The Color of Family (30 page)

But Susan countered with, “What I'm saying to you, boys, is that there are two sides to everything, and you can't fault people for being scared. A lot of bad things happen in this world because people are scared, and all I'm saying is that some of the white
people in the South in those days were scared and so they did those bad things out of fear of black people. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that's why those things happened.”

“Why were they scared of them?”

And before he would give Susan the opportunity to give some indulgent answer that wouldn't come anywhere close to the heart of the question, Clayton answered with swiftness, “Because they had been conditioned by their fathers, who had been conditioned by their fathers who had been conditioned by their fathers to consider black people less than human because they didn't have white skin. And so all the bloodshed and hangings in the South can be blamed on white ignorance.” And he had no idea why he blamed the brainwashing on fathers, except that as he spoke, Susan's father was coming clearer into his mind, as if the evil thoughts had summoned the man's image.

Noah and Luke hung their heads pensively, as if to observe a moment of silence for passed-on souls. Then Luke said, “In a way, it makes me feel ashamed to be white. I mean, if George Washington who was the father of our country made black people be slaves, then how come he's so special?”

“No!” Susan snapped furiously. “I don't want you to ever say that. Now, what happened, happened. It was an unfortunate part of history, but the important thing is that it's over. Why, there're black people in this country who have way more money than we do. They can be educated at whatever college they want, eat at the finest restaurants, and they can even drive the bus now—forget sitting in the back of it. I want you to feel just as proud to be white as black people have a right to feel proud to be black. And as far as George Washington is concerned, well, you should still consider him special because he fought for this country's independence from British Colonial rule. You boys know that. Sometimes people who do good things also do bad things, and it's important that the bad things they do don't cancel out the good things they do.”

Clayton gave his wife a sideways glare, knowing that the only reasonable thing for him to say in answer to what she'd just told their children was that she needed to acknowledge how easy it was to feel pride at being white. The white that had never had to
fight to be equal in any way. White owned the world. Where was the humility in that? But what he said was, “All right boys, it's getting late now. So is homework all done?”

“Yes, Daddy,” Noah said. “What we were doing here was trying to decide what we were going to write our reports about the Civil Rights movement on, and I think I'm going to do mine on how the presidents should have stopped the mistreatment of blacks before it got to the point where blacks couldn't take it anymore and had to riot and march to be treated equal to whites.”

“And I'm going to do mine on black people who lived through the Civil Rights movement and grew up to do special things,” Luke said.

“I think those are both really good ideas,” Susan said, almost distractedly. “Now, why don't you two go on and take your showers and get ready for bed. We'll be in when you're done to say good night.”

The boys gathered up their books and papers that had been strewn over the bed. One by one they kissed and hugged their mother, then kissed and hugged their father and left. And it was clear by the stagnant energy still in the room that once the door was closed, things had to be said.

So as if to give the boys some time to be out of earshot from the other side of the closed door, Susan waited before she said, “Clay, what on earth is the matter with you?”

“Me? There's nothing wrong with me, Susan. I'm just trying to teach the boys something about history that's not all that distant.”

“You're teaching them that white people are evildoers. You heard what Luke said. It makes him ashamed to be white.”

“No, Susan,” Clayton said getting to his feet with angry passion. “What I'm teaching those boys is about man's inhumanity to man. It's an intangible notion on many levels for them, but there is no greater lesson on the matter than what I told them. And there are people alive now, parents and grandparents of kids in their class, who can tell them firsthand what it was like.”

“Well, as it is, you already told them too much.”

“I told them enough to keep their thinking right.”

Susan got up and went to the window. She looked out at what was going on way down on Light Street and the few people milling around over at the harbor, then turned to Clayton and
heatedly said, “Clay, I don't want them going through life feeling as if they have to answer for the sins of—”

“Your father?” Clayton said, without letting her finish, and peering at her from a place within that had hardened him with an unexpected suddenness.

Susan glared back at him, set her jaw firmly as if to hold back some out-of-control response waiting to break free, then said, “I was going to say white people. But you brought up my father, so I guess there's something you need to say.”

“I don't need to say anything, Susan. You know who your father is and what he's done. What I'm saying is that I don't want some hell-bent horde coming along with the same views as your father and leading them to an inhuman place where they see black skin as something less than their white skin.”

“My father's inhuman to you?” she said as if it just might be a direct disparagement of her.

“His views are certainly inhuman, and I don't think you can disagree with me on that.” Clayton went to the door and put his hand on the knob. But before he turned it, he said, “You know, when this country was in the midst of slavery, Thomas Jefferson wrote something like this to John Quincy Adams:
If there is a God, we will have to answer for this
. He knew then what everybody knows now. Except maybe your father as he sits in prison in answer to his sins from those days.” And he turned the handle and went through the door.

T
his time, it was Clayton lying in wait for Antonia. He had watched and waited for her every now and then since their chance meeting. And the part of his unconscious mind that did not want to see her again is what compelled him to seek her out. It was like an unrelenting tap on his shoulders, first one, then the other, where no matter how hard or fast he turned to either side, he couldn't find the finger tapping him, and something in him said it was Antonia—there was nothing chance about this woman's presence, he believed. And so if he were to see Antonia now with her deceptive lunch tray, he knew he would still have no choice but to acknowledge a more substantial connection between his mother and Antonia than his mother had claimed. An association that would place him directly at the center, and this is what his extra sense—the one that had grown suddenly in him for no reason other than the appearance in his life of a mysterious woman who may or may not have just been passing through for lunch—made him believe.

So he ate his salmon roll and looked one way, then another. Then, just when he was about to get the first twinge of impatient jitters for her arrival—in spite of New Orleans never keeping her children apart for too long—he looked up from where he sat just as she turned the corner carrying a tray of something, he couldn't see what, and couldn't have cared even less. It was her. She knew he'd be there and she'd come to see him. And at first, he could have believed that she did not see him, expected anyone but him
to be there, as she looked everywhere around her but at him, who was the most obvious person in her sight, since he was the only one there. There was an inexplicable twinge of hurt when he felt that her darting eyes, that would not dart on him, were trying to avoid him altogether. But when the passing of time within vacant space seemed to give her no choice but to acknowledge him, it was her face that gave his restlessness pause, as it was at first tightened with what looked to him to be dreaded expectation before she finally offered him a softened smile full with teeth as she headed straight for him.

“Miss Antonia,” he said, standing and tipping his head with a southern man's charm and courtliness. “This is a surprise, running into you again down here.”

“Yes, it is a surprise,” she said through a wide grin.

“Please join me.”

“Why, thank you,” she said, as she smoothed her furry coat beneath her and sat. She unhooked the top of her jacket and said, “I must say, I'm surprised and flattered that you remembered me.”

“Well, it's not exactly easy to forget you, being that you're from New Orleans, and all,” he said with a soft grin.

“Yes, well of course. But you must meet people from down there all the time with the way you travel. Do you remember them all?”

Once he'd swallowed his bite of salmon roll, he smiled at Antonia and said, “Only the memorable ones.” Then a silence fell between them; they weren't exactly seated smack in the middle of an itchy awkwardness, but it was certainly a fearsome quiet that left Clayton, and seemingly Antonia, without the nerve to follow the thought to its conclusion. But Clayton knew it had to be resolved, so he continued, “So, I guess now you know that you're memorable.”

“I guess I do know that,” Antonia said with a bashful laugh that seemed to hint at her southern girlhood. “What I don't know is what makes me so memorable to you.”

Clayton put down his chopsticks and moved himself slightly away from the table. “Miss Antonia, what makes you memorable to me is that I found out that you know my mother. At least I really believe you know my mother. You had lunch with her. My
boys remembered your name—Antonia. There can't be too many Antonias from New Orleans runnin' round here in Baltimore.”

Antonia's eyes rounded with surprise as she took him in. “I do know your mother. At least I did know her in New Orleans.”

“Why didn't you tell me you knew her when we met the last time?” Clayton asked simply.

She looked, first curiously at him, then honestly when she answered, “Because I had no real reason to tell you. We ran into one another by chance, something that didn't have anything to do with her. If I had mentioned that I knew your mother—I don't know, maybe you would have thought that I was angling to get some free tickets to your concert or something. Maybe you would have thought that I had ulterior motives.”

“But don't we all, Miss Antonia, have ulterior motives at one time or another?”

“I'm sorry, I don't understand,” Antonia said as she studied him with eyes that seemed to question his intent. “There was nothing underhanded about the way we met here the last time.”

“No, I didn't say underhanded, Miss Antonia. And please don't be insulted. What I'm saying is that of all the places, empty places, vacant tables, you could have sat at that day, you sat right over there next to my table. You don't think that speaks of an ulterior motive of you wanting to introduce yourself to me? Get to know me?”

And with an impulsive passion that seemed laced with bashfulness and the disappointment of being caught that showed itself in her lowered eyes, Antonia said, “Well, it just didn't seem possible that there you were, right in front of me having lunch.”

“And I'm sorry, Miss Antonia,” he said swiftly. “I made an assumption, that didn't necessarily have to do with anything at all but a coincidence, but the theory remains the same, whether it's real or not.”

Antonia put her eyes in her lap and smiled thinly, then looked up at him and said, “I love your music and have always been proud of you being from New Orleans and all, but that's it. I'm not trying to weasel my way into your life, or anything like that.” And then she seemed to close down, fold into herself and away from him, moving with haste toward the finish of her lunch.

Clayton lowered his head like a scolded little boy and said,
“I'm sorry, Miss Antonia. I know it sounded as if I'm accusing you of something, and I'm really not. It's just that the coincidence was way too striking. In my world where I can anticipate every chord progression, every key change measures away, sudden happenstance from out of the blue fascinates me.”

“So, do you know that I wrote to her about a long-ago matter that she and I needed to settle?”

“Well, I saw a couple of envelopes addressed to her from you, but I don't know what was in them. I really didn't think that much about them, till now,” he said as he absentmindedly moved his food around with his chopsticks. “So is that why my wife said you two were in the middle of some sort of heated argument when she and my boys walked in? Is that when you two were trying to settle this thing?”

“Yes, exactly,” and Antonia laughed, seeming to put as little care into it as she could manage to fake. “I'm going to tell you something, Clayton. No matter how old you get, you can still find yourself going all the way back to your teenage years to settle things that don't matter to anybody anymore because your feelings were hurt and you can't forget.”

“My mother hurt your feelings when you two were kids?”

Antonia looked at Clayton, then swiftly away from him, with something in her every movement resembling unyielding guilt. “Well, yes, but it was so long ago, and there's no way I'm going to talk about it with you. She and I talked about it, though, and that's all I wanted to do. Talk about it with her.”

Clayton chewed and swallowed his last piece of salmon roll, then smiled at her with a grin that wore all his charm and said, “So, Miss Antonia, you're definitely not going to tell me what it is that was between you and my mother. What it is she did to hurt your feelings?”

Antonia fastened the top hook on her furry before she stood. She picked up her tray, looked down at Clayton, and simply said, “That, you would have to ask your mother. But she may not discuss it either, and she may not want to remember it all.” Then she touched two fingers softly to Clayton's cheek and smiled as if he were her own. “It was wonderful seeing you. You take care of yourself and keep playing that piano with the fingers of angels that were given to you when you were born.”

As he watched her turn and walk from him, the memory of himself as a sleeping or maybe awakened little boy pulled him up by his lapels and took him to her before she could get too far, and away perhaps forever. He took two steps, touched her arm firmly until she turned around, then asked, “Miss Antonia, did you know someone down in New Orleans named Emeril?”

There was nothing in the straight line of her mouth, or the controlled stare she gave him, or even the stillness of her arm he held that could have told him, or anyone, anything. Yet her eyes, whose passion, as they drank him down in a guttural slurp he believed he could hear if he stayed still enough, shifted something sharply within him. And it made him want to crawl into and stay in those eyes that, for the first time, he knew possessed him now and would most likely do so forever. And so to Clayton, through all of what seemed in every way to be her holding on to some semblance of tranquility, she said plainly, “I had a brother named Emeril. But just like there're a lot of Antonias, there're a lot of Emerils too.”

And that was all she said as he watched her walk away, leaving him as unsure as he had been sure that Antonia, with a brother named Emeril, had simply not made some cursory visit into his life for the sake of chatting with a concert pianist.

So he went back to the table and slid into the comfort of the quirkiness of it all as easily as he slid into his seat. If he believed at all in his mother, he had to believe in the happenstance of this most uncommon situation of same names and places. And if this were indeed the coincidental, he could let it do nothing but continue to twist and freefall into his life until it fell directly into his lap with everything configured neatly and explained thoroughly for him. That's what flukes do, and for that he would wait. And even though he knew the origin would be no different by fluke or force, by waiting for chance—if it would ever come—he could still love his mother with fullness.