—Champ
The wind sends a broken branch into the same bed of sawdust where, one night, my girl stabbed my toothbrush so deep in the soil, you could only see the tip. Why? It’s a long, long story, both the original version and the extended remix. I’m trying as best I can to keep you from getting distracted. That’s a lie, but I’d rather not speak on it. I couldn’t stand any of you thinking less of me.
From the room where I keep my computer and books, I watch my neighbor, the one from across the hall, pull up in his dented compact. Dude’s a teacher, which I know because he corners me everywhere he can (in the laundry room, in the elevator, by mailboxes, near the trash) and dupes me into saga-length Q&A’s. I’m so serious, if he catches your ear, it’s the Indefatigable Express, with nonstops till you break, either that or smack (never did it, but believe me it’s crossed my mind more than once) him right in his trap! Guys like him, if I was less prone to fits of guilt and shame, I’d curse them to hell, but since I’m not, I cut him slack cause we know how it is with those college-educated middle-to-ruling-class whiteys: Everybody’s business (how else to keep the rest of us on lock?) is their business.
Tonight, Mr. Chat-You-to-Sleep lollygags in his ride longer than the norm. He climbs out, finally, holding a clutch of papers and a lunch pail. He loses a few sheets and chases them down. He presses the damp papers and his metal box to his chest and scurries inside. End of show.
The encore ain’t the chatterer, but a clique in letterman coats slapboxing their way along the block. Every few steps, they drop their bags, square off, start a new round. Nothing special really, but bam, just like that, I got an idea for my personal statement. An anecdote about the time one night I was coming home from a game and a carload of gang members cruised beside me, screamed, What up, blood? and dumped a few shots my way.
Now, having an idea is one thing, but the real work is turning a blank screen into words, into sentences, into a few fucking paragraphs. My laptop’s fan is whirring, that’s how long it’s been since I last tapped the keys. A slew of starts and stops, starts and stops and deletions then back to ogling the cursor, the glowing white screen. Wasn’t checking in the least for grad school before now and look? I want in on my accord, though. On merit or not at all. No handouts, no punk-ass affirmative actions for me. I get the few first lines tapped out, but after that—nathan. Just me fumbling for a next sentence and losing track of time. Maybe I was wrong: What’s tougher than a blank screen is a sentence or two and nowhere to go from there. I get up and walk again to the window, thinking it worked once, why not? I look far, far down the street and then up at the clouds, always the clouds, where a star or two twink. I slug into the kitchen, grab a two-liter (real pop too, none of that diet crap) out the fridge, and meander back to my laptop, where I take a swill that crawls down my throat. Then it’s me back gazing at the screen and praying for afflatus. A prayer answered when, I’ll be gotdamned, words arrive, begrudged, one word and then the next, and after a while I got a whole page and I’m dancing around the table. What is it? What is it? Kim says, from the front room. I carry my laptop to where she is and peep her doing what she does best besides harangue your boy: laze on the couch and channel-surf. She’s got her feet (bare toes cause the doc said polish could poison the baby) on the table and her shirt hiked above her tumescent belly. She pats the couch for me to sit. It’s the statement, I say. I think I got a start. Let me read it to you two. By the way, this reading to the baby is brand-new.
Not baby. It’s a girl. It’s a girl. We’re having a baby girl!
Tell me, what was the sense anymore in fighting it?
Yes, I was hella-resistant at first, but hearing the heartbeat did a retrograde number on my resolve. These days I’m a baby-book bibliophile: The New Dad’s Survival Guide, Man to Man on Child, Daddy Prep, A Father’s Firstborn . . . these days, I’m a neophyte baby-supply specialist, packing our closets with all things infant: the stroller, the car seat, the booster seat, the high chair, the potty chair, a swing, a bouncer, a bottle warmer, a breast pump; catch me stocking an oversized toy chest with rattles, dolls, building blocks, touch-and-feel flash cards. I’ve bought cases of diapers, wipes, bottles, washcloths, bought doubles and triples of baby soap and lotion and shampoo and oil, stockpiled bibs, burp clothes, blankets.
Got to the point where some mornings I stand at the mirror and sing lullabies. Cause between you and me the near birth of my future Princess has my vulnerability levels dropped way down, any lower and I’d be on par with dudes like Jude, the proud owners of lifetime weep-for-free passes. But all in all in all it’s for best, right? Who among you would claim different?
You hear that, Princess? I say, to Kim’s navel. Dad’s going to grad school.
Say it first and believe it second; that’s my psalm.
Okay, and what happens after? Kim says. What happens all the while?
We went over this, I say.
We did, she says. But what if it doesn’t work out the way you think?
Don’t let her hear you, I say. You best not ever let her hear you doubt me.
Champ, she needs to survive, she says. We do.
I’m supporting us now, ain’t I? I say
You need a job, Champ, she says. A job. Why don’t you just finish and work?
You act like you don’t know me by now. You act like you don’t know better than judge me by these local-ass standards. My dreams are bigger than this place, and you nor no one else is going to kill them.
What’s that supposed to mean? she says.
You know what the fuck it means, I say, and whip her around by her chin rougher than I should. I refuse to be one of these fools anonymous everywhere but inside their head. Fucking refuse, do you hear?
Kim falls quiet. She tugs her shirt over her stomach.
My pager goes off. It’s one of my regulars calling too late for a lick, but I need the dough—and that’s that.
Who’s that this late? she says.
It’s business, I say. My business, I’ll be right back.