by Curtis Bunn
“No, you didn’t,” he said. “I did see where you called me a few times.”
“Who you think put the comforter on you?”
“You didn’t have a key to my room, so how could you have gotten in?” he asked.
She went on to tell Carter the story of how she got into his room, and he could not contain his laughter. “Are you serious? I was laid out, naked and snoring with a beer in my hand?” he said. “Wow. Wow. That is crazy. I musta been more messed up than I thought. I don’t remember any of that.
“I just got up at some point and stumbled to the bathroom and got back in the bed. But you know what? I do remember thinking that I smelled your perfume when I came from the bathroom. But I thought I was just trippin’.”
“I could have done anything to you and you wouldn’t have known a thing,” Barbara said. “It’s pathetic to be that drunk.”
“I know I had a buzz, but I wasn’t, like, wasted,” he said. “I have been wasted before and that wasn’t it. I think the drinking all day at the day party, then all night, too. I was just fatigued and drunk. It all caught up with me.”
Barbara did not tell Carter about what she saw in his text messages. She decided she would wait, but having it hang over her did not allow her to freely enjoy the festivities.
They made their way to the NSU Alumni tent, where alumni director Michelle Hill gave them wristbands so they could eat from the pretty significant spread that was laid out. Jimmy had wandered off with E. Franklin, a graduate of Virginia Commonwealth who got hooked on Norfolk State’s homecoming a few years earlier. He and Jimmy had met at Nordstrom, where E. Franklin was a manager in the men’s department.
E led Jimmy to a tailgate area where a boisterous man with a grease-stained apron manned the grill. “That guy right there,” E said, pointing to Reverend Davis Wilson, a 1973 graduate of Norfolk State who was on the flight with him to Norfolk. “He is a trip.”
Rev. Wilson was in the first-class section of the plane, across the aisle from E. Franklin, dressed in a lavender suit, black shirt and matching lavender tie. A flight attendant noticed him from television, and asked, “Who are you going to save on Sunday, Reverend?”
“This weekend I’m doing my saving on Friday and Saturday,” he said. “I’m going to my homecoming, and there will be a lot of people there in need of God’s grace.”
The flight attendant and others laughed. Before the plane backed out of the jetway, Reverend Wilson broke out loudly in prayer, startling E. Franklin and others.
“God, we ask that you guide this plane directly and safely to our destination,” he began. “We know you can shift any storm out of our path, any issues to the side, and elevate us up off the ground and down softly in Norfolk, Virginia. I ask that you do that for us today, and that our homecoming weekend be a blessing to many. In the precious name of the Son of God, we pray. Amen.”
At sixty-something, “Rev” was a fixture at homecoming. He was proud of his school and he was close to the dozens and dozens of old classmates and the dozens and dozens of new friends he’d met over the years over the sacred weekend.
What he enjoyed most was that he was not looked at by most as mega church pastor Davis Wilson. Rather, he was “Rev,” a spirited man who financed probably the biggest and most lively tailgate party of the weekend. It was one of his contributions to the occasion. He spent more than three thousand dollars on a deejay, alcohol, soft drinks, supplies, chicken, burgers, cole slaw, beans, salmon, chips, beer, hot dogs, condiments—whatever was required to have a full-fledged cookout . . . for whoever came by.
All that, and he spent hours on end at the Saturday tailgate behind a huge grill, sweating and talking to anyone in front of him. He got off on not only providing the food, but cooking it, too. A huge football fan, he eschewed attending the game and instead cooked food all day and mingled with the tailgaters.
“I love this school,” he said, placing a chicken thigh and leg on Jimmy’s plate. “This is where I became something. I came here a seventeen-year-old from Rock Hill, South Carolina without any idea of what was going to happen for me. I was snotty-nosed and scared. This school held me together. It hugged me my entire five-and-a-half years here. Yeah, it took me a while to get out. When it let me go, I was a man who knew where I was going.”
“Same thing happened to me, sir,” Jimmy said. “This is my first homecoming, and I graduated ten years ago. Now that I’m here, I feel embarrassed I haven’t been back before now.”
“No need to be embarrassed; you here now,” the reverend said. “Where you live? And I see you have a wedding ring on. Where’s your wife?”
“I live in Washington, D.C.,” Jimmy said. “My wife? She’s at home mad at me because I’m here without her.”
“I see,” Rev said. “Well, I understand both your points. I wish your wife were here so she could see how wonderful it is. It’s always good when you can show off your school, you know? But my wife is at home, too. She came with me two years and had enough. She saw what it was about and now she’s fine. But we had a few arguments back in the day when I told her she didn’t need to come.
“I gave in after several years—and that was it. She was amazed at the number of people, the spirit of the people and the spirit that covered the whole weekend. She actually had a good time because she knew a few women, so she was able to get away from me for a time and do something on her own. That’s what worked for me. You might want to think about that. But know that she could get here and have a ball and want to come every year. I don’t know if you want that.”
The two men laughed.
“She doesn’t get that I’m not here trying to get women—although, I must say, there are plenty of cute ones here,” Jimmy said. “I just need some time for myself. Plus, she’d be bored here. She wouldn’t know anyone.”
“This is no secret, I’m sure,” he said. “Women, us men don’t quite understand. And I can’t pretend to know all the dynamics of your relationship. And you aren’t asking for my advice. But I’ll just say this: you will have moments that you’re glad she’s not with you, and you’ll have moments when you wish she were here. That’s just how it is.”
And “Rev” was right. Throughout the tailgate, as Jimmy maneuvered through the thousands of couples, he wished Monica were with him. He saw married couples enjoying the day: Tony and Erika Sisco, Susan and Kevin Wigenton, Leroy and Sybil Savage, Kevin and Hope Jones, Hadley and Sharon Evans, Sheri and Rodney Dickerson, Leigh and Ed Hughes, and Carla and Andre McManus.
But their cases were different: They all met while at Norfolk State. So, they were attending their own homecoming and knew many people.
“My wife would enjoy some of it, but once she started to feel out of place, she would have made it miserable for me; I know it,” Jimmy said.
Thinking about her prompted him to call her. He felt much better after their previous conversation and he wanted her to know that he was thinking of her. She would not be entirely over the situation for a while, he realized. But staying in touch with her would accelerate the process, he believed. He hoped.
“What’s going on, Mrs. Hamilton?” he said when she answered the phone.
“Not much, Mr. Hamilton,” she said. “I’m sitting around watching movies. I’ve cleaned the house, eaten lunch. So, I’m just here.”
“Well, there’s something to be said for quiet time, right?” Jimmy said.
“It sure doesn’t sound quiet there,” Monica shot back. “Where are you?”
“I’m at the tailgate, which is basically a big outdoor party for thousands of people,” he said. “There are—I don’t know—seventy-five, a hundred—different parties out here. Each one has its own grill and its own music and its own food. It’s pretty crazy. I’m about to find Carter and walk down to the game. But I’m told thousands of people don’t even go into the game. They just hang out and eat and drink and mingle for hours.”
“You telling me all this like I’ve never been to a tailgate before,” s
he said.
“Well, excuse me,” Jimmy said jokingly.
“You know what?” he said, getting serious. “I must admit that there’s a part of me that wishes you were here with me.”
There was silence on the phone. Monica did not know how to respond. The cynical part of her wanted to say, “Yeah, well, it’s kind of late for that now, isn’t it?”
But the rational part of her, the part she did not show often when she was emotional, took over. After all, she loved her husband and she realized, in honest moments with herself, that he put up with far more from her than she did from him. She even contemplated counseling on her trust issues. But she never took the step.
“That’s really sweet of you to say, Jimmy,” she said. “I wish I were there, too.”
They talked about him getting back in time on Sunday to watch the Redskins game and then taking her to dinner. “That’s the least you can do,” she said.
“Oh, I’m going to do more,” Jimmy said. “You can believe that.”
“Promises, promises,” Monica said.
“Okay, you wait until I get home,” Jimmy said. “I got something for you.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
LET THE GAMES BEGIN
Tranise, Mary and Charlene
“I can’t believe they are selling those giant, deformed smoked turkey legs,” Charlene said as she, Mary and Tranise walked the concourse of Dick Price Stadium just as the game began. “I like to eat—make that love to eat—but I wouldn’t mess with that. If a turkey was big enough for that leg, he would be able to post up Shaq.”
“And look at that line,” Tranise said. “I guess folks are hungry.”
There were a lot of hungry folks in the bowels of the stadium for the homecoming game between Norfolk State and Howard. There were thousands of people who remained at the tailgate and did not even attend the game. And there were more than thirty thousand at the game. Most were in the stands, but many people made their rounds walking the concourse. It was a prime opportunity to see even more former classmates.
Most people, especially women, attended the game only to reconnect with old friends and to see the band perform at halftime. They wanted the Spartans to win, but it was not that important to sit there and see how they won.
“Oh, I just got a text from Joi Edwards,” Tranise said. Joi was a friend she had met in Atlanta at a Jill Scott concert at Chastain Park two summers ago. They complimented each other on their hair and learned that they went to the same place, Like The River The Salon in the Inman Park section of Atlanta.
“Who’s Joi?” Mary asked.
“She’s my girlfriend from Atlanta,” Tranise explained. “She’s a dentist. She went to Howard, but I don’t hold that against her.”
“She came here just for the game?” Charlene asked.
“Yes,” Tranise answered. “Her cousin plays for Howard and she hadn’t seen him play in person this season, so she picked this game. She told me she was getting in this morning. We’ve got to connect with her. She’s a sweetheart.”
The ladies backed away from the center of the concourse, away from the wall-to-wall foot traffic. “I can’t believe this many people are here,” Tranise said. “This is so great.”
Steven Nottingham came up and pointed his high-tech camera toward Tranise. “Hello, ladies,” he said. “Strike a pose.” And they did. Before they could break up, Marsha Lewis, the AKA, asked them to stay there for another picture.
Steve and Marsha were special in that way. Seemingly every other person had a camera and took photos. But those two loved to capture the weekend in pictures. They did not ask for money to receive the photos or even a donation. They did it because they enjoyed doing it.
They inspired Tranise to pull out her camera. “I have been so overwhelmed that I forgot I even had my little Canon,” she said. “Come on, ladies, pose.”
She took photos of her friends and then anyone who passed by them. “It just feels good to be here,” she said. “I am embarrassed to admit this: I went to a homecoming at the University of Georgia last year. I hadn’t even come to my own but this guy who went there invited me.”
“How was it?” Mary asked.
“It was good,” she said. “But it wasn’t this. He was a nice guy and made sure he introduced me around. But the bond I see here wasn’t what I felt there. This is like one big family reunion, one big community. There, it was the few black people among ninety-thousand white people making their one little spot on a huge campus. The people I was with were great and they were happy to see each other. It just was on such a smaller scale and nowhere near the passion I see here.”
Indeed, they stood by and watched old classmates reconnect over and over and over, with a few of them shedding tears. “I cried when I saw you, Mary,” Tranise said. “When I think about it, you and Charlene and other people we were close to—and Norfolk State—represent a special time in my life. By the time I left, I was more proud of being a black woman than I can even tell you. I believed I could do anything. That pride has stayed in me, made me stronger when I could not get the job I wanted out of college.
“That’s why I wear this Norfolk State T-shirt with so much pride. I have about five of them. I wear them in Atlanta. I tell my students about NSU. I have told my students about the both of you, how the friendships I developed in college mean so much and last a lifetime.”
“Damn,” Mary said, “and she ain’t even been drinking yet. Already into her sentimental speech mode.”
“You just want to play hard all the time, but I saw you crying, too, when we first saw each other,” Tranise said to Mary.
“Ain’t nobody cry when you saw me,” Charlene said in mock disgust. “That’s some bullshit right there.”
“Awww, you know we love you,” Tranise said, hugging her.
“Speak for yourself,” Mary cracked. “I ain’t liked this bitch since she ate my Pop Tarts junior year.”
“Must we go back to that?” Charlene said, laughing. “I was hungry. And I replaced them with some fresh Pop Tarts. The ones I ate were dried out.”
“This is what I’m talking about,” Tranise said. “The memories.”
“I also remember you stealing my TV out of my room and putting it in the living room to entertain some guy,” Mary said.
“Damn, right,” Tranise said. “You were sleep and the TV in the living room was broken because you tried to do a cartwheel and banged into it, remember? So, it was your fault it was broke. I needed a TV.”
“Oh, yeah, I remember that,” Charlene said. “She was mad as hell. She was being all selfish about her little-ass TV. Thing couldn’t have been but about fifteen inches.”
Playfully, Mary said: “You had no right to steal my TV. I should have called the police. I—”
BOOM!!!! came a sound from inside the stadium.
The ladies jumped.
“What the hell was that?” Mary said. “Scared the shit out of me.”
“Oh, that was the cannon going off,” said Jimmy, who was walking by with Carter and heard Mary’s question. “It means Norfolk State just scored. The cannon goes off every time we score.”
“Well, damn,” Mary said. “They need to warn you before they do that. Somebody’s gonna have a damn heart attack.”
Jimmy laughed. “Well, the good news is that Norfolk State is in the lead,” he said.
“And that I have a strong heart. Thanks,” Mary added as Jimmy and Carter walked on.
“Maybe we should go into the game and see what’s going on,” Charlene said. “I happen to like football. And my damn feet are starting to hurt.”
“No one told you to wear heels to a tailgate and football game,” Tranise said.
“That’s okay,” Charlene added. “I got my flats in this bag, so when it gets too bad, I’m changing. But I need heels to give the illusion of a slimmer me.”
They laughed and made their way up the ramp on the home side of the stadium, where the stands were packed with students and alu
ms. Charlene heard someone call her name. She looked up to see Aundrea “Inky” Johnson, who waved her to come up to where she was sitting. There were some available seats on her row three-quarters of the way up the stands.
They greeted Inky and slid their way past fans and plopped down on the aluminum bench. Just behind them were the Alphas, and they were in a celebratory mood.
During breaks in play—dozens of them clad in black and old gold led by Colonel Ronnie Bagley, Sam Myers and Randy Brown—chanted, “You, you, you know the story . . . Tell the whole damned world this is Alpha territory. Oh-six, mother-fucka, oh-six!”
In the next section, the Deltas, wearing red and white, made their “ooow ooop” sound signifying they were in the house. And that made the Alphas address them with another chant: “The Ques are your brothers but the Alphas are your lovers. Say what? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha . . . this situation is serious!!!!”
The band, stationed in the north end zone, rocked ESPN’s theme song and a series of hits, current and old school. The dancers shook what their mommas gave them, creating a sort of huge party atmosphere. On the track on the perimeter of the field, the alumni cheerleaders—some of them looking more exuberant than others—tried to summon their youth. On the other end, the current cheerleaders, perky and spry, did their thing. And Mr. Norfolk State—an elderly gentleman who had attended NSU games for decades—pranced around the stadium with a green umbrella clad in an all-green suit, shirt and tie. After halftime, he would change into an all-gold ensemble.
“I feel like I’m back in college,” Tranise said. “I forgot how great it felt to be a Spartan. Homecoming is the best thing ever. I’ve got to go over to my sorors’ section for a while. I’ll be back.”
And off Tranise went to convene with her Delta sisters, many of whom were surprised and delighted to see her after so long. She pulled out her iPhone and programmed the numbers of several friends—the experience inspired her to be committed to keeping in touch with her sorors.
At halftime, Joi texted her again and asked to meet. But Tranise insisted on doing so only after the band, the Mighty Spartan Legion, performed. “I know y’all band at Howard sucks,” Tranise said. “But ours is awesome. You should stay and watch a band give a great halftime show.”
