Percival Everett - I Am Not Sidney Poitier

I nodded. “Well, she certainly doesn’t seem to be shy about liking it,” I said. The quality of the silence that followed made think I’d been a bit disrespectful, and so I added, “Shows strength.”

“That’s where the Christmas tree will go,” Maggie said, pointing at the corner near the fireplace.

“What does your mother do?” I asked.

“She heads a conservative think tank.”

Maggie might as well have said it in Russian for all the words meant to me. I didn’t say what? but I thought it and I’m sure it showed on my face.

“My mother testifies before Congress and goes on television all the time talking about conservative issues. She’s trying to get rid of the welfare system because it keeps black people down and to stop gay rights because it endangers the family structure and keeps black people down and to abolish affirmative action because it teaches special preference and that keeps black people down. That sort of stuff.”

I nodded.

“You’ll love her,” Maggie said without a lot of conviction.

“I’m sure I will.”

Maggie showed me up the spiral staircase to my room at the end of the hall, so I could get cleaned up and, as she put it, rest for a spell. The upstairs was considerably less red than the downstairs, but no less troubled by many knickknacks, figurines, snow globes, shot glasses, and small bells. The bells gave me a shudder as I recalled my experience with Beatrice Hancock. The guest room, my quarters, was a stable to an array of stuffed animals, small and not so small, mostly bears, but also two lions, a pug dog, a giraffe, and what I took to be a lemur.

I sat on the bed and felt suddenly like I ought not. The spread was gold in color, stiff and shiny, smooth as if it had never been touched. I stood and stepped away. I went into the bathroom and looked at the many-colored soaps on the sill of the sink. There was a shower, but no tub. Violet had put a stack of clean towels and a cloth on top of the hamper by the door. The was a knock on the door, and I stepped back into the bedroom to find Maggie entering.

“How is everything?”

“Great. It’s a very nice room.”

“You’re comfortable?”

I nodded, picked up the stuffed pug. “Your mother’s?”

“All over the house. She grew up dirt poor and never had a doll or a stuffed animal and now she says she’s making up for it.”

“What about you? Did you have a favorite stuffed animal when you were little?” I set the dog back down unto the bed.

“A bear,” she laughed. “Named Teddy. Pretty boring, huh?”

“I don’t know. Apparently a lot of people named their bears that.”

“What about you?” she asked. “Any animals?”

“Not that I can recall. For some reason I don’t think my mother would have approved.”

Maggie sat on the bed and I sat next to her. “What was she like? Your mother, what was she like?”

“Intense,” I said. “Smart, I believe. I’m pretty sure she was smart. Intense, certainly.”

“How old were you when she died?”

“Eleven.”

“And that’s when you moved to Atlanta? You told me you went to live with an uncle.”

“That’s right,” I said.

“I heard a rumor that you lived with Ted Turner.”

“That’s crazy.” I felt bad for lying to her and I in fact had no idea why I was. It felt especially bad to be lying when she had so plainly articulated what was true. “No, I lived with an uncle, my mother’s younger brother. He died last year.”

“Oh, I see.”

I heard voices out of the room and then footfalls on the stairs. “Is that my baby up there?” a woman said. “My baby come from college?”

“We’re in here, Mommy,” Maggie said.

“And not alone, I understand, not alone,” Maggie’s mother said as she turned into the bedroom. She was a tall woman with no shoulders, and though her clothes were not made of metal, it seemed to me she was wrapped in foil. She glittered, but maybe not in a good way. She was wrapped in gold necklaces and bangles. Surprisingly, however, she wore no red.

I stood and glanced back to see if I had rumpled the bedcover. It seemed I hadn’t, but still I smoothed it.

“Mommy, this is Not Sidney.”

My name, as it did with so many, gave her pause, and I could see the thought bubble over her head, Then what is his name?

“Not Sidney,” I repeated. I reached out and shook her hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Not Sidney,” she said.

“Not Sidney,” Maggie said, “this is my mother, Ruby Larkin.”

“Ms. Larkin.” I let her hand go and it hung there in space.

“Not Sidney goes to Morehouse.”

“Not Sidney,” Ruby Larkin said. She cocked her head to the side and regarded me. “That’s a very interesting name.”

I nodded. “My mother was eccentric.”

“Was?”

“Not Sidney’s mother died when he was eleven,” Maggie told her.

Ruby Larkin looked blankly at me for a second, then said to Maggie, “Well, you two get situated. Daddy will be home in an hour or so.”

“Okay, Mommy.”

Mother kissed daughter’s cheek. To me, she said, “Not Sidney,” turned, and left us alone. To get situated.

Maggie informed me that we would be grabbing a bite out, eating light, and saving ourselves for the coming feast, as she called it, of the next day. I didn’t remember Thanksgivings with my mother. I did remember that she found the day somewhat ridiculous as she railed on about how the soon-to-be-removed Indians were actually saving the starving and stupid Pilgrims and not having some warm and fuzzy picnic. The truth lay somewhere in the middle of those two depictions, I was sure, and though her reaction had not left me with bad feelings about the holiday, I found it difficult to generate a lot of enthusiasm.

Maggie left me so that I could get ready to go out, though I didn’t know what getting ready really entailed. I showered, standing with raised goose bumps under a nearly icy spray as I’d grown tired of waiting for the water to heat up. I put on fresh clothes, but after seeing the attire of Maggie and now her mother, I thought, as I buttoned and zipped, that my clothes were more clean than fresh. Then, as I sat on the ladderback chair near the window I discovered that one could hear conversations quite well through the listening device that was the heating vent. Mr. Larkin was no doubt home, and Ruby had a few words to say about me, beginning with:

“He’s just so dark, Ward.”

“Well, how dark is he?” Ward Larkin asked.

“Black.”

It hadn’t occurred to me, but now it did that the Larkins were all very light in complexion. It hadn’t dawned on me that I should have noticed or cared. More fool me, I guess.

“Well, what’s his name?” Ward asked.

“That’s the other thing,” Ruby said. “His name is Not Sidney.”

“Then what is it?”

“That’s it. Not Sidney. The word not and Sidney.”

“Hmmph. Some kind of ghetto nonsense, no doubt.”

“I don’t like him. He acts all nice. But you know what nice and a nickel will get you.”

“Nothing costs a nickel anymore,” Ward said.

“Exactly.”

“I’ll check him out. What’s his last name?”

“I don’t know,” Ruby said.

“I’ll get it from Maggie.”

“Are they eating here tonight?” Ward asked.

“No, they’re going out. I’ll go let Maggie know you’re home.” I could hear Ruby less clearly now as she, I assume, was leaving the room. “Ward, it’s just that he’s so dark.”

I pulled my white socks over my black feet and laced up my sneakers. Maggie came in and observed the expression on my face, an expression that though I’m certain I cannot describe, must have conveyed a bit of terror, some disgust, and a dash of get-me-the-hell-out-of-here.