eighty-five
eighty-five • r • travis/nicki minaj, travis/gabe, other background pairings.
21,301 words total • non-graphic sex scene, some racism, lots of swearing.
so i finished this yesterday but somehow i forgot to post it. i wrote it for my teacher (it sounds strange, but run with me on this) because she is really interested about fanfiction and wanted to know what it was like. she got super eager today when i finally gave her the finished copy.
anyway, i hope you guys enjoy it. it's set in 1985.
Hip Hop is a modern sub-culture that originated in the 1970s in the inner city African American and Latin community of New York City. DJ Afrika Bambaataa outlined the four pillars of Hip-Hop Culture: MCing, DJing, breakdancing, and graffiti writing.
schleprock:
a term used to describe someone who thinks his or herself to be popular and fantastic, but who is actually foolish and dorky.
---
The air in New York City is stale and cold during the early autumn months, with winds cold enough to make Gabe dash into the closest general store. The owner of the shop eyes him suspiciously, though Gabe isn’t surprised at that. He must look like your every day punk; skateboard under his arm, jeans hanging low and his t-shirt splattered with paint-styled designs. He catches his breath by the door as the shop keeper looks him over a second time, frowning as he estimates Gabe’s age.
“Shouldn’t you be in school?” He asks lazily, resting a hand on the edge of the counter, close to the cash register. It almost looks like a defence mechanism, so Gabe laughs.
“I’ve graduated,” he lies easily as he approaches the counter and digs into his pocket to take out his wallet. “Gimme some Marlboro’s, yea’?”
The shop keeper isn’t so easy, though. He rolls his eyes and leans back, uttering, “Yeah, right.” Gabe just frowns at him, eyeing the name tag on his shirt before meeting his eyes again.
“I have an ID, Donald,” he claims, dropping his board to fish out the fake driver’s license from inside the wallet. The shop keeper remains unfazed, though. Gabe doesn’t like him already. He thinks, if this was the regular store that he stops by, then the shop keeper wouldn’t question him.
“Sorry, kid,” he spits back, smirking a little as he does. Gabe wants to swear at him, cause a bit of a scene, but there’s no one in the shop who will notice and he’s sure that won’t help his cause.
The bell above the door rings and Gabe automatically looks over as a dark skinned girl walks inside and begins to wander towards the counter with her eyes on the cigarettes on the back wall. Gabe turns back to the shop keeper and spits, “It’s ‘cause I’m latin, isn’t it? Racist motherfucker. I bet you’d sell your cigs to any skinny white fellas who’d come in here beggin’ for it, but-”
“Hey, hey!” The shop keeper frowns and seems to tense up as he rests both hands on the counter. “This has nothing to do with the colour of your skin. I don’t believe you’re eighteen and so I’d like you to leave.”
Gabe glares hard at the man, but before he can call him out again or make a step towards the door, the girl who had come in looks up in alarm. Suddenly, she grins at Gabe and pushes his arm gently, as if they’d been friends for years.
“Jerry! I didn’t see that was you!” She exclaims, catching both Gabe and the shop keeper off guard. “Are you havin’ trouble again?”
Gabe doesn’t know what to say, but finally nods slowly. The girl looks at the shop keeper with a winning smile as she opens up her purse and fishes out an ID card. “Jerry’s my friend. He looks young, don’t he? But he was born in ’66, just like me,” she nods, pointing at her card and sliding it across the counter. The shop keeper eyes both of them then looks at her card, inspecting it before he reluctantly turns around to grab a pack of the Marlboros from the wall.
“Go on,” he grumbles, holding a hand out for Gabe to shove the cash into his palm, snatching up his ID and the cigarettes before the keep can take them back. “Thanks, fuckhead,” he says in sing song as he turns away from the counter and walks towards the door.
The wind outside has died down, but it’s still a trouble to light up outside the door to the shop. When he finally has a lit stick in his mouth, the girl from inside steps out and rests a hand around his shoulder. “You owe me so fuckin’ hard for that,” she says, plucking a cigarette from the box and putting it into her mouth. Gabe watches her in awe for a moment, almost forgetting to inhale when she takes her arm from around him.
“Oh. Yeah. Thanks,” he nods, closing the pack and shoving them in his pocket. “Who, uh, are you?”
The girl grins wider and holds a hand out, claiming once he’s given her his lighter, “I’m Nicki. Nicki Minaj. Proud Schleprok for life. What about you?”
Gabe frowns gently and tries to think of where he’s heard the word Schleprok before. “Gabe Saporta,” he finally informs her. “What’s a Schleprok?”
Nicki raises her eyebrows at him and cocks her hip as she lights her cigarette. “We’s a crew, haven’t you heard of us? We tag practically all over the inner city sector.” A light goes off in Gabe’s head as he remembers seeing the word graffitied in big bold letters in the half pipe of one of the skate parks he’s been to.
“Yeah, actually. I have heard of ya’s.”
Nicki nods again, rolling her eyes as if it had been obvious from the start. “Where’s you off to, Gabe Saporta?” She asks after a moment, “Hittin’ the parks?”
Gabe looks down at his board then shrugs, plucking the cigarette from his lips as he adjusts his grip on it. “Nowhere, today,” he admits, “Just been walkin’ around.”
Nicki seems to think to herself for a minute or two before holding a hand out to him quite gracefully. “D’you wanna spend the afternoon with me and my friends?” She offers, waiting as Gabe eyes her hand. He gradually relaxes into a smile and takes it, adjusting his fingers a little awkwardly as she leads him back the way he had come.
She doesn’t seem very harmful, and when would a girl be harmful anyway? As far as Gabe’s heard, the Schleproks aren’t a very violent bunch. They tag their name in graffiti all over the city and some of the subway companies have even given them permission to spray the sides of the trains, mainly because the art tends to be nice to look at, but that’s as far as the stories go.
The walk is surprisingly short, where in half an hour’s time, Gabe finds them approaching the edge of an abandoned park. Nicki leads them through it, down the concrete stairs from the elevation and to a deep tunnel that serves as a bridge for the trains to travel over the top of. The mouth of the tunnel is fairly big, big enough for cars to drive through, and Gabe can see the bright graffiti poking out the sides of the concrete structure.
Gabe has just gotten adjusted to holding Nicki’s hand when she lets go and leads Gabe towards a group of boys their age sitting outside the tunnel entrance. They look up and watch Gabe approach, though he’s not surprised. He’s an outsider. He’s unfamiliar. He’s a contrast against their dark skin, but when they realise that he’s just there with Nicki, they all smile and give him a small wave.
“Hey girl,” one calls, reaching out to push her gently as she walks past. She laughs and kicks him lightly in the back, then leans over to rub her hand against his cornrows. He groans and ducks his head away from her, then turns his attention to Gabe as he approaches. “Sup?”
“Nicki invited me,” Gabe says quickly, as his first method of self defence. The boys lean their backs against the outside edge of the tunnel and shrug, keeping their eyes on him. “M’Gabe.”
“Dejesus,” the boy grins, nodding at the boy next to him as he shuffles something in his hands. Gabe looks down at the ground to see the four of them are playing a game of cards, but he doesn’t recognise which one.
“Disashi,” another says, lifting a hand in a wave. “If I like you then you can call me Sash, though.” Gabe laugh quietly and nods, keeping that in mind.
He only hears one more name (Tyga, a younger looking boy sitting with his back to Gabe to face his friends) before he hears Nicki calling out to him; her voice echoed from the cylindric tunnel walls. He immediately approaches her, starting to like when he gets to see her pretty little smile. He finds her standing up close to boy about a foot taller than her, closer to Gabe’s height and perhaps taller. Her hands are wrapped around one of his arms as he faces the wall, painting with a spray can as his brush.
“I want you to meet Travis,” she says, glancing at the boy she clings to as he paints. Gabe turns his attention to him, watching the look of concentration on his face as he fills in an unpainted section of the picture. When he’s done, he drops the can and turns around to give his full attention to the two with a smile fuller than Nicki’s.
“Hey, ‘sup, I’m Travie,” he says, holding a hand out to Gabe. Gabe grabs it and they don’t so much shake hands as they do grab each others fingers, as if ready to start a thumb war. They pull back though and Travis puts his hand in his pocket, while his other arm wraps around Nicki’s waist. Gabe’s a little disappointed to realise that they’re dating, but he mentally shrugs it off as she unravels herself from him to approach Gabe.
“Lemme introduce you to the others,” she offers, patting a hand to his chest before grabbing onto his upper arm and carting him back out of the tunnel. She doesn’t guide him around everyone specifically, but sits him back down with the first group they’d bumped into so that Gabe can learn how to play the card game they’re involved in. He finds out the last boy’s name is Wayne and that Tyga is Travie’s younger cousin, as well as the best techniques to win in a game of Bullshit.
During the middle of the tutorial they give him, Gabe lights himself another cigarette. After he’s finished three more and won one of the games, he reluctantly announces that he should be going. The five of them boo him playfully as he stands up and grins, mumbling a quiet, “Thanks,” then gives Nicki a quick hug when she stands up as well. “Would you mind if I came back to say hey?” He asks a little nervously, but she just gently pushes his chest before hugging him again.
“Of course not. You’re cool, come back whenever you want.”
Gabe gives a wave to everyone then scoops his skate board up from the ground. He decides not to bother Travis to say goodbye, and instead just turns towards the park. When he walks far enough to get away from the dying greenery, he sets his board on the ground and steps onto it, giving himself a push to ride home down the sidewalk.
On his way, Gabe smiles as the breeze stings his face and he thinks about the afternoon. He feels as if he’d been deprived of his own culture until that point, solely because it had been so long since he’d hung out with a crowd like that. Most of the crews around the city are able to treat one another like good friends, normally because they are. The kids welcome newcomers and most of the groups show just as much hospitality as the Schleproks did. He smiles because he’s looking forward to going back, because the encounter had made a boring day better.
When he reaches his house a few blocks away, Gabe kicks up his skateboard and holds it under his arm. He jogs up the front steps of the little house squashed between the two other buildings either side of it. He doesn’t take the time to look at them, though, and instead just opens the door and lets himself inside.
“Dad, Gabe’s home,” he hears his younger brother call from the kitchen. Gabe looks over at him as Ricky leans up against the kitchen counter and takes a gulp from their carton of milk, and when he figures nothing interesting will happen, he walks down the hall to his bedroom.
“Gabriel?” Gabe shuts his eyes when he hears his father and dumps his skateboard in his room.
“What?” He calls back, not even knowing where in the house his father might be. It’s a small place, though, so he can’t be far. “I just went for a walk, okay?”
“You’re making dinner.” He groans and closes his door, leaning back against it with his head tilted towards the ceiling.
“Why can’t you?”
“We agreed to this, Gabriel.”
Gabe bites back a cuss and instead flings his door open to step back out into the hall, shouting to wherever his father may be; “I cooked two nights ago! It’s Ricky’s turn!” He storms out towards the way he’d came, back to the kitchen where he walks past his younger brother and snatches the milk from his grip. He ignores his protests and grabs a glass from the cupboard to pour himself a drink.
“No, it’s your turn tonight.” Gabe turns around to see his father standing behind the island kitchen counter. Gabe frowns at him, putting the milk down and tipping back the glass of milk.
“No, it’s not,” he growls. “I don’t have anything to make, so you’re gonna starve if you reckon I’m doing it. You weren’t even here when it was my turn.”
Diego, Gabe’s father, looks at him sternly as he leans up against the kitchen. “You’re lucky I’m here tonight. I’ve taken time off of my studies so I can have a family night with you boys.”
Gabe doesn’t look at his father as he grumbles, “You’re shit outta luck, old man,” and ignores when his father shouts his name in scolding. “Adrian fucked off to be with his girlfriend again and I’m not gonna put up with one of your stupid family nights.”
Diego steps into the kitchen to make sure Gabe doesn’t duck out, but Gabe never gets punished for his cussing. Diego blabs on about it but it’s not as if grounding him will have any affect. “They are not stupid, they give us time to talk to one another like human beings.”
Gabe laughs loudly in his face, but he pulls back and crosses his arms. Diego can’t look intimidating next to his son, his six-foot-three son who is taller than him and stronger than him and who would probably win in a fight if they tried. “I’m going to bed,” he claims after a second or two, but Diego just blocks his path.
“Did you go to school today?” He asks, eyes in a hard glare and arms folded over like Gabe’s.
Gabe isn’t phased, though. He says bluntly and honestly, “No,” snorting a little as he does.
Ricky finally pipes up from his corner of the kitchen, “How come Gabe don’t have to go to school?” Which earns him a glare from their father.
“Because Gabe is throwing his future away,” he says darkly, as if Gabe isn’t there in front of him. “Gabe doesn’t care what other people think of him and so he’s rude and obnoxious and a role model for everything that you shouldn’t be when you’re older.”
Gabe rolls his eyes and gives in, finally shouting at his father to go fuck himself. Before Diego can stop him this time, he pushes past him and speed walks to his bedroom. He locks the door when he’s inside and walks over to his bed, dropping down on his back and holding a pillow over his head, just so he doesn’t have to listen to his father scolding him through the wood of the door.
---
tag:
a slang term to describe graffiti. tags are normally a crew’s name or emblem for other people to see.
---
The next day, Gabe stays home. He had been planning to go see the Schleproks but decides against it, and not just because his father had shouted something about him being grounded before he went to bed. Grounded means nothing to Gabe.
He’s been staying in his room, savouring his cigarettes for when he really feels like them and listening to his two brothers moving around the house. Of a day, it’s quiet for they go to school and his father returns to his university campus in order to study, just like every other day. Gabe’s family had moved from Uruguay to the states, and so Diego’s medical license became void and he’s been spending the past six years since redoing all that he had learned in an American college. It means that Gabe doesn’t always see that much of his dad, but he’s grown numb to it.
Gabe finally gets up out of bed a couple of days after meeting Nicki and trudges out of his bedroom. The little house is empty, unsurprisingly, so he takes his time to find some clothes in the clean washing baskets and get himself something to eat. When he’s comfortably awake, he sneaks into his father’s room and takes out a couple of twenty dollar bills from the stash in his sock drawer, shoving it deep into his pockets to rest beside his near-empty packet of Marlboros.
Gabe grabs his skateboard from his bedroom and ties his sneakers on, tucking the laces into the sides of the shoes before he jumps up to his feet and heads for the door. As soon as he’s outside, he drops his skateboard down on the pavement and steps onto it, pushing off the ground to roll at a steady pace down the sidewalk. Rather than finding the general store he stopped at those few days ago, he finds the shop he’s used to going into and buys another pack of the same cigarettes, this time without trouble or need of rescue.
The only difficulty Gabe has is keeping the pack in his pockets, rather than taking it out and beginning to smoke through it. He keeps it sealed and untouched, only taking it out when he skates up to the mouth of the tunnel and finds everyone sitting inside, talking and hanging out as they had been the last time Gabe was here.
He doesn’t say anything at first, but Nicki soon spots him when Disashi raises a hand to wave. Gabe waves back and kicks up his board, carrying it under his arm as he enters the tunnel.
As Nicki approaches him, her face is illuminated by the flickering lights on the curved ceiling above them. She grins and gives him a hug, but before the greetings are swapped, he holds up the packet of cigarettes between two fingers then holds it out to her. “As a thanks,” he says with it, pleased to see the smile broaden on her face.
He knows she hadn’t asked for it, but that’s just what you do; if someone does you a favour, you return it. Gabe sees that as some kind of unwritten rule of their society.
“Come chill,” she offers, tapping his arm before heading over to the boys leaning up against the curved wall. Gabe glances over at Travis standing with some caucasian kid on the other side of the tunnel, but ignores them when he sees them both working on another bigger tag on the wall.
“What are you guys doing?” He asks as he sits down, crossing his legs indian style and resting his board in his lap.
“We were just talking,” Wayne shrugs, then nods at Gabe’s board. “You skate?”
When Gabe nods at him, Wayne instantly turns to look over his shoulder at Travis, his long dreadlocks flicking around as he does. “Yo, Travie! We got’s a park kid!” Travis looks over at Gabe and laughs, then shakes his head before returning to the painting.
“What did I do?” Gabe asks quietly, looking at Nicki for some kind of explanation but only finding her with a hand over her mouth to stop herself from laughing.
“Ignore ‘em,” Dejesus says with a roll of his eyes. He reaches over to push Wayne’s shoulder, sending him falling onto his back and the group into a small fit of laughter. “I reckon it’s cool. They ‘aint got balance, or any kind’a board skill. So they’s just be laughin’ at you to make up for it.”
“Fuck off, De-jay,” Tyga spits, shoving him aside with a grin plastered on his face. “I can skate plenty fine, you’re the sucker.”
The conversation continues for a little while longer, mainly consisting of playful insults thrown around as well as an offer from Tyga to paint the underside of Gabe’s board. “We do it for the park kids, sometimes,” he tells him, catching Gabe’s attention. He hadn’t realised that the Schleproks hung out with any other crews.
Gabe finally stands up and wanders to the other side of the tunnel, his board held in a firm grip under his arm as he strays a few feet behind Travis. Every now and then he glances over at the caucasian sitting close to the wall with his knees up to his chest and a spray can in his hand. He hadn’t noticed him the previous time he was here so he’s left wondering whether he’s a Schleprok or not.
“Shit, man,” Travis suddenly spits, jumping back the second he’d turned around. “Scared the shit out of me. What’s up?”
Gabe snaps out of his trance and he looks past Travis at the paint on the wall for a moment before replying, “They said you was the best painter here.” Travis nods, either in agreement or for Gabe to continue. “They reckon I should ask you for a paint job on my board.”
He holds the skate board up, so Travis drops his can to take in from him. With a hand holding each end, he flips it over to look at the underside and purses his lips in thought. “I reckon I can fix it up a bit,” he thinks aloud, then hands it back. “Maybe. Got any clue what you want?”
Gabe just shrugs, hoping Travis doesn’t mind. He hadn’t even though about getting it painted, let alone a design for it. “You can run free with creative license or some shit,” he ends up telling him, making Travis laugh.
“Yeah, whatever, parkie,” he teases. “Listen. You should come back tomorrow. Tomorrow afternoon, maybe. There’s some kids I want you to meet, we’s gonna go see ‘em. You should tag along.” Gabe nods and smiles, watching as Travis bends down to pick up his spray can. “Now, fuck off. I got work to do.”
Gabe smirks at the joking grin on Travis’ face but he turns away nonetheless to return back to the group. He doesn’t say anything about the board, but sits in silence for the rest of the conversation. Just listens.
On his way home later that evening, Gabe thinks about what he could have as a design as he slowly skates down the sidewalk, dodging the occasional pedestrian. His father is sitting on the sofa when he gets home, leaning over the coffee table with spreadsheets and textbooks laid out and his glasses on the end of his nose. Gabe says hi but he just grunts in reply, without even realising that Gabe should be in his room, grounded.
---
“So, where are we going?” Gabe asks, the following day as the Schleproks and he begin to wander through the tunnel to reach the other end. He takes a hold on his backpack straps to make sure it’s firmly on his back, then looks over his shoulder to check his skateboard is attached to the front.
“There’s a skate park in the suburbs we’re headin’ to,” Nicki tells him, keeping her head down to watch their feet as they walk. Her hand is interlocked with Travis’ and they swing their arms gently with each step, the whole group walking in a small bunch out the other end of the tunnel. “The Clandestine Crew spend all their wakin’ hours there, we gots to go see them.”
Gabe nods and falls back into the rest of the group, listening in to a few of the jokes they throw at each other. It doesn’t take very long to walk the few blocks, although on their way they do receive a few shouts from passing by adults. Some of them try to stop the group and tell them they need to be in school, but all of the comments fall on deaf ears.
The skate park that they stop at is small and open. There are no fences around it and it’s outdoors, unlike some of the places that Gabe has been to. A few half pipes are littered around the middle like hollow pools, while small ramps poke out from above the ground. Skaters roll around the concrete on their skateboards, doing tricks from the ramps and holding the edges of their boards and balancing on the edges of the half pipes.
Travis lets go of his girlfriend’s hand to call out to the few in the park, a short and quick holler of, “Wentz!” Immediately, a short young man about their age stops mid-trick to hold his board against the edge of a ramp. He flicks his dark fringe from his eyes and grins at the group, then slides down the ramp again. He skids to a stop and kicks his board up into his grip, then approaches the Schleproks.
“Carden; get my bag!” The Wentz boy calls out to someone over his shoulder. Another boy with dark but slightly longer hair stops himself from performing a flip so that he can jump off his board and run to a bench on the other side of the park. By the time he’s grabbed up a faded red backpack and started heading towards him, Wentz has stopped by Travie’s crew.
“Hey man,” he greets, reaching out to grab Travis’ fist and pull him into a hug with their hands between them. “I got your shit. You done your share?”
Travis grins and nods, then looks past Wentz to eagerly eye the backpack in Carden’s hands. “Whatchu got for us this time?” He asks.
Wentz grins wider to show his straight, white teeth. He takes the bag from Carden and kneels down with it, starting to unzip the top. “Winfield’s,” he says as he grabs three packs of Winfield cigarettes from the bag, throwing them in different directions for the Schleproks to catch. Reaching in again, he pulls out a can of spray paint, “More black, ‘cause you’s were running out,” and throws it up to Travis. “And some fluro’s. Don’t want my schleps to start paintin’ dreary, now, do I?”
He hands the spray cans around for the boys and girl to inspect. They all exchange a look before Travis finally grins at Wentz, as if giving him his approval. “We spent the weekend flashin’ up a hotel. You’ll find the Clandestine name all over the Paramount.”
By now, a few of the other skaters have wandered over to join the group. Upon hearing this, they hiss in excitement and share a few high fives as Wentz crosses his arms with a proud smile on his face. “Man, I can’t wait to see that,” he admits, glancing around at his friends before looking back at Travis. “You goin’ anywhere?”
Travis shrugs and reaches a hand back to blindly find Nicki’s. She reaches out and they lace fingers before he continues, “Maybe scoutin’ a bit. We need to find some new territory, ‘cause these downtowners keep coming in and takin’ up all our wall-space.” Wentz nods thoughtfully at that and looks around again.
“I’ll see what I can do about ‘em, yeah? But for now we should hang. Wendy’s for all ya’s, my treat.” Disashi and Tyga bump fists in silent victory and Gabe laughs to himself as he watches the scene. As soon as he makes a sound, though, Wentz looks at him with an eyebrow raised. “Who’s this cat?”
Travis glances back at Gabe and grins. “This is Gabe. Nicki picked him up off the street,” he chuckles, but Gabe just rolls his eyes. “He’s a parkie like you fags, I thought you might get along.” Wentz pushes him playfully but the two just laugh before straightening up. Wentz couldn’t really do that much damage if he tried; he must be at least a foot shorter than Travis.
“Well, Gabe,” Wentz turns to him, “I’m Pete. Pete Wentz. You’ll find these mates are the Clandestine Crew -” He pauses to gesture vaguely at the boys behind and around him, “- They’s my boys. I reckon you’d fit with us, but I also reckon you’s fitting in with the Schleppers pretty well too.”
He seems to decide that that’s it for his introduction, for he just grabs up the backpack and slips it on over his shoulders. He kicks his board up into his grip again, carrying it under his arm as he beckons his crew to follow him on his way towards the exit of the park. “You’s coming?”
The Schleproks follow easily, the two groups melding into one. Gabe lingers behind as usual to take a look at the people who he hadn’t been paying attention to. A couple of them have tattoos up their arms, one of them with ink on his shoulders that Gabe can only see because of the singlet he’s wearing. There are a couple of girls that catch up who he hadn’t even noticed before, but he definitely feels like paying attention to them now.
He smiles at the girl with the burgundy hair, but she just gives him a shy glance before jogging past the boys to catch up with Pete. Instantly she ties their hands together and leans up against him while they walk, her pale skin and designer jacket contrasting against his tee and tattooed arms.
The other two girls are a little more lenient, though. They don’t brush him off immediately, and one of them even looks at him. A girl with bright orange hair, brighter than the Schleprok’s fluro’s, chuckles to herself when she looks Gabe over. But the other, a thin but sturdy girl with short brunette and blonde hair strays a little closer. “Hey,” she says, shoving her hands in the pockets of her khakis, kicking at the ground with her sneakers. “You a newbie, here?”
Gabe grins a little sheepishly as they speed up to catch up with the rest of the group. “I guess so,” he shrugs, mimicking her actions by resting his hands in his pockets too. “I’m Gabe.”
“I heard,” she grins at him, turning her head to flick her blonde bangs from her eyes. “I’m Cassadee. Surprised I ‘aint seen you round here before,” she admits, “Why’s you hangin’ with the Schleppies?”
Gabe gives a shrug at first and glances up at their path every few seconds. “Nicki kind’a took me under her wing,” he starts, but Cassadee’s slightly thoughtful frown (or perhaps confused; it’s difficult to tell) makes him stop and fix his sentence. “I ‘aint white.”
She looks a little taken back at first, almost worried like she’s offended him but luckily she doesn’t walk away. “Pale. Pale latino. I don’t normally come here, I’m guessin’ ‘cause you guys look pretty strict on your racial policy.” He grins bitterly when he says it.
“We don’t judge,” she frowns a little harder. “Just ‘cause we white, we don’t judge. Park owners do, though. Fuckin’ asses,” she bites her words but the creases the frown makes in her forehead instantly smoothen out when she realises she’s being a little too crude for a first meet. “Sorry. What I was sayin’ was just that you seem different from them. Quieter, maybe. They got’s a whitey with them, didn’t you know?”
Gabe looks up at the group walking ahead of them and spots the caucasian lagging behind Travis and Nicki. He gives a nod. “I didn’t know who he was,” he admits, “Saw him yesterday. Somehow he blends in.”
“Yeah,” Cassadee just agrees, “That’s Matty. He hits beats for Travie. You know, for the spittin’.” Gabe nods, because he knows that, at least. “That white boy’s got a rhythm,” she grins, almost teasingly even though Matt can’t see her.
When the melded group gets to the fast food restaurant, they all step inside and spread out into booths. Pete fishes through his backpack to find his wallet, finding some cash to share between all of the Schleproks. Gabe squishes into a booth with five other Clandestine’s, two Schleppers and Cassadee. She’s practically on his lap, sending a gentle hue of red over his face whenever she turns to talk to someone on the other end of the table, but he manages to ignore it for the most part.
“You should come skate with us some days,” she suggests when they’ve got their burgers and milkshakes in front of them. “Rather than just taggin’ along with the Schleproks. It’d be cool, I reckon you’d fit in.”
Although he tries to, throughout the meal, Gabe doesn’t speak very much. He finds that he doesn’t have much to say, so he sticks to his old habits of just listening and laughing along with a joke every now and then. He doesn’t mind, though, and he feels he’s scored a good lunch even though he hadn’t helped on any of the tagging that the Schleproks did for the Clandestine’s.
On their way back to the park, Gabe notices that Cassadee has started to stray away. When he takes a look around, he realises that it’s only because Pete is approaching him, fairly casually but in a way looking as if he’s got something to say. Most of the group has dispersed to smaller trios or quartets, talking amongst themselves.
“Hey, newbie,” Pete says to him, grinning as he looks up. Gabe must have at least ten inches on him, so he finds it rather comical for Pete to be referring to him as the newbie. “You likin’ the crew so far?”
Gabe just nods, sliding his hands into his pockets as they walk along the sidewalks, squinting to avoid getting the setting sun in his eyes. “Everyone’s cool,” he comments simply.
“They are, they are.” Pete nods as he takes a look around at everyone, but finally caves in and grins up at Gabe again. “You seem to be takin’ a likin’ to Cassie.”
Gabe feels like he’s going red again but he just blames it on the sun on his face. “She’s cool,” he says, only just stopping himself from screwing his face up from his own words. He really needs to find a new adjective. “Nice. Fun to talk to.”
Pete nods absently and taps his palms against his thighs to match a beat in his head. “Yeah,” he agrees lamely, then changes the topic in a flash. “You like Travie? He’s got some pretty wicked skills, huh?” Gabe thinks about what’s being asked before he quickly nods. “We get him and the guys to do our tags for us. We gotta get the Clandestine name out but we ‘aint no artists, y’know?” Gabe nods.
“Territory, right?” He asks, and Pete’s eyes go wide in a smile as he claps his hands.
“Exactly, yeah! You get it! We ‘aint getting them to tag in places we ‘aint been, that’s just unfair. But no one wants to see scribble on the wall in pathetic Sharpie’s ‘n shit, y’know? We gotta be flash, gotta be noticeable. Big. We gotta make sure they know we own this place.” Gabe decides not to ask who “they” is, because he’s got a feeling that it won’t be summed up too quickly.
“D’you reckon you’ve got taggin’ skills?” He asks after a moment, slouching his shoulders as he dips his hands in his pockets. Gabe thinks about it for a moment, tries to remember the last time he actually drew something, and pulls a face. “Don’t answer that, then,” Pete just laughs.
“If you gonna be a Schlep then I reckon you should talk to Travie, though. That boy’s got some talent, y’know? Real, raw talent. That’s rare shit in places like these,” he comments, gesturing wildly with both hands around the street they’re walking through. “And if he don’t think you got it, then I still think you’d be good to chill with us. He likes you, I can tell.
“But don’t hold me to it. That whole, chill with us, thing,” Pete grins after a moment, nudging Gabe in the arm with a loose fist. “I’m just judging the way you skate by the way you walk. You’re confident, y’know? ‘Course, if you skate like you got ants in your pants I’m gonna have to cancel the deal.” Gabe laughs at that, punching Pete back.
“I can skate, don’t sweat it,” he assures him, resting his hands back in his pockets.
When they return to the park, everyone either remains in their smaller groups or join onto others to sit on the edge of the half pipes and talk. Some of the boys grab their new spray cans and start messing around with words and pictures on the sides of the ramps, ducking their heads out of the way just in time as the skaters skid along the sides.
Gabe, though, feels it’s enough. He only watches Travis paint for a few minutes, maybe enough to add up to half an hour, but when the sun sets low enough to be hidden behind buildings, he supposes it’s too late for him to be hanging around in the city. He does his rounds to say goodbye, only slightly regretting it when he doesn’t give Cassadee a little hug before he leaves.
---
spitting:
a slang term for rapping. variations include MCing or rhyming. popular in the hip hop era as a way for people to get a message across through music, without necessarily singing.
---
Gabe doesn’t return to the Schleproks’ tunnel until the following week. He had tried to leave the house, really, but his father either stopped him, his brothers called him out, or he got to the streets and became distracted from searching for as many tags as he could in his area.
When he finally does arrive at the tunnel a few days later, it’s like he never left. He jumps down the concrete steps from the park to the solid ground, his backpack on his back but lacking a skateboard. Rather than gravitating towards Nicki, he mingles for a while with some of the boys. He’d hate to give the impression that he’s only here for her, and although at first, he was, he’d rather get to know everyone else. It’s not like he has a chance with her, not since she’s dating Travis.
He stops and leans against a short concrete wall lining the park. The caucasian (Matty, right?) is sat up on top of it, so he smiles when Gabe comes over. Neither really know what to say at first, just standing silently as Matt taps his thighs with his palms.
“How do you know Travis?” Gabe finally asks, trying his hardest to not sound touchy or judgmental. He doesn’t want to ask how a white kid got mixed up in a bunch of African-Americans, but Matt doesn’t seem to mind anyway.
“His dad works with my dad,” Matt says, smiling almost proudly as he does. “Travie saw I had a drum kit and we started shootin’ out tunes, it was pretty sweet. Now he lets me help with the wall. I ‘aint got as good a hand as he’s got, though.”
Gabe nods as he dips his hands into his pockets and absently looks around. The boys are playing another card game, cracking jokes every now and then and Nicki stands on her own by the mouth of the tunnel; one hand in her hoodie pocket and the other clutching a spray can. Travis is probably inside the tunnel, out of Gabe’s view.
“What about you? How’d you get here?” Matt asks after a moment of silence.
Gabe shrugs at first, thinking back to when he met Nicki. “I was trying to buy cigs,” he laughs, “The clerk rejected my ID, so Nicki came outta nowhere and helped me out. Brought me back here, let me chill.”
“That’s good,” Matt says, and Gabe nods in agreement. “How old are you?”
“Only seventeen,” Gabe shrugs, looking down as he scuffs his shoe against the concrete.
“Oh, cool. Okay. Same.” Matt takes a look around then adds, “Nicki is too. Travie’s sixteen, but you don’t notice that.” Gabe nods in agreement, because he wouldn’t have guessed it. “Tyga’s a little younger, just hit fourteen a few months back. Everyone else is seventeen, too.”
A few moments pass in silence while Gabe continues to toe at the ground, until Matt finally pipes up again. “It’s kinda cool you’re hanging out with us,” he says, making Gabe look up at him. “I mean, like. Yeah.”
Gabe frowns gently and leans back against the wall, resting both hands either side of him. “Cool?”
Matt just nods. “Yeah, cool. We don’t normally get people chillin’ with us. New Schleppers, I mean.” Gabe has to think about that for a second, because even though he never considered himself as an actual part of the crew, he doesn’t want to disappoint Matt by saying no.
Before he can explain that, he hears his name being called, Both he and Matt look up to see Travis leaning against the outside wall of the tunnel, beckoning Gabe over with a spray can in one hand. Gabe gives Matt an apologetic look before he steps away from the wall and heads over in Travis’ direction.
“Hey,” he greets, Travis nodding in reply. “Um, what’s up?” Travis beckons him into the tunnel and walks inside, expecting Gabe to follow.
“I wanna show you this,” he tells him, smiling excitedly as they cross to a different wall to where he normally paints at. Gabe follows at his heels, stopping only when Travis stops to admire the art on the wall. “I’m doin’ a big one. A mural thing. For the whole crew,” he adds, pointing up at an unfinished picture of cartoon caricatures of all of them. Gabe laughs when he sees it, only because the pictures are cute and yet funny. Travis looks at him with an appreciative grin.
“This is great,” Gabe comments, wanting to reach out and touch it, but the light from the sun outside filters into the tunnel and shines on the picture, making the paint twinkle, so he can tell it’s still wet. “What about that picture underneath, though?”
Travis frowns gently in thought as he looks over to where Gabe’s line of vision is, but the frown lines smooth out and he laughs and shakes his head when he sees the graffiti that he’s painting over. “It’s old art, man,” he tells him, smiling as he does. Gabe bites his tongue, but he feels it to be such a waste of talent for it to just be painted over. “Gotta stay fresh, y’know?”
Gabe just shrugs and nods, studying the picture for a little longer. He holds back an immature giggle at Nicki’s avatar on the wall; her big lips making a kissing face and her breasts looking too big for the tank top she’s in. “Has your girl seen this?” He asks, grinning at Travis as he points at the picture of her.
Travis laughs when he looks and begins to shake up his spray can. “Yeah, actually. She’s the one who told me to paint it like that. I was gonna make it a little more modest,” he admits. “But, hey, I wanted to ask you something.”
Gabe looks at him to give him his full attention as Travis glances away, trying to focus on a certain point of the picture. “I didn’t know how to spell your last name,” he admits, “And I figured I should get your permission. To have you in it, I mean.” Gabe’s eyes widen and he only just stops his jaw from dropping as he turns to look at the graffiti.
“Why would I be in it?”
Travis laughs. “‘Cause you’re a Schleprok, man.” He nudges Gabe’s arm, waiting for the smile to reappear, and he laughs again when it finally does. Gabe hadn’t realised that they’d taken to him so quickly. “D’you wanna write your name?”
Gabe pulls a face and crosses his arms to tuck his palms under his armpits. “Wouldn’t wanna fuck it up,” he says, lowering his eyes to read over the different names under the picture. They’re all done differently, in different handwriting, and he’s guessing that everyone’s written their own name. His stomach drops.
“It ‘aint that hard,” Travis assures him, holding the can out. “C’mon, give it a go. In a year’s time we’ll be laughing about how shit you was at art.” Gabe smiles at him, but as Gabe reaches out to take the spray can, they hear the sound of a car horn.
Travis turns around to look at the other end of the tunnel, wincing when the car’s headlights flash him in the eye. Gabe feels it too but he looks away quickly, then holds a hand up to block the light from hitting him directly in the eye.
The car stops midway through the tunnel and the door opens, a man in his late forties stepping out and shutting the door after him. Travis looks up, squinting against the headlights contrasting in the darkness of the tunnel, then cusses to himself. Gabe studies the vehicle and the man a second longer before he realises it’s a policeman.
“What’s all this, here?” He says, walking over to them with his hands on his belt as he looks up at the wall. His voice catches the attention of the boys and girl sitting outside the tunnel, who then stand and walk slowly into the tunnel to see what’s going on.
“It’s graffiti,” Travis says in a bored tone of voice, almost glaring at the officer. Gabe can see the way his eyes shine in the car’s headlights. “You got a problem with that?”
“Yeah, actually,” the police officer says, standing tall in front of Travis with his chest puffed out, but he only just reaches the same height as Travis while the boy is slouching. “I do. This is vandalism.”
Travis laughs in a breath of air as he drops the spray can. The sound echoes against the silence in the tunnel, but no one pays attention. All eyes are on the officer and the group leader. “We’s got permission to be here. Just ask the trains runnin’ overhead. They gived us permission ‘bout two years ago, they like it. Reckon it’s good for the community ‘n shit.”
“There’s no need to use that language,” the officer says to him. Gabe has to try and hold back a laugh when he sees the way the man tries to straighten up constantly to be taller than the boy. “Besides, you kids should be in school. Truanting, are we?”
“Oh, come off it,” Nicki yells at him, crossing her arms tightly and cocking her hip out. “You’s just lookin’ for something we’s doing wrong. We don’t have to go to school.”
“Yeah,” Tyga pipes up, walking over to stand next to his cousin to frown up at the officer. “There’s some white kids off rippin’ trees up in Central, why don’t you go pick on them? We ‘aint doing nothin’.”
The officer takes in a sharp breath and glares at Tyga, before he looks back at Travis. “I’ll deal with them when I’m done here.”
“Yeah, I bet,” Wayne shouts at him, jumping on the spot to be seen behind Travis’ six-foot of gangly limbs. “I bet you gonna go ask ‘em how their day was, ask if you can join in. But no, when there’s some darkies mindin’ their own business you just gots to go break them up.”
“Now, that’s enough,” the officer raises his voice, standing his ground and watching the kids around him. They all stand in a small group, not making any advances past their slightly bitter words. Gabe wonders what the officer could be thinking. “There is no racial discrimination going on here. I’m just abiding by the law in investigating what you kids are doing.”
“And we told you,” Travis spits, crossing his arms, “we’s just mindin’ our own business, sprayin’ our paint where we’s allowed to. Nigger hater.”
The second the last word comes out, the officer’s eyes go wide and he whips his small bat from his belt, swinging it at Travis. Gabe yelps and falls back against the wall as the others all jump back as well, watching as Travis shouts and drops down to his knees and hold his hand over his shoulder where the policeman hit him. Luckily, it doesn’t go past the one swing, but the officer does grab his wrists and tug him to his feet. When the handcuffs come into view, the Schleproks all begin to boo at him, shouting insults but making sure not to go to the extent that Travis had gone to.
Travis leans up against the hood of the car while the officer tightens his cuffs, but rather than being bothered by it, he’s just rolling his eyes and blowing his curls from his eyes. “They’s got nothin’ on me,” he calls to Gabe, noticing the distraught look on his face. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Gabe remains leant against the curve of the wall as Travis gets thrown into the back of the car, the police officer muttering something about the disgrace of kids today and harassment of police officers. The shouts from the Schleproks die down as the car reverses out the tunnel, but none of them return to where they were sitting too quickly.
“What are we gonna do?” Gabe looks to them, eyes wide and angered. Nicki approaches him, shaking her head as she puts a hand on his shoulder.
“Nothin’. There’s nothin’ we can do. Just wait ‘till tomorrow.” Gabe frowns at her and she says quite calmly, “It’s happened before. Travie’s done nothin’ wrong.”
Gabe still can’t comprehend the situation. He pushes her hand from his shoulder and runs his fingers through his hair as he sits down with his back slouched against the contour of the wall. “This is sick,” he mutters. “Fuckin’ racist assholes.”
“Gabe,” Nicki says sternly, looking down at him with her hands on her hips. “There ‘aint nothin’ we can do. Forget it.”
---
white collar criminal:
people who disregard rules and laws in order to have their opinions listened to and their needs met, but who call out other people who don’t follow the same rules. they care about no one but themselves.
---
Despite Travis’ assurances, Gabe didn’t sleep well that night. It wasn’t worry, but anger. Sometime around midnight he started yelling into his pillow, just trying to find a way to pretend that it was that stupid white police officer’s head that he was punching. And despite Travis’ assurances, it was surprising for Gabe to show up at midday and find Travis where he normally is.
“Hey.” Gabe heads towards him immediately, not even thinking to give a wave or some simple kind of greeting to the others lounging around and spraying the outside of the tunnel. “Hey, Travis.”
Travis stops spraying close to the wall and stands back to watch the paint dribble down the concrete. He turns to Gabe with a smile that isn’t met and replies, “What up, Saporta?”
“Nothin’,” Gabe grumbles, crossing his arms after dropping his backpack and his skateboard to the ground. He’s happy Travis is here, really, because here is better than jail. Better than a police station. He’s just.. still angry. “What happened?”
Travis rolls his eyes and turns back to the wall, leaning close to blow on the wet paint. “Nothin’ special. He started talkin’ shit to his boss but they had nothin’ on me. I ‘aint done nothin’ wrong, Gee. One day they’ll get what they deserve for messin’ with us, s’all set in place.” He waves a hand absently towards the roof and Gabe looks up to the flickering lights. “It’s fine. Don’t sweat it.”
“Yeah, but-”
“Don’t.” Travis just laughs and looks back at Gabe, grinning at his frown and finally dropping his spray can. “C’mon, don’t do that.” He nudges Gabe’s arm with his fist and smirks at him. “Don’t frown like that or you’ll look forty or somethin’.”
Gabe shrugs and shakes his head. He rubs his palms against his forehead as if that’ll fix it, as if that’ll smooth out his crease lines like Travis does with a simple smile. “It’s just gettin’ to me, ya’ know?”
“Yeah, I know.” Travis leans back against a dry patch on the wall, tapping his fist against an open palm. “Hey, look, lemme take you for a drink or somethin’. It’s hot and you could use a chill pill. Plus my bro’s in town and he gave me some cash.” His grin is dazzling and hopeful enough to convince Gabe to nod, but as he turns to head towards the others, Travis reaches out to grab his upper arm. “Nah, don’t worry about them. We can just go get milkshakes or somethin’.”
Gabe ends up with his backpack on, his skateboard strapped to the front once again. Travis gives a simple coo to tell the others that they’re going for a drink, before he leads Gabe out the other end of the tunnel and into town. The walk doesn’t feel as long as it did the last time, but then again, by the time they reach the milkshake parlour Gabe has lost count of how many cigarettes they shared between them.
Travis buys himself a chocolate milkshake with ice cream, and despite knowing Gabe would rather vanilla, he buys him a strawberry flavoured, “because you were being such a girl for worrying.” Gabe punches him in the arm. Travis laughs.
They drink slowly to savour the treats, especially after Travis explains that his step-brother doesn’t come to New York often and his father doesn’t give him free money. Travis suggests after a few minutes, “We should go tagging,” and Gabe’s ears metaphorically perk up.
“I’ve never been,” he admits, stirring the pink froth in his cup with the straw. “Is it much different to normal graffiti?”
Travis shrugs and looks down at his drink as he sits back in their booth. “Not really. You just gotta be quick. Unless it’s a safe place, like the tunnel. We do have permission to spray there, y’know.” Gabe nods, because he does believe him. “Might go see Wentz first, see if there’s anything he wants done. We normally tag for other crews who can’t or don’t have the time, y’know? They give us shit in return. It’s cool.”
They take their unfinished milkshakes with them on their way out of the parlour and head towards the skate park that the Schleproks first took Gabe to. As they approach, Gabe spots a few of them crowded around a ramp, watching others skating and flipping their skateboards. Travis lingers by the diamond fence that’s pulled down around one side of the park, thus losing it’s purpose, as he watches the girl with bright orange hair working on a manual at the bottom of the ramp.
He whistles to catch someone’s attention and Pete happens to look over, grinning and giving a wave. Gabe can see his smile from where they stand, which makes him chuckle. The skater carries his board over, leaving the rest of his crew to watch and take turns skating on the ramp.
“Sup, McCoy?” he greets, punching Travis gently in the arm and looking up at him through his sunglasses that almost eat up his face.
“We’s was going tagging,” Travis says, gesturing to himself then to Gabe.
Pete grabs onto his sunglasses, lifting them up to look at Gabe and raise his eyebrow. “So the parkie can paint, can’e?”
Travis laughs quietly as Gabe takes a nervous sip from his brightly coloured drink. “We’s about to find out. You want any place done up? We could use some stuff.”
Pete drops his glasses back onto his nose as he glances back at his friends and thinks for a moment. “Depends on what kinda stuff you need,” he concludes.
Travis just shrugs again and thinks aloud, “Cards, maybe. Playing cards, but some fresh ID’s would be cool. Our fake ones apparently expire soon.”
Pete whistles low and runs his fingers through his black bangs. “I’ll see what I can do. The ID’s might take longer, but for the playing cards, you could brighten up Fourth Street for us.”
As if to seal the deal, Travis reaches a hand out and Pete grabs it. They hug with their hands between them and Travis pats Pete’s shoulder with an assuring nod. “I’ll see you next week, yeah?”
Gabe doesn’t speak until they’re walking away, and even still, it’s about a block away. He thinks out loud to himself, “Fourth Street ‘aint far, is it?” And Travis shakes his head. “I don’t want to fuck up their tags,” he adds, “It’ll probably give ‘em a bad name.”
Travis waves a hand absently and pulls Gabe into another street. “You can’t be that bad. I’ve seen people who’ve painted for years and they’re worse than first-timers.”
Gabe hooks his hands onto his backpack straps for something to hold onto as they walk along. It turns out they’re in a mostly residential town, which causes Gabe to frown in confusion as they stop in front of a house. “I thought we was tagging?”
Travis nods. “We are. I need fresh paints, but,” he points out, holding a finger up to signal Gabe to stay where he is before he dashes up to the house. Travis jogs to the front door, helping himself inside and coming out barely a minute later clutching black, red and purple spray cans. When he returns to Gabe’s side, he stands behind him to unzip Gabe’s mostly-empty backpack and put them inside.
“Um.” Gabe waits for him to zip his bag back up and continue walking before he continues, “Do you know who lives there?”
Travis looks at him with his eyebrows raises before he begins to laugh. “Oh, man. I keep forgetting you don’t know where I live.” He jabs his thumb over his shoulder as if to signal. “S’my place.”
Gabe looks back at the house as Travis leads him along. They turn out of the street at the end of the block and continue walking in near silence, kicking stones and spitting against their lips to make faint beating sounds for their own amusement. When Travis leads him into a back alley, Gabe can see cars driving by and pedestrians walking along a sidewalk on the other side of the alleyway. He figures this is it.
“Up here’s a good spot,” Travis says, pointing a long finger up at a mostly-bare wall from a tall building next to them. No one should see them spraying back here, but any kids who walk through the alley as a short cut should see the finished tag just fine.
For the most part, Gabe sits back with his legs crossed indian style, watching Travis spray out large letters, larger than any of the small scribbles on the wall. It definitely stands out. Gabe hands him the specific coloured cans when he asks for them, and when he’s nearing the finish, Gabe can see he’s spelt out “Clandestine” in long, dripping letters in red paint with black outlines.
“You wanna draw the wings?” Travis asks, grinning down at him as he shakes up a purple can. “S’not hard, you won’t fuck it up.
Gabe thinks for a moment before he finally shrugs his backpack off and standing up. He approaches the wall where Travis is standing, closer to the C, then takes the can from him. “You can draw bat wings?” He asks, nudging Gabe’s side. Gabe shrugs, so Travis laughs.
He picks up the black can and draws two semi-circles next to each other, making a slightly broken circle. From those, he adds lines to create a basic, stick-figure-like rendition of bat wings. “S’not hard,” he concludes, taking his can away from the wall and looking at Gabe expectantly.
Gabe lifts his can up, trying not to spray too close to the wall because he knows it’ll make the paint run. He chews his lip when it does anyway, but Travis doesn’t tell him to stop. The wings are a little crooked, but he’s got a basic shape down. Travis grins at him when he’s done. “Sweet, bro,” he comments, holding a fist up that Gabe bumps his own against. “S’been a good day. Good tag.”
Gabe surprises himself by the excitement of drawing more tags. He thought he’d be bored, maybe nervous, but now that he’s more confident to paint, it’s not that bad. He can’t do the curves or the straight, clean lines that Travis can, but he can get out the basic shapes that he needs to prove his point. They move around a bit, but they stay mostly within the same block. Pete would be proud.
Travis finally makes proper conversation (aside from the short, quiet instructions and tips under his breath) when they’re sitting on the concrete sidewalk, leaning against a short brick wall outlining a small park that takes up a quarter of a block. He waits until Gabe’s mouth is full from stuffing a McDonald’s cheeseburger into his cheeks, then leans back against the wall from where he’d been slouched. “So,” he starts, making Gabe look up. “You should stay the night. At the tunnel, I mean. We do that sometimes, ya’ know? It’s fun. Light a fire ‘n shit, no one can see us.”
Gabe sticks the straw of his soft drink into his mouth to wash down his food before he nods quickly, adding in confirmation, “Sure.” He doesn’t even think about asking his father, for he’s sure he won’t be missed. “Sure, yeah. That’d be cool. Yeah.” They bump their fists together then continue to eat in silence, although Travis does steal a few glances at Gabe to smile at him and how eagerly he scoffs down his food.
---
part two over here
21,301 words total • non-graphic sex scene, some racism, lots of swearing.
so i finished this yesterday but somehow i forgot to post it. i wrote it for my teacher (it sounds strange, but run with me on this) because she is really interested about fanfiction and wanted to know what it was like. she got super eager today when i finally gave her the finished copy.
anyway, i hope you guys enjoy it. it's set in 1985.
Hip Hop is a modern sub-culture that originated in the 1970s in the inner city African American and Latin community of New York City. DJ Afrika Bambaataa outlined the four pillars of Hip-Hop Culture: MCing, DJing, breakdancing, and graffiti writing.
schleprock:
a term used to describe someone who thinks his or herself to be popular and fantastic, but who is actually foolish and dorky.
---
The air in New York City is stale and cold during the early autumn months, with winds cold enough to make Gabe dash into the closest general store. The owner of the shop eyes him suspiciously, though Gabe isn’t surprised at that. He must look like your every day punk; skateboard under his arm, jeans hanging low and his t-shirt splattered with paint-styled designs. He catches his breath by the door as the shop keeper looks him over a second time, frowning as he estimates Gabe’s age.
“Shouldn’t you be in school?” He asks lazily, resting a hand on the edge of the counter, close to the cash register. It almost looks like a defence mechanism, so Gabe laughs.
“I’ve graduated,” he lies easily as he approaches the counter and digs into his pocket to take out his wallet. “Gimme some Marlboro’s, yea’?”
The shop keeper isn’t so easy, though. He rolls his eyes and leans back, uttering, “Yeah, right.” Gabe just frowns at him, eyeing the name tag on his shirt before meeting his eyes again.
“I have an ID, Donald,” he claims, dropping his board to fish out the fake driver’s license from inside the wallet. The shop keeper remains unfazed, though. Gabe doesn’t like him already. He thinks, if this was the regular store that he stops by, then the shop keeper wouldn’t question him.
“Sorry, kid,” he spits back, smirking a little as he does. Gabe wants to swear at him, cause a bit of a scene, but there’s no one in the shop who will notice and he’s sure that won’t help his cause.
The bell above the door rings and Gabe automatically looks over as a dark skinned girl walks inside and begins to wander towards the counter with her eyes on the cigarettes on the back wall. Gabe turns back to the shop keeper and spits, “It’s ‘cause I’m latin, isn’t it? Racist motherfucker. I bet you’d sell your cigs to any skinny white fellas who’d come in here beggin’ for it, but-”
“Hey, hey!” The shop keeper frowns and seems to tense up as he rests both hands on the counter. “This has nothing to do with the colour of your skin. I don’t believe you’re eighteen and so I’d like you to leave.”
Gabe glares hard at the man, but before he can call him out again or make a step towards the door, the girl who had come in looks up in alarm. Suddenly, she grins at Gabe and pushes his arm gently, as if they’d been friends for years.
“Jerry! I didn’t see that was you!” She exclaims, catching both Gabe and the shop keeper off guard. “Are you havin’ trouble again?”
Gabe doesn’t know what to say, but finally nods slowly. The girl looks at the shop keeper with a winning smile as she opens up her purse and fishes out an ID card. “Jerry’s my friend. He looks young, don’t he? But he was born in ’66, just like me,” she nods, pointing at her card and sliding it across the counter. The shop keeper eyes both of them then looks at her card, inspecting it before he reluctantly turns around to grab a pack of the Marlboros from the wall.
“Go on,” he grumbles, holding a hand out for Gabe to shove the cash into his palm, snatching up his ID and the cigarettes before the keep can take them back. “Thanks, fuckhead,” he says in sing song as he turns away from the counter and walks towards the door.
The wind outside has died down, but it’s still a trouble to light up outside the door to the shop. When he finally has a lit stick in his mouth, the girl from inside steps out and rests a hand around his shoulder. “You owe me so fuckin’ hard for that,” she says, plucking a cigarette from the box and putting it into her mouth. Gabe watches her in awe for a moment, almost forgetting to inhale when she takes her arm from around him.
“Oh. Yeah. Thanks,” he nods, closing the pack and shoving them in his pocket. “Who, uh, are you?”
The girl grins wider and holds a hand out, claiming once he’s given her his lighter, “I’m Nicki. Nicki Minaj. Proud Schleprok for life. What about you?”
Gabe frowns gently and tries to think of where he’s heard the word Schleprok before. “Gabe Saporta,” he finally informs her. “What’s a Schleprok?”
Nicki raises her eyebrows at him and cocks her hip as she lights her cigarette. “We’s a crew, haven’t you heard of us? We tag practically all over the inner city sector.” A light goes off in Gabe’s head as he remembers seeing the word graffitied in big bold letters in the half pipe of one of the skate parks he’s been to.
“Yeah, actually. I have heard of ya’s.”
Nicki nods again, rolling her eyes as if it had been obvious from the start. “Where’s you off to, Gabe Saporta?” She asks after a moment, “Hittin’ the parks?”
Gabe looks down at his board then shrugs, plucking the cigarette from his lips as he adjusts his grip on it. “Nowhere, today,” he admits, “Just been walkin’ around.”
Nicki seems to think to herself for a minute or two before holding a hand out to him quite gracefully. “D’you wanna spend the afternoon with me and my friends?” She offers, waiting as Gabe eyes her hand. He gradually relaxes into a smile and takes it, adjusting his fingers a little awkwardly as she leads him back the way he had come.
She doesn’t seem very harmful, and when would a girl be harmful anyway? As far as Gabe’s heard, the Schleproks aren’t a very violent bunch. They tag their name in graffiti all over the city and some of the subway companies have even given them permission to spray the sides of the trains, mainly because the art tends to be nice to look at, but that’s as far as the stories go.
The walk is surprisingly short, where in half an hour’s time, Gabe finds them approaching the edge of an abandoned park. Nicki leads them through it, down the concrete stairs from the elevation and to a deep tunnel that serves as a bridge for the trains to travel over the top of. The mouth of the tunnel is fairly big, big enough for cars to drive through, and Gabe can see the bright graffiti poking out the sides of the concrete structure.
Gabe has just gotten adjusted to holding Nicki’s hand when she lets go and leads Gabe towards a group of boys their age sitting outside the tunnel entrance. They look up and watch Gabe approach, though he’s not surprised. He’s an outsider. He’s unfamiliar. He’s a contrast against their dark skin, but when they realise that he’s just there with Nicki, they all smile and give him a small wave.
“Hey girl,” one calls, reaching out to push her gently as she walks past. She laughs and kicks him lightly in the back, then leans over to rub her hand against his cornrows. He groans and ducks his head away from her, then turns his attention to Gabe as he approaches. “Sup?”
“Nicki invited me,” Gabe says quickly, as his first method of self defence. The boys lean their backs against the outside edge of the tunnel and shrug, keeping their eyes on him. “M’Gabe.”
“Dejesus,” the boy grins, nodding at the boy next to him as he shuffles something in his hands. Gabe looks down at the ground to see the four of them are playing a game of cards, but he doesn’t recognise which one.
“Disashi,” another says, lifting a hand in a wave. “If I like you then you can call me Sash, though.” Gabe laugh quietly and nods, keeping that in mind.
He only hears one more name (Tyga, a younger looking boy sitting with his back to Gabe to face his friends) before he hears Nicki calling out to him; her voice echoed from the cylindric tunnel walls. He immediately approaches her, starting to like when he gets to see her pretty little smile. He finds her standing up close to boy about a foot taller than her, closer to Gabe’s height and perhaps taller. Her hands are wrapped around one of his arms as he faces the wall, painting with a spray can as his brush.
“I want you to meet Travis,” she says, glancing at the boy she clings to as he paints. Gabe turns his attention to him, watching the look of concentration on his face as he fills in an unpainted section of the picture. When he’s done, he drops the can and turns around to give his full attention to the two with a smile fuller than Nicki’s.
“Hey, ‘sup, I’m Travie,” he says, holding a hand out to Gabe. Gabe grabs it and they don’t so much shake hands as they do grab each others fingers, as if ready to start a thumb war. They pull back though and Travis puts his hand in his pocket, while his other arm wraps around Nicki’s waist. Gabe’s a little disappointed to realise that they’re dating, but he mentally shrugs it off as she unravels herself from him to approach Gabe.
“Lemme introduce you to the others,” she offers, patting a hand to his chest before grabbing onto his upper arm and carting him back out of the tunnel. She doesn’t guide him around everyone specifically, but sits him back down with the first group they’d bumped into so that Gabe can learn how to play the card game they’re involved in. He finds out the last boy’s name is Wayne and that Tyga is Travie’s younger cousin, as well as the best techniques to win in a game of Bullshit.
During the middle of the tutorial they give him, Gabe lights himself another cigarette. After he’s finished three more and won one of the games, he reluctantly announces that he should be going. The five of them boo him playfully as he stands up and grins, mumbling a quiet, “Thanks,” then gives Nicki a quick hug when she stands up as well. “Would you mind if I came back to say hey?” He asks a little nervously, but she just gently pushes his chest before hugging him again.
“Of course not. You’re cool, come back whenever you want.”
Gabe gives a wave to everyone then scoops his skate board up from the ground. He decides not to bother Travis to say goodbye, and instead just turns towards the park. When he walks far enough to get away from the dying greenery, he sets his board on the ground and steps onto it, giving himself a push to ride home down the sidewalk.
On his way, Gabe smiles as the breeze stings his face and he thinks about the afternoon. He feels as if he’d been deprived of his own culture until that point, solely because it had been so long since he’d hung out with a crowd like that. Most of the crews around the city are able to treat one another like good friends, normally because they are. The kids welcome newcomers and most of the groups show just as much hospitality as the Schleproks did. He smiles because he’s looking forward to going back, because the encounter had made a boring day better.
When he reaches his house a few blocks away, Gabe kicks up his skateboard and holds it under his arm. He jogs up the front steps of the little house squashed between the two other buildings either side of it. He doesn’t take the time to look at them, though, and instead just opens the door and lets himself inside.
“Dad, Gabe’s home,” he hears his younger brother call from the kitchen. Gabe looks over at him as Ricky leans up against the kitchen counter and takes a gulp from their carton of milk, and when he figures nothing interesting will happen, he walks down the hall to his bedroom.
“Gabriel?” Gabe shuts his eyes when he hears his father and dumps his skateboard in his room.
“What?” He calls back, not even knowing where in the house his father might be. It’s a small place, though, so he can’t be far. “I just went for a walk, okay?”
“You’re making dinner.” He groans and closes his door, leaning back against it with his head tilted towards the ceiling.
“Why can’t you?”
“We agreed to this, Gabriel.”
Gabe bites back a cuss and instead flings his door open to step back out into the hall, shouting to wherever his father may be; “I cooked two nights ago! It’s Ricky’s turn!” He storms out towards the way he’d came, back to the kitchen where he walks past his younger brother and snatches the milk from his grip. He ignores his protests and grabs a glass from the cupboard to pour himself a drink.
“No, it’s your turn tonight.” Gabe turns around to see his father standing behind the island kitchen counter. Gabe frowns at him, putting the milk down and tipping back the glass of milk.
“No, it’s not,” he growls. “I don’t have anything to make, so you’re gonna starve if you reckon I’m doing it. You weren’t even here when it was my turn.”
Diego, Gabe’s father, looks at him sternly as he leans up against the kitchen. “You’re lucky I’m here tonight. I’ve taken time off of my studies so I can have a family night with you boys.”
Gabe doesn’t look at his father as he grumbles, “You’re shit outta luck, old man,” and ignores when his father shouts his name in scolding. “Adrian fucked off to be with his girlfriend again and I’m not gonna put up with one of your stupid family nights.”
Diego steps into the kitchen to make sure Gabe doesn’t duck out, but Gabe never gets punished for his cussing. Diego blabs on about it but it’s not as if grounding him will have any affect. “They are not stupid, they give us time to talk to one another like human beings.”
Gabe laughs loudly in his face, but he pulls back and crosses his arms. Diego can’t look intimidating next to his son, his six-foot-three son who is taller than him and stronger than him and who would probably win in a fight if they tried. “I’m going to bed,” he claims after a second or two, but Diego just blocks his path.
“Did you go to school today?” He asks, eyes in a hard glare and arms folded over like Gabe’s.
Gabe isn’t phased, though. He says bluntly and honestly, “No,” snorting a little as he does.
Ricky finally pipes up from his corner of the kitchen, “How come Gabe don’t have to go to school?” Which earns him a glare from their father.
“Because Gabe is throwing his future away,” he says darkly, as if Gabe isn’t there in front of him. “Gabe doesn’t care what other people think of him and so he’s rude and obnoxious and a role model for everything that you shouldn’t be when you’re older.”
Gabe rolls his eyes and gives in, finally shouting at his father to go fuck himself. Before Diego can stop him this time, he pushes past him and speed walks to his bedroom. He locks the door when he’s inside and walks over to his bed, dropping down on his back and holding a pillow over his head, just so he doesn’t have to listen to his father scolding him through the wood of the door.
---
tag:
a slang term to describe graffiti. tags are normally a crew’s name or emblem for other people to see.
---
The next day, Gabe stays home. He had been planning to go see the Schleproks but decides against it, and not just because his father had shouted something about him being grounded before he went to bed. Grounded means nothing to Gabe.
He’s been staying in his room, savouring his cigarettes for when he really feels like them and listening to his two brothers moving around the house. Of a day, it’s quiet for they go to school and his father returns to his university campus in order to study, just like every other day. Gabe’s family had moved from Uruguay to the states, and so Diego’s medical license became void and he’s been spending the past six years since redoing all that he had learned in an American college. It means that Gabe doesn’t always see that much of his dad, but he’s grown numb to it.
Gabe finally gets up out of bed a couple of days after meeting Nicki and trudges out of his bedroom. The little house is empty, unsurprisingly, so he takes his time to find some clothes in the clean washing baskets and get himself something to eat. When he’s comfortably awake, he sneaks into his father’s room and takes out a couple of twenty dollar bills from the stash in his sock drawer, shoving it deep into his pockets to rest beside his near-empty packet of Marlboros.
Gabe grabs his skateboard from his bedroom and ties his sneakers on, tucking the laces into the sides of the shoes before he jumps up to his feet and heads for the door. As soon as he’s outside, he drops his skateboard down on the pavement and steps onto it, pushing off the ground to roll at a steady pace down the sidewalk. Rather than finding the general store he stopped at those few days ago, he finds the shop he’s used to going into and buys another pack of the same cigarettes, this time without trouble or need of rescue.
The only difficulty Gabe has is keeping the pack in his pockets, rather than taking it out and beginning to smoke through it. He keeps it sealed and untouched, only taking it out when he skates up to the mouth of the tunnel and finds everyone sitting inside, talking and hanging out as they had been the last time Gabe was here.
He doesn’t say anything at first, but Nicki soon spots him when Disashi raises a hand to wave. Gabe waves back and kicks up his board, carrying it under his arm as he enters the tunnel.
As Nicki approaches him, her face is illuminated by the flickering lights on the curved ceiling above them. She grins and gives him a hug, but before the greetings are swapped, he holds up the packet of cigarettes between two fingers then holds it out to her. “As a thanks,” he says with it, pleased to see the smile broaden on her face.
He knows she hadn’t asked for it, but that’s just what you do; if someone does you a favour, you return it. Gabe sees that as some kind of unwritten rule of their society.
“Come chill,” she offers, tapping his arm before heading over to the boys leaning up against the curved wall. Gabe glances over at Travis standing with some caucasian kid on the other side of the tunnel, but ignores them when he sees them both working on another bigger tag on the wall.
“What are you guys doing?” He asks as he sits down, crossing his legs indian style and resting his board in his lap.
“We were just talking,” Wayne shrugs, then nods at Gabe’s board. “You skate?”
When Gabe nods at him, Wayne instantly turns to look over his shoulder at Travis, his long dreadlocks flicking around as he does. “Yo, Travie! We got’s a park kid!” Travis looks over at Gabe and laughs, then shakes his head before returning to the painting.
“What did I do?” Gabe asks quietly, looking at Nicki for some kind of explanation but only finding her with a hand over her mouth to stop herself from laughing.
“Ignore ‘em,” Dejesus says with a roll of his eyes. He reaches over to push Wayne’s shoulder, sending him falling onto his back and the group into a small fit of laughter. “I reckon it’s cool. They ‘aint got balance, or any kind’a board skill. So they’s just be laughin’ at you to make up for it.”
“Fuck off, De-jay,” Tyga spits, shoving him aside with a grin plastered on his face. “I can skate plenty fine, you’re the sucker.”
The conversation continues for a little while longer, mainly consisting of playful insults thrown around as well as an offer from Tyga to paint the underside of Gabe’s board. “We do it for the park kids, sometimes,” he tells him, catching Gabe’s attention. He hadn’t realised that the Schleproks hung out with any other crews.
Gabe finally stands up and wanders to the other side of the tunnel, his board held in a firm grip under his arm as he strays a few feet behind Travis. Every now and then he glances over at the caucasian sitting close to the wall with his knees up to his chest and a spray can in his hand. He hadn’t noticed him the previous time he was here so he’s left wondering whether he’s a Schleprok or not.
“Shit, man,” Travis suddenly spits, jumping back the second he’d turned around. “Scared the shit out of me. What’s up?”
Gabe snaps out of his trance and he looks past Travis at the paint on the wall for a moment before replying, “They said you was the best painter here.” Travis nods, either in agreement or for Gabe to continue. “They reckon I should ask you for a paint job on my board.”
He holds the skate board up, so Travis drops his can to take in from him. With a hand holding each end, he flips it over to look at the underside and purses his lips in thought. “I reckon I can fix it up a bit,” he thinks aloud, then hands it back. “Maybe. Got any clue what you want?”
Gabe just shrugs, hoping Travis doesn’t mind. He hadn’t even though about getting it painted, let alone a design for it. “You can run free with creative license or some shit,” he ends up telling him, making Travis laugh.
“Yeah, whatever, parkie,” he teases. “Listen. You should come back tomorrow. Tomorrow afternoon, maybe. There’s some kids I want you to meet, we’s gonna go see ‘em. You should tag along.” Gabe nods and smiles, watching as Travis bends down to pick up his spray can. “Now, fuck off. I got work to do.”
Gabe smirks at the joking grin on Travis’ face but he turns away nonetheless to return back to the group. He doesn’t say anything about the board, but sits in silence for the rest of the conversation. Just listens.
On his way home later that evening, Gabe thinks about what he could have as a design as he slowly skates down the sidewalk, dodging the occasional pedestrian. His father is sitting on the sofa when he gets home, leaning over the coffee table with spreadsheets and textbooks laid out and his glasses on the end of his nose. Gabe says hi but he just grunts in reply, without even realising that Gabe should be in his room, grounded.
---
“So, where are we going?” Gabe asks, the following day as the Schleproks and he begin to wander through the tunnel to reach the other end. He takes a hold on his backpack straps to make sure it’s firmly on his back, then looks over his shoulder to check his skateboard is attached to the front.
“There’s a skate park in the suburbs we’re headin’ to,” Nicki tells him, keeping her head down to watch their feet as they walk. Her hand is interlocked with Travis’ and they swing their arms gently with each step, the whole group walking in a small bunch out the other end of the tunnel. “The Clandestine Crew spend all their wakin’ hours there, we gots to go see them.”
Gabe nods and falls back into the rest of the group, listening in to a few of the jokes they throw at each other. It doesn’t take very long to walk the few blocks, although on their way they do receive a few shouts from passing by adults. Some of them try to stop the group and tell them they need to be in school, but all of the comments fall on deaf ears.
The skate park that they stop at is small and open. There are no fences around it and it’s outdoors, unlike some of the places that Gabe has been to. A few half pipes are littered around the middle like hollow pools, while small ramps poke out from above the ground. Skaters roll around the concrete on their skateboards, doing tricks from the ramps and holding the edges of their boards and balancing on the edges of the half pipes.
Travis lets go of his girlfriend’s hand to call out to the few in the park, a short and quick holler of, “Wentz!” Immediately, a short young man about their age stops mid-trick to hold his board against the edge of a ramp. He flicks his dark fringe from his eyes and grins at the group, then slides down the ramp again. He skids to a stop and kicks his board up into his grip, then approaches the Schleproks.
“Carden; get my bag!” The Wentz boy calls out to someone over his shoulder. Another boy with dark but slightly longer hair stops himself from performing a flip so that he can jump off his board and run to a bench on the other side of the park. By the time he’s grabbed up a faded red backpack and started heading towards him, Wentz has stopped by Travie’s crew.
“Hey man,” he greets, reaching out to grab Travis’ fist and pull him into a hug with their hands between them. “I got your shit. You done your share?”
Travis grins and nods, then looks past Wentz to eagerly eye the backpack in Carden’s hands. “Whatchu got for us this time?” He asks.
Wentz grins wider to show his straight, white teeth. He takes the bag from Carden and kneels down with it, starting to unzip the top. “Winfield’s,” he says as he grabs three packs of Winfield cigarettes from the bag, throwing them in different directions for the Schleproks to catch. Reaching in again, he pulls out a can of spray paint, “More black, ‘cause you’s were running out,” and throws it up to Travis. “And some fluro’s. Don’t want my schleps to start paintin’ dreary, now, do I?”
He hands the spray cans around for the boys and girl to inspect. They all exchange a look before Travis finally grins at Wentz, as if giving him his approval. “We spent the weekend flashin’ up a hotel. You’ll find the Clandestine name all over the Paramount.”
By now, a few of the other skaters have wandered over to join the group. Upon hearing this, they hiss in excitement and share a few high fives as Wentz crosses his arms with a proud smile on his face. “Man, I can’t wait to see that,” he admits, glancing around at his friends before looking back at Travis. “You goin’ anywhere?”
Travis shrugs and reaches a hand back to blindly find Nicki’s. She reaches out and they lace fingers before he continues, “Maybe scoutin’ a bit. We need to find some new territory, ‘cause these downtowners keep coming in and takin’ up all our wall-space.” Wentz nods thoughtfully at that and looks around again.
“I’ll see what I can do about ‘em, yeah? But for now we should hang. Wendy’s for all ya’s, my treat.” Disashi and Tyga bump fists in silent victory and Gabe laughs to himself as he watches the scene. As soon as he makes a sound, though, Wentz looks at him with an eyebrow raised. “Who’s this cat?”
Travis glances back at Gabe and grins. “This is Gabe. Nicki picked him up off the street,” he chuckles, but Gabe just rolls his eyes. “He’s a parkie like you fags, I thought you might get along.” Wentz pushes him playfully but the two just laugh before straightening up. Wentz couldn’t really do that much damage if he tried; he must be at least a foot shorter than Travis.
“Well, Gabe,” Wentz turns to him, “I’m Pete. Pete Wentz. You’ll find these mates are the Clandestine Crew -” He pauses to gesture vaguely at the boys behind and around him, “- They’s my boys. I reckon you’d fit with us, but I also reckon you’s fitting in with the Schleppers pretty well too.”
He seems to decide that that’s it for his introduction, for he just grabs up the backpack and slips it on over his shoulders. He kicks his board up into his grip again, carrying it under his arm as he beckons his crew to follow him on his way towards the exit of the park. “You’s coming?”
The Schleproks follow easily, the two groups melding into one. Gabe lingers behind as usual to take a look at the people who he hadn’t been paying attention to. A couple of them have tattoos up their arms, one of them with ink on his shoulders that Gabe can only see because of the singlet he’s wearing. There are a couple of girls that catch up who he hadn’t even noticed before, but he definitely feels like paying attention to them now.
He smiles at the girl with the burgundy hair, but she just gives him a shy glance before jogging past the boys to catch up with Pete. Instantly she ties their hands together and leans up against him while they walk, her pale skin and designer jacket contrasting against his tee and tattooed arms.
The other two girls are a little more lenient, though. They don’t brush him off immediately, and one of them even looks at him. A girl with bright orange hair, brighter than the Schleprok’s fluro’s, chuckles to herself when she looks Gabe over. But the other, a thin but sturdy girl with short brunette and blonde hair strays a little closer. “Hey,” she says, shoving her hands in the pockets of her khakis, kicking at the ground with her sneakers. “You a newbie, here?”
Gabe grins a little sheepishly as they speed up to catch up with the rest of the group. “I guess so,” he shrugs, mimicking her actions by resting his hands in his pockets too. “I’m Gabe.”
“I heard,” she grins at him, turning her head to flick her blonde bangs from her eyes. “I’m Cassadee. Surprised I ‘aint seen you round here before,” she admits, “Why’s you hangin’ with the Schleppies?”
Gabe gives a shrug at first and glances up at their path every few seconds. “Nicki kind’a took me under her wing,” he starts, but Cassadee’s slightly thoughtful frown (or perhaps confused; it’s difficult to tell) makes him stop and fix his sentence. “I ‘aint white.”
She looks a little taken back at first, almost worried like she’s offended him but luckily she doesn’t walk away. “Pale. Pale latino. I don’t normally come here, I’m guessin’ ‘cause you guys look pretty strict on your racial policy.” He grins bitterly when he says it.
“We don’t judge,” she frowns a little harder. “Just ‘cause we white, we don’t judge. Park owners do, though. Fuckin’ asses,” she bites her words but the creases the frown makes in her forehead instantly smoothen out when she realises she’s being a little too crude for a first meet. “Sorry. What I was sayin’ was just that you seem different from them. Quieter, maybe. They got’s a whitey with them, didn’t you know?”
Gabe looks up at the group walking ahead of them and spots the caucasian lagging behind Travis and Nicki. He gives a nod. “I didn’t know who he was,” he admits, “Saw him yesterday. Somehow he blends in.”
“Yeah,” Cassadee just agrees, “That’s Matty. He hits beats for Travie. You know, for the spittin’.” Gabe nods, because he knows that, at least. “That white boy’s got a rhythm,” she grins, almost teasingly even though Matt can’t see her.
When the melded group gets to the fast food restaurant, they all step inside and spread out into booths. Pete fishes through his backpack to find his wallet, finding some cash to share between all of the Schleproks. Gabe squishes into a booth with five other Clandestine’s, two Schleppers and Cassadee. She’s practically on his lap, sending a gentle hue of red over his face whenever she turns to talk to someone on the other end of the table, but he manages to ignore it for the most part.
“You should come skate with us some days,” she suggests when they’ve got their burgers and milkshakes in front of them. “Rather than just taggin’ along with the Schleproks. It’d be cool, I reckon you’d fit in.”
Although he tries to, throughout the meal, Gabe doesn’t speak very much. He finds that he doesn’t have much to say, so he sticks to his old habits of just listening and laughing along with a joke every now and then. He doesn’t mind, though, and he feels he’s scored a good lunch even though he hadn’t helped on any of the tagging that the Schleproks did for the Clandestine’s.
On their way back to the park, Gabe notices that Cassadee has started to stray away. When he takes a look around, he realises that it’s only because Pete is approaching him, fairly casually but in a way looking as if he’s got something to say. Most of the group has dispersed to smaller trios or quartets, talking amongst themselves.
“Hey, newbie,” Pete says to him, grinning as he looks up. Gabe must have at least ten inches on him, so he finds it rather comical for Pete to be referring to him as the newbie. “You likin’ the crew so far?”
Gabe just nods, sliding his hands into his pockets as they walk along the sidewalks, squinting to avoid getting the setting sun in his eyes. “Everyone’s cool,” he comments simply.
“They are, they are.” Pete nods as he takes a look around at everyone, but finally caves in and grins up at Gabe again. “You seem to be takin’ a likin’ to Cassie.”
Gabe feels like he’s going red again but he just blames it on the sun on his face. “She’s cool,” he says, only just stopping himself from screwing his face up from his own words. He really needs to find a new adjective. “Nice. Fun to talk to.”
Pete nods absently and taps his palms against his thighs to match a beat in his head. “Yeah,” he agrees lamely, then changes the topic in a flash. “You like Travie? He’s got some pretty wicked skills, huh?” Gabe thinks about what’s being asked before he quickly nods. “We get him and the guys to do our tags for us. We gotta get the Clandestine name out but we ‘aint no artists, y’know?” Gabe nods.
“Territory, right?” He asks, and Pete’s eyes go wide in a smile as he claps his hands.
“Exactly, yeah! You get it! We ‘aint getting them to tag in places we ‘aint been, that’s just unfair. But no one wants to see scribble on the wall in pathetic Sharpie’s ‘n shit, y’know? We gotta be flash, gotta be noticeable. Big. We gotta make sure they know we own this place.” Gabe decides not to ask who “they” is, because he’s got a feeling that it won’t be summed up too quickly.
“D’you reckon you’ve got taggin’ skills?” He asks after a moment, slouching his shoulders as he dips his hands in his pockets. Gabe thinks about it for a moment, tries to remember the last time he actually drew something, and pulls a face. “Don’t answer that, then,” Pete just laughs.
“If you gonna be a Schlep then I reckon you should talk to Travie, though. That boy’s got some talent, y’know? Real, raw talent. That’s rare shit in places like these,” he comments, gesturing wildly with both hands around the street they’re walking through. “And if he don’t think you got it, then I still think you’d be good to chill with us. He likes you, I can tell.
“But don’t hold me to it. That whole, chill with us, thing,” Pete grins after a moment, nudging Gabe in the arm with a loose fist. “I’m just judging the way you skate by the way you walk. You’re confident, y’know? ‘Course, if you skate like you got ants in your pants I’m gonna have to cancel the deal.” Gabe laughs at that, punching Pete back.
“I can skate, don’t sweat it,” he assures him, resting his hands back in his pockets.
When they return to the park, everyone either remains in their smaller groups or join onto others to sit on the edge of the half pipes and talk. Some of the boys grab their new spray cans and start messing around with words and pictures on the sides of the ramps, ducking their heads out of the way just in time as the skaters skid along the sides.
Gabe, though, feels it’s enough. He only watches Travis paint for a few minutes, maybe enough to add up to half an hour, but when the sun sets low enough to be hidden behind buildings, he supposes it’s too late for him to be hanging around in the city. He does his rounds to say goodbye, only slightly regretting it when he doesn’t give Cassadee a little hug before he leaves.
---
spitting:
a slang term for rapping. variations include MCing or rhyming. popular in the hip hop era as a way for people to get a message across through music, without necessarily singing.
---
Gabe doesn’t return to the Schleproks’ tunnel until the following week. He had tried to leave the house, really, but his father either stopped him, his brothers called him out, or he got to the streets and became distracted from searching for as many tags as he could in his area.
When he finally does arrive at the tunnel a few days later, it’s like he never left. He jumps down the concrete steps from the park to the solid ground, his backpack on his back but lacking a skateboard. Rather than gravitating towards Nicki, he mingles for a while with some of the boys. He’d hate to give the impression that he’s only here for her, and although at first, he was, he’d rather get to know everyone else. It’s not like he has a chance with her, not since she’s dating Travis.
He stops and leans against a short concrete wall lining the park. The caucasian (Matty, right?) is sat up on top of it, so he smiles when Gabe comes over. Neither really know what to say at first, just standing silently as Matt taps his thighs with his palms.
“How do you know Travis?” Gabe finally asks, trying his hardest to not sound touchy or judgmental. He doesn’t want to ask how a white kid got mixed up in a bunch of African-Americans, but Matt doesn’t seem to mind anyway.
“His dad works with my dad,” Matt says, smiling almost proudly as he does. “Travie saw I had a drum kit and we started shootin’ out tunes, it was pretty sweet. Now he lets me help with the wall. I ‘aint got as good a hand as he’s got, though.”
Gabe nods as he dips his hands into his pockets and absently looks around. The boys are playing another card game, cracking jokes every now and then and Nicki stands on her own by the mouth of the tunnel; one hand in her hoodie pocket and the other clutching a spray can. Travis is probably inside the tunnel, out of Gabe’s view.
“What about you? How’d you get here?” Matt asks after a moment of silence.
Gabe shrugs at first, thinking back to when he met Nicki. “I was trying to buy cigs,” he laughs, “The clerk rejected my ID, so Nicki came outta nowhere and helped me out. Brought me back here, let me chill.”
“That’s good,” Matt says, and Gabe nods in agreement. “How old are you?”
“Only seventeen,” Gabe shrugs, looking down as he scuffs his shoe against the concrete.
“Oh, cool. Okay. Same.” Matt takes a look around then adds, “Nicki is too. Travie’s sixteen, but you don’t notice that.” Gabe nods in agreement, because he wouldn’t have guessed it. “Tyga’s a little younger, just hit fourteen a few months back. Everyone else is seventeen, too.”
A few moments pass in silence while Gabe continues to toe at the ground, until Matt finally pipes up again. “It’s kinda cool you’re hanging out with us,” he says, making Gabe look up at him. “I mean, like. Yeah.”
Gabe frowns gently and leans back against the wall, resting both hands either side of him. “Cool?”
Matt just nods. “Yeah, cool. We don’t normally get people chillin’ with us. New Schleppers, I mean.” Gabe has to think about that for a second, because even though he never considered himself as an actual part of the crew, he doesn’t want to disappoint Matt by saying no.
Before he can explain that, he hears his name being called, Both he and Matt look up to see Travis leaning against the outside wall of the tunnel, beckoning Gabe over with a spray can in one hand. Gabe gives Matt an apologetic look before he steps away from the wall and heads over in Travis’ direction.
“Hey,” he greets, Travis nodding in reply. “Um, what’s up?” Travis beckons him into the tunnel and walks inside, expecting Gabe to follow.
“I wanna show you this,” he tells him, smiling excitedly as they cross to a different wall to where he normally paints at. Gabe follows at his heels, stopping only when Travis stops to admire the art on the wall. “I’m doin’ a big one. A mural thing. For the whole crew,” he adds, pointing up at an unfinished picture of cartoon caricatures of all of them. Gabe laughs when he sees it, only because the pictures are cute and yet funny. Travis looks at him with an appreciative grin.
“This is great,” Gabe comments, wanting to reach out and touch it, but the light from the sun outside filters into the tunnel and shines on the picture, making the paint twinkle, so he can tell it’s still wet. “What about that picture underneath, though?”
Travis frowns gently in thought as he looks over to where Gabe’s line of vision is, but the frown lines smooth out and he laughs and shakes his head when he sees the graffiti that he’s painting over. “It’s old art, man,” he tells him, smiling as he does. Gabe bites his tongue, but he feels it to be such a waste of talent for it to just be painted over. “Gotta stay fresh, y’know?”
Gabe just shrugs and nods, studying the picture for a little longer. He holds back an immature giggle at Nicki’s avatar on the wall; her big lips making a kissing face and her breasts looking too big for the tank top she’s in. “Has your girl seen this?” He asks, grinning at Travis as he points at the picture of her.
Travis laughs when he looks and begins to shake up his spray can. “Yeah, actually. She’s the one who told me to paint it like that. I was gonna make it a little more modest,” he admits. “But, hey, I wanted to ask you something.”
Gabe looks at him to give him his full attention as Travis glances away, trying to focus on a certain point of the picture. “I didn’t know how to spell your last name,” he admits, “And I figured I should get your permission. To have you in it, I mean.” Gabe’s eyes widen and he only just stops his jaw from dropping as he turns to look at the graffiti.
“Why would I be in it?”
Travis laughs. “‘Cause you’re a Schleprok, man.” He nudges Gabe’s arm, waiting for the smile to reappear, and he laughs again when it finally does. Gabe hadn’t realised that they’d taken to him so quickly. “D’you wanna write your name?”
Gabe pulls a face and crosses his arms to tuck his palms under his armpits. “Wouldn’t wanna fuck it up,” he says, lowering his eyes to read over the different names under the picture. They’re all done differently, in different handwriting, and he’s guessing that everyone’s written their own name. His stomach drops.
“It ‘aint that hard,” Travis assures him, holding the can out. “C’mon, give it a go. In a year’s time we’ll be laughing about how shit you was at art.” Gabe smiles at him, but as Gabe reaches out to take the spray can, they hear the sound of a car horn.
Travis turns around to look at the other end of the tunnel, wincing when the car’s headlights flash him in the eye. Gabe feels it too but he looks away quickly, then holds a hand up to block the light from hitting him directly in the eye.
The car stops midway through the tunnel and the door opens, a man in his late forties stepping out and shutting the door after him. Travis looks up, squinting against the headlights contrasting in the darkness of the tunnel, then cusses to himself. Gabe studies the vehicle and the man a second longer before he realises it’s a policeman.
“What’s all this, here?” He says, walking over to them with his hands on his belt as he looks up at the wall. His voice catches the attention of the boys and girl sitting outside the tunnel, who then stand and walk slowly into the tunnel to see what’s going on.
“It’s graffiti,” Travis says in a bored tone of voice, almost glaring at the officer. Gabe can see the way his eyes shine in the car’s headlights. “You got a problem with that?”
“Yeah, actually,” the police officer says, standing tall in front of Travis with his chest puffed out, but he only just reaches the same height as Travis while the boy is slouching. “I do. This is vandalism.”
Travis laughs in a breath of air as he drops the spray can. The sound echoes against the silence in the tunnel, but no one pays attention. All eyes are on the officer and the group leader. “We’s got permission to be here. Just ask the trains runnin’ overhead. They gived us permission ‘bout two years ago, they like it. Reckon it’s good for the community ‘n shit.”
“There’s no need to use that language,” the officer says to him. Gabe has to try and hold back a laugh when he sees the way the man tries to straighten up constantly to be taller than the boy. “Besides, you kids should be in school. Truanting, are we?”
“Oh, come off it,” Nicki yells at him, crossing her arms tightly and cocking her hip out. “You’s just lookin’ for something we’s doing wrong. We don’t have to go to school.”
“Yeah,” Tyga pipes up, walking over to stand next to his cousin to frown up at the officer. “There’s some white kids off rippin’ trees up in Central, why don’t you go pick on them? We ‘aint doing nothin’.”
The officer takes in a sharp breath and glares at Tyga, before he looks back at Travis. “I’ll deal with them when I’m done here.”
“Yeah, I bet,” Wayne shouts at him, jumping on the spot to be seen behind Travis’ six-foot of gangly limbs. “I bet you gonna go ask ‘em how their day was, ask if you can join in. But no, when there’s some darkies mindin’ their own business you just gots to go break them up.”
“Now, that’s enough,” the officer raises his voice, standing his ground and watching the kids around him. They all stand in a small group, not making any advances past their slightly bitter words. Gabe wonders what the officer could be thinking. “There is no racial discrimination going on here. I’m just abiding by the law in investigating what you kids are doing.”
“And we told you,” Travis spits, crossing his arms, “we’s just mindin’ our own business, sprayin’ our paint where we’s allowed to. Nigger hater.”
The second the last word comes out, the officer’s eyes go wide and he whips his small bat from his belt, swinging it at Travis. Gabe yelps and falls back against the wall as the others all jump back as well, watching as Travis shouts and drops down to his knees and hold his hand over his shoulder where the policeman hit him. Luckily, it doesn’t go past the one swing, but the officer does grab his wrists and tug him to his feet. When the handcuffs come into view, the Schleproks all begin to boo at him, shouting insults but making sure not to go to the extent that Travis had gone to.
Travis leans up against the hood of the car while the officer tightens his cuffs, but rather than being bothered by it, he’s just rolling his eyes and blowing his curls from his eyes. “They’s got nothin’ on me,” he calls to Gabe, noticing the distraught look on his face. “I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Gabe remains leant against the curve of the wall as Travis gets thrown into the back of the car, the police officer muttering something about the disgrace of kids today and harassment of police officers. The shouts from the Schleproks die down as the car reverses out the tunnel, but none of them return to where they were sitting too quickly.
“What are we gonna do?” Gabe looks to them, eyes wide and angered. Nicki approaches him, shaking her head as she puts a hand on his shoulder.
“Nothin’. There’s nothin’ we can do. Just wait ‘till tomorrow.” Gabe frowns at her and she says quite calmly, “It’s happened before. Travie’s done nothin’ wrong.”
Gabe still can’t comprehend the situation. He pushes her hand from his shoulder and runs his fingers through his hair as he sits down with his back slouched against the contour of the wall. “This is sick,” he mutters. “Fuckin’ racist assholes.”
“Gabe,” Nicki says sternly, looking down at him with her hands on her hips. “There ‘aint nothin’ we can do. Forget it.”
---
white collar criminal:
people who disregard rules and laws in order to have their opinions listened to and their needs met, but who call out other people who don’t follow the same rules. they care about no one but themselves.
---
Despite Travis’ assurances, Gabe didn’t sleep well that night. It wasn’t worry, but anger. Sometime around midnight he started yelling into his pillow, just trying to find a way to pretend that it was that stupid white police officer’s head that he was punching. And despite Travis’ assurances, it was surprising for Gabe to show up at midday and find Travis where he normally is.
“Hey.” Gabe heads towards him immediately, not even thinking to give a wave or some simple kind of greeting to the others lounging around and spraying the outside of the tunnel. “Hey, Travis.”
Travis stops spraying close to the wall and stands back to watch the paint dribble down the concrete. He turns to Gabe with a smile that isn’t met and replies, “What up, Saporta?”
“Nothin’,” Gabe grumbles, crossing his arms after dropping his backpack and his skateboard to the ground. He’s happy Travis is here, really, because here is better than jail. Better than a police station. He’s just.. still angry. “What happened?”
Travis rolls his eyes and turns back to the wall, leaning close to blow on the wet paint. “Nothin’ special. He started talkin’ shit to his boss but they had nothin’ on me. I ‘aint done nothin’ wrong, Gee. One day they’ll get what they deserve for messin’ with us, s’all set in place.” He waves a hand absently towards the roof and Gabe looks up to the flickering lights. “It’s fine. Don’t sweat it.”
“Yeah, but-”
“Don’t.” Travis just laughs and looks back at Gabe, grinning at his frown and finally dropping his spray can. “C’mon, don’t do that.” He nudges Gabe’s arm with his fist and smirks at him. “Don’t frown like that or you’ll look forty or somethin’.”
Gabe shrugs and shakes his head. He rubs his palms against his forehead as if that’ll fix it, as if that’ll smooth out his crease lines like Travis does with a simple smile. “It’s just gettin’ to me, ya’ know?”
“Yeah, I know.” Travis leans back against a dry patch on the wall, tapping his fist against an open palm. “Hey, look, lemme take you for a drink or somethin’. It’s hot and you could use a chill pill. Plus my bro’s in town and he gave me some cash.” His grin is dazzling and hopeful enough to convince Gabe to nod, but as he turns to head towards the others, Travis reaches out to grab his upper arm. “Nah, don’t worry about them. We can just go get milkshakes or somethin’.”
Gabe ends up with his backpack on, his skateboard strapped to the front once again. Travis gives a simple coo to tell the others that they’re going for a drink, before he leads Gabe out the other end of the tunnel and into town. The walk doesn’t feel as long as it did the last time, but then again, by the time they reach the milkshake parlour Gabe has lost count of how many cigarettes they shared between them.
Travis buys himself a chocolate milkshake with ice cream, and despite knowing Gabe would rather vanilla, he buys him a strawberry flavoured, “because you were being such a girl for worrying.” Gabe punches him in the arm. Travis laughs.
They drink slowly to savour the treats, especially after Travis explains that his step-brother doesn’t come to New York often and his father doesn’t give him free money. Travis suggests after a few minutes, “We should go tagging,” and Gabe’s ears metaphorically perk up.
“I’ve never been,” he admits, stirring the pink froth in his cup with the straw. “Is it much different to normal graffiti?”
Travis shrugs and looks down at his drink as he sits back in their booth. “Not really. You just gotta be quick. Unless it’s a safe place, like the tunnel. We do have permission to spray there, y’know.” Gabe nods, because he does believe him. “Might go see Wentz first, see if there’s anything he wants done. We normally tag for other crews who can’t or don’t have the time, y’know? They give us shit in return. It’s cool.”
They take their unfinished milkshakes with them on their way out of the parlour and head towards the skate park that the Schleproks first took Gabe to. As they approach, Gabe spots a few of them crowded around a ramp, watching others skating and flipping their skateboards. Travis lingers by the diamond fence that’s pulled down around one side of the park, thus losing it’s purpose, as he watches the girl with bright orange hair working on a manual at the bottom of the ramp.
He whistles to catch someone’s attention and Pete happens to look over, grinning and giving a wave. Gabe can see his smile from where they stand, which makes him chuckle. The skater carries his board over, leaving the rest of his crew to watch and take turns skating on the ramp.
“Sup, McCoy?” he greets, punching Travis gently in the arm and looking up at him through his sunglasses that almost eat up his face.
“We’s was going tagging,” Travis says, gesturing to himself then to Gabe.
Pete grabs onto his sunglasses, lifting them up to look at Gabe and raise his eyebrow. “So the parkie can paint, can’e?”
Travis laughs quietly as Gabe takes a nervous sip from his brightly coloured drink. “We’s about to find out. You want any place done up? We could use some stuff.”
Pete drops his glasses back onto his nose as he glances back at his friends and thinks for a moment. “Depends on what kinda stuff you need,” he concludes.
Travis just shrugs again and thinks aloud, “Cards, maybe. Playing cards, but some fresh ID’s would be cool. Our fake ones apparently expire soon.”
Pete whistles low and runs his fingers through his black bangs. “I’ll see what I can do. The ID’s might take longer, but for the playing cards, you could brighten up Fourth Street for us.”
As if to seal the deal, Travis reaches a hand out and Pete grabs it. They hug with their hands between them and Travis pats Pete’s shoulder with an assuring nod. “I’ll see you next week, yeah?”
Gabe doesn’t speak until they’re walking away, and even still, it’s about a block away. He thinks out loud to himself, “Fourth Street ‘aint far, is it?” And Travis shakes his head. “I don’t want to fuck up their tags,” he adds, “It’ll probably give ‘em a bad name.”
Travis waves a hand absently and pulls Gabe into another street. “You can’t be that bad. I’ve seen people who’ve painted for years and they’re worse than first-timers.”
Gabe hooks his hands onto his backpack straps for something to hold onto as they walk along. It turns out they’re in a mostly residential town, which causes Gabe to frown in confusion as they stop in front of a house. “I thought we was tagging?”
Travis nods. “We are. I need fresh paints, but,” he points out, holding a finger up to signal Gabe to stay where he is before he dashes up to the house. Travis jogs to the front door, helping himself inside and coming out barely a minute later clutching black, red and purple spray cans. When he returns to Gabe’s side, he stands behind him to unzip Gabe’s mostly-empty backpack and put them inside.
“Um.” Gabe waits for him to zip his bag back up and continue walking before he continues, “Do you know who lives there?”
Travis looks at him with his eyebrows raises before he begins to laugh. “Oh, man. I keep forgetting you don’t know where I live.” He jabs his thumb over his shoulder as if to signal. “S’my place.”
Gabe looks back at the house as Travis leads him along. They turn out of the street at the end of the block and continue walking in near silence, kicking stones and spitting against their lips to make faint beating sounds for their own amusement. When Travis leads him into a back alley, Gabe can see cars driving by and pedestrians walking along a sidewalk on the other side of the alleyway. He figures this is it.
“Up here’s a good spot,” Travis says, pointing a long finger up at a mostly-bare wall from a tall building next to them. No one should see them spraying back here, but any kids who walk through the alley as a short cut should see the finished tag just fine.
For the most part, Gabe sits back with his legs crossed indian style, watching Travis spray out large letters, larger than any of the small scribbles on the wall. It definitely stands out. Gabe hands him the specific coloured cans when he asks for them, and when he’s nearing the finish, Gabe can see he’s spelt out “Clandestine” in long, dripping letters in red paint with black outlines.
“You wanna draw the wings?” Travis asks, grinning down at him as he shakes up a purple can. “S’not hard, you won’t fuck it up.
Gabe thinks for a moment before he finally shrugs his backpack off and standing up. He approaches the wall where Travis is standing, closer to the C, then takes the can from him. “You can draw bat wings?” He asks, nudging Gabe’s side. Gabe shrugs, so Travis laughs.
He picks up the black can and draws two semi-circles next to each other, making a slightly broken circle. From those, he adds lines to create a basic, stick-figure-like rendition of bat wings. “S’not hard,” he concludes, taking his can away from the wall and looking at Gabe expectantly.
Gabe lifts his can up, trying not to spray too close to the wall because he knows it’ll make the paint run. He chews his lip when it does anyway, but Travis doesn’t tell him to stop. The wings are a little crooked, but he’s got a basic shape down. Travis grins at him when he’s done. “Sweet, bro,” he comments, holding a fist up that Gabe bumps his own against. “S’been a good day. Good tag.”
Gabe surprises himself by the excitement of drawing more tags. He thought he’d be bored, maybe nervous, but now that he’s more confident to paint, it’s not that bad. He can’t do the curves or the straight, clean lines that Travis can, but he can get out the basic shapes that he needs to prove his point. They move around a bit, but they stay mostly within the same block. Pete would be proud.
Travis finally makes proper conversation (aside from the short, quiet instructions and tips under his breath) when they’re sitting on the concrete sidewalk, leaning against a short brick wall outlining a small park that takes up a quarter of a block. He waits until Gabe’s mouth is full from stuffing a McDonald’s cheeseburger into his cheeks, then leans back against the wall from where he’d been slouched. “So,” he starts, making Gabe look up. “You should stay the night. At the tunnel, I mean. We do that sometimes, ya’ know? It’s fun. Light a fire ‘n shit, no one can see us.”
Gabe sticks the straw of his soft drink into his mouth to wash down his food before he nods quickly, adding in confirmation, “Sure.” He doesn’t even think about asking his father, for he’s sure he won’t be missed. “Sure, yeah. That’d be cool. Yeah.” They bump their fists together then continue to eat in silence, although Travis does steal a few glances at Gabe to smile at him and how eagerly he scoffs down his food.
---
part two over here