Dignity and Disgrace

The air conditioner hummed noisily as he lay awake in the chilly dormitory room. His anticipation grew stronger and more cantankerous as the night steadily progressed.

I cannot believe I’m graduating from college in the morning.

This thought incessantly entered his mind as he stared at the plain wall above him. It circulated through every crevice of his brain. As he reflected, a tear formed in his eye, but he quickly brushed it away. His graduation was not necessarily unexpected, particularly because he came from a rich Californian family, but the completion of this journey triggered a euphoric disbelief. Regardless of this strangely satisfying melancholy, he knew that he could not begin crying. To him, crying symbolized weakness, regardless of the cause. Still, he had to express his gratefulness in some form. He began to reflect more pensively. Maybe the source of the tears stemmed from the night, so long ago, when dignity and disgrace were exchanged instantaneously.

Get on the ground! Now!

The chilling memory of being slammed to the ground flooded his consciousness.

Officer, this is a misunderstanding. I have done nothing wrong.

Shut up, boy! You talk when I permit you to talk.

Fear rushed through his body as blood dripped from his cheek. His thorough confusion lasted briefly as pain rushed through his body. That morning, he had just intended to celebrate the completion of high school; now, he was in police custody and staring at an unyielding and unforgiving cold wall of a jail cell.

The sound of the alarm startled him. He realized how much time has passed as he had drifted away in his thoughts. The day had finally arrived and, as he rose to take a shower, an overwhelming sense of calm spread throughout his being. As he walked to the bathroom, a brief thought about her entered his mind. He knew exactly what he would do once he was finished getting ready.

Hey baby. Ready for our big day?

He beleaguered over the exact wording of the text because of the fight that occurred the previous night. He couldn’t remember when the conflict began. He recalled an enjoyable dinner, but that memory quickly faded into the cacophony of screams.

You refuse to let me in! I have given everything to you and have received little in return.

In his mind, and particularly for this situation, simplicity would likely have more of an impact than a profuse apology. The minutes between the outreach and the response felt as long as the period preceding Beloved’s death at the hands of Sethe.

Hey X. Yeah, hard to believe it’s finally here.

Relief quickly announced its presence and made a home in his calm and collected composure. It was unexpectedly accompanied by a deep desire to make love to her.

I need to see you. Can I come to your place?

As he set out his graduation robe, he thought that a love-making session could possibly assuage the inevitable tension that would otherwise be inherent in their myriad interactions over the next few days. Then, as suddenly as his passion took prevalence over his thoughts, his mind began to drift to the first days of their romance.

I love you.

He uttered those three forbidden words without hesitation. Admittedly, after a tumultuous year and a half courtship, it was difficult. As difficult as Beatrice’s decision to kill Eugene. But the choice was born out of an unspoken necessity. Given the back and forth nature of the relationship, reluctance did not quite capture the intensity of the emotion he felt. She looked at him with a gaze that evoked surprise and curiosity. It seemed like the period lasted for hours. She finally spoke, but her words fell on deaf ears. He immediately recognized that the tone indicated the typical non-compliance that he had grown accustomed to in the past 18 months.

Well…

He was resigned to curse her and the effort he had consistently put forth, but she uttered the four words that released him from his cage of insecurity into the freedom of acceptance.

I love you too.

He could not adequately express how content he was to hear those words. They lifted him to a place that he had only achieved by retreating to his vast collection of books as a teenager. Morrison’s Love. Faulkner’s Sanctuary. Baldwin’s Another Country. He would finally be able to share the most intimate details of himself with the woman to whom he had devoted his attention. He could finally tell his beloved about the deep shame associated with that dark period of his life.

The phone rang and interrupted his wildly disjointed train of thought.

Hello sir.

Son, we’re coming to take you out to eat before the ceremony. We’ll be there in fifteen minutes.

Sounds good sir. See you soon.

As long as X could remember, the authoritative voice of the District Attorney dominated wherever it was presented. He strained to think of a time when he viewed his father not as the District Attorney, but as his father. The District Attorney’s conservatism had created a rigid childhood that was rooted in structure. He would tolerate no less than perfection, particularly because X was an only child. Honors courses, football, piano lessons, church. The list continued as long as each excruciating moment of X’s stressful upbringing. When he was seven, X determined that he would never again call the man father. He came to this realization when he observed his father screaming at his mother in a drunken rage.

Shut up! This is my house and my rule is law! I will not entertain insubordination!

Reflecting on that moment 15 years later, he realized the irony of it all: the pious district attorney had just come from a church meeting to announce his campaign to the parishioners, and, just hours later, he was attempting to tear down the woman who he publically claimed to adore. X recalled this moment with extreme clarity and, at that point in his childhood, he realized that he would never be able to reconcile the man he saw in public with the villain he witnessed in private.

X used sir when he addressed him, but he attempted to avoid situations in which he had to talk to the District Attorney. For the first time, as he smoothed the creases in the graduation robe, he began to wonder about the source of the District Attorney’s impossibly high standards. Perhaps it was because of his status as an impoverished child of a teenage mother. Or maybe it resulted from the absence of his father and the bitter indifference of his grandparents. X vividly recalled a time in which he snuck into the District Attorney’s study, rummaged through his book collection for a new read and happened upon an old leather-bound book. There was a marker on a page half way through it, and X quickly read the faded text:

March 21, 1985

As I return from my final spring break of my undergraduate years, I find myself particularly reflective. My childhood was tough, and I lived in dire poverty. In the absence of material possessions, I searched for affection in numerous places to no avail. Then, I discovered the power of Jesus Christ by attending a church service with a neighborhood friend. I am about to be the first person in my family to graduate from college, and I owe it all to the redeeming grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. I pray that when I one day start a family, I will be able to instill a deep-rooted appreciation of the Lord in my children. I will become an attorney to teach my community the value of working for oneself and not relying on the government for assistance.

Typical District Attorney. Always preaching, but a fervent opponent of altruism and compassion.

As he reflected on the passage, X thought of the numerous ways in which he tried to rebel against the District Attorney as a child. He was generally unsuccessful because of the stoic nature of the man-who-he-could-not-bring-himself-to-call-father. However, he thought back to that dark time, the only solid memory he had of the district attorney assisting him. For all of the contempt he had for the man, he had to begrudgingly acknowledge that had it not been for the District Attorney, his college graduation would not be occurring.

Ambivalence. That is what I feel toward him and that is what I will entitle my next poem.

Whatever the case, the District Attorney had resolved to overcome his circumstances through, what he called in countless campaign speeches, the liberating power of education. As a summa cum laude first-generation college graduate, the District Attorney’s path to law school was as cleanly paved as the road that led to the gated community in which he now resided. The politician was born. X laughed as he thought of the predictability of the rest of the narrative. The District Attorney married a law school classmate, had one son, and began to establish his supposedly beneficial mark on the world.

The District Attorney’s verbal abuse and dual nature inspired contempt in X, but it did not originate out of sympathy for his mother. Although she was a law professor, an indelible blandness overpowered her impressive intellect. As he searched the repository of his mind, he could not find a discernible memory of her. She was always just present to him. A necessary prop in the District Attorney’s perfectly portrayed world, but nothing more.

Ten minutes had passed and he remembered to look at his phone to see her response.

Spending the morning with my family. I’ll see you at dinner.

X smirked. After all this time, she knew him better than he knew himself. He could see her expression as if she were in the room. Her lips would form a terse smile and that would convey everything he needed to know in that moment. He left his room and headed for the car that would carry him to breakfast. He hoped the sustenance would calm his racing mind.