by Barry Wolfe
At 3 am, Friday morning, I wakeup in a cold sweat. I’ve just dreamt that I am the soothsayer in the play Julius Caesar and I say the infamous line, “Beware the ides of March”. I awake with such a heavy feeling. Today we play for the Fraternity League championship in Howard’s Intramural Basketball program, and it is March 15th. Is this a bad omen or just a bad dream? Normally, I don’t think of myself as a superstitious person, but I wanted to ward off all possible dangers to our championship chances. At 8 o’clock in the morning, I call Desirie. She’s barely awake. “Why are you calling me so early, Izzy?” She says in a sleep-altered voice.
“Hi Hon,” I respond in a super treacly voice. “I have a favor to ask, my dearest love.”
“Izzy, what’s the matter with you? You sound funny. What is it that you want?”
“Well, you know how I was telling you that when things are good in one part of my life, they stink in another?”
“Yeah, so?” Her voice switches from curious to suspicious.
“Well, I’m so happy with you and happy we’re together.” Desirie quickly picks up my drift. “You don’t want me to come to the game today, do you?
“It’s not that I don’t want you to come, but I’m afraid that your presence will jinx me.”
“Izzy, I’m going to use one of your words. Why do you have to be such a schmuck?”
“Desirie, I want you to come more than anything, but I’m just afraid….”
“You white weenie. I hope you and your fear will be very happy together, because I won’t be at your wedding. And I won’t come to your game.”
“Aw, Desirie. Don’t be mad,” I say to a dial tone. She clearly does not want to hear anymore from me today.
The championship game with the Ques is close throughout. Neither team has more than a five-point lead. The Ques are led by former Howard star Mike Ingram, a 6’4” sharpshooter. He scores the first ten points for Omega Psi Phi. He’s making jump shots from everywhere. My jump shot is falling today, thanks to the help of Bad Ass Barnes. We work the pick-and-roll play successfully at least six times during the first half. Bad Ass moves close to my defender to set a screen for me. If no other defender comes near me, I have an open jump shot. And like I say, I’m making these shots today. If however another defender moves toward me, Bad Ass rolls to the basket and I throw him the ball for an easy lay-up. The Ques seem to have no answer for this. Three times I make a jump shot and three times Bad Ass makes an easy layup. Mel’s making his patented jump shot from the corner while our big boys are in a fierce battle under the backboards with the “trees” of Omega Psi Phi. At halftime we lead the game 42-40.
During the second half, the Ques make an adjustment and work their “switching” defense much better. Our pick-and-roll play is less successful. Neither Bad Ass nor I have an easy open shot. Because defenders are switching to cover Bad Ass on the pick-and-roll, Colby and Eagle are open on the wings. They provide a hefty amount of the scoring for us during the second half. Mel and I have to work very hard to get space enough to shoot our jump shots. Mike Ingram stays hot for the Ques and is now joined in the scoring by their seemingly unstoppable point guard, Randall Carr. Neither Mel nor I could cover him. When we try to cover him close, he drives right by us. If we give him any space at all, he makes his jump shot. The lead changes back and forth several times during the second half. With one minute left, the Ques are winning by two points and they have the ball. Mel is covering Carr and is able to knock the ball away. Mel gets the ball and dashes toward our basket. I see what’s happening and race after the two them. Carr is very close to Mel and I am ten feet away. Mel fakes a layup and throws me a behind-the-back pass. I catch the ball and score an easy layup. The game is tied with 30 seconds left. The Ques are moving the ball around searching for an open man with the easiest shot. Eagle Holloway is overzealous in his defending and fouls the Ques center in the act of shooting. The center makes his first free throw but misses the second. Bad Ass gets the rebound, throws it to Mel on the left wing. As soon as I see the missed foul shot, I dash down the right side. Mel launches a 20-foot pass to me, and the lone Q defender charges toward me. With time running out, I shoot a jump shot from 22 feet, which touches nothing but net. The final score is Boss 81, Ques 80. We win the Fraternity League championship on my rediscovered jump shot. All of my teammates storm after me to congratulate me on my shot. Eight men, all bigger than I am, grab me, knock me to the ground, and damn near smother me with their weight and enthusiastic cheers.
I have completely forgotten that I had offended Desirie. I call her and excitedly share the news of our victory. She gives me an insipid expression of congratulations. Her underwhelming support brings me back to reality and I spend the next 30 minutes on the phone begging her forgiveness.
The Intramural Basketball Championship pitted the League champions against one another. We face the Jayhawks, the winner of the Independent league. The Med School team, the winner of the Professional league, plays the Frosh League representative, Drew Hall “A”. With evenly distributed scoring among our first team players, we dispatch a feisty Jayhawk team. We come back from a ten- point deficit to win 85-81. The Med School has an easy time defeating Drew Hall “A” on the strength of Former Little All-America Howard star, Simon Johnson’s 34 points.
For the first time in my life, I’m playing in a championship game. Desirie is so shocked that the Boss team has made it this far that before I can say anything, she informs me that she’s coming to the game. I raise no objection because I want to avoid a repeat of my previous faux pas. To be honest, I don’t know which will rattle my cage more—her being at the game or her anger at me if I forbid her to come.
During the first week of spring, we play the heavily favored Med School team for the Intramural championship. The Med School is led by Si Johnson, who was Howard’s star guard some four or five years ago. Si can score from anywhere. He shoots well from the outside and possesses a repertoire of about 15 different ways to shoot the ball from just about any place on the court. Then add to his game an unstoppable hesitation move and you have a player who always gets himself open and who can shoot with two or three men guarding him at the same time. In the rare instance that he can’t get a shot off, he passes to his big center, ironically named Ollie Short. Short is even taller than Bad Ass. Si Johnson has been averaging well over 30 points per game in the Intramural League, just as he did when he played for Howard. The Med school jump out to a quick lead and hold on to it during most of the first half. Even though I can clearly see Desirie sitting in the makeshift stands and can hear her cheering loudly, my jump shot is not affected. Toward the end of the first half Si Johnson and I are trading jump shots. We both make five in a row before I miss one. Almost on cue Johnson then misses his next shot. At the end of the half we reduce a 10-point lead to four.
For the first six or seven minutes of the second half, we get our offense in gear. Mel feeds me; I drive toward the basket and then dish the ball to Bad Ass. If Bad Ass is double-teamed, either Colby or Eagle is open for an easy layup. If our frontcourt players are well defended, Mel or I will be open for a jump shot. Our sharp passing assures that someone is open for an easy shot. We take an eight-point lead. Then every one of us goes stone cold. The way our shots are clanging off the rim, I think I am listening to the Anvil Chorus. With our offense grinding to an ignominious halt, Si Johnson takes over the game. He scores the next 12 points. The Med School’s four-point lead continues until the final minute of the game. Mel makes a jump shot from 18 feet. On the very next play he steals the ball from the Med School point guard and passes the ball to me. I race to the basket as if I am going in for a layup, but instead I pull up for a 15-foot jump shot as time is running out. I watch the ball go on its merry-go-round, around and around the rim. I am transported back to that horrible moment in the High School City Basketball playoff game against McKinley Tech when I was in the exact same position watching the ball make its soul-crushing way round the rim and then out to the side of
the basket. Once again, I watch the same despairing, repetitious end to a critically important game. As if it is genetically programmed to repeat itself, the ball rolls around and around and out to the side of the basket. We lose the championship game 86-84.
I am inconsolable. Even the warmth of Desirie’s hugs and kisses fail to raise me from the depths of my despair. “Not again,” I keep muttering in a barely audible voice. My teammates crowd around me patting me on my back and making supportive noises. “Tough luck, Izzy!” “You’re all heart, Izzy!” “You laid it all out there, Izzy.” Even Si Johnson comes by to say encouraging words and to congratulate me for being a battler. Desirie helps me out of the Hut as if I am a member of the walking wounded. She waits for me while I shower. In the shower, Mel and I stare at each other. I see a struggle of emotions playing out on his face, between sympathy and anger. Neither one of us says anything. But the anger I detect in Mel’s face through the mist of the shower seems to have to do with more than just the loss of a game. I make a mental note that it is time for Mel and me to have a heart-to-heart.
When I meet Desirie outside, I still find speech difficult. A sprig of hope sprouts within me because I can smell spring in the glistening air. Silently, we make our way to the Student Union. We each order coffee and find our way to a secluded table. Desirie breaks the silence with the following encomium: “I’m sorry you missed that last shot, Izzy. You were so good throughout the whole game; and when you made those five jump shots in a row, even though I was there, I was convinced that the spell had been broken and you were going to win.”
“Yeah, well, we didn’t win.”
“But you got your jump shot back. You made 7 out of 13 jump shots. That’s something, isn’t it, Izzy?” I smile at her with gratitude that she cares enough to count. But then the pall returns.
“But I missed the one that really counted. I let the team down.”
“Oh Izzy, I know you feel awful, but you weren’t the only one out there missing shots. You can’t take the whole loss on your shoulders.”
“Then why do I feel like such a failure?”
“This is you, Izzy. You minimize your accomplishments and over estimate your failures. I love you, Izzy, but you don’t love yourself.” I look at her with such a mixture of love, gratitude, and admiration. She really sees me.
“You seem to know me better than I know myself, Desirie?”
“Maybe I do, Izzy. Maybe I do.”
Chapter
24.
Not In Our House
In our Abnormal Psychology class, we are studying the depressive personality, and the more I learn about its nature and causes, the more uncomfortable I become. So far this semester, I have seen myself clearly in the descriptions of every mental disorder we’ve covered. But the characteristics of the depressive personality seem to represent my own unique mental X-ray. The abstract characteristics presented here open a floodgate of memories of grey days and greyer moods, of sights when all color has been drained from every natural object of beauty, as if the flora and fauna of the world have been attacked and exsanguinated by a psychic vampire. While I am ruminating over my latest mental illness, I feel a note slipping into my hand. It’s from Desirie. In a beautiful hand, replete with curlicues, she writes Let’s talk after class. I have something very important to tell you.
After class we walk hand in hand out of Douglass Hall and into a brilliant spring day. The touch of her hand and the warmth of the long-awaited spring sunlight allow me to shed my melancholia like an annual skin. All the colors of the world are bright in my mind, and I conclude perhaps I am not a depressive personality after all.
We sit on the stone bench beside the campus sundial. I’m all ears eager to hear what she intimated is so important for her to tell me. The day is unusually warm and Desirie has unbuttoned her overcoat revealing a resplendent forest green sweater and a lighter green skirt. She has on black heels, and I am struck once again by how many Howard coeds wear heels to class. I’ve never even worn a tie in my almost four years here. Desirie is giving me her super serious look, which says that my unwavering attention is demanded. “Izzy, do you know about the new men’s gymnasium that’s being built on campus?”
“Of course, I’m really sad that I won’t be able to play in it. I always hated the Hut.”
“But do you know who’s building that gym?”
“No, why?”
“Segregated unions, that’s who!”
“Desirie, what are you talking about?”
“I’m not kidding. Four of the unions in which the construction workers belong have a total of three Negro workers among them. Needless to say, they discourage Black applicants to their unions.”
“How did the three get in?”
“I have no idea, Izzy, but that’s not the point. For all intents and purposes, these unions are segregated, and their white workers are building a gym on the campus of a primarily Negro university?”
“That’s disgusting,” I say with genuine anger. Desirie’s eyes grow wide with rage. “You’re damned right it’s disgusting. That’s what I want to talk to you about. The Liberal Arts Student Council is organizing a student protest against those unions and I want you to come with me to the demonstration.”
“When is it?”
“Next Friday. Will you come?”
“Let me think about it Desirie. By the way, what kind of unions are we talking about?”
“Oh Izzy, I think you’re avoiding a decision. What difference does it make which unions are involved. None of them should be segregated.”
“I agree. I’m just curious. By the way, I haven’t said I wouldn’t go.” Desirie puts her hands on her head and begins shaking it. “Izzy, you drive me crazy!” Shaking her head again in capitulation, she says, “I think there’s a plumbers’ union, uh…uh electrical workers’ union, a sheet metal union, and a steamfitters’ union. There. Are you happy? I feel like I have to pass an exam with you.”
“A Plus, my darling!” My jocular grading does not charm her at all.
She sneers at me and says with exquisite mockery “And you’re being ‘A Putz’, my darling.” As she’s saying this, she moves her head from side to side. I burst out laughing at her use of a Yiddish obscenity with a Negro accent.
“What’s so funny?” she asks. She looks like she’s ready to punch me.
“Nothing. I need a day to think about it.”
“What’s to think about?”
“Desirie, just give me a day.”
That afternoon, I take myself to a basketball court where I often did my best thinking. Even though I think my basketball career is over, I practice my weak spots: Dribbling and shooting with the left hand; the cross-over dribble; the step-back jump-shot. I knew I should go to the demonstration with Desirie. It felt right; it wasn’t particularly dangerous; and it would make her very happy. But would I be going just to be what she wanted me to be? I’m not sure. The Civil Rights Movement is a passion we share although I’ve been a little short on action. And whatever successes we help bring about would not only create a better world for people in general, but also a better world for us; a safer world in which we can be together. My choice is complicated by Mel’s attitude toward my relationship with Desirie. Anything that brings Desirie and me closer threatens my friendship with Mel. Greedy me, I want both people in my life.