Single Mom (51 page)

“Yeah, well, he’s taking it one semester at a time,” I told the coach. If I had my way, I’d have my son attend a school where the coach was a strong black man, like John Thompson at Georgetown, or John Chaney at Temple. There were a few other good black coaches out there, but Chaney and Thompson had been doing their thing for years. And it wasn’t that I was particularly prejudiced, I just liked the connection that older black men had with younger black men, like fathers and sons or nephews and uncles. The world was about more than just basketball, and I felt that black men could relate to one another’s strengths and struggles a lot more readily. Then again, there were plenty of older black men who I didn’t relate to or learn anything from, while my boss and I got along just fine and talked about everything. He was an older white guy, and Polish, so maybe it didn’t make a damn difference what color they were, just as long as they were men who were willing to care. My high school coach cared a lot about me, and he was a white guy, too.

Coach Melecio nodded. “Well, keep doing what you’re doing, because this kid is seriously talented,” he said with a hand on my son’s shoulder.

I smiled and said, “Yeah, we figured that out already. It takes more than just talent to be the best, it takes a lot of hard work and a lot of practice. You hear me, Jamal?”

Jamal had rejoined us once the basketball was gone. He smiled and nodded.

The coach looked at him and asked, “So is he the next one?”

I responded, “Yeah, the next doctor, lawyer, or whatever he wants to be.”

Coach said, “That’s the right attitude to have.
My
son’s a lawyer. My other son works in the movie industry out in Hollywood.”

“Is that so?” I asked him. White folks always had something extra going on. I wanted to create that type of extra talent with my kids. We didn’t have to necessarily play basketball or football. There were plenty of things young black men could learn how to do and be successful at.

I usually talked to my son in the gym until we were literally kicked out of the place, because it was cold outside. Sometimes I wished I had a car instead of having to catch trains, buses, and cabs, and whatnot, then we could just ride around and talk inside the car.

We all started walking toward the exit door.

Coach Melecio said, “I heard you played basketball for West Side in the early eighties.”

I nodded. “Yeah, we lost a close one in the state tournament. I was heartbroken.”

“Not everybody gets a chance to win the big game. It’s just twelve kids out of hundreds, year after year.”

I said, “You got that right.” We walked out of the building and were smacked in the face by cold weather. I shook the coach’s hand again and Little Jay, Jamal, and I headed on our way to the bus stop.

“I’m gonna have to get me a damn car,” I told my boys. At the time, I didn’t even have a valid driver’s license. I hadn’t had one for years. I just never took the time to go to the license offices to get one. I guess it was too many policemen around for comfort, but I would have to get over that to get myself a car.

We all got on the bus for a short ride. Little Jay was getting off after just five minutes. We would have walked him home if it was warmer out. Jamal and I had to ride to the blue line train, a twenty-five-minute ride.

I shook my son’s hand and hugged him before he got off. “We’ll see you Friday,” I told him.

“Yeah,” Jamal added.

“And tell your mom I said hi. Okay?”

“All right, I’ll tell her.”

I thought about my son, Jamal, and their futures for the rest of the ride home. I was very satisfied with the role that I was playing in their lives. If I went to church regularly, I would have testified on it. Being a father to a child was a good thing to be.

• • •

Jamal was so worn out from shooting baskets that night that he fell asleep on the train, and I had to carry him off. He went back to sleep as soon as we made it in. I laid him down in his room and immediately thought of calling Denise. I wanted to thank her again for letting me be a part of my son’s life. She didn’t have to do it, especially since I wasn’t able to help out economically. I guess she realized that money wasn’t all that fathers were there for.

“Hi, I heard they won their first play-off game today,” she said to me. She actually sounded excited by it.

“Yeah, are you gonna be at the next one?” I asked her. I figured it was a long shot, but what the hell?

“Yeah, I’ll be there. They all talked me into it.”

I thought about her being there with Brock and Walter. I probably would have liked the idea more if she came alone. Then again, I wouldn’t be alone, because Jamal would be with me. So I guess it was all a fantasy, a fantasy that I needed to forget about.

Denise asked, “You called to talk to Jimmy? He just started doing his homework.”

I wanted to ask her if Brock had eaten with them, and if he was still there, but it was none of my business. “Actually, I called to talk to you,” I told her.

“Oh,” she said. There was a long silence on the phone, as if she wanted to ask me what I wanted to talk to her about, and she didn’t have the heart to do it, which would have been rare.

I said, “I just wanted to thank you for not pushing me away from my son after all of these years. I mean, I know that you’ve done most of the work.”

“
Most
of it?” she asked.

“Okay,
all
of it,” I told her. She was still a tough-as-nails woman.

To my surprise, though, she chuckled. “No, I can’t take all of the credit. Over these last few months, you’ve helped out a lot. I have to be honest about it. I kept thinking,
When is he gonna slack off?
but you never did.”

“Yeah, at least not until basketball season is over with,” I joked with her.

“Well, if that’s the case,” she said, “then you won’t ever stop because that boy plays basketball all year round. And if he makes it to college with it, that’ll be four more years, after the three that he has left in high school. And if you guys spend seven years together through all of those basketball seasons, then I really can’t complain.”

I had to slow her down for a second. I said, “Denise, it’s not all about basketball. I’ve really had a chance to learn about my son’s likes, dislikes, and tendencies as a teenager.”

“I know,” she told me. “I was just talking about that the other day. His work habits are really improving. He’s just more focused and confident now.”

“Exactly,” I told her. “And I wanted to thank you again for allowing this to happen. I know I haven’t been no saint, but no man or family is perfect, so we all have to find out a way to make it work.”

“Amen to that,” she told me. Then she caught me off guard. She asked, “What do you think would have happened if you and I had a daughter instead of a son?”

I had never even thought about that, or at least not for fifteen years. Once I had my son, that was it, and there was nothing to think about.

I thought fast and smiled. “Girls play basketball now too.”

“Yeah, and I’ve noticed that a lot more mothers and little sisters are at those games as opposed to fathers and brothers.”

“That’s not true,” I told her. “Their fathers are there right next to the mothers in the stands. How do you think a lot of these girls started playing ball?”

“Because they were interested in it. Jimmy didn’t start playing basketball because of you.”

She had a point there. I wasn’t around Little Jay for most of the development in his game. In fact, he could teach
me
a few things.

I said, “Okay, you got me there. But I don’t know what I would have done if we had a daughter.”

“Mmm hmm,” she grunted.

“What made you ask me that?”

“I was just curious about it,” she said.

“Oh, there
is
a difference, if you want to know,” I told her.

“Why? A child is a child.”

“Yeah, well you tell that to China.” I had watched a program on television where they talked about the Chinese literally killing girl babies to make room for boys in the families because girls were traditionally given away in marriages. In other words, if you had two daughters and both daughters were married off, then you’d end up without any kids. But if you had two sons, you would be gaining numbers.

Denise said, “This is
not
China.”

I started to laugh. I said, “Well, you ask another man that question,
and see what he says. Ask Brock. I met him at the game today,” I told her.

“Yeah, I heard,” she said, “and he feels the same way. But I guess it’s normal for a man to relate to a boy, as long as he doesn’t take things overboard.”

“Well, again, I just wanted to say thanks,” I told her. I didn’t want to wear out my welcome, and it was better for my ego if
I
ended the conversation. I didn’t expect to talk to her for that long anyway.

“How many times are you going to thank me?” she asked. “A son
should
be able to spend time with his father. I never stopped you from seeing him, you stopped yourself.”

I nodded with the phone in hand. “Yeah, you’re right,” I told her.

“So stop making it seem like I did you a favor, because I didn’t. I’m not that kind of mother. If I was, I would have taken your behind to court.”

I chuckled, but the shit wasn’t funny. “I guess that’s what I’m thanking you for then.”

“Well, if that’s the case, then you
need
to thank me, because I can’t sit here and say that I’ve never
thought
about it. I just knew you didn’t have any money. But still, that was no excuse for you not to at least
try
to provide for your child, if we’re going to talk about it. That’s why single mothers are the lowest-income families today, not only because some of them are on welfare, but because it takes
two
incomes to survive in America.”

“Not in your case,” I told her.

“That’s because I only have two children, and one has been taken care of since birth. Economically speaking, I only had to worry about one child.”

Damn! I felt like crawling under a rock somewhere. But what was I supposed to do? “So how do we solve this problem, you know, of fathers who are broke?”

“Well, first of all, they’re gonna have to stop getting in trouble with the law, because you can’t get a job with a jail record.”

“I know that’s right,” I agreed. “It took me
years
to find a stable one.”

“They have to stop sleeping, unprotected, with women who they
don’t
love and can’t see themselves having children with,” she added. “And then, they have to get motivated to be the so-called
man
of the house, and that does
not
mean just with attitude. If
they
want to complain so much about women doing what they have to do, then they need to start
doing
more
so that they can still hold their heads up high without acting like assholes about who is doing what and making what.”

I couldn’t agree with her more. I had been thinking all of those same thoughts for the last five or six months. I had stepped up to the plate, and was no longer running away, complaining about my strikes like so many other brothers were doing. You just keep swinging until you start getting some good hits, but too many brothers were quitting altogether.

“I agree with you,” I told Denise. What else could I say? It was the truth.

I don’t know if she was expecting my agreement, because we suddenly had a long pause on the phone.

“I hear you’ve been raising another son,” she finally said to me.

I smiled. I’m sure she knew that for a while. I never told Little Jay not to tell her, but after Brock popped up at the game, spotted me with Jamal, and posed the father question, I knew it would get right back to her.

I said, “Yeah, after getting back involved with raising Jimmy and liking it, I guess I got over my fear of raising kids.”

“Is this Kim’s son? His name is Jamal, right?”

I took a deep breath. Denise knew about Kim for a long time. She
used
to think that Kim’s son was mine, but he wasn’t.

“I remember you used to swear up and down that he was my kid,” I reminded her.

“She
wanted
to have your kid,” Denise reminded me.

“Yeah, she did, didn’t she?”

“I always wondered how you were able to avoid that.”

“It just wasn’t meant to happen, I guess,” I told her. “I mean, when things are meant to be, they’re meant to be. And when they’re not, they’re not.”

Denise sighed and said, “Yeah, that’s just a bunch a B-S. I’m getting sick of people talking that stuff. That’s why we have so many broken families now. ‘It wasn’t meant to be.’ That’s plain bullshit.”

I chuckled. She was giving it to me straighter than an arrow. She was right again. I could have had a family with her. We could have
made it happen
, but I punked out, not because it wasn’t meant to be, but because I didn’t hold up my end of the bargain.

“It seems like a long, long time ago since we were together,” I said to her. “The time just flew by.”

“It didn’t fly by fast
enough
for me.”

I thought about Kim and Jamal before I moved in to live with them.
Things were a lot smoother with me there. “Yeah, I guess not,” I told Denise.

“So, how are you liking this newfound father thing? Is it something you think you would promote?” she asked me.

She was reading my mind. I responded, “Definitely. I tell people about my two boys as much as I can now. My boss and I are having bragging competitions at work,” I joked.

“What about
before
you came back into Jimmy’s life?”

I grinned and shook my head. All I used to say beforehand was that I
had
a son. I really couldn’t say too much about him then, because I didn’t know much about him.

“I guess there wasn’t much I could say back then,” I answered.

“Well, I didn’t give Jimmy enough attention myself when he was younger. That’s why I was so fortunate that he liked playing basketball, because if he needed more personal attention like Walter did, I don’t know
what
I would have done. Walter was a handful, and he still is. But he’s starting to come around.”