Detention is one whole hour. A man teacher, who looks mean as can be, sits at a desk in front while we sit in desks in a classroom not saying a word. Anybody says anything gets another day of detention. But this ain’t nothing like library quiet. More like jail quiet. Half the older boys in the room I’ve never seen before and don’t want to see again. Lymon knows a few, though.
When detention is over, I rush to get my books and get out of the classroom, but there’s no need to rush today. Lymon’s not even looking at me. He’s talking to some of the older boys so I take my time walking down the stairs, through the school yard and back to the apartment.
I have some pennies in my pocket so I stop at the corner store for some candy. The bell on the door jingles as I open it and close it behind me. Inside it’s dark and smells like cigarettes and mints. Mr. Jackson sits on his stool listening to the Cardinals and Red Sox game on the radio behind the counter, an unlit cigar hanging out the corner of his mouth. Boys at school been talking about the World Series. Seems in Chicago everybody’s a baseball fan but me and Daddy. Even though I know exactly what I’m getting, I take my time walking up and down the case, running my hands along the wooden counter. Finally I grab a roll of Life Savers and put my pennies in Mr. Jackson’s fat, sweaty hand. He puts the money in the register and reaches back to turn up the knob on the radio.
* * *
—
I look in the window of the shoe store next door wondering if Daddy’s gonna be able to get me some new shoes ’fore the winter comes. Maybe even the boots they have in the window with shiny black leather and thick, strong laces. I seen pictures of snow in my schoolbooks, and I don’t think my shoes are gonna hold up.
I get nods from the men standing in a group in front of a barber shop. At the corner of Forty-Third Street a newsboy holds out the paper, shouting the headline: “Louis KOs Mauriello in record time!”
“Can’t no one beat the Brown Bomber,” folks laugh as they pass, like Joe Louis is fighting for all us colored folks.
I remember the first time I walked home from school. I was so scared I’d get lost, sweat prickled under my arms. Everywhere I looked, folks looked like they were moving so fast I wondered why everyone was in such a hurry. Now I can’t tell if folks have slowed down or I just sped up.
Up ahead I see Miss Fulton sashaying toward the building. I see some men tipping their hats to her face, then turning to look at her behind as she walks past. Miss Fulton keeps walking like she doesn’t even notice but I can tell she does. She sees me too and waves hello and waits for me at the stairs.
“Well hello, Langston.” She smiles. Ever since the week when Daddy went away, Miss Fulton is acting like we are bosom buddies. She’s fine and all, but I’m not sure whether she’s being nice because of Daddy or nice because of me.
“Hello, Miss Fulton.”
“I was hoping I’d see you,” she says.
“Ma’am?” I ask.
“I wanted to show you a new book of poetry I found. I thought you might like it.”
“By Langston Hughes? ’Cuz I read nearly all the ones in the library….” I know I’m talking fast and excited, but I can’t stop.
“Speaking of the library, did you ever talk to your father?” she asks.
“Yes ma’am,” I say. “And he don’t mind me going to the library.” I don’t know when lying started coming so easy to me. I’m sorry, Mama.
“Didn’t I tell you he wouldn’t mind?” she says.
“Yes ma’am.”
“Well, I’ll drop the book by tomorrow,” she says at her door.
“Thank you, Miss Fulton.”
The cold follows me into the apartment. Daddy says the landlord turns on the heat only when he’s in the mood, so I guess he ain’t in the mood today. I ain’t allowed to light the stove, so I’m gonna be cold till Daddy gets home.
On my bed, I flip through the Weary Blues book and let my mind wander. In my daydream I see Daddy seeing Mama for the first time reading a book under a tree. And I see Mama writing in her fancy letters the words of Langston Hughes, word by word, in a letter to Daddy. I picture Daddy trying to make sense of those pretty words. He said he didn’t know nothing about poems, but when he left everything else behind, he kept the words she wrote tied in a ribbon and brought them all the way to Chicago. She never told him that Langston Hughes made her heart sing the way he does mine. That she wanted to name her baby boy after the poet she copied in her letters.
I ain’t got the heart to tell Daddy those weren’t Mama’s words. Seems like Mama left us both with her secrets and we bound to keep it that way.
WALKING to school the next day, my satchel has the same amount of books but feels heavier than ever. I been practicing what I’m gonna say to Miss Cook, scratching out lines in my head that don’t work. So far I got Afternoon, Miss Cook. When I got home, this Weary Blues book had some pages torn out. But that don’t sound right, so I try Miss Cook, my daddy got mad when I wasn’t doing my schoolwork and ripped up this book. But I don’t want Daddy in trouble for something he didn’t do. Daddy said a man’s got to own up to his mistakes, so I’m gonna tell Miss Cook just what happened with Lymon and hope she’ll forgive me. My stomach is hurting something bad but I got what I’m gonna say inside my head. Since Mama passed, I ain’t much for praying. God let me down once before, but I bow my head and say a little something to God now.
All day at school I keep going over my speech to Miss Cook. When the bell rings at the end of the day, I’m not the first one to the door, not even the second. First time I ever walked slow to the library. Ain’t no need to rush something you don’t want to do.
Kicking leaves out of my way, I hear “Watch where you going” in front of me.
With my head down, I nearly bump into Clem standing in the doorway of the library.
I jump back. “Watch where you standing,” I say.
“I been waiting here for you,” Clem says.
“Why’s that?” I ask.
“Thought you might be wanting these.” Clem waves a fistful of pages over his head like he’s waving a flag. The pages from Weary Blues.
I grab them fast. “These all of them?” I ask, flipping through.
“Yup. Every single one of them. Had to climb a fence to get the last one, but I got it.” Clem looks real proud of himself.
“If your friend Lymon hadn’t…”
“Lymon ain’t my friend,” Clem says.
“Since when?”
“He been getting on my nerves anyhow. But when he went and ripped your book…I’m staying away is all.”
“Thanks for this,” I say. “I was thinking Miss Cook’s gonna take back my library card.”
Clem laughs loud in my face. “Take back your library card? They don’t do that. They mark the book damaged, maybe make you pay. Now that you got the pages they can fix it.”
Clem can see I feel stupid thinking they take back the card.
“I’ll tell Miss Cook with you,” he says.
Miss Cook is downstairs at the desk, filing cards into a drawer.
“Excuse me, Miss Cook,” I start.
She smiles. “Yes, Langston. Oh, and hello, Clem.” She looks a little surprised.
“I need to talk to you about this book.” I hand her The Weary Blues.
“Yes,” she says, staring at the cover.
“Well…I was in the school yard….”
“Kid from school named Lymon ripped out some pages, but I got them all. Show her, Langston.” When Clem said he would help me tell Miss Cook, I didn’t think he would do all the telling.
I show her the pages and Miss Cook gets a frown on her forehead.
“And these are all the pages here?” she asks me.
“Yes ma’am.”
“Langston, a library book is your responsibility. And you are—”
Clem cuts in. “Wasn’t his fault, Miss Cook, honest.”
“Thank you, Clem, but as I was saying, Langston, when you borrow a book, it is y
our responsibility to make sure the book is returned in the same condition as when you borrowed it. This book will need to be repaired, but I think it can be done.”
Even though Clem told me how the library works, and Miss Cook said the book can be repaired, I still ask, “So you’re not gonna take back my library card?”
She smiles then. “Of course not, Langston. You are our number one patron.” I sure don’t know what patron means, but I like the way it sounds. Number one patron.
“Then I can check out more books?”
“Absolutely,” she says, smiling again.
Clem goes off to get a new one of those books he’s reading. I head back to poetry to get another book, and he waits while I check it out.
Upstairs and out on the sidewalk Clem asks which way I’m walking. “Over to Wabash,” I say.
“I’ll walk with you a ways,” he says, not even asking if it’s okay.
We walk a block without saying anything at all.
“What is Weary Blues about?” he says finally.
“Ah, just a book I took out.”
“But Lymon was reading those words—hast, loveliness—what kind of book is that?”
“It’s poetry,” I say.
“Like Romeo and Juliet?” Clem asks.
I never read a poem called Romeo and Juliet. I shake my head no.
“What’s poetry about?” Clem asks.
“Poetry’s about a lot of things, I guess.”
“Like love and flowers.” Clem laughs, elbowing me in my side.
“Sometimes, I guess. But I like the poems that talk about other stuff.”
“What is it you like about ’em?” Clem sounds serious, like he really wants to know.
“I like that it feels like…like someone is talking just to you. And that someone else knows what it feels like being…you. I can’t explain it….,” I say, feeling mad I can’t say in words what I mean.
But Clem says, “You mean like the way you feel about Lymon.”
“Kind of like that. But not just Lymon. The way I feel when I think about Alabama and my mama….”
“Your mama? Where is your mama, anyway? I saw your daddy when he came to the school.”
“My mama passed.” I don’t say no more.
“My daddy passed.” Ain’t like Clem to say so little, so I wait. “That big explosion on the Navy ship in California? Port Chicago disaster, they called it. My daddy was on that. Been three years now….” He stops again. This time he don’t say no more.
“Sorry, Clem. That why you want to go into the Navy? To be like your daddy?” I ask, scared he’s gonna be mad, or worse, sad ’cuz I’m reminding him about his daddy.
“Guess so,” Clem says. He don’t seem mad. “Sorry ’bout your mama.”
We stay quiet, crunching leaves as we walk.
“So the poetry you read is a way of putting all the things you feel inside on the outside.”
“That’s about it.” Between all he knows about the library and getting my mixed-up words, Clem is a lot smarter than I thought.
“I gotta go up this way,” Clem says at the corner. “See you tomorrow.”
“See you tomorrow, Clem.”
He didn’t laugh. Didn’t make me feel like a fool.
I walk on home thinking about poetry and Mama and Clem. My first friend in Chicago.
I’M feeling like this is about the best day I’ve had in a long while till I walk into the apartment. Miss Fulton is there at the table with Daddy, and when I walk in they look funny, like I just caught them at something.
“Hello, Daddy. Hello, Miss Fulton.”
“Son,” Daddy says.
“Hello, Langston,” Miss Fulton says. “I brought you over that book we talked about.”
Got a feeling that ain’t the reason she stopped by, but I keep quiet about that. She hands me a book of poems called Harlem Shadows.
“Thank you, Miss Fulton,” I say, wondering what Daddy’s gonna say once Miss Fulton leaves.
“I’d better be going or I’ll be up all night grading papers,” she says to Daddy, smiling like Daddy is one of those actors in the picture shows.
Daddy walks Miss Fulton, Pearl, to the door and sees her across the hall. I watch him watch her and realize Daddy is looking at Miss Fulton same way the men in the street look at her when they tip their hats.
The door barely closes when I ask, “Daddy, you in love with Miss Fulton?”
Daddy makes a sound something between coughing and laughing. “No, son. She’s a nice woman who’s been neighborly to us is all. What’s this book you got here? More poetry?”
“Um, yes sir. Miss Fulton said she thought I’d like it.”
We stand in the middle of the room looking at each other. Man to man. Me waiting, Daddy waiting. I don’t know how Daddy feels about the library and me reading poetry and me being smart like Mama. Don’t know if he thinks that’s a good thing or bad. And since he ain’t saying much, I’m gonna guess it ain’t good.
“I’m gonna get started on some supper.”
“Yes sir.”
“You made your apologies to that boy?” Daddy asks.
“Sure did, and he didn’t say nothing. Just walked away.”
“You just steer clear, you hear me? I don’t want no more foolishness at that school.”
“Yes sir.”
We eat our supper quiet like always. I scrape the plates and wash up for bed. Daddy takes his towel to head to the bathroom. I lie on my bed staring up at the cracked ceiling, peeling all over. I close my eyes and see Mama, clear as day, smiling down on me.
I open my eyes, open my book, and start reading.
I would liken you
To a night without stars
Were it not for your eyes.
I would liken you
To a sleep without dreams
Were it not for your songs.
I hear Daddy at the door, stepping into the apartment. But for the first time, I don’t put the book down, or hide it under my covers. I keep reading.
“Langston,” Daddy says. And I hold myself tight, waiting for what he’ll say.
“Yes sir.” I keep my head in the book, making sure he sees me.
“Time to turn these lights out and go to sleep. Tomorrow’s Saturday, and I don’t want to hear any fuss in the morning about getting up ’cuz you were up all night reading.”
“Yes sir.” I can’t help but smile. That’s all he’s going to say?
Time the morning sun comes through the window, I can smell the oatmeal and toast Daddy’s making.
“Come on, son, we gotta get a move on,” Daddy yells from the stove.
I shuffle sleepyheaded to the table. Toast ain’t burned too bad this morning so I start with that. Daddy sips his coffee, looking at me.
“Gotta make an extra stop today, so I need you to hurry it up this morning.”
“Where we going?”
“Don’t worry about that. Just need you to get moving so we’re not out all day,” Daddy says.
Outside, the October sun is warm on my face and makes me miss the warmth of Alabama. Daddy is walking faster than he usually does so I struggle to keep up behind him. He nods at nearly everyone he passes and I do too. We make all of our stops—the bank, the landlord, the post office. I show Daddy the boots I saw in the window and he says he needs a little more time to put some money together ’fore I can get shoes. I hope my feet don’t get frostbite in the snow while I’m waiting. That’s how cold I hear Chicago gets in winter.
We get to the corner of State Street where we usually turn to go to the fish market, but Daddy nods his head in the other direction. I get to thinking how much I didn’t know about my Daddy when we lived in Alabama. With Mama there, he barely spoke to me, and I didn’t know what to say to him. But now, with just us two in Chicago, I know Daddy better than I ever hoped to. I know now he ain’t in the mood for talking, so I walk right ’longside him, wondering where we heading. Trees pop up along the sidewalks and the run-d
own apartments turn into houses with nice cars parked in front and fresh-painted trim around the windows. We get to the corner and Daddy turns to me.
“Which way is the library?”
“The library?” I ask, not believing my ears.
“Want you to show me this library where you spending all your time.”
Now I recognize the neighborhood. “Over that way.” I point.
We cross the street and I can’t help but realize that two blocks back I thought I knew my Daddy. Now I’m back to not knowing again.
When we get to the big wooden door of the Hall Library, Daddy looks around like he ain’t so sure anymore about seeing the library.
“Wanna see inside?” I ask him.
I open the door and Daddy walks in behind me. In the entry, the bright October sun shines bright, warming the whole room. Grandma was right. I can feel Mama looking down on me. Daddy’ll probably never know that in the letters he hid was a secret she kept. That she named me for a poet whose words she loved and kept hidden in her heart, just waiting for a baby boy. Maybe she knew she wasn’t long for this world, knew I’d need something to get me through, but whatever it was, Mama led me to this library. Helped my hand reach out to a shelf holding a book with my name, and it saved me from the pain of losing her and from a city I hated. And Mama, all the way up in heaven, helped me along the way to finding home.
The road to Langston’s apartment at 4501 Wabash Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, could never be found on any map. It winds through stories told by my mother-in-law, Margaret Williams, and my husband, James Ransome; through memories of my childhood summers at Aunt Ophelia’s home in Charlottesville, Virginia; across the pages of Isabel Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Suns and past the round wooden tables of the Malden Public Library in Massachusetts; along the Illinois Central Railroad and down the streets of Chicago’s South Side.
Finding Langston Page 7
