Stars above Detroit
It was a cold and snowy December when I was handed the address of a “crack house” in one of the deserted and boarded up Detroit neighborhoods once inhabited by happy families whose source of livelihood were good paying manufacturing jobs. The closing of the automobile plants made the neighborhoods ghost towns. A significant percentage of housing parcels in the city were vacant, with abandoned lots making up more than half of the total residential lots in the city.
They call me “Mr. X” around the office because it’s my job to “tag” deserted homes for demolition by spray-painting a large red “X” across the front of the homes. It’s my first job since graduating with a degree in drafting. The City of Detroit hired me because I grew up remodeling homes with my father and I knew building materials. My official title was “Building Safety Inspector,” but my work had nothing to do with building safety. The City was broke and sent me alone, armed with only pepper spray into the blighted neighborhoods to identify homes with valuable building materials like copper, used brick, marble, or fine woods the City could sell before bulldozing the home. My work was dangerous because poking around deserted homes; you’d never know what you’d find. I’ve been chased away by crazed drug addicts, packs of wild dogs, or the stench of decaying human corpses who were drug addicts, or sadly, the elderly owners of the homes who died silently and forgotten.
The address led me to a boarded up Victorian mansion which was the largest home on the block. My instincts told me it would be a treasure trove of valuable building materials which might earn me a raise or promotion. I didn’t realize the old mansion was occupied, but I decided to assume the role of a homeless man, hoping the occupants would permit me to stay long enough to assess the value of the building materials. Besides, I was single, and alone in Detroit, without family to spend Christmas with.
Winters are a blessing and a curse in these blighted neighborhoods. The winter cold brought paying “lodgers” like me in from off the streets. Ice is plentiful, permitting the preservation of food and water for drinking and bathing. There were no utilities in the house. The toilets were removed exposing the sewer pipes, permitting us to directly deposit faeces and urine. Fire for cooking and heat was from wood siding poached from nearby homes. Ride-share and taxis won’t come into the neighborhood. The nearest shopping mall was four, long residential blocks away on 7 Mile- consisting of a discount retail store, independent market, and a few fast food joints. Downtown Detroit is about fifteen miles away.
Nobody asked me any questions other than telling me the rent was $5 per day. It provided a roof over my head, along with a blanket and a place to sleep in the hallway amongst junkies. I did my best to hide my red-paint-colored index finger. Despite the bleak environment, it was a Christmas I would never forget.
It was a long night for Roxie when I first met her. She was returning home from working as a prostitute. It costs a heroin addict $150-$200 per day to support a habit like her’s. I offered her a cigarette and told her I had just “checked in” as a “lodger.” This put her at ease. She told me she made bank and I could tell she was eager for her fix, which would anesthetize her throughout the long, dreary, winter day until she was ready for another evening on the stroll. Roxie was no older than thirty. She was a beautiful woman born to a Puerto Rican mother who was a prostitute. Her father was of mixed race. Roxie inherited a beautiful exotic face, and an attention-getting curvaceous body, permitting her to earn top dollar from the businessmen traveling through Detroit. She was taken from her mother as a teenager and placed into foster care where she was molested by the husband and thrown into the streets when the wife found out. She never reunited with her mother. Roxie was quite the entrepreneur- creating a loyal network of hotel concierges, bartenders, and limousine drivers who handed out her business card to potential clients in return for her special treats.
We heard a flying helicopter and she ran to the boarded up window peering through a knot hole to see a fire department helicopter, its spot light rained upon the fully engulfed house down the street. 911 won’t send the fire department, cops, or paramedics into these abandoned neighborhoods because it’s too costly. In the case of a fire, it’s less expensive to send the helicopter to assess the need for further action. Most of the time, the helicopter is sent in to determine if the home is vacant and lets it burn to the ground. Even if the fire department wanted to extinguish the fire, the water from the fire hose would freeze up in the winter cold. A man shouted, “Get away from that window girl! If that search light catches your cat eyes we’ll be thrown out of here!” Roxie quickly took her beautiful eyes away from the peep hole. Samuel placed his frail arm around her in an attempt to comfort her, whispering, “Don’t fear the spotlight, child. It’s a reminder that the bright, shiny star will soon reveal itself, and shine upon us all”.
Samuel was a tall, lanky, balding, black man with a scruffy grey beard; he was nearly eighty. He was once a headliner in the best jazz clubs in the States. He became a junky, and it ruined his musical career as a tenor saxophonist. Although he kicked the habit decades ago, he’s was an alcoholic, finishing off a fifth of cheap whiskey each day. He sometimes rode the bus into Detroit with Roxie at night- where he busked; playing on street corners for change. His old tenor sax had lost its luster, but like fine wine aging graciously over time, the music coming out was as sweet as ever despite the arthritic fingers squeezing out the notes.
