One Last Song
It wasn’t the perfectly timed rain at his funeral that made Jolée break. Not the headstone, reading “killed in the line of duty,” not the barrage of reporters, and not even the mob of New Orleans’ finest crying could shake her to the core.
Jolée came home and opened the door just like every school day before, juggling her books in one hand and her violin in another; yet when the door opened, she stopped cold. The house was busy as usual, family members all buzzing about, but there was Popo’s chair, empty and forgotten, like the 150-year-old Bible on the coffee table.
“Welcome home, honey,” greeted her mother, “how was school?” The words blew away in her wake as she shot off to her room.
Jolée threw the violin case on her bed after slamming the door, desperately working to open the latches. She pulled the instrument close without bothering to tune, hurrying to get a song out of her heart. She made her way back down the hall, playing some concerto no one else would recognize. Arriving at Popo’s chair, she sat down beside and strung along.
“Jolée,” shouted her father, “Jolée, pipe down!” He turned up the TV, the sounds of the evening news drowning her out.
Jolée slammed her violin to the ground and bolted, retreating to the comfort of her room. She threw the case from the bed, falling face first, burying her eyes in the pillow. Memories brought back a brighter time when Popo would order that TV turned off so she could perform for the family. Now, her parents were proud to put out for a Tulane education, but couldn’t care less about her art and performance.
A catchy rhythm interrupted Jolée’s reminiscence. The screen read, “Rayanna” when he reached for her phone, followed by a cheerful voice inviting her out for the night.
“He’s gone, Ray,” she replied.
Silence resonated across the phone.
“He’s the only one who cared and now he’s gone.”
“Oh, Jo…” Rayanna replied. “I’ll be right over.”
Rayanna arrived, barging through the house without knocking, heading straight for Jolée’s room. Pulling her girlfriend up on her shoulder, Rayanna produced a flyer that had been placed on her windshield. “See your loved ones again - call Medicine Man at 504…”
“Hey, I wonder if he can help you.”
“What, voodoo magic?”
“You want him to come back? Let’s give it a whirl!”
“Why are you pulling me into this?”
“Girl, I know what you want - one more day with the man, right?:”
“Yeah…”
“Then let’s go!”
The pair walked boldly through the living room, wading through the bustle of family preparing for dinner. Jolée ran her hand along Popo’s chair on the way out, nearly tripping over the violin still lying on the floor.
As the sun set, Rayanna drove down Magazine Street, turning down a shady one-way back alley. They pulled up to a house with a four-foot flood line that still hadn’t been painted over. The sign on the front door read, “The Medicine House.” A short, balding man answered the door, nursing a glass of boxed wine.
“Peter Robillard, Medicine Man,” the man greeted. “What can I do for you two ladies?” Jolée stood unresponsive. “You got someone you wanna see again? I hope so, cuz I ain’t buying nothin’.”
“My Popo,” Jolée whispered at Rayanna’s nudge.
“Ya who?”
“My Popo, Eugene Chaisson.”
“I heard dat name…cop gunned down last week?”
Jolée nodded quietly, miffed at his brash response.
“Come on inside, dahlin. Now first of all, did he have a favorite food?”
“Red beans, sir.”
“Then this ya lucky day, have a seat.” Robillard turned on the stove and put water on to boil. “Now I have to warn you, he won’t come back like you expect him to. But from this point on, just try to keep ya mind on him. Now, is there anything you see, anything you hear, anything that specifically reminds you of him?”
“My violin. He loved to hear me play, always did.”
“Any favorites?”
“Vivaldi.” Jolée smiled for the first time. “He always loved ‘Four Seasons.’”
Robillard returned her smile. “I’ll see what I can do. He poured the rice into the pot and retreated to a side room. The first notes of the Spring movement shot through the air when Robillard returned.
Jolée’s smile widened. “You do classical?”
“I have everything.”
“But how did you find it so fast?”
“iTunes, dahlin.” Robillard patted her on the shoulder as he tended to the food. “Big man, ya Popo.”
“You knew him?”
“Held me ‘gains da wall one time, caught me on a drug raid.”
“Wow, I…”
“Don’ worry, chere, years ago. I was a dumb kid. But Sergeant Chaisson, he took care of me. I got out the next day, he put me workin’ on his house, paid me twice what I was worth. Robillard placed bowls of red beans in front of them. “He’s a good man to bring back.”
“So what’s it gonna take?” Rayanna interjected.
“Well, we jog chere’s memory until she fall asleep. She’ll bring him back herself over night. You just lay down in dat bed in yonder and let ya mind work its own magic.”
“Lay down?” Rayanna shouted. “Overnight? What kind of a place is this?”
“Girl, dis a house of dreams. She has to be asleep to do the trick.”
“Forget it!” Rayanna stood up and grabbed her purse. “Jo, let’s go. This whole thing is way too shady.”
Jolée sat quietly, immobile.
“Come on, you’re not seriously doing this, are you?”
“I have to.”
“No you don’t, girl, let’s go! Just cause a man cooks you some red beans and says he’ll bring ya Popo back doesn’t mean you owe him anything.”
“But you brought me here to begin with.” Jolée looked up in her friend’s eyes. “
“You stay up and keep guard, I’ll be okay.”
Rayanna sighed. “Okay girl. Call ya mamma and tell her you’re staying at my house.”
As Jolée bedded down, Rayanna took her hand. “I’ll be right here, chere. Sleep good.” Jolée drifted off to sleep, ‘Canon in D’ wafting through the air.
Jolée’s eyes opened at the feeling of being pulled by one arm. “Where are we going?”
“Move, girl, I knew there was something shady about that Medicine Man.” Rayanna threw her in the car. “Call ya daddy, report that man to the cops.”
“But what will I say?” Jolée, still a bit groggy, dug for her phone. “Last they knew, I was staying at your house. How do we explain-”
“No time, bebe. Just call!”
Jolée was searching for the number when suddenly her father’s name popped up on the screen calling her.
“Jolée, where da hell are you?” her father snapped.
“Papa, call the police. Rayanna and I-”
“Honey, come get here now! Ya Popo is sittin’ here in the living room!”
“Popo?”
“Yah, like Lazarus come right out da tomb, straight outta St. Louis #1.”
“Papa. That’s great! It worked!”
“What worked, honey? You better-”
Jolée stared at her phone, silent from dead battery.
“Hold on, Jo, we almost home.” Rayanna fishtailed around the corner and zipped into a spot along the street.
Jolée reached for the door handle, still groggy from the sensory overload. Her momma came out the front door jabbering 90 miles per hour. Jolée caught about five words of every twenty her mother shouted as she was ripped from the car seat.
“Mama C, I can explain,” Rayanna interjected. “Jo and I went to see this Medicine Man, but he tried some funny stuff and I think he laced her wine, and-”
“Honey, there’s a dead man alive and sitting in his old chair, and there’s blood everywhere and-”
“But Mama C, dis creepy man took your daughter and tried to-”
“Hon, just shut up! We have bigger problems we got to figure out why-” she stopped as Joleee broke free from her grasp and ran to the door. She zipped past her father and stopped inside as her eyes adjusted to the light. The old man sat before her in his chair, bleeding like the day he first got shot.
“How did dis happen, Jo?” her father yelled.
“Papa, we went to Uptown, saw this guy Medicine Man, said he could bring Popo back-”
“Yeah then he started gettin’ all funny!” Rayanna interrupted.
“Ray, you lead us over there,” ordered Mr. Chaisson. He grabbed the other men in the house and hit the door.
Jolée started walking towards his chair, still amazed that Medicine Man’s tricks worked.
“Why did ya have to do this, girl?” her mother screamed. “We just got over him, now you had to dig him back up again!”
“Over him? Mama, I ain’t over him, not that easy!”
“Look at him, Jo! Just look at him!” She grabbed Jolée by the chin and turned her head. “Just how do you think we gonna take care of him? We can’t bring him back to the hospital, they just signed his death certificate! And what we gonna do when he dies again?”
Jolée bowed her head, starting to cry. “I just wanted to see him, mama…I didn’t know….”
“Yeah you didn’t know because you didn’t think! You didn’t think of nobody but yaself. Then you get in with this funky Medicine Man and get the men all riled up. Now what the rest of us gonna do? How we gonna make all this happen, huh?”
“I don’ know, mama!” Jolée cried.
The house phone rang as Mrs. Chaisson walked across the room. She continued to pace around talking while Jolée sat crying on the floor.
“They coming back, Jo. Aint nobody there - no Medicine Man, no lights, no stuff, no nothing.”
Jolée didn’t bother to look up.
“If we find dat Medicine Man, I’ma kill him! First he tries to do whatever with you while you’re asleep, then he brings Popo back from the grave, now he’s leaving him on our hands without helping clean up the mess he made?”
The men returned, barging in the door, guns blazing, each one telling the next how he planned on finding Medicine Man and what he planned on doing after that.
Jolée picked her head up briefly. Through teary eyes, she saw her violin and bow still lying on the floor beside his chair. Jolée crawled over to reach them and began to play. Silence arrested the crowd.
“Jo!” her father shouted. “Jo, not now!” Jolée wept profusely, playing all the louder. “I said stop it, Jo!” Mr. Chaisson ripped the instrument from her hands.
A different kind of music filled the air, police cars arriving in front of the house. The entire party ran outside, adrenaline still pumping, leaving Jolée and Eugene alone in the living room.
Laid back in his chair, Eugene took shallow breaths. His formidable frame exhausted his body. What had been his strength in his time on the force became his burden in this weakened state.
Jolée touched him for the first time since he was shot. She hadn’t touched him in the coffin. When she was a child, her mother told her that if she touched a dead person’s body, she’d never see them again in her dreams.
Jolée leaned down to hug her grandfather. After so brief a touch, her jacket was already stained with blood. Jolée crawled onto the chair and rested her head on his shoulder. She could hear him suffering, each breath becoming more strained.
“I’m so sorry I brought you back, Popo. Medicine Man said it wouldn’t be like I expected, but I didn’t know you’d be hurting.”
“It’s okay, chere,” he whispered as she drifted off to sleep. “I’d come back every night like dis just to hear you play.”
Jolée opened her eyes to hear shouting, gunshots, and explosions. She raised her head to see Robillard sitting on the couch, playing Halo with Rayanna. Both of them were laughing hysterically at her inability to play.
“You back, dahlin?” Robillard shouted. The two walked over to greet her at bed.
“How ya Popo doin?” Rayanna asked.
“We need to go get my violin from the house,” Jolée beamed. “He’s coming to hear me play again tomorrow night.”
(C) 2008 Bring It! Ministries