by John Ridley
“New York.”
Shaking his head, talking as if we were some species just beyond his level of understanding: “All you Northern blacks …”
“It's my fault? This is my—”
“You don't think. None of y'all up there ever—”
“Think about what? Think about getting strung up? No, we don't. But ‘us all’ up there don't have crazy yokel-billies running around with nothing to do but drink and lynch.”
“Yes, sir. In the North you have everything nice and quiet and polite. You don't get uppity, and they don't change anything.”
I sat for a moment looking at, but not really seeing, the lights of Miami as they finally drew nearer.
A thought got with me. “You were driving alone. You're getting on me, and you were out driving by yourself.”
“I'm not by myself.” He patted the gun that lay between us.
“If you weren't out by yourself, you wouldn't need a gun.”
“There isn't a time in his life a black in the South doesn't need protection. And I've got a long drive. Heading back to Mississippi from a regional conference.”
“You a salesman?”
He laughed a little at that. Then thought. Then reconsidered my question as not being so funny after all. “In a way. We're not really selling anything. We're offering. Offering blacks—”
“Blacks. You keep saying—”
“They called us colored and Negro. Black is what we're starting to call ourselves. Same as they're white, we're black. It's who we are, what we are. And what we're offering blacks is dignity, equality, and the chance … the right, the right to be treated just the same as white folks.”
“Who's ‘we’? Who's doing the offering?”
“The N-double A-C-P.”
My turn to do the laughing.
“Don't think much of us,” the stranger said.
“I think you think you're doing some good, but if you figure issuing some proclamations and giving after-lunch speeches is going to do anything—”
“Demonstrations, boycotts, voter registrations—”
“Do anything more than get a bunch of peckerwoods riled up …”
“You don't think it will?”
“I've had a taste of this bunch firsthand.”
The stranger nodded at my cheek. “They do that to you?”
“Didn't do it shaving.” Not ten minutes fresh from almost getting killed and here I was doing bits.
“They cut you?”
“They chased me into a fence.”
The laughing swung back to the stranger.
“Doesn't matter how I got cut, it hurts!”
“Yeah. It hurts. You know what I've seen?”
“What have you seen?”
“I've seen old black women thrown to the street just because they refused to ride in the back of the bus, and I've seen men hauled from buses and killed for the same thing. I've seen schoolchildren, boys and girls, beat for demonstrating for better books and better classrooms. I've seen men who are so afraid of being strung up for looking wrongly at a white woman, they step out into the street rather than brush past them on the sidewalk, while the same time white men practice back-door integration on our women.
“I've seen Emmett Till.”
Emmett Till. They beat him because he wouldn't cower, and when he wouldn't grovel they killed him. Emmett Till. Fourteen years old.
I danced.
I turned my head, looked out the window as if there were something in the dark that needed to be looked at. All I saw was my own face reflected back at me, guilt and disgrace its strongest features.
“And with all that,” I said to the image and to the stranger, “with all you've seen you really think you're going to get these people to give you anything.”
“No. They're not going to give it to us. We've got to earn it: sitting in at lunch counters where they say we can't. Staying on the sidewalk when they think we should be walking in the street. We earn it by holding up our heads and looking white people in the eye. We earn it by standing up for ourselves.”
“Like that Martin King in Alabama? All he ever earns is a free beating and some jail time.”
“If you know another way …”
“I know another way.” Looking back to the stranger now, selling him some of my religion. “You make it. You make it so big and so good that white people can't stand in your way if they wanted to, and they don't want to. What they want is to see you, be near you. They want to line up and pay their hard-earned money just to spend a couple of hours in your presence.”
“And that's what you're doing, making it big.”
“Better than taking a billy club to the head.”
“Then how come you were walking back to Miami instead of staying at a beach hotel?”
The sting of that made me forget about my cheek. I sat there, not answering.
The stranger drove.
There was a stillness to the rest of the ride. The road a little rough, but the car found a pace and rolled in a smooth rhythm that almost forced you to ease yourself. Around us there was only dark and quiet, and it all seemed wrong somehow. I felt as if the whole world should be going crazy in the wake of my trauma, people out screaming how and why could such indignities happen to Jackie Mann? But there was just the dark and the quiet. I was a victim alone. The world couldn't care less and did just that.
Eventually we got to Miami, the Madison.
“You going to be okay?”
I nodded. I think. I don't remember. My mind, rattled beyond functioning, was completely focused on the suddenly monumental job of opening the car door. “Thank you.”
He shrugged. “Sure you would've done the same for me.”
Not knowing any other way to conclude things with the man who saved my life: “Good luck.”
“Same to you. Who knows, you doing it your way and me mine, maybe we'll meet in the middle.”
I got out of the car and the driver drove off. I had no doubt he'd make it back to Mississippi all right.
I went into the Madison. Sid was in the lobby looking as anxious as a guy could. The second he laid eyes on me he started in with his panicky bits.
“Jackie, what the hell …” Seeing my blood: “Are you hurt?”
Was I hurt? I had gotten it in my head I had joked my way to being somebody, only to be reminded in the harshed manner I was still just a little black nothing. Was I hurt? I hurt like hell.
“Where were you? I've got half the Miami Police Department out looking for you. I called every hotel on the beach, in the city. I've been driving all—”
“I just want to get some rest.”
Sid didn't ask any more questions, didn't say anything beyond that. He bought me a drink, bought me an entire bottle, then sent me off to my room.
I drank.
I threw up.
I drank.
I got in the shower. In the cold, rust-brown water I stood crying. After ten minutes I slid down the chipped tile wall and sat in the tub, crying. After forty I turned off the water and just cried. When I was done with that I told myself, told myself several times, that what had happened was a good thing. It was good because I had learned; I had gotten some real-world, near-death educating. The lesson was I still had a lot of getting big to do. I had to grow so large that I would never be near the backwoods of Florida, any backwoods anywhere, ever again. I rededicated myself. On the floor of a tub in a pool of gritty liquid I swore to myself that Jackie Mann would be the biggest thing going. Whatever it took, he would be the biggest thing.
I threw up again.
I drank some more.
I went to bed. I could have slept just about forever.
Sid woke me the next morning, having made arrangements—by instinct—to get us an earlier train out. I was very glad for it.
As I packed up I realized I still had the stranger's handkerchief and no way to get it back to him, as I didn't know who he was. I tossed it.
Sid and I made the train.<
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We got out of Florida.
All I thought as I rode was that every mile traveled carried me a mile closer to home, closer to Tommy. I knew that when I was with her, without her saying a word, without an action, she would have a way of making every single thing in the world good again.
TOMMY SAID TO ME: “I've met a man.”
Rednecks with their boards with nails and their brass knuckles couldn't have hurt me more. What Tommy delivered was a hit to the heart.
Right away Tommy saw my ache and clarified herself. “No, no. I don't mean I've met another man. I met a man, an A&R man for a record company. Small label. New one. That's all I'm saying, baby.” She took my hand in hers, squeezed it, let me know through strong physical contact that our relationship was just as solid. Tommy was giving me extra sensitivity that morning. She knew I'd had a rough time of things my last week on the road—the proof in the bandaged cut on my face—but not the details of why. I spared her those. It spared myself from having to relive events.
With her touch my pain died off. But the memory of the moment of having “lost” my girl was a fear that wouldn't fade.
Tommy said: “I really want you to meet him, Jackie. This company, they've got some really good ideas about music. I don't mean just about a record. About putting together a look and a sound, a whole presentation.”
“Slow up a tick. Where did you meet this guy? Through an agent?”
“At the Vanguard. He just came up to me, told me he liked what he saw, and wanted to work with me.”
Call me Charlie Green-Eyes. I got real skeptical real fast. Maybe I didn't exactly have years in the entertainment business behind me, but I'd put in enough time to whiff the stink of a player when he was stepping to my girl: some Harvey rolls up on her at a club, tells her he's in the record business, tells her he can help her out, tells her all she has to do is come back to his office, or hotel suite, or—what the hell—let's just go out to the alley behind the club and … talk about the future.
I said, and I said plainly and obviously: “I don't dig this character.”
“You haven't even met Lamont.”
“Lamont? I don't need to meet Lamont to not dig Lamont. Coming around telling tales, trying to talk you out of your slacks.”
“He's not like that. The man is all business. The only thing he cares about is my voice.”
“Yeah, your voice and how high he can make it go.”
“You're jealous.”
“I'm not—”
“You are. You're jealous.” Tommy smiled with that, thinking me cute.
I wasn't trying to be cute. I was trying to be serious.
“Yeah. Okay. I'm jealous,” I admitted. “How am I not going to be jealous when some low-rent Harry Belafonte is trying to load his banana in your boat?”
Smiling more, thinking me cuter, Tommy dipped her head, looked up at me with her doe eyes. Her teeth separated a little. Her tongue darted out and wet her lips.
I felt my blood rushing from one end of my body to the other.
Tommy said: “I'm not a little girl, Jackie.”
Young, sweet. Possessing an innocence without being innocent; no, she wasn't a little girl. Tommy was nothing but woman.
“Don't you think I'd know if a man was trying to romance me?”
“I … probab …” The look Tommy tossed me made concentrating a full-on chore.
“And don't you think if I thought a man—a man besides you— was trying to romance me, I would send him walking?”
“… Yes …”
“So you've got nothing to worry about, do you?”
“… No.”
“No.” Tommy moved her hand, cupped her small fist in my palm. The fit was nearly perfect. “Jackie, I want you to meet him. I think … I think he could be really good for me. Not just for my career, but for my singing, for the kind of music I want to do. I want you to be okay with it. I want you to be part of it. Would you please? Would you meet him?”
Walking over hot coals. Sucking on broken glass. Was there anything for any reason that I could have ever refused Tommy?
No.
“You know I will. If it's that important to you, I'll have a sit-down.”
She leaned over and touched me with her lips.
How long had we been steady? How many times had I kissed her? I still needed a moment to recover.
When I had: “You didn't tell me.”
“What's that?” Tommy's eyebrows popped up.
“The label?”
“It's new. Small.”
“You said. What's it called?”
“Motown.”
“I'M NOT TRYING TO MAKE YOU NERVOUS or anything, but this is huge; this is the next step for you. The Copacabana.”
Sid was talking, up and animated, moving around his office. I was listening but looking out the window at Manhattan—the buildings, the skyscrapers. The people. One point seven million people shoved onto an island two and a half miles by twelve and a half. We worked among each other. We lived among each other. We were anonymous to each other. We were all just background and extras to someone else's life. Every other person in this city had their own concerns. I had mine. My hand into my jacket pocket: I felt my concern.
I let my attention drift back to Sid….
“… Hard as Hades for an act to get into the joint, especially … they're not exactly Negro friendly. But after the shows you put on at the Fontainebleau, the word's out, from Mel, from Buddy. Emmis: You're one of the hottest openers around.”
But I couldn't stop thinking about Tommy.
“Tell me about your wife.”
After a second of not doing or saying a thing, Sid went behind his desk, fell into a chair as much as sat down.
“I'm sorry,” I said. “I didn't mean to—”
His hand came up and swatted down. “Let me tell you about Amy. Amy is the most beautiful woman I ever met. What man doesn't say that about the woman he loves? But as far as I care, you'll never meet a sweeter, kinder woman than Amy is.
“I remember a week—we were still just dating—I'd been working late. Two, three o'clock in the morning every night, going to clubs, watching acts. By the time I got home, got to bed, got up, and got to the office, I didn't have time enough to sleep, let alone eat a decent meal. So I come back to my apartment one morning, open the door … Jackie, there is this smell, this gorgeous smell: eggs, toast, coffee. All hot and ready to eat.” Sid's smile was resurrected by good memories. “Amy had the super let her in, cooked all that up for me, and didn't even stick around for a thank-you kiss.” His smile went Vegas bright. “But don't think I didn't track her down and give her one. That's just the kind of woman she is.”
“You keep saying … is.”
“I know I do. And I know she's passed. I'm not trying to trick myself into thinking she's still alive, but … but you know something, Jackie. She is. She is alive right here.” He tapped his middle finger to his head. “And here.” His finger went to his heart. “There isn't a day that goes by I don't remember something about her, or I walk by this corner or that and don't recall something she'd said or something we'd …”
His smile went away. His color left him.
“I lied to her, Jackie.” Sid sounded like he was making a death-house confession. His eyes got slick. “She told me she was going to a picture with a friend, and I told her … A pipe.” The wet in Sid's eyes turned to running water. He was hurting. I didn't know if I should cut him off, or if this was the kind of hurt that every once and again a man forever mourning needed to allow himself, so full with his own pain, if he didn't let it out, misery would pull him under. Drown him. I let him go on. “That's the thing that makes it so … If it was a drunk driver, a crazy with a gun, but a pipe falls off a building from thirty stories up, who are you supposed to get mad at? Where are you supposed to put your anger? Just a pipe falling off a building. If she'd left five minutes earlier, ten minutes later … I lied to her, Jackie; that day she went to the picture. I
told her that I'd see her later … and I lied,”
I turned my head some to give Sid a bit of privacy to compose himself. And to brush away my own tears.
The point of my question-asking hadn't been to drag Sid to the verge of breaking down. But in that breakdown I found the solution to my concerns.
I said: “I'm going to marry Tommy.”
As quick as it had gone, a smile came back to Sid. Not on purpose, I was making him do emotional acrobatics. He pulled off every one of them. “Oh, Jackie, that's … that's great. I can't tell you happy I am to hear it. You have a date? And don't tell me you're doing a Vegas job. The girl deserves big, and you've got to give me a chance to lose a little weight so I can fit back into my cutaway.”
“There's no, uh, there're a couple of things I have to do first.”
“Do? Whadaya need to do? You're getting married, not landing on the moon. Get a church, reception hall …”
“I need to ask Tommy.”
“… Yeah, well, that you need to do.” Sid took a minute to chew around a question, come up with the best way to spit it out. “Look, Jackie, I'm not trying to be a dark cloud, but what if—if mind you— but what if she's not as hot on the idea as you are?”
From my coat pocket I pulled out what my hand was clutching: my concern. A box. I popped it open.
Sid gave a low whistle.
Sid said: “Holy cow. Get a load of that rock.” He took the engagement ring from the box, held it up, admired it. In the setting was as big a stone as a guy pulling in three hundred a week most weeks could buy. And back when most families were making less than five grand a year, that kind of green could buy a lot.
“You think it's too big?” I asked.
“Depends. If you're Elizabeth Taylor, no.”
I was so deep in my anxiety, I couldn't figure if Sid was joking or trying to hip me to my overdoingitness. “I can take it back. The guy at the jewelry store said if there's any reason I—”
“Forget the ring, would ya? It's nice and all. It's beautiful. But it's not the ring Tommy's yes or no-ing.” That got punctuated by Sid putting the ring back in the box, handing the box to me. He tossed off: “But if she doesn't, I'll marry you.” A beat. “I'm happy for you. I really am. I think about the times I had with Amy, the good and the bad.” Another beat. “They were all good. You look back, they were all good. All good, and all too—” Abruptly Sid quit the thought he was working on and went back to another. “Okay. The Copa.” He stared at the contract on his desk, used it to help him focus. “It's one week opening for Tony Bennett— yeah, Tony Bennett—Tuesday through Sunday. Two shows Friday and Saturday. Same rate as Miami. Not a bump, but it's good in-town money. Ah, heck, it's the best in town—” As quick as he started, he stopped.
