The Busting Out of an Ordinary Man (2 page)

Phyllisine shook her head sadly, knowing that he was probably eating his first meal of the day.

She backed into the high stool behind the counter, her eyes still on the door, the jangling bell above it, her thoughts still on the little boy.

Well, at least mine don't have to go through that. Maybe Momma made a good choice after all.

She gazed around the store, a momma 'n poppa affair with two aisles and a small meat display counter.

Yeahhhh, maybe Momma did do the right thing.

Her stepfather, never called anything but ol' man Jackson, the geechee, clanged through the door with a crate on his shoulder.

“Why don'cha git off that stool 'n come 'elp me?!” he called to her in his West Indian singsong.

Phyllisine, her thoughts jarred by his sudden entrance, stumbled as she dismounted the stool.

“Huh! What did you say?” she asked him.

“What's the matter, ya hard o' 'earin'? I said, come 'elp me!”

She skirted the edge of the counter, grinding her teeth together even after five years, she still found it hard to understand ol' man Jackson sometimes, especially when he got excited and his Barbadan dialect thickened.

He was already inside the store with the crate; what did he want? She stood in front of him, hands clasped behind her back, a question mark on her face.

“'Urry up oat dere 'n git that large brunn bag in the front seat o' the truck, make it quick else the dahm thieves'll bee'cha to it.”

Phyllisine hurried out to his many dented pickup truck, rubbing her arms, suddenly chilled by the late afternoon cool. She struggled to pull the shopping bag from the cab of the truck, cursing under her breath.

“'Urry it up, Phyllisine! We ain't got ahl day!” ol' man Jackson yelled as he rushed to pull the burglar guard mesh across the front of the store.

Phyllisine muscled the sack of potatoes out and struggled into the store with them. She looked hatefully at her step-father's back as he quickly removed the day's take from the register, scurried around, checking the alarm system, turning off lights.

“Where you want me to put these?” He turned to her and, with that surprising burst of warmth that caught her off balance so often, said, “Ohhh, just leave 'em dere, ahl'll dump 'em in the bin tomorra'.”

She watched him carefully reach into the meat display counter and give a final pat to the long, meat-loaf shaped piece of sausage he had brought in, that and the two dozen half-stale steaks cleverly covering each other, the result of dealing with the neighborhood dope fiends.

Damn, he really moves quick for an old dude, she thought, watching him scurry around one last time.

“Ahl set t' go?”

Phyllisine nodded affirmatively in the dim light, anxious to get outside, to find out what had gone down during the time she had been locked up.

“Where's your mother?” he asked abruptly as he slammed the guard mesh together and padlocked it.

“She's upstairs with the kids.”

Ol' man Jackson frowned slightly, went over to the curb to make certain his truck was locked and returned to Phyllisine standing at the foot of the steps leading to their apartment over the store, growling, “You mean t' say thot she left ya dohn'ere ahl by yerself in the store?”

“Not all day, she was down in the mornin' and then I spelled her in the afternoon.”

Ol' man Jackson, frowning, started up the steps mumbling, “Ah don' lak dat, should be a grown up in the store at ahl times, ahl times.”

He was at the top of the steps before he realized she wasn't behind him.

“Ya comin' up or not?” he asked, his question as blunt and gruff as the rest of his actions.

“Uhhh, nawwww, not right now. I'm gon' walk over to Mary Jo's for awhile.”

“Well, don' stay too long, ya know 'ow ya mother gets when ya leave 'er alone with the kids too long.”

“I ain't gon' be long,” she answered, easing away down the street. He entered the hallway of their building and slammed the door behind him.

Should be a grown up in the store at ahl times, ahl times. She corrected her thought. Shit! What was she, if she wasn't grown? What did it take beyond having two babies and being eighteen years old to be considered a grown up? She dug her hands into her pockets, stepping into the brisk evening breezes, having no definite place to go.

Mary Jo's was a lame excuse. Mary had gotten strung out two years ago and disappeared, but neither Mr. Jackson nor her mother knew, they didn't care to know, being so busy trying to make ends meet.

Daddy! Maybe I'll run into him, he's usually someplace around the Dew Drop 'round about this time.

She walked a little faster, feeling happier about the possibility of seeing her father.

“Heyyy, Phyllisine! Phyllisine!” Billy Woods called to her from across the street. She watched him, a neutral expression on her face, dodge around and between cars, to reach her.

Billy Woods, almost a brother to her, from living in the same neighborhood so long, she felt but somehow the point was never fully conveyed to Billy.

“Where you on your way?” he asked, trying to be cool about it.

She almost lied but thought better of it, why lie?

“I was just takin' a lil' walk.”

“Any place special?”

“Uhhh, not really,” she answered, looking away into the distance.

“I'm goin' your way.”

“I'd really much rather be by myself,” she said coldly.

Billy's eyes wandered over her body before he coughed deep in his throat, trying to cover up the slap to his macho.

“Right on! I can dig where you comin' from,” he replied lamely, trying to save face. “Everybody needs some time to be by theyselves.”

Phyllisine turned away from him, feeling a little embarrassed for him, but felt she was doing the right thing. After all, she didn't dig him, she knew exactly what he was after, and she wasn't going to give him any so why jive? Billy Woods, like most of the dudes in and around the neighborhood wanted to cop Phyllisine Why not? The damage had already been done, and what was left just had to be pure jelly.

Billy looked wistfully at her full, taut buttocks as she strolled away.

Phyllisine, aware that he was following her movement, tried to tighten the roll of her hips, but failed.

These jiveass motherfuckers! All they want is a piece o' pussy, ain't gon' do shit to help with your kids or anything, bunch a' chickenshit niggers! Momma's right! Niggers ain't shit!

She walked past Big Momma's window, crossed the street in front of Lubertha's apartment building, thought about Mayflower's death as she passed his building and turned the corner.

The Dew Drop Inn glared at her from the end of the block, drew her like a neon magnet.

What do I say to him if I run into him? she asked herself, slowing down despite the deepening chill.

She never felt really capable of handling herself when the mood came down on her, the mood to see her father; long ago, when she had been pregnant with a rapist's baby, her father came around with three other men, asking her to tell them who had raped her. She never told them because she didn't know, but she did know that Chu-man was the father of the second one, the one they had had trying to forget the traumatic experience of the rape.

Chu-man Chu-man the thought of him made her jam her hands deeper into her pockets. What had he said in his last letter? “Soon as I get out, we going to get it together, for real!”

She peeked into the bar hesitantly, blinking her eyes in the semi-dark.

“He ain't here, honey!” a buxom woman in a champagne colored Afro wig called out to her. “I'm lookin' for 'im myself, wid his raunchy ass!”

Phyllisine ignored the raucous laughter that spilled out at her, turned and started back home.

Of all people, why did I have to see that bitch of his!

“Hey looka'here, Miss Lady … lemme buy you a drink?” a tricky voiced, superfly type sang out to her softly from the interior of his gangster whitewalls at the curb.

She nodded no-thanks quickly and began walking faster, getting away from the sly looks, the chilliness of the air and the rapidly descending darkness.

Too bad that ol' man Jackson ain't like my real father so cool, so smooth, so hip. Oh well, I guess you can't have everything. At least we got a roof over our heads and food every day. Momma knows what she's doin'.

Rudolph Little, alias Rappin' Rudy, fumbled with three of his books, dropped them on the sidewalk as he made his way down the steps from his third floor apartment, cursed, picked them up and rushed past Phyllisine to get the 7:15 downtown.

“Hi, Rudy!” Phyllisine spoke coyly to him as he dashed past.

“Oh, hey Phyll, what's happenin'!” he replied, not really caring to know pre-law, the current government scandals involving so many lawyers, the American judicial setup, decisions of the Supreme Court from 1925 to 1965, and a dozen jurisprudential matters on his brain, in addition to the fact that he was running late again. He was at the corner before he fully realized that he had spoken to Phyllisine.

Wowwww! I gotta slow down a lil' taste! For Phyllisine? he probed himself as the bus approached, nawww, not for her, fine as she is, for myself She ain't into nothin', with two crumbcrushers and no ambition.

Yeahhh, I better slow down for my own good.

He mounted the bus steps with two jumps, dropped his coins into the fare box and dashed to the back of the bus, determined to read one more chapter before class.

The bus moved along, lurching and jerking, making it harder for him to concentrate.

Miss Rabbit sat across from Lena Daniels at her kitchen table, sipping strong, black coffee and listening to Lena, cocking her left eyebrow into an inverted V from time to time, as Lena rapped to her about a developing problem.

“So, that's why you see, I just can't have no mo' babies, not right in through here, anyway.”

Miss Rabbit countered her bold, questioning plea for help with an oblique glance at the sampler above her kitchen stove. God Bless This Home.

“God Bless This Home,” she read slowly, moving her full lips slightly. “So, now whatchu wont me t' do, Lena?”

Lena Daniels twisted her gold wedding band around twice, three times, five times, nervously. “I want you to help me out, Miss Rabbit … I know you can, I just don't know what t' do,” she added, a pathetic curl to her tone.

“How you know I can help you?” Miss Rabbit asked sharply, her eyes narrowed in a threatening way. “Somebody tol' you I could?”

“Oohhh no, no, Miss Rabbit! ain't nobody tol' me nothin' about what you can uhh could do, nobody!”

“Well then, if that's the case, what made you come t' me with your problem?”

Lena Daniels' eyes darted from one corner of the room to another, settled down finally on the coffee cup in front of her as she spoke in a low monotone. “'Member a few years back, when Jim was messin' off all his money 'n foolin' 'round in the streets?”

Miss Rabbit released a satisfied smile at the memory of her constructive interference. “Daggoned right I remember, got 'im squared away quite nicely, as I recollect.”

“'Member how you blessed Jimbo 'n Suki-man? after they came down with whatever it was they had, and they got well had the doctor all confused and everything.”

Miss Rabbit's smile broadened, showing seven dark, empty spaces strategically arranged in her teeth. “Uhm huhn, 'course I remember all that,” she answered slyly.

“Miss Rabbit, I just can't have this baby!” Lena burst out, her eyes glassy with frustration and tears.

Miss Rabbit leaned toward her, patted her arm maternally, reassuringly, sat back in her chair, lit a cigarette and smoked half of it before saying anything.

“Lena,” she began heavily, “you know, doin' somethin' like you talkin' about doin' is damn serious.”

Lena nodded solemnly in agreement. “I know it is, Miss Rabbit. I know it is, but we got six now, and you know how hard times is.”

Miss Rabbit nodded in turn, stabbed her cigarette out and lit another one. She took four slow, deliberate drags. “Tell ya what, honey today is Monday, lemme thank 'n pray on it for a couple days.”

A look of deep gratitude washed across Lena Daniels' full face as she reached across the table impulsively, to grab Miss Rabbit's hand.

“Don't be gettin' all het up 'n everythang!” she spoke in a semi-stern voice, “I didn't say I'd do anythang, I just said I'd pray on it.”

Lena's look of gratitude became a bit more guarded, but refused to fully slip away. “I understand, Miss Rabbit whatever you decide will be o.k. with me,” she said and uncoiled herself from the chair.

Miss Rabbit took a full, professional look at her waistline. “'Bout three full months gone, huh?”

“Just about to the day.”

“Well,” Miss Rabbit rose with a sigh, “that ain't too turrible bad.”

She shuffled the few steps to the back door with Lena, her arm draped lovingly around the younger woman's waist.

“You know somethin', Miss Rabbit,” Lena said to her as she was about to take her first step out of the door.

“What's that, honey?”

“Sometimes sometimes I wish you had raised me.”

Miss Rabbit's stem-gentle features softened. “Gon' girl! git outta here 'n mind them chillun o' yourn!” She scolded her gruffly, ill at ease with Lena's thought.

Lena smiled, understanding.

Miss Rabbit watched her make it down to the alley before closing the door.

She shuffled back over to the kitchen stove, reheated the coffee, poured another cup, sat down at the table and began to cry. A quiet trail of tears spilled down alongside her nose, over her high cheeks, as she wrestled with the deep problem of taking the life from Lena Daniels, of destroying something that nobody but God had a right to destroy.