Fool, Stop Trippin'

by McKinney, Tina Brooks

  “Damn, girl, watch your mouth. There are children in the room.” I look around to see if they are listening to our conversation, but if they are, they’re hiding it well. “Whether you like them or not, they are still children.”

  “Humph.”

  “Come on, Tarcia, if you let them stay here for a little while, I’ll bring you back a little something-something.”

  This gets her attention. She is the greediest bitch I’ve ever known.

  “Like what?”

  “What do you want?”

  “Break me off some of what you’re going to get. And don’t tell me you ain’t gonna take none ’cause I know you.”

  “Girl, are you trying to get me hurt or killed?”

  “No. I just want a piece of what you’re gonna take anyway. Do we have a deal?”

  I take a few precious minutes to think about it, but the reality is I don’t have much of a choice at this point. I was planning on skimming at least an ounce off the top. Lil’ John always gives me a bonus for timely deliveries, so I can afford to break her off a small piece.

  “Okay.”

  “Don’t be gone all day either. I don’t have anything for them to eat, and me and my cousin are going out later and I’m not taking them with me.”

  “So your cousin is still here?”

  “Why you so interested in my cousin?”

  “I’m not, I was just asking. I can’t win. You jump on my ass when I don’t know and you jump on me when I ask questions.”

  “Just hurry up and get back.”

  “I’m coming right back.”

  Lasonji comes in from the guest bedroom looking lovely as ever in her no-nonsense way. I smile and greet her. “Hey, how you doing?”

  “Fine. Tarcia, can I speak with you for a moment in the kitchen?” She turns without waiting for a response and they leave the room.

  Lasonji’s reception was even icier than Tarcia’s. Without realizing it, I check her out, but Tarcia’s evil eye busts me, and her annoyance is etched on her face. She follows Lasonji into the kitchen while her eyes dare me to watch Lasonji’s ass. I try to hear what is so important that she has to interrupt our conversation, but they keep their voices down.

  They are evidently fighting about something, but as long as it doesn’t interfere with my little run, I’m not going to sweat it. That’s Tarcia’s cousin and she has to deal with her shit, not me.

  “Kayla, I want you to mind Ms. Tarcia while Daddy makes a run. Don’t give her no trouble and when I get back, we’ll go and get some ice cream, okay?” Kayla nods her head, but she is fighting back tears. I know they don’t want to stay here any more than I want to leave them but my back is against the wall. They absolutely cannot go with me where I am going and I have to go.

  “And watch out for your brother and sister, okay?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Yo, Tarcia, I gotta run. I’ll be back soon.” Without waiting for her to come back into the room, I jet. I don’t know what it is about that cousin but she gives me the creeps. Every time she has looked at me, it’s like she’s looking into my head and I don’t like it. Perhaps she knew that I was using her cousin and she didn’t approve.

  “Oh well, two tears in a bucket, fuck it.” I hop in the car and peel out of the lot before Tarcia can change her mind and fuck up all my plans. I do have one other stop to make before I come back, but Tarcia doesn’t need to know about that.

  Tarcia

  “I can’t believe that you allowed that man back in your house after what happened the last time he was here.”

  “We didn’t find anything, so what’s the beef?”

  “Did you ask him about it?”

  “Uh…”

  “So you just let him in, no questions asked, and you allow him to leave his kids here. You don’t know anything about them kids.”

  “I’ve been with them before. They know me.”

  “I didn’t say anything about them knowing you. I said you didn’t know them. For all you know, they could be conduits to the dark side.”

  “Oh, come on, Lasonji, they’re children, for Christ’s sake.”

  “Haven’t you ever heard of the devil’s spawn?”

  “Oh, there you go with that shit. I’m not going there with you again. You worked me up so bad the last time, it was a week before I could sleep through the night.”

  “Well, I’m glad that you have started sleeping again because I haven’t. That skin is still out there whether you want to believe it or not, and the fact that it appeared when your man was here means they are connected.”

  “Give me a break.”

  “I’ll give you a break. But I want to show you something before I go.” She turns and walks out of the kitchen and into the dining room. Without asking my help, she pushes the dining room table to the far corner of the room. How she pushed that table without moving the scatter rug is a mystery to me. It is heavy as shit and took three men to carry it in, but she shoved it aside as if it were weightless. I expect to see scrape marks on the hardwood floor, but surprisingly it appears to have been freshly polished. It’s unlikely because the room hasn’t been used since the night of the dinner. I am distracted from the clean floor by a strange marking that is on the wood.

  The drawing looks familiar and unfamiliar at the same time, if that is possible. My heart pounds and I can feel the blood rushing through my veins. I look at Lasonji, hoping that she will clarify this for me, but she just stares at me. She does not look at the drawing and that worries me more than anything. Perplexed, I get closer to it. Heat emanates from the floor, rising to meet the cool air from the air conditioner. The room feels more like a jungle than a dining room.

  “What the hell is that?”

  “Answer your own questions. Who was sitting there?”

  “Me…Kentee…what does it mean?” Despite my fear, I get down on my knees and try to wipe it up, but it won’t come off. It is engraved into the floor but that doesn’t make sense.

  “This wasn’t here when I moved in.” I start to hyperventilate. Falling back onto my butt, I propel myself away from the drawing. As sweat pours from my face, the room begins to sway before my eyes. “Cover it up, please!”

  Lasonji just stands there staring at me.

  “Did you do this?” I ask Lasonji. I don’t want the children running into the dining room to see what is going on, but at the same time I want an explanation from her.

  “You know the answer to that, so stop trippin’. I’m going out. If you don’t take your spiritual well-being seriously, then that’s on you. I’m going to protect mine.”

  “You’re going to leave me here with that?”

  “It’s been here since the dinner.”

  “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “You didn’t want to hear it, remember?”

  “But I didn’t know.”

  “Well, you do now. Listen, I won’t feel safe until the matter of the snake is resolved. Plus, it’s time I start looking for my own place anyway.”

  I immediately start to panic, but not because of the engraving. For a minute, I forget all about it. I cannot afford to have Lasonji move right now. The money she is giving me is keeping my head above water while I search for a job. My unemployment benefits don’t start until next week, but it won’t be enough to cover the bills. I need Lasonji to stick around until I have a steady paycheck coming in.

  “Girl, I’m sorry. I guess I wasn’t thinking. I thought since we didn’t find the other skin, everything was okay. I mean, damn, you haven’t said anything about it for over a week. Tell you what, Kentee’s only going to be gone for a few hours. I’ll keep the kids in the living room and you can have the rest of the house to yourself.”

  “No, I need to get out to clear my head. I can’t think with all this energy up in this house. Just keep them out of my room and hit me on my cell when they have left.” She slams the door on her way out.

  “Let the doorknob hit you where the good Lord split you, bitch.
”

  I throw the rug over the drawing, using my feet to straighten it out as best I can. When it is completely covered, I can no longer feel the heat. I try to push the table back into place, but every time it gets near the rug, the rug bunches up and exposes the picture. After several tries, I give up.

  “How the hell was she able to move the table without disturbing the rug?”

  Sammie

  I arrive at Jazz’s mother’s house just as a florist truck is unloading large bouquets of lilies. They are beautiful, in all different hues of pink, yellow and white. Looking around the circular driveway, I see that mine is the only other car present, so I heave a sigh of relief. Unless some limousine service dropped off the rest of the family, I am the first guest to arrive.

  Jazz is the only grown woman I know who lives at home with her mother by choice and is happy about it. She says they keep each other company and they are more like friends than mother and daughter. From what I can see, they are. I envy their relationship. My own childhood was troubled and my mother and I never got along until right before she passed away.

  If only our relationship could have been like Jazz and Andrea’s, maybe I would have turned out differently. But there is no sense crying about that now. What’s done is done and I have to believe that God doesn’t make any mistakes. My life is what it is.

  I follow the delivery guys around to the back of the house and go in through the back door to help Andrea.

  “Hello?” The kitchen is empty, but the air is filled with the smell of fresh lemons. The table is piled high with paper plates, cups, plastic silverware, and red, pink, and yellow napkins.

  “Hello,” I call again. I move from the kitchen into the living room. I don’t want to startle Andrea, so I make sure to walk heavily instead of tiptoeing around like I normally do when I am uncomfortable with my surroundings. Although I have been to the house on numerous occasions, I never will forget my first visit to this mini-mansion. I could not help but feel bitter because of their obvious opulence compared to the humble home I was raised in. I finally understood that money would not have made our house into a home. Love, given freely, makes all the difference in the world between a cardboard box and a penthouse suite.

  Andrea rushes into the room, rousing me from my memories.

  “Oh, Sammie, I didn’t hear you come in.” Andrea holds out her arms to me and I walk into them, squeezing her tightly in return. She smells like she has just gotten out of the shower and I inhale her scent deeply. Despite our rocky start, I fell in love with Andrea and consider her to be my second mother.

  “Sorry about the mix-up, but your father’s folks can be downright demanding at times.”

  “It’s okay, Ma. I needed to do this by myself anyway.” I break free of her embrace. “Can I help you with anything?”

  “No dear, the caterers will be here any minute. Why don’t you put your purse in Jazz’s room and relax a bit before folks start coming.”

  “Nope, I told Jazz I would keep you from overdoing it and I intend to do just that. I will stow my purse, but I’ll be right back.”

  The house is more like two apartments joined by a main staircase. Jazz’s room, as Andrea called it, is off to the left, consisting of two bedrooms, a sitting room, bathroom, two walk-in closets that are larger than my bedroom, and a small kitchen area. She has a balcony off her bedroom with steps leading down to the backyard providing her a private entrance if she chooses to use it.

  Unlike my room, hers is bright and airy and void of clothes and abandoned shoes. She even has an entire wall devoted to her collection of purses. Every time I see that wall, I can’t help but to laugh because before I met Jazz, I had two purses to my name. Now, I’m not happy unless I get at least two a week. Jazz is definitely rubbing off on me. Not wanting to dilly-dally any longer, I rush back downstairs.

  The kitchen is a hub of activity as I walk around looking for Andrea. The caterers, along with three servers, had arrived and taken over the kitchen. I want to help, but there are so many folks milling around. I’m the only one who doesn’t have any purpose for being there. I wander back outside as the grill is being set up. All the workers are dressed in white pants and long white jackets. Most of the men are wearing hats and the ladies have their hair tied back in tight buns. When I return to the kitchen I find Andrea slicing some cakes. Without asking, I grab a knife and get to work.

  “I was looking all over for you.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, dear. I got hung up on the phone talking to Uncle Marvin. He got his invites mixed up and thought he was coming to a poker party instead of a cookout.”

  “Now that’s funny. Is he still coming?” I secretly hoped that he would cancel since that would be one less person staring and judging me.

  “He’ll be here. He isn’t one to turn down a free meal. Just don’t pay any attention to him if he starts sipping from a bottle in his pocket. I asked him to leave it at home, but he doesn’t rightly pay me any attention.”

  Great, that makes me feel better.

  Right, just what I need, a drunken uncle I’ve never met to liven up the party. Thinking of booze, I could use a drink myself. I finish cutting up the last of the cakes while Andrea answers the phone. I go into the dining room and pour myself a double shot from one of the crystal decanters on the buffet table. I really don’t care what it is; I just need to knock the edge off my uneasiness.

  “Where are you going to put the cakes?”

  “We’ll leave them inside because of the heat. We can put them back in the dining room until we are ready to have them served.” With the cakes all wrapped, I look around for something else to do.

  “What now?”

  “Now we fix us a drink and relax before the troops come marching in.”

  “Amen to that.” Jazz was worried about her mother for nothing. She has enough sense to sit back and let the hired help do the job they are being paid for.

  “Did Jasmine tell you about your aunts and uncles?”

  “Not too much. She said she didn’t want to scare me away.”

  “They can be a handful, but most old people are. They feel like their age gives them the right to say anything that comes to mind.”

  “Well, I can understand that. After all, age does have its privileges.”

  “Yeah, but sometimes they go too far. So don’t let them get all up in your personal space. None of them have been married or had any children, but to hear them tell it, they got all the answers.”

  “None of them married? Wow, that’s strange for a whole family not to marry.”

  “Yeah, except your father.”

  I had almost forgotten why we are gathering in the first place. I spent so much of my life thinking my stepfather was my daddy; it is hard to believe my birth father is someone else and even harder since I never got to meet him. “So tell me about his brothers and sisters. How many are there?”

  “There are six of them; your daddy would have made seven. Rosa is the oldest. She is eighty-two; Leonara is seventy-nine, Rufus is seventy-eight. Marvin and Mavis are twins at seventy-six and Maceo, the Romeo of the bunch, is seventy-four.”

  “How old would my dad have been?”

  “He would have been sixty-eight.”

  “Wow, that’s a big break in between kids. There is no way I would wait seven years to have another child.”

  “Yeah, your daddy was a shocker. His mom and dad, rest their souls, thought they were through until he snuck in there.”

  “I’ll bet.”

  “And his brothers resented him, especially Maceo, since he was enjoying his status as the baby until your father came along.”

  “This is all so new to me. I’m not familiar with the feeling of having brothers and sisters. It has always been just me.”

  “I understand. I was an only child as well. I met your father when I was sixteen and we became childhood sweethearts. We lost contact for a while when he enlisted in the army, but we got together again soon after basic training. He and
your stepdaddy were real close, so when they got assigned to their first tour of duty, your father sent for me and your stepdaddy sent for your mother.”

  “Wow, I didn’t know that. Jazz told me ya’ll were close, but not that close.”

  “Yeah, we had a double ceremony and lived next door to each other for years. Whenever one was transferred, the other followed at the first opportunity. We traveled that way for years. Your mother and I kept each other company while the men were away.”

  I wonder when the cheating started and better yet, how they were able to carry it out living so close to each other.

  Jazz’s arrival stops any further conversation and not a minute too soon. I could feel the tension rising as we strolled down memory lane. I feel the need to apologize for the pain my mother inflicted, so I am relieved to have escaped the moment.

  “What are ya’ll doing in here? The guests are starting to arrive.”

  “We were having cocktails and catching up. I don’t get to spend as much time with Sammie as you do.” Andrea rises from the couch to greet Mavis.

  “Mavis, you look…uh…you look…” She turns to Jazz for help, but she is busy trying not to bust out laughing.

  “I look scared, damn it,” Mavis says defensively. “That’s how I look. This here chile done scared the shit out of me with all that fancy driving of hers.”

  Unable to hold back her laughter, Jazz’s shoulders begin to quiver and Andrea’s stoic face dissolves into gales of laughter. I try to hold back my laughter, but I can’t help myself.

  Mavis whips around at the sound of my laughter and stumbles back, clutching her heart. “Sweet Jesus, I didn’t see you back there.” I immediately stop laughing outwardly, but I am still cracking up inside. Her wig is lopsided with hairs pointing all over the place. Her lipstick is smudged around her lips and her eyes are fixed and dilated. Jasmine got it together enough to make the introductions but Andrea is still laughing.

  “Aunt Mavis, this is Sammie.”

  “I can see that. She looks just like that brother of mine. Matter of fact, she looks a lot like you, ’ceptin’ you’re not as fat.”