A House Is Not a Home Read online

  Dedication

  To all the Pooquies & Little Bits in the world

  Contents

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Friday, June 6, 2003

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Saturday, June 7, 2003

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Sunday, June 8, 2003

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Monday, June 9, 2003

  Chapter 21

  About the Author

  Also by James Earl Hardy

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Acknowledgments

  Well . . . all jood things must come to an end.

  Hard to believe, but Pooquie, Little Bit, L’il Brotha Man, and all the other characters have been a part of my life for more than a decade. I’ve laughed with them, cried with them, loved with them, and most of all, learned with and from them. I never would’ve chosen this path to take as a writer but I am so glad it chose me. If I didn’t listen to that little voice that rainy night in November 1993, I don’t know where—or who—I’d be today. The novels have taken me places I might’ve never gone; introduced me to people who have become friends of the highest order; forced me to face my fears, my transgressions, myself; and enhanced and enriched my world in ways I am not aware of (and won’t be for years to come). So, while I am sad to see this chapter come to a close, I believe that even with an ending there is a beginning. Who knows what other adventures await on the horizon. This chapter may be over, but it ain’t over yet.

  Special shout-outs to . . .

  God, for the gift of life and the gift of the word. What a blessing and joy it has been to share them both.

  Bam Bam: Goddaddy is so proud of the young man you’ve become and the man you’re becoming.

  Matais Pouncil, a.k.a. Mista Wonderful. Feels like I’ve seen you before, maybe in a past life, you were mine and I was yours. . . .

  Tei Black, a.k.a. Shmookie Pooh. I’ll always be your one and only Baybay Boi. What you do is crazy, baby, not like you belong in an asylum. . . .

  Anthony Antoine, a talented musician, brutha, and friend. Your courage is very necessary in these times. Keep on keepin’ it real for the Children. Live for the dream, follow the dream, beautiful dreamer. . . .

  The fans. I’ll always cherish your testimonials and affirmations, and appreciate your patience (it is indeed a virtue!).

  Luther Vandross who, for nearly a quarter-century, has inspired my work (can’t ya tell?). I look forward to hearing you in concert again, soon. Heaven knows I love you. . . .

  And Pooquie, Little Bit, and Li’l Brotha Man, for inviting me to take this trip with them. It’s been so much fun, a better-than-jood time. This might be our last dance, but it won’t be the last song we enjoy together.

  Friday,

  June 6, 2003

  Chapter 1

  The routine is so familiar that Mitchell doesn’t have to look at the clock to know what time it is.

  At 5:45 A.M., he wakes up when he hears the hall bathroom door close. The toilet flushes at 5:47. The water faucet comes on at 5:48; when it’s shut off, it’s 5:55. Then the door opens and Errol’s footsteps travel pass Mitchell’s bedroom door and upstairs to the fourth floor, where Errol hits the treadmill and works out. When he hears Errol’s footsteps coming back down the stairway, it’s 6:45. Mitchell rises and heads into his own bathroom to wash up as the hall bathroom door closes again. After showering, Errol heads out of the bathroom and continues heading down the hall at 6:57.

  Knock, Knock.

  The voice is a mumble since Errol isn’t within earshot, but Mitchell knows what Errol is saying. . . .

  “Destiny? Time to get up.”

  Errol closes his bedroom door at seven. That’s when Mitchell makes sure Destiny is up.

  It took her a while to get used to rising so early. When the school year began, she’d ignore the wake-up call and turn over. After being forced out of bed by Mitchell, she’d sleepwalk to the bathroom. Sometimes she’d fall asleep while sitting on the toilet, so he’d have to watch her scrub and brush up. But now she needs no prodding or pushing. Just as he opens his own bedroom door and steps outside, she’s marching into the bathroom.

  At 7:01, Mitchell reaches Destiny’s bedroom. He eyes the clothing hung over her rocking chair. She didn’t change the outfit he chose for her the night before (let the weather warm up just a little like it has over the past few days, and she wants to wear a summer dress). He makes her bed. As he reaches Errol’s room, Mitchell hears Errol’s current Great Day ’N’ Da Mornin’ song: “Give It to Me While It’s Hot,” by TLC. Errol chooses a new one every week. The only artist granted more than a five-day run was Aaliyah; after her death in August 2001, she reigned with “More Than a Woman” for the entire month of September.

  Mitchell puts on the coffee at 7:04 and gets The New York Times, which is usually stuck in one of the holes of their front gate. What he fixes for breakfast depends on what day it is. Monday is bacon, scrambled eggs, and cinammon toast. Tuesday is cereal and corn muffins. Wednesday is blueberry pancakes and turkey sausage. Thursday is oatmeal and fruit salad. On this day, Friday, “anything goes.” He surprises them with one of their favorite combos: buttermilk biscuits and cheese omelets.

  By the time the meal is prepared, it’s 7:30. Errol is pouring their chocolate milk as Destiny enters the kitchen. “Jood morning,” she sings.

  “Jood morning,” Mitchell and Errol respond.

  As she’s done so many times before, she proceeds to switch the thirteen-inch color TV that sits on the island from the Today show to Little Bill. She peers at Mitchell. “May I turn the channel?”

  And, as he’s done so many times before, Mitchell answers: “Yes, you may.”

  This is the first weekend of the month, which means Destiny will be visiting her grandparents. Errol, who normally heads up to Harlem to stay with his mother and stepfather, will remain in Brooklyn; he’ll be having a party Saturday night to celebrate his fifteenth birthday.

  “Are you gonna save me a piece of birthday cake?” she asks.

  “Of course,” Errol matter-of-factly declares, pinching her right cheek as he sits next to her.

  She giggles. “Thank you.”

  Mitchell places their plates in front of them. He and Errol turn to Destiny, who takes both of their hands. They all bow their heads.

  “God is great, God is good, thank You for our food, A-men,” she sings.

  “Amen,” Mitchell and Errol reply together.

  As Destiny laughs along with Little Bill, Mitchell and Errol talk about the party.

  “Did you get ahold of that other deejay?” Mitchell asks.

  “Yeah. He’s got another party at midnight but it’s in Crown Heights, so he can do it. He’ll only charge us two hundred dollars.”

  “Jood.”

  Errol glances at the list Mitchell is making. “Oh, don’t forget the blue bulbs.”

  “I won’t. Are Sidney and Monroe coming over after school to help you set up the basement?”

  “Nah, we’ll do it tomorrow.”

  Mitchell pours himself a second cup of coffee. “You all should do it before you go to Monroe’s tonight.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re going to the matinee tom
orrow, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That means you won’t be back here until three.” He examines one of Errol’s twists; they’ve grown several inches over the past year. “It’ll take at least an hour for me to touch up your hair.”

  Destiny pats her own ’do. “Are you gonna touch up mine, too?” She also has twists, which are shoulder-length.

  “No. Yours will hold up for another week.”

  “Okay.”

  Errol takes his last bite. “But there’s not that much work to do. Sweep, set up the chairs, make a space for the deejay.”

  He sighs. “Okay. And what about your room?”

  “What about it?”

  “Knowing you, it’s a mess.”

  Errol shrugs. “It might be, but it’s a manageable one.”

  “Yeah, I know, it may look a mess but you know where everything is.”

  “Right.”

  “At least clear a path so I can see the floor. And make up your bed.”

  Errol nods, turning his attention to The New York Times. Mitchell continues going over the shopping list; he’ll make his first bimonthly trek to the supermarket at 10 A.M.

  At 8:05, Destiny and Errol rise from the table. Errol takes their dishes, rinses them off in the sink, then places them in the dishwasher. She puts on her backpack; he picks up his duffel bag, placing the paper under his left arm.

  “You two have a jood day,” Mitchell advises.

  “We will,” they respond together.

  Destiny picks up the remote and flips from Blues Clues back to the Today show.

  Mitchell smiles. “Thank you, Sugar Plum.”

  “You welcome.”

  He hands Destiny her Little Bill lunch box; today she has a chicken-salad sandwich, sour-cream-and-onion potato chips, homemade lemonade, a banana, and raisins (her favorite food).

  “Thank you,” she says.

  “You’re welcome.” He pinches her nose. “I love you.”

  She pinches his nose. “And I love you, too, times two!” she squeals.

  They hug.

  He turns to Errol. He reaches up to pinch his nose when Errol draws back. Mitchell jabs him in the left arm with his clenched fist instead, handing him his lunch. (Errol has not one, not two, but three chicken-salad sandwiches.)

  Errol takes it. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Bye, Daddy.” Destiny waves, then takes Errol’s right hand as they walk out the front gate.

  Mitchell waves back. “Bye, Sugar Plum.”

  It’s now 8:08. Mitchell watches them walk to the corner, cross the street, and disappear.

  If anyone had told Mitchell that he’d be raising his teenage godson and his own daughter at this point in his life, he would’ve laughed. Not that being a parent wasn’t something he didn’t ponder—or have a little practice at. Errol had been a part of his world four and a half years before Destiny arrived. But there is something about holding and molding your own that’s different. And this wouldn’t be a sometime or half-time (or, as it was with Errol several years ago, a one-weekend-a-month) deal. He now knew what folks meant when they said being a parent is a full-time gig.

  Well, it’s actually an overtime gig.

  There’s always something. A PTA meeting. A class play. A class trip. Karate lessons. A science project. A bake sale. A cold. A nosebleed. A stomachache.

  And all of those things happened last month.

  It’s been a challenge but one he’s been up to and met. He has made his life easier by putting the family on a schedule. Running a household comes down to time: knowing how little you’ve got and doing the most you can with it. He learned very early that the less he’s pressed, the less he’s stressed. Of course, there’s always going to be stress, but you can either let it drive you crazy or you can let it drive you. He’s chosen the latter.

  He’d be lying, though, if he said the load didn’t get heavy. It’s during those times—not to mention when the ordinary that is really so extraordinary happens, such as Destiny counting to ten for the first time and Errol being smitten by the puppy-love bug—that he wishes he wasn’t doing it solo. He has an idea of what his mother experienced when she became a widow.

  It ain’t easy being a divorced father of two.

  It’s been four years since he and Raheim unofficially broke up. It was unofficial because neither one of them said, “It’s over,” or “Get out,” or “I never want to see or speak to you again.” None of those things had to be said. And there weren’t the usual melodramatic overreactions, like placing harassing phone calls, stalking the other at home and work, or pulling a Bernadine (torching the car and clothes, and having an all-his-shit-gotsta-go one-dollar Love’s Hangover sale). They didn’t have to have a mediator or court step in to defuse the situation, separate their property, force the other to pay back money owed, or issue a restraining order to keep the other away. But that didn’t mean their separation was any less trying or taxing.

  Up until that moment, Mitchell’s world had been divided into two chapters: life before Pooquie and life with Pooquie. Life without Pooquie . . . how could he have a life without him? Mitchell knew, though, that it could happen . . . and not just because, statistically speaking, odds were that they wouldn’t last as a couple (it’s hard enough for two heterosexuals to make it work, but two Black same-gender-loving men?). In addition to this pressure, Mitchell feared the more Raheim got drawn into the lights, camera, and action of being a model and actor, the less lights and camera there’d be on and action there’d be in their relationship. And so it came to pass: little by little, Raheim started slipping away. He went from being very attentive to very distant. He said he’d call—and he didn’t. He said he’d be there, wherever there was—and he wasn’t. Even when he was around, he wasn’t there. Mitchell once saw nothing but love in his eyes; now they were vacant and cold. Raheim became a man of very few words, yet there was so much in the words he didn’t say. Raheim was no longer the man he’d fallen in love with; he was a stranger Mitchell sometimes shared a bed with. And Mitchell was no longer the one that Raheim turned to; he was the one Raheim turned away from. Mitchell had been replaced: Raheim was having an “affair” and his heart now belonged to another.

  Mitchell felt helpless and paralyzed, watching what they once shared die a slow and painful death, not being able to do anything to save it. He first blamed himself: Was it something he did? Said? Didn’t say or do? What could he do to make things better? He didn’t know the answers, and Raheim didn’t have any. He had lost faith in Raheim, had lost faith in them. And if he didn’t have faith, how could he continue to give his all when he wasn’t getting that all in return? He wanted to stand by his man, but how could he when his man wouldn’t stand by him? He could no longer invest more than he could afford to lose. It hurt like hell, but he had to force himself to let Raheim go, to let them go. He cried over Raheim, over them, enough. He was all cried out.

  And it just wasn’t about them. Mitchell couldn’t and wouldn’t allow Errol and Destiny to watch their parents go to war or turn them into weapons to fight it. Destiny was barely two when Mitchell and Raheim parted, so she wasn’t aware of the emotional gymnastics being played out. Errol was a different story: He could see and sense the tension between his father and Mitchell, and Mitchell didn’t want him to think that whatever they were struggling with he had to struggle with, too, that it was in any way his fault. His father might have turned his back on Mitchell, but Errol would know that Mitchell wouldn’t turn his back on him. Just because they couldn’t have the family they wanted didn’t mean that they wouldn’t be a family at all. So Mitchell continued to nurture their family—without Raheim.

  Time has healed the hurt, but it hasn’t erased it. It also hasn’t erased the connection Mitchell still has to Raheim—and that connection isn’t simply because of Errol. In spite of the betrayal, his heart still skips a beat, although not as quick. In spite of the heartache, he still has butterflies, though the number has dwindled to about half. And
in spite of the anger, he still has dreams about what their family can be.

  The Emotions once asked: “How can you stop loving the one you do?”

  As Mitchell has learned in the hardest way, you don’t.

  Chapter 2

  This morning, Raheim is attending a “surprise” party—for himself.

  It will be a very informal affair. No streamers or balloons will decorate the space. There will be no deejay, and music won’t be played, so there won’t be any dancing. Bottled water, orange juice, and soft drinks will be served, as well as punch (it won’t be spiked). There will be chips and dip, cookies, maybe even a bowl of fruit (they know how much he loves bananas).

  And he didn’t have to dress in a shirt and tie for the occasion, but he did anyway.

  When he arrives, no one is looking out so that those in attendance can hide, dim the lights, jump out, and yell surprise. He just receives handshakes, hugs, and kisses. And smiles. Miles of smiles. These people. These people from all walks and ways of life, living on the pledge. They’ve become more than friends; family, that’s the right word. He never had a brother or sister, but most fall in those categories. And although his parents are very much alive, another couple assumed the role of father and mother, raising him up when he needed assurance and bawling him out when he needed to check himself.

  No one received a personal invitation, but everyone knew to come. And no one came with boxes or bags, but they all will be giving him a gift. Not the type one gets from a department store, through a catalog, online, or even from one of those vendors hawking their wares on sidewalks throughout the city. It’s something one can’t buy, something priceless.

  After mingling, everyone takes a seat so the fellowship can start. The leader makes a few announcements.

  And then, for what he hopes will be the very last time, Raheim stands up, smiling, and announces, with more conviction and courage than he ever has before: “My name is Raheim, and I’m a compulsive gambler.”

  They all smile back and respond: “Hello, Raheim. Welcome.”