It was strange stepping off the plane and standing face-to-face with a tall, brown, slim man I recognized but didn’t know. I looked just like him, especially around the eyes. Just seeing my daddy looking older with gray hair in his beard, around his hairline, made me forget everything wrong, made me feel like a kid with a big bag of candy.
That rich voice of his came to me with a smile. “Hey, Dana.”
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to call you.”
“Well, whatever makes you comfortable: Chuck, Charles, or Daddy.”
“Nice to see you again, Daddy.”
I didn’t know if I was supposed to hug him or shake his hand, didn’t know how to touch him, but he gave me hugs to go with his smiles, told me how much I looked like a woman and resembled his momma. My grin was so wide it hurt my face.
He carried my bag, opened my door for me, sat me in that clean Cadillac of his, then cruised me out into the sunshine. On the way to his Cococabana, the warm breeze was pleasure on my skin. We drove through Fort Lauderdale, passed by buildings that didn’t block the skyline, a bazillion
Miami Vice
-looking palm trees, headed into Pembroke Pines, a section called Town Gate.
Older people were cutting grass, getting tans. Everybody had their own yard. Kids didn’t have to scrape up their knees playing on asphalt.
As he pulled up, I stared at a breathtaking stucco house and its Spanish tile roofs, a bodacious crib on the edge of a lake, hidden inside a spanking brand-new community. I took a deep breath and asked him, “This is your house?”
“Yep.”
“Wow. Where do you work?”
“Me and a friend own a couple of auto-repair shops. One in Fort Lauderdale, another one not too far from the house.”
“You must be making a grip.”
He gave up an unsure smile. I guess he thought a sister was about to start asking him for money. I wasn’t. Not my style to beg. I sold cakes, pies, did whatever I could, so I had my own money. Besides, Momma had already told me not to stick my hands in his pockets. I was just wondering what it would take for me to get a life like the one he had.
That’s what I wanted. That’s part of what I want.
While he kept on being a gentleman and grabbed my suitcase from the trunk, I stared at his house with my mouth wide open. I was in a dream, imagining him asking me to live with him. Spending time making up for lost time. I really did.
His wife came down the stairs like she was Norma Desmond in
Sunset Boulevard
, smiling like she was ready for Mr. DeMille to shoot her close up. She was around the same age as my momma, early forties. A pretty woman with a Texan accent. The skank gave my jeans the once-over, did the same with my mix-matched luggage, gawked like I was a Cambodian refugee.
“So, you must be Dana.”
“Nice to meet you, Ann.”
The heifer wagged her finger at me. “Never call me Ann. I’m old enough to be your mother. You may call me Mrs. Smith.”
“And you may get your finger out of my face.”
She chuckled, folded her hands in front of herself.
I stayed eye to eye. That was over before it started.
His other kids came down the stairs like they were a negrofied Brady Bunch. They checked me out like I was Thelma on
Good Times
. They had quite a spread. A living room damn near larger than our apartment. Five bedrooms. Three-car garage. Three and a half bathrooms. Two family rooms. Getting carpooled to karate lessons, piano lessons, gymnastic classes, all kinds of toys.
But most of all, they had Daddy.
I looked at all he had done for them, at all he’d done for his wife, then thought about what he hadn’t done for me, what he’d never do for my momma. When a man met a woman worthy of being his queen, he showered her with gifts. And he’d showered a hurricane of blessings on his family. That let me know not to ever depend on him. On any man. That was a hard lesson, probably the best lesson my daddy ever taught me.
So the world my daddy was living in was—that existence that had weird pictures by Salvador Dali all over the place, unnatural pictures of melting clocks . . . I dunno—was strange to me. Why would anybody spend all that money on a picture of a melting clock?
I didn’t get upset with my dad then.
That didn’t come until after we hopped on a red-eye flight and headed to Harlem. He was going to kick it with his friends in Brooklyn.
Momma met us at the door of our fifth-floor walk-up. I kissed her and went in. Our apartment seemed so small, compared to his southern plantation. His neighbors had been so quiet. All day every day, right outside my window were all kinds of noises: buses, people yelling, sirens.
I hate long good-byes, so I held back my feelings, gave him a hug, told him thanks for the birthday trip. Momma had this strange look in her eye, said that they had to talk for a minute. She had said a few things, told my daddy that she was working at Random House, but wasn’t making a lot of money and was thinking about moving on. At that point I assumed their conversation was going to be about money.
I showered.
When I was done, Daddy’s luggage was gone. The living room was dark. Momma was in bed, the glow from her nightstand light slipping underneath the door; that meant she was reading.
I yawned, tapped on her door as I passed by. “Nite, Momma.”
“Nite, Dana.”
I stared at that empty spot where Daddy had left his luggage. Didn’t know when I’d see him again. Sadness went through my body in nonstop waves. But after I stole a little bit of Momma’s wine out of the fridge, sleep took away the sadness and pulled me into a world with no dreams.
I woke up in the middle of the night when these ghostly noises, these moans and groans, crept into my room. Sounds that came from Momma’s bedroom. Momma’s catlike whines. She’d never let hard times with one man keep her from moving on to another. I thought that the man she’d been seeing had come over to spend the night.
My bladder was talking to me when I woke up, so I headed to the bathroom. When I passed her door, I heard her sing out my daddy’s name.
I stood there shaking.
With the sunrise came the street noises outside my window. The city was one loud-ass alarm clock. Momma was up early, sounded like she was tap-dancing and singing while she cooked breakfast—Momma
never
cooked breakfast. Heard her moving around, talking to my daddy. I stayed in my room. Wanted to stay sequestered until I was sure he was gone.
Momma called me to come eat breakfast. I didn’t answer. Then she said my name in her no-nonsense, I-know-you-heard-me tone, the one that made me hop up, grab jeans and a T-shirt, and get moving.
I went out into the living room, our front room that was smaller than my old man’s southern-fried foyer. Me and Momma looked at each other.
My lips were turned down, hers pursed.
She was defensive: “Now, you know if he had left here in the middle of the night, fools down there would have mugged your daddy before he got out the building.”
“We have a sofa,” I retorted. “How could you?”
Softly she said, “He’s your father. Don’t act up.”
Daddy came out of the bathroom, freshly showered, looking embarrassed, all duded up in blue linen pants and a beige cotton shirt, ready to eat and run to take care of his business in Brooklyn. I sat in the middle chair.
With a difficult smile he said, “Morning, Dana.”
“Daddy, what you did was wrong.”
That jarred him, stunned Momma.
“Momma, how could you? He’s married. You know you’re gonna be upset when he walks out that door and goes back to his wife—”
Daddy said, “Respect your mother.”
I tilted my head sideways like that RCA Victor dog, dropped my fork, and snapped, “Respect? I know you’re not trying to come into my life and act like you have some real authority. Momma has done everything.”
That wasn’t exactly what I said, but that was whatever words jumped out of my mouth meant. My head was about to pop. I went off. I didn’t throw my head to the sky and break into a Klingon death howl, just stayed firm and vented about how he had been living, all the stuff he’d done for his kids.
Momma was telling me to stop it, but I kept on reading him the riot act, told him how fucked up it was that he never responded to my letters, how many of my birthdays he’d missed, went over every lie I remembered.
I said, “You’re a coward. A liar. And since you spent the night in my momma’s room, I guess I can call you a thief too.”
Nope, my teenage words didn’t come out exactly like that, not that crisp and articulate, but I do know that liar, thief, and coward were in there holding hands like the cousins they are.
Before he could wipe his watery eyes, I left the kitchen table, threw on my clothes, and left. Didn’t come back up those five flights of concrete stairs until it was almost a new day.
By the time I made it back, Momma was in bed. A tattered Bible was on her nightstand next to an empty glass of water. I stood in her doorway for a while, knowing that she was pretending to be asleep. We had five old, noisy locks on our metal door, so there was no way anybody could sneak in any time of the day or night.
I softly asked, “How could you do something like that?”
Momma moved her feet like she did when she was irritated. Her eyes were open; I saw the corner of her left eye when she blinked. She didn’t turn and face me. Her response was soft, damaged, and given to the wall, “How could you not want your momma to be with your daddy?”
“He ain’t my daddy.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because you’ve been my momma and my daddy. That’s why I give you Mother’s Day and Father’s Day cards. And get a grip, you know he’s married, he ain’t your husband no more, never will be again.”
She made a wounded noise. I was ready for her to snap and put me in my place, but all she did was bounce her feet and make a series of hurting sounds, creaks and groans that mirrored what I felt inside.
I knew when to fight with her. Knew when I’d gone too far. Knew when she needed me like I needed her.
I sat on the edge of her bed. “You never got over him, huh?”
“Guess not.” She sighed again. “Guess not. When you’ve been in a relationship that meant anything, I don’t think anybody ever really gets over it. Not even in your grave.”
I didn’t understand that she was telling me that Daddy hadn’t gotten over her either. It never occurred to me that those type of feelings ran up and down a two-way street. I rubbed the hair on the back of her neck, told her, “Scoot over.”
“Hot-comb my hair for me tomorrow.”
“Why don’t you just get a perm?”
“No chemicals will ever touch this head.”
I lay next to Momma in the bed. She reached back and patted my leg.
Momma spoke tenderly, “What his wife look like now?”
I described her better-than-thou attitude. Ragged on my half-bros and -sister. Let Momma know that PBS bunch was weak and spoiled. Described their castle, his car, everything down to the beige paint on the walls.
Then we didn’t talk for a while.
I know it was wrong the way I had snapped on my daddy, had dogged out his rug rats. So much jealousy was in my eyes. I wanted my daddy to myself. Maybe that’s why I want any man in my life to myself. Anything less is, well, less.
I asked, “He leave a number?”
“Yeah. You gonna call him and apologize?”
I was surprised she asked me that instead of demanding.
Softly, I answered her, “Okay. He leave any money?”
“A little.”
“Little won’t do a lot. Why didn’t you ask him for more?”
“I ain’t never begged a man for nothing. Never will.”
“Shouldn’t have to. Why don’t he send money?”
“Never expect a man to do something his own daddy didn’t do.”
I didn’t agree with that, not at all, but I keep my opinion inside.
A few tick ticks later she mumbled, “Can’t blame a man for being human when human is all he’ll ever be.”
That was the end of that.
When all was said and done, I put my arms around the woman who birthed me and held her like she’d been holding me since the day I was born. She was a strong woman who had suffered a weak moment. Even the strongest woman falls from time to time. And Momma bounced back up every time.
Maybe if I’d put my head to her chest, maybe I would’ve noticed her heart was slowing down, that so much hard labor and complicated loving had taken its toll. Hypertension and what the doctor said was mitral valve prolapse, something that Momma thought were just her nerves acting up.
I asked, “Want me to read to you?”
“Not tonight. Tired.”
“You’re working those long hours, no wonder.”
“You don’t get to be an editor by resting while other people are working. Especially a black woman. Five times as hard for a black woman.”
I put my arms around my favorite Harlem girl. Lay there in a room that was two inches bigger than a phone booth, my eyes to the ceiling most of the night. I’d been so mad at her for losing her mind when Daddy showed up, but the way I had packed up my best clothes and hopped on that plane the moment I heard his voice, I guess I hadn’t gotten over him either. I loved him so much. He just didn’t know.
When I closed my light brown eyes, instead of darkness I saw melting clocks. Remembered the name of that eerie picture:
Persistence of Memory
. My daddy’s life, that trip would always be persistent in my mind.
So, that memory was part of what scared me. Vince could lose his mind when his ex came back. Whether it’s ten days or ten years later, they always come back. If he had kicked her to the curb because it was over in his heart, it would be different. That would mean his heart had gone cold for her. Maybe, just maybe and not guaranteed, I’d feel different about the situation. But she had broken his heart. And she had his child.