The Planet of Junior Brown Read online

  “That was the plan me and Junior had,” Buddy said right back at her.

  Boldly, Junior’s friend was staring her down. She knew any decent boy would have lowered his eyes. But she continued to study him as though he were some rampant thing too widespread to be destroyed. He was not too different from the growth she weeded from her window box. And if she ever had the garden she dreamed of, she would cut this Buddy down toward evening.

  “Come along then,” she told him. Buddy waited for Junior to go first. Then he followed, ashamed he hadn’t found the nerve to tell Junior’s mother what he thought of her.

  Buddy never did know too much about the inside of people’s houses. He had only a few vague memories of such places. The homes were dark, walls were bare and moist with grime. Always there was one table, maybe two chairs. A bed set in the center of the room away from rat holes. There was listless quiet, or noise, coughing sickness. Buddy kept hold of the memories because they were what he had.

  Junior’s house brought back no memories to Buddy. He saw a nice sofa and a couple of easy chairs as he passed through the living room. The dining room was in an alcove off the kitchen. The walls of the room were papered in a design of gold weave. A big table had a yellow tablecloth on it and high-backed chairs all around it. Carved candlesticks on the table had tall candles burning in them. The table had been set for three people. Next to each dinner plate there was a smaller one. And above the dinner plate there was still another small plate. There were cloth napkins the color of the tablecloth. Besides having a knife and spoon, each plate had three forks next to it.

  Buddy was about to be nervous. His insides fluttered; he put his hands in his pockets, then awkwardly down at his sides. But something bright washed over his brain. In one sweep of his eye over the vivid table he knew how much care had gone into arranging it. He knew that on this Wednesday night in the middle of the week, with nothing better to happen than the coming of Thursday, the table had been set for a holiday supper. This was to be the Thanksgiving or the Christmas feast, or maybe even just the Sunday one before the time Junior’s daddy went away again.

  No. This time Buddy was to be the occasion.

  Junior’s mother came from the kitchen carrying a platter of roast stuffed turkey. She next brought gravy and sweet potatoes, broccoli and hot baked rolls.

  No, Buddy thought. It’s not a big turkey, but it’s turkey just the same. You eat it. I am it. She’s going to slice me up and help herself to my guts. She’s going to suck my bones. She thinks so.

  Thinking like that helped Buddy feel calm. Instinct born in him gave him an inkling of the man he would become. Some inbred notion told him that a table was no more than wood put together a particular way, no matter how you dressed it. The highback chairs were only more of the same. They could have been boxes, it didn’t matter what they were as long as you could sit on them, with some surface to put your food on so you wouldn’t have to eat in your lap.

  No. Sitting down to a spread like this has to make you feel good. Good as anybody. Without it you can’t feel half as good.

  Silently Buddy stood across the table from Junior. Standing beside her chair, Junior’s mother was between them at the head of the table. Buddy could feel her eyes on him. He glanced at Junior to find Junior again waiting for something.

  The food steamed up over the table in a mixture of delicious smells in the candlelight. The aroma curled around foreknowledge in Buddy’s mind. Easily he moved around the large table to Junior’s mother. He pulled the chair out for her and gently held it as she sat down, pulling it in to the table.

  All this done in a moment and in silence. Junior sat and Buddy sat down.

  Expertly, Junior’s mother carved the stuffed turkey. Talking all the while, she said, “I learned carving from my father and his father. My own husband was never home, you see, so learning to do for myself was necessary—Junior, you may pass the sweet potatoes and gravy. Buddy Clark, begin the broccoli around, please. I expect you are used to the turkey wings, the bony parts—shall I give you the back? Which do you prefer?”

  Buddy had served himself a large portion of broccoli and had passed it over to Junior. He had two sweet potatoes neatly on his plate, then spread a small amount of gravy over them. After that he turned to Junior’s mother. In the moment he kept her waiting, instinct came to him. Buddy said, “No thanks—if there’s giblets in the stuffing, I won’t have any of it, either.”

  Mrs. Brown was caught with the serving fork in the air, ready to puncture the back of the turkey.

  Junior grinned at her. “I’ll take what he don’t want,” he couldn’t help saying. His mother served him nearly a quarter of the bird and a wing portion with a mound of stuffing. She took a small amount for herself.

  “I expect you are some sort of Black Muslim,” she said to Buddy. “Pass me the sweet potatoes, will you please?”

  “I just don’t like eating off any flesh,” he said, placing potatoes and gravy near her hand. “It don’t seem right somehow.”

  Junior had filled his fork with glistening thigh meat and skin. He looked at the meat a long moment before he put his fork down.

  “Nonsense,” Mrs. Brown told Buddy. “A fowl or animal is not ‘flesh’ at all. It is meat meant to be eaten.”

  Buddy knew what he wanted to say. He could make Junior’s old lady throw up right in her plate if he wanted to. But there was Junior sitting across from him, about to die from hunger, unable to eat because he had called the meat flesh.

  Buddy swallowed hard. “I know it’s just some kind of problem I have,” he said. “I know I should eat meat—no reason not to.”

  Mrs. Brown smiled, buttering a roll. “I expect your mother finds meat too expensive to buy,” she said.

  “My aunt,” Buddy said. “My mother’s still down in Texas.” Old lady, see you scrounging in alleys. You’d know meat only could slow you down. Break away fast, and meat’s going to stick in your side like a knife.

  “It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Mrs. Brown said. “True, we sometimes fail to appreciate how much we have.” She glanced at Junior. “My own father always did say that whatever one had was a blessing.” She looked at Buddy. “We have plenty of meat here. Please feel free to help yourself.”

  In spite of herself, Junella Brown had a feeling for this son of the poor, this stranger in her house. Pity eased into her heart as she reminded herself how he would rather not taste the turkey than have to long for it sometime when he couldn’t get it.

  “Go ahead,” she said. “Believe me, we have plenty.”

  Junior’s mother breathed through her mouth. Buddy had seen that when he first met her but now the fact stuck in his mind.

  Fool lady, Buddy thought, see you cut up in pieces. Let some air in. Fry you and see the skin pop. Burn!

  “I’d appreciate some water,” Buddy said. There was nothing at all to drink at the table.

  “Goodness,” Mrs. Brown said, “of course you can have some. I never thought, since Junior seldom has anything with his dinner.” She got up to get Buddy some water from the kitchen, her breath strained, winded, as she walked away.

  “I hate water,” Junior said when his mother had gone.

  “I’d hate it too, if she was my mother,” Buddy couldn’t help saying. Rage stung in his throat.

  “She being nice to you,” Junior said. He looked sullen and guarded.

  “Wouldn’t want to see her when she’s being mean,” Buddy told him.

  Junior stared at him. “Never mind,” Buddy said. “You want to go to a film or not?”

  Junior’s mother came in with a tray. She handed Buddy a glass of water. “I forgot the salad,” she said. Buddy said he didn’t want any but Junior had some. There was apple pie for desert. Junior had two slices. Buddy drank the water, gulping it, not caring about the sound he made. The water cooled him off inside.

  Junior’s cheeks bulged with pie. His mother eyed his hunger, her face feverish and damp. She saw that Buddy Clark had not e
aten his roll, although he had cleaned his plate of vegetables and gravy. She sighed to see so much leftover food. Better to put it away now before Junior became hungry again. She knew she would be short of breath before she had the dishes done.

  “Junior and me want to go see a movie,” Buddy said. “I’ll see he gets home safe.”

  Slowly Junior’s mother began to clear the table. As she worked, going back and forth to the kitchen, she commenced to wheeze. Midst muffled coughing she managed to load a pile of dishes and silverware in her arms, and lurched into the kitchen. The dishes clattered in the sink. At once Junior was heaving himself out of his chair. Still chewing, he moved toward her bedroom. A moment later Junior returned with a bottle of medicine and an oxygen mask.

  It all happened so quickly, like a crazy, speeded-up film. Buddy was standing, not realizing he had got to his feet. He hooked his thumbs on his pockets and held himself utterly still inside. Always he could silence feeling when instinct told him death was stalking. Mechanically he gathered small plates neatly in his arms, while hearing as in a dream the muffled sobs of Junior and the choking of Junior’s mother.

  At the sink Buddy washed turkey grease from his hands. Junior’s mother was sprawled helplessly in a kitchen chair. Junior had hooked her arms through the ladder back so she wouldn’t fall to the floor. He had attached the oxygen mask to a silver cylinder he had rolled from a kitchen closet. He shoved the mask over his mother’s nose and mouth and held it there. With the other hand Junior released a valve on the cylinder. There was a hissing sound as the oxygen surged, rushing to bring back life.

  Buddy had seen Mrs. Brown’s discolored face. He knelt beside Junior and took her hands in his. Her hands were no longer warm. Contact with their lifelessness made Buddy wince.

  “She’s choking to death,” Buddy said. “Junior, take off the mask, she’s choking.”

  Splashed with tears, Junior’s face looked as though someone had sprinkled droplets of water on it. His body quivered with minute tremors. His hands were steady.

  “The mask stays on until she can cough up the sputum. Here,” Junior said to Buddy, “hold it for me.”

  Buddy reached to hold the mask in place. He had to press hard on the mask to keep his fingers from jumping.

  Carefully Junior took a gleaming hypodermic syringe from a black box on the table. Buddy hadn’t noticed the box until Junior opened it. Junior attached a long, hollow needle to the syringe and then, sunk the needle into the bottle he’d brought from his mother’s bedroom.

  “She’s a junkie,” Buddy said. He couldn’t believe his eyes.

  “No,” Junior told him. “Needle used for other things, mainly asthma.”

  “What’s the stuff in the bottle?”

  “Epinephrine,” Junior said. “Sometimes I use it in the needle and sometimes I let her inhale it from a nebulizer.” Junior had taken his mother’s arm, finding the large vein below the forearm. Buddy knew better than to ask him questions now. He watched as Junior rested his thumb lightly on the needle’s plunger. He saw the needle pierce the vein in one sure thrust of Junior’s hand. Junior’s thumb pressed down on the plunger. Buddy turned his face away.

  By the time Junior had cleaned and put away the needle, his mother was no longer choking. She began to cough into the mask.

  Alarmed, Buddy turned to Junior. Junior turned off the oxygen. As though she were a rag doll, Junior tossed his mother toward the sink and then was there to prop her up before she fell. His mother gagged and brought up a mass of sputum over the dirty dishes. That was all. The siege ended; Junior held her like a doll, dragging her to her room.

  Junior and Buddy cleaned the entire kitchen and dining room. With no trouble, they worked together—they were both so used to being careful and to silence. For an hour they hardly needed to speak; when they finished, the two rooms were spotless.

  In his room once more, Junior sat on the piano bench facing Buddy, who sat on the bed. Junior’s face was innocent, like a child’s could be. He did not plead for anything from Buddy. In his mute exhaustion, he told Buddy how it was he had to live.

  Buddy got to his feet. Junior swung around until he was facing the piano. His dark, brawny hands, swollen with flesh, arched skillfully as he pressed the keys. Swaying, and with his eyes closed, Junior played the music he alone could hear.

  “So that’s all, then,” Buddy said.

  Junior heard Buddy but it was hard for him to listen and hold the music steady at the same time. He could feel heat rising in the core of him, where he kept his fire. He waited to flame.

  “It’s my fault your mama got sick,” Buddy said. “She went to all that trouble fixing that turkey.”

  “She won’t ever mind cooking,” Junior heard himself saying. “She always manage to make a nice dinner.”

  “Anyway, I’m sorry,” Buddy said. “I didn’t have to come—I made you bring me here.”

  Music grew distant. Junior’s hands fumbled with the keys. His hands ached with muscles too taut and he had to stop playing a moment. Some halfhearted need took hold of him. He recalled how much of a friend Buddy was. He and Buddy were together. He had no one else to be with. Junior remembered, he took care of his mother but he cared about Buddy. He cared about music—Miss Peebs.

  Junior said, “I got checkers. We can play some, if you want. You can take the black. When me and my daddy play, I take the black and black always wins.”

  Buddy thought about playing. How could they play a game after what had happened?

  “I haven’t played checkers in a hundred years,” Buddy said. He didn’t know whether to go or stay.

  “You don’t ever forget how to play them.” Junior left the piano to get the game from his desk.

  “Why is that?” Buddy asked him.

  “Because you learn it when you’re so young,” Junior told him.

  “How come you so sure I learned it?” Buddy said.

  “You learned it,” Junior told him. “Somewhere, sometime, you had to learn to play checkers.”

  Buddy had to smile. He and Junior sat on the bed with the checker board and the box with the checkers between them.

  Junior had placed his red pieces before Buddy had half the blacks arranged.

  “How come you so fast?” Buddy said.

  “Why you so slow?” Junior said.

  Buddy said, “I was thinking about when I learned to play checkers. I couldn’t have been more than four or five.”

  “With your dad?” Junior asked him.

  Buddy had this vague feeling, almost like night and shadow. He recalled a figure of a man, laughing, playing with him. “Must have been my dad,” Buddy said. The memory sank into forgetfulness.

  “Down in Texas, where you were born?”

  “Must have been,” Buddy said.

  They played the game. Buddy couldn’t get in the mood of it. In the middle of it Junior went to see if his mother was feeling better. When he came back, he sat down again on the bed.

  “She all right?” Buddy asked him.

  “She’s sleeping,” Junior said. “She’ll sleep real hard like that until morning.”

  They played. Black won the first game and the second.

  “You want to play another?” Junior asked Buddy.

  “Not if black’s going to win again,” Buddy said.

  “What you got against winning?” Junior asked him.

  Buddy got to his feet. “If I’m going to win altogether every time, there’s no fun even playing.”

  “Black always wins,” Junior told him. His face broke into a wide grin. He shook with laughter.

  “Why you want me to win every time?” Buddy wanted to say. Instead, he said, “Okay, I’ll play another game if you take the black.”

  “I can’t take the black,” Junior said. “I’m always red because I’m fire.” He laughed in stitches, shaking the bed, his big hands hitting the board and overturning the checkers.

  Buddy stared down at Junior. Junior sat there, his arm outstretched
on the board and black checkers squeezed tight in his fist.

  To Junior Buddy’s eyes were glinting pins, then one steel needle darting out to go right through him. Junior imagined Buddy’s eyes were telling him he was a mama’s boy.

  “Why don’t you just come on out with me and leave her?” Buddy had to say. “You not supposed to take care of her the rest of your life. Your daddy’s supposed to.”

  Junior moved. He threw black checkers at Buddy’s eyes as hard as he could. He was up off the bed with his fists swinging. Buddy was too swift for him—he knew that fighting was living and breathing. He had brought Junior to life.

  Buddy had whacked the checkers away to the floor in a motion so fast it had ended before Junior saw it. Buddy had Junior’s flailing arms pinned behind Junior’s back before Junior realized Buddy had got behind him.

  “You so smart,” Junior said. “Think you’re so tough.” With one great heave Junior lifted Buddy onto his back and shook Buddy off again over his head. Buddy landed, tumbling over his own head onto his shoulders and then on his back. He barely had time to get one hand in position to protect his neck as he went over. As it was, he had to lie still until air seeped back into his lungs.

  “If I sit on you, I’d crush you like stepping on a worm,” Junior told him.

  “Man, don’t sit down on me!” Buddy managed to say. He had to laugh, he couldn’t help himself. “Whoo! Man! You got me that time!”

  “Get you any time I want,” Junior said, “s’long as I’m red—talking about my mother.”

  “Ohhh!” Buddy said, holding one shoulder. “Yea, that’s right. I did hit on your mother. Yea, okay, you’re red, all right.”

  Junior collected all of the scattered black pieces, and with the checkers on the bed, put them in the box. He put the game away in his desk, then stood by Buddy as Buddy slowly got to his feet.

  “I have to go,” Buddy told him. “I got to get out and walk around.”

  “You going to see a movie?” Junior said.