Token Negro

I remember standing outside a bar, way downtown in alphabet city. It's around Christmas time and I'm on my way home after a long day of drinking.

I'm exhausted. Not so much from the whiskey I pounded all day. Oh no, it was the exercise of staying patient with folks who tacitly, yet insistently, kept telling me “you don't belong."

I'll give you and example. In the afternoon session of the holiday party, a young man whom I hadn't seen in some years approached me. The holiday party serves as a sort of reunion of sorts, and we are genuinely happy to see one another. A few moments of smalltalk reveals that he was in finance, like so many of the alumna of this group of people, and he ruefully adds that on this Saturday, two days before Christmas Eve, he actually has return to work. I give him the appropriate condolences, and yuk it up, saying that his bonus would more than make up for the inconvenience.

After a few laughs, and swigs of our respective drinks, we're out of things to say. As I go to excuse myself to get some of the fried food across the room (and ditch what was becoming and awkward exchange), my old friend launches himself into a joke.

My addled brain really isn't listening to the set up. Something about Helen Keller somehow gaining the ability to see. It's cumbersomely told, and by the end of it, a few other alumna of the organization have joined our “discussion."

The joke ended with Helen Keller saying something like “ I'm black, the world's black, everything's black, I HATE BLACK!"

Some folks laughed, believing the joke to be genuinely funny. Others laughed because of the terrible way that the joke was delivered. Oh Billy.

“That's fucking racist," I hear myself say, as the guffaws around me hit as nervous pitch. They can't tell if I'm joking or if I'm truly outraged.

My old friend smiles in his aloof manner and begins telling the joke again, as though in the second telling, I'll more clearly see that the joke is alright.

He misses the point. The setup is immaterial. Its his conclusion that is a kick to the stomach.  Somehow, the joke equates being blind to seeing everything in black, which we're given to understand, would be TERRIBLE.

The takeaway: even individuals who have never seen color know that black is ugly or somehow awful. “I HATE black!"

Somehow I untangled myself from that conversation, that afternoon. I knew that they believed that, as usual, I had taken a perfectly reasonable conversation and distorted it into a racial “thing." My reputation as a racial rabble rouser preceded me.

These sorts of incidents peppered the afternoon and evening. As I begin to walk away from the bar, I'm called back my wirey fellow.

“Hey man," says that the kid, smoking a cigarette and unabashedly drinking a beer outside. I knew this man when he was a little boy. Though I haven't seen him in years,  I know he's gained a reputation for partying hard.

“Leaving kinda early, huh?"

I was drunk and annoyed. I wanted him to be absolutely clear that I  wasn't leaving because I lacked the capacity to have fun. I wanted him to understand that for hours that I HAD been at the party, I had endured the weight of tokenism, and that I had stayed well longer than I should.

“I hate white people," I say descriptively.

At that moment, I did.

Maybe Tomorrow

All I can think of is the woman's delicate features. Her petite little body with a hint of birthday cake caboose. With her striking auburn hair, that curls gently to her shoulders. That porcelain face that looks as though its been carved out of tinted ivory. Her soft golden eyes that stare ever vacantly into the soft netherlands of space and place and race.

She's a teenager, or maybe she's just barely 20, and she's got the whole world in front of her and the whole world behind. She stares out the window of the bx1 bus winding its way slowly along the Grand Concourse, her expression as dead as the lifeless trees that line the street on this morning in late fall.

Why does she look so empty, I wonder to myself. Why is she so sad? Does she have a grandmother sick? The one who took her in when her mother sent her to live here in the United States when she was only 14? 

Grandma. The person who had coached her through those difficult high school days when she had struggled with English, and dreaded the humiliation of getting made fun on account of her accent.

Grandma. Abuela. Who reminded her that she had come to the country alone, with no one to cry to. Working 13 hours shifts in the hospital laundry, making pennies. Who had lived a roach infested apartment building, in a 2 room apartment with 7 exhausted bodies.

Grandma. Abuela. Tata. Who had left her family in the DR when her children were still in grade school, to forge her own path in the United States. Who didn't care about what the parents of her dead husband said, when they screamed that she was abandoning her children just at the time when they had lost their father. Who did what she had to do in partly to support the whole family, and partly for her own sanity.

She would never call herself a feminist, but she was fiercely independent. She did only what she wanted. She visited the DR often, but never enough, and knew that her children were growing up, supported by her dollars, but without her guidance. She owned this fact, but never questioned her decision. When she'd gotten a chance to raise the child of one of her children, she did not blink, for she knew that the had neglected her own. 

Maybe this girl on the bus seems dead because her Tata has cancer. Perhaps she's smoked Lucky Strike cigarettes her whole life, and, at 65, the effects are finally making themselves known. Maybe the vacancy registering on the young girl's face is bewildered shock. 

Yes. Yes. Or. 

It could be the boyfriend that's making her grim.

 He's probably a massive guy, with an authoritative swagger. Maybe he was a football player in high school, or something. That's probably where they met, right after a game she'd come to with her friends. Maybe she had been a senior then, and he only a bold sophomore. Perhaps she was still self conscious about her English, but she had an idea of her beauty because she can feel the eyes that constantly stare at her. The truth is, she probably knew for awhile that men looked at her. Maybe this boy was the first one to make a move. After the game? Near the bleachers? After Dark? Cool fall breeze, and the smell of distant halal food from a cart wafting towards them?   I can see them, her and him, exploring each other's every nook and cranny, in a fit of jagged ecstasy. 

 Maybe she was happy when the first started off all those months or years ago. Maybe she'd even laughed when she was with him. Perhaps, though, the same thing that happened there that probably happened to her everywhere: she got bored. 

Boredom. Dull, drab, nothing-going-on-dom. Ugh, gray, everything-the-same-dom.

 Is that why her delicately rouged lips are always pursed in a lifeless expression. She probably works.  That's where she's going this morning on this bus. Or, maybe she's off to the community college. It strikes me that Tata probably wants her in school. She has always been a stickler on education, and also thinks that school is a great place to meet people. She likely encourages her grand-daughter to be more social.

  I can't imagine this little woman partying, but she probably does, sometimes.  She drinks a little, and she doesn't mind smoking weed. She never overdoes it though, ever. She probably goes with her hulking boyfriend, and turns the other way when he cheats on her right in front of her. She knows, as she's always known, perhaps, but it just doesn't matter. 

 Well, here she is, standing up to depart the bus, staring ahead with those priceless eyes, those eyes that say there's nothing inside. 

When she walks by me, I want to scream. 

"CAN YOU SEE  ALL THE FACES THAT PASS YOU BY?  DID YOU EVER KNOW THE PLEASURE OF DAWN'S FIRST LIGHT?   WHEN YOU WERE A GIRL, DID YOU DREAM OF PRINCESS? OF CASTLES AND KNIGHTS, AND DASHING PRINCES? SMILE, CHICA, SMILE PLEASE, LIFE'S TOO SHORT, TO LOOK SO MEAN!"

In my mind, everything rhymes but I know that what I have to say is too nuanced for all that. Maybe tomorrow I'll find the words that will matter. Maybe then I'll let her know.  

HARDER BETTER FASTER STRONGER

There is no substitute for patient, diligent, good old fashioned hard work. Watching Marlene twist my hair back and forth, spending countless hours at her art, the entire time on her feet, I marvel how often this lesson is lost on me. Twisting and retwisting, constantly readjusting, heedless of the time, she's obviously working for the sake of quality, not for the convenience of efficiency.

Her snail's pace got me thinking about the premium I've placed on efficiency in my life:

In third grade, I was proud that I had mastered my times tables and would beam when it was announced that I was among the speediest multipliers in the entire grade. There were others who had gotten the problems right, but none had done it with such blazing accuracy.

In high school and college, I routinely finished essay based exams with time to spare, and I pompously left the test sites with a smug grin.

Of course, where I was slow in execution, I assumed I lacked aptitude. I remember doing calculus problems at the beginning of senior of high school and realizing that I was always the last person to complete assignments. My confidence plummeted, not because I got wrong answers, but because, I was slower than my classmates, and therefore a weak math student."

Life in the real would has not been different from my school days. As a 24 year old intern at Sony, the name of the game was handling and prioritizing tasks from a list of 300,000 things that had to be completed, and then, like a sniper, shooting them down with pin point accuracy and acuity. I remember that I would often arrive to the job a full 45 minutes early to do battle with the copy machines, and have the 600 pages printed well before any executive walked in (the 600 page figure is not an exaggeration. They ate up massive quantities of paper over on Madison Ave.). I wanted to give the appearance that I could fly through anything, and do so with superior accuracy.

Even in quotidian matters I demand speedy execution. I want faster internet, cell service, and Wi-Fi. I insist that the subway arrive sooner than its made to arrive, and when I finally get on, I insist that it get to where I need to go with dizzying speed. FASTER, I frantically mutter to myself as the east side trains inch along during rush hour, FASTER!!!!!!!

And yet there was Marlene, and her slow, meticulous fingers. Committed to craft. Invested in style. Pulling my hair with gentle firmness that makes my scalp sing in pain. Her attention to detail, immaculate. By the fifth hour that I had been in the chair, I wanted to scream. But when she finally released me to the care of a hair dryer I knew the magic she had worked. Another stylist would have had me out an hour before. But I surely wouldn't have been so beautiful.

Twisted Locks

"You look sick, " said Marlo, with  perfect West Indian bluntness.

"Why you look like that?"

As she looked up and down the haggard face of her twenty-something son, she clucked her tongue in disapproval.

The whole time she spoke, her fingers flew, dexterously pulling strands from her client's stubbornly nappy  hair, retwisting the new strands of growth into beautiful locks.

"I'm fine Ma," Justice said wearily,  stifling a massive yawn.

Normally, he went directly from his job as a writing assistant at Hunter college, to the apartment he shared with his college buddies, down near 14th street. This morning, though, his mother had whined at him in a phone message that, saying that he absolutely  had to  come see her, and that she would be off work at 5.

The truth was, Justice hadn't visited his mother since he had been obligated to go to the apartment he'd grown up in way out in Flatbush for Christmas.

Then, she had ranted and raved that he hadn't brought home his girlfriend, and chastised him for dating a white girl.

He had protested that his girlfriend had had to go home to Puerto Rico (and that she was not white but Latina) , and he complained that she needed to stop stalking him on Facebook.

He had left immediately after Christmas dinner, and ignored the numerous messages his mother had left on his phone. He'd been fed up.

It wasn't until February that he even brought himself to listening to messages she left thrice a day, and he ruefully observed that she had started coughing violently in long drawn out messages. She never explicitly stated that she was dying but used a worn, frayed voice to complain about "grandchildren whom she would surely never know." Eventually, her histrionics had winnowed down his resolve to avoid her.

Now, as he saw his mother looking fresh as an ox, he could barely contain his annoyance.

He WAS exhausted,  having graded 82 written midterms over the course of the week, and his patience was very low.  He had been told she would be done at 5, but he could see that is mother had just started on someone's hair and wouldn't be done for another several hours. 

"I'm gonna go Ma," Justice said, already turning to leave.

"That's my son" Marlo cooed sweetly,  the young man in the chair, "he don't have no time for his mother."

"Ma,-" Justice began,  but he was immediately cut off by older woman talking to her client.

"Noooo time for his little ole mama. A shame shame shame!"

She aggressively yanked the client's hair at every "shame," causing him to wince in pain.  The scene in front of him was immensely more uncomfortable, however, he made sure not to cry out so as to remain inconspicuous.

Justice was half way out the door, when she barked at him, with a combination of venom and despair.

"WILL I AT LEAST BE INVITED TO THE WEDDING?!!!!"

The door slammed with a thud.

Justice took a deep breath as he stepped into the bright late spring sun  and he could feel that summer wasn't far off. He could feel his whole body relax.

He silently cursed his buddy for posting the video of his proposal to Rosa, and cursed himself for not having unfriended is mother on Facebook.  He'd wanted tell his Ma that he was getting married delicately, in a manner that wouldn't send her perpetual anger  spiking.

He knew that she expected to be consulted on the matter. However, he also knew that whatever his choice was, she'd never be happy with it and had long ago stopped trying to please her.

While he could not articulate it, Justice intrinsically understood that his mother took out the woes she'd had with men on her him. She'd been abandoned by Justice's father and step father alike because they too knew that her bitterness was boundless.

The young man chuckled sadly to himself as he descended the stairs to the 6 train. She had unwittingly pushed away the only man who she had left in her life, he thought. She was so alone.

Sage and the Collared Shirt

It was an average day outside. Sixty-three degrees and partly cloudy, with light variable winds out of the southwest, and a 30 percent chance of rain after 3pm. Sage knew these things about the weather because his grandma always kept the news on at the apartment. He liked the weather.

Yes, it was an average day outside. Sage waited for the the BX 1 to arrive to take him from 185th street, where he went to Central Middle School, back over to his grandmama's house in Mott Haven.

The bus arrived in average fashion, about 10 minutes behind schedule. He climbed on, slid his student metro card through the slot, and picked a seat in the area that he usually sat, in the middle part of the bus, on the driver's side.

In terms of distance, he wasn't traveling very far, but the bus always took it's sweet time. Always there was someone racing after the hulking mass of public transportation, and the stories folks had for why they lacked the fare or metrocard to pay their way were always long winded and entertaining.

Today, Sage spent most of his time on the bus, staring at the sky over the small office and apartment buildings that dotted either side of the Bronx thoroughfare. He wondered if the 30 percent chance of showers had been a bit of an underestimate, as he could see thick storm clouds way off to South. A storm was brewing for sure.

At 149th street, the boy got off the bus and headed east toward Lincoln Hospital. Manny, the who ran the food cart outside of the hospital entrance, was always kind to him, and sometimes gave him a quarter off the hot pretzels he sold. The man seemed to have an unusual knack for telling the weather too, and Sage was interested to see what he thought of today's forecast.  He was almost certain that his suspicion about the impending storm would be confirmed.

As he made his way down the the slope that that exists between Grand Concourse and Lincoln Avenue, he passed an average sort of folk. Hospital technicians and staff smoking cigarettes on break. Men with missing teeth, teetering the side of serious drunkenness  calling out for anything so that they could buy a cup of "coffee."  Young men and women heading up and down the avenue, going to and coming from the local community college.

To Sage, the 4pm hour in the Bronx was never more alive than it was on days like this. He whistled a tune that he liked from the radio, and made his way eagerly down the hill, anxious for his salty, doughy snack.

At the cart,  the average nature of his average day was shaken. Instead of Manny, a tall white gentleman stood behind the cart. He wore a tuxedo, and his face looked pinched from years of screwing up his face at mediocrity. As Sage approached, he could feel the man's eyes move up and down, appraisingly. From the outset, the boy could tell that the man didn't like what he saw.

"Excuse me," Sage said in his shy manner, "can I git the pretzel?"

The man coughed condescendingly, and shook his head from side to side. He did not even so much as glance at the hot pretzels next to him.

Sage felt himself blushing, and he wasn't sure if the man could hear him.

"Can I git the pretzel?" he said again, more loudly.

This time, the man in the tuxedo seemed to wince, and his pinched face became wracked in obvious displeasure.

"Young man," said he in the cart, "in order to patronize this cart, you must wear a collared shirt. And besides, sneakers and sweatpants certainly won't due."

Sage was confused. For one thing, he did not know what  the word  "patronize" meant, but he was certain that whatever it was, he was being insulted. And what was so wrong about his outfit? He'd never been told about his clothes before.

He knew that he would look foolish to ask again for his snack, and he felt even more embarrassed as the man behind the cart now looked passed him as though he were invisible. With a last uneasy look at the cart, he trudged away back toward his Grandma's apartment, his gait noticeably more labored.  In the distance, he could hear a low rumble of thunder, and a single rain drop struck his head.  Story gentrification had begun.

NIKE

The shoes that had been gifted to him had quite obviously seen better days. They were vaguely orange, with dark splotches here and there from years of exposure to the elements.  Nike swoshes appeared on either side of each sneaker, as though even deterioration could not thwart the power of branding.

He wasn't enthusiastic about the donation  he'd received on the corner of 96th and Lexington. No, he hadn't really been happy it all. His blackened bare feet had longed developed calluses that could withstand subarctic temperatures with relative ease.

In fact, he was proud of his lower extremities.  It was on them that  he had walked from Philly to New York in three days, when his brother had expelled him from the house.

"You can't stay here no more " Robert had said to him somberly, one morning in early January, some years ago. "My wife has had enough of your carrying on and such. "

He hadn't said anything. Without putting on a jacket or grabbing any of his personal articles, he'd simply walked out of the house, barefoot, and and walked northeast.

He wasn't sure why he'd picked that direction. Maybe it was because the Amtrak train tracks ran adjacent to his brother's place in Germatown and he'd been sure that he could travel a good ways without being seen.

That had been two years ago,  and he enjoyed telling the story to anybody on the street who would listen. In his retelling he always left out the part about how as he walked out of the house, he HAD in fact made sure to grab two  things: his flask of Jamieson and his flask of Bacardi.  He also neglected to discuss how he had somehow abandoned the tracks just north of Levitown, PA,  and hitched a ride all the way to New York. Ah... these details he kept to himself; depending on the day these particularities were lost even to himself.

As he stared at the shoes he'd been given, he began to become a little angry. He hadn't been holding doors open at the Associated Grocery Store so as to gain shoes; what he needed was money for his essentials! A small handle of Jack Daniels would do just fine.

"NOOOOOOO" he shouted to the next customer as she walked in and disregarded the open door that he dutifully held open. He could not remember who had given him the old sneakers, or when during the day he had even received them. It could have been an hour ago...it could have been days.

Whatever the time,  he felt his rage converge on this petite shopper who just passed by him by. With a guteral scream, he flung the shoes at her head with all his might.

The woman, who could not have weighed more than 110 pounds, fell heavily to the ground and several shoppers nearby screamed. Someone called out for ambulance as blood began to tricke from the back of her head.

The man felt a little sorry as he raced away toward nowhere in particular on his feet of the earth. He supposed it didn't matter where he went next.  He'd asserted his agency and that felt pretty fucking good.

Golden Slippers

That night he had the same old dream.  Of the thick brunette girl with pursed lips sitting up, waiting for him to come home from his first job in the afternoon.  In this instalment she wore a huge State U t-shirt and golden slippers.  They were actually solid metal through and through he knew because in the dream she had barely been able to lift her legs.

Beneath the T-shirt she was quite obviously naked. Her hard nipples pressed up against the thin fabric of her shirt,  inviting him to touch them. With effort, she spread her legs wide and, began to begin a kinky gyration on his bed. She licked her lips suggestively and her hazel eyes bore through him.

He didn't remember having taken off his clothes but in an instant he too was naked. His insecurity about his tiny stature and puny equipment was off his mind for once, and his olfactory sense was overwhelmed with the smell of sex. He was particularly turned on by the fact that she was essentially chained by her golden slippers, though somewhere in his mind he was vaguely repulsed by himself.

Needless to say he ravished her, this way and that,  over and over and over again. She didn't seem to have the capacity to make noise but he could tell from her expression that she orgasimed at least thrice. He was a sexual God.

When his phone rang that morning to signify the beginning of another meaningless day on his shift at the  University bookstore and then class, he found that his boxers were utterly soiled. Grunting,  he pulled himself out of bed and headed towards the bathroom. He had to piss, badly.

As he showered that morning, he felt himself get hard as he contemplated the dream. He found it somewhat ironic that even though he was a gender studies master's student,  his  fantasies trended toward the chauvinist. Technically,  his research focused on womanism, that African American brand of feminism, and yet his subconscious was so deviant.

 In principle,  he preferred black woman to white woman (and golden Latinas above everybody) but his wet dreams were stubbornly fixated on this singular white girl.

Who was she? What did she mean to him? Was he a complete hypocrite? 

He rolled out of the shower, and dressed himself quickly, grabbing his massive backback. He would have to read some serious bel hooks today to atone for his sinful thoughts. 

That's What Friends Are For

Sam, a young man in his early 30s sits alone at a bar that is mostly empty. He is in a suit and has clearly come from a corporate job. He sips a gin and tonic and stares at the television screen behind the bar. Suddenly, Malik, a rail thin, immaculately dressed man in a fabulous pea coat and boots walks into the bar. He signals to the bartender who stands at the far end of the bar. As he sits at a stool directly to the left of Sam, his  drink (a long island iced tea) is brought forth; clearly it had been prepared in advance.

SAM: You owe me.

MALIK: For what?

SAM: The game last week. You and ur friend said the Knicks were gonna      get crushed.

MALIK: Aww--

SAM: Aww nothin.

MALIK: You the one making all that lawyer money, shit! Plus, you're drinking one already!

SAM: Well then get my next one.

MALIK: (not convincingly) Oook, fine.

Sam laughs

SAM: Cheers!

MALIK: Salud!

The two clink glasses and drink. This after work drink is  something of a ritual for them.

MALIK: (haltingly) Hey... speaking of my buddy...  what happened that night after I went home ?  I mean he won't call me back, and he won't answer my texts.

SAM: I dunno. He was cool when he left.

MALIK: Yea?

SAM: Yea man.

MALIK: You didn't get him fucked up or nothin.

SAM: Oh come on-

MALIK: Seriously. I mean he wasn't crazy drunk was he?

SAM: Malik, he's a grown ass man.

MALIK: He's 22.

SAM: Which is plenty grown!

MALIK: He's a baby.

SAM: He's old enough to know his limits.

MALIK: And young enough to be pushed into ANYTHING. I know how you can talk people into drinking more than they should.

SAM: Excuse you?

Malik lets it drop for a moment and sips his cocktail, readying himself for his next offensive.

MALIK: How bad was he?

SAM: He was FINE!

MALIK: Fine like 'fine fine', or fine like 'oh shit' fine.

SAM: (chucking) Man, when you're done with the whole starving artist/ teacher bit, you should consider law school. You're better than most prosecutors, trust me.

MALIK: Please, just answer the question.

SAM: He had a few drinks and and left!  I don't know what he did after that.

The two sit in silence for a moment; Malik eyes his friend suspiciously.

MALIK: Him mom called me that night.

SAM: His MOM?!

MALIK: Well, I WAS once his tutor.

SAM: I thought that was when he was in middle school.

MALIK: Yea, well, I helped him out a few times after that too.

SAM: (sarcastic) The gift that keeps on giving, huh.

MALIK:(accusingly) At 2am he still wasn't home.

SAM: (finally peeved) Look, imma tell you this one good time. YOU were the one who brought the him that night.  Before then,  I obviously had never met him before! If you were trying to babysit him to make sure he got home to mommy, maybe you shoulda PERSONALLY seen to it that he made it there.

MALIK: Woah woah, chill.

SAM: I'm just saying,  I don't understand why we're pretending this ADULT is 5 years old.

MALIK: Well it's...he's just someone I care about OK?

SAM: (mimicking Malik from earlier with sexual emphasis) Someone you care about care about,  or someone you just care about?

MALIK: You're disgusting.

SAM: Am I?

MALIK: He's a former student.

SAM: So?

MALIK: You're joking.

SAM:(exasperated by the game). I didn't do nothin with him, if that's what  you're fishing for. I'm not into white guys anyway.

MALIK: Hey, no I wasn't suggesting-I just want to see how he is!

SAM: Mmhm.

MALIK: Seriously! I just think its weird that he disappeared so crazily that night,  just totally off the radar.

Beat.

SAM: (syrupy) So...you wanna know...if something HAPPENED that night.

MALIK: (wary) Uh. Yea.

SAM: (overly cheery) Well, why didn't you just SAY that!

MALIK: I did...

SAM: No you didn't.

MALIK: What are we talking about?

SAM: The kid you tutored.

MALIK: Sam-

SAM: There was a girl.

MALIK: That night?

SAM: Yea man. At the bar. After you left.

MALIK: I see.

SAM: Do you?

MALIK: I...yea....was she cute?

SAM: He thought so, he bought her a drink.

MALIK: (noticeably deflated) Oh.

SAM: Yup.

MALIK: Did he seem...I dunno ...excited?

SAM: (sly) Excited, how?

MALIK: No, not like that, Ugh. Never mind.

SAM: OK.

MALIK: OK.

Long beat

SAM: You gonna ask it?

MALIK: Ask what?

SAM: They left together.

MALIK: (almost shouting) You're making it up.

SAM: I swear to God.

MALIK: Then why didn't you say so before?!

SAM: Damn man, you really WERE looking to score!

MALIK: It ain't like that!

SAM: It is!

MALIK: You're trying to piss me off.

SAM: Would it piss you off if he got some pussy?

MALIK: Of course not!

SAM: (mimicking with feigned) Of course not!

MALIK: You're a dick sometimes, you know that?

SAM: Just doin' my job. Are we done talking about your potential boy toy?

MALIK: I'm leaving.

SAM: You owe me a drink!

MALIK: Fuck you!

SAM: Come on don't be like that.

MALIK: I'm tired.

SAM: You're horny.

MALIK: (resigned) Just...just shut up OK? For once would you not say the thing that's at the top of your head? Thanks.

SAM: (laughing kindly) OK Malik, OK. But what kinda friend would I be then?

The Devil In Me

It I is said that I was born on a Sunday in September where it rained so hard that some car windshields were smashed, but I think that that's probably a bit of inebriated hyperbole, perpetrated by one Ms. Rolands.

By all accounts, it had indeed been a Sunday, and my mother had been where she normally was on a Sunday afternoon, singing with the Christ Redeemer AME Church, our little store front church at 140th and Cordlandt Avenue. The before mentioned Ms. Rolands had been slurring out her alto part in the hymn “Were you there" when my mother apparently broke forth screaming that she was convulsing with the holy spirit, eventually accosting the terrified Ms. Rolands with balled fists.  (Again, this hyperbole was egregious on all counts as it is said that  my mother quietly and inconspicuously tapped Mrs. Rolands on the shoulder and asked  to get by her.

No one disputes that the Reverend Candies (yes, that's ACTUALLY his name) had been railing about eternal damnation,  and the pit of fire that was sure to consume "so ah,  so, ah ah, so many of this here congregation, yassah."

Let me take a moment to address Rev. Candies' speech, as it is something that Ms. Rolands was fixated on. At one time, his particular vocal tic in saying "ah" had been one that he had intentionally invested in for the purpose of sounding what he believed to be scholarly. Eventually, however,  the ism had turned into something of a real stutter,  of which he was immensely proud. When he was saying something of particular merit,  he could "ah" for minutes at a time before concluding his point.

That morning, as my mother ambled by Ms. Rolands, Reverend Candies' sermon had been littered with "ahs" and his sermon had been rather directed  In fact, one might say that his message had been somewhat pointed during the entire season of my mother's pregnancy. The store front church being what it was, it was no secret that the Reverend had a, how shall we say, insatiable thirst for those of the (ah) "weaker sex" with a (ah ah ah ah ah ah ) pious disposition. That is to say, when young, quiet Jesus-seeking women entered into his flock, he could not help but tend to them--- personally.

I can only imagine my shy, petite mama, joining up the church having just come from Tortola,  British Virgin Islands.  Her manners were perfectly British, and I can almost see her big brown eyes taking in the Bronx.

I've often asked myself why my mother chose the Bronx.  She worked as a bank teller was all the way downtown, near the world trade center, and she must have had quite a commute. In the 80s, when she'd arrived,  I imagine that there were parts of Harlem that would have been safer than Mott Haven,  the southernmost part of the Bronx. Most of her other relatives who lived in the states either lived in Brooklyn or East Harlem. Perhaps she moved to the converted warehouse building in the South Bronx because there was no lease and she didn't need proof of employment.  She had somehow found two roommates, and made do.

Whatever it was, she'd made the church the center of her life,  going to all services. (Sunday, Monday,  Wednesday,  Friday, and Saturday). Ms. Rolands says that it's precisely this fact that caused a misunderstanding between the Rev and my mother.  Reverend Candies thought my mother came for the powerful and (ah) undeniable SPIRITUAL magnitude that (ah) young women were often fond of (ah ah) receiving from him. On numerous occasions, he had entreated her to join him for one-on-one bible study at his home, only a few blocks from the church, and she had quietly refused. When he became desperate that she wasn't understanding his meaning, he'd  asked her on a date directly, apparently to dinner at some pizza joint on 149th street. She'd hemmed and hawwed the way my mother was wont to do, but in the end it was clear: the answer was no.

According to Ms. Rolands, "God is a jealous God, but wasn't nobody more jealous than Rev. Candies." You must imagine, therefore,  that it was with great agitation that Reverend Candies received news that his most prized sheep was pregnant. For one thing, the young woman spent so much time in church, that he could not fathom when she would have had time for such "Satanic absurdities." Moreover, he had assumed that he had been making inroads with this little lamb, as she had almost smiled at him at the Wednesday Friday services.  

 When she later rebuffed his extraordinarily magnanimous gesture of taking her as a wife so that she could avoid utter shame, his incredulity cemented into bitterness. His sermons took on a glistening edge, and all he could preach about, for several months straight, was the evil and snake-like trickery of woman.  Ms. Rolands says that it was hard to stand the man during that time, but hell, it was their church, and they weren't about to abandon it. 

  I should take a moment to a apologize, for I do ramble so. It was the my BIRTH we were discussing, and it is the birth we have finally come to. My mother inched her way by Ms. Peterson, and began to trudge toward the back of the church.  Several watchful eyes noticed that she seemed unstable, and Elder Dinkins (possibly one of the only members of the church who was ever openly critical of Rev. Candies, but that's another tale) immediately bolted forward, as my mother sank to her knees.

"REPENT THY SINFUL EVIL WOMAN! RENOUNCE THE SIN OF TEMPTATION YOU HAVE INDELIBLY REVELED IN! REPEND THY PRIDE IN REJECTING THE LORD'S CARING AND TRUSTING HANDS" shouted a delighted Reverend Candies, who, according to Ms. Peterson, didn't seem to have a clue that the young woman had hit her time. He assumed that she was actually submitting to his withering torment. 

The choir had ominously swollen to a fever pitch in their hymn, the 8 sopranos screeching 

"WERE YOU THERE WHEN THEY STRUNG HIM FROM THE TREE?

WERE YOU THERE WHEN THEY STRUNG HIM FROM THE TREE?

OOOH, OOH OH OH! SOMETIMES IT CAUSES ME TO TREMBLE. TREMBLE, TREMBLE.

WHERE YOU THERE WHEN THE STRUNG HIM FROM THE TREE?" 

When my mother began to call out, several members of the choir raced to Elder Dinkins' side.

Suddenly, the lights of the church began to flicker on and off, and the very ground trembled. Rain thrashed the little edifice, and rolling thunder shook the place to its core.

After a moment, though, the earth stood still, and the wind calmed. The lights steadied, and the choir silenced. 

"It's a BOY!" Elder Dinkins cried, and the woman began cooing. 

Almost concurrently, however, a shriek went out from the choir.  The Reverend toppled over the front end of his rostrum, and fell to the ground. 

He was dead.

My first victim claimed and I was not yet a minute old.