A Good Dude (34 page)

How come you don’t tongue kiss me a lot in public? That was only the third time you touched my butt. In four months it was only the third time.

Why don’t you touch my booty more often, Tino? Why don’t you grab it and squeeze it?

Don’t you want it?

Don’t you want me?

And why don’t you attack me when we’re alone?

Why don’t you pull me into the bedroom and throw me on the bed and rip my panties off like in that movie
Fatal Attraction
?

Why are we still on second base, Tino?

After four months?

What the hell?

But Candace was much too ladylike to ask those questions. So she walked with him instead. When they reached her car, he gave her a full-body hug that almost lasted forever. And since Candace still got goose bumps whenever Tino touched her, she got lost in the hug and forgot about those other questions, just like she always did.

“Are you staying for Christmas?” he asked.

Candace backed up to her car and pulled Tino close to her, so close their belts touched.

“
Mi mama y mi tias
are making tamales on Christmas Eve,” he said.

“
Tamales
?”

“We make tamales every year,” he explained. “All the women do. The guys just get drunk and start eating them as soon as the first batch is done.”

Candace laughed, but Tino was distracted by something a Hispanic female said as she walked by. She was a pretty girl with long, black hair, dark lips and pencil-thin eyebrows. Candace didn’t hear what she said. She wouldn’t have understood it anyway because it was Spanish, but Tino stared after the girl for a few seconds. His expression was somewhat somber when he looked back to Candace.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“Tino, you suck at lying. Tell me what happened. What’d she say?”

He shook his head. “You don’t want to know.”

But that only made her want to know more. “Tell me, Tino.”

He sighed. “She asked me what’s wrong with me. She said, ‘Can’t you find a nice
Mexican
girl?’ ”

Candace looked after the student, but she rounded a corner and was out of sight.

“I didn’t know people trip like that,” she said. “What do you mean?”

“In New York, brown and black is like, the same. Where I live, everybody is either black or black mixed with Mexican, or Puerto Rican, or whatever. Blacks and Latinos are in the same boat. We’re all brown.”

“Well, you’re down south now,” Tino said. “Texas likes racism more than baseball. We get so much racism here, the minorities end up being racist toward each other.”

Candace thought about that for a second. But Tino never left her on a sour note.

“So are you going to make tamales with my aunts or what?”

“You sure they want me to?” she asked. “They’re not going to get mad because you didn’t bring a
Mexican
girl?”

“Naw,” Tino said. “My parents love you. My aunts already know I’m going out with a black girl. They don’t care, so long as I’m happy.”

“Are you happy?” Candace asked.

“Very happy,” he said.

“All right. I guess I’ll learn how to make tamales then.”

“Are you going to come for Christmas, too?” he asked.

“What do y’all do on Christmas?”

“Eat everything they made the day before. We open our gifts and play with our toys and eat some more. We watch TV and fall asleep and wake up and eat some more and get drunk.”

“You get drunk?” Candace asked.

Tino smiled. “Not me
personally
, but pretty much everyone else. Even some of my younger cousins. If you’ve never been around a bunch of drunk Mexicans, then you gotta go. My grandma usually takes her teeth out and throws them at somebody before the day is over with.”

Candace laughed. She told him she would go. She looked forward to spending the holidays with him and his intoxicated relatives. She left the campus headed to Trisha’s house. She hoped Leila was still awake so she could try on her Christmas outfit.

* * *

When Candace got on the freeway, a terrible thought occurred to her. She just told Tino she’d stay with him for Christmas, but she also promised her parents she would fly home for the holidays. There was no way she could do both.

“
Damn!
” she spat.

It seemed like an awful dilemma, but there was a pretty simple solution: She had to cancel on someone. And that person was sure to be hurt. But who? Candace reached into her purse and found her cell phone close to the top. It didn’t take thirty seconds to make a decision.

“Hello?”

Damn
! Why couldn’t her mom answer?

“Hey, Dad. It’s me, Candace.”

“Hey, baby! What’s going on?”

“Um, is Mama there?”

“She’s out back in the garden. You want me to get her?”

Candace sighed. “No. I guess I can talk to you.”

“You
guess
? I’m not that bad, am I?”

“No, Dad. It’s just that I’ve got bad news. I’d rather tell Mom than you.”

There was a pause.

“What is it, Candace?”

“You, um, you remember when I said I would come home for Christmas?”

“Yes. Your mother’s talked about nothing else. We’ve got a big dinner planned. Everyone’s going to be here
. The whole family
. And you will be, too, right?”

He knew how to lay on the guilt.

“Actually, Dad, I’m going to stay down here instead.”

“Why?”

“Tino asked me to go with him and his family.”

“This is that same shit,” Gerald said.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you running behind that boy the same way you did with that other asshole. When are you gonna get it, Candace? When are you gonna see how they’re screwing up your life?”

“Daddy, Tino’s different. You know that.”

“All I know is you’re doing the same thing, Candace. You got a family who loves you, but you’re too busy running behind them knuckleheaded boys.”

“I love y’all, too,” Candace said. “And it’s just one Christmas. I can come for spring break if you want. Plus I’m going back to New York next year. Then I’ll be there all the time.”

“Candace, I’m not going to sit here and beg you to do right. You know right from wrong.”

“Dad, it’s—”

“Is that it? Is that what you called for?”

“Daddy, don’t do that.”

“I gotta go, Candace,” he said. “I’ll tell your mother to call you later.”

He hung up on her. That was the first time he ever did that. It hurt just as much as she figured it would.

* * *

When she got to Trisha’s house, Candace was not surprised to see Delia there. She was, however, surprised to see the hoochie holding her baby. Delia was feeding Leila, and for some reason that was even worse. The contents of Candace’s stomach did a flip as she entered the living room.

Delia looked up at her and smiled innocently. “Girl, you got a good baby. She don’t cry or nothing.”

“Yeah,” Candace said. She walked to the couch and took a seat next to CC’s girlfriend. Leila immediately began to fuss and reach for her mother.

“I knew she was gonna do that,” Delia said. “Here you go, sweetheart. I know you want your mama.”

She handed the baby over politely. Candace smiled down at the infant when she had Leila in her arms. Leila always made things okay. She could put a smile on Candace’s face with just her presence.

“She got some pretty eyes,” Delia said, leaning over Candace’s shoulder.

“She does,” Candace agreed.

“They look familiar,” Delia said. “They remind me of somebody else’s.”

Candace’s heart stopped and her mouth went dry. She had long since determined Leila’s hazel eyes favored CC’s much more than Rilla’s dark brown irises. It was a hard thing to accept, but Candace had made peace with it. She wondered if Delia already knew about her and CC. In the months since Delia first saw her baby, she made a lot of comments that came very close to the truth but never quite made it.

She’s too cute! You sure that’s Rilla’s baby?

She got all of your hair, Candace. Her hair don’t look like it got no Puerto Rican in it.

How come you didn’t give her Rilla’s last name?

How come you don’t take her up there so Rilla can see her?

If I was Rilla, I’d want to know who you been sleeping around with, ‘cause that baby’s way too pretty to be his.

And now this:
She got some pretty eyes. They remind me of somebody I know.

But Delia didn’t look suspicious when she said any of that stuff, and she didn’t look suspicious now. It was hard to believe, but Delia still didn’t know anything. All of those innuendos really were coincidental.

Trisha stepped out of her bathroom, wiping sweat from her face. “Ooh, I’m sorry, girl. Is she still eating? Oh, hey, Candace! I didn’t know you were here.”

“I just got here,” Candace said.

“I had to go to the bathroom,” Trisha said. “I would have taken her with me, but the air don’t blow good in there.”

Candace smiled and nodded. She thought it was respectful how Trisha offered an explanation for leaving the baby with Delia. She knew Candace didn’t want just anyone holding her child.

“How was she?” Candace asked.

“She was fine,” Trisha said. She lifted Sammy from the love seat and took the chair for herself. Sammy looked around the room until he saw Delia’s empty lap. He ran to her, and she scooped him up like a bag of potatoes.

“You off school now, ain’t you?” Trisha asked.

“Yeah,” Candace said. “I’ll only need you to watch her when I go to work.”

“Ain’t you going home for Christmas?” Trisha asked. Candace shook her head.

Trisha grinned. “So you’re staying with
Celestial
, huh?”

“Yeah, we’re making tamales,” Candace said with a smile.