Blanche Cleans Up

by Barbara Neely

  “It’s Blanche White. Call me as soon as you can. I got news.”

  He called her back in twenty minutes and was at her door an hour after that.

  “I know who killed Ray-Ray Brown and Miz Barker. His name is Donnie McFadden. He ain’t old, but he wears kind of old-fashioned clothes,” she told him. “The woman who saw Ray-Ray near the pool said the man with him was an old person ’cause that’s how he was dressed. It was Donnie. I’m sure of it. All that bullshit he gave me about wanting his letters back from Ray-Ray was really to find out if Ray-Ray had things stashed somewhere else besides Miz Inez’s house and Miz Barker’s.” Then she told him about all the other lies Donnie had told.

  “Donnie probably tried to talk Ray-Ray into the money-for-tape idea, but Ray-Ray wouldn’t go for it, so Donnie killed him. Donnie thought he knew where Miz Barker had put the tape, only she’d moved it and wouldn’t tell Donnie where it was. That’s why he killed her.”

  “It all adds up,” Othello said, “but we don’t want to make no mistake.”

  “I thought of that,” Blanche said, and told him how she planned to get Donnie to tell on himself.

  “If you’re right, it could be dangerous.”

  “That’s why I called you,” she said, and saw her whole income-tax-return check going to the Ex-Cons. Cheap at the price.

  “I’m game if you’re game,” he told her. “What about tomorrow night?”

  “Hi,” Taifa mumbled, and stomped upstairs when she came in from school. Blanche decided to wait a while before she tried to find out whether this snit was about something that ought to concern her.

  Malik came in and went right to the phone to call Aminata.

  “Nothing yet,” he told Blanche when he’d hung up. “But she said Teddy’s sure he can find what we need on his computer. Aminata’s gonna call me.”

  Blanche smiled not so much at what Malik said as at the fact that the sound of Aminata’s name no longer made her hackles rise. Progress.

  “You really like working on this, don’t you?” Blanche instantly saw his name over a column in the New York Times.

  “It’s okay,” he said, adopting the hideout attitude of a teen who senses a career talk coming, but he couldn’t keep the pleasure out of his eyes.

  Blanche turned on the radio. “There’s some sliced chicken if you’re hungry.” She enjoyed the surprise on his face when she didn’t do her career talk. She could wait.

  Shaquita’s little butt was dragging low when she came home. Blanche called the girl to the kitchen after Malik went off to his room. Blanche knew Shaquita didn’t want to hear the best advice Blanche had to give, so she decided to play it another way.

  “You can’t be moping around with a baby in your belly.” Blanche handed her a glass of orange juice. “Baby needs a mother thinking positive thoughts, planning the future, and sending love.”

  Tears big as peas rolled down Shaquita’s face. She leaned over in her chair and hugged her body, rocking back and forth. Blanche knelt in front of Shaquita, put her arms around the girl, and held her until she was ready to talk.

  “He doesn’t want it. He…”

  “You mean Pookie? What did he say?” Blanche held her breath.

  “He…He…I asked him if he would come with me to talk to Gran. He said”—she took a deep breath—“he said he wasn’t into being a father. He said I should…”

  Sobs cut off Shaquita’s words. Blanche put her arms around her again, in part to hide the smile that was blooming on her face. Thank you, Pookie, Blanche mouthed.

  “I thought…I thought this was what he wanted. He kept saying…”

  “But you’re the one who has to—”

  “But I wanted it, too! I was the one who said it was okay not to use a condom. He didn’t make me.”

  “But you wouldn’t have done it if he hadn’t wanted you to,” Blanche insisted. “And now he’s changed his mind.” Ancestors bless him, she added to herself.

  “What am I going to do, Aunt Blanche? I’m so scared! I just…”

  “So was I, Quita. And I was older than you.”

  Shaquita stopped crying and raised her head.

  “I was eighteen when I got pregnant,” Blanche told her. “Just outta high school. He wasn’t even a boy I particularly liked. I mean, I liked him well enough. He was nice and all, but I didn’t have a real thing for him. I just went out with him ’cause I was mad at Leo, my regular boyfriend.” Blanche stroked Shaquita’s head. “I wanted to be grown. Grown women had sex. So…the next thing I knew, I’d missed my period.” Blanche shook her head and laughed a little. “I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared since. I knew Mama would kill me, or at least make me wish I was dead. I sure didn’t want to have to marry Sonny Jones. And I was already wondering if I ever wanted to have children at all.”

  Shaquita was dry-eyed now and totally caught up in Blanche’s story. “What did you do?” she asked.

  Shoulda told her this before, Blanche thought. “Well, I thought about just having it. Just not saying anything to Mama and letting the size of my belly give her the news. Then I stopped thinking about me as Mama’s child and started seeing me as somebody’s mama, having to do everything: go out to work, cook, clean, and take care of my own child at home, just like my own mother did. When was I gonna have fun? Be young? How was I gonna be able to stay home to take care of a baby? What was I gonna use to pay somebody else to watch the baby while I went to work? How was I gonna get to Harlem, USA, like I’d been dreaming about?” All the confused feelings of that time welled up in Blanche. She felt the weight of that never-born baby and the deep sorrow that had lingered for weeks afterward. She wiped the tears from her eyes.

  “My cousin Murphy helped me. She was a lot older than me. Mama always called her ‘worldly.’ So I figured she might know what to do. She took me to a friend of hers, a nurse or a midwife. But first Cousin Murphy made me pray for what would not have a chance to become a full baby born to me, made me thank it for giving me my life back. Made me promise to give of myself to some child already in the world. Atonement, she called it. I thought that was really crazy stuff, but I didn’t argue with her; I’da done anything, anything. Now I see she was right. Now…” She thought about the role Taifa and Malik had played in her atonement, and thanked her sister for the opportunity she’d given her. Now, using her experience to try to help Shaquita, she was aware of having found yet another way in which all of her life was connected.

  Shaquita squeezed Blanche’s hand. “Did it hurt?”

  “A little pinch. I was about as far gone as you. I had cramps and bled some afterward. It wasn’t no picnic. And I felt sad for a while. But at the same time, I was glad I did it. Glad to know that…”

  “It was all over.” Shaquita finished the sentence for her.

  Blanche stood up. “Now you got to decide, Quita. Whatever you decide, you know I’m in your corner. And so is Cousin Charlotte. But think about it, honey, that’s all I ask. Think about who you are, and what you’ve always said you wanted. Don’t stand in your own way.”

  Shaquita rose and kissed Blanche on the cheek. “Thanks, Aunt Blanche,” she said. The phone rang. “I’ll get that!” Shaquita said, and was gone.

  “Is that for me?” Malik called out, and thundered down the stairs when Shaquita said it was.

  Blanche slumped against the table. Honesty was hard work.

  “We got it, Moms!” Malik yelled, and ran into the kitchen. “When Laconia Waterford died, when they got married, and when the corporation was started! Aminata was right, the company wasn’t started until after Laconia Waterford died. He musta forged her signature or something. There’s gonna be a Community Reawakening Project meeting about it on Thursday.”

  “Congratulations, honey!” She hugged him and relished the knowledge that Samuelson was finished as the minister of truth and virtue. By the time Aminata and company got done trashing him for poisoning black kids and the state jacked him up for his bogus corporation and lead v
iolations, the Reverend and his Temple might have to do what he’d done in Delaware: get out of Dodge. She let herself feel the full pleasure of that and wished she could add a kick in the balls to go with it. But she did have her own little surprise for him.

  Her house and the neighborhood were enjoying middle-of-the-night quiet when Blanche left home carrying a pillowcase with paint, a funnel, a pair of rubber gloves, a small flashlight, and a box of sugar inside. She took her pepper spray from her jacket pocket and carried it in her right hand.

  She stood across the street from Samuelson’s house for almost ten minutes in which she wondered what the hell she was doing there. Samuelson’s goons were as ready to push her face in as look at her, and here she was, sneaking around his house. She remembered that old thing about falling off a horse: The best thing to do was to get right back on before the fear of riding set in. Was that what she was trying to do? Keep her courage up by acting like she had some?

  The house and the Temple next door were both dark. If Samuelson’s boys were working security, she didn’t see them. She walked down the driveway. The car was parked in back under a carport. It seemed to crouch there like a monster sleeping beneath a huge umbrella. She half expected the doors to spring open and Samuelson’s boys to jump out and grab her again. She realized she was panting loud enough to be heard downtown. She took a deep breath and told herself to be cool as she moved closer to the car.

  She set her pillowcase on the ground and put on her rubber gloves. She figured a car like this probably had an alarm as sensitive as a cat’s whiskers, so she moved with the delicacy of that same cat on the prowl. She opened the lid to the gas tank, unscrewed the cap, and laid it on the ground. She opened the pillowcase, took out the sugar, the ice pick, and the funnel. She took off the protective cork that covered the tip of the ice pick and inserted the tip it into the opening around the gas tank cover. She moved the tip slowly around the gas cover until it popped open—a trick she’d learned from an old Harlem neighbor who’d kept his gas tank full of other people’s gas. When the gas cover popped, she wedged the funnel into the gas tank. The sugar slid into the tank with a low hiss. Blanche smiled.

  “And now for today’s sermon,” she whispered. She jumped at the sound of the ball bearings pinging against the sides of the paint can as she shook it up. Still mindful of the car alarm, she held the can high and leaned over the car without touching it. The result was worth the ache in her upper arm. The letters stood out like flames against the car’s dark body. She used the other can of paint to draw arrows leading from the sidewalk down the driveway to the car. She chuckled all the way home at the thought of Samuelson and his Temple members following the arrow trail to the minister’s car, which now proclaimed that god don’t like ugly—a car that even with a new paint job wasn’t going to be worth a teaspoonful of cat piss once that sugar made its way into the engine. He wouldn’t be roughing up any other women in this baby.

  Life might not be fair, but it sure as hell could be satisfying.

  FOURTEEN

  DAY THIRTEEN—TUESDAY

  Taifa was moaning and whining about the state of her fried hair; Shaquita remembered a book report due today and was busy scribbling when she wasn’t throwing up. Malik mumbled something about women and slammed out the door with a piece of toast in one hand and two slices of bacon in the other. And there were women who actually wanted to stay home with their kids. Amazing!

  Blanche waited until ten-thirty to call Donnie at work. She wanted to make sure he’d be there. Her mouth went dry at the sound of his voice. She was careful to keep rage out of her voice.

  “Donnie? This is Blanche White. I got something I want you to see. Can you come by this evening, say about seven-thirty? I won’t have it before then.” She didn’t want him to surprise her by coming earlier.

  “What is it? Something of Ray-Ray’s?”

  Blanche didn’t answer him. “I’ll have it ready when you get here. My kids will be out.” She didn’t expect him to refuse—and he didn’t.

  She walked around the room to calm herself, then called Othello and told him everything was set.

  Blanche checked the Yellow Pages and made a couple of calls until she found what she was looking for. It was going to cost more than she expected, but her Brindle check came that morning. She’d been paid for an extra week. It seemed just right to use Brindle’s money to pay for his downfall. She fished the tape out from among the dirty clothes and put it in her bag.

  The little girls’ faces rose up from it like mist from a lake. Blanche hoped it wasn’t too late for them. She was relieved to have the doorbell interrupt her thoughts—until she saw who was leaning on her bell.

  “Hiya doin’, Blanche?” Karen the borrower blew a mouthful of cigarette smoke past Blanche into the house.

  If I was inclined to lend her whatever it is she wants to borrow, she won’t get it now. Blanche waved the smoke back toward the door.

  “I was wondering if you got any cornmeal I could…”

  Something in Blanche snapped. She grinned at Karen.

  “Now ain’t this a coincidence. I was just heading for your house to ask you if you had some cornmeal I could borrow. And what about mustard? You got any of that?”

  Karen’s mouth fell open.

  “And I could sure use a couple cups of rice and some flour.”

  Karen backed off the stoop.

  “What about a roll of toilet paper? I guess I could use paper towels if that’s all you got.”

  Karen began walking backward toward her own house. She kept her eyes on Blanche.

  “What size shoe do you wear, honey?” Blanche called after her. “I could use a sweater, too! Blue would be nice,” Blanche shouted.

  She could hardly close the door for laughing. She was still chuckling when the phone rang.

  “Hello. May I speak with Blanche White, please?”

  Blanche sank into a chair. All laughter was gone now.

  “I’m so sorry about your son, Felicia.”

  “Yes, my son.” Felicia paused a few seconds.

  In the long silence that followed, Blanche could feel Felicia’s pain leaping through the phone lines like static.

  “I wanted to…you were here, you see, and I…”

  “Yes, I understand.”

  “Allister doesn’t talk about it, except to remind me that I’m responsible. Of course, he’s right. If I hadn’t been…Life is so, so…I don’t know.”

  Blanche could hear the tightness in Felicia’s throat. She suddenly saw Felicia with Marc’s blood in her hair, screaming as though her voice had the power to turn back time. Now she sounded like a person hit too often to expect anything but pain. Felicia’s sorrow touched Blanche in that place all loving mothers shared, where death or danger to your child lived. It was not the kind of connection it was healthy for her to have with an employer. Even so, she couldn’t help but feel for the woman—and Felicia wasn’t her employer anymore.

  “The funny thing is, I didn’t even care for Saxe,” Felicia said. “It was just a physical thing. Allister and I don’t…It was just sex. That’s all I wanted. If I’d had any idea, any idea that Saxe and Marc…that Marc would…”

  Here it is again, Blanche thought: Felicia blamed herself for not knowing her lover was screwing her son and for Marc’s death. Aminata kicked herself for not having known the effects of lead paint. Pam blamed herself for not having been there to save Miz Barker. And she herself wondered whether Miz Barker and Ray-Ray might still be alive if she’d acted differently. She wondered if men thought they were responsible for things they couldn’t control, or was this a woman thing?

  “It wasn’t your fault any more than it was mine, no matter what your husband says,” Blanche told her, and clamped her teeth shut on the desire to tell Felicia she’d soon be getting a package that would show how little right Allister had to point a finger at anyone for anything.

  “I hear you’re going away,” she said.

  “We’re leavin
g. But not together. I should have left him years ago. And if I know Allister, he’s going to make me wish I had. He’ll use Saxe and whatever else he can against me in the divorce.” Felicia paused, then went on. “It would help if I had…Did you ever hear any more about Allister’s tape?” Felicia paused again, but not long enough for Blanche to answer. “As I said, I’m prepared to be very generous.”

  Blanche considered how to answer. She’d be happy to take Felicia’s money any day. Of course, she didn’t intend to admit to knowing anything about the tape, but she did want to make sure Felicia knew where to send the check.

  “Lost things are found all the time,” she said. “Maybe the tape will be one of them.”

  “I’ll keep my fingers crossed,” Felicia said.

  “And your checkbook handy,” Blanche added. “And, of course, you have my address…”

  After she hung up, Blanche sat by the phone for a couple seconds, thinking about the harm Allister and Donnie had done to so many people. The children in the video, Miz Barker, Ray-Ray, Marc Brindle, Saxe Winton, Felicia bent almost to broken, Donnie’s wife about to get one of the nastier surprises of her life, Pam, Miz Inez, and all the other mourners left to try to wade through their pain without drowning. Oh yes, she wanted to really fuck with both these boys!

  She took the bus to Centre Street in Jamaica Plain. The two-story buildings on this main street made it look like a small town. Blanche gave the chubby young woman behind the counter of Rick’s TV & Stereo Shop a can-I-trust-you? look before reluctantly handing her the videotape to be copied. When Blanche had called the place earlier, she’d made sure the tape wouldn’t have to be viewed in order to be copied, so that was okay, but she still didn’t like letting the tape out of her hands. The copy setup was right behind the counter, surrounded by rebuilt TVs and car stereos, jam boxes, and clock radios, so at least she could keep her eye on it. She watched the young woman’s blue-and-red fingernails as she put the tape in the machine and pushed some buttons. Blanche waited with as much patience as she could muster for the copies to be made.