The Deal, the Dance, and the Devil (10 page)

“No!” Adam and I had said at the same time. Adam had added, “Your grandmother would never be tired of you. Not with the way she loves you.”

Ethan and the twins may not have understood much of what had been happening to Ruby, but they’d understood one fact—their grandmother’s love was the truth. Though they loved both of their grandmothers, it was hard for them to hide that Ruby was their favorite. Not that I blamed my children—Ruby Langston was my favorite, too.

The doctor had gone on to explain, “We don’t know how
much your grandmother hears,” he’d told the children. “Just keep on talking. Make sure that you include her in your life. I’m sure she wants to know what’s going on.”

So, that’s what they did; that’s what we all did. Once a week—almost every Saturday—we came to visit and fill Ruby in on life in the last seven days.

While the visits were a joy for the children, I could see that Adam left a little bit of himself behind every time we took the trip back home. I saw his fear with each kiss good-bye, the question in his eyes, his wonder if this would be the last time. The doctor’s prognosis was that not many lived beyond seven years with this kind of dementia, and Adam couldn’t be here very often. The ninety-minute drive made it a difficult weekday trip. But we’d sacrificed the time he’d be able to spend with his mother for this facility. Though we’d been used to seeing Ruby three, four times a week when she’d been well and then, of course, every day when she’d lived with us for three years, we’d traded the ability to spend time with her for these exquisite surroundings, the above-average care, and the world-renowned staff. No matter what the future held for Ruby, we were committed to ensuring that the end of her life was going to be far more comfortable, more peaceable than her beginnings.

Breaking up the children’s chatter, Adam walked into the room. “Hey, Ma.” He kissed her cheek.

When Ruby flinched a bit, Alana said, “See, Daddy, she heard you. She did the same thing when we kissed her.”

“Oh, she hears us.” Adam grinned and scooted onto the bed next to Ethan. Taking his mother’s hand, he asked, “So, how’s it going, Ma?”

It was the same every week—the way Adam paused and held his breath. As if the son hoped that his mother would turn herself inside out and come back to life.

But then Adam breathed and I did, too. I stayed at the
edge of the room, my heart breaking. My heart’s tears were for Adam, who’d been blessed to really know a mother’s love, and for our children, who deserved many more years with this incredible woman.

“Hey, I got an idea,” Adam said. “Let’s go get your grandmother a sundae.”

Our children cheered as if this was something new, even though every week this was their ritual—to go to the ice cream sundae bar in the cafeteria.

“I’ll stay here,” I said, which was part of
my
ritual—this was my time alone with Ruby.

Adam kissed my cheek before he ran behind the girls and Ethan.

That scene made me sigh, once again content. Yes, Ms. Johnson and that check had interrupted my peace, but only for a little while. I was back to feeling at ease.

“How are you, Ruby?” I asked her once we were alone.

When she turned from the window and looked at me, my heart skipped. It was my turn to be hopeful. But there was not even a hint of recognition. Blankly, she stared at me before she turned her empty eyes toward the wall.

Moving to her dresser, I lifted the antique hairbrush that Adam and I had found a few years back in one of the small shops we’d explored in the market town of Stratford-upon-Avon about three hours outside of London. The moment I’d spotted the elegant set, I’d thought of Ruby. When we’d brought it home for her, her eyes had been wide with amazement.

“Oh, my goodness. This is too much,” she’d exclaimed. “I’m a simple woman. I don’t need extravagant things.”

“Nobody needs extravagance, Ma. It’s just what we do.”

“You two do too much.”

Adam had laughed. “Well, we’re in charge now, so suck it up, Ma.”

I smiled as I remembered the way Ruby had glared at her son, with one of those old-school black mama’s—don’t play with me, boy—looks.

But when Adam had said, “It makes us feel good to do these things for you, Ma,” Ruby’s eyes had filled the way they always did.

We’d done all that we could to surround Ruby with the best of everything. Even though we’d never come close to repaying all that she’d done for us, we never stopped trying.

For me, Ruby’s love began on the day that I told my mother that I was pregnant. Though Adam almost wrestled me to the ground, insisting that he go with me, facing my mother was something I had to do alone …

“It doesn’t make sense. You’re not in this by yourself,” Adam persisted.

“I know that. But I know Marilyn and she’s less likely to go off if you’re not there.”

Adam frowned. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“My point exactly. Nothing with my mother ever makes sense, so I’m betting that if I’m by myself, she’ll feel sorry for me.” I paused and thought about who my mother was. “I’m hoping that she’ll remember how it was for her.”

So, grudgingly, Adam left me alone to face my mother.

The words “Marilyn, I’m pregnant,” were barely out of my mouth before she jumped up and started wailing and flailing, talking about how I was ruining her life once again. How she’d told all her friends that I was going to be the first one in the family to graduate from high school. How now that would never happen. How I was messing it all up for her, just like I’d done when I was born.

“How could you be so dumb? How could you get pregnant? You’re barely sixteen!”

I guess she’d forgotten that she’d gotten pregnant at the
same age. But then again, hadn’t she just told me that being here was my fault?

That was when I wished that Adam
had
come with me, because surely his presence couldn’t have made this any worse.

“Just get out of here!” my mother screamed.

“What?” I could not believe that she was actually sending me to my room.

“I can’t stand to look at you. Get out of my house.”

Out of her house? Her words made me do just the opposite—I froze. She couldn’t be kicking me out—not when the exact same thing had happened to her.

But the longer I sat, the more irate my mother became, looking like she was about to throw her head back and howl at the moon.

So I slowly stood and made a move toward my bedroom. I wasn’t sure what I was gonna do—pack a few things? Where I was gonna go—to Brooklyn’s or Tamica’s?

“I said … get out!” Marilyn screamed, letting everyone in Barry Farm know our business.

“I … I was just going—”

“Going where?” she interrupted. “You don’t need to go nowhere but out of here.”

“I was going to my room to get—”

“You don’t need to get nothin’. Walk out of here with exactly what you came in here with … nothing!”

“But, Marilyn,” I whimpered, scared out of my mind. “What am I supposed to do? Where am I supposed to go?”

“Oh, now you’re asking me? You didn’t ask me when you had your legs all wide open for that boy!”

I wanted to tell her that it wasn’t like that. I wanted to tell her that ours was a different kind of love because God had put us on earth for each other. But I didn’t say any of that because she wouldn’t understand.

“Since you laid up with that boy, why don’t you go to his house? Let his broke-down mama take care of you.”

So that’s what I did. With nothing more than the jeans and the sweater I was wearing, and the tears that were falling from my eyes, I left.

I went straight to Adam’s house, and when he and his mother answered the door, Ruby pulled me into her arms without speaking a word.

She just held me until I stopped crying. When she finally spoke, she told me that while she wasn’t happy about Adam’s and my situation, she was going to stand by, sit by, be by our sides. Whatever, whenever, however.

When I told her that I needed a place to stay, she set me up in her bedroom with a stern demand that Adam and I were never to have sex again until we were married. We honored her wishes and lived under her roof from that day—through the rest of that summer, to our junior year in high school. I gave birth to our babies, Alexa and Alana, in February, and was back in school within two weeks.

Ruby quit her day job as a clerk in the local Safeway grocery store and stayed home with the twins while Adam and I were at school. At night, she worked while we studied and took care of our children. The summer didn’t change our schedules—Adam and I went back to work for the parks, Ruby worked on the janitorial staff for Georgetown University at night.

It was a grueling, exhausting, wonderful life. In Ruby’s home, I learned about family and relationships, about commitment and sacrifice.

In Ruby’s home, I learned the truth about devotion and that was why, before Adam and I were even married, I considered her my mother-in-love.

Even now, sometimes I cried at the memories of those days—I cried for the joy of Ruby’s love and I cried for the
loss of my own mother, though on the day of the twins’ birth, Marilyn had shown up to the hospital and told me that she’d forgiven me because she’d always wanted twins. But still, sometimes, the memories of how Marilyn had tossed me out so easily hurt.

Then—I felt it. The touch. I looked down to where I’d laid my hand on Ruby’s shoulder; her hand was atop mine. I rushed around and hunched down in front of her.

“Ruby?”

Her eyes were on mine—still empty. I stayed there for a moment, hoping that the love that I’d felt in that touch would come once again, through her eyes, through her voice.

But there was nothing more.

“Do you know how much I love you?” I asked Ruby as I stayed crouched down in front of her.

Still nothing.

“That’s all right,” I said, thinking that if she did hear me, I didn’t want her to feel my disappointment. “It’s gonna be all right because Adam and I and the children will always be here. Even if we have to move you to another room. But having a roommate might be fun. Someone you can talk to, someone—”

“What are you doing!”

My head snapped back and I jumped up.

Adam marched toward me, his lips pressed into a thin line, his eyes squinted into thin slits.

“I was just talking to your—”

He pushed past me, dropping the already dripping sundae that he carried onto the dresser.

Behind him, our children’s eyes were wide with surprise, maybe even a bit of fear, because I’m sure they couldn’t remember the last time their father had raised his voice.

“Ma,” Adam began, “don’t listen to Evia. You’re not going anywhere.”

Alexa said, “Grandma’s leaving—”

“No!” Adam exclaimed. He turned back to Ruby and stroked her hand. “It’s gonna be all right,” he kept saying, he kept stroking.

I’d been just talking, rambling, really. I would never do anything to upset Ruby, didn’t Adam know that?

But I stayed quiet. Mostly because of the children, who still stood with their backs pressed against the wall, silent and tentative, their eyes moving between their father and me. The ice cream they held slowly melted in the heat of the tension, dripping into tiny puddles on the carpet.

The silence stayed for just a while longer before Adam announced that we were leaving. We gave our kisses and said our good-byes to Ruby, and headed back to our car. Back to the city. Back to our home.

Leaving all of that peace behind.

Chapter 13

I
N THE TEN YEARS THAT WE
’
D
been the five Langstons, there had never been a time when we’d driven together for more than thirty seconds in complete silence.

Until today.

There was no music piping through the speakers, no mindless chatter from our daughters. There was not even the constant electronic beep-beep-beep from Ethan’s games.

Just strained silence.

Except for one question that came from our most sensitive child. “Is everything all right?” Alana asked after we’d driven the first forty-five minutes with only the rolling hum of the spinning tires filling the car.

I didn’t answer right away, waiting for Adam to reassure our children, since he was the one who’d brought all this tension. But when their father said nothing, I turned around with a fake smile and reassured them myself. “Everything’s fine.”

The twins and Ethan lowered their eyes, as if they couldn’t look at a mother who would lie so easily.

The minute we pulled up to our home, the girls and Ethan bolted from the car, into the house and upstairs to the protection of their bedrooms.

I, though, wasn’t about to run from anything.

Before Adam could get away, I said, “Are you going to tell me what’s bothering you?”

He didn’t even look at me when he jumped out and slammed the door so hard that the windows rattled.

Now my calm was gone, too. “That’s a real grown-up way to handle this,” I stomped behind him. “So, you’re just gonna walk away?”

Adam whipped around so fast that he startled me. “Okay, you want to talk about it?” His eyes were like red-hot flames against the frosted air. “You had no right to say that to my mother.”

I held up my hands to the heavens. “What … did … I … say?” I asked, my voice now as loud as his.

“All that stuff about how she was gonna have to go to another room and get a new roommate. That’s not gonna happen.”

I shook my head, giving myself a few seconds to choose the right words. “First of all, Ruby is my mother, too, and I would never say anything to hurt her. Secondly, what I said was the truth.”

“You must not be listening to me.”

“No, I’m not. Because you’re living in some alternate world. We don’t have the money for Pearly Gates. Hell, we don’t have the money to live here.” I pointed to our house.

“See? This is why I didn’t want to tell you anything.”

A passing car’s horn stopped me from saying something that I knew for sure I would’ve regretted. We both looked
toward the slow-moving, rust-colored Volvo. From the passenger side, Lucy Miller smiled and waved; I wiggled my fingers, too. But that was it; I didn’t have enough in me for a smile.