Mo Baraka?
You askin 'bout Mo Baraka?
Ya know I really shouldn't be tellin you. He never like no cops or reporters in his business.
But yea, I knew him. Not long, ya know, not long. Saw him months 'fore I met him. Didn’t know his name then, just caught a glimpse on a Brooklyn-bound L, slidin ‘tween cars.
He was interestin, ya know? Somethin right outa Mad Max. Stompin tall in black combat boots, SWAT cargo pants and jacket. Bleach blonde mohawk. Covered in climbin gear, backpack straps, blue-ink tattoos. A very interestin brother, ya know?
He looked like someone into excitin stuff, ya know? Maybe taggin, urban spelunkin. Maybe bounty huntin. But it wasn't gritty – like what you think ‘bout when you hear that kinda stuff. Was somethin breezy ‘bout him. Somethin superhuman, like he was torn right outa comic book.
Took me a while to realize I was thinkin 'bout him. Sittin around all day, wonderin who he was, what he did with all those carabineers. Wonderin if I ever gonna see him again.
But I ended up gettin lucky, spotted him twice.
Once I was watchin the stations scroll past, uptown N express. He was stridin in those big black boots down the platform. We rushed past and he was gone.
After that, I couldn’t really get him outa my head, ya know? Had to be some reason I seen him twice. Outa all the million others down in that subway. Why was he poppin up, this stranger?
The third time in November. I remember 'cause it was finally gettin cold, Central Park gettin orange, leaves on the pavement.
In the evenin, comin out from the station I see him. Wind blowin in my face, I see him. Just as he starts walkin down, he brushes past me, that same mohawk, yellow earbuds snakin out his cargo vest, dark arms bare in the cold.
Yea, I coulda let him go, that third time. Probably the last time. I’d never see him again and he'd be a mystery. An enigma. Or I could turn, trot down after him, decipher his strange mission. What he was about, ya know?
So that’s what I do. I follow him. He swipes his card, steps through sideways, his backpack brushin the gate. I watch him. He turns sharp left, stompin in those big boots.
Thing was, I'd just ridden the train few minutes 'go and my card's denied. Lucky me, find two crumpled bills and buy a single pass just as the train's screechin up. So I push through, dash after him.
Didn’t see him at first 'cause he's way down the end of the station, where the door of the first car stops. He steps in the far-most door.
So I jog over and I make that first car, shoulderin open the doors as they closin. We movin.
Now I get the chance to see him clear for a good long minute. I always seen him in passin before, from a distance, on the move. He was a transient, ya know, somethin always in motion, either on train or on foot. Poundin through those dark corridors of concrete and steel.
But now he's silent and still, starin out the front, watchin the rickety scroll of the track. His back's to me, but I can tell from his stance he’s concentratin, fixed on every turn and signal light, every low hangin rafter, access door and ladder. He's focused, not just absorbin the momentum of the train. Studyin.
When we squeal into the next stop I can tell he's gonna get off. His body tenses up, hands on his backpack straps, leanin into the momentum. He never touches the metal handles and railins, he's always sidestep to the motion, and even when the train brakes are jerkin and screamin, he's stable. Like a young tree in a storm, ya know?
Then he’s off, steppin out. I stick with him, keepin my eyes on the back of his head.
We get out at an older station, black mosaics in the wall missin rectangles, grime from the black underground sprayed in long jags on the concrete, old posters curlin off the wall. The train rumbles outa the station. The platform's empty.
We way down at the end, at the No Exit signs, red and white warnins, rodent-cide. He settles against the back wall, and I watch him. That’s the first he sees me. He's frownin. Those long minutes 'tween trains, we alone.
“Need somethin?” he asks, watchin me. I shrug, movin closer.
“Waitin for the train?” he asks again, foldin arms across his muscled chest. “Or just me?”
“What’s your name?” I say.
He breaks into a white tooth grin. “So you come to see what Mo Baraka’s about. You a reporter, cop?”
“Nah.”
“Good,” he says. “Keep your eyes open.” He has a deep voice, a rumblin roll in his larynx, maybe a bit of southern drawl here an' there.
He steps to the ledge, the corner of the platform where the white walls end and the dark swallows the track. There's a steel beam there, vertical, blue paint fleckin off the rivets. He looks up, grabs a firm hand eight feet up, plants the waffle tread of his boot thigh high. Then he hefts up, wedgin his boot in the steel, his backpack juttin out in the path of the next train. Wouldn't say it if ya saw him, but he's got agility hidden under all that gear.
For a while he's danglin out over the track. Then a slow pull-up, crunchin his shins, a leg over the horizontal beam. He perches ‘tween ceiling and rafter like a black bat. The glow of the train roundin the bend down the tunnel already comin.
“Ride this to Queens Plaza,” he calls down. “I’ll meet you on the Seven line, get you strapped up.”
I watch him till the front car screams down the track, slicin him from view. A final glance at the space 'tween train car and that black arch and I’m on.
Four stations to go. I listen above for the tramp of those heavy boots. Each squeal I'm peerin out at the platform for him, see if he's jumpin down and stridin away, breakin his promise.
Mo Baraka, I’m thinkin. Who was he? Why's he share his name, invite me to follow him on his adventure?
One last curve and we’re risin, outa the bowels of the East River, the chuggin track below us, matchin the dirty steel of Queensboro Bridge, the caked grime of that industrial armpit. But there's a grandeur to it, ya know? The air's instantly cooler, the wide grey expanse sucked out, there's a view to the sky and the boxy sweatshop warehouses, little old Asian ladies hunched over sewin machines, with those slow ceilin fans, psychedelic graffiti on the abandoned walls. All this dozens of feet above the street, ya know?
Then we into the station, three stories up. The day's dwindlin. I step out when the door dings, lookin around. Nothin. Step back, look up at the grimy steel of the car, the spot he’d been ridin. He's gone.
Then a tap on my shoulder. I spin around. He’s there, arms folded, wide stance in those big boots.
“You came this far, boy. You down for some surfin?”
“That what you do? Ride the trains?”
“Some of it. We try somethin easy first. No tunnels or wires, here to Jackson Heights. Easy on. Easy off.”
He looks me over again, first my shoes. “Lemme see your soles.” I lift my foot, holdin the toe, twistin the ankle so he can see. “Not bad, some grip.”
But tuggin the tail of my coat, he frowns. “That jacket. Not good in the tunnels. Saw a guy get caught up by one before. Hung by his armpits for twenty minutes until a train come, smash him loose.”
“I’m not interested in any tunnels. Sounds suicidal.”
Big white tooth grin again. “You got that, boyo.”
The train groans out, and we wait for the platform to empty out, all the hunched grey people in the chill of the late afternoon. We watch the sun sink ‘tween the rectangle high rises cross the river, the sharp needles of Chrysler and Empire State punchin the sky.
“Come,” Mo says, gesturin to the gapin metal maw where the N train rises out of the tunnel. The Seven is above ground south of Queens Plaza, but climbin the N railing gives us a path up to the platform roof.
Mo climbs naturally - his long arms extendin, swingin his momentum to heft up those heavy boots. Most of all he was quick, ya know, from down strollin the flat deck to crouched above in a fingersnap.
But I dwindle. I'm awkward, hangin scared after a misjudged leap, my shins bangin a gutter, palms shredded on a rusted girder. The slam knocks the wind outa me, and Mo pulls me up by my belt. He says nothin.
And 'fore I know it, I'm ridin the train. Surfin that steel beast, snakin below long and lean. The track goes out as far as you can see, way out east and north in Queens. There's a haze in the air, ya know, and it all seeps into that.
But the wind's the thing. It's not a full on blast in the face, it's whistlin crossways and every which way. Can't but hope to lean into it and hold on.
We fly out and through as the train picks up. The chug of the metal on the tracks blurs into this roar, but the pressin air is louder still. It's shriekin and thick. I stay down, crouched for support, hands on the top of that cold car husk, the ridges on the roof.
But Mo moves up. Keeps his big boots spread and apart. He rises, still leanin into the wind. He straightens completely, hands out like wings.
That's how he rides, like he's flyin.
We ride all day till it gets dark. Then we turn 'round and head back to Manhattan. He tells me to ride low then, 'tween the cars. He's flat on his belly till we get underground, musta been inches below the top of the tunnel.
So then we in the station and he motions me up through a crack in the wall. He fixes his rope, loops it through my belt. Pulls me up into this dusty tunnel. We gotta crawl. Now I just met this guy, ya know? But I want to see what he's about, so I go with it.
I'm coughin and spittin, there's rat bones and who knows what else lyin around. Needles. Garbage from last century.
It's gettin dark. The light from the station dyin on us. I'm thinkin of askin him to turn back when he pops his elbow into a crook of the wall and some loose bricks fall away.
Leads me into this cozy little room, got a couch and table, looks like fridge and microwave. There must be a thousand lightbulbs on the walls, all these dusty wires runnin to the cracks. He's got all sorts of photos on the walls, black and white, snapshots of him, looks like relatives, celebrities and politicians, newspaper clips.
He tells me to sit, pulls a cold beer from the fridge and we chill. He don’t talk at first, eyein me a while as I'm sippin.
"You a reporter," he says.
"No," I say.
"Cop?" he says.
"No," I say. "I told you this before. Remember?"
"Yea," he says. "But I'm takin your word for it. I'm trustin you. Wouldn't want to get those kinda folks involved in what I'm about."
"I know," I say. "What’re you about?"
“Surfin,” he says.
“Yea,” I say. “How you start somethin crazy like that? What’s your story?”
“Was in the army,” he says. “First gulf war. Gunner on a tank. Didn’t see much action, bomber jets laid waste all the way into Baghdad. We just saw bodes. All charred up. Burned out cars.” He leans back in his chair. Finally openin up.
“They liked me though,” he says. “Want me to stay on after it was done. Hung out in Germany for a time. Took in those cities, the castles and farms.
"Round that time, my sister, live up in 130th and Broadway, got shot. This was still early nineties. I got out after that. Came back. Tossed her ashes into the Hudson. This was a fall, bout this time of year. Was cold, I remember that. The wind just took it, the ashes, sprayin them out and across the water. Mamma just kept cryin.
"Couldn’t find no work for a while. Did security jobs. Janitor in midtown, lawyer’s offices. Got into some trouble with the secretary. Gave me the eyes after hours, real nympho, that one. On the bosses desk. That’s what did me in. The guy noticed a paperweight out of place, watched the security tapes.” Mo laughs.
"Mamma died a few years later. Didn’t know no one else up here in the city, and I thought movin south every winter. Have some cousins down south, Atlanta. Called em up a few times, even rode the bus down there a few times. Never could commit. Stayed up at my sister’s place on 130th. Rent was steady, controlled. That helped. Church helped too when I was low.
"Hauled trash for a year. Then tried sandhoggin. How I got into the underground.
"Crew contracted out by ConEd. Maintenance on the big steam mains. Pipes eighty, hundred years old. Pumped four hundred degree steam through em, all times. Day and night. The iron corrodes, steam leaks out into the bedrock, up through the cracks in the sidewalks. Sometimes it explodes.
"We tried to catch it before then, weld on big steel plates. We crawled through abandoned shafts, subway lines, the old water mains. I was underground twenty hours at a time on jobs.
"That’s when I started ridin. Friend of mine, Joel Black, big Brooklyn guy. He knew about it from the lines down there. The L, G and B. We were strung out on coffee and uppers that night. Most nights we were, anyway, better to be jittery than drowsy with a twenty pound solderin iron. The work was way downtown, over Brooklyn Bridge area. Rode the B to Brooklyn, that first time, over the Manhattan Bridge. We crouched ‘tween cars leavin the station. Then risin out the tunnel, Joel reaches up, pulls himself to the roof. Gives me a hand and I’m up. Both crouchin, him a few feet front of me. The wind howlin. Eyes waterin."
He stops for a minute, starin off. Rememberin his past, ya know?
"After that," he says. "I was hooked. Somethin ‘bout it. Up there ‘bove everyone else. They don’t know you ridin. You outside their world, the place they know. You outside all it. Circumventin the system."
I was with him. I think he knew that.
So a little while later we finish the beers and he leads me out and tells me when to meet him again. Few days down the line. Says he wants to do Brooklyn, gotta show me.
So we take a ride out to Coney Island. Brooklyn B. Mid day, little after rush hour we cross the river, look back and watch the bridge under the grey overcast. There's cars stalled out, pedestrians walkin, the water glintin under the metal.
Mo's in front again. Always lookin out for me, watchin for the tiny powerlines an wires. Scoutin.
We almost there, too. I can see the wheel in the distance, still dead in its moorins, rusted and crusty. I can see the ocean.
Somethin comes over me. I feel wheezy, like we goin too fast. The wind ain’t right. So I duck, crawl back to the gap ‘tween cars.
Last thing I see, Mo with his arms out. Maybe his eyes closed, just feelin his body against the wind. But he wouldn’ta gone down with his eyes closed.
And then the pigs start blazin away with those guns. Never stood a chance, ya know? Never gave him a chance to talk. I saw him crumble to his knees, roll off the side. And that was that.
It's done, I know. What's done is done. Can't go bringin him back. But you should know the truth of him. What he was. Now ya know.
He wasn’t no terrorist. Never was. He just wanted to live, feel the wind on his face ridin up top a train. That’s all.
Let him rest with that.
Now if you’ll ‘scuse me, I gotta train to catch.
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