The Perfect Place (16 page)

I make sure she's good and gone before I inhale my dinner, every last bite of it. And it's good, too. Looks like one of my wishes yesterday at the lake came true.

I lie down again and my eyes close immediately. Sometime in the night, I hear footsteps and feel the bed sink as someone sits down next to me. A rough hand on my forehead, and then the weight of someone's head on my chest as they listen to me breathe. It is not until the footsteps are near the door that I force my eyes open, just in time to see Great-Aunt Grace slip out of our room and into the hallway.

T
HE
next morning, I open my eyes to see Great-Aunt Grace standing over me, this time holding her ancient cordless phone.

“It's your mama,” she says, thrusts the phone at me, and leaves.

Mom doesn't even let me say hello before she shrieks, “You got into a fight?”

I glance at the clock. It's barely nine in the morning and Great-Aunt Grace has already snitched. “Gag made me have an asthma attack.”

“She didn't. You got yourself worked up, as usual. Now, why were you fighting?”

“Because this girl, Jaguar, said something mean to Tiffany.”

At the sound of her name, Tiffany stirs and wakes all the way up, blinking hard. “Who're you talking to?”

“Mom.”

Tiffany flies across the room and snatches the phone. I don't put up a fight. “Hi, Mommy! Did you find Daddy yet?” Tiffany frowns. “I don't know how to put it on speaker.”

She hands me the phone. I don't want to press the speaker button, but I do. Mom picks up right where she left off.

“What did the girl say?”

“What girl?” asks Tiffany.

“The girl your sister fought.”

“Oh, her,” Tiffany says, and then the dramatics start. She recounts the fight, word for word, hit for hit. By the time Tiffany's done, Jaguar is the most deficient human being on the planet and I am the hero to trump all heroes.

“There
is
such a thing as the perfect place for us and Daddy is looking for it. That's why he left,” Tiffany says.

“Is that right?” Mom says. She sounds far away. I hear a horn honk in the background.

“It is. Jeanie even talked to a sidekick and the sidekick said that Daddy is in our future as long as we don't stop believing that we'll find him.”

“A ‘sidekick'?” Mom sounds bewildered.

“A psychic, not a sidekick,” I put in. Then I tell Mom what Jane told me. “She said happiness is in our future, and we can't have that without Dad, right?”

Mom is quiet for a good long while. She's been gone for days now. We've been talking for ten minutes, and she still hasn't mentioned anything about finding Dad.

“You can't give up hope,” I tell her.

“I'm doubling back to Boydon, North Carolina, because he hasn't used the card since, but—”

My eyes meet Tiffany's. If Mom gives up hope, so will she. “Mom, don't give up hope,” I say again, more firmly this time.

Mom sighs. “Okay.” She pauses, but when she speaks again, her voice is just as sad and flat as before. I remember Jane's words: Happiness doesn't come easy; you have to be willing to fight for it. Suddenly, I know what I have to do.

“Let's get off this phone before Grace starts talking about you running up her bill,” Mom says. Then she says a bunch of stuff about us behaving ourselves and ends with, “You two got that?”

Tiffany says, “Yes.”

“I got it,” I say, even though I didn't. What I do have is a plan.

 

Since I refuse to return to Camp Jesus Saves and Tiffany won't go back without me, it'll be business as usual: breakfast and then a full day of work at Grace's Goodies. We find Great-Aunt Grace and Moon in the kitchen. He's sitting at the table, sipping from a can of soda, as Great-Aunt Grace wipes down the kitchen counter with broad, quick strokes.

Something is missing. I look around. There's Mr. Shuffle, perched on the windowsill, looking like an overstuffed black trash bag. There's the newspaper on the kitchen table, open to the word find, and Great-Aunt Grace, leaning against the counter and chomping on something—hard.

What's missing is smoke. Not a tendril of it hovers in the air.

“Well, don't just stand there gapin',” Great-Aunt Grace says to us. “Tiffany, feed Mr. Shuffle. Treasure, set the table.”

When she speaks, I see a big wad of chewing gum rolling around in her mouth like a lone T-shirt tumbling in the dryer. There's no smoke because she's not smoking.

“What's with the gum?” I ask, even though I know.

“Nothin'. Just ran out of smokes.”

I hide my smile as Great-Aunt Grace reaches into the silverware drawer and hands me forks, knives, and spoons. Tiffany opens up a can of wet food for Mr. Shuffle. Moon grunts a “Good morning” at us.

“My leg is actin' up again, Gracie,” he says.

Great-Aunt Grace stirs the grits and says, “Been to the doctor?”

“Not since that first time. Nothin' he can do about it really, but put me back on those pills. Damn things made me sick as a dog.”

Tiffany and I take our seats at the table. She quietly points out the word
faith
nestled in the letters of Great-Aunt Grace's word find. I find
tiger
and
comeuppance.
We do this silently until Great-Aunt Grace comes over and spoons steaming grits into both our bowls. Then she spits her gum into the trash and eats her grits standing up. Moon either isn't hungry or isn't ready to stop talking about his leg. He doesn't eat anything. He goes from his leg to his heart trouble and high blood pressure to the headaches he gets only in the fall. And all the while he's talking, his hand is reaching into his pocket, feeling around for something. He finally pulls out a pack of cigarettes and an orange lighter. Great-Aunt Grace is focused on her grits, but when she hears that lighter flick, her head snaps up. Moon looks at her and shrugs.

“Stress,” he says.

“What did I tell you?”

“I said I got stress, woman!”

“And then what? You gonna have another?”

“Don't see why not. Some of us is temporary, while others is permanent.”

Great-Aunt Grace stares at Moon long and hard. Something's going on here, but I can't tell what. This is the first time I've ever seen Moon stand up to Great-Aunt Grace. She responds by taking an ashtray from the top of the refrigerator and slamming it down on the table in front of him. Then she turns to Tiffany and me.

“Let's go. We got thangs to do.”

“What about the dishes?” I ask.

Great-Aunt Grace tells me they can wait. “Get dressed and get back down here in five minutes—or else I'm comin' up.”

We meet Great-Aunt Grace at the front door in five minutes flat, sweaty and winded. She has an empty fold-up shopping cart with her. We leave Moon sitting in the kitchen, working on cigarette number two. Or three.

Great-Aunt Grace's expression is grim as we walk. Dot is outside sweeping her walkway. When she sees the three of us passing by, she shakes her head and scowls.

“Dot's still suspicious of you,” I say.

Great-Aunt Grace looks back over her shoulder at Dot and then quickly away. “I ain't got time to be worried about that fool. I got thangs to do.”

Tiffany and I have to just about jog to keep up with Great-Aunt Grace. By the time we make it to downtown Black Lake, sweat is pouring down my face and into my eyes.

“You're walking too fast,” Tiffany complains.

Either Great-Aunt Grace didn't hear her or she doesn't care. She keeps up the same rapid clip as we cross at the intersection of Main and Ridge. Byron comes walking toward us with the girl from church. He calls out, “Morning, Ms. Washington,” and waits for the three of us to approach him. But Great-Aunt Grace just passes right on by, grunting something that sounds like hello. Tiffany and I stop, trying to make up for Great-Aunt Grace's rudeness.

“What's with her today?” Byron asks.

“She's on a mission,” I reply, and he laughs.

“I heard she got into it with the sheriff.” He shakes his head. “Ms. Washington is all types of crazy.”

The girl is hanging all over Byron just like Sasha was, only this girl is taller, more legs than torso, showing more skin than clothes. She's wearing short white shorts and a red T-shirt with an elephant walking through a triangle on the front of it. Tiffany sizes her up.

“You look different,” Tiffany says.

“Different from what?” the girl asks.

“Different from Sunday, I guess. We saw you at church,” I say quickly. “I'm Jeanie and this is my sister Tiffany.”

“I'm Keyana, Byron's girl,” she says, as if that's part of her name.

Tiffany is still staring up at Keyana, this time at the design on her shirt.

“I'm a Delta,” Keyana says, pointing at the elephant. Tiffany gazes at her blankly. “It's a sorority at Howard. We collect elephants for good luck.”

“Oh,” Tiffany says. “Sasha collects jewelry.”

“Who's—”

Byron breaks out into a fit of coughing. I grab Tiffany by the collar of her shirt and pull her away. “See you around!” I call out over my shoulder.

“Get off me!” Tiffany rages.

I don't let her go until we're inside Grace's Goodies. Tiffany rubs her neck.

“Sorry,” I say, but Tiffany won't settle for anything less than a hit.

“On the leg or the arm, not the face,” I warn her.

She's cocking her arm back to pop me good when Great-Aunt Grace emerges from the stockroom. “What are you two fools doin'?”

“Jeanie dragged me here by my shirt and almost choked me to death.”

“She was getting ready to tell Keyana about Sasha.”

“Oh, that
was
Keyana Douglas,” Great-Aunt Grace says. “Thought I recognized her. She's as big a fool as the rest of them.” Great-Aunt Grace pats her pants pockets, checking for her keys. “All right, now, listen to me and listen good: I got a calling that I just can't ignore. So while I'm out, I'm trustin' the two of you to keep my door locked this time.” She points at me. “You keep workin' on them shelves. I'm gonna fetch you a face mask so you can't use dust as an excuse.”

Great-Aunt Grace bends to look beneath the counter for the face mask. Tiffany reaches over and pops me on the leg.

“Ow! You happy now?” I ask, rubbing my stinging thigh.

Great-Aunt Grace finds the mask and tosses it on the counter. “Well, come on and get to it, girl.”

I trudge around the counter, snatch up the mask, and stop just inside the doorway to the stockroom, taking my sweet time putting the mask on.

“Now, Tiffany, I got a job for you. First I want you to label something for me. Then I want you to straighten the racks.”

Great-Aunt Grace comes toward me, stopping short of the entrance to the stockroom. She bends down over the box containing her security system and opens it. Everything inside the box is wrapped up in plastic.

“Take this,” she says, shoving a tape at Tiffany along with a package of labels. “Put this past Sunday's date on that. Write neat as you can.”

Who in the world labels a blank tape?

Great-Aunt Grace heads to the door. She stops just in front of it and stares out into the street. “Gonna be a storm,” she says, and over her shoulder to me, “Treasure, you got a job to do, so stop peekin' around that corner and get to it.” She leaves, locking the door behind her.

I stomp toward the shelves, but I've got no intention of cleaning a single one of them. I wait until Tiffany is busy with that label. Then I walk right over to the phone on the wall in the corner and rip the mask off my face.

In all the time I've spent in this stockroom, the phone has never rung. Does it even work? It has to.

I pick it up and hold it to my ear.

It works.

I picture the sign again.
APARTMENT'S FOR RENT. FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL BROWN & ASSOCIATES AT
973-627-3746
.

I punch in the number to Mr. Brown's office. A woman answers on the second ring. “Brown and Associates, how may I help you?”

“I'd like to speak to Mr. Brown, please.”

“Is this his grandbaby?”

“No. It's Jeanie Daniels. He might know me as Treasure. My family and I used to live in Apartment 2F. Is he there?”

“He is, but he doesn't have time to be talking to kids.”

I can't give up now. “Please. Just ask him.”

“Hang on.”

The woman places me on hold, leaving me alone with a recorded voice telling me that Brown & Associates is a family-run business that's been around since 1987.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Brown?”

“Yeah. Who is this and what do you want?”

“It's Jeanie Daniels. I used to live in Apartment 2F. Remember?”

“Yeah. Your mama skipped out on three months' worth of rent, and sent me half of it about a week ago.” He pauses. “What are you, kid, like, ten? What're you calling me about this for?”

“I'm twelve, actually, and I'm calling because my father left us a few months before we snuck out—that's why we didn't have the rent money—and now my mother is trying to find him, but we've got nothing to go on and I was wondering—well, I was wondering if he'd called looking for us and maybe when he couldn't get in touch with us at the old apartment, he called you and mentioned where he was and—”

“He didn't.”

“Oh.”

“Listen, kid, I got work to do. When you talk to your mama, tell her—”

“What about the mail?”

“Huh?”

“Maybe he wrote us. Where's our mail from the past week?”

“Still piled up in your box. I haven't found another tenant yet.”

I take a deep breath. “Do you think you could . . . check the mail for me and see if he wrote to us?”