by Neta Jackson
“So now you worry about jumping in the cold lake,” Ruth sniffed. “Seems I remember you doing that Polar Bear Plunge on New Year’s Day.”
“That was different,” Yo-Yo insisted over our laughter. “What I was thinkin’ was maybe the first weekend in May—our anniversary.” She must have caught our blank faces because she sounded exasperated. “Duh! The anniversary of that women’s conference thing last year—the weekend we all met, remember?”
Recognition dawned around the room. The first weekend of May. “Bendito sea Jesús!” Delores whispered. “Has it been a whole year?”
Everybody started talking at once—till Yo-Yo yelled, “Hey! Can I finish?”
The hubbub died away. “Thank you very much,” she said sarcastically. “Anyway, I don’t go to no church, you know, I usually gotta work, so I was wondering if Uptown would do the baptizing thing—since four of you Yada Yadas go there already. I kinda like that church, anyway.”
“Absolutely, Yo-Yo,” Avis said. “I’ll speak to Pastor Clark.” She glanced around the circle. “If that’s all, why don’t we close our—”
“Not dat Yo-Yo been showin’ up at any other churches when Yada Yada comes to visit,” Chanda pouted, ignoring Avis’s attempt to wrap up our meeting. “So, what the rest of you sistas t’ink about Paul and Silas last week? What you say, Sista Jodee?”
Oh great. Why is she picking on me? I squirmed, and then blurted, “Okay. I’m glad I went. I especially liked that processional song, the one about ‘Can’t turn around, we’ve come this far by faith.’ But . . .” I groaned. “I still feel so white when I’m in an all-black setting. I mean, I’ve been around you guys for a whole year, and I still don’t blend in.”
“You feel so—what?” Florida started laughing so hard she had to hold her side. Her laughter was so contagious we all ended up giggling. Except—what was so funny about what I said? I was just trying to be real.
Florida finally wiped her eyes. “Jodi Baxter, honey girl. Nobody here wants you to be black. God sure don’t, or He would have made you that way. Just be your white-bread self—that’s fine by me. Most important thing you do is show up. And not runnin’ when this racial stuff gets messy. Now that counts for somethin’.”
She wagged a finger at me. “We all come a long way, baby. Way I see it? We need all the sisters in this Yada Yada thing to show off just how big God is. Praise Jesus! We got a good thing goin’ long as we accept each other for just who we be, takin’ those itty-bitty baby steps along the way. Some day we get there . . . Say, Avis.Wasn’t you tryin’ to close us out?”
40
Don’t know why I felt so teary after Florida wagged her finger at me. “Most important thing you do is show up . . .” Wasn’t sure what she meant, exactly, but for some reason she made it sound like it was enough to just be there, together, slogging along.
Yeah, I could do that.
Our meeting had run over its usual time, and even Daylight Savings hadn’t kept darkness from blanketing Nony’s genteel neighborhood. Those of us with cars gave rides to those who’d walked from the el. Delores seemed especially pushy to make sure she and Edesa rode with Stu and me down to the Howard Street el station.
“Jodi,” she said, as soon as she’d squeezed her “pleas-ant plumpness” along with the bulging plastic bag into Stu’s skinny backseat. “It is true you are home by yourself this week? Not working? Oh, gracias a Dios!” she cried happily when I nodded. “You are my answer to prayer!”
Red flags went up. “Uh, in what way? I do have lesson plans I gotta—”
“You can sew, sí?” Delores leaned forward and lowered her voice, as if the car might be bugged. “I was planning to sew these quilt squares together this week— but with my work hours? Imposible! And there’s no time to lose—not if Peter is taking Avis to South Carolina. Am I right, Edesa?” She leaned back, the plastic bag crinkling and squishing. Edesa just laughed.
I twisted around in my seat as Stu headed down Chicago Avenue toward Howard Street. “Delores! I don’t know anything about putting a quilt together. Doesn’t it have to be, you know, quilted? All those tiny little stitches?”
“No, no, do not worry about that! When the top is pieced, we take it to my friend. She will do the quilting. But she needs at least two weeks! That’s why we need to get the squares sewn together pronto.”
“But—”
“I’ll help you,” Stu said, pulling up alongside the el station. “It won’t be hard. I did one of these before.”
I stared at Stu. Thank you very much, Leslie Stuart. I was trying to get out of this! I jumped out of the car and pulled my seat forward so Delores and Edesa could wiggle their way out of confinement. “Gracias, gracias!” Delores cried, giving me a big kiss on my cheek and thrusting the lumpy plastic bag into my arms. “I will call you—oh! I hear a train coming. Edesa! Come, come!” And she bustled through the lower-level doors.
“I need instructions!” I yelled after her, but with a wave they were gone.
MY ANSWERING MACHINE WAS BLINKING when I let myself in the back door after saying good night to Stu. Willie Wonka rose stiffly from his watchdog post just inside the door and gave me a quick wet-nose greeting, though he obviously had bladder issues in mind. I let the dog outside and then punched the button on the answering machine.
“Hi, Jodi. It’s Avis. Just wanted to let somebody know I decided to go see my cousin. Not sure when I’ll be back—by next Sunday for sure. Don’t want to miss Easter service. Tell the sisters to be praying.” Click.
“Decided to go see my cousin.” I grinned in the dark kitchen. Decided to spend the week with Peter Douglass is more like it.Well, visit her cousin too, of course. This was definitely a multilayered thing.
The next message was from Denny. “Hi, Jodi! Sorry we missed you.We’re going into New York City tomorrow to see Ground Zero, maybe stay overnight at a hotel and see some of the sights on Tuesday. I’ve got the cell if you need to get hold of us.” A pause. “It’s pretty lonely without you, babe. Hope you and Wonka are managing okay. Call me back just to let me know you’re okay.”
I hit redial, but all I got was the senior Baxters’ voice mail on the other end. Tried the cell too; same thing. Left a brief message both places, yet it wasn’t the same as talking to Denny in person. Wasn’t the same crawling into our queen-size bed a while later, either. Only three days down . . . six whole nights to go? Emptiness stretched like a desert on Denny’s side of the bed.
Okay, I knew it was against house rules, but I let Wonka sleep on the bed. Actually, I had to hoist him up there like a crate onto a cargo ship. Once on top of the big beach towel I spread over our wedding-ring quilt, Wonka’s eyes closed in doggy bliss. His bulk and soft wheeze were comforting—though he didn’t smell as good as Denny.
I’d definitely have to wash all the bedding before Denny got home.
I TRIED TO LAY out the quilt squares the next day on the living room floor but realized I was definitely in over my head. Besides the embroidered quilt squares from the various Yada sisters, Delores had included squares of a beige, black, and gold leaf print, plus long strips of solid muslin and solid black. At the bottom of the bag was a pencil sketch showing the basic idea: embroidered squares alternating with print squares, solid muslin strips separating blocks of squares, muslin and black strips making a large border. Gosh, it was going to be beautiful . . . if I didn’t ruin it first.
By the time Stu got home from work, I had sewn the first row of squares together—three embroidered and two print—and made a beef and broccoli stir-fry supper for two. We sat on the living room floor with our plates of food, admiring the different embroidered squares done by such different personalities. Nony had done an appliquéd shape of the African continent, with the country of South Africa highlighted in gold-colored cloth. She had embroidered the word LOVE in the middle of the continent, and in embroidered script under the Cape of Good Hope: Nony Sisulu-Smith . . . Chanda had embroidered a border of flowers and the words Best
Wishes in the center . . . Adele had three dancing “sistahs” and the words YADA YADA in a rainbow over their heads; just her initials beneath the dancing feet identified her square . . .
Stu picked up my square, which hadn’t been sewn yet. “Jodi! I like this. But where did you get the idea?” My insides fluttered as I looked at my hours of work: an angel with brown skin hovered over a circle of stick figures, all different colors. The angel’s wings and arms stretched out and around the huddle of stick figures. Over the angel’s head was the word Avis . . . and below the drawing, I’d embroidered the words: Refuge in Battle.
“It’s her name. Avis means ‘refuge in battle.’ I . . . thought it was very appropriate. She’s definitely been that to me. To our whole group, I think.”
To my surprise, Stu gave me a hug. “That’s awesome, Jodi. Makes me wish . . .” Her voice got funny for a moment, but she swooped up another square that had Spanish words embroidered in reds and yellows and orange all over it: ¡Gloria a Dios! ¡Jesús les ama! ¡Bendiciones! ¡Alegría! “Must be Edesa’s or Delores’s—hey, let me show you how the strips get sewn on. Not a big deal once you know how.”
As Stu hunched over my sewing machine in the din-ing room, blonde hair tucked behind her ear with the row of little earrings running up the curve, I grinned at her back and made a silent promise: Someday, Stu, we’ll make a quilt for you, and I’ll make a square that says “Leslie Stuart . . . Caretaker.”
I PROBABLY WOULD HAVE existed on cold cereal, toasted cheese sandwiches, and tomato soup all that week if Stu hadn’t suggested eating suppers together. As it was, we scarfed down black-bean enchiladas, chicken breasts in mango sauce, and homemade vegetable beef soup before tackling the quilt each evening.Our conversations had been sufficiently low-key and chummy that I dared raise a question.
“Stu, you didn’t share about, you know, the abortion and Andy Wallace’s birth date at Yada Yada last Sunday. Did you decide not to? If you did, that’s okay,” I added hastily. “Just wondered.”
She shrugged and pushed food around on her plate. “No, I wanted to, but so much was going on, never seemed to be a good time to announce, ‘Okay, listen up everybody, I had an abortion.” She smiled ruefully. “But actually, I’m okay with it. Not that I want to hide it. Just . . . maybe it’s something better shared one on one—at least at first. In fact, I called Nony the other night and had a long talk with her. She told me about this program—Rachel’s Vineyard or something like that—that does retreats for women who have been wounded by abortion. I’m thinking about doing something like that.”
“Oh, Stu. That sounds great.”
Stu’s features softened, the way mine do after a soothing face rub. “Nony gave me some scriptures to pray, too, when I’m tempted to get down on myself. This one especially: ‘The Lord is near to those who have a broken heart, and saves those with a contrite spirit.’ I’ve been praying that one from Psalm 34 every day.”
The phone rang—as usual. Denny’s once-a-day phone call, perfectly timed to interrupt dinner. He always seemed surprised and delighted that he actually found me at home, “resting” like the doc had said. “You sure you’re okay? Not sick or anything?”
“I’m fine. Really.Wonka and I get out for a walk a couple of times a day; otherwise I’ve been working on this Yada Yada quilt for Avis and Peter, and doing les-son plans for school.” I wandered out of Stu’s earshot. “Just . . .”
“Yeah? Just what?”
“Nights,” I whispered into the phone. “They get awfully long without you.”
“I know, babe. Me too.” His words were so low and sweet, I wanted to eat ’em with a spoon.
Between Denny’s phone calls, suppers with Stu, time to get caught up on my lesson plans for the last weeks of school, and seeing Avis’s quilt coming together, my spring break moved along better than I had imagined. Except for one thing . . .
Parent-teacher conferences—coming up next week, the last marking period before the end of the school year. Normally I looked forward to meeting with parents, sharing their children’s successes, looking for things to encourage in each one. Yet as I wrote out my reports, a growing sense of dread settled in the pit of my stomach.
What am I going to say to Hakim’s mother?
Not just because Geraldine Wilkins-Porter had read me the riot act at the fall parent-teacher conference when she discovered I was Hakim’s teacher, though God knew my knees turned to jelly every time I thought about it. And not because Hakim had been having any “big” problems. He still startled and delighted me with occasional moments of brilliance, such as the time we took apart our broken electric pencil sharpener, and Hakim put it back together so it would work. And his weekly sessions with the school social worker seemed to minimize his mood swings.
But overall? Hakim was still falling behind the other students academically, especially in reading and writing. I’d practically begged his mother to let him stay in my classroom, so sure I could help him. I hadn’t, though—not that much. So what was that about, Jodi? Why did it feel so important to try?
IT MEANT MISSING GOOD Friday service at Uptown, but by late Friday evening, Stu and I had Avis’s quilt top pieced together—including a blank muslin square smack-dab in the middle, per Delores’s instructions. “Ah, that is for God’s timing,” she’d chuckled when we’d called to ask why a blank square. Oh, yeah, I remembered, grinning sheepishly. A square to embroider their wedding date.
“Shall I send José up to get it?” Delores asked. But Stu said she had to do a foster-care evaluation down in the city on Saturday, so she offered to drop it off.
That left a long, empty Saturday stretching out before me. Stu would be working, Denny and the kids wouldn’t get home till late, and the fresh April day—awash with blue sky, billowy white clouds, and a promising green fuzz busting out on all the trees—was too smashingly beautiful to stay inside and clean another closet.
I pulled on jeans and sneakers and caught Stu just as she was heading for the garage. “Stu! Drop me off at Adele’s Hair and Nails, will you? I’m going to take MaDear for a walk.”
She frowned at me. “What about afterward? That’s a good mile walk back home.”
“Stu! I’m not an invalid. I’m so rested I’m gonna rust! I’ll be fine. But I won’t be fine if I stay inside this house one more day.”
“Okay, okay,” Stu grumbled and headed the car for Clark Street.
Dropping me off at Adele’s Hair and Nails only took Stu five minutes out of her way, and I gave her a wave as the Celica disappeared into the southbound traffic. Gosh, it felt good to be out! The air felt sun-kissed, chasing about on a light breeze. The food vendors were out—a sure sign of spring. Chunky wheeled carts, some with faded umbrellas, sat on the street corners, signs beckon-ing Fajitas de Pollo and Nachos Grande.
I grinned to myself as I pulled open the door to Adele’s Hair and Nails. Maybe MaDear and I would just have to get some of those nachos.
“Hi, Adele!” I called out, as the door tinkled shut. Adele had a customer in the first chair swathed in a black plastic cape, snipping away at the back of her hair. “Hope you don’t mind me just dropping in. Can MaDear come out and play?”
“Hey, Jodi.” Adele chuckled. “Sure. Help yourself. She’s in the back—Geraldine, honey! You gotta sit still, or I’ll cut something you ain’t expecting.”
I’d been grinning at Adele, but at the customer’s name my eyes snapped to the mirror. The startled eyes of Geraldine Wilkins-Porter, Hakim’s mother, stared back at me.
“Oh!” I stammered. “Uh, hello, Ms. Porter. I . . . didn’t realize that was you.” I wanted to back out the door, but my feet seemed nailed to Adele’s floor.
Adele looked at me, then back at her customer’s startled face in the mirror. “Mm-hm. You two know each other?”
41
Geraldine Wilkins-Porter, still staring at me from the wall mirror, took a deep breath and pressed her lips together. I managed a weak smile. “Uh, yes. Her son . .
.” I could hardly breathe. The name Jamal had almost popped out of my mouth. “Hakim is in my class at school.”
“Oh.” Adele scrunched her eyes at me. Did she recognize the name? Did she put it together with the mother of the boy I’d struck and killed with my car last summer? But—snip, snip—she carried on. “Well, feel free to abscond with MaDear. She’s driving Corey crazy back there.”
Gratefully, I pried my feet forward, found MaDear muttering in her wheelchair near the nail stations, and wheeled her quickly out the front door with a squeaky, “Bye!” Took my sweet time bringing her back too. We window-shopped, stopped at several vendors and got something—flavored ices, nachos, a messy tamale—and only turned back when MaDear fell asleep so soundly from food and fresh air I had a hard time keeping her from tumbling out of the chair.
The bell over the door jingled as I wrestled the wheel-chair back into the shop with MaDear a dead weight. Adele left her new customer—a twenty-something get-ting a weave, praise God—and helped me get MaDear settled in the back room. Then she folded her arms and studied me.
I squirmed. “What?”
“So that was the mother.”
I nodded. “Did she, uh, say anything?”
“Uh-huh. Wanted to know how I knew you. So I told her.”
“Oh. About Yada Yada?” Oh dear God. What about Yada Yada?
All she said was, “Uh-huh.”
“Did she say anything about—you know, the accident and her other son?”
“Nope.” Adele gave me a once-over with a critical eye, then went back to her weave. “ ’Bout time you made another appointment, Jodi Baxter. That hair got split ends all over the place. Should do something about those raggy nails too.”
I COULDN’T GET HAKIM’S mother out of my mind the rest of the day. I hadn’t seen her since she’d threatened to take Hakim out of school—though at Avis’s intervention she had finally agreed to leave him in my class and allow some counseling to help him deal with the losses in his life. But could I do it again? Meet as teacher and parent and talk calmly about Hakim’s progress—or lack of it—with The Accident hanging like a sword of doom over our heads?