Losing Hope (3 page)

I met him the second week of my freshman year of college. Tall, slightly muscular, and a beautiful shade of golden brown, he had eyes the color of peridots—the pale green gem that was my mother's birthstone—and a smile that flashed brighter than any jewel I'd ever seen. In the summer, when the sun stayed on him, hints of olive underlined his perfect complexion, revealing his Mediterranean heritage. The biracial son of a history professor from Italy and a chef from the French Caribbean nation of Saint Martin, he was fluent in four languages—English, French, Italian, and Dutch—well read, and well traveled.

I was eighteen and fresh out of my mama's house, thinking that the rural acreage of my eastern Pennsylvanian college was exotic enough compared to my urban Baltimore upbringing. RiChard Alain St. James was a different type of foreign to me.

He was a visually and intellectually delicious man. And believe me, I tried my best to gobble him up.

The first time I saw him was at an impromptu student rally. He was standing on the steps of the student union, delivering a passionate call for student action on behalf of the Rwandan people. It was 1994, and the three-month genocide that the world community had largely ignored was starting to make real headlines. Too little too late.

But not for RiChard. He was a graduate student earning a master's degree in public policy and international relations, and his words were so potent and powerful, few could walk away. I watched football players cry. He told us that we had the ability and responsibility to be our brothers' and sisters' keepers, no matter what color or what country we all hailed from.

I loved him immediately and signed up for the public policy student organization over which he presided. I changed my major from theater arts to political science and nearly melted when I discovered he was the TA, the teacher's assistant, for my intro to political theory class.

The day he looked directly at me and smiled, I knew I wasn't going to make it to my sophomore year at that university.

We were going to go change the world together. . . .

“Ms. St. James, are you with me?” The police officer looked bored. A half-written missing person report dangled between his thick fingers, which were connected to thick arms that led up to a thick neck. Something about his facial features reminded me of a bulldog. The name Collins was written across a badge pinned to his uniform. The two of us were standing in the Monroes' too-yellow living room, but my mind was a decade and a half away.

“Oh, yes.” I shook my head out of my daydream, out of my memories of RiChard, and tried to focus again on the situation at hand. Mr. Monroe sat stoically on the sofa, his fingers entwined in his lap. Mrs. Monroe alternated between wringing her hands and rearranging a shelf full of ceramic black angels. Every now and then a muted whimper escaped from her tightly pressed lips.

The display of nerves and angst in that room was getting to me in more ways than one. It was six thirty. I knew Roman was home. And I was not.

“We are so sorry.” Mr. Monroe rumbled out another apology. “Like I said, we were driving to Bible study in my car, and when we got to Belair Road, Dayonna just jumped out of the backseat and ran off. We've never had a foster child run away from us. Ever. She did not give us any hint or clue that this was coming. I don't know what we did wrong.” His voice trailed off, and I searched for something therapeutic to say, but Officer Collins was not interested in therapy.

“So, Ms. St. James, you were giving me the girl's date of birth?” He tapped on his pen impatiently.

“Oh, yes.” I flipped through Dayonna's massive chart. “April twenty-third, nineteen ninety-seven
.
”
That date
. That was why I had gotten sidetracked.
April 23, 1997.
That was the date of the last time I saw RiChard face-to-face. I will never forget the last time my eyes beheld him, just as I can never forget the first.

April 23, 1997.
The last time I saw RiChard was the same day Dayonna first opened her eyes. A shiver went down my back, but I had to stay focused. My son was home with his father's box of ashes. I had to focus. I had to think of what to tell Roman. I had to get through this missing person report for Dayonna.

“Okay.” I cleared my throat. “She is five-seven, one hundred eighty-three pounds. No . . .” I looked back up. “She is not that heavy anymore. She lost weight.”

“She's a hundred twenty-seven,” Mr. Monroe chimed in, his fingers still entwined in his lap.

“All right, DOB four–twenty-three–ninety-seven, five-seven, either one hundred eighty-three or one hundred twenty-seven pounds . . .” Officer Collins let out a loud sigh as he scribbled. “You already told me what clothes she was wearing. It would be helpful if we had a picture of her. No luck with that, huh?”

“Sorry.” I shook my head softly. “We don't routinely keep pictures of our clients in their charts, though I think given situations like this, we probably need to start doing so.”

“You guys don't have a picture, do you?” Officer Collins was folding up the paperwork, ready to move on to the next disaster in somebody else's living room. I started to wonder anew what was going on in my own home at the moment, but something in the officer's gaze caught my attention. He was studying the Monroes, who were staring at each other. Mrs. Monroe was no longer wringing her hands. Was that terror in Mr. Monroe's eyes?

“Um, no . . . yes. I mean, I . . . we do have a picture.” Mrs. Monroe stammered through her words as Mr. Monroe's eyes grew even wider. I watched his Adam's apple move up and down as he swallowed hard.

Officer Collins raised an eyebrow. “Well, are you going to get it?” he nearly barked at the elderly woman.

“What? Oh, yes, the picture! If you think it will . . . help.” Mrs. Monroe looked nervously back at her husband before scurrying up the stairs.

Mr. Monroe and I stayed quiet in her absence, while Officer Collins uncapped his pen to write down an extra note.

When Mrs. Monroe came back down the steps, a faded Polaroid snapshot rested in her open palms. She extended it gingerly to the officer, who studied it before handing it to me.

“Is this her?” His eyebrow was raised again.

I took the picture from him and nearly gasped. I had in my own records that she was once nearly two hundred pounds, but seeing the extra weight
on
her was different from simply reading a number off of a chart. In the faded photo Dayonna looked about eleven or twelve years old. She was standing in the middle of what looked like a narrow street. A blue shingled house with an orange porch swing stood in the distance behind her.

Either it had been nearing nighttime or the picture taker had not used the flash correctly. Either way, it was obvious that Dayonna was not happy in the picture. She stood sideways and looked back over her shoulder, as if someone had called out to her. She was wearing a puffy light pink jacket, and dirty snow and slush surrounded her feet. A scowl was unmistakable on her plus-sized face, and her hair stood uncombed all over her head.

“Where did you get this picture from?” I looked over at the Monroes, who were standing so close to each other, I wondered if they would both topple over if forced to separate.

“Oh, that p—p—picture . . .” A nervous smile played on Mrs. Monroe's lips.

“Dayonna had it,” Mr. Monroe said with finality. “My wife found it in her things when she helped her unpack. It was the only picture Dayonna had in her belongings.”

“That's right.” Mrs. Monroe still looked nervous. “I hope it wasn't w—wrong for me to go through her things,” she stammered. “I tried to ask her about it, b—but she did not want to talk.” She looked from me to her husband, then back to the officer.

“Okay.” Officer Collins took the photo from me. “If you think of anything else that could help, here's my number.” He gave a card to the Monroes and looked back at me. “In the meantime, we'll keep you updated on our search. To be honest with you, since she's just coming back to the area from an out-of state-facility, she's probably out reconnecting with old friends. It might be a good idea for you to go through that whole chart to see what other past placements she's had in Baltimore. You might just find her yourself. We'll be in touch.” I did not miss the quick shared glance between the Monroes as the officer bounded out the door and back into his cruiser.

“I guess that is all we can do right now.” Mr. Monroe was holding the door open for me. I was a little slow in realizing that they were expecting me to leave right behind the officer.

For the second time today, I was being rushed out of the Monroes' home, but before I could protest, my cell phone began ringing.

Roman.

“Okay, good night.” I played along with the Monroes' hurried good-byes. “I will talk to you tomorrow—unless something else comes up tonight. Don't worry. We'll find her.”

“Yes, we will.” Mr. Monroe nodded.

I turned away and nearly ran down the steps. My phone was on its fifth ring. I did not want Roman to leave a message. I needed to talk to him directly. I squeezed a tear out of my eye, inhaled, and pressed TALK.

“Hello, Roman?” I plopped down into the front seat of my car. My eyes were closed.

“Mom!” His voice was two octaves higher than normal. “I can't believe this!”

“Let me explain, Roman.” I imagined him standing over the package with RiChard's remains, a look of devastation on his young face.

Roman always looked through the mail as soon as he got home. After a girl in his class last year sent him a graphic love letter, which I quickly discarded, he checked the mail daily to see if he had any other admirers. The only person I had known my son to admire was his father.

Though he was only an infant on April 23, 1997—the last time both of us saw RiChard face-to-face—Roman idolized his father. I had been careful not to talk badly about the man in his absence from our lives, and RiChard had kept up his end of the bargain by calling both of us from time to time and sending exotic presents and packages to Roman throughout the years. Though now his father rarely came up in his questions and conversations, every once in a while Roman would still ask me to tell him again about my and RiChard's adventures through remote villages and busy townships in Africa, Asia, Europe, and South America. The man was a legend in Roman's eyes, a larger-than-life legend whose worldwide humanitarian efforts outweighed his personal failings. To Roman, RiChard had never, would never, could never do wrong. His role of absentee father was an acceptable casualty in his warlike quest for social justice.

“I can explain this, Roman,” I said, wondering if and how I ever could. My eyes were still closed, and I remembered suddenly a sunset I watched from a fishing canoe on a lake in Argentina. I knew from experience that there were some things that existed outside of the realm of explanation.

“Mom! I can't believe it. You were telling me the truth!”

“Listen, I . . . What? Of course I told you the truth. I'm not going to lie to you, Roman. Wait, what are we talking about?”

There was a man sweeping his front sidewalk across the street from me. The setting sun shone just enough light to reveal his cinnamon-colored, oval face and narrow eyes staring at me as he swept. Still sitting in my car next to the Monroes' house, I knew I must have looked a sight. I had never been good at maintaining my facial expressions, and the whirling cyclone of emotions I was experiencing in those few moments was doing a number to my face. I was sure of it. The man with the broom kept staring over at me with a quizzical look on his face. I felt like I was a living sitcom and both of us were waiting for the punch line.

“The ring! The lion's head ring! You weren't joking about it!” Roman's excitement was causing his words to run over each other.

“Roman, slow down. What are you talking about?” Of course I knew
what
he was talking about. Flashbacks from KwaZulu-Natal and the village elder who gave RiChard the prized possession flashed through my mind. The golden ring had a large lion's head on it with eyes made out of rubies and sapphires and a mane edged with diamonds. RiChard had worn the heavy jewel on a chain around his neck until he lost it while helping tsunami victims in Indonesia back in 2004. At least that was what he told me during one of our final telephone conversations. I knew
what
Roman was talking about, but nothing he had just said made sense. “Start over, please. Roman, I don't know what you are saying.”

“The box that came in the mail! I'm surprised you didn't open it.”

I could hear him crunching and smacking his way through something and remembered again that he'd just spent the afternoon with my nephew Skee-Gee. Who knows where they'd been, what they'd seen, what he'd eaten, but I'd have to debrief him about that later. He was talking about the box, and it sounded like he'd opened it!

“You opened that box?” I could feel my stomach open up and pull me down inside of it. The taste of bile filled my mouth.

“Of course! Mommy, you know that whenever it's a package from overseas, it comes from Daddy somehow!”

I don't know what bothered me more: the way he said the word
Daddy,
as if it rhymed with Jesus, or the way he was talking to me like I was two years old. But I did not have time to dwell on either irritation, because Roman was still talking.

“Anyway, Ma, I opened the box, and there was this big ole pot inside that looked like the kind Grandma has in her china cabinet or somewhere like that. That thing was heavy, but I opened it up, and all it had inside was bubble wrap and the lion's head ring right in the middle of it. I'm not going to say I thought you were lying about the ring, but I was just a little kid when you first told me about that story. I thought you were just trying to make me feel better 'cause I missed Dad.”