The Talking Drum

by Lisa Braxton

  “The drummer?” Sydney took a closer look at him. His face looked puffy. One cheek was swollen, and the area under his left eye was purple. He had a long scab coming down the center of his forehead shaped like a crooked teardrop.

  Omar slapped the face of his djembe. Sydney was relieved that after a few minutes his playing was low enough that she and Della could have a normal conversation.

  “He got into a fight last night at Jake’s and got the worst of it. The cops showed up, threw him in a squad car, but then let him go.”

  Sydney thought about the argument she saw Omar having with one of The Fierce Warriors before Malachi threw him out of The Talking Drum.

  “So,” Della started, as she unfolded her napkin on her lap. “Fill me in. How was the grand opening? When Jasmine got home, she said, ‘It was fun, Mommy!’” She mimicked her daughter’s high-pitched voice. “But I was looking for a few more details.”

  Sydney told her, leaving out Jasmine’s tantrum, which was set off when Kofi and Anamara had to leave. Jasmine had reacted so badly that she hurled herself on the floor in the middle of the lecture hall. She screamed and kicked her feet at the customers. Sydney had to grab her by the wrists and take her upstairs and make her lie down for a while.

  “Glad it went well. If I waited for Kwamé to tell me anything, I wouldn’t know nothing about it.” Della rolled her eyes.

  “What do you mean?”

  Della sighed. “He’s not really talking to me right now. He thinks me going back to school is a waste of time. He says I don’t need no more education. He can’t or he won’t see that I need to do this for me, and it’s not just about trying to advance my career.”

  “I’m sorry, Della.”

  Her brow wrinkled. “For what?”

  “I’m the one who gave you the idea to go back to school.”

  “Oh, girl, that was one of the best ideas I heard all year. I’m just dealing with an insecure man.”

  The kitchen doors swung open. Mustapha went over to the bandstand with a glass of water and put it on the stool next to Omar and then came over to their booth. “Mesdames, what am I today to get for you?”

  Mustapha seemed preoccupied, as if his mind was on something else. Sydney guessed that he was exhausted from the demonstration last night at council chambers. She had initially thought today would be the right time to interview him, but she now had second thoughts.

  Della handed back her menu. “I’m not that hungry. Couple of appetizers would be fine.” She turned to Sydney. “What do you want?”

  “That’s fine, with me, too, but I thought…”

  Della looked up at Mustapha. “How about a couple of orders of karokoro and beignets mboga jenn?

  Mustapha nodded. “All good desires. I will add the surprise at the end, a special dessert.” He collected the menus and returned to the kitchen.

  Sydney turned to Della. “What happened to the mafé? The lamb stew? I thought that’s why you wanted to come here.”

  Della was watching Omar and nodding in time with the beat.

  Sydney knocked her knuckles on the table to get her attention. “Am I missing something?”

  Della turned back. “What do you mean?”

  Sydney looked over at Omar. “What’s going on with you and the drummer?”

  Della furrowed her brow. “Ain’t nothing going on. I told you, he just needs someone to listen to him, that’s all. He’s probably depressed.”

  “I think you have a crush on him,” Sydney said.

  “A crush? Of course not.” Della took a sip of her lemonade. “Besides, Kwamé would have a fit if he thought I was looking at another man.”

  As they ate their appetizers, they talked about Della’s schoolwork, in particular, her library studies class on storytelling. She was learning about the history of storytelling, and in the coming weeks she would learn performance techniques. Sydney invited Della to practice during story time at The Talking Drum. While Della talked, Sydney glanced out the restaurant’s front window and saw a rush of flashing red lights and fire trucks.

  Mustapha served them the surprise dessert, thiacry—a thin pudding made with couscous, fruit, and raisins—in a vanilla cream sauce, and then returned to the kitchen. Moments later, a man ran through the front door and dashed into the kitchen.

  “I wonder what that’s all about?” Della asked.

  Mustapha rushed out of the kitchen and yelled something to Omar in Wolof. Then he hurried out the door following the man. Omar stopped drumming and went to each table, clearing dishes, and ringing up customers’ checks.

  “Something’s wrong,” Della said and then approached Omar.

  She returned a few moments later. Sydney could see the anguish on Della’s face. “There’s a fire up the street. It’s the building where Esmé’s Africa Wear is. There might be children trapped in the apartment upstairs. They can’t find Esmé.”

  Sydney’s stomach tightened at the thought of Esmé trapped in the burning building. She didn’t know Esmé but had seen her setting up clothing and jewelry displays on the sidewalk in front of her shop. Sydney unzipped her camera case and pulled out the press pass Max had given her, hanging it around her neck. Then she twisted off the camera lens, switched to a zoom lens, and slid her flash onto the top of the camera.

  “Watcha doing?” Della asked.

  “I’m not sure yet, but Inner City Voice wants me to do some stories about Petite Africa. I don’t know if they’ll need pictures of the fire, but I’ll see if I can get close enough to get something. Are you coming?”

  Della shook her head vigorously. “I’m gonna sit right here and pray for them people. I don’t want to see no babies burned up. That would break my heart. I don’t think I could take it.” She looked at her watch. “Besides, I have to get home to Jasmine before long.”

  Sydney put some bills on the table to cover her share of the check. Outside, she walked briskly, along with the crowd. People were rushing from their buildings, crossing the street and going down a block to Hancock Avenue, toward the sound of the sirens and blowing, grey smoke. Soon, she saw smoke clouds hovering over a three-story building with flames shooting from windows. People were lined up on both sides of the street. Beyond them were three fire trucks and a small, red van parked in front of the burning building. Nearby, a police cruiser was parked on the sidewalk with its back end in the street. Sydney squeezed her way through the crowd, holding her camera high into the air, aimed, and snapped. She made her way to the front of the crowd but could go no further because police were holding people back a safe distance from the building.

  She noticed a group of people who looked like a family standing by the fire department van—a man, woman, two kids, and an older woman, a grandmother probably. They had blankets wrapped around them. She trained her camera on them. The mother was screaming that her baby was still inside in the crib. Other people stood by, watching, waiting.

  Sydney continued to take pictures, moving about to get the best angles. Two firefighters climbed an aerial ladder extended on the front of the building to the third floor. Sydney took shots of the firefighters making their ascent, and then of the lead firefighter breaking the window with an axe and climbing inside. She swung around and snapped pictures of the front door with smoke billowing out, crowd shots, and then back to the family, getting close-ups of their facial expressions. She whispered a prayer for the baby. From out of the corner of her eye, she saw Uncle Mustapha push past the barriers and run up to the front of the building to the firefighter in a white helmet shouting orders to the others. Mustapha started shouting at the chief as another firefighter grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him away.

  Sydney scanned the crowd. She didn’t see Esmé anywhere. She asked a man standing next to her if he knew anything. He told her that Esmé had run back inside her store to save more of her merchandise before firefighters could stop h
er and hadn’t been seen since. That was ten minutes ago.

  Suddenly, a hush fell over the crowd. She followed their eyes to the firefighter in the building handing a child through the third-floor window to the other firefighter waiting on the ladder. That firefighter came down the ladder with the child who looked to be about three or four years old. The child’s head was bobbing with every step the firefighter took. Sydney couldn’t tell if the child was unconscious or dead. On the sidewalk, her mother screamed. Her husband held her back as the firefighter laid the child on the front lawn and administered mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Several people cried and looked skyward with their palms pressed together, calling for God. After several tries the child’s eyes fluttered open. The mother broke away from her husband and ran to the little girl, falling to the ground on her hands and knees near her. People cheered. Sydney exhaled and quickly looked back at the front door. Paramedics were carrying a woman out on a stretcher. She was badly burned and looked as if she was covered in charcoal. They placed her on a gurney and put an oxygen mask on her face. Then they hoisted her into the back of an ambulance. Sydney didn’t recognize her. The man next to her wiped at tears. “That’s Esmé,” he said.

  As the crowd began to disperse, Sydney saw the figure of a short man wearing a bow tie and suspenders approaching—Max. “I hate stories like this,” he said. “They sell papers, but they break my heart.” He pointed to the camera around her neck. “Get anything good?”

  She gave him a rundown of her photos. He looked back at the building. “Esmé Tavernier’s been in business seven, eight years. She was just turning a profit. It doesn’t look good for her.” He glanced at the captain in charge wearing the white helmet and then back at Sydney. “Fire department wants to see your pictures.”

  “They’re confiscating my pictures?”

  He chuckled. “No. This is a good thing. They tell me that you were on the scene here taking photos before anybody else. You might have caught the arsonist in a crowd shot. Sometimes they return to the scene to check out their handiwork.”

  The fire captain waved him over. Max looked back at Sydney. “I’ve snagged an interview with the captain. Come on. You’re part of this, too. We’ll write this story together.”

  “What happened to you?” Malachi was lying on the living room couch with his feet propped up on the armrest. John Coltrane’s “My Favorite Things” was on the stereo. She looked down at herself. She hadn’t realized that she had sweat stains on her blouse and that she smelled like smoke. In rapid delivery, she told him about the fire.

  He turned off the music. “I hope Esmé will be all right. It doesn’t sound good, though.”

  Exhausted, Sydney responded, “No, it doesn’t. I’ve never seen anybody burned like that before.”

  He went to her and wrapped his arms around her. “I can tell looking at you that this was a hard thing to see close up. Are you sure you’re up for this freelance stuff?”

  She pulled away from him and looked in his eyes. “This is what reporters do. It’s the job. It’s a shock, though when the story affects somebody you know. I’ll be fine.”

  “You sure?”

  “I’ll be fine, Malachi. You don’t have to baby me.”

  He sniffed her hair.

  “I know. The smoke’s all in my hair, in my clothes. I’m surprised you want to get close to me.”

  “It’s not that bad.” He gave her a peck on the lips.

  “What happened with the money? Did it eventually add up?”

  He exhaled. “No. We’re still short.”

  “So what next?”

  “I’ll watch the register like a hawk from now on and keep an eye on Lawrence. I hope he doesn’t have sticky fingers.”

  CHAPTER 25

  THE AFRICAN CULTURAL CENTER on Clermont Street in Petite Africa was housed in what used to be Beth Shalom Temple, a cornerstone for the largely Jewish population that dominated the community until they fled in the late 1950s to the suburbs west of Boston. Beth Shalom sold the temple to the Africa Cultural Alliance for one dollar.

  The new owners, mostly Petite Africa immigrants, lacked money for basic upkeep. The building desperately needed renovations. As the years passed, exterior bricks began to crumble and shatter on the sidewalk. Rainwater leaked through the roof. The main floor served as a shelter. The Africa Cultural Alliance invited the poor, destitute, and needy African and West Indian immigrants to temporarily move into the sanctuary. They slept on pews and washed up in the bathrooms. Volunteers prepared meals in the kitchen.

  Cultural activities were set up in the basement. Classrooms lined the walls on three sides. An elevated stage was at the front. Rooms formerly used for Hebrew, Torah, and Talmud study were replaced with Ethiopian coffee ceremonies, Kenyan pottery workshops, a Ghanaian braiding salon, and Trinidadian Seventh Day Adventist services.

  Today, the Senegalese community was preparing for its upcoming fundraiser for the four families and the business owners burned out last month by the fire on Hancock Avenue, one block over from Le Baobab. Esmé Tavernier was still in Bellport General Hospital’s trauma and intensive care unit with burns over sixty-five percent of her body. Mustapha was distraught over his goddaughter’s condition. Omar thought the best thing he could do for his uncle would be to volunteer to rehearse the children’s troupe that would perform at the fundraiser. Now, he stood at the foot of the stairs leading to the stage where the children waited for him, and counted twenty heads—Kofi and Anamara among them. He had perfect attendance.

  Omar pressed a finger to his lips while the children formed a semi-circle around him on stage. They quieted down. As Omar pulled his drums out of the bags, Marie-Claude Agbo stepped out of a classroom. The building owner had purchased the property from the Africa Cultural Alliance and was supporting Uncle Mustapha in his lawsuit against the Bellport Redevelopment Authority. Omar tugged on the strings of his djembe, hoping she would assume he was busy and go away. Instead of leaving, she walked onto the stage, clip clopping along in her chunky platform heels. She leaned over him, her red-stained lips close to his ear. Her breasts almost fell out of her blouse.

  “You’re late, Mr. Bassari.” Her voice had an edge to it.

  Omar checked his watch. It was three-fifteen. He’d intended on arriving by three but had slept in. The fire that put Esmé in the hospital had him worried about his own safety. He hadn’t slept much since it happened. “The children have barely gotten out of school,” he responded.

  She raised an index finger like a teacher scolding a child. “We are in America, Mr. Bassari. We don’t operate on Africa time here. The parents will be here promptly at four-thirty. We need to make sure these children know their routine before they leave here today.”

  Marie-Claude, a Ghanaian, was starting to remind him of Natalie, the way she insulted his culture. When he first arrived in Petite Africa, Marie-Claude would show up at Fulani Sound performances in her tight dresses and wait for him to come off stage. Omar didn’t want Marie-Claude. He had Natalie, who at the time was heavy with his child. Marie-Claude didn’t care. She never forgave him for refusing her.

  “We’re dropping out of the lawsuit,” she declared. “If the city wants the property, we’ll sell it.”

  He looked up at her. She had a self-satisfied smirk on her face, most likely because she now had his attention.

  “I do not understand.”

  She inched closer to him. “If the city wants to give us a decent amount for this place, we’ll take it.”

  He continued tightening his drum. “My uncle fought hard to preserve Petite Africa. You are betraying him. You are betraying the property owners in the lawsuit. What about the drumming institute?”

  Marie-Claude shook her head. “Your uncle will have to find somewhere else for his little school.”

  Omar wondered how his uncle would handle the news, if his heart would hold up. Mustapha’
s nerves already seemed frayed from all that was going on—the lawsuit, the fires, and Esmé. Marie-Claude’s change of plans could be too much for him.

  He shifted his attention to the stage. “There’s no point in this conversation now. The kids are getting restless.”

  As Marie-Claude turned to leave the stage, Omar pounded on the head of the drum, startling her enough that she turned, stumbled, and almost fell on her fat behind. Omar laughed out loud, but she didn’t hear him over the drumming. He created a bass sound, then snapped his hand back as if he was cracking a bullwhip. The boys copied him on their little djembes. Then, on the beat, each girl came forward from the semicircle one-by-one to rehearse her dance moves. First, they stamped their feet and thrust their arms into the air. Then they pivoted on one foot and shook their hips. Omar was puzzled. They were awkward, stiff one moment and forced the next. He expected better from them after weeks of rehearsal. He would send them home with instructions to get their mothers to practice with them.

  It wasn’t until he’d gotten the kids to the second number they would perform that he looked out at the rows of metal folding chairs facing him. The rows were empty except for the last one, where a white man with grey hair and a thick build sat, holding his hat in his hand. When had he come in? Omar had been so distracted by what Marie-Claude said that he hadn’t noticed the stranger. What could he possibly want? If he had business about the building, he should go to Marie-Claude. Omar continued drumming, but each time he looked up, the man was still there.

  Maybe he was from immigration, looking for expired visas. Well, he was a fool if he thought Omar would give him any information. He hadn’t the other times he’d been approached by government men. Omar’s stomach began to churn. Could he be a friend of Sam’s, that black American idiot at Jake’s Tavern? Was the man sent there to get revenge? He regretted that he hadn’t listened to Uncle Mustapha that day, that he hadn’t gone with his uncle to the lawyer’s office after they left the bookstore grand opening. He concentrated on his drumming, striking the center of the drum with the ball of his hand, creating a mellow bass sound, and then hitting the edge of the drum with his fingers to create a sharp sounding tone. He rounded out the rhythm with a series of slaps on the drumhead, his fingers bouncing off the instrument repeatedly, creating a sharp, ringing sound. In his own way, he was speaking to the drum, asking its spirits to protect him from the man in the back of the room.