Begging for Change

by Sharon Flake

  “Now you know how it feels,” she says.

  I know she ain’t talking ’bout the sand, neither.

  “I hope he stole all your money,” she says, hopping around on the hot sand. “Just like you stole mine.”

  I stand up and walk over to her. Put my left foot on top of my right one. “You got plenty more left,” I say.

  Zora pulls at her swimming suit straps. She’s fed up with me, I guess. “I’m gonna tell my father, right now, how you stole money from me,” she says, standing on one foot, and rubbing sand off the other.

  I wanna tell Zora that it don’t feel good having somebody you know take what’s yours. But she’s running for the water. “Don’t tell,” I say. “Don’t tell on me!” I say as loud as I can. But she’s in the water. Swimming. Standing by her dad. Pointing my way.

  I don’t know why Zora ain’t tell on me. But she didn’t. If she had, Dr. Mitchell woulda said something, or treated me different. When he got out the water, he pressed his wet hands on my back and asked if they was cold. Then he winked at Momma and pulled me into the water. Him and me swam all the way out to the roped-off part. Zora stayed back on the sand reading magazines and drinking pop.

  By the time we get home, it’s late. People next door are out playing cards and loud music. Zora’s asleep in the backseat, so Dr. Mitchell says he ain’t gonna come in the house. He drives off once Momma and me go inside.

  “I think my back is sunburned,” Momma says, looking over her shoulder.

  I go to my room to pull my swimsuit off, watching wet sand fall to the floor in clumps. I tell Momma it’s hot in here and the fans ain’t helping none.

  “Go to sleep and you won’t notice,” she says, turning the shower on. A half hour later she comes in my room wet all over and smelling like oranges. “Cut the lights off,” she says, yawning, bending over and kissing me good night. “I already locked the front door.”

  Momma’s snoring fifteen minutes after she leaves my room. I ain’t ready to go to sleep, so I take a shower too. It don’t help. As soon as I’m done, sweat is running down the side of my face, soaking my shirt and the back of my shorts. I take a butter knife and try to open my bedroom window. The knife bends all the way over, but it don’t open the window.

  I go to Momma’s room and answer the phone when it rings. It’s Dr. Mitchell. He’s not calling for Momma. He’s calling for me. When we were on the beach, he says, Zora told him that I wanted to talk to him. “But not with your mom around. So that’s why I’m calling now.”

  I almost pass out.

  “Something wrong, sweetie? You in trouble or something?”

  I tiptoe outta Momma’s room. “No. She musta made a mistake.”

  Dr. Mitchell’s in the kitchen. I hear the microwave going. “Zora says it was really important. Something bad.”

  I open the front door. Sit out on the steps.

  “Is it about your dad?” he asks.

  I fan myself with my hands. “No.”

  I wish Dr. Mitchell would hang up the phone. He won’t. He’s still trying to find out what happened. Saying he’ll get it outta Zora then.

  I don’t want Dr. Mitchell to be disappointed in me and leave me and Momma. So I lie to him. “It’s, it’s Miracle. The girl up the street,” I say, peeking to see if she’s out. My voice gets low. “She’s still bothering us.”

  He asks what she’s doing. I can’t think of nothing. So I make more stuff up. “She said she was gonna kick my butt if I didn’t give her some money.”

  Dr. Mitchell goes off. He says he’s coming over tomorrow and talking to her. That he wants Momma there too, ’cause they need to put an end to all the crap from her and “that Shiketa.”

  I’m on the pavement, walking back and forth. Chewing my nails and wondering why I keep making things worse.

  “It’s okay, Dr. Mitchell. Miracle, ummm, said she was sorry. Right when we came back from the beach she apologized.”

  I ain’t sure he believes me. But he quiets down. “If anybody, anybody messes with you or your mom,” he says, “call me.”

  A cab pulls up to Miracle’s building. Miracle gets out wearing a long white gown, like maybe she was in a wedding.

  Dr. Mitchell says he’s going to bed. But before he hangs up, he asks about me and Zora. Why we not talking. I do what Zora did. I don’t tell the whole truth. “It’s partly her fault, partly mine. But we back to being friends now.”

  When he hangs up, I go back inside. I fix a bowl of cinnamon flakes and watch TV. Then Zora’s words pop in my head like answers to a test. You’re a thief and a liar, just like your dad.

  I don’t get mad when I hear the words this time. ’Cause I know they true.

  I didn’t want to tell on Momma, but I had to. Our place is burning up. My hair stinks all the time ’cause it’s so hot in here. When I woke up this morning, my bed was soaking wet. Wasn’t no talking to Momma, ’cause she had her mind made up. “The windows’s gonna stay nailed shut for good.”

  Odd Job says I did the right thing, calling him up. “Both y’all gonna end up in the hospital if she keeps this up,” he says, walking through the place with a chisel and knife. Busting the nails and pulling the windows wide open.

  Momma tells him it ain’t none of his business what she does in her place.

  “My place. I’m the landlord. This is my building. And you can’t nail the windows closed, ’cause if they find you two up here dead, they gonna say it was me that offed you.”

  Momma don’t think that’s funny. I do. “Smell the flowers, Momma,” I say, going over to the window and sniffing.

  Momma’s walking from room to room, picking up paint chips. Telling Odd Job Daddy’s gonna break in here for sure, now that the windows ain’t nailed down.

  Odd Job takes her by the arms. “He didn’t break in. Raspberry let him in. Before that, he walked up to the front door and knocked.”

  Odd Job goes into my bedroom and comes back with a can. “Okay. I’ll drive around the place a couple times a week. I’ll check things out when you ain’t here,” he says, holding the can under Momma’s hands. The nails fall to the bottom like pennies in a pot.

  Momma looks so scared standing there with her hands out. “It’s not just him. It’s everything. Shiketa. Miracle. All of it.”

  I walk over to Momma and put my arms around her. She goes to her room, comes back, and hands Odd Job a letter.

  Dear Miz Hill,

  They say I should write you. So that’s what I’m doing. Sorry I hit you. Sorry you had to get stitches. But you shoulda stayed out my business. Anyhow, I’m gonna do community service when I get out. Right round the corner from my old place.

  Odd Job tells Momma she needs to show the letter to her lawyer. To tell ’em she don’t feel safe with Shiketa communicating with her. Momma hands him another letter.

  Dear Shiketa,

  I hope you never get out.

  Momma’s crying. Saying she don’t know why she’s writing such mean things to Shiketa. “A child.”

  Odd Job pats her back. Let’s her know that she got the right to be mad over what happened. Momma presses wrinkles out her dress with her fingers. “Nail up the windows,” she says, reaching in the can and pulling crooked nails out. “If we don’t nail the windows shut, he’s gonna come back. She will too.”

  I look at Odd Job. Then at Momma. This ain’t like her. She’s always strong. Always knows just what to do. “Mail the letters, Momma. Let her know how mad you are at her and then maybe you won’t be so mad and sad inside.”

  Momma won’t look at me. She’s at the window with the hammer. Banging nails. I go over and reach for the hammer. Odd Job pulls me away.

  “Hit it,” he says, raising his hand. “Bash the window in, if you want. Smash a hole in the wall,” he says, pulling Momma’s hand back and aiming for the window.

  When glass smashes and falls to the ground like frozen water, we all look at each other like we don’t know who did it.

  “Sometimes i
t’s better to be mad all at once,” he says, “not in little bitty pieces that leak out of you like oil from a busted tailpipe. That happens, and you never do get over it. Just stay sad and miserable all the time.”

  Momma bends down to pick up the glass. She says she’ll quit her job at the dry cleaners to be home with me more. I don’t want her to do that. We need the money.

  “Raspberry can work for me. Make some extra change, you know,” Odd Job says, sitting down on the couch.

  Momma drops glass into the trash can. “I don’t know.”

  Odd Job’s voice gets low. “When we lived in the projects, your mother took my mother and me in, when hard times hit. She let us stay there three whole years.”

  Momma’s crying again.

  “I’m always gonna look out for you and yours.”

  I pick up the hammer. Odd Job winks. I take that thing and slam it into the glass.

  “Hey, Reds. I like it,” a boy says, making an outline of my body with his hands. When I look his way, he blows me a kiss from the window of a shiny black car with tinted windows and big silver rims. He tells me to come talk to him a minute. I shake my head and turn away, but I can feel my cheeks burning.

  “You growing up, all right,” Odd Job says, staring at the boy. “Guess I need to be calling you plain old Raspberry, huh? Not Raspberry Cherry and stuff like that.”

  We left Momma back home cleaning up and waiting for the glass man to come by. Me and Odd Job going to the bank, then out to eat.

  Everybody knows Odd Job, so we get stopped six times before we even get to the bank.

  When we walk into Goodies Restaurant, Odd Job opens the door and lets me go inside first. “Any boy that don’t open the door or pull out the chair for you ain’t worth your time,” he says.

  “Boys my age don’t care ’bout stuff like that.”

  Odd Job don’t wanna hear that. “You gotta make a boy treat you the way you want to be treated. But first,” he says, opening up the menu, “you gotta know how you want to be treated.”

  I don’t wanna talk about boys with him. So I change the subject. When the waitress comes, Odd Job asks me what I want to eat. I order waffles.

  “Me too,” he says, licking his lips. “But make mine three orders of three each. Bring me a bowl of blueberries and plenty butter.” He stops the waitress when she turns to walk away. “How ’bout a order of bacon, some eggs, and a large orange juice, too.”

  The busboy over at the other table keeps staring my way. I don’t take my eyes off the fork and knife till my food comes.

  “The boys treating you all right, ain’t they?” Odd Job asks.

  “Why you wanna talk ’bout that stuff?” I say, putting my napkin in my lap.

  Odd Job says he just noticing how the boys are looking at me. “Especially Sato,” he says, smearing butter on his waffles and toast. “You like him, huh?”

  I’m playing with the food on my plate.

  “You like him or not?”

  I smile. Try to eat a piece of bacon but I can’t stop grinning. “He’s all right.”

  When we’re done eating, Odd Job pulls out his cash. “A gentleman always pays for a lady’s meal,” he says. “And leaves a tip. You know a brother is cheap and triflin’ if he eats and don’t give the waitress her due when he’s done.”

  I look at him, wonder why he’s telling me all this. When we get back outside, Odd Job asks me if I miss my father.

  I belch and keep walking.

  “When your father was in his right mind, he treated your mom like she had golden feet and diamond eyes,” he says, letting out a belch, too.

  We walk for blocks not talking to each other. Then Odd Job says he seen Daddy, not too long ago.

  I stop walking. Press my fingers to my lips and close my eyes. “He ain’t coming back, is he?”

  Odd Job’s big brown arms cover me. His muscles bunch when he squeezes me tight. “He ain’t stealing from you no more,” he says. “Me and him talked about that.”

  I wipe my eyes and look up at his. They are burnt-toast brown and got long red lines shooting through the white parts, like he’s way past tired. “You get back my money?” I ask.

  Odd Job turns me loose. Starts walking again. Says he woulda got my dough, but wasn’t none of it left by the time he caught up to Daddy.

  I ask if he went looking for him. Odd Job don’t say yes or no. Just that he put the word out that Daddy better stay clear of Momma and me.

  We almost back at Odd Job’s spot when I ask him if he would ever hurt Daddy. He don’t answer, just says can’t nobody do nothing worse to Daddy than he already done to hisself.

  He’s right, I guess. But I can’t help wondering what Odd Job said or did to Daddy to get him to stay away from us— for good.

  Finally, some good news! We moving into that house in Pecan Landings. Momma went to the hearing today and the judge told those people who live around there that he will hold them in contempt of court if they try to interfere with us moving in. Momma says we can move in right away. Today is July 1st. We moving in there one month from today.

  I’m thinking about this while I’m sitting out front of our place talking to Mai and her cousins. They’re headed for the market not far from here to buy some ginger. “My dad says it’s cheaper at that store,” Mai says.

  This is the first time I’m meeting her cousins. The little one says her name is Ling. She’s six years old. Short and cute.

  Got long, straight black hair down to her navel. Crooked front teeth and blue eyeglasses shaped like stars.

  Ling’s sister is named Su-bok. She’s thirteen and really pretty. Her hair is short and spiked high on top. It’s black, but the tips are as white as glue. I don’t know what her eyes look like ’cause of the sunglasses.

  Mai asks if I want to go with them to the store. I lock up the house first and try to make conversation with Ling while we walk. She act like she ain’t got no tongue. She hunches up her shoulders or shakes her head no when I ask her something. When we get to the store, Mai says for her and Su-bok to wait outside with the dog. They brought it with them from California.

  “They make me sick,” Mai says, smacking her forehead with both hands. “Every chance I get, I ditch ’em.”

  When we walk up the cookie aisle, Mai opens a package of chocolate sandwich cookies. The kind with thick, white cream inside. She looks up and down the aisle and pulls out four of ’em. “Here,” she says, handing me two. I shake my head no. She shoves two into her mouth and two into her pocket, slips the package back on the shelf, then starts walking real fast.

  I ain’t never seen Mai take what wasn’t hers before. I tell her that, too. She rolls her eyes. Says it wasn’t stealing. “Just sampling. That’s all.”

  Mai is walking up and down every aisle, even though we already got the ten bottles of ginger she came for. She keeps talking about her cousins. “Since they came, people stay on my case,” she says, pulling out a cookie and stuffing it in her mouth. “We went to a Korean grocery store yesterday and the owner gave them free cookies and gum. Su-bok had to make him offer me something. I told him to keep that crap.”

  Mai wipes black crumbs off her lips, then hands the cashier the money. We walk out the door and up the street. Su-bok and Ling trying to keep up, but Mai and me moving so fast, they end up half a block behind. I make Mai stay put so they can catch up. When they do, a boy sticks his head out a car window, starts speaking gibberish and pointing to Su-bok. His braids are undone and his hair is all over his head. “Hey you. You,” he says, pointing to her. “Come here. I got something to ask you.”

  Mai takes the last cookie out her pocket and throws it at him. It bounces off the car and gets smashed to pieces when the tire rolls over it. “See?” she says, walking fast. “See what my father did? Made everything worse.” Then she takes off running.

  Su-bok snaps her fingers and moves her hips to music the rest of us don’t hear. “Evil,” she says, pulling up her sunglasses and staring at me. “Mai
is evil.”

  I don’t say nothing.

  “She wakes up mean, goes to bed mean, and is mean in between,” she laughs. “Hey, that rhymes.”

  Ling stoops down and hugs her dog, Couch. They call him that because he lays on the couch all the time at home. Then she takes her fingers and pulls his lips back, trying to get him to smile.

  “It doesn’t bother me,” Su-bok says.

  I look at her, wondering what she talking about.

  “The way people stare. That doesn’t bother me. I just figure they think I’m cute.”

  Su-bok takes off her shades and sticks them in her back pocket. Except for the brown of Mai’s skin, and the crinkles in her hair, them two look almost the same—even their teeth are shaped alike.

  We stop at a corner store and get something to drink. The boy whose father owns this store never pays me no attention. Now, he is sweet as pie. Saying “Thank you” and “Yes” for no real reason at all. Putting our stuff right in a bag, not asking me if I want one or not, like he usually do. I see him making eyes at Su-bok. I don’t care. I hate him anyway.

  Su-bok takes Ling’s hand when we cross the street. “Where I live in L.A., there’s all kind of boys: Black. Chinese. White. Hmong. Mixed. Mexican. Korean. Shoot,” she says, holding out her hand so she can take a sip of my pop, “around my way, a girl can have a different color boyfriend every day of the week. Nobody stares. Nobody cares.”

  Mai is waiting on my steps when we get there. Su-bok ain’t in no hurry, though. She stops on the corner. She says she wants to check out the boys. Ling races the dog to the house.

  “You like it here?” I ask Su-bok.

  “I like the boys. They’re cute. They ask for my phone number all the time,” she says, smiling. “At home, my father is strict. Watches everything I do.”

  I ask Su-bok if she speaks Korean. She says yes. They have to speak it at home. We’re on my front steps now. Couch is across the street lying on a sofa somebody put out for trash last month. Ling is with him.