Girls Like Us (20 page)

But it might not be any different. Lizabeth, she old and she could up and croak anytime. Biddy, she getting purtier and braver ever day. Some boy might come along and want to be her boyfriend. I’d be an orphan again.

All this thinking making me crazy-headed.

I gathered Lizabeth and Biddy ’round some presents all wrapped up nice in the middle of the table.

“Is it someone’s birthday?” Lizabeth axt.

“Nope, this is a ‘just because Quincy say so’ day,” I say.

Biddy and Lizabeth set down and look at me.

“I have presents for everybody.” I hand the first one to Biddy. “Open it.”

She grin big and take off the ribbon and the paper real slow, making sure not to ruin the littlest piece. It took her a long time, but I didn’t holler at her to hurry up. Sometimes taking extra care is a fine way.

“It’s a book,” Biddy said. “I can’t read no book.”

“You can read this one,” I say.

Biddy open it. “It’s a cookbook.”

I made Biddy a cookbook of all the recipes that Mr. Hallis made me. Only instead of words like “cup” and “teaspoon” and “lettuce” and “chicken,” there was drawings. It had took me forever.

Biddy got tears in her eyes. “A book I can read.” She hug it ’gainst her chest and didn’t say nothing else. I felt some good.

I hand another present to Biddy. “This for you too.”

She open it. “It’s a tape.”

Lizabeth look at it. “It’s nursery songs.”

“I called Ms. D.,” I said. “If you want to do it, Ms. D. can set you up to help in the hospital nursery. You got to take a class and wear a uniform, but then you can hold babies for one hour a week. You can sing to ’em if you want.”

Nobody said nothing. But this time the nothing was chuck full of sumpin’.

“If you don’t want to hold no babies, it’s OK, but if you do . . . well, you got to learn sumpin’ more than ‘Itsy-Bitsy Spider.’”

Before they could say anything, I hand a package to Lizabeth.

Now, Lizabeth, she be my kind of woman. She tore into that package with ribbon and paper flying in the air.

“A camera.”

“Somebody in every fambly got to be the picture taker. A fambly takes pictures at Christmas and birthdays and suchlike, don’t they?”

Lizabeth look at that camera, then put her hand up in front her eyes.

“And I need you to promise me something,” I say.

Lizabeth clear her throat and wipe her eyes.

“I know you old and might”— I tried to think of a polite way to say it —“be pushing up daisies sooner than later. But try not to die on us too soon. OK?”

Lizabeth, she made the phone call like I axt her. The policeman say he would come in a car and pick me up so I could make a statement.

Lizabeth and Biddy, they got right in that police car and hold my hand all the way. They sat by me and hold my hand while that policeman make a tape of what I said about Robert. They wouldn’t leave even when the police lady took pictures of my scars.

Biddy tole that policeman how she find me in the alley. How she washed my clothes.

Lizabeth said that we had done what we thought was right, but that there was no every-dence but my good word.

That policeman look at me and he say, “Ms. Ford.”

Biddy say, “Who Ms. Ford?”

I got to say, it took me a bit of a time to figure it out too. “Biddy, that’s me.” I don’t guess Biddy ever heard my whole name. I cain’t remember me a time when anybody used it. Everybody call me Quincy. Even if they don’t know me none.

I straighten up my back. And I look at that policeman. All of a sudden, I knew Lizabeth had been right. Maybe folks like Biddy and me not different. He done call me Ms. Ford.

“Ms. Ford, Robert and his buddy are well known at this station. They’re both bad actors.”

I frowned ’cause I didn’t understand what that meant. And I knew he’d think I was stupid.

But that policeman say, “I’m sorry. That was sort of station-house slang. I meant that Robert and his friend act badly.” He clear his throat. “Those scars on your stomach are evidence — enough that we can get Robert and Darrel into the station.” He tell me them boys was cowards, and maybe he could have them pointing they fingers one at the other. “We’ll do our best to bring them to justice for what they have done.” He tole me that what I done was the best thing to keep Lizabeth and Biddy and me safe. And he tole me that I was keeping Robert from hurting some other girl later on.

I walk out that station house with my fambly hanging on to my hands.

I knew that Biddy and me — both of us — we wasn’t nobody. We count.

Sometime I hear a loud car and I think Robert is out there waiting to hurt me. Sometime I get mad at Biddy and Lizabeth. Sometime I get mad at my ownself. I still think this world be harder for folks like me and Biddy than for folks that are smart and don’t have a smash-up face.

But sometime Biddy be singing ’bout somebody comin’ ’round a mountain and she cleaning like a fool, but she happy. Sometime I cook something extra good and we all smile at one another. Sometime we get laughin’ fits. Sometime I don’t worry. Sometime I do. Sometime I want to box Lizabeth’s ears. Sometime I think I gonna buy Biddy a pet. Something that won’t try to eat Mama Duck if she come back. Sometime I think I need to stuff that girl’s cleaning rag in her mouth to keep her from singing.

Every once in a while, I hug that fool girl.

Just for nothing.