Chapter 35

Two weeks passed with alarming speed. There wasn’t much for either boy to do to get ready to go. Each would have a suitcase, with some clothes in it, but that was about it. The gold coins would be carried in their pockets.

Bernadette stayed away from Curtis Lee, primarily because she couldn’t stand to be around him and not be able to touch him. This time of the month was a very bad time to let him touch her. The other kids were willing, after their overdose of dangerous sex, to stay apart, though, as the summer wore on that would change. Nathan also stayed away from Flossie. With things going so well, neither of them wanted to take a chance on being caught now. That lasted until the night before they were to go.

They couldn’t resist meeting then. Flossie was tense. She had been tense for weeks. Their interlude on the 4th of July had been a welcome relief, even though she had worried about all that sperm. Her period had started on the 6th, brought on early, she thought, because of all that sexual activity, but it had still been welcome, particularly because it was abnormally short. Now, six days after she had stopped, she felt sure that it was too early for their last night to do any harm. She could not know that her emotional highs and lows, and the tension, had affected her body in ways that, had she known, would have changed her plans. She could not know that an ovary had dropped another egg days sooner than usual, or that the egg was already halfway to her womb, safe and viable in the fallopian tube that was its highway.

When Nathan’s millions of sperm entered her this night, her uterus was awash with them, battling for the chance to meet and conquer that egg. They died by the millions, their little tails wagging slower and slower as they ran out of energy. When Nathan left her, half were already dying. When he got into his mother’s car the next morning, only hundreds of thousands were left alive. By the time he and Curtis Lee were on the bus, sitting in different sections, because the bus was segregated, the number had dropped to thousands that still wiggled and swam. As Nathan nodded off, letting the miles flow under the tires of the bus as it took him away from her, several hundred sperm cells found a dark tunnel to swim up into. One, the strongest of them all ... the most persistent ... was the one destined, by the time the bus stopped for lunch in Arkansas, to make Nathan a father.

Again, he had left part of himself with his lover. This time, that part of him would still be in her body when he saw her next.

The first thing they did was find a coin shop and inquire about the worth of the coins they had. Nathan explained that his grandfather had left them to him, and that now that he was striking out on his own, he was thinking about converting them to cash. The man said they were in remarkably good condition, and offered eighty dollars apiece for all five coins. When Nathan said he actually had ten, the man licked his lips and started counting out cash.

The next thing they did was buy a car for a hundred and fifty dollars.

Then they checked in at the address Nathan’s mother had given him. They were told when to report for testing, and provided a voucher for staying at a motel for two days and three nights. It was good up until the night of the test, but they were warned they’d have to pay back the money if they failed the test. If they passed, they’d be given a dormitory room in the academy until the next class started. No one seemed to think it was odd that Curtis Lee had showed up, or that he wanted to be a policeman. Two of the people they dealt with in the application process were also colored, and they worked right alongside white people. It was a whole new experience.

The test was almost a let down. There were only ten people in the room. There was no mood of excitement, or anticipation. It was almost like taking a test in school. You didn’t have to wait for the results, but if you elected to, your test was graded first. They waited, along with two others who wanted to know how they did right away. The results of that were anticlimactic too. A mousy looking man came out, called out a name and handed whoever answered a piece of paper. One of the other’s name was called first, and as he looked at the paper he cursed, wadded it up, tossed it in a corner, and stomped out. Waggoner was called before Wilson. The paper told them they’d passed, and to report to the academy for an interview and room assignment. That was it. On the way out, Nathan picked up the paper the other man had thrown away. It said they were sorry, but that he had not passed. It gave instructions on when he could take the test again.

The interview was more interesting. They were interviewed separately, but compared notes later. There were quite normal questions, about where you were from, and what you liked and didn’t like. They asked if you’d ever been arrested, or in trouble with the law. But then there were other questions, asked by a man with slicked back hair and horn-rimmed glasses. Those were questions like “If you came upon an accident scene, and there was a mother and her child injured, and you could only save one of them, which one would you save?” Another was “Would you rather fly or drive to Canada?” Those questions didn’t seem to have a right answer, and they were thrown in between normal questions.

They were sent to another office to draw uniforms, equipment, books and get a dormitory assignment. Whey they asked to room together, no one seemed to think that was odd.

The academy would make a story in itself, but that’s for another time, except for a couple of things. Neither the physical demands, nor the academic work caused either of them to sweat. They studied together, quizzed each other, and worked hard. It was six weeks long and it was tough in the sense that they had no time for themselves, except on weekends. Those weekends were instructive too. Initially, with their soft Southern drawls, they were made fun of and assumed to be bumpkins. But, when they consistently scored first and second, alternating in those positions in the academic standings, people began to realize that these two were sharp cookies. Weekends found others in the academy gravitating toward them, and in those few short weeks, they found themselves with a large group of friends, both black and white. The groups didn’t mix well, at first, because even in this much more relaxed city, cultures were different enough that there was uneasiness. But, as they sat around drinking beer and telling stories about home, they found that they weren’t so different, and bonds formed. Four of the recruits in the class lived in Kansas City, and Bar B Ques happened that brought both blacks and whites into parts of the city they were rarely, or had never been seen in before.

Quite suddenly, it seemed, the graduation ceremony was done, and they were hunting for an place to live. They had one week to get situated, and then report for work.

One of the things they learned in school was that Nathan and Flossie couldn’t get married in Missouri. It was against the law. Not only was it illegal to get married in Missouri, it was also against the law for an interracial couple who were married somewhere else to live as husband and wife in Missouri. It was one of the few laws that segregated people by race, but because of that, Nathan had to find a place to live on the Kansas side of town. He rented a post office box in Missouri to use as an address on all his records.

Curtis Lee was amazed at Kansas City on a number of levels. It was segregated, but it was segregated by pure bigotry, as opposed to law. What that meant was that, if someone was a racist, he or she would treat Curtis Lee just like he had been treated back home. On the other hand, everybody else treated him like ... everybody else. There were no signs saying “Colored Only”, or “White Only”. He could go into any store or restaurant. He might get the cold shoulder, but no one yelled at him and said he had to leave. People might say things to let him know he wasn’t welcome, but they almost never cursed at him or ordered him around. It was jarring, because you could tell a racist to go jump in a lake, and nobody would do anything to you at all. On the other hand, he and Nathan couldn’t find any place to live, because they wanted to live together, and all the landlords in decent places wouldn’t allow a colored tenant. Nathan could rent anything, but Curtis Lee wasn’t welcome.

The sad part was that any place Curtis Lee could rent, meant the people who lived around there didn’t want Nathan living with him! No honkys allowed, no sir!

It was through the new friendships they had forged that they found a place to live. It was owned by the grandfather of one of their classmates. The grandfather had farmed, but was now retired and in a nursing home. The family didn’t want to let the land go, but they didn’t want to live there or farm it either. The offer was made that, if they’d take care of the place, they could rent it for fifty dollars a month.

It was an old two story farmhouse in Wyandotte County, north of County Line road about five or six miles. That put it near both the Rosedale area, which was all colored, and a rough part of town, as well as Mission Hills and Prairie Village, which were affluent white suburbs. There were four bedrooms upstairs, and a large parlor, living room, dining room and kitchen downstairs. There was no insulation in the walls, but there was a huge old pot-bellied stove for use in the winter, and ample wood on the property. The barns were full of old equipment. Grandpa’s furniture, dishes, books, and even some of his clothing had been left there, along with a shop full of tools.

It was quiet, remote, and perfect, as far as they were concerned. They arranged for the utilities to be turned on, including their own phone number. It was a party line, but there were only two other families on the circuit, and both of them were elderly.

Their first call, of course, was to Nathan’s mother.

Marian was almost frantic with relief when she heard Nathan’s voice on the line.

“Where have you been?“ she yelled into the phone. “It’s been almost two months!“

“Calm down, Mamma, we’re fine. We both graduated, and we have a house to live in and a phone and everything! I’m calling you on our phone right this minute!”

He had to apologize two or three times for worrying her “half to death!“, but eventually she cut him off. Her voice was terse.

“Flossie’s pregnant!” she moaned into the phone. “And things are happening around here you wouldn’t believe!“

Nathan was stunned at the news that he was going to be a father, but part of him was elated too. He peppered her with questions, and found out Flossie had tendered her resignation to the town fathers two weeks after she missed her first period. Even though they hadn’t heard from him, she was working on faith that his situation was working out. She couldn’t appear in school the next year with a swelling belly, and no husband.

The next news made Nathan have to sit down. His mother had offered, and been hired, to take Flossie’s place.

“But you’re not a teacher!” he gasped.

“I know that, but they have to have somebody!“ she said back excitedly. “And it’s only temporary, until they can get a new school built and hire a proper teacher.”

“A new school?” he asked, amazed.

“Harvey’s finally getting his way,” she said. “When I offered to teach, I sort of didn’t tell him I was going to, and they accepted and everything, and then he found out. I thought he was going to have a conniption fit, Nathan! He said there was no way I was going to teach in that school. He got on the phone and yelled and screamed or something, because the State is going to build a new schoolhouse!”

“Wow, that’s great, Mamma,” said Nathan, dazed.

“Well, it didn’t all work out,” she went on. “They’ll only build one school, because of those Supreme Court people up there in Washington. He’s fit to be tied that I’m teaching Negroes. He’s acting so angry, and Flossie doesn’t know what she’s going to do! She’s been helping me with lesson plans and all that, but the only time we can meet is at school, when he’s at work. She’s been showing me how to teach. How in the world did she ever teach you all those things in that horrible old place? Oh I wish you were here, Nathan.”