When we arrived I started the intro by telling Blondie who had sent us.
"I know," he said calmly, interrupting me. His eyes told me that he knew, his words said stop talking. We had known who he was too, even before the call was made. He was usually on the stoop of his building, laughing, joking and hard to miss.
"So who's coming inside?", he asked. His hand was holding the door to the building open. White Coat walked forward.
We watched as White Coat entered the apartment building and the door closed behind him, slamming lightly. The three men who stayed outside with us were thin and very quiet. We all chose not to speak, sharing head nods instead. The streets were filled with the noise of a summer night; children and adults alike were talking, and playing in front of houses, and little bodies were running to the corners. The neighborhood was live. The blaring drum of hip hop seamlessly melded with the voice of Romeo; the blend was smoother than I expected it to be. The music was the sound of possibility.
When we did begin speaking our conversation was short and shallow; we touched on nothing with weight. Our words were just a way to eat time until the door opened again and we could all leave. I stared through the glass of the door, trying to make my eyes bend around the corner of the hall. I could see nothing. I felt worry creep into my thoughts.
These men were tall and frail when compared to their compact leader, who we all now waited on. He was short, very short but also very muscular, he was the kind of muscular guy who wore clothing that let everyone know that he was very muscular. He reminded me of a pitbull; kind of scary, but somebody loved him and a lot of people feared him. He was also incredibly young, maybe twenty one at best. Despite his wealth of youth and lack of height, he succeeded in winning respect. In his group, they all knew that his being in charge was what was best for them. Leaders are always chosen for a reason, and over time the questions about that choice are quieted by respect and agreement. Everyone finds the special quality about the man in charge.
At first glance, I was blind to this guy's specialness but I did notice his hair, no one could miss that hair. The man wore a conspicuous shade of blonde on his head. It was a color that always made me think of gold and Amber Rose. A brother with blonde hair in the hood, he must have had something to back that decision up.
We met Blondie because we were having a party and our guests had requests. The sort of requests that were to be expected from a group of young, recently-hired professionals, and graduate students. People who were still in and just out of college had certain expectations when coming to a party in a famed city and at a large house.
Outside, there were crowds of three to four men at almost every corner and in both directions. It was an incredibly thick market; I had real trouble figuring out how any of these guys made any money. Being new to the neighborhood we had few connections, and didn't know who we could trust. We had one option though, there was a Dominican kid I had worked with not too long ago and he lived close by. He had always been cool; a version of cool that descriptions like genuine would stick to.
"Oh what yall need? Some regular?", he asked. I could hear the wonder in his voice; he hadn't expected me to call him, especially not for this. "Aight, hit up lil' blondie on your block. Short, diesel dude. Tell him I sent you," his knowing tone and the speed of his recommendation confirmed that I had made the right choice.
The convenience was uncanny, we only needed to walk a few hundred feet and we were there. It was a ten second call that had ended five minutes ago and now we were making connections. The timing of events reminded me of just how fast life in New York could move. Our wait on the stoop would be over before we knew it.
Over the next few months we learned more about the black kid with the blonde hair. The lightness of his dye made his skin look very brown to me, even red at times. This often made me wonder if this is why brown people colored their hair so light, to make themselves appear lighter? Maybe. I saw him constantly, he became a part of my route. I have a skill for recognizing faces and he would often greet me before I spotted him. I appreciated his effort with this. He would shoot a quick and loud "Yo," in my direction without breaking his stride. The smoothness of the exchange always left me feeling humbled.
No one else in the neighborhood came to know us so quickly. I knew that he greeted other members of our house too, even those who weren't there that night. He was a person who did not need familiar settings nor nametags to remember who you were. I liked this about him, it let me know that he remembered people, and led me to believe that he cared about his neighbors. This was when the edge of what made him special was beginning to reveal itself to me.
Three brownstones separated our house from his apartment, and in one of those brownstones lived our elderly neighbor. She moved slowly and spoke with a delicate joy, but remained aware and independent where she could. Occasionally, she would pass by with her hands full, and limbs weighed down by groceries. Whenever I would see her come near Blondie he'd pop up from his stoop and take her bags before she could protest. She would not ask for help but she did take it. Some days I saw him walk her from the subway, smiling while holding the brown bags like briefcases. Even when she had nothing to carry he would still greet her with a mischievous smile that belied something about his nature. "Good afternoon, Mrs. S!" he'd shout.
Blondie was no taller than 5'6" but he knew how to carve out a space in memory. He had left his mark with all the members of our house. We all had stories about seeing Blondie and all knew him; so when he went missing toward the end of that year, every one of us noticed.
A week after our first meeting on the night of the party, White Coat saw Blondie for the second time. Both Blondie and White Coat were up early, paying their respects to the grind. On that morning the sun was shining, and the responsibilities of the day were at the front of White Coat's mind.
When we first moved in it was impossible to go two blocks without being solicited. Someone always had that "purp", or "dro", or something I had never heard of. Someone always had "what you needed." It was a strange exchange, always stopping to say no. For some reason, I always felt like they had expected me to say no.
White Coat was in a hurry to work and so he attempted to avoid Blondie. He did not want to buy anything and he did not want to be seen. Of course, Blondie saw him. "Yo, whatchu like a doctor or somethin'?", Blondie asked.
"Yea, somethin' like that . . . I'm a medical student", White Coat responded full of hesitation. He was unsure of what Blondie was after; all he knew was that he was losing time.
"That's cool," Blondie said. "You know, I know you think I'm a bad kid but I'm not," Blondie began to explain; he had picked up on White Coat's apprehension. "I do this so that I can pay for school." His unexpected and unprompted explanation caused White Coat's nervousness to thaw into a slight embarrassment. Blondie was looking for a way for the two to bond and he had found it. What had seemed like a prying sales pitch was actually a thinly veiled aspiration.
Blondie wasn't an aimless drug pusher. He was a young man affording his education the only way that he knew how. He was hustling; this is New York. For him, loans were not an option for whatever reason, or maybe they were just not enough. So he spent his nights and mornings, earning money at lower interest but a lot higher risk. He was young, ambitious, and would not easily burn and peel in the sun -- he was us. Blondie and White Coat stood there taking in their new-found similarity. The two then held an even understanding about the unaffordable nature of big dreams. Making it out of the hood, or becoming a doctor from humble beginnings were not all that different.
When the new year came mobile police command were planted in our neighborhood. The marketplace became thin so quickly, and soon dried up. Couples of uniformed police sprouted up and became common. The familiar groups slowly vanished and the corners soon swelled with officers speaking in accents that did not match the flow of the block. Rumors about a shooting on New Year's day that invited the police were tossed around. I never confirmed them but I had seen a makeshift memorial, with more candles than cards, in a small plot of land near the end of our street.
Our concern surrounding Blondie quickly went from 'I haven't seen that kid in a while' to wondering what had happened to him; we knew something had happened. He was a fixture. People like him just don't disappear. More days went by and his stoop remained empty. We passed it everyday and always looked over, but he was never there. It seemed like no one was there much, anymore.
One afternoon, White Coat and I saw a girl on the stoop and decided to ask her about Blondie. It was random, but she was just there and looked friendly. We started with a general description and hadn't even made it to his hair before she said, "that's my brother." Blondie had a sister. She was polite, well mannered and returned smiles. The two did not look alike but the image of her brother was in her. Their parents had done a good job.
When she told us that her brother was locked up it was with hope in her voice. There was a faint joy in the words; her brother was alive and would come home again. These were all good things. She told us that he was doing fine and that it would not be too long before he was here, on the stoop. Just a few more months maybe, but he would be home. He would be home soon. When we left she was still on the stoop.
I moved a few blocks away and stopped seeing many of the familiar faces that I used to see. I didn't even see White Coat as much, although we took the same train and kept the same friends. New York has a very efficient way of hiding people. So when I did not see Blondie when a few months had come and gone and then more than a year had slipped by, I assumed that New York was just keeping him somewhere.
Earlier this spring, I texted White Coat to congratulate him on his residency match results. His dream was coming true, he was about be a doctor. It was a long-awaited accomplishment and a good reason to celebrate. That same week I also saw my Dominican friend, the same kid who introduced us to Blondie. I hadn't spoken to him since that night; three years had now passed. His face held more weight than I remembered. He had quickly gone to not fitting the description of a kid, he was a man now. I was astonished by how fast time could move.
We stood there on the quiet corner and updated each other. It was late and the streets were mostly empty, quiet and cold. The blocks were still. A night that has only one way of being good: one gets to go home and sleep. This was not summer. I never understood how seasons that touched could feel so different. It was very good to see him and better to hear that he was doing well. From the moment that we started speaking, I knew that I would find a way to ask about Blondie.
Finally, after we had caught up on life for a while and the cold began to take its toll, I brought up Blonldie. He at first didn't remember him. Had it been that long? I hadn't forgotten him. Soon enough, he knew who I was talking about. He called him by his name, his real name.
"Oh yea, I remember him, he's doing serious time. Serious time," he said this while motioning toward the distance, nowhere in particular just out there, far away. The way he dragged out and emphasized the words serious and time made me afraid to ask how long he would be gone; it was long enough for him to start being forgotten. “Yea, they busted up in his crib and caught him on a gun charge. He’ll be gone for a minute. They gave him like ten years or somethin',”he said. Ten Years. The numbers sounded heavy coming out of his mouth. Ten years is a very long time and because it was nearly half of Blondie's age, it made the sentence seem so much longer.
I walked home and wondered who else had started forgetting Blondie. Who would remember him after ten years? I was having trouble imagining his sister sitting on the stoop, still full of hope and waiting to welcome him back. When I arrived to the stairs of my building I found the trash containers outside had been rummaged through. The handles from the paper Trader Joe's and Whole Foods' bags wrapped loosely in the wind. They hung there moving wildly and loudly, begging to be pulled out or pushed down, but I did neither. I went inside and wrote about Blondie.