Clayton Byrd Goes Underground

  HONORS FOR THE NOVELS OF RITA WILLIAMS-GARCIA

  Newbery Honor Book

  National Book Award Finalist

  Coretta Scott King Award

  Scott O’Dell Award for Historical Fiction

  ALA Notable Book

  New York Times Editors’ Choice

  Coretta Scott King Award

  ALA Notable Book

  Publishers Weekly Best Books of the Year

  Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year

  SLJ Best Books of the Year

  ALA Booklist Editors’ Choice

  Horn Book Fanfare

  Coretta Scott King Award

  ALA Notable Book

  SLJ Best Books of the Year

  Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year

  ALA Booklist Editors’ Choice

  Horn Book Fanfare

  Washington Post Best Books of the Year

  DEDICATION

  For Fred, who is the whole show

  CONTENTS

  Dedication

  When, Cool Papa, When?

  Midnight Jam

  Lost at Sea

  A Small Wind Dance

  The Sky Is Crying

  Takers

  Empty Room

  The Four Corners of the World

  Blues Day

  House of God

  Stay Awake

  Scolding Tones

  The Plan

  Clayton Byrd Goes Underground

  Every Rider, Clap Your Hands

  Show Your Love

  Beat Boys

  The Opposite of Bluesman

  Six Rings

  Chasing the Beats

  What He Told Himself

  In the Midst of the Swarm

  In Search of the Bluesmen

  Going Down

  Without a Warning

  Guardian Angel

  Ms. Byrd and Mr. Miller

  Believe

  Sometimes a Ghost Note

  A Note from the Author

  Back Ad

  About the Author

  Books by Rita Williams-Garcia

  Credits

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  WHEN, COOL PAPA, WHEN?

  Clayton Byrd kept his eyes on Cool Papa Byrd. Cool Papa had a way with his electric blues guitar, Wah-Wah Nita. He could make her cry like no one else could.

  While the crowd waited for one last song, Clayton waited for the sign. And then it came. First, dead silence. And then, instead of picking true notes on the strings, Cool Papa hit a few ghost notes, thumping his brass thumb ring against solid wood. He slid his thumb ring’s edge along the metal strings. Electric blues sparks jumped out into the night.

  The crowd in Washington Square Park ate it up. Hungry for the last bit of blues, the people clapped and called out, “Play that thang.” Those ghostly thumps followed by twangy sparks teased the crowd. But for the Bluesmen and Clayton Byrd, the ghost notes laid out the song. Everything from chords, their order, and who would do what. The Bluesmen knew their parts. Clayton Byrd knew his.

  Jack Rabbit Jones on keyboard laid down smooth chords with his left hand while the fingers on his right hand hip-hopped across the twelve-bar blues trail. Big Mike on bass walked the bottom bass line up and then down. Hector Santos kept the beat tight on percussion with two buckets, a brass hi-hat, and a snare drum. And Clayton Byrd on harmonica, a.k.a. the Mississippi saxophone, or what Cool Papa Byrd called the “blues harp,” drew in and blew out as much life as he could between the musical spaces the Bluesmen left open for him.

  When rhythm and slow-burning funk cooked into the blues, Cool Papa Byrd spoke-sang, deep and high, raspy and smooth:

  “Trouble, don’t you find me; Trouble, leave me alone.

  I SAID, Trouble, keep your distance, Trouble, you better leave me alone.

  Every time I think I kicked you to the curb, Trouble, I turn around and find you hanging on.”

  The wave of whoops from the crowd raised up into autumn air. It was like Cool Papa said. Happy people need the blues to cry, and sad people need the blues to laugh. And while the crowd clapped, called out, and boogied on that last song, Clayton found an opening to plead his case. His silver blues harp wedged in his mouth, his head cocked toward Cool Papa Byrd, Clayton Byrd drew more air in than out, asking,

  “When, Cool Papa, when?

  When, Cool Papa, when?

  When, Cool Papa, when?”

  When?—the last “when” blown into three pleading notes.

  Instead of drowning out Clayton’s plea with Wah-Wah Nita’s full-bodied cry, Cool Papa answered back as only Cool Papa would. Cool. Clear. But sharp.

  Not yet, Little Man, not yet.

  Then louder. I SAID, Not yet, Little Man, not yet.

  Softer—Not yet, Little Man, not yet.

  Wait.

  The Bluesmen smiled and played on. They’d heard this discussion between grandfather and grandson many times over. Even though Cool Papa and Wah-Wah Nita had answered, that didn’t stop Clayton Byrd from hoping, and waiting.

  All Clayton wanted was a twelve-bar solo—not even the twice-around-the-block solo that the other Bluesmen played. He wanted twelve bars and to be a true bluesman among bluesmen. Didn’t Cool Papa tell the crowd earlier that the blues was more than a song, it was a story? Clayton knew that. Felt that. His lungs and soul were ready to pour out his own story through the ten square holes of his blues harp. He just needed Cool Papa Byrd to wave him in for a solo. Twelve bars. That was all.

  Clayton counted twenty-four bars to each man’s solo. He kept his arms at his sides, his ears open, his silver blues harp tight between his left thumb and pointer finger. His head bopped a light, steady groove. He could jump into the stream of blues like a fish since he was already in the musical swim of things.

  So when Hector Santos, the last Bluesman, hit the brass hi-hat, twelve beats in a neat, tight buildup to finish his solo—

  Clayton raised the silver harmonica to his lips, ready to draw in for that high pitch to start off his blues story.

  But Cool Papa Byrd twanged in mightily and fiercely, told “Trouble” to “stay gone,” and Clayton had no choice but to swallow the air for his solo and to come in with the Bluesmen on those final blues chords. Each voice faded out: keyboard, bass, percussion, blues harp, and blues guitar. The crowd went wild. Even better, every other person “dropped some greenback love,” as Cool Papa would say, down into Wah-Wah Nita’s open guitar case.

  Clayton kept cool, although he felt himself getting a little hot inside. He had to keep cool if he was going to hang with Cool Papa and the Bluesmen. After all, his grandfather could have left him with his neighbor Omar’s family. Or with his father, who wanted to field foul balls or show Clayton his baseball card collection. Clayton did those things with his father once a month. Once a month was enough.

  Before it was completely dark, the Bluesmen and Clayton boarded the uptown train with their instruments. They laughed among themselves and said the set was tight and the “take” was good.

  Clayton agreed, but his cool had worn off. “Cool Papa. When do I get my solo?”

  “Yeah, Cool Papa,” Jack Rabbit Jones said. “He’s in the union. Clayton, show ’im your union card.” He meant his blues harp.

  The Bluesmen laughed.

  Clayton smiled but didn’t laugh.

  Cool Papa answered, “When you can bend that note proper, I’ll wave you in. For now, just play rhythm. You’ll be all right.”

  “I can bend it,” Clayton said. He raised his harmonica to his lips, cupped his hand around his blues harp, and sucked in hard to show his grandfather. Riders on the train roused from their dead gazes. “You tell him, baby!
” one lady shouted.

  Big Mike cupped Clayton’s head with fat, square fingers. “It’s coming,” he said. Jack Rabbit Jones and Hector Santos agreed.

  Cool Papa disagreed. “No, son,” he said with a smile in his eyes. “Not yet.”

  Big Mike said, “You gotta bend that note like you bend the truth.”

  Hector Santos said, “Like you bend backward, especially when you don’t want to.”

  “Yeah, man,” Jack Rabbit Jones said. “Gotta get that round-the-corner, back-to-tell-the-tale blues bend.”

  “Got to feel it deep down. In the gut,” Cool Papa Byrd said. He patted himself somewhere between his heart and belly. “That’s when you know you’re crying.”

  “Just before you laugh,” one said.

  “Sometimes after,” another said.

  “But son,” Cool Papa said, “a bluesman ain’t a bluesman without that deep-down cry.”

  Clayton was full of questions and disappointments. His notes were good. True. He could reach high notes on one end of the harp, or run with the train in the middle notes, and draw in deep and way down for low notes. And he had a story. A blues story.

  When Clayton couldn’t stand it any longer, he said, “Why I have to bust a gut to be a bluesman? Why I gotta cry to get a solo?”

  Clayton’s outburst sent Cool Papa and the Bluesmen hollering. A few train riders chuckled.

  “Don’t think about it, Little Man,” his grandfather said. “Don’t think too hard. One day . . .”

  “Or night,” said Big Mike.

  “It’ll come,” said Hector Santos.

  “Just do what you’re doing, Little Man,” Cool Papa said. “Look sharp. Be cool. When it rains down on you, you won’t have to ask because you’ll be crying the blues on that harp.”

  “Amen,” said the Bluesmen. “Amen to that.”

  MIDNIGHT JAM

  The Bluesmen said Cool Papa and Clayton could find them either here or there, but they would most likely be in Washington Square Park for the next two or three weeks.

  “After that we hit the road. You know how it is,” said Hector Santos. “Warm weather.”

  Cool Papa gave each man a folded-greenback handshake from their take at the park. The Bluesmen said, “Later,” at Forty-Second Street, then changed trains to hit a few blues clubs uptown. Cool Papa and Clayton stayed on the train that would take them home to Queens.

  Clayton and Cool Papa tiptoed into the house just after nine and found the house quiet. Cool Papa gave a jolly and wicked “Heh, heh, heh” laugh. “Looks like we made it.”

  “In the nick of time,” Clayton agreed, and the two slapped hands.

  Clayton washed up while Cool Papa threw a pot and a frying pan on the stove. In no time the house smelled like spaghetti and fish sticks, instead of the chewy and mushy three p’s Clayton’s mother left for them: pork chops, peas, and potatoes.

  Luckily, Ms. Byrd wasn’t there to catch them sneaking in after a day of playing the blues in the park. Ms. Byrd had a low opinion of the blues. Almost as low an opinion as she had of her father, Clayton’s grandfather. Whatever her reason, Clayton couldn’t understand it. After all, the people in the park loved Cool Papa Byrd, and the Bluesmen looked to Cool Papa as a leader. So did Clayton. Cool Papa wasn’t just Clayton’s grandfather or a blues musician. He was Clayton’s best friend, while Omar, who was Clayton’s age, was his next best friend. Even with nearly six decades between the two Byrds, Clayton and Cool Papa had what Cool Papa called “harmony.” He could tell Cool Papa anything and ask him anything. Around Cool Papa, Clayton didn’t feel like a kid. He felt like a person.

  Clayton looked forward to “double shift” nights posted on the refrigerator door, held secure by one of his mother’s many angel magnets. Whenever Ms. Byrd worked a double shift at the hospital on a Friday or Saturday night, Clayton and his grandfather snuck out to find the Bluesmen here or there, but mostly at Washington Square Park.

  If Clayton’s mother had any idea what the two had been up to, she’d let her father have it, but good—and probably kick him out of his own house. Clayton’s ears picked up a lot when he was supposed to be asleep. He’d hear his mother scold her father and he’d hear his grandfather take it. She scolded Cool Papa for playing his blues records too loud and for wearing his shades inside the house. That made Clayton laugh to himself. He figured Cool Papa wore those shades indoors on purpose, just to hear her scolding voice. Cool Papa had a way about him that was fine with Clayton.

  Clayton liked his father. Mr. Miller was all right. Nice, even. But Mr. Miller loved baseball. Science fiction. Jazz that sounded like angry elephants blowing their trumpets at each other. Mr. Miller tried to get Clayton to love those things too, but Clayton loved comic books. The blues. His blues harp. And Cool Papa Byrd.

  “I want my solo,” Clayton said. “I want the people to hear me play.” He winked at his grandfather. “I know I’m good.”

  Cool Papa laughed. “Might be good, but you’re not ready. You need seasoning.”

  “Aw, man!” Clayton balked, half joking, half whining. “Seasoning’s for salt and pepper shakers.”

  “Precisely, man,” his grandfather said back. “Blues gotta cook. Cooking and playing are the same thing.”

  Clayton fiddled with the angel-shaped shakers on the table, knocking one against the other.

  “Look, son, I know the people in the park would drop more love in the guitar case if I waved you in. But I’m not raising you to be a cute kid.”

  Milk shot out of Clayton’s nose. He wiped it with his pajama sleeve. Cute kid. He had to laugh.

  “I’m raising you to be a bluesman,” Cool Papa said. “Or just a man. But don’t worry, man. I got my eye on you.”

  Clayton liked that. The way his grandfather broke it down, plain. Man to man. Even though he was a boy.

  “I wasn’t born cool like this,” Cool Papa said in a way that could only be described as cool. “Before I was cool—”

  Clayton heard this before and came in on cue: “‘I was hot. Mr. Louisiana Hot Lick.’”

  “Got that right,” Cool Papa said. “I had a road to travel and a life to live before I got this far. Mr. Louisiana Hot Lick had the good, raw stuff, like you. But you don’t get any better than Cool Papa, and that takes time.”

  After they ate, Clayton brushed his teeth and got ready for the midnight jam, even though in reality, ten fifteen was closer to the hour. Clayton sat up in his bed, blues harp in hand, while Cool Papa Byrd pulled out First Guitar, a wide-bodied acoustic guitar that didn’t need an amp and didn’t glint like Show Guitar or cry like Wah-Wah Nita. First Guitar was on in years, and pluck-weary, but its strings produced the purest sound with a sweet echo on the end. She was perfect for the soft midnight jams.

  Cool Papa sat at the foot of Clayton’s bed in his “watcher’s chair.” That was what Clayton called his grandfather—his watcher. Someone who looked out for him.

  Cool Papa tuned First Guitar and began picking an easy intro to lay out the chord changes. Clayton picked up the chord changes and joined in. Together, they played a sweet, sleepy blues riff. Sweet and low so neighbors wouldn’t report them to Ms. Byrd, or to the police for disturbing the peace.

  “One sheep over the meadow.”

  Clayton blew.

  “Two sheep over the dale.”

  Clayton blew.

  “Three sheep down by the river,

  And four jump over the bed. . . .”

  When the sweet notes faded to sleepy notes, Cool Papa nodded and said, “All right,” which to Clayton was as good as applause. Cool Papa sat First Guitar on her stand, and Clayton shook the spit out of his blues harp, wiped it with his pajama sleeve, and tucked it under his pillow.

  “Still wired up, son?”

  “I guess,” Clayton said, his eyes alert.

  “All right. Strap in.”

  Cool Papa Byrd did what he’d always done after they jammed. He removed his dark shades, put on his reading glasses, and took the b
edtime book from the shelf. There was nothing wrong with Clayton’s reading. He read just fine. He preferred Cool Papa’s smooth, raspy voice, narrating the beckoning waves and the choppy waters. Both his mother and father said he was too old to be read to, but not Cool Papa. Besides, who better to read about embarking on travel and escaping trouble than Cool Papa, who had sailed the seas as a navy man, and traveled the road, both home and abroad, as a bluesman?

  Clayton settled in.

  No matter how much adventure the boy in the story, Pablo de Pablo, encountered, Clayton always fell asleep after the first few pages on double-shift nights. Within minutes that night, Clayton fell fast, dreaming of adventure.

  LOST AT SEA

  The house settled under a quiet spell, broken only by the rubber marshmallow soles of Ms. Byrd’s hospital shoes padding up the stairs, followed by the creaking of Clayton’s bedroom door being pushed open.

  Ms. Byrd peeked inside Clayton’s room but didn’t cross the threshold. Once again, her father and her son had fallen into a deep sleep. She felt a pinch of envy when she saw the book in her father’s lap. He had never read to her.

  “Angel,” she said softly—and she didn’t say this often about Clayton. As much as she refused to admit it, Mr. Miller, Clayton’s father, was right: at times Clayton Byrd could be a handful.

  She wanted to kiss his cheek and forehead, but didn’t. Instead, she stood at the door and watched her angel, his lids closed, the form of his body beneath the covers, rising and falling as he breathed in and out. She stood and watched her angel while he was that. Her angel.

  The serene picture almost moved her to enter the room to kiss her father good night. But she hadn’t kissed her father good night since she was a little girl. And even then, she didn’t kiss him often, although she wanted to. Back then, Cool Papa Byrd had been light on the fathering side. He had been a brass-buttoned, polished navy officer. A navy officer on a ship, out to sea, sailing around the world. When his time with the navy was over, she hoped her father would drop anchor at their house and take her to baseball games. How she loved baseball stadiums! Or she hoped he would sit and have tea with her and her dollies. Or play his old guitar and sing happy songs to her and her mother. But instead, when her father’s time with the navy was over, he went on the road with two of his flashy electric guitars. His old acoustic guitar was left behind, where it got kicked on angry birthdays. Cool Papa Byrd—which was what those blues-loving people called him—stayed on the road in blues clubs, honky-tonks, and juke joints, playing the blues with the Bluesmen. He would return home bearing gifts for Little Miss Byrd and her mother. He’d stay in their house for a month, maybe two. But as soon as a tour called his name, he’d pack up two of his three road guitars, his alligator boots, his fancy show vests, and his brown porkpie hat. He’d kiss his daughter and her mother and was once again gone for months and months. By the time Little Miss Byrd was Clayton’s age, she hid from his kisses, wiped them away, and told anyone who asked that her father was lost at sea.