Malawi's Sisters

by Melanie S. Hatter

  “Girl, what do you know about jungle fever?”

  “Enough to know to stay away from white boys.”

  Her sister’s words had given Ghana pause. She wondered if Ryan was just interested in the exotic, rebelling against his parents. She’d never asked him, afraid perhaps of what he would say. But when he invited her to dinner with his parents, they welcomed her. His mother awkwardly asked about her hair—does she do it herself, does she get it trimmed, was it all her own hair? Perhaps Ghana’s expression caused the woman’s cheeks to flush a bright red. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know anything about, what do you call them, braids?”

  “No, no. It’s fine.” Ghana wanted to put the woman at ease realizing there was no malice in her questions, just simple curiosity, an attempt to connect. So she explained her hair was a style called dreadlocks. “Some black women do have what we call extensions, you know, fake hair that gets sewn into their own. Mine is all natural. It’s taken a number of years to get this long, but I visit a friend who twists it for me to keep it from getting matted.”

  “I swear,” the woman had said. “All women, no matter their race, have issues with their hair. Mine’s starting to fall out and by the time I’m seventy, I’ll be bald as an eagle. Maybe you could help me pick out a wig?”

  They laughed then and Ghana felt accepted, knowing she could be herself with Ryan’s mother. If he was rebelling, it hadn’t worked. Although, she wasn’t so sure about his father, who seemed to keep a slight distance. “He likes you,” Ryan said with a wry smile. “He’s just wary of women who get tattoos.” Ghana didn’t let it worry her. If Ryan’s mother liked her, that’s what counted.

  Now, though, she wondered if the divide between them was simply too wide. This blond, blue-eyed man, who wore a uniform with a badge and carried a gun. He belonged to a community that too often inflicted pain and degradation on her people. Across the country, black men and women were dying at the hands of police and vigilantes. The numbers grew every day. It was frightening. And now her sister. Another statistic. Murdered by a white man who said he was afraid. Afraid! Ghana blew snot into a tissue, folded it over and wiped her nose.

  Ryan wasn’t evil, she knew that. He wouldn’t kill someone because of the color of their skin. Still, maybe it was time to walk away, sever her connection to a populace that believed black people didn’t matter.

  22

  Bet tidied around her studio wondering if she was ready to paint again. The prescription had been working, gifting her each night with heavy sleep like a newborn; she felt human again. She skimmed through her sketches of Malawi. Pencil drawings of her daughter seated on the couch. She’d been developing into such a beautiful woman, so smart and thoughtful. “Dear God, why did you take her?”

  The sudden burst of noise from the phone shocked her and she froze, listening to it ring, as if any movement would give away to the caller that she was home. When it stopped, she exhaled and gathered stray paint brushes, setting them together in a box.

  Malcolm wanted her to go with him to Florida for this stupid protest march, but a knot had lodged in her chest at the thought of going back there. The march was in Malawi’s name; Teddy said the family should be there.

  Teddy Livingston. Cocky son-of-a-bitch. Bowing to Malcolm and being overly loyal as if he hadn’t once planned to steal his wife. She wondered if guilt had him acting as Malcolm’s champion. What would have happened had she left Malcolm for him? This thought plagued her at times when she wasn’t happy, though deep down, she loved Malcolm and thanked God he’d forgiven her. Thanked God he’d stayed.

  A sliver of light reached through the basement window, just touching the long wooden workbench. The floorboards creaked as she shifted her weight and surveyed her workspace—the stacks of paintings (some she’d completed, some she’d abandoned halfway through), the art supplies that could fill a store, and the old oak drafting table she’d found in an antique store in Virginia. The room needed dusting.

  Her father poked his way into her mind. He had resurrected himself, for reasons she hadn’t yet figured out. As a child, she had stuffed him into a dark box inside her mind and told the world he’d died when she was eight. Truth was, he had died in prison when she was seventeen. From a lung infection, according to a letter her mother received. Good riddance. But here he was now, in her thoughts. Seated on a high stool, she closed her eyes and saw him reach for her, cuddling and kissing her cheek, his rich laugh reverberating through her chest. How could she not have seen it then. Or perhaps she had, but wouldn’t admit how much Teddy reminded her of her father. That same “I got a secret” smile and wink.

  In many ways, Teddy was more handsome than Malcolm, roguish yet sweet and tender when he wanted to be, just like her father. Three, no four times they had shared a bed over two months. There’s no telling what would have happened had they not been caught, if his wife hadn’t hired a private detective who took pictures.

  “I adore you, Bet,” Teddy had whispered, nuzzling her neck in the darkness of a hotel room. Yes, yes, I adore you too: She’d kept the thought to herself, but it had surfaced each time they were together, and frightened her. “Come away with me,” he’d urged. “We can go to Europe and start over.” But she hadn’t wanted to go to Europe. She hadn’t wanted to leave Malcolm. Not really. She loved her husband, which didn’t explain Teddy’s allure. Just a fling, an indulgence of her desire, she reasoned. Though it had been more than that. Teddy had made her feel free, free of motherhood and from being the responsible judge’s wife. As tedious as her married life felt sometimes, Malcolm was safe, steady, reliable. There was comfort in that. Years after the affair, Teddy would look at her when their paths crossed at an official function, a look of longing. The one who got away, he’d said. But that would only be true if she had ever been his.

  She opened her eyes and looked around the room, searching for what to do next. Dust motes hung as if caught in the stream of light from the window. She didn’t want to return to Florida. Didn’t want to be anywhere near the place of her daughter’s murder. But she’d go. For Malcolm’s sake.

  And for Teddy.

  Flipping through an old notepad, she found drawings of all three girls when they were youngsters. Beautiful girls, all three. Each one a slightly different shade of brown, but all with the same dark chocolate eyes of their father. She stared at a recent sketch of Malawi on the couch then looked at the couch as if her daughter was sitting there now.

  “Can you hear me, Sweet Pea?” She walked over and settled into the cushions imagining Malawi lounging there, eyes down, focused on her smart phone, fingers tapping out messages to who knows who. “I miss you. Miss you a lot. I never really told you.” Her words disappeared instantly into the stagnant air. Bet rested one hand on top of the other. “Figured you knew. What mother doesn’t love her children? I hope you knew, but I should’ve told you.”

  She fell silent, her thoughts spinning through the years. Malcolm loved his girls with a gentleness Bet could never muster. Surely she could have been a better mother. To all of them. She winced at the memory of her anger at their chattering, their giggling and screaming at one another, such racket shattering her focus and disturbing her work. Fuming, she’d watch them run from her, escaping, huddling in Kenya’s room, humming and singing as if to drown her out. Their singing irritating her all the more, as if they cared nothing for her sanity. And now, thinking back, she didn’t understand why she’d been so angry at them. They were simply being children.

  She sank farther back into the cushions hugging the notebook of pictures to her chest. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “So, so sorry.”

  The doorbell startled her and she gripped the notebook tighter, holding her breath, waiting for the person at the door to go away. The bell rang again and when she heard rapid knocking, she decided to answer. Maybe it was Danita with more food. She laid the book on the couch and, wiping her palms across her face, took her time going up the stairs, still hoping the visitor would leave. She peeked
through the glass and saw the outline of a tall, thin woman. She closed her eyes. Good God, not Caroline.

  “Elizabeth? Elizabeth? Open the door!” Her mother-in-law’s voice shouted from the other side.

  Reluctantly, Bet opened and peered out. Caroline held two newspapers in her hand. “These were on the lawn.” The woman pushed through and strutted inside.

  “What’s going on?” she said and stared at Bet with those sharp, bird-like eyes that never missed a thing.

  Bet feigned a smile and said, “Well, hello Caroline. So good to see you. What brings you here?”

  Malcolm’s mother walked through the foyer to the kitchen and sat at the table. Bet obediently followed behind. Her mother-in-law was dressed in white slacks, a floral blouse and white sneakers. Her silver hair was trimmed neatly around her face and gold earrings dangled from her pierced ears. She looked in her late sixties instead of early eighties.

  “Would you like some coffee or tea? I think I have some lemonade in the fridge.”

  “You look better than I expected.” Caroline chewed on the inside of her cheek, a habit that annoyed Bet for reasons she didn’t know. “Malcolm says you’re not doing so well.”

  “Does he now?” Bet pulled out the carton of lemonade and shook it vigorously before pouring. She sat the tall glass on a coaster in front of her mother-in-law and took a seat opposite her. Caroline waited for a response and wouldn’t move until she got one, a stubbornness Bet had both admired and despised over the years.

  After their first meeting, Bet was certain Caroline hated her. Malcolm reassured her that his mother always was “a tad cold” toward any woman he dated, though he said he had only introduced her to two previous girlfriends. “She’s just protective,” he explained. The woman’s protectiveness had never wavered in the forty years Bet had known her.

  “I’ve lost a child, Caroline. How do you think I am?”

  Caroline said nothing for several moments, taking a short sip of her lemonade and wrinkling her nose slightly as she returned the glass to the coaster. “I lost two children before I had Malcolm. A girl in childbirth and a boy who died at two weeks old from a problem with his heart. I know what it’s like to lose a child. I know what it’s like to lose my parents, to lose a sister, and I know what it’s like to lose a husband. You may have forgotten, but Malawi was also my granddaughter, and I feel this loss as much as you do. So don’t act like you’re the only one in the world who is suffering.”

  Bet’s cheeks flushed hot. “You don’t have the right to come into my house and talk to me this way.”

  “No?” Caroline took another sip of lemonade, this time without the frown. “Malcolm may be your husband, but he’s still my son and I worry about both of you. Yes, both of you. What happens to you, happens to my son. What you feel, he feels. You are both in pain. I understand that, but this moping around the house, acting like you’re the only one in the world who has suffered a loss, is a complete waste of time. Get it together, Elizabeth, or you will lose more than your daughter.”

  Bet raised her eyebrows. “Is that some kind of threat?”

  Caroline laughed. “I have no reason to threaten you. What happens is your doing. Not mine. I’m just here to let you know you are on a slippery path, and if you’re not careful you’re going to fall over the cliff.” She stood up, smoothed her blouse and walked back to the foyer.

  Bet remained in the kitchen, seething at the audacity of that woman, angry that after all these years Caroline Walker could still get under her skin.

  And she’d wasted an entire glass of lemonade.

  23

  Kenya rummaged in her purse for a tissue and pressed it firmly on her forefinger, trying to stop the bleeding, trying to be discrete. Chewing the skin until it bled was a habit she had never understood, and struggled to stop. She folded over the tissue and dabbed the clean side on her temple. The temperature was hotter than she’d expected, and she knew the back of her dress was soaked with perspiration. She looked around hoping no one was paying attention to her despite sitting on a stage before a mass of people. She hoped she still appeared cute and stylish.

  Signs bobbed and swayed above the crowd: “Justice for Malawi” . . . “Make an Arrest” . . . “Black Lives Matter” . . . “Black Women Matter” . . . . Something about that last one stung. Until now, she hadn’t seen any headlines about black women being killed by cops or vigilantes. She was sure her sister wasn’t the first and wondered if the news media didn’t consider the deaths of black women as newsworthy enough. Black women did matter. They were mothers and daughters and sisters. And wives. She thought of Sidney, always expecting her to take care of everything at home, always taking her for granted. He had promised to be here today, but an important meeting had come up in New York. That was what happened when married to a man who ran an international events business. It made for a comfortable life, but he was never home, which gave him plenty of opportunity to stray. Two times that she knew of, but her gut said there’d been many more. She loved and hated him. The two emotions collided, bashing each other and jockeying for the forefront of her mind. She wanted to love him, to put his transgressions behind her. That was how her mother put it. “It’s a transgression. Something men do. You can’t blame them for it.”

  “Has Daddy cheated on you?”

  “Oh, heavens no.” Her mother had laughed as if it was unthinkable, but he was still a man.

  Junior kicked his feet against the legs of the metal chair and Charlene leaned heavily on Kenya’s arm. She should have left them at home, but when Sidney said, “no” to them attending the rally and then up and left for New York, she decided he didn’t get to dictate what she did with the kids.

  Ghana had stressed the event would be a teachable moment. “The children need to know,” Ghana said, her hands gesturing wildly. “They need to understand what kind of a world we live in, the horrors they face. Malawi is part of something bigger. This is a movement. We’re on the cusp of change and if we don’t engage the young people, then all hope is lost.”

  Her sister’s enthusiasm had inspired Kenya, swooping her up in the moment with the notion that the event would teach her children something about race and unity, something she hadn’t figured out how to teach them herself. Now sitting on a stage in front of all these emotional people, Kenya began to nibble another finger. She eyed her sister standing by the lectern, next to a woman (whose name Kenya had forgotten) speaking into a microphone. Television cameras were lined up along the front of the stage, filming every move made by anyone at the mic. Her father sat on the other side of Junior, calm, stoic. Her mother, next to him in dark glasses hiding dark circles around her eyes, and a straw hat with a small brim shading her face. Kenya looked back at her sister, dressed in a long skirt and a tank top, her jacket slung on the back of the seat next to Charlene. Such a hippie chick. But Kenya was glad it was her sister addressing the audience and not herself.

  Ghana was graceful as she stepped to the microphone, and this surprised Kenya. Her sister was eloquent, strong, passionate. All the things Kenya wished to be. Ghana was free. Free to be anything she wanted. In high school and college, Kenya panicked whenever she got a B; the fact that Ghana never got her bachelor’s degree dumbfounded Kenya, who would never have gotten away with not graduating. But then, look at her life. She got paid by the hour and probably had no health insurance. There was no security in that kind of a life.

  Junior patted her forearm. “Mom, when will the speeches be over? I want to march.”

  “I don’t know, Honey. Sit up. It won’t be long. Look at your Aunt Ghan-Ghan. Isn’t she beautiful?”

  Junior shrugged. Ghana was beautiful, Kenya thought. She wished she were more like Ghana.

  Speeches and more speeches, then everyone would march to the courthouse to demand the arrest of Jeffrey Davies, who apparently hadn’t been seen since the shooting. Ghana said a group had been camping outside his house with signs, and the police had come to make them leave him alone. Because
they were across the street and not on his property, the police couldn’t legally get them to move. Ghana found this amusing, but Kenya thought it was pathetic.

  “Too many of us are dying,” Ghana said, her voice echoing through the speakers into the air. “My sister will not die in vain. We must demand change.”

  The crowd burst into applause, and Kenya nudged her daughter to a sitting position and clapped her hands with a sudden burst of energy. The balled-up bloody tissue fell to her feet and a breeze shifted it toward the edge of the stage causing Kenya to panic. She watched it teeter like a red-spotted carnation afraid of it being blown into the audience. Then her father stood up drawing her back into the moment and she looked at Ghana, who glanced back, perhaps seeking reassurance or checking to make sure everyone was still awake, and Kenya stood up to applaud, forgetting the tissue. Her sister was a superstar.

  They marched slowly; this was Kenya’s first protest march. Some linked arms, making her feel awkward. She avoided linking arms by walking between Charlene and Junior. This wasn’t the march in Selma across the Pettus Bridge, after all, yet a weight settled in her stomach. A woman approached. Older, perhaps her mother’s age, wearing a bright green blouse and black pants. Arms outstretched, she took Kenya’s hands forcing Kenya to stop walking. The crowd nudged past.

  “I lost my brother,” the woman said. Her small eyes were full of tears yet to fall. “He was shot by the police. They just don’t care about us. Just don’t care.”

  Kenya wasn’t sure how to respond. “I’m so sorry,” she said, squeezing the woman’s hands. She didn’t understand why so many African Americans were being shot. And why Malawi? Ghana was right, this was bigger than the Walker family. Bigger than their loss and their pain.

  The woman said, “You’re not alone,” then pulled away, and Kenya gripped Junior and Charlene’s hands. As the crowd swallowed the woman, Kenya tightened her hold on her children and spied Ghana’s hair up ahead.