The Kindest Lie

by Nancy Johnson

  “Patrick! What on earth? Why is this floor wet?” Lena took in the boxes on the floor that now had the mark of water stains.

  First, fear flashed across his face. Then guilt. His expression reminded her of one of those poor milk carton kids, with big begging eyes that kept neighbors searching long after they’d gone missing.

  “Answer me,” Lena said. “Everything is wet. I can’t afford to have any of my merchandise ruined.”

  The cashier with the blueberry eyes must have heard the yelling. She poked her head in the stockroom. “Is everything okay?”

  “Go on and get back to work,” Lena scolded. “What if a customer walks in and you’re not at the register and we miss a sale? You know we can’t afford that.”

  The young woman bowed her head, mumbled an apology, and hurried back to the front room.

  Lena ripped open a pack of Newports and placed a cigarette in the corner of her mouth. “You still haven’t answered me.” She directed her attention back to Midnight. “I swear, if anything has water damage—”

  “I’m—” Midnight began to speak but Ruth cut him off.

  “It’s my fault,” she said. “It was dark in here when I walked in looking for you and I tripped over the pail of water. I’m so sorry. I can pay for any damages.”

  Midnight’s eyes widened, but he didn’t dispute her cover story. Lena waved her hand. “No. Don’t be silly. I refuse to take your money. Accidents happen.”

  Ruth stared at Midnight until he made eye contact with her. She gave him one of those looks that said, You owe me, and don’t be surprised if I collect, even if you are just a kid. He quickly averted his eyes.

  Everything about Lena seemed more frantic and desperate than she’d remembered, and she felt sorry for this kid caught in the middle of all of it.

  “You said you’re surprising Ernestine, huh? I know she’ll be glad to have you home for Christmas. Come on out here and sit down so we can talk. And, Patrick, go get some paper towels and clean up that water. Check those boxes and make sure nothing got ruined.”

  Midnight unrolled reams of paper towels, wrapping them around his hand, while Lena dragged two folding chairs into the store for them to sit on. It was obvious life had not been kind to Lena over the years, and she moved like a woman twice her age. She took a long drag on her Newport. Years ago, as soon as Lena turned her back, the kids from school would hold straws between their lips in mockery, blowing fake smoke into the air. Then they’d fake wheeze until they almost passed out. Ruth never joined in, since Lena was a friend to the family, the only one to bring chicken pot pies to the house when Papa got sick. They returned the favor when Lena’s husband, Neil, died young of a massive heart attack on the plant floor, a few years after Papa passed.

  Losing their husbands bonded Lena and Mama more than ever. Maybe that was why this store was Ruth’s first stop in town. When she couldn’t talk to Mama, she turned to Lena, who knew how to take care of people, filling all those empty places inside you.

  A symphony of jingles, explosions, and moans erupted from Midnight’s phone. After making a dismal show of drying the floor, he’d followed them into the store and sat on the floor hunched over his phone, grunting every few seconds. Lena sighed in that exasperated way parents often do over some annoying habit they’d chided their kids about time after time.

  “I can’t believe that boy’s thumbs haven’t fallen off yet. Always playing some game about greed,” Lena said.

  “Assassin’s Creed,” Midnight said without looking up from his phone.

  “Whatever it is. I tell you, that boy hears everything.”

  Ruth lowered her voice and scooted her chair closer to Lena’s. “I found that kid hiding in the back room while you were out. How do you know him?”

  Laughter that turned into a deep cough made Lena’s body shake. “You have been gone a long time, dear. That kid is my grandson. Patrick’s a good boy. Smart as a whip. Problem is he knows it. That combination can be trouble if you don’t channel it the right way.”

  Lena had two daughters—Hannah, the older one, who was just a couple of years younger than Ruth, and Gloria, who had to be at least six or seven years younger than Ruth.

  “Is that Hannah’s son? He was just a toddler when I last saw him. I can’t believe he’s a grown boy now,” she said, shaking her head. “You know, he told me his name was Midnight.”

  “These kids and their ridiculous nicknames. But yes, indeed, that’s Hannah’s boy. You know she passed a few years ago, so Patrick lives with me now.”

  Mama had told Ruth the sad news, and now Ruth felt guilty about not reaching out to Lena at the time to offer condolences. It seemed she was always guilt-ridden over something. “I heard, and I’m so sorry. I’m glad Midnight has you in his life.”

  Ruth glanced at Midnight and noticed his sweatshirt hanging off his shoulders, the red logo having faded to a dull pink. Electrical tape held together the frames of his glasses. In the distance, the screech of a snowblower grew louder, but Midnight stayed intent on his game, his mouth open slightly and his eyes locked on the screen of his phone. Eventually, he walked outside, scooping handfuls of snow and stuffing the snowballs in his sweatshirt pockets.

  Now that Midnight was out of earshot, Ruth said, “I know you have that young lady working the register, but you should keep that back door locked, too. It’s not safe for your merchandise or your grandson.”

  Lena tapped her cigarette with her index finger until gray ash fell from the bottom. “I don’t pay any mind to robbers. Even with so many folks out of work, I haven’t had a break-in yet. It’s these gangbangers I worry about trying to get their hooks into my grandson.”

  When Lena read the skepticism on Ruth’s face, she puffed harder on her Newport. “These thugs don’t discriminate between Black and white. All they care about is green, and they’re coming from the big cities like Chicago over here to do their dirt. No offense or anything.”

  She was right. Balloons, stuffed animals, and poster board notes memorialized crime victims on many South and West Side Chicago streets. Yellow crime scene tape roped off manicured lawns on tree-lined blocks. Gang violence had almost become the city’s shadow, walking with its residents everywhere until some grew numb to its existence. Even when they tried to step out of that shadow, it stalked them relentlessly. Ruth and Xavier lived in a zip code close enough to feel the heat from the flame but far enough away not to get burned on the regular.

  Amid the threat of violence in the toughest areas, people still worked hard and raised families and launched businesses, and Ruth wanted to paint that picture for Lena to show her how both could be true at the same time. But she’d grown tired of all that obligatory educating. Even if gang violence had sunk its teeth into Ganton, Lena wouldn’t move. Of those who left Ganton, most didn’t come back, but the truth was, most people never left. Lena was born there and would die there.

  Neither of them said more on the subject. Sitting in silence for a moment, Ruth watched a wispy cloud rise from Lena’s cigarette.

  “Ernestine told me you got married a few years ago,” Lena said.

  Ruth looked down at her gloves and rubbed the leather, thinking of Xavier. The way things stood when she’d left for Ganton caused her to seriously question the strength of her marriage. “Yes, I did. My husband had some commitments back in Chicago and couldn’t make it this time.”

  Lena opened her mouth as if to respond but said nothing. She touched Ruth’s chin, lifting it until Ruth met her eyes. “I for one am glad you’re back home. You stayed away too long.” There was something about the way Lena looked at her that said, I know all about what happened long ago, but we’ll pretend I don’t. Mama had been fiercely adamant about keeping Ruth’s pregnancy secret. Was it possible she’d told someone?

  “How’s business these days?” Ruth said, eager to change the subject.

  Growing up, there had been a steady stream of customers, especially around the holidays with people buying one-of-a-kind
gifts for family and friends.

  “People don’t shop as much now that Fernwood has shut down.”

  “Shut down? What do you mean? The plant meant everything to Papa.”

  “They couldn’t afford to keep the production here. Closed about six months ago. So many out of jobs now. Patrick’s dad, Butch. Your brother. It’s hard out here right now. Everybody’s just looking out for their own, you know.”

  “Damn.” Ruth closed her eyes to gather herself, recalling how Eli would come home after work with grease streaking his face. Over the years, Fernwood had laid off workers during lean times, but no one thought it would ever shut down for good. It’s not like Mama would have called to tell her Eli was out of work, and Ruth knew Eli was too proud to have called her himself.

  “Butch hasn’t been himself since he got his walking papers. You know, losing your job isn’t just about the money. It’s like you lose everything. Everything that makes you who you are can be gone just like that.” Lena snapped her fingers for effect. “All these car companies around the country are talking about filing for bankruptcy. And I don’t know that Obama’s going to do anything about it.”

  Hearing a white woman, even a family friend, make a subtle criticism of the incoming president who hadn’t even taken the oath of office yet annoyed Ruth. It was like somebody talking trash about your crazy uncle. Family could mock and drag him all day, but nobody else could. Lena must have read her mind.

  “I voted for him, don’t get me wrong, but he promised change like all the rest that came before him. So, we’ll just have to see. I’ll believe it when I see it.”

  Ruth laughed to take the bite out of her frustration, hoping her words would come out restrained, minus any low-grade anger. “The man hasn’t even measured the drapes in the West Wing yet. Give him time.”

  Lena had been good to her family. Her politics shouldn’t matter, but Ruth couldn’t help but wonder if she was like her colleagues at Langham who said one thing at work but did something very different behind the curtain of the voting booth.

  Eight

  Midnight

  The ice grunted under the wheels of Miss Ruth’s car, and the faster Midnight threw snowballs at them, the harder she must have mashed the gas pedal trying to get away. Her car swerved. He laughed. Granny couldn’t see him from inside the shop, and he knew she’d have a fit if she saw him acting out, as she called it, but the diabetes made her eyes so blurry she once poured salt instead of sugar in her apple pie filling. Instead of going back inside, he stood there on the street and watched the car get smaller and smaller until it was an itty-bitty speck and then just part of the big blob of gray sky.

  Midnight sat on the curb, the butt of his pants soggy from the snow. He heard steps and sniffles behind him, and that’s when Bones ran up with his mouth open for one of Midnight’s Reese’s Pieces. Granny didn’t like him feeding him candy, though. She said it made a dog’s blood sugar drop, which made no sense because she insisted sweets made hers go sky-high. He counted out four Reese’s, enough to stop Bones from begging but not so many to make him sick.

  Bones hardly had any hair to keep him warm, and his thin skin felt slippery and rubbery, his bones jutting out in places like those raw chickens Granny had him hold by the legs while she seasoned them. The dog had followed Midnight zipping down alleys and through empty lots on the Pratt side of the railroad tracks. Nobody had ever claimed him, so he became the neighborhood’s dog. The name Bones stuck. Every living thing needed its own name, maybe not the one it was born with, but one that fit. Granny wouldn’t let Midnight take him home, though. I have enough mouths to feed, she said.

  “Where do you think Miss Ruth is headed now?” he asked, and Bones shook his head, either to say he didn’t know or to shake off the cold. Miss Ruth’s skin glowed a dark bronze and she looked like one of those models from the clothes catalogs Granny got in the mail. She smelled sweet, too, like the perfume ads. What he didn’t like was how she asked the same silly questions most grown-ups did. Even worse, she looked at him over the top of her glasses like the school principal did that time she gave him detention for putting thumbtacks on the substitute teacher’s chair. Still, she’d covered for him and hadn’t ratted him out. Nobody had ever done that for him before. Not ever.

  The sun peeked through the blinds the next morning and Midnight wished it were still dark, so he wouldn’t have to see the roach, small and black, on the kitchen floor right next to Auntie Glo’s open pizza box from the night before. Once you got a roach in your house, you were stuck with it for a long time. They didn’t die too easy. And as soon as you got rid of one, more came. He tiptoed across the kitchen tiles and raised his foot, then cursed under his breath when he realized it was just a stupid button from Granny’s coat.

  He fell back on the couch and let the springs bounce him like a trampoline. The spare room Granny had set up for him was so small it made his chest get tight and his mouth go dry, so he usually slept in the living room. The only cool part was that he could see the blink of the Christmas lights on the leaning tabletop tree Granny had put up after Thanksgiving. Burying his head in the pillow cushions of the couch, he banged his bare feet against the wall and tapped a beat to drown out the buzz of Auntie Glo’s blow dryer and the bass from her speakers.

  He pretended to be glad that school was out for winter break because every other kid was glad about it. But being in the classroom was way better than this. In more than a week, it would be a whole new year, but he’d still be in this house with people he didn’t understand who didn’t understand him.

  A sour odor filled his nostrils before he heard the cry. His cousin, Nicky, toddled toward him on legs as wobbly as the ones on their kitchen table. The smell of a soiled diaper grew stronger the closer Nicky came, testing the sturdiness of his bowed legs with each step. Nicky reminded him of the way Daddy walked when he was drunk. Mom had always said Midnight would be the best big brother, and now he could see she’d been right. If his little sister had lived, he would’ve changed her diapers, too, and helped her walk and learn her first words.

  At age one and a half, Nicky was often the first one up, and every morning, he wandered out to find Midnight, his cheeks red and puffy, eyes bright and searching. All he wore around the house was a diaper that drooped at the crotch when he dropped a load. Auntie Glo rarely bothered to dress him in much else, and she wore just a skimpy nightgown that was so sheer you could see her breasts through it. Mostly, she wore that when Daddy stopped by. Sober, he ignored her. Drunk, he stared a really long time. Once when Midnight invited his friends over to play video games, Auntie Glo walked through the living room to the kitchen three times, and their eyes got wider each time. He stopped inviting them over.

  “I got you, little man.”

  Midnight carried Nicky with one arm and searched behind cereal boxes on the kitchen counter until he found a clean diaper. Auntie Glo had no sense of order and no appreciation for cleanliness. That’s what Granny started saying three months ago, when she and Nicky moved in with them. He let out a frustrated sigh like Granny would.

  “Hold on. Be still for me.” Nicky was pink and doughy, and sometimes when Midnight held him, he pretended it was his baby sister and that Mommy stood right beside them and everything was the way it was supposed to be.

  With Nicky’s body wedged in the kitchen sink, Midnight ripped off the boy’s stinky diaper with a quick jerking motion and wiped him with a paper towel he soaked in liquid Ivory. Nicky’s arms and legs flailed, splashing water, some of it stinging Midnight’s eyes.

  After cleaning up Auntie Glo’s son, he fixed himself a peanut butter sandwich and grabbed a gallon jug of water. He turned it up to his lips, ignoring Granny’s voice in his head saying it’s not proper to drink from the container.

  Midnight heard a door open down the hallway and the pad of feet on the floor. Quickly, he wiped his mouth with the back of his arm and shoved the water back in the fridge.

  “You’re up early,” Granny sa
id. A pale light flickered down the hall and she walked into the kitchen rubbing her eyes. “Made your own breakfast, too, I see.”

  Midnight had lived with his grandmother for six months, ever since the day he watched Daddy whack Granny’s knickknacks with his aluminum lunch box.

  She’d said, The day you married my daughter, I knew you were trouble. But she wouldn’t listen.

  Bay horse head vases crashed to the floor and cracked, along with porcelain angel bells that still rang faintly after they hit the ground. Granny crumpled in the corner between the front door and the wall, deflating, like somebody had stuck a pin in her. The general manager at the plant had told Daddy and the others that they were shipping production overseas.

  No one knew what to say to Daddy when he lost his job. After his big blowup, Granny found Midnight hiding in the bathtub. Without saying anything, she sat on the edge and put his head against her stomach and rubbed his hair the way Mommy used to do when he was sick.

  This morning, Granny fixed herself a bowl of oatmeal and a scrambled egg, nothing sweet anymore. She said if you did something or avoided doing something long enough, it became a habit.

  When Granny found out she had diabetes and had to start poking herself with needles every day, Midnight rummaged through her cupboards and checked food labels, throwing away anything with more than a few grams of sugar. He dumped chocolate hazelnut spread, Frosted Krispies, and pickle relish. She hid caramel nougats in the pockets of her housecoat, and he flushed those down the toilet after she went to sleep.

  On the mantel was a picture of Granny in one of those big purple church hats tilted enough to cover her left eye. Must have been taken Easter Sunday, since that’s the only time she went to church. His best friend Corey’s folks took him to church a lot, but Granny had taken Midnight to get his first library card, and had taught him how to bake a lemon Bundt cake from scratch and how to change a diaper, insisting there was no such thing as women’s work and men’s work. The same summer she showed him how to thread a needle, she also made sure he could change a tire. He didn’t mind not being taken to church like Corey.