Saving Ruby King

by Catherine Adel West

  “I just had a fight with Dad is all. About Ruby and everything that happened last week. Dad wants to bury his head in the sand. I’m sick of it. It’s like he doesn’t know how to help any other people except Lebanon King.”

  The sun, hidden behind the fluff of clouds, emerges again shining light on the church. Wind whips around our bodies, daggers of cold air cutting our skin.

  “Did you know your dad was the only one who could get my dad to stop drinking for a while, get him to come home?”

  I shake my head. I knew parts of Tim’s story. The ones I pieced together from our childhood. The memories I made with him, the ones I make with him now. He was alone a lot in school if Ruby or I weren’t with him. His clothes worn and hair matted. He didn’t always smell very good. Kids made fun of him, but I knew better than those silly kids. So did Ruby. One time, Tim stayed with me when I scraped my knee falling off the slide. His arm, skinny and ashy, a comfort, and I leaned on him until Momma found us together several minutes later.

  “Your dad was the one who suggested the army. He took me to the recruitment office. Helped me study. Don’t you remember?”

  I shake my head again.

  But I do remember. My dad leaning over Tim, timing the practice tests for the ASVAB, or some other aptitude test with a lot of capital letters. The tests. Dad would go over the answers in a gentle way. The encouragement. It was like the spelling tests he’d help me study for. Dad has the same smile when he’s proud. It takes over his whole face. And the hugs he’d give. Now Tim has me softening my resolve when all I want is to rant and be angry. When all I want is to dig and find answers to help Ruby and now I’m considering going back into that church and hugging Dad and asking if we can start over.

  “Why don’t you come to my place for a while? Cool off.” Tim suggests, snapping me out of my thoughts.

  I check my phone for any other texts, calls. “I can’t. I gotta be somewhere.”

  “Ruby,” Tim says answering a question that no one asked.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You didn’t have to, Layla. Everything you want to say, even when you’re not talking, is on your face.”

  I hear the loose gravel from the cracked concrete underneath Tim’s feet shift as he makes his way down the stairs.

  I catch up to him and look in Tim’s eyes. He knew I was going to speak, but he did so first.

  “I know he upsets you and I know he’s not easy, but you’re not either. Make the effort while he’s here. If these past few days didn’t teach you anything, learn that. Please.”

  The deep brown globes of his eyes show concern and something softer.

  “I’ll talk to you later,” he says.

  “So there’ll be a later?”

  Tim smiles, a sole dimple embedded in his right cheek. “You don’t get rid of me that easy.” The gravel shifts under his feet once again as he walks down the final few stairs, past the guys on the corner, and out of my sight.

  CALVARY

  April 22, 1971

  Lebanon is a little older and my locks are a little weaker. He can easily find openings and enter without others knowing he walked my halls. It’s nice to have unexpected company. I’ve always been happy to see him and he is happy to have a place where Sara isn’t around. I am home when he can’t stay with his best friend or doesn’t want to be around all that happiness. Happiness is sometimes too much for him.

  Lebanon tries to figure out the last of his math homework. He’ll start on English next.

  His birthday is tomorrow.

  I feel from him dread instead of the happy anticipation that comes along with one’s day of birth.

  Looking inside him, I see Sara is always in a foul mood, but his birthday brings out something very bad. Lebanon can hear her in the bedroom. When the door is closed and she wails and drinks and then leaves to go meet more strangers.

  There is a draft in the hall and he feels cool air and it’s nice to feel something other than her hot breath, smoky with the cheap whiskey bought in the store downstairs from their dirty apartment, where burnt embers of old cigarettes and the musty smell of another man leaving her bed perfume the narrow hallway and empty living room.

  The Strangers. Their gold teeth mouthing familiar pleasantries to which they are not entitled. Slapping him on the back, as they buckle their pants and drunkenly bellow, “Hey, little nigga!”

  These wretched festivities always begin at least a week before his birthday. Lebanon doesn’t know why.

  I do.

  I can’t speak and if I could, I wouldn’t tell him. Lebanon wanted Sara to love him and now all he wants is to be left alone. Sometimes he goes to the bathroom and stares at himself in the dirty looking glass. To ponder, to brood, to covet white-picket-fenced lives—dads that smiled and played baseball on fake green grass and moms that made apple pies and didn’t sleep with random men picked up in dark lounges at desperate hours, before daylight intruded on evil indulgences and thin mirages of humanity.

  RUBY

  The bell tinkles, but it isn’t Layla. Not yet, but she’ll come. She always does.

  The dark scarlet peeling wallpaper in the coffee shop reminds me of Grandma Naomi’s home. I trace it with my fingertips. There was a similar paisley pattern of thick teardrops floating from top to bottom on each strip in the living room. The white of the design yellowed with age, the wood floors creaked and groaned when you stepped on them, but her house was always clean and warm.

  You could breathe there. And smile. And laugh. Smell the fresh sunflowers in the vase on the table. Lebanon, my father, wasn’t watching and Mom wasn’t hiding her tears by bowing her head lower than normal while washing dishes, her sorrow in salty droplets hitting the water while she washed plates and cups and forks and sharp knives. I taste something nasty on my tongue like bile or soap or blood when I think of my connection to Lebanon, not one of love or admiration. Lebanon isn’t anything to love. He’s something to be overcome.

  But when I sink somewhere deep and dark in my memories, I pull out something golden and good. And I remember Mom and me leaving, in the night, like our ancestors searching for a North Star. And we’d end up on Grandma Naomi’s doorstep, hundreds of miles away.

  Sometimes God took pity and answered the prayer of a little black girl and it was peaceful when we’d leave the house with the apple blossom tree in the front yard. But Lebanon would come find us and stand on the porch, for hours or days. Three days was his record. He slept on the porch like a dog.

  Then Mom would take pity. Then Lebanon would be nice and maybe make Mom smile or laugh. Lebanon might twirl her around and talk about how pretty she looked on their wedding day, or Lebanon might buy her gardenias and kiss her on her swollen cheek or blackened eye. And Mom would tell Grandma Naomi things were okay and we’d leave. Grandma Naomi would hold on to my arm, say, “Let me keep the girl until things settle.” Or Grandma Naomi would say, “You foolish! He means you no good! Don’t go, baby. Don’t go!”

  But Mom would pry my arm from her grip. She’d kiss her grandma Naomi and we’d leave.

  Lebanon would be nice for a while. Then mean. Then Lebanon said, “Sorry.” And then we’d all try to forget. Then something would happen. Like it always does. A bad day at work. Not enough money. Someone told him No.

  When we stayed at Grandma Naomi’s in Tennessee, when Lebanon didn’t hunt us down right away, I liked to sit and absorb all the silence. There was no crying or fighting. No grabbing or bruising. I’d sit and my eyes would soak in all the details of Grandma Naomi’s home. The feel of the pine floors. The notches on the fireplace, each one its own piece of natural, world-worn art. And on the mantel of Grandma Naomi’s fireplace was one picture in a silver frame. There were three girls and they all smiled except for the girl in the middle. She seemed so familiar. I swear she even looked like me a little or maybe I recognized that same l
ook of desolate sadness. I would make stories in my head about who these three girls were together.

  Sunlight from windows bounced off the frame in sharp, naked pieces, and found the grim corners of each room filling them with life, enlarging the space of the tiny raised ranch house so much so that the small living room seemed comparable to a palace.

  But I missed Layla. I’d talk to her on the phone. Mom would talk to Ms. Joanna. Mom and I enjoyed our time with Grandma Naomi, but we had our people.

  We had our own friendships, and, in those friendships, we had our places, our pacts, our unspoken vows. We had our disagreements and reconciliations. We had each other and that was enough.

  Mom had Ms. Joanna. I have Layla.

  Layla is smart. People in church talked about that, still do. They remark on how smart Layla is and how pretty I am.

  Smart. Pretty. Like no woman can be both. And I suspect church folk, in their own way, mean it as a compliment, but these are the only two attributes assigned to me and Layla.

  One time when we were about twelve, in the basement of the church, Layla and I sat in her dad’s office. This was before there were scars marring the skin of my arms. Elder Alma came in with paperwork for Reverend Potter to sign.

  “Layla, your dad told me you made the honor roll again. I’m not surprised in the least,” she beamed. “And, Ruby, you just growing up to be such a beautiful young lady. Mmm-hmm.”

  And she left and Layla and I laughed. I reached into the pocket of my blouse and handed her a dollar.

  “You were right,” I admitted. “Elder Alma just can’t help herself.”

  “Or Sister Cullen or Sister Ellison,” added Layla.

  “Who knows? Most of the time they’re gossiping anyway! Like we believe they’re discussing Jesus. They barely look at those Bibles!”

  But I remember Layla’s face and how it drew down slowly, her smile disappearing. “You know,” she said, “for once I’d like to be pretty.”

  “And I’d like to be smart,” I replied.

  So it went. People say things so much we believe them, and Layla is good with strategy, but I don’t want her to scheme and plot and plan. I don’t want her to tell me things are going to be okay. I just need her to do something small but hard at the same time.

  I just need her to listen. Even if I don’t talk much.

  I just need my friend to look at me, be with me. Even if it’s only for a short time.

  The bell rings again shaking me from my thoughts and Layla walks through the door. My friend is here.

  LEBANON

  I used to wait for Alice here, at the top of the church stairs. She was always inside those walls helping with something. Fundraisers. Sunday School. Usher Board. Anniversary Committee. She didn’t want to leave this place. I didn’t much like to stay. It was always “God this” and “Faith that.” I went from one woman who couldn’t stand the inside of a church to one who couldn’t stand to be outside of one.

  Alice felt guilty all the time. Felt guilty she couldn’t give more time to the church though she was here sunup to sundown. Felt guilty she didn’t pray more or read the Bible more. Felt guilty she didn’t change me or couldn’t leave me. Alice wanted me in some kind of box, and it was a box I had to stay in. “You’re a good person,” she’d say. “God knows that. I know that, too. You need to learn that.” She’d tell me, “You’re better than what’s at the bottom of a glass.” How the hell would she know who I am? She had no right to think that. She wanted to fix people that liked being broken. Me. The girl. You can’t make a triangle a square or a circle a rectangle.

  You can’t change the shape of things. Not with words or good thoughts. Not with love. Not with God.

  There are some boys smoking on the corner. A mixture of cigarette and weed smoke singes my nostrils. They start sliding away from the church one by one. I suspect they feel as comfortable here as I do. A thing like a church can mess with your head if you let it. One of them still lingers finishing his cigarette by the time I make my way to the street.

  “Let me get one of them squares,” I say.

  I’m polite enough about it, but the boy still looks at me like I’m crazy. His pants sagging too damn low like these young ones do nowadays, but there’s a book in the left back pocket of his jeans. His hat is angled, low, to the left. There’s something familiar in his face, but I can’t place it right now.

  “Thought people in church didn’t smoke or drink,” he says, throwing the smoldering butt of his cigarette in the street. Smoke hangs above him for a moment then disappears. His eyes don’t hit mine. He glances past me down the block.

  “You the expert on church folk?”

  “Didn’t say all that, but I—”

  A car rumbles up from behind us, his hand grabs for his waist as he turns his head. It’s just a Toyota with an old man behind the wheel. The boy takes a loose square behind his left ear and a lighter from his right pocket. He hands it to me. Letters in cheap green ink on his left hand spell out the name Anne. He takes a deep breath.

  I say, “What’s the verse in Saint Mark? ‘Don’t trouble your heart...’”

  “Nah bruh, that’s Saint John, fourteenth chapter and it’s, ‘Let not your heart be troubled...’”

  Guess my face showed some kind of surprise before I could hide it. The boy smirks a little. “I can show you I’m right about that verse. Where’s your Bible?”

  “Don’t got one on me right now.”

  “Damn, man, what kind of Christian is you?”

  “Kind that don’t like a lot of questions. And if you so smart, what the hell you doing hanging with those boys that left?” I ask.

  He doesn’t answer. His smirk leaves, his eyes narrow some, but he isn’t challenging me. He’s sizing up my intentions. Information, giving it to someone, is a heavy gamble especially in a gray place with high walls and thick bars or a holy place with red doors and stained glass. Ragged bits of gossip or knowledge can get you extra cigarettes or a knife in the belly. Church and jail ain’t that different most times.

  “You read a lot on the inside?” I take a drag.

  “I read some,” he finally answers. “You read a lot when you was in?”

  Guess my nice suit and shoes don’t always cover up things. One convict can most times recognize another. It’s a brand we carry like scars or tattoos, but it’s in our eyes, the stain of lost freedom. The stink of a jail doesn’t leave you. It’s a cross between sweat, shit, metal and the cheap cologne the guards would wear. You never quite get comfortable with the sun and the air, walking to the bathroom when you want to, eating when you want or doing anything you please without someone watching you.

  “Obvious to you I spent time downstate?”

  “Figured you spent time somewhere. Game recognize game, Old Man.”

  “Name’s Lebanon, not Old Man.”

  “Yeah, I know. You live next door to my grandma.”

  “I thought you looked familiar. You Ms. Anne’s grandson.”

  “LeTrell. Yeah, I come by and check on her time to time.”

  “She’s a nice lady.”

  LeTrell nods while I take another drag from my cigarette. Strips of cloud cover the sun before it peaks out again from its momentary veil.

  “So what’re you reading?”

  He takes out an old paperback edition of Moby Dick. “I prefer the classics, but Grandma’s always trying to read to me from the ‘Lord’s Good Word.’ That what she calls it. She goes to this church sometimes. I probably know the Bible better than the pastor.”

  “Doubt that.”

  “Yeah, Bibles didn’t do me much good before or now. Places like this either,” he says placing the book back in his left back pocket.

  “The church?”

  “Lotta churches, not a lotta anything else around here. Grandma just gives them her money. Nothi
ng really changes. No matter how black you make Jesus, we blindly follow the adopted religion from our adopted country.”

  “Okay, Malcolm X, besides hanging on the corner, what you doing to make things better?”

  “Opportunities ain’t always easy to come by.”

  “So it’s everyone else’s fault, that it?”

  “I didn’t say that, but it’s either our people being scared of us or white people being scared of us. Either way, none of it puts food in me or my brother’s mouth.”

  “Yeah, we all got a pretty side and an ugly one.”

  “There’s a lot ugly round this city.”

  “Suppose so. Maybe not always.”

  A dark sedan pulls up slowly. Two white faces peer through the dirty windshield. Detectives. Gotta be. No other reason for two white men to drive down a street in Bronzeville than to size up the people that live here. They’re not looking for directions. They know exactly where they want to be. No smiles from them. We don’t smile either. Why bother with niceties? We don’t want them here and they think the boy is a statistic waiting to happen. It’s just the matter of whose gun would take his life—theirs or a rival gang member’s. He’d be dead just the same.

  “What you do now to make it by? Support yourself?” I ask.

  “Whatever it is I gotta do.”

  I know what that feels like, the inevitability of a lifestyle, trying to find some other way, but the streets and the schools and the damn government at times are pushing you toward those corners instead of away from them, but I made something of myself regardless. I have a business and a little money. But now I also got a dead wife and cops that wanna tear down everything I built. And I can’t go back there, prison. The smells, the bodies, the guards. The piss and shit and sweat. The hopeless, endless feeling of nighttime. I don’t care if I’ve done things that deserve to put me back there. I can’t go back.

  I won’t.

  This boy isn’t cut out for whatever it is he thinks he’s doing. None of them are, but not many here to show them different.