Almost Crimson (15 page)

TWENTY-FIVE

TONIC

 

 

CECE SIPPED HER DRINK AND glanced at her watch. She hadn't intended to arrive to the bar so early, but realized the cushion gave her time to safely return a call to Rocky. Rather, she logged into her voicemail and returned his message with a voice note. “Thanks for calling me back so fast,” she said. “I wanted your opinion on something, your advice, I guess, but I think I got it worked out. Well, I'm working on working it out. Anyway, you don't have to call me back. I mean, you can. But if you can't, it's OK. OK. Bye.”

CeCe slipped the phone into her purse, applauding herself and her timing. She pushed Rocky from her mind as Eric appeared in the restaurant window. Emerging from the rows of parked cars, his gait was athletic and graceful. As he approached, CeCe's chest thumped harder and harder.

This was her first date in more than a year. CeCe shifted on her barstool, spinning the wedge of lime inside her glass of tonic. She'd read online that ordering alcohol ahead of her date could send a negative subliminal. Perhaps she'd failed at dating prior to this most recent hiatus, she thought, because she hadn't known about “subliminals.”

Eric disappeared from the window's frame to enter the building and CeCe pulled out her lip gloss for a quick, final swipe. In the closing second, she also reached into the bar well and popped a maraschino cherry in her mouth. The article also suggested subtle, fruity breath instead of overwhelming mint.

Eric saw her right away, smiling past the hostess. He was handsome, not gorgeous—less like a movie star and more like an “everyday-guy” movie extra. CeCe liked that. She had enough to be self-conscious about. He offered a pleasantry to the hostess as he continued past her and toward the end of the bar where CeCe and her tonic waited. CeCe gave a little wave as he drew near, forcing herself to breathe.

TWENTY-SIX

SPECTACULAR

 

 

CECE NEVER HEARD FROM MICHELLE again. Rumor had it Mrs. Johnson moved with Michelle and Michael to Milwaukee. CeCe never found out whether Mr. Johnson went to jail. She would never know if Michael had forgiven her.

With time, she felt less guilty about the experience. She never told Michelle's secret, but shared with Coretta how her friend had moved away without notice. Coretta would ask about Michelle during their phone calls for a while, and then the subject melted into bra cups, sanitary pads, hair grease, and Ronald Reagan.

“He is the beginning of the end for Black people,” Coretta would say. “Remember I told you.”

CeCe anticipated a beginning to several ends of her own that summer. She had completed middle school and braced herself for the ninth grade at Maclin High, one of the feeder schools for Valmore. She and Pam were already talking about their shared college dorm and bridesmaid dresses.

CeCe planned ahead for her mother's future, too. Dr. Harper assured CeCe her mother would be fine when CeCe went away to college. CeCe took into account the added chores and habits her mother had assumed over the past two years and realized she agreed with Dr. Harper. For the time being, CeCe was still the one to make sure their apartment had what it needed, when needed. She'd even forged a letter to the brokerage firm requesting an increase in their monthly disbursements. Even though they were petite, buying food and clothes for two women proved more costly than a woman and a child. The confirmation letter explained the restructured payments would exhaust her mother's trust fund four years sooner than scheduled. CeCe calculated she would be out of college by then and capable of picking up her mother's expenses.

CeCe faced only two new significant stressors during her middle-school years. One was the changing landscape of her neighborhood. The county had converted their apartment complex into low-income housing for anyone, not only veteran families or seniors. On Kennedy Boulevard, Mr. Curtis' newsstand was long gone. The corner store replaced its bread and penny candy with liquor bottles.

The second frustration was her father's continued silence. They had started trading letters after her mother's breakdown. For three years, he had penned CeCe long and winding letters, full of advice, glimpses from his past, affirmations for her future. In every letter, he proclaimed an undying love for CeCe and for her mother. CeCe asked why he didn't write her mother, too. He wrote that he felt afraid.

CeCe thought of that day sometimes, when she and her father had caught the bus together from the library to this apartment. Her father had found the listing by accident, he had told CeCe. Being drafted had made him eligible for the new housing just in time. He'd only slept three nights there, with his wife. CeCe calculated she had been conceived inside those three days. Inside a love so thorough between Quentin and her mother. She understood why her mother buried herself inside that bed every day.

She'd waited in the courtyard for her parents to push open the screen door and step into the sunlight beaming down on their porch slab. She waited to see them hand in hand, or with her mother curled girlishly into Quentin's one-armed embrace. Instead, Quentin had crashed open the door commanding CeCe to find phone numbers for her mother's doctor and family.

“One minute she had my face in her hands and the next minute she crouched on the floorboards, moaning,” Quentin repeated to the paramedics, the intake nurse at the mental hospital, Dr. Harper, and Aunt Rosie. To CeCe, he kept saying he was sorry. So, so sorry.

CeCe's letters to Quentin after her mother's release described a vivacious recovery. She wanted him to feel at ease about returning to them soon. CeCe also wrote about Mrs. Anderson and training the new library assistant, as well as sleepovers with Pam, books she read, and all the places she hoped to visit one day.

From the very beginning her letters outnumbered his three to one, but CeCe didn't mind. Her father was busy getting better, just like her mother, without, she hoped, the mumbling, rocking, and staring. CeCe couldn't call him because their phone didn't have long-distance service. Her father placed calls to her on Christmas and her birthday. Both times, CeCe asked if he wanted to speak to her mother, and both times he said he didn't know if that was a good idea.

His letters came less consistently throughout middle school and to a complete stop before the end of her eighth-grade year. CeCe vowed if she didn't find a letter or postcard before she went to Decatur for the summer, she would go back to pretending he didn't exist. When she dragged her duffel bag from the house with no letter from her father, CeCe fumed for weeks, assigning every broken thing in her life to him. Their small apartment. Their fixed income. That she couldn't play volleyball or basketball or be a fashion model because of the short genes he'd given her. That her mother was broken, almost beyond repair. That he'd broken CeCe's heart.

Barely a week after arriving in Decatur, Coretta announced CeCe would stay with Aunt Rosie for a few days. CeCe wasn't surprised Aunt Rosie would want to be the first to offer advice about her upcoming year as a high-school student. At least her father had given her family.

CeCe and Aunt Rosie watched back-to-back episodes of
Jeopardy!
, worked the garden, cleaned and cooked mustard greens for Sunday dinner, and sucked Popsicles in the back yard. One afternoon, CeCe read in the porch swing when Aunt Rosie sat in the fan-back chair next to her with a large brown envelope.

“Sometimes when we lookin' real close at a patch,” she said, “we don't know we only seeing part of the quilt.”

CeCe looked over the edge of her book at Aunt Rosie. She could rarely guess where these Rosie-isms might lead, but had come to trust they always held a nugget of wisdom. Aunt Rosie's eyes did not sparkle as she spoke, though. CeCe lay down her book, looking from Rosie's solemn face to the envelope in her hands.

“What's going on, Auntie?” she asked.

Aunt Rosie held CeCe's gaze before speaking. “Your daddy died, baby.”

The inside of CeCe's chest constricted violently as she struggled to focus on Aunt Rosie's face. Rosie waited while CeCe tried to blink and twitch into understanding. Her mouth formed slow shapes, but ejected no words.

“I guess he been sick for a long time,” Aunt Rosie said. “Your letters was gettin' sent from his apartment to a nursing home.”

CeCe's chest convulsed again.

Aunt Rosie laid the square envelope on the swing next to CeCe. The flap was already opened.

“I saw your name on the envelope, but it didn't make no sense why it came here. So I read it,” Rosie said. “Look like he been lovin' on you harder than he could say. We was all seein' his little patch, but the quilt is always bigger, baby. Always bigger.”

Aunt Rosie lifted herself from the wicker porch chair and stood above CeCe for a moment. She used her thumb to wipe away the tears that sprang into CeCe's eyes, kissed the top of her great-niece's head, and shuffled back into the house.

CeCe stared at the yawning envelope. She recognized the return address as the Milton Olive Towers, the residential hall where her father had settled in Detroit. In the early letters he wrote to her, he described the facility as a kind of hotel for, mostly, veterans of color. CeCe slid a sympathy card from the envelope with a folded letter tucked inside. The card was signed in a florid script, Anna Schultz. The letter was typed:

Dear Crimson—

We've never met, but I feel as if we have. I've had the privilege of knowing your father for several years now. He was one of the men I cared for here at Olive Towers. Your father was special to me for many reasons. First, when he moved here three years ago, we were both new to this building. I loved the job right away, but there are always so many things to learn in a new place. He was one of the only residents to sit down and ask how I was adjusting and to encourage me on my rough days. Odd, it was MY job, to make sure HE was OK. I knew instantly he would be one of my special residents, and I was right.

He was a quiet presence, but when your father did speak he had wise advice, insightful observations, sincere questions, and wonderful stories about you. He told me all about your job as a library assistant, the straight As on your report cards, and what a big help you've been to your mother. He was so proud of you, Crimson. He saved all of his best words for talking about you.

When he started to get sick, no one knew what he had for a long time. His coughing and wheezing had gotten so bad he couldn't get out of bed. The doctors ran tests and learned he had a disease called pulmonary fibrosis, even though he wasn't a smoker. He said it felt like someone was trying to smother him.

We moved him to a nursing home, and the front desk forwarded your letters to him there. This last letter landed on my desk because your father passed away in March, just before his birthday. Please forgive my invasion of your privacy, but I opened your letter because I knew something wasn't right. I don't know why you weren't informed of his passing by Carla Weathers (our contact of record). I also couldn't say why your father stopped writing you.

What I am certain of, though, is that your father loved you more than anything in this world. He kept your letters in a box on his nightstand all the time. All the time. It's not unusual for residents to withdraw from their families when they get sick, to protect them somehow. But I'm only guessing at what Quentin might have been thinking.

I am deeply sorry for your loss, Crimson. Not having your father will be hard enough (trust me, I know. My father died when I was just a little older than you). The last thing I would want is for you to go another day thinking he didn't adore you. His body eventually lost to the illness, but I want you to know that his heart was entirely devoted to you, his only daughter.

My prayers are with you and your family, Crimson. Thank you for bringing a spectacular man such spectacular joy.

Sincerely,

Anna Schultz

TWENTY-SEVEN

TETHERED

 

 

CECE SAT ON AUNT ROSIE'S porch for the rest of the summer. Coretta's had too much light for her now. Laughter, movies, skating, pancakes, all of it too much.

Between her checklists of chores, CeCe gave small pushes to the swing with her bare heel. Sometimes she read. Sometimes she stared at the seam of field and sky. Sometimes she succumbed to violent weeping. And sometimes she watched the chase of wind through Aunt Rosie's pecan trees. Before summer ended, CeCe called Anna Schultz to thank her. They spoke for a few minutes, both admitting to feeling lighter in spirit before disconnecting the line.

CeCe next phoned Dr. Harper, who explained, again, that he could not divulge anything her mother had or had not told him about CeCe's father. CeCe began to unfasten. When the scream rocketed from her throat, vile and sick, CeCe collapsed against the kitchen table and fell to the floor.

 

CeCe took the glass of water in Coretta's outstretched hand. She gave CeCe a soft smile and small nod before turning to leave the living room. CeCe sipped and placed the water glass on the couch's end table. The telephone waited. CeCe picked up the phone and balanced it on top of her legs. She wore a skort, convinced by another cousin that her shapely sprinter's legs were showcase caliber. The base of the blue Princess phone sat heavy and hard against her skin.

CeCe dialed her house number as Coretta and Aunt Rosie listened to the rotary's spinning clicks from extensions in the kitchen and master bedroom. Since CeCe had refused to wait for her return to Prescott and an appointment in his office, Dr. Harper insisted CeCe have family around when she called to confront Carla. CeCe would have phoned her mother the night before if the meds from the ER hadn't put her to sleep. Four stitches. She awoke stringing together beads of venom for this call.

CeCe sat on the edge of the couch, the phone cradled in her lap. Her sutures pricked at the hardening gauze. CeCe hadn't taken any medications that morning; she wanted all of her pipes and circuits to be open and clear. The phone clamored its first ring. On the fifth ring, they heard Carla's voice.

“Hello?” she said. Her voice was hollow and dry.

“It's me, Mama.”

“CrimsonBaby,” her mother said.

CeCe snorted, repelling her mother's shorthand affection.

“CeCe?”

CeCe scrambled to block the vicious words from leaping in front, moving them to rear flanks like she'd practiced. Everything in CeCe teetered, like wobbly table legs. She couldn't predict the wreckage of this collision, but resigned herself to fly directly into it.

“Daddy died,” she said.

Silence.

“Four months ago.”

Silence.

“You knew and didn't tell me,” CeCe said, her voice climbing.

Carla cleared her throat.

“Why didn't you tell me?” CeCe asked, fervor flooding into her mouth.

Her mother hesitated again, and said, “I didn't know how.”

“You didn't know how?” CeCe repeated, incredulous. She expected “I wanted to protect you,” “There never seemed to be a right time,” or “You're going through so much right now.” But not this. Not a complete lack of effort. Another failure without even trying.

“What did you need to
know how
to do?” CeCe mocked. “I don't
know how
to keep us alive, but I do it. I figure it out, don't I? You couldn't figure this one thing out?”

“CrimsonBaby,” her mother started, letting her voice trail away and fill the phone line with quiet.

“What?” CeCe demanded. “CrimsonBaby, what?”

All of them listened to Carla's silence. They could not even discern her breath.

“What, Mama? What could you possibly want to say to me right now?” CeCe asked. Volume pushed her vocal cords against the inside of her neck, blood against the inside of her veins, and a thick gurgle of rage against the inside her skull. CeCe bolted onto her feet, the powder blue base crashing to the floor.

“Exactly!” CeCe said again and again, louder, to a shrill scream. The tethered phone base tumbled alongside CeCe's feet as she stomped a furious circle into the living room carpet and emptied her venom into the receiver. By the time she screeched, “I hate you,” Aunt Rosie stood in front of CeCe mouthing for her to hand over the phone.

“At least Daddy wanted to be here with me,” CeCe screamed at her mother, the velocity pitching her forward onto her toes.

CeCe disassembled into hysterical tears while her mother kept mumbling her name. Rosie swiped the phone but not swiftly enough to dodge CeCe's parting words to her mother: “You should be the one who's dead.”

CeCe spent the last three weeks of summer with her temples and flesh pounding. The rage eked from her pores like a film of sweat. She was furious with everyone: her father for leaving her alone for the last and final time, her mother for being inept at living, the social worker for not seeing the forest for the trees, Rosie and Coretta for not finding the legal loophole to retain her in their care, and her cousins for enjoying their tennis classes and mascara while she waited for two sets of failed genetics to implode inside of her.