by Neta Jackson
“Sorry about the blue flowered plates, Flo,” I grunted, trying to reach the corner of the room above the computer desk. “Didn’t have any to match the crepe paper.” With a last stretch, I smashed the piece of tape on the end of the streamer to the wall.
“Oh, that don’t matter. They’re pretty—yikes!” The door buzzer made us all jump. “Hope that ain’t Carl yet.”
Chanda and her three kids trooped up the stairs . . . followed in short order by Edesa with twelve-year-old Emerald in tow. “Mama had to work today,” Emerald explained, immediately attaching herself to Amanda, who was filling paper cups with jellybeans and cellophane-wrapped suckers for party favors.
“Amanda.” Florida stood over the two girls, scratching her head, which was covered in springy corkscrew curls. “Do you know any party games? We ain’t got much room up in here, but it’s too cold to go outside.”
“Um . . .” Amanda flashed me a Help! look but said, “Uh, sure. Emerald and I’ll think of something. Hey! Can we use these suckers for a candy hunt?” Suddenly all business, she pointed at Cheree,Tia, and Thomas. “Mom! Keep Chanda’s kids in the kitchen for a few minutes till we get these hidden.”
Florida grinned as Amanda and Emerald headed for the front room with handfuls of suckers. “Knew that girl would pull it together.”
Two kids who lived in the building—a boy and a girl—arrived at two ten with a gift wrapped in used Christmas paper. At two twenty, Cedric—Florida’s twelve-year-old—came barging in the back door, jacket unzipped, shoelaces untied, a basketball tucked under one arm. “Where’s Chris?” Florida demanded, glancing at the clock.
Cedric shrugged. “I dunno. He went off with some guys.” Rolling her eyes, Florida marched him to the bathroom to wash up.
Carl and Carla finally walked in the back door at two forty-five. “Surprise!” we all yelled, clustering around the Hickmans’ table. “Happy birthday, Carla!”
A brief smile flickered over Carla’s face as she took in the motley crew of kids and adults all grinning at her. Her hair was done like her mother’s—short, bouncy corkscrews all over her head. Her eyes swept up to the crepe paper streamers, and her face clouded in a pout. “That’s ugly. I want pink streamers!” Crossing her arms across her flat chest, Carla glared at her mother accusingly. “I always had pink streamers at my other mommy’s house.”
“Ah, I’m sure ya did, honey.” Florida tossed an apologetic glance in my direction. “But we have pink roses and words on your birthday cake, see?” She raised her voice. “Okay, all the kids in the front room! Amanda and Emerald have some games for you.”
I gave Florida a quick hug in passing as she shooed the younger set down the long hallway. She made a face at me as though to say, “I’m hangin’.” Then she slipped into the bathroom and stayed there for five minutes before re-appearing. Her eyes looked red.
Squeals from the front room, then kids darting into the bedrooms and back to the dining room, hunting high and low, was evidence that the candy hunt, at least, was a huge success. Amanda insisted on giving each child just one sucker from the stash, then she handed me the rest to divide out between the paper cups of jellybeans. By the time I was done with that, she had all the kids lined up behind a broomstick in the front room, trying one by one to toss a bag of pinto beans from Florida’s cupboard into a plastic bucket. Even the big boys—Cedric and Chanda’s Thomas—wanted a turn, so Amanda pushed the broomstick starting line way back.
“Look at that,” Florida murmured, as the two of us peeked into the front room. The kids were jostling each other for another turn. “Don’t know what I woulda done without Amanda and those games. Saved my butt.”
Carl holed up in the bedroom while Chanda, Edesa, Florida, and I chatted in the dining room, accompanied by rhythmic clapping at the other end of the apartment as the kids hollered, “Who stole the cookie from the (clap) cookie jar?” The door buzzer went off during an alphabet game, and Florida yelled, “Carl! Get that, will ya?” while she refilled our coffee cups. But he came back alone and disappeared into the bedroom again. “Musta been a wrong buzzer,” Florida cracked, then excused herself to the back porch for another cigarette.
Chanda shook her head. “Dat woman, she one nervous wreck.”
When Amanda finally herded the kids back to the dining room for cake and ice cream, Florida lit the fat candle in the shape of a 9 and we all sang “Happy Birthday.” Even Carl came out of his self-imposed exile—though I didn’t blame him, since he was the lone adult male in a house full of female hormones and kids with big lungs.
“Okay, baby.” Florida stood poised with the knife. “You want the piece with your name on it?”
Carla shook her head. “Don’t want any.Wanna open my presents now.”
“Don’t want cake and ice cream? It’s your birthday, baby.”
Carla shrugged. “Daddy bought me a shake and fries at Burger King.”
If looks could kill, Carl Hickman would have been dead on the floor right then and there. I’d never seen Florida so mad! Tight-lipped, she cut the cake and passed paper plates to Edesa, who was dipping ice cream. I noticed that Florida set aside the piece with Carla’s name on it.
Carla ripped into her gifts, which included a bubble-gum bank from the kids downstairs, a birthstone locket from Edesa and Emerald, a dollar lottery ticket from Chanda, and a white plastic purse on a long strap from Chanda’s kids (“Ina case you be a winnah, girl!” Chanda giggled), the books and bubble bath from us Baxters, and a black Barbie in a fake-leather pants outfit from her mom and dad. Most of the gifts got tossed aside two seconds after opening, except for the bubble-gum bank and the black Barbie, which held her interest for several minutes. But suddenly Carla stood up and looked around. “Where’s the big present?”
Cedric snorted. “What big present?”
“The big one! From my other mommy and daddy! They said they were gonna get me a Barbie bike for my birthday.” She stamped her foot. “Where is it?”
I could see Florida struggling to keep her cool. “Honey girl, we don’t have a Barbie bike—”
Carl cleared his throat. “Uh, actually, there’s a big box out in the hallway. Got delivered ’bout a half-hour ago.”
Squealing, Carla ran down the hall toward the front door of the apartment and out into the hallway, followed by every single kid. Within sixty seconds, they were back, pushing and pulling a big, long box—just the size of a girl’s bicycle. “I knew it! I knew it!” crowed Carla, hopping up and down. “I knew my mommy and daddy wouldn’t forget!”
I never did see Florida again. Carl opened the box—sure enough, a pink Barbie bicycle, with only the handle-bars to be screwed in place—and Carla insisted on riding it up and down the narrow hallway. Chanda took her kids on home to get them out of the way, Amanda and Emerald played video games with Cedric, while Edesa and I cleaned up after the party. I knocked on Florida’s bedroom door on our way out but got no response.
All the way home, tears for my friend blurred the brick facades lining the el tracks. Even Amanda rode home in silence, staring out the smudged train window. As we walked up our block, Amanda suddenly pulled on my jacket sleeve. “Hey, Mom! Isn’t that Stu’s car parked out front?”
12
Stu! I’d completely forgotten our phone call that morning, and I did not want to talk to her right now. After what happened at Carla’s party, I just wanted to have a good cry in my bedroom. But she was probably upstairs talking to our neighbors about the apartment. Maybe we could just slip inside unnoticed.
Wrong. Stu was standing in our living room, talking in excited rushes with Denny and Josh. A basketball game flickered on the TV behind them, the volume turned down. “Jodi!” Stu whirled as Amanda and I came in the front door. “I got the apartment! Can you believe it?” Her laugh followed, like a shadow on speed. “The Bennetts are so happy you referred me.”
Denny scratched his head. “I didn’t know Stu was looking for an apartment.” He narrowed his eyes at me slightly
as if I’d been withholding information. Well, okay, I had. But—
“You’re going to live upstairs?” Amanda grinned. “How cool is that!”
“Yeah. Especially if you make more of that cranberry bread you brought for Thanksgiving.” Josh smacked his lips.
Stu laughed again, giddy with success. “That’s a deal. Soon as I unpack.”
I swallowed. God, this is what You wanted, right? So help me here. “That’s great, Stu. Uh, when do you move in?”
“Next weekend. The movers are coming for the Bennetts’ stuff on Tuesday—that gives me a few days to do some painting up there. Not much. You guys wanna help? Oh!” She held out a bunch of mail she’d been clutching in one hand. “Here’s your mail—I grabbed it on my way in. Something there from Lincoln Correctional. Open it!”
This was too much! “Uh . . . later. I’ve gotta . . . I’ve . . .”
I grabbed the bunch of mail and fled to the bathroom. Locking the door behind me, I turned the water on full force in the sink and bawled into the closest towel.
TEN MINUTES LATER, I heard a gentle rap at the door. “Jodi? You okay?”
Grabbing some toilet paper, I blew my nose and unlocked the door. Denny was leaning against the door-jamb, his eyebrows arched in little question marks. I sighed. “Yeah. Sorry about that. I need some coffee—no, make that some tea. Something calming.”
Over mugs of chamomile, I told him it wasn’t so much Stu moving in but what happened at Carla’s party. “Carla was an absolute brat, Denny! Florida is so hurt. And Chris never did show up . . . I know Florida’s worried. What is he—fourteen?” I shuddered. “She knows better’n anybody the dangers out on the street for kids that age.”
Denny didn’t look one whit surprised when I told him Carl had slept till noon—not exactly “helping” with Carla’s party. He cursed, slapping the table and making our mugs jump. He looked at me guiltily. “Sorry. I’d like to shake Carl—or kick him in the butt. That man’s gonna lose his family again if he’s not careful, but . . . feel like I gotta be Mr.Nice—you know, the white guy/black guy thing.”
“Maybe Pastor Clark could talk to him.”
Denny threw up his hands. “Sure he would! But he’s white too. I don’t know if the trust is there. Maybe I should talk to Mark Smith.”
I nodded—though two African-American men couldn’t be more different. An academic professor and an unemployed ex-addict? One other drawback: Mark and Nony didn’t attend Uptown Community.Well, Carl didn’t either, but at least his wife and kids did. That placed their family under Uptown’s pastoral care.
I sighed. This diversity business was complicated. What did we know? Not much.
We could hear the TV back on in the living room. Denny got up. “Guess I’ll catch the tail end of the game. By the way, how come you didn’t tell me Stu wanted to move to Rogers Park? Or about her new job? You usually give me an earful about all the Yada Yada doings.”
I shrugged. “Sorry.” I could barely explain it to myself, much less Denny. My reasons sounded so . . . petty, so small-minded. I was a big girl, wasn’t I? Why did Stu always catch me off balance?
Denny disappeared into the living room to join Josh in front of the TV. I wanted to call Florida to see how she was doing, but decided to wait till later that evening. “Better start the laundry,” I muttered to Willie Wonka, “before the Bennetts tie up the machines with last-minute stuff.” Wandering into the bathroom to unload the hamper, I saw the mail I’d dumped on the floor and bent to pick it up.
There it was. Postmarked Lincoln, Illinois. A letter from Becky Wallace.
Slitting it open with my thumbnail, I pulled out the sheet of lined notebook paper. The letter was short, the scrawl now familiar.
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Baxter,
Don’t know who to send this to, but I still have your address from last time. Got the package of nice hand cream and stuff. The card inside said, From the Yada Yada Prayer Group—guess that’s you guys. Tell all the ladies I really appreciate it. It was the only Christmas present I got.
But tell the lady who sent me a phone number, I don’t get no answer. Maybe it’s a wrong number. Could she help me contact my boy? I miss him so much, I think I might go crazy.
Respectfully,
Becky Wallace
I read the letter again, then slowly folded the sheet of paper and slid it into the envelope. I should probably apologize to Stu for not opening the letter while she was here—after all, she was the one who’d ordered that Estée Lauder stuff on Yada Yada’s behalf . . . and got the phone number. I sighed. Great way to start off our new relationship as “housemates”—me eating crow.
THE MOVING TRUCK MUST’VE come and gone while we were all at school on Tuesday, because that night everything was silent upstairs. Until Stu arrived, that is, cheerfully lugging in buckets of paint, rollers and brushes, disposable paint pans, and even a short step-ladder. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure how she got a stepladder in that sporty little car of hers.
We never did get to say good-bye to the Bennetts. They were just gone.
I sucked up my courage and told Stu—and the kids—they could help her paint after they got their homework done. I had to do lesson plans. Didn’t much matter, because Denny gallantly offered to help and stayed up there till eleven o’clock, scraping and spackling. I took up a plate of taco salad left over from supper, and Stu acted as though I’d brought up caviar and prime rib. “Mm! I’m so excited about moving that I forgot to eat lunch!”
I showed her Becky Wallace’s letter and apologized for the other day. “No problem,” she said, spooning globs of black-bean salsa all over her taco salad. “Amanda said Carla’s birthday ended in a big upset—was sorry to hear that. I’ll call Florida and tell her not to get discouraged. Reuniting a family takes time.”
I hesitated a nanosecond, but the words popped out of my mouth. “Easy to say; harder to do—not get discouraged, that is.” Then I left Stu and Denny to their scraping.
I had tried to call Florida Saturday night, but the line had been busy—or off the hook. And neither Florida nor the kids had come to church the next morning. I was really getting worried. I’d tried again Sunday afternoon and Chris had answered the phone. “Ma! It’s Mrs. Baxter!”
After what seemed long enough to grow tomatoes, Florida had come on the phone, her voice flat. “Hey, Jodi. Whassup?”
“What’s up? You tell me! I see Chris got home.”
“Yeah. An’ grounded till they put a man on Mars.”
“Huh. Don’t blame you. Are you okay?”
The phone seemed to go dead for a moment. Then a sigh. “All right, I guess. Just, you know, wanted to do a nice party for Carla. Ended up wantin’ to wring her sassy little neck. Carl and Chris, too, for that matter.”
I stifled a giggle. “I know. I would’ve gladly helped you. Might as well throw in Carla’s foster parents too.”
“For real!”Now Florida snorted, and we’d both started to laugh.
That was Sunday. At least she’d talked about it. But I knew she still felt hurt. Had to admit, though, when I got a little distance from it, I couldn’t really blame the foster parents. This was Carla’s first birthday not with them— after five years. Like all absentee parents, they were trying to make up for their loss with expensive gifts.
But it had sure done a number on Florida’s soul.
BOTH MY KIDS SEEMED elated that Stu was moving in upstairs. They even hustled their homework so they could go upstairs and help her paint. Stu’s idea of “not much” paint expanded to include nearly the entire apartment. Her choice of colors knocked me over till I got used to them: melon and lime in the living room, sea blue and lavender in the kitchen, seashell and burgundy in her bedroom. It was kind of fun seeing the former beige-on-beige rooms burst into life, like a garden of perennials. I even tackled the pantry myself with two brushes, one for each color.
On Wednesday night, Denny and I excused our-selves from the paint party to attend Bible stu
dy at Uptown. Pastor Clark had been teaching on the parables of Jesus since the New Year—a lot more appealing to me than that “end times” stuff he’d tackled last fall.
When we got home, loud music pulsed through the floor from upstairs, and the phone was ringing. “Don’t tell me Stu likes punk rock too,” I groaned, rolling my eyes as I grabbed the phone.
“Doubt it.” Denny wandered off to turn on the evening news. “She’s just tolerating the kids’ music ’cause they’re helping her paint. The honeymoon will wear off.”
“Soon, I hope!” I yelled after him, covering the phone. “Stu hasn’t even moved in yet, and already we have our own episode of Upstairs, Downstairs—Hello?”
“Upstairs, downstairs?” said a familiar voice. “I may have the wrong num—”
“Delores!” I laughed. “Sorry. I was still talking to Denny. It’s a little crazy over here—did you hear Stu is moving in upstairs?”
“Sí! She called me a couple of days ago—called everybody, I think. Anyway, Jodi . . . I know it’s late, but José keeps asking me if you and Denny have decided if we can go ahead with a quinceañera for Amanda.”
Oh, brother! How long had it been since we’d talked? Denny and I really did need to give the Enriquezes some kind of answer. “Delores, I’m so sorry. Have to admit, I’ve been a little slow on this one. Denny and I still have to talk about some stuff, but”—I went out on a limb—“I think we can pull something off, if we can keep the expenses down.”
“Oh! Wonderful! Amanda is such a special girl.We can plan it together.”
“Okay, Delores. I’ll call you by the weekend, okay? Wait a minute—hold on.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Denny waving his arms in the doorway.
“Is that Delores?” His voice was anxious. “Don’t let her hang up!”
I covered the mouthpiece. “What is it?”
He pointed back toward the living room. “Isn’t her family from Colima? I just heard on the news—there’s been a huge earthquake there!”