Manchild in the promised land

by Brown, Claude, 1937-

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  callin' no ambulance or no doctors around here. We ain't gon

  ibave no police coming in here."

  i Mama started hoUermg, "The boy might be deadi The boy

  might be dead!" , j . u

  Dad said, "Huh?" He'd stop and say, "He am t dead. He ain't dead. It's just that old dope." They both panicked.

  When Mama finally got Pimp to wake up, after so much slapping and calling his name. Dad was convinced that it was time for Pimp to go. I guess he should have been convinced. It must have been a pretty frightening thing, even for him, though he wouldn't admit it, to come into the bathroom and see his son slumped over a toUet with a needle in his arm, after having heard so much about the junkies dymg from using dope, after having been to so many funerals, after having asked so many times about this kid and that kid who came up with his older son and being told that he'd died from dope—^it must have been a pretty frightening

  thing.

  Pimp had deceived just about everybody in the family for a long time. After a while, we all knew, but I knew before anybody else that Pimp was dabbling. I was the first one to say, "Come on, man. You got to do something."

  I guess Pimp sort of knew that I suspected him of using stuff. The first time after I saw him high that night in the Low Hat, I took him to a bar. He didn't know that I had seen him nodding. I said, "Come on, let's have a drink. I want to talk to you. Let's sit down and have a drink."

  I asked him what he'd like to drink. I remembered that he used to like lum. I think he just took a rum and Coke because he knew I remembered it and thought I might get suspicious if he didn't.

  When he took his first sip of the rum and Coke, he grimaced. He said, "Man, it's, like, I'm so tired. I'm so tired, Sonny, this stuff almost knocks me out."

  I looked at him and said, "Yeah, man. It can do that to you."

  Then he looked down and started fumbling with his glass, as if he knew I was suspicious of him. The next thing he said was, "Man, you know, I ain't had no good rum in a long time."

  When he said this, I paid it no attention. I knew he was going to try to bullshit me. I looked straight at him as he went on talking. I said, "Pimp." I sort of qulefly shouted it at him.

  "Yeah, Sonnyf;

  "How long have you been dabblin' in stuff?"

  He looked at me for a long time. He got kind of quiet, and he dropped his head. He said, "Oh, about four months, man."

  "How far are you? How much stuff are you usin* a day?"

  "Oh, man, I buy a bag about every other day, but I don't get high every day."

  "Are you snortin' or skin poppin'?"

  "Man, I'm just startin', and I can keep a bag two or three days."

  "Uh-huh. That's good, because now is the time for you to stop. You got to stop now, before you really get yourself into some trouble."

  "Yeah, yeah." He was glad to hear this. It seemed as though he had heard something that he had been waiting to hear, he had been given some kind of signal. He seemed to feel that all he had to do now was agree with everything I said and everything would be okay. He was going to prevent any violence from taking place by just being agreeable. j

  "Look, Pimp, you got a job, and you're still working. You're doing good now. Now is the time when you can quit, because if you keep on dabblin', man, you're gon actually go to the dogs. After a while, you won't be able to quit, and you won't have anything to quit for, because once you blow your job, your clothes, and everything you've got, it just won't matter that much. You got a nice girl, man. And maybe you'll want to get married or something. But what you're doin', man, you're gon blow everything."

  "Yeah, Sonny, I know what you mean, man. I've been tellin' myself. I've been planning on stopping this stuff for the last two weeks. As a matter of fact, last week . . ."

  I just knew he was lying. He was saying all this so relaxed, and he seemed so pleased with the way he was telling it. But I could tell he was lying. I knew. He didn't know how to lie, not to me anyway.

  He said that he had bought some Dorphine tablets and that he had taken his first two today. He was going to keep taking the Dorphine tablets and start cutting down on other drugs from day to day, and in a couple of weeks or so, he'd be reacjy to sign himself into someplace.

  I asked him if he'd ever heard of Norman Eddie, in thej East Harlem Protestant Parish. He said no, he hadn't. I said, "Well, he's doin' a lot of good work with drug addicts, and if

  you're really interested, I think I could get him to work with you, man. You could kick it now, before it really gets a strong hold on you."

  Pimp went right on bullshitting me. He said, "Yeah, Sonny, that's what I want to do. You go ahead and see this cat and let me know what's happening."

  I was crushed. He didn't understand it at all. He just seemed to look at me as if I were someone who was trying to deprive him of something. And he wasn't even going to pretend to defend it, even though he wanted it terribly. He was just going to sit there and say, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, uh-huh. I'll go along with you. You're right; that's so right. I'm going to be doing it, so there's nothing else to talk about when you stop trying to sell me on it."

  Even though I could see this, I still felt I had to try. He was my brother, and I could make him kick it. He couldn't help but kick it if I was in his comer, if I really wanted him to. I was going to put everything I had into it.

  When Mama called me that Saturday night and told me what Dad had said to Pimp, how he couldn't come back in the house any more, and how afraid she was for him, I said, "Look, Mama, he'll be coming back."

  She said, "No, he ain't gon come back, because he was really hurt. I think he's just gon go some place and try and take enough of that stuff to kill himself or something."

  I said, "No, Mama, junkies don't kill themselves. They've got something to live for. They got to live for another high, for the next one. He'll probably come down here." I knew he wasn't coming, but that's what I told her. "Mama, he'll probably come down here, and when he does come down, I'll put him up for the night and call you and let you know.'*

  Mama said, "He just might go someplace and get himself into some trouble in the meantime, before he gets down there. Why don't you go out and look for him for a little while. He's probably around there on 144th Street. And let me know if you can't find him. Call me and keep in touch with me, because he ain't had a bath all week, and he got on those dirty old pants. That shirt he has on, he put it on day before yesterday, and it was white. It looks Hke it's black from the dirt and grime. He ain't had nothin' to eat in a long time. I don't know if he even had anything to eat yesterday, and he's probably hungry."

  I wanted to,tell her, "Look, Mama, junkies don't care

  about eating. They don't care about clothes. They don't care about baths and stuff like that. It just don't matter to them. All they care about is some heroin, and this is the only thing that's gon do thena any good, Mama. You got to face the fact that he's at that sttLte where soap and water's not gon do him any good. Clothes ain't gon do him any good. Food ain't gon do him any good. He's just dead, and maybe the thing that'll do him the most good is the O.D., the O.D. that he's waitin' for." But I couldn't tell her that. I just couldn't seem to bring it out.

  I knew it was no use, but she got me to promise that I'd f look for him. She was a woman, and that was her child. I " couldn't tell her that many other women had sons and daughters out there dying too. It wouldn't have meant anything to her, because this was the first child that she had out there who was a drug addict. This was the only one out there she was concerned about, the only one that mattered.

  I went uptown to start looking for Pimp. I looked everywhere. I went to all the places where junkies might go, looked in all the dope dens, in all the backyards where the junkies might sleep. Nobody had seen him or heard about him. Some people hadn't seen him in days. I kept on looking and hoping. When Mama called me, it had been about eight-thirty or nine o'clock. When I hadn't found Pimp or anybody who had seen Pimp by th
ree-thirty, I became a little worried.

  I started fearing for him. When this happened, I started getting mad at myself, because I felt myself going right back into the same pattern again. I knew that if I had seen him then and he was in pain or said his habit was down on him, I would have had to give him some money to get him some stuff. I probably would have fallen right back into Pimp's trick bag and helped send him to Kentucky and waited for him to come back and start all over.

  Still, the longer I looked for him, the more worried I became. And the more worried I became, the more angry I became with myself for worrying, for going back on my word, for weakening, for weakening from Pimp and his weakness. This was what he had always played on with me. He'd beg me for my clothes, to pawn them, because he knew I worried about him.

  He'd intimidate me with my concern for him. He'd tell me he was going to have to go and try a stickup or something like that. Many times, after he'd left, I'd say, "Nigger, go on. Go on and pull a stickup. Go on and do what you want to.

  Just hurry up and get it over with; Hke, pull a stickup and get shot, or go on and throw a brick. Rob somebody's house and get thrown out of a window, or just go on and take that O.D. But whatever you do, please do it in a hurry. Please do it in a hurry and get oflf my back."

  That was what I should have told him, but I guess every junkie looks pitiful to his brother. Pimp always seemed to be the most pitiful creature in the world when his habit was down on him. He looked so helpless. I knew I could never turn my back on him if I saw him when his habit was down on him. I was almost certain that this morning would be another case like that.

  There was nothing else to do but go on uptown and tell Mama that I couldn't find him but that we still had Pimp, we still had our problem.

  When I got there, I hesitated to knock on the door. I felt ashamed to go in there and tell Mama, "Look, I couldn't find him. I couldn't find hide nor hair of him. Nobody's seen him or heard from him."

  She expected me to bring her some hope. That's why I went out to begin with, because I figured I could bring him back or at least find him and ease her mind. But I had to come back with nothing, not even knowing where Pimp was.

  When I finally got around to knocking on the door. Dad opened the door. I think he had just come in. Not from looking for Pimp—he had come in from his Saturday night. He looked at me as if he was a little disappointed or something. Maybe he expected the police to come and bring Pimp home or bring his body home or bring the information that he was dead. It was just me, and he seemed to resent the knowledge that my presence brought him: that we still had our problem.

  Dad went into the bathroom, and I went into the front room. Mama was sitting at the front window. I just came in, walking slowly, and said I couldn't find him.

  Mama said, "Yeah, he might just be someplace dead, in some strange backyard. Maybe some of those junkies could have taken him and thrown him in some boiler down in the cellar. Like they did around on 144th Street last year, when that boy took a lot of dope and went in that coma. They put him in that boiler, just about cooked him. Yeah, he just might be layin' around in one of them boilers cookin' right now."

  I didn't "^ay anything, because I knew what Mama was doing. I felt son^^ for her. She was trying to prepare herself for the worst by saying all that stuff. I knew she didn't believe it, and she didn't want to believe it. She just wanted to hear herself say it, just in case somebody brought some sad news. If she told herself that this was what had happened to him, and something happened to him that wasn't as bad, it had to be good.

  Then Dad came in and said, 'Woman, why don't you stop all that foolishness? You don't have to be worried about them damn junkies. Them damn junkies take care of their-selves twice as good as you can. You see that they be out there so long, look like they be dying, and they be hanging around there for years. Why don't you stop talkin' all that foolishness?"

  Mama didn't seem to hear Dad. She looked out the window, saw the daylight creeping in, stroked the cat—about the tenth cat named Tina—and seemed to realize that Saturday night was gone. Mama stroked the cat lightly and looked out the window, greeting the daylight with a question. She said to the dawn, "Lord, where can my child be this momin'?"

  I FIRST heard about the Black Muslims in 1955. They had started talking at night down on 125th Street and Seventh Avenue. This seemed to be the speakers' corner m Harlem. Everybody talked down there, all the poUticians. Anybody who had to address the Harlem public got up on a soapbox on 125th Street and Seventh Avenue.

  The Coptic speakers had been down there at the beginnmg of the fifties and the years just before. They were still down there, but they were being overshadowed by the Black Muslims.! never paid too much attention to them. All I knew was that these cats were building up this black superiority thing. I'd heard it before. But I hadn't heard it so vividly. At the same time, these guys were tearing down anything that was white. As a matter of fact, they seemed to reseat the clouds for being white.

  They were really carried away, and they were coming on strong with this thing of "Buy Black." They were talking about boycotting all the white stores and taking over Harlem economicaUy. I suppose it was frightening to all the white shopkeepers down there. They'd come to their doors and stand and look, as if to say, "Why don't the police do something about it? These niggers seem to be talking the same sort of thing that Hitler was doing." , .

  There was nothing that could be done, because they weren't causing any violence, and they weren't inciting any violence, not at that time anyway.

  No one thought there would be much to this thing. I figured this was just the next phase in the Hariem Black Nationalist movement. I thought, They had the Garveyites in the twen-

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  ties, then there were the Coptics in the forties and early fifties, and now this. It's just another thing that's going to die out soon. ^

  A few cats I laiew were joining. They seemed to be impressed with the badge. It was all sort of childish, the way I saw it. I remember, about 1955, I went by Seventh Avenue, and these cats were picketing a theater. I think it was at the RKO Alhambra. These cats were picketing because the theater was showing the film Hannibal the Great. They were picketing because Hannibal, according to the Muslims, was a black man and they had a white actor starring in the movie. It just didn't make sense to me; I thought all these cats were crazy, and I couldn't do any more than laugh at them.

  Every other week or so, I'd pass by 125th Street and Seventh Avenue. I'd see them, and I'd see the people who'd stand around listening. It was like a mass street-corner prayer meeting. They'd be talking about this Allah business and about somebody named Elijah Muhammad. The people would be looking and saying, "Yes, yes," like some of those aflBrmatives they shouted out, grunted out, and nodded out at a Baptist church prayer meeting.

  As I went down there, week after week, it seemed as though the crowd was getting larger. Younger guys were beginning to listen to this sort of thing. Then I started meeting people around there I hadn't seen in years.

  I recall seeing Floyd Saks there. Floyd was up at Wiltwyck with me. He was a good painter; as a matter of fact, he was very talented. I figured that he could go places. When I met Floyd on 125th Street one afternoon, I didn't know he was a Muslim. He told me that he had a studio and had painted a few models, that sort of thing. He wanted to take me up to his studio and show me some of his work. I hadn't seen him in a long time, and I wanted to talk to him anyway, so I went on up to his studio. He had a piano up there, and I sat down and played. Then he showed me some of his work.

  He had painted pictures of lynchings in the South, and he had painted a lot of biblical characters—a black Moses, a black Jesus Christ, and a black Abraham. Everybody was black. I asked him if he ever painted anybody who wasn't black. Floyd said that he hadn't and that he wasn't going to paint any. He wasn't interested in anybody but colored people.

  He started telling me about the superiority of colored

  people, and I asked him
if he was a member of the Coptic. He said no. He'd heard of them, but they didn't know what was going on. He asked me if I'd heard of the MusUms.

  "You mean the Moslems?"

  "No, man. Everybody thinks it's the Moslems, but it's the Muslims."

  "You mean those cats out there on Seventh Avenue and 125th Street, don't you?"

  "Yeah. They're into things, man. A new day has dawned on us. Allah has sent Muhammad to free us."

  "To free us from what, man?"

  "To free us from these white devils down here, who've stolen our heritage and poisoned our minds."

  I looked at him. I said, "Are you all right, Floyd?"

  "Yeah, man. It doesn't sound like the things that you've been hearing. Did you know that you were a black god?"

  "Oh, man. It sounds as though they have stolen the Coptic line."

  "No, man. They know. You may not believe me, Claude, but the white man was made by a colored scientist, in a test tube, man. He isn't even real. He's like a Frankenstein monster."

  "Floyd, perhaps I'm just a little skeptical. I suppose I'm just a bom skeptic, but I find that hard to believe, man. For a long time now, I have been believing that man is man, be he white or black. And that every man originates from sperm."

  He said, "It was only the original man that originated from sperm. The other man originated in a test tube."

  I said, "Man, do you know what he put in that test tube? If this is what happened, it must have been a test-tube baby, like they have modem test-tube babies. Only this one must have come out with a lighter pigmentation, for some reason or another."

  "No, man. He was made out of some chemicals and stuff."

  I said, "Floyd . . ."

  "Yeah, you're a nonbeliever like a whole lot of these people, man. They don't even know that they're not free. You remember that I had said Allah had sent NJuhammad to free us, and you said, 'Free us from what?' Here you think you're free. If you really think you're free, man, all you got to do is go to jail one time. You find out how it is. You ain't got that much going for you once you get out of jail."