Love in a Carry-On Bag

by Johnson, Sadeqa

  While crossing the street, it dawned on Erica that throughout her life she had been waiting for her mother to have her “Ahhh ha” moment and change into the respectable, available, working-class mother that she wanted. After all of these years she was still hoping.

  Her mother shouted after her. “Love you, Slim.”

  And as Erica dodged between traffic, she wondered which lie was bigger—her mother paying her back or that she actually loved her.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Not Love, but Circumstance

  Erica had no overnight bag when she arrived at the Wyndham Hotel at Franklin Plaza in downtown Philadelphia. Her leather tote was stuffed with a new pair of panties and a pantsuit she purchased from an inexpensive boutique along Broadway.

  Although the reservation was in Warren’s name, she was the first to arrive. Their hotel suite opened into the living area, facing the flat-screen television. The heavy taupe drapery was pushed open, exposing a terrific view of the Philadelphia skyline. The stars looked like crystal droplets suspended against blackness. On the coffee table was a woven basket filled with exotic cheeses, colorful fruits, fancy mixed nuts and tea biscuits tied together with a heart-shaped balloon and the words “I Love You” stenciled in metallic gold. Erica was tickled by the gesture; Warren knew her well.

  The plan was for them to meet by eight, spend the night together and wake for work before dawn. But Warren was late, and that made Erica nervous. In the bathroom mirror she checked her reflection several times, fingering through her red hair, adding shiny mascara, dabbing away eye shadow and glossing up the pout of her lips. It had only been nine days since she last saw Warren, but when he finally walked through the door with his cell phone tucked at his ear, cap pulled low on his head, face filled with that crooked smile, brows thick and full, cashmere coat swinging behind him, and his pinstriped suit revealing nothing of his long day, she felt herself lean forward, like a baby who wanted up. It was in his arms that she felt the warmth of his breath and the coolness of his cheek as they tangled themselves around each other. Swaying like driftwood, their bodies moaned sweet nothings to each other through the barrier of unwanted clothing.

  Warren made the drinks: Scotch neat for him, red wine swirled for her, and they sipped while catching each other up on the day. “Distant Lover” by Marvin Gaye crooned from the clock radio and Erica held her hand out to Warren for a slow drag. The power of him had already begun gathering between her legs, but she wanted her heat to last until the cry of the morning birds. It had been too long, and even longer if Erica counted when it was good, normal. She needed this. They needed this.

  Spinning her and then pulling her close, Warren dipped Erica and hummed the melody in her ear. His voice was hot on her throat and the sensual hard-day-at-work scent drifting from his body made her nipples warm. She wrapped her arms around his waist and tugged on his belt. The moment could have gone on like that forever, but then Warren opened his mouth, and the spell they had created completely shattered.

  “Before I forget, my father needs me at the church Friday night. What time are you getting in?”

  Erica blinked, not meaning to stutter but did, “F… first thing Saturday morning.”

  He dropped his hands and Erica tried explaining. “I have to go to L.A. for the Image Awards, but I’ll be back in time for…” but then Warren shocked her into silence by swiping at the radio, making it crash to the carpet.

  “Unfucking believable. So that’s what this is all about. I should have known.” Anger mucked the whites of his eyes.

  “What?” she asked, feeling as dumb as the word sounded. Warren threw back his drink and moved from the bedroom to the living room.

  “So you thought you could fuck away missing my father’s wedding.”

  “No. What are you talking about?”

  “You are such a brilliant bullshit artist. I can’t believe I didn’t see this coming.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Fair? Well what is? It certainly isn’t fair that I no longer fit into your plans.”

  “I didn’t say that,” she wrung her hands.

  “It’s never in what you say, Erica,” said Warren. The fury in his eyes was palpable.

  Over the last few weeks, Warren had been through more than she could even imagine. And when Erica offered to meet him in Philadelphia, it was a relief. She had been his life support for so long, going two weeks without her in the midst of so much chaos made life unbearable. Warren needed Erica. He needed to be close and feel her skin against his if only for a few hours to rejuvenate his soul, so that he could get on with things. Now she wasn’t even real to him. Who was this selfish girl standing in front of him? He could hire a hooker to be more available than Erica, and that was the thought that burst the pimple.

  “I can’t do this anymore,” flew from his mouth and he clinched his teeth, choking down the urge to take his words back.

  The phrase hung in the air for so long that a few moments passed before Erica really felt the prick from the sting. But when it hit her, it was like a full blast of steamed gas.

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” She searched for his eyes, but when he wouldn’t give them to her, she dug her fingernails into his arm.

  “Stop.” He shook her off.

  “You stop. This is bullshit.”

  But his chest sank in defeat. “This hasn’t been working.”

  “That doesn’t mean we stop trying. I love you. Don’t do this.” She reached for his arm again, but this time he pulled out of the way.

  “Stop, Erica. Just stop it.”

  But she didn’t, and came at him with a flying fist that he grabbed midair.

  “It’s too late. Just stop.”

  “The fuck you mean it’s too late.” She was shouting but didn’t seem to care, and before she could come at him again, Warren picked up his briefcase, mumbling that he was sorry it had to end like this.

  “Good luck in L.A. and with the promotion. I really hope you find what you’re looking for,” he offered, and without a second glance closed the door behind him with a soft thud.

  Erica had every intention to run after him but her feet wouldn’t move. It was as if a sudden paralysis had come over her. The patter of his footsteps had died, and the elevator must have chimed half a dozen times, while the “I Love You” balloon rocked from side to side mocking her.

  “Warren,” she called finally, surprising herself with the desperation of her voice, and then she opened the door and ran after him. The elevator was moving too slow, and if she wasn’t on the twentieth floor she would have taken the stairs. In the lobby, she searched the restaurant, the bar and every lounge chair scattered throughout the floor.

  “Where’s the parking garage?” she asked a bell hop in a red and black uniform. He pointed her to the right. Now she was running like her life depended on it, with wild tears dampening her cheeks. Don’t do this Warren, she repeated over and over again. Opening the door to the parking area, she saw two men dressed in identical uniforms. One had a cigarette behind his ear.

  “Did a man come for a red Yukon Denali? Tall guy, brown skin, long coat,” she started describing, not caring that her face was surely blackened with mascara.

  “Yes ma’am. Pulled off a few minutes ago,” said Mr. Cigarette, while the other reached into his breast pocket for a tissue. It was then that the cold from the cement registered, and Erica realized that she had left the hotel room in her stocking feet. She asked the man if she could have his cigarette, allowing him to light it. Hugging herself on the metal bench, she inhaled hard as the men rushed back and forth, moving cars.

  The scent of motor oil made her think of her father, and just like that she was back in her house on Monroe Street in Newark, standing barefoot on the shiny hardwood floors. Her ten-year-old shoulders pressed against the frosted-glass vestibule door, blocking her father from leaving, and like then, the man she loved with everything still went.

  PART 2

  I
used to want the words “she tried” on my tombstone, now I want “she did it.”

  Katherine Dunham

  To be a great musician, you’ve got to be open to what’s new, what’s happening at the moment. You have to be able to absorb it if you’re going to continue to grow and communicate.

  Miles Davis

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Monroe Street

  Erica could remember the day her father walked out on them. Jazmine had stayed home from school that morning with a sore throat, so she dawdled in both directions alone. It was a brisk autumn afternoon, and tri-colored leaves covered the lawns of her neighbors as she sauntered from her after-school stop at the library. Even though it wasn’t late, the sky was getting dark; the Sunday before Erica had turned back their clocks to observe Daylight Savings Time. It had been her job to adjust all of the timepieces, but the one in the kitchen was too high, and she had to wait for her father to take it down. Ms. Hauptmann was her teacher, and she was just settling into fifth grade hoping that the pimples rising on her cheeks were just a passing phase. She had a crush on Javier, a Puerto Rican in the sixth grade, and she was fantasizing about what it would feel like to kiss him when she slipped the key from around her neck and unlocked the front door.

  The soap opera Guiding Light was on, and Reva and Philip Spaulding were laughing about shaking up a blue blooded party. But their glee didn’t have any effect on her mother, who was sitting limp on the peach floral couch. She was still wearing her nightgown, the sheer blue one that she wouldn’t part with even though the hem had come loose against her left knee. Her eyelids were puffy and her hair was soggy against her forehead. Her shoulders sagged away from the sofa.

  “What’s the matter with you?” Erica kicked off her oxford shoes and tightened the band around her bushy ponytail.

  “Nothin’,” her mother uttered, but her hand shook as she stretched the remote and turned down the volume. “How was your day?”

  “What’s wrong?” Erica could feel a heaviness pressing down on them like thick smoke.

  “There ain’t no easy way to tell you this. I already told Jazmine.” Her mother kept her eyes trained on the hardwood floor.

  “Tell me what?”

  “Your daddy’s moving out.”

  “Huh?” The six Now and Laters Erica had sucked down on the way home felt like gallstones in her belly. “What’re you talking about?”

  “Leavin’,” her mother’s voice broke and fresh tears fell. “I ’on’t know where. He’ll be here in a little bit to get his things.”

  “So you have to make him stay.” Erica clenched her fist.

  “Girl, I can’t make that man do nothing that he ’on’t want to do. You might as well go start your homework. Ya sister’s upstairs lying down.”

  The first floor of their home was railroad style, so Erica had to pass through the dining room to get to the breakfast area where she did her work. As she unzipped her book bag she heard her mother moving the seat cushions of the loveseat. Then she heard the cap twist. The tilt and sip to her mother’s lips was silent but Erica knew she was drinking, and resentment burned through her chest like a smashed bottle of hot pepper sauce.

  It was her mother’s fault that her father was leaving. If only she would act right, stop running the streets with Bonnie, get a job, try harder so he wouldn’t get so angry. Erica tugged on her ponytail and wondered how they would survive without him?

  She idolized her father and wanted to be just like him. Whenever she asked him a question he knew the answer, never needing to go to a dictionary to look up the spelling or meaning of a word. It was him who sparked Erica’s longtime affair with reading. Once a month, he took her to the black-owned bookstore on Broad Street in Newark, picking out books on slavery and black historical figures.

  “Don’t ever stop learning,” he would say while explaining the material to her at a level that she understood.

  Every Saturday she worked with him in the garage tallying up receipts, mopping oil and sorting auto parts. Over turkey sandwiches stuffed with sour cream potato chips, they discussed poetry by Langston Hughes, Claude McKay and Sonia Sanchez. Jazz was always playing in the shop and her father would stop her in mid-sentence, asking, “What instrument do you hear?”

  “Trumpet?”

  “Close, alto sax, baby,” he’d tease, ruffling her hair. Their relationship was easy and free. They were thick as peanut butter, two halves of the same whole. Erica was his main girl. So this business of him leaving had to be a lie and Erica decided to pretend like her mother hadn’t said anything at all.

  At the table, she turned her attention to the fraction worksheet that Ms. Hauptmann assigned. But after two problems, the equations bled into each other. She couldn’t concentrate because her stomach hurt and her ears were cocked for the sound of her dad’s tires rolling into the driveway. Every noise made her jump: a basketball bouncing, teenagers talking mess, horns honking, neighbors calling their dogs in from the yard. Her nerves were muddled and tangled and she knew the only thing that would calm her was a word search puzzle. So she pulled her book from her bag and started seeking words associated with the desert.

  Three puzzles later, his key turned in the door and Erica was out of her seat, running to greet him.

  “Daddy,” she shouted, throwing her arms around his waist. She was growing like corn stalk and her head reached the top of his chest. As he kissed her forehead she could smell spearmint on his breath. When he pulled away his manila-colored face looked oily and long. His posture, which was usually so erect and poised, was droopy and unsure. Something was indeed wrong.

  “Did your mother tell you?” The tweed cap he wore was so low Erica could barely see his brown eyes, and his navy work jacket had a bleach stain on the elbow patch, because her mother was terrible at laundry.

  “Tell me what?” she feigned innocence.

  “I told her, but she need to hear it from you,” her mother’s voice invaded their privacy, and Erica cut her eyes up at the ceiling wishing her mother would just disappear.

  “You can’t do nothing right,” he grumbled on his way upstairs with Erica on his heels like a loyal puppy. She followed him down the long hallway to the back bedroom that used to be her parents’ but was now just her father’s because her mother slept with her. The tattered suitcase that she and Jazmine took to Grandma Queeny’s house on weekends sat at the foot of the bed, and the old zipper stretched and groaned under the weight of his wardrobe.

  “Where are you going, Daddy?” Erica asked when he reached under the bed for his second pair of work boots. Even with the evidence in front of her she still refused to believe.

  “I’m moving into the apartment on top of the garage.”

  “But why, Daddy?”

  He sat heavily on the edge of the bed and removed his cap. A misty sheen had gathered in his eyes. “Things haven’t been right between your mother and me in a long time.”

  “So, she can keep sleeping with me. I won’t complain. Just don’t go,” she whined and he opened his arms to her. Erica fell against her father and clung to him so tight it was hard for her to breathe. They rocked for what felt like forever and all of the fear that had been rising since she walked in from school poured out.

  “Ta... take me with you.”

  “I can’t, E-bird. Girls need their mother,” he squeezed her shoulder. “I’ll still come get you on Saturdays to work at the garage. Nothing will change.” He rose to his feet and picked up the heavy bag.

  “But it will.”

  Erica pleaded with him down the long hallway and on the stairs. By the time he set the suitcase down in the living room, she was beside herself, and had thrown her skinny frame and blocked the entrance to the vestibule door.

  “Come on baby, I’ll be back soon,” her father promised, but his words held no value and when Erica moved from the door she threw herself on him again. The commotion must have woken up Jazmine because she ran down the steps. When she saw what was going on she
joined Erica’s tantrum. Both girls carried on with fever. Jazmine was on the floor holding his legs, and without thinking Erica kicked the suitcase over and stomped it with her foot.

  “Enough,” her mother intervened. “Girls, you can’t cage a man who wanna be free.”

  “What are you talking about, Gweny? You ain’t got no cause to speak. This is on you,” he pointed his finger.

  “You’re the one leavin’,” she replied, and her sad eyes hung heavy and the room fell quiet.

  Erica was thinking about the Jets season, which had already begun. How could she watch a football game without her father? Right before Thanksgiving, they would turn their attention to basketball. They didn’t have a favorite team, so they rooted for coaches and players. That year, they were going for the 76ers.

  “What about the game? You promised to take me to Philadelphia,” Erica screeched.

  Her father rubbed her back and then wrapped his callused hands around the suitcase for the final time.

  The air was humid and stuffy when he kissed her cheek goodbye, the tears so blinding and hot, she didn’t even feel his lips. Watching him through the white screen door, Erica held Jazmine’s hand while tattooing a picture of her father on her heart. She strained her ears for some type of music, something to remember him by as the engine of his Chevy Impala turned over. But there was none. The car pulled away from her life as silent as a hearse heading for a funeral. Erica was left unprotected, and fully in charge for the first time. She was 10 years old.