“You already said that,” Ms. Keisha says with attitude.
“Um, Ms. Keisha, I’m going to go upstairs,” I say, trying not to let my voice sound croaky, which it does. I grab Twinkie’s hand and walk away, like a mummy in a fog.
Ms. Keisha yells after me, “Dorinda, what you want me to do with your laundry bag?”
“Oh,” I say, embarrassed, “can you just put it in the laundry room and I’ll get it in a minute?”
“Oh, I’ll help you with that,” the strange man says, reaching to pick up my laundry bag.
“No!” I yell out.
“We got it, Dorinda. Go on upstairs,” Mrs. Bigge says, jumping up from the bench. Now everybody in the courtyard knows there is some drama going on, which means the whole building will know in a few hours.
My heart is pounding out of my chest as I run to the elevator bank. I dread having to tell Mrs. Bosco that some man who says he’s Corky’s father is hanging around downstairs. Even worse, I dread having to repeat what the man has told us about having custody. Twinkie and I press both the buttons like the boogeyman is after us. Up, down, whatever. Just please let the elevator come.
“Is he really Corky’s father?” Twinkie asks, looking up at me, her eyes filled with fear.
“I don’t know,” I say, trying to hide the fact that my cheeks are flushed. I don’t want Twinkie to know how upset I am. The man can’t possibly be telling the truth. If Corky’s father had won custody, our caseworker, Mrs. Tattle, would have told us about it. No way, José, can this be for real. This man is tripping.
“I don’t know either,” Twinkie says, shrugging her shoulders.
It seems like we’re waiting forever for the elevator to come. Suddenly, I start to think about my sister Tiffany. Well, she is really my half sister (we have the same birth mother and different fathers), but she is adopted. Mrs. Tattle arranged for us to meet because Tiffany was looking for me. I didn’t even know I had a real sister, half sister, whatever. “Why won’t the elevator come when I need it?” I snarl, pressing the buttons repeatedly.
“Don’t tell me the elevator is broken, too,” Twinkie moans.
“The elevators are definitely on vacation,” I say, stomping my foot. Twinkie stomps her foot too. Suddenly, I lose the courage to face Mrs. Bosco. If I tell her what that man said, it’s only going to upset her, and if her high blood pressure acts up, it could make her sick again. Three months ago, Mrs. Bosco suffered a mild stroke and stayed in the hospital for two weeks. I stand there frozen. I don’t know what to do. But if I don’t tell her, and secretly leave a message for Mrs. Tattle to call immediately, I know that Ms. Keisha will flap her lips and the news will reach Mrs. Bosco anyway. Actually, I’m surprised that Ms. Keisha hadn’t already heard about the strange man hanging around the courtyard.
“Come on, Dorinda,” Twinkie says, grabbing my arm and motioning for us to climb the stairs.
I snap out of my daze and realize there’s no point in waiting for an elevator that will never come. Twinkie and I climb the six flights of stairs to our apartment. When we reach our door, I am panting so hard I have to stop and catch my breath. Twinkie takes my keys out of my hands and opens the front door. I hear Mrs. Bosco in the kitchen. It sounds like she is washing the dishes even though she is not supposed to. Chantelle is supposed to wash the dishes on Sunday mornings. I look over at Chantelle sitting on the couch and I radiate serious attitude, but she is staring a hole into the television, trying not to look at me.
“The one job you have to do on Sundays and you can’t even do that,” I say. I just want to go over to the couch and shake Chantelle like a rag doll, wearing an Afro wig but I can’t. Twinkie has already unlatched the wooden gate and run into the kitchen and is babbling away at Mrs. Bosco. I don’t even stop her. “What?” I hear Mrs. Bosco ask.
“You’re washing the dishes tonight, that’s all I’m saying,” I say gruffly to Chantelle. Even though she doesn’t look at me, I know she hears me, because her eyes are twitching from all that pretending. I slowly walk into the kitchen. “Um, you’re not supposed to be washing those dishes,” I say politely to Mrs. Bosco.
“Never mind that—what is this nonsense Rita is talking about?” Mrs. Bosco says, scrubbing a plate with a Brillo pad. She’s not even wearing her rubber gloves to protect her hands. (Mrs. Bosco is supposed to protect her hands because she has psoriasis—a nasty condition that makes her skin get scaly, kinda like a snake shedding its skin.
I recount the whole story of what happened in the courtyard. At first she just scowls and says, “Some people ain’t got nothing better to do than mess up other people’s lives.” Then her hands start shaking and the plate she’s holding drops to the linoleum floor, shattering in big shards. Nobu jumps off his blanket and hides behind the garbage can. I can see his little white butt and tail sticking out.
“Come here, Nobu.” I crouch by the garbage can and wait for him to come out by himself. After a few more seconds, I gently grab him, then cuddle him like a baby to make him stop shaking. Mrs. Bosco stands there like a chess player contemplating her next move.
Twinkie hears someone talking in the hallway and runs to the door.
Oh, God, please don’t let this man come to our apartment.
Chapter
3
“It’s Mr. Bosco!” Twinkie hollers, letting me know not to be afraid. She waits until he opens the door with the key, because she is not allowed to open the door for anyone. Now I hear the keys jingling outside. Maybe he was talking to one of the neighbors.
“Don’t say nothing to him,” Mrs. Bosco calls out to Twinkie, her hands still shaking.
I make eye contact with Twinkie as she stands by the door, and put my finger over my mouth. She puts her finger over her mouth and nods her head to let me know that she understands. Luckily for us, Mr. Bosco is very slow. Usually he is really tired by the time he comes home. He works as a security guard on the graveyard shift—three A.M. to eleven A.M.
“We’ll deal with this mess. Let him go sleep,” Mrs. Bosco explains to me. Mr. Bosco has his routine—he always goes straight to the bedroom once he gets home from work. We can hear him watching the television before he passes out.
“Hi, Mr. Bosco!” Nestor yells as he runs into the kitchen.
“How ya doing, shorty,” Mr. Bosco says, looking down at Nestor. Mr. Bosco is a really big man and he coughs a lot from smoking. He lets out a big grin, then heads right to the bedroom and closes the door.
Mrs. Bosco stands there for another few seconds, then wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. She instructs me to go call Mrs. Tattle. She ain’t gonna be there, but leave a message for her.”
“Okay,” I say, but I don’t move, because I don’t want to leave Mrs. Bosco by herself.
“Go on, Dorinda. I’m not going to keel over or nothing,” Mrs. Bosco says. “Just let me catch my breath.” Sure enough, Mrs. Bosco starts wheezing, then the hacking coughing starts up. I stand there helpless.
“Go on!” Twinkie says, staring up at me.
I walk into the alcove to get the pad where I write down all the phone numbers for Mrs. Bosco’s business. See, Mrs. Bosco is illiterate. She can’t read or write. She pretends that we don’t know she is illiterate, but we all know. Suddenly, I drop the whole pile of papers and bills and letters all over the floor. Twinkie runs over and helps me pick up the papers. “Go play with Corky,” I whisper to Twinkie. “But don’t you say one word about this to him. You promise?”
“You gonna let me be in the Cheetah Girls?” Twinkie asks earnestly.
I don’t even smile. “Just go play with Corky.” Twinkie nods and runs to knock on Corky’s door.
I finally find Mrs. Tattle’s phone number. Shaking, I dial Mrs. Tattle’s office. Of course I get the voice mail for the Administration of Children’s Service, Division of Foster Care. To stop my voice from cracking, I have to pause every second, then I decide to keep it brief. “Um, this is Dorinda. Mrs. Bosco needs you to call here. Please cal
l.”
I hope that I sounded okay. I hang up the phone and run back to Mrs. Bosco. She is sitting down in a kitchen chair. I know she is trying to hide how upset she is. “I’m tired of fighting with these people,” she mumbles under her breath, then puts her hand on her forehead and massages her temples. I sit down and stare at her. “Y’all go on with your business today, but make sure Corky don’t leave this house,” Mrs. Bosco instructs me.
“But what about, um, Corky’s—I mean, the man?” I say. “I have to go back and do the laundry.”
“Don’t pay him no mind. He can stand there until he turns into Frosty the Snowman, for all I care,” Mrs. Bosco says, then starts coughing again. This time I can hear her swallow the phlegm in her throat. I grab her some tissues so she can spit it out. I fight back the tears. I want to call Galleria, and even talk to Ms. Dorothea, but I just go back to the table and sit with Mrs. Bosco.
“He got some nerve showing up here. He want to thank me,” she says. I can tell that Mrs. Bosco is really upset, because her voice is getting wobbly. “He lucky I don’t go down those stairs and crack his knucklehead open.”
I hear commotion in Corky’s room. “I don’t want to stay in my room!” Corky screams at Twinkie, who is trying to push Corky back into his room. The two have gotten into a fight and Nestor is trying to help Twinkie.
“Get off me!” Corky lets out a piercing sream that sends Nobu hiding behind the garbage can again. I reach down to pick him up. This is definitely too much noise for my poor little Nobu.
“You left a message?” Mrs. Bosco asks me.
I nod.
“Then we talk about this later,” she instructs me, walking out of the kitchen. “Y’all come out here in the living room,” she commands Twinkie, Nestor, and Corky.
“She pushed me!” Corky whines.
“Rita, come on over here,” Mrs. Bosco says. When the kids are gathered around, Mrs. Bosco tries to explain to them: “I’m not feeling well today so I need for y’all to stay in the house in case I need for you to help me. Y’all understand?”
“We understand.” Twinkie nods, knowing that Mrs. Bosco is telling a fib-eroni.
I decide to go into Corky’s room and sit with him for hours. This means the rest of my day will definitely be ruined. All I can think about is Corky’s father hanging around downstairs, like the candyman waiting to snag us with his hook. I’m sure Ms. Keisha has already told all our neighbors about the whole drama and kaflamma, and is watching Corky’s father out her window like an eagle ready to swoop down on its prey.
But I’m not bad-mouthing Ms. Keisha anymore, because she did our laundry for us and had Pookie and Tamela bring it to our apartment. No way was I going back down to the laundry room in Building C. I can’t imagine walking into the courtyard and seeing that strange man standing there. At about five o’clock Ms. Keisha knocks on our door, and I answer it. “The coast is clear,” she informs me.
“I can’t believe he stood out there that long,” I respond, shaking my head.
I’m so glad we were able to keep Corky inside all day, but he knows something is wrong, because he’s bouncing off the walls like an astronaut lost in space.
“Y’all should have called the police,” Ms. Keisha says, sucking her teeth. “But he gone now.”
“Who gone?” Nestor asks, jumping up from the couch.
“Nobody. Go sit down,” I say gently. But Nestor knows something is up.
“Eunice there?” Ms. Keisha asks through the crack in the door. I wish Ms. Keisha didn’t talk so loud all the time, like she’s got a built-in bullhorn.
“Um, she is lying down,” I whisper quietly, hoping she’ll take a hint. Mrs. Bosco has been in her room for most of the afternoon.
“Well, tell her if she need anything else, I’m here, all right, Dorinda?” Ms. Keisha says.
“Um, thank you for doing the laundry,” I say, smiling. “I owe you.”
“I won’t let you forget either,” Ms. Keisha says, winking.
“I know.” I chuckle. Closing the door and locking all five of the locks, I still don’t feel safe. It don’t matter if Corky’s father has left, I’m still scared. As a matter of fact, for the rest of the evening, every time there is a loud noise, I flinch like a scarecrow. By dinnertime, Mr. Bosco has gotten up from bed, and I hear Mrs. Bosco talking to him behind their door. She is probably telling him the whole situation. Even though I know Mr. Bosco isn’t going to work tonight, I still feel scared.
“Ain’t nothing to do till morning, Eunice,” I hear him telling Mrs. Bosco.
Corky is listening, too. He keeps watching me, waiting for me to tell him something. So does Kenya.
“Somebody got in trouble?” she asks. I’m not surprised by her question, because that somebody is usually her.
“Just go play, Kenya,” I tell her.
Kenya drags her feet and heads for her room. I wasn’t trying to be mean to her, but I really have to talk to my crew. It’s times like these I wish I had a phone in my room. Instead, I head to my room and hop on the Internet and let the Cheetah Girls know that I need to talk. I ask if we can assemble in the Phat Planet chatroom at nine o’clock. Then I get out my schoolbooks so I can do my Spanish and math homework.
Mrs. Bosco finally comes out to fix dinner. She has turned on the television in the living room again.
“Look, Dorinda, it’s the tiger special!” Arba says excitedly, pointing to the television.
“No, it isn’t,” says Nestor. “It’s the cheetah special.”
I glance over at the television to see what they’re talking about. The voice-over announces, “Operation: Save the Big Cats.”
“Oh, it’s a special about all the big cats,” I explain to them.
“What are big cats?” Arba asks, twirling around in her chair.
“Tigers, jaguars, lions, cheetahs, leopards, bobcats,” I rattle off a few of my favorite wildcats.
“Cheetahs!” Arba yells out.
“Yes, cheetahs, I said that—and cougars,” I say, mesmerized by the image on the television. Since I’ve been in the Cheetah Girls I’ve become fascinated by the Animal Channel specials. I’m sure Galleria and Ms. Dorothea are probably watching, too, since there isn’t an animal program they don’t know about.
“Oh, that’s scary!” Nestor says, staring at the grizzly sight—three lions eating a baby giraffe they just killed and “cracking the ribs to suck out its vital organs,” explains the narrator.
“I can’t watch this,” I mumble to myself. I’m already too creeped out by the man who hung around in the courtyard all day.
“Look at the hyena!” Corky says, giggling.
“No, that’s a jackal,” I explain, watching the sneaky predator wait for a few scraps of leftover giraffe meat.
“The jackal that’ll make you cackle!” Corky bursts out, riffing off one of the verses of the Cheetah Girls song “Wannabe Stars in the Jiggy Jungle” that we sang at the competition last Saturday. Tears well up instantly in my eyes. He is so smart and funny. How can he go live with his father now? I know the foster care system is screwed up, but they can’t do that. Can they? I mean, the man was trying to be nice, but how can he just show up here like this?
“That’s right, Corky,” I say, going into the kitchen to help Mrs. Bosco. If I watch any more of the wild cat special, I’ll lose it.
Putting the plates out on the dining room table, I suppress the urge to ask Mrs. Bosco what she knows about Corky’s mother and father. I don’t want to bother her with any more drama today. I know she is upset, because she didn’t even play her gospel music all day, like she usually does. Mrs. Bosco loves anything by Mahalia Jackson and Shirley Caesar—gospel singers from back in the day. She also plays a lot of old-school soul stuff, like Al Green, Otis Redding, and Bill Withers. When I go back into the kitchen to get the silverware, Mrs. Bosco asks quietly, “What did that Ms. Keisha have to say?”
I guess she heard Ms. Keisha at the door earlier.
“She
said Corky’s father left,” I say, trying to keep the situation “lite FM,” as Galleria would say. That means not causing more static.
“I bet Ms. Keisha made it sound like she chased the man off,” Mrs. Bosco adds, humming to herself.
“Um, yeah, something like that,” I say, smiling.
“Make sure you lock that top lock on the door tonight,” Mrs. Bosco tells me. “No telling what creepy crawler is out there trying to bother people.”
I chuckle at Mrs. Bosco’s joke, but now I’m even more scared than I was before.
“And would y’all turn down that television, please—we about to eat dinner,” demands Mrs. Bosco while she pats the top layer of cheese on the macaroni-and-cheese casserole she is about to put back in the oven. She always likes to give it a second cheese round, then she puts it in the bottom of the oven for a little extra toasting.
Ignoring Ms. Bosco’s command, somebody has turned up the volume instead of down on the television. Now we can hear the narrator’s booming voice all the way in the kitchen.
“What do we know about ferocious wild cats? Cheetahs will travel six hundred square miles to capture their prey. A jaguar can swim the Panama Canal, eating fish along the way. Tigers can weigh up to five hundred seventy-six pounds, and can eat up to ninety pounds of meat a day. Despite the man-eating lore that surrounds these big cats, they are generally able to live in close proximity to humans without disturbing them.”
“What on earth are y’all watching?” Mrs. Bosco asks, wiping the sweat on her forehead with a napkin.
“Oh, it’s this special on wild cats,” I tell her while putting the meat loaf on the serving plate. Even though I feel bad that people are killing off wild cats, I shudder at the thought of being attacked by one.
“Ain’t nothing wrong with wild cats—they just doing what nature intended for them to do. It’s people you got to watch out for,” Mrs. Bosco says, rubbing her forehead. I know what Mrs. Bosco is trying to say—that people can be foul sometimes.
Bring It On! Page 3