by Casey Gerald
I parked in front this time. “How Does It Feel” had been playing on repeat, only because I was trying to tell you about the song and had to make sure I didn’t miss anything important. I turned it off once he knocked on the passenger window.
Hey.
Hey, River.
Same greeting as so long ago. Same feeling, once he sat down, that a whole universe had been crammed into a single car. Off we went.
I didn’t drive fast because I was no longer in a hurry to get places, and I did not want the cops to blow my brains out like they seemed so fond of doing at the time, and I did not know where we were headed. The sun had just gone down.
Have you seen Moonlight? I asked, thinking that the movies would be an easy way to kill a few hours.
Yeah. The NAACP had a screening out in LA, so I hit that up.
I laughed.
What?
You went to something with the NAACP?
Uh, yeah. I’m a member.
Since when?
I’d heard this laugh of his before, the one halfway between amusement and anger.
Since I was in high school, Casey. Like, since I was seventeen.
You lying. I met you when you were nineteen. Pretty sure I would have known if you were going around with the NAACP.
Whatever. You never wanted to see me in a positive light. Your fault if you didn’t know.
Well, damn. My bad.
I had, with time, learned to de-escalate.
We continued down the highway, nothing on the radio. He told me about his life in Los Angeles, about a trip to Rotterdam to see his ailing grandfather, where he’d caught a cold that he still had. For some stretches we were quiet and that was fine.
You wanna come with me to IKEA? I asked. Need to find a plant for my house. I had not owned a plant or any living thing since my dog was put to sleep in ’97. Actually, I bought two beta fish in ’98 or thereabouts, housed them in the same tank so I could watch them rip flesh off each other until they both were dead.
He snickered. You know they say don’t go to IKEA unless you want to end up in a fight.
Who is they?
Don’t remember. Read it somewhere. Said that couples always fight when they go to IKEA.
I looked over. He was staring out the window.
Pretty sure we won’t have that problem.
True.
We arrived at the sprawling furniture depot. Strolled through the aisles, under the copious lights—industrial-strength fluorescent tubes, den lamps, vanity mirrors—pushing a cart. He said the California sun made his room a hotbox from morning on, so we loitered among the window curtains for a while. When we reached the plant department, I realized I didn’t know a goddamn thing about plants. I confess to you that I had also learned how much better people feel when they feel needed. Which one should I get? He suggested a tall, treelike situation. Majesty palm, it was called, perhaps because it resembled those homemade fans Cleopatra’s servants used back in the day. In any event, it was under twenty dollars and required little maintenance. We were done in half an hour.
You hungry? I asked, truly hungry and also out of ideas.
Nah, not right now. Probably be starving by time you get somewhere, though.
And he was, or so he claimed, when we walked into the restaurant, on the ground floor of a once-abandoned power plant. The waitress sat us at a table in the center of everything. That was fine.
I’ll get whatever you get, River said. When the dishes came, he closed his eyes. When he opened them, I was still watching.
What?
Never seen you pray before.
What you mean? I’ve always prayed.
Never saw it . . . Who you pray to?
Huh? To God. I mean, I stopped going to church a long time ago. Doesn’t mean I don’t believe in God, though. Just talk to Him on my own. Works for me.
Hmph . . . I feel you. Didn’t know.
Clearly.
* * *
—
River’s cold had gotten worse by the time we settled into my living room. I brought him a warm face towel, which didn’t do much good. Brought a glass of bourbon, which didn’t do much good, either. Brought some medicine, which he reminded me was not supposed to mix with alcohol.
Why don’t you just go to bed? I suggested. And so we did.
Lying there felt like cooking a dish you’ve cooked many times, except with new ingredients. Or cooking a new dish with the same ingredients you’ve always had. I don’t cook much, hell. What I’m trying to say is that I’ve rarely felt so awkward doing something I’d already done before. Perhaps that’s why, when the room went dark, a quiet laugh escaped.
Are you staring at me? he asked, in all seriousness.
Um, no. I really wasn’t. This is just funny.
As hell. Welp . . . good night.
Night.
* * *
—
When I woke the next morning, he was already propped up, reading the news on his phone. I saw, in the morning light, that there were bags under his eyes—just a little puffiness, enough to prove that he had lived more life than he had when we last saw each other, as had I. He was still beautiful, maybe more, with life under his eyes. Can’t say that about everybody.
You like breakfast tacos? I asked.
Man, my mom used to make those all the time. Which meant yes, I figured.
Cool. Be right back. I slipped on a pair of jeans and grabbed my car keys. Returned with a paper bag. He looked inside.
I thought you were gonna cook.
Boy, I’m not your mama.
A smirk on River’s face.
Damn it’s almost twelve, he said. I better shower.
* * *
—
While he bathed I made my bed, having recently read that people who make their beds every morning are happier. When I finished I felt about the same as I had before, which was fine, and found River in my living room packing his suitcase, naked. I brought up the newly elected president, not knowing what else to talk about.
Is he saying “big league” or “bigly”? I asked, referring to the president-elect’s abnormal use of the English language. I hope it’s “bigly” . . . Kinda like that word.
Yeah. That sounds like a word you would like.
I had been walking away when he said this. I stopped, turned around.
What you mean by that?
You know, River said, it’s just different . . . quirky.
Oh.
I took a few deep breaths, per the meditation guide I had begun to use. All the rage that had suddenly appeared left just as quickly.
You ready?
Think so.
* * *
—
It was a jean jacket afternoon outside, the weekend after Thanksgiving, leaves already separated from lonely branches. The sun shone pale enough behind a veil of clouds that you had to scan the golden sky to find the thing itself. I wore my shades until we pulled up to the airport terminal.
You’re not getting out? River asked when I reached over to hug him.
Oh yeah. I hadn’t planned on it.
He sat his suitcase next to my car and we did the whole curbside goodbye thing.
You were actually nice, he said. I was surprised.
Hmph . . . maybe we should just have a reset, you know?
A reset?
Yeah. We’ll talk about it.
He laughed. Aight.
You better run.
* * *
—
From the airport I drove to a nursery in search of soil and a new pot, then home to transfer my plant. Sent River a picture of the final product. I sure hope this works.
Don’t worry, he responded, from a tarmac in Los Angeles. It should be harder to kill it than to keep i
t alive.
* * *
—
I followed the instructions. Poured water in the soil and let it drain through to a nice ceramic dish. Opened my living room blinds so the light could shine in. Watched the plant grow.
Days later, I watched a long green leaf immolate, shrivel, collapse to the floor. No alarm. Watched another leaf and then a branch begin to wither. Tried to prune. Less light. More water. Tried less water and more light. Watched the plant stop growing.
By New Year’s Eve, the plant was dead.
I carried its brown body to the backyard and laid it down in an empty garden patch. Last time I checked it was mixed in with the dirt. I still don’t know what I did wrong but I will try again, someday. Promise.
To my mother, my father, and my sister. I hope this book is worth a part of all we have endured.
GRATITUDE
To write this book meant to walk, nearly blind, toward an unknown destination that I knew I had to reach yet also knew I could not reach without the grace of God. Each day, God took my hand and led me toward the destination, helped me get a little rest at night, woke me up the next morning ready—or at least, willing—to go on. Never was I left to walk alone. My editor, Becky Saletan; my agent, Lynn Nesbit; my friends Brenda, Matthew, and Paula-Raye—walked beside me. They picked me up each time I fell, pushed me when I did not want to move, had the guts to warn me if I started walking in the wrong direction. We made it.
I am grateful for the grace of God.
CREDITS
Not infrequently ending in death: Gilbert Millstein, “Books of the Times” review of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, The New York Times, September 5, 1957, http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/09/07/home/kerouac-roadglowing.html.
As a high school quarterback growing up in South Dallas: Laura Miller, “Broken Bodies, Broken Dreams,” Dallas Life, June 22, 1986.
“Oh butter!” cried Jessie: Gertrude Chandler Warner, The Boxcar Children Bookshelf, Box edition (Park Ridge, Illinois: Albert Whitman & Company, 2010).
the war may not have brought a great deal of bloodshed to Texas: Elizabeth Hayes Turner, “Juneteenth: Emancipation and Memory” in Lone Star Pasts: Memory and History in Texas, eds. Gregg Cantrell and Elizabeth Hayes Turner (College Station, Texas: Texas A&M University Press, 2006).
I wish to hear more about this god whose name is Love: E. M. Forster, The Life to Come, and Other Short Stories (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1987).
when the gods have ceased to be and the Christ has not yet come: Gustave Flaubert, from a letter quoted in Marguerite Yourcenar’s “Reflections on the Composition of Memoirs of Hadrian,” Memoirs of Hadrian, trans. Grace Flick (New York: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2005), pp. 319–20.
placed into the dipper and poured back down on the world: Little Richard interview on Jimi Hendrix for 1973 documentary Jimi Hendrix, produced by Joe Boyd, John Head, and Gary Weis, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHlRa-RPjWE.
How does it feel to be a problem?: W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk (New York: Random House, 2005).
laugh and eat well and grow strong: From “I, Too” by Langston Hughes, https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47558/i-too.
One must wait until evening to see how splendid the day has been: attributed to Sophocles, Antigone.
We had then to discuss / Whither or where we might travel: Louise Glück, “Parable,” in Faithful and Virtuous Night (New York: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2014).
black and shining prince: Ossie Davis, eulogy for Malcolm X, February 27, 1965, http://malcolmx.com/eulogy/.
i made it up / here on this bridge: Lucille Clifton, “won’t you celebrate with me,” in Book of Light (Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press, 1993).
For generations men have come into the world: James Baldwin, in conversation with Audre Lorde, originally published in Essence in 1984, http://theculture.forharriet.com/2014/03/revolutionary-hope-conversation-between.html#axzz56LaQFsUL.
There are years that ask questions and years that answer: Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God: A Novel (New York: Harper Collins, 2009).
I am an invisible man: Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (New York: Vintage International, 1980).
My fellow Americans, we live in an age of anarchy: President Richard M. Nixon, address to the nation announcing the invasion of Cambodia, April 30, 1970, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=2490.
Nobody ever died too early or too late; you always die right on time: Clarice Gerald.
It’s been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did: Barack Obama, Grant Park Victory Speech, November 4, 2008, http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/convention2008/barackobamavictoryspeech.htm.
to form a secret society with but one object: Will of Cecil Rhodes, http://pages.uoregon.edu/kimball/Rhodes-Confession.htm.
to call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth: Raymond Carver, “Late Fragment,” from A New Path to the Waterfall (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1989).
Two thousand years ago: President John F. Kennedy, remarks at Rudolph Wilde Platz Berlin, June 26, 1963, https://www.jfklibrary.org/Asset-Viewer/oEX2uqSQGEGIdTYgd_JL_Q.aspx.
I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion: Jack Kerouac, On the Road: The Original Scroll. (London: Penguin Classics, 2008).
Roosevelt drew a large cross in his diary: Edmund Morris, The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt (New York: Random House, 2001).
[Julius Caesar] came to Gades: Suetonius and Joseph Gavorse, The Lives of the Twelve Caesars (New York: Modern Library, 1931).
Long service in Washington at the court of power: Theodore H. White, The Making of the President, 1960 (New York: Harper Perennial, 2009).
isn’t worth a warm bucket of piss: Attributed to John “Cactus Jack” Nance Garner, https://www.politico.com/gallery/2012/08/11-insults-about-being-vice-president/000342-004455.html.
Who’s the man to see?: Theodore H. White, The Making of the President, 1960.
Business—in the Roman Senate—could be interrupted or postponed: The Lives of the Twelve Caesars.
Robert Moses was the optimist of optimists: Robert Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (New York: Vintage Books, 1975).
only the people, voting at the polls: Theodore H. White, The Making of the President, 1960.
This world is not enough: José Esteban Muñoz, Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity (New York: New York University Press, 2009).
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Casey Gerald grew up in Oak Cliff, Texas, and went to Yale, where he majored in political science and played varsity football. After receiving an MBA from Harvard Business School, he cofounded MBAs Across America. He has been featured on MSNBC, at TED and SXSW, on the cover of Fast Company, and in The New York Times, Financial Times, and The Guardian, among others.
* A 1980s covert CIA operation, supported by Texas Congressman Charlie Wilson, aimed at helping jihadists defeat the Soviets in Afghanistan; an operation, you might have guessed, that muddied our moral high ground in Afghanistan two decades later.
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