IT'S REALLY GOING DOWN!!

So here I am - it’s really gonna go down…we’re actually gonna break into the art room…holy shit!

Na-Na is there as advertised, standing in front of Roselle High, toothpick in mouth. He’s twirling his umbrella, and thrusting it forward in the night air, as if stabbing imaginary people, I presume.

“Yo, champ.”

“Hey, whassup, Na-Na?”

“Damn, my man be fierce, an’ shit, last night.”

I smile, trying to play cool, but now my curiosity is really aroused.

“What the fuck happened last night, man?”  

He studies me for a few seconds, I guess trying to figure out if I’m kidding, or not. He shakes his head, chuckles, and clucks his tongue, then picks up this huge boom box and knapsack.

We head towards the parking lot, to the green fire exit door on the side. I look at Na-Na, wondering what his plans are, as he pulls out this tremendous set of keys from his coat pocket. Where he got them? Who knows? Feeling our way into the darkness of the hall, he flicks on his gold plated lighter. We bound stealthily up the stairwell, our footsteps echoing like Goliath into the empty midnight hour.  

The spooky glow of the shadows cast by Na-Na’s flame, infuse me with a strange type of giddiness. I’m imagining I’m in one of those Adventures of Johnny Quest cartoons I used to watch on Saturday mornings. Exploring some ancient, forbidden underground temple in Egypt, or some crazy place like that. Suddenly, I get this uncontrollable impulse to yell out in that Indian kid, Hajji’s, accent.

“Johnny, Johnny! Race! Dr. Quest - look - it is the sacred jewel of the mythical Monkey God, Babaganush!”  One glance at Na-Na, though, and I resist that urge. Who was that kid Hajji anyway? And why was he always following around Dr. Quest, Johnny, and Race Banyon?

We march our way through the second floor corridor, till we finally reach the object of our illicit journey. Mr. Silverstein’s art classroom. Na-Na opens that door with another one from his magic set of keys, we switch on the lights - and it’s all right there in front of us, now. Gazing up at that wall above the closet in the back, the wonder of it all just stone hits me. This is to be the canvas that will fuel our revolutionary hunger. Whoa.

 Inexplicably, in the next second, pangs of fear and anxiety with all the force of a typhoon crash through me. Obliterating the exhilaration that had filled me on the way up here. Now, the wall seems to me a towering monolith of epic impossibility.  

This is gonna take, like, Michelangelo type of talent!  Who am I to even attempt to immortalize Esperanza like this? She is so beautiful. I don’t know if Na-Na reads the panic expressing itself in the sudden paleness of my face.  Maybe he does.  Maybe he doesn’t. He sets up his boom box on one of the tables.  

“Yo, Strong, check it out, man.  This be Hawaiian, man - this be the shit for creatin’.” 

He torches up the monster spliff he’s got in his hand, takes in a couple of major hits, and passes it off to me. I grab it warily, remembering last night when I nearly hacked to death. Man, I’m already feeling super uncool right now, I don’t need to sink even further in esteem. I close my eyes and pull in a toke. Fuck it.  

“My special blend a’ herbs and spices.” Na-Na says, the smoke still cascading out of his mouth. 

To my great surprise, this stuff goes down easy. Nothing like last night. No burning my throat or chest this time.  No, this is a distinct and different flavor and feeling. We just sit there in the night silence, me and Na-Na. Handing off to each other, puffing totally mellow. No laughing. No coughing.

THE MORNING AFTER

Ok, so this is the morning after our ( me and Na-Na) big trip to the Savoy Lounge to get ‘material!’

Next thing I know, I’m in my bed, waking up to the morning sunlight flooding through my curtains. Still clad in my dishevelled golden ensemble under my covers! The manic activity of everybody getting ready for school must have blasted me out of my slumber, and it takes me a minute to figure out where I am. To say nothing of how I even got here. This confusion is accompanied by nausea, and a headache bigger than Hardcore. I feel horrible. My mother sticks her head in my bedroom door.

“Get up, Joseph, you’re going to be late for school! 

Within minutes, I convince her, or she realizes, that I am way too sick for that. I’m careful not to let her see that I’m fully dressed under the covers.

I take a peek at my sketchbook, mysteriously lying next to me. Opened up to a crudely drawn picture of some black man’s face contorted into a fierce grimace, head apparently on the floor.  That’s weird, I think to myself as I drift back to sleep. I lay in bed the whole rest of the day, and somehow, in between frantic dives to the toilet bowl, and falling in and out of consciousness, remember that Na-Na and me had decided we were going to break into the school tonight. And, for the next three nights, to get down this mural thing. I just hope I’m not dreaming. Or, indeed, having a nightmare. I’m far too incapacitated to go to work, which is fine with me, and I take a certain redemptive comfort in that it’s a rainy day – raw and chilly. The real autumn is absolutely barging in on our Indian summer now.

It calms me, along with periodic visits from my mother, with homemade vegetable soup and hot tea with honey. There is a nurturing, soothing feeling I haven’t experienced in a long while.

It goes on like this all day, falling asleep to a fantastic montage of mysterious, other worldly dreams, waking up, and back again. Until the piercing whistle from the southbound train at the Roselle Park station blows me into final awakening. I dazedly peek at my clock radio! Holy shit, its eleven o’clock in the night!  Whoa. It’s almost time to go. As if on cue, I hear my parents turn off the TV downstairs, and begin their treacherous, middle-aged ascent of the steps. Yawning, as their footsteps drag. They take their turns in the bathroom, and have their nightly whispering argument in which my father asks my mother where the clean towels are. Finally, they close the drama – and their door. I wait the requisite fifteen minutes for them to settle in, don my work clothes, and creep down the stairs.

The rain had stopped, but it’s damp and cold as a bitch. The instant I hit the street, doubts about what I’m going to be able to accomplish tonight begin swirling around my head, like the invoking winds blowing down the nape of my neck. I shudder and quickly zipper all the way up.

The warm, satisfied feeling that had enveloped me while I was lying in my bed, has now disappeared. I observe the vapor from my breath, and begin trudging down Third Avenue, a stabbing tinge of sadness, of being alone - separated - curls around me. I hesitate, gazing back at my house, and stop for a second.

How am I going to do this mural?! I really have no idea of what I’m going to do! Panic sets in. Na-Na and I have never even talked about it, really. I mean, I made this big bravado speech and everything…what if I - we - get busted? How are we going to finish this in only three nights, anyway?! And, to be honest, I am still kind of afraid to be alone in a room with him for any extended period of time. Especially with nobody at all around. Maybe I should turn back now! I keep going, though, more scared of not showing up than anything else.

THE SAVOY

It’s REALLY happening! Oh my God - how did I get myself into this situation? But here I am, sitting in a stolen car with Na-Na Johnson at almost midnight on our way to the notorious Savoy Lounge!

I sit there on the Corinthian Leather, stiffer than a 47- year old virgin librarian on her honeymoon night. I look over at Na-Na, not knowing what to say. Apparently, this is as normal for him as, say, Ward Cleaver returning home from a day at the office. He plucks out a joint from his jacket pocket, sparking it up with his Kool, pulls it in deeply, and passes it over to me. What Na-Na doesn’t know is that I have never partaken of the good herb before. A virgin. In more ways than one.

I try to copy his nonchalant expertise, taking in a huge hit - and proceed to hack like a wounded seal for, like, the next five minutes. Tears are rolling down my cheeks like I’ve just watched, Born Free, or something.

“Damn, Strong, ain’t you never smoked this shit before?”

“Yeah, Na-Na, but – I protest between deep hacks – but…damn, this shit is potent, man!”

He nods knowingly.

“I ain’t never had shit like this before – whew!”

I can only hope that he believes my flagrant attempt at saving face.

He fishes out a pint bottle of NIGHTRAIN from his other pocket, and downs a big gulp. Then hands it over to me, keeping the steering wheel on cruise control, not using his hands at all.

I don’t know what type of liquor this is, but I eagerly down it in an attempt to extinguish the burning bush raging inside my chest. It goes down like a flammable concoction of pure rubbing alcohol, grape Kool Aid, and Vick’s cough medicine, and immediately sprays out of my nose. Na-Na gives me a look like I’m some kind of sexual deviant. In between the sneezing, wheezing, and tearing, I quickly take another long toke on the jay, then, throwing down a lethal gulp of the firewater, back and forth, in a manic effort to prove myself.  Suddenly, I start cracking up, Laughing, laughing, laughing, until my belly is sore.

Even Na-Na breaks a smile, which has to be a first, also, as we pass the twin vices between us.

“Man, you be buggin’ an’ shit,” he keeps repeating somewhat bemusedly, as I continue snorting NIGHTRAIN and smoke out of my nose and mouth. By the time we near The Savoy, I’ve completely forgotten what it is that I’m supposed to be afraid of in the first place.

We hop out of the ride, and Na-Na brandishes a brown leather cap, instructing me to put it on and wear the bill tilted heavily over to the side, overhanging the right part of my face.

“Yeah, now you cool.”

I start to wonder if I’m going to even get in tonight, never mind get served. I mean, I’m only fifteen and a half.

“Na – you sure I’m gonna get in tonight, man? I mean, I don’t have any I.D, or anything like that –“

“Yo – you wit’ me, man.”

Enough said.

As we’re bopping towards The Savoy, fog, the stench of the river pollution, dead fish, gasoline and diesel fuel exhaust envelopes our senses, and we finally come upon this crazy building set right off the docks. It looks like it used to be a White Castle, those greasy hamburger chains, where you could order a rat burger and fries for, like, twenty-nine cents. The color is a strange bluish-green, probably oxidized from the port air, like The Statue of Liberty.

James Brown blaring hard from the jukebox, pierces the silence of the chilly river breeze. We step inside, to find ourselves navigating through another cloud. This one of cigarette and reefer smoke, burning up my already ghoulishly bloodshot eyes. As I take off my glasses to rub the fumes out and then return them to my face, I believe we’ve somehow wandered onto the movie set of Cleopatra Jones. Only this is for real.

Pimps like the ones from, Starsky & Hutch, now strut right in front of me. Incredibly, they really are decked out in these outrageously colourful, bright orange and lime green gabardine suits. Wide-brimmed, plumed fedoras. Studded five-inch platform shoes. And a mouthful of gold, to match their blinding array of jewellery.

Holy Shit! I stand there for a minute, spellbound, the colors glowing in the dim light of the room. I strain to listen to the conversations over the steady bmmp-bmmp-bmmp of the music. Then my trance is shattered by the sharp sound of a cue ball smashing against a newly racked set of pool balls.

“Shit!  Mo’fucker singed my ass.”

Within minutes, I’m immersed in a carnival of sights and sounds, that amplifies the perception of my first-time stoned drunkenness.

Dice rolling. Knocking against the wall. Cards being expertly shuffled and dealt. Always followed by the most original curse words and swearing I have ever been exposed to. I soon realize it’s all about gambling. Gambling here is a skill, a livelihood, a game within a larger game.

Yeah.

Everyone seems to know Na-Na, and he introduces me around, always assuring them with - “He cool”, as they cast suspicious glances. This goes on for a while until he gets me my first order of ‘grog.’

The last thing I remember, is downing a can of Olde English 800, chasing it down with a shot of some kind of whiskey. Then, hearing Na-Na speaking with the largest, most muscular specimen I’ve ever seen, appropriately named ‘Hardcore’.

“It still be early, brother, shit definitely going down tonight.” He half whispers, assuredly.

THE BIG NIGHT

So, after ‘my call to arms’ Nat Turner speech to Na-Na about Mr. Silverstein (and the White man in general) suppressing the artistic vision and creative process, I must now face the consequences of my diatribe.

First of all, what the hell was I talking about with that spontaneous call to arms? I mean, the stuff was just rolling off my tongue, but I had never even thought about it consciously before, to the best of my recollection. Port Elizabeth?  The Savoy Lounge?  With Na-Na Johnson?! From what I’d heard – and this was when I was at the PAL – those guys said they would never even set foot in the Port, that a “fool could get himself kilt over there.” And these were Gold Glove boxers! As for the Savoy Lounge, I had never even heard of it before. In fact, didn’t want to know anything about it now, either. Am I deranged? But, how can I possibly beg out of it now?  I am doomed.

The plan is that I meet Na-Na in front of the high school after I finish up work tonight. To make it even more treacherous, I have to go home first, because my father would surely be waiting up for me, as he always does.  Then, I’ll have to wait for my folks to fall asleep as I lay waiting in my room. Only then can I finally sneak out, wearing my coolest clothes.

Whoa. We figured on meeting around 11:30 PM. Apparently, the Savoy is hopping all night.

I wind up working longer than usual, and don’t even make it home until after eleven. There’s my father sitting on the living room couch, watching Mary Hartman! Mary Hartman! on TV.  Smoking a White Owl cigar, my Uncle Joey had left over a few days before.

My father always laughs when that show is on, which thankfully puts him in a good mood. We talk for a few minutes, and I make a point of telling him how totally exhausted I am. I trudge up the stairs heavily, yawning and sighing, hoping that he’ll take the hint and go to bed soon.

My patience is rewarded about fifteen minutes later. The familiar rhythm of his plodding steps on the notoriously creaky stairs, follows the equally squeaky shutting of his and my mother’s bedroom door. Within five minutes, I slip on my gold ensemble, grab my sketchbook, and am gently stealing down those stairs. Strategically avoiding the minefield of groans that would betray one misplaced step.

I’m late, and panic that Na-Na will be gone already, dismissing me as a punk. But when I arrive, breathlessly sucking wind on Sixth and Chestnut, there he is, casually leaning against a maroon ’73 Mercury Sedan, which matches his equally cool, full-length maroon leather coat.

“Yo Na-Na - what’s up? Sorry I’m- ”

“Aiight, Strong, let’s tip.”

He leisurely flicks the butt he had been dragging on, lights another Kool, and gives his ever-present umbrella one final twirl.

“Yo, that’s a bad ride you got, Na.”

“Aiight,” he nods.

We hop into the sedan, and I am immediately impressed that the seats are Corrrrrinthian Leather, the kind that Ricardo Montalban pitches on those Volare commercials. Corinthian Leather. The way he rolls those R’s kills me, man. Then I notice that Na-Na is starting the car not with a key, but with a contraption that looks suspiciously like some kind of wire. It takes a few seconds for it to set in.

Oh my God! We’re driving a stolen car! And I’m an accessory! Oh shit!

I almost yell it out, but quickly decide I’d better not. Jesus – not only am I going to this notorious Savoy Lounge place to ostensibly witness a murder - with Na-Na Johnson, no less - but we’re also driving a stolen car! Visions of me participating in the next televised documentary of Scared Straight flash through my mind.