by Kia Corthron
Dwight.
I snap awake!
Maybe you better go on up to bed.
I gather up my sketchins, draggin.
I sure do like your drawings.
Okay, I say, an pull myself up the steps. Mr. Randolph is gone two days fore I think back to that sleepy moment. Was he askin to keep a drawin?
I already done the sketch a me an Mr. Randolph on the middle a the night porch same day he left. He wrote down his address on the pad in the kitchen. I draw a copy a my drawin for my own keepin, then take out the money I got for cuttin ole Miss Priscilla and Miss Pauline’s grass an buy a three-cent stamp. Send the original to him.
I get the hang a Carl’s Monopoly over the nex couple weeks, clean him out one day leavin him scowlin. Come home, think I’ll draw me dressed like the Monopoly money man, top hat an cane, when I see a postcard my side a the bed. I never get mail. On the front is this white palace. I wonder is it the White House or do the King a England live there? But flip it over, at the bottom left the printed letterin says THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART [THE MET] NEW YORK CITY. On the right side is my name an address an a stamp. On the left-side top, neat and small: Thank You! A.P.R. An under it this crude pencil sketch of a lightnin bug smilin at me, carryin his own light.
ELIOT
Windy! Sunday school this mornin, wind almost blow me an Dwight away! Mama say it like March but today June the 22nd, outside chilly, inside chillier! Mama holdin me in her chair in the blanket. Dwight on the floor in the blanket, studyin the funnies. Color funnies!
I think Miss Onnie like me better now. I useta think she didn’t like me.
She set in her ways, say Mama. I like Mama in her lazy moods.
I thought maybe she didn’t like me cuz I’m colored.
Dwight look at me funny.
Why wouldn’t she like you cuz you colored? Mama say.
Cuz don’t some white people don’t like—
Dwight rollin on the floor.
What!
Miss Onnie is colored, my mama say.
She look white!
Well she ain’t.
Her eyes cole blue. When I was settin on the curve cryin—
Curb, say Dwight.
I think Miss Onnie a nice white lady! Save Parker’s life after she seen me settin on the curve cryin—
Curb!
She’s not white. She jus got a lotta white in her.
Whatcha mean? I ask Mama that, in my head I see all these little white people walkin aroun inside Miss Onnie.
White people come before her. I bet some of her white male ancestors didn’t come by invitation neither.
I can tell Dwight sigh a little, then go back to drawrin. I frown, gonna ask Mama what she mean again, but she rip it in the bud: An that’s all you need to know on that subject.
The wind Whoosh! Whoosh! Dwight flip to The Yella Kid, got his sketch paper sketchin The Yella Kid. Why on’t he bring me some a the funnies?
Miss Onnie same like The Yella Kid? Dwight find that funny too, Shut up, Dwight!
Don’t say that, my mother say to me.
I wanna read Annie!
When I’m done.
He gonna take all day drawrin!
He only had the funnies a little while, he ain’t gonna take all day drawin. Right?
Right, Dwight say, an don’t even look up at her! He ain’t respeckful!
Well look like he is! I’m jus tryin to rip it in the bud!
Nip, an Dwight laugh like the funniest thing ever, like he the smart one. On my report card Miss McAfee wrote It has been a delight to have had such a fast learner in my classroom, nobody wrote that for him! I start to say somethin else but Mama rip it in the bud: You gonna get your turn, an she snuggle me warmer.
Tray’s The Yella Kid! Hahahaha!
Don’t talk like that boutcher cousin, stop callin people yella. She quiet a while. Then she say, Don’t say nothin. But I heard when Miss Onnie was young she was pretty, an light enough to pass. She got the offers for dates an even offers for marriage from the white men, but all she refused. Coulda past on over to white never look back, but liked her own people too much.
I never hearda pass before excep like I pass firs grade, but I think I got it from the contest. Whoosh! the wind comin through the cracks under the doors. Mama hole me tighter. Dwight, you need another blanket?
Nah.
When she did marry her husband, he a real dark man. I heard wunst they was visitin Boddimore on a trip, he jus enlisted in the army an wearin his uniform, an walkin down the street some white men surround em. They didn’t think colored should be soldiers anyway, an him there with a white woman. Threatenin to lynch him.
Now Dwight look up.
They grabbed him an her screamin I’m colored! Lucky she got a colored voice, it spared her husband. I heard they never went back to Boddimore.
What war Miss Onnie’s husbin a soldier in, Mama?
I don’t know, she say, holdin me warm. One of em.
We gonna have a war?
Hm. Might be.
Daddy gotta go to the war?
No, your daddy too ole, she answer Dwight. Too young for the other war, too ole for this one.
Too young for the other war, too ole for this one, my daddy jus right! Hahaha! When I get to read Annie, Dwight?
Wonder how Daddy Warbucks got all rich? Dwight ask me, I know he bein smart. War. Bucks.
Your daddy thirteen, too young but his brother gone. Uncle Leeroy in Harlem then, parta the Harlem Hellfighters dontchu say that word. The Three Sixty-ninth. Good soldiers, earned the medals. An good musicians, Uncle Leeroy play the clarinet, the Hellfighters had a jazz band. The French dancin, happy, French didn’t know nothin bout jazz. Till then!
Mama, what’s lynch?
She look at me. Dwight don’t look up but he stop sketchin, he was shadin but I hear him stop. Time tick-tick I think she ain’t gonna answer. I hope she tell me, Miss McAfee say you learn a vocabulary word by usin it in a sentence.
Killin colored people. When white people kill colored people, they don’t need a reason. Kill em jus cuz they colored.
Firs I wanna laugh, I think she kiddin. Then I see she not. I stare at her. I turn to Dwight, he don’t look up but he don’t drawr, his face all serious. Then I’m cryin, cryin, I can’t stop, I don’t know why I’m cryin! I don’t understand what she say but I feel sad! Sad! Mama hole me. Dwight get up an leave. I don’t know why Dwight get up an leave but I don’t think it’s meanness.
Mama gotta go make supper. Dwight leff the funnies behine, mine! I see the funnies, but in my magination I see me in the mansion, me an Annie an Daddy Warbucks but Annie’s colored. Her hair already look colored, hahaha! An Daddy Warbucks colored, then in come the soldiers, the Three Sixty-ninth, nobody shootin, jus marchin an playin the jazz toot-toot. Then they salute me, an I salute em back! Then I’m singin! I’m the boogie woogie bugle boy a Company B!
DWIGHT
Carl gone off to camp three weeks which he says he does every July. Firs day he’s gone I wanna go to Roof’s but I feel funny cuz prolly been a week since I seen him. I had it in my mind to split my time even, Carl an Roof, but it seem more n more I jus started headin toward Carl’s every day by habit. I figure if I set out my front porch on the slidin chair Roof come by eventually, either walk by ignorin me mad, or come up say hi, either way I’ll know what’s what. Nex door Eliot playin with Parker, Miss Onnie come to her door talkin to him, I sketch it. Wavy lines for Miss Onnie’s gray hair, gettin loose from her bun an fallin like a white woman’s.
Guess Carl ain’t aroun for you to play with.
I look up.
He gone to camp.
We stare.
So I ain’t good enough play with even when Carl ain’t here?
I look down at my pad. I jus want
ed to get some drawin in, I say. In the lower right I jot my name even though I ain’t finished yet even though most an genrally I forget signin off anyways. It don’t look so neat so I erase, write it over. That don’t look so neat so I erase, write it over.
You don’t play with me if Carl’s here, you don’t even come over say let’s three play together.
You don’t like him!
Roof look down at Carl’s house without thinkin, scowl at Carl’s house. What I don’t say is also Carl don’t like Roof, which is the real reason I don’t suggest threesomes. An Carl all tricky, he jus might act all for it, then we three get together an don’t know what happen. Thirdly, I got my Carl life, I got my Roof life, think they work better apart. I don’t play badminton with Roof, but I ain’t never taken Carl to Messengill’s neither, which for truth me an Roof still ain’t made it to this summer.
Messengill’s?
Like Roof got so loss in how much he hate Carl, eyes glued in Carl’s house’s direction he forgot about me till I ask that question. His eyes snap back.
Now it is a treasure hunt to actually find anything, it all been pretty much cleared out. What’s leff mostly is rubble filled with the remnants a some recent teenage rendezvous: beer bottles, cigarette packs. A box a matches with a few left inside. We go for the fireplace like Roof wanted, but the couple loose bricks don’t lead to much. We separate, scurryin through the trash. I find some mug, look like it was stole from a bar. A little Cracker Jacks magnifiyin glass, that I definitely hold onto. Four pennies.
A crash an Roof screamin. I run to the nex room.
Hole in the rotten floor, he gone right through to the basement. I didn’t know Messengill’s had a basement.
Roof!
Nothin.
Roof!
Oh God. Oh God, Roof’s dead. Or knocked out God. I gotta get somebody. I gotta run home get his mother, get my mother oh God.
Roof! My tears.
Snickerin. I peer into the darkness.
Roof! He laughin out loud. Idiot! I’m kickin crap into the hole, on his dumb head I hope.
Okay, stop! I see his han aroun the hole, then he pull hisself up, head an shoulders visible. I did fall through, but it ain’t deep. Just a shallow drop, five feet. Tryin to lift his foot up. I think a offerin my assistance, then don’t.
Then the rotten floor aroun the hole give way again an he fall back down. Now I’m laughin.
Dammit!
Here, gimme your han.
Wait. Wait a minute. Hey pass me down that matchbox.
How come?
Jus do it!
I hand it to him. I hear the snap, then: glow.
Holy smokes!
What!
Holy smokes!
I jump down through.
What Roof lit was a ole rusty lantern, still workable, thrillin enough. But what it lit up. Mural. Oil paintin completely coverin a wall. The Vitruvian Man nex to God reachin out to Adam from the Sisteen nex to David. Like exact replicas, though course David was sculpture. Replicas except these all dark-complected. Brown-skinned.
Geeminee, that’s a lotta ding-dongs! Roof crackin up.
How’d he get down here? I ask.
Who?
Who ya think. Painter. Then we fine the real entrance, little square door lead up to the ole kitchen. Take some effort to push it open but we manage, all our strength together. Now see the problem: the artist done hid the doorway, covered with bricks, moss. We climb out.
Wait, says Roof.
What?
Gettin that lantern.
Leave it.
You lost it? That’s the best treasure this place ever coughed up!
And what about when he comes back?
Who?
I give him a look.
Dang, alright!
An don’t come back later by yourself to get it.
You’re not my boss.
Don’t.
You’re not my boss.
Midday so me an Roof go home to eat. Mama left out boiled egg slices for a sanwich. I remember when I was little we never had nothin called lunch, if I happen to say I’m hungry between breakfass an supper Mama try to fine me somethin, nothin formal. Then school lunch start the habit, she try. Roof I know for sure jus goin home to scavenge, an he might or might not come up with somethin. All them Bartons is beanpole skinny.
You’re puttin your filthy hands on that bread? Go worsh yourself, boy!
I worsh up in the bathroom, lookin out at the high summer sun. After dinner be hours fore I got to be back, supper.
Over the crick bridge, through downtown, along the railroad tracks, up the hill. Hour hike to the outskirts. I thinka when Richard miss the school bus, havin to walk them four miles.
By the time I get there the clouds rollin in, wind pickin up. I ain’t never been to Richard’s place before but I know the way—Follow Ole Mill Road till it stops: woods.
There’s a wood house and there’s a little wood house. Couple little girls jumpin rope in the dirt, no grass. They stop, look at me. Richard was first, then five sisters after.
Richard aroun?
One of em speak, look about eight. Think that one’s Jojo, Josephine. He in his studio.
Studio?
She point to the little house. I walk over. Tap tap.
Richard swing it open, mad face. I guess that was for his little sisters disturbin him cuz when he sees it’s me he break a smile. Hey Dwight.
Hey Richard.
Whatchu doin over here?
Jus walkin.
Oh.
His little sisters starin.
You wanna throw a baseball?
Your sister said you got a studio?
Oh yeah. Come on in.
It ain’t huge but bigger n it appear from outside. Pictures everywhere. I start takin it all in, slow, an Richard go back to paintin, let me experience his gallery. A few pencils but mostly oils, still lifes an landscapes an people, his sisters, that must be his mama, his daddy. Apple on a table, a boy’s big left han foreground clutchin the apple, the boy’s face peekin over the table but mostly hid behind the apple so all we see’s right eye, right ear, temple, hair.
Self-portrait?
Uh-huh. Little smile on Richard, seemin to enjoy my tour. From his easel he can see out the winda at his sisters. What he’s workin on’s two girls skippin rope.
Where you get oils?
We got relatives in Pittsburgh. Near em this ole lady, live by herself. Miss Tootie. She own a general store for years, save up all her life, now all she do is paint. Her mother was a little girl slave, her granmother remember slavery well. Miss Tootie got flowers in her paintins, slaves in her paintins, she see I got the knack, whenever we visit, she gimme the oil paint, brushes.
How you rate a studio?
This my granmother’s house, she use to keep chickens. The Depression come an she didn’t no more, then she died. Nothin in the coop but cobwebs for years, I asked my mama could I. She said long as my chores done first.
I look at his sisters outside. I look at the easel. Not at all naturalistic, but better. Still early on but already I see he captured their essence: joy.
You like it?
I ain’t one to oblige anybody fishin for a compliment. These paintins is good, he gotta know it. So I’m all set to shrug, They okay, but when I turn see his face I catch the tension, like my opinion mean a lot an he ain’t exactly sure what it be.
Yeah, I say. I like em.
I see the relief.
None of em look like what I seen at Messengill’s.
His mouth pop open a minute. Then he close it, smile. How you know?
Who else aroun here good at art? Who else gonna make David colored?
He crack up.
How come?
&nbs
p; He shrug. Good to copy ole masters, ya learn somethin. They’ll tell ya that in seventh grade art.
I mean, how come you paint it there when you got yourself a whole studio here?
He stop smilin. Some things I don’t think my mama want me to paint.
Oh. His sisters outside: Miss Mary Mack Mack Mack. The wind whippin.
I seen these, art book in school. How you remember the details?
He look at me. Then he loosen a couple floorboards, pull out a big ole art book.
Stole it?
No!
Why you hidin it?
Miss Tootie give it to me. He shrugs. Didn’t know if my mama’d understand it all. Hans it to me. It’s heavy, so I set on the floor with it on my cross legs, lookin at every page.
I stop at a bunch a people dressed like Shakespeare times. Action: talkin, plannin. There’s darkness at the ceilin, an a lotta dark on the people, though a little light captures their faces. Only woman in the paintin is lit ridiculous bright, gazin at a man dressed in gold.
Rembrandt, says Richard. The Night Watch.
I turn. Mona Lisa an Starry Night an Degas’ an Matisse’s dancers. Nex chapter I stop in my tracks. All them people! An rifles, an determination. In the middle a lady stands strong, her own rifle, serious face, her two black eyebrows seem like one long one. Ballad of the Revolution by Diego Rivera. Take me a while fore I can pull my eyes away for nex section: sculpture. Venus de Milo. The Thinker.
David.
Details: curl a his hair, curve a his brow, sharpness a the nose. Smooth chin, an the right hand at firs seemin graceful an lazy but no. Somethin deliberate. The right fingers gentle indent the thigh. The lines a the torso. An somethin. Somethin below the torso.
You sure been lookin at David long, says Richard. I jump, didn’t know he come right nex to me. Little smile his face. You know David had a friend? Jonathan? From under his bed, Richard pull out another of his own paintins. Two brown men in loincloths lookin at each other, somethin sly, somethin tender. On the top’s one caption: 2 Samuel 1:26, on the bottom’s another: 1 Samuel 20:30.
Now Richard back to David, Richard’s fingers delicate grazin David’s private parts. How Michelangelo make us see how beautiful it all is unrobed? I can’t take my eyes off Richard’s fingers caressin the page an I think I oughta move my leff knee away from Richard but it don’t move, my knee stay right there warm against his knee his face so close I feel his breath also warm very warm
