Mama took the voucher from Miss Munroe and stuck it in her wallet. She put the list on top of her TV, under an ashtray, where it stayed, untouched, until the Saturday morning two weeks later when Miss Munroe came back to pick me up for camp.
“Patricia, honey,” she said in her singsong voice as she walked into the living room, “are you all packed up and ready to go?”
“No, ma’am,” I answered.
“What do you mean?” Miss Munroe asked, sounding confused.
I saw her eyes dart around the room. Her gaze landed on the camp list sitting on top of the TV, covered in spilled ashes and beer stains. She cleared her throat and turned to Mama: “Miss Williams, where are Patricia’s things?”
“I wasn’t able to pick up none of that shit,” Mama said, staring at the ground.
“But you knew your daughter was going to camp today?”
“Yeah.”
“And you couldn’t get any things on the list?”
“Nah.”
“Not one thing?”
“Nope.”
Miss Munroe pressed her lips together so tight her mouth disappeared from her face. “Was there”—she cleared her throat—“a problem?”
“I been busy.”
Miss Munroe glared at Mama for what felt like a full minute. She looked so mad, standing there with her mouth clamped shut, I thought for sure she was gonna pick up an empty Schlitz can from off the floor and throw it at Mama’s head. But instead she straightened her back, grabbed me by my hand, and marched me out of the apartment.
She took me to Kmart herself, speed-walking through the store, snatching up T-shirts, towels, and flip-flops and pitching them into her cart. Mama won the battle over who would buy my supplies for Free Summer Camp, but Miss Munroe won the war. After Kmart she put me in her Buick and drove me there herself. When I came home two weeks later, Mama didn’t say a word.
In the living room, I stood with my back against the wall and watched Mama and Miss Munroe like I was watching a tennis match, only I was the ball. Miss Munroe tapped her clipboard. “There is also the matter of the child’s father,” she said, looking up. “Patricia tells me her boyfriend is twenty years old.”
Mama shot me a look.
“Have you met this young man?” continued Miss Munroe.
“Yeah, I met him.”
“So you’re aware of his age?”
“I don’t know nothing about that,” said Mama. “I don’t know how old that boy is. ”
“Miss Williams, as I’m sure you’re aware, it’s a crime for an adult to have sexual relations with a minor. My advice to you is to get the authorities involved. You need to file a complaint with the police.”
“The police? Oh, hell, nah! I ain’t talkin’ to them.”
“Miss Williams, the father of this baby is an adult male who has committed statutory rape.”
“Rabbit,” Mama said, turning to me, “did this boy rape you?”
“No, ma’am,” I said. “He my boyfriend.”
Mama turned back to Miss Munroe: “She say he didn’t rape her.”
“But she’s a child!” said Miss Munroe, her voice rising. I’d never heard our caseworker yell before. Her anger startled me, but Mama just narrowed her eyes.
“I already told you,” she said for the very last time. “The answer is no.”
Before she left, Miss Munroe pulled me aside. She handed me a pamphlet for the Free Prenatal Clinic at Grady Hospital and a bus pass to get there. “It’s important for you to see a doctor and to make sure you and the baby are healthy,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am,” I answered. “I’m gonna be a real good mama.”
“Of course you are,” she whispered, leaning over to give me a hug. I was surprised to hear her voice catch in her throat as she told me good-bye.
Chapter 10
Wife on the Side
I couldn’t wait to tell Derrick about how I saved his ass from jail. I imagined him leaning over, putting his arm around me, and telling me I was the most ride-or-die girlfriend ever. Maybe he’d even bust out a song, like they did in the movies, singing to me the chorus of Whitney Houston’s “You Give Good Love” as a sign of his appreciation. I was so excited about him pouring his thank-yous all over me that I ran to his car the minute I saw him pull up outside Mama’s place the next morning when he came by to drive me to school.
I told him the whole story, barely pausing to catch my breath: “Miss Munroe wanted Mama to call the police. But I said you were my boyfriend. I told her it wasn’t no rape!”
When I was done, I leaned back in my seat waiting for my thank-you, but instead Derrick just sat there, rocking back and forth with his thumb in his mouth. “Oh man,” he groaned. “Oh man . . .”
“What?” I asked, wondering if maybe he didn’t understand what I just said.
“I can’t get locked up behind no shit like this, Rabbit. I can’t go to jail.”
“That’s what I just said! You not going to jail because I told Miss Munroe we go together!”
“Urgh . . .” Derrick leaned his head back and made a sound like he’d just been punched in the stomach. Then he turned to me. “Get out the car,” he said, suddenly.
“What . . . why?”
“Just go in the house,” he said staring straight ahead. “I gotta bounce.”
I was so stunned, I didn’t move.
“For real, Rabbit. Get out the car.” Derrick leaned over me to open the passenger-side door. I didn’t understand why he was being so mean. I knew he had his moods—sometimes he’d snap at me for no reason, and once he grabbed me by the top of my arm for having a smart mouth—but he’d never talked to me like this before, kicking me out of his car.
“But you coming back, right?” I asked.
“Yeah, whatever. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I waited for him the next day after school, but he never showed up. Not the day after, either. I called him at Fish Supreme, but he wouldn’t come to the phone. I went by his sister’s place, but she said she hadn’t seen him. I sat on Mama’s front steps watching the road for hours hoping to see his car, but he never drove by. Weeks passed and still no Derrick.
At school, I’d sit in the back of the classroom and write over and over in my exercise book, I love Derrick, I love Derrick, I love Derrick . . .
One Saturday morning almost a month after Derrick ran off, I was glued to the TV set trying to take my mind off my troubles with The Smurfs. I was interrupted by someone knocking at the front door. My heart jumped into my throat.
DERRICK!
I raced to the front of the house and flung open the door. But instead of my boyfriend, standing on Mama’s porch was a lady I’d never seen before, dressed in jeans and a lavender T-shirt stretched tight across her belly.
“Is Rabbit home?” she asked.
“I’m Rabbit.”
A look of surprise flashed across her face. “You’re Rabbit?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Who the fuck are you?”
She put her hand on her chest. “I’m Evaleen,” she announced. “I’m Derrick’s wife.”
I stared at her, confused. What did she mean “wife”? Derrick didn’t have a wife.
“Me and Derrick been married more than a year,” she went on. “We live out in Decatur.”
Decatur? I thought. Derrick told me he stayed by his mama’s house, around the way.
“. . . with our baby,” Evaleen continued.
Baby? What baby?
“Our daughter’s going on seven months now.” Evaleen paused, as if to let the news sink in. “We got another one on the way.” She patted her stomach. “I’m pregnant. This one’s a boy. We’re naming him Derrick Junior, for his daddy.”
What the hell? ‘Derrick Junior’ was my idea for a baby name.
Evaleen looked at me like she was waiting for me to say something. But all I had were questions.
“How are you his wife?” I asked. “You have to be a girlfriend before you’re his wife and I�
�m his girlfriend.”
Evaleen sighed. “How old are you, anyway?” she asked.
“Thirteen.”
She put her hand to her mouth and gasped: “That dirty dog.”
For a minute the two of us stood there, staring at each other in shock. I tried to make sense of what Evaleen was telling me. I played back all the months I’d been with Derrick and thought about the times we’d had sex in his car, at the park, or in Catfish’s old apartment on the dirty floor. I wondered if Evaleen was the reason Derrick never took me to his house or to meet his mama. Maybe him having a wife is why his sister always gave me the stink eye every time he brought me over to her place.
My mind flashed back to this one time when Derrick and I were sitting in his car and a girl ran past, banging on the front window. “That nigga married!” she yelled. “He married!”
Evaleen must have been putting the pieces together, too, because standing on my doorway she closed her eyes and began to pray. “Lord,” she said, “please give me the strength not to kick his sorry ass for this unholy alliance and transgression.”
When she was done, she opened her eyes and looked at me. “Girl,” she said, “I know you pregnant. We need to talk.”
I couldn’t imagine what she wanted to talk about. But just as I was opening my mouth to ask her, from up the block came the familiar sound of the ice cream truck. It made its way toward us, and parked right at the curb in front of Mama’s stoop. Evaleen glanced at the truck, her hand on her belly.
“You want one?” she asked, reading my mind. I was pregnant. Hell, yeah, I wanted ice cream!
I nodded yes and followed her to the truck. Evaleen bought herself a Creamsicle and handed me a Bomb Pop. Then she got right back to business.
“How far along are you?” she asked.
“Almost four months.”
“Good, there’s still time.”
“Time for what?”
“Time for you to get an abortion. You’re not even showing yet.”
“Why would I get an abortion?”
“Because if you have this baby it’s really gonna mess up my marriage,” she explained. “I have a family. He’s my husband so you need to get an abortion.”
I couldn’t believe I’d only met this lady three minutes ago and now she was asking me to kill my baby. In fact, I couldn’t believe any of this was happening. The day before I’d been a regular pregnant seventh grader. Now, suddenly, I had the kind of problems I’d only ever seen on The Young and the Restless.
I started to tell Evaleen that she wasn’t the boss of me—I was having my baby no matter what she wanted—when, from out of nowhere, Derrick drove up in his Chevy, like a bat out of hell, screeching to a stop in front of us.
“Bitch!” he hollered out his car window. At first I thought he was talking to me. But it was his wife he wanted. “Evaleen!” he yelled. “What the hell you doing? Get your ass in the damn car!” I stood on the curb with my Bomb Pop melting down my hand and watched Evaleen slide into the passenger seat. As soon as she closed the car door, Derrick punched her in the face.
I walked back into the house. I wasn’t ready for all this. These were grown-folk problems and way too much for me to handle. Especially since, with Derrick gone, I had no one to talk to. He had been my only friend. I wanted things back to how they used to be, when all I had to worry about was what to wear when Derrick took me roller-skating.
I lay down on the sofa and curled into a ball. With Smurfette giggling on the TV in the background, I tried to face the facts: my baby daddy was a low-down lying cheat. Still, all I wanted was for him to come back.
Chapter 11
It’s Time
I was eight months pregnant and ready to pop when Mama told us to pack up all our shit because we were moving again. I don’t know how she could predict the exact number of months and weeks she could go without paying rent before she got evicted, but she always knew when it was time to leave.
Other folks weren’t so organized. They’d fall behind on their rent and then a red eviction notice would get nailed to their front door and the marshals would show up and haul all their furniture and clothes and dishes and personal items out onto the curb. Getting put out was bad for other people, but good for us because that’s how we got new furniture. Mama would send us kids out to pick through the stuff the marshals had left by the side of the road, before the tenants came home to find out they’d just become homeless.
The new place Mama moved us to was in a run-down neighborhood called Vine City, and it was the worst place we’d ever lived. The apartment was called an “efficiency,” which I guess is short for “one step before hell.” It was a single, cramped, roach-infested room with a kitchen along the back wall and a small bathroom with a stand-up shower. It was only supposed to be for one person, but we all stayed there: me, Mama, Sweetie, Sweetie’s three-month-old daughter LaDontay—named for her baby daddy, Dontay, who happened to be Derrick’s younger brother—and my brothers Dre, Andre, and Jeffro when they weren’t locked up. It was such a shit-hole that when Dre got out of juvie and saw how we were living, he flagged down the popo and asked them to take him back to jail.
For home furnishings we had two beat-up sofas we picked up on the street. Mama slept on the brown corduroy one. Mine was dark yellow with a pattern that looked like flowers from far away, but on closer inspection seemed to be cooking grease and body fluids. Sweetie and her baby slept on a piece of foam we laid on the floor between the sofas. During the day we stored her foam in the shower stall, which meant we had to wash up in the sink. But first we had to heat the water on the hot plate because Mama hadn’t caught up on paying the gas bill, so there was no hot water.
We’d been living in Vine City for a month when I woke up in the middle of the night feeling like a thick rope was tightening around my belly. The pain came and went like waves coming in. I lay there for a while, trying to wish it away. But when it got so bad I was sure I was dying, I called out to Mama.
“Ohhhhhh . . .” I moaned. “My belly hurts.”
“Okay,” she said, flicking on her lamp. “Maybe you just got some gas. What it feel like?”
“I dunno.”
“Like you need to doo-doo?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Do it feel like a regular upset stomach or more like your cycle coming on?”
“I don’t know what it feel like,” I said, turning my face to the wall. “It just hurts.”
Mama didn’t trust a doctor, so whenever something was wrong with one of her kids, she liked to do the diagnosing herself by asking a million questions and then taking a wild guess. Over the years she’d told me I had infantigo, trench mouth, chicken pox, sour stomach, a case of the nerves, and fleas. No matter what the ailment, the remedy was always “rub some Vicks on it.”
“Do it hurt in the front or the back?” she asked.
“All around.”
“Like you getting squeezed real tight?”
“Yeah, like that.”
“Oh girl, sound like you in labor.”
Mama lifted herself half off her sofa and swatted at Sweetie, who was still sound asleep on her foam. “Get up, girl. Go to the pay phone and call 911 before your sister has her baby on my damn floor.”
Sweetie groaned and turned over, but didn’t make a move to get up. So Mama kicked her, hard. “Get the fuck up and go make the call!”
I rolled over onto my side. The pain had only started, but it was already way worse than I’d imagined, and I was scared about what was coming next.
“Contractions will increase in intensity and duration, signaling the impending arrival of your baby,” a nurse at the Free Prenatal Clinic had tried to warn me, reading from a pamphlet called “The Exciting Days Ahead.” I just stared at her because I didn’t know what the hell she was talking about.
“Girl,” the nurse had said, leaning forward. “This means it’s gonna hurt like a son of a gun. When the pain starts coming, you find your way to the hospit
al.”
“Ohhhhhh . . .” I moaned.
“All right!” said Sweetie, jumping up and handing her sleeping baby to mama. “I’m going! Hold your horses, Rabbit. All you gotta do is squeeze your legs together so that baby don’t pop out your coochie while I’m gone.”
“You tryna be a smart-ass, now?” Mama said. “You need to get a move on and go make that call. No telling how long the ambulance gonna take to get here.”
It was a known fact that 911 took their sweet time showing up to Vine City. Just about everybody had a story about an uncle or brother or cousin who almost bled to death on the gotdamn sidewalk because the ambulance took their muthafuckin’ time.
Lucky for me, Sweetie had a special talent with 911. She discovered it by accident one day when Dre was twelve years old and had an asthma attack after he and Andre tried to get high huffing gasoline out of the gas tank of Mama’s Pink Panther.
Sweetie had run to the pay phone and screamed into the handset, “My brother can’t breathe. He dying!”
Minutes later, an ambulance showed up, sirens blaring. Sweetie and I piled into the back with Dre. When we got to Grady Hospital, they wheeled our brother into the ER and Sweetie and I followed him in. While we were waiting for a doctor, a little old lady hospital volunteer in a pink smock came by handing out free sandwiches wrapped in cellophane and little containers of apple juice. She didn’t even care that Sweetie and I took four sandwiches each. “We gonna hold these for our brother,” Sweetie had said, and the volunteer just smiled.
From then on, whenever food got real scarce Sweetie would call 911, Dre would have a fake asthma attack, and we would all get to eat. It wasn’t a regular thing. That would be abusing the system. But there are certain problems in life—like being really really really hungry, or going into labor—that can only be solved by calling 911. That’s when Sweetie’s God-given talent for sounding hysterical came in handy.
Sure enough, only minutes after my sister came back from the pay phone, two EMTs showed up at the door. That was quick, even for her.
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