BOMAW 1-3 (28 page)

“Hello?”

“Hi, mama, it’s me. What’ya doin’?”

“On my way out, why? What you doin’?”

“Getting ready to exit the expressway, on my way there.”

“What? How come you didn’t call first?”

“Mama! I didn’t know I had to phone ahead to visit my own mother.”

“I don’t see why not, it ain’t like I’m just sittin’ around here with nothing to do.”

“Well, can you at least wait until I get there before you leave?”

“Excuse me? I don’t think so! I’ll leave the keys downstairs with Eartha. I’ll see you when I get home.”

“Oh, wow, thanks, mama. I travel four hours down here to see you, and you can’t even wait for me to get there before you leave?”

“After travelin’ four hours, you ain’t goin’ nowhere. I bet you’ll be here when I get back. You better be here, I’m leaving my keys downstairs! So, if you leave, make sure you do the same. I gotta go, bye!”

{{ Click }}

“Ach!” Sylvia shook her head, clicking the end button to turn off her cell phone, then dropped it onto the seat next to her as she maneuvered her vehicle to the right lane to exit onto the street that led to her mother's residence in Chicago. Maybe it
was
a good thing that her mother wouldn’t be there when she got there. That would give her time to bring in her bag and settle into the place, and prepare what she would say when her mother began bombarding her with questions, which she was certain that she would. Truth be told, she’d answered enough questions that morning at the police station, after she’d left Shawn’s at the crack of dawn.

Sylvia returned to a home she no longer felt welcome in. It was no longer her safe haven. Her aching body and tender scalp kept up the reminder of what took place there. The presence of Raymond had forevermore damaged the feeling of peace she once felt upon entering there, living there, working there. Weird, but she felt that
it
, the house, had somehow let her down, betrayed her…allowing that man within to wreck her life…her world. It no longer felt…her own. Entering cautiously, making sure that she was alone, she hadn’t wasted a moment in gathering some things together in her suitcase. She had almost ignored the blood in her bedroom. His blood, mixed with Shawn's. She couldn't leave it like that. She washed down the walls where it had splattered, washed it off of her bedside table and scrubbed it out of the carpet.

Done, she wasted no more time getting out of there. She felt like the house was watching her, waiting to close in on her and trap her there, so that it would give leave of entry to someone else to possibly attempt to molest her. She knew her thinking was crazy, but she didn’t trust the safety and security of her home anymore. Once she changed her clothing, wincing and crying out softly with every little move, she practically ran to the best of her ability to get out of there, looking over her shoulder with every step she took until she made her exit. Spying around the door of the garage, and checking the back seat of her car before she got in. Inside of it, she experienced a panic attack as she waited for the garage door to open behind her before she could back out.

At the police station, Royce Collier had been very considerate of her during the remainder of the questioning, making sure she intended to press charges against Raymond, which she did. Making her falter and almost change her mind about leaving, was Shawn, whom she’d left sleeping peacefully. Had he tried to make love to her last night, she would have let him. With the bruises and strained muscles, however, they were both too worn out to even attempt it. At the same time that she wanted and realized that, she was glad that he hadn’t tried. After all the years she’d spent in a marriage where she was always the one trying the hardest to keep things right and make their family life match the American ideal, she wasn’t equipped with the courage or bravery to struggle through another relationship. Yet here she was, in love with Shawn Everett McPherson. Right now, things looked so promising. He was considerate, gallant, protective, handsome and forever seeking to please her. But for how long? Her first husband had been like that in the beginning too. Maybe not as perfectly so as Shawn…but in his own way. Once they married, everything changed. The hell had begun…and there she was, trapped right in the midst of it. What if she was setting herself up for the same thing again? Something told her if things turned bad with her and Shawn, it would be worse for her. She didn’t like all of those ugly, insecure, scared feelings she experienced from her first marriage. All the cheating, drinking, lying, fights, putdowns, and the long hard struggle up to gain the self-esteem that she lacked going into the union.

It had taken her a long time to obtain the confidence she had in herself now. If this didn’t work with Shawn…what would it do to her? She was afraid to risk it; giving her heart. It was one thing to know that she loved him, but another entirely to let him know it. What would he do with that? Where would it take them? And would it be for good? That’s what she wanted, assurance that it would be for good—permanent. No games and heartache. Nothing in the world hurt like a broken heart…nothing. And she couldn’t fight through another one. She needed to be away from him where he couldn’t find her. She needed to wean off her need for him, now, while there was still time to do so. Thank
god
he hadn’t taken her up on her invitation to make love to her. Doing that would have cemented her in a relationship that might have wrecked her life later on. Everything had just gotten so out of her control since he’d come into her life. Right now, she hated the feelings of guilt plaguing her over leaving him after he had risked himself to save her. He’d fought for her, defended her, and here she was running scared.

She pulled up in front of her mother’s two-flat. She was tired, her eyes burned and she needed a nap. She dreaded trying to pull her stiff body out of the car after sitting in it for four hours. Slamming the trunk closed, she moved slowly, entering the wrought iron gate, making sure to close it behind her. Her mother would have a fit if she left it open. Up the front steps, she rang the downstairs doorbell. Ms. Earthaleen looked out of her door from within the vestibule and immediately recognized Sylvia. Smiling, she stepped up to the building's glass door entry and unlocked it, letting her in.

“Hey, chile…yo’ mama left the keys for you. Said you be here pretty soon. Come on in, I get’em fo’ you.” Smiling, Sylvia followed the older woman who was about her mother’s age, a little older. Now that she had the keys, there were three to remember to get in her mother’s entry door. This was the last thing she wanted to have to deal with as sore and hurting as she was. It took her a good five minutes, sighing between each key that wasn’t the right one to turn the tumbler. Once she got in, she made sure to turn and lock all three locks back. Then up the long flight of stairs to her mother’s floor, where she once again, had to find the key to the giant padlock to the bars pulled closed; that was an easy one to find. Then she had the joy of finding the two keys to get in the door once she pushed the bars out of the way. “Gee whiz ma, move already! This don’t make no sense. God help us if there’s a fire.” After finding the last key…she was in! “Hallelujah!” she cried out after finally getting in.

With a start, Sylvia woke, almost leaping clean out of the bed. Her body hurt more now than this morning. She whimpered, wincing as the doorbell rang on like crazy. “Oh, shoot…Okay! I’m coming, mama! Hold on! I’m coming!” Sylvia yelled as she rushed from her room, having gone there straight away to nap. She laid the keys down somewhere and couldn’t find them. “Oh, man…I’m coming!” she sang in a panic, her mother laying on the bell. Finally she spotted them on the sofa about to fall in between the cushions. “Phew! I’m coming…dog!” She scrambled to the door, unlocked it, but had to undo the padlock to the gate. Slamming that back, she squealed out after pinching her finger between the closing crossbars. “I’m coming!” she yelled, sucking on her finger where it throbbed trying to rush down the long staircase, her muscles rebelled, slamming into the door beneath that broke her speed down, her muscles were too sore to do it for her. Quickly she turned the deadbolts and needed the key for the top one. She moved the curtain back to see her mother tapping her foot, with one hand on her hip and looking belligerent.

“Would you hurry up!” her mother yelled, her head moving to punctuate each word. Sylvia smiled, fumbling with the keys, found the right one then unlocked the top deadbolt. “What the heck was you doing? I’m down here ringing the doorbell for the last ten minutes! And I gotta pee and I can’t get in my own house?” she fussed, passing Sylvia, marching up the stairs. “And lock that door back!” she called down from the top. Sylvia obeyed. When she reached the top of the stairs again, her mother heard her, yelling her reminder, “Lock that gate back! And my door!” she called from within the open door of the bathroom, where she could be heard relieving her bladder.

“I know…I know.”

“Em-hm, well this ain’t Wisconsin…we can’t leave our doors unlocked here! And put them keys on the buffet where I can find’em.”

“I know—I know!”

Coming out of the bathroom, and undressing with every step she took leading her to the middle bedroom right off of the bathroom, which had always been hers, she asked, “Okay, what’s going on…whatcha doin’ here?” She never missed a step as she reached up behind her to undo her bra…the first that had to go. She was home, time to break free and breathe.

“Whataya mean ‘what I’m doin’ here’? Can’t I just come to visit?”

“You can, but you don’t. You don’t like the neighborhood, remember? So, whatcha doin’ here?”

“Mama, you make it sound like I never come to visit with you.”

“You don’t!”

“Mama, I do, too!”

“Emmm-hmmm,” she mumbled through a crooked lift of her lips.

“Mama! It’s not like I live right across town anymore!”

“That’s right, you don’t! For no reason at all, you up and moved away! That was your choice, when you coulda at least try to stay near me when I might need you! But, nooo, don’t nobody give a hoot about mama! Unless you need something…or something wrong! So, which is it?” she asked, dropping her house dress over her head as Sylvia stood in her open bedroom doorway. She signed deep as her mother started hanging up her clothes.

“Mama, why do you have to always be so irritable? So grumpy and mean?”

“You can call it what you like, when the truth is, you bust your butt to raise yo' kids right. You make sacrifices for them. Doing all you can for them. But when they get grown, they move on and forget to look back. I’m just taking my cue from y’all. Y’all go about yo’ lives and don’t look back…so I’m doing the same.”

“Mama, I call you all the time.”

“Well you about the only one!”

“That's not my fault, so don’t make me suffer because Jr. and David too selfish to pick up the phone. I cannot control what they do, or neglect to do.”

“I’m not blaming you!”

“But I'm the one who's getting fussed at! Excuse me, I just got here and you’re jumping all over me for something they’re not doing. You haven’t even asked me how I’m doing…or what’s going on with me!”

“Tha’sa lie…it’s the first thing I ask. If you here, it’s for a reason. So, what is it?”

Sylvia crossed her arms over her chest and poked out her bottom lip, now being the belligerent one. “Chile, you too old to be poutin’,” her mother griped, walking past her out of the bedroom, heading for the kitchen. Sylvia had no choice but to follow. “Well?” again her mother asked, heading for the stove where a pot of collard and turnip greens that she cooked earlier sat; next to that, a platter of fried catfish. She watched her mother turn on the eye under the pot, Sylvia stood leaning against the wall in the kitchen, her ears picking up the clicking sound from the stove’s top pilot about to light. The flame burst to life and the greens were getting warmed. Her mother walked away from the stove to the refrigerator in the corner, opening it to remove some Cranberry juice. She sat it on the table and stopped, looking at her daughter who leaned quietly against the wall.

“Sylvie?”

Sylvia looked up at her mother and her eyes watered up. Slowly, she pulled herself away from the wall and approached the table, where she pulled out a chair and eased herself into it. There she settled into place, waiting for her fatigued muscles to stop punishing her for moving.

“What’s wrong with you? Why you moving like that?”

“I’m sore.”

“From what?”

Sylvia sighed deeply, swallowing back tears. “I was stalked. A man broke into my house, went through my things. Then came back yesterday when I was home. He attacked me, tried to rape me.” She sighed tiredly, sadly. Tears streamed again. “Oh, my
god
, baby…why ain’t you tell me?” her mother cried, coming around the table to grab a hold of her daughter.

“Owww, mama, I’m sore…please…don’t.” Right away, Lydia pulled away.

“I’m sorry, honey. Where you hurtin’ at?” Sylvia wiped at her tears.

“All over…especially my scalp…I’ve been removing loose hair all night and morning.”

“You wanna take somethin’? A painkiller?” Lydia asked. Sylvia shook her head. “No, mama, I’ll be fine.”

Lydia walked around the table and took a seat across from her daughter. “You say he tried to…what stop him from doin’ it?” she asked softly.