Chicago Heat

Abstract

Hello? Mama? It’s me, Floyce. Me and Hank just got back from the courthouse. You won’t believe it. Something terrible has happened. They kept Harley. And it looks like my husband is dead. The police was just here and they took my husband out of here all covered up on a stretcher. They asked me and Hank all kinds of questions. And we have to go to the police station tomorrow morning because I got to sign some piece of paper. But, Mama, we didn’t even know Medwin was dead. After the trial we drove home like that with him sitting up in the front seat, kind of all slumped over but still sitting up. And I could’ve sworn he was just sleeping. And you know, sometimes I have trouble waking him up. He just won’t wake up. And I thought this was just another one of them times. ’Cause Medwin was messing up! You know, I told you before that Medwin had been abusing his medication lately, and it wasn’t the first time he had passed out and come back hours later. So, that’s why we thought he was passed out again. But he had to have died while we were in the courthouse. Can you imagine that? Sitting out there in that hot car all that time in this Chicago heat just ’cause he didn’t want to see Vernon. And August in Chicago, as you know, is hell. He wouldn’t even come in to Harley’s trial. But I guess he didn’t have any love to lose on Harley or Hank, for that matter, the way they treated that poor man. It was like Medwin and Hank had never been friends. And you remember it was Hank who introduced me to Medwin while they were in recovery in the VA hospital. When was that? Already nearly ten years ago. My, how time flies. And you know, Hank brought Medwin home with him, playing on my sympathy, with all this mess about the poor man didn’t have no place to live. Hank kept saying did we want to see his friend, Medwin, homeless, out in the streets? And knowing I had a sympathetic heart! So, there was Medwin staying with us. Hank’s friend, but a man almost my own age! And, you know, you remember, at first it was all right because it was just Hank and Medwin being friends and sitting around in the front room, watching television all day, and taking their medication and drinking beer. But when Medwin come justa noticing me and everything, reaching out and touching me when I walked by, no, boy, no way, Hank didn’t go for that. Not with his mother! Not his friend ...