My Deer Eye
I was sitting on the roof of my Volvo, right outside my apartment, smoking a hand-rolled cigarette and drinking a non-alcoholic Clausthaler when I saw him.
I had been imagining what I would say to the pretty waitress if she emerged out of the back of El Tapatio. I was searching for a way to say “my heart is broken” in Spanish. But I thought she spoke English so I could just say “my woman left me and my heart is broken.” That could elicit a response. Or not; I didn’t care. I decided I would say “Perdi mi ojo venado (I lost my deer eye).”—My favorite line from the band Jaguares. Maybe she would know it. Maybe she wouldn’t. The voices cackling as if drunk behind the frenzied banda music blaring just inside the door of the restaurant were probably the voices of the clean-up crew. It was 1:30am. I wasn’t confident she remained on the job this late.
The figure all in black spotted me from outside the fence and sauntered into the parking lot. He said to me, “Got an extra smoke,” so softly that had it been a daylight hour I could never have heard him from my high perch.
“Yeah,” I mumbled as I dug the tobacco pouch out of my pocket.
From the sleeve of his hoodie he brandished an indistinct shape that I understood to be a blade when he said, “Empty your pockets!”
I did it; it wasn’t hard. My tobacco, a handkerchief, and my lanyard with my keys. I held them in my hands.
“Throw down your wallet,” he ordered.
“I don’t carry it with me this time of night,” I stated. I didn’t; it was true. I’d left my wallet in my apartment in case of this very event.
“Then we gonna go get it,” he told me.
“Go where?” I asked.
“Get off this motherfucker fore I shank you.”
I stepped down and set the cigarette and Clausthaler aside and stood there.
“Motherfucker move.”
“Move where?”
“Go. Go. Don’t fuck with me.” He cranked his elbow up and turned the blade to the side as if he were bearing a gun down on my chest.
I shrugged. “Alright.” I rounded the car and unlocked and opened the driver’s side door. I sat in the driver’s seat with the driver’s side door open.
He followed me and wedged himself in the opening, blocking my exit.
I looked up at him. “Well?”
“Get me that shit fore I cut your fucking mug.”
“You wanna come get it you gotta get in.”
“You got about three seconds.”
“I told you my wallet’s at my house. Let’s go get it.”
He practically sang in falsetto, “The fuck is your house, nigga??”
“Up the way a bit.” I motioned. “I just stopped here to drink a drink and smoke a smoke.”
“Oooh, I wanna stick you right now!” He was looking around for another warm body on the street.
“Get in,” I said. “Passenger side is open.”
He ran around the front of the car and opened the passenger door and fell into the passenger seat. “How much money you got in your wallet?”
I shrugged.
That wasn’t good enough for him.
“Don’t remember,” I said.
“Nigga mash. Come on! Let’s go fore I cut you up.”
I turned on the car and sat awkwardly still for a moment. His gaze swung up and down me and around to each window. “You got about one second fore I start fucking you up.”
I shifted the car into gear. “Had to let it run for a second.” Backing up offered a quick study of the blade. It was a dull gray strip of something that had been painted and chewed up so that it either no longer resembled a knife or never was one. I turned up the heat, brought us around, and exited the parking lot.
I decided on driving up Fruitvale. My passenger was restless. The streets were mostly empty. At the sight of a few prostitutes milling about on a corner he scoffed.
“Women,” I said.
He frowned and shifted in his seat.
“I just broke up with my lady.”
He didn’t bite. “Come on, man! Drive!”
“It’s still up a ways.”
“Make this motherfucker mash.”
I pressed the gas. Liza’s house, I decided. On Macarthur I went left then switched to Excelsior. She lived on Park. I’d pretend it was my house and as we approached I’d somehow (I hadn’t figured out how) alert her to call the police. Text? How would I text her without him seeing? Would she even be awake?
The homes were getting bigger and nicer. My passenger was shifting around more but frowning less. I still hadn’t thought of a plan by the time I reached Liza’s house so I passed it.
“Nigga what the fuck is this?? What the fuck is this??” Now that we were in a car together he decided he could use the full volume of his voice to intimidate me without the risk of alerting the authorities. “Nigga pull this car over right now and let me shank you in your motherfucking ass! I am going to shank you until there ain’t nothing left! I—am—going—to—shank—you—until—there—ain’t—nothing—left!” My god he was having a sort of rhythmic conniption fit.
“Chill the fuck out!” I yelled. “I told you I’d give you my money—all my motherfucking hard-earned money—that I worked for! So chill the fuck out. You’re the one who’s getting what he wants. I’m the one who should be upset. Now, fucking kick back for a minute. We’re almost there. Jesus Christ.”
This actually worked.
He ignored me and scanned the wide avenues as if they were a threatening jungle.
I turned on the radio. For a moment he stopped moving, but he did so because he was weary, not relaxed. I tuned it to KMEL. This ploy wasn’t working either. I turned the radio off. He remained tense.
He no longer shifted in his seat. There wasn’t so much to regard. The road now went straight uphill. To one side was a downhill drop, to the other a wall of redwood forest. I was convinced now that both of us knew I was full of shit. I didn’t know where I was gonna take it from here. But wherever I was gonna take it, I resolved I was gonna take it with gusto.
“Man, pull over your motherfucking car and get out,” he said in a disappointed tone.
“Obviously you’ve noticed that the higher we go the bigger the houses get. You can have this car. You think I’d care about this car living up here?” I turned up Redwood road and into the darkness created by towering trees lining both sides of the road. “I been wanting to give it away. Gotta tell you, though, it needs new brakes and an oil change. Probably seven hundred bucks in work.”
“Man, I should just stab your ass and leave you out here,” he said without lifting his blade or removing his gaze from the road ahead. He’d sunk into the passenger seat.
Once my headlights illuminated the sign for the Chabot Space and Science Center I knew where our road ended. I pulled into the parking lot.
“Science center?”
“I live right behind the Chabot Space and Science Center. Seriously.”
“Ain’t no houses up here neither.”
“Seriously. I live right behind it.” I parked, turned off the engine, and took his lack of protest as a good sign. I got out. “I’ll show you.”
When he opened his door and climbed out I rejoiced within, though I had no idea what I was doing.
“Come on.”
He followed me up the wide paved ramp that wound around the back of the building. I let my enthusiasm carry me ahead and lead me off the pavement and across the little landscaped area to a wide cool window that I placed my palms and forehead against. Upon a large wall inside was a portrait of Jupiter with majestic bands of clouds.
“Check it out.” I waved him over.
He had his hands in his pockets.
“You know which planet that is?” I asked.
“Saturn?”
“Jupiter.” I walked over to the next window and pointed. “See that’s Saturn,” I said. “It’s got the rings. That’s Pluto over there.”
He was strolling back to the pavement but he could see the image I was pointing to. He nodded once.
“Fucking amazing, isn’t it?”
He shrugged. “They all the same to me,” he said.
I ventured ahead again. The courtyard with two huge telescopes was fenced off of course. I climbed the fence at a juncture where it was easier to avoid the barbed wire. I leapt down then faced him, realizing that I was for the first time beyond his reach. “Climb over,” I said.
He had more trouble getting over than I did. His hoodie and pants didn’t help. By the time he got over I was already on top of an AC unit from which I could grip the ledge of the roof. Once up on the roof I started rolling cigarettes.
When I was finished he was on the roof with me, walking its perimeter, looking down over the ledge. “Don’t look down,” I said. “Look up.” I pointed at the stars. Then I held up a cigarette. Once he was close enough I tossed it and he caught it. I got up on my knees and lit his with mine. I smoked sitting while he smoked standing.
I kept my attention moving in a triangle between the lights of Oakland below, the humps of the two telescopes, and the stars spaced out overhead. I chucked my cigarette and lay on my back so my attention could wander among the stars.
When I sat up he was looking out over the lights of Oakland and the Bay. He was so silent and still and watchful I decided not to disturb him.
He bowed his head and kicked pebbles between his feet.
I stood and joined his side. “Where do you live?”
“73rd,” he said without looking up.
“Come on,” I said. “I’ll give you a ride home.”
WordCityLit 
One thought on “My Deer Eye. Fiction by James Moran”