Sweet, Hereafter

by Angela Johnson

  “I’m so proud,” the woman says, her eyes filling up with water. I feel bad for her. I look at her baby and figure her husband or somebody real close to her is going to fight or is already there. I figure she feels sick with worry every day.

  “Is someone in your family over there?” I ask.

  She keeps moving the stroller and looking at the baby. “Oh, God, no!” she says. “I don’t really know anybody in the military….”

  She smiles.

  I stop watching the TV and look at the baby. And hell, I know this kid already has a college fund. His mom’s eyes shine, and I realize she looks like she just stepped out of a spa.

  Her skin glows, and she smells like apples in her hooded yellow top and white yoga pants. Her wedge-cut hair catches a breeze. Her diamond tennis bracelet sparkles when she brushes an imaginary hair off her cheek.

  And why did she say, “God, no!”? I betcha there’s some accountants and doctors over there who had to go into the reserves to pay for their degrees.

  She keeps talking.

  “I’m proud because we know our safety is at stake, and—well, we really do need to bring these people down….”

  I start to light another cigarette but remember the baby and slide the pack back into my jeans.

  “What people?”

  The woman looks at me the way people look at children they think are stupid and uncared for—with a mixture of The schools have failed us and I wonder if this child’s parents know anything.

  “Those people.”

  “Who?” I say.

  The woman starts to look me over. Black girl, five feet six, curly ’fro, jeans, and T-shirt with dogs on it that says I’M ONLY IN IT FOR THE PUGS.

  “Oh, honey … You’re too young to understand, I guess.”

  She looks like she wants me to understand. She really does. But she doesn’t get how dumb she sounds with those words coming out of her well-made-up lips. I want her to go away. I want her to go back to her well-fucking-appointed house and shut up. I want her to not have an opinion that is not mine. I want her to be somebody else who walked up to this window and talked about how bad and hopeless this all is. I want her to be anybody else but who she is.

  I want her to ask me if I know somebody over there.

  Then again—no—I don’t want her to ask that. She’s not special enough to know. I close my eyes and wish her away.

  When I open them again, she’s still there, so I say—

  “All I know is those people never follow me in stores to make sure I’m not stealing, those people don’t pull me over for no good reason when I’m driving, and other than that I know about as much about those people as you do about them.”

  That got rid of her….

  In five seconds the woman is moving away from me down the sidewalk and pushing the stroller toward the baby boutique. The kid wakes up, screaming. And I wonder if she would be so damned sure about bombs and guns if her child was running through the desert trying to stay alive.

  I pull out my pack from my jeans, light up another cigarette, and finish watching as the talking head smiles her stupid smile and talks about how the army and marines do a great job. I want to grab her through the TV, shake her, tell her to stop reading the script and think for herself.

  The army and marines would rock so much better with their asses back here at home.

  6

  HOW I MET CURTIS.

  Curtis has the darkest eyes. Clear and shining. His eyes are like the girl with the wings, but longing. I met her before I met him. I’d seen his eyes way before I started working in my friend Jos’s store. Even though technically that’s where I first met him.

  I knew his eyes.

  Then he smiled at me.

  Okay, I thought I knew him as he wandered around the store touching some things and laughing at others. (That Santa with his pants falling down was pretty stupid.) But when he took a pair of silvery wings down from the wall—it was like I’d known him for a long time. And then I knew him. His eyes used to live next door to me.

  I used to live on lockdown. It was always for something so minor I couldn’t remember what I did a few hours later, but in hindsight know I probably did it. I did what I always did when the parental popo nabbed me. I sneaked out of the house to sit in the backyard, ’cause I was in lockdown—a lot. And I sneaked out—a lot. After a while it was almost like a game. For me, anyway. My parents just gave up thinking they could keep me jailed in my room. And I just did what I did.

  I used to watch our next-door neighbor from my lawn chair.

  I started noticing the Wing Girl, ’cause she never left the yard. I figure she was probably in her mid-twenties. She had some teenaged brothers and sisters who were older than me, but they all went to JFK, the Catholic high school, and never hung out with anybody in the neighborhood.

  She got mailed wings through the UPS. And one day, when she opened them, they fell out from some sparkling green tissue paper shimmering and ready to tie onto her back. And I didn’t know then (like I didn’t know her name) that there would be a story about her and the wings.

  Everybody’s got a story.

  So I’d sneaked out again to sit in the backyard, knowing that it was time for the wings.

  The only thing that divided our yards were two rose of Sharon trees. And in a few minutes she was out back—big ’fro, bare feet, jeans, and an old T-shirt—unwrapping her wings. She was about ten feet from me, but it didn’t look like she knew I was there.

  Her new wings were green with yellow and orange butterflies.

  She put them on and walked across the yard like she always did. I stood up and watched her. The wing thing was in then—but she was pushing the age limit. Even so, I was drawn to the smile on her face. I thought she might just take off and fly over Heaven.

  She walked up and back across the lawn, until after a few minutes one of her brothers came out, took her by the arm, and started to lead her in. She let him. Before he walked away, he turned and stared at me for almost a minute with the darkest eyes I’d ever seen.

  • • •

  Now here comes the stupid thing. I wanted those wings.

  I wanted to sail around my backyard, wings ready to fly me anywhere. I wanted to be the girl over five who could wear wings and have everybody believe it. You know—magical and dreaming of sprites and troll kings. There were a couple of girls I knew who could carry it off. And damn—there was the woman next door.

  I wanted not to be of the earth.

  I wanted to be winging around in the sky.

  A couple of weeks later I took the package from her porch before she could get to it. I saw that the wings came from some shop in New Orleans. The box felt empty.

  Stupid, but I wanted them.

  I wanted to be as happy as she looked in her wings, but just as I was about to jack the wings, she came out on her porch. She walked out and smiled at me. Just smiled. Then I saw what it was about her. She had an old gash that went from her cheek, up her forehead, on into her hairline. Her eyes were faraway and unfocused.

  It wasn’t the wings.

  I handed her the box.

  The rest of the summer was messed up and boring except for the few times when my girl Marley and Bobby busted me out.

  But by the end of the summer the Wing Girl and her brothers and sisters were gone. I missed her walking back and forth. Winged and ready to fly.

  A couple of years later Curtis walked into the store. When I saw him and looked into his eyes, I saw her eyes—the girl with the wings. He strolled around the store, looking for wings to send to her. His face was kind, and he had his sister’s eyes, but they twinkled.

  7

  CURTIS AND ME STAY UP ALL NIGHT LONG and listen to the water crash against the beach up at Mentor-on-the-Lake. We camp next to the bikers and their families having bonfire cookouts and staying in the cabins all over the woods by Lake Erie.

  We usually bring burritos from Taco Tantos and warm ’em up on somebody’s fire.<
br />
  No problem.

  Sometimes when it gets real quiet, I think I hear him calling over to someone on the dark beach to turn the music up. He does that. He doesn’t care what kind of music it is; he just thinks it should be loud.

  And whoever is playing it always turns it up.

  • • •

  I drive up my old street, real slow, and I think I can do it this time. I can turn in to the driveway, turn the truck off, open the door, and get out.

  It’s okay if I stand by the truck for a few minutes.

  It’s okay if I think about it for a while too, I don’t have to go up to the door like I’m being chased by something. I can take my time.

  I can look at the perfect grass.

  I can count the petals on the perfect rose bushes.

  I can see my reflection in the sparkling front windows.

  I can stand and wait before I knock on the door. I won’t go running in. I want them to know that I miss them but can do all right without them. I want them to smile when they answer the door and not get that look that says—What the hell is it?

  I want them to ask me where I’ve been and if I’m getting enough to eat and am I in a good place. I want them to take me in their damned perfect house and sit me down on the couch and tell me they made pie. Or even bought pie just for me.

  I want to be asked to stay to dinner (I always wanted to have dessert before dinner in that house). And if somebody asked me to play piano—I would. Even if I haven’t played for anyone in ten years and used to slam out of the house if anybody said anything about it.

  I’d play.

  And after all of that if somebody asked me to stay the night, at first I’d say no. I can’t. Got something to do and somebody would miss me. I promised a friend. I’ve got to get up real early the next morning. Or even I don’t want to put anybody out.

  But maybe my room is now that office my dad always wanted. And maybe I won’t get to listen to his story about being so poor when he was little they picked dandelions in the park to eat.

  But I would.

  I’d listen.

  In the end Alice and me roll on by the empty driveway and dark house that used to be my home. I turn the music up, ’cause that’s the way it should be, and head back to Curtis and the cabin with a smile on my face.

  8

  EVEN THOUGH IT’S RAINING AND LOOKS like everything might be flooding, I go for a walk down by the river. It runs about fifty feet behind the cabin. I like to watch the fish. I can sit there for hours.

  Most days are so quiet here.

  Sometimes here in this cabin I have to turn the volume on the radio-CD player up to the point of me getting a headache to keep it all together. Too much quiet. I don’t know anybody who lives in the quiet like me. It would drive my friends crazy. So I don’t ask them over.

  But that’s not the only reason. There are other things.

  I got no iPod.

  No TV.

  No computer.

  But there’s books lined up and down the walls on bookshelves Curtis built himself from some trees in the woods.

  When everybody found out I had left home, it didn’t seem to be any big thing. I think they wondered why it took me so long to leave or why my parents took so long to kick my ass out. But when they found out about Curtis—everybody started talking.

  You know people always think it’s about sex. Everybody is too hooked up on who’s doing what to who. And most people were wondering who my who was. Only my friends didn’t care that I didn’t hook up. But like Brodie said, it makes you dangerous. People can’t put you in a box.

  I’m not dangerous.

  I wore knee-high rain boots and white lipstick for years. Didn’t bother me, but I think it pissed people off. I still don’t understand. These days it pisses them off that I go to parties and hang but not at school.

  I guess most people are like—how the hell did she get here? And who is she? But I always get invited. I always have fun, so even when I’m leaving school for the woods somebody usually yells across the quad—“PARTY TONIGHT, SHOOGY!”

  And I drive Alice and probably pick up about five or six people who sit in the back of the truck and ride to some loud-assed party with too much beer in the middle of a field or some rich kid’s house whose parents are gone. Me and Brodie usually end up standing around and bitching and complaining about nothing in particular and everything in between.

  I sit by the creek after coming out of the woods and only notice that I’m soaked through when I stand up and feel the water run down my legs. I walk, dripping, through the green leaves, stepping over branches, and I watch where I’m going so I don’t fall in animal holes or break an ankle on hidden rocks. But I know the way back to the cabin with my eyes closed.

  I walk down the path and climb the six steps.

  I start stripping everything as soon as I’m inside. I drop my shoes and shirt by the front door, my shorts by the couch, my bra by the bathroom door, and my panties in front of the tub.

  I run hot water into the tub as I stare out the big window above me. With the stone floors and tree brushing against the window, it’s like bathing in the woods.

  The big claw-foot tub makes up for no iPod, no TV, no people around. I climb in and sink down up to my chin, and that’s when I know I’ve been walking around freezing. The heat feels good. I start to warm up.

  There’s still enough light to read when I reach for the book I’ve been keeping on the floor by the tub. It’s a story about a girl who takes care of her brother while being haunted by the ghost of a long-dead uncle. And I keep reading till the trees beside the window are hushed but still wet and have blocked out the little bit of sun left.

  9

  A FEW THINGS ABOUT CURTIS …

  He loves dogs.

  He’s six feet two.

  Never swears.

  He hardly eats meat but loves fish.

  Loves hip-hop, jazz, baroque, bluegrass …

  Has seven brothers and sisters.

  Has been to Iraq once and doesn’t want to go back and doesn’t want to talk about it.

  His sister Sadie, the Wing Girl, is the oldest child.

  He slammed poetry for a few years.

  Loves silent movies.

  Can recite whole parts of James Baldwin’s books.

  Was picked up by cops once when he was seventeen ’cause he was in the “wrong” neighborhood.

  Isn’t bitter, but doesn’t trust like he used to.

  Is three years older than me.

  Didn’t say no when I showed up with my box of jeans.

  Curtis walks off into the dark of the night, and it’s usually after a real bad dream. I hear him cross the floor, pull on clothes and shoes, then disappear out of the room, then out of the little cabin. And for a few days afterward he hardly speaks.

  It ain’t that he’s mad at me—I can tell. He smiles, does what he has to do, and listens to me when I’m talking. But it’s like something took his voice away. After a few days his voice comes back. I don’t say a word. I don’t ask where he goes or ask why he’s not talking, ’cause sometimes you almost don’t want to know the answer to some things.

  I couldn’t give an answer to my parents when they asked me why I disappeared for a week last year in my truck.

  I couldn’t tell them that it was just a long long end to not ever feeling like I was one of them. How do you tell people who love you that? How do you tell them you spent much of your life looking around the rooms of your house and not finding much that might keep you there?

  I ain’t mad anymore. It doesn’t do any good.

  But after I left the first time, I knew that was the beginning of the end of my life with my family. I’d spent the days I was gone at the lake or at the Cedar Lee watching art films. I spent a whole two days watching opera on the screen in high def. I love opera now right alongside Jay-Z.

  I gave a ride to a woman named Jodie and her little girl Maddie who were broken down on the side of the road.
Jodie’s cell phone was dead and her little girl (dressed in a tutu and a Cleveland Browns jacket) was late for her recital. I took them to the high school where the recital was taking place. Hundreds of little girls and boys in dance clothes ran, danced, and hopped into the building.

  Jodie thanked me for the ride and for letting her use my cell phone (which I’d turned off days before so I didn’t have to listen to my parents calling me every few minutes asking me to come home). The recital had been more important than staying with her car until her husband got there. I liked that.

  Maddie sang the whole way and was singing when they both got out of the truck and joined the hordes. I thought of my mom. But I still didn’t go home.

  I spent a few days with Bobby and Feather. Feather would wake me up with toast and shoes in her hands.

  We took walks into their backyard and the woods beyond it. Her hand was warm as she held on to mine and pointed out squirrels, birds, and wildflowers. Her curly black hair was wild on her head as she ran past me to find something new under a tree.

  Bobby didn’t question me as he made the couch up for me to sleep. We just stayed up late talking about nothing. But once, just once, he wanted an answer to something I didn’t have an answer to.

  “What do you feel connected to, Sweet?”

  I sat there surrounded by his canvases and pictures of his family back in New York, Feather’s picture books and little-girl toys poking out everywhere. I knew what he was connected to. And he was connected without pain.

  I couldn’t answer the question. I just leaned against him and read him one of Feather’s books.

  And when I finally went home—I still couldn’t tell them why I left. And there was no way I could tell them that even though I was sleeping in my own bed again, I was already gone.

  10