The Intruder Read Online Free PDF Page A

you respect me? Or are you just frontin’ ‘cause I’m down with the crew?”
    “Well, ah, ah, ah . . .”
    A boy with a pacifier in his mouth imitates John G. in a Gomer Pylish voice. The others crack up, slapping hands and bumping shoulders. Individually, they’d each barely have the nerve to stare a man down across a subway car. But together, they’re a vicious little army.
    It hurts John’s heart, knowing they can treat him so badly. Has he let himself fall that far?
    “Say, what’s the matter with you, bitch?” asks the leader. “You got a stutter? You like a retard?”
    “No, I’m just a little nervous.”
    “Why, ‘cause you got so much respect for me? Let’s get back to that, man. Why you got so much respect? You all afraid we’re gonna fuck you up?”
    “No, no, you seem like reasonable guys. We’re all reasonable people.”
    “Well, what if I did decide we would fuck you up? You got a problem with that?”
    “I don’t think you really want to do that,” says John G., trying not to sound weak.
    “What’re you, a mind reader? You know what’s going on in my mind?”
    “I don’t even know what’s going on in my own mind.”
    “You know what, man?” The kid in the Blackhawks jersey shares a smile with a girl sporting a cathedral of cornrowed hairand gold-painted fingernails. “I really don’t think you’re sincere. I don’t think you know what it means, having respect, after all.”
    “Well, I, uh...”
    “Man, you know what you are?” the kid says. “You are unclean. You know that? White man smelling all bad and bummy. People like you oughta be exterminated.”
    Get to zero, John G. tells himself. Offer zero resistance. Don’t make them feel they have to prove something by beating you up.
    “I guess you’re entitled to your opinion,” he says.
    The leader takes a blue Bic lighter out of his jeans pocket and moves toward him.
    “And what if my opinion is I should set your ass on fire?” he asks, reaching out and knocking the Yankees cap off John G.’s head.
    Is this what’s meant to be? Is this the punishment he’s deserved all along? It doesn’t feel right.
    Don’t come any closer. John finds himself trying to send the kid a mental message. Don’t come any closer or I can’t promise what will happen. Fight or flight.
    “Would you still respect me if I did that?” The lighter in the kid’s right hand flares like a firefly.
    The guys in the crew laugh hysterically. The girls look impatient.
    Fight or flight. Don’t come any closer. John’s right hand goes into his pants pocket and feels the razor-edged box cutter he keeps there.
    “What? Are you gonna beg now?” the leader says.
    Fight or flight. The kid’s moving out of flight range and into fight range. He flicks the lighter right under John G.’s nose, so the hairs curl up inside. There’s no longer any choice. John G.’s hand tightens around the box cutter and pushes out the blade.
    “Come on, bitch, let me hear you beg. I want to hear you say how much you respect me.”
    The kid in the Blackhawks jersey thrusts out his left hand.
    John takes the box cutter out of his pocket. The kid’s mouth falls open. John lunges at him, slashing wildly at the kid’s hand, nicking the side. The boy gives a girlish yelp and jumps back. Heputs the hand up to his mouth a second and then lowers it to his waist to look at it, as if it’s not part of his body anymore.
    “Man, why’d you have to do that?!” he says in a high-pitched whine. “We was just fucking with you.”
    All of a sudden, the boy seems smaller, younger. His posture is less threatening. The other kids in his group move away from him, as though he’s disgusted them by the very act of getting hurt.
    “Just get away from me before I cut your fucking eyes out,” John hears himself say.
    The kid in the Blackhawks jersey stares at John and tries to make a fist with his cut hand, but his crew has already started to disperse. One by one, they move across