The Force

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You grow up in that neighborhood, you do the right thing.

The prevailing attitude on Staten Island is that men can leave their wives, but only black men leave their kids. Which isn’t fair, Malone thinks—Bill Montague’s probably the best father he knows—but that’s what people think, that black men go around knockin’ they bitches up and then stick white people with the welfare bill.

A white guy from the East Shore tries something like that, he’s got everyone up his ass—his priest, his parents, his siblings, his cousins, his friends—all telling him what a degenerate he is and showing him up by picking up the slack themselves.

“You did that,” the guy’s mother would say, “I couldn’t hold my head up going to Mass. What would I say to Father?”

That specific argument don’t cut much weight with Malone.

He hates priests.

Thinks they’re parasites, and he won’t go near a church unless it’s a wedding or a funeral and he has to. But he won’t give the church any money.

Malone, who also won’t pass a Salvation Army bell ringer without putting at least a five in the bucket, won’t give a dime to the Catholic Church he grew up in. He refuses to donate money to what he thinks is an organization of child molesters that should be indicted under the RICO statutes.

When the pope came to NYC, Malone wanted to arrest him.

“That wouldn’t go down so well,” Russo said.

“Yeah, probably not.” With every cop over the grade of captain elbowing each other aside to kiss the pontiff’s ring or his ass, whichever was presented first.

Malone ain’t crazy about nuns, either.

“What about Mother Teresa?” Sheila asked him, when they were arguing about it. “She fed starving people.”

“If she passed out condoms,” Malone said, “she wouldn’t have had so many starving people to feed.”

Malone even hates The Sound of Music. It was the only movie he ever saw, he rooted for the Nazis.

“How could anyone hate The Sound of Music?” Monty asked him. “It’s nice.”

“What kind of shitty black man are you?” Malone asked him. “Listen to the fucking Sound of Music.”

“That’s right,” Monty said. “You listen to that rap shit.”

“What you got against rap?”

“It’s racist.”

It’s been Malone’s experience that no one hates rap and hip-hop more than black men above the age of forty. They just can’t stand the attitude, the pants hanging off their asses, the backward baseball caps, the jewelry. And most black men of that age aren’t going to let their women be called bitches.

That just ain’t gonna happen.

Malone’s seen it. Once, back before it fell apart, he and Sheila and Monty and Yolanda were on a double date, driving up Broadway on a warm night with the windows open, and this rapper on the corner of Ninety-Eighth saw Yolanda and yelled out, “You got one sweet bitch, brother!” Monty stopped the car in the middle of Broadway, got out, walked over and clocked the kid. Walked back to the car, didn’t say a word.

Nobody did.

Claudette, she doesn’t hate hip-hop, but she listens to mostly jazz and makes him go to the clubs with her when one of the musicians she likes is playing. Malone likes it okay, but what he really likes are the older rap and hip-hop guys—Biggie, Sugarhill Gang, N.W.A. and Tupac. Nelly and Eminem are all right, too; so is Dr. Dre.

Malone stands in his living room and realizes that he’s been spacing out, so the Dexedrine hasn’t kicked in yet.

He locks up and walks to the garage where they park his car.

Malone’s personal vehicle is a beautifully restored 1967 Chevy Camaro SS convertible, black with Z-28 stripes, 427-cubic-inch engine, four-speed manual transmission, tricked out with a new Bose sound system. He never takes it to the precinct, rarely even drives it in Manhattan. It’s his indulgence—he uses it to go to the Island or on joyrides to escape the city.

Now he takes the West Side Highway downtown and then crosses Manhattan near the 9/11 site. It’s been more than fifteen years and he still gets mad when he doesn’t see the Towers. It’s a hole in the skyline, a hole in his heart. Malone, he don’t hate Muslims but he sure as hell hates those jihadist cocksuckers.

Three hundred and forty-three firefighters died that day.

Thirty-seven Port Authority and New Jersey police officers.

Twenty-three cops ran into those buildings and didn’t come out.

Malone will never forget that day and wishes that he could. He was off-duty but responded to the Level-4 mobilization call. Him and Russo and two thousand other cops went, and he saw the second tower fall, not knowing at the moment that his brother was in it.

That endless day of searching and waiting and then the phone call that confirmed what he already knew in his gut—Liam wasn’t coming back. It was Malone had to go tell his mother and he’ll never forget the sound—the shrill scream of grief that came out of her mouth and still echoes in his ears in the gray hours when he can’t sleep.

The other gift that keeps on giving is the smell. Liam once told him that he could never get the smell of burning flesh out of his nose, and Malone never really believed him until 9/11. Then the whole city smelled like death and ash and scorched flesh and rot and rage and sorrow.