The Waking (5 page)

Of my father, I have no memories. “You’re as Cajun as your daddy,” Auntie June told me after all my eye had seen that day, “but you put him right on out of your mind because he’s way down in New Orleans.” And from that moment on, my father became the Cajun, a mythical man in a far-off land, the man my mother waited for, became a heroin addict for, cried for, and died for.

Maybe I’ll think of Mary when I jump. Her hands, so warm, so tender, so caring. Yeah, I’ll think of Mary. She’s strong, alive, kind. She told me she fell in love with me by watching me work on the brownstone across the street from her house, said I was so serious, so strong. That first day she came over with a cold can of soda while I was sitting and sweating on the edge of a bathtub I had just dragged to the curb. She was barefoot and plain. Hair pulled back, no makeup, no rings, no jewelry of any kind, no fingernail polish, no fancy clothes, no tight clothes either. Just plain Mary with bright eyes and bright smile and soft laugh and—

I hear the sound of a loud horn and look up the river toward Pittsburgh. It looks as if a dark football field is moving my way, its four corners lighted. A barge that big, I can’t possibly miss. Should I jump off this side or the other? I want to land in the front, right? I should have asked Flake more about this part. If I jump too soon, I’ll hit the water and get run over by a football field of coal. No, it’s probably better to wait until it comes out on the other side.

I wait for a few cars to go by, a few folks turning necks and staring.

Yeah, I’m about to jump, and no, you can’t stop me.

I wave at a white girl in a little sports car, probably on her way to a party. Yeah, I’m just another black man on a bridge, so get to stepping.

When I get to the other side, I find it hard to breathe. My mind’s still right, but I can’t breathe fast enough. This must be what dying is like. It ain’t slow at all. A fragment of some poem from my childhood rolls into my head, something about crusts of bread and corners and seconds to smile and moans coming double. Who wrote that? And why does a poem hit me now?

The horn sounds and jolts me again.

It’s almost time, almost time.

I roll up my sleeves, exposing my whip marks to the rain. It’s been a beautiful infection, my addiction, a child I haven’t whipped to chase now. And my child has almost arrived, and me, a father? I can’t be a father with a brain of sponge. I’m nobody’s father yet. I may never be anybody’s father. It’s hard to be a father when your future is painted with fog. I lift my arms into the night. They aren’t black like me at all. My scars, a little crimson, a little purple, a little black, a little bronze. Maybe they’ll become rainbows and wash off in this rain.

Or in the river. Yeah, they’ll be sure to wash off in the river. Maybe I’ll float down south with a couple dead dogs.

And it’s raining harder now, like a deluge, like a flood. Water bubbles up from the street, and the sewers at the end of the bridge have become fountains. Cigarette butts and lottery tickets float by, and I can barely open my eyes. If I open my mouth, I’ll drown, right here in the middle of the McKees Rocks Bridge. The lights of the city flicker and go out then come back on all around me as lightning so fine, like spider webs trying to trap me, a fly on a bridge, sparks the night, the water below roaring and foaming and—

There’s a little bird, a sparrow, less than thirty feet away from me. On a night like this? It hops back and forth on the ledge, and it’s crying? What is it, two, three in the morning? What’s it doing out here? Why isn’t it in a cozy nest somewhere? I don’t need an audience for this!

I take a few steps toward it, and it turns its marble-sized head my way and stops whining. Maybe it’s going to jump, too. I wish I had wings. But
can
the bird fly? Its wings have to be soaked. How does a little bird wring itself out in the rain?

I look down. The front of the barge sweeps slowly underneath me like a huge black and red tongue, drawing me closer to the edge. I find myself leaning forward in spite of my fear, and in the corner of my eye, I see the bird looking down, too.

Four huge rectangular coal cars covered with red tarps float past. Is it time to fly? I pull myself up onto the railing, steadying myself with a hand on a metal support that goes all the way to the top of the bridge. I see the bird
still
sitting there.

“
You first,” I tell it, and I stamp my foot.

It drops more than flies directly down into the darkness.

Maybe its wings dry themselves in flight.

I take a deep breath. “This is for Mary,” I whisper, “this is for my child, this is for Mama.” I stick my face up into the sheets of rain. “And God, if You’re there, whether I’m going south to hell or just going south, please …”

I haven’t been inside a church more than five times in the last ten years. Why would God listen to me? I want to ask God to watch over Mary … and my son. I don’t know why I think it’ll be a boy, I just have a feeling that it will because he’ll be born around Christmas to a saint named Mary—

The second row of coal cars has almost cleared the bridge.

I let go of the support and almost tumble back to the sidewalk, get my balance, and step off into the abyss, sighing “don’t want to hurt no more,” the wind and the darkness sucking me down, down, down …

Part II: On the Water

3: Somewhere on the Ohio River

“
Honey, now you get some sleep. Mama’s gonna be back before you know it and make you breakfast. I’ll bring you some Captain Crunch, and I’ll even bring you some fresh doughnuts, okay? Don’t open the door for anyone, you hear? Sweet dreams …”

The little boy runs into the kitchen with sleepy eyes the next morning looking for the red box of cereal and the doughnuts, and when he doesn’t find any, he tiptoes to the door of his mama’s room. He listens and hears no sounds. He crawls back into bed …

He wakes and still no Captain Crunch. He listens at his mama’s door again. Still no sounds. He’s not supposed to open her door, but he does and sees—

“
And Kazula was a fierce warrior taken from his people, and he was chained to a bunk in the bottom of the boat for many days while others around him called out for death to take them. When he arrived in Mobile Bay, the white men took him to a swamp where he lived off the land for many days before working at a plantation. When the Civil War ended, he and his tribe found each other again at Africatown …”

“
No, Manny, please, I can’t, I want to stay pure. You know I love you, but we can’t do it until we’re married … I know Mama’s not here, but that’s no reason to … Will you marry me if I get pregnant? I feel safe with you, Manny Mann …”

Rosary beads skitter on the cold granite floor, and he grabs at them, each time coming up with rats, the circles around him glowing. He looks up and sees St. Benedict the Moor, his arms no longer spread, his arms folded in front of him, his voice clucking at him as another rosary bead skitters into the Circle of Honor and turns into a syringe which floats into the air and comes down on a man’s back, the man on all fours, a man with glassy eyes, the man saying, “Least I’m good for something now, huh, Manny?”

Cooking in the Ellis, using a Coke bottle cap … “It’s the real thing, huh?” Flake says, handing him a tube … his own blood squirting on the walls covered with dangling crucifixes over ancient toilets and tubs—

“
Maybe I’m dead and this is hell,” he hears a voice saying. “Maybe I’m dead and this is hell, I’m dead and this is hell, maybe this is hell and I’m dead …”

I open my eyes and see nothing but darkness, and the darkness is hard and slimy.

And red.

I’m lying on a tarp, and underneath is coal, and my blanket is a hard, cold rain on my back.

I’m not dead yet, I’m not dead …

“
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Crawford Grill in Pittsburgh’s ‘Little Harlem’! We will be really swinging tonight! George Benson’s on the guitar, and he’ll be breezing through so many riffs we’re gonna lose count. We also have Earl Hines on the piano, so you know those ivories will be laughing out loud because he’s gonna tickle them hard tonight. Say hello to Art Blakely on drums and Stanley Turrentine on sax. While Art makes you feel the noise, Stanley will make his saxophone talk to you like a long-lost friend you haven’t seen in years.”

Sarah Vaughn and Cab Calloway step up to the mike and are belting out a scat-soul version of “How High the Moon” when who should walk in but Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige, and Cool Papa Bell, all of them talking
about getting haircuts from Woogie Harris at the Crystal Barber Shop. And there’s Mary serving up some wings for August Wilson. “Still hearing those voices, Mr. Wilson?” she asks him, and he nods. Then he writes everything down on a little notepad before leaving two nickels and two pennies for Mary’s tip, and Mary’s comes to my table and says, “I don’t need you anymore, Manny Mann, here’s your meal,” and I look at my plate and see a bundle of “Death Wish” and a bloody syringe in my ice water—

It’s cold.

I turn my head only slightly and feel pain all the way down to my toes. It’s getting lighter out, but that rain just won’t quit. If I don’t get out of the rain, I’m going to die. The back of my head aches most, and I feel two knots on my calves and a huge bump on my hip. I’m almost afraid to roll over, and when I try, I can’t move my arm because of a bloody gash on my elbow that’s stuck to the tarp. If I can just figure out where I am on this thing—

I wrench my elbow off the tarp, and it starts bleeding again. That wakes me up. I roll over my good hip and sit, staring through the fog … at nothing.

I push up on my shaky arms and see more coal containers but no tugboat pushing us the fog is so thick. It’s like a sea of red tarps floating on air. How did I land backwards? I hear water rushing behind me, so I turn carefully to see waves and spray not ten feet from my head. How did I land in the first row? I must have jumped out pretty far. I also find that I’m almost dead center in the rectangle, the hump of coal sliding to my right and left. Maybe I can slide to the edge and roll under the tarp.

I end up rolling to the edge and sliding my body headfirst between the tarp and the cold metal side of the container only to realize that I’m not going to fit because of the mound of coal underneath. I push off that dry, gritty coal with my hands and pop back into the light.

Maybe if I go feet-first I can kick away some of the—

Hey, where’s my left boot? I had a pair of Wolverine work boots when I jumped. I must have jumped right out of it. So I peel back the tarp, stick my right foot down, and start kicking and digging in the coal.

I barely make a dent, and the exertion makes me feel dizzy. Maybe I have a concussion.

I look at the container to my left and see its tarp flapping in the wind at one corner. I wish I was over there, but I am not about to do a tightrope act from one coal container to another. Maybe I can squeeze enough of me under the tarp to sit.

Or I can just sit here looking bruised and stupid.

Oh yeah. Bruised and stupid and
alive.

After practically tearing the tarp from the side, I ease underneath until I’m wedged with my feet going up the pile of coal and my back against the side. Most of my head still sticks out into the rain, but maybe that’s good. The cold rain feels good on the bump on the back of my head. I’m glad it’s foggy so no one can see me. I feel like one of those prairie dogs, I feel like a periscope on a submarine, I feel like …

“…
thirty-seven is old around here …”

“
I’m closing accounts.”

“
I’ll pray for you.”

The little boy sees his mama lying on the floor in her bedroom. He tries to wake her, but she’s stiff. “Mama, Mama,” he says, “where’s the Captain Crunch, Mama?” Both her eyes are open, and her skin is cold, and she won’t squeeze his hand, and he runs back to his bed to hide under the covers, only one eye visible in case a monster comes out of his mama’s room to freeze him like her forever.

He spends the whole day like that, and he has to pee, and he’s hungry, and he’s scared, and he can’t leave his bed because the monster will get him for sure, and he can’t make a sound or his mama will be mad, and when he can’t hold it any longer he wets his bed and cries because Mama’s gonna be so mad—

I wake and hear my kidneys screaming, my bladder screaming, just about everything below my neck screaming in pain. All that whiskey and beer last night. I fumble for my zipper and pull it down, but I’m too late.

“
Geez!” I shout, not because I peed myself but because the pee is shooting up my pants legs then trickling back down to my underwear.

I turn my head and still see fog. How long have we been traveling? How fast is this thing going? I wonder if I’ve crossed the Mason-Dixon Line yet. Every so often a breeze parts some of the fog and I see the shore. There’s not much to see except trees hanging over the edge. I wonder who planted them there. It doesn’t seem to be the right thing to do, planting trees so close to the edge of a river. What if there was a flood and they all got washed away …