Red White and Black

Chapter Ten

Sammy

Sammy never appreciated his knees until he was unable to bend one. Well, he could have bent it, but the pain would have made him faint. He had always taken for granted the ability to perform mundane tasks, things he struggled with now. Stairs had proven to be a major obstacle, not to mention just getting dressed. Pulling on his underwear in the morning had been an exhausting ten minute ritual that nearly convinced him to go without and only his stubborn pride prevented it.

A visit to the orthopedic specialist had confirmed what everyone had already suspected: his ACL was torn and his meniscus damaged. The examination itself was ridiculously painful as the doctor manipulated his knee and flexed it until Sammy begged him to stop. The doctor said it was really the damaged meniscus--the cushion between the bones-- that caused all the pain and the only relief would be surgery. Sammy hated the thought of surgery with almost the same passion he hated the black guy who took his job.

Fueled by the constant, nagging pain in his leg and compounded by his inability to get out and do anything to distract him from his failed promotion, he began to focus all his disappointments and frustrations on anything with black skin. Trapped at home and able to discretely observe the comings and goings of his black neighbors, what started as mere annoyance didn't take long to evolve into a full fledged loathing. It began with the way they dressed: gaudy vivid colors that would embarrass a circus clown. They were constantly grabbing at their crotches leaving Sammy wondering if they were periodically checking to ensure their privates hadn't run away or fallen off. It was so vulgar; he hated to think of the impact on the women.

He needn't have worried, he later realized. Most of the teen girls had on clothes so revealing it was no wonder the guys were constantly monitoring the conditions of their crotches. It baffled him that any parent would allow a son or daughter to run around in public dressed this way.

He sat at the window two days after his visit with the doctor shaking his head in disgust. In addition to the cacophony issuing from the radio next door, the steady pounding of the basketball caused him to grit his teeth. He was cranky and irritable, snapping at his mother when she dared enter the room and growling at anyone who called on the phone.

Estelle had grown weary of it. "Alright, mister. What on earth has put you in such a snit?"

Her voice startled Sammy, who turned from the window with his brows furrowed. "What? What are you talking about?"

She wheeled close to him and leaned forward, "You. I'm talking about you. You're like an angry old bear caught in a trap. You've become impossible to live with and heaven forbid I dare try to have a conversation, you'd chew my head off."

"Pfft." Sammy either disagreed or didn't care. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm not exactly mobile these days. I can't walk or get dressed without hurting, I can't even sit on the toilet like normal. You know how hard it is to try and lower yourself onto the toilet without bending your leg? For crying out loud, this is getting old."

Estelle folded her arms and stared at him. "Welcome to my world, young man. You've just described my everyday existence except for one major difference."

She stopped and waited till he had no choice but to respond. "Okay... and the difference is what?"

"I'm old. I'm not going to get better. I'll live out the rest of my life like this." She paused to see if he was listening. "But you, on the other hand, are young. You'll have a little surgery, a few weeks of rehab, and boom; you're back at it. Soon this will seem like a distant memory."