Razorblade Tears

Jazzy tells Ike that she might never be ready to come back to work. She also tells him not to ruin what he has built. Buddy Lee arrives, and Ike tells him about attacking the car with the bikers in it. Ike remembers that one of the boys at the cake shop said he had done a job for Tariq, the music producer who might be Tangerine’s boyfriend. Ike calls the bakery and impersonates an important customer, acquiring Tariq’s address in the process. He and Buddy Lee get in the car and drive away.

They reach Tariq’s property, but a guard stops them. Ike says to tell Tariq that they are there to talk about Tangerine, and he lets them in after a brief call. Buddy Lee has another coughing fit on the way.

Four bodyguards search them and take Buddy Lee’s knife. Ike asks about Tangerine. Tariq listens calmly, then tells them that they are going to stop looking for her. When they protest, the four men beat them badly. During the confrontation, Buddy Lee gets one of their guns and holds them off. Even though it delays their escape, he insists on getting his knife back—then they escape.

When they pull over to check their wounds, Buddy Lee says that he and Ike are built for this kind of work. He is exhilarated. Ike asks about the knife, and Buddy Lee says it belonged to his father. Ike says he knows someone who owes him a favor and who can help them get back in. Ike takes Buddy Lee’s knife and goes into a barbershop in a Chesterfield strip mall.

Inside, he tells the barber that Riot Randolph is looking for Slice. There is a drag show commercial on the TV. The men in the barber chairs make anti-gay jokes and talk about how drag is a government conspiracy to keep African American men weak, and that a man with a gay son has failed the boy. Ike has always enjoyed barbershops, which he views as one of the last places African American men can be themselves. However, he does not like this ugliness.

A man frisks him and takes the knife, then takes him to Slice. Slice had taken over a gang called the North River Boys for his recently killed brother, Luther, when Ike had gone to prison. A man named Romello Sykes had killed Luther, and Ike had killed him in return, which resulted in his incarceration.

Ike tells Slice he needs information about Tariq. He talks carefully, remembering that Slice’s name comes from the fact that he slices off the tongues and fingers of his enemies’ families. Tariq is Slice’s business partner. Ike says Slice didn’t live up to his promise to take care of him, Mya, and Arianna when he was in prison. Instead, he had found himself fighting for his life inside; it turned out that Romello was affiliated with the East Coast Crips, who were enemies of the North River Boys. Slice says to come back in an hour and Tariq will be there. He will help Ike find Tangerine if Ike doesn’t try to hurt Tariq.

Ike leaves and gets Buddy Lee’s knife. On the way out, he tells one of the men who were joking about the drag show that if someone slit his son’s throat, the man wouldn’t care about who his boy had been sleeping with. He and Buddy Lee go to get a drink while they wait.

At the bar, Ike and Buddy Lee talk about racism again. Buddy Lee tells Ike that it’s hard to think of yourself as a racist when racists raise you. He’d never been able to consider what a man like Ike would think of certain jokes or remarks, given how he was raised. Ike grudgingly accepts this and says: “It’s easier to keep your head in the sand than it is to try and see things from somebody else’s point of view. There’s a reason why they say ignorance is bliss” (196). Ike and Buddy believe that each of them is learning things that would have served them well while their sons were still alive.

Tariq, Slice, and a bodyguard are waiting at the barbershop an hour later. Tariq relays that Tangerine—full name Tangerine Frederickson—says killers are hunting her. He also admits to being a social media gangster, as opposed to Slice, who is the real thing. Slice says they are even now, and they leave. Then Slice calls Grayson. He will give him information on Tangerine if they help him meet a meth cook that can help him expand his business. He says that Tangerine is staying near Adam’s Road in Bowling Green. Slice authorizes Grayson to do whatever he needs to.