The Speed Queen (11 page)

Sorry, I'm getting a little ahead of myself there. I start telling that story and I can't stop.

We were married before I started to show. It's not hard to figure out, all you have to do is count backwards. I won't lie; a lot of things overlap in here, like me already being pregnant at that Christmas party, or the other arrest. I'm sure you've got that too.

What's important is that we stuck together through all of that stuff.

Sister Perpetua says love endures, and that's what Lamont and me did—we endured each other. I still am. After everything that happened, if he pulled up and opened that door for me again, I'd still get in.

It's funny though. When I'm driving, I'm always by myself.

I never thought I'd get married. I never thought I'd have a kid. These weren't things I wanted right then. They weren't things I'd think about the way some girls I knew did. It was all kind of a surprise.

Lamont proposed to me at the Saturday flea market at the Sky-Vue Drive-In. We were at this booth where this old guy sold knives and cast-iron skillets and bleached steer skulls. Him and his wife sat in plastic lawn chairs under a canopy off of their camper; they never got up unless you had your money out. They had a bunch of old campaign buttons and pocket watches and Mexican coins in a glass-topped box, and in there was this pearl ring. The pearl had colors all swirled around in it, the way oil makes a rainbow on water.

"That's pretty," I said, to see what Lamont thought.

"How much is it?" he said.

The little tag was turned over.

Lamont got the man up. His hands were big, his fingers square as fish sticks.

"Four hundred dollars," he said, and held the glass top open like it was a question.

"Can we see it?" Lamont said. I don't know why; we couldn't afford it.

The man pinched it up by the band.

Lamont tried to take it with two fingers but he missed. It dropped in the dust under the table, and he knelt down to look for it. He had it before I could help him, but he didn't get up. He stayed there on one knee and held the ring out to me. And then he proposed. He said it just like you always hear.

People walking by were staring at us. People stopped. The old man's wife got up From her chair to see better. I didn't know what to say. We'd been fighting all week about how I hadn't told my mom yet, and now here he was being sweet. It was his baby, he knew that. I did love him. He was all I had.

"Yes," I said, "I will," and the people around us clapped.

Lamont slipped the ring on my finger, price tag and all. I still have that tag. It's going to go to Gainey. I'm keeping the ring.

When I told my mom, she didn't say anything at first. I had to repeat it.

"I heard you," she said. "I'm just trying to think."

"We're going to have a baby."

"I knew there was a reason," she said. "I was hoping that wasn't it. What does this boy do?"

It was going okay, I thought. She could have just hung up.

"Will you come?" I asked her.

"It would be nice if I had a little warning."

We didn't say anything then.

"Of course I will," she said. "What kind of mother would miss her daughter's first wedding?"

"So?" Lamont said when I got off

"She's coming."

"Is that what you want?"

"Of course," I said. "Why wouldn't I?"

That Friday we got married at Edmond City Hall. My mom gave me her dress. It was yellowed and smelled of mothballs but it fit. Lamont rented a tux. We picked up my mom on the way. She wore blue, and hadn't had her hair tinted. I flipped the seat up so she could get in back. She reached between us to shake Lamont's hand.

"Nice to meet you," he said.

"Just don't be like the last one," she said.

Lamont gave me a look, and I shrugged like I didn't know what was going on. I knew we'd fight about it that night, but right then I didn't want to get into it. Nothing was going to ruin my wedding day.

We were there early. My mom was our only witness so we borrowed the lady from the Traffic Bureau. In the pictures she's the only one smiling.

We decided on Las Vegas for our honeymoon, but we didn't have enough money. We got all the maps and tour books from the Triple A, and at night after work we'd lay them out on the coffee table and go.

"The Sahara," I'd say.

And Lamont would go, "We're playing seven-card stud and drinking Jack and Coca-Cola."

"Pepsi."

"Okay. We're at the Sands — "

"We're playing blackjack and eating the free sandwiches. We're at the Flamingo — "

"We're winning. We've got all these silver dollars from hitting the slots, and instead of blowing it, we go upstairs and pour them all over the bed."

"Then what?" I'd say, and he'd pick me up and carry me into the bedroom and kick the door shut behind us.

After a while, we didn't even make it to Vegas. We'd get off 40 and stop at the Petrified Forest or the Painted Desert or the Grand Canyon. The overlooks were empty, the sunset throwing shadows. We stopped in the middle of Hoover Dam and climbed onto the roof and pulled off each other's shorts. Lamont's bikinis fell until we couldn't see them. The vinyl was warm against my

back. Lake Mead was upside down and blue.

"I love you, Marjorie," he said. "I love you so much." And I believed him. Because it was true then.

I wouldn't say my relationship with my mom got better while I was pregnant. We talked now, and sometimes I'd visit her, but she wouldn't come to our apartment and she wouldn't talk to Lamont. Whenever he answered the phone, she'd ask if I was there, and if I wasn't, she wouldn't stay on. She called him "he" and "that boy of yours," as in "What would your father think of that boy of yours?"

She came to Casa Mia just once, for my shower. Garlyn was drunk and spilled the guacamole on the carpet. She started bawling and swabbing at it with her hands.

"I'm sorry," she said, "I'm just losing one of my best friends in the whole world."

My mom swooped in with a wooden spoon and a bowl. In the kitchenette, she said, "I can't believe anyone would come to something this nice in that condition."

"She's my friend," I said. "And that u her condition."

"She reminds me of someone we both knew before she cleaned up her act."

"My life is not an act," I said.

"That's not what I meant, and you know it."

We both said some things then. The kitchenette was right next to the living room, there was a bar in between. Garlyn came over to apologize; she was still crying. She wanted to hug my mom but I got in between them.

"I don't know what you're thinking," my mom said later. She was on her knees, scrubbing at the green stain. "You're not doing her any favors by putting up with it."

"What am I supposed to do, write her off?"

"Are you saying that's what I did with you?"

"I'm not saying anything," I said. "Why is it that every time we talk about anything it always comes back to me and you?"

She quit and walked past me and ran water onto the sponge. "I don't know why you invited me here if you're just going to treat me this way."

"What way?"

"Maybe it would be better if we just spoke to each other on the phone."

"Maybe it would," I said.

She got her purse and checked to make sure she had exact change for the bus. "Well," she said at the door, "it's been pleasant."

"For both of us," I said.

But here, listen to this. Out of everyone, my mom was the only one who came to my trial. Every day she had a new outfit on and her hair looked just done. Mr. Jefferies said it was important to show the jury that I had people who believed in me, and he called her and she came. She got a babysitter for Gainey and sat right behind us in the first row with the people Mr. Jefferies hired. And she didn't have to, she could have just stayed home.

I'd see her on TV, trying to get through all the cameramen, trying to smile. Mr. Jefferies said she didn't have to answer their questions but she did. She said some of the nicest things about me on TV.

I remember once she said, "Even if she did all those things they say she did, she is still my daughter."

And I think she meant it, no matter what happened after that.

I think she'll be awake at midnight, listening to KOMA's live broadcast from outside the main gate. She'll be waiting For Mr. Jefferies to call.

And then what will she do? Will she turn the light off and roll over and look at the moon? Will she sit there with the light on and open the Bible I sent her? She could do anything. She could go downstairs and make a sandwich at the kitchen table. She could walk out into the backyard and fall on her knees in the grass. But she won't. I know my mom enough to expect something quiet and private that makes sense to her. Something dignified.

There's a phone here I'm allowed to use, and when it gets close I'll call her. Three years ago when I was close, she answered and said she had nothing to say to me. I scared her, I think, after all those years. I don't expect anything different now, but it would be cruel not to.

I know what I'll say —the same thing as last time. "It wasn't your fault," I'll say. "You did everything you could. Mom," I'll say, "I love you." And I won't wait then. I won't hurt both of us. I'll just say goodbye and hang up.

See, I knew you'd have this one too. Mr. Jefferies tried to use this at the trial. I didn't want him to, but he said it was our best chance. Even though we were both arrested that time, he said the jury would blame Lamont because he was a man. It was even better that I was pregnant then. He was afraid my pictures wouldn't be admitted as evidence. He didn't expect the prosecution to use Lamont's.

The report doesn't say what started it, it just says "domestic disturbance." That was a big question during the trial, but since Mr. Jefferies didn't want me on the stand, no one could answer it. What started the disturbance is that Lamont found a pint of Popov's in my bag. I knew it was wrong but I was so low, just sitting in the apartment all day, waddling downstairs to the hot laundry room. I needed something to keep me going.

I was in the kitchen making dinner when he came up behind me.

"What's this?" he said, and held up the bottle.

I looked at it and all I saw was the two inches I wasn't going to get to drink.

"Must be an old one," I said.

"It was in your purse."

"What were you doing in my purse?"

"Don't lie to me," he said. He leaned in to smell my breath, and I pushed him away. I had a big slotted spoon in my hand for the string beans, and when he grabbed my other arm, I hit him with it.

He ripped it out of my hand and slapped me, knocking me back against the stove. I got ahold of the kettle and bonked him on the shoulder; the water went all over the place. I threw the kettle at his face and ran for the bedroom.

"I don't know where you think you're going," he called after me, because the door was gone; the landlord never fixed it.

I grabbed the lamp from the nightstand and threw it just as he came in. He was ready for me; he had a folding chair like a lion tamer. The lamp shattered against it. He dropped it and covered his face, swearing. There was blood between his fingers.

I groped in the drawer and came up with a flashlight.

"Why do you want to fight?" I said. I was crying and holding the flashlight up like a club.

He was still holding his face. I didn't think he could see, so I tried to run by him.

He caught hold of my blouse. I twisted and it ripped, and I had to hit him. The third time, the top of the flashlight came off and the batteries flew out. One of them cracked the mirror on the headboard. Lamont tell halt onto the bed and rolled off, one arm caught underneath him. There was blood in his hair but I didn't stick around to see it he was all right.

I ran downstairs to our landlord Mrs. Wertz and banged on her door, but she wouldn't answer. Finally some old guy down the hall stuck his head out and said she was with the police over in B building. They were there because someone was fighting.

They were in the parking lot behind B. They had a guy in the back of the car and the gal with them, holding a towel to her mouth. When the first cop saw me, he said, "You with her?"

They made me stand on the landing while they went in to get Lamont. They had their guns out and everything. A minute later, one of them came back.

"Is he all right?" I said.

"I'm going to have to ask you to turn around," he said.

"Is he okay?"

"He's unconscious, ma'am. Now if you'll place your hands behind your head with your fingers knitted together."

They arrested Lamont too, but he got to go to Baptist. That's why his picture is him on the stretcher. I was arraigned and made bail in time to be there when he woke up.

He had a bandage around his head like a soldier. They said one cheekbone was broken and he had a concussion but otherwise he was fine. The skin around his eyes was the color of grape jelly, and sitting there looking at him, I swore that I would hurt the person that had done this to him, that somehow I would get rid of her.

How did our life change after the baby? We were busier. We didn't sleep or make love as much, and I was stuck at home while Lamont got to go to work. It was quiet, and I got to read a lot, but the only people I talked to all day were clients who came by for an eighth and stayed five minutes.

Gainey wouldn't take my milk, and that was a hard thing. I was tired of being thrown up on. My stomach was mush; my breasts hurt. In a weird way. I wished I was still pregnant. I started smoking again, and I knew Lamont was going through my shoeboxes. He was good about changing Gainey and feeding him dinner, but the baths and the laundry and all the rest of it was up to me. When Gainey cried in the middle of the night, Lamont wasn't good enough for him. My mom said I was lucky, that my dad never touched a diaper.

"I'm sorry," Lamont said, "I wish I didn't have to go to work either."

"It's when you are here," I said. "That's when I need your help."

He'd remember for a little bit, then he'd go back to ignoring me.

One day he came home while Gainey was taking a nap and found me crying on the couch. I couldn't stop.

"What happened?" he asked. "Marjorie, what's wrong?"

He held me by the shoulders and looked at me like I'd gone crazy, and I felt sorry for him, stuck with a crazy woman.

"What's wrong?" he said.

It was just my life, I wanted to say, but then he'd say he loved me and that we had a beautiful baby —things I couldn't feel bad about. How could I explain that that was why I was crying?

"Marjorie," he said, "come on."

"I don't know," I finally said. "I don't know. Nothing. I'm just tired."

It got better when Gainey started sleeping through the night, but still I felt tired all the time. When he went down for his afternoon nap, I'd take a carton of ice cream down from the freezer and skim a line off the top of an eighth and lay it out on the coffee table. You'd feel it pinch in the back of your nose and then drip down your throat all bitter. I'd put the stereo on low and run in place tor halt an hour, then do two hundred sit-ups. Before my shower I'd weigh myself and check my stomach in the mirror. The water there was great in the middle of the day. I'd turn it up as hot as I could stand.

Right there's two things I miss —privacy and water pressure.

Gainey would be getting up just as I finished drying my hair. I'd see if he needed changed, and then we'd play on the couch until Lamont got home.

"Anything happen here?" Lamont would ask, and I'd tell him who came by. At dinner I'd push my food around till you could see the middle of the plate. I did the dishes, so he never caught on.

I started doing two lines, then three. Instead of skimming, I just kept an eighth for myself and raised the price. It took him a few weeks to notice how flat my stomach was, and that was in bed; the next day he didn't say anything.

My mom did, though. I hadn't seen her in a month or so when I took Gainey over to Kickingbird Circle. It was April and in the eighties, so I wore shorts. The Underwoods already had their sprinklers going. I rang the bell. When she opened the door, she looked at Gainey first, then turned to me and just stopped.

"Oh my God," she said.

"What?" I said, cause she was staring. She touched my cheek like she couldn't see me.

"You're not drinking again."

"No," I said. "I'm all done with that."

"Then what is it — drugs?"

I laughed like she was being silly, and kissed her. I lied right to her face, though we both knew the truth.