Femme Noir (3 page)

On a hunch, I called directory assistance for Tulsa and got several listings for McKerr. I called each one and no one told me anything until the last one. I had developed a thin ruse to explain my call. The woman who answered sounded like she had been crying.

“You want to speak to Michelle? Who are you? What do you want?”

“I’m a…friend. I have some money for her. Can you tell me where she is?”

“You’re a friend and you don’t know she’s dead?” The woman began crying softly. “Killed. Shot in the head. Oh, Lord have mercy, my baby—”

I hung up without a word.

Tonya took me into her house and gently into her arms.

The next day, I played hoops for ten hours. If I wasn’t joining pick-up games, I played by myself or sat under a tree staring into space. I played in the old outdoor lots with battered chain link fences and broken asphalt. I needed to be close to something urban and ugly. The squeaky-clean beautiful hardwood floors and pristine outdoor courts of my college were repellant to me now. I played until Tonya came for me on her way home from work. Tonya gently pried my numb hands off the ball and pushed me into the car. I passed out into sleep on the way home. Tonya woke me gently and boosted me into the house, tucking me into bed without dinner. I slept, not moving, until dawn when I reached for Tonya. I drowsily sucked Tonya’s luscious black nipples into erect bullets. Tonya groaned sleepily and shifted her big hips up to meet my slow, firm stroke. With my eyes closed, I grinned as I felt Tonya’s legs spread wide and smooth the sheets in an arc. I tenderly cupped Tonya’s body close as she arched her back. Barely conscious, I nuzzled Tonya’s throat and she curled her heavy body around me and relaxed into a long, deep orgasm. I loved the feel of Tonya’s wide hips and belly roll. That’s the way all women should be. Ample and voluptuous and able to fuck for hours. Tonya was still undulating with pleasure as I kissed her brow. When Tonya finally lay limp, I moved to her slippery cunt and took her swollen clit in my mouth. She gasped and her eyes flew open.

“Mornin’, sunshine,” I said to her glistening pussy. “We’re just getting started.”

Two hours later, Tonya’s alarm clock woke us from a sleep-glutted sex haze. I realized how sore and exhausted I was. With the bright light of day, my catatonia returned and I went back and played basketball for another twelve hours. By the time Tonya came to get me, I felt a little clearer, somewhat steadier. Tonya tried to talk me out of leaving and going to Tulsa, tried to get me to stay with her longer and think things over, but I was resolute.

My face and attitude would’ve been recognized by my team as absolutely nonnegotiable. I had carefully and patiently built four dream teams over the last fifteen years and sent many a talented and ambitious player to a good career. I groomed my players for championships and they never disappointed me. My Panthers were a West Coast phenomenon and years ago, I had been famous as a powerhouse player myself. Some reporter started calling me the Pat Summitt of Los Angeles and it caught on. I was waiting for the day that Pat Summitt would be called the Nora Delaney of Tennessee.

I inherited my determination from my beloved grandmother, who passed it to my mother and then to me, just like the gold Ugandan coin on a chain I had inherited from them. That coin was as much a part of me as my fingerprints, and I had nearly been hospitalized when I lost it.

My grama, white-haired but still a tall, majestic queen, had told me the simple story of the coin when I was a child.

“You see, our ancestors were royalty. We used to wear brilliant robes and great crowns. We were the rulers of the cradle of civilization. You are a descendent of the Acholi Tribe in Uganda.” Grama paused to let that sink in. I listened with all of my ten-year-old heart.

“And when a war came, a princess saw a hard future ahead and sewed gold coins into her dress so that she might sweeten her fate. Chaos and cruelty came to Uganda. What family was not slaughtered or burned were either lucky enough to run away or unlucky enough to be kidnapped and sold into slavery. The princess was unlucky. She lost her home, her family, her position, her wealth, all the life she had known. She was not much older than you. Two or three years, maybe.”

I blinked, feeling great pride in the resourcefulness of children like myself.

“She used her coins one by one. At first trying to buy her freedom, but when that didn’t work, she used them to bribe food from her captors and to persuade them not to rape her. When at last she arrived in the New World, she used her remaining money to buy a better station in life. She saved her last coin to remind herself of who she really was. She prayed with it in her hands at night, carried it in her bosom at day. It never left her. See how it is rubbed smooth?” My grama tilted her wrist so I could touch the warm coin and feel its silky surface. I nodded.

“That is how many prayers have been rubbed into this coin. That’s how many women have carried the heritage and the memories. My great-grandmother got it off her mother’s body after she died, before the slave owners could steal it. Then my grandmother carved a hole in it so she could wear it. Then my mother gave it to me, and I’ll give it to your mama this year on her birthday. And someday, it will belong to you. You must treasure it always and never lose it. Remember who you are and the wishes for a better life that the princess has passed down to you.”

“Okay, Grama.”

My grandmother, Elsie Merica Madewell, saw the antebellum South in depressed shambles with picking cotton as a black person’s only possible future, so she packed up her husband and nine children and moved, by horse and buggy, to Los Angeles where my grandfather, Amos Madewell, started a restaurant to feed local railroad workers and my grandmother took in sewing and started a little church.

My mother, Emily Anne, pitched in with the rest of her siblings, helping with the restaurant and working hard getting her education. During college at Mooreland University, Emily met Benjamin Delaney and they married. My father was one of a handful of black veterinarians serving the black farmers and black cowboys and rodeos of the entire Southwest region. When my father was killed by a horse trampling him, I was ten years old, and the hardest hit.

That was when I discovered basketball. I was a skinny, knock-kneed, googly-eyed, nappy-haired, broken-hearted girl alone on the court. Even though the boys called me names and tried to keep me out, my mama had power and influence in the community, so she was able to put me on a team even though I was the only girl.

I excelled and went to my parents’ collegiate alma mater on an unheard-of basketball scholarship.

That night at Tonya’s, after basketball all day, after dinner and sex, my shock broke like a fever and I felt alert and strong and ready to leave Los Angeles.

Through Tonya, I had gotten a referral for a hotel and a bar. Tonya knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who had been to Tulsa. “The Phillips Hotel and Jody’s Bar and Grill,” Tonya said, hanging up the phone. I frowned at the piece of paper with addresses on it. “The Phillips is downtown, and Jody’s is on south and east of that, whatever. And I checked my
Lesbian Connection.
There’s a contact dyke in Tulsa, Darcy Tate, who might be helpful. Will you be okay?” Tonya handed me the scrap. I nodded. I needed to be alone for a while to think. I needed a plan. Tonya left me alone by the pool in the back until I had a game strategy and a game face. Then I wordlessly took Tonya to bed.

Chapter Four

The next day, my plane took off from LAX headed for Tulsa International Airport without a single empty seat. I was surprised to see so many people wanting to go to Oklahoma. I expected an empty plane where I could stretch out, perhaps be the only passenger. Who the hell else would go to Oklahoma and why? If it was going to be a crowded airplane, I expected barefoot hillbillies in overalls and live chickens under their arms. But these people were polished, well dressed, well groomed, polite and well spoken.

I was squeezed in between a large, red businessman and a young female student. My knees were wedged firmly against the seat in front of me. I had bouts of breathless claustrophobia so intense that I forgot to flirt with the flight attendant. I grabbed the beers out of the attendant’s hands and gulped them. “Jesus, help me,” I muttered in resentful surrender as the student gave me a vicious shove in the ribs and a brilliant smile. I gave up, hugging my chest and holding my beer under my nose like an aromatic sedative.

Tonya!
I sat up straight suddenly and banged my cup of beer onto the tray table. I needed to call her. The businessman glared at me as I twisted around, removing my cell phone that I despised using, even as Dick Tracy as it was. I dialed and then heard Tonya’s voice in sweet, safe LA.

“Hey, baby!” I shouted over the deafening vibration of the plane. “Just wanted to call and thank you for everything. I had such a great time over the weekend.” I smiled my sunniest smile into the phone, wrapping it around Tonya.

“Me too. Where the hell are you?”

“In the plane.”

“The plane? Girl, are you crazy? See you soon and take care of yourself.”

“I’ll be looking you up when I get back. I owe you big.”

“I’ll say. Take me out to dinner.”

“You got it, baby. That and much more.” I hung up and called Cherisse. Then Karen. When I finally replaced the phone in my pocket, the student was stifling giggles and fingering her WWJD bracelet. The businessman had abandoned his armrest, trying to hold himself as far away from me as possible.

“Jealousy,” I spat as I placed Tonya’s headphones on my head and rang for my fourth beer. “John Coltrane, take me away.” I closed my eyes and spread my arms over both vacant armrests, smiling.

My second surprise was the “international” airport. I laughed. International? There was nothing international about it, and no city with a tiny toy airport could have any serious trouble for Michelle. It was probably a waste to have come. I carried my bag, wandering through the deserted building. The airport had escalators and elevators and security and snack bars and lots of ticket counters, and very shiny floors and airline gates and long concourses and cheesy souvenirs and insurance machines and flags from many nations bidding me welcome, just like any airport, but it was so clean and quiet. It was eerie. I stopped at baggage claim not to get a bag—I had only carry-on—but just to take a minute to absorb this strange atmosphere. And where better to stand, looking lost, than at baggage claim?

“Ma’am, are you lost?” a security guard asked.

I stared at him, speechless. Politeness, courtesy, concern for people—what in hell had I gotten myself into?

“Perdida?”
the man asked gently.
“Perdue?”

My mind was blank. The security guards spoke Spanish and French?

“I’m sorry. I don’t know any African languages. Hmm, let’s see…”

That snapped me out of my trance. “No, no, I’m all right. I’m from LA,” I said, feeling stupid immediately.

“From LA,” the guard repeated inscrutably. I thought he put something sinister into it too. “Well, you looked a little stunned, so I wanted to make sure you were all right.”

I blinked. “Yes, yes, thanks.”

“Welcome to Tulsa. Have a nice stay.”

“Sure,” I replied. The guard turned to leave when I said, “Car?”

“You need a ride?” he asked. “Out at the curb are taxis or hotel buses. Where are you staying?”

“The Phillips.”

“Oh, nice. They don’t have a bus, but you can take a cab or rent a car right over there.” The guard pointed. I felt like an idiot for the second time in five minutes. Not a good sign. Just across the baggage claim conveyor were all the car counters in a row, brightly lit with the uniformed agents smiling perkily, not forty feet from where I stood. I glanced to my side out the wall of glass, which was the airport exit. A line of yellow taxis was right there. What do you know. I was struck again by the silence of the place. No yelling or running or harassed mobs. No travel tension at all. No rudeness or rushing or stress. The baggage belt began moving with a jerk. The people waiting for bags, murmuring quietly, all stopped talking and leaned forward expectantly.

“Thank you again,” I said to the guard and stuck out my hand, knowing myself to be a dolt.

“Sure thing, anytime.” The guard shook my hand briskly and walked away.

I looked around and sighed, finally getting my bearings. I was the only black person here. I was the only person of color at all. My gaze met that of an elderly Hispanic man pushing a broom and rolling a trash barrel on wheels. He nodded and I smiled, starting to relax. I decided to rent a car, drop off my luggage, and head for the local watering hole. My beer buzz was wearing off in this smothering silence. Approaching the car rental counter was strange because I was the only customer, and the agent smiled stiffly. The entire long walk from baggage claim to counter, neither my nor the agent’s eyes dropped and neither of us said anything. The other passengers had collected their bags and headed home on the arms of loved ones. I heard my boots ring on the slick, polished floor. I rented what passed for a full-size, hoping for enough legroom.

The agent was chipper and helpful and drew a route on the cartoon map of how to get to the Phillips.

“It’s an historic building, you know. From the early oil boom,” the agent said.

“No, I didn’t know.”