BOMAW 7-9

by Mercedes Keyes

  "No ma'am, I just wanna get in and lie down, get some rest." He answered palming the extra keys she gave him to get in.

  "You go on do that then, make sure you hang onto them keys, don't lose'em, they my extra's. Look like I'm gone have to get some more made."

  "Yes ma'am." He answered tired. As he did, an old white tow truck pulled up. Ms. Earthaleen saw it first.

  "He back here again Ms Lydia! Pretty soon he be movin'on back in wit'cha." Earthaleen stated, moving passed Benjamin to call out the door. "HEY MR. HENRY - SEE YOU BACK AGAIN!!!"

  Lydia shook her head, rolling her eyes to the ceiling above. Benjamin grinned, despite being warn out, he and Lydia shared that little secret, that Ms Earthaleen could be a pain while boldly first in line to get in your business. She loved Earthaleen, but she was too busy wantin' to know everything about everyone coming and going in this building. Considering her age and life, Lydia supposed she had little else to do. Lucas Henry stepped out of his tow truck with his working overalls on, slamming the door.

  "You bet not park there long, they gone give you a ticket!" Earthaleen warned, turning to Benjamin she informed him, "Yo'daddy come the otha'day and park there! Tol'em, tol'em he gone get him a ticket he park there... what he do? He park there, and sho'nuff - he got him a ticket! Where you parked at boy? What's ya'name again?"

  "Benjamin, ma'am - I'm parked around the corner."

  "See that? Boy smart and good lookin'! Gone downstairs chile and get you some sleep! Ain't gone be no women's comin' to join you later is there? 'Cause me and Ms. Lydia ain't runnin' that kind o'house!"

  "No ma'am, no women." Benjamin grinned, stepping past Lucas speaking, "Afternoon sir."

  "Afternoon young man." Lucas Henry greeted him back.

  "That's one of Jake's young men!" Earthaleen spoke up to make Lucas aware before Lydia could get a word in edgewise. "You know who that is?" Earthaleen asked him next.

  "No ma'am, I don't think I do." Lucas returned watching her get geared up with skeptical eyes. Lydia looked at him in sympathy.

  "He the white man renting that downstairs apartment below me. He is - yo'chiles husband's - brother!" She pointed out that matter of fact with her finger going. "Ain't that right Lydia?"

  "Yes ma'am Ms Earthaleen, you right there."

  "I'mo tell you somethin' else, you bes' get on the phone and call that boy daddy, let him know he down there! Young man like that! There be some girls down there in no time flat! I know how they are! Ain't got but one thang on they mind, an'tha's somewhere to hide out and get a piece!"

  "Ms. Earthaleen, look to me the boy needin' some sleep is all. I doubt if he got women-..."

  "Gul - tha's 'bout why he ti'ed! Been out wit' some girl the night, wake up late - still need sleep! Better call his daddy - let'em know! I'm tellin' yah'now! You'on wanna call'em and tell'em, gimme the number, I'ah call and tell'em!"

  Lydia whimpered, and whined not wishing to rile the old lady up, but she did get on her nerves sometime, "Ms Earthaleen... please, would you mind yo'own business. That boy ain't doin'-..."

  "I pay rent here too you know! It is m'business! I hear any-thang goin' on down there - I be down them stairs knockin' on that dough! You bes' believe that!" She fussed, backed into her apartment and slammed the door.

  Lucas laughed low shaking his head. "Lord I bet you sorry you rent t'ha!" He mumbled following his wife up the stairs.

  "Lucas, she report every little thing she hear, see and notice. She gone have to leave that man and his sons alone. Hell, his mama sent me rent for the whole year! You don't get no rent paid like that now'a'day! She bes' leave'em alone... I ain't gone have her makin' him sorry he rented that basement. I hadn't even planned on rentin' it out to be truthful, it just happened."

  "I hear'yah... what he like? Shawn's brother she say? What his name again?"

  "Jake - or - Jacob Patrick McPherson. I like'em! He and his brothers all good as they can be. Respectful, well mannered young men. Lord they love them some black women, let me tell you..." Lydia started, closing the door behind her husband. He'd taken to coming there for lunch now. She always prepared him something nice so he could come and talk while relaxing mid-day. "Yo' daughter had a little friend that was younger than her, use to come to the house all the time. Her name Vivian... Lucas... I'm telling you now, he got his mind on that girl! She's a hot one too - man got him some taste."

  "What the hell is goin' on wit'that all o'sudden? Goddamn white men everywhere, marrying black women - that shit keep up, a black man ain't gone have no where to go back to." He fussed light heartedly.

  "Em hm, you betta' believe it - had me wonderin' 'bout one myself!" She teased, simpering.

  "Alright now, don' start no'stuff up in here woman! See, and I was gone give you a little mid-day treat... change m'mind now!"

  "Wooooo Lucas! I'm sorry... now you know me... know I'm just playin' wit'chu."

  "Look at'cha! You can forget it, we get to goin', Ms. Earthaleen be knockin' on this door, talkin' bout - "What'yall doin' in there!? 'Bet not be havin' no sex!"" They both laughed because something told them it would be true. Lucas sat at the kitchen table while his wife served him up some smoked pigtails, in small white beans and okra, corn bread, fried pork chops and stir fried kale greens.

  "Umm emmph! Woman you know I miss yo'cookin' - Lord have mercy!" Lucas started, picking up his spoon.

  "Lucas Henry, you ain't washed yo'hands!" She scolded him.

  "God - dammit! Why I got to wash my hands? I'm the one eatin' it!?"

  "Lucas Henry - get yo'en' in there and wash yo'hands at my table! You know me!"

  Grumbling he went and did as he was told with her calling out to him to ask, "When we goin' up to Wisconsin for that barbecue this weekend Lucas?"

  "I'on know, when you wanna go?" He asked walking out, drying his hands, heading back to his seat, where he sat and picked up his spoon to start eating. He didn't use a fork, preferred a spoon and his fingers.

  "Sylvia's friend Sheila call me and say they might be going up there Thursday if Dennis can get Friday off. She wanted to know if we wanna follow them?"

  "Thursday? That's tomorra'!"

  "I know!"

  "I'on know now... gots to work!"

  "Lucas Henry... I wanna go! You and I been absent from our kids lives long enough! Now, they might be going tomorrow, ain't no reason for us not to go! You yo'own boss! If you decide to go, ain't nobody can stop you! I wanna go!"

  "God-damn woman, ordering me around already!" He grumbled eating.

  "What's it gonna be Lucas?"

  "Why'on you go wit'them and I'll be up-..."

  "No Lucas... we should go together. Now close up that yard and put yo'sign out or whatever you need to do! I tol' Sheila I'ah call her and let her know. I'm callin'ha!"

  "Well what you ask me fo'then!? You done already made up yo'min'!"

  "I still want you to be agreeable Lucas." She gentled her demand, getting up from her chair where she'd sat to pour him some lemonade. "We can go in my car."

  "If we go, we goin' in my truck! Might be able to make some money along the way."

  "Lucas!"

  "You want me t'go don't you? Ah'ight then! I bes' get right back out - make as much money as I can since I'm takin' all this time off. How long we gone be staying there? And where we gone be stayin'?"

  Lydia gulped, this was the part that was going to be really hard. "Shawn's mama? She call the other day, after Sylvia called, and said they have plenty of room, she thought we'd enjoy staying with them."

  Lucas looked up at her. "Ain't they white?"

  "Yeah... they is."

  "What done happen to you? You use'ta didn't even like white folks?"

  "I told you Lucas, I've grown up. That was all nonsense. I like Shawn and I like his brothers. Met'em both, one name Derrick and the other Jake, who rent that basement apartment. If they anything to go by, we should be just fine with they folks. I know they mama sound as sweet as she can be."

  "Well
where this Sheila and her family stayin'?"

  "At a hotel not far from Sylvia's."

  "Why can't we get a room there?"

  "Lucas! 'Cause Shawn mama invited us to stay with them, and - well - I told her we'd be glad to, I done already accepted."

  "Well shit! Ain't no reason for you to be askin' me nothin'!"

  "Please Lucas? Le's not embarrass her. She so excited about us coming and so is Shawn, let's do our part this time?"

  "Don't nag me woman! I guess... ah'ight - we'll go. You still ain't told me how long we stayin'?"

  "'Til Monday?"

  "You mean to tell me, I got to wait - let's see, Thursday, Friday, Sat'day and then Sunday and then Monday... hell, that's a lot o'days off! You know how many people gone be broke down 'cause o'this weekend?"

  "You takin't the truck Lucas, if there any breakdowns, you'll be right there." Although Lydia said it, she sure hoped to God there weren't any. They'd never get there if he was stopping every bit along the way, giving someone a tow. She was glad he was back in her life, but he wasn't making being back easy. She suppose it was his way of showing he wasn't going to be the way he was when they'd been together when younger. Resigning herself to the difference, she grinned and was willing to bare it.

  * * *

  Benjamin lay in his bed on his back with his mother on his mind. He knew she was probably going nuts right now, not knowing where he was. No one did. He knew that sooner or later he was going to have to call someone, but he was in no hurry. He was simply, sick and tired of the lies, whispers and bullshit. He was sick and tired of his mother standing in his face and telling him that Jake was his father, when she knew it was possibly not true. He'd been struggling with this issue for most of his life once he entered school. Not one year, not ONE - had gone by without someone ribbing him, taking the piss out of him for being the "Mystery McPherson!" They'd talked, and teased him so about it that if they weren't calling him Jake's Maybe - they were calling him, M & M - Mystery McPherson! "Whose - bastard - is he?" A few had had the nerve to taunt as if a game show host. He finally started getting sick and tired of it to the extent that he began popping a few in the mouth. That had only made things worse, because then they started saying that he was just like his father. A bully! No... not Jake... but Shawn... Shawn Everett McPherson.

  It first started with mothers who went to school with Shawn. They saw him, and said, "Look at'em - he's just like him." Of course they had no doubt gone home and began talking about it, their kids heard them talking about it and thus, they'd return to school and tell him - in not such a nice way - what they heard their parents talking about. And that was, that his mother - "The McPherson Brother's Whore!" - had done both brothers. Shawn found out, dropped kicked her to the curb, took off and left her behind pregnant with him. She went crying to his parents and instead of saying it was Shawn's, she blamed the brother that was left behind... Jake.

  The more he grew. The more he heard it.

  - "Jake ain't your daddy! Shawn's your daddy!"

  - "She was dating that older brother Shawn - he your daddy!"

  - "That poor sap Jake - she got him good! Got him supportin' his brother's boy! You just like him!"

  - "You're just like your father! Know who that is? Shawn - well - maybe! 'Cause your mama did'em both! Whore!"

  - "I think both'ov'em's your daddy! They no doubt screwed her at the same time!"

  - "You look just like him! Landsakes boy, don't you know who your daddy is?"

  - "Heard that's why he left - found out she was pregnant - and took the hell off out'ah there! I would'ah too!"

  - "Hey boy!? Who's your daddy!?!" That shout was usually followed by laughter, from men who hated both, Jake and Shawn.

  As tired as he was, the way his eyes burned, he should be out cold. Dead sleep. But maybe it was the pounding in his chest, his heart, hammering at him like mad. Both hands covered his face as his middle fingers dug into his tired eyes, eyes seeping moisture from tears and frustration and anger. He was frustrated at himself, because it shouldn't matter. But it did. It ate him alive sometimes. The question... 'Who is my father?' It wasn't that he didn't love Jake. He did. He would always be his father, just as he would always respect and honor Quincy. Because of both of them, nothing in his life did he lack. He and his brother had wanted for nothing. Well... one thing... peace. They longed to be left alone. They longed to be like normal kids, who knew who their father was. Most of the ones he went to school with had it either way, they knew who their father was and he was married to their mother and living with them. OR - they knew who their father was... but he was absent. One or the other.

  Yet, he was the one lucky enough, to have a selection of three fathers. A stepfather, A stand in father, and perhaps, an absent father.

  It was starting to piss him off.

  At 22 years old, it frustrated him that he couldn't just drop it, just leave it alone.

  Over and over and over again, he kept telling himself, what his family, the McPherson's kept telling him, "You're a McPherson Ben! Don't matter what people say, you're a McPherson!" He'd nodded his head respectfully and said no more to his grandfather. To his grandmother, to his Aunt. The only one who had ever been brutally honest with him was his aunt Kathy Ann, who said once to him when he'd asked her, "Boy - damned if I know! Could swing either way! Don't care what your mama says, I know she did'em both! Just pick one, you ask me - stick with the one you got... Jake... he's my favorite."

  She was the only one out of everyone that said, his mom had been with both of them. He'd never asked Jake, because he didn't want to make him feel bad. He loved Jake, looked up to him as a young boy. In truth, although he was in place as his father, he had always seemed like a much older brother or Uncle to him. For that matter, he had been the same way to Kevin and Paul as well. So it wasn't as if he treated either of them any different. If he took any time with them, it had always been fun. He had never stood in a father position with either of them. Never yelled at them. Never disciplined them. Just played with them, indulged them, laughed with them, told them jokes. Ran away from home with them once, and acted pretty much, like a much older brother... one at times, they had been more responsible for, than him being responsible for them. If they asked him for money, he'd give it to them... like a favorite uncle would. Their first time drinking. Jake gave it to them. They said they wanted to smoke, Jake bought them all a full pack of cigarettes. Neither of them smoked to that day. Kevin once asked Jake what was it like to get high, he bought some weed and got them all high, and laughed all while their mothers cussed him, yelling that he needed to, "GROW UP!!!"

  He'd never taken being their father... seriously.

  As young boys growing up, they thought he was fantastic! Still thought that he was fantastic. Would do anything for him.

  Yet now, Benjamin lay wishing that Jake had been more of a father to him, maybe if he had been, he wouldn't be struggling with what he was right now.

  Benjamin remembered when all the talk of the family had been that Shawn was coming back to Wisconsin. He had been with his grandpa Bart when they found the property he lives at now. Bart had asked, "What you think boy? Think he'll like it?"

  "He should grandpa... there's plenty of land here for him."

  He had been anxious, excited, and hyped about the fact that this other man... the older brother, was coming back... finally - after being gone for all those years. He'd grown up looking at pictures of him. Then looking at himself in the mirror to see if he looked like him. He'd stolen a few and hidden them under his mattress, to click a flash light on at night, and then look at it, wondering, "Are you my father?"

  Shawn had a reputation for being tough, taking no shit from anyone. He soon copied that rep, because he'd been given plenty of fuel for the fire with all the constant teasing and taunts. Then it happened, last year... they'd been by their grandparents, and his grandma had been on the phone with him. HE WAS THERE!!! At the property... he'd moved in! He was finally back in Wisc
onsin. He remembered feeling stupid for fighting back tears. After all, he was a man now.

  Another big hit to his emotions, they all said he was coming to the sap rush. He was bringing his fiancé that everyone had been talking about, because he was always talking about her to his mother. The day before the sap rush, he, Kevin and Paul went to his grandparents and that's when he saw her - for the first time. Shawn's daughter from California. There had been pictures all around of her. He'd taken a few of those too and kept with the other's he horded. When he saw her live, his heart had skipped a beat. They looked so much a like. Yet... everyone was comparing her to Shawn2! No one compared them. No one made the statement that in fact... Benjamin and Angela looked more alike than anyone. No one said it once, he waited to see if they would... never did.

  His frustration built.

  In eager anticipation, he'd been working out checking the trees, knowing that at any moment, he would show up on the scene. And sure enough, it happened. He showed up at the pavilion. Benjamin had stayed back in the woods watching him, trying to come to grips with his emotions. Kevin knew... Kevin had always known how he felt, there had been no one else to talk to about it. After all, he'd entered a many battles with him at school over the name calling.

  Benjamin remembered when he stepped into view, the air had been sucked right out of him. He couldn't explain it - but something deep in the core of him, told him, he was looking at his father. He covertly studied how he walked, and then tried to compare it to the way that he himself walked. He studied his gestures, the sound of his voice and its pitch and tone - there was a similarity. He heard him laugh, saw him smile, watched his face light up. Yet... the entire time there, he hardly looked his way. Just briefly when his grandmother introduced him to them. His main attention had been on his fiancé - and talking with his parents, keeping up with his daughter and avoiding Kathy Ann. The night of the bon-fire, he had wanted so badly to talk to him, but he kept his distance.