Seventeen
LEON MAYO WORKED as an apprentice auto mechanic in a small garage on a single-digit block of Kennedy Street. He had been given the opportunity to learn the trade by the owner, who had done Lorton time himself back in the early ’90s. The owner’s former parole officer, who now had Leon as an offender, had put them together. Ramone and Rhonda Willis found Leon after stopping by to see his mother at the apartment where both of them lived. She had told them that Leon was working, hitting the word emphatically, and gave them the location of the garage.
The owner of Rudy’s Motor Repair, Rudy Montgomery, met them with unwelcoming body language and a glare, but he led them to Leon Mayo when they described the nature of their visit. Leon was in a bay illuminated by a droplight, using a sprocket wrench to loosen a water pump with the intention of pulling it out of a beat-to-shit Chevy Lumina. They badged him and gave him the news about his friend. Leon put his fingers to the bridge of his nose and stepped away. They left him to his grief. A few minutes later he emerged from the garage and met them in a lot overfilled with previous-decade sedans and coupes manufactured, primarily, in Detroit.
Leon stood before them, rubbing his hands on a shop rag and twisting and untwisting the rag. His eyes were pink, and he kept them focused on the asphalt. The fact that they had seen him spontaneously break down had shamed him. He was a thin, strong young man who looked five years older than his twenty.
“When?” said Leon.
“Sometime last night, I expect,” said Rhonda.
“Where was he got?”
“He was found at Fort Slocum, around Third and Madison.”
Leon shook his head. “Why they have to do that?”
“They?” said Rhonda.
“I’m sayin, why would anyone do Jamal like that? He wasn’t into no dirt.”
“Your records say otherwise,” said Ramone.
“That’s all past,” said Leon.
“It is?” said Ramone.
“We did our thing.”
“You stole cars, isn’t that right?”
“Yeah. We touted and ran for a while, too, over there on Seventh. To us it was all in fun. We wasn’t tryin to make no career out of it. We were just kids.”
“Seventh and Kennedy,” said Rhonda Willis, who had worked UC around that hot corner for several weeks back when she was plainclothes and on the way up to Homicide. “That was more than just boys playin like they were in the game. They were serious over there.”
“There was some like that in the mix. But not us.”
“What made y’all special?” said Ramone.
“We caught grand-theft charges on the cars before the drug thing went to the next level. Ain’t nothin more complicated than that.”
“And you don’t have any idea who would have done this to Jamal.”
“Jamal was my boy. If I knew —”
“You’d tell us,” said Rhonda.
“Look, I’m on paper right now. I come to work every day.” Leon held out his greasy hands and looked hard at Ramone. “This is me, dawg, right here.”
“What about Jamal?” said Rhonda.
“The same way.”
“What was he doing for money?”
“Jamal had steady work as a housepainter. I mean steady. And he was fixin to start his own business, soon as he learned the finer points, you know what I’m sayin?”
“Sure.”
“He wasn’t never gonna go back. We talked about it all the time. I’m not lyin.”
Ramone believed him. “Why would Jamal be walking around late at night?”
“He didn’t have no whip,” said Leon. “Jamal rode buses and walked all over town. He didn’t mind.”
“Any girlfriends?” said Rhonda.
“Lately, he was just interested in one.”
“You got a name?”
“Darcia. Petworth girl, that’s all I know. Pretty redbone he met a while back.”
“No last name? No address?”
“She lives with this other girl, a dancer down at the Twilight, goes by the name of Star. Far as I know, Darcia dance there, too. I don’t know where they stay at. I told Jamal, don’t be fuckin with girls like that, you ain’t even know who they runnin with.”
“Girls like what?”
“Fast.” Leon looked away. His voice was hoarse, a whisper. “I told Jamal that.”
“We’re sorry for your loss,” said Rhonda Willis.