by Robin Farmer
“Why don’t you take a nap?” I won’t tell. Something flickers in his eyes. Sadness? Man, I can’t stand Mom.
“I’m glad your brother didn’t see,” he gestures at the window, “all that foolishness last night. You, okay?” He rubs my cheek, and suddenly I’m undone. The cockiness rediscovered minutes ago vanishes and my deepest fear comes clean.
“Are you two going to dddi . . . vorce?” Saying that horrible word makes the possibility of it more real, which makes me collapse into a bawling heap. Lately, pain clings to me like gum on a shoe.
“Ssssh, no one wants a . . . that.” Daddy avoids my word. “I’m not going anywhere.” He pats my eyes dry with his hanky. “Focus on getting along with that nun and winning—” Angling his head, he snaps his fingers. “When’s that contest?”
My heavy heart lightens up with a quickness. The hope that fortune cookie and horoscope gave me minutes ago balloons back. Daddy mentioning the writing contest is no coincidence.
“February and I’m taking gold this year,” I chirp. “First place or nada.”
Grinning, he stands and stretches. “I can see it.” He snaps photos of me with an imaginary camera as I pageant wave. “Even if you take third or get an honorable mention, we’ll be there rooting.”
“We?”
Daddy tilts his head as if he misheard. “Your family, what other we is there, silly?”
“W-e doesn’t work without y-o-u. When are you coming home?”
Daddy looks down at the floor then back at me with bright eyes. “Soon. We had a disagreement that blew up. Our biggest problem yesterday should have been stomachaches from too much cake.” He flashes a dimpled smile. His eyes say everything will work out. “I’m sorry you saw us acting like that. I love your mother. Call me at Uncle Jimmy’s if you need me.”
That’s where he is. My stomach stops feeling like a pretzel.
We step into the hall and find Charles sitting on the top step, clearly eavesdropping.
“Find a movie you two want to see this weekend.” Daddy hugs us at the bottom of the staircase.
Squeezing his waist, I realize winning a first-place medal four months from now will do more than prove I’m the best writer in eighth grade. It’s the ticket to reuniting us. And proving to Sister my words matter.
We follow Daddy outside, where he says he’ll stop by tomorrow and check on us.
“Yay,” I say, “because we didn’t talk about Malcolm X. I’m learning tons.”
“There’s a documentary about him that was nominated for an Academy Award last year,” Daddy says. “It’s at Uncle Duke’s community center next month. Maybe we can go.”
“I’d love that.” I beam at him.
He slides into his Roadrunner, honks twice, and drives off. I vow that when he stops by tomorrow, I’ll work up the courage to ask what happened. Bet he tells me to keep what he says between us. We have other secrets. What’s one more?
Mom walks in minutes later. She probably waited until Daddy drove off.
“Daddy just left. How long is he staying at Mom-Mom’s?”
She shrugs, hands me the newspaper. I trail her into the dining room as she glances at mail. Her blank expression when I mention my father bothers me.
“How long is he staying at Mom-Mom’s?” I repeat.
“I don’t know.” She pauses to cast a side long glance. “Why didn’t you ask him?”
“He’s not staying with Mom-Mom.”
She crosses her arms. “So why ask questions when you know the answers?”
I swallow the scream forming in my throat. “What did Sister Elizabeth say?”
“That you have a tendency to be mouthy, which I know to be true.”
“I did nothing wrong. I honestly answered her question. You see how big she—”
Mom shushes me with a raised finger. “We spoke by phone. I couldn’t leave work.”
“Oh! My! God! You have to meet her face to face to see what I’m dealing with.”
“I made my point. There will be no round two.” She frowns at Daddy’s newspaper spread out on the table.
“What’s Uncle Jimmy’s number again?”
“Why do you need it?”
“To call Daddy.”
Mom’s shoulders tense. “It’s at work. He changed it. I’ll give it to you tomorrow.”
She’s a few feet away but it feels like we are worlds apart. Mom clears her throat.
“What your father and I are dealing with is grown folks’ business.” Her eyes narrow. “So stay in a child’s place, nosey. I told you to stay off the phone, motor mouth.”
“You told me to stay off my phone.”
“You’ll be on punishment until you stand on your head and spit wooden nickels.”
Her ridiculous sayings rival Sister Elizabeth’s. Talking to her is as useless as eating soup with a fork. She hates when I suck my teeth so I do it super loud and hurry away, taking comfort in knowing she’s freshly annoyed.
The next day I sleep until mid-morning because I can.
For hours after I wake up, I lose myself in Malcolm’s fascinating story until I crave a sugar rush.
I head out (after being careful to take the phone off the hook), passing row houses dotted with “For Sale” signs. Above me, telephone wires bear several old sneakers and a few gray rubbernecking pigeons. I cross the street to avoid bird crap dropping in my hair. Dad calls pigeons “rats of the sky.”
Mr. Hostetler’s face lights up when I enter the basement candy store. Even though the Hostetlers smell like mothballs mixed with lotion, we dig them. They were the first white neighbors to welcome us when we moved in. How long their store remains open is unclear. Their family wanted them to move like yesterday since most of their customers are Black kids.
“My sweet Roberta, school let out half a day?”
“I had an upset stomach. I feel better.” With their old hearts, fibbing works best.
I get butterscotch Tastykakes and Mallo Cups. I hand him a dollar, but he winks.
“Thank you, Mr. Hostetler.”
“Feel better, Roberta. Tell your parents I said hello.”
I hurry home and hang up the phone so calls can get through. It rings. It’s Mom. Perfect timing.
“Get your father’s suitcase ready. He’ll swing by.”
“Mom, when do you think—”
“I’ll bring pretzels home for dessert,” she says, cutting me off. “See you soon.”
Then Daddy calls. “Hey, Pumpkin.” He exhales, and I picture the cigarette in his fingers. “I’m working double shifts. I’ll pick up my suitcase when I take y’all to the movies. Okay?”
“Okay.” I try to swallow questions bubbling up. About being Black and Catholic. About divorce. About Malcolm. About what to do when your heart thunders. I chew my lip, but the most pressing question slips out. “What happened?”
A deep sigh follows his quiet breathing. “You know better than to ask me that.” His tone is clipped like with Mom sometimes. It pushes me away. “I gotta go. Listen to your mom. Love you!”
“Love you, too.”
The calls ends, but I stare at the receiver’s greasy holes, wishing they offered clues.
My parents’ marriage is a lot like Bible stories. The details don’t make sense. Mom nags Daddy, who always works overtime, about money so much that she now works. That infuriates him since he says her job is to stay home. But two paychecks don’t seem enough.
During one fight that forced me to turn up The Brady Bunch, Mom screamed that we better not get the lights turned off again and reminded Daddy we had no heat for a week. She didn’t mention if he was gambling on card games.
Daddy stayed with Mom-Mom after fights. But not always. I overheard Mom on the phone say she drove over there one night while we slept. His car wasn’t there. She also said she’s hiding money just in case. In case of what, I do not know.
Lies and secrets, like the holy spirit Mom-Mom sent through prayer, fill our house.
CHAPTE
R 6
I’m nervous about returning to class tomorrow. Unable to discuss it with Daddy who stays working, Mom will have to do. But as soon as I step into the kitchen, she sends me to the store for detergent.
Heading toward the avenue I recall how I landed on Sister’s hit list long before, on the third day of school. Thinking back to that day gives me a stitch in my side.
That day, I ran into the schoolyard, which was empty except for Stephanie sporting two fluffy Afro puffs. Her hair looked like two servings of brown cotton candy attached to her head.
“Love it.” I squeezed a springy puff. It bounced back to its original afrotastic shape.
“Mom did it,” Stephanie said. “She was in a good mood after trashing her girdles.”
We giggled like first-graders as we rushed inside and took the stairs two at a time.
“I never want to wear one, even though my butt is big,” I said, chuckling.
“You have a cute shape,” Stephanie said fingering her right puff. “I tried to wear an Afro, but my hair won’t stand up in the middle.”
“Your hair is pretty like that.” Her stick figure required no comment. “I’m sick of my press and curl,” I said as we round the landing. “I had an Afro this summer. Boys called me fine. White folks said my hair was soft . . .” I giggled. “. . . like cotton.”
Stephanie chuckled wryly along with me. “I bet it was pretty. You have good hair. So what—” Two seventh-grade boys racing up the steps nearly knocked Stephanie over. But so could a hearty breeze.
“Girl, you better stand up for yourself.”
“Boys are stupid, I don’t care,” Stephanie said. “Whatcha do over the weekend?”
“My dad took us to the drive-in. We saw Billy Jack.”
“You like it?”
“Yup, except when Charles farted in 3-D. Girl, it was a struggle to breathe!”
We laugh as I remember the worst part of the night that had started with Daddy whacking the metallic box attached to his window.
“The speaker is real raggedy,” he said as it hissed and crackled.
Mom frowned at the speaker and fished out a cigarette and a pack of matches. She was about to strike a match when Dad whipped out his lighter and lit the end of her Salem.
“Look at you! Listening to all these no-men-having women libbers killing chivalry,” Daddy said. “You used to wait for me to light your cigarette. Don’t want men opening doors, pulling out chairs, treating you well.” He shook his head.
Charles and I rolled our eyes. We knew this argument well.
Mom blew a cloud of smoke that took its time exiting. “I do want that, but I need you to help me carry the load, pay bills. How about that?”
“Daddy, can you turn up the volume?” I asked.
“I guess next you’ll be telling me you’re going back to school,” Daddy snorted.
“And?” Mom softened her tone. “You know I wanted to teach.”
“Mom, I didn’t know that,” I said, leaning forward. “What happened?”
“You!” she said.
Full-throated laughter filled the car. It didn’t last because Daddy continued. “I say, ‘Hey, let’s take the kids, do something fun as a family.’ But,” he thumped the steering wheel, “you just have to put a hard-working brother down.”
“Chuck, you started this nonsense over me not waiting for you to light my cigarette.”
Charles gave me a do-something nudge. “People are staring!”
I slumped.
“I’m doing the best I can,” Dad said, pausing to light his own cigarette. “We have a roof over our heads, three meals a day, two cars, kids in private school—”
“Which reminds me. Tuition payment is late, the one you were supposed to pay last month,” Mom said. “We keep being late, and they will kick us off the payment plan.”
“Stop listening to women talking about not needing a man. I take care of mine.”
“That and a dime gives me a whopping ten cents,” Mom muttered.
Daddy responded by slapping the steering wheel and accidentally honking the horn.
“Nothing I do is good enough!” Daddy yelled.
“Lower your voice,” Mom hissed.
“I will say what I want, how I want and when I want. None of these damn people pay my bills!” Daddy glared at Mom and the air sizzled. Then he turned to us. “Popcorn?”
“Yes!” We responded with relief.
Slamming the door, he made the speaker work. We watched the film in silence.
I told Stephanie a happier version. We beat the late bell and entered homeroom smiling. At my then front-row desk by the door, I removed from my book bag textbooks in glossy covers instead of grocery bags cut to fit. Everything felt new-school-year fresh.
I peered over at Sister to see if she still looked like her feet hurt when I noticed that she looked more pained than usual while watching Stephanie load books into her desk.
Later, in history class, Sister kept eyeballing Stephanie as if she stole something.
“When you get your pop quizzes back, most of you will be rendered speechless by your dismal performance. I suspect your brains went to mush over the summer.”
I aced it so I asked to be excused.
Returning from the lavatory, I wasted time retying my shoe outside the class door. That’s when I hear Stephanie whine, “I like my hair this way.”
In full Nancy Drew mode, I pulled my thick curls back and peeked into the classroom.
“Why do you want to look like the least common denominator?” Sister asked. She towered over Stephanie, who looked like she was melting into her desk. “You’re a pretty girl, but that hairstyle is not becoming?”
Maybe it was from reading Malcolm X’s book, which I had just started. Maybe I felt bolder with the record number of Black students this year, about 300 out of 1,200. Maybe it was Stephanie shrinking at being told her beautiful hair was anything but.
Breathing fast, I rushed in and blurted out, “Her hair has nothing to do with the least common denominator. Our natural hair is beautiful.”
Sister cupped one hand behind an ear. “Excuse me? Was I addressing you?”
“I’m just saying—”
“That you eavesdropped on a conversation that,” she glanced around the room, “as students like to say, was between A and B, so C your way out.”
“Good one, Sister,” Geoffrey said.
Laughter from the class set my jaw on edge. I slid into my desk, cheeks warm at Sister’s effort to be hip at my expense.
I raised my hand. Sister looked skeptical as she nodded for me to speak.
“Is there a rule against wearing our hair the way we want to?”
“No, as long as it’s clean and you don’t impede your classmates’ view.”
The next day I showed up with my humongous Afro, which is what got me reassigned to the back of the class and put me squarely in Sister’s crosshairs.
Thinking about Sister’s antics almost gets me hit by a car on the way back from the store.
I wait until we do kitchen chores to express my fears. “I’m worried what Sister Elizabeth may do to me,” I blurt out as I sweep up Charles’s crumbs. “What answer do you think she expected?”
Mom stops stacking dishes. “Don’t be. She won’t put her hands on you again. You know I asked about Jefferson. She said his views reflected the times. I said people even then knew slavery was wrong. Some things are black-and-white. He was definitely a hypocrite.”
“Right on, Mom!” My pulse quickens and the air feels lighter.
Mom grins and squeezes dish detergent into the sink.
“She lied when she said Africans weren’t needed. Black people built this country.”
“You got that right.” Mom turns on the faucet as I empty the dustpan into the trash.
“Did you know Malcolm X’s teacher called him a nigger when he was my age?”
Mom’s smile fades. “I read his book years ago. When did you start?”
&n
bsp; “Last month. We have something else in common. He couldn’t stand hypocrites.”
“Interesting that you’ve been using that word a lot lately.”
“Mom, look up hypocrite, Sister’s and Jefferson’s faces will leer back at you.”
“Who gave you permission to read that book?”
“Huh?” I stop wiping the table. “I didn’t know I needed permission.”
“Thirteen isn’t grown, miss. You can’t keep taking things. I saw it in your room while picking up the dirty clothes I keep telling you to put in the hamper.”
“You take Daddy’s book while I was out?”
She nods. Something closes up in me. Chewing the inside of my cheek to hold my anger in, it escapes anyway.
“I can always go to the Free Library and borrow a copy, Mom.”
“Oh, so you’re going to do what you want and have the gall to tell me to my face?”
“You encourage us to read and now you’re banning books? That’s censorship.”
“It’s called parenting. I didn’t say you can’t read it, I said get permission.”
“Daddy and I talk about it all the time,” I huff, gripping the broom handle.
“Then why was he looking for his book all last week?”
What’s really going on? Is she mad she failed to toss his book, too? Hand to God, she gets the silent treatment until Daddy returns. Super glue can’t seal my mouth tighter.
“I have Daddy’s permission.”
“But you don’t have mine.”
Nope, not asking either. All the nopers in Noperville say nah. I look away. The scorched wall from the grease fire is ugly and crumbly like our relationship.
“Think you’re grown? Be grown then. Wash and dry.” She wrings out the dishcloth and slaps it down. “You better not touch that book without my permission.” She bolts.
If someone had to leave, why not her? Guilt instantly slaps me upside my head. Now I’m breaking part of the fifth commandment: Honor thy father and mother. I’ll be in confession for a year at this rate.
Rubbing the dishcloth too hard against a glass stained with Mom’s lipstick, I crack it, nicking my finger. I hold it under the faucet and watch the blood wash clean. Why am I the only one in pain here?
