Читать книгу Magic City Gospel - Ashley M. Jones - Страница 7

SAM COOKE SINGS TO ME WHEN I AM AFRAID

Sam Cooke plays on the cassette deck in our Nissan Sentra. I am strapped like a parachuter in my booster seat. It is Saturday night. We are travelling from grandma’s house in Bessemer, having waited until the night’s third episode of “Walker, Texas Ranger” to leave for home. I am scared because I am not touching my mother. Sam Cooke is crooning about a party or a lost love or a change coming, and I’m afraid to die. Tonight, Alabama doesn’t feel like home—it is too dark to see and the alleys beckon our little car to them. Dad knows all the shortcuts because he’s a fireman, and I wish so hard for the interstate with lights and its fast, homeward promise. I wish for our little home and all my toys, even the ones that scare me at night. I wish for morning, when I will eat collard greens and cornbread with Mom. I wish for playtime with Monique and our blue couch that is a jungle, that is Pride Rock, that is a spaceship. Sam Cooke is painfully singing. He’s screaming. I can barely breathe behind all these straps—I am straightjacketed and trying to understand the hurt in Sam Cooke’s voice, and why does grandma never get up from her easy chair? Why does she look out at us like we are this night—like we are something she will never quite touch? Even when she laughs, why does she still look sad? Why have we not made it home yet? If I close my eyes and reach for sleep, can I make us teleport home? Sam Cooke, give me the answers instead of your steely wail.