CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Friday evening after work, after the collector didn’t show up for Reno to confront, and Reno and Trina disappeared in their bedroom. Jimmy grabbed a coke out of the frig and sat out on the dilapidated front porch where Dom and Sophia were playing cards at the small card table and where Carmine was sitting on the top step reading a book. Cars were beginning to pile up at the house across the street as people were going over and bringing what appeared to Jimmy to be dishes of food. They all headed into the backyard. Nobody so much as glanced their way, which Jimmy found odd. Before he knew that big-city Reno was his father, he was raised in a small town. He knew how they spoke to everybody, no matter if they personally knew you or not. But here, in Washwater, it all felt so different. As if they knew outsiders when they saw them and they weren’t trying to be hospitable. They weren’t trying to make friends.
Which was fine by Jimmy. He just wanted this nightmare to be over with and he and his family could go back to a normal life. He knew his daughter Madison was on that cruise ship and was being well guarded, and he knew Oprah, even though they’d broken up, had protection on his insistence too. But he still missed them both. But no contact was the order. If their cover was ever blown, their loved ones would be even more vulnerable to attack too.
“What’s your names again?” he asked Carmine.
“My name is Carmine. Sophie’s name is Clementine.”
Jimmy laughed out loud at that.
“Very funny,” Sophia said without looking away from her card game.
“Mommy’s name,” Carmine continued, “is Becky with The Good Hair.”
Jimmy laughed even louder at that.
“And Daddy’s name is Tyrone. We’re the Blacks.”
Jimmy’s grin disappeared. Then he shook his head. “Uncle Sal wrong for that. Tyrone? The Blacks? Really? He wrong for that.”
“There are white Tyrones you know,” Carmine made clear.
“Name one,” said Dommi.
“Tyrone Power,” said Carmine.
“That old actor, okay,” Jimmy said. “Name another one.”
“Tyrone Smith.”
Jimmy frowned. “Who’s Tyrone Smith?”
“He’s not white, but he’s from the Philippines. He’s an Australian-Tungan rugby player,” said Carmine.
“Don’t nobody know nothing about no rugby player,” said Dommi.
Jimmy shook his head again. “Uncle Sal wrong for that,” he said.
“Wrong for what?” asked Reno as he suddenly stood in the doorway, in jeans and a t-shirt, of their wide-open front door. “What’s Sal wrong for now?”
“Naming you Tyrone,” said Jimmy.
“Damn right he’s wrong,” said Reno. “And when I see his ass, I’m going to give him foot loads of wrong.”
Jimmy smiled and glanced at his father. Then he did a double take.
“What?” asked Reno.
“I rarely ever see you without wearing a suit, no matter how wrinkled it is. You look different,” he added.
“Don’t he though,” agreed Sophia. “All my friends think you’re cute, Daddy.”
Reno smiled. “Oh yeah?”
“I have to remind them that they’re too young for you.”
“What too young?” said a defensive Reno.
“What do your girlfriends think of me?” asked Dommi.
“They think you’re cute, but no good.”
Jimmy laughed out loud.
“What they think about Jimmy?” Dommi asked. “I’d bet they say he’s a nerd and no good.”
“Not really. They say Jimmy’s very attractive. They want his phone number, too, but I wouldn’t give it to them because he was with O.”
“Those days are gone,” Dommi said. “She left his boring ass.”
“Working hard for a living isn’t boring,” said Reno.
“Pop,” asked Dom, “do you realize you always defend Jimmy? No matter what it is, Jimmy can do no wrong in your eyes.”
“That’s a lie,” said Jimmy. “All those licks I’ve endured? You must be joking!”
Everybody laughed at that.
“Where’s Ma?” Jimmy asked Reno.
“She’ll be out in a minute.”
“What were you two up to?” Jimmy said as he looked down and realized what his father and stepmother had been up to.
When Reno saw where Jimmy was looking, he looked down too. That was when he saw that he had forgotten to zip his pants. Jimmy shook his head as Reno smiled and began zipping up.
“I can only imagine what y’all been up to,” Jimmy said with disgust on his face.
Reno grinned at his oldest son, although they were close in age. Reno had him when he was only a teenager himself. “You wouldn’t know the half of it, my son,” Reno said.
“Just keep it in your pants, Pop.”
Reno laughed out loud. He and Trina went at it hard after work. So much so that they had to constantly kiss each other to drown out their moans. Then they showered together and went at it again in the shower. They hadn’t spent this much time together in years. And Reno found that he liked it. He knew he had a desirable woman, but damn. He had forgotten just how desirable Trina truly was when she wasn’t running her mouth and getting on his last damn nerve. It was the only silver lining so far.
“What’s going on over there?” he asked as he looked across the street. He walked over to the loveseat rocking bench and sat down. Jimmy was in the rocker next to the bench. “What’s the deal over there?”
“Looks like a party I guess,” said Jimmy. “Some sort of get together.”
Trina came out onto the porch with the rest of the family and sat on the bench beside Reno. She wore Puma shorts and a t-shirt, too, that highlighted her nice figure. Jimmy always thought that Trina was a gorgeous lady, but because of all those rumors of Reno’s infidelities he felt she never got credit for it. She was always, in the eyes of the public, the put-upon wife, the cheated on wife, the gold digger that only stayed with Reno because he was loaded. Even though those same women spreading those lies wanted Reno for themselves.
“You look refreshed, Ma,” Jimmy said, always glad to give her a compliment.
“Thanks baby,” Trina said with a smile.
It wasn’t lost on her nor Jimmy that Reno said nothing.
“Somebody’s coming,” Reno said as Otis came from the back, seemed to see that the whole family was on the porch now, and he began hurrying over. “Put on your best behavior for these hicks,” Reno added. “And that includes you, too, Carmine.”
Carmine looked up from his book and rolled his large eyes at his father. But their neighbor was already in the yard and hurrying up to the porch before he could speak up.
“Howdy,” Reno said with a big fake smile on his face, causing his children to suppress grins. Reno was about as howdy as the King of England. “How you doing this fine evening?”
“I’m doing good,” said Otis. “How y’all doing?”
“Good,” the family said in various iterations.
“My name is Otis Freeman. I own the house across the street. I wanted to welcome y’all to the neighborhood by inviting y’all to my crab boil.”
“Crabs?” said Trina. “Did you say crabs?”
“Yes ma’am, I sure did. Come get y’all some crabs,” said Otis.
Trina, a crab lover from way back, was the first to stand. “Don’t mind if I do,” she said and began hurrying down the steps.
“I’m with you, Ma,” said Jimmy, who loved crabs too, as he hurried behind his stepmother.
Sophia and Dommi, who loved crabs as well, were right behind their mother too.
Trina glanced back at Reno. “You stay here with Carmine,” she said as she placed her arm in Otis’s arm, causing him to blush happily, and then they began walking toward the house across the street.
Reno was getting a hard on just watching Trina’s ass. But then Dommi looked back at him as if to remind him that he would stand in as bodyguard for the family, which only reminded Reno that he missed his real life.
And Reno felt blindsided. “Crabs,” he said with a frown. “I wouldn’t walk across a room to eat no disgusting crabs, but Tree will walk several miles.”
But then he looked at Carmine, his only company for the evening. “What are you reading anyway?” he asked his genius son.
“I’m reading about the intricacies of needlepoint.”
Reno couldn’t believe it. “ Needlepoint ? Your Florence Nightingale ass sitting up here reading a whole book about some fucking needlepoint?”
“How many times do I have to tell you, Father, that Florence Nightingale had nothing to do with needlepoint or crocheting or anything of that nature. She was a nurse and a social worker. How many times do I have to tell you that?”
“They call me the King of Vegas. Mister Tough Guy. You name it. And I’m sitting up here on a big Friday night watching my baby boy read a book about needlepoint. I can’t. I just can’t. I’m out,” he said, hopped down from that porch, and made his way across the street too.
Carmine, not keen on being by himself in that strange town, didn’t mean to run his father off. He hurried up, went and locked their front door, and then he ran behind his father. He was a genius, but he was still a kid too.
When he caught up to his father, Reno wrapped an arm around him, and together they made their way to the festivities too.
When they disappeared in the backyard, a black car drove up and stopped. Two men, both in black, both seated on the front seat, began to assemble their rifles.