A Place at the Table (12 page)

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I had forgotten to tell Pete to call his mom, and she had called instead, wild with worry when her son didn’t come home. We never heard the phone ring. The whirl of the fan must have been too loud. And so Mama made her way to my room, telling Daddy that she could handle it (did she know what she might find?), but Daddy followed her, angry at me for lying, planning to give both Pete and me a good talking-to. If Mama knocked on the closed door we did not hear it over the fan. Or maybe it was our excitement for each other that plugged our ears. That made me forget to tell Pete to call his mom in the first place. But none of that matters. What matters is that we are exposed. Exposed doing something that once caused God to destroy an entire city. Doing something that puts our eternal souls—our
eternal
souls—in peril.
This Daddy says again and again, pacing back and forth in front of the bed where Pete and I sit, as far apart from each other as we can, our heads bowed.

When the doorbell rings we all move downstairs, as if we are one. Pete’s mom looks haggard and exhausted, the circles under her eyes like small change purses. She is telling Daddy how sorry she is. She is wiping away tears. On his way out Pete glances at me, gives me a small, worried smile, but doesn’t say anything, just follows behind his mother.

I sit on the sofa in the living room while Mama and Daddy discuss the terrible thing they came upon, speaking of me as if I weren’t there. Mama says, “It’s clear he wants to hurt us.” I stop listening. A softness, like cotton, settles around my brain. I can no longer be here. Mama and Daddy could not have witnessed Pete and me doing what we were doing. I have to disappear. At some point Daddy says this is too big of a problem for them to handle on their own. At this I tune in. There is talk of Riverside Military Academy; there is talk of a rehabilitation center in Virginia, a place that is known for turning wayward teens around. I know that Daddy recommends it only to desperate parents with especially destructive children. The type who chop off the cat’s tail and set the drapes on fire. “It’s not an easy place,” Daddy once told Mama after encouraging a congregant to send his troubled child there, “but better to suffer some temporary discomfort here on earth than to burn for eternity.”

At last I am told to try and get some sleep, that there will be lots to figure out the next day, that Daddy has some calls to make, to seek wise counsel, but bottom line is they love me and they are going to help me fight whatever sickness has gotten inside of me.

Back in my room I sit on the edge of the bed, where Pete and I first started kissing. I am so very tired. All I want is to lie down and sleep. But I know I cannot. I know I am fighting for my life and I must stay awake. I know that by morning my fate will be outside
of my control. Daddy will have contacted his oldest friend, Colonel Higgins, who will probably suggest military school, while Mama will probably push for that place in Virginia.

This I know: I will not survive either. And so I open my window to the cool night air and push myself through, landing on the soft dirt below. I don’t take anything with me. I walk slowly around our house, afraid of setting off any lights. But once on the street, though the way is lit only by streetlights, I run pell-mell, faster than I have ever run in a race, faster even than if Pete were beside me, up Lamont and then down Clairmont, which is such a busy street during the day, but in the middle of the night is ghostly, empty. I could easily trip, smack my face against the pavement, break my nose or my front teeth or even an arm. Be stranded in the middle of the road, for someone to find or someone to run over. But I can’t; I won’t. Falling is not an option.

I run, arms pumping, through downtown Decatur, passing the courthouse, then, later, the high school. I run until I cross the railroad tracks, until I am in Meemaw’s neighborhood, on Ansley. I run down Ansley until it intersects with Jefferson Place, passing the house where Keisha’s auntie still lives. I do not stop until I am in front of Meemaw’s bungalow. Her porch light is on. I knock, and my grandmother comes to the door right away, wearing her pink velour housecoat that zips up the front.

“I’ve been thinking about you all night,” she says, leading me inside. “I got out of bed hours ago, so worried I couldn’t sleep. I kept picturing your precious little face and I knew something was wrong. Are you hurt, sugar? I think Jesus was trying to tell me you’d been hurt. I almost called y’alls house, but I decided to wait till morning. I didn’t want your mama to think me an old fool. But something has happened, hasn’t it?”

I nod. I am staring at one of the photos hanging above the mantel. It’s one of Hunter, Troy, and me, taken years ago. I couldn’t
have been older than six. In the picture I am curtseying for the camera; Troy and Hunter stand solid and stoic behind. We all three wear navy Izod shirts and khaki shorts, picked out by Mama.

“Sit down, sweetheart; I’m going to get you something to drink.”

I make my way to Meemaw’s ancient sofa, covered in a floral print that has faded over the years, the once red roses now the palest pink.

Meemaw returns from the kitchen carrying a mug. She hands it to me, and I got teary after taking a sip. It is warmed milk, darkened with vanilla and sweetened with sugar. The drink she would always fix when I was staying over and could not sleep.

“Sweetheart, are you in some kind of trouble?” she asks.

“Yes, ma’am,” I whisper. “Yes, ma’am, I am.”

“Does it have something to do with that new friend of yours? That Yankee boy from your track team?”

I look at her, stunned. I nod, too embarrassed to answer her question out loud. I am so ashamed. My face is hot and I am so exhausted and I want to weep, but I fight the urge because I know if I do I will lose all my strength. I will crumble.

“I don’t understand what’s happening between you and that boy, Bobby. I’ve seen the two of you together, and, well, I just don’t understand.”

I hold my breath. If Meemaw says she can’t love me it won’t matter whether or not I’m going to hell. I will already be in it.

She picks up my hand, holds it in her soft, wrinkled one. “What I do understand is that you are a beloved child of God.”

She looks up to the ceiling. “Do you hear that, Jesus? He is still your beloved child.”

“They’re going to send me away,” I say. “To military school or some place for juvenile delinquents. I won’t make it at either place, Meemaw. I won’t.”

She is quiet for a moment, as if waiting for an answer. And then
a look of certainty passes over her face and she presses her lips together and nods. Picks up my hand again. “You are
not
a delinquent, and you are not a child who should go to military school. If your mama and daddy want to send you away, they can send you to me. You can come live here. I’m slowing down. I need help. Man’s always saying that.”

“I don’t think they’ll let me. It’s bad, Meemaw. They caught me doing something really bad.”

“Now listen, I don’t want you to worry. I know how to get Mannie to do the right thing. Edie might fuss, but that’s all she’s going to do. Your meemaw is not going to let anyone throw you to the wolves. Your meemaw is going to keep you loved and safe. You hear me?”

Something loosens in my chest, a rock pushed aside, and the trapped air expels itself in sobs and there is my meemaw, pulling me into her embrace, patting my back and whispering soft words both to Jesus and to me, trying to convince the two of us that I am worthy of love.

May 15, 1981

Dear Meemaw,

Money goes fast in New York City. There’s no way around it. The other day I was walking around my neighborhood—the neighborhood where the residence hotel is—and I passed what you would have called a precious little bakery. French. There were tiny cakes in the display (petit fours), each about a square inch in size, dipped in white glaze and topped with a rose made of pink frosting. Well, I ordered two. (One for me, one for you . . .) You won’t believe how much they cost. Two dollars and fifty cents! For two little bits of cake! The worst part was, I didn’t say anything at all. I was too scared of looking unsophisticated, like a yokel.

I’m sure I do come across as a yokel. One of the front desk guys at the hotel calls me Mr. Deliverance (ha ha ha) because of my
accent. Apparently I have a thick one. Who knew? Pete Arnold used to tease me about having one, but I always thought that was because I made fun of the Yankee way he talked.

Everyone dresses differently up here. And not like how they used to dress, not how you described, back when you and Granddaddy Banks visited Manhattan before he shipped off for the war and you were intimidated by all of the ladies with their white gloves and fox stoles. No. Things are grittier now. Ripped jeans, spiked hair, torn shirts. Like the other day when I stopped by my friend Mike’s room to see if he wanted to go get a drink. (Sorry!) I was just standing in his doorway, waiting for him to respond, when he walked right over to me, grabbed my shirt by the collar, and ripped it halfway down the front. “There,” he said. “Now you’re ready to be seen.”

Mike is from Providence, Rhode Island. He has a terrible accent, the opposite of soothing. Which is okay, I guess, for a guy. But I can’t imagine somebody’s mama talking that way. The only southerners I’ve met are this little band of evangelicals who are also staying at the residence hotel. They are from somewhere in Tennessee. Half of them have guitars and they are always sitting around the lobby, singing folk songs about Christ. I’m not sure what they do during the day, maybe distribute tracts to apartment buildings, but every night there they are singing their songs. I know some of the lyrics from having been an RA, but I’ve never asked to join in. To tell the truth, Meemaw, this merry band of evangelicals seems pretty naïve to me, like they think they can change this whole city just by strumming their guitars.

The truth is, I don’t think this city changes all that much. I think it changes people. I’ve only been here three months, and it’s already changing me.

I wish you were here. I wish I could phone you. I wouldn’t be able to afford to talk for long, but at least I could hear your voice. The truth is, I’m lonely. You don’t know how alone you are until
you move by yourself to New York City. Here’s the thing about this place: No one cares. No one cares about Bobby Banks up here, no, ma’am. To be honest, that realization can be exciting sometimes, freeing, like no one knows you and no one cares, so you can do whatever the heck you want. That’s when I might go to a bar or go to the clubs or walk through the Ramble at Central Park at dusk, observing all of the forbidden things happening around me. Compared to Mike, who is forever sharing details of his sexual exploits, I’m pretty inexperienced. But I can’t claim innocence. I suppose it’s been a long time since I could do that.

Daddy always said that God knows each and every one of our hearts. It’s hard to imagine that here. That night I was out with Mike, after he ripped my shirt, we were on the Upper West Side, walking on Broadway, and some guy turns a corner and nearly walks into us. I start apologizing, even though it was actually his fault, and the guy reaches out and grabs the St. Christopher medal I wear—wore—on a silver chain around my neck and just rips it off. Just rips it off and runs with it. As if it’s worth any money, when in fact I purchased it for five dollars at a little secondhand shop in the East Village.

Don’t worry, Meemaw, I haven’t turned Catholic or anything; it just made me feel safe to wear the Patron Saint of Travelers around my neck. Actually, I don’t imagine you would mind if I did go Catholic. I can just imagine you saying, “As long as you’ve got God in your heart.” Lord, you were a good person, Meemaw. I don’t think they make many like you.

I have a roommate at the hotel. It’s hard to get a single here, and besides, it’s so much cheaper if you double up. My roommate’s name is Alex Marcus, and the only times I see him are late, late at night when he comes into the room and starts jumping up and down on his bed, chanting, “Oh my God, I’m so coked up! I’m so coked up!” He’s not talking about Coca-Cola, Meemaw.

Can you see me from where you are? Is any of what I’m writing
down news to you? Are you witnessing my life? Truth is, I don’t always
want
you looking at what I’m doing. I certainly didn’t want you looking the other night at the Anvil. Just turn away when I’m at a club, okay, Meemaw? Just turn your head and know I’m still your Bobby, just a little roughed up.

I try to avoid the bars and the baths. I really do. I’ll tell myself I’m not going to go, and I don’t, not for a long time, not for a month, and then I’ll get this hungry feeling and without telling myself where I’m headed I’ll leave the hotel and find myself there.

But that’s not how I spend most of my time. Most days I’m looking for a job, and if not that, I’m exploring the city, trying to do something both cultural and cheap. I went to the main branch of the New York Public Library the other day. Boy, does it beat the heck out of any library I’ve ever been to, even the big one in downtown Atlanta. I sat in the reading room among the rows and rows of tables with little banker’s lamps positioned every few feet, a pile of magazines beside me. I had been job searching earlier that morning, literally pounding the pavement, and I was discouraged and exhausted. And so I read
GQ
and
Esquire
and
Vogue
cover to cover while college students studied around me and a wild-haired man wearing a brown sweater scribbled away at what must have been a novel. It was nice to be in such a beautiful space. There’s sure nothing beautiful about the residence hotel. Not that I’m complaining, Meemaw. It serves its purpose. I just aspire to a life more lovely. I guess I’ve still got some of Mama in me after all.

Lord, am I worried about money. I have got to get a job soon, because I know that once the money you left me runs out, that’s it. I cannot expect any from Mama or Daddy. Sometimes I get so scared it’s like my heart clenches up in my chest. I imagine myself having to move back home, having to take the train because I can’t afford the plane ticket, arriving at the Amtrak station on Peachtree, calling Daddy to come pick me up. I imagine being driven back to
Decatur, my duffel bag in the back of Daddy’s car, and Daddy and me walking in the back door to greet Mama, who would be chilly but resigned.