Ellen David Sullivan
Flaco

When the landlord called his name, Julio didn't answer, even though he knew it was stupid to pretend he wasn't home since the man had the key. As Cesar's footsteps thumped away down the stairs, the muscles in Julio's neck shrank tight, snaking pain across his shoulder. It wasn't up to him to pay, but still he spent the next few hours dreading the old man's return. He could have gone out, but he was wiped from practice and lifting. Besides, he couldn't even hang around the mall checking out girls when he was totally distracted by the rumble across his belly that wouldn't quit until he got something to eat.

Hunkered down watching a grainy movie his friend Ralphie copied for him, Julio knew the landlord would be back. And Julio had no money. He'd have to stand up to him, which would be easier to do later because as he got hungrier, Julio found he could channel his body's irritation to produce a fierceness he didn't feel when he'd been fed.

Later the knocking began again and Julio opened the door.

"Rent," Cesar said, holding out his hand, his scarred thumb rough on Julio's skin as they shook hands. "You gotta pay me."

"My dad's working overtime every day," Julio said. The man he lived with wasn't his father, but his mother's boyfriend.

"It's Saturday," Cesar said. "The factory's closed."

Julio had no answer for this, so he shrugged, feeling a pinch in his delt. "I tell him where I'm going, he doesn't tell me." Though he was spindly, Julio was tall for a Puerto Rican, 6'3" and Cesar seemed to respect that as he tilted his neck to look up at him. Still the older man carried his thick middle like a boxer who knew how to use it.

"You gotta pay," Cesar said.

Julio lifted his shoulders in a motion large enough to loosen the coiled tension furling his back. He stood taller. "Not my name on your papers."

"God damn citizens," Cesar said. "Not afraid of nothing." Cesar was Dominican like the families in the two apartments below who probably weren't even legal. "You tell Victor I'm gonna take that car if he don't pay," Cesar said.

"That's not his," Julio said, leaning forward to stare down at the sparse hair on the landlord's head. "It's my sister's." It had been hers. Victor had promised it to Julio as soon as he passed his driving test.

"That's her problem," Cesar said. "This ain't no garage."

Julio's sister lived in New York, where she couldn't afford a car. Hers wasn't the only ride parked on the asphalt front yard of the building day after day. The second-floor people had a Dodge Charger they must have been keeping for parts.

"You can't take it. It's no different than that other car out there." A ferocious energy rose up from Julio's empty belly. "Don't be hassling me." He used this growl with guys who shoved him under the basket. After a single thrust, he only ragged on them, but if they tried again he'd pop an elbow into the kid when the ref couldn't see. Julio wouldn't do that to Cesar, because he was old, but Julio needed to keep the car.

Cesar backed toward the door. "Don't get hot," he said. "Just tell your old man to pay."

Julio said he would, though he hadn't seen Victor in five days. Each night Julio imagined gruesome accidents, Victor's car rolling over in a watery ditch, a machine taking off his arm at the factory. He could be in a coma in a hospital or even dead and who would know to call Julio? Only his mother and she hadn't. He would have called her, but she was in the women's prison in Framingham and the rules didn't allow kids to call. It was just like her to leave him alone with no idea what was going on. She'd used silence before to keep Julio from learning about the drugs, but that didn't make this right. Maybe she didn't know what had happened to Victor either.

The first time she went to jail, Julio only understood that his mother had to leave. The reasons were part of the adult world of whispers and shrugs. When she'd come out, she'd been clean and muscled because she'd spent a lot of time lifting weights. Those years in middle school had been the best Julio could remember because his mother, a solid person with creamed coffee skin, bright green eyes and reddened curls, liked to shoot baskets even though she wasn't very tall. She was strong enough to box him out and Julio learned from her where to insert the knob of his elbow into someone's ribs.

When his mother went to jail this time, Victor agreed to stay in Lawrence with Julio so he could finish his last two years of high school and get a basketball scholarship even though the apartment was forty-five minutes from Victor's job in Southern New Hampshire making computer parts. Julio had looked for the phone number of the factory, but couldn't find it among the bills and mail and flyers piled on the kitchen counter. He knew the name was something with "Tech" in it, but he couldn't remember the rest. It wasn't odd for Victor not to come home for a night. He slept at a friend's when he worked overtime and was too tired to drive home. Then he would show up the next night with a bag full of groceries. Julio kept telling himself Victor must have had four days of overtime, but that didn't explain where he was on Saturday.

That night Julio had trouble sleeping. Without Victor, there was nothing in the house but ketchup and hot sauce, ice packs in the freezer, stuff like that. Around midnight Julio woke, hunger ripping through him. He cursed his mother at the same moment he longed for her. If he had keys to his sister's car, he'd drive out to the jail and demand to know how he was supposed to keep on. He could almost hear his mother's soft questions asking about his workouts and games. She loved hearing how many points he scored. She believed he was good, better than he really was. She was sure he'd graduate from college and play basketball and she wouldn't be poor any more. She told everyone Julio was her "ticket."

In the morning he took a shower and dressed in clothes he'd washed in the sink and dried on the back porch. The iron worked, so he looked pretty good, except he hadn't had a haircut in two weeks. The razored line around his forehead had grown shaggy. Since it was Sunday, he called Ralphie who told him to come over later, after practice.

Coach Walls worked them hard even though the season was still a week away. Julio put in his ear buds on the way to Ralphie's trying to pull energy from the music. His knees trembled when Ralphie's mother gave him a big hug. Relieved and grateful, Julio accepted Mama Cecilia's invitation to stay for supper. He hadn't known how he was going to sleep with nothing to eat for over a day. He nearly gobbled the pork with beans and rice after she filled his plate.

"You eat more, Flaco," Mama Cecilia said to Julio. She pushed her son's arm as he reached for the plantains. "Rafael, how you gonna run down that basketball court for your scholarship, fat as you are?"

Ralphie wasn't fat, but he loved his momma's cooking. With his father away in the DR, Ralphie had had to drop out to take care of the store. Missing practice and weights, he'd bulked up. He told Julio he'd get in shape as soon as he was back in school. Every time Ralphie talked to his father, he put off the date when he'd be home. Julio felt for Ralphie, because being out of school stunk, but at least he had his mama. And hot meals.

Mama Cecilia filled Julio's plate a second time. Julio kept his head down as he thanked her. When he glanced up, she looked like she might cry. After dinner he and Ralphie loaded up songs on Julio's iPod, which wasn't really an iPod, but it worked most of the time.

"Call me, man," Ralphie said as Julio was leaving.

"Wait, Flaco." Mama Cecilia came to the door with a plastic bag. "You take this home in case you get hungry."

"No, thanks," Julio said. "I'm O.K."

"We can't leave it here," she said. "Rafael will get into it when I'm asleep."

"Ma." Ralphie's whine singed the air.

As she hugged him, Julio felt as if Mama Cecelia could see under his hoodie into his heart. Though she wasn't a friend of his mother's, Lawrence was a hard place to hide anything. The Dominicans and Puerto Ricans claimed they lived in separate worlds, but people talked. Did anyone know he'd been living alone? Julio hoped not. Maybe she just wanted him to have some home cooking. Everyone knew his mother was in jail.

On Monday after practice, the coach told Julio he'd drive him home. This was good because it meant he'd feed him, but Julio had to be careful not to give anything away. If Coach found out about Victor, he'd tell people. Julio couldn't take pity on top of everything else.

As they drove down Broadway, Coach kept his large head fixed on the road. "You were dogging it on the outlet passes," he said. "Your knee bothering you?"

Julio had sprained his ACL last season. "Nah, it's fine."

"Then you're going lazy on me, " Coach Walls said.

"I'm not. I run hard."

"You need to be more aggressive. I've told you before. Get inside. Put your body up against the other guys."

"I need to build up, get more muscle."

"You need to use what you've got."

The coach came from Jamaica. He'd played basketball at a nearby college and he talked pretty much like a white guy, even though he was very black.

They went to a place with great fried chicken and after they ordered they sat across from each other in a worn booth. Julio opened the Sprite in front of him. Milk would have been more filling, but places like this didn't have milk in the cooler. The hot chicken was sweet and the fries were crisp. Julio dunked his in ketchup.

"You know you've got to get your grades up or it'll be tough for me to sell a college coach on you. And when they come to games, they gotta see you going big, using your height."

"You promised my mother if I stayed I'd get a scholarship."

"I promised I'd do my best to get you one. You gotta do your best too."

"I'm trying." Julio believed the coach was too hard on him. How was he supposed to do everything with no mother? "I think I need to get a job."

"You don't have time for that. You've got to use your free time to study. What do you need money for?"

"It's getting colder. I don't have a coat."

Coach's eyes, black and doubting, pinned Julio in a small bore gaze. He should have come up with something that didn't sound so lame.

"I'll find you a coat. I'll look in my closet and see what I've got. You stick to doing your schoolwork. I don't want to be hearing about any more Ds."

Coach bent his head, his big teeth grabbing a chunk of meat. After he'd chewed and swallowed he looked at Julio. "Keep eating like this, they won't call you skinny anymore."

"Flaco," Julio said.

"Yeah, that," Coach said as if the Spanish refused to stick on his tongue.

When they'd eaten all the fries and most of the chicken, Coach asked the kid at the counter to wrap the rest, then he held the plastic bag out to Julio. "For later," Coach said.

"I'm okay," Julio said. "You take it."

As he opened the door to leave, Coach tossed the bag and Julio had to catch it.

He didn't like going into his mother's bedroom because it made her seem more gone, but since Victor hadn't come home, he'd looked all over the apartment for cash. He was sure there was some because Victor had said over and over he didn't believe in banks, though so far Julio had only found a pile of dimes and quarters on top of the dresser. Julio pushed open the door and stopped, decked again by the mess: the unmade bed, crushed socks draped over a pair of sneakers, clothes strewn beside Victor's tool kit as if he'd just come in from outside working on the car and had left everything pliers, jeans, ripped tee shirt in the same pile, greasy rags among his mother's ceramic palm trees and silver hair clips. She wouldn't have put up with this.

Julio had been through every drawer of the dresser, but now he opened the top drawer again. Stuffed in the small space were papers, envelopes, old pay stubs, tax forms, socks, a woven case full of his mother's earrings and bracelets. Julio groped deep into the mess to the back of the drawer where he touched a smooth cube. He pulled out a small leather box. Inside were the keys to his sister's car. The surge in Julio's chest soothed him. He was meant to find this. He felt as if his mother had hidden it away for him; though probably Victor had figured he was too lazy to reach that far back.

Julio couldn't believe he could now go see his mother. He ran down the stairs. Outside the chilled night wind blew a gust of orange and yellow leaves across the black asphalt. Julio strode to the car, inserted the key in the lock and let himself in. He gripped the steering wheel. Victor had let him drive enough that Julio knew what to do. As Julio turned the key the car sputtered and died.

He got out and lifted the hood. From what he could see under the streetlamp's halo, everything looked all right. He felt around the cold box of the engine tracing black hoses from end to end. No splits or holes. Reaching along the plastic container of blue window washer fluid he touched something sticky. He yanked and a piece of duct tape appeared, which wasn't surprising. His sister knew nothing about cars and would have thought that was a perfectly good fix for a leak. As he tried to re-wrap the tape he brushed against lumpy plastic. He tugged harder and something thudded to the ground. Crouching, Julio stretched out his arm and hooked a well-wrapped package, layers of plastic sealed with silver tape.

As soon as he held it close, Julio knew pretty much what he had. Though he wasn't sure what to do, he knew better than to stand around in the yard thinking. He shut the hood, locked the car door and trotted back inside.

Only when he was upstairs sprawled across the sofa, did Julio begin to wonder whether Victor had been doing the same as his mother or if his sister had been dealing and left it behind. It was worth something, maybe a lot, but she was scattered and could have forgotten. Or maybe this had been his mother's secret, something she didn't have time to get rid of before the cops came to the door.

Julio couldn't keep up with the rush of his thoughts. Some guys at school would give him cash for what he had, but they'd be quick to put it on Julio if anything went wrong. That would be the end of getting into college. He couldn't let that happen, crushing his mother's hope, but Coach couldn't promise he'd get into college anyway. He could use money. He had to pay Cesar.

Did he mean to sell stuff just this once or was he turning into someone he'd said he'd never be? If he sold it, he could give the landlord enough to stay and buy clothes and everything for the rest of the year. Just holding the package in his hands was making crazy shit run through his head. He could buy Mama Cecelia a gift. He could buy gas to drive to Framingham to visit his mother. He could get an iPhone. He had to get it out of the house. If he was going to sell it, he might as well do it fast.

He put the package under the homework papers in his black drawstring bag and slipped the laces over his shoulders. Outside he loped along, trying to look normal with the corner of wrapped plastic sharp against his spine, the weight bouncing with each step. The streets to the store were familiar, but Julio felt different, as if what he carried behind him emitted power. He nodded to the few people he passed, sure they could sense he was now somebody.

When he opened the shop door Ralphie was checking the cash register. "Hey." Ralphie grinned. "You're out late."

"I've got something to sell," Julio said.

"What're you talking, Flaco? This is a store. People come here to buy."

Julio checked to make sure no one was around, no head bent behind the fluted chip bags on top of the rack. "You alone?" he asked.

"You on some secret mission?" At that moment Ralphie was still making fun, but when Julio opened the drawstring and let him look into the bag, he let out a serious whistle. "What're you, loco bringing that in here?"

"I thought you could help me sell it."

"What? And end up like-"

"My mother? It's just one time."

"You get caught, wham no scholarship."

"I won't. Besides I need money."

"Get a job."

"Coach won't let me." The rush that had brought Julio into the store began to leak away.

"Where'd you get it?"

"I found it." Julio was sorry he hadn't invented a story for that, but Ralphie looked like he didn't want to know.

"What do you need to buy so bad?"

"My Dad stopped cooking dinner." Julio figured a little truth made what he didn't say less of a lie.

"I got food. Take what you need."

"You got coats?"

"He's not giving you no money?"

Julio shook his head.

"Give him a few days." Ralphie reached into the open register. "How much you need?"

"No," Julio held up his hand.

"It's a loan," Ralphie said. "Pay me back when he starts giving you again."

"I can't." Julio couldn't see how he'd ever pay Ralphie back unless he sold the dope, so he might as well just turn it into cash and leave his friend out of it. "I'll come over to eat. I love your mama's cooking."

"You want something for later?"

"I'm okay." Julio saw he'd made a mistake thinking Ralphie would help him sell the stuff. He could already see he was slipping in his friend's eyes. "I'm going to throw this away."

"Not in my trash."

"When I get home."

"No, Flaco, on the way home."

Julio knew a little about the street, but Ralphie was shrewder. Maybe running the store had taught him how to read people so he knew who was trying to steal, and who just needed a break until pay day. When Julio looked around for someone to sell the stash to, he would need to be at his most watchful. He'd have to look in their faces with Ralphie's eyes.

Out on the street in the moonlit evening, Julio made a deal with himself. He'd take the shortest way, cutting into the alley behind the barbershop. If he didn't run into someone he could sell the stuff to before he got there, he'd throw the package in the dumpster. He examined the few people nearby, rejecting immediately a short guy who'd been doing too many overhead reps, his neck bulged to his shoulders. Julio wouldn't take him on. Next came a cat with a do-rag and the slink to go with it, a guy who could easily have a pistol under his tented jersey. Forget that. Julio knew what happened when the scent of a fight drifted into the air: people materialized out of nothing, surging to see, jostling each other and in the crush a hand could easily snatch his package from him, even as he was being pummeled by another. He'd seen enough fights at school to know how that went.

Julio walked the next block without passing anyone. By a restaurant with a neon beer sign a ball-shaped girl swinging a plastic grocery bag came toward him. He hadn't thought of a woman, but why not? He'd seen a lot of his mother's friends the last time he visited her in jail. He could stop this girl. She'd be pleased at the attention, but what if guys he knew drove by and caught them in their headlights? Julio couldn't risk that. Farther down the block, he spotted a long-limbed girl who was floss. What would she say if he approached her? Maybe she'd be interested in him, but if she was, he couldn't mention dope or she'd think he was some desperate loser. He could only talk to her if she saw him as he was with the team, an athlete who was cool.

At his shortcut two men hunched toward each other smoking in a shaft of light from the bodega window. Julio hesitated. They were his last chance. "Hey," he said.

The taller one nodded as the men fell silent. Julio didn't know what he was supposed to say.

"What you want?" the smaller man asked staring at Julio as if he ought to know him, his cigarette inches from his lips.

"I've got-" Julio dropped his shoulder to release his backpack. As he stretched the gathered neck, the smoker raised the cigarette's glowing end to Julio's cheek.

"We didn't ask what you got. Beat it."

The warmth of the lit ash that could have scarred his face sent Julio bolting, his pack banging against his ribs. As he rounded the corner into the alley a thick smell of corroded metal, bitter and mean, spread down his nose to his throat. Dumpsters lined the alley, sprouting out of a base of boxes and crates. The biggest hulk had a greasy lid that Julio strained to raise over his head. Holding it up, his shoulder twitched. Julio stretched to look inside. Black plastic bags shone in spots between moldering coffee cups, spray bottles and stained rags. The heap reeked. Julio let the door close.

He opened the drawstring and lifted out the package. If he threw it in, he'd never get it out. But he'd made his deal and he hadn't been able to even start talking money with anyone on the street. He hoisted the door again.

A deep voice said: "What you got there?"

Julio pivoted until his eyes met those of a short, lean man leaning against the back wall of the auto parts store, his arms crossed over his denim jacket. He wasn't either of the two men beside the bodega. Where had he come from?

"Just something I'm getting rid of," Julio said, suddenly sure he should throw the package away. Yet with this man staring, he couldn't do it. The door pressed down, pinching his sore shoulder.

"Maybe worth something to someone?"

The man edged along the wall until he was under a light. His eyes looked like Coach's when he suspected the team was talking about him in Spanish. If Julio offered him the package would he pull out a wad of cash? Or did he have a knife in his sock?

"Maybe."

"Let me see." The guy held out his hand, which struck Julio as not right. They were too far apart. Did he expect Julio to throw it?

"I'm going to get rid of it," Julio said, raising the door.

The guy scuttled closer. Now Julio could see he had the straight smile of someone who'd grown up with parents and he was too clean-shaven to be living in the alley. He could be a cop.

"I'll take it." The man didn't make a move.

"I'd need to get something for it."

"You were going to throw it out."

"I won't if you'll pay for it."

The man put his hand in his pocket. "What do you want?"

Julio tried to remember how much the rent was, but he never listened when Victor complained to Cesar. "A thousand," he said.

"A thousand dollars? Must be solid gold."

"It's solid." Julio lowered the dumpster door.

The man came toward him with something black he'd taken out of his pocket. Julio dropped the lid. As it clanged, Julio took off. The guy could have been about to use his phone or a glock. Maybe he was a dealer or maybe he was undercover which would explain why he only looked part street. Julio didn't care. His long strides put him at the end of the alley before he heard the thud of footsteps behind him. Julio dodged the two guys talking. "Hey," one called. Julio kept running. Near the corner he saw there weren't many cars in the street. He crossed with only a quick glance each way.

At the opening of the chain-link fence around his front yard Julio looked back. No one was running after him. Whoever the guy had been, Julio had been too fast. Or the chase hadn't been worth his while. Panting, Julio thought of ditching the package in the car, but he wanted to get out of sight in case the alley guy crept out of the shadows again. Julio ran up the back stairs and shut the door.

Julio was still shaky a half hour later when Cesar showed up.

"He's not home," Julio said.

"Then you pay me." Cesar checked out the kitchen as if Victor were hiding in the oven and he could get his scent if he sniffed hard enough.

"I got no money."

"Maybe I should tell Children's Services I got a kid living alone."

"I'm not alone."

"When I come here you are."

"What if I give you something worth a year's rent?"

"I'm a landlord, muchacho flaco, not a hock shop."

"You said you'd take the car."

"What do I need with an old shit can? Besides, you said the car's your sister's."

"She's okay with it."

"You got the title?"

"I've got the key."

Cesar laughed. "Good. You got someplace to sleep after I evict you."

For the first time Julio let himself imagine where he would go if Cesar made him leave. He could stay with Ralphie for a while. Mama Cecelia would let him, but what would happen when Ralphie's father came back? "I got something worth money."

"I don't want 'worth money.'" Cesar flashed his stained brown teeth. "I want money."

"This is just as good."

"Nothing's 'just as good.' Either it's money or it's shit."

Julio wondered if Cesar knew what he had, but the landlord didn't say anything more. "Some things become money real easy."

"So sell what you got and give me the rent."

Julio lurched forward until he was between Cesar and the door. As they stared into each other's eyes, Julio grabbed his book bag and pulled out the package. "I'm going to give you this and you're going to let me stay here 'til school ends." He thrust the bundle into the shorter man's chest, pressing hard.

As Cesar raised his fist Julio swooped back. His long arm held off the landlord's punch. It cracked air. Then Cesar socked Julio in the elbow. The pain bolted through to his shoulder. Julio pulled the package away, dipping behind the landlord. Julio leapt onto the old man's back. He pushed the wrapped plastic against the man's spine. Cesar flailed, but couldn't reach him. Then he dug his fingernails into Julio's thigh. Julio fell off. He grabbed the landlord's shoulder, inserting his elbow into a ridge in Cesar's throat. Julio must have hit nerve because Cesar moaned. "No mas "

"You gonna take it?"

"No mas."

Julio separated himself from Cesar, setting the package on the landlord's open hand.

Cesar moved to the door, gave a scornful snort and opened it. "You should be ashamed to do this to an old man."

Julio was ashamed and he was sweating and he was sore and he was exhausted, but mostly he was hungry. He'd done a bad thing, but what else could he do? Staying in this place was the only way he'd learn what happened to Victor, the only way his mother could find him. Julio put on his jacket and followed in the landlord's footsteps down the back steps and out the door. The wind had kicked up. Julio hunched his shoulders as he headed over to Ralphie's. He hoped he wasn't too late for supper.

_ _

Ellen Davis Sullivan is an award-winning author of fiction, nonfiction and plays. A member of the Dramatists' Guild, her plays have been performed in theaters around the US. Her fiction has appeared in Moment Magazine and other journals. Her essay "The Perfect Height for Kissing" won the 2014 Columbia Non-fiction Prize.

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