She Said, She Said

by Celeste Norfleet

  Laura and Tamika looked over the menu, decided, then placed their order. They stood waiting, looking at the dessert case, trying to decide what else to buy.

  “Laura Hopkins?”

  Hearing her maiden name, Laura turned around. “Yes.”

  “Don’t you dare tell me that you don’t remember me. It’s me, Grace. Grace Hunter from Fraser High. Although I guess I should have called you Laura Fraser since you went back to your original, original name.”

  “Grace,” she repeated. Then, like a light turning on, her face brightened. “Oh my God, Gracie,” Laura squealed. “I can’t believe it’s you. How’ve you been?”

  Tamika moaned inwardly. Her mother was a talker and given half the chance she’d probably be standing there all night talking to everyone in the place. Tamika looked at the woman hugging her mother and half smiled. She definitely didn’t look as though she’d be a friend of her mother’s. Round, fleshy and comfortably full figured, she had to be her mom’s age but she was dressed as if she were still in the 1980s.

  “Girl, I been all over the place but I’m just fine now. I’m single, you know. Oh yeah, I finally divorced that no-good fool I had dragging me down. His mama had a fit when I sent his tired ass packing back to her. So, girl, the only thing I got on my mind these days is fun. That means a cold drink and a hot man.”

  Laura cracked up and Tamika just stood there. She couldn’t believe that this apparently wild woman was once her mother’s friend. They were as different as night and day.

  “Oh my God, girl, you still as crazy as ever. So, how long has it been?”

  “It’s been forever, girl. So, what are you doing here? Where are you staying?”

  “We’re staying at my parents’ house. We came down to clean and close it up to sell.”

  Grace nodded. “I heard about your mom. I’m sorry. She was good people. We all adored her. I was out of town when she passed and missed you when you came down. I sent a card but I don’t know if you got it.”

  “I got it and thank you.”

  “So you’re selling the house yourself now?” she asked.

  “Yes, hopefully we can put it on the market before we leave. My aunt Sylvia is moving out now. But to tell you the truth, I have no idea what the place even looks like anymore.”

  “As your neighbor down the road, around the corner and a few miles away, I can tell you that the place still looks good. But it always did.”

  “That’s good to hear. Oh, wait a minute. I want you to meet my daughter, Tamika. Tamika, this is Grace Hunter, an old schoolmate and my bestest friend in the universe since Clark Elementary School.”

  Grace burst out laughing. “Lordy, child, I haven’t heard that line in forever, my bestest friend in the universe. Yep, that was us,” she declared. “Hello, Tamika, nice to meet you. Girl, you look just like your mother did when she was your age.”

  Tamika half smiled. As far as she was concerned she looked nothing like her mother.

  “How old are you?”

  “Sixteen.”

  “Sixteen,” Grace repeated. “Oh, to be sixteen again.”

  “I know, wouldn’t it be great?” Laura said.

  “What grade are you in?”

  “I’m going into eleventh grade in September.”

  “Eleventh grade. Lordy, they grow up so fast, don’t they?” she said, leaning into Laura and chuckling. Laura nodded. Tamika just looked at both of them as if they were nuts. “My youngest son is a few years older than you and I still can’t believe he’s already in college. But between you and me I’m glad he’s gone. Lordy, that boy was driving me crazy. Had all those hot-behind wannabe hoochie mamas calling my house day and night. Near about drove me crazy.”

  Laura cracked up laughing. Grace joined in until she looked over, seeing her companion waving to her from across the room. “Lordy, I better get back over there. That man’s ’bout ready to break his arm off if I don’t get my butt back over there.”

  “You are exactly the same,” Laura said.

  “Yeah, right, and about a hundred pounds overweight but I’ll take the compliment. But, girl, look at you. You look like you walked right out of high school yesterday.”

  “Liar,” Laura said, giggling.

  “Mom, I think our order’s ready,” Tamika said as the counter person called their receipt number and placed a large plastic bag on the counter.

  “Okay,” Laura said, then hugged her friend and promised that they’d get together.

  “Y’all go ahead, I’ll see you later. Call me, I’m at the same phone number. We can maybe hang out while you’re here,” Grace said.

  “Okay, sounds good. I’ll do that,” Laura said.

  Grace went back to her table and Laura paid for their takeout. After stuffing the bag with extra sauce, plates and plastic utensils, Tamika grabbed the bag to leave. Laura turned for a brief second, seeing Grace waving at her from across the room. She waved back, then followed her daughter to the exit. “I can’t believe that I forgot all about her. After I left college I guess I forgot all about a lot of things.”

  “So, that was a friend from high school,” Tamika said as they got back into the car with their food.

  “From elementary, middle and high school, yes. There were four of us—Grace, Francine, Judith and me.”

  “She doesn’t quite fit your style.”

  “No, I suppose not. We each had our different strengths. We kind of grew apart over the years.”

  “That’s one thing Lisa and I are never going to do, lose touch with each other.”

  Laura nodded and smiled. That was the same thing the four of them had promised each other almost thirty years ago.

  Chapter 7

  Tamika

  They’d eaten dinner and then cleaned up.

  No dishwasher—Tamika still couldn’t believe that.

  While her mother talked on the phone to her dad then to her aunt Sylvia, Tamika walked outside to get some fresh air. The house, at the end of what was called Diamond Point Road, was huge with a lot of land and woods behind it. Closed up for nearly four days, it was stiflingly hot and she thought that if she stayed inside any longer she was sure she’d spontaneously combust. Unfortunately it was just as hot and uncomfortable outside.

  The night sky shone bright as stars and planets dotted the velvet mass above her. Crickets and frogs and cicada and whatever else sang in the hot musty air. It had drizzled again, leaving the air thick with moisture and heat. The fog that had threatened earlier rolled in slowly, dusting the black asphalt with a gentle haze.

  Tamika, sitting on the front wooden rail, picked up the extra paper plate she’d been carrying around ever since they’d arrived with the food and fanned herself. The disturbed air felt good but not good enough. How could anyone live without central air?

  “Hey, what are you doing out here?” Laura asked through the screen door.

  “Nothing. I’m just sitting looking at the sky, at how clear it is here. You can see almost every star.”

  Laura opened the screen door, walked outside, sat down beside her daughter and looked up. Crickets and other critters sounded in the darkness.

  She sighed. “Man, I forgot about this part. I used to sit out here late at night sometimes and just stare up at the sky. My dad even bought me a telescope and I kept a journal and everything.”

  “Really, a journal?”

  “Oh yeah. I was big into writing in my diaries at one point. As a matter of fact, I wanted to be a writer.”

  “But you stopped writing, right? So what happened?” Tamika asked.

  “I guess I grew out of it. I made more money copywriting for advertising. Although, you know what? I think that telescope is still upstairs in the attic someplace. Do you want to bring it down?”

  “Nah, maybe later,” Tamika said, knowing that there was no way she was gonna lug a telescope around as hot as it was. “So, what do people do around here for fun? Speak all countrified while eating vittles like chitterlings and pigs�
� feet and shooting each other?”

  “What? Where did you get that?”

  “I don’t know, this is the country, isn’t it?”

  “This is Fraser. I don’t know where you’re talking about. We have cars and CD players and hip-hop and cable TV and DVDs and everything else the rest of the country has.”

  “But no dishwasher and air conditioners,” Tamika said.

  “There are air conditioners all through the house, just no central-air system.”

  “What’s the difference? Hot is hot.”

  Laura opened her mouth to rebut, but she couldn’t argue the fact. It was definitely hot. “Well, maybe you have a point there, so just maybe you’ll learn to appreciate all the little amenities you do have once you get back home.”

  “Speaking of which, whose car is that out front?”

  “Never mind,” Laura said quickly.

  “Fine, so where’s Aunt Sylvia? I thought she was gonna be here when we got in.”

  “She’s probably visiting a friend. I’m sure she’ll be back soon. Do you know why they call this Diamond Point Road?” Laura asked. Tamika shrugged. “It’s because when the family started selling off the land generations ago, it was sold in diamond shapes. This house is the point of the first diamond.”

  “I don’t get it. So, if General Joseph Fraser was so in love and left everything to his black wife and we’re her descendants, then shouldn’t this family have more than this house?”

  “Do you really think that the rest of his family and the good people of Fraser would allow a former slave to own land, let alone be a widow to a white man?”

  “So they stole the land back.”

  “It reverted to his family and they gave her just enough land to work. Their biggest compromise was that she and her children remained free. I guess that’s all she really wanted in the end.”

  “That’s wrong.”

  “That’s life.”

  Tamika looked around and sighed. “Two weeks, right?”

  “That was your father’s idea. I doubt very seriously that we’re gonna be able to get this place ready to sell in just two weeks.” Laura’s cell phone rang just as she finished. She checked the caller ID. “It’s your dad again.”

  Tamika stood up. “I’ll be inside.”

  Laura opened her cell and answered.

  Tamika went back into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water from the refrigerator. It had been a bother at the time, but now she was glad that her mother insisted they stop by the local grocery store and pick up a few things after they left the barbecue restaurant.

  She opened her bottle and walked around checking things out again. It had been a long time since she was there; everything looked new or rather old. After checking out the first floor she decided to get a better look at the second floor. She climbed the stairs and started opening the doors. Each room, dark and musty, was more depressing than the last. She finally got back to her bedroom, went inside and sat on the bed, opening her cell at the same time.

  She left a message on Lisa’s cell, then debated about calling Sean but decided against it. She wasn’t sure if she was ready for that yet. She finished her water, then went back downstairs and looked around. “Mom?” she called out as she stepped out onto the porch, but didn’t get an answer.

  She went to the kitchen, then back upstairs. “Mom?”

  “Up here,” Laura called out.

  Tamika climbed the narrow stairs to another floor and walked down the short hall. The door was open at the end. “Mom?”

  “Yeah, in here.”

  Tamika walked in and looked around, then spotted her mother sitting on the floor with several open boxes around her. “Dad okay?”

  “Yeah, he says hi and that he misses you. Why don’t you call him later? I told him that I would call back tomorrow, but I’m sure he’d like to hear from you.”

  Tamika nodded while looking around. “Dang, didn’t y’all ever throw anything out?”

  “Doesn’t look like it, does it?” Laura said.

  Tamika peeked into a box, seeing a stack of magazines and newspapers. “Y’all saved old newspapers?”

  “Special newspapers, headlines,” Laura said. “When World War Two ended, when the space shuttle Challenger exploded, when President Nixon resigned, when Martin Luther King and the Kennedys were assassinated, things like that. My mother collected newspaper headlines all her life.”

  “Really? Huh,” Tamika said, slightly interested. “What about the magazines?”

  “Um, I think she had the first issues. Like Time, Newsweek, Life, things like that.”

  “So, are they worth anything?”

  “Maybe, possibly to collectors, I guess.”

  “Cool, we should sell ’em.”

  “Let’s first see exactly what we have, okay?”

  Tamika walked over to stand beside her. “What’s all this?”

  Laura sighed contentedly. “Memories, dreams, hopes, disappointments, trash.”

  Tamika looked around. “Is any of this stuff worth anything like antiques or something?”

  “Maybe. I guess we could get some things appraised. I think there are a few antique stores in town.”

  “So, what exactly are you supposed to be doing?” Tamika asked, seeing shelves lining the perimeter of the attic walls and everything neatly arranged and in labeled boxes—clothes, schoolwork, photos, etc.

  “Actually, I started off looking for my telescope and my journals but then I found all this.”

  Tamika looked down at the huge mess her mother had made in the middle of the floor. There were open boxes and piles of clothes and books all around her, including a pile of jeans and T-shirts on the floor beside her.

  Tamika reached down and picked up a pair of jeans. She held them out to see better. “Oh, check, whose are these?”

  Looking up and seeing the jeans Tamika held up in front of her, Laura said, “Mine.”

  “For real, these are yours? since when?”

  “Oh, since about 1978 or so, I guess.”

  “But these are seriously in style right now. They’re vintage. You can only get them in specialty boutiques and online and even then they cost a fortune.”

  “My mother always said there’s nothing new under the sun. If you wait around long enough, everything comes back in style again.”

  “Calvin Klein, Gloria Vanderbilt, Jordache jeans…I can’t believe it. I’ve been looking for a pair of these in stores for the last few months now. Nobody has them yet.” She held them up to her hips and chuckled. “I bet they fit perfectly.”

  “There’s another box of clothes over there. You might want to check it out,” Laura said. Tamika nodded. It took some digging around in several other boxes, but for the next twenty minutes she tried on at least ten pairs of jeans. Checking herself out in the mirror, she admired the way the clothes fit her so well. Although they were all dusty and musty, it was like finding diamonds in a coal mine. Totally unexpected but seriously well worth it.

  “They look good on you,” Laura said.

  “Can I wear them?”

  “Why don’t we wash them first? They’ve been stored in these plastic containers for over twenty years.”

  “Okay.” She gathered the jeans and put them by the door to go downstairs to the clothes washer in the basement.

  Tamika walked back over and picked up a T-shirt from another pile. She held it out, then chuckled. “Where’d you get this?”

  Laura looked up and smiled. “Grace and I went to their concert a hundred years ago. That’s before they were really popular, then broke up and became music moguls and a preacher with his own reality show. I bought a T-shirt with my allowance and I think Grace got a cap. We climbed up onstage, danced, then Grace got Russell’s phone number as we left.”

  “Get out, y’all did that?”

  “We did that,” Laura affirmed.

  “Wow, I seriously can’t see you doing that.”

  “We did, but that was a long time ago
.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah, wow.”

  “What about this T-shirt?”

  “Yep, went to that concert too.”

  “So, how come you don’t do that now?” Tamika asked, poking her head into a box sitting on the floor beside her mother.

  “What, climb onstage at concerts?”

  “No, I mean acting cool like that.”

  Laura shook her head, amazed by her daughter. “You are so bold and defiant. I envy that. Your life is laid out in front of you with every possibility available. All you have to do is reach out and grab it.”

  “No way, it’s not that easy,” Tamika said.

  “Of course it is.”

  “No, you have the perfect life. You do what you want, when you want, nobody to tell you what you have to do,” she said as she poked her head into another box.

  “It’s not perfect, Tamika, trust me.”

  “What’s this?”

  “Gimme that,” Laura said, reaching out for it.

  Tamika held it away. “No way, this is your yearbook, isn’t it? I want to see it.” She opened the book and started laughing almost immediately as she began checking out the stately statuesque photos lined across the pages.

  Laura, now ignoring her, busied herself digging into another box.

  “Oh, trip, look at y’all. This is you, right?” Tamika asked, turning the book around so that her mother could see it.

  “Yep, that was me all right.”

  “Check out your hair. Look familiar?”

  “It was a bad hair day.”

  “Nah, don’t even try it. It’s the same style I have now and you know it,” she said, then continued turning the pages and seeing all the autographs and sentimental salutations written throughout the book. “Ooh, who was this?” she asked, turning the book around again.

  Laura glanced up, then instantly smiled bright. “That was Keith Tyler, all-star football player, quarterback, team captain, crowned prom king and of course most popular guy in school,” she said, then continued digging in the box. She pulled out several thin books and began reading through the pages.