by Kia Corthron
“The theme was this true story from 1944, just three years before. Episode happen right close to here. These white navy officers got bored so they started placin bets, which a the colored sailors would be the speediest loadin ammunition. They ordered em to rush, hop to it, and an order not followed was potentially a court-martial. ‘Hurry! Hurry! Throw the damn boxes!’ them officers wanted to win. Well. Only took one particular tossed box to trigger the rest. Explosion. Three hundred dead, the vast majority black. Nobody prosecuted. I don’t know, maybe all the perpetrators died with their victims. That was the first parta the paper. The second part. A few a the survivors was transferred to San Francisco. When they come here, they told their fellow sailors bout the previous incident, and when push come to shove, fifty a the black enlisted charged with mutiny for refusin to load ammunition in a time a war. Thurgood Marshall was among the ones from the NAACP arguin the case before a military court, all white officers claimin there was no racial discrimination in their guilty verdicts against the protestin sailors. But the idea of a retrial come up, and the Powers That Be weren’t interested in more publicity nor did they feel like bein subjected to naggin on behalf a the blacks by Eleanor Roosevelt, so the fifty soldiers were released, put back on active duty. I don’t know where Eliot got his information cuz apparently they just struck that procedure from the official record, like the whole thing never happened.” Dwight chuckles. “All I needed, my military aspirations disappeared then and there. After I graduated I got a job liftin crates for the local market, just before ole Mr. D’Atri retired. Till I made my career with the U.S. Postal Service. A while.”
They are quiet. Dwight sees now for the first time something like outrage in his nephew. It had begun with George Jackson’s sentence of one to life and had become progressively more severe. He waits to see where it will go, but after a few moments the creases in Rett’s face smooth again. Dwight thinks of how their lunch repartee had been less a conversation and more akin to a journalist (Rett) asking simple questions to get long answers from his subject (Dwight). The whole reason the latter had undertaken this frightening risk of allowing the boy to visit was to come to know his brother’s only child, and he was learning absolutely nothing.
“Did my father know he wanted to be a lawyer way back then?”
“Seem like the idea come to him somewhere around that time. Maybe that story was what activated him.”
Rett seems to be considering this.
“What makes you wanna be a lawyer? I know it got to be more than just your mama and daddy done it.”
“You don’t think I can?” More than a hint of defensiveness.
“No. I didn’t say that at all.”
Rett frowns, a furrowed brow of worry, looking down into his plate. “Lot to live up to,” he mutters, his volume so low Dwight presumes he had not intended for his uncle to hear it. Rett takes a bite, and before Dwight can decide on how to speak to what had just occurred the young man smiles. “I used to play this song on my guitar.” Now Rett turns to his food with gusto, making it clear that he’s finished with the subject of law and, more pointedly, he’s finished with the subject of Rett.
After Dwight pays the check, they go to a movie rental outlet. Dwight gets a kick out of the descriptions on the blaxploitation shelf. He is surprised when his nephew comes up to him holding an old silent movie. “I saw it in a film class. It’s really funny.”
“Okay.”
“Well, it’s about Confederates. I mean, it’s not offensive, it’s not Birth of a Nation. Except the fact that Buster Keaton tries to be a Confederate soldier, which you kind of forget. Sort of.”
“Well, I guess you piqued my curiosity.”
Dwight is not at all sure he wants to spend the evening viewing some ancient silent championing the Old South, but Rett is right. He does kind of forget, laughing in spite of himself at the outlandish physical humor. At one point he glances at his quiet nephew. The young man is not even in the ballpark of smiling, staring at the screen with the solemnity of a pacifist who has just been drafted into the Marines and is somberly resigned to serve his time.
6
On Sunday they go to City Lights Bookstore where Dwight purchases The Color Purple, a recent bestseller he’d been meaning to read, and Rett, in honor of his first visit to the legendary bookshop, buys Howl.
“You need me to pay for that? I imagine you ain’t received your first check yet.”
“I got it, thanks.”
They have a seafood lunch at Fisherman’s Wharf, pick up chocolate at Ghirardelli Square, then head to the bus stop. When they get off, Dwight walks to the Presbyterian church and Rett goes back to the apartment. After his meeting Dwight does some grocery shopping, then walks home. Rett is in the living room practicing his guitar when his uncle enters. The younger jumps up to help put the groceries away. After dinner they spend a quiet evening, Dwight on the couch and Rett on the loveseat, reading their new books.
When Dwight gets home from work Monday, Rett is sitting in the living room watching music videos, his favorite treat on the coffee table: a large bowl of barbecue potato chips and a glass of milk. He informs Dwight that he’d asked at work for time off, and was told he could take a week as long as he let them know two weeks in advance. He’d thought about Dwight’s offer and decided a trip down the California coast would be fun.
“Then that’s what we’ll do.” The uncle heads to the kitchen. On the counter are a jar of peanut butter and a jar of grape jelly, both opened, a soiled knife, and a saucer from the resulting sandwich, crumbs on and around it.
“Rett?”
“Yes?” His nephew turns away from the image on the screen, white men in designer Western clothing as they sing and traipse around poor Asian cities and jungles.
“You wanna come out here and clean up your mess?”
“Oh. Oh sorry, Uncle Dwight, I forgot!” He runs to the kitchen and puts the victuals away, washes the dishes, and wipes the counter spotless. Not wanting ants, Dwight is meticulous about cleanliness in the kitchen but has not pestered his nephew about the fact that the guest bedroom has come to look as if a cyclone hit it, directly contradicting Rett’s claims in his letter to being “neat.” The boy seems so cautious in his every breathing moment, Dwight is actually relieved to witness a bit of carelessness in his nephew so long as the disorder is kept behind the closed door.
Saturday Dwight returns from his meeting with news.
“This man, Mervin, I done a little work for him. He travels for his business, and offered me a couple frequent flyer vouchers. So if you want to go someplace else on the vacation, someplace to fly to, we could maybe do that. Course we’d have to stay in the cheap motels.”
Rett seems confused by the complication of this new element in his choices. “Oh.”
“You think about it. We can still just do the California drive, up to you. Ready to head out?”
They take the BART to Oakland, strolling the streets. Dwight shows his nephew the former Panther headquarters, which Rett regards with a solemn respect. The uncle points out the Mormon Temple, and they stop in the Oakland Museum. As they are coming out, Rett sees flyers posted to a wall and laughs. “Look at that!”
Dwight nods. “I drew it.”
Rett stares at his uncle, then turns back to the Shaft/Superfly AIDS PSA. “I should’ve known. It’s totally your style.” But as they walk a little further, his smile fades.
“Uncle Dwight?”
“Uh-huh?”
“You’re healthy. Right?”
Dwight is touched by his nephew’s concern. “I been to the doctor. Negative.” One of life’s insane ironies. Rett is instantly relieved and even cheered.
On Sunday they take the BART to Berkeley. Walking around the campus, then they have a late lunch in the last hour before they’ll need to board the subway again in order to make Dwight’s late afternoon meeting.
“It was okay.”
“You like St. Louis?”
“It was okay.”
“I always wanted to go there. Always wanted to see that Gateway Arch, catch the view from up there. What’s it like?”
“Oh I never went.”
Dwight stares at him. “You were in St. Louis four years and never went up the Gateway Arch?”
“It’s for tourists.”
“Well. Weren’t you a tourist the first day or two?”
Rett bites his burger, not looking at his uncle.
“So what’d you and your friends do for fun?”
“I wasn’t there to have fun, I was there to get my degree,” an irritation in his voice that Dwight had not previously sensed so the elder drops the subject.
Wednesday is the last day of school, the teachers looking at least as thrilled as the kids. Ms. Lorenzo asks Dwight to come to her office.
“Well, congratulations. You made it through your first year.”
He returns the principal’s smile.
“I just wanted to talk to you a bit about the summer schedule. You know about the alternate Fridays?”
He shakes his head.
“You have every other Friday off.”
He stares. “That a cut in my paycheck?”
“Oh no, no!” She laughs. “Just a little perk during the down season. There are twelve Fridays between now and the resumption of school in September. Pick any six. One will be part of your vacation week.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll give you a list of the more substantial jobs to be accomplished over the summer. Which walls need to be painted, waxing the floors. We’ve already talked a little about this.”
“Yes.”
“You also can rearrange your eight-hour day as you see fit. Eight to five, including your lunch hour, or nine to six. But I suppose the regular schedule works well with your eleven o’clock meetings.”
“Yes. I like the routine of it.”
“Okay! I may pop in a few times here and there, but I won’t bother you unless something comes up. And of course you have my home number if you need anything.”
“Yes.”
“And take it easy! You won’t have the pressure of getting things done before the kids come back the next day. It’s summer, Dwight! The building’s yours.”
When his meeting at the church is over, Dwight rushes back to school. Half-day dismissal at noon, and he wants to catch the kids, their beaming faces as they depart for the season. The little children wave. “Bye, Mr. Campbell! Have a good summer, Mr. Campbell!” Stephanie Takahashi who just passed to the third grade says, “Mr. Campbell, thank you for telling us about Mr. A. Philip Randolph!” and Dwight is gratified to tears.
When the kids are all gone, he goes to the shed and pulls out the neatly stacked summer playground equipment. As he gathers the swings, he notices three children across the street observing him in anticipation.
On Thursday Dwight strolls over to the meeting early. He had volunteered to set up today, to bring the cookies (store-bought) and to make the coffee provided by the church. He is also a greeter.
“Hello,” he says to a new face.
The white man, reddish-brown hair, around Dwight’s age and height, nods, looking around nervously, and Dwight surmises this isn’t just his first meeting at this venue but his first meeting. At eleven the door is closed, and it’s part of Dwight’s duty today to set the ground rules: speaking optional, the three-minute limit. When the circle comes round to the newcomer, he chooses to talk, and the more he does, the more familiar he appears to Dwight.
“My name is Drew and I’m an addict. To drugs, and I guess to sex too. I just got outa rehab, I been clean three months. Well, I’m gay. I’ve had some real relationships but mostly fleeting. Lately.” A long quiet. “Lately I get a little feverish in the night, I haven’t been to any doctor, I might.” He begins tapping his foot rapidly, silently. “You all don’t gotta worry, you can’t get it from using the toilet after me, and these days I give up on intercourse and the needles so.” He falls quiet again. “Had me this band. Not many people thinka the flute as a rock n roll instrument, it’s all over rock! Canned Heat. Van Morrison. Traffic, Chicago. Tull of course. And ‘Stairway to Heaven,’ it weren’t nothin till they added the recorder at the top. War! you ever listen to ‘Spill the Wine’?” Against his instincts, Dwight does what he is honor-bound to do: glances at the clock. The gesture was not meant for Drew’s eyes, the speaker still has a full thirty seconds left, but he just happened to be looking at Dwight at that moment. “Well,” Drew says, and sits back in his chair arms folded, done.
When the meeting is adjourned, Dwight looks to Drew for any signs of recognition. It had come to Dwight where they had met but the newcomer, who had obviously gathered up all his energy to make it through the door an hour before, summons up whatever is left to bolt out at twelve on the dot.
**
You like this music? He screaming over it.
Nope.
Let’s get outa here.
His place was big and a wreck. We did poppers and sex, poppers and sex, then lying down, look at the ceiling. Mirrors. I don’t even look at him in them all I see’s myself, and looking at myself I see nothing.
You ever been to that place before?
Nope.
You prefer white men?
I don’t say nothing. My in-between life. The Panthers I’m my black self but not gay. The Castro I’m my gay self but not black. Was a black mens club a while. Then one 3 a.m. I leave with Larry Keys and these white boys out of nowhere Fag! Nigger! Fag! Busted my head, left Larry near dead. I never gone back.
You like the flute?
He plays these songs sound good. I got me a band. Then he walk across his place naked, his body nice. When he come back he holding them. The works.
You ever shot up before?
I don’t say nothing. I ain’t never shot up before. Reefer yeah. Coke one time, a party. Poppers. I ain’t never done hard drugs I don’t say nothing.
Here, he says. It’s nice.
I know it ain’t right, everything always come back to the same thing. But those days I was on a treadmill, every bad decision I make I blame the hurt, come out of that one thought: Eliot, Eliot. Wow. My blood in that tube?
**
Dwight wakes at the regular time. He didn’t set his alarm, but even when he does he always wakes a few minutes before. He hadn’t decided if he would take this Friday off, today, but maybe he would. He imagines he didn’t receive Ms. Lorenzo’s news regarding the long weekends with the enthusiasm she’d expected. Time on his hands. Of course he could continue his regular routine, working every Friday, but he had been clean two years. Perhaps he was ready for time to be a reward, not a threat.
Playing tour guide to his nephew the last two Saturdays had meant forgoing his gallery visits. Over his bran cereal he scans the Chronicle and is excited to see an exhibit featuring the work of Henry Ossawa Turner, a nineteenth/early twentieth-century black American painter, his work including the stunning The Banjo Lesson. The weather looks gorgeous and he decides he will take today for himself, starting with a leisurely stroll, his meeting at eleven, and in the afternoon catching the Ossawa show. He showers, feeds the cats, and heads out into the sunshine.
Dwight stares at the bench. He has walked four miles to here, a beautiful view of the bay. Ages ago he was coming down, his head wildly clear before the inevitable withdrawal. He was living on the street then, and it was morning like now, and he’d looked up and on this bench sat Keith. Their times in San Francisco had not been all bad, but certainly mostly had been. Dwight’s rage, then his infidelity, then his swearing off all things white. This started long before the Panthers, who at any rate had friendly relations with white radical organ
izations though a white homosexual lover definitely would have been pushing it. But Dwight’s connection with his first love had by some small thread always remained intact till the drugs. And after all the screaming and tears, here sat Keith whom he hadn’t seen in more than a year—and who didn’t see Dwight now—Keith with another white man. They talked, and smiled, and occasionally kissed. Something in Keith’s face Dwight had not glimpsed since their early days in Humble. Comfort. To Dwight’s knowledge, this would be the first time Keith had been with another man since he and Dwight had met. And though his head was telling him to start some crazed junkie tirade, to ruin this whole damn blissful scene, Dwight was paralyzed by the tenderness of the moment, to perceive happiness in Keith after all these years, and he walked away trembling, a rare moment when such convulsions were completely irrelevant to the chemicals in his system or lack thereof.
He sketches an hour until he hears a church bell striking nine. He puts his pad back into his shoulder bag. He would be home by ten, a quiet morning alone as Rett would have left for work. Dwight realizes it will be the first time since his nephew arrived that he would have his apartment to himself. And while Rett is hardly some rowdy teen disrupting the household peace, Dwight still looks forward to a few hours of pure solitude.
He’s sitting on his couch and gazing meditatively out the window, a book in his hand, when at 10:25 he’s startled to hear a sound from Rett’s room. He bolts up. The door opens and Rett emerges, yawning, clearly having just rolled out of bed. He turns to see his uncle and jumps back.
“Oh! Hi, Uncle Dwight.”
Dwight stares at him.
“Oh, they’re. They asked me to come in later today. They’re having these meetings in the morning, they said they don’t need their xerox boy in till eleven.”
