Soul City

by Touré

  Fulcrum never sold any of the things he stocked. He knew all the things had a magic residue left over by the gods and goddesses who’d wielded them. Putting prices on such sacred nostalgia was unthinkable. Fulcrum had traveled long and hard to acquire the items and had gotten all of them directly from whoever had given them life. In every case he’d promised never to sell. And Fulcrum was a man who kept his word. That was essential for someone with friends in Heaven and Hell.

  Dream Negro had never been to Heaven or Hell. She was just a hairdresser from Niggatown with a big-time husband, but she was essential to the well-being of Soul City. Her Desire Obliterating Weaves were the best weaves in the city. She told everyone, “Girl, my weaves be so good they bring you inner peace. After I finish with yo weave you won’t want for nothing else in life!” She made so many women so happy on a daily basis that she was like a one-woman army beating back depression, low self-esteem, and poor self-image.

  Cadillac and Mahogany were admiring Nat Turner’s machete when Hueynewton rumbled up, his Tupacmobile audible long before he pulled into view. He slammed the door and strutted inside Fulcrum Negro’s, his Tupacmobile idling outside, the music still blaring. Everyone knew he’d never once committed a crime in Soul City, but still, most people crossed the street when they saw Hueynewton coming. They were so ashamed that they wanted to spit when they saw him but so scared that they didn’t dare swallow. He strutted into Fulcrum Negro’s and called out, “Did y’all see me on TV?!” He was wearing a Soul City T-shirt and looking to have a few rough moments alone with Precious before he ran off to the big Negritude University football game. Soul City may have been disgusted by him, but he sure loved Soul City.

  Outside there was a commotion. People were pouring from shops and stores to watch twenty men marching slowly up the street, chained together at the neck and ankles by thick rusty links. They were shirtless, shoeless, and wearing nothing but dirty burlap shorts, their skin sweaty and coarse, their faces weary and blank, their feet callused and cracked, their chains clinking in a garish rhythm, their backs crisscrossed by whiplashes. A fat man in a seersucker suit followed close behind holding a bullwhip. As the men trudged by, people cheered with the pride usually reserved for the military. Hueynewton ran outside and saluted them.

  This, Mahogany told Cadillac, was the Slavery Experience, a yearlong odyssey that men volunteered for as a way of showing reverence for their slave ancestors. Neo-Slaves lived in shacks out in the fields at the edge of the city, picking cotton and getting whipped from dawn to dusk.

  “I always wanted to do that,” Hueynewton said.

  “What?” Precious said, incredulous.

  “Ever wonder if you’re tough enough to have made it as a slave?”

  “No,” she snapped, her voice cold enough to slap the idea out of the air.

  Then he and Precious rumbled back into Fulcrum’s and found a closet. Five minutes later, clearly recharged, Hueynewton jumped in the Tupacmobile and roared off toward the game.

  Cadillac suddenly found himself feeling guilty considering the bourgeois comforts of his world and the lifelong degradation of his slave ancestors. The privation and suffering you’d feel in the Slavery Experience could be like paying tribute to their ordeal. A sort of libation where you gave not your liquor but your pain, and you gave not a little but a lot. It could assuage the guilt, the slavery-survivor guilt he sometimes felt slithering through his spine. Then, Cadillac tried to imagine Mahogany as a slave, standing in the field in her Jimmy Choos, smoking with postcoital aplomb despite the heat. “No,” she says to Massa while rolling her neck, “I will not be picking any fucking cotton.”

  7

  _____

  MAHOGANY HAD a gigantic apartment in Honeypot Hill with superhigh ceilings and a spectacular view of the Afro Pick. As soon as they arrived Precious jumped into preparing the B, but Cadillac stood at the living room window drinking in Soul City’s great monument. “Ho hum,” Mahogany said drolly as she breezed in from the bathroom. “I don’t really see what’s the big deal about Soul City anyway.”

  There were thousands of records stacked in milk crates that were layered to the ceiling, but no ladders anywhere. Cadillac imagined Mahogany flying to reach the records at the top. She had turntables, big speakers, a tower of old Soul Train DVDs, and a gigantic mirror.

  As Mahogany sat on her furry white rug, Precious held a lighter to the bottom of a bottle. “It’s better when it’s hot,” she said. He had a vision of basketball stars freebasing.

  “What are we listening to?” Precious said.

  “I wanna hear Satchmo,” Mahogany said.

  She pulled out a record and Precious placed the needle on the hallowed vinyl. Snap, crackle, and pop flowed from the speakers and Mahogany leaned her head sideways. Precious took the dropper from the bottle and placed three thick drops of brown bliss into the hole of her ear. Mahogany kept her head sideways for a moment, letting the liquid seep into her brain, then pulled her head straight up. In a moment her face turned zombie blank and a tear slipped from a motionless eye, meandered down her cheek, quivered at the edge of her chin, then plunged from her face. Precious eased Mahogany’s limp body onto the rug as if she were a life-size doll. She lay there, seeming not to breathe.

  Cadillac turned to Precious. “Is she alright?”

  “Oh, she’s better than alright,” Precious said. “Your turn.”

  He turned his head sideways and felt the hot drops enter his ear and singe a path to his brain the way whiskey burns as it moves through your chest. Then his eyes glazed over and his body went soggy and he felt Precious lower him to the ground. He had no sense of anything and his vision was blurry. But he could hear Armstrong’s magnificent triumphant croak. The sound became visual and he entered “(What Did I Do to Be So) Black and Blue” and found himself standing at the door of the cramped windowless room Armstrong was painting with his voice. The light was dim, the mattress was spitting stuffing, rats were zipping in and out of view, and the wallpaper was bubbling and peeling as if the room were about to implode, and there was Armstrong, grinning the grin of a man who knows more than the eye can see, standing beside a record player saying, “C’mon, Pops, come check this out.” He moved toward Armstrong and leaned down into the record player, his face inches from the needle, and suddenly he was inside the record, walking along the grooves of the LP, walking through peaks and valleys of black vinyl until he came to a man in garish blackface, his skin eight-ball black, his lips a white blob. The man said, “Niggas and flies, I do despise! The more I see niggas . . .” and took off his top hat as if to bow, passed it in front of his face, and was suddenly no longer in blackface at all, but handsome and dignified, with the soft, pleasing features of a model. He finished the song: “the more I love them.” Wait, Cadillac tried to say, doesn’t it end: the more I like flies? But now he was staring at a slave, his body ravaged, his soul crushed, his chains heavy, his face empty—Cadillac’s own face. He reached out to touch himself and thought, I have to help him, me, then a thought came into his head, as if broadcast from somewhere else. I’m fine. He thought, You’re a slave! The slave thought, I’m a man. Still, he felt the urge to save himself but knew not how, for now they were standing in the middle of Grand Central Station and there were whitefolks everywhere and they were walking around the slave, noticing him, not staring, but avoiding him, but they weren’t walking around Cadillac. They were walking right through his body, not knocking him down, just moving through him as if he weren’t even standing there. It didn’t hurt his flesh, but it made him feel like his flesh meant nothing, like he was nothing, like he had no power over the space his own body occupied. He started to scream, but then he was trapped under a mountain of fat, listening to a bed creak like a large, wheezing, trapped mouse, and he was being squashed by a sandpapery walrus of a woman whose Black face he couldn’t see. She shimmied her gigantic soaking body atop him, her skin smelling of burnt chicken grease as if she’d just come from the kitchen. And then she faced
him. It was Aunt Jemima, naked except for her red kerchief, riding him with a face that got more furious by the second, thrusting hard and mean as if to injure him. There was murder in her eyes. She moved and a breast leaped toward him like a killer seal and whacked the side of his head, leaving her sweat on his face and the taste of greasy fried chicken in his mouth. She turned and said, “What’s a matter, baby? Cain’t ugly be beautiful?”

  Cadillac wrenched his eyes open with his hands and found himself in a cold sweat. “I am not doing that again,” he announced. He wouldn’t tell them about the visions he’d had, but they could see the strange look in his eyes as he sat there twitching and trembling. Mahogany was embarrassed he’d had such a bad trip. Precious wanted to drop again.

  8

  _____

  AT HALF past seven on Sunday morning Cadillac felt as though Saturday night still hadn’t ended. His eyelids ignored his mind’s commands and remained padlocked shut. Soul City’s unhurried air floated in through the windows of his hotel room, and he felt he was changing, felt it just barely, like the hairs on your arms standing up. But there was no time for introspection. Revren Lil’ Mo Love would be at his pulpit in half an hour, and the sermons of the boy who could preach like he was grown but hadn’t read the Bible were not to be missed. Cadillac shined his shoes with one hand while holding an eye open manually, hoping maybe a little time in church would cleanse his sins of the previous night and bless his young book, which was so far going nowhere.

  He ran down Freedom Ave, sweating into his suit, and at five past eight slid into the most popular church in Soul City, St. Pimp’s House of Baptist Rapture, widely known as Baby Love’s because the pastor, ten-year-old Revren Maurice Love, was the son of the famous Right Revren Daddy Love, which is why everyone called him Revren Lil’ Mo Love. The sermon was already under way.

  “. . . and I’ve gotta thank Mrs. Dawkins,” the Revren said, standing in the pulpit atop two telephone books, “who was so nice as to take time out of her busy schedule to help me with my math homework on Monday night, and Mrs. Stickney, who left her home and came all the way over to the church to bring me a glass of milk Friday night as I was trying to write today’s sermon.” The first three rows were filled with grown women on the edge of their seats, fanning themselves furiously with fans that had Revren Lil’ Mo Love’s picture on them. They weren’t burning up from the temperature inside the church but from the heat caused by staring intensely at Revren Lil’ Mo Love, the most beautiful boy in all of Soul City.

  He was just a wisp over four feet tall, with angelically gleaming skin, ceaselessly wet lips, and old-soul eyes wrapped in long, curled lashes that looked lapped by mascara. But the thing that dropped jaws lowest was his hair. Soul City called it the Sanctified Doo. And each Sunday after church people stood around deconstructing the messages he was sending them through his hair. The Revren was blessed with soft and silky chestnut brown curls so manageable that each Sunday he appeared in a different style: one week a gigantic fro, the next one cornrows, then it all blown out and straight, glistening halfway down his back. But no matter how it was shaped, the Sanctified Doo seemed to gleam. This was possibly because he washed the Sanctified Doo with nothing but holy water and a shampoo and conditioner blessed by his mentor, the Revren Hallelujah Jones. Today he’d passed the blessings on to his congregation with a glorious James Brown-style pompadour and a little purple pinstripe three-piece suit.

  With his beautiful Sanctified Doo, his Mighty Mouse machismo, and the untouchability his tender age granted, the Revren was a magnet of such undeniable force that the sexual tension between him and the women constantly around him was as thick as chocolate cake. He used every bit of the power his youth and beauty bestowed upon him to inveigle and fondle Soul City’s curvier citizens, and though it was true a few had begged on their knees for carnal knowledge, he remained the most hotly chased not-so-chaste virgin in the city. He paid more attention to the females of his congregation than to the quality of his sermons, but it really didn’t matter. Whether sermonizing or spanking a sinner, Revren Lil’ Mo Love was a natural. “You’re just like your daddy,” said devotees and spankees, and between the strange but soulful preaching and the perpetual sexual tension in his church, it was absolutely true.

  “. . . and I’m so happy sweet Mrs. Lovejoy came to church early this morning to grease my scalp and comb my hair so I’d look presentable for y’all today,” he preached. “And thank you Miss Birdsong and Miss Delicate Chocolate. They spent the last hour giving me the most wonderful manicure, pedicure, and foot massage. Thank ya so much, ladies!”

  The church applauded politely.

  “Now, we in Soul City are privileged to consider God a friend of the family!” he preached.

  “Thass, right, Revren!” someone yelled out.

  “And when ya know God like we know God,” he thundered, “ya get freed from a certain . . . spiritual gravity! Ya feel ya can fly even if ya cain’t! Can I get an amen if ya feel your spirit’s got wings because ya live in Soul City!”

  “Hallelujah!”

  “Is there anyone here-uh . . . !” he roared, “scared of going to Hell-uh!”

  The congregation said as one, “NO!”

  “Is there anyone here-uh uncertain of the grace-uh . . . !”

  “Well!”

  “. . . and the perpetual watchful eye . . .”

  “Bring it home!”

  “. . . of your friend and mine . . .”

  “Come on with it, now!”

  “. . . the Lawd-uh!”

  “No-uh!”

  “I say, is there anyone here uncertain that they’re going to Heaven?”

  “NO!”

  “Well good,” he said, no longer thundering, just talking now. “Then let’s have some fun.”

  “Hallelujah-uh!”

  “Now, a few of you been sayin I need to refer a little more to the Bible, and I’m gonna try. Once I finish it. You’ll be happy to know I’m almost finished.”

  They applauded.

  “So, today, as usual, we here to talk about our favorite savior . . . Shiftless Rice!”

  “Tell it like it is, Revren! Tell it like it is!”

  “Last week I told you the story of how Shiftless turned the slaves’ water into wine . . . !”

  “Thass right!”

  “. . . while turnin Massa’s wine into water!”

  “Hallelujah!”

  “Well, this week we gon pick up where we left off, with Shiftless still on the Jerusalem, Lose-ee-anna, plantation of Massa Utterly Unctuous!”

  “The belly of the beast!”

  “One mo’nin Shiftless went into Massa Unctuous’s massa bedroom to clean up and found Massa Unctuous jes then rising from a res-less sleep. Massa Unctuous say, ‘Shiftless, my friend, I had the worst dream last night. A bonified nightmare.’

  “Shiftless say: ‘Let’s hear it.’

  “Massa Unctuous say, ‘Well, I dreamed I was whippin this slave so hard my heart gave out and I died. But then St. Peter made a mistake and sent me to Nigger Heaven! There was garbage everywhere and it smelled bad. The houses was tore down, the fences was ripped up, the streets was muddy, and a bunch of raggedy Nigroes was sloshing around bein lazy and stupid. It was really scary!’

  “Shiftless say, ‘Know what, Massa Unctuous? I had a nightmare last night, too! I was out in the field pickin cotton when the sun got s’darn hot I jes keelt over and past away. That’s when St. Peter sent me to White Heaven! The streets was lined with gold, the trees was filled with fruit, and the fountains was bubblin wit wine!’

  “Massa Unctuous say, ‘Shiftless, you said you had a nightmare. What’s the scary part?’

  “‘Scary part’s that I was in Heaven and there wasn’t a soul in the place!’”

  “Let ’em know, Revren! Let ’em know!”

  “After a few years of Shiftless outwittin Massa Unctuous and performin the miracle of gittin out ah all kinds ah work, Massa Unctuous sold Shiftless to the cruelest
massa in alla Mississippi: Bums A. Honkymothafucka!”

  “Preeeeeach!”

  “And even though it was Sunday mo’nin Massa Honkymothafucka vowed he’d make Shiftless work! On Shiftless’s first mo’nin Massa Honkymothafucka waddled out and say, ‘Now, Shiftless, ya gone work t’day whether ya likes it or not! Ya gone start by pickin six load a cotton, cleanin the manure out the stables, and fillin the pig troughs, and if ya ain’t finish alla that by noontime I’ma whip ya til ya wish ya was never born!’

  “Shiftless say, ‘Alright, Massa Honkymothafucka. But lemme asks ya somethin. Does ya like ta laugh?’

  “Massa Honkymothafucka say, ‘No, I don’t! Ah ain’t never laughed in alla my life.’

  “‘If I makes ya laugh right now, will ya let me out of cleanin the stables?’

  “‘Bwoy, ain’t no slave in this world smart enough to make me laugh! For you to make me laugh would be a miracle. Tell ya little joke, and if I laugh I’ll set ya free. When I don’t, I’ll whip ya but good, which is fuh sho all I been wantin to do all mo’nin!’

  “‘Well, it’s late one afternoon on the Honky plantation and up in the big house lil’ Ofay Honky’s in the kitchen making a chocolate cake with the help of his mother, Honkie Honky. When Honkie turns around lil’ Ofay dunks his whole face in the batter and whips around and say, ‘Look, Mama! I’m Black!’ Well, Honkie ain’t one bit happy bout this. She grabs a broom from the closet and beats lil’ Ofay’s entire ass. Then she say, ‘Go in the study and show your father what you’ve done!’ He runs in the room and say, ‘Look at me, Daddy! I’m Black!’ Now, Mister Charley Honky don’t find that so funny. He gets his bullwhip and whips lil’ Ofay’s ass summin good. Then he say, ‘Now go out on the porch and show your grampa what you’ve done!’ Ofay drags himself out on the porch and gets beat down a third time. When Ofay gets back to the kitchen Honkie say, ‘I hope you’ve learned your lesson, young man!’ Ofay say, ‘Oh, I surely have. I been Black five minutes and already there’s all these motherfuckin Honkys beatin my ass!’