Dr. Stein batted her eyes, which were quite beautiful. “Tell me about your hair.” She spoke steady and calm.
I wanted to respond to the soothing mother-speech oozing from this blue-eyed Amazon, but my words dissolved under my tongue.
The doctor patted my shoulder. “Would you feel better if I put my wig on? I forget how I look to the first-timers.” Sugary laughter chased the bitterness of words.
“You’re fine. You just caught me off guard. My hair? Well, I have my ups and downs. Loss from chemicals, thinning temples from braids, just plain rough, dry hair . . .”
The woman took notes. “Your sample indicates that your diet is fairly nutrient rich. Do you exercise? Do you sleep with your head covered?”
“Yes to all. I lose my cool with food when I’m running around too much or upset, but I do pretty well at home. The water is hard for me, but I’m up to two quarts a day now.”
The doctor examined my scalp once more before scribbling again. “What about moisture? I notice your hair is straight today.”
“It’s pressed. I like to change up sometimes. I make my own hair butter and braid spray. I coat the ends every night.”
A few hairs floated to the floor as the woman raked her fingers through my tresses. She sat back on her stool. “Is there something that you enjoy doing? A hobby?”
“I’ve taken up dancing again. My hair is still coming out, but it seems to help.”
The doctor stopped writing. “Well, I’ve got good news and bad news.”
“Go for it,” I said, not sure if I really meant it.
“The good news is it’s not alopecia, female pattern baldness, or anything like that. The change from chemically processed hair to natural hair is a difficult one for African American women. In your case, doing so probably saved your hair. Though it may seem to shed a lot, this is about right for the stage you’re in. Drugs and chemicals can stay in the hair shaft for years. In time, you and your hair will adjust to each other. The bad news is that there’s more than normal shedding going on. Some of your hair loss is stress related.”
Makes sense. “I did just move and get a new job.”
“I don’t think that’s it.” She paused. “I’m reluctant to say this, but since we discussed our faith on the phone . . .”
I swung my legs over the edge of the table. “Just say it.”
“There is something you’re trying to hide, but instead, it’s hiding you, eating you up, if you will. Until it’s dealt with, your hair will keep coming out, perhaps all of it. When I prayed about your case, that’s what came to my spirit. What I’ve seen here is in line with that.”
No wonder Thelma sent me over here. I get church even at the doctor. Not sure how I feel about it. “No offense, but I don’t think it’s that bad. I’ve got some issues at work, but other than that, my life is going great.” My voice cracked at my audacity.
Yeah, right. Everything is just peachy.
She nodded and handed me a list of directives: hair vitamins, eight hours or more of sleep a night, eight glasses of water a day, five servings of fruits and vegetables. Things I was already doing, except for the sleeping.
I lowered my voice. “Have you ever had a patient with loss like mine?”
Light gleamed off the doctor’s head, accenting her eyes. “I’ve had one case like yours.”
“And what happened?”
The doctor took my hand and placed it on her own smooth skull. Her lips trembled as she spoke. “This.”
49
Brian
It made me crazy every time I thought about it. Grace and Mal? The two of them knowing each other, much less almost getting married, was enough to drive me to my second job at Testimony Social Services. The stack of case files leaning against my sad excuse for a desk would be just the thing to keep my mind off the two of them.
Only it wasn’t working.
“Just leave things to me,” Mal had told me the first time I landed in juvenile hall, picked up because I had the wrong face in the wrong place. He was still at Imani then, though he’d gone on to every private school around. He was the new kid at school, but a veteran of the system. He’d encouraged me to stay calm and stay quiet, ask for books, and obey all the rules. Days later, when we were both released, I’d marveled at his ingenuity. Years later, when he filled the gaping hole left by my nonexistent family, I learned the hard way that Mal Gooden was no friend.
Through the fabric of my shirt, I traced the scar his crew had left me as a reminder. If it weren’t for that girl, Mal’s half sister, if it weren’t for Joyce . . .
If it weren’t for God.
The scar, raised and hard under my fingers, was some of why I didn’t get too close to people. Didn’t trust them. I had tried to ask Mal once, at a symposium, what happened to his little sister or cousin or whoever that girl was who used to hang over there. Mal had laughed in my face and walked away. Ron said that the guy had changed now, that he did amazing things with youth. It might very well be true. From the way he’d looked at me at that assembly, it was adults he still had issues with. Like everyone else, that guy was still trying to get rid of me.
And yet, I was still here.
The sad thing was that Ron and I had never really recovered from all that. Rejected by his white friends—they were horrified to see where we lived, which made me mad since Ron’s own house had looked ten times worse—I had pushed my brother, my closest friend away. I’d lost track of the others too: Zeely, Jerry, and all the Imani grads. By the time I connected again, nothing ever seemed the same. I never felt welcome. Fueled by anger and isolation, I’d studied hard, earning several degrees simultaneously. Only when I saw a girl with brown, frizzy hair and smooth curves did I let my guard down. Though I’d been blessed to meet my late wife that day, I knew now that it was Grace that I thought I saw then, Grace who I’d been searching for all along. Maybe I’d been searching for the rest of them too, especially Ron. The past few months were the closest Ron and I had been in a long time. Too long.
My back arched in the chair as I closed my eyes and the last five years sped under my eyelids: talk shows, book tours, red-eye flights, and then lesson plans and research files like the ones stacked behind me. Where God had once reigned, I placed goal after goal until I settled on the unattainable—finding my birth mother. Though I continued to scour documents for clues, there was no certificate for my birth. I’d been a mama and ’nem adoption, as I called them, family taking family, friends taking friends. I didn’t want to deal with it, but the secret I longed for was lodged between the pews of Mount Olive Missionary Baptist Church, and God himself would have to get it out. Still, what I’d learned the other day at school when I wasn’t really trying gave me hope, even though it had nothing to do with my case.
I reached for the next file. For now, my search was stalled—locked like Grace’s file—but I could still help these other people trying to put their families back together. I’d been so angry about Mal, upset about Joyce, that I’d forgotten that Grace, like these people, was hurting too. What was it she’d said in our conversation about having children? “It’s not always that easy.” Maybe it wasn’t. God knows I’d simplified my own situation, made the story fit what I could handle. Now I had to accept that perhaps my mother gave me up out of love instead of abandonment. While I thought the idea misguided, I had to consider it.
And I did consider it as I updated case after case, filed the information request forms. From the things Eva had said about my mother, she’d been in her twenties at least, not some teenager with no options. When I’d ranked high on IQ tests, Eva didn’t seem surprised, saying I’d come by it honestly, whatever that meant. From the quirks in my personality, it was hard to tell. She could have been a genius with no time for children or a nutcase who tried to trap a man only to have it blow up in her face. I wasn’t sure that I liked either option.
The agency director, a slight man with straight teeth and a crooked smile, walked in and shook my hand. “There yo
u are. It’s great to have you back. I know you’ve been tied up with school for a while.”
He’d probably be seeing a lot more of me. “It’s good to be back. I should have this pile down some before I leave.”
The man whistled. “I can’t believe the dent you’ve put in it already. Why do you think I missed you? That stack has been on every desk in here. Nobody’s made much progress.”
I nodded, understanding how the documents could be mundane for people who had parents and kids of their own. For me, every entry represented someone like me: misplaced, searching. Perhaps one day the piece of information I filed would be the key I was looking for to unlock all my questions. “It’s no problem. I love it.”
“And we appreciate it. I wish I’d been here when you concluded your own search. We were a little sad you didn’t call, but we understand these things are personal. It’s good to know you’ll still be with us.”
Huh? I tried not to get excited. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I still haven’t found anything.”
“No? What about the lady?”
“What lady?”
He spoke faster now, his homespun Spanish mixing with his on-the-job English, something that only happened when he was excited or worried. “A black lady come here and ask for you. She ask if you find your mother. When I say no, she say, ‘That’s okay. She will find him.’ ”
My body stayed still, but my mind sped away. Would the woman I’d searched so hard for just walk in off the street like that? Maybe. This was Testimony, after all. Sweat trickled down my forehead. “Did she give her name?”
“Let’s see. She had a nametag on her uniform. The sister on Good Times? You know, the TV show?”
“Thelma?”
The director smiled, nodding. “That’s it! Do you know her?”
The folder I’d been holding slipped from my fingers and littered the floor with papers.
“I thought I did.”
The car jerked with my uneven pressure on the gas. I tried to remember the list of questions I’d rehearsed for so many years, but I no longer cared about the reasons. What I wanted was the truth.
I asked myself all kinds of questions as I drove. Had Thelma moved into the neighborhood before us or after? It seemed she’d always been there. Hadn’t she always treated me special growing up—extra cookies on my plate, Easter baskets, Christmas gifts . . . Was she just being neighborly or was it something more?
My old house came into view. I pulled into the drive, glancing over at Thelma’s. Light glowed through her windows. Gospel music vibrated across the street. James Cleveland, I think. I put my car in the garage this time, in case our local stalker decided to visit.
No matter how many times I tried to think of a reasonable way to ask Thelma if she was my mother, my mind was blank. It was jacked up no matter what I said. I reached up and pulled down the garage door. When I felt a hand on my shoulder, I jumped.
“There you are.” Thelma stood behind me in a flowered housecoat. Her head was full of rollers. “I saw you over here the other night, but I had a kitchen full of heads. Pastor’s anniversary. All the girls wanted a new style.”
I nodded, studying her face for some piece of me, something I could claim as my own.
She laughed. “Can’t talk, huh? Well, I’ve got some smoked turkey wings, rice, and gravy over there that will loosen your lips. I came to Social Services awhile back to bring you dinner.”
Here was my opportunity. “My boss, he told me you came by. He said you asked—”
Thelma looked around the yard. “Funny for him to remember me.”
“He said that you mentioned something about my mother. That she would find me.” I stepped closer, looking into my old friend’s eyes. “Has she found me, Thelma?”
She grabbed my hand. “I asked him if you found your mama. When he said no, I told him that Lord willing, she might just find you first. That’s all.” Her words raced like a runaway train.
I stared into her eyes, still streaked with blue eyeliner from a long day in the lunchroom and a longer night at church. She knew more than she was telling, but I wouldn’t get more. Not a bit. Great. Another dead end. “How would she know where to find me?”
Thelma patted my hand and looked away. “Trust me, baby. A mother always finds her children.”
50
Grace
Of all the Cincinnati Zoo exhibits, I loved the World of Insects best, especially Whiting Grove, the picnic area, where I could ruminate about the monarchs and hummingbirds I’d seen. It was too cold for all that, so the Japanese maples held my attention instead. Their snow-covered branches extended like fingers ready to carry me away.
Mal had picked me up early with a call only when he was almost to town—he and Brian had that in common. Why I’d come, I wasn’t sure, but here I was, shrimp salad sandwich in hand, with the nerve to wonder if Mal remembered to put in the grapes.
He’d remembered, all right. He’d even thrown in something else too.
“Ow!” I clutched my jaw.
He reached for me. “Are you okay? I guess I didn’t think about that part. Oh goodness. Here I am trying to be romantic and I hurt you . . .”
I dabbed my bloody gums with a napkin and stared at the offending ingredient. A ring. And a huge one at that. Whoever said that diamonds were a girl’s best friend hadn’t had lunch with Mal. It was everything I would have wanted a year ago, but now it was just a piece of jewelry hidden in my lunch.
An oak above us pointed accusingly at my hands. Not only had Mal evaded my questions all morning, now he’d thrown another twist into my knotted life. I turned to face him with grapes and celery lingering on my tongue. I sighed.
Mal cracked a grin. “Speechless, huh?” He placed a jewelry box on my lap.
“Basically.” What does one say after almost choking on a diamond?
“I’ve had this planned for a while. When I found out about Joyce, I knew the time was right, that you’d be coming home—”
Was he serious? “Are you kidding me?”
He looked offended. “Of course not. I just wanted to make my intentions clear.” Malachi slipped off the bench and onto the icy ground, gathering my hands between his. Firmness lurked beneath his gentle grasp.
“I thought you’d be happy. I thought . . .” He raked his fingers through his cropped curls, sprinkled with gray.
“You thought what? That something has changed? It hasn’t. I’m still the same woman you walked away from a few months ago. The woman who accepted that and moved on.” My voice faltered.
He had the look of a man intent on getting what he wanted. “You make things so complicated, Grace. I made a mistake—”
“A mistake? You called off our engagement!”
His forehead creased a little. “I was confused. Now I know what I want.” His fingers pressed through my wool coat. There was a lot of difference between this and Brian’s light yet strong touch. Although Mal met all the requirements—saved and single—his hands felt like a death grip.
“I want you.”
How long had I waited to hear those words from him? If only it were true. Need. That’s what this was about, need masquerading as love. I needed to get out of here. And quick. I opened the jewelry box and pushed the diamond into its slot. “Here.” I pressed the box into his palm.
Malachi took it, but his eyes remained fixed on me, almost threateningly. An ultimatum of sorts. His expression spoke almost audibly—I won’t ask again.
Again, God’s promise came to me:
For your maker is your husband—the Lord Almighty is his name— the Holy one of Israel is your redeemer . . .
“Just say yes. It’s so easy.”
I shut my mouth tight so that no words could escape and betray me. My head shook back and forth, saying no without words.
He ran a hand through my hair, then went silent again. Though only six years older than me, the sprinkle of gray on Mal’s scalp gave away his well-masked worry habit. The rest of hi
s body exuded youth. He loved God, looked good, worked hard, and he wanted me. What else could a woman pray for? A vision of flashing eyes and a head full of locks swept across my mind.
Everything.
Malachi knelt to gather the remaining food into the basket. He looked up at me, a determined smile creasing his lips. “I’ll keep the ring until you’re ready. Even criminals get three strikes, right?”
I prayed for the right words. “Please, Mal. Don’t.”
He slammed a loaf of French bread into the hamper. “I’m sorry for letting your past scare me away, okay? How long do I have to pay for that?”
“You’re missing the point.”
“I—”
I held up a finger in protest. “That day after you left, after I told you about me, God gave me a peace and a mission. I’ve been a little sidetracked, but I’m going to give myself to these kids. It’s enough. It has to be.”
Mal stood and buried his face in my hair, the thing he’d complained about most. “Sweetheart . . .”
The warmth, the closeness, threatened my sanity.
An unmarried woman . . . is concerned with the Lord’s affairs. Her aim is to be devoted to the Lord, in both body and spirit.
The rest of the verse hung in my mind like a dead weight.
But a married woman is concerned about the affairs of this world—how she can please her husband.
Futile attempts to please one husband festered in my mind. Would spending the rest of my life trying—and failing—to please Mal be enough? If I was honest, I wanted more than a man with all the trimmings. I wanted something I’d never had; I wanted to fall in love.
I moved away from his touch.
Mal tossed the ring into the basket at his feet. “So nothing will change your mind?” He flipped a wheel of Gouda cheese atop the pile.
“I’m not waiting for somebody to love me so I can live, Mal. I’m ready to live now. I don’t want to be anyone’s wife.”
“Not even Brian’s?” Malachi stood, his fists in his pockets, the basket handle dangling at his wrist.
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