“Didn’t I tell you to change your clothes? Dinner is ready. Y’all come and eat.” She disappeared back into the kitchen and Jalissa didn’t acknowledge a word she said.
Vanessa liked Skipper Ryle just like the next kid but she didn’t want to risk pissing off aunt Callista within the first hour of her stay.
“Come on,” she whispered to Jalissa. “Your mother said its time to eat.”
“I told you not to pay any attention to her,” she said in a normal tone as if her mother wouldn’t be able to hear her even though she was just in the next room.
Vanessa sat quietly not enjoying the show at all anymore. When it was over they went upstairs to her mom’s room and changed into shorts and t-shirts. Jalissa and her mom lived in a one-bedroom apartment and aunt Callista got the one bedroom. Jalissa slept on the sofa bed and kept her clothing in her mother’s room and her toys in the coat closet. It wasn’t a bad apartment but it was obvious that aunt Callista’s taste went to the extravagant. They had a purple sofa and red curtains on the walls and a gold fur rug beneath the glass cocktail table.
Vanessa followed her cousin into the kitchen where aunt Callista was once again on the telephone, sitting in one of the kitchen chairs and smoking a cigarette with a plate in front of her that held the remnants of her eaten meal…and cigarette butts. Ugh.
Jalissa passed her a plate and while aunt Callista laughed raucously they quietly ate their meal of boiled potatoes and butter, hamburger steak with gravy and mushy canned peas. It was good, even the mushy peas as long as Vanessa hid them under the gravy and potatoes.
“Hey!” Aunt Callista called to them while covering the mouthpiece of the telephone when they made to leave after dinner. “Just because you’re over here little girl, don’t mean you’re going to leave a bunch of mess, you understand?” Vanessa’s aunt was staring at her and she opened her mouth to explain that she had no intentions of messing with or messing up anything but aunt Callista continued. “I expect you to wash your own dishes and clean up after your own self. So before you go outside get to washing.”
Jalissa blew out an annoyed voice and then turned tail and headed right out of the room! Vanessa didn’t dare disobey her aunt so she went to the sink and grabbed the dishcloth and dish soap.
“Vanessa! What in the hell are you doing?” Vanessa jumped as her aunt stood over her looking down at her incredulously. She returned to her phone conversation briefly. “Girl, I’m going to be watching this little girl and she thinks she’s going to come up in here and waste my dish soap!” She returned her attention to Vanessa. “Run some dish water, Vanessa!”
Feeling nervous tension fill her, Vanessa did as requested although it made no sense to run water in the sink just so that she could wash one plate, one fork and one cup. After placing her washed dishes in the drain board aunt Callista stared at her with a frown so Vanessa washed all of the dishes including the one in front of her aunt with its ashes and cigarette butts buried in congealed gravy. She wanted to vomit at the sight of it but her aunt, misreading the look of disgust rattled off a list of insults that she perceived had been slung at her by ‘this little girl’ to her telephone partner. After the sink was drained, the dishes dried Vanessa quickly left the kitchen before her aunt could say anything else against her.
She was trembling when she met Jalissa who was waiting for her on the front stoop of the apartment complex. She sat down next to her cousin.
“Your mother is mean.”
Callista nodded in agreement. “Forget about her. Let’s go down to my friend Cherrelle’s house. She has a Tiffany Taylor Townhouse with a pink Cadillac for her Barbies!” Vanessa nodded in agreement; anything to get away from her aunt’s loud, mean voice.
Cherrelle’s apartment was a den of activity. The 9 year-old girl had baby brothers and sisters who were loud but funny and cute. Vanessa wanted to play with the little babies more than the Barbie’s. Cherrelle was nice and she oohed and ahhed over Vanessa’s hair, begging to take out her two braids so that she could brush it. Vanessa hated when people asked to play with her hair but she allowed it or else Cherrelle might call her stuck up. Jalissa was content to play with the Barbies alone, making up imaginary dialogue that included one Barbie talking on the phone about her bad-ass kids.
The girls watched the Brady Bunch and then went outside to play Jacks—which had to be played outside or one of the babies might swallow them. Before long they were joined by other little girls and soon they were all lined up and dancing an impromptu soul train line. Vanessa was not generally shy about singing or dancing in front of Jalissa or her mother but these girls knew dances that she had never seen before. She watched them and only did a quick bump down the line when it was her turn.
When Cherrelle and her new friends had to go inside to eat dinner Vanessa felt sad. She liked Cherrelle’s house and her brothers and sisters and her mother that left them alone and didn’t have a loud voice. But most of all she liked having friends to play with.
Instead of going back to the apartment, she and Jalissa walked to the corner store for sunflower seeds and Bar-B-Q Grippos potato chips. Vanessa preferred the smaller bags of Grippos because those chips were coated with so much of the sweet and tangy hot spice that it left her smacking her lips.
On their way back Jalissa saw a group of girls that she knew and she introduced Vanessa to them. Vanessa quickly realized why Jalissa was so loud and why she hit so often. Between her loud mother and these girls that hollered instead of talked and who hit each other and dodged away in laughter, Jalissa had no choice but to be that way as well.
~***~
Mama was there to pick her up at nine so she didn’t bother to put on pajamas or climb into the sofa bed with Jalissa. They were watching Charlie’s Angels when aunt Callista answered the door.
“Hey sis,” she said to Leelah in an animated voice.
“How did everything go? Hi girls.”
“Hi mama.”
“Hi aunt Leelah.”
“Girl it went great. The girls ate, did their homework, played for a while and now they’re watching some T.V. I think Vanessa had a good time, didn’t you Vanessa baby.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Vanessa answered truthfully. It had been enjoyable despite the instances with her present.
Vanessa gathered her things and said goodbye to her cousin who was too preoccupied with Charlie’s Angels to do more than say a brief bye.
“See you tomorrow, Van,” Callista gave one of her braids a gentle tug and smiled at her warmly.
So fake. And she hated auntie using her mama’s pet name for her.
“Bye.”
While they drove up the hill mama asked her if she was hungry and she said no and told her mother what they’d had for dinner. Mama bobbed her head to the music playing from the eight track; Voices Inside by Donnie Hathaway. It was old but mama said that Willie Weeks on bass was the very definition of soul.
“Everything is everything,” she sang when the song was over and then nodded her head in agreement. Vanessa rested her head against the door and yawned.
“What does that mean?”
“Everything is everything? It means that it is what it is.”
Vanessa giggled. “And what does that mean?”
Leelah smiled. “It means that what you see is what you get.”
Vanessa smiled warmly. “But what does it mean?”
Her mother thought for a while. “Everything is everything means that there is nothing more than what is right before you. No tricks, no secrets; its all laid out.”
One day Vanessa would know that everything is everything also had another meaning. But at that moment, at the age of twelve she felt comfortable in her mother’s car, with soul music playing softly over the stereo and the sound of her mother’s hums lulling her to sleep.
~***~
Two days later Mr. Price arranged a ‘field trip’ for the both of them to visit Walnut Hills High School. Although he didn’t want to admit it, Scotty was intrigue
d with the college preparatory and the students that attended it. He was told that there was no true dress code but he was still surprised to see that everyone dressed just like they did at his school. He knew that rich kids attended the college preparatory just like poor kids like him, but he literally could not tell the difference between them.
Another difference is that there were just as many white kids as there were blacks, which meant that he wasn’t in the minority. He chuckled at that. Several white chicks actually looked at him with interest and then continued to eye him. Most of the girls that he liked at his own school had no interest in a white boy whose mother was often seen tricking out on Vine Street. So he didn’t even try when it came to girls.
Scotty shook his head as if bringing himself around to the real crux; he didn’t want to like this school. He didn’t know if he could…
He gave Mr. Price a desperate look but lowered his eyes before the teacher saw. They continued to one of the honors classes and the teacher there was young, smart and hip. He talked to the students like he was a student and the students listened and interacted in a way that showed that they weren’t just trying to pass the time but actually wanted to learn something.
Did he want to learn something?
He supposed that was the question.
~***~
Vanessa and Jalissa’s gang began meeting after school hours. Once the girls knew that Vanessa would be in their territory everyday they became excited and formed a second clubhouse located in the park by the benches. At first the girls acted like they were too old to play on the outdoor equipment but after a few days they were on the swings and jungle gym just like the other kids.
As the weeks moved forward Vanessa decided that she was a fool for not wanting to come down the hill to stay with Jalissa. Yes, aunt Callista was mean but she learned to just stay out from under foot. Every day she did the dishes without being asked and once she even got her aunt a bottle of Coke without her even asking for it. For that little stunt she earned a surprised thank you.
Aunt Callista had a boyfriend named Mr. Johnny. Jalissa didn’t agree that Mr. Johnny was her mother’s boyfriend since he had a whole lot of girlfriends, but he did come over and keep aunt Callista preoccupied so she welcomed his appearance. At least until the one night that she and Jalissa were asleep on the sofa bed and Mr. Johnny came downstairs and walked into the kitchen wearing absolutely no clothes.
She pretended to be asleep but had clearly seen Mr. Johnny’s. He ignored them and went into the kitchen for soda. The light from the refrigerator is how she was able to see ‘it’, gross and sticking out. After getting the soda he quickly returned upstairs and then Vanessa heard the mattress squeak and auntie making sounds like the ladies made in the R rated movies at the Regal Theater.
Vanessa stifled a giggle. Her mother didn’t have a boyfriend and no man ever came to their house so this was a sound that she was unaccustomed to hearing, but it was one that she would soon get used to.
On Halloween Vanessa went trick or treating with Jalissa and their gang and it was the best fun that Vanessa had ever had. After they returned home aunt Callista failed to check their candy the way her mama always did. They gorged themselves anyways and found no razors or other questionable ingredients embedded in their candy. Aunt Callista allowed them to stay up late and they watched Maude before falling asleep with the television on. Vanessa couldn’t be sure but she believed that her last thought before drifting off into a contented sleep was that life was really good.
Chapter 7
~November 1977~
Scotty and Anthony got off the bus at the entrance to Garden Hill Top; not exactly a school bus but the Metro--which is what kids in the city rode in order to get to the school. There were a few other kids from Winton Terrace that also went to Walnut Hills High School; Anthony Johnson was one of them.
Before going to Walnut Hills he hadn’t known Anthony well, just that he was a kid in a lower grade. Now Anthony was someone that he actually liked. It was mostly born out of desperation. Scotty was lost at the huge school. He’d missed the opportunity to attend the summer bridge program that gave new attendees an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the massive building. Since Anthony had been going to the school from the beginning of the year he had an edge. Also, Anthony was just plain smart and despite being younger he was as big as Scotty. In just a matter of two or three weeks the boys had formed a friendship.
But the school wasn’t as easy as Scotty thought it would be. One of his teachers had actually said that he shouldn’t have been allowed to be included in the honors courses because his grades up until the Walnut Hills tests had all sucked. And then he had insinuated that Scotty had cheated and that getting in didn’t mean that he would be able to stay in. He decided then and there that he would prove that he had a right to be there just as much as any of the other students.
But he couldn’t deny that the class work was a challenge—not just because he was behind due to starting at the school two months late but because he had never been taught many of the things that he was expected to already know. And in addition to what he should have been taught he was expected to learn Latin as well as a foreign language—as if Latin wasn’t already a foreign language. He was behind in his reading and should have already been reading Shakespeare not to mention other classics. He was told that he would have math homework every single day and that it would take him no less than two hours to complete. He had smirked to himself at that--until he ended up spending all evening on homework, leaving him little time for much else.
Scotty and Anthony walked to his house arguing good naturedly about the Super Bowl and who was going to win between the Broncos and the Cowboys. Anthony was going to tutor him in algebra and Scotty had absolutely no trepidation about being tutored by an underclassman. Opportunities needed to be accepted when offered. He was no longer that same cocky kid. And the algebra formula they were learning was literally kicking his ass. He was pretty sure that he should not have been placed in honors class—and probably shouldn’t be at Walnut Hills High School at all—but he would never let anyone know that.
After an hour of tutoring he needed to go home to get started on his homework. It wasn’t easy concentrating at home, though. The kids always came to him whenever they needed or wanted something. And even if they left him alone it was just too loud. And that was not even factoring in when Tino demanded his time. Tino wasn’t someone that one could easily say no to.
When he got home, he found that the apartment was unnaturally quiet despite the fact that nearly everyone was there. Since it wasn’t the end of the month there should be something worth eating in the house. But strangely no one was eating and although the television was on, no one was really watching it.
He gave Ginger a quizzical look because her eyes were red-rimmed. Had she been crying?
“What happened? 2-4-1-Kids been here?” He started counting heads. Tino and Beady were the only ones missing.
Scotty’s mother was standing at the kitchen sink with her back to them. She braced herself on the counter and lowered her head. Tracy Tremont was thirty-two with eight children that ranged in age from 16 years to 8 months. Somehow she managed to still look little more than a teenager herself. Mostly that was due to the fact that she was thin to the point of emaciation. It gave her a waif-like quality. With pale skin and soft brown hair, Tracy was most definitely still able to turn heads. However, when her customers looked at her closely they saw the circles and lines beneath her eyes and the hardness developing around her thin lips. And then they no longer mistook her for the under-aged girl that they thought they were purchasing.
After a prolonged silence, Ginger was the only one willing to answer. “Beady got taken by CBS.” CBS? Did she mean CPS, Child Protective Services?
“What?” Scotty said softly. “Why?”
No one answered.
“Mom!” He said sharply and she turned and gave him a confused look. She was high on something, but he
r red and puffy eyes carried the evidence that she had been crying as well. Scotty felt a thread of fear.
“Somebody molested her,” Ginger said. “What does that mean, Scotty?” The seven year old whispered.
“Fuck…” Scotty ran his hand through his hair. He was stunned. Child Protective Services had been around before but mainly for things like negligence when the kids were left alone without adult supervision, or truancy because someone skipped school too much. CPS had even come around when Phonso’s wrist had been broken and when Scotty came to school with one too many black eyes--but never because any of them had been touched sexually.
Beatrice was 13 and she and Scotty were a mere 10-months difference in age. He was very close to his sister with her tough attitude. He would have never thought that anyone would do something like that to Beady. She had gotten into and won more fights than any girl that he’d ever met. She didn’t take shit off anyone. She was a product of the ghetto and made tough out of necessity. But Beady was lucky, because she knew who her father was she was able to escape to her relative’s homes and often stayed with them during summer and Holiday breaks.
Beatrice was like Alphonso and Baby Tyrone; they each obviously had a black father—though not necessarily the same one. Beatrice and TyTy were Mr. Johnny’s kids. However, Tracy’s on-again, off-again boyfriend did not claim Alphonso and Alphonso could care less. No one liked the man who barely acknowledged the kids that he did claim.
“Who…” Scotty blinked his eyes at Tracy. “Who did that to her?”
“I don’t know.” Tracy said brokenly.
“God…are you serious? Do you know anything?”
“I don’t know anything about it, Scotty!” She glared at the boy. “Do you think I’d allow something like that to happen to my own child?”
Scotty frowned and Ginger wrapped her pudgy arms around him, upset but not quite sure why—only that someone had taken Beady away because of something called molestation. He placed a calming hand on her red curls and then reached down and picked her up even though she was far from little. Ginger was special and went to a special school for children with learning disabilities. She had just turned seven and now Scotty was worried about her--worried about them all.
Scandalous Heroes Box Set Page 39
