Somebody's Someone (9 page)

I just plain stared at this teacher woman, standing in front of me. Somehow I knew that if I told her anything, all hell was gonna break loose. And I didn’t wanna be the one to cause it to happen. I had done ’nough already by leaving Big Mama. I would do just like Odetta had told me; I wasn’t gonna tell our business. “Everything’s fine at home,” I told her as I put my hand to my collar to make sure the ribbons was tied tight, praying she couldn’t see through me.

“Is there any truth to them welts being on yo’ body?”

She was pushing for a answer, and I knew I couldn’t give her one. I told myself to play dumb, and to see what would happen.

“Now, I need you to talk to me, Miss Regina. Go ahead and tell me the truth. Ain’t nobody gonna hurt you.” This time she was smiling a big white-woman smile, the kind that the teacher at my old school had flashed me when she tried to tell me that “little black girls” didn’t ask “little white boys” out on dates, which I once did against my betta’ mind. I usually felt betta’ when the teaching was followed by a smile, but this time I wasn’t gonna give in to it. In my mind’s eye, I pressed my lips together, zipped ’em shut, and threw away the key.

“Well, since you refuse to cooperate with me, you leave me no other choice but to send you to the principal. Wait right here, and I’ll get you a hall pass.” Then she walked into the classroom. I stood right where I was and let my breath out. My head was beating like crazy. Ms. Teacher came back and gave me a hall pass. She pointed to the main office and told me to return to her room when I was finished, but that I wouldn’t be allowed in unless the principal had signed the pass. I took the small piece of paper and headed down the hall. The back of my neck could feel the teacher’s eyes staring at me. I didn’t dare turn round for fear that she would know just what I was thinking. But I knew what I was gonna do. I couldn’t talk to nobody. So at the moment when I should have gone inside the office, I turned the corner and ran to the first door I could find and pushed through. As I hauled tail across the play yard, I could see that there was nobody but me outside. My body felt like a firecracker that was ’bout to explode, but I kept moving.

I came to a tall Cyclone fence which made its way round the whole school ground. I put my feet into the li’l diamond shapes and climbed to the top. Making sure that I didn’t touch the spiked ends of metal, I grabbed the smooth bar between the jagged pieces and swung my legs over as I jumped the fence.
Splat!
My feet landed on the ground, making my legs feel like concrete knives had stabbed through ’em. But I didn’t care. I had got away without that teacher lady seeing me. And I figured that by the time they had missed me, I’d be back home with Odetta.

Odetta was waiting on me when I arrived. She told me the school had called and said that I’d left without permission, and that they had reason to believe that I might’ve been some kinda victim of child abusing. They also told her that they had to tell the police. I knew right then that I was being cursed by God. Big Mama and Lula Mae’d told me my mouth was gonna get me in a world of trouble; and here I was, trouble staring right down my throat, and this time I hadn’t even said a word. I wanted to tell her that it wasn’t my fault. That I had to join the other kids in a running test and that my shirt came undone. I wanted her to know that if it hadn’t been for them ole stupid, nosey-ass kids, I could’ve stayed at the school, like the other kids. I wanted to tell her. But I couldn’t. I just let my words hang close to my tongue and slide back down my throat.

“We gonna have to keep a low profile, baby.” Odetta spoke after what seemed like hours of quiet. “I already called my daughter Carlene, and we’ll be going to her place for a few days.”

The hair on the back of my neck raised itself like a porcupine. I recollected some eavesdropping I’d done a while back when I learned that I might’ve had a whole slew of kinfolk livin’ nearby to Big Mama’s. That day I heard the grown folks talking ’mongst themselves ’bout somebody named Carlene Walker. S’posedly she was my daddy’s younger sister who was on her way to making a real name for herself. Big Mama’d said, “Oh yeah, Odessa—who was her friend—you should hear what dem folks round town sayin’ ’bout that Walker gal. I thank her name’s Carlene or something or other. Yeah, they say she got herself into a tussle last night over some man at one a dem joints down on Sixth Street. Uh-huh, they say she received the hundredth cut, somewhere on her face. Somebody sliced her up real good wit’ a switchblade. Yeah, from what I hear, that gal’s got more cuts on her than a li’l bit. Somebody say she even gots ’em on the bottom of her feet. Hell if that Gina don’t watch that mouth a hers she gonna wind up just like her. Y’all knows fruit don’t fall far from they trees now.” I r’member thinking to myself that I sho’ did hate it when folks thought they knowed what I was and wasn’t gonna do. And just for that, I told myself I wasn’t gonna be nothing like no bigmouth girl named Carlene Walker. I didn’t care if she was the last person standing on the earth—I wasn’t gonna have nothing to do with the likes of her.

Now I was having to go and be with the woman I’d ’magined to look like the scariest monster I’d seen. Odetta looked over at me and asked what was wrong. “You all right, honey? You look like you done seen a ghost.”

I tried to move but couldn’t.

“Come on now; Carlene’s waitin’ for my call.”

Afraid of letting Carlene’s name fall from my tongue, I decided not to ask nothing ’bout her, in case I got jinxed. So I asked what a low profile was, and Odetta said it meant that we had to stay away from the police. Those words I understood, so I gathered up my clothes into a brown paper bag while Odetta called her daughter to come and get us.

From the minute I met her, I kept turning my head and lowering my eyes so that I didn’t have to look straight on into her face. I found things on the ground that seemed more inna’resting than the possible switchblade marks that I was s’posed have one day—if I kept on running my mouth.

“Hop on into the backseat,” her voice said to me. And man did she sound tough. I did as I was told, and when she got into the driver’s seat and placed her big hands on the steering wheel, I tried to peek at ’em to see if there was scars from where she’d had stitches. I didn’t see none. I turned to look out the window as we drove along in quiet.

We arrived at Carlene’s house in the later part of the afternoon, at school letting-out time. Everywhere I could see there was kids with they books and bags walking on the sidewalks in all directions without a teacher or a grown folk. As we drove up to Carlene’s house, my eyes liked to popped outta my head. That house was better than her own mama’s. Seemed like the only place I had ever seen’d houses like this was on TV.

Inside there was as many rooms to eat, cook, and play in as there was rooms to sleep in. And all the rooms had they own door. In the kitchen was a machine that you put your dishes in and it did all the washing, while in the garage there was a real-life washer and dryer. My lands, I sho’ ’nough hadn’t seen the likes of this. Carlene named off all the things she owned as she showed me round her house. The whole time she talked, I was slyly staring at her to see if I could find the scars that was s’posed to be all over her body. There was none that I could see— not even on her face. Since her feet was covered I couldn’t see the bottoms of them. Anyway she still made me scared by how big and tall she was. But by the time she finished showing me her house I was more inna’rested in that than them scars.

At Big Mama’s we all slept in three different rooms. The whole house was no more than five rooms, and that’s only if you count the bathroom that was hanging on to the side of the house by tar and a few nails. As far as a washing machine goes, we had the kind that had two rolling pins on the top, with a crank handle attached so you could wring clothes through, after you washed ’em by hand—we first soaked our clothes in a tin bucket, then scrubbed the dirt out on a accordion-shaped board, then run ’em through the rolling pin part, since the washing machine itself was broke.

I overheard Odetta talking to Carlene ’bout what had happened. Carlene was asking Odetta why she was getting into “those” folks’ business. She said that Ruby hadn’t even bothered to tell Glenn that I was his child. And if it hadn’t been for LouCinda—her sister and Odetta’s daughter, who had seen me outside playing and swore up and down I looked dead-on Glenn Hathaway—nobody would know to this day.

“Hush yo’ mouth right now, Car,” I heard Odetta saying. “The chile might hear you.”

I heard her all right. And I could see why they called her Carlene. Her forehead was so big you could lean a car on it and not even notice it. Plus, I didn’t give a hoot ’bout her sorry brother anyway. Like the grown folks say, you can tell how good a man is by the way he treats his family, and so far, her brother was good for nothing.

Again I heard Odetta tell “Car” to watch her mouth. But this time I didn’t hear what she said. I was too busy thinking ’bout Carlene’s nickname. I made myself recall the nickname they gave me out at Big Mama’s. It was “King Nappy.” It sho’ wasn’t the kind of name you’d go round bragging about. But at least I could say that somebody took the time to rename me. Daddy Lent gave it to me ’cause my hair was so bad that the combs either got lost in it, or shot ’cross the room from the force of the naps. Daddy Lent told me I was lucky to get that name. ’Cause as the truth be told, I was also known for eating dried stray animal shit from the yard.

“Regina!” The sound of Odetta’s voice brought me back. “Come in here and show your Aint Car your arms and legs, chile.” I walked away from my eavesdropping post and went to her. She told me to take all my clothes off, ’cept my panties. I did as I was told. When Carlene saw me, she put her hand over her mouth.

“Mama,” she gasped. “Somebody oughta go over there and whip whoever’s ass that done this.” Then she turned to me. “It’s a good thing you ain’t my goddamned chile, ’cause I’d blow somebody’s fucking head off! Go on. Put your clothes on and go and watch the television in my room.” I got dressed and went into the room I was told to go into. Instead of turning the TV on, I just laid down and pulled my knees up to my chest. I rocked myself as the tears rolled down my face one right after the other. But I was careful not to make noise. My mouth screamed, but there was no sound. My stomach pushed down like I had to go to the bathroom, but still I had no sounds to go with the tears. After a while, my chest got so heavy and my breath so hot that I gave in and let what little noise I could find out. But nobody heard me.

When I opened my eyes I saw Odetta sitting on the side of the bed. She told me that she and Carlene was going downtown to talk to somebody about the situation. I was to stay put until they got back. Carlene had told her that I was old ’nough to be by myself. And she was right. I had been alone many times b’fore, and I’d been just fine. I got up and went into the kitchen, where Carlene was cooking. I watched as she put a ham hock in with a pot of beans. After adding salt and pepper, she put a top on the pan and turned to me.

“Have you ever cooked before?”

I don’t know what came over me, but somehow I felt that all the years of me watching Big Mama cook had somehow made me a cook. “Yeah, I can cook,” I told her. “They let me cook a lot back home.”

“Good, ’cause you need to earn your keep. I’m taking my mama downtown, and I’ll be back in a couple of hours. And while we’re gone, I need you to watch my pot of beans. I’ve set this here timer, so it will let you know when the beans are ready. When it goes off, just turn the fire off, okay?”

“Okay!” I told her. “Don’t worry none.”

I was old ’nough to cook, but Big Mama never let me in the kitchen without her. All ’cause I almost burnt the kitchen down one time while tryin’ to heat up a pot of greens. I’d tried asking Sister to help me light the stove, and she didn’t wanna be bothered. Sister yelled back at me from the room she was sitting in, and told me how to light the pilot. I had done just like she told me. I took the newspaper, put it to the pilot light in the oven, turned on the gas eye, and aimed the burning paper at it. Before I knew it, the paper was in flames and the room was starting to smell like gas. I got scared and ran to the sink, trying to get water on the newspaper. Meanwhile, the plastic curtains had caught fire and was melting to the window frame. I tried to holler out, but nothing came out my mouth. Next thing I knowed, Big Mama had knocked me to the floor and thrown water on the fire, all at the same time. But I didn’t feel the need to tell Car all that.

Within minutes they was on they way, and I was left in a big ole mansion. I did what I’d do in anybody’s house I hadn’t been in before; I started rummaging through everything. I pretended I was Nancy Drew—she was my second favorite to Huckleberry—and I knowed that Nancy Drew had a way of snooping through all the evidence to find her clues to solve her cases. That was all well and good for Nancy, but I didn’t know what case I was on; so I didn’t know what I was searching for, but I kept on looking anyway. Finally, after I found a real thick book with pictures in it, I stopped. The outside read “Our Memories,” and it had a white man and woman on the cover, sitting by a lake under some trees. I wondered what Carlene was doing with these folks’ belongings, so I decided to snoop out the answers. B’fore I opened the book, I went and searched the cabinets until I found a box of Fig Newtons. I returned to the couch and started flipping through “Our Memories.” Whoa! Once I opened the pages I realized that there wasn’t one person in it that looked like the peoples on the front. As a matter of fact, they was all different colors of black. Some was lighter than me, and some was darker. Some of ’em had red hair, and some even had what looked like goldish hair. I kept looking through the book, but I never came ’cross those two on the cover. When I had gone through the whole book, I decided to go through it one more time, just to make sure I didn’t miss nothing from the pages sticking together. The second time round I wanted to see if Glenn was in the book—I knew I’d recognize him from his picture on Odetta’s headboard.