Love the One You're With (30 page)

I had to catch myself; I was
leering
. “Uh, you got here just in time. I was about to leave.”

“I'm so sorry I'm this late. I just flew back in from the West Coast, and it took forever to get out of Newark Airport.”

“Thanks for coming, but you certainly didn't have to. I'm used to seeing Will's grandmother, and she was the first one here tonight.” Like she always is.

“Uh, could we just sit for a moment?”

“Sure.” I was about to get a crick in my neck, gazing up at him. We both sat.

“Will's always been a precocious kid. He always got good grades, but they began to slip two years ago. I think he started to resent his mom dying when he was just a baby and me not being around to raise him. So he lashed out and became the comedian. Transferring him to this school was the best decision we made. He's really blossomed over the past six months and it's all because of you. Will really likes you, and he loves your class. I think it's given him a voice he never really had—or helped him find the voice that was always there. So, I just wanted to come up and personally thank you for all you've done.”

Now, hearing
that
was worth getting a migraine.

And I was stumped. “I … I really don't know what to say.”

“Well, I hope you'll say yes to a cup of coffee.”

Hmm … “A cup of coffee?”

“Yes, or a drink, whatever you prefer.”

I was still stumped. “I … was on my way home.”

“Have you forgotten I live not far from here myself? My mother and Will have said they've seen you out in the neighborhood. We don't have to go far.”

I was
still
stumped. “I … really have a splitting headache. As you can imagine, it's been a long night.”

“Maybe we can do it tomorrow night.”

No, he's not asking me what I think he's asking me … is he?

“Mr. Grant, I—”

“Please, call me Will. Well, I guess you'd have to call me
Big
Will.”

Uh-huh …
Very
Big.

“I really appreciate the offer. But I couldn't.”

He eyed me curiously. “You don't date widowers?”

“No, that's not it.”

“You don't date men over six feet?”

I giggled. “No, that's not it.”

“Ah … then it's the one I feared the most: You're involved.”

Bingo. “Yes. I'm currently in a relationship.” Damn … I've said that more in the past two weeks than I have in the past two years.

He didn't seem surprised by that bit of information. “Of course. A man like yourself would be.”

“Even if I wasn't, I don't think it'd be a good idea to get involved with the parent of a student.”

He chewed on that one, playing with his striped light blue tie. “Mmm … ethical. A caring, considerate man, thinking of what impact the actions you take will have on your students—or at least one of them. But you won't be Little Will's teacher forever. And, not that I'm hoping it happens, but maybe you'll be available one day, too.”

“You're a very charming man. Thank you for making my night.”

“You're more than welcome.”

I had to know … “Uh … do you mind if I ask you something?”

“Go ahead.”

“We … we just met. How … how …”

“Elvin has been singing your praises. And he also mentioned that you were … my type.”

Oh, did he? I always had my suspicions about Elvin and I guess he's had them about me. Did that background check also include info on my love life? I wouldn't put anything past Fooliani.

“Sorry if I kind of put a rush on you,” he gushed.

“That's all right. It was a good rush.”

“If you don't mind and don't think it would be any trouble, I'd like to walk you home.”

Hell … why not? “That would be nice.”

It's a short walk, but it seemed longer this time. He offered the résumé—thirty, Florida A&M U grad, accountant for the stars (i.e., the new jacks and jills in the music biz), works out twice a day (no kidding!), loves sushi, R. Kelly (one of his clients), August Wilson plays, and John Sayles movies. Hard to believe we had been living blocks from each other for five years and didn't know it. Never found ourselves on the same line at a store, or doing our laundry. Never passed the other on the street or rounding a corner. And if we had, I would never forget it: You couldn't miss a constellation like him! That we would meet in this way, at this time …

As I watched him bop up the block, zeroing in on that big booty—which had more stories than the Empire State Building—I sucked my teeth in disgust, thinking:

Life can be
so
cruel sometimes, can't it?

Oasis occupies the first floor of a two-story building (a CPA rents the upper level) that is nestled between a twenty-four-hour Korean grocery and an Indian restaurant called Curry in a Hurry on Lexington Avenue in Gramercy Park. Only in New York could three different cultural stations like these be neighbors.

Given that this is a residential area—and a lily-white one, at that—it seemed the oddest locale for a rhythm-and-blues club (actually, the recorded message described it as a “rhythm blues cabaret”). And it's such a nondescript establishment that you can pass right by it—like I did. I was expecting town cars, Jeeps, limos, and taxicabs parked in front, and the proverbial velvet rope and a bouncer or two trying to keep a noisy, rambunctious crowd in line. But the streets and sidewalks were deserted (was the party over?), and there wasn't even a mini-marquee with the club's name emblazoned on it. After checking the address Montee wrote down for a third time—and seeing that the address I was in front of matched for the
third
time—I reluctantly opened the rickety and somewhat rusted steel door and stepped inside.

I was greeted by a white woman, midtwenties, wearing a strapless polka-dot dress (skinned right
off
the dalmatian, okay?) and no makeup, not even lip gloss (not that it would've helped). The straight blond hair was teased a bit too much.

“Good evening,” she chirped, standing behind a black podium, the kind you'd see in a lecture hall at a university.

“Good evening. I'm here for Montee Simms's set.”

“Your name, please?”

“Mitchell Crawford.”

She went down the roster. “Ah, yes.” She checked off my name and retrieved a menu. “Please come with me.”

I followed her through a heavy bloodred curtain. A bank must have occupied this spot before Oasis: the teller station was now the bar and the four customer self-service posts were SRO tables, which formed a square around a dozen other tables. The gray walls were painted with palm trees and covered with framed posters of legends like John Lee Hooker, Robert Johnson, Lavern Baker, Etta James, Ruth Brown, Dinah Washington, and Ray Charles. Smoky (cigars and pipes were being puffed, and incense burned), packed (just about every seat and bar stool was filled), and buzzing with chatter and laughter (much of it coming from the bar, where a posse of brothers were huddled together), it was a very intimate, festive setting.

The hostess led me to a table—front row, center—just footsteps from the stage (which was a cement-block-high platform). A single yellow rose sat in a thin black vase. Propped up against a burning white candle was a brown envelope with my name on it.

“Do enjoy the show,” she advised, removing the “Reserved” placard.

“Thank you.”

No sooner had she left than a fifty-something waitress popped up popping gum. While the patrons and the few personnel were in semiformal attire, she wore a gold lamé blouse with green stretch pants and black knee-high leather boots, hoops as big as her pudgy face, several dozen silver bracelets on her left arm (none on her right), and a foot-high, beehive hairdo. Yeah, a real tart. She looked like she'd be more at home serving drinks at a 1950s drive-up malt shop, à la
Grease
. But with Jane Doe manning the door, I suppose they had to have
someone
a little more colorful up in here to brighten the spot.

And that she did. “Hay, sugah,” she sang, chomping that gum like a cow. “I'm Janine. Can I get ya somethin'?”

“Uh … a Long Island iced tea, please.”

“I'll be right back.”

After she swished away (she was a tiny woman with a not-so-tiny rump), I opened the envelope.

Mitchell
,

I hope you enjoy tonight's performance. I chose each song with you in mind.

Montee

Hmm … I was used to singin' for or to the men in my life. It would certainly be a different experience being on the receiving end.

Janine returned with my drink, cackling with two of the brothers from the bar who each climbed on the stage (one behind the drums, the other getting his bass in position). The glass was formed and ridged like a pineapple. “Here ya go.”

“How much is that?”

“All your drinks are on the house, honey.”

“They are?”

“Mmm-hmm. As the
very
special guest of Mr. Simms.”

“Ah.” That was nice of him.

“If I can getcha anything else, you just let me know.”

“I will. Thank you.”

“Enjoy the show.”

“I'm sure I will.”

The lights dimmed. A figure came from behind a black curtain and slid onto the piano stool. He began to play. The intro sounded familiar. Then came the first verse. Hmm … Montee is a bold one to do this particular Aretha tune.

“And I really gotta tell them … exactly how I feel … and make you understand … that love ain't playin' this time …”

He turned to the audience—or, rather,
me
—with the song's title: “This is for real …”

Yes, he was.

His voice favored Sam Cooke—the same timbre, the same throttle, the same flourishes, the same clarity, the same molasses-soaked soulfulness, the same spiritual intensity, the same gospel-deep power.

Heavy but hearty. Strong yet sweet. Tough yet tender.

The other two gentlemen joined in. And when he got to
the
part—“… and make you understand … that Miss Re ain't playin' this time …”—he replaced
Miss Re
with
Montee
. It was a perfect substitution. He almost stole the song from Aretha (once she sings a song, it's damn near impossible to stake a claim on it).

One thing's for sure: Her version never made me
moist
.

“Good evening, ladies and gentleman,” he said after the applause ceased. “I want to welcome you all to Oasis. I am Montee Simms—”

“We know, baybay!”
screamed a sister seated two tables to my left, waving her hands as if she were a traffic cop.

Montee blushed. “Thank you for that. That's Stan ‘The Man' Grady on drums …”

Short, stocky, and dressed in all white (including a bandanna tied around his forehead), Stan raised his hands, crossed his drumsticks, and tapped a beat on them.

“And that's Cool Cal Cooper on bass.”

Tall and thin, Cal tipped his teal-colored wide brim hat (which matched the silk shirt and slacks he wore) and bowed.

“And we are the Simms Trio. We hope you'll enjoy the words and music we'll be throwin' at ya this evening. We invite you to groove with us, to groove with the one you're with—or the one you're next to.”

Some took that invitation to heart: in addition to those same-gender couples holding hands and exchanging loving glances, one female couple did their own slow screw against the wall, another swayed in each other's arms by the bar, one male couple was parked up against one of the SRO tables (one brother melded his back and back
side
into the other's front), and another slow-dragged to just about every tune. Funny, but I hadn't really noticed that most of the pairings weren't heterosexual when I first walked in. It certainly was refreshing to see such intimacy displayed by Black Same Gender Loving people in a non-dance-club setting like this.

In addition to encouraging the smooching, the lineup of tunes—Randy Crawford's “I'm Under the Influence of You,” Donna Summer's “Fascination,” Phyllis Hyman's “The Answer Is You,” Will Downing's “Closer to You,” Dionne Warwick's “Where My Lips Have Been,” Stacy Lattisaw's “I've Loved You Somewhere Before,” and Lalah Hathaway's “Smile” (which really gave me a chill, since it was the song I sang for/to Pooquie moments after we first met)—signaled that he
did
choose tonight's repertoire with me in mind. In fact, at various points during the evening, he was singing directly
to
me—something that wasn't lost on the audience.

The highlight of the night was his “blues medley.” Actually, it was a
crying
medley—the songs featured were about shedding tears.

“You know when someone really loves you? I mean, really
really
loves ya?” he asked.

A brother in the back shouted: “Yeah—when they'd mortgage their house for ya!”

Even Montee laughed. “No. It's when they don't only want to share the pleasure, but the pain.” And with that he dove into “Cry Together” by the O'Jays.

“I'm sure many of you have lost a love so good you really knew what having a broken heart meant …” was the interlude before Alexander O'Neal's “Crying Overtime.” And he prefaced the pop/jazz standard “Cry Me a River” (on which he scatted up a storm) with the very pointed words: “Take you back?
Take you back?
Ha, as Ashford & Simpson advised: 'Get out your handkerchief … you're gonna
cry
!'”

Then he did two songs
by
Ashford & Simpson—“Add It Up” (on which he tackled, not tickled, those ebonies and ivories) and “All for One”—and closed with a rocking version of Bill Withers's “Grandma's Hands” that had everyone on their feet. Several folks (including me) begged for an encore, but since he had another set at one
A.M
., he declined.