Midnight (10 page)

The American Embassy. Big Time Bullshit happening
. Bop felt a bit awkward trying to pull four hundred cedis out of the pocket beneath the robe covering his pants.

He felt high enough and outrageous enough to want to get into the reception line.

If we got this many white people in line, there must be something good at the end. He shook the tall, pale, fuzzy-eyed guy's hand and kept on moving into the interior of the American Embassy before he realized that he had shaken hands with the new American ambassador.

Ten yards beyond the receiving line, he found himself on a huge terrace, mingling with hundreds of people. Despite the fact that they were multi-culture, there seemed to be a common bond uniting them.
A fuckin' bunch o' phonies.…

He wandered from group to group, monitoring conversations.…

“Yes, of course, but cawn't you see that the problem of our situation rests in the under-development of our resources …?”

“Hah hah hah.… One of the things you must understand is this: the Ghanaian masses are a patient, long-suffering bunch, but once they decide to move as a collective unit, things happen.”

“I could appreciate that capability if they made a greater effort to be on time.”

Bop made his way through the conversations to one of the six bar tables fringing the terrace. He was momentarily dazzled by the selections offered. Scotch, gin, rum, bourbon, vermouth, wine, beers (he didn't recognize the brands they had icing in a number 10 tub).…

“What is your pleasure, sah?” The sound of the “sah” threw him back into his night in England for a moment.

“Uhhh, let me have a gin.”

“Gin 'n tonic, sah?”

“Nawww, just gimme a triple shot of gin.”

“Yessah.”

Wish y'all had some Beck's. Or some herb. He took his triple shot of gin and strolled away from the table.
Wonder who's holding the bag here?

The sound of music on the outer fringe of the bullshit drew him, tipsy from three earlier gins and a Guinness, reinforced by a late triple shot.
Wonder if they got some Old English up in here?
The thought made him smile as he slowly edged himself toward the sound of the music.
Nawww, they wouldn 't have none of that shit here
.

Saxophone up front, a drummer with six drums, a bass player, a man playing double gang, and another one working a chekere to the bone. The group was cookin' but no one seemed to be paying attention.

Bop was transfixed by the intricacy of the music. The drummer was a whole group by himself.…

Wowwww.… These motherfuckers
is
bad
.

He looked around at the multi-cultured heads bobbing, at the people holding their drinks at the port arm position. They oughta be dancin' instead of standing around talkin' big-time bullshit to each other.

“That's really a dyno-mite group, isn't it?” Bop turned to stare at the youngish, owl-faced looking man at his side.
Who is this punk?

“The group, really dyno-mite, huh?”

The gin had created a soft haze in his head, making him feel slightly hostile. “What the fuck is dyno-mite?”

“Oh wowww! You're an American! I never would've guessed. I thought you were a Ghanaian. My name is Russell Franklin; what's yours?”

Russell Franklin shot out a right hand that looked like a pink paw. Bop cautiously shook the man's fingers as though he were handling four-day-old fish.
The last thing I need hanging around me is a square-ass white boy
.

“Name is Clyde Johnson. 'Scuse me, I see somebody over there I have to talk to.”
Weird about shit here. People I never thought about knowing want to know me over here. I wonder why?

“Bop, take if from one who knows. The first thing you have to learn to do is stay away from white liberals in Africa. They're dangerous for us emotionally. 'Cause a lot of 'em want to be hurt, to atone for the sins of their fathers, especially in Africa. They come to serve Africa and a lot of the Africans seem to want to serve them, 'specially the women.

“Be forewarned.”

Yeahhh, Chester was definitely onto this scene, he knew what he was talking about
.

Basically he got in the line to get behind this fantastically pretty brown-skinned woman. “Uhhh, 'scuse me, what's this line for?”

The sister's look made him feel two feet tall. “This isn't a line, we're having a conversation with Kojo Adjei, one of Ghana's best known writers. Have you read his book,
A Time for Us
?”

“Uhh, no, not yet. You got a funny little accent; where you from?”

“I'm from New York. Where are you from?”

“Chicago by way of Los Angeles.”

The line that wasn't really a line had slowly placed them in front of Kojo Adjei. Bop didn't like the man the moment he spoke.

“Ah hahh, a brother and sister from the U.S., I can tell. You are welcome to the land of your fathers.”

It wasn't so much what he said as the way he said it. It sounded to Bop as if he thought that he owned Africa and that he was giving them his special, personal blessing.

Bop eased away from the group around brother Adjei.
I don't need no snub-nosed pumpkin-faced asshole to welcome me back nowhere, I paid my way over here
.

“What's wrong? You act as though you've been insulted or something.”

The pretty brown woman stood at his side. He couldn't really figure out how to explain what he was feeling. “Nawww, it ain't about being insulted. I just don't like phonies.”

Ten minutes later she suddenly deserted him for more articulate prey. “Nice talking to you, Mr. Bop; I must run.”

He watched her swivel away, an alcoholic haze squeezing his eyes half shut.
Wowww! Wonder what her problem is?

A return to the bar table for a fresh triple gin sweetened his mood. He stood in different areas, pretending that he was looking for someone or waiting for someone. Occasionally he glanced at his red-black-and-green watch, the outline of Africa holding the time.

Aunt Lu, Uncle David, wonder what y'all had for dinner tonight?

It felt weird to be in the company of so many different types of people and not know any of them. For long moments he stared at small groups of bobbing heads and tilting glasses, trying to decide if he wanted to join them.

Bunch o' phonies …, punk-ass phonies.…

He wandered back out onto the fringes of the crowd. The musical group was bringing everything to an unappreciated ending. He carefully placed his drink on the lawn near his feet and applauded too loudly and too long. The group leader looked at him with a startled smile.

Five minutes later Bop was standing in a grove of trees behind the bandstand, smoking high-grade Ghanaian marijuana with two members of the group. These were the first hip brothers he'd run into. They clicked.

“Glad you liked the music, man.”

“It was copacetic.”

“Right on.”

Copacetic? Where is my mind?

He was standing because they didn't have lots of stuff to sit on and no one wanted to dirty themselves sitting on the grass. The Ghanaians, he noticed, sit anywhere. And sleep anywhere—on the edge of walls, on narrow benches, standing up. They have perfected the art of sleeping. And staying awake.

“Think about the accomplishments of people like Du Bois, Nkrumah, Padmore, guys like that, way back then. They were intellectual giants to have figured out the philosophical currents to come, in a manner of speaking.” It was the pretty brown-skinned woman. He stared in her mouth as she talked.

What the fuck is she talking about?

“Africanists, Bop, people who are into ‘their' Africa, can wear your ass out because there's a lot to know about Africa. She's an old continent, gave birth to the world. People will drop names on you you've never heard 'cause you haven't read shit but fuck books and your interest in the Pan-African world is almost zero.”

“Awwww c'mon, Chester, git off my back, man; I read.”

“You read what?”

“Books.”

“What kind of books?”

“Like you say, fuck books mostly.”

They shared a laugh and Chester Simmons gave Bop a list of books to read. He read a couple of them but they didn't seem to have anything to do with his world or his life.

“Malcolm X was cool. But he couldn't dance worth shit. That's one of the things I got.”

Chester would hold his sides laughing at Bop's literary critiques.

“Why would anybody wanna read
Native Son
? It's boring shit to me.”

Chester counseled him often. “You know something, Bop, you and your generation are a rare breed. Some of the most aware people in this world are in your age group, but they are balanced off by the most stupid—nawww, can't say stupid, let's say—most ignorant young black people I've ever known. You don't know anything about yourselves, your history, your place on the planet.”

“Awwww, c'mon, Chester, gimme a break, man.”

Nkrumah. Mao. Gandhi. Hitler. Mussolini. Castro. Peron. Franco. Jackson. King.

“Bop, these people changed the course of history, man. Do you understand what I'm saying?”

“Yeah, Chester, I understand; whaddayou think I am, dumb or somethin'?”

And now he was standing in front of all the things Chester had talked about and didn't know what to say.

He felt bad about his ignorance, but he was too high and too drunk to really care. He wandered away from the name-dropping with a malicious smile on his face.

No wonder she didn't want to talk with me. I don't know a lotta shit
.

The lights blinked the signal to leave. He was startled.
White folks are so fuckin' orderly. Damn, we could've had some fun
. He felt bottled up by the atmosphere. They had stood around for a couple of hours and chit-chatted and drunk heavy, and now suddenly it's time to go.

He wanted to party. He was high and mellow and wanted to get loose. The party was over.

Being in Accra, Ghana, was, for Bop, something like a beautiful freak show. The colors the people wore, the colors the people were. He fit right in. Until he said anything.

“Take me to Troas Street, in Osu.”

“Eight hundred.”

“Awww c'mon, man, don't gimme that shit, it don't cost but four hundred. I take taxis all the time.”

Bop and the driver shared a laugh.
What the hell; it's only money. Why am I bargaining with this dude over a few cedis? It wouldn't hurt me if I gave him a hundred thousand cedis
.

“No, don't go to Osu; just drive around for awhile, to different parts of town.”

The driver, a small, wolfish looking man with slashes on his cheeks, grinned. “You wanna see Accra?”

“Yeahh, show me Accra.”

The driver drove along the beach, turned in and out of turnabouts, like traffic circles eddying and whirling.

“What's your name, man?”

“Zeke.”

“Mine is Bop. Go around the circle again.”

The driver didn't question his requests; he obeyed. Bop was fascinated. It was like having a servant. Someone who would obey you without question.

People moved like different tides on both sides of the street. There were people out for pure pleasure and people who were hard at work, huge trays of bread on their heads, fish, brass fixtures, brassieurs, iron pipes, charcoal baskets, kitchen stoves, typewriters, automobile parts, everything but human beings. They carried human beings on their backs and stuff on their heads.

Bop stared out of the taxi window at the people on the rutted paths flanking one of the main streets.

Wowww.… That's amazing to be able to carry that much shit on your head. They must walk real straight
.

The driver, his eyes glowing from fatigue, watched Bop watch the people, intrigued by the young American man in African clothes. He took note of his slurred remarks and his droopy eyelids. “Home, Osu?”

“Yeahh, take me home, home.”

Elena woke him up with her soft, insistent nose. She had taken time away from her job to be with him. He faced his future with resignation.
Fuck it, if she got AIDS, I got it too, by now
.

“Elena, have you been taking your birth-control pills regularly?”

“Ohh my Gawwd! I knew I had been forgetting something!”

Crazy women. Crazy like hell. And sweet as sugar cane.

“Bap?”

“Bop, Elena, not Bap.”

“Bap?”

“Yes, Elena, what is it?”

Look at her—pretty clear white eyeballs, face so pretty and smooth, square as a brick.

“What do you do in America?”

It took three Guinness stouts to loosen him up enough to try to explain.

“I'm retired from what I used to do, OK? I used to be a gangbanger.”

“A gongbonger, what's that?”

He didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

“I was a Brick.”

“What does that mean?”

He stared at her innocent expression and reached over to pull her into his arms. “Hey, it don't mean nothing. Nothin' at all over here.”

He could almost point at the moment he felt the first shivers. He was kissing Elena good-bye at the front door and feeling her ass and trying to get her to stay a few more hours with him.

“No, Bop, I must go; my boyfriend is waiting for me.”

“What?! Your what?! Your boyfriend?!”

“I'm just joking with you.”

“Well, don't joke with me like that.”

He realized for the first time that he loved Elena and that she loved him. He could tell from the way he felt and from the way she looked at him.

“Thank you, Bop.”

“Thank you, Elena.”

He gave her right cheek a final squeeze and patted the other one.

“Come back tomorrow, OK?”

“Maybe.”

“OK, try? OK?”