Only the Strong Read online

  Copyright © 2015 Jabari Asim

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission from the publisher.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Only the strong / Jabari Asim.

  Summary: “The lives of a reformed hit man, a crusading doctor, a genteel mobster, and a headstrong college student cross in a sweltering Midwestern city in 1970”-- Provided by publisher

  ISBN 978-1-572847-52-1 (ebook)

  1. City and town life--Middle West--Fiction. 2. African Americans--Fiction. 3. Nineteen seventies--Fiction. 4. Middle West--Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3601.S59O55 2015

  2014040170

  9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents, and dialogue, except for incidental references to public figures, products, or services, are imaginary and are not intended to refer to any living persons or to disparage any company’s products or services.

  Bolden is an imprint of Agate Publishing. Agate books are available in bulk at discount prices. For more information, go to agatepublishing.com.

  For my wife, Liana, in this and all things

  Love is divine only and difficult always.

  —Toni Morrison, Paradise

  Let me in, let me in, let me in, let me ease on in.

  —Otis Redding, “Open the Door”

  CONTENTS

  LEG-BREAKER

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  TENDERNESS

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  TROUBLE

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  THE STRONG

  CHAPTER 12

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  LEG-BREAKER

  GUTS TOLLIVER HADN’T KILLED A MAN in two years. The night Dr. King went down in Memphis, Guts had steered his sedan through streets aflame and undergone a change of heart. Not a complete conversion, to be sure. He still believed in an eye for an eye and, on occasion, had done his part to make the bargain equal. But he had taken to considering whether killing was always the first, best option.

  Not that he had ever killed as many people as some folks in Gateway City had suggested. After more than a few highly public, much-talked-about brawls, his legend had spread. His many years as chief enforcer for Ananias Goode taught Guts that the idea of his fists was as compelling as his fists themselves. For those on the wrong side of his wrath, his thick knuckles were the least of their concerns. According to local legend, Guts had put men to death with everything from a hairpin to a sledgehammer. He was tall, massive, and quick. Big men couldn’t out-brawl him and little men couldn’t outrun him. But he regarded every opponent with equal respect, and it was that attentiveness—a curious mixture of humility and confidence—that kept him alive. By the time of King’s death, Guts had become more of a persuader than a killer.

  After the Dreamer was laid to rest, Guts went to his longtime employer and confessed to this shift in his thinking. Ananias Goode had come not only to trust Guts, but also to regard him with genuine affection. And, because his business experience had taught him that a trustworthy man was as valuable as at least five others, Goode maneuvered to keep Guts close. The big man’s severance package was a taxi stand complete with 31 cabs, for which Goode served as majority investor and silent partner. In exchange, Guts agreed to handle difficult assignments when they arose.

  Guts loved managing the taxi fleet—the give-and-take with the drivers, and even sometimes taking to the road himself, to roll down Delmar or Natural Bridge with the wind at his back and nothing on his mind except his pet obsessions: Pearl Jordan and banana pudding.

  Before Pearl had become a regular visitor to his bed, Guts had settled for dreaming of her. Lately that had become unnecessary, when all he had to do was wrap his powerful arm around her petite, sleeping frame.

  He was snuggled against her, a bear cuddling a bunny, when his phone rang. He grunted and tried to ignore it.

  “Lorenzo.”

  Guts pulled his pillow over his head.

  “Lorenzo. You gonna answer that?”

  “Answer what?”

  “You know you hear that. Now grab it.”

  Defeated, Guts removed the pillow and picked up the receiver. “Guts Tolliver, problem solver.”

  It was Sharps, the man who’d replaced him as Goode’s driver and right-hand man. Guts had instinctively disliked him the moment they’d been introduced. Now Sharps was snickering over the phone. “‘Problem solver?’ That’s your new handle? I guess ‘leg-breaker’ is hard to shake.”

  “Sharps, you better have a damn good reason for bothering me at home. How do you even have my number?”

  “Boss man wants you. Meet us at the Frontier at eight.”

  “Did he say what it was about?”

  Guts heard a click and silence. “That mother—”

  Pearl swatted his ample rear. “Lorenzo. At least wait until sunrise before you start cursing.”

  By the time Guts had shaved his upper lip and showered, Pearl was busy in the kitchen. She was wearing a cream-colored apron with bright yellow daisies on it—and nothing else. Admiring her tight curves, Guts let out a long, low whistle.

  “Don’t get used to it,” Pearl said without turning around.

  “I could never get used to something so good. The thrill is new every day.”

  “Talk that stuff if you want to. You know what I’m talking about. I’m 31 years old and my clock is ticking.”

  “Baby, let’s not start an argument so early in the morning.”

  “Have it your way. What do you want for breakfast?”

  “Six eggs, six pieces of toast.”

  “I thought you were cutting down.”

  “That is cutting down.”

  “Let’s make that three eggs and two pieces of toast.”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Serious as that heart attack you’re trying to have.”

  Pearl required little coaxing to untie her apron and sit on Guts’s lap. Between kisses, she lifted each tasty forkful of breakfast and held it to his waiting lips. “You’re too good for me,” he told her.

  “I know,” she said, smiling. “But you’ll do.”

  Guts knew her efforts to rein in his appetite were absolutely correct. Still, he struggled to suppress a hunger pang or two, ignoring his disgruntled stomach’s protests as he eased his Plymouth away from his home on Margaretta and steered onto Fair Avenue. He tried to avoid even looking in the direction of Fairgrounds Park, but he couldn’t help himself as its green borders loomed to his left. He could almost hear the ducks calling his name.

  Sighing, he turned into the park entrance, rolled to a stop at a curb, and got out. He leaned against the side of the car. Just for a minute, he thought to himself. He could barely see the edge of the pond. The ducks were out of sight, tucked away in the tall fronds skirting the stone bridge. It was quiet, despite the nearby traffic of Natural Bridge Boulevard already building up to the predictable frenzy of rush hour. A few of the park regulars were going about their activities, and seeing them gave Guts a brief feeling of comfort. He could describe each without so much as glancing at them: The two gray-haired ladies who carefully tended the Abram Higgins Memorial Garden every morning. The quiet fisherwoman sitting still in her lawn chair, her fishing line nearly invisible as it stretched toward the water. An unsmiling man, clad in exercise clothes and cradling several tennis rackets
under his arm, sternly herding his four children toward the courts. The man had read newspaper accounts of Arthur Ashe, a black man, trouncing the field at the US Open, and in the nearly two years since that historic triumph, he had pursued his dream of seeing his children duplicate Ashe’s feat.

  Guts closed his eyes for just a moment, imagining the ducks. Feeding them, quietly assuring them that he had enough for everyone, then sitting back and watching them eat was the closest thing to prayer that Guts had. He’d never been comfortable with the kind of praying he’d grown up knowing—too much desperate pleading in it for him. He never understood begging for things that, in the end, you had to take care of your damn self. His mother had been a fervent believer in the power of prayer. Once, when Guts was about 10, he was sitting at dinner with his parents, head bowed and hands obediently folded, when he peered through narrowed eyes to find his father winking at him.

  Another park regular, Jerome “Crusher” Boudreau, spotted Guts and jogged over to him. He was wearing sweats and a towel rolled around his neck like a scarf. Boudreau had been a contender before a roundhouse to the throat nearly disabled him. Now he spoke in an amiable mumble and ran a TV repair shop. He had a reputation for skipping his bills and Guts was glad that Ananias Goode had never been one of Crusher’s creditors. If so, it would have been up to Guts to collect. Although Guts had about 40 pounds on Crusher, the prospect of going up against him gave him pause.

  Crusher, shadowboxing, tossed a few slow softies in Guts’s direction. Guts made a big show of ducking and feinting.

  “I see you still got it,” Crusher said, smiling.

  “I got something,” Guts said, “but I’m not sure what it is.”

  “Ah, you haven’t lost a step. How’s everything?”

  “I’m not complaining, Crush. Not that it would do any good.”

  Crusher mopped his brow with his towel. It wasn’t blazing hot yet but he had already worked up a good sweat. “I hear that.”

  Guts watched as Crusher stretched his neck toward his left shoulder, then his right.

  “Guts, I know you’re strong, but not even you can toss breadcrumbs into the pond from this far away.”

  Guts laughed. “Not feeding the ducks this morning. If I get too close to the water, sit on a bench, watch the ducks, I won’t feel like doing anything else. And I got places to be. So I’m just allowing myself a brief visit.”

  Crusher nodded. “We all got to do shit that we don’t want to do. Got to squeeze the quiet moments in where we can.”

  “Damn, Crush, nobody told me you were a philosopher.”

  “I think I read that on a cereal box.” Crusher continued to stretch. “I saw your boy the other day.”

  “My boy?”

  “Yeah. Nifty.”

  Many unfortunate souls who’d crossed Guts had paid for it in blood and pain, but Nifty Carmichael was an exception. Guts had sentenced him to a lifetime of servitude in exchange for the privilege of walking the earth intact. Nifty was a fool and a crook, but he kept an ear to the ground. As long as his information was good, Guts let him keep breathing. Guts wasn’t particularly concerned with Nifty. He knew where to find him when he wanted him. He feigned interest out of sheer courtesy. “Yeah, what was he up to?”

  “Talking to Sharps.”

  “Sharps?”

  Crusher grinned. “Got your attention, right? Saw them having coffee in Stormy Monday’s. Looked like they were having a good ol’ time. Figured you should know about it.”

  Guts tried to keep his contempt for Sharps under wraps, but apparently Crusher had sniffed it out. He wondered how many others had.

  It was not quite eight a.m. when Guts pulled up beside Frontier Barbershop. Except for the Bona Fide gas station and Kirkwood Cleaners, all of the other businesses along that stretch of Vandeventer Avenue had yet to open. In minutes there would be a crap game going behind Wilma’s Tavern and music blasting out of Pierre Records, something like “Baby I’m For Real” by the Originals or “ABC” by those kids from Gary. But right now it was as peaceful and empty as it ever got. A woman left the cleaners and strode purposefully to her car, her cleaning over her shoulder. Guts tipped his hat to her, then waved at the sign painter Reuben Jones, who was at the gas station getting two dollars’ worth of regular for his Rambler wagon, his ladders strapped to its roof. Guts noticed that Sharps had left Goode’s New Yorker unlocked. Sloppy.

  Barbershops traditionally closed on Mondays, but Rudolph Fisher, the tall, pious proprietor, had opened just for Ananias Goode. According to word on the street, Goode had provided the initial down payment for Fisher two decades before, but Guts had never been able to confirm it. At any rate, Fisher had been Goode’s personal barber since way back when. Guts waited while Sharps took his time letting him in.

  “Finally,” Sharps said. He had features to match his name, and his choice of clothing accented his slender angularity. His hat, hiding a full head of processed hair combed straight back, was—like his tie, suit, and alligator shoes—a dazzling shade of lemon yellow. His sunglasses, worn indoors and out, were dark green. Cologne wafted off of him with every movement. Guts marveled that Goode could ride in the New Yorker with Sharps without passing out.

  “It’s eight straight up,” Guts said. “Now, you can step aside or I can walk over you. Make your choice because Mr. G. is waiting.”

  Sharps paused as long as he dared. He grinned, revealing teeth as pointed as the rest of him. He stepped aside with a dramatic bow.

  Guts ignored him.

  “My dear Mr. Tolliver,” Goode said. “So glad you could join us.” He was dressed in bankers’ pinstripes as usual, and the gleam on his custom boots was bright. Goode, though bigger than most men, was not nearly as large as Guts, but his personality and confidence were expansive enough to fill any space. He removed his cigar from his mouth and held it out expectantly. Fisher rushed to remove it to a nearby ashtray.

  Guts said good morning to Goode and asked Fisher how he was feeling this fine day.

  “Praise the Lord,” Fisher replied before draping a smock over Goode and fastening it behind his neck with an efficient flourish. Each day brought another customer announcing his abandonment of the close-cropped “quo vadis” haircut in favor of the long, bushy “natural,” but Fisher was adapting and staying afloat. Goode, like Guts, kept his head shaved.

  “This is a change,” Guts said.

  “How so?”

  “Fish used to come to your house.”

  “Sharps talked me into it,” Goode said. “Suggested a change of pace.”

  “The boss needs more sun,” Sharps said. He pulled up a chair and straddled it backward. “It’s healthy, plus he can keep an eye on things.”

  Guts stared at Sharps. When he was Goode’s driver, he never would have sat with his back to the door. He wouldn’t have sat at all.

  “He’s got people to keep an eye on things for him, and you’re supposed to be one of them,” Guts said. “Folks are crazy. No need to make them think they have an opportunity.”

  Sharps smirked. “Who’d be stupid enough to go after Ananias? You talk like he’s Al Capone. He’s a businessman. You’re thinking about guns and gangsters when we’re talking about stocks and bonds.”

  Guts turned and looked at Goode. Never, not once during their long association, had he ever called the boss man “Ananias.” But Goode seemed to take no notice of Sharps’s brazen informality.

  Guts began slowly. “That may be so. Still, I’d think about changing things up. Maybe next time, say, come on a Wednesday, before the start of business hours.”

  Sharps chuckled. “That’s a lot of thinking for a cab driver. What are you, one of them intellectuals?” The word sounded bad falling out of Sharps’s mouth. “An egghead in dungarees, hard to imagine.”

  Guts suddenly felt underdressed. Dungarees and work boots had been his standard uniform for as long as he had worked for Goode. The pair’s contrasting styles drew a lot of whispered comments, but no one had ev
er dared to say anything within his earshot. And Goode had never complained. For a split second Guts pictured himself draped in yards of lemon-yellow fabric.

  “A lot of things must be hard for you to imagine.”

  “An egghead in work boots. What size you wear? Sheeit. Them some big-ass clodhoppers, son. Handy on a farm, maybe. But damn, you in the city.”

  “I got one of them stuck in a man’s ass once.”

  Sharps looked liked he wanted to spit. But there was no place to do it. “Do tell.”

  “Yeah. He reminded me of you. A skinny bitch in a shiny suit.”

  “I got your bitch, fat man.”

  “Too bad. I don’t swing that way.”

  Goode cleared his throat. By then Fisher had coated his generous jowls with a thick lather of shaving cream. Flashing his pearl-handled straight razor, he expertly drew the blade lightly along Goode’s jawline.

  “Gentlemen. Your repartee is beneath the dignity of our enterprise.”

  Sharps frowned. “What?”

  “Shut the hell up,” Goode said. “You too, Guts. Enough.”

  Both men immediately stopped talking.

  “Sharps.”

  “Yeah, boss?”

  “Go across the street and see if Stone Drugs is open. Grab me a racing form and a Gateway Citizen. Guts and me got business.”

  “But—”

  “Go on, now. Run along.”

  Guts was sure that Sharps’s eyes were welling behind his shades. Sharps stood, adjusted his tie, and left.

  Guts crossed the room and locked the door. Fisher had seen Guts in action more than once but was still amazed that a man so huge could move with such unlikely speed and grace. Wisely, he kept his amazement to himself.

  “You like Rip Crenshaw?” Goode asked.

  Guts shrugged. “I’m more of a football guy, but you know that.”

  “Still, you know who he is.”

  Guts shrugged. “Yeah. Baseball. The home team can’t do much unless he’s in the game. And he’s missed a few lately.”

  “That’s right, he’s on the injured list. I need you to keep him company for a while. Drive him around, show him some friendly places, keep him from hurting himself.”