Short Story - Red

Red
By Mackenzie Littledale
06/16/2020


My office closed operations for the day hours ago, but I had a special project to put the finishing touches on, some deep-pocketed potential client wanted the big guns on his side. It was on me to impress their team of buyers. Now that I could sign my name to it with pride, time to get home for Tuesday night tacos.

As I stepped out under the white light of the street lamp, a couple of teens were yelling and shoving each other in the parking lot behind my office building. I’d never seen these boys before, so I didn’t know whether to step in. They could have been riling each other on their way for burgers, for all I knew. Another man, also dressed in office attire, came out of the rear entrance. We glanced at each other, and a knowing look passed between us that nondominant males can never quite get right. I grabbed one kid, and he grabbed the other.

“Hey, back off,” we both said. “Break it up.”

The boys called us names in Spanish and tried to shrug us off, but we successfully pulled them away from each other. Typical teenage males with raging, aimless hormones.

“I’ve never seen you two around here before,” I said. “You best get on home to your folks and stay out of trouble.”

“And don’t come back around here,” said the man, smacking one teen upside his head. Better a smack than a police baton, so I let that go.

The kids shrugged us off, and the man’s jacket flew open, revealing a pistol similar to mine. The boys took off together, and the man looked at my hip. “You packing heat?”

I had to admit he was sharp to notice and trained my eyes on his holster. “So are you.”

“You expecting trouble?” he asked.

“My moms raised me to avoid it, but to be prepared. This neighborhood is pretty safe. Never had trouble before.”

“Ol’ Ginny here,” he said, patting his gun, “keeps it safe, just the way I like it. I live nearby.”

“Ol’ Ginny, huh? I call mine Django,” I said, not sure what he was getting at and taking a disliking to his tone.

His dark brown eyes shot me a warning. “I moved here to start a family.”

“Uh-huh. I have a family, too,” I said, raising my eyebrows, wondering where this conversation was headed. “We like it here.” My blood began to simmer.

“Which car is yours?”

What in the hell? “There’s only one car in the lot, buddy,” I said, pointing to my two-year old Camry about ten spaces behind him.

He turned to look and back at me with pure disgust.

My Camry sat alone under the parking light. It looked lonely and vulnerable, kinda like I was feeling at the moment. I imagined my wife, son, and daughter packed in it for our upcoming summer road trip. We’d voted on Grand Canyon this year. Was this prick gonna let me make it to my car? My heart rate and breathing sped up and my blood grew too hot to calculate.

“Where’s your car?” I asked. Maybe stalling for time to think would save me. Maybe stalling until more late night office workers came out back would let me get to my car in peace.

“My car’s behind you,” he said, nodding his head and looking over my shoulder.

I glanced behind at the only other car in the rear lot, a Honda Accord, in a similar color to my Camry. No other cars beside his and mine meant no one else would be coming. Stalling or not, I needed a plan.

“You play poker?” he asked, hand still within a couple inches of his piece.

“If you want to call my bluff, the fact is I don’t trust you. I’m uncomfortable with whatever this is, man. What exactly is this?”

“I don’t trust you, either.” He spat to his side, but his eyes never left me. “My wife is making my favorite dinner, and I get the impression you’re standing in my way.”

“Way I see it, you’re in my way. I would also like to get home to dinner and my wife,” I said, beads of sweat pouring down my forehead and back. My button-down shirt clung to my shoulders and my mouth went dry.

“You should be clearing out,” he said, jerking his head toward my Camry. “You sure you live in this neighborhood?” He took a few steps to the side and back, patting Ol’ Ginny like a pet.

“I know where I live. You’re the one should be clearing outta here.”

“I’ll leave when the threat is gone,” he said, sneering, his eyes becoming defiant. “My brother’s a cop.”

“The only threat was those kids, and they gone. Long gone. And before you get too high up on your horse, my cousin’s a cop.”

“Fuck you, I’m a goddamn law-abiding citizen. Haven’t done anything wrong.”

“You the one brought up calling police. I ain’t done anything wrong either.” The angrier I got, the more my office vocabulary escaped me. He was getting down into my core, where the words reigned raw and unrefined and jagged.

“Yeah, but we both know the truth, don’t we?” he said, coming close enough for me to feel the heat of his breath. “Cops don’t like niggers.”

We stood eye-to-eye and a cold shiver coursed through me. I imagined my wife getting a phone call that she’d been dreading for our whole lives. “Who you calling nigger? With bologna on your breath, pasty-faced piece of shit,” I demanded, standing my ground. I stood straighter, clenching my fist. I peered into the hate-filled abyss of his soulless eyes, breathed in his stink. His sweat stains spread around his neck, his cocky expression summoning my outrage. I had no way of knowing what my chances were of getting home alive.

“You don’t belong here. This is my neighborhood,” he said, growling.

“Listen, I pay my mortgage, taxes, and bills just like you. This neighborhood is mine, but damn you make it hard to trust a white man.”

“What was that, boy?”

Being referred to as a boy unleashed a blind rage from even deeper than the realm inside me of jagged and raw words. It may not have mattered after that point who shot first, but his shot hit me square in the shoulder. I got off two rounds, hitting him in the chest and blowing out his right kneecap. It’s just as anyone could have known, should have known: the blood pouring from our wounds cascaded in red. It pooled on the asphalt, with glints of silvery light from the streetlamps, taking with it some element of our souls, and laying it to waste.

I ran behind the enclosure for the Dumpster and called my cousin. Claiming my cousin was a cop had been a bluff; he was an EMT. He and two ambulances arrived within minutes. The prick and I got taken to the same hospital, and that’s all I knew of his fate for the time-being. After they admitted me to a room, I called my wife to come see me. “Can you bring me a couple extra tacos?”

While I waited for her arrival, I had time to reflect on the night’s events. I never knew where in the human anatomy racism resided, but it surely wasn’t in the blood. Blood has ever been, will ever be, universally red.