Birth of a Dark Nation Read Free Page A

Now
that I could see him full on, I saw the depths of his beauty. He
wasn't plain at all, nor was he sinister. He had impossibly dark
eyes and a smooth, dark brown face. His dreadlocks crowned him
perfectly.
    "I don't need any music," I said, suddenly
full of confidence. "But I'll tell you what-find me some movies
that are stronger than an R rating, and we can talk."
    He looked at me quizzically.
    "Oh…you mean you want some of them nasty
movies? Some triple X?"
    "Yeah. Sure."
    "I gotchu. Where you be at?"
    "I work across the street at Magdalene."
    "Aight bet. I'ma be back through here with
some flicks on Friday, aight?"
    "Bet," I replied. I jogged back across the
busy street.
    What was I doing? Did I really just arrange
for my friendly neighborhood bootleg man to bring me some X-rated
movies in front of my job?
    Yes. I did.
    He was kind of cute though. Might be nice to
see him again. And I was somewhat of a connoisseur of pornography,
so why not? Straight, gay, whatever—I just liked porn. Not like
there was much else to do with my free time.
    ~
    Toward the end of the day, I got notification
of an event I had put on my calendar. The Syracuse alumni chapter
in DC was putting on another one of their happy hours downtown. I
didn't really want to go, but I didn't have any reason not to.
Maybe I could do some networking or something. Or maybe find a
dude.
    I looked very much like an IT professional
that evening. Navy blue polo shirt and khaki pants. Nothing
special. I looked like everybody else coming from work on the train
I took to get to Gallery Place.
    I exited the train right by the humongous
Chinatown arch extending over H Street. Chinatown is like a tiny
version of Times Square. Lights and LED signs blink all over the
place and the streets are clogged with tourists toting digital SLR
cameras they never take off automatic mode.
    The happy hour was at this Spanish tapas
place. A tall, bald white guy dressed in his best business casual
with an Orangemen button on his shirt shook my hand and asked me
when I graduated. I told him and he smiled, noting that he'd never
seen me at a function before. I said I normally didn't come, but I
figure I might as well see what it was all about. He smirked.
    The Syracuse folk had an area in the back
sectioned off with orange balloons. I sat at the furthest corner
table and looked at the "Syracuse Specials," as they were called. I
ordered some kind of apple and walnut salad and something with
scallops. They were cheap.
    I didn't really feel like talking, but I
forced myself to make sounds come out of my mouth when the white
people I didn't know asked me questions they didn't care about.
    Computer science , when asked my
major.
    For about eight years , when asked how
long I'd lived in DC.
    Yes , I remembered Tasha-Lynn Williams,
the African American president of the Student Association and the
only other black student they personally knew.
    No, I didn't know where she was
now.
    No, I didn't know where any of the
basketball players ended up.
    I hurriedly downed my first and second beers
and contemplated a third micro-plate of Spanish food.
    Just when I thought the evening couldn't get
any more vapid, in strolled the hosts from BET's 106 and Park.
    Okay, not really. But it was just as bad.
    I never connected closely with my African
American classmates at 'Cuse. I mean sure, I had my close friends
and suitemates. But I wasn't that dude who joined the Black Student
Alliance or waged protests. That was fine for some. I just wanted
to graduate, play some video games, and maybe smoke a little
weed.
    But these other people, the ones who put on
full faces of makeup and carried leather satchels just to go to
class, had morphed into a shiny black buppy class that did happy
hours and brunch and spent money they couldn't afford on galas for
causes they didn't care about, just in the name of being seen.
    These were not my kind of people.
    "Hey Justin man, how you doing!"
    "Long time no see!"
    "Where you