Nanowrimo - Day 21

They ran for a few blocks, Jasmine kicking off her heels and running in her stockings, Mike ahead of her, alternately pulling her along and stopping to peer around corners. They only stopped when they couldn't hear shouting or sirens or gunshots. Then Jasmine put on her shoes again, and they walked.

Jasmine was starving, so they stopped by a food truck parked outside on the corner, near a Best Buy. Mike bought two sandwiches and sodas, and the two of them walked through the electronics store to try to catch some news on the televisions there.

Apparently, the protesters had been pushed back into the park, with many arrested and a few injured, presumably shot. The leader, the disheveled white man with the dreads and the burlap shirt, was being carried away on a gurney, the only casualty of the evening.

"Thanks, Mike," Jasmine said after eating her sandwich, "That was amazing back there."

Mike shrugged his shoulders and picked up a digital camera that was cabled down to the counter it rested on, turning it over to look at the screen.

"Really," Jasmine said, grabbing Mike's arm and turning him towards her, "Not just what you did, which, by the way, I could not be more grateful for, but ..." She looked into his eyes, as if searching for something written in them. "How did you do that? I mean, how did that happen? When I saw that man fire that first shot, I thought for sure you were gone, and then so many more shots. And you came through it like you had some charm on you."

Mike raised the camera and playfully took a picture of Jasmine, but his face was serious, even sad.

"You don't think that was a miracle?" Jasmine said, pushing the camera aside just after it flashed. "I wish you would say something. I wish you would react."

Mike looked at the picture, which showed Jasmine's inquisitive face half blocked by her hand and arm reach out to the camera. He turned it around and showed her, trying to muster a half-hearted smile for her.

Jasmine nodded, glancing at the screen and then sharing back into Mike's face. "Things like that don't bother you?" she said, "Or do they bother you too much?"

Mike shrugged again, putting down the digital camera and picking up a camcorder. "It's just not the first time I've had a gun pointed at me, or the first time I've been shot at."
Jasmine took the camcorder out of his hands and pointed it at him. "So, for the record, is that just hip-hop rhetoric, street cred and bravado with just a dash of reality?" She zoomed in until the screen held only Mike's face turning away from her, his eyes growing red. "Then when was the first time you were shot at."

"When I was five."

Jasmine watched Mike's face for signs that he was kidding, hoping he was just making a joke at her expense. Mike just looked back at her through the camcorder screen.

"Dammit," she said, dropping the camcorder on the counter, where it slid back into place as the cable retracted. "I did it again," she took Mike's right hand in both of hers and stroked it. "I am such a jerk. I'm so sorry."

Mike smiled at her, genuinely this time. Something about Jasmine's concern and compassion found a depth in him he hadn't explored before. "Don't worry about it." he said, "it's an old wound anyway. Just something about that guy tonight that brought it all back to me."

"Why?" Jasmine squeezed Mike's hand, as if truth would come out of it. "Who shot at you when you were so little? Was it some kind of drive by or something?"

Mike pulled his hand free and walked on a little, turning his back to Jasmine for a moment as he stepped to the shelves of music, tons of CDs arranged in shiny packages, protected in their plastic shells. "It was my father." Mike looked at her furtively, gauging her reaction, and then picked up a De La Soul CD from the rack. He turned it over and read the song list. Jasmine stood next to him, as close as she dared, staring at him with a look of shock and incredulity on her face.

"My dad had gotten drunk that night, punched my mom." Mike put the CD down and walked farther off, down the racks with his back to Jasmine, who followed close behind. "He punched her like she was a man, knocked her out for at least a minute. I tried to wake her up, but even when she opened her eyes, she couldn't get up." Mike stopped and picked up a CD of EPMD's greatest hits. "But she could talk. She sounded funny, because her jaw was fractured, but she told him to get out. She said she wanted him to leave and never come back." Mike put the CD back and looked into Jasmine's wet, soul-stricken eyes. "I told him I wanted him to leave too. That's when he pulled out his gun."

He could feel his eyes growing hot, and he knew if he wiped them or touched them, he would start crying, so instead he just looked up at the ceiling and opened is eyes as wide as he could, until he could collect himself.

"He didn't even say anything," Mike said, "He just shot her. I felt the bullet go by me so close it was like a hot wind coming out of the oven when you're trying to take something out."
"He shot your mother because she was kicking him out?" Jasmine asked, tears filling her eyes.

Mike looked up and down the aisle of music, but no one was near. He stood like a small boy, hands in his pockets, eyes on the floor. Then suddenly he looked up into Jasmine's face. "I think he was shooting at me."

Jasmine stared at Mike for a few seconds, and then suddenly grabbed him and pulled him close, hugging him, her face in the crook of his neck, making the collar of his sweater wet. After she calmed down and stepped back from him, dabbing her eyes with her fingertips. "Did he try again? Did he shoot again?" she asked.

Mike shook his head and looked down at Jasmine's feet. "He didn't get the chance."

Around the corner was a display room for televisions and sound systems, with a black leather couch standing in the center of the wood floor. The walls were the same kind of wood, a dark brown walnut that extended all around and caught the music and speech and explosions that poured out of the speakers at the front of the display and sent them all bouncing back at the couch. The main television at the front, a sixty inch 3D LCD showing scenes from movies, parades, and football games, while a few people tried on the glasses and gawked at the images. Mike just dropped into the couch and watched the blurry image on the screen, trebled figures of football players running down a bright greener even field criss-crossed with white lines.

Jasmine slowly eased down next to him, sitting straight up with her hands in her lap and watching him for a moment before speaking.

"Listen, Mike," she said, stammering just a little, "I think I misjudged you, and I'm sorry. I know I gave you a really hard time, but you have to understand what it's like for me." She moved her head around in front of him, and he turned to look at her. "I got the job I have as a way of starting my own thing. I want to be the one discovering talent, and giving people choices about what to listen to, not just the same tired crap full of violence and vulgarity. I want more of the music that I like, that seems to be hard to find now." She shook her head and put her hand over Mike's. "But you have to pay your dues first, learn the system by working your way up. Fine, I get that, and I'm willing. But in the meantime, every rapper and singer, whether they've made it big or not, comes through those offices and takes a shot at me. Every one of them."

She looked down at her hands and her small black purse. "Okay, so that sounded kind of conceited. But it's still true. And it's not just me. All the girls in the office get hit on, propositioned, more like. Some of them step in line, and some don't. Very few don't. I'm not looking to be on the next BET or VH1 reality show about so-called models and baby mamas. I want to be producing the shows and the music, but unless these people take you seriously, you don't have a chance. And they don't seem to want to take me seriously."

"I took you seriously," Mike said, gently, "Right from the start." He flipped his hand underneath hers and squeezed it, just briefly.

"Okay, I believe you." Jasmine said, smiling, "but just know it wasn't really you."

Mike pinched his eyebrows together and nodded. "I get that." Putting his other hand over hers, he rubbed the back of her hand and cocked his head to one side.

"So tell me something," he said, "is this what a brother has to do to get on your good side?"

Jasmine laughed and shook her head. "Usually it's a lot tougher. I think I'm just in a good mood."

"I think you're just dazzled by my charm."

"No, it's definitely not that." Jasmine said, "You've just got luck, not charm. Or else somebody up there is looking after you."

Mike looked back towards the blurry screen if the television. "Yeah, somebody is, I guess."

They walked out of the store holding hands. Mike felt tired, both physically and emotionally. He couldn't remember ever being that open with somebody, or that worried about somebody either. There was something about her eyes, he thought. There was a power there, a force that pulled on him. It was the opposite of Dagon's blue eyes, which made him feel cornered and trapped, pushed by his own fascination and greed, but magnified times a million, into situations that made him feel less and less in control, less tethered to the earth. No, these brown eyes made him feel grounded, real, honest, and more than anything else, understood. He wasn't sure why he had told her so much, and wasn't sure if he could bring himself to tell her everything, all that he had seen and all that he had done. But he knew that he wanted to. It occurred to him that he now had a better reason than ambition for wanting to win the competition and the contract and stay in New York.