Soulacoaster Read online

“I like the river,” said Lulu. “I like looking at the water.”

  “Me, too.”

  Although there was a sign on the gate that said “Danger! Keep Out!” there was also a hole in the fence that beckoned us in. The rains had swollen Thorn Creek. The water flowed faster and stronger than normal. We were fascinated just to look down at the water, which had a rhythm of its own.

  After a while, a bunch of other kids came along. They were laughing and carrying on. One of the kids, a boy bigger than me, said, “Hey, this is our river; what you doing around here?”

  “River belongs to everyone,” said Lulu. “You can’t own a river.”

  “Hell I can’t,” said the boy, as he stepped up to Lulu. “I say it’s my river and y’all get out.”

  I stepped in front of Lulu and said, “We were here first. We’re not leaving.”

  “Out!” the boy screamed.

  “It’s our river, too,” I screamed back.

  With that, the big kids started pushing and shoving. And one of them pushed Lulu so hard she fell backwards into the water. Before I knew it, she was struggling to get out. I reached for her, but the fast-moving current, stronger after the rain, was carrying her away. I didn’t know how to swim, and neither did she. The other kids were running away, and she was screaming, “Rob! Rob!” And I was screaming “Lulu! Lulu!” Suddenly she was out of sight beyond the river’s bend.

  I started yelling out for help, but I didn’t know what to do. I was scared. I was hysterical. I was jumping up and down. After what felt like forever, some grown-ups arrived. I explained what had happened and followed them downstream until they came upon a big rock. There was Lulu, her head crushed against the rock. She wasn’t talking, wasn’t moving. But there was a lot of blood coming from her head.

  “Lulu can’t be dead!” I screamed. But the gash and the blood and the women moaning told me what I didn’t want to hear.

  I wanted Lulu to come back, wanted this day to start over. This time me and Lulu wouldn’t go inside the fence. We wouldn’t go near the water. We’d go back to our cardboard dream house and sit on our make-believe rug. We’d go there and live happily ever after.

  Death couldn’t be this real. Lulu’s life couldn’t be snuffed out like this because some fool pushed her too hard. It didn’t make any sense. Lulu couldn’t be dead. She’s alive. I knew that I’d be seeing her smiling eyes soon as I woke up from this dream.

  But it was no dream. It really happened.

  That night I was still in a state of shock. Mom, sensing what I was dealing with, held me close in her arms and said, “Wasn’t your fault, baby. You couldn’t do anything to save her. Lulu is in heaven now. She’s with the Lord, sweetheart, and you with me. It’s okay to cry. Cry all you need to, baby, ’cause I got you; I’m with you, I’m right here.”

  My mother’s words helped, but she couldn’t change the awful truth that Lulu was gone. I kept seeing her caught up in the current, reaching out for me. I heard her screaming out to me. Watched the river washing Lulu away until she disappeared, gone forever; a beautiful butterfly lost in a raging storm.

  THE DREAM

  When I was about nine years old, I had a strange dream I’ll never forget. I was in this house where everything was white—walls, floors, ceiling, carpet, bricks on the fireplace, curtains at the windows. I saw myself seated at a white piano and playing a song. This was weird because at nine I didn’t know how to play any kind of instrument But in this dream the melodies were flying off the keys and filling the room. It was as if I was in the midst of a musical storm.

  Then suddenly I heard the doorbell. I stopped playing and ran to see who was there. I opened the door, but no one was there. Stretching my neck to look in all directions, I couldn’t see a thing. In the distance, though, I heard the faint sound of giggling. I didn’t know who it was that was laughing or what they were laughing about.

  So I went back to the piano, and the beautiful melodies and chords just started back up. Then the doorbell rang again. And again, when I got to the door, no one was there. Except this time the giggling was louder.

  The third time it happened, I was at the door practically before the bell rang. I desperately wanted to find out who it was doing all that giggling. I quickly opened the door, and standing there were musical notes, except they were all cartoon characters.

  I tried to reach out and touch them, but they took off and ran like the wind. I chased after them, giving it all I had, but they were too fast for me.

  I yelled as loud as I could: “Hey! Who are you guys?”

  They stopped dead in their tracks, turned around, and came back to me and said: “We’re your biggest hit song.” Then at the blink of an eye, they ran clean out of sight.

  I went back to the house and sat back down at the piano, and I played a melody that was like no other melody I’d ever heard. I began to sing the hook to the song, but for some strange reason, when I woke up, I could not remember what I was saying in the hook, couldn’t remember the words.

  It would take about 20 years, but the words came back and the dream made perfect sense.

  COFFEE WITH THREE CREAMS AND SIX SUGARS

  We moved around a lot when I was young. We lived in the housing projects on 63rd Street on the South Side before moving to a small place on 107th and Parnell. Back then the projects didn’t seem as bad as people make them out to be today. My family knew everybody in the neighborhood, and everybody in the neighborhood knew my family.

  We were always broke or not having the things we wanted. But I remember love taking the place of the material things we wanted or needed. We might not have had the money to pay the rent a lot of times, but when I remember sitting out on the porch until 1 or 2 in the morning, listening to Al Green or Marvin Gaye and playing cards with my Mom and my aunties and cousins—I wish I could have brought that part of my childhood with me into the world of success. Because now that I’m successful, that’s what’s missing in my life.

  The world I was born in, though, was filled with its own beauty.

  In the 63rd Street projects, nothing was more important than the game of basketball. I started hooping when I was five with street ball and haven’t stopped since. Hooping was everywhere, and me and my brothers would hoop any chance we got.

  Hooping isn’t just a hobby or a sport. It’s a way of life.

  Unlike indoor, supervised basketball, in street ball you had to adapt to the rules of the neighborhood where you played. Aggressive hand and leg checking was allowed; you could play full court or half court, sometimes three pointers were three pointers and other times they were just considered beautiful shots. There were no hardwood floors; when you got knocked down, you landed on concrete or asphalt. Some 'hood courts had only a rim and a backboard. Instead of the familiar “whoosh” of the ball through stringed net, you listened for the clang of chain or the sweet sound of nothingness as the ball dropped through a net-less rim.

  I love basketball because it helps me blow off steam. It gives me somewhere I can put some space between all the other things going on in my life—even music. Like music, hoop makes life good. I love it for the fast action and high energy, but I’m gonna be straight: I’m also pretty damn good. Thousands of brothers play better than me, but no one loves the game more.

  Joann Kelly knew about me and basketball early on. She had vision. Mom never looked behind; she looked ahead. She saw something in me that I could have never seen myself. She understood that I loved basketball more than most other kids. That’s why she encouraged my passion for the sport. She knew that nappy-headed little Rob needed to feel worthy, strong, and proud. She saw how I loved to compete, so she let me play hoop as much as I wanted.

  Mom and I always had beautiful times together. It could be something as simple as getting up in the morning and walking to McDonald’s. She didn’t have enough money to buy us breakfast, only coffee for her and a Danish for us to share. To me, that was enough. I just wanted to be with her. She fixed her coffee with three cr
eams and six sugars and tasted it to see if it was sweet enough. She wore this cheap red lipstick, and when she tasted her coffee, she left a red mark on the cup. She always asked me if I wanted a sip and I always did. And because I loved my mother so much, I always turned the cup to where she had left that red mark. I liked to drink from the same spot where she drank.

  “One day you’re gonna be famous, baby,” she would say with a smile. But I didn’t really know what “famous” meant.

  “I mean famous like Al Green,” she added. “Famous like Sam Cooke and Marvin Gaye. See, you got a beautiful little singing voice that’s only gonna get bigger and stronger.”

  “And then I’m gonna have enough money to buy you breakfast here every day, right, Mom?” I would ask.

  “Yes, you will, sweetheart. You sure-enough will.”

  My mother would take me back home and, after dropping me off, get ready for work. She had a job at the hospital where she was training to be an EKG technician. Before she left, she never failed to kiss me goodbye.

  “Be good today, baby,” she said, “and listen to your grandma.”

  We lived in a typical Chicago three-family building—we call them three-flats. Grandma lived with her man, Uncle Cary, on the top floor. Uncle Cary owned a TV repair shop, but some of his customers were never happy. They complained that after Uncle Cary fooled with their TVs, they worked worse than before. Uncle Cary said they just didn’t want to pay their bills.

  Grandma was heavyset like Mom. I loved her, but the woman had her moods. I could tell when she had her mood swings on because she and Uncle Cary would get to screaming at each other. That usually meant they were already hitting the hard stuff. They liked their Old Grand-Dad whiskey, and by early afternoon, they could be down a bottle already.

  “I told you to fix that TV of mine a week ago,” Grandma was screaming, “and the damn thing still don’t work!”

  “It was working till you started messin’ with the antenna,” Cary screamed back. “You the one who done fucked it up!”

  “Me? Here you go again, blaming me for shit you can’t do. What good are you ’round here if you can’t even fix a goddamn television set?”

  “If it’s so easy, you fix it.”

  “I’ll fix you, you son of a bitch!”

  It was World War III. Grandma and Cary went at it something fierce. I couldn’t tell if he was beating on her or it was her beating on him. Next thing I heard was Grandma yelling, “Rob! Rob! You get up here!”

  I ran upstairs and Grandma told me, “Go to Mr. Ikenberg’s store. Get me a pack of Pall Malls, a hunk of Hogshead cheese, and some of them Moon Pies.”

  I waited for money.

  “What you waiting for, boy?”

  “Cash money or food stamps.”

  “Don’t got either. Tell Mr. Ikenberg I’ll pay him on the first.”

  I ran over to the store, wondering if Mr. Ikenberg would go along with Grandma’s pay plan and let it slide. He did. Back then, small neighborhood store owners still operated on the basic principle of trust and family ties.

  “You come from good people,” he said. “Plus, I’ve never seen you try to steal anything from me, not even a candy bar.”

  “Never would do nothin’ like that,” I said. And with that, Mr. Ikenberg gave me an Almond Joy candy bar.

  Back at the house, after giving Grandma her stuff, I heard my stuttering Uncle Doug calling me from down in the basement. The basement was his kingdom.

  “N-n-need your h-h-help, Rob. G-g-get down here,” he yelled.

  Uncle Doug was a mess. He had a big pot belly, wild woolly hair, and smelled like someone’s sweaty feet. That day, like so many others, drinking Wild Irish Rose straight out the bottle, he started in with stories about how he’d been shot four different times and stabbed another six times. I’d heard them all before.

  “You call me down to tell me stories, Uncle Doug?” I asked.

  “No, b-b-boy, I called you d-d-down to see if that d-d-distant cousin of yours is here.”

  “Which one?”

  “The one with the b-b-big t-t-titties.”

  “Uncle Doug, why you always wanna be looking at big titties?”

  “No h-h-harm in looking. Is she around?”

  “No.”

  “Well, I’ll just stay d-d-down here and let you h-h-help me get this j-j-job done.”

  “What job?”

  “This here j-j-job b-b-behind the m-m-milk crates.”

  Uncle Doug walked to the other end of the basement where he’d dumped nasty old car seats and junky lamps. Bunches of old records were scattered on the floor. Dirt and dust everywhere.

  When he moved the milk crates, I saw Tempskins, our German shepherd, lying there.

  “Tempskins asleep?” I asked.

  “No, T-T-Tempskins d-d-dead.”

  “Dead?”

  “D-d-dead, as in the b-b-bitch ain’t b-b-breathing.”

  “How’d he die?”

  “Accident.”

  “What kinda accident?”

  “I set some p-p-poison in the p-p-peanut b-b-butter to k-k-kill the rats. K-k-killed T-T-Tempskins instead.”

  “Mom’s gonna be furious,” I said. “She loves that dog.”

  “She can’t n-n-know.”

  “How she not gonna know?”

  “You ain’t gonna t-t-tell her.”

  “When she comes to find out Tempskins ain’t here, what we gonna say?”

  “You b-b-better not s-s-say nothing. D-d-dogs disappear.”

  “Not this dog. This dog don’t even go outside.”

  “He g-g-going outside n-n-now 'cause we b-b-burying him in that empty lot d-d-down the street. Now p-p-put him in this b-b-bag and f-f-follow me.”

  I followed my uncle’s instructions. I knew better than to argue with my elders, even when my elders did crazy things. Uncle Doug did the supervising, I did the digging, and, after a long while, we managed to bury Tempskins.

  That night when my mother got home, the first thing she asked was, “Where’s my dog?”

  She looked at me. I looked away. She called up to Grandma and Cary. They were asleep from a long day of drinking and fighting. She called down to Uncle Doug, who didn’t answer. She looked at me again.

  “You know something, Rob. I can see it in your eyes,” she said. “You ain’t good at lying. Now tell the truth and anyone.

  “ Truth is what?”

  “ Truth is Uncle Doug’s rat poison killed Tempskins.”

  “Oh Lord!” she cried. “Now I’m gonna have to go down there and kill Uncle Doug.”

  Next thing I heard was a big commotion from the basement. My mother was down there chasing Uncle Doug, and Uncle Doug was doing all he could to duck and hide.

  “You can run, you bastard,” she said, “but you can’t hide.”

  “Your b-b-boy’s 1-1-lying,” Uncle Doug lied. “I d-d-didn’t k-k-kill your d-d-dog.”

  “My boy don’t ever lie to me,” said Joann Kelly, “and never will. There’s only one mothafuckin’ liar around here and that’s you. Now you gonna get me a new dog or I’ll kick your sorry ass from here to Mississippi.”

  By noon the next day, Uncle Doug was presenting Mom with a new-born mongrel puppy.

  WOMEN IN THE HOUSE

  There were always women in our little house at 40th and King. There were cousins, aunties, friends of my aunties, all older women. When my mother wasn’t home, the women ran a littler freer, meaning that when my mom or my grandmother were home, they’d dress a certain way.

  There were always women in our little house at 40th and King, There were cousins, aunties, friends of my aunties, all older women. When my mother wasn’t home, the women ran a littler freer, meaning that when my mom or my grandmother were home, they’d dress a certain way. When my mother and grandmother were out, they felt free to wear less clothing. You could see through their blouses. Sometimes they wore bras, sometimes they didn’t. When they walked around in nightgowns or pajamas, you could see their
panties and on a few occasions, like on a very hot summer days, they wouldn’t even wear panties.

  As a very young boy, I didn’t think much of it. The women didn’t really pay much attention to me or my brothers. I looked at them the way any kid would. Kids are naturally fascinated by body parts, and I was no different. As I crept up in age, though, and made my way through grammar school, I found myself more curious and sometimes aroused; and I was ashamed of being aroused. But there was no one I felt I could talk to about this. I couldn’t have a sit-down with my mother because I wouldn’t know what to say or how to say it. There was no man that I trusted enough to share such shameful feelings with. Growing up with that shame has haunted me throughout my life.

  One winter afternoon, I came back from school early when my mother wasn’t home. As I came through the door, I heard a strange noise. It sounded like bedsprings squeaking. The walls in our place were paper-thin, and sound came through like there weren’t any walls at all. This squeaking got louder and louder.

  Then I heard voices. A woman screamed—but it didn’t sound like a scream of pain or panic.

  Then I heard a man’s voice, shouting, but it wasn’t in anger.

  “Oh God! Do it! Do it! Get it right there! Right there, baby, right there!” the woman pleaded.

  “You like it, don’t you, bitch?! How much you want? How much can you take?” the man shouted.

  “All you got!” the woman shouted back.

  I was just eight-years-old. I didn’t understand what was happening. I thought the man was maybe hurting the woman, but that didn’t seem right. I was confused, curious, so I went to see for myself.

  I crept toward the bedroom where the noises were coming from. They were doing so much hollering, I figured they wouldn’t hear the door if I opened it just a little.

  I opened it just a little.

  Then I looked inside.

  I was just eight years old

  A man’s backside was high in the air, coming down on the lady with her legs spread wide, her big booty propped up on a pillow. I didn’t understand how it was all working, but he was moving down on her and she was coming up on him. First the rhythm was slow, then faster, then crazy fast. They were screaming, moaning, going wild. I couldn’t stop looking. I’d never seen nothing like this before. Screaming, cursing, bed sagging, bodies bumping.