Deliver Me From Evil (12 page)

I
had enjoyed meeting and chatting with Jesse Ray Thurman, but I didn't give him another thought after I left the flea market that day. I spent the rest of that Saturday afternoon with Miss Odessa. I had to laugh when I thought about how I'd gone from hanging out with some of the coolest kids in town to hanging out with a woman old enough to be my grandmother.

Unlike a lot of old people I knew, Miss Odessa wasn't nosy and meddlesome. She'd asked me only a few questions about my folks, like where they worked and what they did in their spare time. The basic information was all she seemed interested in. And, each time I attempted to tell her what my folks were really like, she changed the subject. I guess in her own way, she already knew by the way I'd latched on to her.

I spent so much time at Miss Odessa's apartment that when some of my street friends came looking for me, they came straight to her door. Jesse Ray Thurman was the last boy on the planet that I expected to pay me an uninvited visit.

I felt so comfortable and at home at Miss Odessa's that I answered her door when he knocked a few days after I'd seen him at the flea market.

“Hi, Christine. Your mama told me you were at your godmother's apartment,” he said, grinning from ear to ear.

“How did you know where I lived?” I asked, my mouth hanging open after I stopped talking.

“I asked around,” he admitted, cocking his head to one side. He was so much taller than me that I had to look up at him. When he looked down on me, his eyelids slid halfway down his eyes, like shades, giving him that “hooded eye” look that made some men seem so mysterious.

“Uh … that's right. My, uh, godmother,” I said, with pride I didn't know I had. I was surprised that somebody as out of touch as my mother would refer to Miss Odessa as my godmother. From that day on, that was what I considered Miss Odessa to be. It had a better ring to it than “friend” did when I told my friends who Miss Odessa was.

The sight of Jesse Ray standing there in that dimly lit apartment hallway had really taken me by surprise. I stood there, reared back on my heels, with my head tilted back, squinting my eyes so that I could see him better. He was better looking than I'd thought. I didn't know how to deal with a boy that I didn't know who was going around asking questions about me.

“I guess you came for the money I owe you for the lemonade.” I grinned, patting the pockets on my jeans, my head still tilted back. My neck had already started to ache, but I didn't care.

“Oh, you can forget about that. I already did. I, uh, thought you might want to go see a movie.” I didn't know any shy boys, but the way that Jesse Ray was blinking his eyes and shifting his weight from one foot to the other, he was acting like one.

“With who?” I asked.

He shrugged. “With me. Your mama let you go out on dates yet?”

“Not really,” I admitted. Neither of my parents had ever discussed my social life with me. “I'm just fifteen.”

“Oops!” Jesse Ray looked like he was going to faint. “I'm sorry. I just thought … I thought you were at least sixteen!”

I shook my head.

“Listen, I'll catch up with you some other time.” He laughed, backing away, with his hands up in the air, like I'd just pulled a gun on him. “I just thought … Well, I've seen you out with some of the kids from the university, so I thought you were older. And, you do look at least sixteen. I don't want your daddy cracking me upside my head.” He laughed some more, wiping sweat off his face. He didn't seem shy now, just nervous.

“You still want me to forget about paying for the lemonade?” I asked, following him down the hall, toward the exit.

“Don't worry about that,” he said, walking away even faster.

“Who was that at the door? Was it one of my kids?” Miss Odessa asked as soon as I returned to her living room. The biggest problem with having such an old person for a best friend was the fact that she had health problems on top of health problems. Today her arthritis was bothering her so bad, it was a struggle for her to get up once she'd sat down. She was wobbling like a spinning top now, trying to get up from her sofa. I padded across the floor and grabbed her by the arm to keep her from falling. “I asked who that was at my door,” she said, flopping back down on her seat so hard, she took me with her.

“Nobody,” I replied, with a shrug. “Just some boy knocking on the wrong door.”

I
didn't go home after I left Miss Odessa's house that day. Instead, I ended up at the house of a tall, lanky girl, with a cute round face, named Tina. I had recently met Tina through Maria. A month after I met Tina, Maria's family moved to San Jose so now I spent most of my time with Tina. Unlike some of the other girls I knew, who would steal your clothes and your man, I trusted Tina because she was always honest and up front with me. She was probably the only real friend I had now that Maria was gone. I had promised that I'd help her braid her hair that night. Like with most of the kids that I roamed the streets with, I didn't even know Tina's last name. And, it didn't really matter, because most of my so-called friends never stayed around too long, anyway. Either they moved away like Maria, got themselves caught up in some criminal situation that cost them their lives, ended up missing under suspicious circumstances, or got locked up. Three of my late friends, two girls and a boy in the same family, had all died in the same year. The girls had been murdered, and the boy had committed suicide when he found out he had AIDS. The fact that I was still alive and walking around free was as much a mystery to me as it was to other people.

Tina said she liked hanging out with me because I was smart. But she'd only started saying that after I started sharing information with her that I'd sopped up from the magazines and encyclopedias in Miss Odessa's apartment. Other kids started to look at me with admiration when I used some of the big words I'd learned.

I was doing something constructive and positive for another person, besides fucking or getting high, and that made me feel good about myself. It saddened me to know that some kids, some even older than me, didn't know that there were black folks from Guatemala. Tina was one of those kids. She didn't even believe me when I told her that that was where my parents had come from until I dragged her to our apartment one night and had Mama say something in Spanish. I didn't know much Spanish, but I knew enough to know that Mama had used a few cuss words when she chased me and Tina out of her kitchen while she was trying to fry a fish.

Tina and I didn't speak again until we were a block away from my building, and even then, we were still running. “Girl, your daddy didn't speak when I spoke to him, and your mama spewed some gibberish and looked like she wanted to bust my brains out with that frying pan. No wonder you like to hang out so much,” Tina told me, looking behind her. “I hope you don't take none of your other homies to your home,” Tina said in a serious tone of voice. “With your folks being so strange, you won't keep no friends too long.”

After I finished braiding Tina's hair in her tiny bedroom, we shared a joint and a can of beer. And, before I left the run-down house on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive that she shared with her alcoholic mother, she told me something that shocked me.

“You remember that boy Wade?” she asked, sniffing and rubbing her runny nose. Tina used to be pretty, but the drugs and fast life had taken a heavy toll on her. She already had dark circles around her eyes and a face that looked as hard as concrete. She didn't bathe on a regular basis or do much with her hair. I felt so sorry for her and the way she looked. That was why I always volunteered to braid her hair for free, when I charged other girls twenty to thirty dollars to hook them up with the same hairdo.

Tina's mother was always fussing about the water bill being so high, so Tina didn't take baths but a couple of times a week. I really liked Tina and I tried to look out for her. Every time she came to my house I encouraged her to take a long shower and to use my deodorant. But I could only do so much for her. She still looked and smelled downright foul most of the time. That's why she couldn't keep a boyfriend. Some of the boys that she used to fool around with ran when they saw her now. And, some of the boys that I used to fool around with did the same thing to me, but for different reasons. I didn't stink, and I did my best to make myself look good when I went out. I honestly didn't know why I couldn't keep a boyfriend. Just hearing the name of the one boy that I would have walked on water to be with made my heart skip a beat.

“You do remember Wade, don't you?” Tina asked, grinning.

I blinked and bit my bottom lip, trying my best to keep from smiling. But Tina saw me smile, anyway. She rolled her eyes and shook her head, patting the neat braided designs I'd just completed.

“Wade Eddie Fisher? What about him? His mama came to my house yesterday to borrow some more money from my daddy,” I complained. “As usual, she was going on and on about him doing so good down there in Hollywood. I haven't seen him in anything yet, and you know how much television I watch.”

“I seen him on a commercial for Pepsi,” Tina informed me.

“Humph! Well, a Pepsi commercial is a long way from him being in a movie,” I muttered bitterly. “The way he went around bragging about how he was going to take Hollywood by storm, I expected him to be costarring with Eddie Murphy by now.”

“But a commercial is better than nothing. I read in one of those magazines you gave me that people can make a lot of money doing commercials. Somebody with Wade's looks and body can make a living just doing commercials.”

“I guess so,” I offered, the bitterness still in my mouth, coating my tongue like venom. On one hand, I was happy that Wade was doing so well and living his dream—if that was the case. But I still had a lot of resentment toward him for the way he had treated me at the restaurant that day, especially after all the sex we'd had in his messy bedroom. “Why did you bring his name up?”

“I seen his mama at Safeway last night. Poor Miss Louise. She was ahead of me in the checkout line. When the clerk ran her credit card through and it got declined, I had to loan her twenty dollars to pay for her groceries.”

“Well, if her son is doing so good down there in Hollywood, how come she can't pay her credit card bills?” I asked, giving Tina an amused look.

“Hell if I know,” Tina said, with a shrug. “Anyway, she waited until I paid for my shit, and we walked out together. Wade was sitting in that old car of hers.”

“So what?” I asked, rising from Tina's lumpy bed.

“They gave me a ride home, but along the way, Miss Louise stopped off at Mr. Bailey's house, you know, that old barbershop man she's been fucking around with all month. She wanted to borrow some money from him so she could pay me back. While I'm sitting in the car with Wade, he starts talking a bunch of shit about the old days. Who's still in Berkeley, who's dead, and who's in jail. When I tell him that you are the only friend I got left, he tells me that if he ever settled down with a black girl, it would be you.”

“I don't know why he told you that,” I responded, with a gasp. “But I know for a fact, he likes white girls.”

“That's probably true. Most of the brothers I know do. But Wade likes at least one black girl, and that's you,” Tina told me in a serious tone of voice. “Why else would he say some shit like that if he didn't mean it?”

I didn't know what to say next. For one thing, I was not impressed. As far as I was concerned, I was too good for Wade Eddie Fisher. But I was willing to give him another chance if he wanted it. “I wonder why he would say something like that about me.” From the look on Tina's face, she was wondering the same thing herself. I had told her about the incident in the restaurant.

“Because you are the only one around here that didn't laugh and make fun of him when he said he was going to Hollywood,” Tina explained. “He said he would never forget that.”

I gave Tina a thoughtful look. “But he forgot my name that day at Giovanni's,” I said, with a pout, anxious to leave now.

“Oh, girl. You know how dudes trip when they are around their friends. Or maybe he had a thing going with that boy or something. Fags are coming out of the closets left and right these days.”

I had no reason to believe that Wade was gay, so I didn't even bother to comment on that.

“Well, what Wade said might have meant something to me if he had told me himself.” I smirked, heading toward the living room, where Tina's mother, Miss Honey, was passed out drunk in the middle of the floor. I hopped over her on my way to the door. It took me a while to undo the three locks on it.

“He's having a party next Saturday night. You want to go?” Tina asked, squatting down on the floor to put a pillow under her mother's head. This is what Tina did when her mother passed out. It did no good to haul Miss Honey to the sofa or her bed because somewhere along the line, she'd end up back on the floor, anyway.

“I'll think about it,” I said, with a sniff. “If I don't have anything better to do, I just might go.”

I
didn't even mention Wade or his party to my parents. From the indifferent looks I received from each one over the next few days, I had a feeling that they didn't want to hear about that boy and his party, or anybody else's party.

My parents would go for hours at a time without speaking to me while we were in the same room. As a matter of fact, they would also go hours at a time not even speaking to each other. As far back as I could remember, they hadn't even shared the same bedroom. My mother slept in the larger of the two bedrooms in our apartment; I slept in the smaller one. Daddy slept on the sofa bed in our living room. I knew enough about adults at the time to know that some couples had similar sleeping arrangements. It usually meant that one was having an affair but was staying in the marriage for other reasons. Usually “for the sake of the kids.” But that was not the case with me. I knew that my parents were not staying together because of me. Why they stayed together at all was as much a mystery to me as everything else with them.

I didn't leave home at eight to go to Wade's party that Saturday night like I had told Tina and a few other kids I would. I had stolen some jeans and a new pink T-shirt the day before from the Gap, some fresh new make-up and some condoms from Walgreen's, and some perfume from Macy's to wear to the party. I'd cancelled my plans to go to Wade's party at the last minute. But I did go out that night at eight: to be with Miss Odessa.

It was the old lady's seventy-fifth birthday, and she had been going on and on about it all week. She'd wept and wailed about how happy she was the Lord had allowed her to live so long. She praised God for keeping her safe in such a violent environment and for sending me to her.

One of Miss Odessa's sons had sent her a cheap bouquet of flowers. Another one had dropped off a cake that was so lopsided, it looked like somebody had dropped it and then stepped on it. None of her daughters had even called or sent anything. Even though she tried to act like it didn't bother her, I had a feeling that it did. If anybody knew what it was like to be ignored by family, it was me. As soon as I found out that Miss Odessa was going to be alone on her birthday, I decided that she was more important to me than Wade's party.

While Miss Odessa was taking her nightly bath, I slipped out and ran down to the corner convenience store. The cashier behind the counter was new, so he refused to sell me some beer like the cashier he'd replaced. And, I didn't feel like hanging around outside, waiting for an older person to come by who might purchase for me the beer that I wanted to give to Miss Odessa as a birthday gift. I ended up buying her a bag of rock candy and a birthday card with a black woman on it.

“Christine, shouldn't you be out with some of your friends at the movies or the roller-skating rink or something? It don't seem right for a popular young girl like you to be sitting here with me and my old self,” Miss Odessa commented, clutching the card like it was gold.

“Oh, I can see them anytime,” I said, with a wave of my hand, wondering what she would say or think if she knew just how and why I was so “popular.” I had a feeling she already knew. With us being right across the hall, it had to be hard for her not to notice how many boys I let in and out of the apartment when Mama and Daddy were at work. But like I said, she was not as nosy as the rest of the old people I knew.

“And, besides, today is a special day. Your special day. You'll only be seventy-five this one time,” I chirped.

“I didn't expect to see seventy-five this one time,” she said, almost choking on a sob. She sniffed and dabbed at her eyes off and on while we sat in front of her television, eating that lopsided cake. When she said she wished she had some beer, I told her that I'd pay for it if she'd escort me back to the store and buy some.

I left Miss Odessa's apartment when she fell asleep in the middle of
America's Most Wanted
, with her fifth can of beer still in her hand.

As soon as I entered my own living room, I immediately wished that I had someplace else to go. Since Daddy slept on the sofa bed in our living room, I couldn't watch television once he turned in for the night. I couldn't see him under all the blankets on the sofa, but I had heard him snoring before I got inside the door. The television in my room was on the blink, so there was not much else for me to do on a Saturday night. I went to my room and flipped through a few magazines I hadn't read. But I couldn't concentrate on anything other than the fact that there was a party going on at Wade's house and I wasn't there.

Now that I felt better about Miss Odessa, I returned my thoughts to Wade. I was still mad at him for the way he had treated me. That made it so hard for me to understand what he'd said to Tina about me. If what he'd told Tina was true, I owed it to him to let him know I knew. Since I already had on my party clothes, I decided to go out and party, after all. Besides, my pussy had been itching for days, and if anybody knew how to scratch me right, it was Wade Fisher.