She opened the door. The whole place was going: television, microwave, coffeemaker, VCR. Karen was surprised to see me, but still, expecting it in some way. She was used to this.
I went to the bathroom but didn’t shut the door. I filled my mouth with water and let it trickle out through my pursed lips, down into the toilet bowl so they’d think I was busy, held open the door some and my ears more:
Karen: How did you end up with him?
Cocoa: I ran into Sammy a few weeks ago, gave him my number, then he wouldn’t leave me alone.
Karen: You think he’s starting up?
Cocoa: I don’t know what else. It’s got to be. He hasn’t done this nonsense in years. He calls me one morning and in an hour he’s at my door, ringing the bell. I’m living with my girl’s family, you know? He started kicking the door if I didn’t answer. So I been with him three days.
Karen: You should have called me or something.
Cocoa: Called who? I wasn’t even sure if you still lived here. I got lucky you and your man didn’t get promoted or relocated. I called your mom but the number was disconnected.
Karen: She needed to get away.
Cocoa: Well, I know how she feels. You know I love that kid, but I can’t keep this up. My son is about to drop in a few months. I’m trying to take care of this school thing. He’s bugging, that’s all I can say.
Karen: You think you could help me out here, until Masai comes?
Cocoa: I can’t take five more minutes. I’m sorry Karen, I am, but I can’t be around him no more. I’m through.
I listened to him walk to the door, open and shut it quietly. That thing was a big metal one, if he’d just let it swing closed behind him it would have rattled and thundered, so my last thought of Cocoa was of him being delicate.
Washed my hands and crept out, pulled the door closed and left the light on so she’d think I was still in there and snuck into her bedroom. On the door was the family portrait everyone has from Sears. A big poster of my sister, her husband and that baby of theirs. My niece. There was enough daylight coming in from outside that I didn’t need the bulbs; besides, the light would have been like my rat-fink friend Cocoa, squealing to my sister about my goings-on.
There was a big bed in this big room, a crib in the corner, clothes in piles, just washed, on top of a long dresser. I walked to the crib and looked down at Kezia. She was wrapped up tightly, put to bed in a tiny green nightdress. Her diaper bulged and made noise when she moved. Dreaming little girl, she had dimples for laughing. I should have been able to make her smile even in her sleep.
From the hallway a slamming door, then, —Sammy? Samuel? Karen kicked into the room like a S.W.A.T. team. I looked, but she didn’t have a rifle. She flicked on the light and ran to me, but not concerned with me, looked down at Kezia and rolled her over, touched her face, pulled her up and onto Mommy’s shoulder. The big light shook Kezia into crying and it was loud, torturous. I laughed because my sister had done some harm even though there was love in it.
—What are you … is everything all right?
I looked at her and said, —Of course. I was just looking at my niece.
—You might have woken her up.
—Seems like you did that just fine, I told her.
Kezia turned toward me and then looked to her crib, twisted and latched on to it, pulled at that because she wanted back in. Karen finally acquiesced and returned her. The tiny one watched me, remembering, remembering and broke out in a smile. You know why kids love me so much? Because all kids are very, very stupid.
—She’ll never get to sleep now.
I thought Karen was wrong. I pointed. —Look at her eyes. She’s still drowsy. Kezia was looking at me, intently. I started rocking from left to right on the balls of my feet and Kezia mimicked me. She held the crib’s rail to keep her balance but when I leaned too far right she followed, tipped over on her side, huffed, grabbed the bars and pulled herself back up to try again. She made a gurgle noise and I returned it, she went louder and I went louder, she screamed and I screamed; Karen flopped back against her married bed, holding her face, laughing.
My hands went around Kezia’s middle, then I lifted her up as high as my arms would allow, brought her belly to my mouth and bit her there. She kicked her feet happily, caught me, two good shots right in the nose; that thing would be flaring up later. But she laughed and I did it again. I dropped her down two feet, quickly, like I’d lost my grip, and across her face came the look that precedes vomit, then a pause and like I knew it would, laughter.
Put her back in the crib and we returned to yelling, added movements with our hands and feet. Whenever I threw my palms in the air she did the same, lost her balance and fell backward; she lay there, rocking side to side so she could get some momentum for rising. I tickled her under the chin. We did it like this while Karen left the room and returned (repeat three times). Finally Kezia sat, watching me. I twirled in arms-open circles and she still had enough energy to smile, but not much else, and then she didn’t have energy enough even for that and she watched me, silent, as she lay on her back, then Karen had to tap my shoulder and shush me because the kid was sleeping.
The lights were still on: around the crib there were pictures taped up. Of our family and Masai’s, all watching over; the picture of me rested closer to Kezia than all the rest, but in it I was only a boy. Looking at my crooked smile I felt detached from that child —like we could cannibalize his whole life and you still wouldn’t have tasted me. Every memory would someday make the catalogue I kept in my room, eleven small green notebooks.
Me and Karen sat in the kitchen. She had been preparing dinner. I started making a plate. —Leave a lot for Masai. He’ll be home from work soon.
I covered all the pots and poured myself some berry Kool-Aid. Karen’s Kool-Aid was the only thing I would drink besides water. After I gulped I told her, —You need more sugar.
She sucked her teeth. —Masai and me decided we should still have teeth when Kezia gets to be seven. Karen finished her rice. You look awful, she said.
—Yeah, but I’ve always looked bad. You got the beauty and I got everything else.
She smacked me, gentle, across the chin. —I had my bachelor’s before you had been left back for the first time. Have you thought about coming to stay with us?
—I like where I’m at.
—You need to be around your family. You’re acting stupid out there.
—Whatever. I shrugged. You don’t know what I’m doing.
—I can see what you’re not doing: washing, changing your clothes. Probably not going to class.
—Man, I said. You don’t understand subtlety. You’ve got to bring these things up cool, easy, otherwise you’ll close all avenues of communication.
That’s how long she paused, watching me. Then she went to the fridge, found a green plastic cup. She put it on the table, sat, sounded stern, —How about you take the medication mixed with something? You still like it with orange juice? I’ll make it.
I looked at the cup, the white film on top, that clump and beneath it the actual Tropicana Original. There had been plenty at my apartment, taken regular for two years, on my own. But someday you want to rest. —How about you put some vodka in there?
On top of the fridge Karen had left a Tupperware bowl of the boiled egg whites she’d been cutting up for her next day’s meal. Even in the light blue bowl they seemed too bright. She wasn’t kidding around. —Drink it. You told us you would. You were doing so well.
—It makes my head feel like rocks.
—But at least it keeps you thinking right. Just drink this cup. It’ll be a new start. Come on.
See, but I was supposed to take that medicine twice a day, every day. She wanted me to drink this one glass and everything would go right but you can’t dam a river with just one brick.
I said, —Karen, you can’t stop the electric soldiers.
I was twenty-two years old and Karen was thirty. How long before it’s j
ust frustration in her, screaming to get out, wishing whatever was the pain would go away.
—Can you? she asked.
Blissfully the goddamn fridge worked, I could hear its engine going, regular like a heartbeat, mumming along and I was so jealous. When I got up she draped herself across the table, spilling the juice and the orchids she had in a vase, the ones her husband had bought two days ago, purple like lips too long exposed to the cold.
It was lucky Masai was at work. I was much bigger than Karen and I could simply pluck her off my arm and leave, but if Masai had been there it would have gotten louder, the trouble in this kitchen would have been contagious, contaminating the living room, the bathroom, their bedroom. We would have been all over the place. But at some point, as I was tugging, she let go. She could fight harder, she had before. Her hands fell to her sides; she opened the door for me.
I had other people I could have seen, but I kept forgetting their addresses. I might have passed four or five out on Malcolm X Boulevard. Later, I walked by the mosque, the brothers in their suits and bow ties selling the Final Call; I wanted to buy one, help them out; walked over to a short one in a gold suit; he pushed me a paper like it would save my life. —Only a dollar.
—And what do I get? I asked.
—You get the truth. All the news the white media won’t show you.
I leaned close to him, he pulled back some. —You don’t know that all this stuff is past tense? I asked.
Now he looked away, to his boy at the other corner, in green, white shirt, black shoes, talking with two older women; each nodded and smiled, one brought out her glasses to read the headlines. —So you want to buy this or what? My friend held it out again, the other twenty copies he pulled close to his chest. I could see on his face that his legs were tired.
But for what would I be buying that paper? Or if a Christian was selling Bibles? Name another religion, I had no use for any. I wanted to pull my man close, by the collar (for effect) and tell him I knew of a new god, who was collecting everything he saw around him and stashing it in his apartment on Amsterdam Avenue; who walked home from the 1 train stealing bouts of Spanish being spoken in front of stores and when he came home prodigiously copied them down; who stole the remnants of empty beer bottles that had been shattered into thirty-seven pieces, took the glass and placed it in his living room, in a jar, with the greens and browns of others—in the morning he sat there and watched the fragments, imagined what life had come along and done such destruction.
Instead I walked backward until I got to a corner, hugged myself tight against a phone booth with no phone in it as the people swam around me and ignored everything but the single-minded purposes of their lives. After an hour was up my brain sent signals to my feet: move.
I stood in front of my apartment again, had a paper to hand in. Go upstairs and slide it in an envelope, address it to the woman who led my seminar on black liberation movements. The one who lectured me only when I missed class and never remembered to mark it in her book. The one who had assured me that if I wrote it all down this mind would be soothed, salvaged. One Tuesday (Tues. & Thur. 9:00–10:45 A.M.) she had pulled me aside when lessons were over, confided, —These days, the most revolutionary thing you can be is articulate.
I had told her honestly, —I’m trying. I’m trying.
I touched the front door before opening it. I’d been struck by the fear that the building was on fire; a church and a mosque had been burned recently. In the secret hours of night they’d been turned to ash and in the daylight their destruction was like a screaming message to us all. Had the door been hot I would have run farther than I needed to, but it was cold so I walked in.
The elevator was still broken. I had ten stories to climb; my legs felt stiff and proud. I moved effortlessly until I reached the sixth floor and Helena stopped me. She was with her girls, they were coming down the stairs. As pregnant as she was I knew the climb couldn’t have been easy, but the look on her face had nothing to do with exertion. It was all for me. —I was coming to talk to you Sammy, she said. Helena’s cousin Zulma stood beside me; she was so big I felt boxed in.
—You should be out looking for your man, I told Helena.
Zulma looked like she wanted to leave, bored, but was there to get her cousin’s back in case it was needed. If Helena had been alone I wouldn’t have had any problem kicking her in the gut and running. When she’d rumbled to the bottom of the stairs I would have crawled down beside her and in her ear asked, —Now tell me, what does this feel like? Tell me every detail.
—Why you causing so much problems? another of Helena’s girls asked, but I didn’t answer. Instead I told them one of my philosophies to live by. —I never tell a pretty woman I think she’s pretty unless we’re already holding hands.
Helena rubbed her face with frustration. —You need to leave Ramon alone. He’s good when he’s not around you. Her watch beeped, not loudly, but it echoed through the stairwell. Its face was glowing. Batteries gave it power.
—Have you been drafted too? I asked Helena.
—Fuck this, Zulma muttered, then her elbow was in my chest.
As the five girls got all over different parts of me I swung wild. Caught Zulma in the mouth and the first drops of blood on my face were hers. They were yelling as I kicked out with both legs. Then I was burning everywhere and I knew without looking that the off-silver colors in my eyes were the box cutters finding whole parts of me to separate. Fabric was tearing as they removed swatches of my clothing so they could get nearer to my skin. Zulma and Helena were at my face; neither of them smiled as they did the cutting. They didn’t seem angry. Their faces were so still.
I grabbed and reached for something, dipping my fingers in everything spilling out of me. The colors were hard to make out in the bad light, but the stuff was beautiful and thick, it pooled. The girls rose and ran; I listened to five sets of sneakers move quickly down those stairs to the emergency exit; the door swung out and stuck, there was the flood of an empty wind up the staircase.
getting ugly
For years I hoped I’d become a beautiful man, but by twenty-five it seemed the shit was not to be. Sitting down across from me, she said, —You know, you’re really ugly.
I smiled that way I do, big eyes and funny skin. —But I get pretty when the lights go out, I said, regretted it because we both knew I was lying.
She laughed then sipped from the tall foam cup of sugarcane lemonade and had to pucker her juicy lips to let the sweetness pass her jawline. She was not perfect-pretty, but she looked much better than me; the bags barely under her eyes were good.
Her girls were waiting together in a bunch like green bananas, each one firm if you squeezed and great to eat warm. They were all tight shorts and closed faces waiting for the right brother to get them open. One said toward us, but spoke at her, —Let’s go, Deidre.
Deidre turned back to me. —Since I was the one who stepped to you, why don’t I just give you my number.
I was glad and said so. —I’m never good at asking for the digits.
—I don’t need to know that, she said.
They had closed down Riverside Drive for the Jazzmobile. Doing that to a Manhattan street always seemed like such an impossible task, like asking your lungs to stop for a few minutes, every part of this island so essential. The guy on the drums was rolling into a little solo; music was the second-best reason to come to Grant’s Tomb this time of year.
Deidre wrote the numbers with flair; her name on the paper had the mark of someone who’d been into tagging up when she was younger—it was in the e’s and d’s. When she put the paper to me she said, —This is my number, not no pager. I was glad, I knew what it meant when a girl passed you her beeper number: you were assed out. I tried to say something smooth, but nothing was coming. When Deidre ran up on her girls, two of them looked back at me like I had done something wrong. I stared and smiled. In under a minute they’d be putting me down and laughing, but I was more than cool with tha
t. I figured them all to be college women—Hunter, City.
At the Tomb, the Old Audience was stacked up. I found some concrete and sat my ass between two old men speaking on seeing Charles Mingus at the Blue Note, Bird before he’d thrown it all away. They were lying of course, but I enjoyed listening to them more than the sounds of people trading numbers and quick feels.
On the phone we were cool; talking for an hour, breezing by the simple early stuff. Deidre surprised me when she cut through all the bullshit to ask, —So are you just out for ass or what?
I laughed. Not that you-caught-me-type stuff, more like, damn straight. She said, —So at least we understand each other, right?
I was nodding for ten seconds before I remembered we were on the phone. —Yeah.
—You know my girls said you wouldn’t call.
I corrected her. —Your girls said I was one ugly motherfucker, and that you should hope I don’t call.
She laughed. —So I guess you know women pretty well, huh?
Sucking my teeth, I said, —I don’t understand a thing, but I make great guesses.
—So when are you taking me to lunch?
I asked, —Me? Take you?
You could hear her back straighten. —You do have a job, don’t you?
—Of course, of course. Do you? Wait, let me guess.
She listened.
—Clothes. You sell clothes.
She was applauding, it sounded distant through the phone. —How did you know?
—I saw you and your girls together, remember? That many pretty women and you either all met working at a clothing store or you’re a crew of strippers.
Slapboxing with Jesus (Vintage Contemporaries Original) Page 3