Chapter One

Raymond Clarke lay across his bed. An empty bowl of popcorn was on the floor. The television was turned up loud.

�Carl Lewis threatens to break Bob Beamon�s historic long jump record at the Olympic Trials in Los Angeles this weekend,� an ESPN sportscaster announced. �Beamon�s record has stood for sixteen years. Lewis . . . �

Raymond got so caught up in the mention of the upcoming Olympic Games that he didn�t hear the front door open.

�Ray,� his father Malcolm shouted as soon as he entered the house.

�What?�

�What? Boy, if you don�t get your--�

Raymond leaped off his bed and hurried around the corner into the living room. �Dad?�

He watched his father wave his hand over the sofa, atop his Reebok sports bag and track shoes. �Get this shit up.�

Silence divided them. In the interlude, Raymond grabbed his belongings, and going back into his bedroom, he tossed them across his bed.

His father made his way into the kitchen. Like a dark shadow, frustrations from having spent ten hours working at a drab automobile plant where he drilled leather seats into one Ford Mustang after another while his line supervisor stood at his shoulder and barked, �Focus, Malcolm. Get your production up,� followed him there. It was in the furrow of his brow and the pinch of his lip. �Ray.� Raymond cursed beneath his breath before he left his room. Seconds later he stood at the kitchen�s edge.

He watched his father toss an envelope on the table. �Letter from Baker came in the mail. Something about you getting some awards when you gradu�� He reached to the center of the kitchen table for a bottle of Jack Daniels. He stopped hiding the alcohol years ago when Raymond turned five. The alcohol looked like liquid gold. Felt that way to Malcolm too. �--ate tonight.�

Malcolm took a long swig of the whiskey and squinted against the burn. He tried to laugh but only coughed up spleen. �You�re probably the only kid in the whole school who got a letter like this. Everybody up at Baker knows nobody gives a rat�s ass about you. Letter said they thought I�d want to let all your relatives know you�re getting some awards so they�d come out and support you.�

Again Malcolm worked at laughter, but instead coughed a dry, scratchy cough that went long and raw through his throat. �We both know ain�t nobody going to be there but me and your sorry ass. Don�t mean nothing anyhow. They�re just giving these diplomas and awards away now days.� On his way out of the kitchen, bottle in hand, he shoved the letter against Raymond�s chest.

Raymond listened to his father�s footsteps go heavy up the back stairs while he stood alone in the kitchen. When the footsteps became a whisper, he looked down at the letter. It was printed on good stationery, the kind Baker High School only used for special occasions. Didn�t matter though. Raymond took the letter and ripped it once, twice, three times � over and over again � until it was only shreds of paper, then he walked to the tall kitchen wastebasket and dropped the bits inside.

�Ray.�

He froze. From the sound of his father�s voice, he knew he was at the top of the stairs.

�Give me that letter, so I�ll remember to go to your graduation tonight.�

Raymond twisted his mouth at the foulness of the request, the absolute absurdity of it. He didn�t answer. Instead he turned and walked back inside his bedroom. He grabbed his house keys and headed outside. At the edge of the walkway, he heard his father shout, �Ray.�

Raymond didn�t turn around. He walked down the tree lined sidewalk the way he�d learned to walk since Kindergarten � with his head down. He stepped over raised cracks in the worn sidewalk, turned away from boarded windows at two empty dilapidated buildings and told himself the neighborhood was just like his father � old, useless, unforgiving and hard.

A second floor window back at the house went up. Malcolm stuck his head all the way out the window. �Get your ass back here,� he hollered down the street. Raymond went to his toes and started to run. His muscular arms and legs went back and forth through the cooling air like propellers, like they were devices Raymond used to try to take off, leave the places in his life he wished had never been. It was what Raymond was good at. All his running had earned him high honors in track and field. He was Ohio�s top miler. He�d made Sports Illustrated four times since middle school.

�Ray.�

�Yo, man, you better go back,� Joey, a troubled eighteen-year-old neighbor who dropped out of school in the tenth grade chuckled. He leaned across a Pontiac Sunbird waxing its hood. �If you don�t your old man�s gonna beat your ass good.�

�Aw, Ray�s cool,� Stanley, an equally troubled twenty-one-year-old who pissed on school and failed to get a diploma, a man who couldn�t read beyond the third grade level, said. �And we know the Brother can run. Shit. We all can run,� Stanley laughed.

�Ray, remember that night we ran away from that Texaco station, our wallets all fat?� Joey laughed. He talked so loudly, Raymond worried he�d be overheard.

�Thought we agreed to let that go,� Raymond said. He looked hard at Joey then he looked hard at Stanley and the nine-month old deal was resealed, another secret for Raymond to keep.

One glance back at his father�s house and Raymond started running again. He ran all the way to the Trotwood Recreation Center six miles further into the city. He stayed at the recreation center watching one intramural basketball game after another for more than an hour, until he felt certain Malcolm had, in a rare respite, drunk himself into a modicum of civility. Then he turned over his wrist, saw it was after five o�clock and ran every step of the six miles back home.

The living room was empty. All the way from the second floor, Raymond heard a noise akin to the rise and fall of a buzz saw. He frowned toward the stairs and mumbled, �Sleep.�

ESPN was still on in his bedroom. He went straight to his closet and pulled out his favorite pair of black nylon dress pants, a crisp white button down shirt and a tie. Fifteen minutes later he was showered and dressed.

His father was drunk. That he knew. It always went this way, every night. After all, like a religious habit, he�d spent his early childhood watching his father drink half a bottle of whiskey soon after he arrived home from work. When he was a little boy, he�d sit across from Malcolm at the kitchen table and swing his legs back and forth, in a pendulum clock sort of way, while he watched Malcolm turn a new shiny glass bottle up until it reached empty. He always brought a toy into the kitchen with him then, a race car or a plastic airplane. He pushed the toy back and forth across the table and went �Voom. Voom,� but he never took his eyes off his father. It was a time gone, like cement, down into Raymond�s psyche. But that was years ago. Since then Raymond had gotten into a few fist fights and had gone on more than one stolen car joy ride with neighborhood boys he hoped would take him in as a good friend, but who never did. But he�d endured. He dodged cops when they knocked on the house door last spring. He�d just returned home from school; mercy abounding, Malcolm was still at work.

With their stiff blue caps squarely atop their heads, the cops questioned Raymond about a robbery at a nearby Texaco station, a wrong - for Raymond - birthed out of a last ditch effort to gain a neighborhood friend but now filled with regret.

Raymond�s academic and athletic reputations convinced the cops that he was innocent. His refusal to rat out Joey and Stanley kept them from going to the big house for the third time in less than two years.

Never mind that Joey and Stanley kicked his butt when he was a kid until he bore new bruises, ones not put there by Malcolm. Never mind that cops badgered him, pounding Malcolm�s living room table and offering him, �If you tell us what part Joey and Stanley played in the heist, we�ll make sure nothing happens to you and we�ll go light on them.� Raymond didn�t tell. If not for him, Joey wouldn�t be waxing his car right now and Stanley wouldn�t be standing around trying to find something interesting to do.

Even with the run-in with the law and despite Malcolm�s drunken rages, once only verbal assaults but burst forth into outright physical beatings that called for blood when Raymond reached puberty, Raymond had found a way to stay alive. He made it to seventeen.

He was running a brush across the top of his hair when the phone rang.

�Hello?�

�Raymond. Raymond Clarke?�

�Speaking.�

The man laughed. �Big night for you tonight.�

�Who is this?�

�You�ll come to recognize my voice soon enough,� the man joked wholeheartedly.

�Coach Carter? Coach Reginald Carter?�

�Yes. Wanted to call and congratulate you on graduation tonight. Have a good time, Son. Look forward to seeing you on campus in what, one, two weeks?�

�Yea,� Raymond nodded. �Soon.�

�Congratulations again, Raymond. You deserve it. Heard you did better than good this year. Heard you did great.�

�Thanks.�

Raymond opened his hand and watched the receiver fall gently against its cradle. A bird squawked outside his window and he stared across his room at nothing in particular. He couldn�t count the number of calls he�d received from college track and field scouts over the last two years. He told his father about none of the calls. When Malcolm pushed and demanded, �Where you going to school next year, boy,� Raymond always told him what he knew he wanted to hear. He always looked right at his father and told him he was going to �Ohio State.�

The phone hung up and Coach Carter�s voice gone, Raymond went into the living room and sat on the sofa in silence. The front door was open. Through the screen door, warm summer air carried the scent of fried meats, pork chops, chicken and hamburger, from neighboring houses into the living room.

Because Malcolm and his kitchen table was bare and inside the refrigerator there was only beer, wine coolers, a bowl of two week old broccoli, a pint of cottage cheese and a celery stalk, Raymond served himself an evening meal through his nose. As if he could get full on the smell of food, he tilted his head back and inhaled in long, slow breaths.

In the living room, the battery operated Ingraham wall clock ticked and slid forward, ticked and slid forward. Soon Raymond had the phone in his hand again. �Yo, Paul,� he said to his high school track teammate, the one guy who gave him good athletic competition, someone he considered a real good friend. �When are you leaving for the convention center and graduation?�

�Five minutes. Man, you know we have to be there an hour before the ceremony starts. I�m running late as it is�� He paused. �You need a ride?�

�Can you swing by and get me on your way?�

�My mom and dad are driving.�

�I mean, Man, please. Can you? Do you think they�d mind?�

�Your pops ain�t coming?�

�Yo, Paul, Homey,� Raymond begged.

�A�right. A�right.�


The Dayton Convention Center was packed. Four hundred students � their purple and white caps and gowns making them the focal point of attention -- filled the front of the main auditorium. A mass of parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins sat in the raised seats at the back of the room.

The program started with a slew of speeches, enough to make the students wriggle in their seats. The evening began to take on an unwanted hue. A stale fatigue had come into the air, had started to make the graduation ceremony feel boring.

Then a good thing happened. Principal Bernard Jones approached the microphone and everyone in the auditorium sat up.

�And now,� Principal Jones said, �it�s time to hand out the diplomas.�

Cheers went up and drowned Principal Jones� voice. Like confetti that had been tossed toward the ceiling, it was a long time before the cheers came down.

It was eight o�clock. Raymond told himself not to but he turned partway and glanced over his shoulder. It was as if he�d suddenly been plagued with dementia, because he forgot the years of abuse heaped upon him with Malcolm�s calloused hands. He wanted Malcolm to walk through the convention center doors sober and real proud like. He wanted Malcolm to be glad to call him his son.

�To the students, as I call out your name, please stand and make your way onto the stage.� Principal Jones flipped through a stack of stapled papers then he pushed his mouth close to the microphone and said slowly, �Sharon Appleseed.�

A loud round of applause, whistling and �way to gos� pierced the air. It went on like that for more than an hour, until all but two students had received a diploma � Raymond and Janice Thompson, a bright sixteen year old who sat in a wheelchair due to spina bifida.

Principal Jones sang Janice�s praises. Hers had been a stellar academic career right from the start. �She�s earned her way onto the Honor Roll every year since the Seventh Grade. She was voted to Girls State by our finest instructors. She has won three presidential academic citations. And,� Principal Jones laughed, �I�m sure her parents appreciate this most. She has earned a full scholarship to Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia.� Principal Jones� hand went out. �Ladies and gentlemen,� he beamed, �Please stand and congratulate the Class of 1984�s Salutatorian, Janice Thompson.�

Janice pushed the wheelchair toward the stage and everyone stood and applauded wildly. Amid the swell of noise and the sea of people, Raymond looked over his shoulder for Malcolm. He searched every face. His gaze darted in a crazed fashion.

Then he felt a tap on his shoulder. It was his friend Paul. �Yo, Man, is your pops coming?�

Raymond turned around, faced the stage and stood tall, head up, shoulders back.

When Paul tapped him again, he jerked his shoulders hard and shrugged him off.

The auditorium grew quiet.

�And now, it�s time for us to bestow the top honor.� Principal Jones gave Raymond an �atta boy� smile before he said, �This young man has earned high commendations academically and athletically.�

In short intervals, Paul, several members of the track team and Raymond�s high school track coach turned and looked to the back of the auditorium.

�Damn,� Paul muttered when he turned around and faced the stage for the eighth time. He bumped shoulders with the guy who stood next to him. �That asshole ain�t coming.� He lowered his head and his voice. �Ray�s pops ain�t coming.�

�This young man has earned all-city, all-county, all-state and top national honors in cross-country and track and field. In fact, twice he�s been listed as the top miler in the country by Sports Illustrated and Track and Field News. He has earned four presidential academic citations. He�s been on the Honor Roll since the Seventh Grade.� Principal Jones scanned the auditorium for Malcolm. When he didn�t see him, he spoke slower. In fact, he started to make things up in the hopes that time would become Raymond�s friend.

�I remember when he first came to Baker. He was a scared young man, but not anymore.� He pursed his lips and gave Raymond a nod. �He�s ready to take advantage of the full scholarship his achievements have gained him.� Principal Jones glanced at the doors.

A few students and several parents squirmed in their seats. Some people glanced at their watches as if to say �come on�.

�He has maintained a 4.0 grade point average since the ninth grade. He hasn�t missed a day of school since the third grade.� The doors demanded his attention again, but no one came through them.

�Ladies and Gentlemen, please congratulate Baker High School�s Class of 1984 Valedictorian, Raymond Clarke.�

Paul clapped until his hands stung. A few students stood in their seats and hollered out, �Go, Ray!� Before long a chant went up. All the students pumped their fists in the air and shouted, �Ray-mond! Ray-mond!�

Raymond�s heart beat wildly in his chest. He clamped his teeth down against his bottom lip and jailed the rising emotion. He extended his hand when he neared Principal Jones� side.

�Well done,� Principal Jones told him while he handed him his diploma. He pat Raymond�s back. �You did a fine job, Raymond.� He shook his head, �A fine job.�


The chain lock was on the door when Raymond got home that night. He jiggled the chain and tried to get it to slide open. When that didn�t work he walked to the back of the house and looked for an opening. He was in luck. The kitchen window was ajar just enough to allow him entry. He grunted and pushed up. The screen didn�t even bang when it landed in the sink. He crawled through the window like a thief.

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