in with loads of sand they’d stolen from a construction site, along with a sign that read ‘Future Site of Barclay’s Bank’.  “We rich now!” they’d said.  “Dis da good ting!” 

They spread the sand in all the ruts and mosquito nests.  They leveled off the back yards and shored up the front yards too.  It was the boys that made the swamp disappear but, now free to walk from one house to the other, it was the women who’d actually formed the pathways and alleys.

The Junies started wearing black gloves and carried cricket bats and clubs.  “Time fi mek wi staat do some dirty work, fellas.”  Junie-J had told them while handing out the cloves.  “But that nuh means we fi get dirty too.”  They didn’t ask the mosquitoes where they came from.  If they found one, they swatted it.  They treated the strange faced men they found in the alleys the same way.  Occasionally, one of the Junies would leave the Alleys at night and not return.  Occasionally the police would come wandering through the alleys; either looking for one of the Junies to take away for years at a time, or to tell his family that he’d been taken by someone else.  There was always someone willing to take his place though; always some young bwai who wanted oh so badly to be a Junie.

Pretty soon there were no invaders in the yards and houses.  The only ones walking in through front doors unannounced were the people that had grown up there.  The only flies people found in their yards were lit roaches.  Junie-B bought a ticket to L.A. the day before the Police came to the Alleys looking for him.  The day after that, Jun-Jun was conceived in full view of his grandmother’s kitchen window.

Twelve and Nine: Part 1

Wally was twelve years old.  His real name was Christian.  His mother, brothers, sisters, teachers, and school friends knew this.  Unfortunately, years before he was ever a tall, gangly twelve year old he was a small child who failed to see the importance of being fully clothed.  He considered the scratchy shorts and faded cotton shirts to be a nuisance and his family members would often find him stark naked in the street in front of the wooden bungalow house, swinging sticks with the other boys or spinning marbles, his bare bottom hovering mere inches over the dusty street.

“Bwai, get yuh backside indoors, yerr?” His mother would shout, swinging a kitchen towel at him as he skittered through the wooden gate on the zinc fence.  She’d gather the fabric of her wide, twice-stitched, thrice-patched skirt in the fist of her free hand, lifting the hem above her knees so that she could chase after him and herd him in through the screen door.  The little naked rascal was more likely to just run through the back yard and into the alley, where the fast-girls and the weed-smokers would only encourage him by laughing and pointing, and shouting “Peely-Batty-Paully-Wally!” 

His father wasn’t much help as far as his mother was concerned.  He’d meet his son outside wearing nothing but what he was born in and grab him up in his black-gloved hands and swing him over his head, exposing the boy’s nakedness to god and everyone.  “If ih da wa bad bwai, yuh fi beat ah.”  His father would say.  The argument, to his mind, was that simple.  “If not, then leff di lee bwai lone.  So what if ih want mek di work know weh ih got.  Da wa lee-lee bwai, mek ih have ih fun while ih young yet.”  And, later, when they were both alone on in their rooms and their clothes had all been folded and put away, including the pair of black gloves his father kept next to his shoes and socks, and just before they both fell asleep on the mattress on the floor, sweaty and tired, Wally’s father would say to his wife: “If you neva want wa lee bwai weh woulda give yuh trouble, weh yuh gone name ah afta me fa?”

 And so it stayed, until Wally was at the proper age for school and school uniforms, which, conversely, he never wanted to take off, not even in the light of physical threats.  By then, however, the name had stuck.  The fast girls, the weed smokers, and the men who played dominoes with his father outside the kitchen window all knew his as Peely-Batty-Pauly-Wally.  The name was later broken down to either Peely Batty, or Pauly Wally.  Over months, the latter won out, and was further shortened to just ‘Wally’.  In fact, it was so popular a name that on a particular hot night one June a neighborhood girl was heard shouting at the screen door, “Wally-Mommy!  Wally-Mommy!  Wally-Daddy just get shot!”

Lizard Tales [NaNoWriMo 2010]

It was dark when they first came. The clutch of us nestled in the spaces between the louvers and the nooks of the window frame. Lizards seldom abide each other's company, but there'd been rumors of a strange new threat that had driven others from as far as the hinges in the front door. Many had run scared and even more had gone missing, so we temporarily gathered together for protection. When the sun came up the light would warm our blood and we would part ways as lizards ought to.

As I remember it there were no signs of their approach. No scurrying, no hissing, not even breathing or heartbeats. From where we were the shadows of the trees in the back yard shifted behind the louvers, blown by the night breeze. My need for sleep had long overcome my vigilance, but I opened one eye and spied three-toes sprawled on the glass, his silhouette contrasting against the sparkling glass louvers and shifting shadows. I opened the other eye to get a better look and noticed that one of the shadows failed to move with the others. I tried to hiss out a warning three-toes, tried to tell him to take off running, but a terrible chirping broke the night's silence and swallowed my frightened rasping.

Just as the other lizards awoke and sluggishly stirred, the creatures attacked. They looked like lizards for the most part, but their four legs had short round toes. Their skin was pale, so pale that they blended into the white walls and were invisible from afar. They didn't shoot in a straight line, but rather took jagged steps toward us, changing directions like raindrops falling down a window pane. When they came close enough, their veins shone out through their skin and each of them had a quivering, black heart that throbbed excitedly as their jaws snapped hungrily at whatever was nearest. We saw the ghostly white creatures seize our brethren, holding them tight in their maws as they proceeded to swallow them hole. It became obvious that they were more than just lizards. They were predators!

Three toes hardly had a chance. They were upon him before he knew it and as the cold blood in his veins moved like tree sap toward the ends of his limbs, the attackers already had his tail. One of them had it in its grasp and the tail writhed of ts own volition. Another of the ravenous lizards seized the bleeding end and while the two squabbled over the dropped tail, Three-toes made a run for it. He'd hardly started off running when another of the creatures waiting in the shadows had him held by the throat.

Some of the others had escaped. I could see wood-brown scurrying through a hole in the screen and was about to make a dash for it when that sound froze me once again. This time the clear, startling chirp erupted from right behind me. It reminded me of the grackles that stalked the back yards, only to swoop in on an unsuspecting lizard bringing a flurry of inky black feathers and an even darker fate. That sound meant death to us all, and when the others echoed the initial cry from all directions, I felt my blood freeze and my joints seize up.

I didn't watch, like some would have you believe, but I didn't run away either. I cowered when I felt the tug and heard them slurping and gnashing, and I squeezed my eyes shut as they devoured my tail. When I opened my eyes again the sun had risen and the light warmed my blood, but I still felt weak. The creatures were nowhere to be seen, but i knew it wasn't safe. Not here. Not anymore. These new creatures had taken my home, but spared my life. Now I would have to brave the grackles and cats in the back yard, and with only half a tail to distract them with.