Tell the Truth & Shame the Devil

by Lezley McSpadden

  The kids were still in the Normandy school district. Mike Mike had left Déja at the elementary school and went on to junior high. On weekends when they were home, Mike Mike would make what became his famous Saturday morning breakfast spread—pancakes, eggs with cheese, sausage, and bacon. His bacon was the bomb! But you could only eat it once a week because he deep-fried it. I used to be telling him that was way too much grease, but that was his specialty. Then after that we might spend the day playing cards. His favorite game was Black Duce.

  By that next fall, Mike Mike had gotten in the swing of being in junior high. He had learned how to read his schedule, and to get his bus on time. Meanwhile, Déja had found her independence without her big brother at school with her. I had to bust my butt to keep up with the bills, and that meant working a couple of jobs and being gone from home a lot. I would leave before the kids got up some days and be back home and gone again by the time they got out of school. But I knew Mike Mike could handle it. He helped me in every way he could with the littler ones, even basic cooking and cleaning. I had to do a lot of parenting over the phone, too.

  I worked evenings till closing, and I wouldn’t get home sometimes until eleven o’clock at night. I would have Mike Mike drop a load of clothes in the wash, make sure the kids got a bath, and he would heat up or cook whatever I’d set out for dinner. I’d bark out orders over the phone like a drill sergeant. “And don’t let nobody in the house! And don’t be outside when it get dark, and get y’all’s homework done. ” I had to put the fear of God in those kids.

  I was Mama and Daddy, but I didn’t want to be. When a boy is between eleven and thirteen, he’s starting to deal with his hormones and I was having to explain the birds and the bees, because Big Mike wasn’t helping me out in that department. Déja being a girl, she had her mama to talk to, but Mike Mike needed and wanted his father. I wanted to put off talks about sex for as long as I could.

  • • • •

  I got a call on Valentine’s Day 2007 that shook me. It was Andre. I didn’t say anything for a long time. I had, for a minute, lost the power of speech. He started explaining how he knew he had done wrong by me in the past but just wanted to prove to me that he still had my back and loved me.

  He asked if he could take me out again. I know I should’ve said no, but his words were everything I had wanted to hear.

  That night Andre showered me with jewelry and new clothes. He told me how sorry he was for beating me like he did. I was sucked in by his every word. This man was crying. Crying! Have you ever seen a grown man cry? I cried with him. We still had love.

  When he asked me to stay the night, I did. He made love to me like he did back when we first started dating. Eight years ago. And it was like every bad, cruel, painful thing that had happened between us disappeared.

  The next morning I tried on one of the outfits he had bought me. I hadn’t had anything new to wear in a while, and it felt good to slip into some fresh clothes. Andre always had good taste. After that we started quietly seeing each other again. But I wasn’t about to tell Mama, or anyone.

  Old habits are hard to break, and Andre began slipping back into his old ways, and so did I. The pressure was mounting between us and he’d push me or slap me, and it felt like things would never be right between us and that too much damage had been done.

  Having a man around had never made my life better, and I realized now that if my life was going to change it was up to me. And my kids—well, they never had any shortage of love. They had their mama, they had their grandparents, and sometimes they had their daddies. But the men I’d chosen weren’t the male role models they needed, and that was becoming clearer to me now that Mike Mike was thirteen.

  • • • •

  I had been in denial about the possibility of being pregnant, but I couldn’t put it off any longer. I looked at the stick.

  Damn . . .

  I slowly got in the passenger side of Andre’s car and let out a long sigh. “So, um, I’m pregnant,” I said looking straight ahead.

  “For real?” He said, grabbing my hand. “Then I guess you just gonna be fat ridin’ around in your Mitsubishi Galant.”

  “For real?” I perked up instantly.

  Hearing that I was going to finally get the car that I had been waiting for for so long, changed my whole mood. Andre’s smile and gifts could always make me happy.

  I felt like cooking. I had seasoned up some pork steaks and put them in the skillet. Then I put some potatoes on to boil and started sautéing some fresh green beans. Within a few minutes the whole house smelled like I was preparing a holiday feast. The aroma of the simmering peppers and onions led Mike Mike right to the kitchen. He came in with his headphones on bobbing to a hip-hop baseline and sat down at the table.

  “Mama, what you cookin?”

  “A li’l somethin’-somethin’. Why, you hungry?”

  “I’m always hungry for your food, Mama,” he laughed.

  I thought it was a good time to break the news to him that I had just found out I was pregnant. I had had Moo Moo five years ago, and I admit, I thought I was done. I don’t want to call it a mistake because I knew I was going to love this baby as much as I loved the three before, but it certainly wasn’t planned.

  “How you feel about being big brother again?” I asked raising my eyebrow.

  He didn’t say anything for a while. Then he looked down and said, “Mama, please don’t have this baby. I don’t want you to have another baby.”

  “Mike Mike, why you sayin’ this?”

  “ ’Cause Mama, you havin’ a hard enough time takin’ care of us.”

  His words knocked the wind outta my lungs for a moment. Looking in his eyes, I saw his fear and I put his larger hands in each of mine, clutching them tightly. I wanted to reassure him that we were going to be all right.

  He was about to be fourteen and my soldier, but he was still my little boy.

  “Mike Mike don’t say that. Listen, for real, nobody wanted me to have you, ’cause I was so young, but that was my choice to bring you here. So that’s why I’ll forever do right by you, Déja, Moo Moo, and now this new baby I’m expecting,” I said touching his face.

  I knew right away that he wasn’t trying to be mean or hurt my feelings. Mike Mike was a kid and he had seen me struggle, and he didn’t want to see me in a bad way any more.

  “I’m just sayin’, Mama,” he said, lowering his eyes.

  “You know, Mike Mike, at five years old, we knew two things about you. You liked animals and video games,” I said getting him to crack a smile. “That meant you was carin’ and inquisitive. Boy, I swear you had every game system from Super Nintendo to GameCube . . .”

  He burst into laughter.

  “Right, that was your thing. I remember when Uncle Bernard tried to get you into sports, but you wasn’t havin’ that. You liked playin’ outside, but your butt didn’t like to practice.” I gave him a playful shove.

  “Sports just ain’t really my thing, Mama.”

  “Mike Mike, when Auntie Brittanie and our cousin Raquel would take you out to the park or the mall, and y’all would have to do walkin’, you’d be like, ‘Auntie, I’mma tell my mama on you for makin’ me walk!’ Then you’d just quit and Auntie Brittanie would have to put you on her back and carry you home from the bus stop to stop you from cryin’!” We both cracked up.

  “Mama, you makin’ that up!”

  “No, I ain’t, but I’d rather you learn them computers than run with a football anyway!” I gave him a big hug. “Look,” I said, taking a long pause. “I hear what you sayin’ about me and this baby, and I ain’t gonna have no more babies after this. But you gotta trust me that we always gon’ be alright. I promise.”

  I gave him another hug and sent him on his way. I know he was worried because of all he’d seen me endure. But, I needed him to know that his mama got this.

  • • • •

  It’s a good thing, too, because Andre wouldn’t come to the hospi
tal. He even demanded that I not give the baby his last name. Strangely, the pain of childbirth was the last step I needed to break ties with him. I named my new princess Jazmine, Jazzy for short.

  The streets got a lotta ears, and they always report back to me. Turns out Andre was having another baby at the same time with somebody else. He didn’t want anybody to know about his second child with me. He ended up showing up at my house when Jazzy was a few months old to apologize for not being there for her. I guess him handing me a stack of money was supposed to make it all OK? This was the same money that was supposed to be for that Mitsubishi Galant. Humph, I gladly took it and was happy to see him leave.

  Watching his car pull away, I suddenly realized that what I always thought was love between me and Andre wasn’t love at all. In fact, I had never had anybody around me growing up who could show me what real love was. I’d seen a man hurt a woman physically and emotionally plenty of times, but never show pure kindness. I wanted to know and feel what Mary J. Blige was singing about. Maybe one day I’ll see it, touch it, and have it. But for now, I was turning the page to a new chapter in my life.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  BOYS TO MEN

  When I had a lot on my mind, preparing food was always my escape, and catering orders for Straub’s would keep me busy for the next six hours. I was busy slicing meat when I felt a nudge from my coworker, who was pointing toward a slim-built brown-skinned brother who was standing near the front case. She and three other coworkers were acting like they hadn’t ever seen a man before. I curled my lip up, thinking, Oh hell naw. He might have looked nice in the face, but the brother had two ponytails.

  They were acting so silly, but nobody else had the courage to ask if he was a new hire.

  “You finna work here?” I asked. He looked at me as if he didn’t know I was talking to him. “Yeah, I’m talking to you. Are you finna work here?” He nodded yes and smiled.

  “Y’all hear that?” I announced to my female coworkers. “OK, thank you, sir. They wanted to know,” I smarted and went on taking care of the customers I had lined up.

  He started just coming around whatever area I worked in after that. I might be cutting up cheese or slicing meat, and lo and behold here this man come. Outside of the ponytails, he was cool, and he could dress under his smock, but him following me around the store was borderline creepy.

  “How you doin’ today?” he asked, flashing his big smile.

  “Fine,” I said flatly.

  I shook my head, thinking to myself, I don’t know why he be talkin’ to me.

  One day I came in on my day off to get my check. I was going over something with another coworker and felt the weight of his eyes. I stopped my conversation abruptly, whipped around, and jokingly lit into him, catching him off guard.

  “Uh, why are you starin’ at me?”

  He laughed, and I shook my head, grabbed my check, and left. But there was something about that moment that got me. He caught my sense of humor, and nobody had really done that before.

  The next day I came back to work, and we properly introduced ourselves. His name was Louis, and he asked me for my phone number. I told him I had to think about it. Next thing you know, a female coworker rushed up to me as I was headed out for my lunch break.

  “Did he ask you for your number? ’Cause he asked me for my number, and he asked another girl, too,” my nosy coworker said.

  “Really, he did?” I shrugged my shoulders and walked off. The last thing I was interested in doing was getting in the workplace gossip mill.

  Louis would always come around when I was having lunch outside and sit at my table. That day he came up and asked me, “Lezley, you never gave me your number. Why?”

  “Well, my coworker over there said you asked for her and another worker’s numbers.”

  “No, I asked the lady over there you pointed to if she wanted something to drink. I only did that ’cause it was hot outside.”

  I knew he liked me when he asked me to walk back inside with him. Next thing I knew, he was motioning for the nosy coworker to come over.

  “Louis, you best not ask that lady what she said,” I whispered.

  Louis didn’t hesitate. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

  She nodded her head. “Um, did you think I meant somethin’ when I asked to buy you a soda?”

  “Well, yeah,” she said, suddenly feeling unsure.

  “No, we work together. I thought you might be thirsty ’cause it was hot outside.”

  Louis had settled any hesitation I had right then and there.

  We started going out a bit, and I had decided that I wasn’t going to have a bunch of expectations this time.

  Louis impressed me. Not with money, a car, or the respect he got on street, but because he was a hard worker, he even had his barbering license and cut hair on the side for extra money. He was an honest guy and a brother trying to earn his way out of here. I hadn’t ever seen those qualities in a guy I dated.

  I heard a song the other day by Kirk Franklin. The lyrics were saying that God won’t ever put more on you than you can bear. But I was suddenly questioning just how true that was. At the start of this year, I told myself that 2011 was going to be the bomb. I had been dating Louis for several months, and I had finally brought real closure to my relationship with Andre. Instead, I had been just four months into the year when 2011 actually dropped a bomb on me. My Granny died April 6, 2011. She was eighty-four years old. It might sound a little fucked up or selfish, but I wanted God to tell me why.

  Mike Mike was fifteen, Déja was twelve, Moo Moo was seven, and Jazzy was two. I had gone through a period where I wasn’t going around Granny too much, sometimes months at a time, and I would be right across the street at Mama Lady’s house a lot of those times. I knew I wasn’t living right, moving from place to place, and dealing with men who I had had my children with, wasn’t treating me right, or being there for our babies. I didn’t want to see her like that, because I knew if she asked me anything I wasn’t going to be able to lie. So, it was best to stay away. I was just starting to come around her more, and now it was too late.

  Granny was the glue to our family. Sitting in the church listening to the eulogy, I had a revelation. This woman had made something out of herself, coming from Mississippi with not a lot of education, then making a life here in St. Louis and raising eight kids. Even with all the mistakes I’ve made, I suddenly saw that if Granny could do it, so could I. I began to cry. There was so much that I didn’t get to say to her in the end, but now I had to show her how thankful I was to have her for these thirty-one years. I had to show her that I could do better and that proof was gonna be in her great grandbabies being successful, and healthy, and me making sure they always know what a great woman she was.

  • • • •

  My phone rang as I was heading out to work. It was Andre’s mother, Rita. I was rushing but didn’t want to blow her off. I answered, and there was a long pause.

  “Lezley, have you talked to Andre?” Rita’s voice was faint on the other end.

  “No, I haven’t talked to him this mornin’. The last time was 10:30 last night. He brought my Moo Moo home. But he was supposed to come back and get Moo Moo this mornin’ for school, and he never showed up.”

  As soon as we hung up, I texted him: YOUR MOM IS TRYIN’ TO GET IN TOUCH WITH U. U NEED TO CALL HER.

  I got no response.

  I went to work. Nothing was really on my mind, but I just felt strange. I got back home after picking all four of my kids up from school. I had even seasoned up some meat and had some tacos cooking on the stove. The smell of the onions and cumin was filling up the house. And, one by one they made their way to the kitchen. I fixed each of them a plate and the kids tore those tacos up.

  I slipped off to my room for a quick nap. I was getting some good sleep in, too, until my phone rang. I turned over, checked the time, and it was 5:00 p.m.

  The caller ID read RITA.

  I wasn’t in the
mood for a lot of chitchatting today. I was also hoping she wouldn’t ask me if the kids could come over. I let the phone ring a few times, then answered.

  “Hello,” I said.

  “Hello?” It wasn’t Rita’s voice on the other end.

  I sat up abruptly. I didn’t recognize the woman’s voice.

  “Um, you know . . .”

  “You know what?” My leg was shaking like crazy.

  “They found a body overnight.”

  “And?”

  “Well, you know, we had been lookin’ for Andre . . .”

  “And?” I was getting more agitated.

  “The police had been lookin’ for Andre, and they said it was him . . .” her voice trailed off.

  I didn’t even bother to hear the rest. My brain exploded. I threw the phone across the room. I jumped up and ran out of my room and through the house. My eyes were wide, I was pale, and I was screaming like a madwoman. The kids were stunned. Nobody moved, nobody said anything. I burst out the front door, running down the driveway and into the street. I ran back into the house, hysterical. Mike Mike handed me the phone again.

  Andre was dead.

  I sat semiconscious, staring out the front window, puffing on a cigarette. When his cause of death was described to me I was told they didn’t shoot or stab him, but that he was bludgeoned to death with dumbbells and some other heavy object. My stomach was queasy just thinking about what they had done to him. His bloody body was tossed in the back of his own truck and driven to a nearby creek, then dumped in the water. After that the killers used his cell phones, credit cards, and went joyriding in his truck.

  Nobody would tell the police anything. Word on the street was that it was some guys from the same Walnut Park area that he was from. They were supposed to be his homeboys. He loved the hood, but the hood had just proved that it don’t love nobody.

  At his funeral I found out Andre had eight kids. I was heated. I was ready to flip out up in this funeral home, but I knew I couldn’t. I felt deceived.