We take Broad Street. Pass Temple University. Pass Hahnemann Hospital, where my grandfather died, and around City Hall, to Market Street. Then we cut over to where the bus station is, at Tenth and Filbert. Mr. Scooter pulls to the curb.
“You need help, Faye?”
“No, I’m fine, Mr. Scooter. Thanks for the ride.”
The bus station is vibrant for that time of night. Four of the ticket counter lanes are open and I get in what I hope is the shortest. A homeless man draped in a pound of blankets walks past me, rattling a dirty coffee cup with coins in it. I quickly turn my head before the smell of him makes me puke. I hear Keith Sweat crooning “Make It Last Forever” on someone’s radio. The song made me feel hot and cold at the same time. It was the fourth song on the slow jam tape that Martin played that one time I told Gran I was meeting Crystal at the Gallery mall to look for church shoes. Martin got me from the corner of Eighth and Market Street. We drove in the Hog down to the Lakes, and did it under the highway overpass. It was the first time I got completely naked in the car.
“Next.”
I step up to the counter and purchased my ticket to Virginia.
“Boarding in five minutes,” the clerk tells me with vacant eyes. The job has desensitized her.
The ladies’ room is in the back left corner, and I head over to pee before boarding. It smells more horrific than the station and I hold my nose, breathing only out of my mouth until I finish my business. I feel like vomiting, so I hurry out of the bathroom before it catches me. I couldn’t imagine heaving on my knees in this filthy place. I find a peppermint in the coat pocket and shove it into my mouth. The sleeping pill I stole from Gran is in there too, and I make sure it’s secure.
“Greyhound bus to Lynchburg, Virginia, making stops in Wilmington, Baltimore, Washington, DC, Richmond. Transferring in Richmond, then stopping in Charlottesville. Lynchburg will be the last stop. All aboard. All aboard.”
* * *
I crack the orange pill in half and it affords me a long rest on the first leg to the transfer. In Richmond, we have about ten minutes to stretch our legs. I take off Gran’s ridiculous hat and trench coat. It’s nice to be somewhere where I didn’t have to hide. Gran’s three dollars went to a Snickers bar, a bag of Doritos, and a Coke. When I get on the second bus I eat the fried chicken and white bread Gran had packed in my bag, then all of my junk food. I can’t fall back asleep, so I pull out the romance novel I packed and try to lose myself in the story.
Aunt Kat had on a yellow scarf just like Gran said she would. But even if she didn’t I would have recognized her. She has the same head shape and cheekbones as Gran and my father. She’s just a little older and her skin was sunburned in a way Gran’s would never be. I wondered if it was because she lived in the country.
“Look at you, gal.” She pulls me into her arms. “I ain’t seen you since you was knee high to a grasshopper.”
Aunt Kat directs me to a navy-blue pickup truck and brings my bag into the cab with us. She keeps up a constant chatter on Route 29, pointing out the shopping center with the Food Lion, the post office, and her beauty parlor. It’s dark and I can’t see much. I nod and look at the Blue Ridge Mountains, highlighted by the moon. Majestic. Like paintings in the sky. After about ten minutes driving, we turned on a back road that leads past an endless row of cornstalk fields. I even spot a few cows, horses, and pigs.
Aunt Kat lived on fifteen acres of land that’s been in the family for three generations. Since the end of slavery, she told me. Gran said that part of the house is hers and that she could come down here and claim it anytime she wants, but I haven’t known her to make a single trip down here in the years I lived with her.
Aunt Kat shows me to a bedroom in the back. The few pieces of furniture in the room were old, but dusted clean. I put my bag down on the little wooden chair facing the window, and just like that I feel a tightening in my belly that spins through me so fast I’m forced to sit.
“Baby knew to wait till you got here.” Aunt Kat put her hand on my belly and looked at her watch. “Let’s see what happens over the next hour. Might be time to fetch the midwife.”
* * *
Thirteen hours later I’m on a bed propped up with pillows, my feet in brown stirrups that look like they belong to the horse out back.
“Puuuush,” grunts the snaggletoothed midwife squatting between my legs. Pats of sweat glisten from the balding spots separating her gray sprouts of hair. I’ve asked at least three times why I wasn’t going to the hospital, and all Aunt Kat said was that this woman would give me better care.
Every time a contraction rips through my body, I feel like cussing. The old lady had already shoved her bare hand and whole arm inside of me, breaking my water and deeming the baby ready. Warm liquid had dripped down my thighs, and was soaked up by the pile of towels propped under my behind.
The overhead light is harshly fluorescent, and there is a desk lamp sitting on the floor at the foot of the bed, which Snaggletoothed is using to see. The wallpaper is a faded mauve color with marching lines of potted plants. A cousin I didn’t know rubs a cool towel across my forehead, and I like her because she kept smiling with the same doe eyes as me.
She whispers, “Don’t worry none. She delivers all the babies within fifty miles. She betta than the hospital. You go there, they’ll cut you for sure.” She smiles and then runs her hand across my forehead. I feel okay for all of thirty-five seconds, and then the next contraction ripples through me like a tidal wave.
Aunt Kat is at the foot of the bed reading Bible verses. She’s Jehovah’s Witness, and prays in a much more subdued way than Gran and her Daddy Gracious friends. I could imagine Gran stomping her feet and catching the Holy Ghost while I was trying to dispel this thing, getting on my last nerve. I’m hot all over and I want this to be over. I pray my own silent prayer. Lord, I’ve learned my lesson. Please let this be over soon.
“I sees the head.” Snaggletoothed leans in closer.
“Grab it,” I sass as a cold pain pierces through my belly with a fierceness that has my teeth rattling, so much that I was sure I would swallow my tongue. Oh, I can’t die like this. Please, please, please I pleaded with my eyes closed.
“Next contraction, give it all ya got, chile, and this baby be here. Push like you’s mad, push.”
Fire. That’s the only way I can describe the heated pain that comes from below as she pulls the thing’s head out, and then lets it dangle between my legs while she sucks the mucus from the nose and mouth.
“Slow and steady,” she says, and then yanks the rest of the body out of me.
I don’t know what happened after that ’cause the room went dark. Maybe I fainted, but the next thing I knew, the cousin was trying to put a swaddled something in my arms. I pushed her away.
“No, thank you.” My voice was weak but stern.
Cousin looked at me with those doe eyes and said, “You sure you don’t want to hold her? She’s beautiful.”
I turned my back. If I didn’t touch it then she wasn’t real. If she wasn’t real, then I could go back to my life in Philadelphia like none of this mess ever happened. Then maybe I’d have a real chance of getting out. If I got out, moved on, I’d be better. Happier. I’d be like the girls on The Facts of Life who had their whole lives ahead of them. That’s what I wanted. Not to hold a beautiful thing that wasn’t mine.
TWELVE
The Restraints
My cell phone vibrates for the umpteenth time against my purse as I stub out my third cigarette.
“Can I get you anything else, doll?”
“No. Thanks.” I push a few bills across the bar. My head is light when I stand, but after I roll my shoulders back and fix my ponytail I feel together. The same men who catcalled on my entrance repeat their same tired lines on my way out. I don’t even turn my head to acknowledge them as I step out onto the street. The smell of McDonald’s fills the air and I wonder if they have a vent or something that pushes the scent in all directi
ons, calling customers to come.
My life is so different than the one I left behind in Philadelphia. How dare Martin call me and dredge all of this up? My cell phone vibrates again when I get inside my SUV.
“Hello.”
“Fox, what the fuck? Why aren’t you answering your telephone?”
I don’t have my answer ready for Preston so I simply say, “I’ll be home in ten minutes.”
I need to get myself together so I drive across the street to the CVS. After standing in line while the lady in front of me goes through every coupon in her purse only for them all to be expired, I buy Listerine, Febreze, baby wipes, and Advil. Out in the parking lot, I spray myself down and wipe my face and hands before heading back home.
The door is barely open before Rory and Two are rushing me. “Mommmeeeee.” They say it like I’ve been to war in Iraq and had to hitchhike back home. It’s one of the things I love about having kids. They love you in every moment. Even the kids of crackheads love their mamas.
“What are you guys still doing up? It’s way past your bedtime.”
“Daddy said we could wait for you.” Two crinkles that cute nose.
Of course he did. Putting the kids to bed is your job.
“Let’s head upstairs.” The baby is in her bouncer. When I pick her up, her diaper sags to her knees.
“You didn’t know the baby needed to be changed?”
“Where were you?”
“Answer me.”
“Answer me.” His eyes bore into me and I stare right back.
“Come on, babies, let’s go brush your teeth.”
On the way up the stairs Rory waves his hand in front of his nose. “You smell funny.”
“And so do you.” I pinch his butt cheek.
* * *
I close the upstairs gate so that I can put Liv on the floor, change out of my smoky clothes, and bury them in the bottom of the dirty laundry pile.
“Go find a book and sit on the floor,” I call to them from the bathroom. The door is cracked so I can hear what’s going on while I brush my teeth, and then move the washcloth in the places that need to be freshened. Gran calls that a “whore’s bath.”
After Liv is changed and clean, I sit all three children on my lap and read a New Age version of Humpty Dumpty by Mark Teague, about a prince who is afraid. They love the story and I take my time acting out all the characters. When I’m finished Rory puts his arms around my neck.
“Mama, can you tell us one of your stories from your head?”
I don’t have anything better to do than avoid Preston, so I agree.
“Yes, I’ll tell you one while I feed the baby. But you have to get in your bed and keep your heads on the pillow.”
“Can I sleep with the girls tonight?” Rory asks.
I nod, and settle into the glider by the window. Liv reaches for my breast. I lift my shirt and unhook the snap on my bra. It’s not until she gets the milk to flow that I remember the drinks and cigarettes.
Bad mommy, unfit. Just triflin’.
I don’t give her strength, and start in on a story about a leaf that got separated from its leaf family in a storm. When I’m finished, Liv is asleep and Two reaches for a cuddle.
“That was the best story ever, Mommy.”
“Many more to come, Two. Now don’t get out of this bed or tomorrow there will be no dessert. Good night.”
I kiss Rory and tuck him tight.
I head downstairs. Every step fills my belly with dread. Preston is sitting on the sofa. The living room and dining room lights are on. His scratch-offs are sitting in a pile on the coffee table.
“Win anything?”
“Thirteen dollars.”
“I can use that for groceries.”
“You going to tell me where you’ve been?”
I ease into the loveseat, opposite from the sofa where Preston is seated, and pull my vanilla throw over my lap.
“Stop with the tight leash, would you?” I snap.
“Leash?”
“Yes, you move how you please. The moment I take some time for myself you’re calling the National Guard.”
“Because you said you were going to CVS.”
“And I did. But I didn’t feel like rushing right home. I’ve been with the kids all day. I needed a break.”
Preston stares at me. “Next time, just say that. I was worried.”
I flip the covers from my lap, am on my feet, hands on my hips, lips poked out. “Worried for what? I was in the neighborhood, for Christ sakes.”
“You weren’t answering your phone.”
“So fucking what? You guys drain the shit out of me.” I move for the stairs, but he’s up, pulling me by the waist. “Let go.” I squirm but he holds tighter.
“Calm down. What has gotten into you?”
“I’m going to bed, Preston. Move.”
“Sit down, Foxy.”
“No.”
“Why do you have to make everything so difficult?” He grabs my chin and pins my waist to his. “I don’t have a problem with you getting air. I just want to know. It’s different when I’m out. I’m a man. I can handle myself.”
“That’s some sexist bullshit.” I push away from him but as soon as I break free he’s on me again.
“Relax, Fox. Let’s make some drinks. It’s Friday.”
His hand pulls my ponytail loose and his fingers on my scalp calm me.
“Please?”
I untangle myself from his arms and head back to the sofa. He brings me a mixed concoction and then sits next to me. The television is set to the Food Network and we watch Chopped.
* * *
The drinks, my worries, my week put me right to sleep, and Preston has to nudge me awake after he’s secured the house for the night.
“Want me to carry you?”
“No, I’m fine.” I get to my feet.
In the bedroom, I strip down to my camisole and panties. Preston is on my side of the bed, reaching for me, smelling me, adoring me. I’m not really in the mood but his lips, his hands are so persistent that I turn my body over to him and let him have his way with me.
Before the fluids dry between us, he’s knocked out cold, snoring like sex is a sedative. I’m wide awake. The cigarette craving is back, and I don’t know what’s come over me.
THIRTEEN
The Colored Museum
Two hours have ticked by on the wall clock and I am still awake. I have gone through three rounds of tapping, rubbed down in lavender oil, counted backward from five hundred, played the city alphabet game in my head, imagined myself sleeping in a peaceful meadow, adjusted my pillows, changed my body position, but still sleep eludes me. Preston’s not snoring tonight, but he’s breathing heavily, and the air from his nose makes the sheets ruffle. On his back with his head lulled to the side, chest naked, one foot flung from the covers, the other nestled between the sheets. He looks at peace. I watch him, sick with sorry.
Preston is the one person I’d never intended to hurt. The omission of my past just happened. There never seemed to be an opportune moment to bring it up. By the time we were serious and I was ready to shed and share, Preston distracted me with his perfect vision of our future, and I didn’t have the courage to smudge his picture even if it was man-made and unauthentic.
* * *
When I met Preston, I was in a play called The Colored Museum by George C. Wolfe. It was the first performance at the Theresa Lang Theatre with an all-black cast. Monumental really because the theater was on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where the rich white folks lived, and people came from every borough to see it. I had minor supporting roles throughout, but my time to shine was in the role of Topsy Washington, and I loved all five minutes and thirty-two seconds of it.
Topsy came onstage in the last vignette, titled “The Party.” Do you remember the first scene of Spike Lee’s 1989 movie Do the Right Thing, where Rosie Perez danced to Public Enemy’s “Fight the Power” so hard, you thought she was going to
lose a breast? Picture me as Topsy dancing just a fraction calmer, but not by much. My costume was ridiculous. I wore a neon halter top, and a blazer with metal bottle caps sewn all over it. The skirt had little cowrie shells and bells attached, so when I pumped my chest back and forth and threw my hands in the air, I was the music. Dancing, dancing, and dancing until I was sweating and out of breath. Then I stopped, looked out into the audience with a dramatic pause, and said,
“Have you ever been to a party, and there was one fool in the middle of the floor dancing harder and yelling louder than anyone in the room? Well, honey, that fool was me!”
From that moment on I had the room mesmerized as I talked about going way, way, way, way, way, way, way uptown to a party where every black icon you could think of was in the room—Nat Turner, Eartha Kitt, Malcolm X, Aunt Jemima, Angela Davis—discussing things such as existentialism and the shuffle ball change. It was a powerful piece, and when I left the stage every fiber in my body was high. So high I could have just glided back to my apartment and called it a night. But my friend Serena, who was the stage manager, convinced me to come celebrate opening night with the cast and have a drink. When I walked out into the lobby, Preston was standing against the wall looking right at me. I looked back, thinking, have we met before? Then he walked over to me. He was a cute thing—tall, bookish, but handsome. Not the badass boys from Brooklyn that I normally liked. There was something behind the horn-rimmed glasses that said security. Safe.
“Excuse me, Topsy Washington, but could you sign my Playbill?” His left dimple deepened. His accent was south of New York, but I couldn’t place it.
Tickled, I turned on my stage charm. “Of course. Did you enjoy the show?”
“Very much. You were fantastic.” His eyes drank me in. “I’m not really into plays but my friend’s sister, Yolanda, is in the production, so I tagged along.”
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