Somebody's Someone (39 page)

“I was scared, that’s why.”

“If you are so scared, how did you sleep by yourself at your white-lady friend’s house?”

“I didn’t sleep by myself; I slept with her.” Once word got back to the director, Mrs. Richards, I was sent back to the shelter real quick-like.

That wasn’t all that was going on in the air at that time. There was some strange something called Proposition Thirteen that was passing, and that sent all the grown folks into a tailspin. I kept hearing folks left and right talking ’bout they didn’t know if they was gonna have a job from one minute to the next. They was asking why it always seemed that when cuts was gonna be made in the president’s house, old people, children, and the what all that talk meant. She told me somethin’ ’bout some man named Howard Jarvis and how he wanted to help pass some bill that would take money from the poor and the people who was tryin’ to help ’em, and give it to the people who made ’em poor in the first place.

Right ’bout then, Miss Forde, my social worker, told me that she had ’bout had it up to here with me and my incident reports from all the failed placements, and that if I didn’t get it right, they was gonna change me from a 601 to a 602, meaning I would be seen as a child criminal. She said that with all the cutbacks, nice folks didn’t have time for my shenanigans and notions of being put into a white foster home. And I had betta’ straighten up and fly right! Under my breath I said, “Yeah right, Miss Forde.” It was a new expression I’d learned at the last placement.

My dream of having Claire take me as her own had never been talked ’bout. I didn’t bring it up b’cause I wanted my social worker to figure it out for herself—that way it wouldn’t be like I was tryin’ to be with somebody white. And it could be her own idea, not mine.

I could see that Miss Forde was mad at me b’cause I didn’t like the last foster home she’d tried to get me to go to after I came back from the group home that lasted only one month. But I swear b’fore God that I wanted to like them folks. They seemed nice ’nough and all, but they just didn’t talk to me like Claire and her mama did.

After Miss Forde had dropped me off at the folks’ house, she ran to her car and drove out the people’s yard like she had just r’membered she had left something cooking on her stove. She didn’t even look back once. I had a high mind to think she was tryin’ to pawn me off on these people.

That weekend, with the new family, I got the bloods. The foster-family people had planned to take me campin’ in they big motor home. They plans was cut real short. Not only did I soil the woman’s white sheets to look like somebody had been killed on ’em, I got the cramps so bad I couldn’t stretch my legs out, so I had to stay bent over in a ball the whole weekend and cried. Since the smell of food cooking made me throw up, my condition got to be too much for the foster-family lady, since they loved food and had to cook it in the same room I was layin’ in. After I throwed up for what seemed like hours, the lady thought that I might be with a baby, since she ain’t never heard of no fourteen-year-old girl carrying on as much as I did with my menstr’ation.

“Do you think you might be pregnant?” she asked me.

“Hell nah!” I told her and rolled to face the wall so I didn’t have to look at her face. That was it! They turned the big motor home round and headed back to wherever they was from. The first thing the foster lady did, after parking her tacky trailer on wheels, was go call Miss Forde and tell her to come and get me quick. I heard her. She was tryin’ to make it sound like I was more than she bargained for.

“Oh, Miss Forde, now you know we’ve always been willing to take on the kids and help ’em out, but this one, honey, she’s a piece of work.”

Miss Forde was there first thing on Monday morning. She told me that the foster-home lady said that I was rude and sassy, and that they had no room for my kinda young ladies. “Regina, I don’t know what is going on with you and these foster-home placement failures, but I think I might have an idea. I have a feeling that you think by being shocking with your behavior, that nobody will want you, and you’ll be able to stay at the shelter.” She didn’t even try and believe that my period was real bad! She just went on with another one of her own stories ’bout me.

“Now I can see that you’ve gone and run a number on all these other people, getting them to think that you are something special, but I’m here to let you know, it won’t work with me! You aren’t special. And since you have folks believing that you aren’t foster-home material, we are considering putting you into a residential treatment facility. Because of the cutbacks, the shelter is on its last leg, and if you keep this mess up you will be heading for Juvenile Hall. You want to act crazy—I’ll show you right where you can go!” She told me the place she had in mind was a center for kids who needed a whole lot of structure. I was to be visiting the Guideways Residential Treatment Center in two weeks.

Oh my Lord. This just couldn’t be. Why was they gonna do that to me right when I’d found somebody that I really wanted to be with? Couldn’t they just see that Claire wanted me? Why come nobody was askin’ her to take me in? I wish I knowed how to ask ’em myself, but I didn’t want nobody to think I wanted to be with her real bad, ’cause then they might not give her to me. I let my mind sit on the time I’d asked Miss Claire if she’d ever wanted to have kids of her own, and she’d said “ab-solute-ly”; and somehow I made that mean she was hoping it could be me.

Finally, I got the nerve and asked Miss Forde if Miss Claire could ever take me home with her for good, and she cut her eyes at me like I had just stole her soul.

“That’s the problem with you now, Regina; you don’t know who you are. You need to be with your own kind. As far as I and the Department of Social Services are concerned, black kids need to be in black homes. Anyway, a law is in the works to be passed so that they will never be able to adopt our black children.”

Who was “they,” I wanted to know. And what did that have to do with what I asked her? Right then and there I saw that she was a damned fool. Anybody who was paying attention could see that my own kind sure as hell didn’t want me. Why was she so stupid? I couldn’t see why folks was wanting me to go back to nothing. How come everybody else like Oliver and Annie got to go to folks who really wanted them? Why did it seem like only the white ones got to get kissed by the prince and live happily and stupid ever after? Was that really the way God meant for it to be? Why was there always more black kids than white ones left in the shelter? Why? Deep down, I hated the color black.

I made plans to be spending the weekend with Marlena. Her mama and daddy was going away, but nobody bothered to tell my social worker or the counselors anything ’bout it. We knowed that if anybody found out, I wouldn’t be able to go on a home visit.

Mr. and Mrs. Ballentino left me, Marlena, and her li’l sister Greta in the charge of Stella, Marlena’s oldest sister. She was somewhere in her twenties, so she could boss us with no trouble. B’fore they left, Mrs. Ballentino told us not to have any boys hanging round the house and then told Stella to keep a close eye on Marlena. We all knowed she was saying that ’cause Marlena was the one who was so boy crazy. “Okay,” we all said together. What her mama and daddy should’ve knowed but didn’t was that Stella had a boy of her own down the road, and she had plans that did not include us three girls.

“What are we going to do?” Marlena asked with a open mouth once the coast was clear.

“Nothing!” her sister Stella told her. “You guys are just going to hang out and do like Mom and Dad said and keep away from boys!” We all three stood and looked at Stella like she was a policeman, giving us orders. “Look, I’m going down a few doors to my friend’s house, and you guys had better just hang out and be cool.” We agreed and promised Stella that we’d sit round and listen to music or something, all of us suspecting what she was up to anyway. “All right,” she said as she cut out, “I’ll be down the block if you need anything.” Now Stella was gone too. And we had that big ole house to ourselves.

“Come on, Regina; let’s go and get Will and Michael. Won’t nobody know if we bring them over. Plus, once my sister gets with her friends, she won’t even remember who we are.”

“Won’t your mama get mad at you?” I asked Marlena. “What if we get caught?”

“Girl, you are such a fraidycat. Don’t worry; I’ll never get caught. I already had Michael in my room once while my parents were home. They didn’t even know.”

I couldn’t believe that girl. As the grown folks would say, she was way too fast for her own good. But I liked Marlena a lot. She treated me just like I was her sister, maybe even better. I figured I owed her for comin’ to get me so many times and forcing her daddy to come all the way out to Martinez to pick me up. He never asked for nothing. Not money or even a thank-you. I used to hear Big Mama complain ’bout how my mama never did nothing to help her out with us, and maybe if Ruby had sent a li’l money or something every now and again, she could have treated us better. Marlena and her family treated me nice, for no reason a’tall, so I wanted to be nice back. And since I didn’t have no money, doing what she wanted seemed just as good.

“Okay, then, let’s go and find ’em.” We told Greta not to say nothing, and she crossed her heart as a promise.

We found Michael first, and he found Will. I don’t know where it all came from, but the next thing I knowed, we was all at Marlena’s house drinking Chateau LaSalle and smoking Kool Longs and huddled up all together like a sports team. I hadn’t smoked for a while, but the alcohol made me wanna have a cigarette, so I did.

Oh, was we partying. I was no stranger to drinking. I had learned that at Ruby’s. Many a night I had sat up with her and her friend-girls under the carport, playin’ spades and rummy, drinking all kinda stuff. One time I even poured myself a glass of Lancer’s and waited while my head wobbled and I fell off to sleep.

I watched as Will made his way over to the couch that I was sittin’ on. He asked Greta to move so that he could sit by me. Greta caught my eye and rolled hers as she moved over. Will sat down and took the empty glass outta my hand. “Look like you feeling pretty good there.” I let him know that I could hold my liquor, and that, yes, I did feel pretty good. Somebody put a record on, and David Gates and Bread was singin’ soft love songs. By now I was standin’ up and singin’ “If” right along with David Gates. Everybody was singin’ now. All us girls, that is.

Marlena sidled up to me and whispered in my ear, “You know you gonna give him some!”

“What?” I asked her. “Give him some of what?”

“You know what, and you might as well go on and do it. Me and Michael love doing it.”

“Yeah?” I asked with suspicion.

“Yeah. Girl, it’s really nothing to be all tied in a knot about. All you do is let him play with you a little bit, get you all hot, and you won’t even know when it happens.”

I didn’t know how to tell my friend that I was scared. I’d never gone all the way before. And I sure couldn’t let myself end up wit’ no baby. Not now, not never. Even though I’d read books and learned from listening to the girls I lived with ’bout all the different ways they let a boy have ’em, I still wasn’t sure how to not end up pregnant.

Hell, I didn’t know what I was feeling no more. Seemed like I was never gonna really have what I wanted, and there was plenty of what I didn’t want just for the asking. I wondered how come life was like that. Why was it that just ’cause I really wanted something—like to live with Miss Claire—it couldn’t happen? But if I told that ole nasty social worker of mine that I couldn’t wait to fall into the arms of a wonderful black family— she’d move faster than Superman. And not only that, but it was clear to me that Miss Forde was gonna have her way—and that I might not ever see my friends again, or even Miss Claire. So what did it really matter what I did? Nobody was gonna give a hoot anyway.

Fine, I told myself as my insides started doin’ double flips; he could have whatever he wanted. I wondered what harm could it really do, and if I didn’t like it, or didn’t wanna see Will afterwards, I’d be gone anyway. But more than that, I liked Will. He told me he had waited a whole month to see me and that he couldn’t stop thinking ’bout me. I’d thought ’bout him too. Ain’t nobody ever waited for me like this before. And from the way things was looking, wasn’t nobody gonna be waiting anytime soon.

His lips was on mine. They was big and swallowed up half my face. We found each other’s tongues and sucked like if they was tryin’ to get away from us. My eyes closed, my heart pumpin’, I wrapped my arms round his neck, and he lifted me up in his arms like I was his baby.

“You guys can use my room.” Marlena’s big mouth made me come up for air.

“Do you wanna go?” I asked Will, not believin’ I was asking him that question. I didn’t care no more ’bout what was gonna be. I was tired of doing what everybody else wanted me to do, and getting nothing for it. What difference did it make anyway?

“Yeah, let’s go.” Will carried me into Marlena’s room.

He laid me down and then fell on top of me. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“Yeah. You?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

I closed my eyes and felt Will’s hand touch my skin. I jumped and got all tingled like if I was cold or something. Then, without my wanting it to, all my mind could see was the hazy figure of a man with me in a car, and I asked Will to stop, figuring I might be doing something wrong. I was also wonderin’ if God could see me, and if so, what he was thinking ’bout me. But Will never stopped. He put his mouth back on mine, and I was quiet. It was like I forgot he was there at all until I could feel the wetness sliding out my eyes, down my face. My voice was nowhere to be found. It had left me here in this place with no words to say how I was.

The next thing I knowed, I was hitting, pushin’, and telling him to get offa me. I didn’t even remember who it was that was on top of me. There wasn’t a face, just a body—a big heavy body. My mind flashed back to how I’d seen and smelled that smell my mama had in that room when Mr. Benny was taking her prettiness away. Is that what was happenin’ to me? Did what I was doing with Will make me a ho’? Right then, I knowed what shame smelled like.