Black Girls Must Die Exhausted: A Novel for Grown Ups

by Jayne Allen

  “Hanging in there?” Ms. Gretchen said. “At your age, nothing should be hanging except your hair, Honey!” Did she not realize my grandmother just died? “Now when are Tabitha’s arrangements? I’m about ready to head back, anyway. Mr. Harper brought these pills—he’s a frisky somebody. Just after me. I tell you, I had to find those pills, little blue things and hide them!—Vinaga, Vegara, somethin’—anyway they had to go, or Mr. Harper was gonna have to have an early meeting with his maker!”

  “Viagra, Ms. Gretchen?”

  “Yes! Now, that sounds like it. He was telling me he had this Vinagra, and I said, Mr. Harper, if you don’t get your old ass away from me!” She broke out in laughter. “What do I look like messin’ with a man older than me?” It felt good to laugh.

  “I’m glad you got him told, Ms. Gretchen!” I said.

  “I sure did! Ok, so now, give me the news. When will we celebrate my friend?”

  “Ms. Gretchen, the funeral will be on Wednesday,” I said. “We just need to find someone to give the eulogy,” I mumbled more to myself, than to her.

  “What do you mean, find someone? You’re not going to do it?” Ms. Gretchen said.

  “I don’t think so Ms. Gretchen. I just don’t feel right…you know, I missed Senior Prom with Granny Tab. I wasn’t even there to help her get ready.”

  “I’m sure you had a good reason!” Did I? How could she be so sure? “I don’t know about that Ms. Gretchen. I didn’t have to do that interview.”

  “Then who woulda done it? The way you kids think these days, I swear I will never understand it. You were always your grandmother’s pride and joy. She’d watch the news every day—wouldn’t miss it, and would make me watch too—just on the chance that you were on,” Ms. Gretchen said, with a small laugh. “She would have wanted you to be your best, Tabby, always. Including that interview. You have the chance to have a career and a life that Tabitha and I could only dream of. I’m sure it wasn’t some Senior Prom that was the highlight of your grandmother’s evening. It was watching you do your interview. She was proud of you and happy for you. I know it as sure as I know my own name.”

  “I don’t know about that, Ms. Gretchen.”

  “Well you should know it. Listen, people can’t control what happens from one moment to another. I can count on one hand all the times I’ve seen Tabitha dance, in all the years I’ve known her, but I know she loved it. If she had a heart attack, it wasn’t ‘cause her makeup wasn’t on right or her updo was missing a bobby pin. Some things are just gonna happen, Honey. Nothing we can do about them one way or another. We just have to focus on what choices we have in front of us, not the ones behind. I know you’ll make the right decision about that eulogy. Now I’ve gotta go—I have to figure out how to get back there before Wednesday. And keep Mr. Harper off my tailfeather ‘till then!” Laughter forced its way upward and carried a smile to my face. Her wisdom was a welcome anesthetic for that portion of my mind that lived to rub salt in my wounds of guilt and self-doubt. And maybe she was right.

  Chapter 37

  By the hardest, I made it to the office, broken, uncertain, hurting, well, aching really, but focused and with my so-called “game face” on for the workday. Chris already knew the events of the weekend and asked me to meet with him first thing to discuss my “certainly understandable” needs for time off. In the meantime, my Daequan Jenkins interview began to spiral upward and outward to take on a life of its own. I was leaning heavily on my reporting team to chase after leads and angles while I contemplated the most important question facing me for the week: would I, and really, should I be the one to deliver Granny Tab’s eulogy.

  Coming off the elevator, the same one that I had shared just weeks ago with Scott Stone challenging my “limited” perspective, I took a breath into the center of my being. I knew that my emotions were running too hot and too raw to be there, but I had no choice. Plus, all I really needed to do on this day was make it through my meeting with Chris, set the direction for my reporting team on next steps for the Jenkins story and get the hell out of there…to start planning my grandmother’s funeral. Granny Tab, is dead, my mind echoed. As I walked to Chris’ office, the mental reminder of my grandmother’s passing operated like a snooze button that I kept pushing, pushing off, pushing away, to stave off the looming breakdown that I felt threatening my professional demeanor. Just make it through this meeting with Chris, I told myself. Just this one meeting.

  Chris’ door was slightly ajar when I got there, and I knocked and pushed it open when I heard his voice call out for me to enter. I headed for the open seating in front of his desk.

  “Tabby! Please, have a seat. I’m so sorry about your grandmother. I know the two of you were close.”

  “Thanks Chris.”

  “I hate to jump right into business, but Tabby, your Daequan Jenkins interview is on fire! Three local stations now covering, two cable nationals and I just got a request this morning for footage licensing from corporate. You’re going national broadcast! Tabby, dammit, it only took you a month, and you proved me right. Congratulations, this is your first major win.” Ask me what I lost though, Chris.

  “I’m sorry, I wish I could be more excited.”

  “Tabby, this is not the time to go falling apart. You hit major pay dirt. This is the once in a lifetime career opportunity that people would kill their own grandmother for. Sorry, that was probably insensitive.” You think? I just sat there and blinked at him in stunned silence. I couldn’t believe that Chris had kids—in that moment, he seemed like he would eat them himself if he happened to get hungry enough. Although I felt the anger rising in my gut, I said nothing. Sometimes, silence speaks for you. “Sorry, honestly, Tabby, that was probably, most definitely, inappropriate… What I’m trying to say to you is, take the time that you need. Take these two days off, mourn with your family. Tina and Jim will cover for you. But don’t take your eye off the ball; you have to run this play. It’s your story. Make sure it’s your win. This is the kind of stuff that makes a whole career.” I had to count backwards from 10 to keep myself from exploding. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, managing to find a measured tone to respond.

  “Thanks Chris, I understand what you’re trying to say. I think I’m going to need more than two days off, I think I need at lea…”

  “No—Tabby, don’t do this.” Chris said, interrupting. “You don’t want to do that. Look, if you insist, I have to find a way to give you the days off. That means, someone else gets your spot. Do you want me to give your spotlight to another reporter?” I sat fuming, but forced myself to think about his question. The honest answer was no. But my soul screamed inside, you need some time to heal! I just couldn’t afford to take any. Chris was right. I could manage with the two days through the funeral, if I counted half of today, that was almost 3. Somehow, I’d make it to the weekend. If, I could just make it to the weekend.

  “No,” I said softly.

  “No what? Which no?” Chris said quickly, in a near panic.

  “No, I don’t want another reporter on my story,” I said firmly. “The funeral is Wednesday. I’ll find availability out of the office as I can. I’ll be back in the office on Thursday,” I said getting up. I was done talking to Chris.

  “Tabby, I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but this is a good decision!” Chris called out to my back as I walked out the door.

  I walked double time to get back to my office, picked up all my things and the paperwork that I would need for the two days off I did have. I sent quick emails to Tina and Jim that I would call them later from home. Jacket on my arm, with a bag full of papers and a mind full of raging thoughts, I walked as quickly as I could with my head down to the elevator. Although, not quickly enough, because steps before the doors to safety, I ran into Lisa, who started talking before I had a chance to make a clean getaway.

  “Tabby, hey! Amazing story over the weekend! Just am
azing. That is the kind of interview that we need to be doing, and you got the exclusive! Wow. Listen, we missed you at the Women’s Issues meeting—your voice is going to be so powerful…” I stopped hearing anything after that. It’s a funny thing about losing control. Perhaps like exhaustion, perhaps like darkness even, it’s another thing that just creeps up on you—it’s there before you know it and when you do know it, you’re already in trouble. And it’s a funny thing about breaking points, all at once, everything is so clear, yet nothing is clear at all.

  “Every problem can’t be my problem, Lisa!” I heard myself say a little too loudly, as I moved toward the opening elevator doors to make my escape. “I’m sorry, I just…can’t. I have to go—I have to go write a eulogy!” I could feel Lisa’s eyes on my back as I walked past her into the closing elevator, not stopping until I could support myself against the wall. I’d need it, because I was near collapse. The doors closed and all the energy that I’d summoned to make it into the office that day drained from my body. I leaned against the wall, and although I tried to stop them, the tears came again, carving their familiar path through my makeup down my cheeks.

  I was tired of crying, so, so tired of crying.

  Chapter 38

  There is only so long that a person can stare at a blank computer screen before certain madness starts to set in. My right mind, I lost somewhere between Saturday and Sunday, so whatever was left was operating on generator power and the gas was running low.

  I squeezed my eyes with my hand for a brief massage and took another sip from my wine glass. Thankfully the calls and text messages of condolence had died down and I could focus on the gargantuan task at hand—to look at my grandmother’s 85 years of life, find the high points, and perhaps a lesson in it all. My memory served as her voice, reminding me of all the patches of stories she told me about her journey. I imagined what an interview with her would cover, what she would want the world to know, and what I needed the audience to hear…and to remember.

  There were the things I couldn’t, or shouldn’t talk about. The things that hide within a family, between the lines of generations—alcoholism, rifts, lack of educational opportunity, racism. Granny Tab had ended so much of the iniquity, yet not all of it. My dad had been fighting battles that I was unaware of. Perhaps I was as well. My mind went to Marc, his words floating in across the waves of other thoughts. “My father is an alcoholic,” I could hear him say again. An alcoholic. My father and Marc were equally yoked by the common sins of their fathers’ burdens. “Your father, he is the rare type,” I heard Granny Tab say in my mind. I wondered if it was her who made him that way. Losing her best friend to segregation and racism at 18, and then her whole family to the same affliction years later when she dared to love a black man, I imagined the same set of circumstances would have been enough to destroy a different woman.

  I couldn’t talk about how she managed to survive abuse at the hands of a persecuted black man, who, by the laws of his own country was denied the basic rights of where he could own a home and send their little brown baby to school; who by the rules of society was denied employment, and a fair shot at making a way for his family—the fundamental ability to provide and protect. I also couldn’t mention the family I didn’t know. So, I wouldn’t discuss my grandmother’s white relatives in West Virginia, who forgot that the ties of blood were stronger than tribe. I would have to leave all of these things out, to focus on the life that my grandmother lived in spite of it all. Instead, I would talk about courage, my grandmother’s courage to continue alone, and to make her own family, by her own definition, through her own love, according to her own vision.

  I couldn’t talk about how she died, or what ultimately took her last breath away. I could only talk about how she lived. Not the adversity, and the hardships and the worry and pain—these were only the seeds that were planted in the fertile soil of her spirit, watered by tears and blood. I would speak only of the fruit—the flowering rewards of transmuted hardships, evolved and metamorphosed into beauty that undeniably radiated from within. My grandmother’s grace could not be obfuscated by the curtains of wrinkles that time pulled into her skin, or dulled by the thinning of her hair and lips and skin on her face. She taught me important lessons of the strength of vulnerability and power in simply holding space. She left a thousand pieces of herself everywhere like the fluffs of a dandelion, carried by the wind—in her students she taught, in the hearts of her friends, in the spirits of her progeny—in me.

  I knew what I needed to say. Not just to people who would come to pay their respects on Wednesday, but to one person who had recently borne the brunt of my worst. As a tribute to my grandmother, I remembered the strength in my own vulnerability. I pulled out my phone to text Marc.

  Me: Sorry about the other night/day

  Me: My grandmother’s funeral is on Wed. Will send you the details.

  Me: You don’t have to come, of course

  Me: Just would be nice to see you there.

  Chapter 39

  For the first time ever, I spent the night voluntarily in Calabasas. On Wednesday morning, we would wake up, get dressed, and as a clumsy version of a family, travel together to lay my grandmother to rest.

  My mother already called me early to let me know that she and the General had arrived from DC. I was impressed that she made no mention of the fact that I would be arriving with my dad, and said only that she would see me at the funeral. For her, that was unprecedented restraint. Alexis, who had called me faithfully, every day since Sunday, said that she would be there also. It was Laila who I still hadn’t told about my grandmother. I didn’t know how. It seemed too soon. My grandmother’s funeral was an unfair burden to ask Laila to bear, so even though I would have loved to have her as support, I wanted to allow her space for her own healing. I hoped she’d understand later why I didn’t ask her to be there on this time.

  I got to the house late in the evening, after a phone conference with my research team. I would return to broadcast just one day after Granny Tab’s funeral, with a follow up interview and report on the Jenkins shooting. As it turned out, the family was considering filing charges against the city and the DA was considering pressing charges against the officer. No decisions had been made, but since my coverage on the steps of the hospital, it had bubbled forward to the biggest local story of the week. I couldn’t ignore it entirely, so I worked as late as I could to keep Wednesday sacred and set aside to observe and honor Granny Tab.

  The morning of, I was in the middle of running through my mental notes and curling my hair in the en suite attached to the guest bedroom, when Danielle and Dixie appeared in my sightline, hovering around the bathroom door.

  “Can we come in?” Danielle asked.

  “Of course,” I said to both of them.

  “I…wanted to ask…if you could help me with my hair,” Danielle said, not fully looking me in my eyes.

  “Sure I will,” I said, trying to sound reassuring. “How do you want it?”

  “I want it to look…like yours,” Danielle said, now half looking up at me. For some reason, those words delivered a sharp pang to my gut. Like mine?

  “Can you make mine look like yours too?” Dixie interjected.

  “Dixie, she doesn’t have time to help us both. She’s speaking for Nana. I’ll do yours after.” Danielle turned and said with loving firmness to her sister. Dixie turned to her signature doe-eyed pout that worked miracles on my dad, but got nowhere with Danielle. I laughed lightly to myself at both of them and brought Danielle closer to start working on her frizzy curls with my flat iron. Thankfully, her hair responded quite easily to the heat after a couple of passes. “We saw your interview on Saturday, of that kid who got shot,” Danielle said.

  “Yeah, it was really good!” Dixie added.

  “You guys watch me on the news?” I asked.

  “Oh, yeah, everyday pretty much,” Danielle said. “Our m
om turns it on at every news hour, just in case you’re reporting. Sometimes you’re not even on and we still watch it.”

  “Yep, KVTV!” Dixie said.

  “Is he still going to be able to be a surgeon? I mean, after he got shot in the arm like that?” Danielle asked.

  “The doctors all think so,” I said. “Thankfully the officer’s bullet just passed through and didn’t destroy anything major. He was really lucky.”

  “We didn’t understand why he got shot,” Danielle said half turning around to look at me. I gently pushed her head back to the forward-facing position so that I could finish the curl that I was working on. She sighed, and then continued, gesturing with her hands. “I mean, he didn’t do anything wrong, did he? It seemed like he was just helping his grandmother move.”

  “That’s right, that’s what happened. He wasn’t doing anything wrong,” I said, still working the flat-iron around Danielle’s head.

  “I bet the officer that shot him feels really bad,” Danielle said. “And the people that called the police on him when he was just helping his grandma. I couldn’t imagine that happening to me. I’d be so scared.”

  Officer Mallory’s words echoed through my mind. No good and decent officer wants to go home at night, knowing that he shot a 19-year-old kid…I hoped that was the truth.

  “I don’t think he wanted to shoot the boy, so the officer probably does feel bad in some way,” I said. “But, no question, it should not have happened.”

  “Should we be afraid of the police, too?” Dixie asked. I felt another strange pang. I looked down at little Dixie, with her huge version of Granny Tab’s blue eyes and her sun streaked straight glossy brown hair, cascading down across her only lightly toasted beige shoulders, and I knew the words that I couldn’t speak. I wish that I could have told her that the answer to her question was no. If all she meant by “we” was her and Danielle, then, perhaps the answer would be no. But if “we” meant all kids, then there was no way for me to tell her how to distinguish the good cops from the bad cops, the well-trained from the under-equipped and that it wouldn’t be just a factor of luck that determined who any kid, or any person, would come across on any given day. I wish I could have told her there was anything that I ever saw in my reporting, or in life in general that could assure me of my safety, or her of her own. Perhaps she would be protected by her straight hair, and fair skin, and those beautiful blue eyes that she could make doe-like at will. Perhaps she’d be protected by the fact that she didn’t look like a black girl, that no one would ever think to see her as a “color”—but it didn’t mean that she wouldn’t be affected. I thought of Officer Mallory and the pain in his eyes and the pleading in his voice, the honesty and sincerity…no good and decent officer wants to go home at night knowing that he shot a 19-year-old kid…I remembered the feeling of fear that must have been reflected in my own eyes in our original confrontation. Maybe we could all be part of a different future. I gave the best answer that I could, the one that reflected all of the truth that I knew and all of the hope that I could muster. I looked directly at my little sister to speak.