The Juxtaposition

I reached into my pocket and found an old gum rapper rumpled into a mixture of paper and a sticky wad of green-gray-white. I couldn’t figure out why my brother was still in the building. He had gone inside to talk to this major player named Cooper. Cooper wasn’t one to be played with. However, my brother had seen him pushing up on his girl Angela the other day.

I had warned T, my little brother, to be cautious of the words he chose, stay alert to his surroundings, and carry something real with him. He assured me that he just wanted to find Cooper and tell him Angie was his girl, period. I guess T had decided he and Angela were going to stay together even after high school. Whatever. No broad was going to make me risk my face against Cooper. But that was T- always did what he felt was right no matter the consequences.

I imagined the worst Cooper would do was beat him up. Thing about it was if Cooper wanted a girl, he got her. The chicks couldn’t resist his charm and his loot, I guess. Plus, my thoughts are if Angie was letting him talk, maybe she wanted to listen. Then again, curiosity can be a bitch. I told T it probably was no big deal and just make sure Angie didn’t go in and out our building when Cooper was hanging around. But T, smart quiet bookworm bee-bopping idealist, was quick to insist that he speak to dude man to man so there is a distinction between his girl and the other girls who come around.

T, charismatic with his words and skilled in self-defense, said he would be in and out of Cooper’s building, easy. I wasn’t too worried. It’s just that he’s my responsibility. I guide him. He learns from my mistakes. I push him to be better. I make sure he’s on the right track. He is my little brother. I haven’t gone to college and don’t plan on going. I haven’t fallen for no broad and can’t see that shit happening. I wasn’t an A student in high school and could care less. But T is going to college to be an engineer and engineer city plans to get us out this hood somehow. T is serious and good and doesn’t play with his future. Playing with this Cooper guy is risky though. Cooper runs things around here.

He had gone in the building nearly 10 minutes ago. To me that’s not in and out. To me that’s enough time for the worst and more to happen to T. I had my baby revolver strapped to my lower leg and my nine at my waist. So I made my way into Cooper’s building. I was ready for whatever. When I got to Cooper’s mom’s door, it was already opened a crack. I pictured my little brother with a busted face in the corner barely breathing or even worse my little brother not breathing at all.

I listened at the door for a hot second, but didn’t hear anything. I had one hand close to my nine as I slowly pushed the door open. I saw a sneaker on the floor, but it wasn’t one that T had been wearing. I walked further into the apartment and saw a used white sock. I peeked around the corner to see the apartment empty except for Cooper and T. T had me blown by what I saw. Cooper was sitting on his own couch like a rebuked little kid, while T stood over him, one foot on the couch looking like he was schooling Cooper. And yes Cooper was missing a shoe and a sock on one foot. I stepped back a little so they couldn’t see me.

I could hear T say with a tight voice, “Hopefully there won’t be a next time with me dragging you across your mom’s nice floors. I won’t tell anyone what happened. It’s between you and me. Everyone knows what’s mine is not theirs and what I treasure is not theirs to burn, pillage, or fuck with. You respect me and I will respect you. We clear Mr. Cooper?”

“We clear?” He repeated.

“We clear.”

“We are clear, what?”

“We are clear, T. I know the rules.” I heard Cooper say.

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I walked out before it was all over and waited by the stairway.

A couple minutes later, T rounded the corner.

“Ay man, what’s going down?” T asked with a big grin on his face.

“What happened?”

“I heard you come in the apartment. I know your steps. So you saw what happened?”

“No, T. What was that about? You done this before? What’d you mean by everyone?”

As we walked back toward the outdoors, he explained.

He had hidden when he knocked on Cooper’s door. When Cooper went to push the door closed and turned around, T headlocked and strangled him from behind and dragged him kicking to across his mom’s apartment to the couch. Scared his ass so bad that he started crying. Not a good look. I had forgotten T was bigger and stronger than Cooper. Apparently, T had the whole block on lock. Come to find out the whole block was scared of my little brother. This had happened multiple times since T was a kid. From the first time a little mu’fucka tried to steal his new sneakers off his feet to his first serious girlfriend, he’s been schooling dudes on what he finds unacceptable. He told me how he has been beating big and small dudes up since he was 11. He had been trained in two two types of fighting by then and had excelled at both. He was always into training, what I had always thought was his hobby. But it was truly his defense. He told me he protects the whole family. He speaks, they listen. He threatens, they hear him. He told me they respect him because he’s a role model for their little brothers and sisters coming up. He told me how they fear him too because he’s never backed down and he’s always won every fight and altercation. And no one has ever tested him and come out the winner. He fights better- quicker, stronger.

I told him, “I thought you had lost it, man, going after Cooper like that.”

He said that’s why he let me come along, but had insisted I stay outside because there aren’t any problems when things like that stay between two people. It’s an understanding, he said.

That night at home, I passed by T reading some dictionary-sized book with Angie curled up next to him. He looked so kind, innocent, like all he had was his charisma, his smarts and his girl. It made me understand. I had done my job with him, and he was schooling me.