Rhozier Brown - DC Noir 2 - The Classics

“Bitch,” I said quietly, “please don’t try that shit on me … I am a person and my name is Linda Frazier.”

She looked at me stunned for a moment. Then she started laughing. I don’t know whether she was laughing at me or with me; but we laughed together, long and hard …

It was a long weekend. Sometime between that Friday night and Monday morning, I made love to Eugene and plotted with them the takeover of the university. So, I let go. Not knowing where any of this would take me, I became a spring child running wild. My blood afire, my nipples moist with milk …

Monday morning we seized the president’s office, which was located in the administration building. We took over the switchboard. About six hundred of us. All of the campus crazies and passionate ideologues. We chanted and sang slogans as we charged across the campus. We locked the president and his entire staff in the offices. Jennie was in charge of logistics. “Abdul” set up a communications network with other college campuses. I was part of the arts-attack team. We moved on the Arts and Humanities building. We cornered Dr. Reed and the music staff in a department meeting. Our banners demanded black music: Ellington, Parker, Coltrane … They trembled. Dr. Reed and his supercilious flock of incompetents trembled. Seeing them like this, we realized that we had power. In the swirl, I caught a glimpse of Dr. Reed giving me an imploring look. He knew I was with them. But still his mouth was twisted in a painful “Why?”

We pressed our demands on them. A few of the bolder teachers tried to defend the policies of the department, but we shouted them down. Then we played our stomps, rags, blues, and be-bop. We played everything “out,” wailing plaintive, atonal black screeching sounds that made us scream with power. Dr. Reed tried to cover his ears, but the sound was so righteous and judgmental that, despite himself, he was compelled to listen. Yes, it was chaos, but it was good.

We ran the university for seven days. On the heels of our rebellion, more spread to other campuses around the country. Eugene’s press briefings were superb. We made the six o’clock news. Our voices went out on radios and tape recorders all around the world. Yes, it was dangerous. But in a snap I had somehow become reckless in my passion. And in my dreams now, the face of my spectral twin alternately changed her expression from stern acquiescence to wry, cryptic laughter. On the whole, though, she seemed to be thoroughly enjoying herself. Because now I was free to go on. Toward what and where?

No, it was not difficult to wash out my permanent and display this kinky hair like it was a bejeweled diadem. Of course, I briefly thought about my mother’s shock. But I was grown now, and our tomorrows loomed bright before us.

Well, we won most of our demands. Seniors like myself, Eugene, and Jennie would be allowed to graduate. A joint committee of students and faculty members was set up to plan an Afro-American Studies program. The director of the cafeteria promised better food. It was a strange and exhilarating victory. Two nights before graduation day, Eugene and I were back at it furiously. We lay under the sheets together.

“I’ve been accepted to law school.”

“Where?”

“Columbia.”

I was impressed.

“What about you?”

“The conservatory.”

“That’s an odd combination.”

“What’s an odd combination?”

“A lawyer with a violinist for a wife.”

“We’ll have to tell Jennie …”

“Oh yes, Jennie,” he said as he slide inside of me again …

The next day I met Jennie at the West Indian restaurant on Georgia Avenue. She was unusually buoyant. Maybe a little high even.

“Well, this is it, ole girl,” she said, “we finally made it out of this plantation.”

“What are you gonna do now?” That was the question everyone was asking each other.

But before she could answer, I said: “Go ye forth, Children, and tear down the walls of Jericho.”

She laughed, flashing an exquisite set of teeth. She had recently washed her hair, and there was about her the scent of coconut oil. “Of course, Jericho must fall, my Sister. What will be your contribution?”

“Why must I make a contribution?”

“Because there is no such thing as personal anything as long as the Beast rules the planet.”

“But why must I give my life to that? This is the only life I know. I want to make music and have babies. Is there really anything wrong with that?”

“No, but you can’t collaborate with this system.”

“Collaborate?”

“Yes, collaborate!” She was suddenly very angry. Then she paused and softly stroked my hand with her fingertips. “Why don’t you come with me?”

“Where?”

“Chicago, to help organize a revolutionary party.”

“Jennie, I wouldn’t be good at that, and besides, Eugene and I are getting married.” I felt her fingers pause.

“Oh, I see … So you two have really been at it. I wish somebody could have told me before now.”

“We were planning to tell you tonight.” I knew I was taking him away from her; I hadn’t consciously planned it that way, but in the whirl of events my body seemed on fire. My womanhood came down on me, and Eugene got to be a habit I couldn’t break.

“I love you, Linda.” It hung in the air like smoke from a stick of marijuana.

“I love you too, Jennie.”

She almost wept, but held back. “I have an appointment now. Good luck, my Sister.” She kissed me on the cheek and walked out of the restaurant.

She must have left campus the next day, because she did not march down the aisle. She was a summa cum laude student, and they called her name. But she was not there. I met Eugene’s entire family of doctors and lawyers. My family liked his family and his family liked mine. And there was nothing unusual about the rest.

So we married, but there is really nothing very special about us. We take it for granted that we love each other, and that we should succeed in whatever we do. Eugene is a tough lawyer, one of the best of a new breed of black constitutional attorneys specializing in the First Amendment. Me? I’m still trying to get into an orchestra. In the meantime, I fly back and forth to Europe for special concerts. The reviews are good, but nothing big has broken for me over here. I just go on working my stuff on Eugene, playing an occasional gig, and keeping this diary. I suspect that we will have children soon. And as Jennie would say, we will raise them in the proper knowledge of themselves. And what of Jennie now?

She’s on the run, living in Paris or Algeria as a political exile. Expatriate—

Eugene was out of town. I was working on a new composition about seven years ago when the phone rang. I started not to answer it because it seemed to ring so harshly. It was Jennie. She was wanted for murdering a Chicago policeman. It was in all of the papers. Hadn’t she considered that our phone might be tapped? After all, Eugene had successfully defended movement people. I wiped the instrument clean and put it in the case. I went to the bank and withdrew two thousand dollars in cash. Suppose they found out and Eugene lost his license to practice law? Suppose they have been followed? This was Jennie’s vortex, no doubt out it.

It was a dingy Irish bar on the West Side. She was not alone. The man was a little younger than Jennie. He wore a suit and a raincoat. He did not take his hat off. We sat at the table facing the door. With his left hand he sipped his drink, but underneath the table, the right hand held a large-caliber weapon. Jennie introduced me to him, but I didn’t really hear his name.

“Sister, you sure look good. How’s Abdul?”

“He’s fine. But he stopped calling himself Abdul several years ago.” I don’t know why I was compelled to tell her that. She could have just as well remembered him as Abdul.