“Pay it no mind,” he said. “In less time than it took you to do that, I blew three thousand on blackjack. Have a good life.” He winked at her and walked off.
She ran after him. “I wasn’t scared. Do you hear me? I wasn’t scared. I enjoyed every minute of that ride. I wasn’t scared.”
“Good. I’m happy for you,” the man said. “But don’t press your luck.” He walked on, but she headed for the Ferris wheel, which she considered far less frightening than the roller coaster.
“I’m not afraid of heights anymore,” she repeated over and over. “I’m not scared.”
She gave the uniformed man her ticket, took a seat, and waited for the chills of fear to settle over her. “My goodness,” she said to herself at the end of the short experience, “that was less unsettling than being on a horse. What else have I missed because I didn’t have the guts to try it?” Petra passed an ATM, stopped, and debited her savings account for five hundred dollars. Credit cards were handy, but you couldn’t use them at a drink or candy dispensing machine.
Exulting from her triumphs over herself and bursting with a need to share her victory with someone—anyone—who knew of her reticence to embrace new experiences, she dashed back to her hotel room and telephoned her friend, Twylah.
“Hello. Sorry I got no time to talk. I got to get to work, and I’m running late,” Twylah said.
“Hi, Twylah. This is Petra. I forgot about the time difference. I’ll—”
“Petra! Girl, where in hell are you? Nobody’s heard a word from you since…Girl, where are you?”
“Oh, calm down, Twylah. I’m in Santa Cruz, and I called to tell you I just rode on a roller coaster that made a figure eight, got off, and took a ride on the Ferris wheel.”
“Huh?”
“And tomorrow I’m going to take swimming lessons.”
“Do Jesus! You sure you all right?”
“Don’t I sound all right?” she asked to avoid lying.
“You call your mama. She said you won’t have no job when you get back. Your boss has practically hung himself. I gotta go. Call your mama.” Twylah hung up, and Petra wished she hadn’t called. The exchange hadn’t satisfied her. Winston would have rejoiced with her. Winston! If I let myself think of him, I’ll go to pieces. She had to call her mother, but with the three-hour time difference, that would have to wait until evening.
She ate a modest dinner, hamburger, French fries, and ice tea, in her room, and at precisely seven o’clock, she telephoned her mother. “Hi, Mama. This is Petra.”
“Like I don’t know my own daughter’s voice. I sure am glad you called. Your boss is threatening to fire you. Do you know any reason why Reverend Collins called here three times to find out how you are?”
“Oh, he was working on me just before I came on vacation,” she said, as casually as she could. “I ought to be home in about a week. It’s so nice out here, Mama. I wish you could live in a place like this.”
“Well, honey, don’t worry ’bout it. If you poor one place, you’ll be poor everywhere you go. I’m always going to be a licensed practical nurse, and nobody’s ever going to pay me as much as they pay registered nurses. Besides, it gets hot there just like it gets hot here.”
In just three short weeks, how could she have forgotten how negative her mother could be? “How’s Krista doing?”
“Fine, I guess. I hardly ever see her. She comes home from work, eats her supper, and goes to her room. Here lately, she’s joined a singing group, and she goes to that on Monday evenings. Otherwise, nothing’s changed far as I can see. Oh, yes, she said something about trying to get into college, but you know these young people don’t stick with anything long.”
“Krista’s dogged and determined, Mama. If she sets her mind to something, she goes after it. I wish you’d encourage her to go to college.”
“I would, if I could back it up with money.”
Petra didn’t pursue it, but the conversation saddened her; her child would need her, and she wouldn’t be there for her.
In spite of Petra’s fears for her daughter, Providence appeared to provide for her. Goodman walked out of Price’s Electronics with a brand new Compaq laptop computer, and an Epson color printer-scanner-copier. He took it to his office and waited impatiently for five-fifteen when Krista would arrive. To his chagrin, he opened the door and looked at Jada, wearing a skirt that was much too tight and a T-shirt from which her voluptuous bosom threatened to escape.
“I told you not to come here unless we arranged it ahead of time,” he said, not bothering to hide his irritation. “Suppose my wife or one of my children was here.”
“Sorry, I needed to see you. Besides, I figured it was time you got some attention.”
“Look, Jada. I have duties at home, and I’m not nineteen.”
“You couldn’t prove that last part by me.”
He leaned back in his chair, looking at her, trying to figure out what she wanted, since he was certain she was faking her attraction to him. The buzzer rang. “Oh, shit!” he said. “Now you’ve done it.”
“Oh, for Heaven’s sake, don’t get bent out of shape. Use your head. I’m one of your music students.”
He got up, started for the door, paused, and said, “You couldn’t prove that by anybody in my family. They’re all musicians.”
“I need about fifty bucks,” she said. So that was her game.
“Oh, hell. I was just going to ask you for twenty-five,” he said, opened the door, saw Krista, and relaxed.
“You two know each other,” he said, refusing to introduce them.
Krista strolled in, sat down, crossed her knees, and said, “Maybe she knows me, but I don’t know her.”
He looked straight at Jada. “Krista is my daughter, the oldest of my three children.”
Jada seemed taken aback, and he meant to take good advantage of her misunderstanding. He stood. “Jada was just leaving, Krista.” To Jada, he said, “I’ll see you to the door.”
“Aren’t you going to kiss me?” Jada asked when they were alone.
“The way you screwed things up? Are you going to give me the twenty-five dollars? You’ll get it back Monday night.”
She gave him the money. “Is your daughter going to tell your wife?”
He shrugged. “She’s a female. How the hell do I know what she’ll do? See you Monday.”
“What did she want?” Krista asked him when he returned to his office. “Suppose I had been Carla? What would you have done?”
“Good question. I have your laptop and your printer. I’ll take them home for you. Do you want me to hook them up?” Krista swung her crossed leg carelessly as if she didn’t have a care, but he noticed that she didn’t look at him.
“Well?” he said, agitated. After all, hadn’t he told her a minute earlier that he’d bought her both a computer and a printer? Didn’t she know what they cost?
“How do you and my grandmother get along? Is she gonna be mad if you come to the house?”
He stared at his daughter. She didn’t grow up with him, and he didn’t believe genes contributed that much to the socialization of a person, but she was so much like him that it made him nervous. She had the guts to say whatever she felt and thought. He’d also been that way, but the years had taught him the efficacy of bridling his tongue.
“I haven’t seen her since before you were born, and from what I remember of her, she probably holds me responsible for your having been born out of wedlock.”
“What’ll you do if she gets on your case?”
“If ignoring her doesn’t work, I’ll tell her who’s really responsible. I’ll be there tomorrow at five-fifteen.” In the short time he’d known Krista, he’d learned that in order to handle her, he had to take control.
“Okay. I’ll be there. Thanks for my stuff. I still can’t believe I’m going to own a computer, not to speak of a printer. I mean, you’re really four square, Daddy.” She jumped up and kissed his cheek. “I missed a lot not growing up
with you.”
“Because I could give you things?” He didn’t want that kind of relationship with her; he wanted her to see him as her loving and supportive father.
“Oh, Daddy, for goodness sake. How could you think that? It’s…Daddies are different from mothers is what I meant.”
“That’s the least they should be,” he said, understanding what she wanted to say but couldn’t articulate.
He stooped to pick up the boxes and grimaced. “I can carry one of them, Daddy. The laptop can’t be too heavy.” She lifted it and headed for the door. “It’s fine. Come on.”
He reached the door where she stood with her hand on the knob and handed her a key. “Put that box on top of this one, and lock the door behind us.”
Sons were easier to understand, and probably also to raise, than daughters, and he’d defy anyone to disagree. His appreciation for Petra mounted each time he was with Krista. As they left the building together, it occurred to him that Petra’s behavior didn’t make sense. After more than eighteen years of silence, she asked to see him and told him he had a daughter nearing her eighteenth birthday and, shortly thereafter, took off on a vacation to nowhere in particular, just wherever her mind led her. He wasn’t a psychiatrist, but he had sense enough to know that Petra had either experienced an epiphany or she was in some kind of trouble.
Goodman placed the boxes i n the trunk of his car, closed it, and asked Krista, “Has your mother ever done anything like this before? I mean like suddenly announcing that she’s going on a vacation without leaving plans, an itinerary of addresses where she may be reached?”
“Nope. And Mama isn’t stingy, Daddy, but she handles money like it was an egg, and for her, a vacation is like…like staying home two days from work. Once, she went to Virginia Beach, but since she can’t swim and she’s scared to death of water, that was a flop.”
“Is she sick?”
“Mama? Sick? Not since I knew her. Mama’s strong as a horse.”
He opened the front passenger door for Krista, seated himself, and ignited the engine. “Looks as if she got tired of being regimented,” he said, but he didn’t believe it. Something was amiss, and Petra had not shared it with her family.
Chapter Seven
Petra stood at the window in her room looking out at the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean. I’m just beginning to live, to understand what life is about, and I have to leave all this. Well, I’m going to do my damnedest to enjoy what’s left. My insurance policy will take care of Krista until she can fend for herself, and Mama would work as long as she can stand up even if she got a windfall.
She took the soiled clothing from her suitcase, and her gaze landed on the little evening purse that she carried the previous evening. Her heartbeat accelerated when she remembered that it contained the little package that Winston gave her. She opened the little box, sat down on the edge of the bed, and stared at the gold band. Dumbfounded. After a minute, she looked at the inscription inside: the date they met and the word LOVE. She slipped it on the third finger of her left hand, and a feeling of contentment washed over her.
Feeling upbeat and almost happy, she washed the soiled clothing, hung it over the bathtub, and went down to the lobby. “Do you have a brochure specifically on the Boardwalk?” she asked the concierge.
“We do, indeed, ma’am.” He gave her several pamphlets. “Please let me know if I can help.” Petra got a cup of cappuccino at the coffee bar and sat down in the lounge to enjoy it and study the brochures.
“Miss, will you keep an eye on the baby while I run over there to the ladies’ room? I’ll be back in a minute.”
Petra glanced up to see a baby carriage in front of her, and, before she could respond, the woman ran off, obviously in a hurry to get to the women’s room. After perusing the tourist leaflets, Petra decided to browse the shops and then take a nap, for she wanted to go to the theatre and then see the midnight fireworks on the Boardwalk. Intending to ask the concierge for theatre tickets, she stood, noticed that the baby carriage was still there, and remembered the woman who was supposed to have made an urgent trip to the women’s room. She peered into the carriage, saw a newborn baby, and knew at once that the woman had abandoned the child.
She went to the concierge and told him what she suspected. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but you’ll have to remain right here while I report this to the police,” the man said, and in a tone less friendly than when he previously spoke to her.
“Why should I wait?” she asked him, provoked because she envisaged a problem that was not of her making.
“Madam, how do we know it isn’t your child?”
Petra took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “That’s the dumbest thing I ever heard of. Anybody can see that it’s not my baby. That child is white.”
“I’ve seen a lot of people who said they were black, but who were as white as I am,” the man said, and tapped a bell. Within seconds, a uniformed and armed guard appeared. “This woman is to wait here until the police arrive,” the concierge told the guard. He left and returned with the baby carriage.
Two policemen arrived at about the time the baby began to cry. “Would you at least feed the child?” the concierge asked Petra.
“With what? You have as much milk as I do. You feed it,” she said and had the pleasure of seeing his face turn to crimson.
“You have to come with us, ma’am,” one of the policemen said. “Child abandonment is a serious matter.”
“Yes, it is, and I hope you find that woman.” She would never forget her embarrassment at leaving the hotel with a policeman on each side of her.
She walked into the station house and looked around at the men and women likely to leave there in handcuffs. “Officer,” she said to the desk sergeant, “I happened to be at the wrong place.” She described the woman who asked her to keep an eye on the child. “Now, I’m a victim.”
“If that isn’t your child, there’s no problem. We have to finger-print you and ask you some questions.”
“I understand that, sir,” she said, “but you could settle the whole thing by getting a gynecologist to examine me. That baby can’t be more than four days old.”
“How do you know that?” the officer asked.
“Because I have an eighteen-year-old daughter, and I know a newborn when I see one. So, could we please go to the nearest hospital? I want to see the head of the GYN service. Otherwise I’ll miss my plane, and all my connections.”
“Where’re you headed?” the officer asked her.
“Ellicott City, Maryland, with a stop off in Atlanta.”
“Okay. This won’t take long. Have a seat.”
Hours later, the police had determined that her fingerprints matched none of those on the baby carriage or the baby’s bottle, and a physician, called at Petra’s insistence, determined that her breasts were not those of a woman who had recently given birth.
“Can you draw well enough to sketch a picture of the woman who left that baby with you?” one officer asked Petra.
“I can try.” She did the best she could and decided that she’d given them a fair enough likeness. “I’d like to go back to the hotel now, Officer,” she said to the one who brought her there, “but I’ve never been in Santa Cruz before, so I don’t know how to get back there.”
“If you’ll wait about ten minutes, I can drop you off at the Breakers, Ms. Fields.”
“Are you on vacation?” he asked as he drove to the hotel. “Maryland is a long way from Santa Cruz.”
“I know it is, but there are so many things I haven’t done and so many places I haven’t been, so I just bought a ticket and headed for South Dakota. For the last few weeks, I’ve been seeing this part of the country. Believe me, it’s been an eye opener.”
He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “You’re young.
You’re not on the lam, are you? Why did you feel the need to do this now? It isn’t like you had one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel, so to sp
eak.”
His words sent chills throughout her body. “You couldn’t have put it more perfectly or more succinctly.”
“What?” He slowed down, drove to the curb, and parked. “What did you say? I mean, were you serious?”
“Unfortunately, I was. From what the doctor said, I figure I’ve got a few months at the most, and you guys made me throw away almost four hours of it sitting in a police station.” She tried to lighten the mood when she said, “Not that it wasn’t a pleasure to be in the company of so many great-looking guys; it was, but I’d rather it had been under different circumstances.”
He leaned back and closed his eyes. “You mean you’re terminally ill?”
“Yes, but at least I know it, and I’m having a ball with what’s left of my life. So don’t be gloomy.”
“You’ve accepted this?” he asked in a tone of wonder.
“What was I supposed to do, shake my fist at God and say no way?”
“Look, this is…This thing put a knot in the pit of my gut. For the last four and a half hours, you’ve had your hooks in me, and now this.” Suddenly, he opened the car door, jumped out, and lost what she assumed was his lunch. After a few minutes, he got back into the car, reached into the glove compartment for a hand sanitizer package, opened it, and washed his face and hands. “I’ve never had anything like this happen to me,” he said. “I’m sorry. Look, will you at least have dinner with me?”
“I’d love to, but you shouldn’t waste your time on me, because it can’t lead to anything good. Besides, I was planning to go to the theatre and after that to the midnight fireworks.”
“May I do that with you? After dinner, of course. I don’t expect more than your company. It just seems a shame not to have at least an evening with you. Is…this something that could happen any minute, or will you get a warning?”
“I don’t know. I have an inoperable brain tumor, and the only symptoms I’ve had so far are sporadic headaches.”
“You’re a brave woman, Petra. I’ve never imagined there was a woman like you.” He ignited the engine, moved away from the curb, and headed to the hotel. “Let’s see. It’s three-thirty. I’m going home to change, and I’ll be back at five-thirty.”
A Different Kind of Blues Page 14