The Statement, Episode 25
Editor’s note: The following is the 25th installment of the serialization of the first novel by Trenton’s own Albert Stark. We hope you enjoy reading this story each week in The Trentonian.
She knew—somehow Lillian knew. To answer. Naima’s charge. Lester felt himself rocketing back to Mt. Calvary and to the side street, parked in the Valiant, Naima behind the wheel and he in the passenger seat. Je responderay. The beauty of those words on her lips. She had spoken to him of his mitzvah as if she were inside his head. He had followed every article about her—or rather, her group, the New Jersey Activists Against the Death Penalty. He would find her, he would wait as long as she deemed necessary, he would ask all the right questions, and he would be open to the answers, like Madame Somebody and the Square Pegs. Je responderay. The answers would come rolling down from the mountaintop, the way Martin said they would. Naima’s hero. He could still see her, eyes shining. Lester, they killed the finest human being on this planet. How can I stand by and just let that happen? How can you?
The answer was easy. He couldn’t.
In his waking hours he never let himself think about the sleepless ones. And in the sleepless hours, he thought of her. He dreamed that she could love him. And then—he usually stopped himself there, shut the fantasy down. But now, with the pot smoke still clinging to his nostrils, it was as if a pathway was opening to him: he was ready to go spelunking into the recesses of his brain, to bat away the cobwebs of rational thinking, and step into a glorious Heaven, designed by Peter Max in glorious swoops of rose and gold, Naima at his side. As every fairy tale comes real.
Later that night, he stopped beneath a lamppost and stood staring at its intricate scrolls, as if he were stoned on the LSD that Mrs. Cala had spoken of. Now, in this very moment, he could acknowledge those nights right after the trial, the endless fretful shredding of his dreams, the half-lucid nighttime pageants in which he tortured himself with the most horrific possibilities— Salim electrocuted, and Naima so distraught that she threw herself off the Trenton Makes-The World Takes Bridge, or leapt from the nave of Mt. Calvary Baptist as the giant organ shrieked and bellowed. In his sleepless hours, he composed his answers to her, sometimes epic speeches, other times funny self-deprecating asides, or long florid apologias, but in every single one, she responded. She saw how truly he had reformed himself, she knew how singular was his obsession. Yes, he would always say, I will find a way to set your brother free.
Lester stood in the alley, pinging stones at Santo’s window. It was ridiculous—Santo
had a good job now, and still they didn’t get a phone. Santo liked to make his calls from the
pay phone on Whitaker in front of Romeo and Juliet’s, a block from the rowhouse.
Finally, Lester went around to the front porch and knocked. After a few minutes, Pops came shuffling to the door and let him in. “He up there?” Lester asked. Pops nodded. “He worked a double shift.”
Pops had aged rapidly in the time Lester had been away; he’d been okay until about a year ago, when he had a small stroke. Now he moved slowly, and he had coughing fits.
Lester followed Pops into the living room and took a seat on the couch—the same musty couch they’d had when he and Santo were in high school. Pops always kept the drapes drawn so you never knew whether it was night or day when you were inside.
Pops settled into his recliner. “How’s your mother? I heard she lost her job.” “Yeah.” “But she’s doin’ okay?” Lester shrugged. “She still thinks the Gestapo’s gonna come pounding on the door. Yeah. I just left her—she was watching Milton Berle.” He turned to Pops. “Guess what? I got a job. The Trentonian. Just last week. Mostly the morgue.” But he knew what his first story would be, and it wouldn’t be anything Amos assigned. He decided to take a risk, speak it out loud. “I’m doing a story on the prison.”
“That so?” Pops said, without turning toward him. He pointed at the set. “That lady’s about to be reunited with her son. He just got back from Vietnam.”
A young man in a military uniform stood behind a curtain, and then was ushered onto the stage, where a woman in a blue dress sat primly blindfolded.
Lester got up and went into the kitchen to get a soda. “My ma, she likes Kojak. The lollipops,” he said as he resumed his seat. The woman was now frantically hugging the young man. Then Bob Barker strode onto the stage, grinning.
“Now that Bob Barker, he’s a straight up guy,” Pops said.
Santo came downstairs, in jeans and a t-shirt, scratching his armpit.
Pops nodded in his direction. “Trenton’s finest.”
Santo flashed the devil salute with his left hand. “Dago pride.”
“You’re saying dago pride to a Jew, for chrissakes,” Pops said, and then gestured toward Lester. “This kid is gonna interview the big shots.” “You took the job?” “Affirmative.” “He’s gonna clean up Trenton.” “That ain’t possible, I hate to rain on your parade.”
Pops shook a finger at Lester. “You go interview Mayor Holland. Now there’s a mayor for you. Was gonna be a priest before he chose public service.”
Santo disappeared into the kitchen and Lester nodded politely as Pops started one of his rants. “Fiorello LaGuardia, now that was a mayor. He knew how to run a city.”
Just then Anthony appeared, coming up the stairs from the basement, and hurriedly crossed to the kitchen, his eyes cast down. Lester barely recognized him— he was lean and angular, and his head was shaved.
“Hey, how’s it going?” Lester asked, but Anthony didn’t even say hello.