“It would be different, Dots. A vast difference.”
“Different? How?”
“Well …”
“You mean that the white people who would now be in the minority won’t hear ’bout it? Because black people is the most prejudiced bitches and bastards I have ever come across, Bernice! Some of my best friends is black, too! oh-heh-heh-heh-haiii!”
“Black people aren’t the same as white people.”
“White people does foop. Black people does foop, too. White people is bullers — they call them queers in Toronto, but we call them bullers. They is the same bullers as the black people back home! Christ, the Sin James coast in Barbados is full-up with them, Bernice! Where were you born? White people is the same blasted wickers as black people.” She realized she had said something she should not have said to Bernice. She herself had had this homosexual experience with Bernice. And she saw Bernice stiffen, preparing the anger in her return thrust. But Dots simply added, “One o’ these days, everybody here in this car will be able to attend a paint-in in my apartment, if he wants to. I going hold one! It ain’t so damn per-missive … that’s the word? … as everybody white or black think … But I wonder if Agaffa would come …”
They had reached Henry’s roominghouse on Baldwin. Dots wanted Boysie to get out and call Henry. Boysie wanted Bernice to get out. “Hey, Bernice! perhaps, Henry and Agaffa are having a paint-in, right now, eh? You could join that one.”
“Haul your arse, Boysie, if you please,” she said, and then immediately begged his pardon; and begged Dots to forgive her for using such words in her car, in her presence.
“That’s between you and Boysie. Left me out, gal.”
“I’ll go,” Estelle said. “I need the exercise.”
“Be careful, darling, getting out on the curb. We don’t want you to lose that baby. That baby belong to all four o’ we in this car, so don’t play the arse with it. Boysie and me is godfather and godmother. And we even picked a nice name for our god-son.”
“What’s that name you pick for me?”
“Boy.”
“What?”
“Boy, you ain’ hear. The name is Boy. Be-oh!-why! … BOY!”
“Thanks.” And Estelle got out, and walked up the path, with the empty bottles and the dead flowers and the empty rotting cigarette boxes lining her way, like fallen rosebuds.
“Estelle looking good, Bernice.”
“Yes. And she’s bearing her burden like a queen!”
“I glad she didn’t do no damn foolishness like giving up her child for adoption, as that blasted fresh doctor suggested. And he had the gall to tell her he is sending social-worker to my apartment to look for her! Be-Christ, some o’ these white people think they rule the world!”
Estelle knocked on the door many times. There was no answer. She started to move away. Then the landlady came. The landlady said, “Mrs. White isn’t home. He is sleeping, or out, or …” She examined Estelle from head to foot. “They had people in last night, late, so perhaps …” She thought some more about it, and said, “They must be sleeping in.” And she smiled. And Estelle smiled, too. Because it was that kind of a morning.
“Any message?” she asked her. “I’m sure he’s sleeping.”
“Just tell him we came looking for him.”
“Who?”
“Estelle and Bernice and Dots and Boysie.”
“Fine.”
They drove back to the apartment, laughing, and arguing about holding a paint-in when they got home. The car radio was playing beautiful rhythm-and-blues songs. And Boysie was singing and dancing while he was driving. Dots was too happy to notice his recklessness. She looked at her watch. It was nine o’clock. “Only that?”
“How much?” Bernice asked.
“Nine o’clock, gal. Every working man and woman should still be in bed — sleeping, heh-heh-haiii! Yuh can’t be vexed that that lazy bastard is still sleeping. It’s Sarturday. And he’s a married man now, too.”
“He might be sleeping alone, though,” Boysie said, sniggering. “Kee-kee-kee-kee …”
The moment they got into the apartment, he put on his favorite record, “Shanty Town People,” by the Mighty Sparrow. When Dots heard the first two bars, she laughed out, in her sensuous way, and shouted from the kitchen where she was preparing a late breakfast (before Bernice cooked as she promised) for them all. “Christ, man! you is one o’ them? Are you one of them, so early this blessed morning?”
“One of what?” Bernice asked her.
“Shanty-town people,” Dots said. “The record he’s playing in there.”
“That’s the same one we were playing and dancing to, when the police came,” Estelle said.
“Fuck the police!” Boysie said, under his breath.
“Blind them!” Dots shouted from the kitchen.
“It’s a lovely record, Dots. It’s a lovely record, and it is our music. We music! We can’t be ashamed to hear it, regardless of the hour!”
“But Bernice. Is that you that just say that ’bout calypso? Girl, have you took a man last night? This is revolutionary for you. Gal, you are blasted agreeable this morning, and so early, too!”
Bright Sunday morning, they cussing, they fighting, they gambling! Beating pan, they beating bup-bup! iron-bolt and stone pelting! Send for the police, still the bacchanal won’t cease! So they violent, so they fast, they better go back to their mansion on the Labasse …
“Wow! wai! wow! waaaaaii!” Dots was saying, as she prepared breakfast, as she danced to the music by herself in the kitchen. “Wow! wee! wow! wee! We living, gal! We are living! Boysie, please turn up that thing a little more louder, man. We only got one chance on this earth.”
Boysie, who couldn’t have been asked a better request, turned the volume up so loud that the entire apartment and perhaps the entire apartment building capsized with the rhythms of the West Indies. Dots interrupted the making of breakfast to come into the living room and dance with her husband; and when he was not available, when he was mixing drinks for the women, she danced with Estelle.
“I can feel that little bitch inside o’ you jumping, darling. Treat it nice. Treat Boy nice. I am the godmother, don’t forget. And I don’t want
