Birth of a Dark Nation (4 page)

I knew my mom wanted more for me, but as long
as I stayed out of trouble, there wasn't much she could do to make
me want more for myself than I already had.

At least I had a job and a handsome guy to
look forward to seeing a few days out of the week, even if it was
just a wave in the air across Rhode Island Avenue.

I didn't know him. I didn't even have his
phone number. But it was nice to meet somebody new.

As I sat down for our semi-regular staff
meeting, I positioned myself at the far end of the room so I could
see out the window.

"New seat?" Steve asked. I smirked. He looked
out the window and saw that Dante was on his regular spot directly
across the street.

"Lawd," he said. I shrugged. Ernie, our
bumbling executive director, sat down and began the meeting.

Magdalene House was the kind of organization
that attracted two types of employees. First, you had the ones who
were claimed to be passionate about the cause itself-women living
with HIV. My boss Ernie fit in that category, as did the majority
of case managers. While their passion was admirable, it didn't
always translate into best practices. I learned that one couldn't
govern or manage a nonprofit based on emotion. It takes a delicate
balance of knowledge, skills, policy, and good, sound business
practices. They were hired based on passion years ago. Now? They
were just taking up space.

Magdalene House was known for none of that.
That made it challenging for the second, business-savvy group of
people, employees like Steve, Cissy, and me to excel in our fields.
Although Steve was a case manager and did have a passion for
helping people, he held a master's degree in social work and often
had a hard time understanding why our data collection and case
management practices were so archaic. It was almost criminal how
poorly records were kept. And that affected Cissy's job in
development, too. Whenever a grant proposal had to be written which
specifically asked for hard numbers, she had no choice but to guess
the figures.

So the day-to-day work got done because of a
love for the clients and their plight, but important work like
grant proposals, operations, and leadership got short shrift
because, really, nobody was in charge. Nobody worth a damn.

Ernie had been executive director for years,
hired by friends on the board of directors who just needed somebody
to keep the organization running day-to-day. By the time I got
there, Magdalene House was already in the middle of a very slow
decline.

Steve was the first to notice. Even though
the formal records were spotty, he saw that the caseloads for all
the case managers were slowly dropping off. The clients weren't
dying. They were just finding other places to receive housing and
the other services we provided. Younger, shinier nonprofits were
opening up their doors across town, and even though they did the
same things we did, the clients were wooed away by the newness and
the incentives of the other organizations. I couldn't be mad at
them, either. With the private foundation money the new
organizations were receiving, they were able to give their clients
cool things for loyalty, like an Amazon gift card for six months of
keeping appointments. Steve tried to introduce a similar incentive
program, but Ernie wasn't having it. Magdalene couldn't afford
that, he said.

Cissy then began to see that Ernie wasn't
giving her as much to do, and that he hired contractors to handle
the government grants. It was obvious to everyone that Ernie was
giving his own cronies work to do while slowly, but surely, taking
away Cissy's responsibilities. She was basically relegated to
writing appeal letters and trying to plan special events.

Finally, I realized that all the external
projects that I used to assist on had been cut. No more volunteer
recruitment, no more supervising interns. Just running virus scans,
downloading software, and ordering new equipment. The salary was
adequate, but it was clear that Ernie was controlling us by taking
away responsibilities.

"I've got some bad news," Ernie began at our
regular staff meeting. "We were denied funding for capital
improvements on the house. We've got to wait another year before we
can improve the HVAC system."

The room grumbled.

"I know, I know… It's tough."

He always said, "It's tough," as though that
were an actual answer to any questions we had.

"But we've got to keep moving forward as a
team."

"I have a question…" I began. "It seems like
we haven't been winning these major grants lately. Is there
anything we can do to fortify this process? You know…as a
team?"

"Not really," Ernie responded. "It's totally
a political process. They already know who they want to give the
grants to from the outset. We just have to keep trying."

Cissy tried her hardest not to roll her eyes
at Ernie. We knew he was feeding us bullshit.

The meeting continued much like a Charlie
Brown special, with echoes of French horns standing in for the
voices of my coworkers. The program staff was ignorant to the major
issues. Except for Steve, they wasted time in meetings telling
stories about clients rather than focusing on the hard data and
contributing ideas toward a long-range plan. Luckily, it was Friday
again, and I'd be home soon enough.

Around 4:30 p.m., Ernie had left for the day,
and the rest of my coworkers slowly tiptoed out. Before I knew it,
I was in the building alone. I turned out the light in the attic
and walked down the steep stairs to the second floor. I went to
each small room, closed the blinds, and turned the lights out. As I
did the same for Ernie's office, I mused that his desk was too
junky to ever find anything incriminating on it.

I locked the door to the second floor and
continued down to the main level. Somebody-probably Steve-had
already locked the big brown door to the reception area, leaving me
to just turn on the security system and lock the front door of the
building as I left.

As I did that, I felt a light tap against my
back, then a second. I turned around and saw Dante down the
sidewalk, lightly throwing small pebbles at me. One hit me in the
chest.

"Nigga, what are you doing?" I asked,
brushing away the dust that the pebble had left on my red polo
shirt.

"Nothin', man. Just messin' with you."

"Don't you have some movies to sell?" I asked
him as I walked off our porch and onto the sidewalk.

"Always man," he said, giving me dap. "But I
just wanted to come by and see the homie. See what's good with
you."

"I'm okay. Ready to get out of here." I
started walking in the direction of my car.

"You got some place to be?" he asked me.

"Just home. Gonna order some food and chill
out."

"It's just you? No kids?"

"Nigga, you know I'm gay."

"Yeah, I know. That don't mean you ain't got
a family."

"Well, I don't. It's just me."

"Oh, okay," he said. He stopped walking. I
paused along with him.

"What's up?" I asked.

"If all you gonna do is go home…I mean…you
ain't gotta go home to kick it."

"Where else I'ma go?"

"You wanna come to my crib?"

"Your place? I don't know about that,
man."

"Come on, I'm just across the street and up
the block."

"I don't know, Dante. Like tonight? Like
right now?"

"Yeah, right now. Come on." He started
walking back up the street.

I followed him and stopped at the corner.

"Dante, maybe we can hang out another day.
I'm really tired and—"

"Will you stop trippin' and come on across
the street? All we're going to do is order some food and kick it.
You act like I'ma rape and murder you or something. Shit, I'm
hungry too, nigga. Damn."

"Well…okay," I said. Spending an hour or two
at his place wouldn't be the worst way to spend my Friday evening.
And I'd only be a block from my car if I needed to make a quick
getaway. Not that I would need to.

I caught up to him at the corner across the
street. As we walked up Thayer Street, we passed a few kids
skateboarding down the street. Where I grew up, skateboarding was
for angry white kids. On the avenue, it was just another way for
black boys to get around.

The houses on Thayer Street were all designed
slightly differently. Though most were square and compact with
small front yards, some had vinyl siding and others had brick
facades. While some had fully enclosed porches that were filled to
the brim with junk, others had no porch to speak of.

Dante's house was near the corner. There was
no actual house on the corner-it was a vacant lot. Because I could
see the front and the side of Dante's house, I could tell that it
was much larger than I originally thought it would be. It was three
stories tall, like the Magdalene office. I assumed that the third
floor must have been a full attic like ours was.

"This is the crib," Dante said.

"All this is yours?" I asked.

"Yup," he replied. "Used to belong to my
cousin."

"I see y'all are keeping it in the family."
He opened the door and let me in.

The house was simply decorated on the inside,
with a brass wall clock and matching sconces on either side
adorning the far wall where the sofa sat. The carpet was thick
beneath my feet. The place itself smelled…old. Not bad. Just
old.

"Have a seat," he said. I thanked him and sat
on the sofa, picking up the remote control from a small coffee
table and turning on the television. I turned it to the channel
nine news.

"Make yourself at home," he quipped.

"Thanks," I replied sarcastically. "I just
don't like to miss the news."

As he disappeared into the kitchen, I could
hear him opening up the refrigerator. Annette Mitchell was on
television reporting on some sort of scandal in city hall, as if
that was anything new in DC.

"I don't watch a lot of TV," he said,
emerging with two cans of Diet Pepsi.

"Word? I love it. I like being entertained.
Music, sports, movies, all that."

"That's what's up," he said, passing me a
drink.

"Thank you," I said, popping open the can.
"So what do you like to do?"

"I dunno, just chill I guess." He sat on the
opposite end of the couch from me.

"What's a day in your life like?"

"Why you got so many questions?"

I laughed.

"You do realize we just met last week, and
the extent of our relationship is me buying your bootlegs?"

"Why you act so saditty, yo?"

"Saditty? Are you kidding me? I'm just trying
to get to know you better, dawg. You seem like a cool dude, but I'm
starting to rethink that."

Now he laughed.

"You feisty."

"Damn right I am." I sipped my Diet Pepsi. He
chugged his and burped.

"'Scuse me," he said.

I burped in response. Loudly.

"Nigga, you nasty!"

"Whatever. I already farted on your
couch."

He laughed hard. I smirked.

"Aight nigga, I'm no good at this, but here
goes," he began. "I live a real simple life. This my family house.
We had it a long time. Right now, it's just me living here. I ain't
go to college or nothin' like that. And yeah, I be sellin' movies
and shit to pay bills. I'm good at it. But I'm good at whatever I
feel like doin'. I don't want you to think I'm just some scrub, you
know?"

"I don't think that," I said.

"Yeah, you do. Look at your body
language."

I looked down at myself and saw what he
meant: my arms were folded and my legs were turned away from him. I
looked like I didn't want to be there.

"You're observant," I said sheepishly. I
uncrossed my arms and faced him more.

"Yeah, I notice shit," he said. "So how long
you been at Magdalene?"

"About four years. The money is okay, but the
work sucks. I sit in front of a computer all day."

"I see. So you sit in front of a computer all
day then come home and sit in front of a TV all night."

"I mean, you make it sound like a bad thing,"
I smiled.

"It's whatever. I just like taking walks
sometimes. You know, be out in the air and shit."

"That's cool," I said. I sipped some more
Pepsi until it was gone.

"That don't sound like your kind of
thing."

"It's cool. Dante, I gotta be honest with
you."

"What's up?"

"I don't know what I'm doing here. I don't
know what you're into. I ain't been on no date in years. I'm
just-"

"Whoa, dude… Slow down. You getting all hype
for nothing. I just want to spend some time with you, yo."

"Why?"

"Because you fine as shit, nigga damn. And
you seem jive smart. And on the real? Ain't no nigga ever step to
me so bold like you did. I mean shit, what gay niggas you know
gonna cop some straight porn? If you don't think that's hot, then
you need to get it together."

"You think it's hot that I like straight
porn?"

"Hell yeah. You know what that says to me?
That you don't have no boundaries like a lot of these niggas out
here. You down for whatever."

"Nobody's ever accused me of that before," I
laughed.

"First time for everything, right? Now just
relax. We gone order some food, watch some TV like you like, and
get to know each other and shit. You say this new for you, well
it's new for me too. A nigga wanna get shit right the first time,
ya dig?"

I nodded. And blushed a little bit. This dude
was different. I liked it.

We ordered some General Tso's chicken and
vegetable fried rice and watched the rest of the news with a few
awkward interruptions for "getting to know you" types of questions.
By the time the food arrived, the ice had finally been broken, and
I felt free to delve a little deeper.

"So, you ever get worried about getting in
trouble for selling your movies?" I asked. I savored each bite of
the spicy chicken dish.