“Well, then. I guess I should give you this.” Memphis took the folded paper from his pocket and laid it on the table beside Theta’s glass.
“What’s this?”
“Anniversary present,” Memphis said. “Been working on it for a week now.”
Theta toyed with the edge of the paper. “Should I read it now or later?”
Memphis shrugged. “Whatever suits you.”
Fresh heat licked up Theta’s fingers. Her heart beat wildly. “I… I think I’m gonna save it for later, like a present,” Theta said, slipping the note under her beaded handbag. She felt like crying, but she was afraid that if she did, her hands would really start acting up again. So she kept her eyes trained on the people dancing until they were a pretty blur of color.
Memphis tugged at his collar. His special anniversary date seemed to be going off the rails, fast. He watched as a group of white fellas escorted their dates to the floor, laughing and carefree. Every night, they came up by the carload to catch the action, then took it back with them downtown, where it was reborn in Broadway shows, swank clubs, and hotels that catered to whites only. It burned Memphis up that they could come here to his neighborhood, to his clubs with their dates, and it was no trouble at all. They expected to be able to do it, no questions asked. But Memphis had to be careful with his own girl in his own home.
Under the table, out of sight, Memphis laced his fingers with Theta’s, enjoying the silky softness of her glove. Just to stroke her palm was a thrill. A couple of tables away, a group of Harlem high-hats stared with disapproval. Well, damn them. Damn the white fellas making the rules and the good people of Harlem for playing by them.
Memphis grasped Theta’s fingers more solidly. Theta gasped.
“Trust me,” Memphis said, and he brought their clasped knot of fingers out of hiding, resting them on the smooth sea of tablecloth. He stared back at his own people a few tables over, challenging them. Finally, they looked away, and Memphis enjoyed the thrill of winning: Don’t tell me how to live. The orchestra launched into another dance number. More dancers swarmed toward the already crowded floor. A white couple passed by, their hands joined like Theta’s and Memphis’s. The girl, a blond in a sparkling rhinestone headband, looked from Theta to Memphis and back again. The girl might’ve taken a lot of care to dress the part of a sophisticate, but her expression was the truest thing she wore, and it was one of naked contempt. She paused for just a second to let her judgment settle on them.
Theta stared back. She didn’t look happy. Memphis held Theta’s hand firmly, letting her know that everything was jake. He was with her. Her hand was warm in his, very warm, and suddenly, Theta’s expression changed from challenge to fear. Rabbit-quick, she yanked her hand away. The blond’s smile was smug as she and her fella ran to join the happy dancers. Memphis felt it all like a stab to his gut.
Theta jumped up quickly, bracing herself on the table and nearly knocking over her drink as she did. She grabbed her purse. “I’m sorry. I’m not feeling so good, Poet. I-I gotta go home,” she said and ran from the club.
“Theta! Theta!” Memphis shouted. He started after her but was stopped by the waiter.
“Your bill, sir.”
“I’ll be right back, I swear!”
“I’ve heard that one before,” the waiter said, unmoved, and Memphis felt doubly humiliated by Theta’s abrupt departure and this man’s suspicion. Nobody was stopping white patrons at the door. Everybody was watching as Memphis reached into his wallet and dropped some bills on the silver tray.
“Happy?” he said.
The special night hung in tatters. To top things off, Theta had left the poem he’d worked so hard on. Angrily, Memphis grabbed the paper and stalked away, never noticing the faint outline of two singed handprints on the edge of the white tablecloth.
Harlem streets that had been bathed in neon hope taunted Memphis as he walked toward home. A cluster of young, drunk downtowners pushed out of the whites-only Cotton Club and stumbled down Lenox Avenue singing “Everything Is Hotsy Totsy Now” at the top of their lungs. They took up most of the sidewalk, and Memphis wanted to knock into them, pushing them into the street. Instead, he shoved his hands deep into the pockets of the suit he wore, his fingers still clutching the crumpled poem.
“Hey, Romeo! What happened to your big date?” Clarence called, laughing, from the front door of the Hotsy Totsy as Memphis passed by. “Aw, now, don’t worry none, Memphis. Plenty of girls inside.”
Not the one I’m in love with, Memphis thought. At the edge of the neighborhood, on a derelict street far from the excitement of Lenox Avenue, a man sprawled across a sidewalk, reeking of liquor. Memphis recognized him as one of the local drunks—Noble Bishop. He didn’t have a coat. A man could freeze to death out here.
Memphis shifted from foot to foot. “Hey. Hey there, Mr. Bishop. You all right?”
The drunkard swore at him.
Fine. Lie there, Memphis thought. He knew what Octavia would say: “You can’t help a person who doesn’t want to be helped.”
But the man was a wreck. His shirt was ripped, and there was a nasty wound on his arm that looked bad. Memphis stood in the cold, torn.
“Looks like you could use a doctor,” Memphis tried.
Noble Bishop gaped up with red eyes and an expression devoid of hope. His voice wasn’t much more than a frayed thread of sound. “Why? He gonna make me free?” And then he laid his head down on the cold sidewalk and cried.
Memphis was no doctor and he was no saint. He couldn’t make either of them free. But he might be able to do something about Noble’s festering cut if he was brave enough to try. Or would he fail at that, too?
“Mr. Bishop, I better take a look at that cut on your arm,” Memphis said, drawing closer. His heart thumped in his chest. The whole night was a disaster, and here he was flirting with the possibility of even more trouble.
The drunk kicked at him halfheartedly. “Don’t need no help from you! Git!”