by Jewel Daniel
"This sucks," she complained. "This really sucks."
"This sucks. This really sucks," echoed her five-yearold sister and emerging shadow, Katanya.
They were spending the week with Auntie Tammy, and Kayla was looking forward to wading in the stream and collecting strange-colored rocks. Ordinarily they would have been in summer camp, thanks to a generous Auntie Tammy, but this year the coffers were dry. Instead Ebony decided they would spend the time with Tamara, since, after all, she was unemployed.
Tamara looked at the bored girls as she rifled through her mail. Devon had finally left the safety of the throw on the sofa and found his way to the PC in the library. She could hear him playing some game. He was becoming so much like Jordan, a computer enthusiast. It didn't matter if it was raining, snowing, sleeting or bright and sunny, give him a computer and Devon was content.
She looked at her two disgruntled young cousins staring forlornly at the window. Kayla was a little tomboy. She always wanted to be outdoors. Katanya, on the other hand, was more like Ebony, wanting to dress up and be pretty. If she could remain in princesslike attire forever, she would. Yet she followed her sister around and echoed whatever she said.
As Tamara turned her attention back to the envelopes in front of her, her heart skipped a beat. There was mail from New Image Tech, the firm she interviewed with a week ago.
She held her breath and crossed her fingers, saying a little prayer. She had been out of a job for eight months and had been on at least seventeen interviews. It was the same each time: you're overqualified, you're not qualified enough, you need a degree, you're not what we're looking for, we don't think you'll be a good fit for this company. Wherever she applied, it was the same. She was beginning to think that she was being discriminated against solely because of her weight. A few months of dallying with chocolate-chip cookies and Haagen-Dazs ice cream and she'd gained back all the weight she'd lost for the wedding and then some.
However, this last interview had gone really well, and she was optimistic. With trembling hands she opened the letter. Immediately hope turned to despair. They, like all the others, thought her experience was impressive, but didn't think she was a good fit for the company.
She held her head in her hands. Her unemployment checks had run out, and she now had zero income. She tried to budget her money carefully, but her credit card bills from the failed wedding and the new house were eating up everything she had. She had even hocked her engagement ring. She'd gotten six thousand for it, when it had originally cost over ten thousand. Two months ago, she'd borrowed money from her mother. She hated doing that because it always came with a lecture that ended with, "Sell your house and move back home." Last month, Jordan had thrown a consulting job her way. With four kids under five, including a young baby and numerous medical bills, Jordan needed every job he could get, yet he sacrificed and gave her that one. It brought in three thousand dollars, enough for her mortgage, utilities and car payment. Her credit cards just had to remain unpaid.
The phone rang. Tamara grabbed it on the first ring. "Hello?"
"This is Visa calling to remind you..." said the lady on the other end.
Tamara did not have the money to pay the credit card, so she did like any other American would do. "The check is in the mail," she lied, and said a silent prayer for forgiveness. She had no idea how she was going to find the money to pay her credit cards or her mortgage next month, for that matter.
Tamara looked out at the sheets of rain pouring on her windows. When it rains it pours-literally, she mused. Tamara closed her eyes. How did it get to this? Just last year she was so happy. She'd had lots of money in the bank and a dream job as an information technologist, making almost six figures despite not having a college degree. She'd gone to UCLA on a full scholarship but after two years had quit, completed a computer-networking course and had gotten a highpaying job in Silicon Valley. A year later, driven by nostalgia and loneliness, not to mention the offer of a lucrative job working closely with her best friend, she had moved back to Maryland.
Living rent free in one side of her mother's tiny duplex in Rosedale and collecting Section 8 subsidized rent from Aunt Leticia and Ebony who occupied the other, Tamara had been able to build a substantial savings. Her only indulgence had been the Lexus SUV she bought a year ago and the clothes and toys she often lavished on Kayla and Katanya and her godson, Devon. She had had no credit-card debt.
Then she met Jared. Tamara recalled her happiness after his proposal. Even Darlene and Ebony's lack of enthusiasm when she announced her engagement and Aunt Leticia's warning that three weeks was too soon for such a life-altering decision did not deflate her bubble. She chalked it up to jealousy. None of Aunt Leticia's boyfriends had ever proposed to her, Ebony had two kids and was still unmarried, and Darlene, despite her phenomenal beauty and her feminine wiles, rarely maintained a relationship longer than three months.
Instead she and Jared had excitedly gone in search of their dream home. They found it, this majestic sixtyfive-hundred-square-foot house on a half acre of land in a new Burtonsville community in affluent Montgomery County. It was custom built, and Jared had insisted on every luxury that was offered. The mortgage was steep, but Tamara didn't mind. She was, after all, a very well-paid IT specialist, and Jared owned a lucrative financial-services company. Moreover, Jordan had bought a modest two-thousand-square-foot home a few blocks away in the same community a year ago.
She was living a dream.
All that changed after Jared abandoned her at the altar. Tamara felt tears of anger and frustration stinging the back of her eyes as she thought about Jared. Not only had he broken her heart, he'd wiped her out and left her in debt. She should have seen the signs when she paid for the engagement ring after his credit card got rejected. She should have realized something was amiss when he had insisted on taking control of her finances, setting up investment accounts with her savings, and adding his name to her bank accounts. She had trusted him as a professional financial advisor and as her fiance. She should have listened to her mother when she compared him to a used car salesman. Instead, Tamara had been blinded by love and had cursed her mother.
Though her mother had forgiven her, Tamara cringed each time she recalled the harsh exchange between them the night she introduced Jared.
"You are making a big mistake. This guy has ulterior motives. I don't want you to marry him, "Leyoca warned.
"That's not your decision to make. You cannot micromanage every aspect of my life. "
"Don't be so conceited, Tammy. You shouldn't rush into marriage with this... this man. He reminds me of someone from my past. "
"Who? My father?" Tamara asked sarcastically. "Oh no, I forgot...I don't have a father. Mommy, Jared asked me to marry him, notsleep with him, notshack up with him. What more do you want from me?"
Leyoca bit back tears. She straightened her back and stiffened her shoulders, holding her head high. "Well,"she said, `for the record, I don't approve of this marriage, and I won't be attending your wedding. "
"That's fine," Tamara responded, angry tears welling in her eyes. "You're not invited. "
Her mother had been right. Two weeks after he'd stood her up at the wedding, her mortgage check bounced. Tamara recalled the nauseating feeling she had when she discovered her bank accounts were all depleted, the investment accounts had never been created, and her credit cards were almost maxed out. Jared had stolen everything from her.
When she reported him to the police, she learned that Jared Turnbull was really Jeffery Walters, an elusive con man wanted for bigamy, embezzlement and fraud. She recalled the embarrassing moment when she'd mentally questioned his reason for postponing sex until marriage, not realizing she'd spoken aloud. When she saw the barely concealed mirth on the officer's face, she wished she could sink through the floor. That's when one officer explained, "Your guy likes men. Jared Turnbull was Jeffrey Walters's lover. When Turnbull died, Walters took his identity and used it to swindle unsuspecting inve
stors out of thousands of dollars."
Tamara remembered leaving the precinct with a sense of futility. There was little she could do to recoup her losses since his name was on the accounts. Tamara was determined to rebuild her finances. However, three weeks later, she'd lost her job, a victim of corporate restructuring. That was the hardest blow. She knew the company was experiencing difficulty. She had seen Jordan, with his bachelor's degree in computer engineering and his master's in business administration, get laid off three months before her wedding. But Jordan, being the optimistic Jamaican immigrant he was, did not despair. He used the severance package offered by the company to open his own info-tech consulting business.
Tamara didn't have that option. Her severance pay was consumed by her huge mortgage and credit-card debt. With a good recommendation from her boss, she'd set out immediately to find another job. In fact, she had been so certain that she would have found one by now, that she'd taken some of the money from the sale of her engagement ring and purchased a bunk bed, dresser and swivel bookcase with a full-length mirror from Ikea for the girls. But here she was, eight months later, broke, and in debt with no income.
"Are you ok?" Tamara opened her eyes to see Kayla standing in front of her. "You look like you're about to faint."
"I'm ok," Tamara responded. "Just thinking."
"About what?" Kayla persisted.
"About what we're gonna do today. And you know what?" she asked, forcing enthusiasm into her voice. "How about we make some cookies?"
Katanya gave an excited, "Yay," while Kayla just shrugged and said, "Ok."
"Devon," Tamara called. "We're making cookies."
Devon strolled into the room. "Cooking is for girls," he said sullenly.
"And who told you that?"
"Daddy."
"Well, I'll have to have a talk with your daddy about that. Come on, it will be fun."
Half an hour later, they were elbow deep in flour. Just then the phone rang. "Kayla, you're in charge. Any of those little ones get out of hand, you just take care of them for me."
"Yes, Auntie," Kayla grinned. There was nothing she enjoyed more than being in charge.
Tamara answered the phone on the fifth ring, just before the answering machine kicked in.
"Please hold for an important call from..." a mechanical voice said over the phone. Tamara promptly hung up. She considered it insulting for a machine to call your home and ask you to hold for an important call.
As she headed for the kitchen, the phone rang again. It was the credit-card company again, but this time she spoke to a live person who warned her if she did not at least make the minimum payment in the next week, her account would be turned over to collectors.
Tamara took a deep breath and did what she had been doing for a while now. "The check is in the mail," she lied.
"Ma'am, our record shows that you claimed to have mailed it two weeks ago. We haven't received any payment as of yet."
"I'm sorry. It must be lost in the mail," Tamara said feebly.
"I suggest you contact your post office and track your mail, ma'am."
Tamara sighed and hung up. Twenty minutes later, the kids were putting the cookies in the preheated oven when the phone rang again. Quickly Tamara finished what she was doing, wiped her hands and ran to the phone, giving Kayla instructions to supervise the cleanup.
"Hello?" she answered breathlessly. It was the credit card company again threatening to take her to collections if a payment was not received within a week. "I just spoke to a rep a few minutes ago, and I told her that I already sent in the payment!" Tamara said, exasperated.
The lady apologized. Just as soon as Tamara hung up the phone, it rang. She picked it up angrily. "I said the check is in the damned mail!" she screamed in frustration.
"Whoa," Jordan responded on the other end of the line, laughing. "No wonder my palm is itching. I knew there must be some big money coming my way. I hope that check has lots of zeros behind it."
"Oh, it's you," Tamara said, smiling. "Thought it was those creditors again."
"Don't you check your caller ID?"
"Took it out. I have only basic telephone service now."
"That bad, huh?"
"That bad, but I'll survive."
"I know you will. So what's my little man up to?"
"He's in the kitchen baking cookies," Tamara responded, peering into the kitchen to ensure that the kids were still on task.
"Baking cookies? What are you doing to my son?" he joked.
"Making him a self-sufficient man!" Tamara responded indignantly.
Jordan laughed lightly. "What are you doing later?"
"Other than babysitting Kayla and Katanya, not much. Why? You have a hot date for me?"
Jordan laughed again. "Actually, I do. How about dinner and a movie?"
"Hey, buddy, I don't date married men," Tamara teased. "Don't you have a wife to take out?"
"This was Becky's idea."
"I'm flattered," Tamara said sarcastically. "When a man's wife begs him to take his best friend on a date, it screams charity case. Believe me, I'm not that desperate."
"Let's put it this way, I have two tickets for the premiere of a sci-fi B movie. I figured we'd catch a bite after."
Tamara couldn't help smiling as she remembered the one time early in their marriage that Jordan had taken Becky with them to see a sci-fi B movie. Becky had been silent throughout the movie, but the minute they walked out of the theater, she turned to Jordan and said, "Honey, you know I love you more than anything in this world, but if you ever take me to another crappy movie like this I will divorce you!" Since then Tamara accompanied him to sci-fi movies with Becky's most enthusiastic blessing.
"Ok," she agreed. "But what will I do with Kayla and Katanya?" Even if she could take them backup to Baltimore to their mother tonight, she knew Ebony worked the early shift and would not be able to bring them down in time before work.
"Becky will watch them."
"That's six kids, Jordan. That's a little much, even for Becky."
"Don't worry about that. Becky can handle them."
Hours later Tamara found herself laughing hysterically at the sci-fi movie. The plot in itself wasn't funny. It was the poor acting that made it hilarious. After the movie they drove to a T.G.I. Friday's not far from home. The rain that had stopped midafternoon had returned in full force. Jordan and Tamara made a mad dash from Jordan's five-year-old Subaru Outback to the entrance of the restaurant.
As she sat across from Jordan, her best friend and greatest supporter throughout all life's changes and challenges, she was filled with nostalgia. They had been friends ever since sixth grade when Jordan was a scrawny kid with a nose and lips that took up his entire face, eyes as big as a frog's and a Jamaican accent so thick you swore he spoke a foreign language. She had saved him from a set of bullies who surrounded him calling him "bug eyes" and "tar face" and telling him to get back on the banana boat. Though Tamara was shy and often the object of their ridicule, she had been angry enough to stick up for him, telling the guys to pick on someone their own size. They immediately turned on her. She had hollered so loud that a teacher came to their rescue. Since then, she and Jordan had been inseparable.
Tamara and her mother had moved to San Diego a year later, and her mother had rented out their side of the duplex to Jordan's family. The next year Tamara begged her mother to let her go back to the duplex in Rosedale and live with Aunt Leticia and her cousins, who occupied the other section. She and Jordan became even closer then, often spending hours together playing computer games, talking and reading.
Jordan and Tamara remained close. Even after his summer trip back to Jamaica just before they entered ninth grade. He left Maryland a scrawny ugly kid and came back a hot sexy catch. His face filled out to meet his nose and eyes. His lips, considered thick and rubbery before, were now full and sensuous, according to her flirtatious cousins. The acne-prone skin was now a smooth coffee-cream complexion. He grew at least six
inches and his body developed. He was suddenly popular. Even then he never excluded Tamara from anything in his life. He remained her best friend. A wife and four kids later, Tamara and Jordan were still like brother and sister.
Tamara looked around the restaurant pensively. It had been a while since she ate out, beyond the occasional Mickey D's. The last time she'd been to a restaurant was almost a year ago with Jared. Tamara smiled at Jordan. "It's been a long time."
"Yup," he responded. "We now know what reality feels like for the millions who made so much less than we did." Jordan's business was doing fairly well, but medical bills had been eating up quite a bit of his income. He failed to find an insurance that would cover Becky's hospital bills because she was pregnant before signing up, and the twins' asthma was a pre-existing condition not covered by most affordable insurances. Yes, Jordan was in a better place than Tamara because he had an income, but it was still a tough and unpredictable road.
They ordered the least expensive things on the menu and chatted and laughed.
"I have a proposal for you," Jordan said.
"A proposal?" Tamara asked.
Jordan looked at her carefully. "It's a marriage proposal."
Tamara laughed sarcastically. "I believe you're already married."
Jordan laughed in response. Then he said, "I have an associate who needs a green card desperately. He is willing to marry any American citizen, just to get it."
Jordan observed Tamara as her expression went from shock, to indignation and then anger.
"What the hell do you think I am, Jordan? Desperate for marriage? I thought you knew me and understood me better than that!" With that, she threw her napkin on the table, grabbed her purse and walked off.