Lost Yinzer
I stopped running. I walked quite a few paces by myself. Calvin and Steve were at least a block back. I turned to wait for them, but they were huddled into a semi-circle with a squat, stocky black guy. The three were laughing and talking as if they were all good buddies.
“What’s going on now?” I shouted, walking back.
They all stopped talking. The black guy looked up at me with a toothy smile that I wanted to wipe off of his face. “You like black girls or white girls?”
“Not interested.”
“I didn’t know we had one of those with us.”
The three of them laughed. Then Steve went right back to talking, as if I weren’t there. “All right, Dave. How much for the two of us?”
Dave looked Steve and Cal. “Forty dollars.”
“Is there room to negotiate?"
“Hey man, as long as the cops don’t roll by, we can negotiate all you want.”
“Twenty-five for both.”
Dave laughed. “Bullshit. Thirty-five.”
“Thirty.”
“Deal.” They shook hands.
We followed the pimp up Wood Street. The city was deserted. But nothing happened on Wood Street. And nothing happened on Grant Street either, except the excited talk of Dave. He buttered Calvin and Steve up. He told them all about the ladies he had waiting for them at the Ramada. I lagged behind as always. I was never sure where I fit in. I wished that I was back home, pining over some woman, and not worrying about what Dave the pimp had planned for me once the guys were snug in a hotel room with their whores.
But then the four of us were standing around the well-lit front of the Ramada. We waited in front of a large panel of plate glass windows, allowing our faces to be examined by the hotel staff. Behind us loomed the Monongahela River and the neon lights of the Southside. How I wanted to go back there, and forget the dead of the city. Ahead of us laid the business district, and every sad and joyless street we’d just tread upon.
Calvin quickly handed Dave two crisp twenty-dollar bills. Dave looked at the two twenties. “That dude gave me forty dollars. The price is forty now.”
“No way, brutha! You made a deal!” Steve shouted
Dave put his hands up. “What deal? Where’d I make a deal?”
“In front of the porn shop!”
“I don’t remember no deal. The deal is for forty dollars.”
“Negative! Give me back the money!” Steve went for the cash but he was too slow. Dave backed up off of the sidewalk.
“It ain’t your money!” He snapped at Steve. Dave turned to Calvin. “You cool with forty?”
Calvin looked around. He looked nervous. “Well, yeah…I mean, I don’t care.” Calvin turned to face Steve. “Forty's okay, right?”
“Aw, come on, Cal! I worked this shit out already! Thirty dollars or no deal!”
“But Steve, It’s only ten more dollars? It’s my treat.” Poor Calvin looked around the failing city of his birth. “I gotta do this!” he pleaded.
“Well, it’s all you then, dude. I think you’re a moron! Go lose your virginity to some forty-dollar whore.”
“Are you in?” Dave said to Calvin. He nodded. The pimp smiled. He put his arm around Calvin. “You ready?”
The two of them disappeared around the side of the building. For two minutes Steve swore. His obscenities echoed off of city buildings and overpasses. He kicked away at a concrete flowerbed, as I worked to fend off all of the horrible thoughts I had of Calvin alone with the pimp. What kind assholes were we to let him go off on his own? Calvin was like a slow-witted younger brother. I cursed the brutal city for its fallen angels. Then a noise came from the other side of the Ramada. It was Calvin and Dave. They were running back down the street. Dave had replaced his t-shirt with another one.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“The security guards inside called the fuckin’ cops!”
