It was only a conversation like this that could inspire joy at the sight of one Olthidius Cole Sr., as it did when Piper saw
him waddling out of the Horizon storefront, pulled forward by his dented aluminum cane. Piper used him as an excuse to break
away, yelling, "Hi, boss! Did you get a chance to read my draft?" to drown out everything else that was being said. Cole looked
so Started to see her that Piper thought for a moment he might try and whack her with the stick, but instead he rolled his
eyes, flapped his cheeks, wagged his head at her impudence, and kept moving.
"So now you know all three of us, who you think is going to make it all the way? Who you think is going to win?" Horus asked
as he unlocked the front door.
"I'm sorry, I don't know what you're talking about." Piper wasn't
sorry, she wanted to be inside, beyond him.
"Oh, you know what I'm talking about. Yes, you do," Horus insisted.
"First let me confess, I'm already a fan. I've been following your byline since your revealing article on the accidental death
rate." Cyrus Marks wore a smoking jacket, silk, Asian markings. He seemed to think this jacket made him charming, or at least
added to his charm, this Piper gathered from the dramatic ritual he made of repeatedly tying and untying its belt, a gesture
she found both absent and vain.
"The one I got scooped on. Well, I'm glad somebody saw the original piece. The
Times
ran a very flattering likeness of you, I remember."
"Yes, well, I have been reading your work with great interest ever since. Olthidius Cole was just in that very seat telling
me how thorough your research into the fire at 121st is, I look forward to seeing the final draft. I love your movie reviews
as well. Even when they forget to print your initials I know if it's you because you're the only one at the
Herald
who ever dislikes anything made by another black person."
"I'm just honest, but I also try to be fair. There's usually some good even in the worst, when there is I mention that too."
It was a small black world. Piper wondered which mediocrity's creator Marks was related to, and why it had taken this long
for her call to task. Her last printed review was a dissection of Bo Shareef's new hit,
Don't Go
There,
where she traced the book's three central cliches back to their origins in
Uncle Tom's Cabin, Birth of a Nation,
and
Nigger Heaven,
going on to list the book's uncanny plot similarities with episode twenty-three of
Malcolm
"Of course you do. I find your reviews very fair. And honest. Blunt, but all true honesty arrives bluntly. I appreciate that.
There seems to be a general consensus to avoid self-criticism in our community, doesn't there? Not simply in the arts, but
in general. I agree with you. It's a new age, I'm all for calling a spade a spade, if you will. Without addressing our deficiencies,
how can we ever hope to improve?"
"I guess. So why am I here?"
Marks took the question like a child had slapped him with it, laughed at it, and pushed it away. "You studied at Columbia.
They have an excellent yournalism program. So you had Akers, Pavez, Wharton."
"Pavez was my adviser."
"I imagine he'd be an excellent one. He's got a good head on his shoulders, albeit a fat one. He had many good things to say
about you as well."
This comment, this was the official alarm. This was the thing that Piper knew made ordinary people pull back yet compelled
her to plunge forward. "OK, now this is getting a little bizarre. Why are you calling and asking people about me and why did
you invite me here?" Piper made like she was trying to gather her coat from the back of her chair, but Marks must have known
she was bluffing. He didn't even attempt to talk until Piper had stopped moving and was looking at him in the face again.
"I have a job for you. That's the short of it. Let me assure you, though, that I was not trying to pry. It's just, well, you
know the black middle class is only but so big, you run into people, topics arise. This whole community, it functions on the
network of friends, the currency favors. I'm really not trying to be obtuse, it's just that I feel this is a large proposition,
so it takes a bit of buildup."
"All right, you got me. Talk." Piper felt herself getting very excited and felt equally foolish about that.
"Right. Well, I just have three questions. Indulge me in those and I'll tell you whatever you like. You went to one of the
top journalism schools in the country, you're obviously very intelligent, talented, it's not like you're over the hill in
any way. Why are you working at a shameful rag like the
New Holland Herald?"
"That's easy, because it wouldn't be the 'shameful rag' you seem to think it is if more qualified black folks didn't run away
to the bigger papers and leave it behind," Piper defended.
"Exactly. That's what we are trying to do here at Horizon - stop the brain drain in our community, stop the financial drain
as well, build something we can all be proud of. I know I don't look it, but I'm old enough to remember what the
Herald
was like before the white papers would hire our best and brightest. It resounded. It was important. It covered issues the
way no other source could."
"So there's your answer. I want to help bring it back to that point. My goal is to make it something to be proud of again."
"And how would you do that? That's actually the second question, so feel free to elaborate." Marks leaned back in his chair
to provide room for her answer.
Piper felt very free to elaborate. There was her plan to dump the tabloid's front-page articles in favor of a full-page illustration
cover with teaser lines like the
Village Voice,
there was her plan to switch from underpaid hacks to clip-hungry interns from New York's top journalism schools who would
work for the same peanuts but actually be good, there was her plan to publish short stories and novel excerpts, in exchange
offering mere exposure as payment. Piper kept going. There was a wall of self-restraint within her, it was great and wide
and as tall as her mind's imagination, but unfortunately it was made of paper and already shredded from all the times she'd
plowed right through it. Still, there was a pause for air when she noticed Cyrus Marks's look of amazement and thought that
might not be a reaction to the ideas but the fact that she'd just mentioned at least two dozen of them in less than three
minutes.
"Well, the
Herald
could reach its potential again," Piper tried to conclude. "I mean, I guess with these things you just have to have patience."
"Oh, no I don't. I don't need patience," was Marks's response. Piper wasn't surprised at the statement because Cyrus Marks
looked to her like a man who believed he didn't need patience. "We, as a people, have had too much patience too long for our
own silliness. No, what I need is you. In charge of the
Herald,
raising the standard, doing all those ideas you just said. So I might as well continue on to my third question. If Olthidius
Cole chose to retire in the next year which he has - if he didn't want his son to assume full control of the mantle — which
he doesn't, apparently - and if it was within my power, would you consider becoming the new editor in chief of the
New Holland Herald}"
"You know, that's a lot of ifs." J/'this was a joke and Snowden was behind it, if this was some sort of passive-aggressive
revenge for any past grievance Piper might have cost him, Piper would hurt him. Physically and with great vigor.
"There are no ifs. I've been an investor in the
Herald
for years now. As of an hour ago, I just upped the percentage a bit. Called in a favor from a friend, you could say."
" I . . . I really don't believe this. But say I did, say I did believe this. Say I believe you're going to call me out of
the blue, someone you don't even know, and give me a job that I might on paper seem barely qualified for. Say I don't think
this is a sick, sick prank, then what's the price? What do you want from me in return?" Piper wouldn't sleep with him, Piper
wouldn't put one cell of his body near her own. When you want something so bad sometimes you ask yourself what you'd do for
it, but it turned out that no, she wouldn't do that. But where was the line? Piper asked herself, because there was one and
it probably wasn't that far away from there.
"You are qualified. Pavez said you did a lovely job editing the
Columbia Spectator,
and this really isn't that different, is it? Everyone I spoke with attested to your character. So to the 'price.' Just a little
project I'd like you to get off the ground. Of course it will involve dropping what you're working on and cutting back on
your
Herald
hours in general, but I assure you you'll find this worth the sacrifice. It deals directly with creating the next generation
of black journalists, a talent pool that ten years down the road the
Herald
can pull from. So, Ms. Goines, I actually have one extra question for you: How good are you with children?"
SNOWDEN WAS A new man. Unfortunately, that man was a paranoid, guilt-ridden wreck of one. Don't kill people and think you
can remain the same. This new guy, he was completely sober, had stayed so since the morning he'd awoken in clothes that reeked
of smoke and it had taken till late afternoon to remember why. The new one didn't watch television, either, not out of any
social purist motivation, it was just that even the most escapist of shows ran ads for the news he was trying so hard to avoid
in the first place. Snowden was a new man. He didn't like the one he'd become, but the more Snowden thought about it the more
he realized he didn't care for the one he'd been before, either.
As a reward for his loyal service, Lester was assigning Snowden the best properties, throwing him the best clients at the
day job, happy-face customers with seven years of clean credit, 30 percent down, and low consumer debt. Snowden spent every
encounter with these fine happy-face buyers petrified they would spin around with badges and cuffs instead of checkbooks and
pens. Be a good realtor and just keep walking through the empty rooms smiling, Snowden kept telling himself. Say stuff like,
"The thing that's really wonderful about this," and point at something.
Solace was sought from Bobby Finley but not found. This was because Bobby Finley was not found, either. Eventually Snowden
remembered clips of a conversation they'd had when they ran into each other outside the Mumia Abu-Jamal fire, but his state
during the encounter had left the images and audio distorted. Since Bobby refused to answer his door when Snowden came around,
or even return his calls, it was a safe assumption that his behavior was in response to some forgotten slight Snowden may
or may not have intended. It was only when Bobby didn't show up for work for days that Snowden decided not to take the silence
personally.
Further concern was somewhat banished when Lester said he'd seen Bobby Finley, that Bobby was just adjusting to the strain
of the job and would be out of the office during regular hours indefinitely. Snowden just didn't like the way Lester said
it. The mounting fear that Bobby was in fact dead, however, was shown to be groundless, irrational even, as Bobby Finley was
seen exiting a property only doors away from the one Snowden was showing. Very much alive, with his own set of prospective
buyers in tow, shaking his own set of hands.
"Yo nig, where you been?" Snowden asked. Bobby walked down the townhouse steps, put his clients back into their taxi-hack
downtown. Snowden's own were deciding on whether to see the three-bedroom condo two blocks south or take this Uptown opportunity
to walk over to the Studio Museum instead. Snowden ceased pretending to care either way and ran from them toward his coworker.
Bobby Finley didn't run from him, he just didn't acknowledge Snowden's calls or cease walking in the opposite direction, Snowden's
hand on his arm the only thing that stopped him. He'd lost weight. Snowden would have never guessed that Bobby had any weight
he could misplace, but now saw that both the padding under Bobby's eyes that kept him from looking haunted and the thin layer
of flesh that kept every single vein in Bobby's throat from showing had both gone missing.
In response to the earnest concern of, "Yo man, where you been?" Bobby Finley had only a shrug and a drained smile to give.
When more was demanded, Bobby gave the weak excuse, "I'm sorry, I've been busy. I'm writing."
"I thought that shit was supposed to make you happy. You don't look happy. You look like a burnt scarecrow."
Giving up on trying to smile, Bobby Finley started walking away instead. Snowden yelled his apologies behind him, but they
were like wind in Bobby's sail.
In the absence of fraternal comfort, there were new vices to be had, sober ones that didn't lead to memory lapse, the will
to perform self-sacrificial acts, or any form of confession in general. For instance, the new Snowden was an ardent smoker.
At least a pack a day, never the same brand twice, as life was short and he wanted to keep the entire nicotine world available
to him. The packs he didn't like Snowden smoked even faster, eager to get to the next one. They made him feel calm. Their
death-bringing gifts gave him a new, rather ordinary mortal fear to occupy his mind and replace more flamboyant ones.
The other vice, Snowden found even more addictive, was pretending that what he and Lester were doing was morally right.
Dangerous, yes, Snowden knew that, could feel its seduction, that it was just the easy way to deal with what was happening.
Yet there it was. Going away but never for too long. The only thing that made all the chaos grow fat and heavy and fall stilled
to the ground was to imagine it. Lester was right. Therefore those deaths were no tragedy. Therefore Snowden had done nothing
wrong. Minutes could go by when Snowden could sustain this reasoning. Snowden went back to the Lenox Lounge and saw that woman
Maisy still waiting tables and her face had healed and Snowden'd felt that reasoning take over him, sipped his soda, and had
his delusion reaffirmed every time he saw Maisy smile so easily. Felt the same thing in ecstatic pangs as he stood at the
lodge's third-floor window and watched Jifar run screaming with child joy in the backyard along with so many other uniformed
kids. No matter the free fall Snowden felt when guilt finally crushed the pillars of this logic, those moments before were
his most peaceful. Ever. The fantasy was not just that he'd done nothing wrong, but that that he'd done something right, daring,
and bold. That the universe had a discernible order of negative and positive and that he'd been blessed with the purpose of
contributing to the good of it.
The strategy necessary for successful urban renewal was rather simple, or at least appeared so, having been repeated with
nearly every Wednesday class of the Horizon Second Chance Program.
First, urban renewal must happen as a mass movement, entire ghetto blocks must be seized simultaneously by decent people,
taken over and converted to outposts of hardworking, taxpaying folk. The problem with attempts to reintegrate the middle class
back into Harlem in the past was that they came as lone pioneers and were invariably mugged and otherwise discouraged into
moving by the lumpen without making a dent in the local culture of poverty. Take heed from Roanoke, colonization works only
when settlers arrive in droves.
Second, decent residents must have pedestrian access to the subway system that is the city's lifeline without having to pass
through ghetto staging areas (otherwise known as "bad blocks"). They must be able to commute to work and New York City's amenities
without risk of personal safety. Otherwise they were virtually trapped in their homes, small islands surrounded by a hostile
ocean.
Third, designated areas should be dead-ended. A basic strategic consideration, this not only ensured there was only a finite
territory to convert but also took care of the larger issue of "walkthroughs." There was no point converting an entire block
to decency if random thugs roamed up and down it, if burglars could pass unnoticed, staring up through residence windows to
glean the contents inside. This is what made Mount Morris such a prime location to begin the terraforming of Harlem: It was
back-ended by the park, behind that was just the hospital and then nothing but industrial ruins and raised lots till Park
Avenue's train tracks.
Once "good blocks" had been solidly established, they would slowly spread beyond their original perimeters. As one block filled,
the next would be occupied, continuing the link beyond. When that pattern was established, new satellites would be started,
maybe toward the north around Strivers Row and Hamilton Heights, maybe south closer to Central Park. The Horizon position
was that this revolution wouldn't even need that many people, as Harlem was already populated by a vast majority of decent,
hardworking folk. The monied newcomers would just be replacing the Terrible Tenth. Eventually, all the links would meet. Then
the struggle would be over.
All of this, which in class Snowden had found compelling in its own right, became even more engrossing when he was forced
to sit in Lester's office and watch the man tape his map of Mount Morris to the wall, each property marked individually with
either a green smiley face or circled repeatedly with red lines. Lester in lemon, the white shirt like the pith just below
the peel, saying things like, "If we could just get rid of the bastards squatting at 671 West 117th, we could link the 3200
block of Lenox to Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard!"
The files covering Lester's desk were numbered with addresses corresponding to the map's angrily circled residences and were
attached with photos of the actual subjects — mug shots and surveillance shots.
"So, come on, the suspense is killing me." Lester tittered. "Who do you want to hunt first?"
Like a high diver preparing for the jump, Snowden was so far in his mind that all that noise, all the sounds of large objects
banging the walls in the hall outside, all the screeches of children that accompanied them couldn't reach him. Lester loved
this. Lester saw the concentration of his protege and thought this was impressive, this was the sign that great things were
about to be done, said so out loud too, though that was ignored along with the rest of the clatter.
Snowden had a plan, that much was clear. Snowden would do his absolute best to execute it as well, that was also evident.
What was probably less clear, at least to Lester in his banana peel shoes, was that Snowden had no intention of killing anyone.
Snowden had figured it out. Snowden had the answer. He would just tell the targeted bastard this time. I have been sent to
kill you, he would say. Get out of town or be dead.
"This is exciting, isn't it? Gives you a sense of power, right? There are some real scumbags in there to pick from, rapists,
there's even a guy who served for kidnapping at 209 West 118th and that's a really important block so that could work great."
First, Snowden's pick had to be somebody who wouldn't try to kill him just for breaking into his apartment, preferably somebody
small with no violent history.
"You know, don't feel you have to limit yourself to felons. There are a lot of petty menaces in the pile as well. If you want,
I can find you good a one."
A true criminal, but a puny, cowardly one, and just in case Lester decided to take a more proactive role than his assigned
one as lookout, the chosen target had to be a complete and utter scumbag as well. Just in case - it was a dangerous mission.
"They don't even have to have a prison record. I mean, you yourself are proof that's not a defining factor in moral character.
I've got a ton of 'quality of life' crimes in here. I've got a guy on this very block who gets in his car at six-thirty every
morning and turns his radio on full blast - it wakes the children, it's just criminal. We've tried calling nine one one, stealing
his radio, his car, he just pays the fines, replaces them, so trust me there's no other way. Not trying to push you in any
direction, but you'd be doing us a real service. Otherwise I won't be able to fit him in till next Thursday."
There he was. Ryan Waters. Even among all those pictures of all those little weaselly bastards, this guy stood out like the
refugee of another, elfin species. Ryan Waters. He looked like a jockey's runt son.
"Ryan Waters? OK. All right. I mean, I guess he's a good starter project, it being your first time going solo. He's not really
much for sport, though, is he? The man can't weigh more than a buck twenty-five Thanksgiving night. He is a real lowlife,
if that's what you're going by. Ryan Waters, then. Well, there's going to be a bunch of old ladies who're going to have to
find a new way to get their groceries home from the Pathmark." That was because Ryan Waters would no longer be waiting for
them in his car, volunteering to carry their bags up to their apartments and taking anything he could shove in his coat on
his way out again. The less alert ones would no longer have him to thank for his repeated visits. The more alert ones, the
ones who went to the police only to recant their accusations later, would no longer have to worry that Ryan Waters knew where
they lived.
Outside, more banging, more uncharacteristic childish yelps. That was the first time it struck Snowden: For a building filled
with children, he almost never heard them. It was like a school perpetually in class.
"So you saw her already, didn't you?" Lester asked the question like his teeth couldn't hold his tongue back anymore. "You
saw her on the way in."
"Who?"
"Oh come now, no secrets here. You must have at least heard her thumping around out there. Let's call her." Lester picked
up his phone, hit the line for Nina, and asked her to send in "Horizon's newest employee." There was a pause, orchestrated
by Lester sitting there, smiling, hands entwined over the top of his folded legs. "To be honest, we took her primarily to
keep a closer eye — she seems to make a habit of staring too long at things best ignored - but she's already proven herself
to be a hard worker. You have good taste in women, Snowden. I can admit that."
When he heard the knock on the door, Lester rose to let her in, made introductions with the aside that they were not needed,
then left the two of them. Snowden was the one who jumped up and shut the door, quietly locking it. Piper Goines. She seemed
to Snowden so out of place standing there, an image clipped from one reality by dull scissors and pasted into another with
too much glue. An image anxiety attacks were made of, specifically the one Snowden was having at the sight of her. Snowden
didn't know the specifics of how she'd arrived at Horizon, but he was pretty confident he could guess the general reason.
Piper had poked her nose into this world so deep that now she was in it, and that type of behavior is exactly why Snowden
knew she shouldn't be there. So don't be. Don't be happy either. Don't offer answers to questions I specifically didn't ask.