🌎 🌎 “Path to Manhood” by Dane C. Hawkins

Lucas’ point hit home for Jairus. As reluctant as he is to forgive Brandon, he remembers his mother constantly lecturing him to forgive and reciting verses from the bible. Jairus and Lucas’ current situation is a perfect example of a lot of people having forgiveness. And at the moment, it feels like it is worth it. The conversation brings them closer together. Close enough that when Lucas asks if he can give Jairus a call from time to time to see how he’s doing Jairus actually agrees.

The weekend comes and it is time for the celebration planned for Mike’s 22nd birthday. This is the first big celebration they have had since all of them have been 21 and Malik started promoting at the strip clubs. This is the first time all three of them have gone to a strip club. Chris, on the other hand, seems to be well versed in the strip club lifestyle although he’s no older than they are. As they pregame before going out he repeatedly jokes about them not falling in love at the club tonight. Duc and Jairus are hyped about going for the first time, especially since Malik is hooking them up while they’re there. Mike seems to be the least interested in the strip club even though he never declines to go for his birthday. His mind is still on the things he still hasn’t done leading into his last semester of school, specifically job hunting.

When they get to the strip club it is another story. Chris and Duc are having a ball, as expected. Duc has money set aside just to make sure they have a good time and is not letting it go to waste. Malik sets them up with one of the small tables in the club and sends them a bottle of vodka so they don’t look broke to the strippers and can get some attention. Duc loves it. Jairus, on the other hand, has an unexpected reaction to the atmosphere. He can clearly see the women are attractive, but it feels sleezy to him. Maybe it’s the protector in him or maybe it’s the urge to always try to do the right thing but the strip club does nothing for him. Mike is in awe at how some of the women look like the ones in their favorite music videos. He tries to fight it but after a while he’s just as into the club as Duc. Especially after Duc gets him a lap dance for his birthday. They can’t ask for a more memorable experience for Mike’s birthday, and it will be a night they recall for years as the catalyst that made Duc start working the strip clubs with Malik.

The next day is the Sunday before school starts for the semester and all the fellas are exhausted from being up way too late at the strip club. They all sleep through most of the morning with Chris even crashing on the couch for the night. All except Mike. Even through all the celebration and excitement he can’t get his mind off what he needs to do to find a job. When he can’t sleep that morning, he gets up and sneaks out without waking anyone up and heads to campus to get online and start searching for the perfect job. He quickly realizes that finding the perfect job requires him to know where to start looking and that is something Cecilia never mentioned to him in their discussion. He eventually just finds himself back on the websites of the companies he has interned with and begins to get frustrated at himself. He decides to step away and take his mind off it for a while and figures this is a good time to stop past his grandparents’ house. He hasn’t seen them since his birthday when Grandma Louise told him to stop by when he has time so she can give him his gift. He really just wants to clear his mind and possibly have one of those heart-to-hearts he has with his grandmother about what to do.

Unfortunately, when he arrives at their house, he doesn’t see both cars in the driveway, so he knows someone isn’t home. He knocks on the door anyway and waits for a while. After a second knock and no answer he starts to walk back to his car and just before he reaches the car door, he hears the house door opening. He turns back to see it’s his father opening the door. Tony sees him and says, “Aye, they haven’t gotten back home from church yet.” It completely slipped Mike’s mind that his grandparents would be at church at this time.

“Tell Grandma I came by to get the birthday gift she told me about and I’ll stop by later.”

In response to Mike’s comment Tony acts like he just remembered something important and tells him to hold on a second as he runs back into the house. He returns momentarily with a birthday card in an envelope. “Yeah, they left your card on the coffee table in case you came by. I almost forgot. Happy birthday.” Mike thanks him but in his head, he laughs at how he hands it to him saying happy birthday like it is a gift from him.

“Aye, so…you gotta a couple of bills I can hold until I can pay you back?”

Mike has a confused look on his face. “Aren’t you working? Why do you need to borrow money?”

Tony drops his head and starts looking at the ground as if he is struggling to make eye contact. “Yeah, it was a situation on the job where someone got hurt so they drug tested everyone. Then they told me I had to go because they saw a little bit of weed in my system. I hadn’t even been smoking.”

Mike has heard enough. Tony has been making excuses for these types of mistakes for as long as he can remember. He is not naive enough to believe the victim stories his father is always telling, but he still finds it difficult to say no in these situations. Which is why he doesn’t carry cash on him when he comes around. It’s easier to say no when he really doesn’t have any cash. He quickly makes his exit in disgust and frustration with his father and heads to his mother’s house with his mind even more set on figuring this out to make sure he never ends up like Tony. He gets to his mother’s house, and she is having lunch by herself after going to the early morning service at church. He keeps her company and grabs a bite to eat for himself. His mother is always all ears for her children, and he tells her of his frustrations trying to find other places to apply for jobs. Just as easily as he says it, she thinks of a solution. Research the top competitors for the companies he interned with. It’s the perfect place to start and he’s upset he didn’t think of it himself. What he doesn’t get is that he doesn’t have the wisdom and experience Brenda has in looking for jobs. In this scenario, she has experience helping his father search for jobs after he graduated college. Of course, she keeps that part to herself because there’s no reason to ruin the advice for him--advice he will use to find multiple companies in Atlanta and other states he will apply to.

That week the semester begins and where someone who is in Mike’s position will normally feel the senior-itis setting in, he is having a different reaction. Mike is the only one of his immediate friend group who is actually graduating. Jairus should have been but dropping the classes their junior year was too much to overcome with so little time left. They knew Duc wasn’t graduating with them two years ago when he decided to switch majors. It was already questionable before the switch. Mike likes to believe Ovaughn would have been the one to walk with him but with his own school issues trying to balance basketball and a difficult engineering major he would have likely needed another year. Not even Chris seems to be preparing to graduate after four years. They really don’t know what Chris is doing. No one will be surprised if he does or doesn’t walk after this semester. Instead of the anticipation of finally moving on to the next adventure in life, Mike is beginning to feel anxious about having to figure everything out alone while all his friends are still together in a comfortable environment with familiar surroundings.

He assumes it is a normal part of the process, which it somewhat is, and he just pushes past those fears focusing on the work he has to do to make it to the finish line. He assumes eventually he’ll start looking forward to graduation. But with those feelings he makes sure not to miss an opportunity to spend time with his boys this last semester. Instead of always being at work he only works as much as he needs to in order to pay the bills. The rest of the time he’s a customer on the Open Mic Nights, the weekly parties, or the times Chaotic Harmony performs. He and Jairus go to Open Mic so regularly that they begin to develop a friendship with Quad, who has become the regular host, performer, and sometimes assistant to Duc. Mike even makes sure to catch up with Kennedy at least once a week even if it’s just the two of them grabbing lunch. It doesn’t go unnoticed by his friends and something they think is a bit weird at times.

22

“He May Need You To Forgive Him Just As Much”

A few weeks into the semester the fellas find themselves all at Open Mic along with Riley and a couple of the members of Chaotic Harmony, Steven and Imani. Steven’s girlfriend Bianca, who is also Imani’s cousin, comes along with them, as well. Riley has been talking to them about doing more original songs and fewer covers, but they have been struggling to put together lyrics they all like. They decide to all bring some lyrics they write to recite in front of a crowd and get an honest reaction to the words without a beat. Between the three of them they perform five times. They get some decent reactions but nothing that stands out for any of the lyrics performed that night, so they are very interested in the opinions of Mike, Duc, Jairus, and Bianca. As they sit and discuss what they hear, trying to give an honest opinion, they also pay attention to the performers that do get big responses from the crowd to understand what people are reacting to. Riley, never being one to withhold her opinion, gets frustrated with Mike because he is reluctant to give an opinion, probably because it isn't positive. “I guess you need to see what Kennedy thinks before you can give us your opinion” she says, instantly regretting her mouth getting the best of her as she tries to avoid the dirty look coming from Duc. The table gets very quiet with no one knowing what to say to break that tension until Quad comes back onto the microphone and performs a piece.

Riley takes notice of the poem Quad recites. She isn’t blown away by his performance, but the words speak directly to her as something they want to talk about. And the response he gets from the crowd is larger than anything the group members got for their performances. Afterward he comes over to their table and Riley loudly says, “Is that piece you performed something new?”

“I wrote it a couple of months back, but I hadn’t performed it before tonight. What you think of it?”

“I think it sounds like good song lyrics. You need to finish it and let us make a song out of it.”

Listening to the conversation, Duc's eyes suddenly get huge sitting at the table. He has a band with aspirations of being more than a cover band and a lyric writer who struggles with stage presence and actually rapping. It’s a perfect solution for both parties interested in getting their art heard. Duc is pissed at himself for never thinking about having Quad help write for Chaotic Harmony before. Quad is ecstatic to write real songs for someone to sing and the band loves the idea of working with him to find their voice.

The semester continues with things going normal for the guys as far as school and work. As usual, women leave them with all their unanswered questions about themselves and each other. The weather is starting to break and that means the start of the track season. When the first track meet rolls around Mike, Jairus, and Duc all attend just like they promised themselves they always will to support Kennedy. None of them are really into track and field so they generally spend the entire time talking about things going on or they forgot to run past the others. This time around Mike seems more interested in the actual races than normal and for Jairus it makes him wonder why and brings back memories of Riley’s comments at Jazzy Belles over a month ago, as well as some other occurrences that seemed strange. Always the one to call out someone if he thinks it’s necessary, Jairus doesn’t bite his tongue. “Dog, you awfully into these races today. I know we here to support but you ain’t never cared this much before.”

Mike looks at Jairus in confusion because he doesn’t understand why it’s bothering him so much and brushes it off. “This ain’t fin to happen too many more times. I’m just tryna enjoy it.”

Jairus wants to leave it alone, but he can’t. “Why have you and Kennedy been so close lately?”

Once again, a look of confusion comes across Mike’s face. He doesn’t think he has been acting any closer to her than normal, but he can see that Jairus and Duc, who are now waiting intently for a response, seem to think so. Before he can reply Jairus continues, “I mean, I have come in the caf a couple of times and found y’all chumming it up eating lunch. Plus, I remember y’all having side conversations all night back at the graduation party, and that comment Riley made a month ago at Jazzy Belles. It’s been looking more than normal for a minute.”

As Jairus rambles off all the things he’s noticed, Mike begins to see how the picture looks to him and realizes he may have the same thoughts if the roles were reversed so he tries not to jump to being defensive.

“For real though, if something is going on with y’all I guess I can see how it would happen,” Duc interjects. “Just let us know.”

“Nigga, I’ll fight you,” says Mike, feeling like Duc is questioning his loyalty to their dead friend. He knows now he has to give them an explanation for what they have been noticing. Trying to brush it off won’t let it die now that Jairus has called him out. “Man, it’s not like that…at all. I started going to Kennedy last semester for advice about Shante because I know that they are teammates and she’s around her all the time.” Normally they aren’t so easily convinced, but Duc and Jairus witnessed how an incident with Shante messed him up and remember how he suddenly seemed to be over it, so they let him continue explaining. “At first, I was trying to find out if Shante was dating someone else, but Kennedy told me that if I really wanted her attention, I needed to stop acting pathetic and start being myself again. That’s the guy she would want. So, then I started going to her for advice about getting back out there and dating women. I didn’t want y’all to know so that’s why it was side convos and shit. At the graduation party we were talking about how she couldn’t convince Shante and them to come out.” Mike is feeling awkward being the only one talking as they just sit and listen. Almost like he’s doing a class presentation, but he carries on. “We would also talk about the other girls I would see or anytime my friend Cecilia and I talk Kennedy would try to convince me she is more than just a friend. Eventually, I started the job hunt and realized Kennedy is the only other person that is walking at the same time as me in May. So, we’ve been talking about what we’re each planning for after graduation, getting fresh starts, me feeling like I’m doing this alone, still me dating chicks, and even her being scared of having to date again…a bunch of shit we didn’t want to make y’all talk about. I was trying to not throw it in your face, especially since you aren’t graduating yet.”

They know Mike well and they know from his body language and tone that he is being genuine with them, and they respect it. What he says makes sense, but Jairus in particular tends to see red flags based on his past experiences. Mike gets it and isn’t upset by it, but he appreciates it when Jairus says, “Aye, my bad young. I should’ve known better.” It’s his way of saying he was sorry for questioning his character. Although they never discuss it amongst them, none of them would take lightly to disrespecting Ovaughn’s memory and for them Kennedy is a part of that. It’s an unsaid fact that they are the best relationship any of them saw occur within their friend group. It is almost sacred to them.

In the following weeks Spring Break is upon them. They have all been very focused this semester with Mike and Jairus both on their way to achieving 4.0 GPA’s or close to it and Duc looking like he’s going to make it to a 3.0 or better. With all their hard work, they make big plans for the break inspired by Anthony, who has been constantly trying to get them to visit his home city of New Orleans since they missed Essence Festival last summer. So, for Spring Break they travel to New Orleans with Anthony to experience Mardi Gras. They are in need of the time away from school and are looking forward to doing something big together before Mike graduates. Anthony doesn’t have enough room at his parents’ home for them all to stay so they get a hotel for the long weekend. They get a suite with two bedrooms. A king size bed that Duc pays extra to have and two Queen's in the second room that are fine with Mike and Jairus. There’s even a pullout couch in the living room in case Anthony wants to crash one night instead of going back home every night.

With Anthony as their guide, they spend their days touring different parts of the city. They get to see the real New Orleans, although they do force Anthony to take them to some places and restaurants he has no interest in since he is a native. At night they are completely in the mix taking part in the crazy and wild behavior on Bourbon Street. Every night Jairus and Mike find themselves amazed at how wild the white people are willing to act for some worthless beads or a drink. They are just looking for a reason to be wild. They think it’s like the white freak-nick. Or at least what they imagine it being since they are all a few years too young to have actually experienced it before it ended. The more they see each night the more adventurous they become themselves until eventually they start flirting and hitting on some of the wild white women themselves. Eventually the four of them find themselves with a group of girls from the Midwest who are just as unfamiliar with black men as they are with them.

One of the girls, named Mandy, is particularly forward and Duc loves it. She isn’t the best looking out of the group to the guys but she’s pretty and slim with a personality that stands out. Duc’s outward demeanor and gift of gab along with her unfiltered aggressiveness lead to heavy flirting as the groups begin to share drinks and talk. Along with the first girl there is Stephanie, who is loud. She finds any reason to get excited and seemingly cheers on anything good or fun she and her friends are doing. She spends the night reacting to everything by yelling out statements no matter how vulgar like, “You better put it on him Mandy” and “Deep throat that shot, bitch!” The guys realize quickly she is what they would probably call a “party girl” and just wants to have a wild time. For some reason she takes a liking to Jairus and makes a point to initiate physical contact with him as the group is talking with things like rubbing the back of his neck or his chest while loudly saying how attractive he is. He thinks she is annoying but overlooks it because she is the only one of the group who has a body “like a black woman.” The other two girls are Amy and Sarah. They are the prettiest of the girls but also seem to have the coolest personalities, especially for sheltered Midwest girls who may have never seen black men in person before. They are mildly flirtatious but are just cool having regular conversation with Mike and Anthony. Mike and Anthony are intrigued by the thought of white women actually being into them.

They all begin to bar hop together since they are having fun and entertaining each other. As the drinks flow, Duc and Mandy become more flirtatious. They go from smart quips back and forth making the crowd laugh to him leaning into her as she sits on a bar stool whispering in her ear and her doing the same in response. Mike and Jairus know where this is going. They have seen him in action before. As they move from the second to the third bar, Anthony runs into some friends from high school and stops to catch up with them going in another direction. He tells the guys he will catch back up to them, but Mike looks at the group. It’s mostly women and he wouldn’t come back either. His expectations of seeing Anthony again get very low when he says, “Y’all know how to get back to the hotel from here right” just before he walks away.

Hearing the hotel room mentioned is all Stephanie needs to start persuading the group. As they get the first round of drinks at the next bar, she starts yelling things like, “Let’s take this party to the room” and “Somebody needs to take me to the hotel” while giving Jairus looks. The guys start thinking about how much money they’re spending, the fact that they have alcohol in the suite and decide she is right. Everyone seems to be fine with the idea of free alcohol and personal space, so they make their way to the hotel. The entire walk there Jairus can’t help but think about how he’s barely ever spoken to white people most of his life, let alone have a white woman throwing herself at him. He starts to get anxious although he doesn’t show it to them.

They arrive at the hotel room and Duc immediately pours out some drinks for everyone. It doesn’t take long for Mandy to call him out. “Don’t talk all that shit at the bars and get to the room and act timid.” He is shocked at just how forward she can be. Before he can respond she pushes him backwards and asks which room is his until they disappear behind the closed door. The rest of them try to laugh it off for a moment with neither group being surprised at their respective friends’ behavior.

It is momentary before Stephanie loudly says, “Hell, I’m not going to sit out here and just listen to them. You better come in this room” as she grabs Jairus by the hand and leads him to the other bedroom. Now Mike is sitting there with both Amy and Sarah. He is stuck and feeling very awkward as the three of them start to hear sounds coming from the bedrooms. All he can think of is to turn on the television, so he asks the girls if they want to move from the kitchen table to the couch. Amy offers to let Sarah and Mike go over the couch alone since she has been primarily talking to Anthony and Sarah to Mike.

Amy doesn’t want to get in the way of her friend but the best she can do is go across the room and kill the lights. Mike doesn’t take her up on the offer and tells her it’s cool for her to sit on the couch, too. The three of them sit and talk. Mike starts off asking “So, what made y’all come down for Mardi Gras? Do y'all come every year?” Amy, still trying not to impose, allows Sarah to respond. “We’ve never been but heard so many wild stories we had to come check it out for ourselves. It is the same time as our spring break too.” “Oh, so y’all are just like us. Well, Anthony is from here but he keeps telling us to come to New Orleans. Just happened that Mardi Gras is during our spring break too.” Mike replies. They realize they have more in common than expected since they are all in college. “So, where do y’all go to school?” Mike asks them. Sarah responds, “It’s a small school in Nebraska. You’ve probably never heard of it.” Without even thinking Mike instantly responds to Nebraska and says, ”So, y’all don’t have any black folks at that school, huh?” This gets Amy to finally break her silence as she bursts into laughter causing them all to laugh. Mike then continues “It’s cool. We don’t have any white folks at our school either.” They are all in the process of discovering who they are and aren’t and a lot of those experiences are universal. They also find a lot of interest in how different they are, being from environments where they don’t see a lot of folks that don’t look like them. The more they talk, the more they like each other, and the girls appreciate that Mike isn’t the type of guy who tries to press the issue of sex on them. They all get a laugh when Sarah jokes “Had I known how nice you are I would have made sure we beat Stephanie to the room.” Mike is cool with how things go down but knows he’s going to get clowned by his friends for being the only one who can’t “close the deal,” but there’s nothing he can do about what they say.

After nearly an hour Duc’s bedroom door slowly opens. He peaks his head out to see if everyone is decent on the couch before coming out. He and Mandy find Mike cuddled up on the couch with Amy and Sarah. Duc throws out a joke at Mike, “You out here waiting for a room to open up?” but Mandy quickly tells him “stop it.” Mike just ignores him, shaking his head. The five of them begin to talk some and then they hear the noises from the other room begin to grow louder again. The noises from the room stop and start again a few times for the next hour and a half leading Mandy to say, “shit, maybe I picked the wrong one” getting a huge laugh from everyone. When Jairus and Stephanie finally come out of the room the other three girls all give him a round of applause. Stephanie loudly bursts into laughter telling them to stop. She is now somehow bashful and after another shot of vodka telling her friends she is ready to go. A few moments later the guys are at the door saying goodbye to their respective partners. Mandy turns to Duc at the door and kisses him on the cheek before saying, “that was fun…have a good life” and winking as she walks out. He smirks at her in return and says good night. Stephanie walks up to Jairus and grabs his crotch simply saying “Mmm” before turning away and yelling “Bye!” He is left standing there in shock. And lastly Mike tells Amy and Sarah “it was cool talking to you”, not expecting nearly the goodbye his friends got but Amy grabs his hand and pulls him close and gives him a big kiss. His eyes get big as he is surprised by the gesture. Sarah then walks up and grabs the back of his neck and French kisses him before saying, “Thanks Mike,” and walking out. He thinks maybe they are trying to make him look better but he isn’t telling that to Duc and Jairus as he just grins as they walk to the hotel hallway.

Sunday is their last day in New Orleans, and they have a late flight back to Atlanta. They plan to just chill that day knowing they will be on the late flight and getting up first thing Monday morning for class. The only thing they have on the agenda for the last day is to go visit Ovaughn’s parents. They sleep in to recover from the late night and, after Anthony drops them off, arrive at the Stover home around noon. They are greeted by a large amount of food that Omelia prepared for the boys, which is perfect for them because they are starving. They catch up over meals and Oscar gets more in depth with how the boys have been doing in school and life. Providing them guidance and warning them of where to avoid trouble all while pushing them to be their best. He’s full of advice for Mike’s upcoming career decision, direct in telling Duc he has to tighten it up, and happy to hear that Jairus has started talking to his father. Every time they talk to him, they remember Ovaughn speaking about his coach parenting style, and they know he’s everything they have ever heard about him. They also do a lot of reminiscing about Ovaughn in the process. The end of the trip is the most special part for them all. They talk all afternoon and early evening until they have to leave to get ready for their flights and make their way back to Atlanta.

When they return to Atlanta there is just over a month left in the semester but for Mike it still feels like there is a ton to get done. The first thing he does is email a copy of his resume to Oscar. He told him that he will check to see if they have any entry level business positions with the NBA team when Mike told him about his job search. He also has some other business connections around New Orleans he is going to look into for potential opportunities for him. Mike fell in love with New Orleans during Mardi Gras and jumped at the idea of finding a job opportunity there when it came up. Sooner than he expects he begins to receive responses for jobs he interviewed for, most of which are positive and include an offer and starting salary. He promises Duc and Jairus he will keep them in the loop on this part of the process. They don’t want him to feel like he can’t include them in this milestone even though they won’t be graduating along with him. It seems like each week came with an offer or two for a couple of weeks and Mike quickly notices that even though his boys are always happy for him they lean towards him taking the offers in Atlanta. He has a huge decision to make but is holding out hope of hearing something back from anyone in New Orleans before he decides.