Ford County (4 page)

They sipped their watery beer and watched other customers arrive. By 11:00 p.m., the place was packed, and more strippers and dancers worked the stage and the crowd. Calvin watched with jealous rage as Amber lap danced on another man, less than ten feet away. He noted with some pride, though, that she did the face-to-face thing for only a few seconds. If he had plenty of cash, he would happily stuff it in her G-string and get lap danced on all night long.

Cash, though, was quickly becoming an issue. During another pause between songs and strippers, Calvin, the unemployed, admitted, “I’m not sure how long I can last here. This is some pretty expensive beer.”

Their beer, in eight-ounce glasses, was almost gone, and they had studied the waitresses enough to know that empties didn’t sit
long on the tables. The customers were expected to drink heavily, tip generously, and throw money at the girls for personal dances. The Memphis skin trade was very profitable.

“I got some cash,” Aggie said.

“I got credit cards,” Roger said. “Order another round while I take a pee.” He stood and for the first time seemed to teeter somewhat, then he disappeared in the smoke and crowd. Calvin flagged down Amber and ordered another round. She smiled and winked her approval. What he wanted much worse than the river water they were drinking was more physical contact with his girl, but it wasn’t to be. At that moment, he vowed to redouble his efforts to find a job, save his money, and become a regular at the Desperado. For the first time in his young life, Calvin had a goal.

Aggie was staring at the floor, under Roger’s empty seat. “The dumbass dropped his wallet again,” he said, and picked up a battered canvas billfold.

“You think he’s got any credit cards?” Aggie asked.

“No.”

“Let’s take a look.” He glanced around to make sure there was no sign of Roger, then opened his wallet. There was an expired discount card from a grocery store, then a collection of business cards—two from lawyers, two from bail bondsmen, one from a rehab clinic, and one from a parole officer. Folded neatly and partially hidden was a $20 bill. “What a surprise,” Aggie said. “No credit cards, no driver’s license.”

“And he almost got shot over that,” Calvin said.

“He’s an idiot, okay?” Aggie closed the wallet and placed it on Roger’s chair.

The beer arrived as Roger returned and found his wallet. They scraped together $45 and managed a $3 tip. “Can we put a lap dance on a credit card?” Roger yelled at Amber.

“Nope, just cash,” she yelled back as she left them.

“What kinda credit card you got?” Aggie asked.

“Bunch of ’em,” he said like a big shot.

Calvin, his lap still on fire, watched his beloved Amber weave through the crowd. Aggie watched the girls too, but he was also watching the time. He had no idea how long it took to give a pint of blood. Midnight was approaching. And though he tried not to, he couldn’t help but think about his girlfriend and the tantrum she would throw if she somehow heard about this little detour.

Roger was fading fast. His eyelids were drooping and his head was nodding. “Drink up,” he said, thick tongued, as he tried to rally, but his lights were dimming. Between songs, Calvin chatted with two guys at another table and in the course of a quick conversation learned that the legendary stripper, Tiffany, didn’t work on Thursday nights.

When the beer was gone, Aggie announced, “I’m leavin’. You boys comin’ with me?”

Roger couldn’t stand alone, so they half dragged him away from the table. As they headed to the door, Amber glided by and said to Calvin, “Are you leaving me?”

He nodded because he couldn’t speak.

“Please come back later,” she cooed. “I think you’re cute.”

One of the bouncers grabbed Roger and helped get him outside. “What time ya’ll close?” Calvin asked.

“Three a.m.,” the bouncer said and pointed to Roger. “But don’t bring him back.”

“Say, where’s the hospital?” Aggie asked.

“Which one?”

Aggie looked at Calvin and Calvin looked at Aggie, and it was obvious neither had a clue. The bouncer waited impatiently, then said, “You got ten hospitals in this city. Which one?”

“Uh, the nearest one,” Aggie said.

“That’ll be Lutheran. You know the city?”

“Sure.”

“I’ll bet you do. Take Lamar to Parkway, Parkway to Poplar. It’s just past East High School.”

“Thanks.”

The bouncer waved them off and disappeared inside. They dragged Roger to the truck, tossed him inside, then spent half an hour roaming midtown Memphis in a hopeless search for Lutheran Hospital. “Are you sure that’s the right hospital?” Calvin asked several times.

In various ways, Aggie answered, “Yes,” “Sure,” “Probably,” and “Of course.”

When they found themselves downtown, Aggie stopped at a curb and approached a cabdriver who was napping behind the wheel. “Ain’t no Lutheran Hospital,” the cabdriver said. “We got Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, Central, Mercy, and a few others, but no Lutheran.”

“I know, you got ten of ’em.”

“Seven, to be exact. Where you from?”

“Mississippi. Look, where’s the nearest hospital?”

“Mercy is four blocks away, just down Union Avenue.”

“Thanks.”

They found Mercy Hospital and left Roger in the truck, comatose. Mercy was the city hospital, the principal destination for late-night victims of crime, domestic abuse, police shootings, gang disputes, drug overdoses, and alcohol-related car wrecks. Almost all of said victims were black. Ambulances and police cars swarmed around the ER entrance. Packs of frantic family members roamed the dungeonlike hallways searching for their victims. Screams and shouts echoed through the place as Aggie and Calvin walked for miles looking for the information desk. They finally found it, tucked away as if it were intentionally hidden. A young Mexican girl was at the desk, smacking gum and reading a magazine.

“Do ya’ll admit white people?” Aggie began pleasantly.

To which she replied coolly, “Who are you looking for?”

“We’re here to give blood.”

“Blood Services is just down the hall,” she said, pointing.

“Are they open?”

“I doubt it. Who you giving blood for?”

“Uh, Bailey,” Aggie said as he looked blankly at Calvin.

“First name?” She began to peck at a keyboard and look at a monitor.

Aggie and Calvin frowned at each other, clueless. “I thought Bailey was his first name,” Calvin said.

“I thought it was his last name. They used to call him Buck, didn’t they?”

“Sure, but his momma’s last name is Caldwell.”

“How many times has she been married?”

The girl watched this back-and-forth with her mouth open. Aggie looked at her and said, “Got anybody with the last name of Bailey?”

She pecked, waited, then said, “A Mr. Jerome Bailey, aged forty-eight, black, gunshot wound.”

“Anybody else?”

“No.”

“Anybody with the first name of Bailey?”

“We don’t enter them by first names.”

“Why not?”

The shooting was a gang skirmish that had begun an hour earlier at a north Memphis housing project. For some reason it resumed in the parking lot of Mercy Hospital. Roger, dead to the world, was jolted from his blackout by a burst of gunfire close by. It took a second or two for his brain to react, but before long he knew damned well that, again, someone was shooting at him. He eased his head up, peeked low through the passenger’s window, and was struck by the realization that he had no idea where he was. There were rows of cars parked all around, a tall parking garage nearby, buildings everywhere, and in the distance flashing red and blue lights.

More gunfire, and Roger ducked low, lost his equilibrium, and was on the floorboard, where he frantically searched under the seat for a weapon of some sort. Aggie, like every other boy from Ford County, wouldn’t travel anywhere without protection,
and Roger knew a gun was close by. He found one under the driver’s seat, a 9-millimeter Husk automatic with a twelve-shot clip. Fully loaded. He clutched it, fondled it, kissed the barrel, then quickly rolled down the passenger’s window. He heard angry voices, then saw what was most certainly a gangster car easing suspiciously through the parking lot.

Roger fired twice, hit nothing, but succeeded in changing the strategy of the gang shooting. Aggie’s Dodge was immediately sprayed with bullets from an assault rifle. The rear window exploded, sending glass throughout the cab and into the long hair of Roger, who hit the floor again and began scrambling to safety. He slid out of the driver’s door, ducked low, and began zigzagging through the unlit rows of parked cars. Behind him were more angry voices, then another gunshot. He kept going, his thighs and calves screaming as he kept his head at tire level. He failed to complete a turn between two cars and crashed into the front fender of an old Cadillac. He sat for a moment on the asphalt, listening, breathing, sweating, cursing, but not bleeding. Slowly, he raised his head, saw no one chasing him, but decided to take no chances. He pressed on, cutting between parked cars until he came to a street. A car was approaching, so he stuck the pistol in a front pants pocket.

It was apparent, even to Roger, that this part of town was a war zone. The buildings had thick bars over the windows. The chain-link fences were crowned with razor wire. The alleys were dark and forbidding, and Roger, in a lucid moment, asked himself, What the hell am I doin’ here? Only the gun kept him from total panic. He eased along the sidewalk, pondering strategy, and
decided it was best to get back to the truck and wait on his friends. The shooting had stopped. Perhaps the police were on the scene and things were secure. There were voices behind him, on the sidewalk, and a quick glance revealed a group of young black men, on his side of the street and gaining. Roger picked up the pace. A rock landed nearby and bounced for twenty feet. They were hollering back there. He eased the gun out of his pocket, put his finger on the trigger, and walked even faster. There were lights ahead, and when he turned a corner, he stepped into a small parking lot outside an all-night convenience store.

There was one car parked directly in front of the store, and beside the car a white man and a white woman were yelling at each other. As Roger stepped onto the scene, the man threw a right hook and clobbered the woman in the face. The sound of her flesh getting smacked was sickening. Roger froze as the scene began to register in his muddled mind.

But the woman took the shot well and counterpunched with an unbelievable combination. She threw a right cross that busted the man’s lips, then went low with a left uppercut that crushed his testicles. He squealed like a burned animal and fell in a heap just as Roger took a step closer. The woman looked at Roger, looked at his gun, then saw the gang approaching from the dark street. If there was another conscious white person within four blocks, he or she was not outdoors.

“You in trouble?” she asked.

“I think so. You?”

“I’ve felt safer. You got a driver’s license?”

“Sure,” Roger said as he almost reached again for his wallet.

“Let’s go.” She jumped in the car with Roger behind the wheel and his new friend riding shotgun. Roger squealed tires, and they were soon racing west on Poplar Avenue.

“Who was that guy back there?” Roger asked, his eyes darting back and forth between the street and the rearview mirror.

“My dealer.”

“Your dealer!”

“Yep.”

“Are we gonna just leave him?”

“Why don’t you put that gun down?” she said, and Roger looked at his left hand and realized he was still holding the pistol. He placed it on the seat between them. She immediately grabbed it, pointed it at him, and said, “Just shut up and drive.”

The police were gone when Aggie and Calvin returned to the truck. They gawked at the damage, then cursed profusely when they realized Roger had vanished. “He took my Husk,” Aggie said, as he searched under the seat.

“Stupid sonofabitch,” Calvin kept saying. “I hope he’s dead.”

They swept glass off the seat and drove away, anxious to get out of downtown Memphis. There was a quick conversation about looking for Roger, but they were fed up with him. The Mexican girl at the information desk had given them directions to Central Hospital, the most likely place to find Bailey.

The lady at the desk at Central explained that the blood unit was closed for the night, would reopen at 8:00 a.m., and had a rigid policy against accepting donations from those who were obviously intoxicated. The hospital did not currently have a patient with either the first or the last name of Bailey. As she was dismissing
them, a uniformed security guard appeared from nowhere and asked them to leave. They cooperated, and he walked them out of the front door. As they were saying good night, Calvin asked him, “Say, you know where we might be able to sell a pint of blood?”

“There’s a blood bank on Watkins, not too far.”

“You think it’s open?”

“Yes, it’s open all night.”

“How do you get there?” Aggie asked.

He pointed this way and that, then said, “Be careful, though. It’s where all the addicts go when they need cash. Rough place.”