How to Knock a Bravebird from Her Perch : The First Novel in the Morrow Girls Series (9780985751616) (24 page)

“Fine. Have it your way.” Ricky’s eyes flinched a little then he backed away. “I be by tomorrow to pick you up.”

My body relaxed inch by inch as Ricky walked out the room until I almost felt like me again. Thought about giving the girls a call but I ain’t know what to say. Figured I’d see them soon enough and by then I’d know what to say. Know how honest to be. Know if I should come up with some kinda fairy tale that’d make sense to the younger ones. Mya’s teachers were always sending notes home with her saying that the stories she made up and the pictures she drew weren't from the mind of a little girl. Ricky said it was because she was too smart for them other kids in her class, that she was mature. But that ain’t what her teachers were getting at. For four years her teachers’d been telling me I was a bad mama. That somehow I let my little girl grow up too soon. It wasn’t fair to her, they said. That a pretty girl like her should’ve been thinking about candy and fun and things like that. The nurse came around to check on me and I pretended to be asleep until all was quiet around me.
 

“YO’ MAMA’S HOME!” The front door closed behind us and Ricky threw the lock.

They came running from all sorts of directions and stopped to look at my arm, all except one. Jackie was nowhere to be seen.

“Well? Y’all not gonna give me a hug?”

“We don’t wanna hurt you.”

“You ain’t gonna hurt me. Now get over here.”

One by one they walked on over, all serious and careful like. Wasn’t natural. Nobody supposed to hug they mama that way. So I made sure to smile real big for them. Ain’t want them thinking I was nothing but fine.

“Aight, Pecan, I’m gonna head back to the gym. Y’all be aright?”

If we weren’t it wouldn’t have been because he wasn’t there. Ricky’s presence never fixed a thing. But I just nodded.

Looking around my living room, the hallway, none of it fit any more. It was all old stuff. Most of it had cracks or rough edges that I’d spent ten years pretending ain’t exist. Up until then they hadn’t posed no kinda threat but suddenly I felt like a fool for letting them near me.

“How about we get started on supper? Where’s Jackie?” They looked around at each other and nobody said a word. “What? Cat got your tongue?”

“She upstairs.”

“She sleeping,” Mya added.

“Okay. Nikki, wanna help me in the kitchen?”

“I’ll help too.”

“Me too!”

It was nice having Mya with me. Most of the time she was like her daddy about the kitchen, wasn’t no reason for her to be there unless she was getting food, but something about that day was different. The four of us mixed and grated and chopped up things then threw them all in the pot to cook. We were having what I called leftover stew.

“How come I don’t have a apron like Nikki?”

“I ain’t think you wanted one. I’ll get you one, baby. Next time we go shopping. Okay? Remind me.” Mya nodded and saw fit to give me a little smile. Sometimes my girls were a complete mystery to me. They just sorta sprung up outta the ground with no help from anybody it seemed. And I was left trying to keep up with who they were turning into.

“Where baby?” Nat climbed up on a kitchen chair and leaned her head against my stomach like she’d started doing. “Huh?”

The others just sorta froze. It was getting back to being flat so she was confused. Wasn’t her fault she ain’t know the game we were playing where we just pretended like things were normal. Natalie was a sweet peaceful chile, more than the others. She could ask the most painful questions with that bubbly damn grin of hers that was still full of baby teeth.

“Mama, where baby?”

“Baby gone.”

“Gone?”

“Yeah. Now let’s add some rice. What y’all think of that?”

“Okay, Mama.”

“Then we’ll go upstairs and wake Jackie up and the five of us go outside for a bit to get some fresh air. What you think?”

They should’ve been excited but not one of them looked it. The lid on the pot snapped shut, started whistling right away, and I couldn’t help but wonder what I was missing.

“Let’s go get Jackie.”

“She sleeping,” Mya reminded me.

“Well, how long she been sleeping?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know? She been sleep since y’all got home from school? Well, she can’t sleep much longer or she not gonna wanna go to bed when it’s time. School day tomorrow. Why don’t y’all go get whatever toys or dolls or whatever you wanna take outside.” I meant to do the waking myself. Got all the way to the stairs and couldn’t go any further. Not one step.

“Mama?”

“Oh, y’all go on ahead. I’ll be up in a minute.”

“Daddy fixed the banister.”

“I know. I see it.”

“You not gonna fall.”

“Yes, Mya, I see it. I’m coming. You go on ahead.”

Just pieces of wood, wasn’t no need to be scared of pieces of wood. They couldn’t hurt nobody. But I cursed them, threatening to do them some harm with every step I took. The girls were piled up in Jackie and Nat’s room, all of them giving me the same big-eyed look. Couldn’t even see Jackie, just Mya sitting on Jackie’s bed like she ain’t know she was in the way.

“She up?”

“She say she wanna keep on sleeping.”

“Mya, go on and sit over there. Let me talk to her.” The two of them was inseparable but not so much that couldn’t nobody else be with them. And I was they mama. So I took Mya’s place on the edge of the bed. Jackie was stretched out on her stomach with her head resting on her hands. She blinked a few times. That was all, though, no words. “You feeling okay, baby? Hmm? You got a fever?”

“She just wanna sleep. We could go down by ourselves...”

“You don’t feel hot. Your tummy hurt? Hmm?”

Jackie shook her head back and forth, shook it so dainty and gentle that I would’ve missed it if I had a blinked right then. “I’m okay.”

“Well, it’s time to get up. Your daddy be home in a few hours and we’re gonna eat supper. So up-see daisy.”

I should’ve seen it. Seen the look that passed between them. Should’ve seen how she swallowed nervous and all at the thought of moving. She probably hadn’t moved in hours. But she tried. For my sake, she tried. Her tiny little arms shaking under the pressure of holding her body up...But it wasn’t until she started to draw her knees in, rounding her back that I saw it. Saw it, heard it, felt it. My baby was in such pain that it shined bright and bold from all over her body. Lit up every corner of her bedroom, shining so hard that she couldn’t move no more.

“What...what...” I couldn’t even get it out. Tears ran down her face, but still not a word. “What is it?”
 

Nikki was already crying buckets on the other side of the room, rocking back and forth with Nat on her lap. If it wasn’t for the way she was moving I’d think it was her that was in real pain. She ain’t have the way that I did to hold things in. I was good at that. I could take damn near any kinda pain and smother it so I ain’t even remember it was there. Nikki ain’t have that.

“I’m okay, Mama.”
 

It was a lie just like the one I’d told downstairs about being fine. “Mama?” She sniffled, panicking a bit as I tore the covers from her bed. She was still in her school clothes, except for her socks. They were nowhere to be seen.
 

“I’m okay. I just sleepy.”

“Come here.” I was standing over her but felt like we were miles apart. I watched her sit up because I couldn’t do nothing to help with just one arm, but once she was up it was easy to pull up her shirt and see. They stretched across her back, criss-crossing even, and they were damn near swelling before my eyes. “How...how your back get like this?”

I
HAD
FALLEN
ON
my right arm, and wasn’t much I could do with the left, being right-handed and all, but I ain’t let that stop me. I’d talked myself into believing I could use my left hand just as good as if I’d been using it my whole life. I talked myself into it then I put myself on a bus headed for Ricky’s gym. Folks around me must have looked at me something strange because of how I was looking. I probably looked like any other woman except in the face. In the face I was different. Every other stop or so I had to put my hand in my purse to make sure it was still there. I wasn’t worried about it slicing off one of my fingers but I should’ve been. Clara had always got on me about keeping the knives sharp. She said if I was gonna use them I’d better respect them. I was real grateful at that moment that I’d followed Clara’s advice. I’d picked the longest, biggest, sharpest one I could find. I’d seen it slice through a twenty-pound turkey without breaking a sweat. It was gonna handle Ricky just fine.

The gym got real busy after work. Lotta men came by for a few hours just to keep in shape or keep up for fights they had with other gyms, not like Ricky. Ricky was always there. Training was his job but none of his people knew me and I ain’t know them. I walked up in there and was covered in they sweat in about a minute. It just hung in the air, like raindrops waiting for the thunder to announce them.

“Hey sweet thing, you looking for somebody?”

“Ricky.”

“What you want with him when you got me right here?” The black lips spread to show off two rows of messed up teeth. “Hmm? Ricky ain’t—”

“I want Ricky.”

“You ain’t even gonna give a brotha a chance?”

“Where is he? He here?” We were starting to draw a crowd but my hand closed in on my friend anyway.
 

“How about this? You tell me your name and I’ll take you to Ricky myself?”

I kept moving. His lips kept on talking but I wasn’t trying to hear a word he had to say. I wanted my husband. The gym was nothing but a bunch of men sweating all over themselves while a few of them bounced off each other in the ring. I recognized his legs before I could make out his face. Ricky was one of the fools bouncing around the ring. Just made me mad, seeing him move like he did. He was free. He ain’t deserve it but his body went where he wanted, did what he wanted but not mine. Not my babies’. We were all paying for his freedom. And I was done.

“RICKY!” My purse slipped from my shoulder to the floor and I snatched the knife outta it. The light made it look all shiny and new even though I’d had it for a decade. “RICKYYY!”

He mumbled something and folks stopped what they were doing to look at me. I was crying by then but they weren’t sad pathetic tears, they were the kind I’d never had before. The kind that made me just as free as him.

“Pecan?” He looked around at all his friends and sorta smiled. “What the...you done lost your mind?”

“Shit man!”

“N’all it’s okay.” Ricky tossed the mask he was wearing to the mat and spit something out his mouth before starting to work on his gloves. “She just...she just going through a tough time. Come on, baby, put the knife down. What you gonna do with that?”

“I’m gonna kill you.”

“Man, you want me to call the cops?”

“N’all she okay. Right? Pecan? You don’t want folks to think you crazy, do you? Come on now...put it down.” He squeezed between the ropes and dropped to the floor, sweaty and taunt. “Pecan.”

“No. I gotta Ricky. I gotta kill you because...because of what you did. You ain’t have to do that! She just a little girl. You ain’t have to do that. She my baby.”