"Now Mr. Polite, are you saying that I haven't always done what's in the best interest of Tank?"
"Naw, that ain't what I'm sayin'," Uncle Cloudy says. "You just gone drop him off at that home with a bunch of strangers. You ain't gone stay with him. That boy need to stay where he's loved and looked after and stay in a place that he know. Not getting upset about someplace new and new peoples. He don't know nothin' about no Savannah."
"Like I said," Miss Francis say, "somehow he's gotten access to drugs. They didn't just magically appear in his body. I'll go up there every week and monitor his progress."
"Now look me in the eyes and listen to me, Tank."
I looked in Twan's eyes.
"You take this money and you go up to that second house with that black mail box and you tell them you there to buy three twenty bags, you understand?"
I nodded.
"Just like the last time. Okay?"
"Okay."
Uncle Cloudy smell like money, he say. He gives me quarters and dollars to buy my chocolate. "When y'all gone take him then?"
"Monday morning. I need for y'all to have him here at seven."
Uncle Cloudy gets up. "Come on Tank."
I hug Miss Francis. "Bye, Miss Francis."
"Can me and Bunt go visit him up there?"
"He's not allowed visitors."
"That ain't right. This boy ain't no criminal. Why he got to be punished? Just for being slow and different. It ain't right."
Twan drove me to the corner. "Go on now. I'll drive around the block a couple of times and pick you up right here, okay?"
I nodded and opened the door and got out. I walked to the yellow house. It was dark. Only a light at the road. There was the pit bull chained up to the tree. He stood and barked. The front porch light came on just like the last time. I stood real still. The skinny black girl opened the door. She waved. "Don't just stand out there. He ain't gone bite you. Come on." She yanked me inside.
"I'll see you Monday morning, Tank," Miss Francis says. "We'll take a drive to Savannah, okay?"
"I want Miss Lisa to take me." I says.
"You want Miss Lisa to take you?"
"Yes. Do like the last time. We had fun at her house."
"What did y'all do?"
"Mm-Mm-Mm-Mm. She's got big boobies."
"Quit rubbing you penis, boy," Uncle Cloudy says.
"What are you saying, Tank?"
"Mm-Mm-Mm-Mm-Mm."
"I think this is evidence of his unraveling, Mr. Polite. That he is using controlled substances. We've got to get him detoxed immediately."
"Come on, son." Uncle Cloudy says. "Miss Francis, he needs his chocolate. It's his one little thing."
"I likes my tingly," I says.
"You see? You see, Mr. Polite? They're not going to let him have it at the home," Miss Francis says.
"So what," Uncle Cloudy says. "A little snuff in the evening ain't gone hurt that boy none. He ain't never gone be able to do nothing. Just like a little child. Ain't got an enemy in the world. This is all he'll ever be. Just the way he is right now. All he's ever been since he was three. I've raised him up since he was a baby. When his momma was locked up, me and his Auntie Bunt took care of him. I just don't see. I just don't see." Uncle Cloudy hit his leg with his hat.
"Let me see the money you got." She grabbed my hand and opened my fingers and got the dollars Twan gave me, then left down the dark hall and left me there with the kids watching cartoons and the other pit bull dog and came out of the back with a paper bag and put it down my pants and then pushed me out the door and I fell and hurt my knees and my nose bled and the dog barked and I ran fast.
"I told you I'd pick you up at the corner, dummy," Twan said.
"That dog barked and tried to bite me. She pushed me out the door. My nose is bleeding and I hurt my knees."
"Damn." Twan took off his shirt and squeezed my nose. "Hold your head back. Well, where is it?"
"Huh?"
"The bag, Tank." Twan put his hands down my pants and pulled the bag out. He looked in the bag and laughed. "Yeah. This is it. You did good. You did good."
"Where did he get the drugs in his system, Mr. Polite?" Miss Francis says. "I'm not happy with Naples about this."
"I still don't believe he took any at all. I don't believe that test," Uncle Cloudy says. "Naples is a sick woman, I'll admit. But it don't make her a bad momma. She's always taken care of that boy. Been able to handle him better than anybody. Me, you, his Auntie Bunt. Anybody. And all the police, judges, lawyers, social workers, probation officers have done is interfere. Pick, pick, pick, pick, I say."
"You haven't been around him twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week the last few months, have you?" Miss Francis says.
"I ain't never seen this boy take no drugs," Uncle Cloudy says. "Naples wouldn't let him take no drugs. That boy ain't never used no drugs."
"You didn't answer my question, Mr. Polite."
"Naw, naw. I ain't been around him twenty-four hours a day the last few months."
"Well, he had to have gotten it somewhere."
"I tell you I don't trust them drug screens," Uncle Cloudy says. "I've heard about ‘em."
Me and Uncle Cloudy leave out of there.
"I swunny that woman smells like the marsh at low tide," Uncle Cloudy says. "Like a salty fart."
We laugh.
Uncle Cloudy's arm is around my shoulder. "Come on sonny boy."
We eat outside. Uncle Cloudy have a porkchop sandwich. I have a hotdog, tater tots, and a Co-Cola. Uncle Cloudy gets us soft ice cream cones.
A white police lady be in the house. Uncle Cloudy be there. Auntie Bunt be there. Miss Francis be there, too.
"Tank, I got to ask you some questions, okay?" the white police lady says. She talks loud and smiles.
Fawquita told on me, I know. "Fawquita's my friend," I says.
"That ain't why she's here," Uncle Cloudy says. "You listen to her questions now son."
"Okay," I say.
"I just want to ask you about your Momma," the police lady says. She got a lot of white teeth. They pretty. She got a big mouth. Big eyes like the sky, prettier than the lady I took to the courthouse. But she don't smell as pretty. She don't smell at all.
"Momma be home the day after this day?" I says.
"No," Uncle Cloudy says. "We've talked about that, remember?"
"No, sir."
"Well, we'll talk about it later."
"Okay. She got pretty teeth."
"Willie," Uncle Cloudy says, "Listen, now."
"Yes, sir," I say.
The police lady be wearing a yellow shirt.
I point. "Yellow," I say. "Yellow. Yellow." I point to my clothes. "Yellow. Yellow."
"Tank, did your Momma let you smoke?" the police lady says. She smells like white bread.
"No. I gots to dip my chocolate outside."
"What's that?"
"That's his snuff," Uncle Cloudy says. He shows the lady my can.
"Let him answer, please," the white police lady says with the pretty teeth.
"Okay," Uncle Cloudy says. He puts the can back on the table.