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The Return Of Simple

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Remembrances

"THE first time I was in love," said Simple, "I was in love stone-dead-bad — because I had it, and it had me, and it was the most! Love! When I look back on it now, that girl couldn't have been good-looking. When I look back on it now, she couldn't have been straight. And when I look back on it now, I must have been simple — which I were. But then I did not know what I know today. At that time I had not been beat, betrayed, misled, and bled by womens. I thought then, if I just had that girl for mine and she had me for hers, heaven on earth would be."

"Why do you choose to recall all that tonight in this bar?" I asked.

"Because I am thinking on my youthhood," said Simple.

"How old exactly are you?"

"I am going into my something-or-other year," said Simple. "Tonight is nearly my birthday, and if you are my friend, you will buy me a drink."

"I have bought you so many drinks on nights which were not your birthday before! Anyhow, what'll it be — beer?"

"Same old thing," said Simple. "I do not want to go home to Joyce with whiskey on my breath. Gimme beer. Joyce is my wife, my life, my one and all, my first to last, and the last woman I intend to clasp! But sometimes I still think about that first little old girl I were really in love with down in Virginia when I were nothing but a boy. She were older than me, that girl, but only by a year. She were darker than me, too, if that be possible. And she were sweeter than a berry on the vine. My Aunt Lucy did not approve of her because her mama had been put out of church on account of sin. But I loved that girl! I'll tell the world I did!"

"I gather your romance came to naught," I said.

"Our romance came to naught, but she weights two hundred and ten pounds now, so I have heard, and has been married twice," said Simple. "But she were the first person except Aunt Lucy who made me feel like somebody wanted me in this world, relatives included. Everybody else was always telling me, 'I am your mother, but your father went off and left you on my hands!' Or else, 'I am your father, but your mother ain't no good!' Or, 'Your poor old aunt loves you, Jesse, but your papa nor mama ain't sent a dime here to feed you since last March.'

"But this girl ain't never said nothing like that. She just said, 'Jesse B., you was meant for me.'

"I said, 'Baby, let's get with it.' And we did, until the old folks broke it up.

"I had nothing, neither did she. So her mama said, 'Let my daughter be.'

"My Aunt Lucy allowed as how I were too young to be going steady, anyhow — that I must be getting too big for my britches, telling her I knew my own mind. About that time they sent me to stay with Uncle Tige out in the country, so I did not see Lorna Jean any more, until I were passing through Richmond on my way North, running away from where I ain't been back since. At which time, I were only interested in getting North. Now here I is this evening, tonight on my birthday eve, remembering a girl I have not seen in twenty-five years, but who were once my sputnik. I wonder do Lorna Jean ever think of me as I think of her, and do she have remembrances?

"Whilst I were living with Uncle Tige, I met another girl named Elroyce. I did not fall in love with her — just sort of liked her a little bit. She were fun to go around with. Once I took her to a dance, and when I took her home, her door were locked. In that day and time down in Virginia, nobody locked doors, there being no robbers then. But her mama had locked her door, lights out, house dark. It looked like nobody lived there, house empty, as if she did not have a daughter who had gone to a dance. It were embarrassing to that young girl to have to wake up them old folks to get in. Besides, it was not that late. That young girl's parents told her to be home at midnight. It were only just a little after one o'clock when we got there. That music was so good we forgot about time.

"It might maybe have been my fault we was late, because her mama told me I could take that girl out, but she said, 'Boy, you get my chile back home here by twelve o'clock. If you don't, it will be you and me!' The way things turned out, it were me and her. That old lady tried to ruin my life."

"The night of the dance?" I asked.

"No, not the night of the dance," said Simple; "nine months later."

"Oh!" I said.

"It were worse than 'oh,'" said Simple, "because I had not touched that girl. I were just a young teen-age boy myself. All I did was kiss Elroyce once or twice on the way home from that dance, from which we walked in the night in the springtime in the sweet and scented air. But the next week, I fell for another girl — you know how young folks is. Yet come that following fall, Elroyce's mama sent for me.

"'Is you the father of her chile?'

"'What child?'

"'You see my daughter, don't you? Her chile.'

"'No, ma'am.'

"'Don't lie,' says Mama. 'Don't you lie to me about Elroyce!'

"I do not know why they always assumes the man is lying. It turned out that girl were secretly in love with me, so Elroyce told her mama I were the father of her child. Before God, I swear to this day I were not. It could not be. I had not touched her. But I left town. That is when I come North to Baltimore. It were not my offspring."

"Why bring up such unpleasant memories tonight?"

"Because her child would be twenty-five years old this year, and I wonder what he looks like."

"How do you know it was a boy?" I asked.

"It would have been a boy if I was its father," said Simple. "I would not know what to do with a girt — daughter — was I to have a girl — when she got teen-age. I would be afraid of springtime and dances and being out late for her, too, like that girl's parents was, if I was a father. But I would not never lock my door on no child of mine, no matter how late they come home. The home door, the door of home, should always be open always — else do not call it home. Rich folks' doors is locked. White folks' doors is locked. But the door to home should never be. If I had a child that stayed out all night and all day and the next day and all week, I would not lock my door against her — or him — be he boy or girl, I would not lock the door."

"Since you are not a parent, you are just theorizing," I said. "The hard realities of how to control teen-age children in this day and age baffle most people. I am sure they would baffle you."

"I baffles not easy," said Simple. "I remember how when I were in my teens, my folks did not so much lock their doors at night, but they locked their hearts. They did not try to understand me. Old folks in them days was a thousand miles and a thousand years away from their children, anyhow. I lived in the same house — but not with them, if you get what I mean. I do not believe, in this day and time, there is such a high wall between old and young. Do you think so?"

"Yes," I said, "I think there is — and always will be. Unfortunately, the gulf between the generations is a perennial one. Take rock and roll: the old folks hate it, the young folks love it."

"I must not be very old, then," said Simple. "I like rock and roll myself."

"Perhaps you are just retarded," I said.

"Which is better," said Simple, "than being discarded. I wish me and my wife had seven children."

"Why?" I said.

"So we could always keep an open door," said Simple.

Wigs, Women, and Falsies

"I WONDER why peoples, when they have their pictures taken, always take their face? Some womens," said Simple, "have much better-looking parts elsewhere."

"You can pose the doggonedest questions," I said.

"Another thing I would like to know is why people's eyebrows do not grow longer, like their hair?" asked Simple.

"I do not know," I answered.

"But, come to think of it," said Simple, "some people's hair on their heads don't grow no longer than their eyebrows. In fact, some women's hair won't hardly grow an inch. Yet most mens have to go to the barber shop every two or three weeks. It should be men's hair that won't grow, not the women's. Why is that?"

"I am not a student of human hair, man, so I cannot tell."

"I knowed a girl once who was too lazy to comb her head," said Simple, "so she bought herself a wig. But she was too lazy to comb that. She would just put it on her head like a hat, and go on down the street."

"You have certainly known some strange people," I said.

"I have, daddy-o, but I have never seen nothing worse than a wet wig," said Simple.

"A wet wig?" I asked. "Where on earth did you ever see a wet wig?"

"On the beach," said Simple. "I seed a girl lose her wig in the water out at Coney Island. That woman had no business diving under the waves when she were in swimming, but she did. And off come her wig, which started riding the waves its own self. That girl were so embarrassed that she would not come out of the water until a lifeguard rowed out in a boat and got her wig, which, by that time, were headed for the open sea. She slapped the wig on her head. But it were a sight, tangled up like a hurrah's nest, and dripping like a wet dishrag. I never did see that woman go in swimming no more. In fact, I never took her to the beach again."

"How did you ever happen to get mixed up with a woman with a wig?" I asked.

"There is no telling who a man might get mixed up with at times," said Simple, "because in them days I were young and simple myself. Besides, she did not call it a wig. She called it a 'transformation.' I do not know why they call wigs 'transformations,' because I have seen some womens put on a wig and they were not transformed at all. Now, what I would recommend to some womens is that they get wigs for their faces — which, in some cases, needs to be hidden more than their heads. Some womens is homely, jack! So if they gonna transform themselves, they ought to start in front instead of in the back."

"Some do," I said, "with falsies."

"Don't mention falsies to me," said Simple. "It's getting so nobody can tell how a woman is shaped any more, because they takes their shapes off when they get home. All those New Forms and Maiden Bras and Foam Rubber Shillouettes! I think there ought to be a law!"

"That would be a bit drastic," I said. "Don't you believe women have the right to make themselves more attractive? A little artifice here and there — lipstick, rouge, transformations, and such."

"And such too much is what some of them does," said Simple. "A wigless woman without her lipstick, rouge, and falsies would be another person. Impersonating herself, that's what! If it is wrong for a Negro to pass for white, it ought also to be wrong for any woman to pass for what she is not. Am not I right?"

"Every woman wants to put her best face forward," I said, "especially when she's out in public. At home, that's another matter. And you don't go home with every woman you see."

"I might try if my jive works," said Simple.

"You'd let yourself in for some rude shocks," I said.

"A man takes a chance these days and times," said Simple. "But then, men was born to take chances."

On Women Who Drink You Up

"HELLO, stranger! Where have you been hiding?" I asked as Simple strolled into Paddy's Bar after a noticeable absence.

"I been busy resting," he said.

"In seclusion?" I asked.

"Naw," said Simple. "I just changed bars."

"What necessitated that change?" I asked.

"Because these women around here drink a man up," said Simple.

"And after they have drunk you up, they will not act right."

"What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"You know what I mean," said Simple. "For instance, the other night I met an old girl in here, and she sat right there at that table and drunk six rumcolas — for which I paid. Also two beers for a friend of hers I had never seen before. Also a whiskey for a cousin who happened to pass by. You know, it being payday, I was free-hearted."

"Also high, I presume," I added.

"Not high," said Simple, "just feeling good. So when I walked that dame home, I said, 'Baby, lemme taste some lipstick.'

"She says, 'Oh, no! I do not kiss no strange men.'

"I said, 'What do you mean, strange — and I been knowing you since ten o'clock this evening?'

"She says, 'I knowed my husband six months before I kissed him.'

"'Where is your husband now?' I said.

"'In the army.'

"'Do he come home often on furlough?' I inquired.

"'He is in Texas,' she says, 'and that is too far.'

"'Then lemme taste some lipstick,' I begged.

"'I will not!' she hollers. 'How would you like it if you was in the army, and some wolf in sheep's clothing tried to lead your wife astray?' "'If my wife stayed out till three in the morning at a bar,' I says, 'I would think she wanted to be let astray. Also if she drunk six rum-colas, then asked for a zombie, I would know she wanted to be let astray.'

"'You did not buy me the zombie,' she says.

"'What is your name?' I asked her very quiet.

"'Zarita,' she chirped. 'Why?' "'Because,' I said, 'if I ever hear anybody say "Zarita" again, I will run the other way — and I will not look back.'

"'It do not matter to me,' she says, 'because I will be missing nothing.'

"'You will never know what you missed, baby, till you miss me,' I said.

"'If you are referring to them few drinks you bought,' she says, 'I thought you was just being a gentleman.'

"'I was,' I said, 'but now I am being a man.'

"'Excuse me,' she said. 'I do not like to be seen standing on the stoop talking to a strange man. Besides, it is chilly this evening.' And she went in and shut the door."

"I see! She left you standing in the cold," I said. "So you never did get to taste that lipstick?" "I do not care nothing about that old broad," said Simple. "Nor any other old broad that drinks a man up that way."

"So that is why you changed bars?" I said. "Don't you realize there are women like that in every bar?" "I do now," said Simple. "And I may buy one more drink for Zarita — but that is all."

"Leading army wives astray," I said, "is bad for morale."

"I reckon I am weak that way," said Simple. "Besides, if a woman wants to stray, I am here to help her. Look! Yonder comes Zarita now. Boy, lend me a couple of bucks till payday. You know, I'm kinder short."

"I thought you said you had turned away from women who drink a man dry. Haven't you learned your lesson yet?"

"I did not ask you for no sermon," said Simple. "I asked you for two bucks. It is a poor fool who cannot change his own mind ... Take it easy, pal! ... Good evening, Zarita!"

Better than a Pillow

"YOU remember I told you once about that fellow who roomed next to me in Baltimore?" Simple began to reminisce one evening.

"Jog my memory," I requested.

"He died," said Simple, "all alone, with nobody to claim his body, nobody to come and cry."

"His death made quite an impression on you, I presume."

"You presume right. After that man's dying I got to thinking about myself — suppose I was to die upstairs all alone by myself in a lonesome room! Man, I hustled up quick on a stick-close gal before the year was out. I had had three or four on-again-off-agains and plenty of fly-by-nights since I'd arrived in Baltimore City. But before I got married, this was the first woman I ever stayed with regular, the one I'm gonna tell you about. I lived with her so long she started to calling herself Mrs. Semple."

"You never told me about her," I said.

"I know I didn't. There are some things I have not told Cod — He has to find out for Himself. I am somewhatly ashamed, even now."

"I am not God, so I won't pass judgment," I said.

"Well, I will tell you. She was the first woman I ever went with steady. Also she was the first woman for which I ever kept a job. Yet and still, I did not love that woman, I don't believe. There was always other womens I had my eyes on, younger and sharper, like Marvalene, or that fly baby-faced chick named Cherie. And I did not have to give that woman I lived with my money. She did not ask for it — so I spent it on other womens. But I always went back to her. That woman was home to me.

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Excerpted from The Return Of Simple by Langston Hughes. Copyright © 1994 Ramona Bass and Arnold Rampersad, executors of the estate of Langston Hughes. Excerpted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
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