glass. We got rid of the murals of angels and demons Thevis had painted on the walls and ceilings. A taxi driver told my brother that he used to drop people off at the house quitefrequently and once saw a bunch of men having sex with young women on the lawn. Well, the taxi driver actually said “raping” women on the lawn.
In my hands, the house took on a younger feel, with my mother in charge of the redecoration. We put in a gold staircase that led to big gold doors outside my bedroom. We installed a giant fish tank that went under the staircase all the way up to the second floor. There were always other people in the house with me—some of my boys actually lived there. Atlanta is a big strip-club town, so many of the local strippers would get off work and come to my house to spend their days. There would be beautiful big-booty strippers walking around all the time, but clothed, because my son and nephews were often there too. One of the house’s most memorable features was the pool—it was all black on the bottom, at one end about twenty feet deep, with a bridge crossing over it, giving it the feel of a deep lagoon. To this day it remains one of the baddest pools I’ve ever seen.
I gave my son Landon a couple of over-the-top birthday parties there in the early 1990s. For one of them, I had the real Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles come. I’m talking the actual dudes from the movies, wearing their actual costumes. I don’t remember at all how much this cost, but it must have been a small fortune. At the time, I certainly wasn’t thinking about the pain of writing a check for something like that. Because MCA owned Universal Studios it was easy for me to get the real Ninja Turtles because it was a Universal franchise.You might ask whether it was necessary to go all out and get the real Ninja Turtles, but my son would have known if they were Turtle impersonators.
A year or so before the Turtles birthday, I dressed up as Batman for his party. He took one look at me and was like, “Uh, you’re not Batman, you’re my dad.”
“No, I’m not your father, I am Batman,” I said, trying to disguise my voice.
I then ran into the house and had my brother come out with the outfit on while I strolled out in regular clothes to stand next to Landon.
“Dad! Now that’s Uncle Tommy!”
I couldn’t fool his ass to save my life, so I figured I needed the real Ninja Turtles.
Despite all the fun we had down in Atlanta, I sensed that a lot of evil shit had gone down in the house while Thevis lived there. To this day I believe that house was haunted. Pretty soon it was a generally accepted fact among my family and friends that there were supernatural presences there. Some of the ghosts were definitely upset. We often would see white women walk down the hallway. People would bust out of their rooms, screaming, “Did you see that?!”
One memorable night, one of the ghosts descended from the ceiling and had sex with me. After you stop laughing, I need you to hear what I’m saying because I’m not making this up. And let me add this: this was before I ever touched any drug besides weed and alcohol. I don’t think anybodycan drink enough alcohol to make them think they are actually having sex with a ghost. In my bedroom I had a big round bed with a mirrored ceiling looming above. I always slept in the nude, so one night I woke up to the sensation of a woman on top of me. I looked up and in the mirrors I could actually see a white woman straddling me on the bed. The sensation felt exactly like sex—I could feel my penis inside of her and everything. It was not a dream; I was definitely awake when it was happening. All of a sudden, she was gone—leaving me alone and incredibly excited and terrified at the same time.
The entire time I was in the house, Thevis’s brother kept on us about selling the place back to him. He approached us so often that we became suspicious there was a stash of money hidden somewhere. That feeling
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