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Back Liliane
Chapters (31)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Dedication
  4. Contents
  5. Room in the Dark I
  6. Fawns of the Diaspora Court Liliane in Paris, While Tabou Combo Whispers “Coq Qualité” in Her Ears
  7. Room in the Dark II
  8. “I Usedta Drink, Smoke and Do the Hoochie-Koo,” or What’s a Girl to Do When Her Mother Looks Like Ruth Brown
  9. Room in the Dark III
  10. “El Bochinche” es que only Fe Cortijo Knows or All the LeBron Brothers Know If Victor-Jésus María Sang Lili to Her Freedom
  11. Room in the Dark IV
  12. And Where Is Garnett Mimms?
  13. Room in the Dark V
  14. I Know Where Kansas City Is, But Did Wilbert Harrison Ever Get There?
  15. Room in the Dark VI
  16. Zoom Went the Strings of Liliane’s Heart, But Arsenio Rodriguez Could Have Told Her the Music Sounds Just as Sweet When We’re Blind and Still We See
  17. Room in the Dark VII
  18. I Know Where the E Train Stops But I’m “Sendin’ Out an S.O.S.” and I’m Not Edwin Starr Either
  19. Room in the Dark VIII
  20. “Happy, Happy Birthday, Baby” or Wouldn’t It Be Great If the Lead Singer of The Crests Wasn’t a White Boy and I Could Be My Mother?
  21. Room in the Dark IX
  22. Every Time My Lil World Seems Blue, I Just Haveta Look at You and Learn Eye-Hand Coordination
  23. Room in the Dark X
  24. “That’s Why I Love Her So and Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, I Want to Know” or Why Jackie Wilson Died in Silence
  25. Room in the Dark XI
  26. There’s No Use Cryin’ “Forever” or Hyacinthe Returns from a Very Blue Holiday for Real B(l)ack at Ya
  27. Room in the Dark XII
  28. Lollie Struts Her Stuff Thru “The Sea of Love” or the Brides of Frankenstein Catch the Bouquet
  29. By Ntozake Shange
  30. Acknowledgments
  31. Copyright

I looked up by the arch to fine dining and he was gone. He was gone. I heard The Chantels weeping “He’s gone, My baby left me.” But I don’t know who this guy is. Nadia thinks I made him up, he exists in my mind, she says. I’m having a panic attack. I go to my notebooks. There he is. There he is again. He’s real. I’ve got him right here. I look up. Heads of Sly Stone-looking muthafuckahs get in my way. Jerri-Curl and Luther van Dross types block my view. Boyz, early in the scene, put they nasty-lookin’ sweatshirt-hooded heads in my way. I don’t know what he looks like. I mean, only I know what he looks like. He’s disappeared. I can’t breathe. I can’t find him. I push the cognac Nadia’s brought me aside. I decide to search for him. He could not have left. He means too much to me. He cannot be gone.

Trying to get niggahs busy chatting up a girl to get out of my way is almost a lost cause. I think their feet grow in my direction when I’m not looking for them, but somebody else. Trip bitch! their feet proclaim. I keep looking in men’s faces. Other men I don’t know. I don’t know his face, either. I should walk backward, looking for his braids. I know his braids, black twists they are really not braids at all. They come down his back like a black surf; like black string cheese. I know this. I should go backward. He would never have left me. I take him home every night. I take him home with me.

And I can’t find him.

And I don’t know how to ask for him.

I don’t know his face, though I feel it.

I don’t know his name, though I breathe it.

I sleep under a six-foot incarnation of his braids in bronze. This is not funny. I’m not in control of this. I can’t stop myself from laughing. I need to find this guy I don’t know. Yeah. Everybody does, they say, “I don’t know his name, but I’ll recognize him.” “Right!” “Baby, you sure you not talkin’ bout me?” “Look close, now.”