OZZIE
The sun had gone down on the annual Memorial Day block party, but the smells of charcoal, barbecue sauce, and smoke still ruled the air. The women of Ringgold Street were covering leftovers of chicken, chitterlings, pig feet, creamy potato salad, and collard greens with tinfoil while pushing children with pound-cake and oatmeal-cookie crumbs in the corners of their mouth into the two-story row houses.
First thing that morning, all the cars had been cleared off the narrow one-way street, and Mr. Raymond’s Teletalk speaker had been placed in the middle of the block. The mothers had insisted that the day start with the gospel sounds of the Blind Boys of Alabama and the Dixie Hummingbirds; the young folks took over in the afternoon, swinging in a circle to Louis Jordan’s “Boogie Woogie Blue Plate”; and now the men were winding it down with homemade hooch and a game of tunk to Fats Waller’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’.”
Ozzie, who had made the mistake of guzzling three cans of Schmidt’s, sucked on an ice cube, trying to sober up, while keeping an eye out for Rita. His head felt heavy as he tried not to think aboutthis being his last evening at home. His final moment with Rita. In less than twenty-four hours, he would arrive for basic training as a volunteer for the United States Army.
Ella Fitzgerald’s “In a Sentimental Mood” crooned through the speakers as the screen door across the street finally slid open. Ozzie rocked forward, steadying his chair on all four legs as Rita’s red ankle-strapped sandal hit the top step of her limestone front steps.
She had gone inside to change her dress after some little kid had spilled cherry water ice all over her. With her curls pooled on top of her head, her long neck was left bare. The sky-blue shirtwaist dress she wore was cinched with a crimson patent belt, matching her sandals exactly. When she saw Ozzie watching her, she dipped her chin at him and batted her lashes in the way that made his heart swoon. Then she waved him over to an empty card table with a set of checkers.
“You doing all right?” she asked, fingering the chips.
Ozzie nodded, intoxicated by her smile. “How you feeling, pretty mama?”
“Can’t believe it’s your last night,” she said, pouting, and Ozzie longed to lean in and kiss her, but there were too many people out on the street.
The mothers had taken their seats with fruity drinks in Styrofoam cups and bowls of potato chips, tee-heeing over neighborhood gossip. His uncle Millard was teaching backgammon to a woman who had wandered over in a short skirt from Oakford Street.
“Got everything all packed?”
Ozzie told her that he did as Mr. Mel, the chubby man who owned the corner store, stopped at their table. He removed his hat and held it in his hand. Ozzie stood, pulling himself to his full five feet and eleven inches, his broad shoulders erect like two boulders.
“Son, I just wanted to let you know how proud we all are of you. Takes a strong man to volunteer. We’re countin’ on you to go overthere and show them. Make sure they know that the Negro man is just as heroic and capable as the white man.”
“Yes, sir.” Ozzie’s chest swelled two sizes. People had been treating him with respect all day, but this was the first time it had happened directly in front of Rita.
“Brought you a little something from me and the missus.” Mr. Mel handed him a paper bag filled with Chick-O-Sticks, licorice Snaps, Red Hots, and Squirrel Nut Zippers, all of Ozzie’s favorites. “Just a little token of our appreciation for you serving, son.”
Ozzie shook Mr. Mel’s hand, and then the older man wandered over to the tunk table.
Rita beamed. “Aren’t you the celebrity?”
“It’s been like this all day. The block mothers made me a quilt, and a few women from Bucknell Street came ’round asking me to talk some sense into their knucklehead boys.”
“Well, I’m proud of you too.” Rita touched her foot to his shin under the table. Her stroke sent a tingle up through Ozzie’s thigh, settling in his midsection. Rita and Ozzie had been going steady for over a year.
“I could say the same about you, college girl.”
“Somebody’s got to change these laws and fight for our daggone rights.”
Her Southern drawl tickled him. “You’ll make a fine lawyer.”
“First in my family. Got to, after what they did to Uncle Maceo.” She stood gingerly and wandered over to the women’s table.
Two years ago, her uncle Maceo Snipes had been shot in the back by the Ku Klux Klan after he’d cast his vote in the Georgia Democratic Primary. He’d been the first Negro in Taylor County to vote.
“Once I’m a lawyer, no more Negroes will die because they don’t have colored blood at the hospital,” Rita said, having returned with two Styrofoam cups containing a tip of clear liquor. “That’s the firstlaw I’m going to work on.” Her uncle had dragged himself three miles to the hospital only to be told that the hospital had no blood for coloreds.
“Hurts my heart still, to think that Uncle Maceo died from wounds that could have been easily treated.” Rita turned somber. After her uncle had passed, waiting on a blood transfusion, her parents had worried over her safety and sent her up to Philadelphia to stay with a great-aunt.
“I have no doubt in my mind that you’re gonna be amazing at whatever you set your sights on.”
“Glad you know it.”
Ozzie raised his cup, tapped it to Rita’s, then downed it. The clear liquor made him cough. “What was that?”
“Corn liquor.” She smirked.
