“He know his way,” the girl said, prying the baby's hand from her leg.
The girl looked at Rebecca. Her gaze traveled over Rebecca's ragged scarf and down to her protruding stomach. Something in her eyes caught and she nearly smiled. “Come on, Jason-Eliot. I told you 'bout roaming the trash.”
“You're welcome,” Rebecca called as the girl and Jason-Eliot turned and headed in the opposite direction.
We started walking back toward my neighborhood.
“It ain't so bad,” the girl called. We turned back to see that she had stopped and was holding Jason-Eliot in her arms. “Once those pains come, it's almost over. After that it ain't so bad.” Then she turned again and continued down the gray snow and ice path toward the slanted shacks.
Rebecca and I turned back and silently headed up the high hills toward home.
Twenty
WHEN MA CAME HOME LATE MONDAY NIGHT WITH A pizza, Marion, Bernadette, Rebecca, and I were doing breathing exercises, sitting four across, Native American style, in front of the television.
“Come join us,” Bernadette said, her forehead shiny with sweat beneath her braids.
Bernadette's mother and father moved here from Kenya soon after they married. Wanting to Americanize as quickly as possible, they moved to the Long Island suburbs, had two children, and named them Thomas and Bernadette. Even now, when Bernadette tells the story, she laughs about it. And even though I've heard the story at least a thousand times, I can sit through it another thousand just to catch the spark in Bernadette's dark eyes when she recounts it, just to play with the cornrows gliding down her back while she tells it.
“You were supposed to hold it for a count of ten, Bernadette.”
“No way. When you get to be my age, the count goes down to six.”
“Same here,” Marion said, rising. “I can't even breathe as deeply as that lady on the screen. She must have a set of lungs on her!”
“You smoke too much,” Rebecca scolded, closing her eyes and pressing her hands against her stomach.
“Thanks, Clair Junior,” Marion said, following Bernadette into the kitchen.
“Marion and Bernadette make a nice couple,” Rebecca whispered.
“They've been together long enough.”
“If the Robertses hadn't asked for the baby first, I'd give him to them.”
I blinked. “You've come a long way. When you first came here, you didn't even like Marion!”
“I didn't know her,” Rebecca said. “How you gonna judge someone you don't know?”
I smirked. “Now you do the short exhales and I count, Rebecca,” I said, pressing the mute button.
“Okay.”
We did the exercise four times.
“I'm starved,” Marion was saying to Ma in the dining room. “Pour Rebecca a larger glass of milk, Catherine. And put an iron pill beside her plate.”
“I thought she only took these in the morning.”
“Dr. Greenberg said she needs to take one at night too.”
“What else did she say?”
Ma was putting another plate at the end of the table when we sat down.
“She said the baby's fine,” Rebecca said, searching for a comfortable position in the straight-back chair. “He's just moving slower these days. She said there's a chance the baby might be premature because I'm so young or something.”
“Did she recommend anything?”
“Bed rest,” she said, taking a slice of pizza from the box and picking off a chunk of cheese. “My blood pressure is too high. She said it's too much excitement for me.” Her look said,
That's a joke.
“You have to stay in bed for a month?” I asked.
Rebecca nodded. “At least, stay around the house.”
“Well, what about your breathing classes?” Ma asked.
“She said I shouldn't worry about that right now. The baby will come whether I take classes or not.”
“What about studying?” Bernadette asked.
“I guess I can't do that either. Especially mathâ”
“Studying's fine, Bernie,” Marion interrupted. “Just so long as it doesn't mean long walks through Seton and heavy lifting.”
“Ah-haaa. Got you!” I laughed.
Rebecca smirked.
“And what about the Robertses?” Ma asked. “Have you spoken to them?”
“Who're the Robertses?”
“They're the ones adopting the baby, Feni. Those people I told you about,” Rebecca said. “They're coming by to see me a week from Wednesday. Hope that's cool with you.”
“It's fine,” Ma said, Bernadette and Marion nodding in unison. “We just want you to be sure you're making the right decision. I know you don't want to raise a baby where you're living now, but there are some beautiful places there in Harlem. I'm not trying to talk you into keeping him or anything. I just don't want you to think you made the wrong choices.”
“I know there are beautiful places, but not where I live. I have to take care of my brothers and sisters. I don't think I could raise a baby right. I wouldn't want him to have to live off welfare like we gotta do now. It would be too much. I know in my heart it isn't the right time now. Danny, he's cool and everything, but he's only seventeen. He's not ready to be nobody's daddy.”
“You sound like you know what you want,” Ma said. After a moment she added, “And I'm glad you're here.”
“I'm glad too,” Bernadette said.
“Count me in,” Marion added, raising her hand.
Rebecca looked up at them, her face a mixture of embarrassment and pride.
Ma picked up her slice and rose. “I need to go make some phone calls so I can be home Wednesday morning. I'll drop Feni off at school and head back over here.”
“You're not working on a Wednesday, Ma?”
“I'll work at home. I want to be here to meet the Robertses.”
“Can't I stay home too? I haven't missed school all year. Please, Ma?”
“Can she, Ms. Harris?” Rebecca pleaded. “Please.”
Ma sighed. “I guess so. How'd you do on that history test?”
“Ninety-eight.”
Rebecca shot me a smarty-pants look.
“I figured you must have done well, since I didn't hear anything from Roper. You can stay home if Rebecca doesn't mind.”
“No. It'll be cool. We're friends now.”
Marion and Bernadette looked up, and Ma, heading toward her den, stopped halfway across the floor. “Friends?” she asked.
I picked some of the cheese off Rebecca's slice, looked her square in the eye, and nodded.
Twenty-one
A WEEK LATER CAESAR CAME HOME WITH ME AFTER school. All the way home she talked about the cotillion.
“I've decided to wear a blue gown,” she said as we headed up Bailey Street. “Don't you think blue would look great on me? Blue with lace. I want lots of lace. What color do you think you'll wear?”
“Caesar, I told you. I'm not coming out.”
“Your mother's going to make you do it.”
“My mother doesn't care about that junk. That was my father, and he's gone now. He can make his new daughter come out if he wants, but not me.”
“It's going to be so fun. Remember Vanessa, who's at Howard now?”
I shook my head. “Uh-uh.”
“Well, hers was so beautiful. She wore yellow. She looked so pretty, Feni. The dress was cut in a V in the back, but I think I want a high collar. Maybe I'll wear white instead of blue.”
At my door Caesar stopped talking and looked around nervously. “You sure your mother isn't home?”
“Positive,” I said, taking out my keys. “She's working.”
“Do I look okay?”
“You look fine, Caesar.”
“Wait,” she said, grabbing my hand. “Are you sure she'll like me? I mean, maybe I should come over some otherâ”
“Caesar. Don't worry. She's not a monster, just a pain sometimes.”
“You think she'll tell us how it felt?”
“No. And don't ask!”
Rebecca was watching cartoons when we came in. Caesar glanced around, then walked over to the top of the two steps that lead down into the living room. “Is that her?” she whispered.
“Yes, it's me,” Rebecca said. She turned, she and Caesar taking each other in from head to toe.
“Is it show-and-tell day?” Rebecca said finally, turning back to the television.
“Where's Bernadette?” I asked, pulling Caesar's coat off her shoulders while she stared.
“She had to leave early. She teaches on Tuesday nights.”
“I'm Caesar,” Caesar finally stuttered, moving slowly toward Rebecca.
“I know,” Rebecca said, not turning away from the TV. “And I know you know who I am.”
“Feni told me a-about you. She said you were, ahm, she saidâ”
“She told me the same things about you.” Rebecca leaned back against the couch, smirking.
“You're supposed to be in bed, Rebecca.” I hung Caesar's coat on the rack.
“I can't stay,” Caesar said. “You don't look so young,” she said to Rebecca. “I hope you have a girl.”
“It doesn't matter what it is,” Rebecca said. “I just want it to be healthy.”
“Then I hope it's a healthy girl. Can I touch your stomach?”
“Caesar!”
“I was waiting for her to offer, but she didn't and I have to go.”
“Sure, I guess.” Rebecca looked at me, raising an eyebrow.
I shrugged.
Caesar took small steps closer to Rebecca. They looked at each other a moment before she reached out to touch Rebecca's stomach.
“That's the coolest thing I've ever felt,” she said, smiling. “Is it going to hurt?”
“It hurts now!” Rebecca said. “Didn't you feel that kick? This baby isn't playing.”
“I think I would absolutely die!” Caesar said, reaching out to touch Rebecca's stomach again.
“No, you won't die,” Rebecca said softly.
A chill ran through me then. Caesar looked up, fear in her eyes.
“You'll just have your baby, start your family, and move on,” Rebecca continued.
“Not me! Never!”
“Hah!” Rebecca laughed. “That's what everybody says.”
“Even you?” I asked, coming to stand beside them.
“Yup! Even me!”
“My mother says when you get pregnant you throw up a lot. Gross!” Caesar stuck her finger in her mouth and faked a gag.
“I didn't get sick a whole lot. Just the first two or three weeks. Something like that.”
“What'd your mother say?” Caesar nosed.
“She didn't know. I always turned the water on.”
“What happened when she found out?”
“I thought you had to go, Caesar,” I said.
“Why you have to leave so fast?” Rebecca asked.
“Jack and Jill is planning its regional conference and I'm on the committee. We have a meeting today.”
“What's Jack and Jill?” Rebecca shifted on the floor and pressed the creases in the fabric on her stomach flat.
“A dumb club that all the kids go to.”
“It's not dumb,” Caesar said. “It's only for black kids, and we have dances and talent shows and go on trips and stuff.”
“We go to places where we can
meet the right kinds of people,
” I mimicked.
“Feni!”
“Well, that's what it's about, Caesar.”
“Sounds snobby,” Rebecca said.
“It's not snobby. It's fun.”
“It is fun, sometimes,” I said, not wanting to betray Caesar. “Once we all saw
Porgy and Bess
and ate at a real French restaurant.”
“And remember when we had that dance last year, and all the girls danced together so then the chaperons got all mad.”
We giggled and slapped our palms together. Rebecca smiled, uncertain.
“So it's like a club,” she said, “for little rich kids?”
“We're not
rich
!” I nearly shouted.
“Yeah,” Caesar agreed. “We just have stuff.”
“Whatever,” Rebecca said, waving her hand. “I don't think we have Jake and Jack in New York.”
“Jack and Jill,” Caesar corrected.
“Whatever.”
“You want to come to my cotillion?” Caesar asked.
“What's that, a party?”
“Sort of. It's a coming out.”
“That's like when you're introduced to ever yone,” I added.
“Who are they introducing you to?”
“Everyone!” Caesar said, throwing up her hands.
“All the other children of doctors and lawyers and bankers,” I said.
“Oh.”
“You want to come, Rebecca?”
“When is it?”
“In four years when I'm sixteen.”
“Let me think about it,” Rebecca said.
“Okay, but let me know soon,” Caesar said, rising. “I'm making a list now.”
“Are you sure I'm a âright kind of person'?”
Caesar waved her hand. “Of course. Mine is going to be all cool kids and rap music.”
“Yeah, right,” I said. “They always make you play classical stuff.”
“Only when you come down the stairs,” Caesar said. “That's so people don't get distracted watching you make your entrance.”
At the door Caesar turned. “I don't think you're a pain,” she said.
Rebecca looked at me and raised an eyebrow. I wanted to die on the spot.