The Rejected Stone: Al Sharpton and the Path to American Leadership by Al Sharpton

strong, assuring presence, a wise word, a sun-eclipsing superstar. Now he was gone. I later found out that among James’s final words to Bobbit were, “Look out for Reverend Sharpton.”
    I called my traveling companion to let him know my plans had changed. Oprah and South Africa would have to be put aside; I was going to Augusta. I called my secretary and told her to make me a reservation. She asked who was traveling with me. I told her I didn’t have time to think about that, so I wasn’t taking anybody. And besides, it was Christmas. “You’re going alone?” she asked, surprised. I never traveled alone. But I would have to make an exception on Christmas. Besides, I wanted to be by myself while I processed it all. But then I remembered something: my annual Christmas appointment in Harlem.
    “Wait, I still want to feed the hungry. He would want me to feed the hungry. So get me a flight to Augusta at about noon, after I go up to Harlem.” And that’s what I did after James Brown died. I fed the hungry in Harlem. Then I got on a plane to Augusta.
    The next three days in my memory are a staggering blur of funerals, sadness, and tears. On Thursday, we had him laid out in state at the Apollo Theater in Harlem, where tens of thousands paid their respects. Then, on Friday, we had a small family funeral in Augusta, and finally, on Saturday, we were going to have his big hometown farewell at the arena that had just been stamped with his name a few weeks earlier. I rode with the body for the entire journey. I was exhausted, physically and emotionally spent. At three in the morning, while I was asleep in an Augusta hotel room, my phone rang, another wee-hour summoning to jar me from my dreams. This time, it was the mortician, Charlie Reid.
    “Reverend Sharpton?” he said, his deep Southern accent slowly oozing through my phone.
    “Yeah, Mr. Reid. Please don’t tell me something’s wrong now,” I said.
    “Nah, nothing’s wrong, Reverend Sharpton,” he said. “I just wanted you to give me authorization. I just got a call from Michael Jackson.”
    I could hear the wonder in his voice.
    “He’s in town, and he wants to come by the funeral home and see the body,” he said.
    “Michael Jackson? But Michael is in Bahrain.”
    “Nah, he’s here. He wants to come by and see Mr. Brown,” Mr. Reid said. “I didn’t want to wake the girls up.”
    I was shaking my head, shocked again by one of Michael’s moves. “Yeah, he’s authorized. But tell Michael to call me.”
    “All right, I will, Reverend Sharpton.”
    I sat there waiting, not able to get back to sleep. An hour passed with no call. An hour and a half. So I called Mr. Reid back.
    “Mr. Reid, did Michael come?”
    “Yeah, he came,” Mr. Reid said. “He sat here a whole hour. He told me I combed James’s hair wrong. He took a comb, and he recombed it.”
    “Wait a minute—he recombed the hair?”
    “Yeah, he redid it,” Mr. Reed said. “Said I did it wrong. He sat here with the body for an hour.”
    “Did you tell him to call me?”
    “Yeah, he said he was going to call you.”
    So I called Michael myself and told him he shouldn’t leave. I knew Michael well—he’d come and sit with the body and then get out of town.
    “One day, you’re going to have to reappear in public,” I told him.
    He had not been in the States and had not been seen in public since his trial, which had ended a year and a half earlier.
    “What better time to do it? You came to show your respect to your idol,” I continued.
    “I’ll think about it,” he said, and hung up.
    Word got out that Michael had been in town, but everyone assumed he was gone. However, the next day, halfway through the funeral at the James Brown Arena, Michael walked in. He came over and sat next to me and the family. The band broke into a memorial tribute to James, playing some of his biggest songs. The band members started motioning for Michael to come join them on the stage.
    “Sit