With Slight Pepper

By Sherwyn Besson

With Slight Pepper chronicles the social education of Ronald "Tulum" Jones, as he navigates an intricate childhood to adulthood experience, having grown up in a conservative household and national culture that romanticized horn, a uniquely Trinidadian infidelity. His emigration to Valley Stream, United States would change the trajectory of the émigré's life as he sidesteps, hurdles, and runs head-first into a visceral and complex American landscape of people, relationships, and circumstances, confronting contemporary issues of race, class, gender, and sexuality.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 13, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543950052

Sherwyn Besson

SHERWYN BESSON is a Distributive Education instructor, community activist, and mentor. He grew up in Trinidad and has been a New York educator for eighteen years. He holds a Master of Science degree in Education from the College of Saint Rose, a Master of Science degree in Business Management from Polytechnic University of New York, and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from St. Francis College. Besson lives in Nassau County, New York.

Book preview

Copyright 2018

Print ISBN: 978-1-54395-004-5

eBook ISBN: 978-1-54395-005-2

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

Cover Credit

Painting: Quattro Man and Pan by David G. Wilson

Cover Design: Shelton Besson

Contents

Acknowledgements

About the Author

1: Who Doh Hear

Tulum

How sweet? Barataria-sweet!

The Mango of Horn

Junior Sec Boy

2: Tiptoe Tiptoe

The Market

Ah Good ‘Oman

3: Bacchanal in Valley Stream

To A Man Out to Eat

Of Boys and Balls

Fess The Whettah

Once a booty-call…

4: How Yuh Bad So?

Furion-bad

All Day, Every Day

Mas and Powder

Serious Inquiries Only

5: Disclaimer

Without Roadmap

A Reckoning

Facebook Follies

Principle of the Principal

Becoming Mimi

Turning Black men into Flowers

Kintsukoroi

Mr. Panty Washer

Man as Prey

6: Look Chubble Now

A Silent Grief

The Fax

Team Chante

7: Fellowship with the Spirits

Of Principles and Principal

Becky’s Available

So Virgo

Fellowship with the Spirits

8: By the Sword

Last Bull

Chinese Children Calling yuh Daddy

9: Horn, With Slight Pepper

Wood Slave

Intimate Introspection

Slaying Ghosts

Sugars and Smallie

Whole Again

Acknowledgements

‘With Slight Pepper’ was seasoned with the help and ingredients of family and friends. To my wife, thank you for your traceable influences in the storyline, and your generous patience as I sacrificed us time for this doubles, of sorts.

I would also like to thank my children, for giving me precious space to complete this work. Raising you, gave me the rich reference for much of the dialogue with my younger characters and the passion to write them. To my brothers, be it ball, pan, or life, your voices helped center me through much, and still remain influential in my craft.

A debt of gratitude is also owed to my taste-testers. Your opinions and insights mattered when my hand was imbalanced on the spices, and especially on the pepper.

And, to my precious parents, you gave me much salt, pepper, and thyme, on which to build a fulfilling life, an inspired imagination, and the sense to know that a San Juan doubles was always better, with slight pepper.

Thank you San Juan. Thank you Barataria. Thank you La Horquetta! Much love.

About the Author

Sherwyn Besson

Sherwyn Besson is a Trinidad-born, American educator and author. With Slight Pepper is his third novel. Besson teaches Business Education with the New York City Department of Education. He lives in New York with his wife and children.

1

Who Doh Hear

Tulum

The delightful, coconutty, molasses, nutmeg, and cinnamon aromas spiced the Don Miguel Road air, fixing an adolescent trap. Ronald bettered his course time from Barataria RC, building his stamina unconsciously. Home was over a dozen blocks away - a ten minute sprint for a primary school boy. As soon as he crossed the concrete threshold from street to yard he was locked into the moral dilemma. It wasn’t sugarcake – that was weak, and too-easily devoured. No, this was better; it was Tulum .

The older child of Dianne and Roger Jones was deft in all things Triniboy - from playing three-hole and catching guabins, to exploding carbide and raiding fruit trees, to tormenting yard-creatures, flying kites, and jump kicking inanimate objects after a martial arts movie. The married couple lived humbly, comfortable in the lower ranks of working class of Trinidad. Roger was a line worker at GTE Sylvania Corporation and Diane, a resourceful and tireless homemaker. In the Jones household, family and friendship, reigned over possessions and pretention. They were a tight unit with even closer community ties.

Mom was busy unpinning dry clothes from the line when Ronald arrived. As much as he wanted to survey the kitchen, his discipline and respect dictated his behavior.

Afternoon mommy. Ronald greeted his mother.

How school?

Normal. Put these inside? Ronald began plotting almost immediately. Angst weakened his restraint and he was poor at deception.

Wait. Leh mih put ah few more in the basket. His mom said, Put these on mih bed and bring back the basket.

Okay.

Opportunity. Housed in the teardrop shaped holes of the grater was shredded coconut flesh. Ronald picked at the disposable morsels before setting it in the worn, single-basin copper kitchen sink for soaking. The fleeting joy of schoolboy heaven bubbled in the steel pot with the cooking spoon treacle-blackened at the bowl, rising to the transition. However, it wasn’t finished. It was yet perfecting, and still thickening. There would be opportunity but mom guarded the finishing confectionary like a Jack Spaniard over its larvae-filled nest.

It would take precise skill, timing, and, guile to sneak tulum in his mother’s presence. After a second glimpse in the pot, Ronald and his mom’s eyes met. He got the judgment of her cut-eye.

Doh touch it. Who doh hear, does feel. Ronald’s mother casually warned.

Mere words, he thought, resisting his mother’s warning. Though not a rude boy, he was beholden to his teenage design. As he changed from his uniform, he clocked mom’s patrol schedule – outside then bedroom for couple minutes at a time then kitchen to check the pot’s progress. He only had seconds to pull it off and didn’t consider the consequences. He didn’t care. Neither burn nor mom’s trauma-inducing pinch was deterrent enough. It was boyhood sport, all about the risk, the competition, the win, and the escape.

Fate intervened with the opportune appearance of Uncle Otis who had stopped by for a timely distraction. Mom and Otis chatted outside but in view of the pot. She positioned herself to see through the side window, unperceived to Ronald.

Ronny, turn the tulum, mom instructed.

But, in his head he heard, on your mark.

Okay.

Searching for courage, he was further licensed by the closing window. A delicious conspiracy it was. He picked up the spoon but it was too hot. It was a second warning to shelve his plan but it fell on disabled senses. Ronny then wrapped the spoon’s handle with a dry rag. The tulum was so thick that he needed more leverage to turn the pending crisis around the pot. Ronald used another rag, a damp one, to hold the pot while he muscled the tulum.

Mom walked Otis to the gate. That was his chance. He put his plan in motion. First, he swiftly took out a tablespoon from the drawer and dipped it in the tulum. It was a greedy dip, and the tablespoon couldn’t handle the depth of his thrust. He needed adult muscle to extract the spoon and his inexperience stalled his plan. Under the pressure of the moment, Ronald grabbed the pot with his bare hand. It didn’t take long for his fingers to be seared but he didn’t make a sound. He just winced. It was muffled. He managed to get quarter of a table spoon out of the pot using the makeshift potholder.

With his burnt finger still lancing, he blew on the spoon before testing the temperature of the tulum. It was still too hot to consume. His tongue burned too, but that was a counted cost. He moved the delightful chunk around his mouth, swishing it in saliva while cooling and sucking on the black bliss. Down it went, wedding his pain with approval. Ronald favored the softer version of the treat over its hardened, teeth-breaking form, after cooling.

The young Jones boy didn’t feel palpable discomfort in his fingers until the satisfaction of the lifted treat faded. Almost immediately he knew it wasn’t a regular burn. The injury was a few degrees worse than he had gotten previously. To ease the throbbing pain, he pressed a few ice cubes on the burn. The cooling effect soothe his agony a little. A couple minutes on his finger and the ice relief rivaled the level of pain he endured from the burn. Mom finished her conversation and walked inside. She knew what had happened but asked anyway.

Wah happen?

Nothin’.

Yuh geh burn?

Nah.

After a wet and dismissive steups mom responded, Yuh go fry yuh hand fuh ah piece of tulum when yuh coulda jus’ wait? Come here leh mih see.

She casually assessed the burn. The hostile pot left a singed, reddened spot on his fingertips. Minor, she diagnosed. Mom softly applied the cure-it-all, Vaseline, on his fingers but it didn’t help much, except for it soothe, emotionally. The ice was better on the injury as the intense pain returned. When she finished, he iced the injury again. Not even the painful sensation could get him to rethink his efforts. Even in hindsight, he’d do it again, only he’d be better at it. When the pain subsided, he did his homework and left for practice in Aranjuez. The intermittent sprint, especially through the dog-armed gauntlet of Pundit Street, took him through El Soccoro Road, Evelyn Trace, and on to Boundary Road for Flamengos practice where everything therapeutic resided in a ball and a patchy football field.

Ronny stopped by his grandmother’s before going to practice. By the time he got to Eleventh Street, the news about his mishap was already old. From a distance, his cousin’s faces reflected their eagerness to torment him. They waited for the re-christening. Eggy started it.

Tuluuuum! Eggy stretched the last syllable to emphasize his excitement.

The yard burst into throaty laughter with Chubby and Lippa exaggerating the comedy.

Except for tomboy Kimmy, the yard was a two-home, dirt plot, teeming with footballing teenage testosterone and every boy jostled for competitive significance. The dirt pitch is where they honed their small-goal skills playing beats-and-score where tomboy Kimmy held her own among her male peers. Fruit-bearing trees including durable Julie and Vere mangoes, temperamental governor’s plum, a poisonous caterpillar-infested lemon, a bird-loving guava, and a highly-coveted soursop, sustained shade and snacking interest to the two families who occupied the yard. A pair of carefree pothounds completed the boy-friendly ambience of the Jones-Walcott yard.

Leh mih see the burn, Chubby asked.

A little embarrassed, Ronny lifted his arm and fixed his hand to show the side where the burn was located. Lippa then asked the obvious.

It hurt?

How yuh mean if it hurt? Leh mih put yuh hand on ah hot pot nuh? Steups.

Ent yuh greedy. Hope it was finger lickin’ good.

Why yuh eh hush yuh fat ass?

The moniker, Tulum, stuck to Ronald for a while. It survived the challenges of other nicknames as he grew. Names like Tulums, Tulumsky, Blacks, Blacka, Tar, Golli, short for Golliwog, and Beetle, made compelling challenges but weren’t formidable enough to overthrow the reigning handle, Tulum. Originally tagged for the act of pilfering the simple confectionary, the name Tulum was later sealed as it was more closely identified with his skin color. Ronny didn’t like the name because its connotation was embarrassing, even burdensome. Black skin, wasn’t a prideful designation. It made him an easy target for heckling. Being black like tulum undermined his social confidence. Girls preferred lighter-skinned boys so he dwelled in the bottom ranks of the coveted hierarchy. This didn’t deter his love for balling under the blackening Trini sun. He saw it as the fire that thickened the tulum, perfecting it.

Yuh eh black enough? Yuh always in the sun. The common reaction was his mother’s response to Ronald’s active weekends. Sun up to sundown on weekends, from Aranjuez Savannah, to Eddie Hart’s league in Tacarigua, to Bourg Mulattresse, and the trove of youth league football along Trinidad’s eastern passageway, he was gone early and wasn’t seen till late evening. His blackness was different. Sun-fried. Shiny. It was as though the sun fortified and polished his skin. Ronald didn’t care much about the barbs. Darkening was a small price to pay for the pleasure of performing chiropractic experiments on defenders and wreaking onion bag abuse on opposition nets.

Tulum’s love for the game demanded that he spend significant time with his football mentor, Brian ‘Stool’ King. He routinely stopped at Stool’s home on the way to practice, hung out there, polished Stool’s football boots, and ran errands for his muse. Stool wore his reputation in the fob of his jeans. He knew that young, middle-aged, and even older women sought the thrill, passion, pleasure, and attention he gave them so he made himself available to the curious, vulnerable, and the volunteering women that sought him out.

Married, engaged, and friend-attached were his exceptions. Stool loved bussin’ drawers. His local celebrity, beguiling charm, and athletic good-looks drew a waiting list of eager and inquisitive females. He hardly discriminated. Too big? He reasoned, ‘big girls need love too and besides, they creative and could take pressha.’ Too ugly? ‘Best bull.’ He thought they were the most eager to please so they possessed whorish initiative. Even girls from the local comprehensive school sought the Stool experience. It was sport leaving his victims ravished. It grew his reputation, lengthening his list of pending prey. Punishing punnany was good for business off the field, and brought more supporters, and drama, to the field.

The revolving door of older sisters, mothers, exes, neighbors, and strangers that traversed Stool’s front and back doors didn’t seem an irregularity to Ronald. Stool referred to them as, friends, family, or his cousins. The playful mentor recognized his influence on his impressionable and precocious mentee, so he acted as a filter when he remembered. Despite his appetite for nookie he was careful to screen Tulum from the vulgar and explicit side of his activities. Not even the get-lost errands Tulum ran for Stool planted a seed of doubt about his mentor’s character. Ronald believed in the deity of Stool.

The ten year old’s childhood would take a radical departure. He was allowed to wake up late the fateful morning. His mom kept him from school. Dad stayed home also. When he asked why, his mother told him that his father wanted the family to spend time at home. He didn’t believe her. Jonesy intuition. She also told him not to go into the streets. And, when he asked why, she sternly warned him of a police presence, and repercussions for disobeying her. He didn’t have to violate his mother’s demand to find out the terrible news. It walked into their yard and onto their doorstep.

Good morning Dee! Dee?

Aye Lystra. Ah comin’ jus’ now. Gimme ah sec.

San Juan news reporter, Lystra, stopped in to broadcast details of the event.

Leh we go in front. Ah doh want lil man tuh hear.

Ok.

Tulum overheard his mother’s ominous whispers. He was curious, so he quietly walked to the room nearest the street, where mom and Ms. Lystra gossiped. Ronald sat out-of-sight but within earshot of the pair’s conversation. He slid down to his butt and adjusted himself closer to the right-most window, extra careful to avoid touching the sensitive curtains. What they spoke of wasn’t clear enough, so he crawled to the other side of the window where they were. He listened.

Ah only hear he chop she. Diane added.

Dee, Harry chop off she head. Then, he went and wait fuh Stool on Don Miguel Road. Chop up the man yes. Stool bleed out two blocks up. Dey just move the body parts. Everybody on the streets in shock. Lystra fed the mill.

Tulum wasn’t sure if he heard Stool’s name so he didn’t react to the faint statement.

Jeeeesus. Laaawd, lawd. An’ where Harry? Diane, continued her questioning.

They take him to the hospital. He drink gramoxone. Ah hear he dead already.

But wah Stool do he?

Yuh know drunk-ass Harry used to beat Usha badly. He been puttin’ he hands on her long time. Ah hear she get tired and started tuh dress nice and say she going by she mother. She was going by Stool.

Fuh what reason?

Wah else?

Nashy, quiet, Usha? Ah thought Stool doh mess wid married women. Diane questioned Stool’s credo and inquired further. Stool horn the man?

Yeah gyal. Nobody know Stool was mashin’ it up. People sleep on Usha. She was quiet

And pretty too.

That’s why everybody in shock. They say she use to go by Stool when Harry went to work.

How Harry find out?

Stool. He boast tuh dem fellas on the block and Harry cousin run back and tell. Lystra had gotten confirmation from the block.

Although Mrs. Jones didn’t claim a sophisticated vocabulary, her sensibilities were refined. She was worried about breaking the news to Ronald. The dilemma pressed her so much that she teared over his anticipated hurt. She knew what Stool meant to Ronald; how he gleefully spoke about Stool’s brilliant performances, travelling with Stool to hallowed footballing grounds, attending international games when his dad couldn’t take him, and the unmerited gifts.

Having heard and processed most of the conversation, with his teenage buffer of ignorance and resilience, he only had one question for his mom. Death and loss were too unfamiliar as working concepts. They were intangible, so Tulum didn’t feel the immediate impact.

What is horn? Ronald asked his mother, after she returned to the kitchen.

On sight, he asked her. Not expecting the question, she balked. What yuh say?

Wah is horn?

Horn, she mumbled in a questioning tone. Where he hear that? This boy quick. Must be something he overhear. Horn, she repeated a little more deliberately. Horn, she tripled with conviction.

Horn is when ah man have sex with another man’s wife, or girlfriend. It’s not good tuh horn. It’s not a good thing because it hurts people. And, when some people get horn dey hurt other people.

Ronald’s mother was clear and simplistic in her explanation. She left out much about the nuances of the Trini horn but his immature eagerness led him to deeper, more innocence-shattering truth.

"So that’s what happened to Stool?

Yes.

Ronald put it together. The women who visited Stool, weren’t just friends and family. They were subjects of his encounters. The ten-year-old realized that he would say goodbye to his friend soon enough. Tulum attended Stool’s funeral. It was his first. He didn’t mourn his friend through emotional tears, but with a mature understanding of loss and an indifference to the whaling and sadness.

How sweet? Barataria-sweet!

Breathing Barataria air was an indulgence reserved for residents, and the fortunate passers through. Villagers spoke with the sweet, predawn inflection of a pico plat, in ballad. The rhythm of Barataria was slow enough to race molasses, but everyone stood ready to offer love. Temperature? Barataria was always warm and welcoming, like an in-season fruit tree. Nevertheless, like its meaning, Barataria knew deception.

Tulum was cultured to be sensitive to girls and women. The training shaped his masculinity. Mom taught him how to tend to his baby sister, June, and how to be a man when his father wasn’t around. As the older brother, he learned how to care for his fairer sibling; changing her diaper, washing her up, feeding and entertaining her. Ronald was patient with his little sister, and she adored her older brother. He was her putty and her personal guard. Their bond was strong.

He go make some ‘oman happy, his mother’s friends would affirm. Tulum heard it many times in different ways. Sometimes it was in the form of a request for help, or by the gift of a treat. Over time, Tulum was programmed female-friendly – selfless, loyal, and delicate.

There was another side to Tulum’s character. Strong and intelligent male examples stood at every step in his maturity. Gentleman patriarch and grandfather, Len, three exceptional footballing uncles, and many more mentors from the classroom to the clubhouse, in and around the recesses of Barataria and San Juan, prodded and pushed him in the right direction. They taught him what to do, how to stand, where to be, when to walk away, and why he existed. He evolved a balanced youth leader with a friendly but assertive masculinity.

One of the more telling experiences of Tulum’s development occurred when he tried stealing a Six Million Dollar Man action figure from Kirpalani’s at the Barataria roundabout. In spite of his condemning conscience and nervousness, he made up his mind to take the toy, without paying. He didn’t know he was being watched. Ronald surveyed the convenience store before slipping the figurine under his clothes. The bulge was patent enough to alert even the listless security guard. When he tried to leave, the guard asked him to stop. At that moment, it was better for him to die of embarrassment, than later, at the hands of at least three executioners – his grandmother, mother, and father. He even thought about his funeral.

But then, a savior came along. A faintly familiar man placed his hand on Ronald’s shoulder and asked, You ah Jones?

To which he responded, Yeh.

Let me handle this, he told the security guard.

Alright, the compliant guard obliged.

He took Tulum to a lesser-lit and quiet corner of the store, looked him in the eye like an older brother, and corrected him.

Give mih the toy. You don’t know me but I know yuh uncles. We went to Barataria Comprehensive School together and does still play ball. Dey is mih friends. Jones’ doh thief. Don’t leh mih ketch you in here again and make this the last time yuh try to steal anything from anybody because dey go put yuh in jail. Yuh hear mih?

Yeh. Ronald eagerly expressed regret for is misdeed, and appreciation for the stranger’s compassion.

The unfamiliar friend didn’t condemn Tulum to an early reputation of shoplifting or the stinging whips of parental punishment. Instead, he reminded him of the greatness in his bloodline and the forward payment his uncles had stored that he was about to make a withdrawal on. The village took care of its own. Youthful indiscretion wasn’t judgment for criminality. Barataria was indeed, sweet.

It was the first time he encountered that level of fear and reprimand outside his family circle. He was awakened to social consciousness. The lesson was so powerful that it shaped his communal concept. Walking a morally straight line became an obligation. That day he learned the royalty-like quality of his last name and the indelible logo that was a Jones face. If he was unburdened by innocence before the incident, pride would be a responsibility of his new knowledge.

The Mango of Horn

When home, Tulum was always in earshot of mother’s conversations with female friends, family, and neighbors because of the house’s confining space of five cramped rooms and its thin, sound-amplifying walls and doors. Ronny’s instinct tuned his understanding and his emotions. He was witness to the tender-hearted women with fragile dispositions who sought his mother’s counsel. Ronny’s mom wasn’t a fixer but she was emotionally articulate, knew how to confront pathology, and console heartbreak, especially horn. She was a great ear and even better cheerleader for the moments her friends celebrated new relationships, shared bed-breaking romps, and salacious gossip.

In spite of the insulating bubble of monogamy and faithfulness at home, adultery was casually cultural in the community. Ronald’s grandparents Len and Francine had been together forever, raising three and eight grandchildren and never visibly straying, as far as Tulum knew. Parents Diane and Roger lived examples of commitment, loyalty, and honesty. Ronald’s uncles too, were one–girlfriend men, good-hearted and wholesome. Tulum didn’t sense scandal and major conflict, but, it was there, concealed. That’s just how the family functioned, almost Waltons-like. Children were emotionally sheltered from all storms.

However, there was next door, and next block, and beyond Third Avenue. Unbeknown to Ronald, Mr. Gopaul, the next door neighbor who drove the yellow Mazda Rx-7, didn’t just disappear. Gopaul’s wife, discovered that the rumors of her husband’s homosexual activities were not only true but were happening in her home with his riding partner Assam, and, she kicked him out. A few blocks down Tenth Street, Mr. Douglas who also disappeared, was sentenced to jail-time for an incestuous relationship with his fourteen year old step-daughter, who had given birth to a stillborn son. Over on Fourth Avenue, Mrs. Fernandez, admitted to her husband, what the entire community knew; that her seven-year-old son was fathered by Fireman Carlyle, who was married himself, and had a few illegitimates. Those scandals flew under the teenage detection of Ronald.

Enlightenment and maturity didn’t always follow a linear progression in Barataria. Although Tulum’s awakening to social and sexual consciousness loomed, no birds and bees discussion could prepare him for his initiation. Ronald had achieved a noticeable level of success on the field, crediting the cerebral part of his game to family friend and coach, Gary Nuts Joseph. Nuts was a strict and abrasive trainer during practice hours, with expertise using profanity and insults to inspire. Off the field, he was as loving as humans went, generous, charitable, and oddly funny.

Coach Nuts’ home was a lively and welcoming space to anyone, and especially players from local football club Flamengo. All-fours and Roamy, headed the list of activities with weight-training equipment, music, and a restful hammock highlighting lyming at the improvised clubhouse. Coach just demanded that his yard be respected. Tulum spent time in Nuts’ gym and much more on his Kaimit and Julie trees.

Mrs. Audrey Joseph, Nuts’ wife, was one of the most pleasant people Tulum knew. She didn’t have children of her own so she regularly made tamarind balls, ice block, and red mango, for neighborhood children. She was very hospitable and comfortable among the big and little boys who frequented the yard. Mrs. Joseph met with Tulum and his mom, Diane, almost every Sunday morning, to go to church. She dressed elegantly in two-piece suits, trendy floral dresses, with matching parasols that universally garnered compliments. She was graceful in her mannerisms and there was no ill-will in her.

Ronald occasionally ran errands for Mrs. Joseph or brought Zepapique and Vervine herbs from his mom’s garden for her. On one such occasion, he quietly stopped in to raid the Kaimit tree when school was dismissed at half day. The broken gate and familiarity with pot-hounds, Scratches and Dumplin, made his