“I’m sure it’s yours.”
“How do you know that it’s not Sweany’s?”
“Sweany and I haven’t had sex in months. I’m sure it’s yours.”
“Bird what happened? Everything was perfect and in one day you come in here dropping bombs on my whole world.”
“Your world? What about mine? My whole life is turned upside down.”
“If Sweany finds out that you’re pregnant by an inmate, he’ll…?”
“No, no one knows except you and me.”
“Good keep it that way. I’m going to call my people and they’re going to arrange for you to move. I’ve one year left and when I come home we gonna be together. I need for you to lay low and don’t tell anyone about the pregnancy. Stay away from Sweany as much as possible but don’t act obvious. Just give me a few days and I’ll have all this worked out.”
“Sweany wants me to go to a Security convention in California.”
“You can’t go. Tell him that you are sick or something. Don’t let him take you away from here. The weekend will be a perfect time for you to pack and leave town without him knowing anything while he’s away. I’ll have a place for you to go.”
“Dorel, I love you. All I want is for us to be together with our baby. I’ll do whatever.”
“Listen, be very careful.”
Later on that day Dorel went to the phones. That evening, he barely dozed off when his cell door was opened.
“Up on you feet Pipin.”
“What’s this, why…?”
“Shake-down, you know the routine.”
“Pipin, you best shut your fucking mouth and stand to the side while my officers search your cell. Or, I’ll have your ass carried off to the hole,” Captain Sweany said as he walked into Dorel’s cell.
Dorel wanted to kill Sweany especially knowing what he was doing to his bird. He gave Sweany the look of unmistakable hatred and revenge. He knew that one day he would be out there and would make Sweany pay.
Monday morning came and Dorel could hardly wait to hear the familiar phrase. It came but it wasn’t that sweet, soft chirping he expected. Dorel went to the front of his cell to see CO Franklin. Where was Trina? He wondered.
Standing behind him was Sweany’s six foot five frame.
“What’s the problem Pipin? You look like you’ve lost something.”
“Matter of fact I have. Someone’s going to pay if I don’t find it.”
“Tough talk. Maybe you need time in the hole to cool you off. Then again you should be around the rest of the animals. They’ve a way of taking care of their own kind. Hey caged animal, your beautiful bird has been sprung,” Sweany shouted over his broad shoulders in a matter-of-fact manner.
Dorel could hear the laughter rising above the sound of the buzzer. Sweany noisily walked away. He was left wondering about his bird. Dorel felt the sharp pain in his side. He looked at the blood on the shank in the fist of Hector, rat-killer. Hector lunged trying to wedge the make-shift knife into Dorel’s midsection. With the grace of a trained fighter, Dorel elbowed Hector, smashing his nose-bone. Hector fell and Dorel used Hector’s hand with the shank to stab him in the neck.
Dazed, Dorel watched blood spurting out of the artery. The would-be assassin went into the throes of death’s dance. The alarm went off, shutting down the facility. Guards charged from every direction. Dorel felt the blows to his head and everything went black.
It was a miracle. He felt her wings over him guiding him to the bright light. His bird was the answer to his prayers. It was freedom at last. The warmth of her smile melted his heart. No longer would they need to hide their love. His bird would shelter him from all coming storms. A smile creased his lips and Dorel drifted towards the light.
immersion
April Stokes
“I won’t leave,” he said.
When he first made love to her, he had understood that what he said was a lie. On some level he thought that she too knew this…Knew this lie. He thought that she understood that a promise is only as good as the moment it is spoken in. When he did leave, he saw the tears in her eyes.
“Don’t go- you promised,” he heard her say.
She knew that he never really meant it. After all, he was his father’s son.
They said he’d be just like his father. They said, someday he’d let everyone down?
He hadn’t tried hard to be like daddy, in fact, he had made no attempt at all.
It was an irrefutable fact. He was destined to be like that foul smelling, woman beating, drug sniffing, non-child support payin’, m’f ’er that had first deceived his momma and conceived him with the same lie.
“If you give me some, I promise I won’t leave you.”
In the end they had both left.
“You got your daddy’s eyes.”
When she first met Aurie Wright, he disgusted her. A tall, wiry man with no shirt and dirty, frayed jeans. He was repulsive, sitting on a dingy plastic chair. From his covered porch, Aurie watched the children playing, legs splayed before him, hair wildly plaited coming undone. He was a sturdy man, muscular man. No more than twenty-five the glow of youth was fading. He barely looked at her when she walked up the stairs of his front porch. Her first impression of him was fear.
“Hello, I’m here to see Mr. Wright,” she said standing in front of him.
“A pleasure,” he smiled with too much tooth. Without saying anything else, he sat watching her in the blazing, Atlanta afternoon sun. She was already upset because she must have been the only person working on the day before the 4th of July.
On top of that, this asshole was just sitting there staring at her. When Sydney first knew that she would have to work with him, she protested to her boss. She didn’t want to make the hour long drive to his shabby house. Sydney didn’t want to do the token black story; disenfranchised youth making ghetto mosaics. Knowing for sure that this was a waste of her time, Sydney fought to stay away from places like this. She suspected the substandard art he produced would not be worth her time. He was surprisingly soft-spoken and educated, having dropped out twenty-eight credits from a degree in psychology.
She shifted her weight wishing that she wasn’t wearing four inch-stilettos. Finally, he sat up stiffly from his chair like a man twice his age, gave a lengthy stretch and yawn and waved her through the opening to his home.
They moved through the small doorway into Aurie’s home. She was disappointed to feel that the temperature was no better inside. It was suffocating. A gloss of sweat formed on her forehead as they entered what she guessed was a living room. There was a card table and two folding chairs in the center of the room. A tattered brown sofa was in front of the mantle. It reminded her of her own childhood and she felt sadness. Along the mantle were several photos of people having fun. The pictures seemed out of place. Almost out of sight was a black and white photo with fading faces. Directly across from the window was a tall wooden bookcase that looked old and weathered.
Aurie led her through the swinging doors and gracefully ushered her into the kitchen. She felt a rush of cool air. The room was small and cramped. Sitting on the windowsill, a noisy air conditioner blew cool air. The walls were the color of split peas. The cupboards were painted the same shade of green. The whole room was beyond repair. Sydney held back a gag when she saw the rolling cart loaded with jars and jars of pickled pig feet and snouts.
Aurie squeezed around the table to reveal the thing that she had come to see. There, leaning against the wall, behind an old sheet, was a large square glass mirror. The frame was covered in the most beautiful glass mosaic she had ever seen. She felt drawn to it. Aurie pulled the curtain over the air conditioner. When the light penetrated the glass, it echoed and danced.
“It’s beautiful.” Sydney gasped loudly and a smile formed on her glossed lips. She moved close to Aurie and could hear his hurried breathing. Her career as an art journalist was reduced to second-rate articles no one remembered. Dreams seemed far out of reach. Her m
ind began to click.
“What is it? I mean what do you use to create the pieces?” She asked, the man taking new shape in her eyes.
“Broken bits of things, glass, sometimes metal. I use the leftover pieces of people’s lives and put ‘em back together.” He shrugged. “The trick of it is time. Time and patience,” he said in a slow drawl. He was right. The detail and intricacy of his work must take hours to create.
“None of ‘em is the same. Each is different. It’s like the glass is alive and they take the shape thar born ta be.”
The words came out sounding rehearsed like something he’d read from one of the art magazines he had carefully placed on the kitchen table. He appeared not to take notice or care of the world around him yet he tried to impress her.
“Where shall we begin?” She said taking a seat.
“It’s up to you Miss Lady. I’m here ta please.” There was that grin again. The more she saw it the more he began to look like a sheepish little boy. She didn’t want to stay long and had called a day earlier in preparation for the visit. She remembered calling him. The phone rang several times before he answered sleepily.
“Hello?”
“Mr. Wright? I’m sorry if I woke you. This is Sydney Graham from Mode. You received our letter?” What was he doing sleeping in the middle of the afternoon?
“Yeah, yeah I got it. Some sort of art story right?” She sighed heavily with impatience. He had no idea what was going on. He probably didn’t even know what art was. Just some back hills bumpkin who happened on something pretty.
“Yes, it’s a story.”
“Each year our magazine features up and coming artists. You and your work have been selected to be part of this issue. There are a lot of people who find your story and your work very fascinating. Our publication, Mode, is well known in both commercial and academic circles. You should be proud.” She had fed him the required bullshit.
The conversation was forced and labored. Getting her point across in a way that she thought he could understand was like pulling teeth. In the end, they had agreed to meet at his home. She had cleared her calendar for this day.
Driving across town and back took a chunk of it. Sydney wore her favorite black Armani pantsuit. This morning in the mirror she saw the twenty pounds she had gained staring angrily back at her. She had dieted feverishly to leave them but the resolute pounds stayed. Her favorite suit made her feel better. Sparkling costume jewels studded her ears and looped her neck.
Sydney touched her earring as Aurie sat at the table across from her, self-conscious that he might see through her façade.
“Tell me your story,” she said.
He took a breath as though he had prepared all night for this moment. Then he rubbed his toffee colored hands together. They were big as oars and rough looking. She watched him not really listening at first. As he continued to speak she was drawn in by the tragedy of his story.
The editor of Sydney’s magazine stumbled across it one day while looking for antiques in the countryside. She had wandered into a small, cluttered second-hand shop where an old woman greeted her. It was the impetus for the follow-up on Aurie’s story. The old woman had reminded her of grandma.
Most of the items in the shop were of little importance and were covered with dust. She was in a sneezing frenzy when something in the corner of a long glass case caught her eye. It could’ve been just another glass picture frame, so delicate she thought she might break it. She bought it for five dollars and an hour later, Sydney’s editor emerged from the shop with damp eyes and an intense fervor to find Aurie Wright.
He was born in the late 70’s to a woman whose name he barely remembered. His mother was a pretty girl with sad eyes. He never knew where she came from or who his people were. He had known that he had a daddy for biological reasons, but who that man was his mother would never say. They were poor, but Aurie didn’t know it. Not because his mother filled the void in other ways, but because all the other kids in the neighborhood were just as poor. None of them had fathers that stayed, so he figured he wasn’t at too much of a disadvantage.
His mother went out a lot. She wasn’t the type for PTA and seemed overly disappointed with her life. And as though she were trying to save the remaining deficient pieces, she gathered her things in two plastic trash bags and walked out of the house that she and Aurie shared. She left two dollars and a tattered picture of young Mary and baby Jesus. The back of it was signed: Love mommy.
This haunted Aurie. He feared that maybe his mother was looking for him. Social workers found him three months later- dirty with his ribs poking through his skin. They forced him to leave the house. He had nightmares that his mother was there, waiting for him to come home. She never returned.
He found himself in foster care until he settled with an older Baptist Minister and his wife. The couple adopted young Aurie and gave him their name. He was happy with them for a time. They were not particularly strict and gave Aurie everything he wanted and needed. Aurie’s own broken pieces seemed to come together.
When he was fifteen, the cruel fabric of life began to tear again. He and his parents were coming home from a revival which had lasted from Friday to Sunday evening. Though the revival was three hours away and Mrs. Wright had begged him to wait until morning, Reverend Wright insisted on leaving right after the lengthy service.
Reluctantly, Mrs. Wright piled into the car. They began the journey talking. Aurie remembered yielding to his dreams as the Reverend hummed: How Great Thou Art. The old Buick sped along Highway 85. Aurie awoke two days later with his tongue thick. He was extremely thirsty and confused.
Aurie expected to be at home but the white room around him was not his own. The light was so bright his head throb and threw him into a desperate panic. A nurse came and quieted him with a glass of water and codeine. Aurie felt the familiar sting of loss creeping over him.
It happened two nights ago as Aurie slept soundly in the back seat of the Buick and Mrs. Wright dozed in the front. Reverend Wright nodded off and awoke too late to avoid the strong oak that stood unmoved when their car plowed head-on into it. They were just five miles from home. Mrs. Wright was killed instantly. Reverend Wright held on for thirty minutes after his body was tossed and crushed easily as a flower.
“I’m so sorry Jesus. I’m so sorry.” He was uttering to the paramedics who found him twelve feet away from the car. Except for a badly broken leg, Aurie was alive. He escaped with a slight limp and was parentless again. In his anger, he turned away from the Jesus who he had learned loved him.
With nowhere else to go, he was placed in a group home where he grew increasingly withdrawn. He met a young counselor, Melinda, who worked part-time in the evenings. She was not much older and took to him immediately. She would sit with him showing him art books and reading him poetry. One evening, while everyone slept, Melinda led Aurie to the river behind the house. They dipped their toes in the chilly water and skipped rocks. The place became a secret hangout.
Aurie had made his first glass piece for Melinda, from a frame he found in the trash and broken pieces of stained glass he found near a church. That night he presented it to her. She gazed at it and wept. Aurie put his lips to her cheek tasting her tears. Telling him that he was sweet, she did not protest as he undid the buttons of her shirt. In the solitude of the river, they made love.
She hadn’t felt dirty afterward or even ashamed though she knew somehow it was wrong. Aurie was still only a boy but he loved her like no man had. For three months the secret carried on between the two of them. Silently, fervently like a fire burning in a room of matches. Her husband found out and blacked both her eyes. He knocked a hole in her mouth where teeth once were.
While nursing his swollen knuckles she held the Glock 28 semi-automatic to her temple and ended her life. The grief broke Aurie.
“I used to tell stories in the beginning, you know, just to sell the pieces,” he looked away from Sydney, ashamed.
“Stories…?”
“But it didn’t seem right. It just didn’t.”
She held his hand. Looking at him intently, his sadness touched her. It wasn’t hard to see that Aurie was wounded. She’d have to tread carefully to get what she wanted.
Sydney pulled off from the curb in her polished, luxury car. She watched Aurie through her rearview window. He stood both happy and sad, house falling down around him. Even though he was repugnant, Aurie was a marvel. He was unmatched in his field of art. His work had made Aurie Wright a lone flower in a field of crab grass.
She made an unscheduled visit the next time. Sydney drove the long hour only to sit in the car thinking, waiting, plotting. Aurie walked to the car, before she had even noticed he was coming. He knocked at the passenger side and motioned for her to roll down the window.
“Come inside. You’ll burn up out here. An’ I got ice-tea for you.”
He smiled and turned back to the house. Aurie made it easy for her. No excuses necessary. She put her keys in her purse, grabbed her tape recorder and followed him into the house. This would be easier than she thought.
They sat in the living room, feeling the evening summer breeze through the open window. Sydney sipped her tea slowly, deliberately. She knew that he was watching her and it was delicious. She began to wonder what else he mastered.
“You want answers right? You’re wondering why,” he finally said. Without saying anything she had given herself away.
“Yes Aurie, I need answers. I need to understand your gift.”
She heard him laughing.
“You can’t understand a gift. It ain’t taught. Why me? I don’t know, don’t care. But that piece thar on the wall. That’s me and nobody can take that.”
His words rang true to her. She stared at him as he sat next to her. After a moment he got up from the sofa and moved to the kitchen. He came back with an odd shaped object wrapped in newspaper and tied with string.
Lipstick Diaries Page 12
