by Love Belvin
Renata nodded. “I leave in three weeks.”
“When did you decide this?”
“When I realized I can’t take this shit no more. Ain’t nothing around here. I ain’t like you. I don’t have a skill that can get me a scholarship nowhere, and definitely not to no place like fucking Blakewood. Them casino jobs are too shaky. My momma got laid off from Trop and went to Borgata just to get laid off and go to Caesars. That’s some bullshit shuffling them casinos be doing. I ‘on’t want that. Momma saying it’s too many of us in her trailer, and she right. She only got three bedrooms with nine of us living there.” For the first time, Renata shrugged, not knowing what more to say. “I ain’t got no kids. No man. So…”
“You sure this ain’t got nothing to do with Cleveland?”
She nodded, eyes hitting me with honesty. “It do. Some days it’s hard for me to get outta bed. This was my first time eating since yesterday morning. I think what brought my appetite back was you coming home. When you left for Blakewood, I started thinking about leaving, too. Then I went looking for the recruitment paperwork from the guy who visited Millville High my senior year.” She nodded. “I made the call last week. And now I’m just happy to hear you going back to Blakewood. It would fuck me up if you came back and I wasn’t here.”
It made sense. That was why she was giving me weird human vibes. My big cousin was making sure I’d be safely away from Millville. And I knew this was serious business for Renata and she had not come to the decision to enlist lightly. Her boyfriend that she was with for three years was murdered a year ago. He was mistaken for someone else by a drug crew. Cleveland was a good guy. He worked in the casinos for a few years. The guy really loved Renata. They tried having a baby since she was seventeen. That may have been early for some people, but around here, having kids was the only thing you could control. Getting married didn’t always work, but making babies did.
“Listen, Tori.” Renata shifted in her seat again, the top of her body facing me. “I ‘on’t know nothing about this Ashton, but I do know you. If he got you thinking he cute, then we finally know you’re normal. I told you, you was normal. The special person for you—girl or boy—wasn’t around here or up in that boxing gym. I told you someone who could make you feel more than angry and afraid was out there. Didn’t I?”
I nodded. She did. At nauseum, Renata would tell me that when I shared with her how awkward I felt about my sexuality. She made it seem so fairy tale’ish, something so hard to conceive. I didn’t readily accept it because above anything else—dating, kissing, having sex—I wanted to be left alone. My cousins wanted romance for me way more than I cared to have it.
“Now,” Her index finger swept the air. “I ain’t saying Ashton the one you gone marry, and shit, but have fun. Act your age for once. You deserve to have somebody make you feel good about you.” A slick, suggestive smile lifted on her face as she pushed me at the shoulder playfully. “Shit. Let ‘im kiss you, too. You may like it.”
My eyes diverted to NeNe. “I did.” I cleared my throat. “I do.”
“Well, daaaaamn—”
“What?” Treesha and Toya were back, thankfully interrupting Renata’s unnecessary excitement.
My hard eyes shot over to Renata, warning her not to open her mouth. I hated attention outside of the ring, and she knew it.
Renata rolled her eyes. “Nothing. Let’s go.”
“Yeah,” I sighed, feeling the exhaustion from a long day into last night and an early day from traveling today. “I’m tired. I hope my mother’s home now.”
I caught the passing look between Toya and Treesha, then Treesha and Renata.
“What?” I demanded, handing NeNe over to her mother so I could stand. Treesha plopped NeNe on her tiny hip then looked to Renata. That’s when I shot Renata a nasty glare. “If you don’t stop with the weird shit, man—”
“She back fucking with Paul,” Renata finally spoke, but I didn’t understand the words right away.
“What?”
“Aunt Dot,” she specified. “She back fucking with Paul.”
My head jolted back until I caught it. My stomach turned weightless, and I couldn’t breathe.
“Paul?” I could hardly get out.
Treesha nodded hard and fast. I could see her chest sinking deeply as though she was out of breath. “I think that’s why momma don’t wanna do Thanksgiving. She don’t want Aunt Dot over.”
Damn. That hurt. It was worse than her not having sent me my money. She was back, messing around with Paul? Was he staying at the house?
I took a deep breath, not wanting them to think I was going to freak out, and I certainly didn’t want to in front of them. “Let’s go. It’s late.”
Toya turned to take off first, Treesha was next with the baby on her hip. Then Renata followed. I trailed behind, shaking like a leaf beneath my clothes.
Renata beeped the horn when my mother opened the door. I didn’t even wave in response. As I swept inside the house, my attention was on my mother in an oversized t-shirt hanging off her shoulder and the same burgundy scarf she had since I was in sixth grade. Wildly, my eyes swung across the living room, small dining area, and kitchen. I didn’t see anyone.
“It’s late, Tori.”
I turned to her, anger stirring in my belly. “I got home a couple of hours ago and came straight here. You weren’t home.”
She sighed, hand brushed up her nose then rubbed her eyes. “I had to clean the bathrooms before I left. The cleaning guy ain’t show up for his shift today so I had to do extra. It ain’t like you always be here no ways. Figured you went up to North Jersey with Cut, or something.”
“I told you I was coming here.” I turned to face her, wondering if he was in her room. “I thought you left me hanging like you been doing all semester with my money.”
“Look, KaToria, I’m tired. Been busting my ass for months now, tryna keep a job.” She yawned, pointing to the table. “That’s most of the money from August.”
“August?” She had to be joking. It’s not like I’d keep the whole check. She always took most, if not half for bills.
“I’mma get the rest to you as soon as I can. I had to get paid up on the rent and my cell phone.”
“Why couldn’t you just tell me that before I left for school?”
“Tell you what?”
“That you lost your job.”
“Girl, you ain’t hardly around. Like I said, you be up in North Jersey so much.”
“But that’s something you should’ve told me, Ma.”
“Tori!” she grunted with her fists in the air and eyes closed. “I did what I had to do. Now, I told you I’m tired. I gotta open in the morning.”
She looked tired. My mother was a brown girl like me, but shorter—average height—and plump. As large as my tits were, I could never fit my mother’s underclothes. My mother and her sister, who was shorter than my mother, were both thick women. I could make out the print of her tear-shape boobs and low nipples through her thin gown—or shirt she used as one. I wondered if she was too tired for company, or if her company was back in her bedroom.
“You back messing with Paul?”
“Tori!”
“Answer me!”
Her eyes opened, lips parted, and head swung back. “I ain’t gotta explain shit to you!”
“Paul, Ma? You know what happened with him.”
She waved me off. “I remember that misunderstanding that Mommy got in the middle of. You grown now, Tori.” Her head shook. “‘Bout to be nineteen. That shit you said when you was a kid is done.”
That felt like a blow to my stomach.
Done…
That word replayed in my mind over and over and over again. All the fear, the confusion, the smell of him, the scent of his nasty deep breaths, that nausea… That wasn’t done. That would never be done. I could still smell him—feel him in my mouth…on my hands. The sound of my pulse in my ears, the turning over of my stomach when he was near. The pain f
rom the muscle in my eyes from trying to pretend I was sleeping when he’d come into my room.
“THAT WAS REAL!” I screamed from the bottom of my belly as my fists clenched painfully tight. My body trembled and I struggled to breathe.
My mother’s bally frame jumped and her wide eyes blinked hard. “KaToria!” Her mouth moved, but no words came out as she watched the tears drop from my stubborn eyes. We’d always avoided this topic. It’s how my Margaret taught me to manage her. But my mother couldn’t be this dense. She saw the paperwork, knew his sentence. It was all very real and no misunderstanding. “I’m tired. I don’t have time for this. You wanna know what good Paul’s been to me?” She pointed to the table again. “There it is. Everything ain’t about you, child. You grown now. I need a life, too. Shit!” She turned for the back of the house.
“He here?”
“Who?” she shouted back. “Paul?” When I didn’t speak, she got her answer. “No, he ain’t here, Tori!” She walked off again.
“Is he coming here tonight?”
“I ‘on’t know!” She swung her arm behind her back. “I said I’m fucking tired!”
Seconds later, her door slammed. That was it. She shut down. And I was fuming, hot to the touch. My entire frame vibrated with violent energy. Never in my life did I want to crack her fucking face in, but tonight I’d come dangerously close to laying her ass out. She’d withheld my money for months, and I could get past her sending just fifty dollars since I left. But dismissing my pain…my never-ending nightmares was beneath even her.
What to do?
I had no car and nowhere to go. There was no way I’d ask Ragee to drive down to come and get me. It was close to midnight, and I couldn’t inconvenience him so soon after I did a few weeks ago for Brick’s funeral. And Raj wasn’t rich with endless means of gas money. Dude was a starving artist, a big man filled with talent and passion. He was no millionaire, not even financially stable.
My eyes trailed over to the duffle bag I dropped when I came inside. It made me wonder why I came home. My mother was right. I preferred staying away. I’d never said it to her, but this was always the last place I wanted to be.
Going to my Aunt Sonya’s wasn’t an option. Renata just told me how she’d been fussing about the army of people in her little trailer. I couldn’t blame her. There was no bed or sofa space in there. The best they could give me was a spot on the floor. I didn’t want to do that either. Sitting down on the couch that once belonged to my Margaret, I wondered what she would do.
My mother had gone back to Paul. I doubted even my grandmother would have predicted this. He may have stopped coming around, but Paul never left my shadows, my memories, my nightmares. This couldn’t be happening. I never understood that woman. Maybe my ideas of parenting to protect were wrong. Or maybe, like my Margaret Maureen said, Dorothy McNabb wasn’t born with the maternal gene, just the reproductive parts.
“Shit. I wish you were still here…” I groaned, sinking to the carpeted floor.
It smelled like her. My mother got most of my grandmother’s furniture after she passed, even her bedroom set. I wanted that, but my mother called rank. Her living room furniture, dining room and kitchen tables, china cabinet, and dishes. And no matter how much the furniture carried the scent of my Margaret, this home held the spirit of my mother.
My eyes traveled over to the TV stand where, beneath it, in the storage cabinets, were my Margaret’s old photo albums. I spent the next couple of hours flipping through them, feeling comforted and sad at the same damn time. It was a needed escape from my present torment. These pictures were her at so many phases of her life that seemed too short for my needs. Her childhood and high school graduation pictures made me jealous of not having her youth, only her later years. I could live, eat, and sleep in that woman’s chest and be just as content as normal humans. There were pictures of her at different jobs she held. My Margaret sported the same fake smile.
Boy, what I would give to see even your scary frown…
Hearing a car pull up, I dropped the last photo album and sprung to my feet for the window. My pulse rocketed on the way. And even after I sighed, relieved it was the neighbor and not Paul, I was still shaken. When he came, I wanted to be alert, prepared. I wanted to be on guard so he wouldn’t think he could still make me do disgusting things I didn’t want to do. I wouldn’t try to play sleep or comatose. I’d fucking fight tonight.
In the meantime, I decided I’d spent enough time yearning for something I would never have again, and packed away the photo albums. Then I was thirsty. After pouring myself Mommy’s powered tea special, I went to my phone for the time. That’s all I could check it for. No one was probably up at close to three in the morning.
Of course, some time after gulping down the entire glass, I had to pee. Cautiously, I went into the bathroom to relieve myself. Everything seemed the same in there. No signs of a man living here other than an extra towel and washcloth. I bet it was for him. My mother had never been short of a man wanting to fuck her, so why go back to Paul? I questioned that as I washed and dried my hands. When I passed by her closed door, I could hear the television playing. Mommy would often fall asleep with that thing on, then turn it off at some point in the night. I guessed she was tired if that hadn’t happened yet.
Back in the living room, I thought to charge my phone. I yawned big and hard, eyes heavy as I headed for the duffle. After getting the charger, I found the outlet behind the sofa to connect for power. As I plugged the charger into the phone, it chirped.
Ashton: Don’t OD on your favorite thnxgvg dish.
That made me laugh unexpectedly. What type of message was that? Who sent stupid shit like that? Old people?
Me: yeah. okay.
I giggled, then lifted my head at the sound of a gate opening outside. From the front view, I couldn’t see anything. It was likely a neighbor.
Ashton: What’s your favorite dish anyway?
I quickly replied.
Me: spaghetti
My eyes were so heavy, but I refused to fall asleep. I decided to hit up the weird, bossy human again.
Me: and why the hell are you up?
Ashton’s first response came right away, and the second appeared as I was reading the first.
Ashton: What part of the game is fuckin spaghetti at thnxgvg? You half Italian or something?
Ashton: I have no fuckin clue. I was tired as hell when I got home then woke up out of nowhere. Hope I didn’t wake you up.
He should have been tired. Ashton’s crazy ass got up after the concert and hanging out with his friends last night and ran laps on the track. Worst of all, he made me go with him. Dude was dedicated to fitness.
Me: looks like my family won’t be doing dinner this year. get some sleep Spence. you need it. goodnight.
And so he’d know this conversation was over I sent another.
Me: this thing is about to die. see you at the airport on Friday.
I needed to be on guard for a monster. Getting caught up with Ashton would only distract me. He weakened me.
Not tonight. Tonight, I’d be strong and fight my ass off.
I jumped to my feet, heart banging against my bone cage. My eyes wildly swung around the living room and kitchen for movements. Then I heard the shower turn-on. Seconds later, I heard the toilet flushed. I swallowed hard when I realized my mother had gone into the bathroom. She was up.
Of course, she was. It was daylight, and she had to work. I must’ve fallen asleep at some point. The last time I remembered checking the clock, it was close to five in the morning. I looked down my body at my boots and crumpled clothes. My head was foggy and mouth dry as a damn desert. Did Paul come in?
How the hell did I fall asleep?
Feeling weak and disappointed, I snatched my Blackberry from the crease of the sofa, yanking it from the charger. It was six-eighteen. Still a little disoriented but determined for answers, I charged to the back of the trailer. My mother’s bedroom door was open. The
television was off, but the room was empty. I searched the other room—my bedroom—wanting to be sure he wasn’t here. That was empty, too.
Going back to the living room, I was relieved, but angry with myself for falling asleep. How could I have done something so stupid? Again. I plopped myself down on the sofa, thinking of my next move. Come hell or high water, I was leaving Millville today.
Chapter Six
-THEN-
“And what’s your mommy’s name?”
“Ka-wen!” she mispronounced with confident accuracy.
“And what’s your daddy’s name?
“Easy!” She slapped her little forehead, rocking back on my thigh. “Ba-wick!”
I shook my head. “No. What’s his real name?”
She smiled, embarrassed, but aware of her error. “Da-da-shawn”
My mom, hers, and the rest of my family in the living room, watching, cheered her on. She wasn’t through, though.
“Deshawn, what?” I challenged.
Keyonna considered it for a few seconds, then shouted, “Lee! Da-shawn Lee!”
“And what’s your godfather’s name?”
I could see my mother’s painful smile in the background. I knew this holiday—the first without Brick—would be hard.
Her little finger pushed into my chest. “You!”
My brows shot up, admonishing her. “I have a name.”
“Ashton. Uncle Ashton,” she answered with confidence, and the whole room sighed and awww’d.
I sucked in a breath. “I got a last name, too, Keyonna Lee!”
Her little head tossed back, and she laughed. “Spencer, god!” Her eye roll-game was to die for.
“And what’s half?”
She paused. “Fifty percent.”
“Oh, yeah? What’s three quarters?”
“Seventy-five.” She blinked, thinking hard. “Percent.”
“Uhn-huhn. And what’s a quarter, young lady?”
“Two…” She hesitated. “Twenty… Twenty-five percent!” Keyonna, so relieved, laughed at her near miss.
