The Planet of Junior Brown Read online

  Junior’s mother accepted the chaos of Miss Peebs’ rooms as the mark of the true artist, even though the filth of the place had always nauseated her.

  “Be careful you don’t bring cockroaches home with you.”

  Standing in the dim hall, Junior stiffened as the voice of his mother entered his thoughts.

  “It’s all your fault anyway,” Junior spoke to the voice. “Leave me alone.”

  Junella Brown materialized in his mind. Her mouth moved but produced no sound. By rigidly controlling his own fantasy, Junior would not permit her any words to say.

  “I got you last,” he said softly. He had to smile. “What you going to do about that?”

  Carefully Junior moved along the path through the dim and cluttered hall. He stopped a moment to listen.

  She says she’s destroyed the piano. Miss Peebs wants to keep me out of the living room.

  Junior inched soundlessly forward, shivering. He felt chilled. He was never cold unless he was getting sick. And it was true, the confusion of Miss Peebs’ rooms made him feel he might vomit. He forced his mind away from the churning of his stomach.

  She wants to keep me out. She’s got somebody in there who doesn’t like music. A relative, living here?

  Miss Peebs came through the door at the end of the hall. She looked at Junior coming toward her and set her mouth in a grim line. “I told you to wait until I called you,” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Junior said. “I have to sit down. I’ll just go on into the living room.”

  “We’ll have our tea right here in the hall at the table,” Miss Peebs said firmly. “You may beat your lesson out on one of the chairs. You may sing the note values in tune as you beat the rhythm, paying attention to the content of the melody as you go along.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Junior sat down at the table. He avoided looking at Miss Peebs. “I want to play a real piano,” he said.

  “I’ve told you so many times,” Miss Peebs said. Her black eyes flashed, seeming to beg him.

  “Yes, ma’am, Miss Peebs, you didn’t hurt that piano,” Junior told her, “you couldn’t harm it.” His tone was nearly a challenge. “It’s all right if you’ve got someone come to visit with you. I know how that is. My daddy, he had a cousin, he told me. And that cousin used to come around to borrow five dollars every time it snowed for more than two hours.”

  Junior forced a half-hearted smile. The last thing he wanted was for Miss Peebs to think he was minding her business.

  A look of warm affection passed between them. Lynora Peebs’ hands shook as she tried to pour tea for them. She spilled it and sank down into a chair. Finally Junior had to pour the tea. He was glad to have the chance. Miss Peebs’ cups were smooth and fragile, and cool to the touch. Awkwardly, Junior performed the task without spilling the tea.

  The two of them sat there, silent for a time. Miss Peebs’ hands shook every time she set her cup down. Junior listened for anyone moving around the living room. Whoever might be there surely knew how to keep quiet. Maybe whoever it was couldn’t stand a lot of sound, just like his mother couldn’t stand it.

  Fleetingly he wondered if Miss Peebs noticed that he wasn’t beating out his lesson.

  I won’t do it, he told himself. She is going to have to let me play her piano.

  Lynora Peebs sat, seeming to struggle with herself. Every other moment, she looked about to say something but would change her mind. Junior quickly understood he would have to give her time for whatever it was she was trying to decide.

  “I told you about the solar system we were making,” he said. “Mr. Pool and Buddy Clark. Buddy made a whole new planet. Now there are ten planets instead of nine and the tenth one they made just for me and named him Junior Brown.”

  Miss Peebs sighed. She shook her head disapprovingly. “Your Mr. Pool has no business keeping you from your school work. You should have no business with a man like that, nor with that boy who waits for you each Friday on the street. Oh, I’ve seen him,” she said, “your Buddy Clark.”

  “No, ma’am,” Junior said, surprised by the meanness with which Miss Peebs spoke. “Buddy knows more math and science. Mr. Pool once was a teacher, see, and he taught Buddy a lot of it. Buddy’s my friend. I thought maybe he could come up one time while I have my lesson.” Junior was shocked to hear what he’d just said. He didn’t know why in the world he’d asked permission for Buddy to come to the lesson and, anxiously, he looked at his teacher. “Buddy could wait in the hall. He wouldn’t bother anything.”

  “I won’t have anyone here while you take your lesson,” Miss Peebs said.

  “That’s what we need to talk about,” Junior told her. “I mean, how can you call it a lesson? I can’t keep on coming here and not even get a chance to show you how I am sounding.”

  “So few students can become concert pianists,” Lynora said. “Perhaps one in a thousand musicians has the gift and stamina for it.”

  “Mainly I just want to know the theory and composition,” Junior told her. “Then maybe I’ll be able to teach it in college or something.”

  Miss Peebs’ face twisted in a lopsided grin. “Then you won’t need to practice on my piano. It’s a concert piano for concert pianists!”

  Her smile changed into tight knots about her lips. “I didn’t mean that!” she whispered. “Junior, I’ve been so upset—I do have someone here visiting.” She leaned closer to Junior. “I don’t know what to do with him since he has no place else to go …”

  Junior looked around, wide-eyed. He felt frightened to think that somebody might have heard every word they had spoken. “I could get my daddy,” he said.

  “Shhh!” Miss Peebs whispered. The sound rushed around them.

  “I mean, my daddy could come down and help you, if you want,” Junior said, as softly as he could.

  The bright smile Miss Peebs flashed at Junior was out of keeping with her obvious fear and whispering. “Why, who said I needed your father to come here?” she asked Junior. “You’re not to tell your father or anyone!” Glancing toward the living room, she said, “I thought I could nurse him back to health—you know, he isn’t well—but he doesn’t seem to know or care how bad off he is. Twice when I’ve been busy in the back, he has slipped out of the apartment. I have no idea how many people he’s infected. I do want to keep him in the house until he’s well enough to leave. Oh, but I don’t know if he’ll ever be well.”

  Junior had long since stopped wondering about Miss Peebs’ occasional queer behavior. Being with her in her house was much like being with Mr. Pool in the basement of the school. He didn’t have to change himself over to suit either one of them. Neither she nor Mr. Pool ever bothered him about his fat. In fact, Miss Peebs never seemed to notice it.

  But now Junior listened to Miss Peebs with a certain amount of disbelief. She had lived by herself since her parents had died. She had been content with her privacy and her music.

  “How come you took him in your house?” Junior asked her. Suddenly he felt uncomfortable with the question. “But I guess he’s some kind of relative.”

  “Relative?” Miss Peebs said. One birdlike hand touched her earlobe. She sighed with an odd, shaky laugh. “Yes, and I thought he must have died by now. But here he comes with his socks on strong, pretending he is ready for a fight.”

  “Would he mind so much if I took my lesson?” Junior said. “Couldn’t I go in and play for fifteen minutes?” Junior longed for the sound of the grand piano. His deep-down loneliness would disappear for a while if he could just play it.

  “He can’t have any visitors.” Miss Peebs’ voice was cold. “He hates noise. Beat the lesson out on a chair, or on the table. I’ll clear it off.” She got up, taking their half-consumed cups of tea and the teapot to the kitchen.

  Junior’s legs felt weak and rubbery when he got to his feet. His insides were churning with a bruising hunger. He walked the short path to the living room. The door was closed but there was no lock. Junior listened. Not hearing any so
und, he turned the knob and went inside.

  High above Amsterdam Avenue, Miss Peebs’ living room faced the scream of fire engines and the rumble of traffic. The closed windows were hung with heavy drapery. Even so, noise seeped inside, became trapped there and lived in the room.

  The room was dark and musty. Uneasily, Junior could feel it settle in around him. He fumbled for the switch on the wall and flicked on the ceiling light. What he saw in the pale, yellow glow made his skin crawl.

  “I told you to leave it alone,” Miss Peebs said. Her crisp voice cut through the noise and narrow light. Not bothering to wash the teacups and saucers, Miss Peebs had dumped them in the sink, then had hurried back to keep watch on Junior. She came into the room on the main path as Junior had a moment before. And now she waited behind Junior, her eyes fixed on the folds of Junior’s neck rolling over his soiled shirt collar.

  Like the entrance hall the living room overflowed with enough antique and equally shoddy decoration to furnish three households. The main path led past chests, bureaus and the one sofa directly to the front windows facing Amsterdam Avenue. Branching off from it to the right was a narrow path leading to a rear hall and Miss Peebs’ bedroom. On the left side of the main path was a perfectly clear, circular area in which sat the grand piano. Its massive, elongated heart shape made all else in the room seem cheap and faded.

  The room was a total wreck. Immediately Junior saw that the piano had been the focus of some attack. Vases, cups and dishes, glasses, lay splintered among the piano legs. The piano’s rich, mahogany surface had been gouged with some dangerously sharp tool and marked by blows the size of hammer heads. A cup of coffee had broken over the black keys, spilling liquid onto the piano bench. The coffee mess had dried the color of turkey gravy on the ivories.

  Miss Peebs’ grand piano had been lovely to look at. It was still beautiful to Junior. The many weeks of his concern for its fate came to rest in that one awful coffee stain. His insides quaked for fear the damage done to the piano had gone beneath its surface.

  “I told him he would never play it,” Miss Peebs said, from somewhere behind him. “When he went ahead, I saw stars—I beat him. Yes, I whipped him about his head and I threw everything I had at him!”

  Someone had flung the contents of bureau drawers from one end of the room to the other. Chairs were overturned. A table lay smashed. Junior saw all the damage through the image of the coffee stain.

  “Why would he want to play it, if he hates sound?” Junior thought to say.

  But Miss Peebs went on, “These are my private things! I cannot stomach anyone searching through my house as if they owned it.”

  “I can clean it up for you,” Junior said. His husky voice came from a great distance. He could not take his eyes from the piano. “All I need is a sponge and a cloth to clean up the keys.”

  “You must get out of here or you will catch a serious infection,” Miss Peebs said.

  “There’s not a soul in here but us,” Junior said, musing to himself. He didn’t need to look around him to know that he and Miss Peebs were alone. He heard the soft sound of her footsteps move away to the doorway.

  “He’s hiding again,” Miss Peebs said.

  “No,” Junior heard himself saying. He turned around to face her. “I think he must have gone out before I got here.”

  A wan smile brightened Miss Peebs’ face.

  “You’d better leave then,” she told Junior, “before he gets back.”

  “Can you manage here alone, with him?” Junior spoke carefully. “I mean …” he stammered, “… not to fight, not to destroy the piano?”

  “Not to worry, Junior,” Miss Peebs said vaguely. “I’m strong. I’ll keep myself busy and not let him annoy me.”

  “You are going to leave that piano like that?” Junior said.

  Miss Peebs became irritated. “I’ll clean it—not to worry, Junior. I can come in here now and not let him get the best of me. And I will give you your lesson next Friday for sure.”

  Miss Peebs smiled brightly. She dismissed Junior with her blank and feverish eyes. Junior could think of nothing to do but gather his books and get out.

  “Next Friday?” he said. He was moving down the entrance hall, away from where Lynora Peebs leaned heavily on the table.

  “Yes! Yes!”

  “I’m going to bring my friend Buddy or I can’t come. I told him he could hear me play,” Junior said this stubbornly. If anyone could convince the relative to let Junior play, it would be Buddy. Furthermore, Junior knew he would not step foot again in the apartment by himself.

  “Yes, go! Hurry!” Miss Peebs told him.

  Junior let himself out of the apartment. In the empty corridor he shuddered with wave upon wave of relief to be gone. Almost instantly he was on his guard, for in the corridor he was cut off completely from the life within the apartments and the life on the street below. Frantically Junior pressed the elevator button. Beyond the elevator the corridor curved to the right. Junior couldn’t help wondering if someone waited just beyond the turn. He thought he heard something.

  It’s the relative.

  Junior made a break for the steps to the left of Miss Peebs’ apartment. He went down as fast as he could. By the time he had gone three floors, he realized he had plunged into semidarkness. The only light was the wan daylight entering onto the stairway at its landing. Each floor had a window overlooking the long shaft between Miss Peebs’ building and the one next to it.

  What’s waiting down on the next landing? Junior thought. He turned on the stairs to start back up again when he was overcome with the notion that whoever had been waiting beyond the curve of the corridor on Miss Peebs’ floor was now waiting on the landing above him.

  In a blind rush Junior heaved his bulk down to the next floor and hurled himself against the elevator.

  Come on! He pushed the elevator button again and again. Keeping his eyes tight shut, he fought back his fear.

  Who was it creeping down the stairs from above? In his mind, Junior saw the man’s shoes. The shoes were black, the leather so worn it had creased to the softness of kid. The leather had gaping holes slit by a razor to ease the pain of festering bunions. The heels of the shoes had worn away. The man’s ankles, covered by filthy silk socks, were swollen and discolored. Behind Junior’s eyes, the stench of the man was unspeakable. It was an odor of decay. Junior saw the man’s ragged pants cuffs caked with filth before his second sight went blank and the elevator door sliding open wrenched his eyes wide and clear. The elevator went down without stopping, carrying only Junior. The whole time Junior concentrated on cooling off and stopping the sweat that poured out of him.

  Junior came tearing out of the building. He swung his legs loosely, his body rolling from side to side. “Man,” he said. He looked up. The sky was evening dark. Not yet night, it was suppertime, the end of a working day. It was a resting, quiet time before the town came to life again as the city of darkness.

  Slowly Junior felt himself grow calm. He turned this way and that, looking for Buddy Clark through the crowd of people hurrying home. Buddy appeared from behind a parked car.

  “It’s late, man,” he said. He looked at Junior, not at all disturbed at having to wait longer than usual. To Junior, it appeared that Buddy had not been waiting so much as he had found himself ready to leave at the same time Junior was ready to go.

  “You didn’t even freeze yourself,” Junior said, noticing how comfortable Buddy looked.

  “I found me this place,” Buddy said. “This some kind of coffee house. Weird, man. I was talking to this soft little thing who don’t know where she going and can’t remember where she been.”

  “Sticks like her going to tie you up one day,” Junior told him.

  “Never happen as long as I keep moving,” Buddy said. Already Buddy seemed to be going off from Junior and preparing himself for the time he would have to leave Junior. Junior felt this withdrawal happening as he had before. He accepted it as he did the fact that fr
eedom ended for him once he went home to his mother’s house.

  “We can take us a bus,” Junior said. “If I get on a subway, I’ll might be sick.”

  Buddy looked at him curiously. “You want to ride a bus all the way uptown?” he said. It was then he saw that Junior was drenched in perspiration. “Getting yourself a real kind of cold, man,” Buddy told him.

  The two of them walked without talking to 79th Street and Broadway. They waited twenty minutes for a bus.

  “You going to catch hell from your mother, being so late,” Buddy said. “You sure musta had yourself some long kind of lesson today.”

  Junior searched Buddy’s face to see if he were teasing. But Buddy was intently watching the street, part of his mind already loose from Junior. Still he and Buddy were talking easy, in a way they had not spoken for a while.

  “She don’t care if I’m late,” Junior told him. “She only want me to be sure that once I do come home, I don’t bring nothing from outside in with me.”

  The way Junior spoke touched Buddy. Gently he said, “You had yourself a time today, didn’t you, man? What happen up there with you and your teacher?”

  Finally Junior said, “You won’t have to wait outside next Friday.” He could see the Broadway bus stopping down at 72nd Street. “Miss Peebs say you can come in while I take my lesson.”

  Buddy kept quiet. His mind clicked off the pieces of Junior he could put together. Junior had tried to get rid of him every Friday. Now Junior was telling him he could go someplace he never was allowed to go. Junior had been late this Friday. Something had gone on at the lesson. Junior had come out of it not afraid to have Buddy say a little something about his mother.

  The bus arrived. After they had found seats together, Junior couldn’t make himself tell Buddy what had happened to Miss Peebs’ piano.

  This relative started messing with Miss Peebs’ piano and she had to throw all kinds of stuff at him—how was that going to sound to Buddy? Or, you see, she had this cup of coffee in her hand and she threw it at her cousin and got coffee all over the piano keys. All right. But how do you explain the hammer marks? Did her relative do that just because he hated noise? Or was he vicious?