Beyond Poetry

by Nathan Jarelle

  From the car window, Junior stared back at Casey, forgetting to greet his mother. Sandy looked over at Casey standing on the staircase and back at Junior.

  “Earth to Junior. Are you in there?” she laughed.

  “Sorry Ma,” he said before leaning over to kiss her on the cheek. The last kiss Sandy got from her son was on his twelfth birthday. “OK?!” she laughed, looking down at the pizza and bottle of Coca-Cola in his lap. “So, what’s all this? And who’s the white girl? Where’d you get the pizza? Is she your girlfriend?”

  “No, Ma!” He felt himself blush. “That’s Mr. Levy’s secretary, Casey. She’s…just a friend.”

  “Mmmhmm,” Sandy teased playfully. “Well, she must be some kind of friend to know that you love Domino’s, Junior. Ooh, wait until I tell Leonard what I saw today! Junior got a girlfriend!”

  “Maaaan,” Junior pulled his hoodie onto his head. “Just drive the car, Ma. Dang.”

  I don’t know yet if it’s love I feel,

  But when I think of you,

  you’re the sun that lights my little dark world.

  —LEONARD G. ROBINSON JR.

  Five

  When Junior arrived at Medgar the next day, his energy from the day before shriveled. He fell back into a shell of himself. When Sandy dropped him off that morning, suddenly there were school buses, cars, and sidewalks loaded with students and faculty unlike the day before. With his shoulders slumped forward, he trudged out of Sandy’s car with his head down, prompting her to roll down the window and yell at him.

  “Pick your head up!” she barked. “Act like you got a good momma and daddy!”

  As Junior ascended the staircase up to Medgar, he passed by the colorful mural of the school’s namesake, Medgar Evers, and saw the dice shooters his mother had tormented the day before. Junior passed by the group of boys using his arm to shield his face.

  Once inside, Junior stopped by the main office and spotted Casey and Mr. Levy’s silhouettes arguing through the office blinds. They cussed at one another the way Junior’s parents fought at home, raising their voices at each other. Mr. Levy called Casey immature and fat, and Casey made fun of his eczema, suggesting he buy new hands. Soon after, she emerged into the hallway to see Junior standing there and her expression softened to him.

  “Junior! Hey!” she snickered. “You didn’t hear any of that, right?”

  “Well, I uh…” he began. “Nah, I didn’t hear anything. I got the journals, though.”

  “Great,” Casey said. Reaching into her bag, she handed Junior back his tape. “Here’s your 2pac tape back. Thanks for letting me borrow it. Man, I listened to it all night.”

  Junior followed Casey into the nearest stairwell. Along the way, she praised him for his poetic genius from the other day and asked to read more of his work. Junior obliged her with two of his oldest journals from the previous year. Together, the two sat on the staircase in the corner, ignoring the army of rushing feet passing beside them. As Casey turned each page, Junior gave his state of mind with each writing.

  It’s your own fault. You hurt you.

  LEONARD G. ROBINSON JR.

  “Man, I was fuck – messed up when I wrote that,” he said. “We’d just moved down from Crawford, and I didn’t know anybody in South Philly, Casey.”

  “It’s OK, you can cuss. Only to me, though,” she told him. “Our little secret. But with everyone else, you have to be respectful. We good?”

  “For sure.” Junior smiled. “So, yeah, I was fucked up when we got to South Philly.”

  “Mmmhmm.” Casey nodded as she turned through his journal.

  People treat love like a winter coat.

  Put you on one season. Take you off for this or that reason.

  Pack you inside a box. Shove you in the back

  of a closet until they need you again.

  I’m not a coat or a jacket that you zip and unzip.

  My love is year-round.

  LEONARD G. ROBINSON JR.

  “So, I was watching this show on TV,” he explained. “It’s just crazy how people play with love like it’s a toy, you know? Like a ball to be tossed around, but it’s not!”

  “Right.” She nodded again, looking over his book.

  As Junior waited on Casey to finish, he became nervous and chatty, wondering if his new friend really enjoyed his poetry or was just being nice. With each passing poem, Junior had an explanation – much like he did at home whenever Senior got on him. Senior was always on his case about something. He cut the grass too short. He ate too much. He used up all the detergent. Some days at home, it felt like Junior couldn’t win. But with Casey, the mood was new. With just barely a day under his belt, Junior felt as if he’d known Casey all his life. He was at her heels, waiting on her validation as she read through his book. As the bell sounded for the first period, Casey handed Junior back his two journals.

  “Whew, child!” she said. “So, you’re on the fourth-floor. You got Mrs. Hawkins in 454. C’mon, I’ll walk you up.”

  “What’s Mrs. Hawkins like?” he asked. “She pretty?”

  Casey rolled her eyes.

  “Sorry, J.,” she laughed. “Ain’t no Halle Berry or Toni Braxton waitin’ on you in 454.”

  “Shiiit,” said Junior. “Man, how come I always get Jurassic Park?”

  On the way to Mrs. Hawkins’s class, Junior surveyed the students at Medgar, looking away as they made eye contact with him as if he was the newest inmate. Meanwhile, as curious girls popped on Now and Later candy, some of the boys sized up Junior, unsure of what to make of him.

  “Why is everybody looking at me?” he asked.

  “You’re a new face,” she told him. “This isn’t like a regular school. Everybody here knows everybody. It’s like a small town. Look J., Mrs. Hawkins is a little weird, OK? So, just try not to get on her bad side. You should be fine.”

  Junior looked down the hall to see an old, fish-eyed woman looking back at him with contempt, ready to devour him the moment he got close enough.

  “I feel like I’m already on Mrs. Hawkins’s bad side, and I haven’t even walked in.”

  Unlike Franklin High, the students at Medgar spent the day in one classroom. There were no varsity or junior-varsity sports at Medgar. The only exception was gym class. Although Medgar’s population was scarce, its student body, by all accounts, was considered the worst of the worst: Philly’s rejects – the “hard-to-learn” and “most-likely-to-end-up-in-jail-or-dead” students.

  As the bell sounded, signaling the start of first period, Junior waved goodbye to Casey and attempted to enter Mrs. Hawkins’s classroom. With a palm to his chest, he was stopped at the door by his new teacher.

  “Do I know you?” she asked him. “You one of mine?”

  “Yes ma’am,” he answered. “I was told room 454? Are you Mrs. Hawkins?”

  Mrs. Hawkins, an older black lady with crooked makeup, grunted at Junior with a wicked scowl on her face.

  “Well, go’on in!” she snapped. “Next time, I’m gonna mark you down as late!”

  As Junior entered the room, Mrs. Hawkins followed behind him, cutting her eyes at him the entire way. When she asked him for his full name, Junior gave the woman his government name before asking to be called Junior. She then sneered at him and went on to introduce Junior to the class as Leonard.

  “Now, go sit down!” She pointed to a chair at the front. “Call you what I want to call you.”

  Mrs. Hawkins didn’t waste any time setting the record straight with Junior. Stunned by her candor, Junior took to his seat in the front row and didn’t cough.

  Mrs. Hawkins’s class had a total of twelve kids: seven Blacks, three Puerto-Ricans, and two white students (a boy and a girl). She treated the whites like gold and the other ten children like escaped animals from the city zoo. Often, she’d play the reverse-racism card, showing favoritism to her white students while condemning her minority students for minor infractions. She started and ended her day with bookwork and sn
apped when the students had questions. During math, she told one kid to go to hell and called another classmate a “jezebel”. The only time Mrs. Hawkins even appeared approachable was when she discussed her bible, sitting on top of her desk. Even then, she likened the characters from her “good book” to the students in room 454 and did not quarrel with calling the kids “dogs” or “devils”. According to Junior’s classmates, Mr. Levy loved him some Mrs. Hawkins. Not only because she pacified the few white students at Medgar, but because she went to hell on the black students there.

  During History hour that morning, Mrs. Hawkins became so irritated with Junior’s class that she walked out of her room and left her coffee unattended. As she disappeared down the stairwell, Junior saw the deceptive look on his classmates’ faces as they eyeballed the unattended cup of steaming coffee on their teacher’s desk. Junior then watched as one kid acted as a lookout, while another rushed to retrieve Mrs. Hawkins’s coffee.

  “Do it!” a kid yelled.

  “Yeah, fuck that bitch!” a second yelled.

  The kid holding Mrs. Hawkins’s cup snorted and dumped a wad of gooey phlegm into her coffee. Junior gagged as he watched his classmates pass around the cup, each student taking a turn. Everyone took a turn – including the white kids on easy street – except Junior. One kid blew his nose with a napkin and stuffed it into Mrs. Hawkins’s cup. Another student threw her grade book out of the classroom window and onto the roof of Medgar. The white girl passed gas in Mrs. Hawkins’s chair, nearly burning a hole in the fabric, and then stole all her chalk. Junior couldn’t believe it. One of the boys then placed Mrs. Hawkins’s coffee onto Junior’s desk.

  “Your turn, Junior,” the kid said to him. “Now hurry up before she gets back!”

  Junior looked down at the swirling phlegm inside of Mrs. Hawkins’s cup and gagged once again. He had every reason to spit inside her cup but couldn’t bring himself to do it. Junior took a second look down at the cup and passed on the opportunity to get even with his teacher.

  “Man, I ain’t spittin’ in no old lady’s cup!” he said. “That’s gross!”

  “You’re a fuckin’ pussy, man,” chimed another kid. “Mrs. Hawkins is a piece of shit!”

  “So?” Junior raised his voice. “That doesn’t mean we should spit in her coffee!”

  As Junior went back and forth with his classmates over soiling Mrs. Hawkins’s drink, the lookout waiting near the door alerted the class that Mrs. Hawkins was on her way back down the hall. With the world watching him, Junior took Mrs. Hawkins’s cup and returned it to her desk. His peers all chastised him.

  “Good Samaritan-ass nigga!” one kid said. “Teacher’s pet-ass ho!”

  “Fuck you,” Junior shot back.

  The second Mrs. Hawkins returned to room 454, she stood overtop of Junior’s desk and accused him of using foul language in her class. It got him extra homework for the night, but at least he’d be able to sleep easier knowing he did the right thing.

  New Kid on the Block

  Later that afternoon, Junior loitered at his locker, wondering what he’d got himself into. Halfway through his second day there, he hated it at Medgar. At the door to the boys’ bathroom on the fourth-floor, students exchanged roles, playing lookout as their peers ran a sex train on some impressionable freshman. The third-floor was much of the same but more blatant, with students exchanging money for drugs and other services. As Junior entered to use the bathroom, he startled one of the dealers there and got a knife pointed at him. Annoyed, the dealer put away his switchblade and confronted Junior near the door.

  “You must be new. So, I’ll let you slide this time,” the dealer told Junior. “Piss and get out. And don’t come in this motherfucka no more. This is my bathroom.”

  Junior quickly zipped up his pants and left without washing his hands.

  On his way to lunch, Junior saw a kid get robbed of his beeper and K-Swiss sneakers. The robbers also took the boy’s reversible NFL starter jacket. The assailants then stuffed the boy inside a locker. Outside of the lunchroom, Junior saw a girl’s teeth get knocked out before she was dragged around by her hair until her roots were stripped out. Mrs. Patterson, the black music teacher who raised hell at Mr. Levy for attempting to dump Junior onto her, was knocked unconscious as she attempted to break up the savagery.

  The food at Medgar looked awful – worse than prison food. On the menu for that day were roasted potatoes, corn, and a half-burnt chicken patty. The potatoes were frozen in the middle, and the corn tasted as if it’d come from outside and hadn’t been washed. The chicken patty was rubbery, and Junior found a bone in his sandwich. At a table near the back door, Junior watched as his peers wolfed through their meals like Neanderthals. A girl passed by the table, asking Junior if he wanted his patty. As Junior went to hand it over, the girl took it off his fork and walked away without saying thank you. Discouraged, he left and went down to the main floor to look for Casey and found her eating at her desk.

  “That look on your face, J.,” she said to him. “It says it all.”

  To get his mind off Medgar, Casey asked Junior to take a walk with her down to the school library on the second-floor. He happily obliged. Junior followed her throughout, rambling about his day there so far and how different Medgar was from Franklin High as Casey inventoried a row of books. At one point, she lowered her clipboard down to her side when Junior told her what the kids in Mrs. Hawkins’s class did to the old woman’s coffee.

  “They did what?” she asked. “Well, I don’t like Mrs. Hawkins either, but I would never go as far as spitting into her drink. Hide her car keys? Maybe. Banana in her tailpipe? Possibly. But spittin’ in an old lady’s coffee? Man, that’s a whole different level of disrespect. Ewww.” Casey shuddered. “So, how in the world did you end up here at Medgar, anyway?”

  “Got into a fight,” Junior told her. “This kid took my journal, and I just lost it. I didn’t mean to…I’d been through a lot over the last year with Lawrence being gone and everything. I guess I just wasn’t thinkin’.”

  “Tell me about it. Why? Who’s Lawrence? Is he your brother?” she asked him.

  Junior told Casey the story of his brother, handing her an old photo of Lawrence from his wallet. She stared into Lawrence’s picture for an extended time as a tear leaked from her eye and down onto Lawrence’s chubby face.

  “This just did something to me because I think you’re a good kid, and I hate that you had to go through some bullshit like that.” She sniffed. “How old was he when he died, J.?”

  “He’d just turned ten.”

  Casey stared down at Lawrence’s picture again before looking onto the back. Behind Lawrence was a poem Junior had written.

  Now that you’re gone.

  they stop by to visit.

  They line up one-by-one, weeping while you’re asleep.

  Not a phone call or a Christmas card.

  Not a call last year or the year before that.

  But on the day of service,

  they show up carrying their lakes & their rivers.

  I will drown every day for the rest of my days, brother.

  Love you,

  Junior.

  LEONARD G. ROBINSON JR.

  “No, uh-uh.” Casey caught herself between tears as she handed him back his picture. “Yo, you just wrecked me with that, Junior.” Her voice cracked. “So…how are your parents holding up? How are you guys gettin’ by?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I guess just one day at a time, you know? Like everyone else.”

  As Junior put away his brother’s photo, Casey took a seat next to him.

  “I’m mad at myself,” she said. “I wish I was here when you and Mrs. Robinson had taken a tour of Medgar. I would’ve told you to find another school. I’ve been lookin’ for a job since May. It’s so fucked up here, Junior, and Mr. Levy could give a shit.”

  Before they could finish talking, the bell sounded, signaling an end to lunch. As the two departed from the library
together, Casey placed a hand on Junior’s shoulder.

  “J., look at me,” Casey told him. “Man, if you need anything at all, you know where I am. Don’t hesitate. We’re family, and I don’t use the word ‘family’ loosely. You’re my little brother, now, and I’m gonna look out for you.”

  “No doubt.” Junior smiled, his eyes reddening. “Man, Casey, you’re the most real friend I’ve had since I moved here. It’s so hard to meet genuine people sometimes, I just…”

  “Not a friend,” she interrupted. “I’m your sister, now. And right now, big sister says it’s time for you to get upstairs to Mrs. Hawkins’s class!”

  Together, brother and sister ascended to the fourth-floor. At the door, Casey fist-bumped Junior and returned to the main office, leaving Junior in the hands of Mrs. Hawkins. As he attempted to enter her class, the teacher blocked him at the door.

  “Go get me a TV from the library, boy!” she ordered. “And hurry up back!”

  Careful not to further anger his teacher, Junior rushed down to the library and grabbed the closest TV he could find. Struggling, he pushed Mrs. Hawkins’s TV cart up the handicapped ramp and onto the elevator by himself and up to the fourth-floor hallway, dripping sweat. As Junior returned to class, he was met with a chorus of teeth-suckers from his classmates. “Fuckin’ boy scout!” one kid whispered. He then rolled Mrs. Hawkins’s TV up to her desk and crashed into his seat at the front row. Before he could catch his breath, she ordered Junior back out into the hallway to question him about an incident from earlier.

  “I know somebody did something to my coffee this morning. So, who did it?” she asked Junior, backing him into a corner. “Was it you? You little devil-heathen!”

  “No ma’am; why would I do something to your coffee?”