Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bro (76 page)

Serena was back at the apartment, waiting for Jessica’s return so that she could go shopping for a birthday outfit. Her cousin Tabitha was there for the weekend, and her friend Monique had spent the night. Serena called Jessica’s cell phone. “When you coming back with the money?” she asked.

“And good morning to you,” said Jessica. It was after one o’clock.

As Jessica headed for home, no man called out or turned to watch her pass; she’d gained another thirty pounds and felt self-conscious about her figure. But when Serena and her girlfriends hit the sidewalks a few minutes later and retraced Jessica’s steps to Southern Boulevard, the attention was fierce.

“Que familia bella,”
said one man. That’s a beautiful family. The girls walked in the shadow of the Bruckner Expressway. They passed the old man scooping mango ices from his silver cart. They floated through a smoky cloud of sidewalk shish kebabs. Tabitha and Monique wore halters; Serena wore a baby-blue T-shirt. All wore tight jeans and topknot ponytails. They ducked into Jimmy Jazz. Serena held a pair of Mudd jeans at arm’s length and, without ceremony, bought them. The store didn’t have a dressing room.

It had plenty of T-shirts, though, with a chorus of messages not much different from the sidewalk calls.
Angel Outside. Rebel. Princess. Too Sexy to Stop Here.
Beside a cell phone:
Call Me.
Beside a strawberry:
Pick Me. Kiss Me
—a rainbow over lips.
Boys Lie.
Monique pointed to one that read
I’m so sorry. You looked cute from far away.

“That’s something you’d say,” Monique said to Serena. But Serena
wasn’t bold with the sneaker clerk. She badgered Tabitha to ask for a pair of zebra-striped Jordans in her size and beckoned her cousin over to the cashier so she wouldn’t have to stand in line all alone, feeling stupid. At the register, a vast rack of sneaker laces hung like a million mini-nooses. Serena, who was as short as Coco, had to stand on her toes to pay the clerk.

Robert met the girls at the corner with the car; he didn’t want them walking home. Jessica, who sat in the passenger seat, reached for Serena’s bag as the girls crowded in. “Let me see,” she said. “More sneakers?” She pulled them out and inspected them critically. “They ugly.”

“They’re mine,” Serena said.

“Don’t go complaining to me when you can’t find nothing to match,” Jessica said, tossing them back in the box. Neither did she approve of Serena’s jeans. They cost $30.

“She found the same ones cheaper,” Tabitha said.

“Why you pay thirty dollars for them, then?” Jessica asked.

“Because I already got them, I didn’t
know,
” Serena said. Jessica wished that Serena had spent the money on an outfit; she wanted Serena to look pretty at the party, not regular.

“Don’t go asking me—” started Jessica.

“Ai, Mommy,” Serena said, exasperated. “My father’s coming to pick me up at twelve.” She was referring to Jessica’s ex-boyfriend George. George still called Serena. “I ain’t calling for you,” he’d tell Jessica. “Put my daughter on.” He’d promised to pick up Serena that night, at midnight, after he got out of work. Serena assured her mother that George would help her out with money for an outfit.

“You better get money from George. Cuz you don’t have nothing,” said Jessica.

“I’ll fight for it,” Serena promised as she gathered her things to get out of the car.

“You better take out your boxing gloves,” Jessica said.

“No boys in the house!” Robert warned.

Jessica called out after Serena, “Vacuum your room!”

O
n the morning of Serena’s birthday, Priscilla’s thirteen-year-old brother gave her a half-eaten bag of M&M’s. Reluctantly, the five-year-old handed her a Twinkie. “You gonna eat it?” he asked.

“Not now,” Serena said.

“Can I take it back?” he said.

The day was windy. Derek surprised Serena with a bouquet of flowers down by the bench. Serena was wearing jeans and one of Monique’s halters, which she partly obscured with a black sweater. He glanced down at her cleavage. “Button up,” he said.

Derek’s Charlie Brown T-shirt dropped below his knees. He had extremely long, curled-up eyelashes and the makings of a beard. He was always on the move—hopping over the fence that lined the driveway, striding down the sidewalk to get high near the school, dancing around Serena like a Harlem Globetrotter dazzling a basketball. The need between them rose and fell in shoves and bear hugs. Desire got presented as a mock threat, affection as a taunt; touch was so conditional that half the pleasure was in the tease.

“Come here!” Serena shouted. He’d try to kiss her. “Stop!” she’d yell. But then if Derek walked away, she’d chase him down and drag him back.

“You making it too easy for him,” Priscilla said critically.

By late afternoon, the wind chilled, and Derek got a kiss. Serena pulled on an oversize sweatshirt. She tucked her knees beneath her and sat on the bench. She pulled Derek’s hands into the tunnel of extra sleeve. “Your hands is sweaty! You nervous?” she said sweetly.

A few hours later, Jessica stopped by Priscilla’s carrying Serena’s gift. She hesitated outside by the fence. Serena and Derek were sitting on the steps of the front porch, shaded by the grapevines that made a room of leaves.

“Your mother, Serena,” Priscilla whispered. Serena broke free, ran over, and sprung open the gate. Serena had clipped her hair back, and stray curls framed her open face. The dark brown strands still showed reddish tints from the summer that Jessica had dyed it blond. Serena was glad to see her mother. Her eyes were bright.

“You look all busted,” Jessica said.

“Nah,” Serena replied happily. She lifted up her sweatshirt to show her mother the halter.

Jessica raised her eyebrows and laughed. “You’d better leave that on,” she said.

“Derek told me to put it on,” Serena said agreeably. Jessica and Serena hugged. Jessica rocked side to side.

“Ooh,” Jessica sighed sentimentally.

“Ma!” Serena said, embarrassed.

“Sixteen years ago you weren’t even a thought,” said Jessica affectionately. “Seventeen years ago!”

“Ma,” Serena said. She grabbed the bag with Jessica’s gift. She read the card from Máximo and the one from Jessica.

“You’re welcome,” Jessica said, hurt.

“Thank you,” said Serena, and kissed Jessica’s cheek. Serena hurried over to her friends and showed them the cell phone. Jessica stood awkwardly in the driveway. She was still wearing her work outfit: a white polyester blouse and navy polyester suit. She clutched her purse beneath her arm and toyed with her pendant, an oval piece of jade. She sat on the warped bench. “Serena!” Jessica yelled. Serena didn’t hear her.
“Serena!”

“Whaa!” Serena said.

“Serena, get over here,” Jessica said harshly.

Serena plopped down beside her. Derek approached and left almost as quickly, as if he were making a U-turn on a skateboard. Jessica called after him, “Your parents don’t believe in giving you condoms?” She turned her head away, feigning a disgust she knew he couldn’t see. She’d spotted his hickey.

Serena started after him. “Serena, come here!” Jessica said, calling her back. “What’d I tell you? What’d I tell you?”

“Whaa?” Serena moaned.

“I told you. I don’t like that. I don’t like you giving boys hickeys. I—”

“What about you and Máximo?”

“Me and Máximo?”

“I don’t like it, and you don’t care.”

“I am thirty-three years old. I don’t have them on my neck. I am a grown woman. I work and I pay bills.”

“I don’t care. It’s none of your business.”

“Serena! Please!”

“Ma, look at you. Catching an attitude,” Serena said, then caught one herself.

“I told you I didn’t like you giving boys hickeys. Tell him to come over here. Tell him,
now,
” ordered Jessica.

“Why, you gonna say something to him?” said Serena, alarmed. “What you gonna say to him? It’s
me.
”

“And what’s that?” asked Jessica, flicking Serena’s neck, where a strawberry spot had begun to fade. “I don’t like that,” Jessica hissed. “Gimme the phone. I’m gonna tell Máximo to come and get me and take me home.”

“Ma, you are wrecking my birthday for real,” Serena cried. She ran into the house. “My mother is ruining my birthday!” she howled to Priscilla, who stood in the kitchen baking Serena a birthday cake. Priscilla went downstairs to smooth things out: yes, Jessica could threaten to cancel the surprise party, but what good was punishment for something Serena didn’t even know about?

Jessica thought she understood Serena’s motive for the hickey. “When he goes to see the baby’s mother, Serena wants her to know where he’s been. My daughter ain’t stupid,” she said.

Serena rejoined her gang on the stairs just as Máximo pulled up for Jessica, who stepped into his car, slammed the door, and left. A blast of Metallica punched out the window as they sped away. Night fell, and the steps where the kids sat became a tunnel of love.

Derek rested his back against the house, and Serena, who sat between his legs, leaned her back into his chest. Derek tenderly chided her about the hickey. He hadn’t wanted one. He knew that he was going to meet Jessica, and he felt the hickey was a sign of disrespect.

“I don’t care,” Serena said.

“She did care, though. I felt stupid,” Derek said.

“I wish she wouldn’ta been stupid and leave. She walks all around with hickeys all over her and I don’t like it, and I tell her, and she don’t care. So why I gotta care?”

The surprise birthday didn’t surprise Serena; Kevin had broken the news when he’d asked Serena for directions to Lourdes’s. Jessica was livid, but at least her daughter didn’t know about the limousine, which would appear at the party’s end. The guests lolled beneath the balloons and a misspelled banner reading “Happy Sweet Sixxteen!” For Serena’s entrance, Máximo blasted “Suave,” Lourdes’s dancing song; Lourdes upstaged Serena, leading her granddaughter in, with Jessica self-consciously pulling up the rear. Serena immediately picked up a baby to deflect attention. A friend of Serena’s from upstate had brought down
Milagros and both sets of twins. Brittany and Stephanie had demanded that Milagros dress up, and she appeared in a halter and tapered jeans. Robert arrived in a shirt and tie. Máximo came straight from the gym in sweats, which irritated Jessica. Serena wore a patchwork denim miniskirt and halter with her new sneakers. When Elaine bustled in, she said, “You’re half-naked! Turn around!” Serena turned slowly. “Where’d you get it?” Elaine asked, then raised her hand and high-fived her niece.

Kids leaped after the balloons, some of which had been tied to a fan. Lourdes sweated in the kitchen. Jessica passed out the corsages; Serena cut the cake. Meanwhile, Priscilla fielded increasingly distressed phone calls from Derek, who was trying to figure out whether or not he should come; Serena couldn’t decide herself. Lourdes, after learning that Derek’s ex-girlfriend was pregnant, had warned Serena that she was going to have a talk with him. “Now is not the place,” Serena argued. “It’s hard enough to come and not know nobody.” Before long, everyone was putting in their two cents. Serena burst into tears, then locked herself in Lourdes’s bedroom; Emilio was already hiding out there, with all the furniture that had been dragged away to make room to dance; Roxanne’s new baby lay asleep on a towel on the floor.

Serena sobbed into her hands. She imitated her grandmother, her mothers, her aunt: “What makes you think if he got one girl pregnant, he’s not going to get you pregnant?” She answered herself, “Who says I’m going to spread my legs?” Priscilla knocked and reported in: Derek was on his way! Serena worked herself up into a frenzy: “They are so worried about me having sex. She has fourteen grandchildren. Why
me
? They don’t care if their sons do it, only their daughters. If I was a grandson, do you think they would all be pressuring me?” she cried. “If I want to have sex, I’m going to have sex. Everybody has sex. They all want me to change. I don’t care what my family, friends, or nobody says about me, I am the way I am and I don’t care!”