Her Secret Life

by Tiffany L. Warren

  “Graham, I’ve never had my own place. I wanted space for myself. If Aaron was going to give me that with no strings attached, I was going to take it.”

  “He’s a man, Onika. There’re always strings.”

  “Were there strings when you offered your place? Were there conditions? Were you gonna make me go to church every Sunday morning?”

  “No. None of that.”

  “You should’ve asked me before, Graham. You should’ve walked right up to the car and asked what was going on. But you decided to assume and get all butt hurt.”

  “I’m not all butt hurt.”

  “You are. And all you had to do was ask. You don’t trust me.”

  “It’s hard to trust a person who tells you lies from the very first day.”

  Onika was so silent that Graham thought she’d hung up the phone. Then he heard her breathing.

  “Is that what your God teaches you?” Onika asked. “To throw someone’s mistakes up in their face when they’ve asked you to forgive them?”

  This had nothing to do with God, but, of course, Onika took it there.

  “I’m not throwing anything up in your face. I just find it hard to believe that what I saw was innocent.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you then. Maybe you should go pray about it. How about you fast and pray. Ask God to reveal the truth to you.”

  Sarcasm and mockery dripped from her tone, but even though she meant it as an affront to what he believed, Graham agreed with her. He did need to ask God about the situation and about her.

  “Onika, I meant it when I said I want to get together next week. I just need some time to process this.”

  “Take all the time you need.”

  Onika didn’t wait until he said good-bye to disconnect the call. She’d told him to take all the time he needed, like she didn’t care if he took forever to process and decide whether she was telling the truth.

  The crazy part was that Graham believed her. He knew she was telling the truth about what had happened in the car. Her voice had sounded sincere and authentic before she spread on the sarcasm.

  But he didn’t want to go through this every time she said or did something suspicious. He didn’t want his heart breaking every time she lied or every time he discovered another one of her secrets. He would only survive this relationship if she promised to tell the truth and he promised to believe her.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  Onika’s first day at her new job was awesome. Her boss was an older white woman who’d been practicing law since she graduated from law school in the seventies. She was going to mentor Onika and had promised to help her get into law school.

  And even though she and Graham were in the throes of their first argument, he had sent her a text letting her know that he was praying for her on her first day. It had warmed her heart, even though she’d only replied with “Thanks.”

  It was a good day.

  Out of habit, Onika checked her e-mail in the library. She had spoken with more than one apartment complex about renting a unit. She was waiting for responses.

  Instead of receiving a notification from one of the apartment complexes, Onika had received an e-mail from Dr. Richard. She stared at it in disbelief. He wanted her to call him, but she was afraid. What could he want? She hadn’t talked to him in years, and she didn’t owe him any favors. As a matter of fact, she was mad that he’d told Aaron about her family in North Carolina. Even though Aaron never admitted it was Dr. Richard, it couldn’t have been anyone else.

  But Onika’s curiosity got the best of her. Although she didn’t want to talk to him, she needed to know what he wanted.

  “Hello.” Dr. Richard’s rich baritone sounded the same as it had nearly ten years ago when she was a college freshman.

  “Dr. Richard, this is Onika. I got your e-mail. How can I help you?”

  “Onika, I hope you’re doing well. I wish my e-mail was good news. Unfortunately, it’s not.”

  His voice sounded so grave that Onika started to worry. “Is it Mrs. Richard? Chelsea?”

  “Oh no, they’re fine. It’s about your mother. She’s dying.”

  Onika was speechless. She took the phone from her ear and sat it down on the kitchen counter. She looked at it like it was a foreign object. She didn’t want to pick it back up, although she could hear Dr. Richard talking.

  Finally, she picked the phone up and put it to her ear. “Dr. Richard, I need you to repeat what you just said. I’m sorry, but I had to put the phone down for a minute.”

  “Your mother is dying.”

  “Did she have a drug overdose? Does she have AIDS? What is she dying from?” Onika asked.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t know the details. Your grandmother called the college and asked that someone get a message to you since she didn’t know how to reach you. She said that she’s unable to take care of your mother. She has cancer and only has a few weeks to live.”

  It was crazy hearing that Judy was dying, truly on her deathbed, when she’d been dead to Onika years before.

  “Is that all you know about it, Dr. Richard?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid that’s all. If I might give you a word of advice, you should go. You’ll regret it forever if she dies without you seeing her again.”

  “Thank you.”

  Onika disconnected the call and set the phone down again. Then it started buzzing. Was that Dr. Richard calling her back? She hurried and pressed the button to answer the call.

  “Yes, hello?”

  “It’s me.”

  It was Graham. “Oh, hi.”

  “What’s wrong?” Graham asked.

  Onika burst into tears when she realized that she couldn’t tell him. She couldn’t tell her boyfriend that her mother was dying, because her boyfriend thought that she was already dead. There was that heavy feeling again.

  “Graham, I just need you here. Can you come over?”

  “Are you okay?”

  “No. I’m not okay. Not at all. Please come.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  Onika was overloaded and carrying too much. She had to tell Graham about Judy, and if he thought she was an unapologetic liar, then so be it. At least she wouldn’t be dragging that last secret around. It would be out, with all of the rest of her lies. She didn’t have enough energy to keep hiding. She needed all of her strength to deal with Earlene . . . and Judy.

  Charmayne knocked on the office door. “Nikki, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  Onika opened the door and nearly collapsed into Charmayne’s arms.

  “My mother is dying,” she sobbed. “S-she has cancer.”

  “Oh, baby, don’t cry. Maybe it’s just her appointed time.”

  Onika shook her head. She wasn’t crying about Judy’s illness. She’d grieved the loss of her mother years before.

  “I’m crying, b-because I lied and told Graham she was already dead. He’s not gonna want me anymore. He’s gonna think I’m a pathological liar.”

  “My sweet Jesus,” Charmayne said. “Well, you never know. Maybe he’ll still love you.”

  This made Onika sob harder. He did love her. He was the first man to love her for unselfish reasons, and she had ruined it with her secrets. She wished she’d told him everything from the first time she decided to be truthful. Now it was probably too late.

  “You think he might?” Onika asked, her voice sounding small and pitiful.

  “Maybe. But I’m going to go to my room and pray for your mother. If you’ve been telling people she’s dead, and she’s yet living, you have more to worry about than a man.”

  Onika knew Charmayne was right, and even though she didn’t want prayers, Onika was too distraught to ask Charmayne to keep her prayers to herself.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  It was going to be a long five and a half hours.

  When Graham had heard Onika crying on the phone, he’d dropped everything and run to her side, only to hear that her mother was on her deathbed in North
Carolina. The mother she’d told him was dead.

  This was the family in North Carolina that Aaron had been hinting about. He could’ve said it was her mother. Graham would’ve moved on from Onika right then and there if Aaron had told him. What kind of person lied about their mother? How sick, depraved, and broken did a person have to be to lie about that?

  Yet he was driving her to her mother’s bedside, because she was distraught and in need. But it didn’t change the way he felt. He was done with this relationship.

  “I didn’t have a normal life,” Onika said after they’d been driving for an hour.

  Graham didn’t reply. The air in the car felt stale and thick, and made Graham cough. Or maybe it was being in close proximity to Onika that made him uncomfortable. She wanted his understanding. She only had his pity. He couldn’t relate to someone who chose lying over the truth. Every time.

  “I am deeply ashamed of my mother. That’s why I lied,” Onika said. “It’s a lie I’ve been telling since I left Goldsboro.”

  He wanted to interrogate her about her reasons, but he just didn’t trust that anything that came out of her mouth was the truth. If she didn’t want anyone to know about her past, all she had to do was not talk about it. No one was entitled to know anything a person didn’t want to share.

  “I grew up going down the street to get her from a shack where she was turning tricks. My grandmother would make me bring her home for dinner,” Onika said.

  Graham still said nothing. He drove and listened, but didn’t comment.

  “When she wasn’t turning tricks, she was smoking crack,” Onika said. “My daddy got her hooked and also turned her on to being a prostitute.”

  It sounded like a bad movie, and Graham didn’t know how much of it he could even believe. She’d lied so much already that she could tell him Rosa Parks rode on a bus, and he’d have to fact-check it in a history book.

  “So how many boyfriends have you actually had? You said one,” Graham asked, wanting to make sure, while she was telling the “truth,” that he had the whole story.

  “That was the truth. I met Aaron when my mentor and his wife took me to Martha’s Vineyard with their family.”

  “Hmm . . .”

  “You really think I’m just lying about everything, huh?”

  “What would you think if you were me?”

  Onika sighed heavily. “I would think you were lying about everything.”

  “So you understand then.”

  “Yes.”

  Graham became quiet again. He was partially angry at himself, because even with the lies, his heart went out to her. If she did really grow up with a crack-smoking prostitute, she was probably irreparably damaged. He couldn’t fix her. Didn’t want to even try. That was God’s work, and she didn’t believe in Him.

  “I’m here because I don’t think you have anyone else,” Graham said. “Not because I still want to be your man.”

  Another sigh from Onika.

  “Thank you. You’re right, too. I don’t have anyone else, except Charmayne. My sorority sisters, my mentors, and everyone thinks my mother is dead.”

  “Even the ex you lived with?”

  “Yep, and he did an investigation, apparently. I don’t know what he knows, but I don’t think he knows about my mother, because he would’ve thrown it up in my face.”

  Graham would try very hard not to do the same while he was with her in North Carolina. He wouldn’t remind her of her lies anymore, because he didn’t have to live with them.

  “She has cancer,” Onika said. “I never thought she’d live long enough to have cancer. I thought she’d have an overdose or a heart attack, or maybe even go how my daddy went.”

  Onika paused and seemed to wait for an interaction from Graham. He didn’t have anything to say, so he remained quiet. He damn sure wasn’t asking her any more questions, because he didn’t trust the answers anyway. But he wouldn’t stop her from talking if she wanted to hear herself speak.

  “He died of complications from AIDS. Some sort of rare cancer.”

  With each additional bit of knowledge from Onika’s childhood, Graham felt his wall weaken. How could she have survived this? And not just survived—gone to a prestigious college and graduated.

  “Your sorority sisters would probably look at you differently,” Graham said, remembering the Epsilon Phi Beta women he’d seen in DC at their conference. He didn’t think they took members with drug addicts for mothers.

  “Probably? Of course they would.”

  “But does it mean anything to be in the sorority if they wouldn’t accept you for who you are?”

  “I didn’t want to be the daughter of a crackhead. In my mind I wasn’t her. I’m not her,” Onika said. “I’m aware that my mother gave birth to me, but I don’t belong to her. I have no mother. I have no father.”

  “But your mother is dying right now. She apparently wants to see you, since your grandmother made sure to find you. After all these years, what do you want to say to her?”

  This seemed to stump Onika. She shook her head back and forth like the question was unbelievable.

  “I don’t know what she could want with me now. Maybe she just wants to see me one more time before she transitions.”

  “Maybe,” Graham said. “But wait. What do you mean by transition? You think she’s going to heaven?”

  “I see what you did there,” Onika said. “I mean we all transition when we die. We transition back into the earth and feed the planet. Nothing spiritual about it. Simply biology.”

  “I am going to respectfully disagree. Even people who don’t go to church believe that we are spiritual creatures, housed in our bodies. When people die, their spirit goes out.”

  “These are your beliefs, not facts.”

  “Okay, Onika. I thought it would give you comfort to know that a part of your mother will live on after she’s gone.”

  “Truth and facts give me comfort. You know, my grandmother prayed for one thing my whole, entire life. I prayed with her when I was little. Prayed for my mother to get clean.”

  “And she never did,” Graham said.

  “She never did. You can’t know what that does to a child. I believed harder than anyone. I begged God to make my mother like one of the mothers on TV. Or if not like one of them, then just a mother who would be there when I got home from school, cooking dinner. Shoot, I would’ve even taken a mother who drank forties and smoked cigarettes on the front porch while scratching her dirty behind. I would’ve taken almost anything other than what I got. Do you understand that?”

  “At least you had your grandmother.”

  “I had a grandmother who had two obsessions, the Church of God in Christ and my mother. She didn’t have room for another one.”

  Onika was in tears now—big, fat, juicy tears that poured down her face. Graham’s wall was gone, but he wasn’t ready to restore the love. That was another matter entirely.

  “You’re sitting here judging me, like anyone else would if they heard these things,” Onika said.

  “I’m not judging you, but if I were, it wouldn’t be about your childhood. It would be about what you could control. No one made you lie. You could’ve owned your tragedies.”

  Onika laughed a bitter laugh. “Listen to you. Reasoning like someone who had an upbringing and home training. You’re thinking about what you would do if you were in my shoes. The truth is, you don’t know what you would do in my place. You’re not seeing things the way they are; you’re seeing them through your own eyes. If you could look through my eyes, maybe you could understand my choices.”

  Onika must’ve been tired of talking, because she turned her back to Graham and pulled her knees up to her chest. She pulled her sweater around her body—it was hot outside, but cold in the car. She drifted off to a restless sleep, leaving Graham alone with his thoughts.

  Onika had pegged him truly and accurately. He was seeing her situation through the lens of his solid, faith-based upbringing. He was
n’t seeing things the way they were.

  Graham couldn’t even comprehend the gravity of Onika’s life’s trials, but he was interested to meet the grandmother. They were almost to her house, and Graham was sure he’d be able to gain insight from one of Onika’s elders. Whether she knew it or not, Onika was lucky to have her grandmother.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  “We’re here,” Graham whispered as he woke Onika. “We’re at your grandmother’s house.”

  Onika didn’t look excited or happy. She had an expression of resignation that she coupled with a huge sigh.

  “Let’s get this over with,” Onika said.

  They both got out of the car, Onika not waiting on Graham to open her door before she jumped out and started trudging toward the dilapidated front porch. He almost couldn’t even call the house a house. It was a shack with a porch.

  A woman came out of the house and onto the porch. She was small, but it looked like she’d shrunken to that size with age. Graham thought she might’ve been a taller woman when she was younger.

  “Who are you?” the woman asked Graham.

  “I’m Onika’s friend Graham, and you must be Onika’s grandmother.”

  “Ms. Earlene to you. Last time she came down here, she came alone. This time she brought reinforcements. Guess she got tired of lying and saying we don’t exist.”

  All of this was said to Graham without even acknowledging that Onika was alive and standing right before her grandmother. Onika didn’t wait to be acknowledged. She walked up the stairs, past her grandmother, and into the house.

  “Come on, Graham,” Onika yelled from inside the house.

  Graham and Earlene locked eyes. He wasn’t afraid to walk past her but felt that it would be incredibly rude to do so. He would wait for an invitation.

  “You might as well come on in, since she insists on being ornery.”

  Graham didn’t think she was being ornery. He thought she was upset because she’d gotten word that her mother was dying.

  Graham followed Earlene into the house. His eyes immediately began to water at the stench. It smelled like an outhouse or a cesspool. Or maybe like someone was boiling manure.