White Lines (3 page)

“Oh, you wanna challenge me? Bitch!” J.D. shouted, and he slapped Ava so hard that she staggered back.

Ava looked stunned at first. Then her expression went feral, and she launched herself at J.D., arms swinging and legs kicking.

“Stop!
” Edna and Jada yelled and screamed, as J.D. and Ava fought. Jada pulled at J.D. But rather than let up, J.D. fought both girls full on, while Edna stood cowering on the sidelines, continuing to beg and plead for them to stop.

J.D. was bigger, but he was also drunk. And it didn’t take long before Jada and Ava had him on the floor, scratching, biting, and punching him. Ava grabbed the broom leaning against the wall and proceeded to knock J.D. all upside his head with it. Finally, Edna rushed forward and pulled the girls off of him.

“Stop it!” she screamed. “Stop it right now!”

Jada backed away and stared at her mother in outrage, while Ava continued to whale on J.D. J.D. could beat their asses from one end of the apartment to the other. But the minute they started to stomp J.D. into the ground their mother came leaping to the rescue.

Jada reached down and grabbed Ava, who was practically snarling like a demon. J.D. lay across the living room floor, almost passed out from the booze and the beating. With Edna crouched over him, Jada had to hold Ava back to keep her from pouncing on him again. Ava turned her fury on her mother.

“He gotta go, Ma!” Ava yelled. “Put his punk ass out!”

Jada looked at her sister in disbelief. Ava never cursed in front of their mother.

Edna shook her head. “Ava! Stop it. Just calm down for a second—”

“Calm down for what, Ma?” Jada asked, still panting. “You saw him hit us. So what are you gonna do about it? Every time he hits us, you sit there and act like you can’t do nothing.”

Ava glared at her mother. “I’m not staying in this house if he’s living here! I can’t live like this, Ma!” Ava started to cry.
“He’s gotta go.
I’m tired of coming home to fights every day. I’m sick of this nigga putting his hands on us, and there’s nothing we can do about it. He has to get outta here tonight.”

Edna looked into her daughters’ eyes, and they stood there, staring at
her angrily. Edna wondered why they were putting her back against the wall. She felt that they were forcing her to decide between them and the man who took care of her. Edna was truly torn.

J.D. had gotten off the floor by now, and he stood against the wall getting his bearings. Then, turning to glare at Ava, he said, “You can go. Go ‘head. ‘Cuz I ain’t going nowhere.”

Edna had never felt so torn. She knew she had an obligation to her daughters. But she was so tired of being lonely, so scared of being single. And while J.D. was far from perfect, in her eyes he was better than nothing. So many nights she had longed for the company of a man. She had needed to be held, needed someone’s touch. J.D. had provided these things in the beginning. And even now, when they had good times, they were really good times. The downside was that the bad times were horrible. And this was one of those times.

“Girls, go to your room until I tell you to come out,” Edna stood up and said, calmly. Jada began to protest, but Edna raised her hand in warning, and yelled,
“Now,
Jada!”

Both girls stormed off to the sanctuary of their bedroom. When they got there, Jada plopped down on her bed and began cracking her knuckles, while Ava walked to the bedroom window and stared outside. Jada finally broke the silence.

“I hate him,” she said. “I don’t know why she don’t throw his ass out! Just get rid of him. He’s a fuckin’ bully. All he does is fight women. But you never see him out in the street fighting no men. He’s a punk. What the hell does she see in him?” It wasn’t long before Jada realized that she was talking to herself. Ava’s mind was somewhere else as she stared out their bedroom window. Jada knew how it felt to be mad to the point of speechlessness, so she allowed her sister several minutes to herself. But finally the silence became too much to bear.

“What’s the matter, Ava?” Jada sat on the overturned milk crate that doubled as their chair.

Ava was still crying, but softly now. She turned to her sister. “I can’t take it anymore, Jada. Every fucking day he starts a fight.” Ava spoke each word slowly, deliberately pronouncing each syllable. “Either he’s
beating her ass or he’s beating ours. And she won’t make him leave.” Ava looked completely fed up, and Jada wondered if this evening’s battle had finally pushed her sister over the edge. Jada felt that Ava had never been as strong as she, that Ava couldn’t take as much stress and drama as Jada could. True, Jada was also fed up with the bullshit, but not as fed up as Ava appeared to be now.

“What are you gonna do? Run away again, Ava? What’s that gonna prove? You already tried that, and Mommy let him stay right here. It won’t fix nothing.” Ava was a professional runaway. She took flight whenever the going got too tough, and her disappearances had always ended when she came home to Edna’s empty promises that J.D. would change, and that things would be different. But they never were.

Ava stared blankly out the window. “Well, I can’t live like this no more. It’s one thing for him to beat on
her.
If she’s dumb enough to let him hit her, what the hell! But me and you haven’t done shit to deserve what he does to us.” Ava closed her eyes and shook her head. “And lately he keeps making comments about my body, talking about how big my ass is, and telling me that Mommy don’t have to know if I let him fuck me.” Ava’s voice was almost a whisper, yet the force of her words was like thunder in Jada’s ears. “He waits until I’m by myself, and he corners me. And I want to tell her. But I know she’s gonna take his side, Jada.”

Jada’s blood was boiling. “How long he been doin’ that to you? Why didn’t you tell me?”

Ava shook her head. “He’s crazy, that’s why. That nigga will kill you if you confront him. And Mommy would probably even forgive him for doing that!”

“Fuck him, Ava! He ain’t nobody. You can’t be scared of him. You want me to say something to him?”

Ava shook her head, looking downcast. “I gotta tell Mommy. I gotta tell her so she can kick him out.”

Jada walked over and hugged her little sister. She shook her head in dismay. Ava was only fourteen years old. It didn’t matter how well developed she was. She was still only fourteen years old, and that sick son of a bitch was violating her. It was only verbal right now, but Jada knew it
was only a matter of time before J.D. touched Ava. And Jada knew that if he ever did that to her sister, she would not hesitate to kill him. Jada consoled Ava, and they talked about what had been taking place. How J.D. had made her too scared to say anything, telling Ava that her mother would never believe her over him. Jada and Ava cried together, frustrated by what was being done to Ava by a man more than three times her age. They talked until J.D.’s snoring could be heard coming from their mother’s bedroom across the hall. By then it was 11:30
P.M.
, and Ava—still teary and upset—decided it was time to go and try to talk to their mother. Jada wanted to come, too. Wanted to provide some support for her little sister, but Ava insisted on going alone. She insisted on talking to their mother one-on-one. So Jada watched her sister leave the room, and listened as Ava summoned their mother and the two of them walked down the hall toward the living room.

Jada sat alone in her room, furious about what her sister had told her. She was disgusted, and so confused. She could hear her mother’s and sister’s voices as they rose and fell when their conversation got heated. Jada couldn’t make out exactly what was being said, but she could tell things had gotten out of hand. J.D. was still snoring loudly, passed out from all the liquor, as Jada climbed out of bed and walked toward the sound of her sister’s anguished voice.

“Why can’t you believe me? I’m telling you, he does it all the time. Why do you think he always insists that I stay home when you go places—when you go to the supermarket and stuff?”

“J.D. ain’t like that, Ava. You can’t tell me that he would say those things to you. No way. I know you want me to put him out—”

“Why can’t you believe your own damn daughter?”

“Watch your mouth!”

“He told me you wouldn’t believe me. I kept my mouth shut for so long because I didn’t want to hurt you. But you don’t even care that he’s hurting your kids!”

“No.” Edna shook her head. “You’re wrong. You misunderstood.”

“No, I didn’t! He told me he thinks about me when he’s having sex with you and—”

“Ava, go to bed. I can’t do this right now!”

“He told me that he wants to feel my pretty lips on his dick.” Ava was in tears. “He’s always talking about my body, and telling me that you never have to know.” Suddenly, Ava’s tears of anguish turned to tears of rage, and she began to breathe heavily. “How come you don’t believe me? I’m telling you the truth!”

“He couldn’t be thinking of you that way, Ava! You’re only fourteen.”

“He is! And he’s making me nervous around him.”

“Ava, you would have said something then, if he was doing that to you. Why didn’t you tell me when he said it? Why wait till now? J.D. is not that kind of man. No way. Maybe you
want
him to look at you like that. You just want him for yourself.”

Ava stood up and walked closer to her mother, towering over her. “What the fuck would I want with a nigga that beats my ass every day?”

Edna hauled off and slapped Ava so hard that she saw stars, momentarily. “You watch your mouth in this house, you hear me?” Suddenly, Edna was the angry one.

Ava couldn’t believe that her mother had slapped her. She stood holding her face, the pain throbbing in her cheek. But that pain was nothing compared to the pain of knowing that her mother wasn’t on her side. She never fought J.D. Not even when he was beating Jada’s ass, or when Ava was being emotionally and verbally molested. But here Edna was slapping her so hard that her face stung something terrible. How could she fight her and never fight the monster sleeping in the bedroom? Ava felt so close to the edge. One last time, she told her mother the truth. “I swear to God, Ma.” Ava was crying no more tears. Now she was firm, her eyes locked on her mother’s. “I swear. I’m not lying.” Ava shook her head. “And he said you wouldn’t believe me. He said you would take his side.”

Edna stood in silence, staring blankly at her baby daughter.

“Ma!” Jada made her presence known as she entered the kitchen. “What is wrong with you? Why can’t you listen to her?”

“Go back to your room, Jada. This is none of your business.” Now Edna was crying, her ears ringing with the allegations against the man
she loved, the man she had invited into her home, and into her heart. Her tears turned into gut-wrenching sobs, and Edna cried her eyes out. For a few minutes both girls thought their mother might hyperventilate. They watched Edna’s breath come in audible gasps as she clung to the wall for support. She was coming undone.

Ava glared at her mother, her anger increasing with each second that passed. Jada stood motionless as Ava suddenly lunged toward her mother, grabbed her by the throat, and made every attempt to squeeze the life out of her. Jada rushed over and tried desperately to loosen her sister’s grip on their mother’s neck. “Let her go, Ava. Let her go!” Jada spoke through clenched teeth.

“I’m telling you the truth!” Ava yelled so loudly that Jada expected J.D. to wake up. “I’m telling you!”

Edna’s fingers clawed at Ava’s as she tried to pry them free from her neck. She gasped for air.

“Let her go, Ava! Let her go! Come on!”

Finally Ava came to her senses and released her mother. Edna sat holding her neck and breathing heavily. Jada walked over to her sister, put her arms around her, and tried to calm her down. But Ava shrugged Jada off her. She didn’t want to be touched. She turned and stormed toward the kitchen. Jada followed her, but Ava ran into the bathroom and slammed the door behind her. Stomping back into the living room, Jada pounced on her mother. Edna was sitting in the corner, holding her neck and crying.

“How could you do that to her?”

“Jada, enough!” Edna was crying so hard, and still trying to catch her breath. “You and your sister made this shit up. You know J.D. wouldn’t do nothing like that to her. Has he ever said anything like that to you?” Edna was standing now.

“No,” Jada admitted. “That’s ‘cause he knows I would kill him if he tried that with me.”

“Jada, I’m going to bed. And your sister is gonna go and get some help! You both need help!” Edna stood, trembling, almost eye-to-eye
with her young daughter as she prepared to leave. Jada’s gaze was penetrating. She shook her head, amazed.

“You know she’s telling the truth. You just don’t want to admit it to yourself.”

“Jada, shut your mouth!”

“She’s never gonna forgive you.” Jada said it bitterly.

Edna walked down the hall, still teary, and into her bedroom, closing the door behind her. Jada stood dumbfounded in the kitchen by herself for several minutes. She couldn’t believe what had just happened. Soon she walked down the short hallway and knocked on the bathroom door. She could hear Ava’s muffled sobs through the door, but Ava refused to unlock it.

“I love you, Ava. I believe you. We’re gonna take care of it, okay?”

No answer.

“Ava, come to bed.” Jada could still hear her sister’s soft sobs. “Stop playing, and come out.”

“I’m not coming out, Jada. Go to bed.” Ava’s voice was faint.

Jada sat there for another fifteen minutes, trying to persuade her sister to come out, but to no avail. Ava wouldn’t budge. Eventually, Jada made her way back to bed, where she sat waiting for her sister. J.D.’s snoring was still audible across the hall as Jada’s eyes closed involuntarily, and she drifted off to sleep.

Early the next morning—so early the hood was quiet—Jada woke to the bloodcurdling scream of a distraught mother. Jada realized that her sister was nowhere in sight as she sat up in bed and looked around her room for Ava. Rushing from the room, she ran past J.D., who stood in the hallway with his head in his hands. She ran toward her mother’s anguished cries and found Edna in the bathroom on the floor, cradling Ava’s limp body. Both her wrists were slit, and a steak knife lay nearby. Ava was bleeding to death at the age of fourteen. And Jada slipped further down the slippery slope of her sanity.