Virgin Soul (24 page)

I
had to continually cross the SF–Oakland Bay Bridge to take care of party business. Donations for Huey's defense fund were coming from all over the Bay. Going back to Oakland was like dragging the new-me suitcase across the Bay Bridge, with the new me falling out and refusing to cross the choppy waters. I found myself saying stuff like “I don't have to go back”; “I'm a Bohemian”; “I belong to the world”; “I will not be pulled backward.”
I still thought in my boxed-up heart I could cut myself neatly from the past.

When I drove back across the bay to go to a special meeting with a renowned jazz singer, I felt all that. I wouldn't have gone to the meeting—for sisters only—at a church, except someone from the BPP needed to pick up a donation. I was too busy to go to the concert but remembered the jazz singer's heart-shaped face and tart tone.

In person, she was even sweeter looking, with her shiny sheath and pumps. I hadn't seen women so dressed up since Aunt Ola's church. The women in the room were dressed in the fashion, dashikis, wraps, bubbas, their naturals cut to a barber's T. They began asking her simple questions, the answers to which they could have gotten from liner notes or magazine articles.
Didn't they read?
They were college-educated women spouting fawning, doelike homage to the esteemed visitor.

After putting the paper to bed and three days on speed, I wasn't in the mood for stargazing. A wave of disgust came over me at the smug demureness, as if a struggle for the life of our people wasn't going on outside to which only the privileged few had been invited. I thought I would be at least interested, not hateful. I turned, ready to hat up, when the great lady asked, “And what about these Panther girls? What do they call themselves? Pantherettes? They dress like men.”

Pantherettes? Pantherettes!? As in Ronettes and Marvelettes?

“They're so . . . ,” she sputtered. She was reaching for the word
crude
, perfect innocence on her face as her off-base questions poured forth. “Do they have to dress like that? Who makes them do that? Do they carry guns?”

A tremendous anger rose in my body, beating a path to my temples. But my mouth was frozen shut. If I said a word, I would have exploded. I nibbled on butter cookies like everyone else. Michelle Stubbs, who went with Allwood's buddy back at City College, approached me in the vestibule.

“Geniece, you look very uncomfortable. Did the Panther stuff offend you?”

“I'm not a Pantherette.”

“How come you didn't speak up and answer her? That's what she was asking.”

“I didn't want to sound too strident or bitter, too black.”

“What's wrong with that?”

“I'm not on twenty-four hours a day. Do I have to defend the party everywhere?” At home? At school? In bed? I got the donation and left.

Driving back across the bridge, I sorted things out.
Was this concept of black people fighting to be free so damn alien that it couldn't be recognized without binoculars? Who did I have to make understand this? Anybody at all? Why was it so important for famous people to endorse us? What was so great about talking to somebody famous? Or fucking a famous man? Or being famous, like we were collectively? Why was I in this? For the excitement? Was I willing to die for the cause? Like Mx? Or Medgar Evers? Or Nat Turner? Had any black women been martyrs? Would I like to be one? (Chairman Bob said we only die once, so there's no use in thinking about it a thousand times.) Okay, I wouldn't think about it, but I could ask. Who was this person I called myself and why was she doing all this?

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

T
he past and present of my life kept colliding. The Sunday after Thanksgiving, I was standing on Sacramento Street in Berkeley in front of Byron Rumford's Pharmacy selling the BPP newspaper. I glanced at the
SF Chronicle
, the right front top part housewives said they didn't read anymore. A Marine had testified in Congress that the new M-16s jammed and killed Americans in 'nam. We had cashed in student council vouchers to the BSU and bought M-1s in Reno for the BPP.

A convertible stopped, young women in their Sunday best, my age. Exactly my age. They knew the BPP logo. They knew the police knocked heads—the heads of sons, brothers, and fathers. They were curious. They wanted to buy the BPP intercommunal newspaper. The women in the convertible called me by name. We had graduated high school together. The driver aimed a fusillade of friendly questions at me.

How long have you been a Panther, Geniece? Less than a year.

Did you quit college? Still in college.

Do you have a boyfriend? Not right now.

What do women do in the party? Run the office, do scheduling, set up rallies, march, we do everything anyone else does.

How come they wear berets? Freedom fighters all over the world wear black berets.

What do my folks think? They just want me to finish college.

Am I going to finish? Definitely.

Do I wear a uniform? Jeans are my uniform.

Am I scared? No time for fear.

Do I carry a gun? I handle guns like everyone else in the party.

Still on the paper like in high school? Once a scribe always a scribe? Yeah.

I opened the paper to explain the ten-point program and put them at ease. They apologized: Geniece, we have to go to church. Like polite tourists they bought all my papers, BPP-intercommunal-paper-as-souvenir. And off they went with their pressed hair, carefully outlined lips, pastel linen dresses, and matching pumps.

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

I
made it to my poetry class for the final, a holiday party with the visiting poet Don Lee. I wanted to have been there for more, but the revolution was moving too fast. The poet wore a handmade embroidered dashiki, probably from the motherland. He looked beautiful, irrelevant, and romantic as Huey called cultural nationalists. Surely we had space somewhere for this kind of softness. Nice thought that had no place in the moment. The grand poet from Chicago finished his presentation by reciting the title poem of his book,
Don't Cry, Scream.
He paused at every “scream” in his poem to shriek. Each scream tore at the box inside my chest. I pled silently:
Would you please shut your mouth?
He answered with a long drawn-out scream.

A
fter tutorial one evening, Bibo drove to the Army-Navy store on Mission. I thought he was getting stuff for himself. When he insisted I go in, I protested that I had to study for my stat final in the car. I did not want to be buying clothes for some other woman's man.

“Geniece, you need fatigues.” He walked me over to a table full of pants for men in green camouflage.

“I know you don't think that's for me. They're not even feminine.”

“In combat, you're not trying to look like Twiggy. It's about protecting yourself.”

“In the jungle, yes. In San Francisco, I would just look conspicuous. I'm behind the scenes, anyway.”

I would not even try them on. “Chanting ‘off the pig' is as masculine as I'm getting.”

In the car I needed to get things straight. “Don't try to dress me again. Do you think you're my father? And since you've never officially hit on me, you're not my man either.”

“I'm just trying to bring you up to speed. I told you I'm married.”

“If you were my husband, I wouldn't like you spending so much time with me.”

“We're comrades, Geniece. At some point, you gotta get it through your head: This ain't a tea party.”

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

S
o I was taken off guard when we kissed, off drugs, for real, and it felt way beyond comradely. It was Christmas in San Francisco. Over a period of two days right before Christmas, nearly 750 demonstrators protested at the Oakland Army Induction Center. Bibo and I were at the Potrero projects in the city, crossing the grassy area, under the squared arch consecrated with piles of Christmas gift wrapping, cardboard rectangles of discarded bicycle boxes, strands of tinsel all over. There at the doorway to the projects, he kissed me.

“This is yours,” he said.

“Mine? On lease? Your mouth, your tongue, your teeth?”

“Whatever you want. It's yours. As long as I have a heart.”

“Thanks. When does the lease expire?”

“Who knows?”

Tammy and Yvette, the two little Tutorial Center girls from the projects, told Bibo they had Christmas presents for us. We walked up to the girls' door, and touched lips again. The door opened as we broke apart and saw the girls standing close together, picture pretty. Their mother, Mrs. Moore, had dressed them alike in princess coats and fur hats, Tammy in green and Yvette in red.

“You look like two little women,” I told them. The door opened wider and I saw the kitchen first. The table was overturned, its chrome legs at right angles to the floor. Broken dishes covered cracked linoleum. One curtain hung torn from the rod. Drawers had been pulled out of the cabinet, dish towels and pot holders strewn across the floor.

“What happened?” Bibo spoke. I moved behind him. But he grabbed my arm and forced me to stand beside him. The girls stood in the same spot, as close as could be short of adhesion, their eyes glistening. Tammy moved first to my side, where she smothered her face in my coat. Yvette spoke first.

“My mama and her boyfriend, Mr. Johnson, had a fight today.” Her voice was strong, her eyes wide open, the first tears yet to spill out. “He beat her because she spent his money on our new clothes.”

Tammy spoke, her hands cinching my waist. “Let's go, Bibo. We hungry.”

We looked at Bibo, who walked toward the kitchen, where he picked up a pot holder. He found a plastic garbage can that had been thrown across the room, surveying the contents spilled unevenly past the couch. Picking up the can and filling it slowly with the garbage, Bibo talked. “I cooked a turkey at the center last night. Fixed all the trimmings. Even a pecan pie.”

He looked at me. “For you guys.” I started to question him, then ran my fist over Tammy's fur hat. “That was a nice thing to do.”

I tried to soothe Tammy, but my eyes went to Yvette. “Where's your mother? I want to see if she's all right.”

“She's drunk.” Yvette watched Bibo pick up garbage. When she finally blinked, a line of tears disappeared into her fur collar.

“Is she in her bedroom?” I asked. Bibo began sliding the curtain back on the rod.

I pried Tammy's fingers from my coat. “Let me go see about your mother. Okay, sweets?” I moved past the girls into the hall, which reeked of whiskey. In the bedroom, Mrs. Moore lay slumped, half dressed on her back, her swollen face hanging on her shoulder, a near empty fifth in her left hand.

“Vette, Tam.” Just above incoherence, the words stumbled away from her. “Pusha new cose on.”

I walked to the foot of the bed. “Mrs. Moore, this is Geniece from the Tutorial Center.” I spoke plain and loud, as if that would bring the situation into control. She tried to straighten.

“I shaid, pusha new cose on.” Her empty hand jerked, and she yelled. Pain twisted the swollen contours of her jawbone. Then she eased down. “Broke my back . . . weasel.”

She pushed her neck back onto the pillow, her grimacing face like Yvette's characteristic scowl. I tiptoed out of the room. In the living room, partially in order, I turned to Bibo.

“We have to call an ambulance.”

As he dialed the operator, I turned to the girls and asked Yvette, “When was Mr. Johnson here?”

“He left about an hour ago.”

“Were you awake when he was here?”

“Yes.” She turned from me, looking at Bibo on the phone.

Tammy spoke up. “Yvette saw him fighting my mama. She was looking through the door. She made me get under the covers, 'cause I was crying.”

“Did he hit her?”

“He picked up the broom and hit her across the back. When she fell down, he kicked her, right here.” Yvette pointed to her left shoulder blade. “Then he kicked her in the face.”

Tammy screamed, “He was gonna kill her.”

Yvette continued calmly. “I came outta my room. They always have fights, but he was looking for a knife. That's why he was breaking everything in the kitchen. He was looking for a knife. He said so. He said he was gonna kill my mother. When he turned around and saw me looking, he cussed at me. Then he kicked her. He kicked her over on her stomach and told her to crawl back to bed. He said crawl in front of your little yellow bastard.”

Yvette shook as she pushed the last words out. “Then he picked up the garbage and threw it at me.” She dropped on the couch, like crumpled velvet.

“The ambulance and the police are on the way over.” Bibo's voice shook with rage and distress.

“The police! Why the police?” I asked.

“Ambulances won't come down here without a police escort,” he said.

I lost my composure. “Down here! We're up on a hill. Why is it we're always down somewhere?” The minute I lost my calm, the girls started to cry. I had to regain it for them. I sat on the couch between the girls. Bibo moved toward the bedroom.

“Either her back or her shoulder's broken. I don't think we should move her,” Bibo said.

“We have to put her clothes on. Come on.” I got up to go help him and Tammy pulled at my side.

“Are we still going to eat turkey?”

They still had on their coats, Yvette's hands inside her muffs, two little black porcelain dolls.

“Just wait,” I told her.

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

I
nside Mrs. Moore's bedroom, she had fallen half out of bed, her bottle propped against the bed, still in her hand. She jerked her head around and moaned as I moved to the bureau to get her some clothing. She pulled her head to the side and looked at Bibo, her eyes surrounded by puffy bruises. She screamed in fright and dropped the bottle on the floor, where it rolled under the bed. She put her left hand beneath her pillow. Bibo stood at the foot of the bed.

“Donchu come near me, fool. I kill you, I swear I point this gun at yo mean-ass heart and kill you.” She had a .38 Special in her left hand. Bibo moved to the side of the bed. She was drunk enough to kill him or me. “You beat da shit outta me, in fronna my babies. I don't care thatcha beat on me. Butchu mess with my child you cheap no good sonofabitch.”

Bibo moved back toward the door. I feared he would leave me in the room. At that moment, I realized we might die for Mr. Johnson's bad behavior. But Bibo rolled on the floor to the right of the bed. She turned to shoot, pulling the trigger with her left index finger. The bullet passed through the closet door, piercing the air his chest occupied seconds before. Bibo sprung up and knocked the gun out of her hand. It fell to the side of the bed. I watched her as he jumped over the bed. She tried to turn quickly and wrenched the last bit of consciousness from her broken body. As he picked up the gun, she slumped. He took the pulse of her left hand. For a moment in time, we stood frozen.

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

T
hen the living room was crowded with eight people, seven of them standing, Mrs. Moore on a stretcher carried by the ambulance attendants, the black policeman talking to Bibo and me. We told him she had been beaten severely by a man friend whose address we didn't know. The girls stood mute, with their fur hats and unruffled princess coats and reddened eyes. At the stretcher with their unconscious mother, Tammy touched her mother's hand and calmly turned to the policeman. “Mr. Johnson live at the Winston Street Motel on the third floor. He beat her 'cause she spent his money on our outfits.”

Outside, a crowd gathered—children on brand-new bikes, a few adults pulled from holiday dinners by the siren. Teenagers in twos and threes with grim smirks, their stares said: Who got beat? Anybody die? I didn't hear no shot. Did you?

I turned to Bibo. “I'll go with Mrs. Moore. I guess the girls are hungry, even still.” I stepped into the ambulance and sat alongside the stretcher. Tammy stepped behind me, but Bibo lifted her up and turned her around.

“Mama's gonna be all right. Come on, let's go get our dinner.”

As he led the girls away, the ambulance closed up and night disappeared. The world became vivid white, bright red, barred and piped with steel. The vibrations of the siren pulsed through me like a blood transfusion as the onlookers vanished into the dark.

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

I
was drawn into the movement by the idea of freedom for black people and the image from my childhood in East Oakland, riding to church in the backseat of my uncle's Chrysler Newport, seeing black males spread-eagled on the ground at the mercy of hulking white policemen. Cousin Reddy's stories from the dispatcher's booth at the Oakland Police Department also profoundly influenced me.

• • • • • • • • • • • • •

Y
et here I was in the emergency room with a drunken mother. And here I was working behind the scenes, laying out a newspaper. Our revolution wouldn't change much for Mrs. Moore, whose life lay at the bottom of a bottle of liquor. I was fighting for Yvette and Tammy to have different lives, different outcomes, and different opportunities. The image that replaced the ugliness of police brutality was of Yvette and Tammy, each walking across a stage, diploma in hand, gainfully employed, living in a clean, well-maintained environment, pretty much what my aunt and uncle wanted for me. It wasn't what I thought the revolution would be, but I could see the connections.