The Man in My Basement by Walter Mosley Page B

would come to my lips with some new curse to level at him. It was like he was still alive and I was in my late teens, forced to care for him after burying my own mother.
    He was bedridden by that time. A nurse came in from social services and Medicare, but I was still expected to feed him and give him some of his drugs. I was never late or forgetful because my mother made me promise before she died that I would take care of him.
    But that didn’t mean I had to talk. I walked into that room with his tray, sullen and closemouthed. He tried to be friendly, but I couldn’t bring myself to speak. I blamed Brent for everything that ever befell me. My father’s death, my mother’s, the feeling I had that I couldn’t tie my shoes right—all of that I blamed Brent for. Even when he looked pitiful and small, I hated him. The skin on his face was brittle and creased. He resembled the center mask in the set—a crack down the forehead to the lips.
    At night in those last days, I would dream about Brent. In the dream I cried over his suffering. But the next morning, when I brought in his soft-boiled egg, my heart hardened again.
     
     
    I spent three days cursing Brent and cleaning up years of squalor. At night I’d buy a cheap pint of Greenly’s Gin and drink it, but only after 10:00—only after I’d read and eaten and done everything that I had to do. I wanted to cut down on the booze because of Clarance and Narciss. Clarance because he thought he was mad at me but really what he was mad at was me from tipsy to drunk. I get mean with alcohol. When I’m high I think I’m being funny, but I knew that Clarance hated being called Clara. I knew it.
    And Narciss thought I was sweet. She thought I was something sensitive and discriminating. Maybe if I stayed sober for a while, I’d become a better person; maybe I could make something out of myself.
     
     
    Anniston Bennet came on Friday at 4:00 exactly. He wore yellow short sleeves over a blue T-shirt, and brown trousers. His tennis shoes were the same blue as his shirt. He had no tie and the yellow shirt was open at the throat, showing a hairy pale neck over the top of the T-shirt collar. His head was oval and his chin came to a tip like the masks that I kept in their box on the windowsill next to my bed. His blue eyes were a perpetual shock, but there was no wonder or magic in the rest of his face.
    “Mr. Blakey,” he said, extending a hand over the threshold. His small hand held a surprisingly strong grip.
    “Mr. Bennet. Come in.”
    “You’re house cleaning?” Bennet asked as we went through the living room that was crowded with the refuse of my ancestors.
    “Cleaned out the cellar.” I led my guest into the nook off the kitchen. There was a round maple table there with three chairs. The window looked out into a stone yard, fenced in by vine-covered trellises. The ground was tiled with broad slabs of mossy granite plates. Sunlight dappled in through the slat roof.
    I thought such a beautiful sight would jack up any price that the white man was willing to pay. But he barely noticed the view.
    “Do you want some cola or lemonade?” I had shopped for this meeting. I also had crackers, French bread, and Parma ham if he was hungry.
    “No, thank you,” he said without gratitude. “Can we see the cellar now?”
    I led him out the back door and to the entrance in the ground. I threw the trapdoor open and stepped aside, indicating that he should go first. I’d left the light on so he would have no trouble descending the stairs. But he hesitated, even took a step backward. Then, with a visible force of will, he steeled himself and walked down the sixteen stairs.
    I followed.
    He glanced furtively from one corner to the other, then up to the ceiling and back to the stairs. He squinted but the light wasn’t bright. He clapped his hands together, took a deep breath.
    I said, “Cellar’s got running water, but there’s no toilet down there, Mr. —”
    “First let me