'Til It Happens to You Read online

  “I thought I’d missed it,” I responded, closing the patio door behind me.

  The morning had a cool, fresh breeze, the kind early morning runners enjoyed. They said it was good for the lungs. I sat down next to her. I was not as relaxed as she was, but tensed and erect, which was an unusual posture to assume in her company.

  “It’s only 6:30,” she said, looking at her wristwatch. She always wore her watch. I once asked her why, and she told me it was her way of making sure time was on her side. I left it alone, never contending her explanation.

  My cup of hot tea sat on the table in front of me as I watched the steam rise up and then vanish into the cool morning air.

  “I have to tell you something,” I said. I’m not sure what she was expecting to hear. Either way, I wasn’t going to torture her with the awkward silence. “I’m moving in a couple months,” I said, letting it out like I had just swallowed my stomach.

  “You’re moving?” she repeated. “Why? Where?”

  “D.C.,” I said, taking a sip of tea. I gave her the most information I could without telling her everything that was going on in my mind. I watched the smile from her face disappear. My mother and I sat in silence, gazing into the sky, and I tried not to let my news ruin the moment.

  “What’s wrong with Connecticut?” she finally asked, looking at me from the corners of her eyes.

  “Nothing,” I said insistently. There was nothing wrong with Connecticut except that the people who had mistreated my love had made living here less than ideal for me.

  My mother wasn’t pleased with my decision and my explanation didn’t win any applause from her, either. Over the next several months it became obvious she didn’t want me to go, but she hadn’t figured out exactly how she was going to convince me to stay. She never understood from whom I was fleeing, and she certainly didn’t know towards whom I was anxiously running. Truth is, the person I was leaving behind no longer belonged to me.

  Her house was becoming empty one child at a time. Devaan, my older sister, had graduated from Yale University with a doctor’s degree in investigative medicine. A clinical research manager at Delta Pharmaceutical, she saved most of the money she needed, and with help from my mother and Mr. Kirkwood, had put a sizable down payment on her own house. She moved from her room in my mother’s house and into a three-bedroom, two-and-a-half bathroom stone-front colonial on Cypress Creek Court in a gated community in Wallingford. She did exactly what she had planned, and what my mother had wanted her to do, and that was the same plan my mother had for me. Now she was watching those plans evaporate.

  2

  Wish You Were Here

  Trevor….

  My mother was a strong black woman from Savannah, Georgia. Her grandmother called her Clara because it “rolled off the tongue like honey pouring from a beehive.” That was her grandmother’s explanation. My mother hated that name, but she never told her grandmother because she didn’t want to offend her.

  I loved talking to my great-grandmother about my mother. My grandmother knew a lot, but it seemed my great-grandmother remembered everything. All it took was a picture and the stories came flowing from her mouth like water through a sluice. After my great-grandmother passed, I held on to the stories. Often I would close my eyes just to hear my Mama Markie’s voice in my head. Sometimes she was there even when I didn’t expect her to be.

  “Pass me my good church hair.” That was usually the last request Mama Markie made of Clara just before heading out the door and on their way to The Great Ebenezer Worship Hall. Clara would stand tiptoe, reaching for the curly black wig that her grandmother hung from the closet door after roller-setting the curls. She hated the way the Georgia sun frizzed her long, natural black hair, not that it had any mercy on the curls in her wig. Mama Markie would lean over, looking in the dresser mirror, tucking her hair under wig, pulling and tugging until it was just right.

  As a child, my mother played church girl on Sundays, flanked between her mother, Cynthia-May, and her aunt Daphne. Clara went to church because she had no choice. Daphne only made it to church when she felt she had a sin that needed forgiving. She could have just repented in prayer and save herself a trip since she didn’t pay attention to anything said in church anyway.

  Of course, she wasn’t the only one whose focus was somewhere else. While everyone else belted out the second verse to “Glorify Thy Name”, young Clara sat with her eyes titled towards the ceiling, comforted by the thumb that never left her mouth, thinking more about the words to Minnie Riperton’s “Inside My Love” than to the Lord she had come to praise. My mother nursed a huge crush on young Robert Seymour Harrison, an army brat from Texas who had moved just around the corner on East Perry Lane. She was probably preoccupied with thoughts of him, too.

  Church was always too long for Daphne, and wordlessly, Clara agreed. Clara didn’t mind going to church; it’s what would happen every Sunday following the service that she hated most. Rather than rushing home, both her mother and grandmother would stand outside talking considerably about the service, as if those they engaged in conversation hadn’t just sat through the same sermon. Or they talked about some shindig at Sister Eden Dwyer’s place, another opportunity to flaunt her money.

  Clara usually sat on the last step of the stair, just outside the church, with her legs crossed at the ankles, praying they would hurry. She hated sitting in the hot Georgia sun, in the middle of August, when she could have been sitting on her own steps waiting for Robert to ride pass on his bicycle. He would wave to Ms. D, who was usually sitting in the corner of the veranda in my grandfather’s chair with her favorite man, Jack Daniel’s, her Sunday evening teaser.

  I loved looking at old pictures of my mother. I was sitting at the small dinette table under an open window. My father was standing in the kitchen, pouring another glass of wine. He always drank wine after breakfast. This morning he prepared homemade waffles, poached eggs and hollandaise sauce, and sliced strawberries. A widow for so long, he’d always cooked for himself. Practice had made him chef-perfect. It was only fitting he knew his way around the kitchen, since he liked to carry his belly with him wherever he went. That’s what my grandfather always told him.

  I stayed the night at my father’s house after having one of our Saturday night hangouts at our favorite spot, Ace of Spades, an upscale bar and eatery on the corner of Salisbury and 7th Streets. We went there whenever we needed to catch up, for the two-for-one drink specials, three-dollar Red Stripes, and four-dollar cosmos. Our last visits had been different. We no longer expected to see my friend Sidney rounding the corner, balancing a service tray of bottled drinks and liquor glasses, wearing a friendly smile that never disappeared. Collin, our usual mixer of potency, was now the owner of Club District, his own upscale bar near Wyoming Ave in southwest D.C., catering to a list of clientele from the nearby embassies and their congressional cronies. But his replacement Tress Symonds did not disappoint.

  “This one is my favorite,” I said, holding a small picture of my mother. I stared at the picture before holding it up to show my father exactly which one I was talking about. My mother’s dress was a bright bride white. She had a single flower in one hand and her arm around a small dog.

  “That’s Hocus,” Robert explained. Hocus was an English beagle given to my mother one Halloween, so I guess the name was appropriate. “That was the first time I really paid attention to your mother,” he continued, laughing.

  “What do you mean? Didn’t you say you knew she had a crush on you?” I asked, turning around.

  “Yes. But I was waiting my turn. See, your mother had a crush on me, but all the neighborhood boys had a crush on her,” he said, handing me one of the two champagne glasses he had in his hands. He took the picture from me and looked at it as if he were seeing it for the very first time. “She had curves like the petals of red roses. One afternoon she went yelling down the street shouting for Hocus. We spent hours looking for him. After circling several blocks, we came back to your
mom’s house to find Hocus sitting on the veranda, lying with his head between his front paws, staring at the front gate. You should have seen the joy in her face when she saw him.”

  “Mom was beautiful.” I have to admit these same pictures that often brought a smile to my face sometimes saddened my heart. It was always like seeing them for the first time.

  “So, did you and mom talk about having more kids?”

  “I wanted a basketball team, my own starting five.” My father handed the picture back to me and sat.

  “And mom?” I asked.

  “When we heard of the complications she was about to face with you, she just prayed you were all right.” He smiled. “You would think she wanted only you from the very beginning.”

  “I wish she were still here.”

  “I wish she were here, too,” Robert said, brandishing a smile.

  “You do? What about Natalie?”

  “What about her? I never stopped loving your mother. And I don’t have to stop loving her to make Natalie my…”

  “Your wife?” I interrupted.

  “One step at a time.” Robert paused and took a sip from his wine glass. “I was going to say fiancée, but I’m not ruling that out, either.”

  “My old man’s taking a dive into the old marriage pool again,” I said in a giggle, shoving him playfully with my elbow. “It’s about time. Set a date, already,” I added, muffling my words as I spoke into my wine glass.

  “I heard that, and your man’s not that old.”

  “Speaking of Natalie, where is she anyway?”

  “Adrian is home for a quick weekend break from school, so she’s spending the day with him.” Robert looked at his watch as if he had been anticipating her return. I loved that he had found someone to share his life with, but I loved having these moments with him more than anything else.

  I looked at my watch and realized time had been slipping away. I still had a busy Sunday evening ahead. My father was one man I cherished having in my life. He had been in my life since birth. With some men walking around dropping babies left, right and center, and then walking away from their responsibilities, leaving these women to play daddies to little girls and teach boys to be men, I was proud my father didn’t fit into the deadbeat-dad category. Besides God, my father was the only other person on whom I could bet my life was never going anywhere. I began placing the pictures back in the lockbox.

  “What’s the rush?” he asked.

  “Did you forget?”

  “It all depends. What was I supposed to remember?” I could see him hiding his smile.

  Yes. My father had forgotten. “Today is the day,” I said, hoping that alone would remind him.

  “Today is what day?”

  “Pop, I told you Jackson was moving here today.” We’d had several discussions about this. I guess with everything going on with him and Natalie, he had pushed this day behind everything else. But it wasn’t his excitement to remember, so I wasn’t going to hold it against him.

  “Are you ready?”

  “We’ve spent the better part of two years getting ready,” I said with a wide smile.

  “And what about Kelvin?”

  “You know, that’s the same question Denise asked me, as if something about him is supposed to concern me. He hasn’t concerned me in a long time, and that’s exactly how I intend on keeping things. Sure, every now and then I may wonder how he’s doing, but I’m human, not evil, and those are natural thoughts. I hadn’t done the ashes to ashes, dust to dust thing on memories of him, like I had our relationship, but I haven’t thought about Kelvin in the context of him and me. Hell, I don’t even think about him in the context of him and Lawrence.”

  “Just making sure. If I remember correctly, that was Jackson’s concern earlier,” Robert said. He picked up the two empty wine glasses and began walking back towards the kitchen.

  Jackson’s concerns were legitimate. Had I been on the outside looking in, as Jackson had been, I would’ve had those same concerns. But the last thing Jackson has to worry about is a Kelvin and Trevor sequel. I had moved on, and Kelvin doesn’t get a do-over. Sure there were feelings I thought weren’t going anywhere, but it’s good to know I was wrong. I saw Jackson struggling to understand them. It made no sense to him, especially since Kelvin was miles away with his new love. So, If I hadn’t put things into perspective, I would have lost Jackson. I would have lost myself. But distance and time was all I needed, just like my father had told me. There’s no better feeling than completely flushing someone out of your system.

  I thought about the last real conversation my father and I had that actually involved Kelvin. That night another phone exchange with Kelvin reminded me I had cared so much about him that I had forgotten how to care about myself. I had allowed Kelvin to rain on my parade, something he had done so many times before because I let him. I told my father about Lawrence’s letter to Kelvin I had found while boxing up Kelvin’s belongings a few days before he moved. I didn’t know it at the time but I was packing Kelvin off to be with Lawrence, my replacement. For whatever reasons, some beyond my control, at least that’s how I felt, I struggled to disconnect myself from Kelvin. But my father was right when he told me I was a lot stronger than I thought. I can’t tell you how much I needed to hear those words. Isn’t it funny how some love just makes you weak sometimes?

  I placed the pictures back into the lockbox where they would be preserved for years to come, carried them back upstairs to my father’s room, and placed them in the back of the closet where he always kept them. I stopped in front of the dresser and stared at the picture of my mother and me. She was still lying on the hospital bed, with my tightly wrapped body close to hers. I could tell in the picture my mother loved me the moment she laid eyes on me. I looked at my watch again and smiled as I thought about Jackson’s arrival.

  3

  By the Time I Get to…

  Jackson ….

  I hated the feeling I got whenever I came home, like I had opened the door to lonely. It bothered me that I wasn’t able to be with the new object of my affection the very moment my body yearned for his touch. I never thought I would do this for anyone, but from what I knew, Trevor was worth it. Trevor and I, so far, had all the makings of a good thing. I’m not sure if that says a lot since this was the same sentiment I had at the beginning of past relationships. However, it said enough to help me make the decision about Trevor.

  For a long time I thought if I hung on and showed interest in one man, he would eventually come around. When that didn’t happen, I spent the rest of my time trying to get over the idea, the hope, and the fact that the “we” I wanted so badly would never be. I often wondered “if broken hearts ever mend?” or “where do broken hearts go?” I finally figured it out. You spend time thinking about the memories you created. You convince yourself you would never find another like them, because they had been the one you prayed for all your life. A few tears make their way to the curve of your chin, but then eventually, that zigzag line that dissects the familiar symbol of a broken heart begins to straighten, disappear, and the heart is whole again.

  I had a lot I still needed to tell Trevor. He knew something about the hurt I experienced, but by whom and how badly never made its way into many of our conversations. If I were going to leave what was never mine in the first place, I needed to keep whom I was leaving behind to myself; for now, that was the plan.

  It was hard for me to leave. I felt no one else would understand what was happening to me, and so, I kept my pain silent and suffered inside. The one person I thought would have understood, the one who told me he would always be there, was always too busy to hear my cries that usually came at night when I found myself alone wondering where he was. I was young and in love—he was only interested in himself. Through all the hurt, the frustration, and the disappointments, I had proven to this one man I wasn’t going anywhere. As I stayed in that place, his eyes wandered, his mind followed, and eventually, so did his heart.


  I was a ball of emotions, but still I embraced the excitement I felt about the changes that were happening in my life. I had postponed this day several times over, and it had finally arrived. This was the day for which I had impatiently waited, and it was met with a level of eagerness I hadn’t experienced in a long time.

  The night air still lingered as the sun started to show the same ugly head that brought the sweltering heat as the month of July ended and August began. I walked from the house to the car with my possessions in both hands. I was on my way to starting anew with Trevor, and that was exactly how I packed. I loaded only the essentials: clothes, shoes, a container of the dinner my mother prepared, and bottled water. A family portrait of my mother, my sister, and me lay perfectly on the passenger seat. A picture of my father, the man everyone said couldn’t deny me at birth even if he tried, was lying under that.

  While I prepared for my departure, I tried not to look in my mother’s direction. I knew it was hurting her to see me leave. It was hurting my heart as well. But what I think hurt her more was not being able to figure out what she was losing me to, and any explanation now would be obscured by the ache we were both feeling. So much for never keeping secrets. She wouldn’t have understood had I told her she was losing me to needed sanity, a mended heart, and tearless nights. Well, maybe she would have understood, but still I offered her no explanation. I just knew I had to go, and that was good enough for me.

  Saying goodbye to my mother was hard, too. Our embrace was long, and when I was ready to let go, I felt her resistance as she tightened her hands around me. She didn’t need words.

  “You can let go now. I’m going to be okay,” I said, but she never responded. If she did, I didn’t hear her. I was too busy holding back my own tears. She slowly loosened her grasp. I bolted to the car, closed the door, and never looked at her. I adjusted the rearview mirror and backed out of the driveway.