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Vance

Basketball
camp turned out to be more than I'd bargained for, with its early morning gatherings and exercise that had my body sore in places that I didn't know could ache. High school practices had nothing on this. This was boot camp—with a vengeance. Waking up at four o'clock in the morning during the summer and spending the entire day on the court—that was my day in a nutshell.

The shriek of Coach Lang's whistle sent us sprinting back and forth across the court; our last set of exercises before the day ended, and I was grateful. I could almost taste that Riptide Rush-flavored Gatorade that was waiting for me on the bench next to Jaylen. He was already turning up his own bottle as he waited for me to get done with practice.

After practice, I headed for the locker room, packed my gym bag and headed for the gym again.

“You owe me for this, son. Gatorade ain't cheap,” Jaylen said, handing me a towel and my bottle when we were done as we strolled out of the gym.

“Gas ain't cheap either, but I don't see you handing me
any gas money every time you hop into my car,” I said and stole a glance at two beautiful girls as they strolled down the sidewalk of our campus.

“Come on, V man. You know I'm just messing with you.”

“Yeah, whatever,” I said and wiped sweat from my forehead. “Let's grab something to eat. I'm starved.”

One of the girls looked my way and smiled. I smiled back as they approached.

“Hey,” the caramel-colored girl with long silky hair said. “You Vance Armstrong?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“I'm Shay,” she said. “I heard you're pretty good on the court.”

“I can do a little something-something,” I boasted, and rubbed the whiskers underneath my chin.

Shay smiled and then introduced her chocolate-colored friend. “This is Kim.”

“How you doing, Kim?” I asked. “This is my boy, Jaylen.”

“Are y'all going to the frat party on Friday night?” Kim asked.

I'd heard the buzz about the frat party that everybody who was anybody was attending.

“Of course,” I stated matter-of-factly.

“Will you be there?” Jaylen asked Kim.

“I might,” Kim said, “but I don't hang out with fresh meat.”

“Kim!” Shay exclaimed. “Be nice.”

“What?” Kim laughed and then ran her finger behind Jaylen's ear. “Look…he's still wet behind the ears.”

“Oh, you got jokes.” Jaylen was embarrassed and I was embarrassed for him.

“I'm just messing with you, sweetie.” Kim smiled and grabbed Jaylen's chin. “You be a good boy and Kim might show you around a little bit. Okay?”

Jaylen grinned. He was like a little kid at that moment. “Okay,” he said.

Jaylen had been punked and now he was acting like one. I wasn't about to give them the satisfaction of making me feel like less of a man.

“I hope to see you there, Vance,” Shay cooed, one little cute dimple on the side of her cheek.

“Yeah, I might show up…depending on my schedule,” I said, not wanting her to think I was still wet behind my ears, too. I wasn't going out like my man, Jay.

“I'll look for you.” Shay's fingertip caressed my face.

I tried not to stare at her ample round behind and she walked away, but I couldn't help sneaking a peek. She was cute but I didn't need any distractions. I had a girl at home who was depending on me to do the right thing. And that's what I intended on doing. I was here to get an education and to play ball.

“She like me,” Jaylen said. “She just playing a little hard to get. But I'ma break her down.”

“Dude, that girl is not interested in you…not even a little bit.”

“Pil-lease! That girl want me so bad,” Jaylen announced. “She gon' be mine before the end of the summer. You watch.”

Jaylen and I strolled over to the McCall dining hall for a bite to eat. Loud conversations filled the room as we walked in, grabbed a tray and went through the food line. We approached a table in the center of the cafeteria.

“Anybody sittin' here?” I asked the tall brother from the basketball team. We hadn't met yet. There were so many teammates that I didn't know, and all of them were from other parts of the country.

“Nah, man. Have a seat,” he said. “I'm Chauncey.”

“Vance,” I said and grabbed his hand in a firm handshake. “This is my boy, Jaylen.”

“You looked pretty good out there on the court today in practice. Where you from, bro?” Chauncey asked.

“Atlanta.”

“What brought you to this little country town, man? There are so many good schools in Atlanta.”

“Just always wanted to go here. Seemed like a good place to be,” I explained.

I wasn't sure when my infatuation with Grambling started, but I knew that I wanted to be at a historically black college, where I could meet some interesting people, get a good education and play some ball.

“I thought about Georgia State myself,” Chauncey said. “I hope you brought plenty of mosquitoes repellant. A city boy like yourself won't make it down here in these backwoods.”

“Not for long,” said another brother from the team as he walked up. He slapped hands with Chauncey. “Where is this city boy from?”

“From the A-T-L,” Chauncey announced as if I wasn't sitting there.

“What's he doing down in the country?”

“I don't know, man.” Chauncey laughed. “This here's Vance and Jaylen.”

“I'm Harlen.” Jaylen and I both shook Harlen's hand.

“What fraternity you looking at?” Chauncey asked.

The truth was I hadn't even given it a thought. I didn't know much about fraternities except that they threw good parties. And sometimes they did stuff for the community. I'd also heard about some of the things that people did to join a fraternity—crazy things. The thought of joining a fraternity had never interested me—hadn't even crossed my mind before.

“Um…I hadn't really thought about it,” I admitted.

“We're Alphas,” Chauncey said, his chest all stuck out. “Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity.”

“I pledged freshman year,” Harlen announced.

“When you consider Greek life here on campus, make sure you consider us first,” Chauncey said. “An organization of true brotherhood. Alpha Phi Alpha set the standard for other black fraternities…been around for over a hundred years.”

“Founded by a group of brothers from Cornell University.” Harlen gave us a history lesson. “Dr. Martin Luther King…you know who he was, right?”

Of course we knew Dr. King…was he kidding? What black person on the face of the earth didn't know who Dr. King was? Not to mention, we'd just driven five hundred miles from Atlanta, Georgia, Dr. King's hometown.

“Of course we know who Dr. King was,” I said.

“Dr. King was an Alpha,” Harlen stated.

“Thurgood Marshall, too,” Chauncey added, “and Keenan Ivory Wayans. I know you know him.”

“Yeah, I know him,” Jaylen said.

“But what do we care?” I asked. “We're just here to play ball, get a good education and party a little bit.”

“But what about your future?” Harlen asked. “What about building strong relationships with men who can help you become leaders? Relationships that last a lifetime? Nothing better than that.”

“Okay, say we were interested in something like that…what do we have to do?”

“Well, you can't join until you've completed at least one semester of school,” Chauncey said.

“And there's a minor initiation period,” Harlen added.

“Aw, here we go,” Jaylen said.

“What about hazing?” I asked. I'd heard about some members of Greek organizations who had been arrested for taking the initiation process too far.

“Hazing is against the law and something that Alphas have
taken a strong stand against. I promise you will not have to participate in anything life threatening,” said Chauncey.

“Give it some thought.” Harlen stood, grabbed his tray. “Come and see us when you're potty trained.”

Laughter echoed across the cafeteria. Chauncey stood and the two of them headed for the door. Jaylen and I looked at each other and shrugged. We had a lot to learn about campus life.

Marcus

By
the time I stepped into my physics class, the professor was already lecturing. Embarrassed, I slid into a seat near the back of the room, gently placed my backpack on the floor, loosened its Velcro and pulled my book out. No one seemed to care that I was late, or that I'd gotten lost and ended up outside of Widener Library instead of the building where my class was. They didn't know that I'd just sprinted across campus, dropped my backpack twice and lost a flip-flop before finally stepping into the air-conditioned building. No one looked my way or even asked “are you lost?” And once inside the classroom, only a few eyes watched as I scanned the room for an empty seat. The professor never once stopped talking and wasn't the least bit distracted when I walked in. In high school, the teacher would've stopped in the middle of the lecture and asked me a million questions about why I was late.

“He's on page ninety-six,” whispered a cappuccino-colored girl with long silky hair as I slid into the seat next to her. Her smile seemed to make her entire face glow. With teeth that were perfect and white, she was the most beautiful thing I'd seen since I'd left Indigo Summer at the curb at
Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in Atlanta. Besides the African boy at the front of the class and me, she was the only other person of color in the entire room.

“Thanks,” I whispered back, and turned to page ninety-six in my textbook.

I opened my spiral notebook to a blank page in order to take notes, and by the time class was over, two pages were completely filled. I'd never taken so many notes. I thought he'd never stop lecturing as I closed my book and stuffed it back into my backpack. The cappuccino-colored girl stood. She wore a denim jacket and khaki shorts against her long shiny brown legs.

As she gathered her books, her light brown eyes looked my way. “You a freshman?”

I wasn't sure how to answer. I wasn't quite a freshman, since I was still technically in high school. But I didn't necessarily want her to know that I was just there for the summer program and that I'd be headed back to my College Park high school in a few weeks; back to being a teenager with a curfew and a part-time job at Wendy's. It would be so much more interesting to make her believe that I was a big-time college student with a college course syllabus stuffed into my backpack and a major that I was actually trying to achieve. I was a Harvard man, after all.

“Something like that,” I answered, and then quickly changed the subject. “I'm Marcus.”

“Daria,” she said and held her hand out to me. I took her small palm into my hand and shook it. “I thought maybe you were here for the summer program.”

Busted. Did I have High School Kid plastered across my forehead, or did I look as if I had milk in the corners of my mouth? I guess I didn't fit the profile of the average Harvard student; maybe I didn't have the bags under my eyes from
staying up all night studying or I wasn't as refined as some of the college men that she knew. After all, I was from urban Atlanta—right off of Old National Highway, a major road that ran right through the hood. What was a boy from College Park, Georgia, doing on the campus of an Ivy League school right in the middle of Cambridge, Massachusetts?

“I am here for the summer program,” I admitted—
reluctantly
. “I'm from College Park, Georgia. What about you?”

“I'm from Riverdale, Georgia.” She smiled. “Small world, huh?”

“No doubt.” I couldn't help but grin at the fact that Daria was a Georgia peach.

“What time is your next class?” she asked.

“I'm done for the day,” I said.

“Me, too. Come on. Let's go grab a bite to eat, Marcus.”

“Cool,” I said and then swung my backpack on to my shoulder.

Daria and I stepped outside into the afternoon sunshine. Before I knew it we were headed for the “T,” Boston's subway station. I dug into my pockets to make sure I had change for the “T,” and also enough for a burger or whatever we decided to grab to eat. Pulling two dollars out of my pocket, I stepped in front of the machine in order to buy a CharlieTicket.

I plopped down into an available seat and Daria slid in next to me. It was then that I noticed the smell of her cologne—enticing. I took a glance at her long slender legs; didn't want her to catch me taking a peek so I quickly looked away, but the memory of them stayed stuck in my mind. They were silky smooth. She had a nice set of toes, too—not crusty or funny shaped. I adjusted in my seat, peered out the window as the train came to a halt at Central Square Station.

“This is us,” Daria announced and stood.

I stood, too, and then we squeezed through the crowd and onto the platform. I followed her up a flight of stairs and onto the sidewalk. As we stepped into the coffeehouse, the aroma of coffee and pastries hit my nose immediately. Several people lounged in furniture around the room. Students studied for tests or simply read novels in the corners of the room. A few people punched the keys on their laptop computers. One guy, dressed in an old T-shirt and cut-off khaki shorts, sent a text message from his iPhone. Conversations were low as light jazz played. Daria stepped up to the counter as a cheerful girl greeted her with a smile.

“What can I get for you?”

“I'll have the iced latte,” Daria said, “and a banana muffin.”

“And you, sir?” The girl behind the counter turned to me.

“Um, I'll just have a Coke.”

“We don't sell Coke.” She gave me a smile; one that said she understood that I was a fish out of water.

Coffeehouses weren't my thing. At home, I hung out at the mall or at the gym at school after practice. My friends and I might end up at McDonald's or Burger King after a game, but never a coffeehouse. The only other time I'd stepped foot into a place like this was the time Pop wanted to see what all the hype of Starbucks was about. He'd dragged me along as he ordered a cappuccino and then complained about how much it costs.

“Hmm,” I said, scanning the menu. “I'll just have what she's having.”

“So, two iced lattes?” she asked, just to be sure.

“Yeah,” I answered, “and that muffin thing, too.”

“So two iced lattes and two banana muffins?”

“Yes,” Daria said to the girl, and then turned to me. “You don't drink coffee much, huh?”

“Nah. Not that much.”

“Marcus, you should get out more.” Daria laughed. “This is where most of the kids hang out. People mostly come here to study or to just unwind after class. You'll find yourself here a lot.”

“This is how you unwind?” I asked. “What about listening to some R & B on your iPod, or checking out an episode of 106 & Park or something? That's how I unwind.”

“Yeah, me, too. When I was in high school,” she said. “I don't really have much time for 106 & Park anymore.”

After we were handed our drinks, two chairs near the window suddenly became available.

“Let's grab those seats!” Daria said and rushed over and sat down before someone else could claim the vacant seats. “This place gets really crowded and quick.”

“So you come here a lot?” I asked, my body sinking into the plush velvet chair.

“Only when I'm in the mood for a latte.” She smiled and took a sip.

I took a sip, too, and to my surprise, it wasn't bad. Before then, I hadn't seen myself chilling in a coffee shop sipping on an iced latte and having a conversation with a pretty girl. But then, I'd never seen myself as a college student before, either. My life was definitely taking a different route.