She looked to her left, where one of her friends, also drunk, was looking back and forth between the binder of songs and the sign-up sheet, pen scribbling.
I snuck a peek at Lucius. He was still in his seat, holding up a cognac glass so it glowed in the Christmas lights around the bar mirror. What was blacker? To do the bidding of these women and sing some rap songs, or to tell them to go to hell?
I broke for her friend. “Oh no, I just got done—”
The first woman grabbed my arm. “You know ‘Baby Got Back,’ right? That’s our song, and you’re gonna do it.”
The friend finished signing me up, pushed the clipboard away, and said, “My friend thinks you look like that rapper from the movie.”
I pictured a gangsta rapper in a ’90s hood flick. She waved her flattened hand a few inches above her center part. “The guy with the big hair. Dance Party or something. It’s always on cable.”
“Right,” I said. “Good movie.”
It was weird to be a black dude who’d just been told by the only other black dude at the bar that he wasn’t black anymore, and to be getting signed up for the only rap song that all white people know, by this woman who kept calling me “brother.” I assumed she could tell I was black, and I was proud. My blacking up was succeeding.
The whiskey warmed my ears and upped my confidence. I’d sung a song and not been beaten up. Most weekends, I wanted to make some drunk woman happy. Why not now?
I said, “Fine. But you gotta buy me a drink.”
Round Two:
The KJ handed me the mic, mid eyeroll. The Valley Girl spoken intro, “Oh. My. God. Becky. Look at her butt,” began. I stood there like a dick, then jumped a mile when hands snaked up from behind and clamped my chest. I wheeled around, arm cocked to thump someone with the microphone and what did I see? The drunk blonde, pulling her head back to avoid the mic, hands still on my chest, “It’s OK, brother. I’m just gonna grind on you while you rap,” like it was business as usual.
Have you ever been scared and horny at the same time? It takes you back to seventh grade real fast. I imagined the same overalls-wearing phantom hick slamming the tavern door open after railing some crank in the parking lot. As his tweaked-out eyes adjusted to the dim bar, he’d see his wife’s empty chair. Then his ears would pick up some horrendous jungle music and, with disgust, he’d look for the ape that’s singing it . . . only to find his wife up there doing that sexy dance they saw on MTV.
The bass line started vamping under the intro. There was rhythmic clapping from the bar, probably my bandmates. Time was running out. I told her, “I don’t think your husband would like this,” hoping that the answer would be, “I’m not married,” followed by a flirty squeeze on the chest.
Instead, she said, “Oh, he’s not here tonight.”
At least I got the chest squeeze.
The song kicked in and so did I. Like anyone who listened to the radio in the early ’90s, I knew the words to this PG-rated ode to big asses. Her crotch and butt bumped my ass and thighs, always off-beat, getting surprisingly close to the backs of my knees. During the breaks, I’d turn to see the blonde gyrating, but I didn’t dance with her. Where was her husband? Were his friends here?
The song ended to applause and she disappeared. I turned to head back to the bar. Lucius flicked an “I’m watching you” eyebrow. My path was blocked by two middle-aged parrotheads who had slid their chairs back and sat smiling, showing teeth. On the round table between them was a phalanx of empty highball glasses.
The man, heavy, with a mullet and Hawaiian shirt, said, “That was cool, man.”
The woman just smiled in her lacy black blouse. I shook the man’s hand. His palms were soft, the chunk between thumb and forefinger, meaty.
“We wanna get you a drink,” he said.
“Uh, OK.”
We started chatting and I told them I was down from Richmond.
“Where are you sleeping tonight?” he asked.
Backyard full of crackers, the n-word floating in an aboveground pool, Tim complaining about his girlfriend in a way that made it clear we couldn’t stay with them . . .
“Ya know, I dunno,” I said.
I was drunk enough to not care if I sounded black, and heard a voice hoarse from singing and liquor.
The wife was still smiling, eyes sinking from my face as she said, “Why don’t you stay with us? We have a hot tub and more cocktails.”
The man smiled slowly as his wife’s eyes stopped at my crotch. The seventh-grade feeling washed over me again. I downed my drink, then was saved by the blonde, who informed me it was time to sing “The Humpty Dance.”
I let her pull me by the wrist. Third time could be the charm and I could get my card back. Mason cut us off at the pass and said, “Hey, it’s time to go. We’re just gonna head back to Richmond.”
Lucius was gone from his stool, his bell-shaped cognac glass empty next to a couple of heavy-bottomed beer glasses. I followed.
The blonde said, “Hey.”
I said, “Bye,” and saluted.
Outside, the song’s sliding bass line rumbled through the walls. No one was rapping. I crawled over Lucius and back into the loft, stealing a glance at the country road between his cornrows as the van rolled out onto smooth pavement.
“You’re telling me ‘Baby Got Back’ isn’t about buttfucking?” Russell teased from the front seat.
“Shut up,” I grumbled into the carpet that Mason had stapled to the top of the loft, then pulled my phone out of my backpack and looked at it for the first time in hours.
Mona 9:46 pm
You’re welcome. Don’t trash any hotel rooms
hahaha
I couldn’t think of a clever or honest answer to that, and fell asleep with my mind in the huge gap between what people think touring is like, and the reality.
I woke up two hours later, dry-mouthed and stale, feeling the van slowing as we exited the highway. Russell was rapping along with the radio, “Every day I pray I don’t pull the trigger. Are you trying to die?” And Mason joined him to boom, “Uh-uh! No, nigga!” as he hit the brake one last time to stop.
I flashed mad. My head thunked the roof as I popped up and shouted, “Really?”
The engine died and my voice echoed through the van. They sat still in their seats.
“Haven’t we heard that word enough?” I asked.
“I thought you liked rap,” said Mason.
“Oh, I do,” I said. “And I see that you do, too.” White guys love rap because they can sing along and have an excuse to say the n-word. “But I don’t like hearing that word out of white people’s mouths,” I said extra loud as Lucius stirred awake in the seat below me. “You don’t get to say it.”
In the past, I’d talked to them about being black, but had never drawn a line and said something serious about white people, because I was scared someone would say what Russell said right then, “But you’re half white, dude.”
I pushed on, fast. “You ever hear me saying ‘nigger’?” I asked, hands curling over the edge of the loft. The word has never sounded right coming out of my mouth. This time it squeaked. No one answered, and my disappointment with Russell caught up.
Mason