The Man Who Came Uptown
- Автор: Пелеканос Джордж
- Год: 2018
- Язык: английский
- Год: Mulholland Books / Little, Brown and Company
- ISBN: 978-0-316-47982-0
- Жанр: Криминальные детективы
Электронная книга - «The Man Who Came Uptown». Краткое содержание книги:
“Look, I need a job,” said Michael. “Saying, I want this job. I can do it. You can count on me, for real. I’ll learn to talk with those people somehow. Can’t be that difficult, right?”
“Let me think about it,” said Angelos.
“You don’t need to think on it,” said Michael. “You already know. I don’t want to leave outta here without an answer. Can I have this job? Why don’t you just tell me? Yes or no?”
Angelos chuckled. “You’re aggressive.”
“Well?”
Angelos thought it over, then nodded. “On the day shift you’d work mostly with the ladies. They have to get their kids late in the afternoon. The hombres work at night. Except for Joe, little macho guy, likes to box. He’s on days too. We have a wood-fired oven. One of your duties would be splitting the wood that gets fed into the oven.”
“I can do that. I saw the logs outside.”
“Pay-wise, you’d start at the bottom. Minimum wage is eleven fifty an hour in the District. It goes up to twelve fifty in July. It’ll be thirteen fifty a year after that.”
“That works.”
“Write down your cell number for me.”
“I’m fixin to get one. I’ll give you the landline number at my mother’s house.”
Michael pulled out his makeshift bookmark, dog-eared the page where it had been, and used Angelos’s pen to write down his mother’s home number. He pushed the piece of paper across the table.
“Good book,” said Angelos, nodding at the cover of Hard Rain Falling. “Like, seriously good. I read it when I was locked up in Clarksburg. That’s all I did out there was read. Still remember the librarian’s name. We called her Miss Margaret.”
“I’m halfway into it,” said Michael. “Curious to see how it’s gonna end up.”
“Not how you’d expect,” said Angelos.
“Thank you,” said Michael. “I won’t let you down.”
They shook hands.
“Get a cell phone,” said Angelos.
Michael nodded. “I’m about to.”
Michael went back down to the bar and took a seat. Angelos had told Callie to take care of him, so he ordered a Margherita pizza and a glass of ice water and observed the operation as the modest lunch crowd streamed in. Callie and the one waiter handled the whole service. A runner, one of the kitchen ladies, delivered the food to the dining room from the basement, and a short man with slicked-down hair, who Michael assumed was the dishwasher, brought up glassware to the bar and went back down to the hole with bus trays. Callie, the bartender, controlled the music, which today alternated between reggae and something like country. A flat-screen TV hung over the bar showed a soccer game with the sound turned off. The atmosphere was chill. Seemed to Michael that they had it all wired up tight. While he ate, his neighborhood mailman, Gerard, came in with the daily delivery. He and Michael exchanged some friendly words.
The pizza tasted fresh. He left Callie a few dollars and told her he’d see her soon.
Michael walked over to Georgia and Upshur Street. There was a brand-new diner there that had opened since he’d been away, and different kinds of folks were sitting in booths and at the counter, having lunch. All kinds of new places here, tablecloth restaurants and bars mixed with the old barbershop and two funeral homes, the longtime Strange Investigations office, and a couple of neighborhood markets.
He walked farther and went into a small bookstore on Upshur that he had noticed but not yet visited. He looked around at the selection and then went to the register and talked to an attractive young woman with a diamond stud in her nose who had a welcoming smile.
“I was wondering if you could help me,” said Michael. “I used to have this book in a series called Elmore Leonard’s Western Roundup. Volume number three. It was two books in one. Can I order that from you?”
The young woman looked it up on her computer. “That series is out of print. But the novels in that particular volume are available separately in paperback. Valdez Is Coming and Hombre. Right? I can get those for you if you’d like.”
“How much would that be?”
She looked at the screen and told him the price. Michael had some walking-around money in his pocket that his mother had given him, and this was an extravagance, but he wanted to celebrate.
“Go ahead and order them,” said Michael. “I could get those books at the library across the street, but I’d rather have them permanent. I’m gonna start my own library.”
“That’s great.”
“I got a job today,” he said, as if she’d asked.
“Congratulations.”
Michael gave her his name and his mother’s landline number so that she could contact him when the books came in.
“What’s your name?” he said.
“Anna.”
“I got a friend name Anna who likes books too.”
“Nice to know I’m not the only one.” The young woman smiled. “I’ll call you when these come in, Michael.”
“See you soon. This here is gonna be my spot.”
He found a bench nearby and read for a while, then walked back toward his mother’s house on Sherman. A couple blocks north of his home, he saw a woman he knew from high school getting out of her road-worn Hyundai. Michael remembered her as Carla. She was with a little girl, preschool age, had tiny seashells in her braids. Carla held her little girl’s hand and smiled as Michael approached them.
“Hey.”
“Carla Thomas,” said Michael. “Like the singer.”
“It’s me.”
Michael looked down at the child and spoke softly. “How you doin, baby girl? You look pretty today.”
“Thank you,” she said, and she leaned her face shyly against her mother’s leg.
Carla was tall with pretty brown eyes, large-boned, but he liked that. She was put together on a low budget. Wasn’t wearing designer stuff, but her hair and makeup were nice and she smelled good. Carla cared enough about herself to keep it tight. Michael had liked her back at Cardozo, thought she was attractive and funny, but for whatever reason they had never hooked up.
“Where you been?” said Michael. “I ain’t seen you in years. Heard you moved out to Mer’land.”
“I was in P.G. for a minute, but I didn’t like it. That wasn’t a place for Alisha,” she said, nodding at her daughter. “It’s safer here in the city. I moved back in with my grandmother, for now. Alisha’s about to go to Tubman next year, so we’ll see.”
“Hmm.”
“What you doin, big man?”
“Working,” he said. “I’m at that restaurant, the District Line, up on Eleventh?”
Her eyes registered relief, and interest, when he told her he had a steady job.
“That’s good.”
“My name’s Michael, by the way,” he said.
“I know your name.”
“You didn’t call me by it.”
“You didn’t give me a chance.”
“We should get together sometime,” said Michael, boldly.
“Hard for me to get out. What with the classes I’m taking, and my job, and my little girl...”
“Okay, then. I understand.”
“I didn’t say I couldn’t. Just said it was hard.”
Michael looked her over. “You look good, girl.”
“So do you.”
“I’m maintaining.”
“So what now?”
“I’ll come past.”
They exchanged a smile, and Michael went on his way.
Later, sitting on his porch and reading his book, Brandy sleeping at his feet, Michael felt flush with anticipation. The new job was a start. This time his life would be different, because he would make it so. He needed to remember, going to work every day, keeping your head down, that was how most folks made it. Inch by inch. He didn’t need to be looking at things he couldn’t afford. Wasn’t any right way to get those things fast. He had to be like one of those racehorses with blinders on. Keep looking straight ahead, no distractions. Keep focused on the task at hand.