Should Have Known Better

by Octavia, Grace

  “Pray.”

  I just stood there and looked at her.

  Even in my anger, there were so many things I’d wanted to say to my mother over the years. To pick up the phone and laugh and tell her what it was like being married. Having children. Learning to deal with life as it came to me. Things that made me a woman. So many things she’d missed. So many things she needed to know. How clean my house was. How I never let my children go to bed hungry or dirty or cold. How everything she’d taught me about making beds and cleaning staircases, washing dishes and warming bread had somehow snuck into my life. But there was something I’d left out of the things I’d wanted to tell her. One thing I’d given up over all those years. And on purpose. One thing I never wanted to say to anyone, especially not her. I didn’t pray anymore.

  My father always said that your desire for light keeps the devil busy. And just as surely as you’ll see the sun, he’ll make sure darkness comes right behind it.

  I always thought it was rather sad to look at life like that. Like saying a glass is half empty rather than half full, and fully expecting it to be empty soon. His way of thinking made happiness seem so temporary, so flimsy and inconsistent. He expected sadness. He expected darkness. He waited for darkness to take the light. And if it didn’t, he took it himself.

  The sun went down and my mother sat at the dining room table playing some card game with the twins. They were betting with pennies and nickels she’d found around the house and R. J. and Cheyenne were laughing.

  They seemed so natural with her. And I had to keep reminding myself that I shouldn’t have expected less. They’d asked about her so many times when they were very little, and when Reginald’s mother died, Cheyenne buried her face into my lap and cried that she only had one grandmother left.

  I’d guessed that over the years their hearts had become as hardened as mine, but I was wrong. Maybe they needed to see her. To snap beans and play cards with her. Maybe I’d been wrong to keep them away because I wanted to stay away. But after one year, the second year got easier, and then I didn’t have to explain anything anymore.

  I sat on the couch watching TV in the living room, listening to them argue over nickels like I had with my mother when I was ten. Only then, when we heard my father’s key in the door, we’d flush the cards and coins into my mother’s purse and pretend we were praying. He’d warn my mother that playing cards was a sin and go for his bottle in the china cabinet.

  I felt like I was in limbo. Struggling through my past and worrying about my future. Like I was standing on a tightrope and going in any direction meant I would fall all the way down.

  I clicked through the channels feeling like something was coming to me, but I have to tell you I had no idea what it was, as obvious as it was.

  “Hey, that’s Aunt Sasha,” R. J. said, peeking over at the television from the dining room. “Right, Mama?”

  I think my heart saw her before I did, because it was pounding and ringing so loud in my ears I hardly heard Cheyenne answer for me or what he said next.

  “Did you say your daddy’s with her?” my mother asked, adding meaning to the mumbling I’d heard.

  I was fixated, stuck and frozen on Sasha’s face on the screen. That same blond hair. Those eyes. She was smiling. Laughing. She held up her hand to say something to a man sitting in the interview seat beside her and I saw her freshly manicured hands.

  We were all silent. And right then I knew what my kids knew. I knew I was hiding nothing. They knew everything.

  “I have to go,” I said, getting up from the couch.

  “Go? Where are you going? It’s dark outside,” my mother said, her eyes digging into me to say so much she couldn’t in front of R. J. and Cheyenne.

  “Just a little errand,” I said loudly and smiled. “I’ll be back. Can you watch the kids?”

  I went to get my purse from the table and my mother was right behind me.

  “What are you doing?” she whispered sternly. “I told you not to go out there and do anything stupid. You need to wait here and pray for direction. Not run out in the street and get yourself arrested.”

  “I did pray,” I lied. “And I got a response. I know exactly what I need to do.” I looked at the television. Sasha’s show was going off in thirty minutes. I could be downtown to CNN in fifteen.

  “Mama, is everything OK?” R. J. asked.

  “Everything is fine,” I said, stepping back from my mother. “You just stay here with your grandmother. I’ll be right back.”

  Apparently, CNN is a big building with lots of big security guards. But I’ve been a woman long enough to know how to get around big buildings and big guards. Let me rephrase that. I’ve never had to sneak around a building that size or lie to security guards whose hands were as big as my head, but it’s amazing what you can do when you’re full of fury and know that in the South, you can get just about anything if you say the right things to the right people. I smiled and told those guards they must be tired from working all day. I didn’t want to be any trouble. I was Sasha’s sorority sister visiting from Augusta. I wanted to surprise her. I even showed pictures of her that R. J. had taken with my digital camera.

  They all seemed a little suspicious. But I pointed out that the pictures had been taken just days before. Clearly, we were friends if she was serving my son pancakes. Everything was fine. They loosened up a little and one copied my driver’s license after I begged him not to call Sasha and ruin my surprise. Another walked me to her dressing room and said he could get fired if I was anything but legit. I assured him everything was fine in my most pleasant voice and kept him distracted with a tale about Sasha’s fondness for big, black, bald men.

  “You sure?” he said, rubbing his bald head as he let me into the locked room.

  “Sure? I know. That’s all she used to date.”

  “So, I stand a chance?”

  “Why wouldn’t you?”

  He laughed and grinned as if he was imagining Sasha on his arm.

  “OK, well you just stay in here, little lady, and wait for her!” he said.

  “And that’s what I plan to do,” I said. “Thank you.”

  I closed the door behind him and exhaled heavily, not realizing I’d been holding my breath since I’d walked into the building.

  I took a few deep breaths and steadied myself as I tried to remember why I was there and what I wanted to say to Sasha. My mother was right. The flames of my anger were fanning so high, I knew I might lose control if I wasn’t clear about what I was supposed to do. I didn’t have any questions, because I didn’t expect any answers. I was coming to the conclusion that everything Sasha had ever said to me was a lie. And I was wondering what lies she’d told that I hadn’t discovered yet. I just wanted her to know how trifling she was. Laying up in my house and lying to me. Taking my children’s father away from them in the middle of the night like a thief. I wanted to look her in the face and let her know I wasn’t a fast loser. I could fight. I would fight.

  There were candles and flowers and lipsticks and makeup brushes scattered everywhere in the room. An open closet full of new suits and a huge box of designer shoes. A monitor over a little couch beside her makeup table showed Sasha was still on the screen.

  I stood up beside the door for a few minutes watching her. Then I sat down. But then my legs were growing so jumpy with my nerves that I had to get back up. I paced the floor. I jumped at each voice I heard from someone walking down the hall, worried that it was her assistant or a makeup artist or just someone other than Sasha coming to discover me in the dressing room.

  I looked at myself in the mirror. My brown face. No makeup. No lipstick. Just my tired eyes, still puffy from this morning. I leaned over the vanity, closer to the mirror. My eyes were starting to look like my mother’s. Losing the bit of shine they had left. I wondered who this woman was staring at me in the mirror. Dawn? Sneaking into the CNN building and posting up in the dressing room of the woman who was obviously having an affair with
her husband? Was that me? It couldn’t be. Nothing in my plan ever suggested this. I wasn’t some angry black woman going out into the world to fight. I had children. I had a home. I had to be better than this.

  A tear rolled down my cheek and I let it sit on my chin until it dove into the vanity.

  “I need to go home—” I tried, turning around to walk out.

  But the dressing room door opened and I jumped back, scared.

  “Oh, oh no, I’m sorry,” an exceptionally—and I do mean so exceptionally—handsome man said, holding the door open. “Did I scare you?”

  “Yeah, I . . . I . . . was leaving.”

  “I’m sorry. I was looking for Sasha.”

  We both looked at the screen to see the credits rolling on her show.

  “Guess she’s on her way up soon. I’ll catch her in the hallway.”

  He stepped back to let the door close and I noticed that he looked familiar. He had light brown skin, slanted, secretive eyes, and strong cheekbones.

  “Wait, are you . . . are you A. J.? A. J. Holmes?” I called.

  The door was about to close, but he came back inside.

  “Yeah, that’s me,” he said and his voice was friendly but humble. He put his hand out to shake mine.

  “Dawn,” I said. “Dawn Johnson.”

  “And you’re. . . .”

  “I went to college with Sasha. We were roommates.”

  “Really?” He chuckled. “I couldn’t even imagine what that must’ve been like.”

  “It was memorable.”

  “So you guys are hanging out tonight? You know Sasha can get you into almost anywhere. Hawks game tonight?”

  “Oh, I don’t think we’ll be going to see the Hawks.”

  “Well, all right,” he said, smiling, and his jaw eased back like he was someone in charge, perfectly confident. “Well, let me know if you all need anything.” He lowered his voice a little. “I’ve been here a little longer than Sasha. I can have better connections.”

  “Thank you,” I said, not realizing I was laughing and grinning at this man. I was melting. I couldn’t help myself. “And, that was a great special you did last year about black women and natural hair. I never thought I’d see anything like that on CNN.”

  “You caught that?”

  “Yeah, it was good. I’ve been meaning to go natural, and it was cool to hear so many black men say they like it.”

  “Yeah, I’m an au natural brother. I’ve been trying to tell your friend to kick the weave tracks to the curb, but you know.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Yeah,” he said.

  And we stood there grinning and nodding until there was a clatter and loud voices in the hallway.

  “I don’t give a shit, Suzy,” I heard Sasha say. “There was no reason for me not to have that information. I’ve been gone for two weeks. You’d think that was long enough for you to do a little bit of research. I was up there looking like a damn fool.”

  “Well, here she is,” A. J. said, pushing the door open.

  I straightened my back and spread my feet apart like I was about to fight.

  “Here who is? Who are you talking to?” Sasha asked before coming into the room. “Was my door open?”

  “Your friend is in here,” A. J. said, slipping out of the room as Sasha came in with a short, Asian woman following close behind her. “I’m sure I’ll see you again.” He nodded at me and signaled for Sasha to call him.

  “Ohhh, I didn’t know I was having company,” Sasha said as if she wasn’t even surprised to see me.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know how she got in here,” the Asian woman said apologetically. “I locked the door but, I guess—”

  “Please, Suzy, just . . . just go somewhere,” Sasha scolded her, “and figure out why you work here.”

  The woman stood there confused for a second and then hustled out of the room.

  Sasha slammed the door behind her.

  “What?” She looked at me. “You came here to fight?”

  “Fight? Why would I want to fight you? You’re my college roommate. We pledged together. You just came all the way to Augusta to visit my family. Made my children pancakes. Why would I want to fight you?” I smiled wickedly in a show of strength, but I guarantee it took everything in me not to tackle her into the back of the dressing room door. The way she moved, spoke, and even smelled just scolded me. Here I was on the edge of everything and here she was having a day at the job and looking at me like I was some spectacle. “And, oh, I almost forgot, you fucked my husband. . . . But why would I want to fight?”

  Sasha walked to the closet and kicked off her shoes into the box.

  “Oh, save the drama, Dawn. You know you don’t even know how to curse. Here’s your first lesson: be careful who you say did the fucking.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means I didn’t make Reggie do anything he didn’t already want to do.”

  “Whatever. You stop calling him that.”

  “Whatever, then,” she said, stepping closer to me, almost daring me to hit her. “Look, I know you didn’t come all the way down here and sneak up to my dressing room, which I never would’ve thought you’d have the nerve to do, so go, soror, for that”—she pumped her fist in the air like a cheerleader—“but I know you didn’t do all of that to come here to tell me what I can and can’t say. And you’re also not terribly slow, so I know you’re not here hoping to pick a fight with me, so what do you want?”

  “I want you to know that you’re a trifling . . . tramp. And I know exactly what you’re trying to do.”

  “Oh, really, do tell.” Sasha stepped around me and went to the vanity to pretend she wasn’t really interested in what I was saying. She began wiping off her makeup as I spoke.

  “All that talk about how you want a man, and how the next one you meet is going to be a father,” I said as she pulled off her earrings and aped my speaking in the mirror. “Yeah, I remember that, Sasha. And I know you couldn’t care less about Reginald. You just want a sperm donor. Someone to take pictures with. But it’s not going to work. It won’t last. He’ll figure out he’s just a pawn in your little scheme and leave you just like all of the other men—the one who slept with your neighbor, the one who slept with your assistant, the one who gave you syphilis in college.”

  Sasha became visibly angered and slung her metal bracelet into the mirror making little hairline cracks spring from a pinhole break.

  “Fuck you,” she said, looking like she was about to spit at my image in the mirror. “And you know what”—she turned around to me—“I did fuck Reggie—”

  “I said don’t call him that,” I warned, balling my fists.

  “And it was good and he’s not going anywhere, so you can pack up yourself and carry your ass back to Augusta where you belong.” She rushed and pushed me into the wall beside the closet, pinning me by holding both of my arms. “You think you can compete with me? You think he wants to be with someone who’s just a nobody? A no-fucking-body? I can make him something. I can make Reggie a real man. Not some lawn-cutting country fool.”

  “I said”—I pushed back against her, slamming her into the opposite wall and pinning her arms—“don’t call him that!” I wrapped my hand around Sasha’s neck and wanted badly to squeeze, but instead I just threatened her, staring into her eyes as the seconds ticked.

  The short, Asian woman came into the office with her head down, looking at a stack of papers.

  I stopped and looked at her and Sasha regained control, pushing me back into the other wall.

  “What is going on?” the woman said, looking up. “Security!” she yelled. “Security!”

  “That’s right,” Sasha said slyly. “Call security to get this bitch out of my dressing room. I think she’s on drugs or something.”

  “Ma’am, you’re lucky she didn’t press charges,” a plump black woman with childlike spiral curls in her hair and a name tag spelling “Sperry” said to me ove
r a desk in the CNN security center. She’d been typing all of my information into the computer in front of her and promised I’d never be let back into the building. “We have a strict security policy here. And we’ll prosecute to the fullest extent of the law.” She slid my driver’s license across the desk to me. “We have good people who work here. And we protect them at all costs.”

  “Sasha doesn’t need any protecting. In fact, you all should probably work harder to protect the rest of us from her.”

  “That’s none of my business,” the woman said flatly. “What is my business is why you thought you were just going to sneak past my officers and go into a dressing room to attack one of my clients. That was stupid. What if she’d pressed charges? If you went to jail? Ms. Bellamy said you have children. Did you think about them when you broke that mirror?”

  “I didn’t break the mirror,” I said, but this little fact was a small defense for how I was feeling. Something had been broken. I’d been dragged by my collar down a hallway and held in a little square room like a criminal. And to all those who watched—the little Asian woman with her papers, A. J. and his confused stare, others with open mouths and pointed fingers, Sasha and her smile as she brushed her shoulders off—I was a criminal.

  “She said you did—”

  “She said? She said?” I snatched my driver’s license off of the desk and looked at the woman’s bare finger, where a slight tan of once-hidden skin revealed a missing ring. “Have you ever been married?”

  “That’s none of your concern, ma’am.”

  “None of my concern? Really?” I said. “Let me guess, he cheated on you?”

  She looked off and said, “Yes, he did, but that’s still none of your—”

  “And what about the woman he cheated with?” I asked. “What would you do if you knew exactly who she was and where you could find her?”

  She looked back at me and I saw in her face the image of myself I’d seen in Sasha’s mirror.

  “I would and did kick that whore’s ass,” she said coldly.