by Maya Angelou
Thomas headed the car toward his street.
“I don’t feel like going to your house,” I told him.
He looked over at me, but I kept my face straight ahead.
“Are you all right? It’s not that time of month, is it?”
“No. I just want to go home.”
No, he hadn’t offended me. No, I wasn’t sick.
I told him we were living in exciting times and that because of the United Nations, Africans and oppressed people from all over the world were making New York the arena where they fought for justice.
“I haven’t lost anything in Africa and they haven’t lost anything in our country. They can all go back where they came from as far as I’m concerned. Anyhow, I get all the excitement I need in my job and I don’t want to hear about politics at home.”
It was a long speech for Thomas and a disastrous one for our relationship. I could imagine future aborted conversations when I would be silenced. Days, weeks, months would pass with neither of us going beyond small talk.
I prepared dinner at home and waited alone for Guy to return.
The next days brought bouquets of mixed flowers and vases of red roses to cover my desk and make me feel like a desirable courtesan. The accompanying cards read “From Vusumzi Make to Maya Angelou Make.” Hazel looked worried and Millie grinned as if she and I were sharing a secret.
Thomas chose the same time to have more wedding presents delivered. Young, shabbily dressed men hauled boxes up the stairs and deposited them in the outer offices. “Tom to Maya.” I opened the cartons to find an expensive record player covered in smooth leather and two more pieces of matching luggage. It was a flattering present, but I couldn’t dispel the idea that the set was stolen property.
I refused Make’s daily invitations to lunch and declined Thomas’ offer to visit his apartment.
Confusion had me spread-eagled. I couldn’t run nor could I dodge.
Office politics were further irritations. Despite the long hours and what I thought of as my diligent commitment, two more men had been brought in to help in the running of the organization. I had had nothing to say about their employment.
After a business lunch with the president of a national Negro women’s club where we discussed the selling of a large block of tickets, it was suggested that I report the results to the office newcomers. When I refused to do so, insisting on my own autonomy, loyalties began to shift. Welcoming smiles faded or gleamed sunshine-bright. Small groups of workers crowded the desks of the new arrivals, while Hazel and Millie used every slight occasion to enter my office, bringing me news or coffee, fresh papers or mail.
CHAPTER 9
Thursday morning I agreed to meet Make for lunch a few blocks from my office. I would explain to him why he had to accept my rejection.
Wells Restaurant, pride of Harlem, on 132nd Street and Seventh Avenue, had been popular since the twenties, when it was a favorite stop on the route of whites, visiting what many called “Nigger Heaven.”
The food had remained good, the menus still listed white items such as steaks and lamb chops, but its main offerings, fried chicken, smothered pork chops, short ribs and biscuits catered to the local palates.
Make stood as I entered. He wore yet another well-tailored suit and custom-made shirt. I didn’t need to look at his shoes to know they were shining like new money. He began talking before I sat down.
He was pleased that I had overcome my timidity. My coming showed I had courage, a virtue which we both knew was a prerequisite in the struggle. He had talked to Paule Marshall, by telephone, and told her that his intention was to marry me and take me to Africa. I couldn’t focus on the menu, but we ordered lunch. He continued talking and I ate food I could neither see nor taste.
He had been jailed for political action in South Africa. When the government released him, the police took him to an isolated desert area near South-West Africa and left him there, hundreds of miles from the nearest human beings. A city-bred man, with no knowledge of open country, he had scrabbled over rocky ridges and found water. He pulled caterpillars from shrubs and ate them (they taste a lot like shrimp). He encountered a group of Hottentot hunters and because he could speak a little of their language, they gave him dried meat and a small water pouch. Keeping away from large towns and following the stars, he walked out of South Africa into Bechuanaland. The Boers’ control and spies had pervaded that country as well, so he kept to the forest. He made a slingshot and killed small animals and ate them raw, or cooked when it was safe enough to light a fire. Their skins padded his worn-out shoes or were laid inside his shirt for warmth. Days passed when the only things he saw moving were the vultures that lazed high in the sky above him. He walked through South and North Rhodesia, making sparse contacts with revolutionaries he had heard about, who were themselves in hiding or on the run. He took his first breath of freedom when he crossed into Ethiopia.
“I was the first Pan-African Congress member to escape. But, Miss Angelou, when I left exile without water or food, I intended to reach Ethiopia. When I knew I was coming to the yew ess, I came with the intention of finding a strong, beautiful black American woman, who would be a helpmate, who understood the struggle and who was not afraid of a fight. I heard about you and you sounded like the one. I met Guy and I was impressed with his manliness and intelligence, obviously your work, and then I saw you.”
He reached across the table and took my hand. His little brown fingers tapered down to small white nails. I tried to picture those exquisite hands carrying caterpillars, wiggling to his mouth.
“You are exactly what I dreamed on my long march. Tall and clear-eyed. Needing to be loved. Ready to fight and needing protection. And not the protection of a bloody bail bondsman.”
Oh Lord, that reminded me.
“Mr. Make, I agreed to have lunch with you to tell you I am going to marry the bloody bail bondsman.”
He leaned his bulk back in the chair and his face darkened and clouded over with resignation.
“You are breaking my heart. I am an African with large things to do. I have left my father and mother in Jo’Burg, and given the ordinary run of time, I shall never see them again. Unless the revolution takes place during my lifetime, I shall never see the land again. To an African, the family and the land … I need you. I want to marry you.”
“I’m sorry.” And God knew I meant that.
“I shall finish at the U.N. tomorrow. On the next day, I shall fly to Amsterdam, an open city, where I am told whiskey is cheap and a variety of entertainment is available to a lonely man.”
I saw those delicate hands sliding over white women’s bodies and in their long, lank hair. But I couldn’t imagine him kissing the white lips.
“I shall stay in Amsterdam four or five days and then I shall go to Copenhagen, another open city. My desire for you is total, Miss Angelou. I want your mind, and spirit and your body. After all, I may be an African with a mission, but I am also a man. I must attend a conference in London in ten days, but before the conference, I must try to drive thoughts of you out of my mind.” He stopped talking and I waited in the silence for a second before I excused myself and went to the toilet.
Wells had wasted none of its elegance on the women’s room. There were two small cubicles for toilets and a small outer area which was only large enough for two people.
A woman bumped into me on her way out. She saw the tears on my face.
“Hey, are you O.K? You sick?”
I shook my head and walked through the open door. She poked her head in. “You sure you don’t need any help?”
I shook my head again and thanked her.
The little mirror over the washstand was vague with dust but I looked in it and saw misery in sharp outline. If I went through with the wedding to Thomas, I would load our marriage with such disappointment, the structure couldn’t stand. He was too good a man to abuse, yet I knew that I would never forget or forgive the facts. Because of him, I would have lost Make, a l
ife of beckoning adventure and Africa. Africa. I would hate him for that. And Make. Make needed me. I would be a help to him. I was brave. Abbey had once told me I was too crazy to be afraid. I would be a fool to let Make go to a bunch of whorish white women in Amsterdam. In fact, I might be betraying the entire struggle. I wouldn’t do that. And then Guy. Guy would have the chance to have an African father. There could be no greater future for a black American boy than to have a strong, black, politically aware father. His being African would add an enriching spice.
Admitting for the first time a decision I had made at the fancy-dress ball, I would accept Make’s offer.
I called Abbey from a pay phone. She answered.
“Just wanted to make sure you were there.”
“What’s happening?”
“Nothing yet, I’ll call back.”
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah. Really. I’ll call you in a few minutes.”
Make stood again as I reached the table. I sat down and took the napkin in my hands. The words refused to get themselves in order.
“Mr. Make, I’ll do it. I’ll do it. I’ll go with you.”
His face broke open. A brown moon splitting, showing its white core. The room was filled with large even teeth and shining round eyes.
“I’ll marry you, Miss Angelou. I’ll make you happy. We will be known as the happiest family in Africa.” He came around the table and pulled me to my feet to kiss me. I noticed other customers for the first time and drew away.
Make laughed, turning to the tables of black people openly watching us.
“It is all right. She has just said she’ll marry me.”
Applause and laughter. The folks liked a happy story.
He held my hand as if I had just won a race, “This is the joining of Africa and Africa-America! Two great peoples back together again.”
I tried to sit back down. He was going to make a speech. A laugh rumbled up his chest and between the perfect teeth.
“No. I claim my engagement kiss.”
His lips were full and soft. Shaken by the physical touching, we took our seats again. The woman who had offered to help me in the toilet came to our table.
“Honey, I should have known you weren’t crying out of sadness.” She smiled. “You all have a drink with us. We’ve been married eighteen of the best years of my life.”
A man’s voice shouted across the room, “Ernestine, just offer the folks a drink and come on back and sit down.”
The woman grinned. “See how nice we get along? He orders. I obey. Sometimes.”
Make and I laughed as she strutted back to her table.
After a few nervous minutes of finding no way to say all the things which needed to be said, I asked Make if he was free for the afternoon. He said he was. I excused myself and went to the telephone.
“I’ve done it this time, Ab.”
“Done what?”
“It. I’ve told Vusumzi Make I’ll marry him.”
“Who?” Her voice was strong with shock.
“A South African freedom fighter. He’s brilliant, Abbey, and pretty. Beautiful, in fact. And we’ve fallen in love.”
“Well, hell, Maya Angelou, what about Thomas?”
“I want to talk to you about that.”
“Seems like to me, you’ll have to talk to Thomas.”
At the moment that chore didn’t seem so onerous.
“I wish you’d come down to Wells and meet him and take him to your house. I have to go back to the office, but I’ll come over after work. Will you?”
She didn’t use a second to deliberate.
“Of course I’ll come. Are you going to wait or do I just walk in and ask for the African who’s going to marry Maya Angelou?”
I told Make that my friend, Abbey Lincoln, was coming to pick him up.
He recognized her name immediately and began to tell me how the Max Roach/Abbey Lincoln records were smuggled into South Africa and then passed around like the hot revolutionary material they were. He knew the title of every track and most of the words to all their songs. The man, indeed, was a wonder.
When I looked through the window and saw Abbey double-parking her Lincoln sedan, we left the restaurant. Abbey got out of the car and shook hands with my latest fiancé. They drove away and the rest of the afternoon passed like film in slow motion starring a stranger. I answered telephones, signed letters, spoke to volunteers, but my mind hovered somewhere between the Serengeti plains, Thomas’ apartment in Brooklyn and the sweet scent of patchouli which rose each time Mr. Make shifted his heavy body.
Max and Mr. Make were talking and Abbey was preparing dinner when I arrived at the Columbus Avenue apartment. Abbey shouted a welcome from the kitchen and both men embraced me.
Make said proudly, “Ah, here is my beautiful wife.”
Max nodded. “Maya, you got yourself one this time. Yeah, you got yourself a man.”
I sat through dinner in a stupor. Max and Abbey’s place was no more real than my office had been. A man I had met exactly one week earlier was grinning possessively at me across the table. Max, who had seen enough of life to be healthily suspicious, approved of the stranger. Later when I helped Abbey dry the dishes, she said that she thought I was better suited to the unknown Make than to the known Thomas. And anyway, I was just wild enough to make it work.
Make slipped close to me over the ribbing of the corduroy couch.
“I am tired, and would like to rest. Max has said I might stretch out in that room.” I was supposed to agree. I did want to grab his hand and lug him to bed, but I said, “Mr. Make, I …”
“Please, we are going to be married, call me Vus.”
“Vus, I’m obliged to clear up the matter with Thomas.” Make leaned against the back of the sofa and kept quiet for a few minutes.
“Yes. I agree. But when you talk to him I want to be present. He might be difficult.”
“I’ll speak to him alone tomorrow night. And then …”
“Shouldn’t I come with you? It might be dangerous.”
I refused his offer. Talking with Thomas was my responsibility. My pompous idiocy had gotten me into the mess, and rash emotion was further complicating the jumble. And I felt a little excitement at the coming confrontation.
“Then I shall be the one to talk to Guy. I’m going to be his father and we must begin our relationship properly.”
Vus put me into a taxi heading for Brooklyn.
Guy had rocks in the jaws and flint in his eyes. He had called the office and had been told that I had left early. He went to the Killens and they had no news of my whereabouts. Thomas hadn’t heard from me and Paule Marshall didn’t know where I was. He couldn’t find Abbey’s number. He chided me. It wasn’t fair to insist that he be considerate and phone home if I was going to treat him with casual indifference. It was nearly eleven o’clock.
Three men looked to me for proof of devotion.
My son expected warmth, food, housing, clothes and stability. He could be certain that no matter which way my fortune turned he would receive most of the things he desired. Stability, however, was not possible in my world; consequently it couldn’t be possible in his. Too often I had had to decline unplayable hands dealt to me by a capricious life, and take fresh cards just to remain in the game. My son could rely on my love, but never expect our lives to be unchanging.
Thomas wanted equilibrium, also. He was looking for a nice wife, who was a good cook and was neither so pretty or so ugly that she drew attention to herself. I tried his number again. I had to tell him that he hadn’t yet found his mate. He didn’t answer the ring.
Vus saw me as the flesh of his youthful dream. I would bring to him the vitality of jazz and the endurance of a people who had survived three hundred and fifty years of slavery. With me in his bed he would challenge the loneliness of exile. With my courage added to his own, he would succeed in bringing the ignominious white rule in South Africa to an end. If I didn’t already have the qualities
he needed, then I would just develop them. Infatuation made me believe in my ability to create myself into my lover’s desire. That would be nothing for a stepper.
At dawn Thomas answered the telephone. He said he would pick me up from the office and collect the wedding gifts. We would stop at my house and after dinner with Guy, we would go back to his apartment for “a little you-know-what.”
The day jerked itself to evening in stops and starts. Time either wouldn’t move at all or it raced like a whirlwind.
At last, and too soon, Thomas stood in my office doorway, smiling, showing his death-white teeth.
“Hey, baby, where’s the stuff?”
I said “Hi” and pointed him to the cartons against the wall. While I was saying good night to the office staff, he carried the gifts downstairs, and when I joined him on the pavement he was loading them in the trunk of his car.
He was still smiling. I wondered how could anybody say goodbye to a smiling man.
“You like the luggage, baby?”
“Yes. Where did you buy it?”
The question wiped the smile from his face. “Why?”
“Oh, in case I want to add to the set.”
He relaxed and the smile returned as full as it was before. “I got them from a fellow I know. And if you want some more, I’ll get them for you.”
I had suspected that the bags were stolen when they appeared in my office in supermarket cardboard boxes, and Thomas now confirmed my suspicions. I needed all the hurt feelings I could muster for the imminent farewell scene, so I kept quiet and waited.
At home, Guy watched television and Thomas read the sports pages while I cooked dinner. I knew that but for my shocking plans, we were acting out the tableau of our future. Into eternity. Guy would be in his room, laughing at I Love Lucy and Thomas would be evaluating the chances of an athlete or a national baseball team, and I would be leaning over the stove, preparing food for the “shining dinner hour.” Into eternity.
We ate without excitement and Guy said good night, going back to his room.
Thomas rose to bring in the luggage but I stopped him.