Girls Like Us

by Gail Giles

  Her name is Lily.

  I slap the tea tray down without saying boo or squat and left them women to fend for they ownselfs. I went to see after Biddy.

  I found her in her room, digging in a little box like a squirrel looking for nuts.

  “What you up to?”

  Biddy turnt ’round and she helt a handful of tapes. “I’m gonna throw these away.”

  “Why?”

  “I made ’em so my baby could have remembery. But she got her own remembery. Mine will make her feel bad.”

  I husht because I could see Biddy had her head set. I trail after her to the kitchen. She open the cabinet under the sink and helt the tapes over the trash can. I could see it hard to let her words be garbage. But she jerk her hand open and the tapes slide in.

  Biddy went to her room and I wait till she close her door, and I snatch them tapes out the trash. Who knows? That little ole baby gonna know she didn’t come from Russia when she can’t talk no Russia talk. And she might want to know where she did come from. Shoot-a-goose, you never know what could happen tomorrow — much less a long time from tomorrow.

  I needed to take me another long hot shower. It had been a bad day, and bad days made thoughts of Robert crowd in on me.

  Biddy done quit making her tapes. Said she don’t have no reason to make ’em. I don’t talk on my tape every night like I used to, just sometimes. Biddy walk to the Brown Cow and back with me every day and we talk. We talk about Lizabeth apologizin’ to Biddy for “ambushin’” her. Biddy tell Lizabeth that she know she just doin’ what she thought best. I stayed some mad at Lizabeth for a while but easied down when I saw that Biddy was OK.

  But what Lizabeth did was bad wrong. Maybe she meant to do a good thing, but she’s a full-grown woman and she ain’t no Speddie and should know when right is right and wrong is wrong. How can I trust her anymore? It’s hard knowing that real people can make mistakes just like girls like us.

  But they’s one thing I hasn’t talk to Biddy about.

  I seen Robert yesterday.

  I was on my break at the Brown Cow. It was looking like rain and I wanted to smell that fresh, good rain smell. And Robert was sitting there in the parking lot. He was in his friend’s car. I start back to the big doors, afraid he was gonna jump out that car and grab me. But his friend start up the motor. He pull out to go into the street, and Robert lean his whole shoulders and chest out the window and yell, “I know where you live, Ho. I know your stupid friend live there too. I know about that rich old lady.”

  He put his finger up and made like he cut his throat with a knife. Then he howl like a wild animal.

  I don’t know what to do. If I tell Biddy, she be scared as me. Lizabeth might fall over dead if she know some evil-minded boy know where she live and that she rich.

  Maybe I should just run away. That way Biddy and Lizabeth be safe, and Robert couldn’t find me neither. But I don’t know no place to run to.

  Ms. Delamino can’t help me. Nobody wants to live with me now. Who would want to live with me with some evil boy after her and anybody ’round her?

  If I tell Lizabeth what that boy done to me, would she think I was trash?

  The police ain’t gonna believe no kinda girl like me if I tole anything. Folks like me ain’t worth they trouble.

  I dreamed me some fierce, evil dreams when I finally slept.

  This morning after my hot shower with plenty of hard scrubbin’, I packed me up a bag. I was for sure that I was goin’ to be leavin’ this little ’partment soon. I went next door and I made oatmeal and sliced peaches and buttered-up toast. Lizabeth came in and we ate, but only Biddy and her was doing the talking. When Biddy stood up to take the plates, I said, “I be needing to tell you something.”

  Lizabeth made a frown. “I sensed that something was troubling you, Quincy.”

  “My trouble ’bout to spill onto both of you now.”

  Biddy’s eyes got all round, and she sat back down. She shook her head like to tell me not to say nothing.

  “Biddy, I got to do this. I been thinking hard.”

  I tole Lizabeth about what Robert done. That ole lady turn almost gray in the face, but she kept her shoulders straight and her eyes locked onto mine. I tole it all.

  I ’spected Lizabeth to tell me to get right on out her house, but then she said something that made the world turn backwards and do the sidestroke. She didn’t say nothing ’bout me bringing this on my ownself. She didn’t say that I had to get out her house. She didn’t say that I was stupid and now some crazy mean boy might break in her house and knock her on her head.

  “Oh, Quincy. What can I do to help you?” she said. She had tears in her eyes, but they didn’t tumble down her cheek. Just looking at that ole woman make me feel . . . strong, maybe. I didn’t feel dirty.

  Biddy and me, we look at each other like monkeys done jumped out that ole lady’s mouth and danced on they hands.

  “I can help you with the police if you decide to report this . . .” She pinch her lips together. “Well, I won’t say out loud what I think he is.”

  “NO!” Biddy jump out her chair so hard she knock it backwards. “No, Quincy cain’t tell nobody else.”

  Lizabeth got all soft-eyed. “Oh, Biddy, I think I can understand why you would say that. I can see that Quincy is afraid too.” She shook her head. Then she put her hand on my hand. “Quincy, you are a woman. You can make your own decisions — I’m not going to meddle and risk making things worse. I can’t force you to tell the police. But I think you should.”

  “I tole you about all this,” I said to Lizabeth, “not ’cause I want you to help with the police. But ’cause I feel wrong, letting Robert be out there, watching you and Biddy, without you knowing that he could hurt you.”

  Biddy got her chair back up and sat. She lean across the table like getting close made what she said easier to understand.

  “You ain’t by yourself no more. You got us to watch for you. And I can watch for that old Robert.”

  Biddy, she was talking brave, but I could see the scared in her face.

  “Do you think this Robert will harm us?” Lizabeth axt.

  “Not if I don’t open my mouth. I don’t think he want nothing but to make sure I don’t get him in trouble. I think if we don’t say nothin’, then we’s safe.”

  “But what about the harm that he’s done to you already? Doesn’t that count?”

  Biddy and I both look down at the table. I could hardly make my voice come out my throat. “Lizabeth, peoples like you count. People like me, it just different.”

  “One day, I hope, you’ll know that you’re wrong about that,” Lizabeth say.

  Next thing I knowed all three of us was having us a snot-nosed crying jag.

  I thought about it a long time. I thought whilst I work on Biddy’s present. I thought whilst I chop and dice at the Brown Cow. I thought whilst Biddy watch the TV. I got tired thinking so hard. I felt like giving up, and sometimes I just cried and Biddy had to make me coffee to bring me around.

  “Biddy,” I said, “what if we wrong? What if them police ain’t like your granny? I got these scars on me. Them police won’t think I done that to myself.”

  Biddy sigh and she turnt off the TV. “We orphans, and the policemans they know that. They don’t care what happen. They don’t care if you tell the truth or not.”

  I tug at my hair like it could make my head bigger and some smart could get inside. “We ain’t orphans. We got a mother and father somewhere. They ain’t dead.”

  “Quincy, we’re . . . heart orphans. Never had nobody that loved us. That makes us different. It ain’t because you a mix-up race. It ain’t because I had a child that got took away. Why should policemans care what happen if nobody ever cared?”

  I didn’t say nothing. I laid down on my bed.

  I never been close to nobody. I always knew not to love nobody ’cause I’d just get taken away and put in another home. People were mean to me more than they was ever nice.
The ones that were nice were ones that was paid. Like Ms. Evans and Ms. D., and, well, even Mr. Hallis and the other foster folks got paid.

  But there was a feeling I had when Biddy tole me stuff and Lizabeth pet my hand. A feelin’ that pulled me close.

  Biddy be wrong. I care that Robert might hurt her ’cause of me. Lizabeth tried to make it so Biddy could see her took-away baby. If Biddy got two peoples that care about her and what happen to her, then she ain’t no heart orphan no more. Is she?

  Biddy, she come out in the world, even in the dark when I was late from work. That fool girl was worried ’bout me. She still walkin’ me to and from the Brown Cow. Lizabeth didn’t put me out her house or even this ’partment. She even had a taxicab come fetch us and took me to a doctor lady that did tests on my blood and checked me out to see if Robert done me any kind of bad that I wasn’t smart enough to wonder ’bout yet. Nobody paid Biddy and Lizabeth to do none of that. That means I ain’t no heart orphan anymore neither, don’t it?

  But it might not be any different. Lizabeth, she old and she could up and croak anytime. Biddy, she getting purtier and braver ever day. Some boy might come along and want to be her boyfriend. I’d be an orphan again.

  All this thinking making me crazy-headed.

  I gathered Lizabeth and Biddy ’round some presents all wrapped up nice in the middle of the table.

  “Is it someone’s birthday?” Lizabeth axt.

  “Nope, this is a ‘just because Quincy say so’ day,” I say.

  Biddy and Lizabeth set down and look at me.

  “I have presents for everybody.” I hand the first one to Biddy. “Open it.”

  She grin big and take off the ribbon and the paper real slow, making sure not to ruin the littlest piece. It took her a long time, but I didn’t holler at her to hurry up. Sometimes taking extra care is a fine way.

  “It’s a book,” Biddy said. “I can’t read no book.”

  “You can read this one,” I say.

  Biddy open it. “It’s a cookbook.”

  I made Biddy a cookbook of all the recipes that Mr. Hallis made me. Only instead of words like “cup” and “teaspoon” and “lettuce” and “chicken,” there was drawings. It had took me forever.

  Biddy got tears in her eyes. “A book I can read.” She hug it ’gainst her chest and didn’t say nothing else. I felt some good.

  I hand another present to Biddy. “This for you too.”

  She open it. “It’s a tape.”

  Lizabeth look at it. “It’s nursery songs.”

  “I called Ms. D.,” I said. “If you want to do it, Ms. D. can set you up to help in the hospital nursery. You got to take a class and wear a uniform, but then you can hold babies for one hour a week. You can sing to ’em if you want.”

  Nobody said nothing. But this time the nothing was chuck full of sumpin’.

  “If you don’t want to hold no babies, it’s OK, but if you do . . . well, you got to learn sumpin’ more than ‘Itsy-Bitsy Spider.’”

  Before they could say anything, I hand a package to Lizabeth.

  Now, Lizabeth, she be my kind of woman. She tore into that package with ribbon and paper flying in the air.

  “A camera.”

  “Somebody in every fambly got to be the picture taker. A fambly takes pictures at Christmas and birthdays and suchlike, don’t they?”

  Lizabeth look at that camera, then put her hand up in front her eyes.

  “And I need you to promise me something,” I say.

  Lizabeth clear her throat and wipe her eyes.

  “I know you old and might”— I tried to think of a polite way to say it —“be pushing up daisies sooner than later. But try not to die on us too soon. OK?”

  Lizabeth, she made the phone call like I axt her. The policeman say he would come in a car and pick me up so I could make a statement.

  Lizabeth and Biddy, they got right in that police car and hold my hand all the way. They sat by me and hold my hand while that policeman make a tape of what I said about Robert. They wouldn’t leave even when the police lady took pictures of my scars.

  Biddy tole that policeman how she find me in the alley. How she washed my clothes.

  Lizabeth said that we had done what we thought was right, but that there was no every-dence but my good word.

  That policeman look at me and he say, “Ms. Ford.”

  Biddy say, “Who Ms. Ford?”

  I got to say, it took me a bit of a time to figure it out too. “Biddy, that’s me.” I don’t guess Biddy ever heard my whole name. I cain’t remember me a time when anybody used it. Everybody call me Quincy. Even if they don’t know me none.

  I straighten up my back. And I look at that policeman. All of a sudden, I knew Lizabeth had been right. Maybe folks like Biddy and me not different. He done call me Ms. Ford.

  “Ms. Ford, Robert and his buddy are well known at this station. They’re both bad actors.”

  I frowned ’cause I didn’t understand what that meant. And I knew he’d think I was stupid.

  But that policeman say, “I’m sorry. That was sort of station-house slang. I meant that Robert and his friend act badly.” He clear his throat. “Those scars on your stomach are evidence — enough that we can get Robert and Darrel into the station.” He tell me them boys was cowards, and maybe he could have them pointing they fingers one at the other. “We’ll do our best to bring them to justice for what they have done.” He tole me that what I done was the best thing to keep Lizabeth and Biddy and me safe. And he tole me that I was keeping Robert from hurting some other girl later on.

  I walk out that station house with my fambly hanging on to my hands.

  I knew that Biddy and me — both of us — we wasn’t nobody. We count.

  Sometime I hear a loud car and I think Robert is out there waiting to hurt me. Sometime I get mad at Biddy and Lizabeth. Sometime I get mad at my ownself. I still think this world be harder for folks like me and Biddy than for folks that are smart and don’t have a smash-up face.

  But sometime Biddy be singing ’bout somebody comin’ ’round a mountain and she cleaning like a fool, but she happy. Sometime I cook something extra good and we all smile at one another. Sometime we get laughin’ fits. Sometime I don’t worry. Sometime I do. Sometime I want to box Lizabeth’s ears. Sometime I think I gonna buy Biddy a pet. Something that won’t try to eat Mama Duck if she come back. Sometime I think I need to stuff that girl’s cleaning rag in her mouth to keep her from singing.

  Every once in a while, I hug that fool girl.

  Just for nothing.

  First, foremost, and well, just always: thanks to Scott Treimel, my trusty agent — and I mean “trusty” in all the best definitions of the word. He believed in this book from the beginning and never, ever let it go. Thanks, my friend.

  And to Pam Whitlock, who would never quit bugging me to get this one into print: here it is.

  Thank you to the SCBWI and the Judy Blume Grant for helping this book along the road.

  And many thanks to my wonderful editor. What graceful direction Andrea Tompa used to get me to make this book what it is.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2014 by Gail Giles

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

  First electronic edition 2014

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 2013944011

  ISBN 978-0-7636-6267-7 (hardcover)

  ISBN 978-0-7636-7018-4 (electronic)

  Candlewick Press

  99 Dover Street

  Somerville, Massachusetts 02144

  visit us at www.candlewick.com

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