The Troubles of Johnny Cannon (5 page)

After a while, they sat down and the preaching was set up to start. Willie went up and started his tape recorder and his pa, the Reverend Parkins, stood in front of the little metal stick on the pulpit and started preaching.

I usually took a nap during the sermons at my church. One time I'd snuck in my radio in my jacket to listen to a football game, but I got caught and whipped for it by every deacon on the board, so I didn't try that no more. I figured that I might catch some valuable sleep while Reverend Parkins was preaching.

But there wasn't no sleeping during his sermon.

He started off kind of slow, talking about Daniel and the lion's den. I thought that was a pretty funny coincidence, and it made me remember the cash Pa'd taken from me, but I tried to put it out of my mind. It got pretty easy, because Reverend Parkins told that story like he'd been in the den with Daniel. He started yelling and shouting, and the folks in the pews would yell and shout right back at him. He'd jump up and down and wiggle his finger in the air, and some of the men would stand and point at him. Occasionally, while he was getting to preaching real hard, somebody would jump, run to the front, and slap some money onto the platform, telling him to “Keep on preaching.” Folks didn't do that at the white church. They was all trying to figure out how to make the pastor shut up.

Reverend Parkins kept going and going, and the folks kept getting more and more into his sermon, and I wasn't getting bored with it or nothing. The only problem I was having was that my head done started hurting, and it got worse and worse as he went on. My Sunday School teacher told me once that a guilty conscience would do that, but I was fine with all the sinning I'd been doing, so that couldn't have been it.

Instead, it felt like my brain was a fishing pole that had gotten grabbed by a big whopper in the water, and it was bending the pole in half fighting from getting reeled in. Now, I wasn't sure if the fish I'd snagged was a trout called “My Brother Just Left Town,” or if it was a bass called “That Dadgum Captain Had His Fingers Down My Throat This Morning,” or what it was, but I felt for sure that it was only a matter of time before my pole got yanked out of my hands. And I didn't want to be around when that happened. Too bad I probably had to be, on account of me being stuck with myself.

I was racking my brain to figure out just what exactly was going on in my head, but then Reverend Parkins said something that just about put all the ache out of my head.

“See, we're all in the lion's den with Daniel, and we're surrounded by lions at every side. But we're also surrounded by someone else. We're surrounded by angels, angels who will shut the mouths of the lions that threaten us. So you have to ask yourself, are you staring at a lion or at an angel? Are
you
a lion or an angel?”

Well, that got me to thinking. Maybe the whole point of all this was that, if I was going to protect Pa from the lions, I had to be an angel for him. When Reverend Parkins said the closing prayer, I said my own that the Good Lord would help me be strong like an angel. It wasn't a long prayer, cause I didn't do long prayers. Besides, I almost felt like I needed a brain doctor for the machine gun that was firing in my head. I wanted to get back home and have the Captain look at me again.

Folks got up to leave, Willie went and packed up his tape recorder, and I hurried to find Mrs. Parkins. She was standing with a group of women, talking with them about the week's schedule and such. I'd learned the hard way not to interrupt women when they was talking like that, back when I was just a kid and I'd spied a mouse in the church and the women all took turns twisting my ear for interrupting. Then they all screeched when they saw the mouse and blamed me for not running it off. Since I figured I needed to wait for her to get done, I headed outside for some fresh air. I'd have to settle for that, since I didn't have no rabbits' feet to trade for a smoke.

Willie and his friends was talking together and laughing at something, which was usually my clue to stay away. That's how it was with the kids at school, at least. But I wasn't sure if them clues was the same with colored folk. Somebody should have written a handbook.

Then I spied Willie's eyes and I realized that there's some things that is the same, no matter what sort of fella is doing it. 'Cause I recognized his look from all the times I'd had it myself. It was the look of a fella trying his hardest not to cry while he's acting like he's laughing.

In spite of the fact that it was the leading cause of death among cats, I gave in to my curiosity and went over for a better listen.

“Maybe we could find you a job at the front, Willie,” the tallest kid among them was saying. “You could give out tickets or something. Provided we got you a stool. That'd be a long time on one leg, even for a flamingo.”

All the fellas with him laughed, and Willie did too, though his laugh was a little too loud and a little too fast.

“What y'all talking about?” I said.

They all got real quiet. The tall fella eyed me all over.

“Who wants to know?” he said.

“This is Johnny,” Willie said, and I could tell he was hoping time would hurry up and move on past the moment we was in. “My ma brought him.”

I held out my hand, 'cause that's what manners says to do. They didn't take it none.

“Figures,” the tall fella said.

“This is Russ,” Willie said. “He's going to be a boxer when he grows up.”

“And I'm going to give jobs to all my friends,” Russ said. “Even my little crippled friend here. 'Cause that's what a good man does.”

Willie winced when he said that, then pretended he'd had to sneeze. He probably fooled all them, but I spoke the language of winces real good, so I knew what it meant.

“A boxer?” I said. “Like Sugar Ray?”

“Sugar Ray Robinson, for sure,” Russ said, then he put up his fists and punched at the air in front of me. “Best boxer there's ever been.”

“Does that mean you're going to lose to Gene Fullmer, too?”

The whole mess of them groaned, and I knew I'd hit a nerve. A white boxer like Fullmer beating a legend like Sugar Ray was something Cullman folks was real proud of, which meant it was something the folks in the Colony was probably butt hurt about.

Russ stepped forward and his fists was clenched. Yup, they was butt hurt.

“Losing to one boxer don't take nothing away from Sugar Ray,” he said.

“Except Fullmer beat him three times. Reckon that makes Sugar Ray a three-times loser.”

“If they fought again, Sugar Ray'd knock him out just like he did in '57,” Russ said.

“I guess there ain't no way to know, is there?” I said. “Fullmer's got too much class than to humiliate him like that again.”

Russ kicked at the ground. Willie eyed me and then him, like he wasn't sure which one of us he wanted to be right.

“Well, Genie, I mean Johnny, maybe there's one way to know,” Russ said. “What about you and me having the rematch for them? Right here and now?”

My stomach clenched in on me and my head felt ready to pop. I had a feeling it was the only move that was the same no matter where you was, challenging a fella to a fight. The one who gets challenged ain't really got no choice in the matter. He's got to fight or be a chicken. Even if he's the pope. That's what them crusades was all about. I think.

“We ain't Sugar Ray and Fullmer,” I said.

“Of course I ain't Sugar Ray. That cat is rich and famous. But around here,” he said, pointing around the yard and at them other fellas he was with, “around here I'm Sugar Ray. And there ain't but one fella that could stand in for Fullmer.” He reached out and patted my chest.

“Come on, Russ,” Willie said, eyeing me like he was worried I might say something I shouldn't. “He didn't come here to fight. Just let him alone.”

That worked for me. I turned to get away. I couldn't help but remember what Eddie Gorman had told me once, about how colored folk was more savage when they fought than civilized white folk, which was why they was such good boxers.

Of course, Eddie was a racist. He rooted against Jim in
Huckleberry Finn
. But he was funny, so it was okay.

Still, there was no telling if he was right or not. But I didn't want to test his theory out. I'd rather be a chicken in the Colony than a body in the hospital. I took a couple of quick steps away.

And that set Russ to laughing.

“Probably a good thing,” he said. “I'd have punched him so hard, his mama would have felt it.”

Now, I'll be honest with you. Folks had made fun of my ma before and it hadn't really bothered me much. And Russ probably didn't have no idea about her being dead. Heck, even the couple of times Eddie, who knew my ma was as dead as a doornail, had asked me where my ma was only made me kick his shins. It just didn't affect me too much, since I couldn't remember her none.

But when Russ said that, it was like the fishing pole in my brain that had been getting yanked and tugged by I didn't even know what all of a sudden broke right in half and I got yanked off the boat.

I spun around and I clobbered him right in the eye. I barely even realized I'd done it before my fist had already met his cheekbone and all them other boys had their mouths gaping open. Even Willie.

Russ touched his face where I'd hit him and realized I'd drawn blood.

Then he cracked me in the mouth.

So I kicked him in the crotch.

He doubled over and I reckoned the fight was done. I was starting to feel like I was back in charge of the boat again, so I offered him my hand. Like a gentleman.

He reached out and grabbed my belt, yanked me around, and threw me into the wall of the church. The whole building shook and a loose shingle fell off the top.

I jumped onto him and we went rolling around on the ground. I was boxing his ears and slapping his face, he was punching my throat and I think trying to rip my arm out of its socket. Not a one of us heard the footsteps of all the grown folk coming around the corner of the church.

Two of the deacons pulled us apart and then Mrs. Parkins ran over and almost had a cat when she saw how messed up my clothes and my body was. She hurried me and her kids to the car, talking about how she didn't know how she'd explain it to my pa, and how she shouldn't have let me out of her sight. I tried my best to let her know I would have probably gotten just as beat up if she was watching me, but she didn't pay me no mind.

She drove us all on out of the Colony and back up to my house, even though I told her I could walk on my own from theirs. While we was going, Willie was trying to ask me all sorts of questions. I wasn't giving him too many answers, not 'cause I was trying to be rude or nothing, but because my head was hurting way too darned bad.

“Russ is a good guy with an ego too big for his britches. He needed to be brought down a few pegs,” he whispered to me. “And you did it. That's really something. He don't usually lose no fights.”

I nodded.

“I mean, you was winning, wasn't you? Gosh, how did it feel? I mean, getting in those punches? Did you feel strong? Powerful?” he said. He rubbed his bum leg while he was talking, and I got a better idea of why he was asking. I nodded again.

Mrs. Parkins was watching in her rearview mirror as he was grilling me with them questions.

“Leave him alone, Willie. Can't you see he don't feel good right now?”

I was thankful for that. My head hadn't stopped hurting, and after getting in that fight, I was realizing the prayer to become an angel was just another one that wouldn't get no answer. Just like the one asking for the Cardinals to get to the NFL Championship.

“Okay, I'll stop asking. Today.” He got a grin on his face. “But, can I do an interview with you some other time? And record it, and everything, like what they did for Gene Fullmer?”

“An interview?” I said.

“Yeah. It's a hobby.”

I nodded to get him to leave me alone and then I acted like I was trying to say something to his sister, who was sitting next to me again. She was asleep 'cause it was probably her naptime. I accidentally woke her up and she stuck her tongue out at me again. Dadgummit, I might have to get a ledger book to keep track.

We got to my house and Mrs. Parkins got out to go tell my pa what had happened. I got out too, and I was embarrassed by our front yard. In between the time I'd left for church and then, Pa and the Captain had filled our front yard with a whole mess of empty boxes and papers and such. It looked like a homeless paradise. If homeless people used RadioShack boxes.

Mrs. Parkins knocked on our door and there wasn't no answer. Then we both heard a loud ruckus of banging coming from the backyard, so she headed that way and I followed her. And if I was embarrassed by the state of our front yard, our backyard made me want to change my name and move to Canada. And you know that's bad, 'cause there ain't no good reason to go to Canada.

Pa and the Captain had dug everything out of our shed, the lawn mower, the deep freezer, my bicycle, everything, and they had it thrown all kinds of ways out in the grass. They was inside the shed hammering and sawing and drilling, and they was laughing and carrying on while they did it like two fellas that didn't have a care in the world.

Mrs. Parkins went and knocked on the shed door that was halfway open.

“Mr. Cannon?” she said.

Pa bolted out of the shed, along with the Captain, and they pushed the door closed.

“Hello, Coretta,” Pa said. “How are you doing today?” He had the kind of grin you got when you was trying to hide something from somebody and you thought it was the funniest thing ever to be doing it, but you knew if you told it to them they wouldn't think it was funny at all and they'd whip you for it. I tried to get the image of Mrs. Parkins having my pa over her knee, swatting him with a paddle, out of my head, but things like that, once it's in there, it's in there.