Hold Love Strong

by Matthew Aaron Goodman

  I never called Rivers. Not at night. Not during the day. No matter how greatly I craved to. No matter how much I wanted to go to Brandeis. No matter how much I wanted to quit on it. Not ever. I could do no such thing. But it was never because of the hour it was, and it wasn’t because of the cost. I didn’t assume Rivers was sleeping or too busy to talk to me. Rather I couldn’t call because I wouldn’t. I was an indefatigably prideful brother. I refused to accept the possession of desperation, which, of course, was all I had become; desperate to learn; desperate to be educated; desperate for Donnel to be free; desperate for the opportunity to fully realize the most fundamental, the most basic element of my life, me. And desperate not to be afraid of leaving Ever, of Brandeis, of the unknown it might make me.

  Another day came and went. And then another. And then Saturday, March 18th, the third Saturday in a four-Saturday month, came and by the end of the day my waiting was worse than any waiting I had ever known because not only had another day passed, but Donnel had cried on the phone when I spoke to him and he told me he just knew college was for me—he had dreamed it and written me a letter about his dream. Did I get it? But when I checked the mail nothing was there, not a single flyer or bill. Not at 10:00 a.m., not at noon, not at 4:00 p.m. or at six, not at eight, or ten, or midnight or a quarter after one in the morning when I finally accepted there would be nothing.

  “Sometimes it don’t come,” said my grandma, hoping to console me. She was sitting on the couch, watching some infomercial because she couldn’t sleep either. “Sometimes, Abraham, there just ain’t none.”

  I mumbled good night and closed the bedroom door, and once again, I spent the night lying in bed, staring into the blackness of the room, feeling the way a boy on a timber raft in the middle of the ocean must feel, lost and isolated and fighting to maintain a sense of self, a sense of significance in the black vastness enveloping him. My uncle slept behind me. I listened to the night. The bed squeaked each time my uncle’s lungs filled. Some pipes knocked. Eric slept on the mattress on the floor. He had a cold and his nose was stuffed, and he wheezed so deeply it sounded as if he might inhale all of Ever, its bricks and concrete through his one clear nostril. For hours, I lay there. But I didn’t pity myself. I knew that whatever defeat I was near, Donnel was nearer.

  Before dawn I got out of bed and went to the kitchen. I was not hungry. I was waiting. I opened the refrigerator. Then I closed it and stood in the blue dark. There was the sound of keys at the front door. Then the door flew open and my Aunt Rhonda, simultaneously turning on the light and slamming the door closed, rushed into the apartment like she had just won the Lotto, her chest leaned forward at a forty-five degree angle, her chin jutting out, her eyes aglow, her overstuffed purse with the broken zipper swinging from her shoulder, paper and envelopes and miscellany jutting from its top.

  “Momma!” my Aunt Rhonda shouted. “Oh my god! Momma!”

  She wagged her left hand over her head like it was on fire and failed to notice me standing in the kitchen or what time it was, that everyone was asleep or, in my case, should have been asleep. She breathed heavily and yet seemed unaffected by her shortness of breath. She crossed the room. She pounded on the door of the bedroom she shared with my grandma.

  “Momma,” she boomed. “Momma, wake up!”

  She shouted like we lived down a hole instead of a two-bedroom Ever Park apartment shaped and as big as a lowercase t, the kitchen ten feet straight ahead from the door, the bedrooms abutting it, the bathroom just to the left of the couch. She stormed toward the kitchen then flicked on the light switch. She was shocked to see me, but her shock did little more than cause her to pause.

  “Abraham!” she said. “What you standing in the kitchen for?”

  My Aunt Rhonda was thirty-five and she had gained thirty pounds from her chin to her knees since Donnel had been arrested. She couldn’t stop eating. She ate for comfort, company, and solutions, as if that box of Oreos, bag of Cheetos, and half gallon of Dolly Madison ice cream might bring Donnel home. She swung around, stepped over the threshold of the kitchen door, and planting her hands on the walls, she leaned forward and called for my uncle and Eric.

  “Everybody!” she shouted. “Momma! Wake up!”

  She turned and looked at me, a determined, joyous gleam banging from her eyes.

  “Abraham,” she announced, “you won’t believe it!”

  She held up her left hand for me to see. Around her chubby finger, the ring was a sliver of gold thread, the diamond like a chip of something, a crumb of crack, a flake of glass, one of the small glow in the dark stars children stick on a ceiling.

  “I’m getting married,” she said.

  She ripped the ring off her finger, handed it to me, and told me to feel how heavy it was. I held it up to the light. The jewel was nearly opaque but not opaque enough to see anything but a blurry smudge where shine should have been.

  “David,” she said.

  “What?” I said.

  “Dave,” she stressed. “Jamel’s brother. We’re getting married.”

  Still holding the ring up, I shifted my eyes to her. I could have laughed. I could have cried. I was shocked and amused and mildly wounded.

  “Doo-Doo?” I said incredulously.

  She snatched the ring from me and jammed it back on her finger.

  “David,” she said. “He hasn’t been Doo-Doo since we was kids.”

  “Since when have you-all been together?” I asked.

  She dismissed my question, sucking her teeth, flapping her hand in the air.

  “Me and him have always had a thing. We just been too scared. You know, we’ve been dancing around each other for years.”

  Half asleep and holding her old bathrobe around herself, my grandma walked into the kitchen. “Rhonda, what the hell is you yelling about?” she asked, squinting in the kitchen’s light.

  My Aunt Rhonda held her hand out for my grandma to see. My grandma looked at the ring for a split second, then she left my Aunt Rhonda’s hand hanging in the air and shifted her eyes to me, her eyebrows buckled over her sleepy eyes, her face still asleep so drooping.

  “Momma,” my Aunt Rhonda said. “Can you believe it? For forever. That’s what he said. Me? Rhonda? I ain’t never thought no one would ask me to be with them like this.”

  “Who asked what?” said my grandma, snatching the tips of my Aunt Rhonda’s fingers from the air and studying the ring.

  “David,” said my Aunt Rhonda.

  My grandma shifted her eyes to me. She needed clarification.

  “Doo-Doo,” I said.

  My grandma couldn’t believe it. “Doo-Doo? Jamel’s brother?”

  My uncle walked into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes in the light.

  “Look!” said my Aunt Rhonda, snatching her hand from my grandma’s grip and thrusting it in front of him. “Its on my finger and I still can’t believe it!”

  My uncle looked at the ring.

  “I’m getting married,” said my Aunt Rhonda.

  My uncle studied the whole scene, every inch of the ring and my Aunt Rhonda and my grandma and me. Rhonda was getting married? He could have said a thousand things. But he said nothing about the ring, nothing about what he thought. Instead, he pointed at my Aunt Rhonda’s purse.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  He reached out, grabbed the envelopes jutting from the top of my Aunt Rhonda’s purse, and held one up.

  “It’s here,” he said, lifting his eyes to me. He handed the envelope to me. “Open it.”

  I studied the outside of the envelope for far too long. I read my name and our address and the stamp and the postage meter’s faded red ink and the return address in the upper left corner: Brandeis University, Waltham, Massachusetts 02453.

  “Abraham, shit!” burst my Aunt Rhonda.

  She stomped her foot and snatched the envelope from me. Her excitement over her ring gave her no patience. She tore the envelope open with her teeth, spit the piece of paper on the floor
, and tore the letter out. The envelope fell to the floor. She unfolded the letter. She read it silently.

  “What?” begged my grandma. “What’s it say?”

  My Aunt Rhonda raised her hand over her head. “Oh my God, oh God,” she said.

  She bent over as if she’d been struck with cramps. Then she stood tall, clapped the letter against her chest and looked at me, her brown eyes wide and welled with something inexplicable, something she didn’t know she’d come home with.

  My uncle snatched the letter from my Aunt Rhonda and read the beginning to himself as quickly as he could, his eyes whipping left to right. I tried to read his face. I tried to understand.

  “Roosevelt!” shouted my grandma. “Jesus! What’s going on? What’s it say?”

  “All I got to say is you better not miss my wedding,” said my Aunt Rhonda, laughing and crying, her voice swollen with exuberance.

  “Oh Jesus,” said my grandma, breathless in her shift from confusion to understanding, holding her hands to her cheeks. “Oh Lord have mercy, He heard me. He finally, finally heard me.”

  II

  It was the first time I wore a suit. It was white with three black buttons. My shirt was black and it had black buttons too. Black were my patent leather shoes, black was my belt, black was my tie, and black was the cane my uncle called my “accoutrement” with a hint of a French accent.

  “Accoutrement?” I laughed.

  “Accoutrement,” he smiled. “Look it up if you don’t know what it means.”

  “Oh you owning the day, Abraham,” said my grandma. “Every hour, minute, and second of it.”

  With a disposable camera, she took pictures of me doing everything. I tied my shoes: click. I brushed my teeth: click. I took the gallon of milk from the refrigerator. Click, wind, click. Like dapper naval men, my uncle, Eric, and Doo-Doo wore similar white suits. Click, wind, click: my grandma took pictures of them too.

  Then like an eager student with the right answer, my grandma waved the disposable camera over her head. “Get together!” she shouted. “Get over there in front of the couch! Stand like you mean something!”

  My grandma wore a white dress, bloodred shoes, and a bloodred shawl draped over her shoulders. Her hair was done, and the smoldering scent of her old hot comb lingered in the air longer than her perfume when she spoke or moved.

  “Rhonda, baby!” she called out. “C’mon. We need you for a picture.”

  My Aunt Rhonda stood in the bathroom, her face inches from the mirror. She put on makeup, one hand planted on the edge of the sink.

  “Coming!” she shouted. “Hold on!”

  There was a knock on the door. I unfastened the chain latch and unlocked the locks. I opened the door and Luscious confidently walked into the room, perpetual sensuality beaming in her eyes. Eric, Doo-Doo, and I swallowed. I looked at my uncle. His face was patriotic, as if the anthem of his country was playing, its flag unfurled. Was she there to take him back? Was she there to open her arms and hold him? Or was she there to throw rejection in his face, tell him how dare he think how he thinks, do what he does, be who he was after being so far, so silent?

  “Oh, Luscious,” burst my grandma. She darted across the room and hugged Luscious hello. “Oh lord, it’s good to see you.”

  Luscious hugged my grandma back. Then when they let each other go, she stepped forward and stood a foot in front of my uncle. He dropped his eyes. She waited. And when he finally mustered the courage to look her in the face, he lifted his head and said, “Hey,” the single syllable the penitent purr of a bass’s deepest string.

  “I thought about what you said,” she said, her tone fierce and strong.

  My uncle waited for clarification. He tried to be patient. Then, lacking confidence, he guessed at what she meant and hesitantly raised his arms to embrace her.

  “Don’t get no ideas,” Luscious said, pushing his arms down. “I’m here cause you said it was important to Abraham.” She shot her eyes at me. “That ain’t the case?”

  I looked at my uncle. I knew damn well my uncle hadn’t wanted her there for my sake. And I knew Luscious didn’t really arrive just to support me. It would only be a matter of time, maybe fifteen or twenty minutes, before they smiled at each other, and the door that was their love would swing ajar.

  “Yeah,” I said. “It means a lot. For real. Thank you.”

  My Aunt Rhonda came out of the bathroom. She wore a white dress too.

  “Let me get this picture!” shouted my grandma. “C’mon. Get together. We gonna be late! Get close! Everybody!”

  We stood together and my grandma held the camera to her eye.

  “On the count of three,” she said. “One, two, three: say Graduation!”

  “Graduation!” they said.

  But I didn’t say it. It was not because I didn’t recognize the significance of the event. Rather, it was because I was struck by absence. The day, would forever be without Donnel. I breathed in my grandma’s declaration and I stood shoulder to shoulder with my family, and we positioned ourselves to look historical, unconquerable. My uncle held his hands together, lifted his chin like he was keeping his face out of rising water and wore a countenance of tranquility. Luscious stood beside him, one foot slightly in front of the other, smiling like a queen loved by a king without a single failing. Eric squinted and clenched his jaw as if, for the sake of the world, he was holding back the power that filled him. Doo-Doo stood behind my Aunt Rhonda, his head peeking over her shoulder, his arms wrapped around her waist while she leaned against him. And me? I was the first person in the history of my family, in the hundreds and thousands of never-known generations, the millions of brothers and sisters sacrificed on shores, drowned in seas of water and concrete, to graduate high school. It was a new millennium, June of 2000. I put my left hand in my pants pocket and made a V with the index and middle finger of my right hand, a peace sign, and holding it over the left of my chest, I stared straight ahead, my countenance chiseled, a bedrock foundation.

  “Just look at you,” said my grandma. “You all so beautiful.”

  We walked down the dark stairs, out of the dim lobby, and into the gold and diamond light of midmorning. Then, with three dozen brothers and sisters in vibrant hues and matching shoes, hats, and clutch purses, blasting shine from gold necklaces and earrings and bracelets and rings; blasting shine from smiles and gold teeth; blasting shine from glossed lips and earthen-toned skin; blasting in finery; blasting the magnificent blasting that drummed in our chests, we waited for the bus to take us to graduation. On the opposite side of the crowd, Lorenzo Davis was there because his stepbrother was graduating. Lorenzo wore baggy black dress pants and a large, pressed, untucked white shirt with razor creases down the arms. He tilted his head and watched me and my family out of the corners of his eyes. When I felt sure that he wasn’t watching us, I watched him. We took turns. Then I looked too soon and we made eye contact. My first instinct was to look away. But I couldn’t be afraid just like I couldn’t be afraid of college, of leaving Ever no matter how afraid I truly was. That is, as if being afraid was crying, I wouldn’t let myself do it. For Donnel, I refused. So I didn’t look away. And neither did Lorenzo. Then Lorenzo did something I still can’t understand. He smiled a half smile, cool as he could be, nodded his head not out of ire or disrespect, but with appreciation, and gave me a lazy thumbs-up. With a level of zeal that I found embarrassing moments later, I reciprocated, nodding then giving him a strong thumbs-up and holding it there, before letting my hand drop slowly.

  III

  We filled the sun-soaked gymnasium, every shade of brown face, every age, every medical condition. It was a mass arrival into an inadequate space. Hundreds of people, two by two, four by four, siblings stretching as far as four generations back. Drug dealers, construction workers, line cooks, city employees; pastors and deacons; salesmen and administrative assistants, security guards, entrepreneurs, deliverymen. I put on the cap and gown that smelled of mothballs and past graduates. Ms
. Hakim pinned a white carnation on my chest. A school administrator shouted through a bullhorn, demanding that all families and friends sit in the back while we, the few hundred who were to graduate, the few hundred who were just half of those I started ninth grade with, crammed into the front rows. Families and friends who did not get chairs stood in the back of the gym. Those who could not fit in the back stood along the walls. And those who could not be squeezed in, those who could not find a square foot of floor to stand on, streamed out of the heavy steel doors and spilled through my high school’s hallways.

  Names were hollered. Signs were held above heads. Cameras clicked. Flashes popped. It was hot. Two industrial fans hacked at the air, pushing the steam of our scents, our body odor and our perfumes, about the gymnasium. A scratchy rendition of the national anthem played over the loudspeakers. I stood beside Yusef, Titty, and Precious, the only other members of my crew to be graduating on time. I lowered my head and thought about my family, about my grandmother and uncle and aunt and Eric and Donnel. Then I was consumed by one thought: my mother. I had done everything in my power to eradicate her from my life. The pictures I had of us I had burned. The last gift she bought me for Christmas, the New York Knicks T-shirt, I had thrown in the trash. And I’d thanked God she was dead. Hundreds of times. Thousands of times. I’d walked to school with the thought and sat in class with the thought and went to sleep with the thought echoing in my head. But this was not what I thought about when the national anthem played. Instead, I imagined my mother singing, her mouth busted ajar by a rare, incredible, and uncontainable sound that could only be caused by the sudden collision of joy and triumph. Cherrie had let me listen to the tape of my mother singing, and I had listened to it over and over again. Chills spilled up and down my spine. I became aware of a lesson that had riddled and tormented my subconscious, a lesson that possessed the potential of guaranteeing my survival, that would perpetuate my ability to continue forth, to hope with even greater force, and to fight, to defend myself, my honor, my family when it was jeopardized. I knew then that regardless of what I did and regardless of time, I carried my mother just as I carried everything. That is, she was not a weight nor a thought, nor an object, a stone I lugged about or dragged and pushed. Rather, she was my composition, the integral integration of me, and, like Ever and all that occurred in Ever, no matter what I did or thought, no matter where I was or would go, I could not nor would I ever be able to strip or rip her being from me.