Baby Talk (6 page)

The guard laughed. “You look like death
warmed-over. You’re white as a sheet.”

Neal touched his face self-consciously, then
opened the door of his van.

“You better see a doctor. I don’t think you
should be driving.”

“I already saw a doctor,” Neal said,
slamming his door shut. “Why don’t you mind your own damn
business?”

The guard shook his head. Neal glanced at
his own face in the rearview mirror and noticed that his forehead
was beaded with sweat. His skin seemed colorless. Yeah, he did look
like “death warmed-over.” That was a good description.

But he had to keep working.

Avoiding any more eye contact with the
guard, he revved up the van’s engine and pulled away.

* * *

Cradling a sleeping Natasha in one arm,
Annie picked up the telephone and punched in the same long distance
number that she had called at least 20 times that day. On her first
few attempts to reach her mother, she was almost relieved there was
no answer. They hadn’t spoken in months, since Annie had, in so
many words, told her mom to butt out of her life.

“Mrs.” Paula Crawford still lived in
Chattanooga and had been dating a guy named Doug for the past sixth
months or so. Annie didn’t care much for Doug—he was a kind of a
dimwitted truck mechanic who only seemed interested watching
football and wrestling on TV. But he was “hard-working,” and “very
loyal,” to use her mother’s words. Annie supposed that if Doug made
her mother happy, that was all that mattered. She just wished her
mom had the same attitude about Neal.

But the breakdown in the mother-daughter
relationship wasn’t Annie’s fault—she was sure a lot of girls would
have done the same in her situation. Didn’t her mother realize what
a double-bind she created for her daughter? She hadn’t wanted Annie
to marry Neal, but she hadn’t wanted Annie to be an unwed mother,
either. What choices did that leave? Have an abortion, or give the
baby up for adoption. That was it. Annie would
never
do
either of those things, and she knew her mother wouldn’t have,
either, had she been in Annie’s shoes. But she offered Annie no
solution to the dilemma. “It’s not my problem, Annie,” is all she
would say. “You’ll have to make this decision yourself.”

The worst thing about all this was her
mother’s hypocrisy. The prim-and-proper “Mrs.” Paula Crawford
couldn’t bear the thought of having a daughter who was an unwed
mother, worried about what all her friends and everybody else in
Chattanooga would say about it behind her back. Yet, “Mrs.” Paula
Crawford wasn’t even married anymore—Annie’s father had left them
when Annie was eight years old—but Paula had no problem sleeping
with whomever she pleased. Before Doug it was Charlie, and before
Charlie it was Wallace, and before him...well, Annie had lost track
of them all. But for her daughter to have a baby without being
married... no, we couldn’t have that, could we!

But now, Annie regretted cutting off
communications with her mother. She didn’t think she could tolerate
another night with Neal, and there was nowhere else she could go.
Having an infant to care for, she couldn’t just drop in on a friend
and spend the night. Not that she had many friends in Atlanta,
anyway—she had only moved there a few months before she met Neal.
She had grown up in Chattanooga, and most of her childhood friends
had moved away. She hadn’t made any real friends since she had
moved to Atlanta, just a few other single girls she had met at the
dance clubs. She had painfully discovered that when you get married
and have a baby, all your single friends slowly but inevitably
distance themselves from you. Shellie, her old roommate, hadn’t
even called once since Annie had married Neal.

Her mother’s phone rang and rang and rang.
Just before Annie hung up, somebody answered.

When Annie heard that old familiar voice,
the voice of Mother, the voice of the prim-and-proper “Mrs.” Paula
Crawford, her vocal cords seem to freeze solid. She hadn’t expected
an answer this time, either, and she didn’t know how to begin.

“Hello?” Paula repeated in an annoyed tone,
as if she thought it was a prank call.

“Mama?” The word just sort of squeaked out
of Annie’s mouth. And though she hadn’t intended it, her voice
sounded very childlike.

“Annie! Is something wrong?”

“No,” Annie said, struggling to compose
herself. “Nothing’s wrong.”

“Oh.” Her mother’s tone immediately shifted
from concern to
I’m still angry and hurt.

There was an awkward silence.

“Listen, Momma...I...I don’t know what to
do...I’m
scared
.”

“Annie, what on earth is the matter? I
thought you said nothing was wrong.”

“Nothing’s wrong, really. Not yet, anyway.”
Annie paused, not knowing how to continue. “It’s Neal, Momma.
He...well, I think he’s going crazy or something.”

There was another long silence. Annie had a
feeling her mother was fighting the impulse to say “I told you so.”
But instead, she said, “Why don’t you just tell me exactly what
happened, honey? You’re about to give me another ulcer.”

Annie stalled for a moment, not knowing how
much detail to provide. If she was completely open about everything
that had taken place, her mother’s already low opinion of Neal
would plummet to rock bottom. On the other hand, if she glossed
things over too much, it would make Annie sound like a
“complainer,” something her mother detested, especially in a
wife.

Annie opted for a compromise. “Neal thinks
Natasha hates him. Every little negative thing she does, he blows
out of proportion.” Annie tried to laugh lightheartedly. “He thinks
Natasha’s out to get him.”

“Out to
get
him?”

Annie glanced down at her sleeping baby,
feeling silly now for even calling. But she was still afraid.
Very
afraid.

She bit her lip, then launched headlong into
a detailed account of everything that had taken place. “Yesterday,
Neal was convinced that Natasha had started talking to him...”

When she finished, there was another long
silence.

“Annie, a five-month old baby can’t even sit
up by itself, let alone t—”

“I
know
, Mamma.” Annie was fighting
tears. “What am I going to do? I don’t have anyplace to go.”

“Doug and I were just getting ready to drive
down there.”

“Down where?”

“To Atlanta. Doug got tickets to the Braves
game this weekend.”

A prick of sadness touched Annie’s heart.
Her mother had been planning a trip to Atlanta and hadn’t even
called. But after their big fight and what Annie had told her (“Get
the hell out of my life and stay out!” were Annie’s exact words),
what did she expect?

“I don’t want to mess up your trip...” Annie
said, hoping her mother might volunteer to cancel it and stay
home.

“I really can’t back out now, honey. Not
this late. Doug went to a lot of trouble to get the tickets.”

“Well,” Annie said, “I guess I’ll have to
find someplace else to stay, if things get much worse.”

There was a long silence. “Annie, you can
come home anytime you want, you know that.”

Annie hesitated. The last thing she wanted
to do was get underneath her mother’s thumb again. That was the
reason she had moved away from Chattanooga in the first place. And
she certainly didn’t want to look like a failure in her mother’s
eyes—when she married Neal, Paula had predicted that the marriage
wouldn’t last a month, that Annie would come running home to
Chattanooga with her tail between her legs.

Annie said, “I just might need to come home
for a couple of days, you know, until this gets straightened
out.”

“A couple of days, whatever you want. Just
stay as long as you need to.”

Annie felt a little better. “Are you
sure?”

“Of course I’m sure. You’re my daughter,
honey. You can always come home whenever you need to.” She paused,
then added. “Your room is just like you left it.”

Annie felt tears coming. “Thanks,
Momma.”

“Do you still have your key?”

Annie wiped her eyes, composing herself.
“Yeah, I still have it. When will you and Doug be back?”

“Sunday night, or Monday. When are you
coming?”

“I’m not sure. I was thinking about coming
tonight.”

“I’ll call you and check on you, then.”

“You don’t have to do that, Momma. I’ll be
fine.”

After they hung up, Annie wasted no time in
preparing to leave. Telling her mother she was “thinking” of going
to Chattanooga tonight was just to save herself some face—she had
no intention of being within a 100 mile radius of Atlanta when Neal
got home.

C
HAPTER 6

After Neal made his last afternoon delivery,
he drove the empty van back to the flower shop, as he always did.
He wished he could have taken the van home and driven it back to
the shop the next morning, but of course that was out of the
question. There was absolutely no way he would be able to hide his
condition from the Snell’s now. His was no longer able to walk
without an obvious limp, and every now and then he had severe bouts
of chills and shook from head to toe. At the very least, he would
have to go inside the shop and give Grammy the delivery receipts
and the keys to the van. And sometimes they made him make another
last-minute delivery or two, if the runs weren’t too far away.

Neal agonized over all this as he drove
towards the shop, trying to think of some solution. But of course,
there was none.

However, it turned out that all his worrying
was for naught.

When he limped back into the flower shop,
the look on both Grammy’s and Mildred’s faces told him that the jig
was up.

“Daddy!” Grammy squealed over her shoulder.
“Neal’s back!”

Neal’s heart sank. “Daddy” was what all the
Snells called the old man, even Grammy, his mother. The two old
women looked back down at their work, pretending to be absorbed in
it, the way people do when they’re about to witness something
deliciously unpleasant.

Neal heard old man Snell’s heavy footsteps
coming down the hallway, from the main office. He sauntered into
the open area where Grammy and Mildred worked. His pale blue eyes
looked Neal up and down. Then, he simply cocked his head towards
his office.

“Uh-oh,” Neal muttered under his breath. He
followed the old man down the hallway, no longer bothering to try
and hide his limp. When they entered the office, Snell motioned to
a decrepit black Naugahide chair opposite his desk, the same chair
where Neal had sat when Snell had interviewed him for the job a
little less than two weeks ago. Neal carefully lowered himself into
it.

Snell sat there a moment, eyeing Neal
suspiciously. Neal glanced away, at the rows and rows of
ancient-looking football trophies that lined the bookshelves.

Snell finally leaned forward and inspected
Neal’s foot. Even through the sneaker, it looked enormous.

“Why didn’t you tell us you hurt yourself,
son? You could have just taken the day off.”

“I...well, it wasn’t really too bad this
morning.”

“Looks pretty bad now, though.”

Neal sat up a little more in the chair and
tried to appear confident—he didn’t want to lose the job, no matter
how bad it was. “I need the money. I was afraid if I tried to take
time off so soon, you might fire me.”

“I can understand that,” Snell said, slowly
nodding his beefy head. “But what I can’t understand it your
disregard for other people, me and my fambly included. You might
screw up and run somebody over.” He looked past Neal, as if
imagining some grisly accident, and then shuddered. “You hit a
pedestrian, I might lose everything.” Glancing towards his open
door, he lowered his voice. “You know how these nigras are now.
They all got lawyers and an axe to grind, and the damn goven’ment
backs ‘em up.”

Neal nodded politely, but shuddered on the
inside. Snell was the type of ignorant redneck with whom Neal could
never have imagined having an extended conversation, much less
having for an employer. But what troubled Neal even more at this
particular moment was how the old man had found out about his foot.
He was almost certain no one at the shop had noticed anything wrong
when he had loaded up the truck in the morning. Grammy and Mildred
had been gorging themselves on coffee and donuts and hadn’t paid
him any attention.

“I got a call this afternoon from a security
guard on your delivery route,” the old man said, as if he had read
Neal’s thoughts. “Said you didn’t look fit to walk, let alone drive
a van.”

“Oh,” was all Neal could manage.
That
nosy bastard
, he thought, remembering the guard.
Why
couldn’t he have just minded his own business?

“He also said he thought you were on
drugs.”

Neal sat up even straighter. “I’m not on
drugs.”

Snell gave another slow nod, then glanced
down at Neal’s foot again.

“What exactly happened to it, anyway?”

“Nothing—I just sprained it last night.”

“Doing what?”

Neal shrugged. “Fell when I got up to go to
the bathroom.”

“That’s mighty interestin,’” the old man
said.

Neal became even more tense. “Why do you say
that?” Surely Annie hadn’t called and told him about—

“Security guard said you did it playin’
tennis.”

“Oh.” Neal felt his face turning red, partly
from embarrassment, but partly from anger. What kind of
conversation had the two assholes had, anyway? Had they discussed
the color of his socks, too? Neal wondered if the old man knew the
guard was black. He doubted it. They wouldn’t have been so chummy,
otherwise.

“So which is it?” Snell said, with a
sneer.

“I don’t see what business it is of
yours.”

“The physical condition of my drivers is my
bidness.” He paused, clasping his hands behind his head. “Besides,
bein’ an ex-athlete an all, I might even be able to hep out.”

Neal sighed, fighting the effects of all the
pain killers he had taken. It was difficult to think clearly.
“Look, I hurt it a little bit after work, playing tennis. Then when
I got up last night to use the bathroom, I turned my ankle, and
really messed it up. Okay?”

Snell looked Neal over as if he were trying
to decide whether to believe him or not. “Go to the doctor?”

“Yes sir,” Neal said.

“Which one?”

“I don’t know—my wife took me to the
emergency room last night.”

“Get it x-rayed?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Nothin’ broken?”

“No sir.”

“Good man,” Snell said, smiling. It appeared
to Neal that he believed the story.

“Doctor give you any pain killers?”

This caught Neal by surprise.

The old man’s pale blue eyes remained fixed
on Neal’s face, waiting for an answer.

“No,” Neal said.

“Well, I have to tell you, bein’ an
ex-athlete and all, that really surprises me. They almost always
give pain killers for sprains, especially one that’s swole up like
that.”

“Well, they didn’t give me any.”

“Uh-huh.” Snell brought one thick finger to
his lips, looking Neal up and down. “Would you mind emptying your
pockets on the table?”

Neal was so stunned he could not speak for a
few seconds. “You bet I’d mind.” He let out a nervous laugh. “What
is this, a concentration camp?”

Snell chuckled. “Wish it was sometimes,
son.” The smile vanished. “You gonna empty your pockets or
not?”

The pain killers were in Neal’s right-hand
pocket. Now, the little prescription bottle felt the size of a
pickle-barrel. He wondered if Snell could see it bulging through
his jeans.

Neal said, “You don’t have the right to
search me.”

“No. But I have the right to fire your smart
ass.”

“Go ahead,” Neal said indignantly. He
struggled his way out of the chair and onto his feet.

“Now, don’t get all worked up over this,”
Snell said.

Neal had already taken a step towards the
door, his hand on the doorjamb for support. He paused and looked
back at Snell.

“Don’t pay me no mind,” the old man said,
with another chuckle. “I get a little carried away sometimes. Just
go on home and take care of that leg. Get some rest, and if you
feel up to it, come on back to work in the morning.”

Neal nodded, but he had no intention of
working another second for Snell. He was sure the only reason the
old man had backed off was because he didn’t have a replacement
delivery boy lined up. But that wouldn’t take long—there were
plenty of people in Atlanta desperate enough to put up with Snell’s
bullshit.

Neal walked out the door, managing to take
the first few steps without limping.

And he didn’t look back.

* * *

Annie had everything packed up and loaded
into her car by a quarter to five. It had taken her a lot longer
than she had anticipated—she kept thinking of “one more thing”
Natasha might need, and she ended up taking almost all the baby
provisions that were in the apartment. The only item that was in
short supply was disposable diapers. There was just one left, but
she had just changed Natasha, so she could make it to Chattanooga
and then buy some more there. She didn’t want to spend any more
time in Atlanta than necessary.

When she was finally satisfied she had
everything she needed, she went back inside the apartment to get
Natasha and to leave Neal a note. The baby was already strapped
into her car seat, ready and waiting on the couch, wearing the
orange jumper that Annie’s mother had made for her. Annie had put
it on Natasha that morning, knowing that she would be going home.
It was too bad her mother wasn’t going to be there and see Natasha
in it—it
was
awfully cute on her. Her mother had embroidered
Natasha’s name across the front.

Annie searched around the kitchen for
something to write on. She finally decided to use a napkin. Just
after she scribbled Neal’s name across the top, she heard the sound
of footsteps coming down the hallway.

“Oh, God,” she whispered, the pen poised
above the paper. She watched the door as the footsteps came closer.
“Please don’t be Neal.
Please
don’t be Neal.”

The footsteps stopped in front of the door.
Annie waited breathlessly for the jingling sound of Neal’s
keys.

Instead, there was a loud knock.

Annie opened her mouth. For a second,
nothing came out. “Who is it?”

“Building maintenance. Here to take care of
the rodent problem.”

“Oh,” Annie said, relieved. She almost
laughed. Now that she was leaving, the manager had finally decided
to do something about the mice.

“Can you come back later?” Annie paused,
then added, “In an hour or so?” She took satisfaction in knowing
that Neal would be home then—maybe the man would fill the apartment
with noxious fumes and it would smell awful. Maybe an entire army
of dying mice would come crawling out of the woodwork—that would
serve Neal right.

“I’ll be back later,” the man said, sounding
a little miffed. Annie sat still as she listened to him walk
away.

She scribbled off the rest of her short and
not-quite-truthful note to Neal, promising herself that she would
call him when she got to Chattanooga and explain in more detail. As
bad a husband and father as he was, he at least deserved that
much.

* * *

Neal’s few moments of self-righteous
supremacy at Snell’s Flowers were short-lived. When Mildred handed
him his final paycheck—the first and only Snell paycheck he would
ever receive—Neal at first thought she had made a clerical error.
The amount was quite a bit less than he expected. When he
questioned her about this, she went over the math with him and he
realized, with quite a shock, that he was being paid less than
minimum wage. A dollar an hour less, to be exact.

He stormed back into old man Snell’s office,
or at least pushed his way in as forcefully as a man can do with a
bad foot and an aching shoulder.

“What is this crap?” Neal said, tossing the
check on the old man’s desk.

Snell merely glanced it. “What’s the problem
now, son?”

“You’re trying to pay me less than minimum
wage, that’s what.”

“So?”

Neal was almost beside himself with anger.
“It’s illegal!”

“No,” Snell said smugly. “Not for part-time
employees, it’s not.”

Neal was confused. “What the hell are you
talking about? I’m not a part-time employee—I worked forty hours a
week.”

“No, sir, you did not. Look at the paycheck.
You worked
thirty-five
hours a week, like all the other
delivery boys. Seven hours a day, five days a week. Eight to four,
with one hour off for lunch.”

Neal picked up the check and stared at
it.

“And, in this Great State of Georgia, you
don’t have to pay a part-time employee minimum wage.” He gave
another smug smile.

“You...why didn’t you tell me you paid less
than minimum wage?”

“Don’t recall you askin’.”

Neal could not believe what the old man was
trying to pull. He hadn’t asked how much the job paid, because he
assumed it was minimum wage...but now that he thought about it, the
ad he saw in the paper had said DRIVERS WANTED—PART & FULL
TIME.

“Look,” Neal said, “I worked
eight
hours a day, or even more. You gave me more deliveries at
four-thirty. Five o’clock, sometimes. I didn’t get back here until
almost six on some days.”

“Well, we gave you a little extra work only
because you were a tad slow with your deliveries. Which is only
natural, you bein’ new and all.”

“What? That’s not true! I made my deliveries
faster
than any of the other...” Neal’s voice trailed
off—there was no point in arguing with Snell. The sneaky
son-of-a-bitch would just have another snappy comeback for whatever
Neal said.

Neal turned to leave, but hesitated—he
couldn’t resist telling Snell one more thing. He looked the old man
straight in the eye and became acutely aware of their age
difference, the wrinkles on Snell’s face, the balding head, the
pot-belly. Neal lost his nerve for a few seconds, but then decided
that he had tell Jimmy Snell what he really thought of him, no
matter what.

With his voice quavering a bit, Neal finally
got it out.

“You’re a selfish prick.”

This was the worst insult Neal could conjure
up, but Snell did not seem to be in the least phased by it. “No,
son, I’m just a bidnessman, tryin’ to do the best I can for mysef
and my fambly. If you don’t like workin’ for us, why, there’s
somebody else who will.”