The Fugitivities, стр. 45
“Simple. You have to take responsibility for your blackness.”
“But…”
“You have to take responsibility for our people! If the ones like you that have it all won’t do it, then no one will. Can’t you see that?”
“But I don’t want to! I don’t want to do any of that! I don’t want to be responsible, I just want to live my life!”
Nathaniel let this go without reply and an uncomfortable silence settled over them. In spite of what he was saying, Jonah thought of his students. He thought of B. and her dreams of getting into a fashion school and all the others who would have to continue without him, who would once again feel rejected and abandoned by the people they were told to trust. There was no way to say it, but he knew Nathaniel was right. He was scared. He just didn’t know what he was scared of or why.
Nathaniel hadn’t meant to get so worked up. “Hey, listen, Jonah. We not gonna solve the world’s problems in a day. And nobody’s saying it’s all on you. Shit, I didn’t mean to make it sound like you the Messiah, cause you damn sure ain’t that!”
“I know, I’m sorry, I feel confused is all. I want to do what’s right, it’s just that…”
“Look, man, life will take its course. You’re gonna do what you think is best for you, and that’s okay. I’m just trying to give you some perspective from where I’m coming from. To remind you that at the end of the day we all gonna have to answer for our choices, what we done, and what we didn’t choose to do. I’m just reminding you that you have the choice, the privilege and the choice, to do a lot of good, and if you don’t know, well, now you know. All right?”
“All right.”
“But yo—don’t let me catch your faded ass downtown no more. I find out your black ass is still knockin’ back drinks when you supposed to be teaching kids, it won’t be no cops. I will come down and give you an ass-whoopin’ myself! Fair?”
“Fair. I really do appreciate it, man. Getting me out of there.”
“Ain’t no thing, I know how to handle that type of situation. It’s always nice to play the famous-ballplayer card on some city cops.”
Jonah said that he should probably get going. Nathaniel didn’t answer him immediately. He got up with a sigh and moved to the window. He stared out at the sky. It was a marvelous deep blue. The planes were shifting east over Queens; others were coming out of Newark flying up the West Side. So many planes, even now, he thought. Grains of light were prickling the dusk over the five boroughs, and the forked tongue of the Cross Bronx Expressway flickered more brightly. The Harlem River quivered. A line about the riverside from one of the hymns his mother loved came to him. Old ship of Zion. Old songs. Why did they always sound like history calling?
Nathaniel went into his office and pulled out a small paper envelope. It had lain there in a corner of his desk drawer for a long time. For a long time, he did not know what do with it, or why he had even composed it in the first place. But maybe it was for a moment just like this. He brought the unsealed envelope to Jonah and placed it carefully in his hands.
“Here, take this with you,” he ordered. “You going anyway, so do me a favor and take it. If you find Laura somewhere down there, you’ll give it to her. Most likely of course, you won’t. And in that case, you can bring it back to me. That way I know I’ll get to see you again. And you’ll remember that you always have a reason to come back.”
Jonah didn’t refuse. He was moved by the gesture, by the great dignity in this man who had rescued him. It was an intimate gift, and even though it was awkward, he felt that he understood it in light of the stories and conversation they had exchanged on this extraordinary day. He understood that Nathaniel wanted to mark the occasion with some material token of its significance. It was a gesture of nobility and hope, and he felt unworthy of its aspirations.
“I’ll hold on to it,” he said simply.
They shook on it, and Nate gave him a bottle of water and an extra Advil for the long ride back to Brooklyn.
When he was alone again, Nathaniel would stare out at the city once more. He would think of what Laura would make of all this if she knew—how this kid had brought back to his mind with such force what they had shared, how close it all still felt, after all these years. But it was getting late. He still had phone calls to make and a late dinner to prepare. He had a group of kids to shepherd and tend to in the morning. The encounter with the lost Jonah would leave him feeling both young and old. Why this pull of remembrance? Why now, when he was past the time of life when it is possible to sincerely believe in new beginnings? But all beginnings are uncertain and hard to see. The coming of the night is not.
—
Back in the borough of Kings, Jonah pressed his key into the lock and stumbled wearily into the apartment. He knew before he had turned the corner into the living room that Isaac was around. He could hear the soft scratch of a record playing, something mid-century and bluesy. The mournful whine of a trumpet. Isaac was deep in the chair by the window, his chunky Dell laptop casting an eerie moonlit glow on