A Day Late and a Dollar Short

by Terry McMillan

  I'm through with Viola.

  Which is why I'm over there with Brenda and her kids. She used to come in the Shack all the time, mosdy around the first and fifteenth. I realize now how much I looked forward to seeing her. I got a rise out of her on more than one occasion. Nice to know you can still get excited standing up. Brenda ain't no beauty queen, but she can be pretty good-looking on a good day. She's very clean. Always smell good. She got the longest fingernails I ever seen on any woman. With litde designs on 'em. When me and Viola broke up, Brenda was so nice and sweet to me that one thang led to another. She always did flirt with me. She said she found me attractive, but I am attractive. I'm blacker than Evander Holyfield. We could be cousins. If you looked at me real hard and long and pretended like I'm thirty, you might could see some resemblance. But maybe not. I ain't no big man, but I ain't short neither. I used to be five eleven, but they say you shrink as yo u a ge. Viola got a little Amazon in her, 'cause she just a inch or two shorter than nie which is why she stayed on me about my posture so I could look taller than her. Even now, I can be anywhere and 1 bolt right up. Even though 1 don't wanna thank about Viola right now, she always find her way into my head, and I been standing out here in this rain like a damn fool for I don't know how long trying to get the nerve to go back up in that hospital room and get my keys. I'ma have pneumonia in a minute. Might need a bed myself. But 1 need another minute or two. To drum up some courage. What I'ma say this time.

  Last time I checked, I was tipping the scales at 225. I'm thanking about doing some kind of exercise this year, since they say it can extend your life, make you feel better, something about some metamorphins get in your brain and make you feel like you on dope. I ain't never wanted to know what dope feel like, but I know I could stand to drop a few pounds. Brenda said she never even noticed how big my stomach was, and when she did, said it didn't bother her none. She said it made a nice cushion. Plus, she said I'm a good man. Not many of us around. She been looking in the wrong places. But she said, "I ain't been looking nowhere. I wanted to be found." Well, I found her. And she love myjheri Curl. She got one, too. Sorta. Hers is long. But sometime Brenda s cousin who wanna be a hairdresser one day practice doing fancy stuff on her even though Brenda say she just really wanna get her hair braided when she get enough money 'cause braids cost a lot more than a curl. I'ma see what I can do about that.

  She ain't got 110 father over there for them kids, which is why she on welfare. She don't like living in the projects (I don't either) and she been trying to find work, but what she really wanna do is go back to school to get her GED. She said she wanna do better for herself. And her kids. I'ma help her. But first she trying to figure out if she should go to AA. First thangs first. She have trouble realizing when she drunk. I like a little taste myself, but I ain't crazy about that drunk feeling: spinning and not knowing what I'm saying, or being confused about my whereabouts and what have you. This is another reason why Brenda likes me. She say I know how to control myself. But that ain't completely true. I got a continuing weakness for them tables.

  To be honest, we both need help. I thank we can probably push each other in the right direction, but not until we get serious. I ain't quite threw the dice away yet. Even still, she appreciates me. And when I win, I brang it home to her. Everythang I do for her, she always say thank you. Viola could learn something from this woman.

  Her kids is still kids. Africa, who they call Sunshine, is eighteen months. Hakeem is three. And Quantiana's five. I call her Miss Q. Why do young black folks give their kids names can't nobody hardly remember let alone spell or pronounce? And why would you name a child after a country instead of a relative? These kids is bad, but I like 'em. And they like me. They thank I'm they granddaddy, but it don't bother me none. Miss Q and Hakeem's daddy might be dead, Brenda ain't sure, but she heard somebody shot him last year. Sunshine's daddy is somewhere running around Vegas. I know him. Took his money in a crap game once. He ain't worth nothing. Somebody gotta take care of these kids, why not me? I don't mind one bit. It's nice to feel needed.

  Get out the rain, Cecil. Go on up there and face the woman. She ain't gon' do nothing to you. Hell, she can't even talk, thank the Lord, and, Lord, please forgive me for thanking it. But those eyes of hen. She can cut glass with 'em. Ain't gotta say a single word. Do it, Cecil. Stop acting like such a chump. Besides, I need to hurry up and get home. I forgot. Brenda asked me to stop by the store and pick up some hamburger meat and ketchup. She making Sloppy Joes. Her kids is greedy. Don't eat nothing but junk, and that baby eat like a grown man. I don't know how they growing, and I told Brenda they should really be getting more vegetables. She said the only kind they'll eat come in a can: them waxed yellow string beans or creamed-style corn. This ain't exacdy what I had in mind, but it's a start. When she do get around to cooking, Brenda is something in the kitchen. She say she wish she could afford a housekeeper. She sure could use one. But it's okay. I ain't been there long enough to make no changes, but I will. As soon as I get settled in. When it feel like I live there and not just on a long vacation.

  I like Brenda. I like the way she make me feel. Like I'm something. She say she thirty-one, but I thank she lying about her age. She look older than that. But I don't care. She was bom and raised right here in West Vegas. Her people live right down the street and around the comer, but they ain't no help to her. They worse off than she is, depending on how you look at it.

  Move your feet, Cecil. And I do. This time I run toward the hospital entrance, and when I get inside I go over to the front desk. "I forgot my keys up in my wife's room. Her name is Viola Price and . . ."

  The lady holds up her hand and dangles my keys in front of me. "She figured you'd be back for them."

  "Thank you," I say. I take them from her real slow. The keys is cold. And I feel bad. I feel real bad. I walk out the hard way, through those revolving doors, and head toward my car. It stopped raining. This time I don't bother to look up toward Viola's window, 'cause she might be looking at me. She might be thanking that she still got the power: over me. But she don't. When I get to my car, I know I should let it run for a few minutes, since it's fifteen years old, but I don't. I gotta hurry up and get to the store. I got some hungry kids at home. Maybe I'll get Brenda a forty. But, then again, maybe I won't.

  Chapter 3

  Clearing House Sweepstakes

  I don't Care what nobody say, ain't nothing wrong with me. In fact, I'm fine. Perfectly fine. My life is going along better than I expected. It ain't perfect, but it ain't as messed up as Mama and everybody else in my family seem to think it is either. To be perfectly honest, sometimes I wish there was a way I could start my life over. And sometimes I wish I'da been born white. Things probably woulda been a helluva lot easier. More like a straight line to some-damn-where instead of this S-curve to no-fucking-where.

  But I ain't stupid. I know I was supposed to go to college instead of prison. Back then, I was stupid. Which is one reason why I read a newspaper and do a crossword puzzle every single day, and it's the main reason why I been taking college classes off and on for the last ten years. Mosdy business and marketing. Computers. Entrepreneurial-type courses. Plus, I try to take some kind of philosophy class whenever I can, because I pride myself 011 thinking 011 more than one level. It's hard talking to people half the time, and these classes give me the opportunity to exchange ideas without feeling ridiculous. I like being able to interpret shit. To look at life from a whole lotta different angles, not just the most obvious. Except this time 1 couldn't afford the inductive-and-deductive-logic class, so this semester I'm gon' have to do all my thinking by myself.

  I got a job. But it's on hold. I'm on disability right now. Don't nobody in my family believe I got rheumatoid arthritis. Just like me, they thought only old people get it. Hell, I'm only thirty-six. It blew my mind when that doctor told me what was happening to my body. I don't know what I'm gon'

  have to do to prove it to everybody. When I told Mama, she acted like I
made it up. Like I invented the disease itself. But I'm at the point now where I can't even hardly hammer. Not all day. Not no more. For years, I pretended like wasn't nothing wrong with me, but the pain started messing up my income. Off and on, for the last six months I been putting in hardwood floors in these upscale housing developments for this guy Woolery who wants me to maybe be his partner if I could come up with about five or ten grand, but where would I get that kind of money? Opportunities like this don't knock a whole lot in my world, and even though I got two sisters with a little money, you think I could ask either one of 'em to lend it to me? No fuckin' way. They'd probably laugh in my face. They think I'm full of shit. Shaky. 'Cause it's been hard to finish things I've started. But it ain't always my fault. And they don't give me no credit for trying. Hell, I could be a crackhead. I could be out here breaking and entering. But I'm trying to be an upstanding citizen. It's a slow process, but I'm doing it the only way I know how and the best way I can. If they could see me without my clothes on they'd be shocked. Shit, I got knots on my wrists that look like acorns. Bones in my elbows that look like they trying to push through my skin. Some mornings they're so puffed up I can't hardly straighten out my arm. And I don't even wanna mention my knees and ankles. I'm on my way to deformity. Most of the time my right knee look like it's got elephantiasis. And ain't no cure for this shit. I live on Tylenol Extra Strength. Sometimes I eat ten of 'em a day. The doctor said it's only gon' get worse. But I ain't complaining. I been through more, much more pain than this.

  The truth of the matter is, I wanna start my own business one day, 'cause I got some 100 percent guaranteed invention ideas which-if I do it right-could make me some real money. Hell, I got a garageful of ideas but I have to keep my mouth shut, 'cause people in a better position will steal your shit right from under you and call it theirs. I know how to go about getting stuff patented, but it cost money. And of course don't nobody in my family wanna hear about my ideas. They think I'm talking off the top of my head again. "Get a job first," Paris always says. "And try keeping it long enough to get some health insurance," Charlotte is guaranteed to throw in.

  Shit, when you got a pre-existing condition, it's kind of hard to get insurance. "I hope you're not getting high or drinking that hard stuff again, Lewis," because Janelle thinks everybody who takes a sip is a alcoholic, or if you smoke a joint every now and then you're on the road to being a drug addict. Mama seems to be the only one who wants to believe in me: "You got good sense, Lewis, I'll just be glad when you start using it." And Daddy, the man who don't never like to take a stand: "Do whatever you can, Lewis. As long as you stay outta trouble, it's fine with me."

  They don't even know me. They remember me. They look at old pictures and think I'm the same person I was twenty years ago. Well, I'm not. My family don't have a single solitary clue who I am today, what I'm going through, what I'm feeling inside, and I don't think they care all that much. They don't respect me, because I ain't doing as good as they are. This shit hurts. But they oughtta take a long hard look at their own damn lives and stop wasting so much time trying to solve the equations of mine.

  I'll be frank. Paris-even though she's the oldest and I love and respect her and everything and she's got a successful food business going and her life is on track-she sees life like it's a straight line. Ain't no room for no detours in her world. You either are or you ain't. It's hard talking to her on the phone. It's like getting a pop quiz when I call her. Plus, she don't have no patience. She don't like to listen, and she think she know everything. Yeah, she smart, she got degrees from two colleges, but she don't know everything. Just 'cause you a success don't mean you perfect. It don't make you flawless. She doing a good job with Dingus and everything, but she likes to put me down 'cause I ain't the kind of father she thinks I should be. You think I need her to remind me? She the one up there in the Bay Area in a big house with nobody to love. I don't have no problems finding somebody to love me. I can get just about any woman I want. Well, maybe not any, but most of 'em. It's some desperate women out here, all you gotta do is learn how to spot 'em. And, believe me, it ain't all that hard to do.

  Which brings me to Janelle. She lives in a dream world. Like she on some Fantasy Island kinda trip. She simple, really, and don't understand that life is like a jigsaw puzzle. That you have to see the whole picture and then put it together piece by piece. Janelle want it all in one lump. That's why she's always trying to latch on to somebody to give it to her. Her husband that died spoiled her, gave her too much of everything. I liked him, though. I ain't so sure if this dude George is the answer.

  My other sister Charlotte don't do nothing unless she positive she can get something out of it. She don't like to make no big investments, just little ones, but she want big returns. Them Laundromats is in shambles, but she too cheap to fix 'em up. I can't count how many businesses she done tried but quit because the money wasn't coming fast enough. Plus, she thinks the whole world is suppose to revolve around her. She was the same way when she was little. She missing the point like a motherfucker.

  All of 'em remind me year in and year out that if I had acted like a real man I'd probably still be married to Donnetta, probably be wearing a suit and tie (which to this day I do not own), working nine to five, pickingjamil up after school and taking him to soccer and Little League practice. But that ain't the way the shit worked out. I'm divorced. And I'm glad. That girl had problems much deeper than mine, but my family made me feel like she was the one who got the booby prize. Donnetta put on a nice innocent act, which was how I fell for her in the first place. There was a softness to her I hadn't seen in none of the black women I'd been out with. She pretended to have ambition just like she pretended to believe in me. But she was lazy. Didn't know what she wanted. Just what she didn't want. Our marriage ended up being a process of elimination, and then the shit just changed up completely after she found God. She wasn't never all that crazy about sex, but after she got saved, if we did it once or twice a month, that was almost too much. To this day I don't know if Donnetta ever even had an orgasm or not. She claimed she did, but for some reason I just never believed her. Patience is what I mosdy got outta this marriage, 'cause I was hoping to have a few more kids, but after nine years and nothing never happened, she just said maybe she was finished, and that one was enough. I went through all them years of hell for nothing. But, then again, it was only because I ended up loving my son more than I did her.

  Jamil: I wish I was in a better position to do for him, but since I'm not--

  at least for the time being-I just pretend like I don't have a kid, otherwise I'd be eaten alive inside every day, which I already am, and it's probably why I drink the way I do. If it wasn't for Donnetta, I'd be in much better shape financially. She's the reason I have to work under the table half the time, because right after we split up she insisted on taking me to court, knowing I wasn't making nothing but two dollars over minimum wage. She didn't care. She wanted that. And she^o/ it.

  As a man, it makes you feel small when you know what your limitations are. When you know you ain't lived up to your potential, when you ain't sure if you ever will. It can fuck your head up big-time when you know how you wish you could be living versus how you arc. I guess the space in between is a big-ass blank you have to learn how to fill in.

  At least I know Jamil ain't over there suffering. He ain't wanting for too much. I know he ain't deprived. Donnetta may not be the brightest person in the world, but she's a good mother. That much I give her credit for. They only forty-seven miles away from here, and I know for a fact that it won't be long before I'm able to pull up in front of the house-or maybe meet 'em at the corner 'cause 110 way am I going into that house-and take Jamil somewhere. Plus, I heard she got another man coming over there on a regular basis. He supposed to be a religious fanatic like she is. But I don't care who he is or what he is, as long as he don't abuse my son, I do not under any circumstances ever want to meet the motherfucker. No way.

  If everyb
ody only knew. It has taken a lot of work just to get where I am. Considering. I mean, I don't hold 110 grudges. Well, maybe a few. 'Cause it's some people who've done some unspeakable, despicable shit to me. One thing I have learned to be true is this: relatives can do more harm to you than a total fucking stranger. They got statistics to prove that most homicides happen within the family, and believe me, I can understand why. As much as I would like to, I've tried hard to forget the fact that my sixteen- and seventeen-year-old cousins-Boogar and Squirrel-pushed me inside the trap door of our fallout shelter when I was ten years old and made me suck their penises. I couldn't believe they was making me do it and I didn't understand why. We were boys. Plus, we was cousins. I ain't never felt s o h umiliated and confused in my life as I did that day. When I threw up afterwards, they just laughed and told me if I ever told anybody about this they would kill me. To this day, I ain't never told a soul.

  But I ain't completely stupid. Just like I know what the gross national product is, I know that this incident has probably had some efFect on my personality and everything, but I don't think it's been the deciding factor in what kinda man I am today. Hell, when I was locked up, to maintain my sanity, all I did was read encyclopedias and that's where I started doing crossword puzzles. Plus I read all those psychology books by Freud and Jung and the rest of them motherfuckers who think they can psychoanalyze everything and everybody. But, like they say on the street: shit happens. And some shit don't always fit so nice and neat into no textbook. Even if it could, so the fuck what? This is the reason why 1 never told nobody. People always want to analyze you. Figure out what slot you fit in. What if you don't fit? If something traumatic happened to you as a child, they automatically think you'll be fucked up or affected by it the rest of your life. Hell, look at me. I'm a perfect example of somebody that turned out okay. That's why I don't buy the shit. And I ain't in no fucking denial either. If you smart, you can teach yourself to forget anything, put it in a little compartment in your brain that you know you won't need, lock it, and throw away the key. This is particularly helpful when you're dealing with shit that hurts. So what if it creep in every now and then? You still gotta live.