Baby Brother's Blues

by Pearl Cleage

“Too late for that, baby,” he said. “Looks like you made your move too soon. Remember I used to tell you how treacherous Atlanta can be? How the same Negroes who were grinning in your face will forget they ever knew your name? Well, now you’re going to see firsthand what I was talking about.”

  Lee had two choices. She could stay there and trade insults with Bob or she could remember Robert Kennedy’s famous advice to a friend who had just been royally screwed: Don’t get mad. Get even. There were no other options and the longer she sat there pretending there were, the longer she delayed making some hard decisions. She was on her own, but she still had one piece of information that might buy her a call back from a concerned mother, even if she was running for mayor. Maybe that information would even buy her one more meeting with the good senator, where Precious could get that self-righteous tone out of her voice and get a dose of her own reality.

  It was time to make a move. Lee stood up.

  “Leaving already?” Bob said, sipping his drink. “Well, good luck, darlin’. I think you know the way out.”

  “You’re right,” Lee said, heading for the door. “I think I do.”

  49

  What do you say when people call you a gangster?”

  Blue and Regina were lying in an oversize hammock that he had hung between the two sweet gum trees that dominated their backyard. Set in a secluded part of the property that rendered them invisible to their neighbors or passersby, but gave Blue an unobstructed view of everything, the hammock had become one of their favorite places to be outside together. They had been lying there in silence for almost an hour, her ear against Blue’s chest as the sway of the hammock and the steady rhythm of his heart soothed her like walking beside the ocean.

  One of the things she liked about Blue was that he could be silent without being disconnected. She often felt like the most complex conversations they had were nonverbal, depending instead on their physical intimacy to carry the weight of the exchange. Lying in his arms, she remembered Samson Epps’s characterization of her husband as a gangster, and her own inability to respond. Her ride home had been filled with snappy comebacks and withering put-downs, but they were all too little, too late. In the face of the accusation, the best she could think of was a strategic retreat. She knew there had to be a better response than that.

  “What?” Blue sounded surprised.

  “When people call you a gangster. What do you say?”

  “No one has ever called me a gangster.”

  She half sat up so she could look him the eye. “Not to your face.”

  He smiled and rubbed his hand lightly over her back. “I’m not required to respond to people who don’t say it to my face, am I? How would I know?”

  “Well, if you did know, what would you say?”

  Blue looked at her. “Did you hear somebody talking about me?”

  She sat up slowly so she wouldn’t tip the hammock and swung her legs over the side, her toes just touching the soft grass beneath them. Blue stayed where he was, one arm behind his head, one hand still stroking her back. His eyes were gleaming gray in the twilight.

  “I went over to Morehouse today to see Samson Epps about the vets program.”

  Blue was watching her, but he said nothing.

  “I told him we would be interested in doing a fund-raiser since they needed money and he told me…”

  She hesitated, looking at her husband’s dark handsome face. She had never seen him angry; had never witnessed him raise a hand to another human being. Would Epps’s accusation make Blue angry? she wondered. The thought caused her hesitation. She thought Samson Epps was a condescending, judgmental bastard, but she didn’t necessarily want to place him in the way of her husband’s wrath.

  Blue gripped both sides of the hammock for balance and easily swung his legs over the side next to Regina. “What did he tell you, baby?”

  There was no way to say it but just to say it. “He said he couldn’t take money from you because you were a gangster and he was afraid it might jeopardize his federal funding.”

  For a second, Blue didn’t say anything, then he laughed out loud and shook his head. “These Atlanta Negroes never change. The world is coming apart and the doc is worrying about me messing up his grants.” He laughed again, genuinely amused, with no undertow of anger or outrage.

  Regina was surprised. “I was afraid you might be mad.”

  “If I got angry every time I ran into a scared Negro, I’d be one mad black man.” Blue chuckled.

  “But you’re not a gangster.”

  Blue smiled at her. “Absolutely right.”

  “You’re a businessman.”

  “Right again,” he said, still smiling.

  “Don’t say it like that.”

  Blue pulled her closer, steadying the hammock with his feet so she could curl up against him again. “Listen, Gina, I’m not a gangster. I’m a free black man. That’s all I am. The problem is that we are such a rare and dying breed in these United States that sometimes people don’t recognize us when we show up, so they call us gangsters, or vigilantes or other things that miss the essence of the answer to their question, which is that I am first, last, and always a free man, and I’m prepared to do whatever it takes to stay free and to keep my family safe from harm.”

  She looked at his eyes, blazing turquoise and golden, and she knew he was telling her the truth. She knew who he was and what he was and Samson Epps could go to hell!

  She smiled slowly. “Why didn’t you just say that in the beginning?”

  “I did,” he said. “I’ve been saying it for at least three lifetimes that I can remember, not counting this one.”

  “How long did it take me to get it the last time?”

  “As long as it took for me to figure out how to say it right.”

  The perfection of his answer pleased her enough to tease him. “So you’re not going to go legit? Even for the sake of our child?”

  “Well, I’m a successful businessman. I’m active in political circles, respected in my community, and I pay my taxes on time. I’m too legit to quit!”

  The idea of her ever-cool husband quoting the ever-manic MC Hammer brought forth a giggle from Regina that Blue smothered with a kiss. They cuddled close, enjoying the hammock’s gentle sway.

  “Our child is going to be fine,” he said softly. “Trust me.”

  “I do trust you.”

  “Good. That’s all that matters.”

  And that was that.

  50

  Baby Brother was on a mission. He had tossed those pissed-out jeans and used most of his check to buy some new clothes. Saturday he played cards with Davy and his idiot friends and picked up a hundred and fifty bucks cheating them at blackjack. On Sunday, he spent the day sleeping and watching whatever games were on TV. At ten o’clock, he walked up to the intersection of Abernathy and Ashby streets and caught a cab to Club Baltimore. When he got there, he went around to the back, paid the ten-dollar cover, and walked in like he did it every night of the week.

  He stood at the bar, sipping a beer since he was off cognac for a while considering his disastrous last outing, and looked around. This was a high-end place, no doubt about that. Straight or gay or somewhere in between, the people who came to Club Baltimore were black and beautiful and unapologetic about the money they spent on cars and clothes and magnums of Cristal. There were only two groups of people allowed in places like this, he thought. The ones with cash and the ones with beauty.

  Baby Brother considered this a trial run, but he knew he had the look. Baby face and a gangsta style always attracted the wannabe bad boys who wouldn’t survive on the street for ten minutes without bodyguards. No way he couldn’t pick up a hundred bucks now and then in a place like this. Even in Iraq, there had been plenty of guys willing to pay to play. Sometimes when he needed cash, he’d let them. That didn’t mean he was gay. At those moments, all that went down was that he was on the receiving end of a blow job in a place where any sex was rarer than a
day without anybody dying. Besides, once he closed his eyes and pictured Lil’ Kim kneeling in front of him, it didn’t matter that it wasn’t a woman at all, only a terrified young soldier with a secret.

  At first, when guys started hinting around, he wondered why they kept assuming he would do it. He didn’t look gay. In civvies, his classic hip-hop style of baggy jeans, oversize T-shirt, and spotless tennis shoes screamed “straight” as loud as if he’d had it tattooed on his stomach like Tupac had thug life. He’d asked a couple of them to explain why they had approached him, but they would just mumble something about a certain feeling; a certain way he looked at them. After a while, he stopped worrying about it. The truth was, he didn’t give a damn what people thought about him. He was here tonight to make some money and if he had some fun in the process, that was all to the good.

  The crowd was already picking up and he was glad he had found a place at the bar that gave him a view of the whole room. Everything sounded and looked and even smelled just like it had the other night when he’d been here with Zora. The only difference was that there weren’t any women. Not on the dance floor. Not at the tables. Not at the bar. Not even behind the bar. Tonight, Club Baltimore was all about the brothers.

  “You look like you could use another beer.”

  That was almost as weak a pickup line as “do you come here often?” but the bottle of Heineken Baby Brother had been nursing was about to give up the ghost and the offer was right on time. He turned to look at whoever was making the offer. Good face, good body, expensive silk shirt, well-cut suit, and a big smile.

  “Thanks,” Baby Brother said.

  The man smiled and signaled the bartender. “I’m Kwame.”

  “Wes,” Baby Brother said, thinking this guy looked more like a Kevin than a Kwame.

  The bartender put down two more beers and grinned at the guy. “These are on the house. Welcome back, brother.”

  “Thanks, J.P.,” Kwame said, tipping him twenty bucks for two beers that would have cost twelve.

  “My pleasure,” the bartender said, heading back to his post. “Just let me know what you need. Denny’s downstairs tonight.”

  Baby Brother took in everything about the exchange. Kwame turned back to him with the same big smile. “Well, I guess that pretty much ruins any chance I had of claiming to be a first-timer.”

  “You some kind of big shot around here or something?”

  Baby Brother knew what he was doing. The thug persona he was wearing tonight didn’t allow for much chitchat.

  “Or something,” Kwame said, taking a swallow of beer. “I got to know some of the guys when I designed their renovation.”

  “That makes you an architect?”

  Kwame nodded. “Guilty as charged. How about you, Wes?”

  Baby Brother looked at Kwame. Punks flirt. Gangstas fuck. “Why don’t you show me what’s up downstairs?”

  He knew that would be where the kind of action he was looking for took place. The faster they got down there, the faster some money would change hands. The way the guy responded to Baby Brother’s directness would indicate whether or not he was serious or just fooling around.

  “Is that what you want?” Kwame said.

  Bingo! Baby Brother drained the beer and put down the bottle. “No, motherfucker, that’s what you want.”

  Kwame wasn’t smiling anymore. He had that look these guys always got when they knew it was really going to happen. If Baby Brother had looked more closely, he would have seen a combination of desire and despair that might have triggered some compassion in him, but it was too late for that. Or too early.

  “It’s nothing much,” Kwame said, his voice already thickening with anticipation. “Sometimes a man needs a little privacy.”

  This was almost too easy, Baby Brother thought. “So you gonna show it to me or what?”

  Kwame looked at Baby Brother while he seemed to be making up his mind, then he raised a hand at J.P., who was handing two cosmopolitans to a couple of guys who looked like they should have been out to dinner with their wives or their bosses.

  “What can I get for you?” he said, coming over as the men touched their glasses in a toast.

  “Ask Denny to bring me the usual,” Kwame said. “Tell him to leave it outside.”

  “You got it,” J.P. said with a professional smile.

  Baby Brother followed Kwame through a door at the end of the bar and down a narrow stairway that opened into a dimly lit hallway. The very last door required two keys. Kwame had both. The room was small with a big white leather sofa, a wet bar, a huge TV, and not much else. Kwame closed the door behind them, picked up the remote, and pointed it at the screen. Rapper 50 Cent, the quintessential video thug, swaggered into view doing the same song they had been playing upstairs. Baby Brother wondered what 50 would think watching a bunch of brothers dancing to “In Da Club.”

  “Got any porno?”

  Kwame clicked the remote and two well-built white men in cowboy hats appeared on the screen, enthusiastically engaged in anal sex.

  “Not that fag shit,” Baby Brother snarled. “Real porno.”

  Kwame complied by switching to a channel featuring a woman with no visible gag reflex giving oral sex to a man whose nickname was probably “Jumbo.” If the fag-shit comment bothered him, Kwame didn’t show it. He knew what came next just like Baby Brother did. All they were doing now was making themselves comfortable. A soft tap on the door let them know Denny had left the usual outside as he had been instructed.

  Sometimes Kwame went to the VIP room upstairs if that was required to get everybody in the right mood, but he was always afraid he’d be recognized up there. Always afraid someone would come up and ask him if he wasn’t Precious Hargrove’s son. He preferred the privacy of this space, which he had included in his design in response to the owner’s request for a personal playroom. A happily heterosexual man, the owner never came in on DL night. He said being around that many faggots made him nervous, although, as J.P. pointed out, that didn’t stop him from taking their money.

  Kwame opened the door and brought in a bottle of expensive champagne in a silver bucket while Baby Brother got comfortable on the sofa. He had already tossed his jacket aside and was rubbing his stomach under the big white T-shirt while he watched the woman performing fellatio on Jumbo with a bored expression on her face as if her mind was a thousand miles away. Kwame poured them each a glass of champagne and went to sit beside Baby Brother. This was the moment Kwame hated most. The moment when the power changed hands. The moment when he wanted something bad enough to risk everything to get it. He reached over and unbuckled Baby Brother’s belt, hoping they wanted the same thing.

  “Are you as good as she is?” Baby Brother said, pointing to the woman on the screen.

  Kwame grinned and slid over a little closer. “I’m better.”

  When the two men exited the club together an hour later, neither one saw the woman in the dark gray sedan snap their picture before they drove away in Kwame’s car. Lee noted the time in her notebook and headed out behind them.

  51

  When Brandi opened the door to find General standing there with his arms full of black garment bags, she clapped her hands like a kid on Christmas morning who’d just discovered that new bike under the tree tied up with a big red bow. Her delight was exactly what he’d been hoping for when he put himself in the hands of the smiling young man at Stephan’s Vintage Clothing who said his name was Terrance and who had no trouble translating General’s vision of a Rat Pack–era Vegas wardrobe into a dazzling array of outfits, all carefully selected in Brandi’s size five. He had asked them to leave the clothes on the hangers to avoid wrinkling and tipped Terrance like he was an Atlantic City blackjack dealer.

  Brandi’s spontaneous applause was the perfect response. She flung herself against his body and kissed him passionately, wrapping her arms around his neck and pressing her warm body against him, even though he couldn’t return her embrace without dropping his purch
ases to the floor. He laughed and stumbled backward slightly.

  “Hold on, girl! You ain’t gotta knock me down just because you’re glad to see me!”

  She laughed, too, locking the door behind him. She was wearing a transparent minidress, a silver thong, and five-inch patent-leather heels. To General, she looked good enough to eat.

  “What you expect me to do?” she said, prancing along beside him, her dark eyes shining in anticipation. “You come in here loaded down like Santa Claus or some shit. I lost my head for a minute, baby, that’s all!”

  “What makes you think any of this is for you?” he teased her, walking in the bedroom and spreading the bags across her bed. With his help, she had moved out of the extended-stay motel and into her own apartment, but she had kept the animal-print bedspread at his request. He liked it.

  She grinned at him, pulled her tiny dress over her head, and tossed it to the floor. “What makes you think any of this is for you?”

  He came to her and wrapped one big arm around her waist, loving the feel of her skin, the slightly musty smell of her sex. She glued her mouth to his and teased his tongue in a kiss.

  “I’m just kiddin’ you, baby,” she said. “You know this ain’t for nobody but you.”

  It was a mark of how deeply attached to her he had become that he almost believed her. Almost.

  “Well, you keep it that way,” he said. “Now come on and try these clothes on before I take them back to the store.”

  “You ain’t got to tell me twice, baby,” she said, carefully unzipping the first garment bag. It stuck halfway down and she tugged at it. “You bought all this stuff for Vegas?”

  “Any law against that?”

  “Hell, no!” she said, her fingers working the zipper excitedly. “You just so good to me, baby, sometimes I don’t know what to do.”

  The zipper finally surrendered and she reached in eagerly to pull out a classic sixties sheath dress in navy blue with white trim. It was accompanied by a small bolero jacket, also trimmed in white. Brandi froze, her face suddenly filled with confusion and disappointment.