Kendra (15 page)

About fifteen minutes later, my doorbell rings and I know for a fact it’s Adonna. The second I open the door, she’s like, “What’s your problem? I know you heard us calling you out there.”

Only thing is, by now I’m not in the mood for her, so I just fold my arms in front of me.

“You gonna let me in or what?”

I suck my teeth and step aside so she can come in, still not saying anything to her.

“What’s up with you today?” She looks around—probably for Nana, who’s in the shower, getting ready for her man. “Why you acting so weird—I mean, even weirder than usual?”

I shrug. I’m getting real tired of having to explain everything to her, and her thinking she’s my mother or something. I don’t even have to talk to her if I don’t wanna.

“Oh, I get it,” she says. “You got an attitude today.”

Like she’s the only one that can get an attitude
.

“Well, fuck you, then,” she says.

“Fuck you, too,” I say finally. “Or is it too late? Did you already get fucked today?”

I watch Adonna’s face get kinda shocked. “Oh, so that’s it. You’re jealous of me and Nashawn. Me and him went out on one fucking date, and, what, just ’cause you can’t get a man, I’m supposed to babysit you all day and not have any fun on my own?”

There’s something about the way she’s looking at me, like I’m some kinda child, makes me wanna tell her about me and Nashawn and what we were doing when she called him last night. Just to see her lose some of that superior attitude because, really, it’s making me sick today.

“You keep on having fun with Nashawn,” I tell her. “Just as long as you don’t think you’re the only one he’s having fun with.”

She puts her hands on her hips and stares at me for a while. “You got something to tell me, then just say it.”

I keep my voice cool and confident. “I’m just saying, maybe you don’t know
your man
the way you think you do.”

“You keeping another secret, Kendra?” she asks. And I think it’s working. I’m starting to get to her. She’s not only mad now, but she’s kinda worried, too. “Like the one about you and Nashawn hanging out together in the computer lab that day?”

“Whatever.” I just shrug, really liking watching her this way, with no control over me.

“I can’t believe you’re being such a bitch,” she says, her voice getting louder. “I hope Darnell knows what kinda girl he’s getting.
If
he still wants your ass.”

I turn around to make sure the bathroom door is still closed. Because that’s the last thing I need right now, Adonna yelling
out Darnell’s name when Nana’s already convinced I was with him last night.

I lower my voice a little bit. “Leave Darnell outta this. It’s not about Darnell.”

“Then why don’t you keep Darnell and stay outta me and Nashawn’s business?”

I wanna say,
Nashawn is my business
. But I don’t. I can’t.

“Just go, Adonna. It’s not like I asked you to come here or anything.”

Adonna shakes her head while she looks at me. “You are such a baby. All that time I spent trying to get you to grow the fuck up and, look, you’re right back to where you were before, even after all the work I did.”

“The work
you
did?” I’m screaming now.

“Yeah, you don’t remember the way you used to look and dress? And
act
? Like a fucking retard. I didn’t even wanna be around you then. You embarrassed the shit outta me.”

“And what, you wanted to help me? Just so long as I didn’t end up looking as good as you, right?”

Adonna makes a short laugh, and she starts doing her neck. “You could never look as good—”

“That’s not what your
man
thinks.” Then I put my hand over my mouth. “Oops, that’s another secret.” I’m smiling now. “Your man probably didn’t tell you who was with him last night when you called him, did he?” I shake my head. “I am so bad at keeping secrets. I really need to work on this.”

As good as she is, trying to act like I’m not getting to her, she can’t do it. For a couple of seconds, it looks like she don’t even know what to say or do. But her eyes give her away. She’s mad as hell and she’s hurt. She can’t cover it up fast enough. I
mean, maybe her friends at school wouldn’t be able to tell, but I can.

“Where were y’all?” she asks. “Still at school? ’Cause I know he wanted to work out and you had that thing with the set.”

That last part is more to herself than me, and I don’t answer one way or another. Let her think what she wants. Whatever makes her happy.

“Oh, you’re not talking now?” she asks.

“If you really wanna know where we were, I’ll tell you, but you’re not gonna be happy, believe me.” When she don’t say anything one way or another, I just let it out. “I was at his house when you called.”

Adonna’s mouth flies open for a second before she catches herself and tries to act all cool again. “What are you talking about?”

But I’m not finished yet. “We were in his room. In his bed.”

She moves closer to me and, for a second, I think she’s gonna grab me or hit me or something. But she don’t. She just gets in my face and says, “You’re a ho now? Is that what you’re saying?” She’s practically spitting in my face, she’s so close.

I step back and say, “Why don’t you take your skanky ass outta here?”

“Look who’s talking!” she screams, moving closer to me again. “You wanna be a ho, fine. But least you could find your own man.”

That’s when the bathroom door opens and Nana practically flies out. She’s in a towel with a shower cap on her head, and she’s barefoot and still all wet.

“What is going on out here?” she yells, coming down the
hall. “Babe, Adonna—what’s all this screaming and carrying on about?”

Adonna puts her hands on her hips again. “Ask
her
!”

“Shut up,” I say, giving her a dirty look, warning her not to open her big mouth about anything in front of Nana.

Lucky for me, Nana don’t give her a chance to say anything. She goes straight for the front door and opens it, not even caring that she’s standing in front of the door with hardly any clothes on.

“Adonna, it’s time for you to go,” she says.

Adonna glares at me for another couple of seconds, then says to Nana, “You better talk to her. ’Cause the way she’s going, there’s gonna be another baby up in here.” And she turns and walks through the door like she’s all that.

Me, I just stand there. Heated. My heart is racing and I’m breathing hard. I’m scrambling, trying to figure out what just happened and why. Why did I tell Adonna all of that? What’s the matter with me?

I can’t sort things out fast enough, because Nana closes and locks the door. Then, just like I knew she would, she starts in on me. “What was that about?” Her voice is still raised. “I could hear you girls yelling and screaming from in the shower. Probably half the building heard y’all. Is this how I raised you? To act like
that girl
, whose own mother couldn’t raise a chicken with any kind of home training. And what the fuck does she mean, another baby? And don’t tell me ‘nothing’ or I swear to Christ I will go upside—”

My heart is still pumping and I can’t catch my breath. I look down at the floor for a few seconds, trying to find the right words to calm her down. But I can’t. It’s over.

So I just look up, stare her right in the eyes, and say, “Nothing.”

And she’s on me in half a second, using both hands to slap and punch me in the head and the face and, when I turn away, the back. “Tell me,” she keeps saying over and over. “You better tell me or I’m—” Her towel falls off, but that don’t even slow her down a little.

I’m crying, but I don’t know why, really. I mean, yeah, her punches are hurting, but it’s not like I didn’t expect this to happen. I knew I was gonna get it sooner or later. I had to with everything I been up to. Better to get it over with now.

But she don’t stop, and pretty soon I’m crying so hard I’m gasping for breath. I finally break away from her to go over to the couch and try to get some air. I’m panting so fast my chest hurts, but it’s still not working. And I’m waiting to see if she’s gonna come over and attack me again.

But she don’t. She takes her time wrapping the towel back around her and tucking it in on the side, her eyes on me the whole time. We’re staring at each other and I’m waiting for her to make her move. Tears are coming down my face so fast, it takes me a while to notice that she got them in her eyes, too.

Nana is crying.

I never saw that before. And while we stare at each other, I can swear she’s not looking all that mad anymore. She’s just looking at me. Finally, she says, “Why are you doing this? Why? I been doing so good with you, and now…” She shakes her head. “What did I do wrong this time?”

I put my head down in my lap and cry. I don’t know what to tell her. Why
did
I do this? I don’t know. All I know is, right
now I feel like everything is over. Done. I messed everything up and now I have nobody. Nothing. I’m empty.

“I put my whole life into raising you right,” she says, her voice a little softer. “I thought—I thought you were gonna turn out…different. I tried to—” She sighs loud, and when I look up at her, she just shakes her head again like she’s already giving up on me.

Tears and snot are running down my face like a baby, and I can’t help feeling like if I don’t stop crying now, I’m never gonna be able to. It just hurts so much.

Nana stands there staring at me for a couple more minutes and I can’t take the way she’s looking at me. Finally, she says, “Babe, go in my room and get my suitcase down from the top shelf in my closet. Then pack your clothes and school stuff, and make sure you take enough to last you ’til the end of the school year. You can get the rest of your things later.”

I look up at her, my heart feeling like it’s stopped beating.

“You’re throwing me out?” I say. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “I make one mistake, a couple of mistakes, and you’re just gonna—”

“You’re going to live with Renée,” Nana says, still looking at me with the saddest face I’ve ever seen on her. She takes a deep, heavy breath and says, “You need your mother now.” And her voice cracks a little bit when she says it.

“But—”

“Go pack while I call Renée.”

I get up from the couch and walk down the hall to Nana’s bedroom. I’m too tired to argue, and I don’t have anything left to say. Anyway, there’s no use trying to get Nana to change her mind. It’s already made up. I’m outta here.

Not even an hour later, I’m standing on the curb waiting for the cab to get here. The dispatcher called and said it was downstairs, but, of course, it’s not here yet. They always do that, just so they won’t have to wait for people, especially in the projects, where there’s always a broken elevator or something. But still, I’m not in the mood to wait, and I feel stupid just standing here like this.

It takes a while for Kenny to see me because a whole group of ten-year-olds is crowded around the truck, buying candy and drinks.

The cab pulls up a second before I hear Kenny call out, “Babe, wait up! Hold on!”

Hearing his voice, it hits me that I’m leaving here, leaving him. But I don’t cry or anything. I’m too exhausted. I’m practically numb.

The cabdriver pops the trunk but don’t even get out to help me with my suitcase. I start to lift the bag when Kenny runs over and helps me.

“What’s going on?” he asks. “Why you—where you—?”

I reach up and hug him tight. He holds me, but only for a couple of seconds. Then he pulls away and looks me in the eyes. “Where you going?”

I shake my head. “I’m going to Renée.”

His mouth is hung open, but I don’t feel like explaining. I mean, how can I talk about something I hardly understand myself?

“Let me take you,” he says. “We can get rid of the cab and—”

“No,” I say. “I wanna be alone right now. I’ll call you tomorrow, alright?”

I open the door and slide into the backseat before he can say anything else. He closes the door for me and I reach in my pocket and take out the little piece of paper that Nana gave me, the one with Renée’s address on it. Convent Avenue. I never even heard of it before.

Before the cab pulls off, I see Clyde getting outta his car, carrying something in his hands. Looks like a bottle of wine probably. And he’s smiling. All of a sudden, I can’t stand him. I mean, he don’t know it, but all of this is his fault. Because if it wasn’t for him, Nana wouldn’t have been so quick to throw me outta my house. She wouldn’t have had someone else to turn her attention to.

As we drive away from Bronxwood, I feel like I’m in some weird kinda zone. Not like I’m dreaming or anything, but like I’m in one of those movies Nana watches on the Abuse Channel. And this is the part where the sad, helpless girl is sent away from the only home she ever knew and has to face life on her own.
Of course, in those movies, right after the commercial break, the poor girl either gets raped, falls in love with a man that beats her, or ends up in a coma after some kinda stupid suicide attempt. And all the other choices are just as bad.

A couple of weeks ago, this was all I wanted, to be on my way to Renée’s new place, to be going to live with my mother. There wouldn’t have been all this drama. And I would have been happy about this.

I wanted Renée to want me to live with her and to want to be like a real mother to me, but now she’s just being forced to take me. Like, really, how’s that supposed to make me feel?

I lean my head back on the seat and try to close my eyes while the cab speeds across the Bronx. I don’t wanna look outta the window and get all sad as I see my neighborhood fly by. Even though I know the girl in the Lifetime movie would do that.

With my eyes closed, all I can think about is how much everything changed in the last two weeks, ever since Renée’s graduation. It’s like I was a different person or something. But the biggest change I can see is that I really don’t even need Renée anymore. Not like I used to.

It’s too late.

When the cab pulls up in front of the brownstone, I’m kinda surprised by how nice it looks, how the block looks, with all these four-story brownstones connected together, and all the steps on the outside. The whole neighborhood is clean and
quiet. No wonder Renée wanted to get away from Bronxwood and move here.

The cabdriver turns around and says, “That’s twenty-six dollars.”

“Huh?” I say, and it’s right then I realize that I don’t have any money on me. “Um, I…I need to…”

I start looking in my book bag, like some money is gonna magically be there. I keep my head down because I’m so embarrassed and scared, but I try to look calmer than I really am.

After two minutes of me pretending to look for my wallet, I pick my head up, trying to think of what to say to the cabdriver. But I don’t have to, because standing there at the top of the steps is Renée. She’s wearing a T-shirt, cutoff shorts, and flipflops. She comes down the steps to the cab, hands the driver some money, and waits for her change.

Meanwhile, I sit there watching Renée’s face, trying to figure out how she feels that I’m here. But I can’t tell. Her face isn’t giving anything away. So I get outta the car and knock on the trunk to remind the driver to pop it open for me. Then I have to get the suitcase out by myself because Renée don’t help at all. Matter of fact, by the time I get the suitcase out and close the trunk, Renée is back upstairs already.

I carry the suitcase onto the curb, wheel it the rest of the way, then make my way up the steps real slow. And when I get near the top, Renée holds the door open for me and I follow her up another flight of stairs and down the hall to what I guess is our apartment now.

When I step inside and look around, I can’t keep myself from saying out loud, “It’s tiny.”

“Told you,” Renée says, closing the door behind me.

Why did I even have to open my mouth? “No, I’m just saying…” I shake my head. “Forget it.”

The apartment is really all just one room, and not a very big one either. Renée brought all the furniture from her apartment in Princeton—the futon, the TV, the little wooden crates she painted and made into coffee tables. Her small white bookcases are here, too, but there aren’t any books in them yet. And there are boxes stacked up all over the place and lots of mess from the move.

Off in one corner is the kitchen, which is kinda separate from the rest of the room, but just as little. There’s a small table in there with only two chairs, and there are already two plates set out for us and a couple of cartons of Chinese food.

I walk farther into the room and put my book bag down on the floor. Right then, the bathroom door opens up and Gerard comes out. He smiles when he sees me.

“Kendra,” he says. “How’s it going?”

“Okay,” I answer, like getting thrown outta my house by my own grandmother is just great. “And you?”

“Good. Good.” He looks around the room. “Lot of work getting all this stuff in here, up all those stairs.” He laughs a little. Then he turns to Renée and asks, “You want me to set up the Aerobed before I go?”

“Can you?”

“That’s what I’m here for.”

I watch him find the box marked
AEROBED
,
PUMP
,
TOWELS
and lift it onto the floor. The one thing about Renée is that all of her boyfriends are fine. She definitely knows how to pick them. Gerard is tall, dark-skinned, and so muscular it’s not even
funny. His arms are huge, and I can see the six-pack through his T-shirt.

Gerard has to move the futon over to make room for the Aerobed on the floor. As he starts to inflate it, I stand there thinking,
Is that gonna be where I sleep from now on? I don’t even get a real bed?

But, really, there’s no room for a real bed in here.

There’s no room for me.

I don’t know what to do with myself. Renée hasn’t even looked at me, I don’t think. And every time I look at her, her face is blank. I don’t know if she really don’t have any feeling for me being there, or if she’s holding it all in because Gerard is there.

When the bed is inflated, Gerard grabs his duffel bag off the floor and zips it up. “Well, I’d better get going,” he says, slinging it over his back.

And for the first time, I can see something in Renée’s face. Her eyes kinda get duller, sadder, and her voice comes out a little softer. “You sure you don’t want to eat something before you go?” she asks him, and then bites on her bottom lip a little bit.

“I’m okay,” Gerard says. “I’ll come by tomorrow and help you some more.” He goes over to her and puts his arm around her. “You alright?”

She nods.

He leans closer to her and whispers a little too loud, “You can do this.”

She nods again.

Then he kisses her on the lips. I look away and walk over to the other side of the room ’til I hear Gerard say, “Take care, Kendra.”

I turn back around and tell him bye, and it’s not ’til he’s gone that I get it. He was gonna spend the night with Renée. And I’m the one that messed up their plans.

I stand there, not knowing what to say to Renée. She’s my mother and I don’t know how to talk to her. I’m not comfortable around her. Even in this tiny apartment, we’re on opposite sides of the room.

Finally, she looks at me, and now I see it, her anger. She folds her arms in front of her and her eyes narrow in on me.

“Are you going explain this to me?” she asks. “Because I don’t understand any of it.”

“I don’t know,” I say, shrugging, not sure what’s left to explain. “What did Nana tell you on the phone?”

“She said, ‘I’m putting Babe in a cab. I hope you have money to pay the man.’”

“And I’m here,” I say.

“I see that.” She keeps staring at me, and the look on her face is like she’s asking me,
Who are you?

But after today, I’m asking myself the same question. About myself. Because I don’t really know that girl back at Bronxwood, the one that acted like that with Adonna and Nana.

Renée throws her hands up in the air. “Well, I don’t know what my mother expects me to do with you.”

I’m
your
daughter
, I wanna say—but, as usual, I don’t. Not because I’m scared but because I know if I say that, she’s just gonna get madder than she already is. And even though I don’t need her anymore, not in that way, I wanna try to make this work because I’m running outta places to go.

So I do the only thing I can think to do. I tell her I have to go to the bathroom, and fly outta the room at top speed. In the
bathroom, I take a whole bunch of deep breaths and try to calm myself down. When I woke up this morning, no way could I ever think that I would be here tonight. It’s too much.

I mean what’s it gonna be like now, both of us living here?

Two strangers.