By Erik Lewin

I had to spend a summer up at the University of Buffalo in the late ’90s. There was an awful course in statistics that stood between me and a Bachelor of Arts degree in English. Incredibly, an actual law school (not an online one with certificate) had accepted me for fall admission, but I couldn’t go without passing this class. Fortunately, I had a few college buddies up there, too, for their own reasons. My friend, Sean, was there with his girlfriend, Zara, and along with my girlfriend at the time, Janine, we all hung out quite a bit.

I was living in this little complex called Caesar’s Court, that rested  on the outskirts of an unsafe neighborhood. There was a rash of criminal activity where off-campus students lived. It just wouldn’t be a complete college education without a brush with your own mortality; the year prior my friends and I got robbed at gunpoint in broad daylight in our parked car before buying our books for the semester. These two twelve-year–old hoods looked more like Kris Kross than crooks, but they stuck a gun in our car, and we handed over our book money.

In a way, they did me a favor; I was only going to waste all that perfectly good cash on course books I’d never open anyway. Who knows, maybe they took it to the bookstore themselves to load up on volumes of sociology and geology. It took the cops forever to make it to the scene, the assailants long gone on dirt bikes. I don’t think they were ever found. The upshot was the weed dealer we relied on was never busted either.         

A local newspaper actually sent a reporter to interview my friend and I as the freshest victims of this large-scale collegiate crime wave,  bribing us into the meeting with a free breakfast. When the story came out in the paper, as I recall, it painted us like two complete morons, too busy lighting cigarettes to disarm a couple misguided pre-teens.

So the general area was shady and dangerous, even in summer, and Caesar’s Court was scarcely a respite; it’s faux charm, with the hint of medieval flair, didn’t exactly scare away any fringe elements. Perhaps the difference was some tenants were rather likable criminals who made you feel like part of the team.

My neighbor was this forty-ish man named Randy. He was stringy but cut and strong with dark eyes set tight. He did, however, favor white tube socks pulled up to his shins, sandals, baggy shorts, and a permanently stained wife beater undershirt. He’d have friends over on a Tuesday at noon, pounding bottles of Boone’s wine, passing blunts, and bumping dirty south hip-hop through giant speakers.

For whatever reason, Randy took a shine to me. He’d be like, “Yeah boy, you dangerous,” as he fed me the Boone’s and switched up tracks in his empty living room. I loved him though, he was very gentle for a ruffian, and I was touched that he took me under his wing. He had bestowed his beaded necklace on me, and one afternoon when Sean picked me up for class, I looked like Mr. Wendell from the Arrested Development video, sporting the necklace and matching hat.

Randy would, however, hit me up for money and rides. How he could afford a unit at Caeser’s, even with Buffalo prices in the ’90s, was something of a mystery, though of course he had no furniture or visible belongings. Sean joked with me that Randy told him if he would take him to the store, he’d hook Sean up with a pair of sweet titties to squeeze at this late-night club he always talked about. Sean was dubious, but I assured him Randy could make good on his promise, as he’d already scrounged six-fifty in change from my car earlier that day.       

That was the thing; whenever I took Randy anywhere, he’d clean my car of any loose currency, then direct me to some random, off-site location, where one person would be waiting in the shadows. Evidently, I was an accomplice to an untold number of transactions, though I fancied myself the strong link in the conspiracy, knowing I’d never crack under questioning. I guess I just wanted to be helpful, though in retrospect, I’m not sure his mentorship was altogether selfless.

He had bestowed his beaded necklace on me, and one afternoon when Sean picked me up for class, I looked like Mr. Wendell from the Arrested Development video.

My girlfriend, Janine, had a brand new sand-colored Saturn, a car that came with a bow-tie wrapped on top, and was easily the thrill of her life. One day she pulled up to my place with a flat tire, and I figured I could knock out two birds. I offered Randy the job, to which he eagerly agreed with an assurance of the highest quality work, and I enthusiastically presented the opportunity to Janine. She gave in because it’d be fast and just a few bucks, and moments later, Randy and three of his buddies set to dismantling Janine’s beauty. It didn’t turn out quite as I’d hoped. They had the whole car bouncing and suspension squeaking, as the metal tools clanged against the tire’s nuts. Janine and I watched this crackhead pit crew turn a simple tire change into a total car wreck.  Her shrieks of horror still haunt me.  

My other neighbor was a lovely sixty-ish African-American woman named Tonya. I’d sit on the berber rug in her living room while she regaled me with tales of her young life as a heroin addicted disco queen. She wore large ladies’ reading glasses and had soft, caring eyes. She’d mellowed in her old age and just enjoyed sharing her story and cooking delicious soul dishes, while we listened to Smokey Robinson records.  

Sean was a thoughtful and funny fellow with whom I had lots in common. We were both boneheaded victims in the neighborhood, of sorts, though his was an inside job. The previous semester, his house had literally gone up in flames; his roommate was stoned and barbequing, a smashing combination, and naturally, he forgot he was barbequing.

Sean’s lovely girlfriend, Zara, was a tolerant person, especially since she had to escape a house as it burnt down. Sean and the boys were standing on their lawn in the early morning light, in robes, smoking butts and giving their bewildered remarks to live news cameras. In any event, tragic-comedy aside, Sean and I loved to smoke blunts and bump Biggie Smalls and ’90s hip-hop.

We also got into working out that summer, exploring creatine powder as our stimulant of choice for the gym. We’d get a jar at a vitamin store, casually pull into a Burger King parking lot and take turns scooping the powder into our mouths. It’s effect was like a triple espresso jolt; we still made it to the weight room, but they were plastering the walls, so on top of spooning creatine, we were also huffing paint. As a result, we put up too much weight for our little bodies, but in the end, I can’t disparage our unorthodox methods. I think we wound up in much better shape, and it certainly made exercise a hell of a lot more fun.

The problem was I needed to pass this stupid statistics course, the reason I was there in the first place, and there was no way that was going to happen. The other math course I needed to pass, some trig thing or other the year prior, was equally a disaster; I had a zero in the course strictly speaking, but convinced the poor geriatric teacher that I was experiencing a semester long panic attack. It was not entirely untrue, though I’m not proud of it, and he was merciful and let me squeak through.  

Sean and the other guys tried to help me with statistics, but it was utterly hopeless. It was an alien language, out of Star Trek; I couldn’t grasp it with Spock’s help. To make matters worse, the teacher was a wacky lady who spent half of each class trashing this “jerk” she dated who had ruined her life, so without taking her medication, she was tough to bear.

But I was desperate, so I decided to try my hand at pre-law—I would attempt to negotiate with the teacher, whereby she would agree to hand me a glittering D minus, in exchange for, literally nothing. That’s all I had to offer. I was madly convinced she could be talked into it, purely out of the goodness of her heart. I figured it could be like an act of charity, like feeding the homeless. 

She resolutely refused. I think it was partly on account of her man-hater state of mind, but I wasn’t going to go out with her, so I had very little leverage to work with. I went to the final exam like a convicted man, ready for the hangman’s noose, and the resignation that my summer escorting Randy around town had been for naught. In my mind I was already constructing a letter of apology to my law school, expecting to get the ax, and spitballing the plan B of a fine Caribbean legal education.

By some miracle, when the grades came out, some poor shmuck actually managed a lower score than me, which meant he must have forgotten his own name, and due to the curve, I was in fact a recipient of my treasured D minus. I jumped for joy! I was going to graduate!

I smoked a blunt with Randy to celebrate, his gigantic speakers bumping, and I’m still thankful to his degenerate pit crew who finally managed to fix Janine’s flat, albeit with the wrong tire. But that’s just details. In the end, we all came out winners.