His First Wife

by Grace Octavia

  These kinds of questionable exchanges occurred in our kitchen for weeks. And after a while, Jamison seemed tired of my constant interrogation and actually tried to turn the thing around on me. He said I needed to be more trusting and made it seem as if I was going crazy with my suspicions. Now I was going a bit crazy; I can admit that. He’d been lying to me and I just knew. I didn’t need him to admit anything.

  The lie was beginning to pull us apart. I didn’t want Jamison to even touch me. I stopped having sex with him, claiming I was sick and feeling bloated. Then, the funny thing was that I actually did start feeling sick and bloated. I was vomiting during the day and my stomach felt queasy all night. I might’ve thought I was pregnant, but we hadn’t had sex in a while and vomiting after lunch didn’t qualify as “morning sickness”—I’d later be proven wrong.

  Things got serious when I finally told Marcy about my suspicions and she volunteered to help me follow Jamison during one of his nights out, which were now a part of his regular routine. We decided to rent a car and follow him one night. I felt bad for doing it, but Marcy kept telling me that if I didn’t do something I’d really go crazy. And there was no need accusing a man of doing something when he was doing nothing. “He could be doing nothing,” she’d said. “But he could be doing something. You need to know either way.” I said maybe I could just ask him again and she frowned. “When most men cheat, they lack the ability to tell the truth,” she said. “And not because they don’t want to—but because they don’t want to risk hurting and losing you. The only time they’ll tell the truth is when you catch them in the act, and even then, they might claim the woman in the bed is their aunt.”

  So, there we were, in a rented car, driving behind Jamison, on our first stakeout. It was exciting and dramatic. And the whole time I was nervous and scared, but also, like Marcy had said, ready to confirm what I already knew. But this changed when we ended up outside Coreen’s house. I’d pat Jamison on the back ten million more times, kiss him more, have sex with him every night, even make nice with his mother, to make this go away. But there it was, in front of my eyes, my worst nightmare, a reality. It wasn’t a lie. It was true. True indeed. How would I ever be able to come back to loving Jamison from that? That was a Hamburger Helper recipe I simply didn’t have.

  Refugee Camp

  From the antique mahogany-encased Victrola in the living room, to the dramatic magenta French lace curtains hanging from ceiling to floor in the formal dining room, every day in Aunt Luchie’s house was like living on the set of an old ’30s movie. It was beautiful and timeless, unchanged in a world that seemed to always look for change.

  When I was a child, my father brought me to Aunt Luchie’s house most Saturdays. She had a great blues record collection, and he’d sit in her den listening to records most of the afternoon as Aunt Luchie let me play with her makeup and jewelry at the vanity in her bedroom. It was a great weekly journey for both of us. My mother hated the blues and constantly came into the room to turn down the music whenever my father listened to records at home, and I wasn’t even allowed in her bedroom, let alone to sit at her vanity and play with her jewelry and makeup.

  Tyrian and I moved in with Aunt Luchie after two days of staying at a hotel where he’d gotten his first cold. I swore that nothing had changed in that woman’s house since the last time my father took me there. From the over-red lipstick lying on the right-hand side of the vanity top to my grandmother’s pearls sitting in a tightly spun circle on her dresser, everything was in its place. It was as if Aunt Luchie wanted time to stand still inside that place. And this was a surprise, coming from a woman who was so full of life.

  After putting Tyrian down for his afternoon nap, I went into the living room to find Aunt Luchie reading a book, as she sipped on a tall glass of brandy. We’d been staying there for about two weeks and I’d come to realize that whenever Aunt Luchie wasn’t out trying to save the world and my mother with her bare hands, this was her afternoon routine.

  “Whew,” she said when I walked into the room. She slammed the book closed and slid it on the coffee table sitting beside the sofa. “That was a good book.”

  “You were done with it?” I asked. “You seemed like you were at the beginning. No more than halfway through.”

  “I know, but the story was over for me, so it’s done.”

  “You’re funny,” I laughed. “You don’t have to stop reading because I came in; I can go to my bedroom and watch television.”

  “Please. Who needs to read the entire story? I’ve read enough of them and seen enough of life to know how stories end.”

  “And how is that?”

  “The big gamble is taken and the protagonist either gets what she wants or not,” she said, sipping on her brandy.

  “But don’t you want to know what she gets?” I asked.

  “I prefer to make that up for myself,” she said. “I don’t like other people choosing fate for me. Sometimes I want a sad ending; sometimes I want a happy ending.”

  “I know what you mean.” I walked over to the window and looked outside to see two children playing in the street. Aunt Luchie’s house was just down the street from the Atlanta University Center. It was a gorgeous Queen Anne–style home with magnificent fireplaces and hardwood floors throughout. She’d bought it with her inheritance after she graduated from Spelman. My mother wasn’t exactly excited that she’d used the money for that. She had enough money to buy a home right beside my mother. But Aunt Luchie’s love with Red blossomed on the campus of the AUC, as he was a senior at Clark Atlanta when they started dating her freshman year. He was in the jazz band and caught her eye the first week of school. She was in love and felt that she’d always be tied to that place.

  “So how will your story end?” Aunt Luchie asked.

  “What?” I turned and looked at her.

  “Your story with Jamison.”

  “I guess I don’t know,” I said, walking over to sit on the sofa beside her. I’d been trying not to think about it. It just hurt too much to consider my marriage being over.

  “Well, there are only two options—either you stay or you go. You just have to decide if you will take the gamble.”

  “Well, it’s the gamble that I’m worried about. Taking Jamison back after this.... I don’t know.”

  “So, you’re just going to walk away?” she asked.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You know, there was a time when folks didn’t just get up and leave over things like this. They stayed and figured it out—worked it out, no matter what. It was a disgrace for a black family to fall apart,” she said. “We’d fought so hard to stay together during slavery, only to have people pull us apart, so when we were free, being with family was a sign of strength.”

  “Well, times have changed,” I said.

  “Just because times have changed doesn’t mean they should’ve. You know that boy loves you. He’s done wrong, yes, but he still loves you and I know you love him. Whatever happened with that woman may not be what you think. You never know what all was going on.”

  “Please, Aunt Luchie,” I said. “I don’t want to think about them right now.” I sat back on the sofa, afraid I’d hurt her feelings. “And since we’re talking about the past not changing, what about this place? Why haven’t you changed anything here in like twenty years?”

  “I don’t know,” she said before swallowing the rest of the brandy. “I just kind of like these things here . . . the way they are. The way they were when my Red was here.”

  “Do you think he’ll ever come back?”

  “Oh, he sends me flowers—”

  “Flowers?” I recoiled. “I thought he was off in Paris living it up in love with some French white woman.”

  “Yeah, he is,” she smiled. “But he still sends me flowers for my birthday every year. White lilies.” Her eyes went off to an old place. “The flower he bought me when we were together.”

  “Well, do you think he’ll come back?” I
asked excitedly. “Maybe that’s why you keep your place the same . . . like a part of the romance when he returns.”

  “Oh, he’s a grandfather now. Been married a long time. He’s not going anywhere. That’s done now,” she said. “I’ve accepted that ending.”

  “Oh,” I sighed. “That’s so sad.”

  “Yeah, it’s amazing how love will make you either accept the stone cold reality or run away from it,” she said. “Now, I just accepted that my only love was gone. I have never looked at another man like I looked at Red and that’s fine by me. That’s just the way love used to be back in the day. You didn’t try to fill someone’s shoes with someone else who clearly couldn’t fit them. But your mother . . .”

  “What about her? You think she’s still upset about my father being sick?”

  “You ever wonder why your mother is so hateful when it comes to your relationship with Jamison?” she asked. “Your mother can’t accept the love you have until she finds her way back to her own,” she said as I poured her another glass of brandy. “Now, she never wanted your father to go away to that war. She told him not to go, said she’d heard they were killing men over there—poisoning their minds with gas and the government was sending them back home and not telling the families what happened.”

  “I know,” I said, getting back up from the couch to go look out the window. I’d heard this in bits and pieces in the past whenever my mother got upset during the holidays or after our annual trip to see my father. She’d cry and retell how she’d told him not to go, but he was too stubborn.

  “Your mother, she loved that man more than you could ever understand—even as their child. If ever the sun did rise and set on a man’s temples, it did the day your mother met Eldridge that afternoon when our mother introduced him as her escort for the debutante ball. Lord, all Janie could talk about was Eldridge this and Eldridge that,” she said laughing. “And it wasn’t so funny back then because my bed was only three feet away from hers and I had to hear her talk about him. Now, we had a big old house and plenty of rooms, but your grandfather was so old school, he’d always say the only privacy we’d ever see was when we got our own houses—that’s how old folks back in the day would keep young people from getting beneath the sheets together—if you know what I mean.”

  She winked and we both started laughing.

  “Anyway, Eldridge promised Thirjane that he’d come back to her in one piece from Desert Storm. He wasn’t going there for combat or anything. He was too old for that and his rank would keep him far from much combat. But when he came back . . . he just was never the same. And your poor mother had to watch his mind slip away from him one day at a time. I was there with her in that house every day, watching him forget and forget and get angry and lash out, until finally he just lost it altogether and your mother had to let him go. And when he left, when she had to send him away, I think she also lost a piece of herself. You both did.”

  “Both of us?” I asked, turning from the window.

  “I don’t see you running to visit your father. Maybe it’s just as hard for you as it is for Thirjane.”

  “I go with my mother every year,” I said.

  “Child, it’s not like visiting a grave. He isn’t dead. Just gone from his mind. And that’s why he shouldn’t be alone. Maybe if you went more, he’d find his way back,” she said. “Maybe that’s why Jamison goes over there to see him.”

  “Oh, don’t defend him now. That’s just more of his bull.”

  “Is it? Or is it just him being the man you married? Trying to protect you and the people you love?”

  I looked down at the slippers I was wearing and kicked at the floor.

  “He had no right,” I said. “That’s my father. If he wanted to see him, he could’ve asked me.”

  “You don’t think I want Thirjane to go see him? Eldridge was my friend too,” she said. “But if both she and you are acting like he’s dead and standing on it, what can we do but accept it and let you live? I don’t want to hurt your mother’s heart no more than it’s already been hurting. She’s my baby sister and I just want to protect her. Maybe Jamison was just doing the same for you.”

  The Color of My Parachute

  “You need to have an appointment for that. Take a number and have a seat.”

  Those were the two sentences the woman sitting at the front desk at the Department of Social Services seemed to say to everyone who approached. She never changed her indifferent tone, no matter what they said, and always responded with one of those two rehearsed lines I’d imagined she’d been saying for years. When it was my turn, I was determined to break the pattern, but also afraid to appear uncooperative. She wasn’t exactly a peaceful-looking woman.

  After Aunt Luchie and I spoke about my father, I told her about the effect seeing McKenzie had on me and how I’d thought about opening a facility to help women like her. She thought it was a fantastic idea and immediately went through her mental Rolodex of all of the people who could help me get it started. I took her suggestions but I kept imagining McKenzie in my mind, standing there with those shopping carts, and something in me said I needed to do this on my own. No connections, no tea and crumpets, making this another rich-people-doing-something-for-poor-people thing. I wanted to do more. To really get involved. I was pumped up and ready to act. Together, we decided that it might be a good idea for me to go over to Social Services to see if there was even a need for the outreach program I was talking about. Aunt Luchie volunteered to watch Tyrian and I set out to find answers.

  Standing in line, listening to the lack of commitment the front desk woman was exuding, I was sure it wouldn’t be that easy.

  “I’m here to get information about the—” I started, but she cut me off. I just knew she was about to tell me to make an appointment or take a piece of paper and sit my behind down for five hours.

  “Internship?” she said, looking me up and down as if I wasn’t even supposed to be there.

  “Internship?” I asked.

  “Here’s the application,” she handed me an old clipboard with a piece of paper on it. “Fill it out and bring it back. Mr. Duncan, the director, will call you in to meet with him.”

  Afraid to say another word, I took the clipboard and went to find a seat in the packed waiting area.

  I sat down and looked over the application. Trying to concentrate above the growing pitch of screaming children seemingly running only around my seat, I learned that the department was looking for interns to volunteer to assist them during the new year. The internship was for students and professionals interested in a career in social services. It wouldn’t pay, but it would give participants the opportunity to see what social services was all about and actually assist in certain cases. It was a part-time commitment that would last five months. It seemed like the perfect opportunity had fallen and was sitting right in my lap on top of a clipboard that someone had apparently chewed on. It was just what I was looking for—well, not exactly, but it seemed like a great first step to get where I needed to be. It would be a good thing to actually have some experience in the field before I put any money behind my project. In the meantime, I could see what other special services were offered and decide how mine would be different. I was so excited, I wanted to jump up and hug one of the screaming children passing by. It was the very first time in a long time that I felt like I had the potential to be a part of something that was of my own making. I filled out the application and anxiously handed it back to the woman. Even she looked more friendly with my new attitude.

  “Have a seat,” she said. “Mr. Duncan is seeing someone right now. So, he’ll probably call you in a minute.”

  The minute turned to forty, and like most of the other women in the waiting area, I was sitting there looking weary and worn out. The noise was too loud, the air was too stifling, and the seat was so hard I thought it was becoming a part of my own behind. In a minute I would have to create a social service project to get myself out of this seat. I was trying
my best to keep my mind on my goal and not lose my excitement, but I was sinking fast. I was about to break my diet and get a bag of potato chips out of the snack machine when someone called my name.

  Mr. Duncan was an old, bald Irish man whose years tackling issues facing the poor seemed to leave him a bit battered but wiser for his journey. Instead of asking me a bunch of questions about my intentions for working in social services (which was a good thing, because I hadn’t intended on anything before I’d gotten the application an hour ago), he told me what I might face being employed there and informed me that this was no job for someone simply interested in pushing papers and even wishing to save the world. “It’s hard work,” he said. “And you have to know when to pull back or it’ll go home with you. Many of us do take it home, thinking we can save everyone, but then we only lose ourselves and burn out. We have good people here, but we all have to learn where to draw the line.” He then looked over my application, saying he’d had many Spelman graduates come through the office and knew I’d be a quality intern because of this. “Now you’re a bit older than the other applicants. Any reason why you’ve decided to come here right now? I see your last position was in administration,” he said eyeing me.

  “Well,” I started, “I just had a baby and . . .” I was nervous and had to stop to catch my breath. All I could hear in my head was Jamison asking why I hadn’t gone back to med school, visualize in my mind the stack of envelopes, the rejections, the look of disappointment on my mother’s face. I was frozen. I couldn’t fail again. I couldn’t lose another thing I cared about.

  “Take your time,” I heard Mr. Duncan say and I knew I must’ve looked like I was about to cry but I couldn’t. I took a deep breath and imagined in my mind Tyrian’s face. The little smile he’d recently learned to flash whenever I kissed his nose or whenever Jamison walked into the room. I looked back at Mr. Duncan and tried to start again. “He’s almost two months now and I can’t lie, I’ve had a very easy time with him. I haven’t had to worry about anything. He’s taken care of and all of his needs are met—just like that.” I snapped my finger. “Now he’s beautiful and deserves everything the world has to offer, but the more I look at him, I realize that other children deserve the same. Other families deserve to know where their next meal is coming from. Mothers need to know how they can provide it. And if I could just be a part of that, it would be great.”