Somebody's Someone (32 page)

“Can you tell me something?” I asked her.

“What is it?”

“What would make somebody want to throw out they own flesh and blood and not even think two times ’bout it? Why do folks go round having babies they don’t even have a mind to keep in the first place? What did I do to make this be?” I watched as my words crawled into her ears, playing hide-andseek wit’ the answers she was wanting to give me but couldn’t ketch ’em fast ’nough to say.

“I don’t know what makes people do the things they do, Regina. And I’m sorry that I don’t know.”

What was it inside me that made me think anybody was gonna give me an answer? So far nobody had nothing to give me but bad news. No God would ever want a child to go through all this stuff. Maybe there wasn’t gonna be nobody for me after all. I let the talking go off by itself. To a place where mouths was moving in slow motion; words didn’t mean nothing, and you didn’t have to believe anything. For the first time in my life I wondered what being dead would feel like.

“Regina, Regina, are you listening to me? I will be presenting your case to the judge and recommending that your parents come to a hearing so that we can determine your legal status . . .” She talked on and on, but I plumb stopped hearing her. Finally she seemed ready to close her mouth.

B’fore she got up to leave, Miss Matthews said she had one more question for me.

“Regina dear, I was wondering if perhaps there is someone or another that you might like for me to call, so that we can get you out of here on the weekends?”

At first I couldn’t think of anyone, but then I thought that maybe somehow Marlena could find a way for me to visit her. At first I was ’fraid to tell Miss Matthews. I didn’t wanna know the truth if Marlena’s peoples said no, and that I couldn’t come. I finally decided to try her.

“I have a friend, but I don’t know if they’ll come all the way out here just to see me. But you can go ’head and ask ’em if you wanna.”

Miss Matthews said that it would be good for me to give her the names of any friends and that she would see what she could do at least to get me out on some weekends. I gave her Marlena’s name and number. I hoped she would come, but deep down, somethin’ wouldn’t let me count on it. I didn’t know how to count on anything.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

DO YOU LIKE ME?

GOOD AS LIVIN’
in the shelter was, the city it was in, Martinez, was hotter than hell. Not only was it dry and boiling, but the ground that our shelter building stood on had more crack lines in it than a road map. It was just what I ’magined hell must feel and look like. Only difference being, you couldn’t see the flames of fire shooting through the ground and burning names on the pews that was put on hold for sinners. I’d thought a lot ’bout hell ever since ole Miss Bushfield described it to me. She told me that there was a pew with mine and my daddy’s name burned right into it, just waiting for us to arrive. Accordin’ to her the Lord had showed everything to her in a dream and let her tell it—God never misled her. I tried not to let what that crazy woman said make a minute of difference to me. Whenever I’d r’member that crazy talk ’bout hellfire and stuff, I’d just try and think on what I learned from the white lady at the Church of the Nazarene with Big Mama—that Jesus loved all the li’l children. Thinking on that put my mind at ease.

Folks said the real reason it was so hot was that we was in the middle of somethin’ called a drought and that’s why everything looked dead and fried: the flowers that was s’posed to be lining the yard never even had their day. All that was left was yellow stubs where butterflies barely wanted to land. And any grass that had a mind for being green never made it past gold. It didn’t seem like a place anything would wanna grow in. Sometimes, if I walked outside barefoot, I scorched the bottoms of my feet. So I learned fast to wear my jellies wherever I went. I was mindful not to stay in one place too long in case they decided to melt on my feet and stick me to the ground like the Wicked Witch of the West.

I’d been living in the shelter for a while, and there was still no word from nobody. I’d been to court four times, and no one came to check on me. Seem like not even the judge could make ’em wanna come. I was wanting more and more to forget that Ruby or any of ’em ever was born. After a while I seemed to forget what they looked, sounded, or acted like. I even stopped talkin’ ’bout ’em altogether. When folks asked me if I had any brothers or sisters, I’d just say, “No, I don’t.” Lord knows I wasn’t lying. And the worst part ’bout it was I hardly if ever wanted to be with my sister. I think that somehow, I must’ve buried her deep down inside with all my so-called kin. From where I stood, not even one of them scoundrels tried to call me and see where I was or how I was doin’. Far as I was concerned, I came from nobody, had nobody, and most of all didn’t need nobody—’cept maybe Miss Kennedy.

And I’d already been on two foster-home visits that turned out to be no good. The first one lasted ’bout seventeen minutes flat. It all happened like this: Miss Coral Matthews picked me up so that I could go visit the Rowhen family. Since I was only going for the weekend, all I took in the paper bag was a change of clothes and my toothbrush. Me and Miss Matthews must’ve drove what seemed like forever in a small, ugly, white county car with a gold sticker on the side. I was so ’shamed of being with her in that car. Anyway we wound up in some place called Pittsburg, California—which was even hotter than Martinez. Once I got inside the house, I met Mrs. and Mr. Rowhen. They was darker’n I was, an’ twice as ugly. The woman did all the talking, while her husband sat next to her and said, “That’s right, that’s right,” to everything she said.

“We’d very much like it if you’d come and stay with us for a while.”

“That’s right. That’s right.”

“How does that sound to you?”

It sounded like I was gonna be dropped off somewhere I didn’t have no business being. Hell would b’come a Sno-Kone b’fore I stayed in some house wit’ a man I didn’t know.

“The lady’s talking to you, Regina. Can you speak to her?” Miss Matthews was nudging my leg and talking at the same time.

“Uh, yeah, that sounds fine.”

I followed Miss Matthews out to her county car and took my bag from her. She waved and took off, but not b’fore she told me to be on my best behavior and that the Rowhens was good people. I watched Miss Matthews leave; then I took my bag and went inside the house with Mrs. Rowhen.

“Here’s your room. You can put yourself down in it, and when you finish come on down and talk with me and Mr. Rowhen. And by the way, I heard that you can be a handful; so I wanta let you know that Mr. Rowhen, he’s got a bad heart, and I don’t want no mess.”

“Yeah, I hear.”

The woman left the room and shut the door behind herself. I wasn’t gonna let nobody say whatever they pleased to me and think they could just get away wit’ it ’cause I didn’t have anyone to take up for me. What did she mean by
handful
? I was outta there.

I was used to climbing out windows, but this time I walked straight out the front door. And all along thought to myself that she could kiss me where the sun didn’t shine.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Mrs. Rowhen called out to me as I walked down her front path and hightailed it out the driveway. I could hear the Jheri-Curled Rowhen lady saying out loud, “Well I’ll be goddamned!”

When me and my social worker was driving up to the Rowhens, I watched the roads she took and the exits she used. I also counted the number of stops she made once we got off the highway. I figured I could make my way back to where I wanted to be. I walked the sixteen or so miles back to the shelter.

They wasn’t none too pleased to see me when I got there. “You know there’s an AWOL report that has been filed on you, Regina.”

“So what?” I told my counselor, not caring one bit ’bout what she had to say to me.

“Well, you probably should’ve stayed there, ’cause now you’ve lost all of your privileges for the weekend. Do you realize that, Regina?”

“I don’t see why come it matters where I’m at, as long as I wanna be there,” I told Miss Faustino as she stood in front of me with her eyes raised and her forehead scrunched up.

“Don’t you want to find a nice home to live in?”

“Not really,” I answered her with a lie. I thought it might matter if she was gonna talk with my social worker; that way they would know I didn’t wanna leave the shelter. It didn’t mat-ter—they kept right on working at tryin’ to place me.

The next foster home was a li’l farther outta town. Again, I packed my brown paper bag with a weekend’s worth of changing clothes. Miss Matthews said I’d think twice b’fore running from this home—on account we had to drive for ’bout three hours to get there. It was close to Bakersfield. Again we drove up to the house. This time Miss Matthews asked me to promise her I’d give it at least the weekend. I gave her my word; I’d do my best to do what she asked. I meant it too.

I met Miss Deanna Walton. She lived on her own with ’bout four other foster kids and her own natural daughter. Miss Walton had a li’l white girl that she was looking after, and all the rest was black. I wondered to myself, Why’d someone leave a li’l white girl here? I figured she must’ve been really bad to be put with the rest of us. This time, I let Miss Matthews go b’fore I started counting. I didn’t stop till I got to one thousand—then I left. At least one time on my way back to the shelter, I stopped to think ’bout how I gave Miss Matthews my word, but I told myself too bad for her; nobody told her to believe me in the first place. I decided to do what the white girls did whenever they run away. Even though I’d never seen ’em do what they called “hitching,” I’d heard ’em talking ’bout it. I got on the side of the road I wanted to be traveling on, stuck my thumb out, and waited till somebody pulled over. It wasn’t long till this nice lady stopped, and I got in her car. She dropped me off five blocks from the shelter.

All the foster-home folks seemed to have agreed on the fact that I took way more than any one human being had to give. How anybody could see all that after one visit was news to me. But if that was the way it was, then that was the way it would be. I didn’t give a damn no more. It had been three months since any of my folks had tried to lift a finger and call me to see how I was doing.

My social worker, Miss Matthews, left—she didn’t wanna work with kids no more. She said it was too hard for her and she’d had ’bout all she could take. I couldn’t help but wonder if I had something to do with her leaving. I knowed I’d kinda been bad to her. Once when she tried to take me to another home, I asked her what color the folks was. When she told me black, I told her I wasn’t going, and she said she’d have me locked up in Juvenile Hall for being “in-cur-ridge-abul.” She took me to the folks’ house anyway, and I locked myself in the car with her keys and threatened to drive off and run over anybody who tried to get in my way. Miss Matthews screamed at me that she was going inside to call the police, and I finally surrendered. The foster-home lady told Miss Matthews that she already had her hands full and a child like me wouldn’t be good for her health.

The incident with Miss Matthews made me get so many red marks that I was off the charts for trying to redeem myself. One counselor said, “There isn’t that much redemption in the world,” whatever that meant. And ’cause I had so many incident reports in such a short time they wanted to send me to a doctor for my head, to see if I’d had some kinda breakdown. I didn’t have no mind to know what these crazy folks was talking ’bout. Whoever heard of going to some doctor so your head could act right? And who cared ’bout marks, redemption, and fool stuff like that? As the grown folks would say back home in south Austin, “That ain’t nothing but white folks getting big on theyselves.”

One day I asked Miss Claire why I had to go and see somebody for my head. She told me that sometimes when people had things that was too much for them to handle on they own, it could make them b’come overwhelmed and anxious. She told me that when this kinda stuff happened, it was sometimes a good idea to have somebody to talk with, and that’s what Dr. Barnett was—somebody to talk to. Claire could make me wanna go and talk to a rock the way she put things. I figured if she trusted the doctor lady, then I could too, so I went and met with Dr. Barnett. But she was no different from all the rest of them fool folks I knowed. All she wanted to know was, “What do you feel?” By the millionth time she asked me that stupid question, I almost told her that “I feel” like jumping ’cross that big ole desk of yours and knocking the mess outta you. But I thought a minute b’fore saying that and was dead set against it in no time. I didn’t wanna have to go back to that jail.

I ended up getting a new social worker—her name was Miss Forde. After a couple meetings, Miss Forde told me that they’d made contact with Glenn, and that it might be a good idea to call him and talk with him, and if things went well, that I could maybe go on a home visit with him. I didn’t bother to let her know she was wasting good thinking time on Glenn. Anybody could’ve told her he wasn’t interested in being my daddy. But I called Glenn and tried to talk to him anyway. It was real hard to not say mean things to Glenn. Just hearing his voice made my flesh wanna crawl right off my bones.

“Hello, Regina.”

“Why you leave me like you did?” I couldn’t wait for him to say a word b’fore I came at him again. “I hate your guts and anything that you touch or think ’bout.” Glenn was so sorry that all he did was sit there on the other end of the line, letting me talk any kinda way to him. The whole while I was talking to him, I kept wanting to say, “
Na na-na na-na na,
I can say whatever I want, and you cain’t get me.” The call didn’t last for long. “Glenn, why come it seem like you never liked me too much?” I wasn’t scared of him. I just wanted to know why he acted like he did. Why couldn’t he be different and fight for me like Robin Hood fought to feed the folks in the Sherwood Forest— a story I’d just learned at my new school.

“Regina, it’s not that I don’t like you. That is incorrect thinking. It’s that I don’t love you. I’ve never loved you—I simply don’t know how.”