The Summer of Calamari

Walter Roberts soon became, and has always been, my best friend. One day during a stretch of about five—made—shots in a row, Walter stopped and looked at me in a way he never had before. His face filled with direction offering something more than concentration. “Why do you think those two black secret service agents were removed from their post across from the Memphis Hotel?” He was thirteen years old.

“What in the hell are you talking about, Week?” I assumed Walter entertained some random thought and would simply retract his question, but instead of firing away he held the ball in his relaxed arms and lowered his head. It seemed like the loose stones on the ground moved to avoid his glance. Neither praying nor crying, the curve of Walter’s body and the shape of his frustration offered one of the saddest things I have ever seen. Years later, I understood the saddest thing about the day was that I really didn’t know what he was talking about.

“I watched this show on TV last night with my mom and it said that Secret Service guys were moved from their post across from the Memphis Hotel on April 4,1968.” Barely audible, his voice trembled.

“What happened on April 4,1968?”

He raised his head and trapped me in his glance. “That’s the day Martin Luther King Jr. was shot.” I wanted to just tell him I had no idea, or to stop talking and shoot the ball, but Walter’s eyes and his tone convinced me to remain silent. He and I could be best friends, we could talk together, shoot together, and spend time together, but we could never create a perfect world. The barricades of society and the torments of history would never let us forget that Walter was black and I was white.

Finally Walter shot the ball and I released a silent breath to settle the tension I felt accompanying my ignorance. I knew in my heart that I still owed Walter some kind of answer. “I don’t know, man. I don’t know.” My simple and useless answer allowed Walter to at least know I listened, and I think that picture alone illustrated what he wanted most.

 “Yeah, I guess we’ll never know.” Walter took a final lay up before picking up his books and walking away from the playground. He took only a few steps before he turned around and looked back at me. We played for about two hours while the clouds of the afternoon sky dimmed the lights in ritual and the day looked more dusk. Walter’s tall, thin frame cast no shadows. “You gonna be here tomorrow?”

“Yeah, I’ll be here, Walter.”

“See you tomorrow, brother.” Then he turned and walked away. His mother would probably be pulling out of the driveway to get him just about the time he got home. He left the playground in the same manner each day when he simply realized it was time to go. He gathered his books, asked if I would be there tomorrow and walked away. On that particular day the last word really caught my attention. He used the word brother differently than I ever heard it before, simply meaning friend, but somehow it carried more weight. Walter always carried more weight. He played defense on the Chris Dillinger’s of the world.