Gotta Be Down
by
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Winters were especially rough. Old clothes and newspapers were bunched around windows to keep the draft out. Rats and stray dogs busted the trash bags open. Giant turds sat on top of the snow. Clothes left on the lines were scattered. Buron’s friends laughed at their house. One side of the roof was caved in and the gray, drab-looking shingles slid off the sides like dead skin. Momma cursed and shouted. She wished she never had any damn kids. She was bitter because Sonny left her with all these responsibilities. It was hard. But the thought of her children in the streets gave her super-human strength. When her car didn’t start, she caught the bus. Buron would never forget that awful winter when Momma had to tough through waist-high snow to get to the bus stop. He watched her from the warmth of the house and felt every deep, cold step she took. She lost her balance and fell. Buron ran out of the house. "Momma stay home today! It’s too bad out here!" Momma turned around. All Buron had on was a T-shirt. "Get back in the house!" she cried. Tears ran down his cheeks. Buron was too young to understand. If she didn’t go to work, they’d get put out on the streets. "You all right, Momma?" "Yeah, baby! Go back in the house with your brothers and sisters!" When he went back in the house Cupid and Terrence were on the floor laughing. They saw Momma fall and thought that it was funny. Then they started cursing. It was every man for himself until Momma came home from work. When Terrence and Buron got Hoof-and-Mouth disease, Momma missed a payment on the gas bill. She had scalding tears in her eyes as she begged them not to turn off the gas. They told her that her bill was just too big. Momma cursed the clerk out. It was too cold to be without heat and hot water. Momma and JT went to the hardware store and bought some space heaters. JT called the shop and told them he was taking off. Before he bought the heaters for them, their only source of heat was pots of boiling water on the electric stove. Momma tacked heavy blankets at the kitchen door to keep the heat in. Everyone slept together. The floors were icy and the water in the toilet was frozen. Everyone was huddled in cots and pallets. They jumped when they heard the front door. The rooms were so cold you could see smoke in front of your face. JT came in with two small heaters under his arms. He put them down and plugged them up. The children crowded around the heaters. Momma was so happy that tears ran down her face. When winter took a bad turn JT went out and shoveled the snow off the sidewalk. He took the gas cap off and stuck a long, T shaped pipe down the shaft. He turned it. Suddenly, the furnace jumped. Foop! JT replaced the gas cap and drug the pipe in the house. The radiators warmed up and they had hot water in the space of an hour. JT was up bright and early making sure the kids ate right. He made hotcakes from scratch. When they got short on flour, he used cornmeal or a box of Jiffy. He bought the old fashioned bacon with the thick, tough rinds. He got them on grits and oatmeal and he made his own syrup out of sugar, butter and warm water. His presence took pressure off of Momma. He helped her catch up on bills and fixed stuff around the house. When the cold weather passed he took the family out to the country. They stayed on his uncle’s farm and the kids had a ball. The only drawback was the mosquitoes. Neat shacks sat off dirt roads and homemade pies cooled in open windows. They went back to the city and told their friends what they did in the country.
JT promised to bring a dog home. Buron was full of anticipation. What did it look like? JT told him that it was a Poodle, but what did an eleven-year-old boy know about breeds? Buron just wanted a pet of his own to play with. On Friday, he begged JT not to forget to bring the dog home. Buron didn’t know if he could handle the long wait ‘till Monday. He couldn’t concentrate on his schoolwork that day. He went straight home and waited. His brothers and sisters teased him. He kept looking out the window every time he heard a car. "He aint bringing home no damn dog!" Vershell giggled. Buron paid her no mind. Dusk came. Buron got nervous. His brothers and sisters were in Momma’s bedroom watching TV. He looked out the window. Cupid shook him gently. Buron got up and went to bed. He got up in the middle of the night. The attic was dark. He heard T snoring. He went and looked down the steps. It was pitch black. Carefully, he tiptoed down the staircase. At the bottom something leaped into his arms. The dog barked when Buron threw it. Paws scratched the floor. Buron cut on the light and his heart leaped with joy. He stayed in all weekend and played with the dog. He didn’t want to tumble or play ball with his friends. All he did was play with Pepé. The dog panted and rolled around in the leaves, happy to be loved. When Sonny came over they shuffled around nervously. He was adjusting to his new life. He picked up a little weight but he wasn’t self-conscious about it. His beard was shaped and his curl fell down to his shoulders. And unlike Momma, he had all of his teeth and didn’t have to dye his hair because of nerves. Sonny never met JT face to face because the old man was never around when he came over. But there were signs that a man was living with his ex-wife. The house smelled of oily grit and manly sweat. Shorts too big to be Buron’s hung on the clothes line out in the backyard. The back porch was shored up. Sonny couldn’t stand the fact that an old man had taken his place with Momma and the kids. $96.00 a month in child support made him feel like he could see his kids any time he wanted to.
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About the Book
When Sonny and Momma got married, it was supposed to last forever. Then Sonny met Pat and left Momma all alone to raise five children by herself. Everyday is a struggle to keep a roof over their heads and put food on the table. T is Momma’s baby and can do no wrong. He and his friends roam the neighborhood in search of fun and adventure. Stoney, the neighborhood thug, is his hero. Meanwhile the bills are piling up, Momma has to work around the clock, and there’s no one to keep track of the kids. T and his friends cross paths with Solomon and soon things escalate from fistfights, to knives. One day, Stoney and T stumble across a gun in an old, abandoned garage while trying to find wheels for their go-cart. Before they get a chance to use it, fate intervenes. Momma’s house is condemned and they move. The only house that Momma can afford is located in the heart of the ghetto. T is separated from his friends and his old neighborhood and now he must adapt to the harsh conditions of the inner city without a father. Alphonso and Tony are his role models, but are they really looking out for him? And can they avoid the mysterious stranger in the long, black Cadillac, the man who calls himself Money?
About the Author
Booker T lives in St. Louis, MO, with his wife and two cats. This book is the culmination of five years of blood, sweat and tears and dozens of face-to-face interviews with the characters whose lives and exploits have been fictionalized within these pages. GOTTA BE DOWN is about the choices some men are forced to make to survive and feed their families. But GOTTA BE DOWN is also a love story and an action-adventure. The inspiration to write this book was drawn mostly from the writer's own experiences. The theme of child exploitation throughout the book came straight form America's newspapers. In GOTTA BE DOWN a boy named T is chosen by Booker T to be the metaphor for exploited children. T is raised by a woman the book simply refers to as "Momma." She is the single mother prototype. Most of her time is spent working two and sometimes three jobs. T's role models are neighborhood thugs. In ghettoes across the country most households are headed by unmarried or divorced women. Just like the author, most, if not all, of T's friends are from homes without fathers. The narrative is filtered through the eyes of the kids who live in the pages of this book. Everything's real. The author felt it, and hopefully the reader will feel it too. In essence, GOTTA BE DOWN is about some of the consequences of not having a father figure.