Up at the College (6 page)

Thinking about how happy Metro Mitchell had been the last time he ran into him with Dayeesha on his arm was enough to make
Curtis give serious consideration to canceling out his playah’s card. But all of that was a whole lot easier said than done
because Curtis wanted to remain in control of everything. It scared him to think about giving the Lord such complete control
of his life. Plus, if he gave over that kind of control, he’d also have to step back and let God do the talking where women
were concerned. He liked to be able to select a woman based on his perception of a need that had to be met. And Curtis knew
that if God started picking his women, first off there would not be any
women
, just the good lil’ Christian girl the Lord saw fit to place in his path.

Maurice snuffed out his cigar on the railing and sat down on the deck bench. He stretched his arms across the back and glanced
upward, lips moving but no sound coming out. He didn’t know how they were going to make it through the season going like this.

Curtis was bound and determined to run from the Lord the way Maurice wished some of those players would run down that court
to score some points. Every victory and every defeat this season would be riding on what Curtis did or didn’t do regarding
getting close to the Lord. Folks didn’t get it that your walk with the Lord directly affected how you went about your business
from day to day.

They were just coming out of the early part of the season and had yet to win anything. They had gotten beaten so badly in
an exhibition game with North Carolina Central University, a MEAC Conference school, that Maurice dreaded having to drive
down the part of Fayetteville Street where NCCU was located.

That had hurt real bad. There was fierce rivalry between the two schools. NCCU, or Central, was pretty much down the street
from Eva T. It had been founded a good decade and a half before Eva T. It had produced many of Durham’s black movers and shakers,
and the students, alumni, and faculty alike never failed to remind Eva T. that NCCU was the
real
black college in Durham.

The last thing Maurice had wanted to hear at that game was the buzzer of the final quarter sounding off with a final game
score of 78 to 20. Central beat them by fifty-eight points. And that had only happened because one of NCCU’s star players
fouled out, another one was on crutches, and a third was sitting on the bench nursing a swollen eye with an ice pack.

If that spanking had not been bad enough, this game was played on Eva T.’s home turf. Eva T.’s president, Dr. Samuel T. Redmond,
had sat through the game looking so mean and evil until there was a moment when Maurice could have sworn he was filling out
pink slips. And the worst part was that this game paid both teams—$55,000 to the victor and $18,000 to the loser, if they
didn’t allow the winning team to keep more than a ten-point lead. In the case of the final score, Eva T. Marshall was eligible
for a measly $3,000. That chump change would barely feed the members of the entire team entourage. The cheerleaders alone
ate like they were all active members of an NFL team.

The season was relatively new, and the sinkhole they were in just kept getting deeper and deeper. And if that was not bad
enough, Curtis’s stubborn behind was stuck on being stupid and resisting getting right with the Lord. Gran Gran had told Curtis
that he could expect to walk in some serious valleys if he kept playing “you can’t see me” with God. And now they were standing
in the middle of the valley, it was starting to rain, they didn’t have any covering, their feet were sinking down in the mud,
and Curtis remained intentionally clueless concerning what he needed to do. About the only hope Maurice had at the moment
was that Gran Gran had offered to bring her prayer group, The Prayer Warriors, to practice to lay hands on and anoint the
team.

But that wasn’t working because Curtis, with his proud and hardheaded self, kept hemmin’ and hawin’ about the offer. He was
just plain scared and punkin’ out over letting his grandmother, Lamont Green’s aunt Queen Esther, and their girls pray over
him and the team. What did he think was going to happen—that he was going to hop up and start prophesying and speaking in
tongues to the crowd during the halftime show at a game?

Those prayers were going to help the team. It wasn’t something that could be seen, or explained, or proven. It just was. Carnal
thinking was a trip and there were times when Curtis Parker, with his excessively carnal-thinking self, practically drove
Maurice crazy.

Maurice sighed heavily and said, “Jesus, what us gone do?”

“It can’t be that bad, can it, dawg?” Curtis asked, now concerned about his best friend and most valuable coach for the team.
There were three assistant coaches working with the basketball team—Maurice Fountain, Kordell Bivens, and Castilleo Palmer,
who’d just earned his master’s degree in sports administration from Eva T. But as far as Curtis was concerned, there was only
one real assistant coach. Those other two really didn’t need to be on the payroll, sucking up precious resources and doing
absolutely nothing but getting on everybody’s (including the players’) nerves.

Kordell Bivens was the kind of negro who was fiercely loyal to those he considered a friend—namely his boy and partner in
crime Rico Sneed, who was around the basketball team way too much lately. Other than that, Kordell could not be depended on
to do what was right and honorable—especially where Curtis and the team were concerned. He was dishonest to a fault. And he
hid it behind a solemn, silent demeanor that made most people think he was just personality challenged and weird. Kordell
Bivens was the type of negro who could be a guest in a person’s house and turn around and bite them with betrayal like a rabid
dog, as his own special way of saying “thank you.”

And then there was Castilleo Palmer—a wannabe player with the erroneous assumption that he was a gift to behold. Castilleo
acted like he had the capacity to add something worth anything to the lives of the women he was involved with. About the only
thing Castilleo ever did that was worthwhile was to break it off with his nicest girlfriends. And he couldn’t even do that
right. The boy was so mean and ugly-acting when he broke off from a woman that she never wanted to have another thing to do
with him. In fact, once one of Castilleo’s exceptionally beautiful ex-girlfriends was standing beside a flat tire at the Southpoint
Mall parking lot in a thunderstorm. When he offered to help, she said, “No thank you. I’d prefer to be assisted by that man
over there.”

She then proceeded to point to a man who was standing at the bus stop singing the theme song from the 1970s version of the
movie
Shaft,
dancing like Michael Jackson on one of his best songs from the famed
Off the Wall
album, and picking and eating boogers, when he appeared a tad bit tired and famished.

Castilleo Palmer and Kordell Bivens—the assistant coaches from the pit of Hell—with their ever-present, annoying, and so unnecessary
sidekick, Rico Sneed. Curtis had inherited those two jokers from his predecessor when he became the head coach of the basketball
team. And the only reason he had not chased those two jokers out of his department with a sawed-off shotgun was that he had
needed to hire Maurice. Curtis knew that firing Kordell and Castilleo would make his boss, Gilead Jackson, mad, and make it
hard to get Maurice on staff at the right salary.

It had seemed like a good plan at the time. But now, having to deal with all the stress, drama, and backstabbing that came
with having Kordell and Castilleo as employees let him know he had not exercised any kind of good judgment concerning this
matter. He wished he would have followed Gran Gran’s admonishment to trust God, fire those two, and let the chips fall where
they may.

Maurice’s eyes were closed and his lips were moving in a silent prayer. Curtis asked him again.

“Man, is it really that bad?”

“Worse,” Maurice answered.

“So, what do we do about June Bug Washington and DeMarcus Brown?”

“Bench ’em, Curtis. They are nothing but trouble, and I’m tired of fooling with those two spoiled, bratty pimp daddies just
because Bishop Sonny Washington’s son is one’s pappy, and Reverend Marcel Brown
sired
the other.”

Curtis started laughing. “Dawg, you make old boy sound like a rutting stag. Sire? If that ain’t some old school mess from
what century?”

“Well, it’s true, ain’t it,” Maurice said with a chuckle. “Heck, you and I both know that DeMarcus’s daddy is still pimpin’
and he what … seventy-nine, eighty?”

“I think Reverend Brown is seventy-seven,” Curtis said. “Reverend Harris told me that her dad, Bishop Simmons, was seventy-five,
and I think Reverend Brown is a couple of years older than Sharon Simmons-Harris’s father.”

Maurice looked toward the back door to make sure Trina wasn’t in earshot in the kitchen before he said, “Sharon is fine.”

“Yes, Lawd,” Curtis said and held out his fist for some dap. “Umph, umph, umph. And Lawd knows I shouldn’t be talking like
this about a preacher. But baby girl is tight—chocolate, tall, slender, with those hips and that butt.” Curtis curved his
hands as if he was drawing the shape of Reverend Harris’s butt in the air.

“I know,” Maurice said, taking care to keep an eye on the door. “And those legs? Where did that sistah get those legs?”

“She got ’em from her mama,” Curtis answered, grinning. “You know Mother Simmons is fine and has some big, pretty legs. Lawd
knows Bishop Simmons has his hands full keeping negroes off those two.”

“Three,” Maurice corrected.

“Three what?”

“Those three. You said two. It’s three.”

“Well,” Curtis said, “who is number three? I know that Sharon has a younger brother, Theo Jr.”

“She has a younger sister, too. Linda Simmons Bradley.”

Curtis rubbed his chin. The only Linda Bradley he knew of lived in Atlanta, and other than being short and red, she did look
a whole lot like Sharon Harris. He said, “Reverend Bradley’s wife, Linda, is Sharon’s sister? Reverend Bradley, the pastor
of River of Life Gospel United Church in Atlanta?”

“Yep,” Maurice answered.

“Small world. But you know she and Sharon favor a lot—especially those legs.”

“Yep,” Maurice answered. “Linda Bradley has a set of legs on her, too. I’ve heard that Reverend Bradley has had to roll up
on more than a few negroes about his wife—especially when they go to the Annual Conferences.”

“I can understand why that would be the case, Maurice.”

Maurice nodded. His baby Trina was fine and he didn’t know what he’d have to do if he had to deal with fine-woman issues as
a preacher. At least folks expected coaches to cuss and fight and act crazy. But preachers were another story. He didn’t envy
them—not one bit.

“Curtis, hurry and do something about June Bug and DeMarcus because I don’t want to be bothered with them this year. They
need to sit out until they bring those grades up and quit ho-hoppin’ in the dorms. I know that June Bug has had two pregnancy
scares since school started. And DeMarcus came this close”—Maurice held up his hand with his thumb and forefinger less than
an inch apart—“this close to getting pistol-whipped by Mr. Chandler, the head of the mail center on campus, for being at his
house with his wife when he wasn’t home.”

“Why was that boy over at Dave Chandler’s house like that? Is he taking a class with Pauline?”

“Yeah. And the dummy is failing it with flying colors. That’s why he was over there—getting some tutoring. At least that is
what he told Dave right before he got tossed out of the front door without his new 250-dollar shoes.”

“What is wrong with Pauline Chandler?” Curtis asked, agitated. “You know one of Kordell’s campus women, Prudence Baylor, told
her not to marry Dave Chandler when she started chasing him five months after his wife died. Prudence said that spending a
night with Dave was worse than standing in a long line at Wal-Mart on Black Friday. Whatever he
thought
he was doing took forever and got on your nerves something terrible.”

Maurice started laughing. Real life at an HBCU could give any reality TV show a good run for its money—and that included his
favorite reality show,
Flavor of Love.

Curtis said, “We have more problems than we need because DeMarcus decided to help Pauline get out of the Wal-Mart line.”

“Yeah. That is part one of our problems,” Maurice went on. “There’s a part two. Dr. Redmond will not override Gilead Jackson’s
refusal to let LeDarius Johnson, Earl Paxton Jr., Sherron Grey, Mario Lincoln, and Kaylo Bailey get cleared to serve as the
starting lineup for upcoming games.”

Curtis ran his hands over the stubble of his close-cut hair and banged his hand on the deck railing. “Do Dr. Redmond and Gilead
Jackson want to win any games this season? Heck, with a starting lineup like that, we have a chance to take the conference
title—even with the losses we’ve already sustained. Those brothers are the best players on the team, and the only ones, in
spite of June Bug and DeMarcus’s talent, with a chance of being scouted for the NBA. Maurice, when was the last time Eva T.
sent anybody to the NBA?”

“Nineteen-ninety-three.”

“You’re joking?”

“Nope. And it’s not because we haven’t had any NBA-quality players. But they all transferred to bigger schools, with better
basketball programs, and more television coverage when it became clear that the last coach wasn’t going to play them right.”

“WHY?” Curtis practically shouted, and then calmed down. This was almost criminal. If this wasn’t his own team, he would have
reported them to the NCAA for unethical practices.

“Not quite sure. But I know that some of the players that were allowed to start had parents with pockets deep enough to buy
their non-basketball-playing sons a prime spot on the team. Or Gilead is sleeping with somebody’s mama and has to do something
to pacify the girl and keep her from acting crazy on campus, or worse, going and telling his wife.”