Then one day the phone rang and it wasn’t Heziah, wasn’t even for me. They were calling from down south for Clara. Wasn’t until she got home and returned the call that I was sure it was bad news. Could tell just from the tone of her voice. When it was over she tried to scrub down the kitchen counter but her hands were shaking too bad. I took the rag from her and held her hand in mine.
“What is it? What happened?”
“My sister ain’t doing too good.” Clara said it with the toughness anyone would’ve had if they already lost three of their four sisters. “Doctors say she ain’t in her right mind. That she probably been like that for a while and ain’t nobody notice.”
“Oh, Clara...”
“And her worthless no good son—my nephew...he don’t give a damn.”
“That can’t be true.”
“He wanna put her in a home.” She looked toward the table so I pulled out a seat for her. “That ain’t what we do. Family take care a family.”
It was a verdict, confession, and apology all in one. I could see it in her eyes. “You leaving me.”
“You don’t need me, hun. You running things real good on your own. You done grown up since I first came here to stay with y’all. You be alright.”
“No...no I won’t. I need you. You can’t go.”
“Pecan girl—”
“No! You can’t go! I mean...” A lump the size of a grapefruit was stuck in my throat. It had never occurred to me that Aunt Clara might one day leave. “You can’t...”
“Now I’m a grown woman. I’m gone do what I’m gone do. Just like you. I can’t make you do nothing just like you can’t make me. Right now I need to be with my sister.”
I couldn’t see straight through all the tears and hurt feelings. I snatched my hand away from hers and took a little comfort from the hurt in her eyes. It ain’t make sense but I told myself that she had tricked me. Got me to trust her, love her, depend on her, and then she wanted to disappear on me like I was nothing. I thought of all the things she’d done for me and it just made my heart hurt even more. She was mine. I lent her to other folks in the neighborhood every now and then but she belonged to me. My Aunt Clara.
“Fine! You wanna go, then go! I don’t need you no way! So go!”
“Don’t be like that.”
But I ain’t know no other way to be. I was no good at goodbyes. I stormed outta the kitchen, stomping and swearing like a chile. Grabbed the phone, locked myself in the hall closet, and dialed Heziah’s number at the store where he worked. For the first whole minute all I did was cry. I couldn’t even tell him what was wrong. He must have thought I was losing my mind. Once I calmed down he talked me into the idea of acting like I was a grown woman instead of a chile. It was the honorable thing to do, he said. That there was too much between me and Clara to let it go like that. Said that I could just pretend it if I ain’t feel it but I should do it because I loved her and she loved me. So I picked my sad behind up off the floor and found Clara rocking back and forth in her chair with Natalie on her lap. They were both fixing for a nap.
“You got something to say?” she asked me.
“I’m sorry. I ain’t mean it. I just...” The tears started to well up in my eyes again so I decided to keep it short and do my best not to look straight at her. “I’m sorry.”
“I ain’t leaving tomorrow. You act like I’m gone be gone forever. I been here for damn near seven—eight years.”
“I know—”
“No, now you gone let me talk.” Clara steadied herself with one foot and raised her chin toward me. “If I’d had a baby girl I’d of loved her just like I love you. And I love this here family and taking care of y’all but I ain’t never want this. I likes my freedom. I like coming and going as I please. And I ‘spect when it come time for it you the one that’s gone be taking care of me. Now I know how you feeling. Like folks just keep leaving you. First your mama, then your daddy...now me.”
“Clara—”
“But I ain’t leaving you. You can’t think of it like that. You gone call me up on the phone and we gone talk about these here kids and Ricky and this Messiah character. I’ma come up to visit when I can. Pecan...girl, you gotta stop crying. You making me feel bad.”
Clara wanted to tell the girls in her own way so I tried to push it outta my mind and go on like normal. It was real hard the first few days but after that I just told myself it wasn’t gone happen. Clara hadn’t mentioned it again so I figured there was a chance she was gone change her mind. Folks did that. Make up their minds to do one thing then change it just as fast. It happened. Why couldn’t it happen to Clara?
Then one night I got distracted from putting the girls to bed because Ricky wanted something from the kitchen—toast or crackers or something like that. When I got back to they door, Clara was in there telling them the news. They took it better than me. No blubbering or sobbing, they just looked real sad. But the same old feelings popped back up in me, and I couldn’t stand it. I ended up hiding under my covers.
“What’s wrong with you?” Ricky wasn’t really interested in it but he asked anyway.
“N-N-Nothing.”
“Then what’s with all the boo-hooing?” He sank into the bed, brushing crumbs onto the floor for me to clean up later. “Pecan, I’m talking to you, least you could do is answer me.”
“I don’t want Clara to leave. Okay?”
“Oh,” was all he had to say. Then he turned off the light.
Ricky had his first semi-championship fight coming up and that was all he thought about. He had enough time to buy Clara a train ticket and drive her down to the station but that was it. He never said a word about Clara leaving other than to open the windows and enjoy the fresh air now that wasn’t no smoking in the house. Nothing about missing her or anything. But we all knew he had his fight coming up. It was a real special night. Ricky got nervous just before every fight but we wasn’t supposed to call it that. Nerves were for weak-minded fighters, not Ricky. He knew he was gone win and that’s how we were supposed to think. Think like nothing bad could happen, that was the rule. But the night Clara left everything reminded me of her. Everything in my kitchen, in my house, everything reminded me of her.
Ricky was sitting at the dining table all frowned up, smelling the food that was resting on his fork. In fairness, nobody else was excited about it either.
“What’s this, Pecan?”
“Meatloaf.”
“N’all this ain’t. What’s this crunchy stuff up in it?”
Nikki just couldn’t wait for supper, so I made her a bowl of cereal to tide her over and I’d accidentally knocked over the box of frosted flakes when I was cooking. I called myself getting them all out but I guess not. Ricky pushed his plate into the center of the table and demanded something else.
“Like what?”
“I don’t care! I ain’t eating that! I know that. I’ll tell you that. So you go up in the kitchen and find me something to eat. I’m already starving so...”
“You want me to cook something else?”
“I been at the gym all day. I’m training real hard—you know I got this fight—what the fuck wrong with you? Huh? You trying to-to-to mess me up? Huh? That what you doing?”
“No...”
“DON’T YELL AT MY MOMMY!”
“DON’T YOU START WITH ME!” Ricky pointed across the table at Jackie. “Your nappy head is just dying for a whooping!”
“Ricky...”
“I don’t care! I’m not scared of you!”
“Oh, yeah? You not scared, huh?” He pulled at the tip of his belt.
“Ricky quit!”
“What? Your ass always letting them run wild. That why they don’t respect nobody!”
“Okay, okay, fine. I’ll...I’ll make something else. Just calm down. Okay?”
My second try at supper that night wasn’t much better. I threw some fish in a pan and, while it was sizzling, started daydreaming. Sat at the kitchen table just thinking about
all the things Clara and me had talked about there. All the stuff she’d told me that I ain’t know to pay attention to because I thought she’d always be there to tell me again. I was already crying by the time Ricky came into the kitchen.
“What the...?”
I shook the tears from my eyes in just enough time to see the look on his face as he turned the burner off.
“You can’t do nothing right! Damn. How I’m supposed to eat this? This side burnt all up.”
“I’m sorry...I’ll scrape it off.”
His feelings were all in his shoulders by then but I got up from the chair anyway. I wasn’t thinking straight. Still thought I could fix it. But even if I could it wouldn’t have made a difference. His feelings always came before reason, before anybody else’s too. When he slapped me across the mouth I just stood there, holding my face. Couldn’t cry. Couldn’t even look him in the eye.
“You can’t be this stupid.”
But I was. I was. Any other girl would’ve grabbed something and knocked him upside the head with it. Not me. I made him some pancakes. Not from scratch, the kind outta the box. I figured I couldn’t screw that up. He sat in the kitchen, watching me just to be sure. When he’d had enough I made some more for the girls and myself and we sat alone in the kitchen, drowning them in warm sticky syrup. They smiled just for me and from then on it was me and them against everybody else. Me and my girls…
THE SATURDAY OF RICKY’S big fight I decided to make a real day of it. Take them someplace they hadn’t been and stay there all day. Pretend like it was just us. Don’t know why but I had it in my head that that was the point of the day. Guess I was wishing and hoping and praying, just like they were, that one day it’d be true. Heziah heard about my day of pretend and wanted to be in it. He came up with the idea of taking us to see some play, so we were meeting him at two o’clock. I ain’t know what was proper to wear to a play so I just laid out the girls’ best dresses and one of my new ones. I had to wait until Ricky left before we could go ourselves. I paced up and down the hall, peeking in our bedroom to see how far along he was in getting ready.
“Shit.” Ricky’s hands shook so bad that his watch slid right between them. “Shit.”
“Want some help?” I picked it up and snapped it securely around his wrist. He almost said thank you.
“I got a lot on my mind.”
I could see that but I acted shocked anyway. Ricky never confessed anything to me. As if the mystery made him more of a man. The watch sparkled under the bedroom light as he rubbed it hard with a polishing cloth. He always wanted to show up looking good. Said it psyched the other guy out.
“Where you going?” he asked me, looking at my fancy shoes. I was wearing a ratty old bathrobe but I figured I’d save time by putting on my stockings and shoes. “You going somewhere?” He stopped polishing. “Where you going, Pecan?”
“No...nowhere.”
“Shit. Don’t be lying to me, woman! I got enough shit to deal with!” He brushed past me and slammed the door so hard I knew our next door neighbors heard it. “Where you going?”
His hands started flexing and curling and I started blaming myself. Why didn’t I think this through? Why’d I think it would be easy? Why didn’t I just stay downstairs and outta his way?
“PECAN!”
“Nowhere! I’m…I’m...we going to a play!”
“A play? Why you wanna do that for?”
“For...for the kids. It’s religious. About how Jesus was born.”
“Oh.”
And he went back to getting ready. I watched him lace up his shoes, trying to catch my breath. “Why...why you do that?”
“Do what?” he asked.
I could tell he wasn’t really paying attention. By then he was searching all the little boxes on our dresser for his best jewelry. I could have just kept still and he would’ve forgotten all about my question. But I didn’t. One finger at a time, I relaxed enough to speak up.
“Why you hit me?”
“What? What you talking about, Pecan? I ain’t hit you.”
“No. I..I mean why you do it...at all. Not now. At all. It ain’t right.”
“What?” He chuckled, turning to look at me like I’d told a joke that wasn’t funny enough to inspire a true laugh.
I don’t know what I expected him to say. He’d stopped apologizing years ago and he wasn’t the type to change just because I wanted it. Maybe I could’ve loved him if he was that type of man.
“You trying to fuck me up? You see I’m getting ready. About to put my life on the line for this family and here you go trying to guilt me about this.”
“A real man don’t…”
“A real man put food on the table and keep a roof over his family’s head! You ain’t had to work a day in your life because of me! How about a thank you?”
Living day in and day out with him was work. It was bone shattering, pride swallowing work that ain’t pay me a nickle. But I kept still about it. Didn’t tell nobody, didn’t ask for help, didn’t even admit it to myself.
He walked past me to the closet and pulled a blue and black dress from its hanger. “Put it on,” he said.
I didn’t make a fuss. Didn’t ask why he cared what I was wearing. The dress didn’t go with my shoes so I pulled out some other ones. I followed Ricky downstairs and watched as he asked for good luck from everybody. Nikki sat rocking to a slow rhythm like Clara used to and nudged Jackie with her foot. Jackie was spread out in her dress, pretending to be watching TV. I know she was pretending because it was the news. The weather ain’t interesting to nobody at seven years old.
“Hey, girl! I know you hear me. You ain’t gonna wish your daddy good luck?” Ricky grinned, somewhat tickled by her stubbornness. “Come on now.”
“Jackie.” Nikki nudged her more forcefully this time but she still ain’t move.
And as usual Mya did it for her. “Good luck, Daddy. Knock him dead!”
“Sure thing, baby girl.”
THE FIGHT CROWD WAS one of the biggest anybody had ever seen, or at least that’s how it was told to me later on. Folks were bumping into each other, trying to get a good view of each blow. They were screaming and holding signs with Ricky’s face on them. The signs went up and down and sometimes landed on the folks that were shouting for the other guy. Ricky’s fans were loud and loyal. And there wasn’t any shortage of women. Some of the womenfolk in the neighborhood couldn’t wait to add that bit into the story because a good wife would’ve been at every fight to make sure her man got home alright.
Anyway, Ricky delivered a blow to the other guy, they called him Sanchez, to his gut and the ref blew his whistle. The two of them went back to their corners. Sweat was pouring down Ricky’s face but he wasn’t anywhere near tired. The ref blew again and the next round started.
I wasn’t into boxing all that much, didn’t know the rules or the moves but the way folks told it to me they could tell something was different. Ricky’s eyes were rolling around in his head and about a minute after the second round started, he stopped landing any of his punches. He swung and damn near flung himself outta the ring. The other guy, Sanchez, he laid into Ricky real good. The old man standing in Ricky’s corner was waving and shouting like crazy. Something was wrong. But the ref wasn’t listening. Ricky’s body went limp and leaned from one side to the other. He ain’t go down right away. Not until Sanchez threw one last punch. Hit him right in the head. Ricky fell like a ton of bricks. The crowd went silent. The old man climbed the ropes and ran to the middle of the ring. Lord, forgive me, but the first thing that came to my mind was that I was finally free.
Stay
THE NEXT DAY FOLKS started popping over in groups of two. Like they knew I wouldn’t be enough to keep just one of them entertained. Some of them I hadn’t done more than nod to as I walked to and from the bus stop. They brought food but most of them just wanted to see the inside of my house. Wanted to ask me questions. Was Ricky in critical condition? Was he ever going to fig
ht again? What did he look like? Was he a vegetable? Nikki was real helpful, keeping their glasses full. I ain’t even ask her, she just did it.
“Mama, you want more?”
I shook my head no and went back to listening to Mrs. Banks and Mrs. Henderson tell me how a friend of their cousin died because the doctors and nurses didn’t realize he had an infection.
“Oh, Pecan, listen to us just going on and on! We’re not trying to scare you or anything.”
“We just want you to be on the lookout for those sorts of things. Lord knows, nobody wants anything bad to happen to Ricky.”
“He such a big strong guy, I bet he just bounces right back.”
They looked to me to say something but the best I could do was kinda smile. I hoped they’d be the last of my neighbors to pop by but they went on for a few minutes more before Nikki came running in the living room all outta breath.
“They fighting!”
“Who fighting?” I suddenly found my voice.
“Mya and Jackie! Jackie said she hope daddy’s dead and Mya hit her!”
I was so embarrassed I couldn’t think straight for a minute. What a mess we were. Mrs. Banks and Mrs. Henderson looked at each other and then at me like they ain’t know whether or not to take it as a joke.
“Mama, they fighting real bad!”
“Okay, Nikki. Would y’all please excuse...me? Um...thank you for the meatloaf. It looks real good.” I followed Nikki down the hall before they could say anything. I could hear them mumbling to the door and peeking down the hall after me. It was gonna be all over the neighborhood that I had one crazy daughter, I was sure of it. What I wasn’t too sure of was what Nikki was saying. Sometimes she would exaggerate things.
We had what they called an enclosed porch out back that we used to store stuff on. And both of my girls were rolling around, knocking into stuff, pulling hair and screaming, scratching each other. I had never seen them like that. Not so much as a bad word had ever passed between Jackie and Mya.
How to Knock a Bravebird from Her Perch : The First Novel in the Morrow Girls Series (9780985751616) Page 9