Midnight

by Odie Hawkins

  He wrapped the top sheet around his body, subconsciously trying to imitate a man wearing the indigenous cloth, and shuffled into the kitchen. The mice circling the kitchen floor seemed to be dancing when the light went on. He barely glanced at their scurrying disappearance. They didn’t disturb him at all. During his first week in the house he had jumped a few feet whenever he saw a lizard in the backyard. Now he took the lizards, the spiders, the mice, the odd changes of weather, the flies, mosquitoes, odd sounds of people and dogs made in the night, the sexy croaking of the frogs, the cars whizzing past his left hip on the rutted roads in stride.

  He opened the refrigerator to scare up a possible snack. Pita bread, vegetables, cheeses, containers of food to be eaten. Wish I had a Big Mac. Or a piece of fried chicken.

  “Bop, there’s enough fruit, vegetables, and whatnot to last you for a month. If you feel the urge for something else, you can get it from one of these women walking up ’n down the streets.”

  Fruit, vegetables, whatnot. He pulled a large carrot out and munched on it. What the hell, I ain’t really hungry no way.

  He felt the sudden urge to go out in the streets but canceled the thought. Where’s there to go around here anyway? He had made it his business to trip to all of the places that were supposed to be “in.”

  Elena had given him a list. “These are places that you would like to go.”

  “What’s that mean, places that I would like to go?”

  “Well, you know, they play very loud music and people do the latest American dances.”

  He had gone to a few of the “loud music” places and felt out of place. One of the places alternated Kool Moe Dee with Natalie Cole. Another one played rap and something that sounded like Chinese opera. He wasn’t enchanted by the loud music places. Maybe I’m getting old.

  Four A.M., Sunday morning, Kokrobite. Or Cocobitty. Or something like that.

  “Bop, one Sunday, while we’re gone, make it your business to get to Kokrobite. You’ll dig it.”

  “Fred, how’s he going to get there?”

  “Helene, sweetheart, Bop is from L.A.; he knows how to get around.”

  He had gotten around. The Penta Hotel bar for gin and tonics, the Chez Mammie, the Kung Fu for Chinese food, the Bukom Night Club (in the Continental Hotel), Black Cesar’s Night Club, the Kalamazoo, the Silver Cup, the Tip Toe, the Dew Drop Inn. Movies at the German place, the Labadi Beach scene, Makola market, everywhere a taxi in Accra would take him.

  He finished off the carrot and shuffled back to bed, absently pulling out a large photo essay book that Fred and Helene had collaborated on.

  He was wide awake as the sun mounted the horizon, slowly reading the text and staring at the pictures in the book. The Children of Osu.

  Wowwww.… These is some bad motherfuckers here. The pictures of some of the most beautiful black children he had ever seen were easy to understand. The seven-year-old girl carrying a huge tray of fresh baked bread on her head, the two-year-old balancing a teacup and saucer on his head, the girls in school uniform playing some kind of jumping game.

  He had paused to watch the game on his way from place to place but didn’t pause to watch it for too long because he seemed to be the only person interested. What if they think I’m a child molester or something? He struggled with the socio-historical text, returned to the pictures.

  Ghana is a child molester’s paradise. He stared at the picture of the trio of laughing third graders with their dresses hiked up, panties pulled to one side, shooting out glistening streams of young pee.

  He shook his head, thinking about the men and boys who pissed up and down the streets, exposing themselves out of necessity, the two little brothers, eight and ten, who came to his back door at least once a day to see if he needed beer or his shorts washed.

  He drifted off to sleep trying to figure out the meaning of “altruistic.”

  Two P.M., time to see what this “Cocobite” is.

  Osu was dressed in her Sunday best. The little boys and girls who wore rags and carried pounds of stuff on their heads all week were dressed in pressed pants and ruffly taffeta, their parents in shirts and silks.

  Bop felt like a part of the scene with his freshly ironed khakis and white-on-white short-sleeved shirt. The only difference between me ’n them is that I got fifty thousand cedis to blow.

  He stood on the corner at the Shell station, near the so-called jazz joint called Bywells, waiting for a decent looking taxi. It seemed hard to believe that some of the taxis could still be running, judging from the looks of them.

  “Hey, lookahere, brother, how much you charge me to take me to Cocobite?”

  “Cocobite?”

  “Yeah, you know, Cocobite Beach, like Labadi Beach.”

  Bop felt proud of being able to tell the man where he wanted to go even though he had never been there.

  “Cocobite?”

  “Yeah, you know, where they play drums ’n shit on Sunday.”

  “Oh! Kokrobite.”

  “Ko-kro-bitey? You sure?”

  “Ahh yes, Mustapha plays there, Kokrobite.”

  It had to be the right place; the Vernons had mentioned Mustapha the drummer to him.

  “He’s been known to drum people right up out of their seats.”

  “How much you charge to go there?”

  “In and out?”

  “Whaddaya mean, in and out?”

  “I take you, wait for you.”

  Bop ignored the traffic surging around his negotiation, the people gliding past with their Sunday best on. The idea of having a taxi wait on him, his own private car, appealed to him.

  “OK, in and out, how much?”

  He knew from the shrewd gleam in the driver’s eyes that he was coming up with an outrageous price.

  “Twenty thousand cedis.”

  “That’s too much, brother; why you wanna jack me up like that?”

  The driver looked puzzled for a second, but obviously understood the essence of Bop’s distress. “OK, fifteen.”

  “How ’bout ten?”

  The driver looked at a distant point for a couple seconds before beckoning for him to get in the taxi.

  “OK, ten.”

  Bop allowed himself a victorious grin. He found out a few days later that he could’ve gotten his trip for five thousand.

  They drove. And drove. And drove.

  “You goin’ the right way to Cocobitey?”

  “Yes, Kokrobite this way.”

  They left the fringes of Accra and plunged into the countryside.

  “How far is it?”

  “Ohhh, maybe seventeen meters, maybe twenty meters.”

  Bop settled back into the passenger’s seat, unable to figure out how far a meter was. Fuck it, it’s a nice day. He smiled at the driver; the driver returned his smile.

  Chester was right; these are the friendliest motherfuckers in the world. For the first time in his life he felt no fear of other people or the police.

  The thought jolted him as he stared out at the lush, rolling green lands, dotted with huts, half-finished buildings, people walking with loads on their heads.

  Always got something on their heads.

  It was a strange feeling, not to fear other people. He glanced at the driver again. In the states I’d have to be on my guard with a dude taking me on a ride this far. And the police, from what he had seen of them, made him think of comic figures in old movies. They stood on crates in the middle of obscure intersections and made single cars screech to a stop. He’d seen a few “hammers” around, but no one who resembled the L.A.P.D.

  It was strange to look out at people who looked like him but were doing things he’d never thought of doing. The woman carrying a tree trunk on her head, the little girl with the tray of pineapples stacked in a neat pyramid on her head.

  “How far is this place?”

  “Not far, not far.”

  A long red-colored road, people walking on the edges like shadows, turning to stare at the ta
xi as though they had never seen a car before. Green fields beyond. The sight of the ocean on his left surprised him, really surprised him, and delighted him.

  “Kokrobite,” the driver whispered to him, as he drove through an old-fashioned, hand-operated road barrier. The driver drove into a grove of trees beside four other cars, tilted his head back as though he were already asleep, and pointed a lazy finger at the gravel path.

  “This Kokrobite. I will wait here.”

  No demand for immediate payment, no bad vibes. The man was half asleep as Bop made his first step up the path leading to the performance area. The drumming accelerated his walk. What the hell is going on here?

  The concrete performance area and the three tiers of audience came into view. The dancers were performing, the drummers were drumming, and everyone was having a good ol’ time. He didn’t know what to think about all the white people in the audience. There were more whites in the Kokrobite audience than he had seen all week in Osu, Accra.

  He made his way to a vacant seat on the left fringe of the audience. The waiter was waiting to serve him the moment he took his place.

  “Lemme, have … uhhh … a double cone-gnack.”

  He did a slow peripheral pan of the audience. Mostly Europeans, he could tell from the accents, trying to clap their hands in time, silly grins on their faces, happy to be present at a “primitive” scene.

  The drummers were hot and the dancers were too cold, but he felt a spark missing. They were doing a performance; it wasn’t real.

  There was a brief lull before Mustapha and his drum ensemble made their move toward the huge drums set up on the concrete stage.

  Bop tossed his double down and ordered another.

  Mustapha and the ensemble shuffled toward the stage from the cover of the grove of trees that Bop had just walked through. He counted eight men and women shuffling toward the drum. The men were chanting and shaking small instruments and playing drums with strings on the sides.

  They pressed the stringed drums under their arms and made rhythmic patterns with every step they took. The woman, dressed in a sky blue and forest green traditional dress, danced beside the men, a distant look on her face.

  Bop settled back in his seat, enchanted by the scene. The horizon was the backdrop, the drum ensemble had shifted into another gear, and the dancer was staring directly into his eyes. He went with it, buzzed on cognac and vibes. He went with it. When the lady’s eyes signaled for him to come out of the audience and dance with her, he went, followed by eight other people.

  Something that seemed like it was going to have a special meaning was spoiled. He returned to his seat and sneered at the rhythmless Europeans trying to git down.

  It was hard not to admire their courage. Pale, blonde, dry people were trying to do it, honestly. Some members of the audience applauded their courage when the drums released them.

  The set went on, the drums reaming Bop’s consciousness. I guess this is what I came for. At one intense point of an exchange of ideas between drums, he felt like crying. He couldn’t put a label on the feeling; it was as though the drum had awakened feelings he didn’t know he had.

  And too suddenly, the drummers were shuffling away, chanting as they moved, the lone dancer a part of the mirage.

  Damn.… That was some heavy shit they just laid on us.

  He looked around for someone to share his vibes with. The Europeans were bubbling with love for African rhythm. He twisted in his seat to take in the rest of the crowd. It wasn’t difficult to spot her; she was obviously the most beautiful woman in the whole place.

  He stood up quickly and made a beeline to her side. It was irresistible not to talk with this sister.

  She is too fine.

  Small sister, ’bout five or so, built like a brick shit-house, chocolate-honey colored. He stopped next to her chair and made a French Army salute.

  “Clyde Johnson at your leisure, and what might your name be, if I may be so bold as to ask?”

  The beautiful chocolate-honey colored woman covered her beautiful mouth with her beautiful hands and laughed.

  Bop became instantly hostile. What’s this about? Why is she laughing at me?

  “What’s so funny?”

  She stopped laughing to reveal a beautiful smile.

  “It sounded so funny to hear someone say what you just said.”

  He plopped into the empty seat beside her. This was going to be fun.

  “Oh yeahhh, you thought that was funny, huh? Well, what do you think of this?”

  He pantomimed slugging her in the jaw with an exaggerated swing. She laughed harder. He knew he had her on his line now. She was sensitive to his Bop-don’t-play-that sense of humor.

  “Seriously, what’s your name?”

  “Seriously, my name is Nana Cecilia.”

  “Pleased to be of your acquaintance, I’m sure.” The continent was changing Bop; he was beginning to feel he could be as suave as the rest of them.

  “Pleased to meet you,” she answered and dazzled him with a smile. “And this is my mommy.”

  Bop stared vacantly at the queen sitting on the other side of Nana Cecilia. He nodded politely, wondering how he could have missed this larger version of his dream sister.

  The queen nodded back without smiling and adjusted the folds of her large batik scarf as though they were ruffled feathers.

  The mother did not approve of him sitting next to her daughter, but he guessed she didn’t want to be impolite. Ghanaians, he had found, were always polite. The older woman puffed her chest out, adjusted and readjusted her cloth around her body, but she didn’t actually come out and say, “You can’t talk to my daughter.”

  Bop took advantage of the cultural lull. “Uhhh, you come here a lot?”

  “To Kokrobite?”

  “Yeahhh, here.”

  He still felt ill at ease trying to pronounce African names like Kokrobite.

  “Not very often. I’m too busy preparing for my exams and, of course, my responsibilities as an Ampoti-hene take up a good deal of my time.”

  “Am-potty-what?”

  Three performance groups later, Bop felt that he knew what an Ampoti-hene was all about. “I had a position something like that when I was in the Bricks.”

  A war chieftainess. He couldn’t really figure out what to make of it. He could definitely figure out what he wanted to do with her, but mommy was the block.

  “Uhhh, look, ’Cilia, why don’t we take a little walk?”

  They were into the jugglers now, marvelous athletes who seemed to be able to twirl anything around on the end of a stick—dishpans, plates, each other.

  “Take a walk with you, where?”

  They were almost whispering now.

  “Uhhh, right over there, towards the beach.” She stared at him a few seconds.

  “My mom would not give permission for me to walk anywhere with you; you are a stranger. It wouldn’t be proper.”

  Bop was ready with the counter-punch, “Hey I may be a stranger to her but you know me. I’m no stranger to you.” He gave her hand a furtive squeeze.

  Mom took note of the action and stood up, outraged. “Come Cecilia, it’s time.”

  He wanted to respond to her shy wave good-bye with a hug, but mom’s forbidding glare held him in his seat. “See you.”

  He slumped in his seat and ordered another double cognac. His dream sister was gone, stolen from him by her jealous momma.

  Damn.

  He sat through a couple more demonstrations of Ghanaian culture, feeling depressed. There was something vaguely disturbing about watching the dancers dance for the Europeans. Why do they have to grin at these mother-fuckers so much?

  Ten minutes later he staggered to his feet and started the walk back to his waiting overpriced taxi.

  The night air bashed against his face, leaving the odor of roasting corn, sugar cane syrup, stray snatches of languages, raw sewage, smoke from charcoal fires, Accra. My last week in Ghana, West Africa.… So much
happened, I can’t even remember half of this shit.

  “Bop, mark my words, by the time you’ve been in Africa a week, you’ll be feeling like you’ve lived your whole life there.”

  You were right, Chester, right as rain. Did I do what I was supposed to do? I didn’t make the slave castles, but that was something Chester warned me about.

  “Ofainey, I beg you, don’t be misled into no such shit as believing that our roots take place in a slave castle. Go deeper than that. You’re young; your hormones are pumping. Fall in love with Africa, Bop; it’s a beautiful place to love. In some of the village places they’ll make you feel like you’re in the middle of your natural habitat. The music of the languages will hypnotize you; you’ll have times when you’ve understood exactly what someone has said, without understanding a single word. It’s in the sounds. People yell ’n scream at each other just the way they do in Chicago—

  “‘Heyyyy maaaan, where you goin’?’

  “‘Ovah heah to pick up this stuff. I’ll see you lataah, down at the joint.’

  “You hear shit like that. It’s a funky old kind of place; people honor traditions. Some of the contradictions will wear you out, but forget about that. Just go with the flow.”

  Wowwww …, the Vernons are home. Let me hurry up and hear what they did.

  6

  Fred and Helene were back from the north, full of piss, vinegar, and good vibes. “Too bad you don’t have more time, Bop; you’d love the north. You know how it is when you go inland; shit is different.”

  Helene made one of her uniquely creative dishes, a lasagna-styled casserole with tamales and pasta. Fred set up the party atmosphere with three beers. They enjoyed each other’s company. Fred exchanged winks with his wife. “What did you do while we were gone?”

  Bop tried to tell them but nothing would come out. “Oooh, I hung out, you know, just sorta hung out.”

  Fred had drunk just enough beer to challenge his description of what he had done. “Just hung out? What the hell does that mean?”

  Wowwww …, shades of Aunt Lu and Uncle David. “Uhhh, well, you know what I mean.”

  Later on that evening, after the mango pie, they spooled it out more carefully. “So, now, you got a woman, huh?”