The Manny

I charged out my office door and almost knocked Charles over in the hallway. ‘Hey! It’s eleven in the morning. Nothing’s going on the air for hours, slow down, baby.’

‘Sorry. I have to meet someone. Don’t want him to get lost coming back here. I’ll call you.’

‘Who you meeting?’ he called after me.

‘Not meeting. Interviewing.’ Then I whispered with my hands cupping my mouth, ‘Mannies.’

‘Real professional thing to be doing in the office,’ he yelled over his shoulder as he walked back down the hall.

I didn’t care if it was professional or not. Who would notice exactly what I was doing anyway? They were all so crazed around the show. I had decided to do the manny interviews in the safety of the office because the first two guys I’d met at home had good résumés but looked a little off kilter; one had greasy hair with his warm-up suit hiked up too high on his crotch and the other never smiled once. Through a domestic help agency with a thorough vetting process over the past weeks, I’d already met about half a dozen young men who were interested in the afternoon job with Dylan: out-of-work actors or waiters, concert musicians looking for extra money, trainers hoping to get in a few extra hours. All wrong. They were either too talkative or too quiet, and all of them lacked the experience to handle a kid like Dylan. I was looking for someone who wouldn’t let Dylan manipulate them and wouldn’t let him fade into outer space.

Nathaniel seemed like a fine candidate on paper, his résumé impressive: he graduated from a reputable public school uptown with a 3.0 average. He hadn’t taken any college courses yet, but at twenty had spent most of his time coaching at a small charter school in Harlem. I’d called the principal, and he seemed to be well liked and a hard worker.

A black kid in an oversized hooded sweatshirt with a Tupac logo that covered his hands and hid part of his face waited for me in the reception area. Under the hood, he was wearing a do-rag, one of those stocking caps with a little knot on the top. ‘You must be …’

He stuck his hand out. ‘Nathaniel.’

‘Come on back,’ I said, trying to be as friendly as possible.

We walked into my office. He didn’t take his hood off and I could barely see his eyes.

I opened my manny folder and tried to keep an open mind: maybe this was the perfect antidote to Dylan’s malaise, maybe he needed a cool homeboy manny to contrast with his sheltered Grid life, maybe I needed a cool homeboy manny to help me chill out. His references told me this guy had hidden talents, a gift for bringing kids out. What the hell did I know about mannies? I had never hired one before. I looked over his résumé again.

‘So you coach a team in Harlem?’

He kept his head down. ‘Yeah.’

‘And is it just basketball or multiple sports?’

‘Both.’

‘Both? You mean basketball and a lot else?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Sorry, both what? Basketball and one other or lots of others?’

‘Just basketball, some baseball sometimes.’ He still didn’t look up.

Charles stopped in my doorway, checked out Nathaniel and looked at me like he thought I was insane. Then he walked in just to bug me and put the pressure on.

‘Oh, hi. Didn’t know you were doing some reporting here in the office.’ He sat down on my couch.

I sighed and gave him a look. ‘Charles, this is Nathaniel. Nathaniel, Charles is a colleague, he was just stopping by for a second.’ I turned to Charles. ‘But now, Charles, I’m going to ask you to leave because this is a confidential meeting.’ I gave him a fake, screw-you smile. He gave me one back and left.

Twenty minutes later after I had walked Nathaniel out of the office, Charles appeared again. When he didn’t have a story, he liked to come in my office and annoy me. I ignored him and kept typing, staring at the screen.

He sat down in front of me and put his elbows on my desk to get me to look at him. ‘You’re nuts, Jamie.’

‘What?’ I snapped.

‘Like Phillip’s really gonna go for you hiring a kid who looks like a badass dealer?’

‘Charles! You’re so racist. He’s a good kid, he works really hard, his mentor …’

‘Bullshit.’ He leaned back with his arms crossed behind his head. ‘You cannot hire a tough kid from the ‘hood for your manny job.’

‘How can you talk like that?’

‘Hey. He’s a brother. I’d like him to get the job. But I’m telling you, you’re out of your mind. This isn’t going to fly in your fancy-ass apartment with your uptight husband and the whole …’

‘It’d be good for Dylan. He was a good kid, smart, not that he actually said that much, but I could tell anyway he was. It’d bring Dylan down to earth,’ I answered, but not with great conviction.

‘You are the one stereotyping here, Jamie. Hiring a black kid who’s poor to help your kid be less spoiled? Like only a black kid knows or something?’

I buried my head in my hands. Maybe Charles was right – Nathaniel was monosyllabic and barely looked me in the eye. Clearly I was getting a little desperate. Most of the coaches I had contacted on my own and really wanted to hire had full-time jobs and were busy in the afternoons with their teams. Nathaniel was the one coach who was available.

I looked up at Charles. ‘But I need a man.’

‘You sure do.’ Charles was not a big Phillip fan.

‘Charles. I’m serious. I need an older, responsible male in the house in the afternoons, at least, taking Dylan to the park. Not a heavy-set Jamaican woman like Yvette who doesn’t know how to kick a soccer ball.’ I put my hands over my face. ‘The school called this morning. Again.’

‘Stomachache?’

‘Yeah. Came on five minutes before phys. ed. He goes to the school nurse, it’s not just basketball, it’s dodge ball, and now it’s soccer. At least after that basketball game, he was still doing gym.’

‘Make him go! I’m not a parent, but I watch you guys coddling your kids and, I’m telling you, it’s screwing them up. My momma was such an ass-kicker. And we weren’t poor; so don’t tell me it was some black thing to get out of the ghetto. She sure didn’t put up with any bullshit like this.’

‘I’m trying.’

‘So what’s the problem? Why is he still in the nurse’s office? Why is that allowed?’

‘Charles, it all looks simpler when you’re not a parent. You can’t force kids to …’

‘Hell, yes, you can!’

‘But he won’t leave the nurse’s office! The school shrink has to go in, with the gym teacher’s assistant, who can’t stay, because it’s the middle of class. But he won’t engage, just looks at them and says, “Hey, I said I’m not feeling well enough to play.” Then the teachers talk to him after school. They call me. Phillip and I go in to meet with them – of course Phillip, always wanting to present a united front to the school authorities, clears his schedule to come to these meetings, but can’t make it to a basketball game. What else do you want me to do?’

‘You need to be tougher. That’s exactly what’s fucked up. You should be tougher on him, then he’ll have no place to go and he will start coping.’

‘I am tough but you have to remember because he’s sometimes depressed, I just feel that he needs to be loved by me and feel safe with me to cry. He still does and if I play military commander role, he’s not going to come to me any more. Phillip doesn’t connect enough; tries to handle his little rough spots, but can’t seem to break through. And though he tells me not to worry, I know he’s secretly disappointed his son is so complicated.’

‘What happens with the basketball team?’

‘We make him go because I’m strict about it, like you say I’m supposed to be, but the coach says he won’t shoot, he’ll dribble and run around a bit. Kind of. Not really. But now it’s spread to just regular gym. Look. I know my kid. I know what he needs. I want to find a great guy every afternoon to kick his ass, just like your momma did, but in Central Park.’

Charles grabbed my wrist across the desk, converted. ‘You’re going to find the right guy. But it’s not any of the ones you just met. You know that.’