Wouldn’t Change a Thing (8 page)

“I forgot how funny she can be sometimes.”

“She is a lot of wonderful things when she takes her meds. I wish you would embrace that fact, Toni.”

“I'll embrace that fact when you tell me why you gave us away.”

The request silences Aunt Mavis. “You're too fragile right now. I promise you'll understand it all later.” She rubs my leg as we pull into the McDonald's drive-thru.

Aunt Mavis's words ring true: my mother was lots of wonderful things when she took her meds. Before her diagnosis, I proudly rode to school with her each day. My mother's third-grade class ran out to greet her every morning. She coasted into her parking space at Sparta Elementary School, and before she opened her door, one student grabbed her piping bowl of grits sprinkled with butter and black pepper, one took her coffee, and one carried her briefcase inside. She favored pantsuits over dresses and skirts, unlike the other teachers. They fit her shapely frame. She walked me to my fourth-grade class and always waved to her fellow teachers in the lounge. By the end of my fourth-grade year, the waves and smiles became turned backs and snickers. I thought they were jealous of her, until a playground incident.

Lisa Jones, our class bully and Principal David Jones's daughter, gathered all the girls in a circle to play a game. We were her servants and she sat on her makeshift throne—a beanbag chair she brought from home—at recess every day. She kicked Annette Cousins in the back. Annette yelped and allowed her access to the middle of the circle. Satisfaction covered her face as she made us bend to her will. Her beaded braids clanked as she moved them to one side. Wielding a legal pad and a fat number two pencil, she sketched a picture of a house, and a mom with kids minus the dad. Above it she wrote, Whose Your Hollywood Daddy? My grammar flag flew at half-mast after she killed the usage of the word whose. Cousin Clayton had drilled the difference between whose, who's, there, their, and they're over the past few weeks. I snatched the pad, struck a line through the word whose, and replaced it with who's.

“Why did you do that?” she snapped. She snatched the pad back and looked at the new replacement.

In fluent Claytonese, I recited our latest grammar lesson. “Whose is the possessive of who. Who's is a contraction that means who is or who has. As in, who is your Hollywood daddy?”

“Oooooo weee, she told you!” said Annette as she high-fived three other servants.

Lisa pointed the pencil at Annette. “Shut up before I take your lunch money!” She shoved the pad in Annette's face. “Since you have so much to say, write your Hollywood daddy's name.”

Annette scratched her head and scribbled
Eddie Murphy
. “My mama said he is so fine she wants to meet him.”

“That'll never happen,” said Lisa. “Your mama barely comes to the school for your PTA meetings, so how is she going to Hollywood?”

The sun glinted off the aluminum foil on the end of Lisa's braids as she passed the pad to Cathy. Cathy wrote
Michael Jackson
.

Lisa's face scrunched. “He's not going to let you live with those animals in his mansion.”

“He could teach me how to dance, though. I could feed Bubbles and do things around the house.”

Lisa waved off the notion and handed me the pad. I remembered Willa's crush on Dick Anthony Williams, but decided against listing him. The only reason she liked him was because Aunt Mavis thought he was handsome. There was only one man I idealized as a good father after my parents started having problems. He was loving, accepting, and made room for children that weren't his. He was a good provider and he was handsome. In all the reruns I watched with Willa, he solved problems and made sure the children were civil toward each other. The best part was that he worked at the house and in an office as an architect. He had drawings in a home office that he'd show the kids. His work even took them to Hawaii for a construction assignment. I wrote in capital letters.

ROBERT REED/MIKE BRADY.

Lisa laughed at my response. “You're not mixed. You can't have a white daddy!”

Another Claytonese phrase sailed past my lips before I could stop it. “Nuts are mixed, not people.”

Lisa flipped the pad to the next page. “Just as well. You'll need a mother and a father soon, since your mother won't be teaching here much longer.”

“What did you say?”

She dropped the pad, stood, and moved closer. “You heard me. Everybody's talking about how crazy your mother is. She can barely make it through third period without laughing and talking to people that aren't there. Why do you think she leaves at one every day?” She placed her hands on her non-existent hips and faced me, a grape Now-and-Later coloring her tongue. “The only reason my daddy hasn't fired her is because he's doing your Aunt Mavis a favor. Your aunt went—”

I reared back and punched Lisa in her mouth. BAM! She fell back, her head narrowly missing the monkey bars. I pounced her, slapping her face as blood trickled. I would move heaven and earth for my mother, and no one was going to disrespect her. Vickie Kendricks and Doris Hargrove pulled me off her while the other servants shouted, “Beat her!”

Mrs. Barnes, our teacher, took us to the office to face Principal Jones. He spanked Lisa and excused her. I rubbed my face from the one punch Lisa got in. Principal Jones gave me a cold compress and it soothed my face for a short time. Too embarrassed to face him, I dropped my head as he spoke.

“I'm very disappointed in you, Antoinette. I've never known you to fight. What got into you today?”

I shrugged. I looked at the photos of Principal Jones with his wife and Lisa. They seemed so happy. So normal.

“What did Lisa say to you?”

I paraphrased her words without thinking. “She said you said my mother is crazy and you're going to fire her.”

Principal Jones made a steeple with his hands. His face reddened as he stood and came toward me. “Lisa said that to you?”

I nodded.

He placed a hand on my shoulder. “Lisa misunderstood a private conversation I had with her mother. Your mother is a valuable member of our school and we're doing what we can to help her. Everything will be fine.”

“May I go back to class?” I asked, pressing the compress closer to my stinging jaw.

Principal Jones picked up the phone and dialed a number. He toyed with the abacus on his desk as he waited for the caller to answer. “Mavis, Antoinette isn't feeling well. Will you please come pick her up?”

I gazed out the window as they discussed other things and waited for him to hang up.

“I'm sorry for what Lisa said, Antoinette. My doors are always open for you. You're like a daughter, and if you need to talk about anything, I'm here to listen.” He paused. “How has your mother been? How is your father?”

Clay and Mavis made me and Willa swear on Grandma Rose's Bible not to discuss anything about my mother or my father's difficulty caring for her. What went on in the Williamson household stayed in the Williamson household. Clay said people were like vultures, always swooping down to get gossip like it's a dead carcass. “No need to feed 'em the bird with your words,” he said.

“She's doing okay, Mr. Jones. We're supposed to be taking a vacation to Florida this summer.”

“I'm sure you'll have a wonderful time, Antoinette.” He paused again. “How is Willa?”

“She's well.” I looked out the window again and was relieved to see Aunt Mavis's Honda.

I knew she wouldn't take me home, because I had overheard Daddy saying he'd take Mama to her psychiatrist's appointment that day. When I got home in the evenings from May and Ray's after Mama's appointments, Mama's catatonic state scared me but made me comfortable. She couldn't hurt us or say mean things. Aunt Mavis came into the office and greeted me with a hug and kiss for my boo-boo. She tossed the compress Principal Jones gave me in the trash and replaced it with one of the cold icepacks she kept in her freezer.

“Thanks for calling, David. I'll take care of her when she gets home.”

“Don't make a big fuss. Lisa's mouth prompted this confusion.”

“Oh.” She looked at my face and motioned for me to go to the car.

I waited in the car as Principal Jones escorted her outside. Concern filled both their faces as they chatted. Principal Jones said something to her and caressed her hand. In return, she gave him a quick hug.

“Are you still allergic to the sauce on Big Macs?” she asks, drawing me back to the present.

“Ma'am?”

“Do you want something to eat or is your stomach queasy?”

Whiplash waits for my response as she nuzzles against me.

I face the canine. “Girl, when did you get out of your seat?”

“I'm taking her for a walk in a sec. She has to tinkle and move around.”

“I'm not hungry. Thanks anyway. I'll eat later.”

“Where were you, anyway?”

“The old days. Do you remember picking me up from Principal Jones's office after Lisa bullied me? How is he?”

“He died of prostate cancer about three years ago.”

“Where is Lisa?”

“You mean Dr. Lisa Jones-Candler? She followed in her family's footsteps and is a professor at Stanford. She's done well for herself.”

Wow. Even mean Lisa Jones found a husband. She probably tied him down and made him marry her. My stomach churns again.

“Aunt Mavis, do you have any aspirin?”

“Will Advil work?”

“Anything will do. Get me a small Hi-C orange, please.”

Aunt Mavis places the order as Uncle Raymond pulls into a spot on the lot. She gets our food, parks next to Uncle Raymond, and gives me the medicine bottle.

“Give me Whiplash's fries out of the bag.”

I pass the fries and pop the cap off the Advil. Whiplash barks louder for her fries as they exit the car. Aunt Mavis joins Uncle Raymond and they walk Whiplash around the parking lot hand-in-hand. I watch them and the way they communicate. Uncle Raymond smiles lovingly at her as she swats his hand away over something he said. I always envied their marriage and wanted my parents to be like them. I shared my fantasy with Clay once and he said marriages like May and Ray's don't happen overnight. He went on to say a lot goes on behind the scenes. Compromising and forgiving. Sometimes forgetting.

My phone tings. Jordan's text asks a familiar question since Saturday.

Did I do something to offend you? Please reach out to me.

What's there to say? I'm not who she thinks I am and I don't know how to make things right. I recline the front seat and let the Advil take effect.

Aunt Mavis taps my shoulder and startles me awake.

“Where are we?”

“Good ole' Sparta, GA. You were beat. You slept all the way in.”

I sit up and check my surroundings. I talk a good game about being a motherless child, but I loved my hometown when I lived here.

“Do you need to stop anywhere?”

“Not right now.”

In the rearview mirror, I see Uncle Ray steering my car. He's keeping pace with the traffic about three cars behind. My old stomping grounds create a flood of questions.

Aunt Mavis reads my face. “A lot of your favorite places are gone.”

“I see.” A towering new high school sits off the road to my right. “When was this school built?”

“Late eighties, early nineties. It was a long time coming, and a welcome site.”

“What happened to the old HCHS?”

“It's still standing. I can drive you by there, but it's a shell of what it used to be and an eyesore.”

I sigh and a quick image of Willa races through my mind. I tagged along with her for summer band practice. She was a majorette who twirled her baton as if her life depended on it. When Mama didn't feel like taking her to practice, Aunt Mavis brought us her homemade butterscotch ice cream sandwiches and dropped us off at the football field. I stood in awe of Willa and the other majorettes as they perfected dance routines with the band's accompaniment.

“Aunt Mavis, let's take a spin downtown.”

She heads toward the courthouse. We round the square and my heart skips several beats. To the right of the courthouse sits the same gas station Daddy and Uncle Ray frequented for oil changes and tires.

“Chamblee's is still standing.”

“Always went toe-to-toe with Rachel's. The store is under new management now.” Aunt Mavis chuckles and points at the competition.

We swing a left and the Drummer's Home stands tall and proud. This was Mama's home briefly, before she went to Georgia Mental. Clay sat at his cherry roll-top desk and wrote out checks for her rent on the twenty-eighth of each month for almost a year. She'd write me letters from the Drummer's Home and I'd refused to open them. He'd offered to read them, but I thought it best they be returned. The roller-coaster ride with her was too high and too frightening.