Second House from the Corner

by Sadeqa Johnson

  Gran sighs, like she has the burden of the whole family on her collarbone.

  Crystal takes a long swig from her bottle and snarls. “You fucked Mr. Orbach to get her into that fancy college in New York City. You didn’t even try to get me into community college.”

  “Crystal!” I’m exasperated. “Don’t disrespect your mother like that!” I shout.

  “Mind your damn business.”

  “And you watch your mouth in my house. ’Sides, you ain’t cared nothing about school. Too busy chasing those boys,” Gran mumbles. “Fast ass.”

  Crystal jumps to her feet, spilling a slurp of her beer on the floor. “Fast? Faye got pregnant right behind me. You always favored Faye and I’m yours. I’m your child. Why? Just ’cause your crazy son tried to kill her mama?”

  Gran slams her fist on the table. “Cut it out.”

  “You ain’t never want to talk about that. Sweeping Faye’s stuff under the rug but letting mine hang all out. Now she gets the house I grew up in and I get the crumbs as usual. Faye don’t even need the house. That’s bullshit, Mama.”

  “Girl, if you don’t watch your mouth—”

  “Faye’s mama was a whore, and the apple don’t fall too far from the tree.”

  “Who you calling a whore?” I turn my head and push my chest forward.

  “You. A stank-ass whore, at that.”

  “You better stop it, Crystal,” I say, fists balled.

  “Mama, bet you didn’t know that Faye been sneaking around with the old man who got her knocked up in high school. You smuggle her off to Virginia in the middle of the night to get rid of her baby, and then it’s like nothing happened. You ain’t do that when I got pregnant with Derell.”

  Gran looks at me with disbelief. I look away.

  “That was different.”

  “Only difference was that it happened to me!” Crystal screams at the top of her lungs, and the framed photos on the piano shake. I consider moving toward her to calm her down, but then I remember her pocketknife, so I stay near the steps.

  “You can give Faye this old funky house. I don’t want it anyway.” Crystal swings her bottle as she slams out the front door. I close it behind her and lock up. My new and cleaned aura is back to being muddled.

  * * *

  “Go get me a beer.”

  I look in the fridge and grab the last Schlitz Malt Liquor. I place it in front of her with a red straw.

  Gran reaches for her package of cigarettes. Her fingers shake. I take the package from her and then flick her lighter, holding it until the tip burns brightly. She nods her thanks and motions for me to turn up the fan. It’s already on high.

  “Crystal got the devil in her, same as her father. Tsk. Can’t do nothing with her when she goes off like that. All you can do is try not to feed the fire.”

  “Gran, you don’t like Corona or Heineken?”

  “Stuck in my ways, gal. ’Sides, neither one of those give me my buzz. Just makes me piss every five minutes.”

  I sit down, across from Gran at the dining room table and fiddle with the end of the tablecloth. The motion calms my nerves. Crystal’s energy still owns the air. The telephone rings and breaks the silence. I wait the required three rings and then ask her if she wants me to answer it. Gran shakes her head no.

  “I’ve always felt responsible for you, Faye, baby. Since you was a little girl. Come ’round here with your mama. Had to have you sleep in my bed. My first grandbaby. I died a little on the day Franklin tried to kill your mama. Broke my heart into a thousand pieces. I knew then if there was anyone I could save, it would be you. They say as long as you save one, well, that’s all you can do.”

  I twirled my wedding band around on my finger. I missed my family, my safe space where none of this ever mattered.

  “Then you got yourself into that mess.” She drags on her cigarette, and the mess comes out in two syllables instead of one.

  “I died a little bit again. But I vowed you was gon’ make it. I wasn’t gon’ lose you to these Philly streets. These streets can swallow you piece by piece until there ain’t nothing left. Chile, I done seen it.”

  She takes three drags on her cigarette and inhales sharply. “That’s why I sent you down South to have the baby. At the time it felt like the only way to give you a fresh start.”

  “Gran, we don’t have to talk about this. The past is the past.”

  “Orbach did give me the money for you to go to college, paid your tuition for all four years, but it ain’t what Crystal thought. Me and that white man had been lovers for years.” She cracks up laughing and shows all of her dentures.

  “What?” I crack up, too.

  “Since his wife passed. You know she died of some type of throat-swallowing problem. We took up with each other and it was a real romance. He was sweet as pie.”

  My eyes are big like buttons.

  “Yes, honey, I have lived my life and then some. Been around the block and seen more than you’d ever know.” Wickedness played on her face.

  She stubs her cigarette out and then reaches for her Bible. Rubber-banded to the back is a folded paper. She removes it and slides it across the table.

  It’s the birth certificate for a baby girl born on June 13, 1989. Behind it is a handwritten letter. The ink is faded and edges of the yellow lined paper are frayed. I let my eyes move over the paragraph.

  Gran talks while I read. “She lived for five days. When I talked to your Aunt Kat, she said the cousin who took the baby told her it was sudden infant death.” Gran brought her Bible to her lips. “Just let this give you some closure, gal. Move on and take care of your family. They all you got.”

  THIRTY-NINE

  The Light in the Tunnel

  I take the papers from Gran and carry them up into my little hot box of a room. I stare at them so long my eyes cross and glaze. Five days. God gave me a second chance, and what am I doing with it? I think about Shira. What do I want? What is my purpose? How can I serve? I slip into the bed and lay on my back. The papers that Gran gave me are on my chest. I imagine those healing crystals that Shira used retuning my body. I search for peace. I search for that brand-new feeling. I’m ready to move on. But first I need to rest.

  I close my eyes but my stomach is queasy. It’s not long before I’m sitting up in the bed with the covers around my waist. Sweat is all over me. My cell phone is ringing. I’ve left it on the living room table again. I scoot out of bed and run toward the sound. Preston’s name is flashing across my screen and I say hello a second before it rolls to voice mail.

  “Felicia, it’s Preston.”

  “I know.” Why is he being so damn formal this time of night?

  “Um, Rory…” He pauses.

  “What? What happened to him?” My voice is seven octaves higher than usual.

  “He isn’t in his room. I’ve checked the whole house. I thought he was hiding. I know I put him to bed.”

  I toss the phone in my purse. Write Gran a quick, sloppy note. It’s not until I get into my car that I look down and realize I’m in my pajamas.

  PART 3

  Although I can’t live inside yesterday’s pain, I can’t live without it.

  —TOPSY WASHINGTON FROM GEORGE C. WOLFE’S

  THE COLORED MUSEUM

  FORTY

  The Five-Alarms

  I’ve watched the sky go from gray to pink, and now the sun is blaring right at me. The traffic on the New Jersey Turnpike is bearable, but I’m only a few minutes before rush hour, so I foot the gas to stay ahead of the congestion. I’m hot, so I turn on the air conditioner. I’m cold, so I turn it back off. I’m restless but confined to the width and length of the driver’s seat in the Nissan. I switch to 1010 WINS for an update, but it’s filled with static. Panic pumps through my veins. I need a cigarette. I flip to a classical music station in an attempt to calm my nerves.

  My cell phone chimes from the passenger seat next to me and I feel for it with one eye on the road, hoping with everything in me
that it’s Preston calling, having found my son.

  It’s Shayla. I let it roll to voice mail. I can’t deal with her right now. But she had better have my house secured. My hands shake against the steering wheel. Calm down, I tell myself. A car accident wouldn’t be good right now. Rory. My sweet son. My only son. I remember when I found out I was pregnant with him. I called him little L. Preston and I didn’t find out the sex but I knew he was a boy. I knew he would be a rambunctious boy. When he was a toddler, I remember one mother at a playgroup commenting on how much energy he had because Rory was curious and into everything. A smile crept on my face when I responded, “God knew what he was doing when he paired us together.” God did know what he was doing, and my sweet baby has to be okay. I switch lanes.

  The traffic is next to nothing after exit 9, and I push the Nissan just above the speed limit. It doesn’t take long for me to get to exit 11 and then hop off the turnpike. The Garden State Parkway is also empty, so I gun it for home. Preston hasn’t called back. No news has to be good news. Please.

  * * *

  Our home looks the same as I pull in to the driveway. When I get to my front door I realize that I don’t have my house key. I lean on the bell and wait. Preston opens the front door and then walks across the enclosed porch and unlocks the second. His head is held low and his eyes don’t reach mine. When he moves to let me in, I hear his breath cinch.

  “Your hair?”

  I run my hands over my short do. “Have you found him?”

  He shakes his head.

  “Did you call the police?”

  “I was waiting for you.”

  “Are you kidding me? He’s six, for Christ sakes. He could be halfway to New Hampshire.” I push past Preston and walk into the house. It’s quiet. The girls must still be asleep. The kitchen is tidy except for a package of bacon thawing on the counter.

  “Call the police,” I order.

  Preston has crumbled against the banister. Crisis always turns him to powder. It’s been my job to handle emergencies in the family, particularly kid calamities. When Rory came down with croup, I had to rock him. Twyla jammed her finger in the door, I had to drive us to the hospital. Preston doesn’t do well with trouble. But that’s why I’m here. That’s why my name is Mommy. I put on my cape and start moving through the house. I grab the cordless phone and call the police. I tell them the little I know and they say they are on their way.

  “Where did you check?”

  “Everywhere.”

  Preston is following me on the stairs. I walk into Rory’s bedroom and look around to see if there is any sign of him. His Spiderman sheets are tangled and pulled back, his blue pillow pet is on the floor. I move the covers around.

  “Where is his brown plush dog?” I look at Preston. He looks back at me. It’s almost as if he didn’t hear me. I talk slow and loud so that my words will sink in.

  “The brown plush dog that he has to sleep with. Gran gave it to him three Christmases ago. He even drags it into the girls’ room when he sleeps with them.”

  Preston’s face is blank. “I don’t know.”

  I open the closet and then get down on my knees and reach all the way into the back, but all I feel are his old shoes. I go into the girls’ room. Man, I’ve missed them. Their breathing is rhythmic, like they are dancing together. I peek into the crib and Two is wrapped around Liv. They look like conjoined twins. I think about pulling them apart but I don’t want them to wake up. Not yet. I search their closet but it’s so narrow that if Rory were hiding in there I wouldn’t have to look hard. Our bedroom is next.

  “Did you look under the bed?”

  “Yes.”

  I look again anyway; nothing but Preston’s shoes and the vaporizer. In our closet, I find the familiars.

  Where are you, darling? Did you leave the house?

  On the stairs, I feel Preston’s heat as he moves behind me. My pulse is as quick as it gets. I’m in overdrive. Where is my child? I head to the basement.

  “You look in all of the storage areas, Preston, and really look. Get a flashlight.”

  Preston opens his mouth to say something but then bites his tongue. I’m being bossy, but so what?

  I check the bathroom, the laundry room, under my desk, and in the space where Preston keeps his tools.

  “Rory, Rory, where are you?” I call his name. I crawl around on the play area rug, looking behind boxes of puzzles, as if he could really fit with his plush dog in such a tight space.

  “What the fuck, Preston?”

  He’s standing, looking at me on the floor.

  “How the hell do you lose one of our children?” The hysteria has reached my voice. I’m no longer Mommy-in-control. I’m Mommy-maniac.

  “I’ve been getting home early, cooking dinner, and putting them to bed myself. I put Rory to bed last night. We talked about submarines. He wanted to know if people in submarines could breathe or if they need oxygen tanks. It was a ten-minute conversation. I checked on the kids again before I fell asleep in the basement.” He sits on the arm of the sofa.

  “When I came up for my middle-of-the-night check, the gate was open and I couldn’t remember if I closed it or not and…” his voice trails. “Rory wasn’t in his bed.”

  “You forgot to set the alarm?”

  “I thought I did.”

  My hands go to my face and I rub my eyes. I don’t want to start blaming Preston but I want to blame Preston.

  This would never have happened if I were home. But there is no time for the shoulda-couldas. I have to find my son. I head upstairs, into the kitchen. Preston is behind me. The telephone starts ringing. I walk to the wall unit and peek at the caller ID.

  “It’s Juju. When did she leave?”

  “A few days ago.”

  I walk to the refrigerator and open it. Preston answers the telephone. I pour myself a glass of apple juice before it clicks in my mind that I don’t like apple juice. I drink it anyway. Gas bubbles are crashing against each other in my belly. Where are the fucking police?

  Preston hangs up the phone and asks me if I’d like coffee. I nod.

  I hear movement upstairs and I sprint up the steps, two at a time.

  “Mommy.” Two says my name loud enough and close enough to Liv’s ear to wake her.

  “Hi, Pudding Pops.” I lift them both from the crib, one on each arm, and carry them to the glider. I’ve missed this chair. “How did you sleep?”

  “What happen to your hair?” Two sticks her pointer finger in her mouth and starts tracing my face with her free hand. Liv is squirming in my lap. She doesn’t seem to know which emotion to go with, happy to see me or mad that I’ve been away.

  “I cut it.”

  “You look like a boy.”

  I smile at her. “Two, we can’t find Rory. Does he have any new hiding places?”

  Her eyes get wide.

  “Yes.”

  “Where?”

  “He likes to hide in your bed.”

  “I’ve looked there. Where else?” I’m staring at the extra door in the girls’ bedroom and realize I haven’t checked the attic.

  “Does he go into the attic?”

  “Sometimes. But he’s scared of the spider.” I stand up and put Liv back in the crib. She starts crying right away. I give her a toy rattle and tell Two to stay with her. The attic steps are narrow and steep. When I reach the top it all looks the same. A mess. I’ve needed to sort the kids’ clothes all summer, but it’s always an extra twenty degrees warmer in this part of the house and I’ve been avoiding the job for weeks.

  “Rory,” I call his name softly. “Rory.” I throw back all of the crawl space sliders and peek in, calling his name. He’s not up here. I hold back tears.

  “Was he there?” Two is crawling out of the crib.

  “Does he have another hiding space?”

  She thinks. “I have an idea. Follow me.”

  It feels fruitless to follow a four-year-old, but I’m at my wits’ end and I do it. A
s we turn in to the hallway Preston is on the steps with a cup of coffee stretched out toward me. I shift Liv onto my other hip and take it.

  “Thanks. I just checked the attic.” Then I shake my head. “Maybe you should call next door or knock on the neighbors’ doors or something. We should be doing something. How long does it take for the police to get here?”

  His shoulders sag, but he doesn’t move.

  Two goes into the bathroom and pushes back the shower curtain. “Sometimes he hides in the tub when we play hide-and-go-seek.” She looks at the entire tub, like if Rory was in there she might miss him. He’s not.

  “Mommy, I have to pee-pee.” She starts dancing from one leg to the other. I put my coffee on the sink and hand Liv to Preston, who is right behind me. I pull Two’s pajama pants down and sit her on the toilet. We all wait as she pees and washes her hands.

  “Oh,” she says. Then she opens the bathroom closet door. The shelves are deep, with sheets, towels, and bins of toiletries. On the bottom space is where I store the oversized bathroom rugs. On top of the rugs is a lump of ill-folded towels. They don’t go there. Two pulls the towels away and there is Rory, curled with his plush dog and fast asleep.

  “Ta-da,” she presents him with her right hand.

  “Rory,” I say his name. “Rory, sweetie.” The tears fall without fanfare. “Baby, wake up.”

  “Mom?” My name is soft on his lips. “Mommy.” He slides from his hiding place. “Mama!” He kicks at the pile of towels and scrambles from the floor. Rory throws himself at me so hard I hit the wall, but I don’t let him go.

  “I knew you’d come back. I just knew it.” He holds me tight.

  “You cut your hair?”

  “Yes.”

  The doorbell rings. Must be the police.

  “Son,” Preston calls his name, “I’ve been looking all over for you.” He takes him from my arms and hugs him. His back convulses in silent tears that will never be shed. “Why’re you in the closet?”

  Rory jumps down onto the floor and then lowers his face into my knees. “Because I wanted Mommy.”