Page 26 of On the Ropes
Dean
Itook a fast shower and grabbed my toolbox, walking to the rec center beneath a sun only getting hotter. Sweat clung to my shirt as I moved down the narrow streets I’d been traveling my entire life. I passed tiny corner shops and delis, butchers, panaderías, and pho restaurants. The air smelled like sweet cannoli. But once I hit the block right before the rec center, the sugar scent was replaced by incense, burning outside a large Buddhist temple, which sat next to a program that worked with refugees settling in our neighborhood.
The rec center’s basketball court was always full of kids playing ball. There was a playground, a library, a computer lab staffed with social workers and literacy volunteers. Various food programs operated from inside, but the new priority was helping the large number of older folks going hungry.
I walked through the small lobby and down the hall toward Rowan’s office. It was more of a busted-up desk in a room that faced the playground. The two of us had used this place all the time, a couple of kids with too much energy in a city without real backyards.
He nodded at me as I walked in, his feet kicked up on the table. “Thanks for comin’. I don’t know what the hell is up with that sink.”
“It’s no problem.” I indicated all the boxes on the floor. “What’s up with all this food?”
He gave me a wry look. “We need a coordinator for the senior program and haven’t found the right person yet. Speaking of, I wanna get Eddie signed up to start receiving one of these food boxes every week.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “I think it’s a smart idea. But also, good fucking luck.”
“Yeah. He’s a tough old bird.” He let his feet drop back to the floor. “So what’s going on with your shit? Any ideas for the vacant lot?”
I cut my eyes to the ground. I had thought about it during last night’s tossing and turning. It’s something beautiful to behold, Tabitha had said. The words had spun on repeat through my brain, tugging me toward ideas I wanted to do but wasn’t sure I could make happen.
“I have thought about it,” I finally said.
“Yeah?” Rowan looked impressed. And surprised. “Anything specific?”
I knocked my knuckles against the wall. “Not really. I’m back to getting nowhere every time I call the hotline. Maybe…” I trailed off. “Maybe taking it on ourselves is our only real option.”
He dropped his hands on top of his head. Pointed to the window. “This lot situation makes me think about Miss Mekenney’s class.”
“You mean sixth grade social studies?”
“Uh-huh,” he said. “She always talked to us about community, right? That we lived in a place where people looked out for one another.”
He waited, and I filled in the rest. “She said every day was your chance to make your city better.”
She didn’t only say it. There was a mural with those words painted on the hallway in front of her door. I never gave it much thought. Of course, we all looked out for one another. I didn’t know there was another way.
Rowan indicated the view out the window again. “These kids out here grew up just like us. What would you tell them to do if they had this same problem?”
I knew what he was doing, but he also wasn’t wrong. Our neighborhoods had been half-abandoned by a city because of our zip code and funding problems and budgets that went to rich people over working-class families.
I sighed. “I’d tell them…hell, if no one’s coming to save us, then we have to make it right. So I guess that means I’ll do it. I’ll figure out how to clean out Annie’s lot and turn it into…whatever.”
He grinned, rubbing his palms together. “You know I’ll help and the neighbors will pitch in. I wouldn’t worry too much about coming up with ideas. It’ll be great no matter what.”
“We’ll see,” I grunted.
His expression grew serious. “I know it’s easier to retreat. You know I’ve been there before. And the feeling fucking sucks. But I think this is the kind of work you were born to do.”
My muscles loosened a little. Rowan understood how it felt to be an athlete with a whole identity and persona controlled by other people. Whether you were good or bad, working hard or phoning it in, loyal to your city or a traitor. Since making the choice to retire, I’d found it damn near impossible to expose myself like that again, to feel like a raw nerve all the time.
Hiding was safety. Retreating was at least an action I could take, even if I wasn’t doing shit with my life. I knew it was only a vacant, trash-filled lot. But it shoved me back into a spotlight, no matter how small. And that made me shrink away.
“Yeah, it is easier to retreat. I hate…letting people down again,” I finally said. “I know you get it. And we’ll figure it out. I’m just extra distracted right now.”
“Oh, you mean because the girl you were into when we were in school is living next door to you now?”
I opened my mouth. Shut it. Scowled out the window. “It’s been less than twenty-four hours.”
Rowan held up his phone with a smirk. “Alice O’Callaghan has been texting me nonstop since the break of dawn. She’s no amateur.”
