Knowing

by Rosalyn McMillan

  The sound of the phone ringing cut off Ginger’s reply. “Mama, will you hang up the phone when I get upstairs, please?” Katherine glared at her, knowing who was on the other line.

  Ginger took several deep breaths before leaping into a cheerful conversation with her husband. Why did her mother always try to make her feel so guilty about loving her husband? Was she weak to give in to some of his demands? Or was her mother jealous because she didn’t have a man to go home to?

  “Hi, sweetheart,” she whispered.

  * * *

  Shaking the snow from her purple leather coat, Kim stood at the front door. Katherine grabbed her arm and led her into the living room. She pressed a finger to her lips, begging silence, then turned on the stereo and sat down to chat with her niece.

  “Every time I come over, she’s either ironing his shirts, matching up his clothes for work, fixing his plate, taking his shoes to the shop to get them polished, and anything else she can think of that he needs. She does too much for that man. The only thing he does for himself is to take a piss.” Kim leaned over toward Katherine, glancing at the doorway. “And sometimes she even holds that for him, after they’d had sex, because he’s soooooooo tired.”

  Katherine shook her head and, following Kim’s lead, checked for a spying figure lurking in the doorway. “I’m always telling her she do too much for Jackson. But she gets mad. I think she thinks I’m jealous. So lately I haven’t been saying anything. When she starts selling real estate next month, she won’t have no time to baby-sit him. All hell’s gonna break loose in this house. She loves that man so much, I bet every time she looks in the mirror, she sees his face.”

  Walking down the circular staircase, Ginger thought about the conversation she’d just had with Jackson. After listening to her pleas and arguments about their needing a cleaning woman, he’d still held fast to his original decision: “No way.”

  She had hoped that under the circumstances, with him missing her and their being apart, he’d be more reasonable.

  Ginger respected his judgment, and his knowledge of the world, the world Ginger had been sheltered from by her first husband. Jackson possessed something . . . something she couldn’t put her finger on. Something that was missing inside her. Was it patience? Yes. But that wasn’t it. Was it his ability to size up any situation and make the correct decision? Yes. But that wasn’t it either. He possessed a certain something that she admired and strove to call her own, but yet she couldn’t quite put it into words. It was . . . it was . . . maturity.

  Overhearing fragments of Kim and Katherine’s conversation caused Ginger to hesitate, cringing, before entering the living room.

  “These young women today are frantic for a man’s company. Marry the first man that asks ’em. Claim it’s not just sexual; they need a man to talk to. Child, you can call directory assistance and talk to a man. Just ’cause you got a huuuuuuuusband don’t mean diddly shit. That’s your man today —”

  “. . . and some other bitch’s tomorrow,” said Ginger, casually walking into the room. “That’s the correct phrase, isn’t it, Mother?” She saw the frown on her mother’s face, smiled, and sat next to Kim. “I thought I heard the doorbell while I was on the phone. How long you been here?”

  Kim looked guiltily at Ginger, then at Katherine. Ginger didn’t miss the connection. They’d been discussing her. It wasn’t as if they didn’t have their own problems to talk about. As a matter of fact, Aunt Jewel had called her the other day while Katherine was at the store stocking up on beer. Evidently, her mother had told Aunt Jewel that she was in the market for a man.

  “Just got here a few minutes ago. I’m on my way downtown. Would you care to join me?”

  “Can I go where?” Ginger asked in a nonchalant tone.

  Kim crossed her legs, baring yards of skin beneath her royal blue suede miniskirt. “I’d like you to come with me to a club in Greek Town, now. Can you go?” It was as much of a challenge as it was a question, Ginger felt.

  She swallowed hard. Jackson would shit bricks if he knew she’d gone out with Kim, whom he called “hotter than a bitch in heat.” “Sure. I have to change.”

  Knowing Ginger would be a while, Katherine continued her conversation. She was feeling kind of mellow. “Sometimes the only thing worse than not getting your wish is getting it. Ginger wanted that man, and now she got him.” She sat on the pink chaise across from Kim, scooted back, rocking a large thigh back and forth.

  Kim crossed her bare legs and puffed on a Kool Light, letting the billowing smoke curdle through her nose, inhaling, then softly blowing it out. She wondered if possibly she and Aunt Katherine weren’t just a tad bit jealous. After all, she and Bill were a long way off from making a commitment. And if he ever found out about her boss . . .

  “Did I ever tell you about a man I was having an affair with while I was married to your Uncle Lewis?” Kim’s eyes bucked. Shaking her head, she urged her aunt to continue.

  “I almost left Lewis for this boss-sex motherfucker, Curtis Carlton. When I first met Jackson, I thought about Curtis, he reminded me so much of him. Problem was, he was married too.” She smiled to herself, thinking of Curtis, and what might have been. “I talked my problems over with my wise old friend Addie; she was in her late sixties. I always had an older woman to confide in. They keep their mouths shut.” She wagged a thick finger back and forth. “Don’t ever tell girlfriends your own age about your personal problems. First of all, they tell their men everything, next thing you know, your business is all over the streets ’cause men gossip worse than women do.”

  Kim had thought about discussing the problem of her boss with Ginger. She assumed her cousin would keep her mouth shut. Aunt Katherine did have a point, though. Ginger would probably tell Jackson, and then where would she be? But she needed to talk to someone about it. Maybe she could confide in Aunt Katherine. She’d understand, wouldn’t she?

  “Anyway, Addie told me not to leave my husband for no high-frequency-sex motherfucker. ’Cause you ain’t gonna have him but a minute. She said women been leaving their husbands since she was a little girl. But a woman with good sense don’t leave their man because he’s having an affair. Sooner or later, they always come back home. Ain’t nothing changed but the weather.

  “Lewis was so damn good-looking, I should have known he’d be a womanizer. Should have married me a ugly man. Men don’t want nothing that look better than them, you know. They want scraggly-looking women that treat them like kings.” Katherine patted her thick, peppery red hair. “Don’t know if you remember, Kim. But your aunt was a fine woman in her day.”

  “Mama’s got pictures of you and Daddy and his brother in her chest. You were gorgeous, Aunt Katherine. And my daddy wasn’t doing too bad either.” She thought of her father withering away in that nursing home, becoming somebody she almost didn’t recognize as her father. He still was a handsome man at seventy-three. But his spirit had left him. He’d given up, lost the zest that had kept him looking youthful even as he aged.

  “Anyway, it lasted for almost a year, before Addie’s words started sinking in. He kept lying about leaving his wife. Next thing I know, I heard he was going out with one of my so-called girlfriends who happened to be married, too, and having marital problems. Anyway, I didn’t have the strength yet to tell him to kiss my ass, because I still wanted to go to bed with him. I’d gotten addicted, and didn’t know how to resist him.

  “One day, he came over, Lewis had gotten sick again, and was in the TB sanitarium in Saginaw, Michigan. I’d just fried some catfish, had a pot of collard greens on the stove, and was chopping the cabbage and carrots for some slaw. He said, ‘That sure looks good, Kate. Them collard greens smell like heaven. Fix me a plate, baby.’ I looked at that motherfucker real hard for a minute. Then I told him he wasn’t bringing me no money, and had the nerve to want something to eat? I told that potato swinging dick motherfucker that he’ll never eat my food and go shit it out in some other woman’s toilet.

&nbs
p; “Next thing I know, he stopped coming ’round so much. So I said fuck it, Lewis was getting out the hospital soon, and I was gonna try to make it with my man. Hell, ain’t nobody perfect. If I hadda let that man blow my mind, my five kids would’ve been picking maggots out of the dog in the backyard, thinking it was SpaghettiOs.”

  Kim couldn’t help but laugh at the picture of her Aunt Katherine painted so vividly. But then her smile faded. If her aunt could find the strength, she could too. She had to if she was going to have any kind of future with Bill, and she desperately wanted one.

  “As I was saying, a man has so many fucks in them, and they pass it around to so many women and let them enjoy it. About time they get around to the right woman, they don’t have shit left.

  “Don’t let a man get to the bottom of your ass and wear you out, so just in case you don’t end up with this man you want to have something left to give and enjoy with someone else. About time he’s trying to push down to the bottom of my pussy, I’m steady rearing back so I can save some of it for me.”

  “Aunt Katherine,” said Kim, laughing, “you’re too tough for words!”

  Katherine stood up, stretching her stocky body. She gyrated her large buttocks, saying, “Screwing is gone out of style anyway. I can’t stand a man sweating all over me. He can kiss my toes and paint each one of my nails a different color and get the fuck out of my face. I like smelling my own funk.” She started humming Nancy Wilson as she waddled to the doorway. “I got to check on my grandbaby. That tape should be . . .”

  “Granny, where’s my mommy?” said Autumn standing in the darkened foyer.

  “She’s upstairs getting ready to go out. Come with me, Granny’s gonna fix me and you some ice cream. We’re going upstairs in Jason’s room so we can get real comfortable, okay?” Autumn nodded. “Say good-bye to Kim. Kim, go upstairs and see what’s taking Ginger so long? She should’ve been ready by now.”

  Before the words had left her mouth, Katherine felt she’d forgotten something. Her daughter had a closet full of clothes — that couldn’t be keeping her. Maybe Ginger was having a hard time fixing her hair. For a fleeting moment it had slipped her mind. Had she told Kim?

  Kim turned the knob, then hesitated, knocking first. “Mama?” asked Ginger. “No, it’s Kim. Can I come in?” Ginger had just pinned a gold hair ornament alongside her french roll, camouflaging a thinned section of her hair. Good, that looks okay, no one will ever know, she thought to herself. “Come on in, Kim.” Kim entered the outer hall of their bedroom, and peered into her bathroom. “You almost ready?” asked Kim.

  Ginger, clad in a black lace strapless bra and half slip, stood staring into the mirror. “I’m just about to put on my makeup. It won’t take but a minute. My dress is over there.” She pointed to the gold-crepe-backed satin dress hanging on the door of her closet. “Kim, look in my jewelry box on my dresser and get me those gold hooped earrings, will you?”

  As Ginger skillfully applied her makeup, Kim sat on the tub watching her. “Ginger, you ought to think about what Aunt Katherine said, about getting someone to come in here and clean.” She looked around the huge bathroom, which was bigger than her whole bedroom. “This house is beautiful. Big and beautiful. I don’t know how you manage to keep it so clean with all the hours you work at the plant.”

  “It isn’t easy. Mama does have a point. I’m gonna talk to Jackson again when he gets home. It would be a lot of worry lifted off me, knowing these kids weren’t suffering from me trying to do something for myself.” She bent closer to the mirror, glancing periodically at Kim, wondering why she had such a worried expression on her face. “Everything all right with you and Bill?”

  “Sure. Fine. He might meet us there tonight, if he finishes his meeting. He’s interviewing another doctor for the clinic. I just don’t understand why it had to be so late.”

  Suddenly, Ginger’s eyebrow lifted as she lined her eye with black kohl pencil. “You never worry about Bill. I thought you said you had his number?”

  Kim stretched and crossed her legs, smoothing the nap of her suede pump with her heels. “We’re doing okay. He just spends so much time on that damn building I hardly get to see him. He keeps telling me to be patient. That it’ll only be until he gets things organized.” She looked into Ginger’s eyes, which showed concern but not intrusiveness. “I just have the feeling that when it’s opened in a few months, we’ll never see each other.” Her voice lowered. “I’d just appreciate a little quality time with him. Lately, it’s been hurried sex. Good, but not like when we’d sit and talk for hours afterwards. You know, that afterglow that you feel after you’re both satisfied, and you feel you still somehow need to connect. You don’t want that closeness to end. So you talk, you touch, you revel in a luxurious time, when you feel as one — knowing that the love you just shared with each other was special, that no one else can make you feel that . . .” She whispered the word special. Tears glistened in her eyes.

  Ginger knew something was on Kim’s mind, but she hadn’t thought it was serious until now. Something must be terribly wrong between Kim and Bill. Usually when she spoke about her and Bill making love, she’d always mentioned how much she was in control, how Bill was putty in her hands in the bedroom. She’d hinted that through the years she’d learned sexual tricks from older, experienced men, and that she’d become quite skilled in the boudoir.

  Kim did consider herself a triple threat to a man. He had to compete with her intellectually, financially, and finally try to satisfy her in the bedroom. Luckily, Bill succeeded in all of the above. His intelligence and financial status were obvious from the beginning of their courtship, but what had taken her totally by surprise was his fantastic lovemaking. He’d waited three months before making love to her.

  Kim had been almost ready to dump him and go on to greener pastures. Until he told her he’d made reservations at a posh hotel for them for the weekend. His psychology had worked its magic on her, and she hadn’t even realized it. Figuring that the anticipation was more thrilling than the act, he had been patiently seducing her inner being. Teaching her the subtle yet priceless joy that spiritual contact with another human soul offered. A touch of heaven. When he finally bedded her, the mere touch of his hand on her bare skin sent her to heights unknown before.

  12

  Going to a Go-Go

  Ginger kissed Autumn good night, promised to bring her home something, and left her contentedly watching Cinderella with her catnapping grandmother. Autumn hadn’t even asked why she was so dressed up. Ginger decided she wouldn’t reveal to her baby daughter that she was going out to a club. Knowing how close Autumn was to her father, the child might blurt it out on the phone the next time he called. No, she’d tell Mr. Montgomery of her outing when the time was right.

  As Kim and Ginger traveled downtown, both were silent.

  Kim knew something had opened inside her heart. It was a strange experience she hadn’t felt since she was a child. Was it guilt? The guilt of knowing that what she was doing with her boss was wrong no matter how she tried to push it out of her mind?

  Sensing that Kim needed some time to sort out her own thoughts, Ginger sought comfort in the view of the mainland shore between Belle Isle and downtown. The gently falling snowflakes cascaded to the ground, making a feathery cushion that blanketed the earth. As they drove, the delicate frozen ice crystals appeared larger, like feathers bursting in a pillow fight, creating a veil around their vehicle.

  It was cold. Winter cold. Kim turned up the heat a notch, and caught the look of serenity on Ginger’s face. “Pretty, isn’t it?” said Kim, trying to clear the air.

  “Yeah. I love the wintertime.” Ginger sighed, snuggling deeper inside her black wool cape. “Twenty inches could fall and it wouldn’t bother me. Most people are scared of driving in this kind of weather. But after ten years of driving alone on the highway to Champion Motors five and six days a week during my first marriage, I’ve gotten to be a fairly good driver. The only thing that both
ers me is the ice.” She shook her head, stretching, extending her pumps to feel the heat on her toes.

  “Look over there,” said Kim, pointing to an old warehouse. “That’s where Randall lives. Entrepreneurs have converted warehouses and small factories into loft condominiums around here. Some were remodeled into taverns and nightclubs.” She saw the sparkle in Ginger’s eyes even in the darkness. “Remember I told you how Randall’s loft apartment was decorated?” Ginger nodded slowly, recalling the conversation about her friend. “Girl, his loft is laid. He might be there tonight. Maybe we’ll stop by la —”

  Ginger held up both her hands. “Wait a minute, Kim. I agreed to go out to a club, though I’ve never been before. And you and Mama both know I don’t usually go out by myself. Going to the club is stretching it a bit — but I could use a little diversion right now. I’ve got a lot on my mind. But going to some man’s apartment is altogether a different situation.”

  “Okay, okay, girlfriend. And you’re perfectly right. You’re a married woman — I’m single.” Her voice rose an octave. “Seems like I’ve been single forever.”

  Her cousin suddenly seemed older than her years. Ginger had never considered that Kim wanted to be anything but single. Sure, she and Bill loved each other, but she’d confided in Ginger on numerous occasions that she loved her freedom. What had happened lately to make her change her mind? Something was bothering Kim. She always appeared to have herself together, cool, calm, and collected. Nothing ruffled her feathers. But tonight her cousin’s mood hinted at something that required further investigation.

  The Renaissance Center, lighted and glistening, was the focal point of downtown. Hailed as “The glass canister set,” the Westin Hotel, the tallest building in the Renaissance, dominated the city’s waterfront skyline. The observation deck atop the Westin surrounded the rotating Summit Restaurant. From there, the seventy-second floor, Detroit spread out in a vast green-and-brown checkerboard of flattened smokestacks down to the river. On the water’s other side, verdant southwest Ontario could be seen.