College Boy : A Novel (9781416586500) (17 page)

The theater employees were mostly White, except for a few Black ushers. The White employees collected the cash for the tickets as well as for the refreshments. Troy reasoned that Blacks were seldom allowed near the money since they wore the stereotype badge of thief. Yet and still, he and Scooter decided to sneak in using tickets stubs from a previous showing.

“These White people should never get any money from us. They owe us the world, cuz,” Troy said to Scooter, as they snickered about the get-over.

Scooter looked over his shoulder to make sure they were clear. “Dig, cuz. Fuck payin'.”

They took a seat in the back to wait for Raheem and Blue.

“Them ushers are stupid anyway,” Troy added. “And you notice how it's always Black ushers at the movies?” he asked Scooter.

Scooter smiled. “Yeah, you right. 'Cause even when we was kids, it was always Black ushers that threw us out. All the White people do is stay at the counters and count the money. See. That's why I don't like Black people. We do stupid shit. We care more about protecting their shit than they do.”

Raheem and Blue finally joined them inside the theater.

“Y'all niggas a trip, man. I got too much money to be sneaking in the movies,” Raheem said.

“Yeah, yeah. Give all your drug money back to the White man,” Troy told him.

Raheem grinned with self-assurance. “Yup, and I'll keep doing it, too. As long as I'm happy, I'on give a fuck.”

“Well maybe you need to stop being so damn happy, then,” Troy snapped. Raheem looked at him, smiled, and shook his head.

Floods of viewers entered just before the movie began. All throughout the film, Troy flinched at the raw portrayals of Los Angeles Blacks and Mexicans who lived and died for gang love. Nevertheless, all four of the Philly friends agreed that the depictions were indeed close to factual. But watching White heroes in the end made their stomachs turn.

When it was all said and done, Scooter tagged along and went back to Troy's aunt's house. Blue split to his girlfriend's in North Philly. And Raheem went back to selling drugs in West Philly.

 

“Man, that was a dumb-ass movie, cuz. They always giving us some stupid-ass parts,” Scooter said to Troy inside the basement that Troy began to call his shop. “They never show the reason why we sell drugs.”

Troy threw his feet up on his aunt's basement coffee table. “Dig, man. But why do we sell drugs, Scooter?”

“Man, them White people made life hard as shit for us. Niggas are tryin' be to somebody. It's real messed up, but sellin' drugs gives us that status. You all of a sudden have all the girls; you can spend all kinds of money; plus you're popular as hell when you sell drugs. Raheem got plenty of honeys now,” Scooter answered.

Troy shook his head with a grin. “A person gets popular for beating somebody, up, shooting somebody and selling drugs. We don't make an inch of sense, man. People shouldn't have been praising me when I was doing all my crazy shit. We sit up here and reinforce it. Like when teenage girls call their children ‘bad,' all they doin' is mappin' out a criminal lifestyle for 'em.”

“I know, cuz. But you can't even get a girlfriend now without having big-time dough. And the only way you can do that at our age is from selling drugs,” Scooter said.

Troy clicked on the television with the remote control. Then he laughed to himself. “Look at this. I've been watching all these White shows about a White world, and every once in a while they'll throw a Black person in there to act stupid.”

Scooter joined in with him. “Dig, cuz. We always get dem roles where we a crook, or we get killed or somethin'. I mean, we just plain nuts, man,” Scooter declared. “White people got all the money and we got nothin.' Like Raheem, wearing that African piece around his neck with the green, red, and black shit on it. And he out here selling drugs. He probably don't even know what that green, black, and red shit means.”

“Yeah, and then we always wanna brag about what kingdoms and shit we had,” Troy added. “We ain't got shit now, so why talk about ten thousand fuckin' years ago, you know? The Egyptians never looked like us any damn way.”

“I know, cuz. The encyclopedia says that the Egyptians were brown Caucasians,” Scooter said. “But you look like one of 'em, Troy. All you need is that wavy-type hair. 'Cause you already got dem sharp eyebrows and the skinny nose. You even brown like some of 'em.” Scooter then looked at his bare hands. “Man, I'm so light I can't fit nowhere in Africa. They would send me back and shit.”

They chuckled as Scooter continued. “Damn, we dumb, Troy! I'm yellow, but the White people got me calling myself Black. And it's people lighter than me, calling themselves Black. See, we just plain stupid, man.”

“Yeah, well anyway, getting back to Egypt,” Troy said, redirecting the subject, “I don't see why Blacks brag about that shit. Egyptians had slaves. And the pharaohs had all the power. And that's just what we don't need. We in that kind of system now, talkin' 'bout kingdoms and shit. The Egyptians had peasants and serfs and all that dumb shit that makes people miserable, but yet we brag about them 'cause they were scientific. What does science do for you if you have to pay for it and you're poor? I mean, what if we would have been peasants in Egypt? I guess that would of made us happy, hunh?”

Troy's intensity increased as he began to present information that had outdone Scooter's input. Scooter decided then to just sit and listen.

“See, man, that's the same kind of shit that White people lived under in Europe. Feudalism. And they never broke away from it,” Troy said. “They had White people havin' all these kids, dirty, stinking peasants that worked in the fields all day for the king, who didn't do shit! Now who the hell is to say that a person shall be born into royalty? That shit is crazy! Then they had the lords who got their shit from fightin' in land wars. Peasants were at the bottom with slaves, poor as hell. But yet we brag about Egypt. I mean, we had it good when we were just hunters and gatherers, sharing everything. That's when people were really equal. But see, the White man got us running around looking for systems that are close to theirs. So we end up being hypocrites.

“The Native Americans were sharing people, too,” Troy went on to say. “That's why the White people started up that dumb shit, calling people ‘Indian givers.' The Native Americans would give the White people tools or land to use, right. Then they would come back to reclaim it when they needed it. But White people wasn't trying to learn how to share shit. All they had ever known is what is theirs and how to take it.”

Troy stopped, momentarily, to use the bathroom. Scooter sat, numbed by the great span of information Troy had learned from his anthropology course. Troy then returned to continue from where he left off.

“And see, Scooter, Mexicans do the same stupid shit that we do. They brag about the Aztecs, who were the craziest of all the tribes. I mean, they were thorough in science and war. But you know what, man? I've figured it out. The more so-called advanced that a people are, the more violent they will be.

“Aztecs gave human sacrifices, killed off other tribes, and they even got a sculpture in Mexico using the skulls of the people they warred against. Now is that somethin' to be proud of? That shit is plain crazy, man. Them Aztecs cut people's hearts the fuck out! And they had serfs and slaves and peasants, too. Nobody wants to be a slave or a peasant. That shit ain't right. So why would the Mexicans brag about that? 'Cause the White people tricked us all into their psychology. That's why!” Troy shouted.

Scooter began to laugh as Troy went on.

“We all complain about this shit we live in now, but we gon' brag about when our people did the same thing. So check this out, Scooter. In this capitalistic system, Blacks, Puerto Ricans, and Mexicans are the peasants. Chinese, Koreans, and Japanese are the serfs. Then we add in all of that religious shit. And White people own everything, so they're the high chiefs and the pharaohs. So, if we so happy about the Egyptians and the Aztecs, how come we complaining about how we live now?”

Scooter chuckled again, noticing that it was getting a bit late.

“Yo, cuz, I hate to end your lesson and all, but I got to get home before I get robbed or something, out here this late. I heard about these Summerville niggas,” Scooter said, walking up the steps.

Troy smiled and said something else. “Damn, man, we can't even travel among our own people without fearing what would happen to us. And we're all Black. Now try and tell some dude in the street that shit, and they'll laugh at you, right before they kick your ass.”

After he had let his friend out, Troy thought about all of the information that he had expressed. Yet one thing Scooter had said had bothered him, “The encyclopedia says that the Egyptians were ‘brown Caucasians,'” Troy repeated. Brown Caucasians?

 

Troy was appreciative that Judy and Lance were allowing him to stay with them until school would resume. He eventually watched less television and started dedicating more of his free time to reading.

And he had become more interested in his family background.

Back home, the following week, Troy opened the familiar Potter front door. Ronald, his youngest uncle, and his aunt Cookie were there, sitting on the couch and smoking cigarettes. Troy had not seen his aunt Cookie in two years. He was pleasantly surprised.

“Is that my favorite nephew?” she asked (only because he was the oldest and the first nephew).

“You see me, don't you?” Troy answered with a snide grin.

Ronald smiled, shook his nephew's hand, and headed for the door. Troy wanted to stop him so they could talk, man to man, one to one. However, his aunt had leaped up and graciously hugged him before he could react to his quickly departing uncle.

Cookie led him to the couch. “Come on over here and sit down so I can talk to you, boy.” She looked him over as he strolled. “My, you've grown! And got real handsome, too. You don't look nothing like your father, though.”

Cookie loved to talk. Troy was in for it. But he had some questions of his own, so he wouldn't mind her babbling.

“Yeah, Aunt Cookie, was it hard dealing with White people when you went to college?” Cookie, the second eldest behind Troy's mother, was the only Potter child that had received an opportunity to go to school. Charlotte could have gone, yet she remained at home to help her mother take care of her kin after their father had died.

“Hell yes!” Cookie answered Troy emphatically. “I came back home ashamed. I didn't like my hair anymore. I wanted to be lighter. 'Cause you know I'm the darkest of all nine of us.” (She was the tallest, too, standing at six-one, a family hybrid.) “And I was even ashamed of where I came from,” she told him.

Grandmom Bessie had had six girls and three boys. Judy was the fourth child and Kim was last. Troy's two other aunts had relocated down south, “to get away from the crime-infested cities,” they claimed.

“Aw, hell, Troy, I hated coming back here!” Cookie continued. “It was terrible. It was an all-girls private school. There was a college full of White boys right down the street from us. And ta hell if I was goin' to mess with them. So I didn't have no kind of love life. Then I had this White roommate who used to sneak her boyfriend inside our dorm all the time. And he tried to come on to me once when she went to take a shower.

“Boy, it was terrible! All I did was study, 'cause it wasn't anything else for Black people to do. But I stuck it through, though.”

Troy couldn't believe it! College life had challenged his aunt just as it was challenging him. He was ashamed to realize that he was becoming attracted to females with skinny noses and small lips. He had played a favor game to his curly-headed cousin. He gave more credence to mixed girls with long hair. In fact, he and Blue, darker than Raheem and Scooter, had always dated redbones. Troy had to think
hard
to remember the last dark-skinned girl he had been with. He had been subconsciously seduced into hating Black features.

 

After finishing the discussion with his aunt, Troy crept up the stairs to talk to his grandmother. She stood in the middle of her ancient master bedroom, ironing her clothes for a family get-together later that evening. Bessie was a youthful and healthy woman. Blacks damn sure have that over Whites, Troy thought. We still look young with age.

He walked in and took a seat on the chair next to the dresser.

Bessie turned and looked him over with a proud smile. “How are ya', grandson? Come give Grandma a hug.” Troy did as we was told.

She then looked down and gently swung her right foot. “Get away from here, you cat!” The multicolored, white, brown, and gray kitten was rubbing up against Troy's leg, begging for food. His grandmother smiled. “These darn cats get to me sometimes. But we need them to kill these mice. 'Cause those darn traps are too much a hassle.”

Troy nodded and cut straight to the beef of his visit. “Hey, Grandmom, can you tell me a little somethin' about our family history?”

Bessie got excited immediately. “Well, sure, what do you want to know?” Troy then realized that his grandmother actually wasn't that old. Charlotte was born when Bessie was sixteen. Troy was born when Charlotte was eighteen. He was nearly nineteen, to date, making his grandmother somewhere around fifty-three years young. Some of his friends' parents looked older than she did.

“Well, I wanted to know what kind of mixed blood we had in us,” he asked.

She nodded, thinking. “Well,
my
grandfather was a half-Spanish man from Costa Rica. He fell in love with my ugly grandmother, who was on a slave plantation in North Carolina. And he stole her from the plantation and ran north to Philadelphia,” she began. Troy chuckled instantaneously at his grandmother's blunt style of storytelling.