“You ain’t going nowhere, are you? Seam?”
“No.” I smile. “I’m staying right here.”
“Take me home soon?”
“Yes.”
“Stay with me?”
“Yes.”
“Seam?”
“Yes, Uncle, what is it?”
But he only nods and closes his eyes.
21
IN FREEDMEN’S Town’s pharmacies, steel bars block the windows. Cigarette and malt liquor ads plaster the walls — cute young black couples, laughing, smoking, drinking on lovely beaches. I know damn well these pristine resorts are still informally “Whites Only” in the world beyond the posters.
So far this afternoon I’ve tried three places; none carries the Lipitor Uncle needs. In fact, their drug supplies seem maddeningly depleted. Finally, one clerk admits to me, “Truth is, we don’t stock many meds in this neighborhood. The people who really need them can’t afford them, you know, and we’re afraid gangbangers’ll break in here and steal the crap.” He shrugs. “It ain’t no profit in us carrying pharmaceuticals. Sorry.”
I consider asking Rue if he can scare me up some heart pills on the street. In the end, I get the stuff at a Kroger’s on Montrose, where wasted queens line up to refill their AZT.
The man in front of me reads an old book as he waits for the pharmacist. A colorful cartoon on the cover. I’m guessing it’s a book he’s owned since he was a boy. The spine’s ancient glue flakes as he turns the pages, and he has trouble holding the volume together.
I step up and order the magic we hope will keep Bitter alive.
I swing by the Row Houses where Kwako, Barbara, and Reggie are dedicating the new sculpture. Its wooden fingers are as tall as I am, brown as bayou water. They point at Heaven as well as the street: supplication to God, a gentle prodding of the locals. The base is a graceful collage of basketball netting, sneakers, television consoles. I recall a Ralph Ellison phrase: A junkman I know, a man of vision …
Reggie hands me an overnight bag with a change of clothes for Ariyeh. She had called and asked him to prepare a care package for her, for me to take back to the hospital. I kiss his cheek. “I’m so happy for you.”
He grins. “You’re going to be with us, right? The flower girl — ”
“The maid of honor.”
“It means a lot to Ariyeh.”
“Me too.”
Barbara hugs me. She’s got a chaw of dirt in her mouth. “How’s your piecework coming?”
“Slow.”
“Ain’t no hurry.”
“I’ve got to return to Dallas for a while, but I’ll be back for Reggie’s wedding. Maybe then I’ll stop by and get some more pointers from you?“
“Anytime.”
Kwako is wearing overalls and loafers, a straw hat, sleek new shades. He looks like one of his objects: enthusiasm spot-welded to exhaustion, age nailed to a lingering, youthful zest. He barely follows our small talk. He gazes at the hands he has made, judging their perspective in relation to the buildings behind them. Prayer, peeling walls. Poverty and redemption. How do they fit? Through his eyes I begin to see the neighborhood as a sculptural challenge. It matters how we piece it all together.
I take Ariyeh’s bag and tell them I’ll see them soon. Reggie nods. Barbara squeezes my hand. “You was made for this outlook, girl. Get your ass back quick.”
“You think?”
“Absolutely.”
“Thank you.” I reach to hug Kwako’s neck. “Thank you both.”
The stairway at Some Other Time smells of asparagus and garlic. I pack a few fresh toiletries, change into a sleeveless yellow blouse. A baby wails down the hall. My quilt huddles in a corner.
Outside, at the pay phone, I leave a message on Rufus’s answering machine saying I’d be delighted to work with him. I don’t know when I decided this. Maybe right away. Maybe just this minute. But it’s settled. That feels certain.
I wait on the front steps. Sure enough, in about half an hour, the Beamer turns the corner. The windows slide down: a mosquito whine. Michael slouches in the passenger seat. The protégé, the new young gangsta. Already he’s got a practiced sneer and an arrogant sway in his shoulders. Lost or saved?
“Say, cakes,” Rue says. He gets out of the car. “You been scarcer’n Lady Justice.”
I stand.
“None of Rue’s fillies just ups and disappears, know’m say’n?”
“I didn’t have a beeper number for you. My uncle’s in the hospital.”
“That so?”
“You didn’t know? You mean something slipped by you?”
He grins. “You a real little bitch, ain’t you?”
You don’t know the half of it, Player. “He’s just out of ICU. I’m on my way back there now.”
“Want a lift?”
“I’ve got my car, thanks.”
He approaches me, rubs my hips. “I missed you.”
Michael’s leering: learning the moves, living out his rap tunes.
“You’re a teacher now,” I say. “How’s it coming?”
“Shit. It’s like these kids got minds of their own.”
I laugh. I do like his hands on my body.
“He ain’t so bad. Might have a chance to make it to thirty, thirty-five, he listens what I say.”
“And his mama?”
“Moving on up.”
“Are you leaving her alone?”
“I’m watching out for her boy. That’s what I promised you.”
“Thank you.” I step away from him. “I’d better go now. My uncle’s expecting me.”
“I be looking for you. Don’t go drifting away on me, Ann.” He slips a hand behind my neck, pulls me to him, and slides his tongue into my mouth. “Aight?”
Michael cheers.
“Bye,” is all I say. Thanks for the ride, Player. Good luck. You’ll need it.
“Later, cakes, hm?” Something in his voice — a catch, a low plea — makes me think he knows the game is over. He squeezes my butt and returns to his car.
On the sidewalk, young sparrows, the color of old dishwater, squabble over spiky weeds shooting up between cracks in the cement. I pull Rufus’s card from my purse and run my fingers over the embossed word Future.
Bitter’s house feels crackly and dry. I pack a couple of paperbacks into my overnight case, then pull Mama’s quilt from the closet. The hospital provides plenty of blankets, but the quilt will make a cozier cover. Its patterns flow into one another like geologic layers. Slavery. The Underground Railroad. Executions.
I touch Mama’s skill.
Now Bitter’s been stitched together, too.
From the bathroom, I snatch some toothpaste and a couple bars of soap (Bitter doesn’t like the hospital’s antiseptic brand). I pass the easy chair where Ariyeh and I used to snuggle into his lap. Tell us, tell us again! Say about the magic!
The floor settles, creaking.
I step outside and lock the house.
Sunset is a fierce pencil line on the horizon. Beyond the cemetery, the front porch of an old home has collapsed a foot or two. Fireflies, as bright, I imagine, as the buttons of a Confederate soldier’s coat, glimmer in and out of honeysuckle vines.
Rap from a passing Passat swamps a faint blues wafting from an open window. I hear, but don’t see, a basketball swishing a net. A silver jet streaks the sky, like the tip of a key scratching a new blue car.
After folding Mama’s quilt into my trunk, I start to switch on the radio, then remember Elias. I don’t want to encounter a glib pundit editorializing about his death.
Around the corner, three yellow bulldozers knock down several former slave quarters. A new sign — this doesn’t appear to be Rufus’s outfit; the competition is swift and fierce — says a four-story luxury condo is coming soon. Reserve Your Space Now!