Getting Rid of Mabel

by Keziah Frost

  Queen held up her small hand and said, “Sorry, no more questions. We’re in a hurry.” As if she were ending a press conference, Queen headed out the door with determination, and Summer, Hope and Carlotta followed.

  Outside, Hope was reunited with Summer in a fit of mutual irritation. Summer was never so alive as when she was in a passion.

  “Who did that lady think she was? Ooh, she’s lucky she didn’t say that to me! How do people get the idea—that Greg, too, he’s another one—how do they get the impression that they can just come up to you and ask personal questions about your family?”

  Hope said, “We learned about it in the foster parent classes. It’s unbelievable, but this is what happens. People see an interracial family, and they feel like they can get personal for some reason. If you foster or adopt interracially, you just have to be ready to deal with it. It goes with the territory.”

  Carlotta, enjoying the shared bristling indignation of her young ones, joined in by observing, “Let it go. I, for one, have no time for ignorant people.”

  Queen added, “Me neither.”

  At home, Queen and Hope were getting ready for bed. Hope had come out of the shower and was toweling off her hair. She sat on Queen’s bed as Queen pulled her pajamas from her dresser.

  Hope said, “When that lady asked which one was your mother, you pointed to me. I was glad you did. But I wondered why.”

  Queen paused. She turned to Hope with her pajamas in her hands. Red ones with hearts. “I pointed to you, because you are my mother--out here. You care about me, and you take care of me, so you are my mother, I think. But I also have a mother that I was born from, and she cares about me, but she can’t take care of me. So, to my way of thinking—I got that from Mary Poppins. I like how she always says, ‘to my way of thinking.’ To my way of thinking, I need two mothers. So, if you would like to be one of my two mothers, I would like to be your daughter.”

  Without waiting for a response, Queen ran off to take her warm bath.

  Hope sat with her eyes closed, wrapped in a warm blanket of gratitude. Norbert had forecasted this for her. He was right again. Her greatest wish was coming true.

  -69-

  It was a Tuesday afternoon in October when that baldy-man with the big stomach came smiling into the café to sniff around Hope. Queen knew what he was up to.

  This wasn’t the first time. Queen had her eye on him. His name was Mr. Arnie Butler and he worked at that bookstore down the street. Why he had to come into the café and bother Hope while she was working, Queen did not know. He always brought a little book or something, and that was stupid, because Hope could buy her own books. He didn’t have anything Hope needed, and Queen did not like to see his grinning face.

  She watched Hope drying her hands on her apron and pushing a lock of hair off her forehead as Mr. Butler handed her the book and a little bag of candy corn. Queen thought, if Hope wasn’t going to eat that candy corn, she would.

  Queen left her spot next to Mr. Zelenka’s table and casually skipped closer to Hope, so she could listen in.

  “Sure, that would be great, Arnie. I’d need to see about getting my Aunt Carlotta or my cousin Summer to babysit.”

  Aw, hell no.

  “Also, I hope you understand, but I don’t like to leave her for very long yet.”

  That’s better.

  “We’re still in the settling-in phase, and I have to leave her for several hours a week as it is because of the café. But just to get a bite to eat—sure! How nice of you to ask!”

  “If you’d be more comfortable, why not bring her along?”

  Queen grabbed Hope around the waist, giving her a big surprise. Queen had never hugged Hope, but this was a good time to start.

  Queen looked right into the eyes of that man.

  She told him, “We go everywhere together, we do.”

  As Hope watched Arnie walk out of the café, she could feel Queen’s eyes upon her.

  “I’ve got to get back to work. Just a couple more hours.” She patted Queen’s back, and the child skipped back to the fortune-teller’s booth.

  Hope was deep in thought as she returned to her work in the kitchen.

  She didn’t know if she just didn’t like nice guys, or if there was something about her that turned nice guys into jerks. Maybe it was the star she was born under. Or some psychological imprint left from her childhood. Whatever it was, she was afraid of her old high school friend Arnie. Afraid of opening her heart to him. She had never thought of him “that way,” probably, she told herself sardonically, precisely because he was a nice guy.

  Or was she being too hard on herself?

  Maybe it was all just dumb luck.

  She had friends with lower self-esteem and worse childhoods than hers, and they seemed to wind up with loving and kind partners. Maybe it wasn’t anything she did wrong, but just the way fate played out.

  The point was, should she send Arnie on his way, or should she “give him a chance,” as Aunt Carlotta kept saying?

  Arnie was a good man; she felt that. She’d hate to turn him into a jerk, if that was the effect she had on good men. They all seemed good, at first.

  He was a handsome man, regardless of Queen’s opinion. He was a sweet and considerate person, but then again, Rudy had seemed sweet. They all had, until they were sure of her devotion. Then Mr. Hyde came out, every time. She just did not have the energy or inclination for any of that angst anymore.

  On the other hand….

  -70-

  In the studio of the Gibbons Corner Art League, Carlotta was preparing for her evening’s lesson. Tonight, she would demonstrate how to put the shine, dimension and shadow into an object. On her easel, she set a blank canvas. On a high table, she set a green apple. She had chosen the apple that afternoon at the Lucky Pig Grocery Store for the leaf that remained attached to its stem, making it more natural-looking, but also different from all the other apples on the shelf.

  Art was all about noticing individual differences. Noticing them, and loving them, if it wasn’t too fanciful to say so. Because as a painter looked at an object with great attention, she felt her interest deepen and grow into something that was very like love. Painting could open a person’s heart to objects, to life. Painting a tulip that stretched its striped head toward the window, straining toward the sun, could not fail to make the painter feel with the tulip, long for the sun, be the tulip. She wouldn’t say such things out loud, even if she did think them. These were things Birdie might say. But maybe Birdie wasn’t always wrong.

  Carlotta knew she was a good painting teacher. Her students told her so, all the time. As a teacher, she understood how to help people achieve their own aims without taking over. Why, then, couldn’t she do that with the Club? Why did her grasp on her friends have to be so tight?

  She knew the answer. It was because, with her friends, she was afraid. And here was another thing she would never say out loud.

  She was afraid that if she did not control her friends, they would leave her. She had to control their interests and their actions. If she let go, they would drop her, because she was not, frankly, a very likable person. She must have decided years ago—she didn’t know when—that if she couldn’t be likable, she could at least be interesting—and commanding. If she couldn’t appeal to people with sincerity and authenticity, then at least she could manipulate and organize them.

  There was an awareness stirring in Carlotta. Like the tulip straining toward the sun, there was something straining in her. It seemed to have something to do with that little Queen. Hope’s foster child stood in Carlotta’s mind much of the time, even when they were not together. In Queen, Carlotta was surprised to see herself, and something better. Something she could aspire to. Like Carlotta, Queen was bright and curious. Unlike Carlotta, she was vulnerable; she had to be, as a dependent child. Yet alongside that vulnerability was an inexplicable confidence. The child had confidence in who she was, on a very deep level. She seemed to possess some se
lf-knowledge. Self-acceptance, perhaps. Oh, it was hard to put into words.

  Carlotta wondered if, at age eighty-one, a person could change in any way. Or were her lessons all behind her?

  Carlotta’s late and disappointing husband Ed had not believed that people could change. At least, he didn’t believe that he could. “This is who I am, Carly. This is who you married. I can’t change.” How old was he when he had shouted that at her? Thirty-five? And yet, she had changed since then. For one thing, she had become a person that others didn’t even think of shouting at. She had changed in dozens of ways. She had developed talents and accepted new ideas. She had continued traveling, reading, and learning. Perhaps she did still have some growing ahead of her, even now.

  As her class filed in, Carlotta looked at each student thoughtfully, seeing their differences and beauty. What was happening to her? She was becoming soft. She wasn’t sure she liked it. But there it was.

  “Tonight, I’ve prepared an exercise for you. Feel free to paint along with me as we focus on making this green apple look as real as possible on our canvasses. Or, if you prefer, you can paint the apple your own way—as an abstract or a primitive—you are the artist. The interesting thing is, we will all paint the same apple, and yet we each have a different perspective, depending on where we are standing. Therefore, no two of us will paint the same apple.”

  -71-

  Upstate New York in the fall was the most heart-soothing, glorious place in the world, even for a native. As Hope and Queen drove through the winding roads and up and down the hills, Hope felt joy and appreciation for the natural beauty all around them, and she and Queen pointed out to each other splendid things to look at: black horses grazing in emerald fields, stone walls, a red barn, and yellow and orange autumn woodlands.

  “They’ll make you go through a metal detector. That’s the part I hate. One time, I made it go off with my belt buckle. When that happens, they act like you’re a criminal. That was so scary.”

  They’d been driving for an hour already, having left at six in the morning to be able to arrive at the Compton Walker Correctional Facility by eight, when visiting hours began. They’d be able to stay until two-thirty, when visiting hours would end. They would get back home at four-thirty. Hope had left Liam in charge, and she worked at brushing away the worry about being out of reach of the café for a whole day. The good thing about this long drive was that it was loosening Queen’s tongue, and she was chatting away, happy with the prospect of seeing her mother.

  “Some of my foster parents didn’t want to take me to see my mother. The Place is way far out in the country, far away from every foster home. So I didn’t see her sometimes. That was terrible.” Queen looked gratefully at Hope. “Thank you very much for taking me,” she added, maturely.

  After a pause, Queen added, “Would this be a good time for you to teach me how to drive?”

  Hope turned quickly to see Queen observing her with a sly smile.

  Queen shrugged. “It never hurts to ask.”

  Summer had argued against the prison visit. She had said, “But wouldn’t that be teaching her that prison is normal? If she enjoys seeing her mother, wouldn’t that give her a positive association with prison? Make her think of it as a possibility for herself?”

  Hope had had to push back again, saying, “You know what, Summer? You didn’t take all the classes at Child and Family Services like I did. Let me do the mothering here. The decisions are my responsibility. You just enjoy Queen for who she is, and I’ll take the fall if I mess up.”

  And Summer was enjoying Queen, as the little girl had a passionate interest in learning foreign words and seemed to have a prodigious memory. Since that night at Renata’s Restaurant, when Summer had seen Queen’s potential for foreign language and then immediately had her righteous indignation button pushed by “ignorant people,” she had flipped sides again. Summer had begun tutoring Queen in Spanish. Hope had never been able to remember her Spanish dialogs in school, but Queen had already started her own notebook dedicated to the study of Spanish, and was considering a career as a Spanish teacher or a translator for the United Nations. Summer thought she was funny and smart, and couldn’t get enough of her. She was also out to prove herself as an outspoken advocate, looking for a fight with anyone who had a question about Queen.

  “Now,” Queen told Hope as they rolled along though paradise, “my mother’s name is Dahleeya. It’s kind of like the flower, the dahlia, but it’s Dah-LEE-ya. Dahleeya Jones. Miss Jones to you. She doesn’t like people she’s just met to just go ahead and call her by her first name. And she will call you ‘Miss Delaney.’ Until she really knows you well. She’s kind of formal that way.”

  Queen twisted her body to look in the back seat.

  “My mama’s gonna love that picnic lunch we packed. Those flatbread sandwiches with the roasted peppers and stuff? Ooh. My mouth is watering right now. Can I have one—just one?”

  “Let’s leave the picnic lunch in one piece, so it will be nice when your mother sees it. We have our smoothies and our blueberries and pita chips. That’s a good breakfast for us.”

  Queen looked back at the picnic basket with regret, but said no more, sipping her smoothie and then resting it back in the cup holder.

  “Can I ask you a question?” asked Queen.

  “Sure.”

  “That Mr. Butler—the bald, fat guy, kinda ugly—do you like him?”

  Hope smiled.

  “He’s an old friend from high school. He’s certainly not ugly. He’s a kind and interesting person; that’s what I think. And I think he would like to be better friends. I really don’t have much time, though, between the café and now taking care of you.”

  “That’s what I thought. You don’t have time for him.” Queen seemed reassured.

  “Let’s play a game,” Hope proposed. “Things You Don’t Know about Me.” She glanced at Queen, who was picking through a pint of blueberries. “So the way it goes is this: I say one thing you don’t know about me, then you say one thing I don’t know about you, and we keep going until we can’t think of any more things.”

  “Okay,” agreed Queen. “But do we ask questions? Because I don’t like to be asked questions.”

  “No. We just tell the other one what we want to tell. No questions.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll start. Let’s see… Oh, I have one. You know I have allergies. But I bet you didn’t know I’m allergic to flowers.”

  “I didn’t know anybody could be allergic to flowers.” Queen looked skeptically at Hope.

  “Oh yes, they can, and the worst flower for me is daisies. Oh, I sneeze and my eyes water. I cannot deal with daisies. Your turn.”

  “Okay…. Maybe you don’t know that I was five years old when my mama went away. Maya was just born, and Tamika was one. So they don’t remember her like I do.”

  Hope did actually know that, but she was glad to hear Queen talking to her about it. For all Queen’s objection to questions, she was now offering some information about her past. She seemed to want to start talking about it. But Hope would have to tread lightly.

  “All right. My turn again. Did you know that I have always wanted to have a little girl like you?”

  “Like me?”

  “Exactly like you. Even when I was a little girl myself, I used to think all the time about the children I would have someday. And I always knew there would be a little girl, just like you.”

  “Is that for real?”

  “That is for real.”

  “Huh. Okay…. Another thing you don’t know about me. Well, when I was six, I was very bad. That’s when I hit the caseworker. I did everything I could think of that was bad. Swearing, stealing,” Queen lowered her voice. “The reason I was so bad all the time was because I thought if I did something really awful, I would get to go and live with my mama. Then I found out it’s not like that. A social worker put her face right up to mine so our noses were almost touching and she said, real slow
and real serious, that no matter what I did, that would never, ever happen. ‘They don’t put six-year-olds in prison with their mamas,’ she told me. So I had to give up trying for that.”

  Hope’s heart clenched and she turned to look at this child who had had to work through so much in her own little mind and heart.

  “What do you miss most about your mom?” Hope asked.

  Queen said, “Now, I thought you said we didn’t get to ask questions.”

  They rolled along in silence for a while, taking turns pointing out the beauty all around them.

  At last Queen said, “I miss my mama reading to me, riding bikes, telling jokes. My mama loves jokes. I have one here, in my pocket. I got this one from school and wrote it down on a piece of paper. She’s gonna love this one.”

  -72-

  As they passed the prison gates and drove down the long driveway, they left a world of color and life and entered a grey, dead world. The parking lot was almost empty. Although they had driven two hours to get here, now Hope did not want to go into the enormous brick building. She was surprised at how frightened she was.

  Queen had told Hope about the metal detector, but Hope was not aware that the processing would take a full hour.

  “Do you have anything in your hair?” asked a guard with cold eyes.

  Hope took down her coiled braid.

  She felt an irrational terror that now that she was in the prison they would never let her leave. She was overwhelmed with a sense that this was a place where terrible things happened.

  Another guard intoned, “Please pull out your pockets and turn around.”

  After the metal detector was a series of large metal doors. At last, they entered a spacious visiting room containing tables, chairs, and vending machines. Some tables had board games on them. Pairs and groups of people were already visiting quietly. Each group had one member in an orange jump suit. Hope found herself studying them.