Dreams from My Father - Barack Obama [126]
I caught a flight out the next day—Roy needed to spend some time with his wife, and I didn’t have the money for another night at the hotel. We had breakfast together, and in the morning light he seemed in better spirits. At the airport gate, we shook hands and hugged, and he promised to come visit me once things had settled down. The entire flight back to Chicago, though, and through the rest of the weekend, I couldn’t rid myself of the sense that Roy was in danger somehow, that old demons were driving him toward an abyss, and that if only I was a better brother, my intervention would prevent his fall.
Roy was still on my mind when Johnnie walked into my office late Monday afternoon.
“You’re back early,” Johnnie said. “How was your trip?”
“It was good. Good to see my brother.” I nodded, tapping on the edge of my desk. “So what happened while I was gone?”
Johnnie dropped into a chair. “Well,” he said, “we met with the state senator. He committed to introducing a bill to get funding for a pilot program. Maybe not the whole half million, but enough.”
“That’s terrific. How about the high school principals?”
“Just got back from a meeting with Dr. King, the principal at Asante’s school. The rest of ’em haven’t returned my calls.”
“That’s all right. What did Dr. King have to say?”
“Oh, he was all smiles,” Johnnie said. “Said he really liked the proposal. He got real excited when he heard we might get funding. Said he’d encourage the other principals to work with us and that we’d have his full support. ‘Nothing’s more important than saving our youth,’ he said.”
“Sounds good.”
“Right. Sounds good. So then, I’m about to walk out of his office when suddenly he gives me this.” Johnnie reached into his briefcase, pulled out a piece of paper, and handed it to me. I read over a few lines before handing it back.
“A résumé?”
“Not just any résumé, Barack. His wife’s résumé. Seems she’s kinda bored around the house, see, and Dr. King thinks she’d make an ‘excellent’ director for our program. No pressure, you understand. Just once the money is allocated, some consideration, you know what I mean.”
“He gave you his wife’s résumé—”
“Not just his wife’s résumé.” Johnnie reached into his briefcase and pulled out another piece of paper, waving it in the air. “Got his daughter’s, too! Tells me she’d make an ‘excellent’ counselor—”
“Naw—”
“I’m telling you, Barack, he had the whole thing figured out. And you know what? The whole time we’re talking, he’s not batting an eye. Acting like what he’s doing is the most natural thing in the world. It was unbelievable.” Johnnie shook his head, then suddenly shouted out like a preacher. “Yessuh! Doctah Lonnie King! Now there’s a brother with some nerve! An enterprising brother! Program hasn’t even started yet, he’s already thinking ahead.”
I started to laugh.
“He don’t just want one job! He gotta have two! Go in to talk about some kids, he gonna hand you his whole goddamn family’s résumé….”
I shouted out, catching the spirit. “Doctah Lonnie King!”
“Yessuh! Doctah Lonnie King!” Johnnie started to giggle, which made me laugh even harder, until soon we were doubled over in loud guffaws, catching our breath only long enough to repeat that name again—“Doctah Lonnie King!”—as if it now contained the most obvious truth, the most basic element in an elemental world. We laughed until our faces were hot and our sides hurt, until tears came to our eyes, until we felt emptied out and couldn’t laugh anymore, and decided to take the rest of the afternoon off and go find ourselves a beer.
That night, well past midnight, a car pulls up in front of my apartment building carrying a troop of teenage boys and a set of stereo speakers so loud that the floor of my apartment begins to shake. I’ve learned to ignore such disturbances—where else do they have to go? I say to myself. But on this particular evening I have someone staying over; I know that my neighbors next door have just brought home their newborn child; and so I pull on some shorts and head downstairs