It felt so good to be out of that store. We climbed into the car and headed home.
I needed to think. I needed to sit on my bed and ponder what I’d seen. I needed to understand the look on my father’s face when he’d put his hand on that woman’s hand.
I thought about him all Sunday. I sneaked looks at him at breakfast while he read the newspaper. He laughed at a Family Circus cartoon (we all loved Family Circus cartoons), and that seemed like a special betrayal—that he was able to laugh with us as if everything was just fine. He leaned toward my mother and shared it with her. She laughed, too. And I thought, Mom, don’t laugh with that liar—that fake person.
The cartoon was the one where PJ asks his father if he can test his knee reflex. It shows PJ innocently holding a real hammer. It was funny, and I could have laughed if I’d wanted to. But I decided not to. How could my father just sit there at the breakfast table with the rest of us and be so false?
At one point, just before he moseyed to the den to watch Sunday news shows, he looked at me and said, “Why so quiet, Sweet Pea? Something wrong?” And that was guilt talking, because my father almost never asked about me. That woman had to be that Paula person, the one who’d written the letter. He must have read it by now. I planned to check on my next visit to his precious office.
CHAPTER 10
Don’t Pass This Way
* * *
EARLY ON MONDAY MORNING I heard loud scraping coming from the front of the house. Lily groaned, turned over onto her stomach, and put the pillow over her head. “What’s that noise?” she said in a muffled voice.
I was reading at the time. I got up, trudged into the den, looked out the window, and came almost face to face with Mr. Nigel, Nigel, Nigel scraping old paint off the windowsills. He was up on a ladder outside, scraping away.
I returned to the bedroom. “It’s Mrs. Baylor’s son. The one in the cap and gown. The Nigel, Nigel, Nigel guy. He’s getting ready to paint some windowsills in front of the house,” I said. Those sills were all cracked and splintered. Our mother had been asking our father to do it for ages, but he didn’t do things like that. He just sat in cafés with strange women.
I looked at Lily, who now had the blanket pulled over her head. I thought about telling her what I’d seen when I was with Jennifer on Saturday. But I decided not to. I’d keep the secret to myself. For now.
I reached for the script and flipped to the first page of dialogue. I flipped more pages, happy to see Olivia on almost every one. I needed to memorize all of it.
Lily pulled herself up and then sat for a bit with her face in her hands. She threw the covers off and swung her legs over the side of the bed. Then she got up. I followed her into the den. She peeked out the window, near the one Nigel was working on. “That’s him,” she said. “Mr. Nigel, Nigel, Nigel.” She yawned—a really big fake yawn.
He was darker than Mrs. Baylor—darker than a burnt sienna crayon. And he was tall and muscular in his work pants and white T-shirt. He climbed down from the ladder and scooted it over a bit and wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his hand.
“He should have one of those things tennis players wear on their heads to catch the sweat,” I said to Lily.
“Yeah. He should.”
I thought of my sister’s guy friends. This past spring she’d had a boyfriend. James. They met in drama class and started going around together. He was light skinned with curly hair so everyone said they made a cute couple. I wondered if that was the reason he dated her—mostly. And if her reason had more to do with senior prom than liking James, because after the prom had come and gone, we saw less and less of him until the day we realized he had faded away.
It was a Sunday morning at the breakfast table, and our mother had said, “Where’s James these days? Why’s he making himself so scarce?” Even Daddy looked up from his coffee and newspaper as if he had been wondering, too. Which was strange, because Daddy was usually not interested in things like our friends or what was going on in our lives.
“We broke up,” Lily said. She dropped her eyes, trying to show sadness, but I knew the truth. I’d listened to her while she was on the phone with Lydia. She was just tired of him. The guy has no conversation. Just cars and football. I want someone who can teach me something I don’t know. Something new.
I turned back to the window. Mr. Nigel, Nigel, Nigel was climbing back up the ladder to do more scraping. “Do you think he’s cute?” I asked, and I actually saw my sister flinch. She bit her lip and didn’t answer, just headed downstairs to our bathroom. A minute later, the shower was going full blast.
I climbed back into bed. I reached under it for my three-ring binder, placed the binder on my lap, and stared at it. Then I opened it and read: Little Minerva looked at the picture on the mantle. It was a picture of her daddy. He was so handsome and brave. Her mama had told her all about his courage in the big war and how he’d been awarded seven medals. I crossed out “seven” and replaced it with “ten.”
Minerva felt someone behind her.
“He was the greatest man who ever lived,” she heard her mother say.
“What made him so great?” Minerva asked.
“He loved his family—you and me—more than anything. He was totally devoted to us.”
A few days ago I’d had a brilliant idea. I would make Minerva’s father really alive but somewhere far away. And I would make him have amnesia. Yes, amnesia. And he would be in a hospital somewhere and people—the nurses and doctors—would all the time be trying to find out who he was. He would tell them that he couldn’t remember anything except the name Minerva. Yes, he would know all about Minerva. And he’d have a way more interesting life than her father in real life, Grandpa Willis—the barber.
But for now, I’d have to put it aside so I could learn my lines. I couldn’t concentrate on two projects at once. I would get back to Minerva’s story after I got the role. There was all the time in the world to write it. I stood up and put the binder on my bookshelf. Then I stepped back and looked at it and sighed. I’m not abandoning you, Minerva. I promise.
Lily emerged from the bathroom for a moment to get the telephone. Then I heard the bathroom window slide open. Soon she’d be on the phone with Lydia and smoking out the window. My sister hid a pack in the cabinet under the sink, toward the back.
I got dressed quickly, then dashed outside with my script just in time to see Jennifer leaving for dance class with her grandmother. Shoot. I’d have to wait until she got back.
Mrs. Baylor’s son looked down at me from his ladder and smiled. “Hey,” he said. His smile was full of very, very even white teeth and he had a perfect dimple in his right cheek. A very, very deep dimple that hadn’t shown up much in his picture with the cap and gown.
“I’m Nathan. You might know me as Nigel, if my mother’s mentioned me.”
I wanted to say, She’s only mentioned you a million times. “Hi,” I said. “I’m Sophie.”
“Sophie,” he said. “A black girl named Sophie.”
My mind stopped on the word black. How easily he’d said it! It could almost be a bad word. Calling someone black might bring on a fight. But his ease filled me with a secret pleasure, as if he was allowing me into his very special club. Of black people.
“Yes. But my mother calls me Sophia.”
“That’s better,” he said.
I stood there for a moment, watching him and waiting for him to say something more. But he just winked and went back to scraping with his little scraping tool. Behind me I could hear my mother in the kitchen getting her breakfast. Lily and my mother really hadn’t been getting along lately. Nowadays, my sister did everything in her power to sidestep her. If they crossed paths, Mom might smell smoke in her hair or tell Lily her pants were too tight or ask why she put all those blond streaks in her hair. She might say that she looked like a streetwalker. Our mother had plenty of criticism for Lily. She called her spoiled and ungrateful and told her s
he’d never had to pick tobacco in the hot sun and then sit down at the end of the row and wait for her sister in the next row to catch up so she wouldn’t wind up doing more than her part. She never had to go without shoes in the summer or share bathwater with her siblings.
Then Lily would ask how that was her fault, and our mother would say she was being disrespectful, and Lily would ask how that was being disrespectful, then our mother would say even that question was disrespectful. And then I would go outside so I wouldn’t have to hear them anymore, because nobody was going to win.
I took my script back to the bedroom and started studying it. “Sophie, let’s take Oscar for a walk,” Lily said out of the blue. She’d brought her Cheerios into the room and was now drinking the milk straight out of the bowl. She wiped her mouth with her hand. I looked at her suspiciously. When was the last time she’d wanted to walk Oscar—with me? I put away That Talk.
“You go get him and I’ll meet you out front,” she said.
After I slipped the leash over Oscar’s head and laughed at how fast he was wagging his tail, I led him around to the front of the house, where Lily was waiting for me and making a show of not looking at Mrs. Baylor’s son. I noticed Mrs. Baylor’s son was not looking at my sister, either.
Before we could start our walk, I heard the Helms Bakery truck’s horn behind us. “Let’s get doughnuts,” I said, moving to the curb to wave at the truck.
Lily reached into her pocket and pulled out a dollar.
The Helms truck came down our street on Mondays. If you stood at the curb, the driver would pull up right in front of you. Then he’d hop out, scoot around to the side, slide open the side doors, and let you step inside. That’s where all the long drawers were—drawers the width of the truck. You’d point and he’d pull open the drawer, and there would be rows and rows of doughnuts. The next drawer would hold cupcakes of every kind, or cinnamon rolls and sticky buns.
My mouth watered as the Helms driver stopped next to us and jumped out of his seat. He dashed around to the sliding doors and opened them to reveal the “magic” drawers. I pointed at the top one and he slid it open.
“I want a jelly doughnut. Lemon,” I said.
“Make that two,” Lily said. “And one bear claw.”
He dropped the doughnuts and bear claw into a white bag, using a square of waxed paper. Lily paid him and deposited the change in her pocket.
We were set. We continued walking, with Oscar tugging at the leash and our little bag of pastries to eat on the way.
“Who’s the bear claw for?” I asked. But Lily didn’t answer because just then her attention was elsewhere.
On the other side of the street, Deidre Baker—the one who’d almost jabbed me in the chest with her forefinger as if it were the barrel of a gun while her sister smugly delivered the news about “no colored allowed”—was making her way up the hill toward Olympiad.
She spotted us and slowed.
Lily slowed, too.
Deidre was probably going over to her friend Carla’s. Carla lived on Olympiad in the big white house with the pillars. It sat where Montego Drive ended.
Lily stopped and stood there, waiting as Deidre neared.
I saw a change come over Deidre’s face: a craftiness. I knew that she was trying to decide what to do. Perhaps she should turn around and walk home or go another way to Carla’s. But then a look of grit seemed to replace all doubt. Without looking at us directly, she took in a big, deep breath. She lifted her chin and kept on coming. Apparently the sight of the empty street in front and behind her was now of no consequence. That’s how much she thought the world belonged to her.
When she was opposite our house, Lily gave Oscar a tug, crossed over, and stood facing her.
They stared each other down for a few seconds, with Deidre pulling herself up to her full height—as if that was going to protect her.
Finally, Lily said, “Did you tell my sister that she couldn’t come to your house because no colored people are allowed?”
I’d actually never seen anyone go pale before, but it was as if all the color drained out of Deidre’s plump little cherub face. You could see that she was considering brushing past, but Lily stood in the way. She seemed to add to her calculation the empty street, and the fact that we lived ten houses up from hers so there could be other occasions like this.
Lily didn’t wait for a response. “Who do you think you are, you little peckerwood? Who the hell do you think you are?”
My eyes grew big. I couldn’t help a little giggle. Lily had said she’d take care of the Baker girls, but I never could picture how that would happen and I never felt so, so . . . I didn’t know a word for it. Gleeful.
“Let me tell you something, little girl! You want to get to Olympiad? You’d better take Presidio from now on because we’re not going to allow you or your sisters to walk by our house even if you’re on the other side of the street! I see you walk by my house, I’ma sic this dog on your behind.”
My mouth dropped open. It was thrilling to hear this delicious threat coming out of my big sister’s mouth. It was also thrilling to see Deidre Baker’s lower lip begin to quiver. She attempted to brush by us.
“Hold up, hotshot!” my sister said. “Where do you think you’re going?”
Deidre had a moment of courage. “I’m going to tell my father what you said.”
“Tell him! Tell him to come on up here. And tell him my daddy’s got something for him.” She lowered her voice. “And you know what I mean.”
Deidre’s eyes widened. “We can call the police.”
Lily had an answer for that as well. “Listen here, little girl. My father’s a prosecutor. You know what that is? He puts away criminals. He knows all the police around here and they love him!” (That wasn’t true. Daddy was a defense attorney. The police didn’t love him.)
Only then did it seem to occur to Deidre that she’d better follow my sister’s rules. The order was immediately in place. She turned and started down the hill to go the long way around to Olympiad.
I’d never heard Lily sound like that. I was amazed that she had it in her. That she could talk so rough and loud, with one hand on her hip, the forefinger of the other hand jabbing the air in Deidre’s direction, as if any second she was going to spear her forehead with it.
I felt a sense of pure joy wash over me. I felt like dancing right there on the sidewalk. I was in warmth and light. I felt like high-fiving my sister. I watched Deidre go all the way back down Montego Drive to take Presidio—the long way around up to Olympiad—and I felt vindicated.
“Can we do that—not allow her to walk by our house?” I asked.
Lily cackled. “As long as she believes we can do it, that’s all that matters. And you know what? She’ll remember this the rest of her stupid life.”
We walked Oscar only around the corner and back. So I began to suspect that this was my sister’s way of getting out and being seen by Nigel. He was in the open garage, searching through our father’s toolbox when we returned. She stopped and watched him for a bit. Then she handed me Oscar’s leash and said, “Take Oscar around the back and give him some fresh water.” I ignored her and stayed put; miraculously, she didn’t seem to notice. She clearly had other things on her mind as she walked over to Mrs. Baylor’s son with the small white bag in her hand.
Nigel looked up from his rummaging and seemed caught a bit off-guard. “You know if your dad has some more sandpaper?” he asked.
“I don’t know about tools and sandpaper and paint and paintbrushes and . . .”
She smiled.
“Got it.” He stood up, leaned back on our mother’s car, and crossed his arms. He looked at my sister but said nothing. Then he smiled as if he knew his smile was his best feature.
“Got you something,” Lily said. She handed him the bag with the bear claw. He peeked inside. He took out the claw, held it up, and squinted at it. Then he looked at her and said, “I don’t know, girl. You
’re kind of scary. You sure this is okay to eat?”
She tried not to laugh, but gave in. I could tell he liked her laughing at his joke.
Finally, she said, “Give it back, then.”
Instead he took a big bite. “Mmm, mmm.” He licked icing off his fingers.
“So you’re Nigel. I’ve heard sooo much about you.”
“That’s my good Jamaican name, but I use my middle name. Nathan. More American-friendly.”
“Yeah. That is a bit more American-friendly, Nigel.”
Then it was his turn to laugh. I could tell Lily liked making him laugh, too. And I could tell she was nervous. Her hand went to her hip. But then she crossed her arms and her weight shifted to one leg as she looked up the street toward Olympiad. She brushed a lock of hair behind her ear and then brought it out to twist and twist it. It was as if she didn’t know what to do with herself.
“So my mama’s been bragging about me?”
“We’ve heard all about you, Nigel. Everything,” Lily said, her eyes twinkling.
He smiled. “Now I’m worried.”
She laughed again, then looked at me. “Take Oscar to the backyard. And give him some water.” I couldn’t get away with not doing it this time because she watched until I did as she said.
I got Oscar all situated, then went into the den to turn on the TV. Through the open window I could still hear their voices, but I couldn’t make out the words. While I waited for the television to warm up, I looked out the window—just in time to see Nigel walk my sister up the porch steps and whisper something in her ear.
Then he stepped back and looked at her. Lily blushed and looked away, then back again. I left the window just as she was coming through the door. I hurried down the three steps, crossed the foyer, and followed her into our room.
“Do you like him?” I asked straight out once I’d closed the door behind me. “I saw him whisper something in your ear. What did he say?”
It All Comes Down to This Page 9
