"My brother and I came to love each other greatly, but that was really when we were a little older. As a little kid I certainly saw him as a nothing but a rival and I know I was nothing but an annoyance to him. When he got famous I resented the hell out of him for a while. Then one day I suddenly saw what a kind, sensitive, just and beautiful human being I have for a brother, and I was a little sad it took me so long to figure it out." -- Biologist, Dr. Lisa McDowell, David Dawn's sister, from the 1995 VH1 documentary, The Plus, Minus and Equals of Being David Dawn.

Martin Luther King Jr. got murdered the next Thursday, April 4th. When they talked about it that night on the news, L.D. thought about his friend Darbey Smith from school. Darbey was a Negro in his fourth grade class. He wondered if everybody was crying at Darbey's house. He thought about how awful it would be if someone killed Darbey just because he was colored.

           That Sunday afternoon, there was a big memorial service for Martin Luther King Jr. downtown. Mom and Lisa went, but with all the riots all over America because of the murder, even in Dayton, L.D. was too afraid of angry colored people to go. There were even more race riots than before and they scared L.D. more than ever. Most Dayton riots were on the West Side, where most of the colored people lived. The colored people seemed so mad and so mean because of it. And they were really mad about Martin Luther King Jr. So, L.D. didn't want his Mom or even Lisa to go to the memorial. But he was as afraid to tell Mom his fear as he was of colored people that might hurt white people.

           Though L.D. didn't know any mean Negroes, personally, he was afraid someday some mean ones would find him and beat him up because he was a white kid. L.D. really only knew two Negroes, Darbey and his older sister, Kelly. There were a few others at his school but he didn't know them. The only other Negroes he knew about were on TV and radio. Of course, everybody knew about Sammy Davis Jr., who was a friend of Dean Martin's. There was Bill Cosby, who was on I Spy and also made funny records where he told jokes and stories about being a kid. There was James Brown, whose records Aunt Linda liked a lot. And he knew about the Negro Cat Woman on Batman. He didn't know her name. And, of course, there was Diana Ross and the Supremes. He knew about them and a few other famous colored people. They didn't seem mad or mean. But a lot of Negro people were. And probably even the famous Negro people were mad about Martin Luther King Jr.

           Then there were all those mean white people that wanted to hurt every Negro person.

           Right after church, when L.D. told Mom he didn't want to go to the memorial, she asked him why. He wouldn't tell her. He said he just didn't want to. He kind of thought she knew why, though. She smiled, kissed him on the cheek and said "All right, Dear."

           Darbey hadn't come to school the day after the murder, Friday. He came in Monday and L.D. felt weird when he saw him and wanted to say something, but didn't know what. Maybe say he was sorry because he was sure every colored person in America loved Martin Luther King Jr. Just after lunch he went over to Darbey's desk.

           "Hey, Darbey."

           "Hey," Darbey said. He always had a crew cut and usually wore white, short-sleeve shirts, like today, with his light-green corduroy shorts and blue tennis shoes.

           "I'm really sorry about Martin Luther King Junior."

           Darbey shrugged his shoulders. "It's not like I knew him."

           "But I thought all colored p---"

           Darbey got a look on his face, like he was frustrated or even hurt. L.D. knew he'd just done something wrong.


Those last two months of school, a bunch of white kids acted like Darbey caused all the riots. They'd scowled at him like he was guilty. Others acted like they were afraid of him, like Darbey'd start his own riot at school. Even Mrs. Snowdon acted strange at Darbey. Her voice got sort of uncertain and she hardly ever looked right at him. She cleared her throat a lot, too, when she talked to him. L.D. could tell Darbey didn't like any of it. He got that same frustrated, hurt look on his face, all the time. Probably his sister, Kelly, got treated weird, too. She was four grades ahead of them, an eighth-grader, so L.D. could only guess, but he was sure he was right. L.D. figured all the six or seven so colored kids in school got treated weird.

           Some white guys got into fights with Darbey a few times. Some white girls even fought with Kelly. That mean word to call colored people was used a lot more than it had been before. Mom hated that word. Grandpa O'Donnell used it and Mom scolded him, her own dad, when he did. Mom hated it, Aunt Linda hated it and so did L.D. It'd been used every now and then at school all along, but white kids said it a lot more at the end of school and during the summer at the Orville Wright pool. And there were a lot of fights between white and colored kids at the pool, too, almost every day. Soon after summer vacation started Darbey and Kelly didn't come to the pool any more. None of the colored kids came.

           L.D. knew all about getting picked on by kids at school. Some kids didn't like him, either. Lillian Fuller always told the other kids he was an ignorant, spoiled, rich kid. He knew he wasn't really a rich kid and he knew for sure he wasn't spoiled. Spoiled kids got whatever they wanted just 'cause they wanted it. A few kids called him weird, too. Sometimes when he played by himself with imaginary characters, kids laughed at him and said he talked to the air. Some guys called him a dork and stuff like that. He had Keith and Willy and a few other guys, like Darbey, but some guys didn't want to be friends. That was okay with L.D. He had friends.

           Though L.D. knew what it was like to have kids mess with you for no good reason, he also knew it was different for Darbey and the other colored kids. And after Martin Luther King Jr. got killed, it was worse.


Then, just before school got out for the summer, just two months later from when Martin Luther King Jr. did, Bobby Kennedy got murdered, too. Maybe that was why there was even more fights between white kids and Negro kids at the pool, before the colored kids stopped coming. Bobby Kennedy got shot on Wednesday, the second to last day of school. That night on the 6:30 news, the CBS correspondent, Dan Rathers, said the doctors weren't hopeful.

           While she cleaned up the supper table, Mom's eyes were wet and she didn't say much. L.D. went to the kitchen to ask if he could have a cherry Popsicle. Dad was hugging Mom close. Dad didn't want Bobby Kennedy to be the president, but he didn't want him to get shot, either. Mom kissed Dad. She looked into his eyes like she said Thank you.

           The next day Bobby Kennedy died. Mom cried, quietly but hard, while they talked about it on the news. It was like a member of the family had died. L.D. was sad, too, but not like Mom. And he thought about Aunt Linda who was on her trip out west. She'd spent that semester in Italy and now was spending the summer traveling around seeing things like Death Valley and the Grand Canyon. Aunt Linda loved Bobby Kennedy and wanted him to be president more than anybody else L.D. knew did, even Mom. She called Mom that night.

           "That poor family keeps losing its sons," Mom said to her, crying.

           That Sunday afternoon was the memorial for Bobby Kennedy. Mom took L.D. and Lisa with her. It was June ninth, the day after L.D.'s tenth birthday. He wished Aunt Linda could've been there. He hadn't seen her since Christmas. But she did leave a surprise birthday present for him, the Beatles album, Rubber Soul.

           In the morning, at church, Brother J.G.'s sermon was all about the will of God, and how sometimes His will is permissive. "We don't know that The Heavenly Father wanted this precious son to be struck down, but He allowed it, in His wisdom. We must call upon His strength in our nation's hour of agony."

           L.D. was glad that God probably didn't want Bobby Kennedy to get killed, and Martin Luther King Jr., too.

           Brother J.G. asked Mom to sing "Amazing Grace" for Bobby Kennedy. She stood at the microphone over to the left of Brother J.G.'s sermon stand. She looked so lonely. She didn't make it through the first verse before she cried. Other people, and not just women, cried too. Brother J.G. came over and put his arm around her while she sang on. She cried all the way to the end. L.D. cried, too. While she stood in front of everybody, while she cried and sang "Amazing Grace," better in a way than she'd ever sang "Nearer My God To Thee," L.D. shuddered.

           At the memorial, everybody gathered at Riverview Park on the Great Miami River across from downtown Dayton. It was very hot out. It was that heat where you feel like the air is real thick and closing in on you and you just want to yell out how you can't take it anymore.


Finally, everybody marched from Riverview Park across the bridge and over the Great Miami to Courthouse Square. There were so many people it took almost an hour for everybody to make the trip. The trip across the bridge took L.D., his mom and sister a few minutes. They were over close to the edge. L.D. watched four ducks swim. The ducks just swam, unaware the big group of people were sad over another murder of another great man. They didn't know people probably marched in a thousand cities all over America. L.D. didn't remember ever seeing ducks in the city before.

           Hardly anyone talked and when they did it was quietly. And the heat just got worse. Every once in a while, the marshal, who walked along the side of the crowd a little ahead of L.D., Mom and Lisa, spoke into a megaphone. "Slow down folks. Save your strength."

           People cried. Mom sobbed. L.D.'s heart and stomach got heavy. All the sad people made him sad. His mom made him sadder. He wished he could make her feel good.

           Just before they got to the Square, while they were in front of the Elder-Beerman department store, Lisa started to bump into L.D. and giggle about it.

           "Lisa, stop it," L.D. said.

           After she bumped into L.D. about the fifth time, L.D. shoved her down, hard. He hoped she would cut her knee or something.

           "Hey!" Lisa almost cried.

           She lunged up and punched L.D. on the arm just as Mom snapped at them both to stop it. L.D. gritted his teeth, clinched his fist and swung to hit Lisa in the face. Mom's hand grabbed his wrist. Then she said they were both in big trouble when they got home.

           There were news crew guys at the memorial, too, from both the TV stations with news shows, Channel 2 and Channel 7. Both teams had three members, the reporter, a cameraman and another guy. The cameramen had big TV cameras on their shoulders. There was a guy next to each cameraman who had a big tape machine with really big reels of tape. They had straps to hang the recorders over their shoulders when they moved to a new place. Those guys also had big ear phones on. The cameras were plugged into the machines and so were the microphones the news reporters held.

           One of reporters was the young news guy Robert General that looked like he could be on a soap opera as a doctor or something. L.D. watched the TV crews as much as he could. He would have gotten closer and followed them around but he knew he wasn't allowed to leave the family. He figured the grownup news guys would tell him to get away, anyhow. L.D. watched the cameraman hold a big square piece of cardboard, with gray lines in different shades, in front of the camera and film it for a minute or so. The guy with the big recording machine looked at it and twisted dials. Then they filmed the cardboard again. L.D. wondered why they did that. Later, L.D. asked everybody he knew why the news guys did that. No one knew. Even Mom didn't.


"It is not how long you live but how well you live," the minister on the stand at the Square said. Then the minister told how when Bobby Kennedy got shot and lay on the ground, the first thing he said was, "Everybody okay?" And when some guys jumped the guy that shot him, Bobby Kennedy said, "Oh no, no don't," 'cause he didn't want them to hurt the guy.

           It just was all so unfair. Why did that guy kill Bobby Kennedy? He remembered when Bobby Kennedy's brother, President Kennedy, got killed. L.D. was a little kid. Back then he didn't know how sad it was. All he knew was his cartoons weren't on. Now that he was older L.D. also didn't know why President Kennedy got murdered. Martin Luther King Jr. got murdered because he was a colored guy that tried to make it more fair for colored people. The news reporters told more and more stories about battles and American soldiers killed in Vietnam. L.D. had watched on TV while firemen in the South opened up water hoses on Negro protestors. Mom said those protestors didn't cause trouble to deserve it, either. And it was mean for the police to shoot the protestors at colleges with tear gas and hit them with clubs just because they wanted the war to stop. There were a lot of mean, bad people and lots of things in the grownup world were too unfair.

           At least L.D. could go to his Beatle records and his Monkees records, though he didn't listen to the Monkees as much. Then there were singers on his little portable transistor radio like Marvin Gaye, Donovan and Stevie Wonder. There were groups like Tommy James and the Shondells, Diana Ross and the Supremes and Steppenwolf. There were songs like "Judy In Disguise," "Light My Fire," "Mrs. Robinson." And he loved TV shows like Dark Shadows, Star Trek, Spiderman and a bunch more.

           The last thing that happened at the memorial was this real good- singing Negro lady who led everybody while they sang the Glory, Glory Hallelujah song. It felt like everybody's hearts vibrated together. L.D. shuddered again, just like earlier in church with Mom's singing.


Play-A-Lot was the spot to hang out and a chance to go to there was never passed up. L.D., and his best friends Keith Higgins and Willy Crenshaw spent a lot of time at Play-A-Lot. None of them hardly ever bowled over one-hundred but that didn't matter. They spent more time in the pinball room where they were much better, especially at Vegas Dealer. The Vegas Dealer champion changed a lot between them, though, Keith won a little more. They weren't old enough to drive the go-carts. You had to be thirteen. Sometimes they jumped around in the foam room, but there were usually too many little kids there. Keith and Willy didn't care much about miniature golf. L.D. liked to play miniature golf, but more with Aunt Linda 'cause they'd been doing it since he was a little kid.

           The Wednesday after the Bobby Kennedy memorial, L.D., Keith and Willy were going to Play-A-Lot and Darbey was going with them. When Darbey pulled up on his bike, Mom called for Lisa and her friend Kimmie to get ready.

           "Mom, they're not going," L.D. said, not liking what was about to be done to him and his friends.

           "Yes," Mom said, "they are."

           "Aww, Mommmm!"

           Keith and Willy just scrunched their faces.

           "L.D., I want you to be your little sister's big brother today. You don't have to devote yourself to her, but you keep an eye on her. Kimmie will be with her so you aren't expected to keep her entertained. But I'm going to give you money for them and you don't withhold it. And don't let me hear that you've been mean to them." Mom looked at the other two guys and said, "Any of you boys. Got it?"

           "Yes, Ma'am," L.D.'s friends said.

           "Honey?"

           "Yes, Ma'am," L.D. said. "My sister and her friend are going," he told Darbey, who'd just got to the front door.

           On the ride to Play-A-Lot, Lisa and Kimmie whispered their stupid whispers and giggled their stupid giggles. The guys all just sat there. In the parking lot Mom gave Lisa some money and then gave L.D. another two dollars for her. Luckily, the girls took off right away to go play in the foam room. L.D. hoped she stayed there the whole time.

           In the pinball room, rings and zaps and bongs and whirls flew around the room sort of dancing with the chatter and laughs of the kids filling the room. The rumble of the bowling balls and their crashes into the pens filled in the background behind the pinball room noises. There was a group of other guys on Vegas Dealer so L.D. and his friends had to wait a little while. They played the Cops & Robbers pinball machine. It was an okay game but it wasn't Vegas Dealer. For one thing there were only the two flippers at the bottom and not half the ways to get bonus points that Vegas Dealer had.

           "Shit!" Keith said, as the tilt light just above the police detective's hat flashed and the machine buzzed at him. Keith Higgins was the skinniest and the tallest of the guys. L.D. figured he would be as tall as a basketball player when he was grown up. His hair was almost white. Keith was the only one of them that cussed. He even sometimes said the F word, but only when he was really mad or was talking about sex. Mostly he said the S word.

           "Aww, man, you tilted the whole game!" Willy said, "Good goin' dork-mode!"

           Willy was pudgy and, no question, the strongest of the guys. Dark skinned like he was Italian, with straight black hair, Willy claimed he was one-fourth Cherokee. L.D. didn't believe him. As far as L.D. was concerned, Willy said he was part Cherokee like some kids said they were Elvis's third cousin. It was cool to say it even if it wasn't true.

           Keith pushed Willy, playfully, and said, "Shut up dork- mode."

           The two began play pushing, both repeating, "You shut up dork-mode!"

           Then, Daryl Stringer and two of his thuggy friends got on the next pinball machine. Daryl was as mean as his bigger brothers and his dad. Daryl bullied everyone littler than him, and some his own size if he could scare them. He picked on L.D. sometimes. He'd shove him around and even gave him a bloody lip in third grade. "Hey Puss!" he would always say, "Suck any dicks lately?" Why he thought L.D. was a homo L.D. didn't know. L.D. thought maybe Daryl just took the shot that'd make the biggest wound. Whatever, Daryl was a guy to stay away from. But there was something different about it for Darbey and Kelly. And Daryl picked on Darbey and the couple other younger colored kids more than others. He always used that word, but he called them other mean things, too.

           With a snarled smile on his face he looked at L.D. and his friends while he dropped a quarter in the pinball machine. He looked at Darbey and snorted a little laugh. He pulled the lever back and snapped his ball up the machine. As the lever smacked back into place he said in a mock, deep, nasal voice, "Nigger lovers." His friends snorted, too.

           Darbey completely ignored him, but Keith made a fist. "Fuck you, Stringer."

           Daryl stiffened up and stepped forward, "What, Punk?"

           L.D. looked down the room at Vegas Dealer and was relieved to see it was now open.

           "Hey guys," he pointed that way, "those guys are done."

           "Come on, let's go," Willy said to Keith.

           Keith stood there for a second. Daryl and Keith just looked dead into each other's eyes. Daryl smiled like it was funny for Keith to not back down.

           "Come on," L.D. said.

           As they walked away, Daryl said, "Bunch of pussies."

           Vegas Dealer was only about twenty or thirty feet away. They made their way over between clumps of kids at other machines. When they were more than halfway there, Lillian Fuller, with her brown pigtails and her I'm-better-than-you eyes, and her friend Amy Brewster came up from the other way, from behind a group of kids. They walked right up to Vegas dealer.

           "Oh, mannn!" L.D. said, especially since it was Lillian. Willy groaned. "Not cool," Keith said.

           They walked up to the machine as Lillian was pushing her quarter in.

           "Man we were s'possed to be on that next," Keith said, almost accusing them of stealing the spot.

           Lillian crinkled her nose and turned her face sideways at Keith. "Too bad. We got here first."

           "We been waitin' for like a half hour!" Willy said.

           "Oh, is that my problem? No, it's not my problem. It's your problem. You wait your turn like everybody else."

           "Hey, Fuller, we waited our turn!" Keith got close to her, but she didn't move back from him even though he was so much taller than her. "Be fair about it!"

           "I am being fair!" she yelled up at Keith, "It's first come first serve. And we got here first." Her eyes moved to L.D. She crinkled her nose, frowned and rolled her eyes like she could hardly put up with his being alive. "Stop looking at me, you spoiled jerk."

           L.D. felt his body tense up. "Shut up, Lillian. I can look at you if I want to!"

           Willy laughed then said, "Hey L.D., don't look at her too long or you'll turn into a snot ball from her ugliness!"

           Keith laughed and said, "Yeah, or maybe she's so ugly you'll turn into a big turd if you look at her too long! A big -- hard -- turd!"

           L.D. laughed along with Keith and Willy. Except he really didn't think she was ugly, just that she was a dorked-out, mean girl, plain and simple. Darbey laughed, too, though L.D. noticed he didn't say anything about her. He never said anything bad about anyone.

           "How easily entertained the retarded are over their moronic selves," Lillian said, rolling her eyes and turning to Amy who laughed and nodded her head yes. Then she turned back and said, "Excuse us while we play our game." She smiled her snotty smile and pulled the lever sending the ball up the shoot.

           There really wasn't anything else the guys could do. They decided to get some colas and go outside and watch the older guys on the go-carts. L.D. hated that Lillian had won. She was just always acting so much better than him. She always got A's in school. L.D. almost never got A's. Usually he got C's. Whenever Lillian found out he got a C when she got an A she smiled this kind of mean smile to herself. He really didn't like her. When they finally got on Vegas Dealer, they only had a half-hour before Dad would be there to get them.

           The trick with Vegas Dealer was to shoot the pinball up from the middle spot of the bottom left flipper. They called this the cluster shot because it sent the ball into the cluster of bumpers on the top right. Done right, the pinball stayed in the cluster and bounced over-and-over, fast, against the bumpers and the point banks. This could rack up twenty-five- thousand points in less than a minute. The Queen of Spades peg was the big point maker but it was only by luck you could hit it. It was a baiter, to distract you. Lots of players lost because they spent the whole game trying to rack up the two-hundred-thousand point prize from her. L.D. and his friends never went for her. They went for the cluster, where the game was won.

           L.D. was just about to make the cluster shot move when Lisa grabbed his arm.

           "We need the other dollar," she said.

           L.D. jerked sideways, "You little brat, you messed up my shot!"

           She scrunched her eyebrows. "We need the other dollar!"

           L.D. went back to the game just in time to save the ball. "I'm not givin' it to you."

           "Mommy said you had to be nice or I could tell and get you in trouble."

           He played for a few more seconds then lost the ball in the left side shaft. He pulled the last of her money out of his pocket. Kimmie looked on like a bystander at a crime scene that didn't much care what was happening. She just stood there with her little red curls flowing off her head. She was actually a pretty cool little kid. L.D. wished he could have a little sister like her. "Here's your stupid money." He felt like throwing it at Lisa.


It was after Dad had dropped everybody else off and told Lisa to go on in the house that he told L.D. the bad news, as they sat in the Oldsmobile in the driveway, Mom's purple Rambler in front of them.

           "You're going to have to get your grades up before you can go to this youth arts center."

           L.D. felt his whole body get heavy, especially his chest and stomach.

           He barely got his yes sir out.

           "If you come into Christmas time with a strong B average and at least one A-minus or better on your report card, then in January, you can go."

           "What if there's not enough places left?"

           Dad put his hand on L.D.'s shoulder, "Well, Son, there'll be the next September."

           With a little frustrated gasp L.D. looked at Dad.

           "I know this is disappointing to you," Dad said, "And your mother and I disagree about this. But, I'm sorry, this is the deal."

           This did not count as a "yet," L.D. decided. "Yes, Sir," he said.