Free Eyes of the Innocent: A Mystery by Brad Parks

wanting to say too much.
    Hoodie filled in the blank: “They’re people you already know. You know?”
    In other words, they were pushing something with a little more kick than subprime mortgages.
    “You ever see people around here selling mortgages?” I asked.
    “Depends. What’s a mortgage?” Hoodie asked.
    I suppose I shouldn’t have been shocked by the question. Why would a black kid raised in public housing—a kid reared in a family that had probably been in America for ten generations without owning a stick of property—know what a mortgage was?
    “It’s…” I didn’t know where to begin. “Never mind. Okay, forget the Puerto Rican guy. You know someone named Akilah Harris?”
    Braids and Hoodie exchanged glances again. But this time they were a lot more knowing.
    “Maybe,” Hoodie said. And suddenly I realized they were both smirking.
    “What’s so funny?”
    “Nothing,” Braids said.
    They stood there, grins widening. Obviously, Akilah was known in these parts. That was hardly surprising. Akilah was only a little older than these two. They had probably grown up with her.
    “C’mon,” I said. “Spill.”
    “I ain’t saying nothing,” Braids said, holding his hands in the air.
    “Why you want to know?” Hoodie asked, obviously curious. “You making a story about her?”
    “Her house burned down,” I said. “There were two kids inside.”
    “Damn!” Braids said.
    “Yeah, I heard about that,” Hoodie said. “Someone was saying it was on the news.”
    Despite the tragedy of the situation, they were still smiling. Something about Akilah Harris was humorous to these guys, though I couldn’t imagine what. I tried to think like a teenaged boy. What made them laugh? Toilet humor. Fart jokes. But how would that be connected with Akilah? It just wasn’t coming to me.
    “What’s so funny?” I said.
    More smirking.
    Finally, Hoodie couldn’t help himself. “You sure there were only two kids?” he said. “I figured she would have had, like, six by now.”
    Braids busted up laughing. “With, like, eighteen different daddies,” he added, which made them both laugh harder.
    Of course. The only thing teenaged boys found funnier than fart jokes was sex. And apparently Akilah Harris was known to be generous in that department.
    “So she’s a ho,” I said.
    “She’s like the biggest ho out here,” Braids confirmed.
    “Is she sleeping with someone in particular?” I asked.
    “Akilah? Shoot, who hasn’t she slept with?” Hoodie said. The boys yukked it up again and I laughed along with them, even though—if I started thinking like a mature adult for a moment—none of this was really all that amusing. I let them giggle themselves out, then tried to push the conversation away from the topic of Akilah’s promiscuity.
    “From what I’m told, she moved out of here about three years ago,” I said.
    “Maybe, I don’t know,” Braids said. “You still see her sometimes. She visits her mom or something.”
    I could feel my brow creasing. “I thought she was an orphan,” I said.
    “Akilah? Hell, no. She got a mom,” Braids said. “Her mom and my mom are like cousins. I mean, they ain’t blood. But they best friends.”
    “Are you sure that’s not her aunt? I thought her aunt raised her?”
    “Naw, that’s her mom,” Braids said. “Whoever told you she don’t have a mom don’t know what they talking about.”
    Lying was more like it. Those alarm bells in my head were starting to ring from one ear to the other. It’s possible the rest of Akilah’s story was true, that she only made up the orphan part just to engender a little more sympathy. But reporters quickly learn lies are like cockroaches: where there’s one, there’s bound to be others.
    I was already starting to feel embarrassed I had been so taken in by her saga. Akilah had Sweet Thang and me figured out from the moment she saw us—a couple spoiled white kids who would bite on the hard-life-in-the-black-city