by Richard Dry
“I don’t want you speaking his name in this house. I got my forbidden people, and now you got yours. You should have been celebrating the day he left and never came back. I told you to keep clear of him, and now look where it’s got all of us. We’ve been stripped naked by that beast.” She came out of the kitchen with a glass of orange juice. They stood face-to-face.
“You never gave him a chance,” Lida said. “You’d have blamed him for this even if he was still in jail.”
“Listen to yourself. In jail. In jail for robbin and lyin and stealin someone else’s away from them. Yes, he’s a fine, upstanding young man.”
“I trust Marcus. I trust him more than I trust anybody. He could have stolen anything from here any time he wanted, but he asked me for money, and I gave it to him. And he gave it back the next day. He knew he could ask if he wanted more.”
“What money’d you give him?”
“What does it matter? He paid it back. What? I can’t give him money if I want to? He’s done more for me than anybody else ever done. He’s done more for me than you ever did. He’s the one who brought me back here in the first place. You should be thanking him. You should be on your knees thanking him if he ever comes back!”
“Lida,” Ruby begged. “Baby, why are you acting like this? Why are you saying such mean things?”
“I want him to move back in here. I’m gonna ask him tomorrow to move back in here.”
“He’s not coming near this house. You can’t have a thief in this house.”
“He’s no thief. You don’t know what he’s done for me.”
“I jus don’t know why you want to live with that man after what he’s done to you. I don’t understand you, Lida. I don’t understand you.” Ruby shook her head and sat back on the couch, facing away from Lida toward the empty shelves against the wall. She pulled a knitted blanket over her legs. “I don’t think I’ve ever understood you.”
“That’s right, you haven’t.”
“From the day you was born, I loved you the best I knowd how. But I always felt that wasn’t good enough for you. I know how you always been jealous of Love E. Marcus done told me all about that. That’s one thing that man has cleared up.”
Lida gaped at her mother, as if the lie she thought could never get any bigger had just swallowed everything around her.
“No.” She shook her head. “That’s not how it was.”
“It’s all right. I don’t mind. I’ve gone and accepted it in my heart. Now I put you first. The truth always sets you free.”
Lida walked up to Ruby slowly and stood above her. Ruby reached up and took her hand and their eyes met.
“He raped me,” Lida said. She’d imagined saying these words out loud so often that she wasn’t sure if she’d really said them.
“Oh baby, no.” Ruby squeezed her hand. “And now you want me to let him move back in?”
“Not Marcus.” She looked straight into Ruby’s eyes; they were soft and filled with more compassion for her than she’d ever remembered, and she nearly stopped herself. But the words flowed to her lips, and she felt herself fall into them as she had fallen into Marcus’s arms off the edge of the bed so long ago.
“Love E raped me.”
She let the silence hang because there was nothing more to add; after so long, those words had become the only fixed point in her life, the most distilled truth. Every time she had imagined saying this to Ruby, her mother responded in a different way, sometimes yelling, sometimes reaching out and holding her. And a part of her regretted having said it, if only because in a moment, it wouldn’t be possible to imagine or to hope anymore.
“What are you sayin?” Ruby asked. “What are you sayin?”
But Lida didn’t answer. Now that this piece of her was out, she felt herself cave inward, bow her head and curve her shoulders. She felt herself run away into the center of her chest as if she’d done something terribly wrong. Ruby pulled her hand away.
“You need to explain yourself. You need to talk to me right now and tell me what you are saying to me.” Ruby blinked her eyes as if sand had been thrown in them. Lida felt the tightness of her jaw, so strong that she couldn’t have opened her mouth if she’d wanted. Ruby stood up and the blanket fell to the floor.
“Don’t feed me no lies,” Ruby yelled. “Just because you’re jealous of the love I had for him. I won’t let you drag in any ole piece of drug-selling trash. You don’t tell me something like that unless you mean to explain yourself. My brother loved you like you was his own. You was like his only chile. He took care a you all your life, and now you up and slap him when he gone so you can bring that man back in my home? You shameful and disgraceful and I can’t stan to look at you.” She walked away and faced the front windows, the couch now between them.
Love sat quietly at the table, his feet crossed at the ankles.
“Then I’ll leave,” Lida said softly.
“That’s right you’ll leave.” Ruby turned to her and held on to the spine of the couch to keep herself steady. “And this time you don’t have to bother comin back. I’ve had enough of your lyin and shuckin for this man. Look at my home. Look at what he robbed me of. I don’t even got money to go back and see my own mother now. I been saving. For three years I haven’t even let myself speak his name, but I’m not gonna let you take the little memory I got left a him, the little decent part of my life I got after the two of you been through me. You love him so much, if he’s such a—a fine man, you can let him take care of you. You shameful. I don’t know what kind a hook he got in you, but it’s clear I can’t never get it out.”
“That’s right, Mama, you can’t never do nothin for me. Come on, Ronny.” Lida grabbed Love’s arm and pulled him off the chair.
“Where we going?” he asked.
“Upstairs to pack.” She dragged him to the stairs.
“I don’t wanna go.”
“We have to go.”
“No. I ain’t gonna. I didn’t mean to.” He pulled back and forced her to turn around. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
“Shut up!” She slapped him across the face. “Now. Come on. Don’t make me hit you again.”
* * *
AFTER LEAVING HER mother’s, Lida and Love moved in with David at the Terrace Apartments. Marcus was already staying with David. With Marcus and Lida out of work and sleeping on the sofa together, it wasn’t long before Lida was pregnant again. It took them six months to finally get their own place in the same building. When Section 8 came through, they moved into a one-bedroom on the third floor. They decided to have a special housewarming celebration on the Fourth of July, Love’s birthday. They had a barbecue on a picnic table that was bolted to the cement in the back behind the first building, between the laundry room and the low wooden garages that the tenants used for storage.
David had a hibachi, and he bought the food. Marcus poured an ample amount of lighter fluid on the charcoal, and the smoke rose up into the buildings; one by one, the neighbors slammed their windows shut. Marcus placed a portable radio on the table and listened to KMEL pump out the tunes. It was a warm day, the chicken smelled sweet, and they drank Bitter Motherfucker out of the bottle, a mixture of port wine and lemon juice.
A man came downstairs with his German shepherd to put in his laundry, and Love ran over to play with the ragged dog. He grabbed his tail, and the dog snapped at him.
“Get back here, Ronald, before I slap your face!” Lida yelled.
“You better go on over there.” The man nudged him.
Lida looked at the man suspiciously. Though the neighbors were friendly enough, she knew people in the complex thought she didn’t belong there if she was a friend of David’s because he was slinging junk.
The man gestured to Lida’s stomach with his chin and smiled. “Got yourself twins on the way?”
“Don’t even.” Lida laughed. “Second one’s bigger, that’s all. Ronald come out like a rabbit, but this one’s drivin his own truck.”
&n
bsp; The man walked away with his laundry, then David slid over to her on the bench.
“I’m glad you got your own place now, but I’m sure gonna miss you.”
Lida smiled and nodded.
All afternoon they ate and drank. Marcus passed out chicken and hot dogs on paper plates. Love didn’t sit still with his food. He ran over to the Dumpsters and, chicken leg in his hand, climbed up onto the roofs of the garages. From there he could see his mother and father and David talking. They didn’t seem to even notice that he was gone. There was a large oak tree next to the garage with one of its branches reaching out across the rooftop. Love put the drumstick in his mouth and climbed onto the branch. He skirted down toward the trunk and then hugged the tree, slipping and scratching himself all the way to the ground. He looked over at the picnic table, but still no one was watching. He stood up and started to cry, looking at his punctured and bloodied arms, but his mouth was full of drumstick, and he was able to get out only a soft moaning.
Later that afternoon, the man with the dog came by again to pick up his laundry. He carried his basket on his head, like a village woman returning from a river with water. Love ran over and grabbed the old dog’s tail again, and the dog barked.
“I told you to keep away from that dog!” Lida yelled. She stood up and came at Love, who laughed and ran behind the man. The man stopped with the basket in the air and let Love use his legs as a shield. Lida came up to the man and grabbed at Love’s shoulders.
“That boy’s going to make me lose my temper.”
“Here,” the man said, bending down to Love and handing him the basket. “Why don’t you carry this?”
“You best not drop that man’s clean clothes,” Lida yelled.
“Look, look.” Love lumbered forward hugging the basket in his arms, his face buried sideways in the clothes so that he could still see the picnic area. Marcus turned to see but never stopped talking to David, then quickly turned back to their conversation, as if they were involved in a very important business deal. Love stumbled and fell, but the basket landed flat on its bottom and no damage was done.
“That’s enough of that.” Lida swiped at Love’s face as he lay on the ground, but he rolled away. The dog barked at her, and she stepped back.
“That’s all right,” the man said and picked up his basket. “It was my fault. I asked him to do it.”
Lida turned away and walked back to the bench. Both men stopped talking as she slid over to Marcus. David got up to take care of the leftovers on the grill.
“I could use just a little snort,” she said to Marcus. “What you got on you?”
“I don’t have a lot, and I don’t have enough cash to get any more.”
“Well, can’t you ask David to front us?”
“Listen, come on upstairs. I might have something.”
“Well, I got to get upstairs anyway. My Lord, this baby is pushin on my bladder somethin fierce. Hold on, baby, I’m comin.”
They left David with the chicken and the grill while Love entertained himself amid a pile of discarded newspapers.
Upstairs, they entered their new home. It wasn’t a large apartment, just a living room with an attached kitchen and a bedroom at the other end, but it was spacious because they didn’t have any furniture yet except the stools that came with the kitchen counter. They hadn’t gotten any curtains either, so they used white towels they’d borrowed from David.
“David’s cool, don’t you think?” Marcus asked through the bathroom door.
“Course.” Lida came out of the bathroom and wiped her hands on the window towels. Then she eased herself up onto a stool. Marcus took a baggy of smack out of his pocket.
“You found something for me?” she asked.
“I can’t afford to just give you mine all the time. You’ve got to buy your own.”
“Well, I don’t have anything, and I can’t do nothing until this baby of ours is born. You know how it all got taken.”
“I feel real bad about what happened to you and Ruby, how you lost all your stuff,” he said. He waited for her to say something, just to see what kind of mood she was in and if this was a good time to go further. She had her arms crossed above her belly and leaned on the kitchen counter.
“I was thinking real hard about how you’re just getting by,” he continued, “and what we could do to get some cash flow. And I came up with something that’s real easy and fast and there ain’t no risk.”
“I already been buying the lottery every Friday, Marcus.”
“That’s not it. There ain’t no guessing with this.”
“You going to put us in jail.”
“It’s not like that. I was talking with David about old times, and he was saying how it’s a shame you so low right now. But he was looking for some way he could help out.”
“Well, he could spot me some for now.”
“He can’t do that. See, he’s got to earn a living too. But he said he wanted to do something for you. He always liked you. You know how he always thought you was real fine.”
She felt an urge to scrape her arm, but instead, she laughed and cupped her hand over her forehead, feeling the bumps of acne that had returned, like in her adolescent years.
“Naw, really. He always told me I was the luckiest man. I didn’t hold it against him none, ’cause it’s true. But we got to talking, trying to work out a solution to your problem, and it got me to thinking about what we came up with. There ain’t one thing in this world a woman has more valuable than her looks. It may not be fair, but it’s the truth. In fact, I wish it was like that for a man. No matter what, if a woman got her looks, then she’s got somethin. She don’t never have to be down too low.”
“I ain’t no supermodel, Marcus.”
“You don’t have to be no supermodel for this. There plenty of people who think you’re pretty. But that ain’t the point. The point is, David still thinks you fine.”
Lida didn’t say anything but her lips parted.
“Let me tell you where I’m comin from,” he continued. “When I was in Chicago, I would have given anything to be a woman and not have to do the things I did to get by. You been through some bad times with me, but you don’t know how bad it can get.”
“I’m not in the mood to be brought up on your time in Chicago, Marcus.”
“That’s not where I’m goin. Just hear me out. I want to help you stay on your feet. But I’m flat broke myself. Even if I get a steady job, it’s going to be a while before we see any money. And you hardly got anything right now, and with this new baby comin, things bound to get thin. I’m just talking from experience. If I was a good-looking woman like you, I tell you what I would have been doing in Chicago. I would have made myself a quick friend. You know what I’m talking about?”
“You talkin about whorin?” She shook her head. “I’m not whorin myself out to no one!”
“I’m not talking about whorin, baby. This ain’t like whorin if you friends with someone. You think David’s a nice guy, don’t you? I mean, he don’t smell bad and he looks nice. You might a been with him for free if I wasn’t in your way. You lucky someone like him wants you, and he’s even willing to pay for it. It’s just a nice thing you can do for him and he can do for you. It’s like friends helping each other out.”
“I’m your wife, Marcus!”
“I know you’re my wife, that’s why I’m telling you all this. I care about you. I love you. I want you to be happy and I want my kids to be happy. It can be just a onetime thing, even. I’m saying you can have enough money for the rent and for the clothes and for anything you want. You don’t have to listen to no boss or wake up early or go nowhere, and it pays good.”
“Why are you so interested in me doing this? How much you gettin out of this, selling your own wife?”
“Baby, no one’s forcin you to do this. I just found a way to help you if you want. Sure I get a little somethin from it, ’cause I’m the one who brought him to the door. And I’m the one who’ll
keep him away too, if you don’t want to see him, just like I done before with your uncle. You know I stand by you.”
Lida shook her head and licked her dry lips.
“You know I love you, baby,” Marcus continued. “I wouldn’t want you to do anything you don’t think is best for you. People make this out to be such a bad thing. It’s just like them rich folks shakin someone’s hand and kissin ass for all their money. Just think how quick it’ll be over and then you got a hundred dollars. It’s not like you lose anything. You may even like it. Fifty dollars for fifteen minutes of somethin you never run out of.”
“When I’m pregnant like this?”
“He don’t mind. He even thinks it’s sexy, and you can’t get pregnant twice, so then it’s even better.”
Lida looked at the baggy in his hand, then squeezed her shoulders up to her ears like cold water had just been thrown on her back.
“He’s down there waiting for an answer,” Marcus said. “You got your chance right now. Let me tell him to come up. I’ll tell him to be real gentle with you, ’cause you’re my lady. You want, I can give you some of my stuff for now if I know it’s the last time—to make it easier.” She shifted herself back onto the stool and put her face on the counter.
“It’s fifteen minutes and it’s all over, like nothing ever happened,” Marcus said softly.
She sat up and rubbed her palms along the thighs of her blue jeans. “You’ll give me a taste first?” she asked.
He kissed her forehead, opened the baggy, and removed a popper. He pulled her shirtsleeve up to see her veins.
“Where you gonna be?” she asked him.
“Where you want me?”