Life Is Short But Wide (25 page)

“Chile, you needs to go to school, like ya father tol ya!”

“You the one said he wa’nt my father! And I’m too old for school.”

“Well, ya sure ain’t too smart for it!”

“I get along, Mama.”

“That’s jes what I been wantin to ask ya. What ya doin stayin out ALLLL night? Who you be with all night long?”

Wanda never got an answer, just a pouting frown.

Wanda continued, “Ya need to marry one them mens ya got comin by here!”

All Rose Bertha would answer was “Ugggh!”

Wanda would mock her. “Don’t ‘Ugggh!’ me! Ya needs to bring a man in here to take the place of the one I had that ya loss for me!”

“Get another one, Mama.”

Crying again, Wanda would say, “I want the same one back.”

Getting up from her seat to look in the kitchen for something to eat, Rose Bertha would holler back to her mother, “Go get em then. He always was a fool for ya.”

Wanda was quiet a few minutes, too long for Rose Bertha. She peeked through the kitchen, and saw her mother deep in thought, and decided to press her mother. “You can get anybody back. You still beautiful to em!”

But Wanda said, very thoughtful and serious, “Ya know? Herman was right; ya all are fools. Don’t know nothin. If I let ya stay here with me I ain’t never gonna have nobody. My best son is James; he writes me sometimes, and send me a few dollars. You don never give me nothing. And ya spreadin ya legs open all over town … for nothing. Herman was right, ya are a fool.”

Rose Bertha slammed the refrigerator door, which was already broken, saying, “I ain’t got time to stand round here and argue with you! I got things on my mind.” And indeed she did. She was pregnant. And she didn’t know who the father was. She thought, as she looked at her mother, “If I have a baby, she gonna help me take care of it.”

She said aloud, “I got to be here cause I’m gonna have this baby. Ya think Herman will help me take care his first gran-chile?”

Wanda smiled slightly. “Since ya open yo mouth so smart, Herman know that ain’t his first nothing. Ya done tole him you ain’t none of his, so that baby ain’t gonna be nothin to him. And I want ya to get this straight; ya not gonna lay on me either, no ma’am, and drop them babies. Cause ya jes beginnin ya life, and I done already lived mine, and I got me a house. You ain’t got nothing but a belly full of baby, and a head and a behind full of men. Don’t count on me, fool.”

Rose Bertha had moved to the doorway to stare at her loving mother as Wanda continued talking. “I might could have me a future … if I didn’t have you, so I sho don’t want two of ya!”

Rose Bertha looked at her mother with the beginning of hatred; but she thought, “I can’t hate my mama, cause I maybe haft’a leave this baby with her.” She moved to hug her mother as she said aloud, “I love you, Mama, we a family. You always tol me that!”

Wanda tilted her head at her daughter, a thoughtful look on her face, as she answered, “I didn’t lie to ya, baby, I jes didn’t know ya yet. I blive ya growin your own family for yourself now.”

After Herman left Wanda he filled his life with his work, and there was peace of a sort. He was reading and getting good sleep again, and he did not really miss his old family, except to feel sorry for them. But he wrote Jerome and James, sent them records, tapes, and love.

He thought of Juliet, Bertha, and Myine often. He would go by there, and they were always glad to see him. But he didn’t want to go too often; he liked them to call, or send for him.

He liked being at home. He cooked, and he thought he ate well, but after a physical checkup the doctor told him he was not up to par. “You have high blood pressure, and still, you are anemic. Take a little glass of port wine in the evenings to build up your blood. Other than that, you’re alright.” He gave him a prescription, and a bill.

Herman didn’t like drinking alcohol too much as he got older. But he got into the habit of having that little glass of wine and developed a taste for it. He started having two or three glasses of wine every evening.

(Well, he was alone, and wine will sneak up on you.)

Soon he began to fall into a deep, heavy sleep in the evenings. Waking a little groggy in the mornings, he had to take a cold shower to wake himself up. It was becoming a habit. Habits are so easy to develop in human beings; you can become addicted to water. Or anything.

Many days went by like that in his life. Days that turned into weeks, and then, months.

Eventually, being the type of man he was, he stopped himself. “I have too much to do. My life is not in a wine bottle.”

So he went out just to see some people, or to do something beside work or sit in his apartment and read. Sometimes he looked at television, but so many people on television were dying all over the world in greedy, selfish wars, some of them unnecessary wars, for greedy people; it made his head and heart hurt. He would then go out to one of the clubs and have a little glass of wine. There were so many deaths, and so many new clubs.

If he happened to see Wanda in a club she shouldn’t be in, or even Rose Bertha, his ex-daughter, he would leave. He would go home, where he would read, or listen to the lying heads in the news again, or look at the sex and death on his television until he snapped it off and read himself to sleep.

When Herman did go by to see Bertha, Myine was usually at work or studying. He held Bertha and Juliet, saying, “Gall me. Gall me when you need someone to do something around here.
I know Cloud is here, but call me anyway.” They didn’t call him because Cloud was indeed there, and he could do many things.

At times, he looked closely at Myine, thinking of her as a young woman, not as a child, saying, “Your mother and Mz. Bertha, here, made all the difference in my life. They helped to give me a life; led my education and all. My self-respect, even my hygiene. Your mother cleaned me up, and Bertha kept me clean.” He laughed a little as he looked back over those years.

Myine was a darker bronze color than her mother had been. Leroy mixed in her blood, he thought. Her eyes were wide and clear with thick, short lashes. And there was an honesty in her face and eyes; there were no shadows she was hiding behind.

Her smile was quick, and fresh, and glowing. Nothing of secrecy lurking there. Her teeth needed some care, but on the whole, she still had all of them. She had a lovely body, as her mother’s had been; slender, medium tall, about five foot four, but rounded and soft looking. She was quiet, only smiling at most everyone; so happy to be doing the studies she loved.

They told him about all Tante had helped them accomplish on her trip. He asked Myine, “So you are now back in school? College?”

Myine smiled, almost apologetically as she said, “I’m not going for a degree, right now. I just want a teaching certificate to teach small children. I need to start working to get some money coming in. Later, I’ll go for a BA. degree, since Aunt Tante tried to invest in me, but I’m trying to hold on to as much of that money as possible. It’s expensive just to live.”

Herman nodded his head, saying, “You need to go for all you can; an education will never let you down. People may, but the
education won’t. There will always be some way to use your education.”

Myine’s face became more serious. “I have a child I take care of, Lola.”

Bertha sat in an old rocking chair, listening. She was in her late sixties, perhaps fifty-nine, and still working when she could. She was ailing from the many effects of a hard, struggling life, and no real medical care. She had often gone without food so Juliet could have medicine.

Bertha spoke, saying, “And everybody else in that Tonya family that can sponge off Myine when they can! They been tryin to move back in that house. Tonya and them grown girls of hers, Tee and Dolly. But they are fools with that dope! That’s why Myine have that Lola child for a long time now, long time!”

Herman was alarmed, and admonished her, “Don’t get mixed up with people who like dope, Myine. You will be the one who will suffer the most. You have no idea what a dope-head will do to take advantage of you. You have much more in life waiting for you. You already have your own house.”

Advice-tired, Myine said, “I’m not going to let that little child down just because of something her mother does. I’m not crazy. I don’t use dope. I just take care of a young girl who needs help.

“I think I’m too old to be in school. But they let me go to junior college, and study hard just so I can get a teaching credential. Then I can take care of my own self, and my own business.”

Herman smiled, thinking, “She still has spunk. That is good, as long as no one wears it down.”

Then Juliet said, “She too good-hearted. People take advantage of her.”

Herman looked at Juliet; he knew they still didn’t pay rent, but he was glad they were there. They were family by now anyway.

When Herman left there he was thinking about his own “business.” He wasn’t sorry about quitting his old job. They were always trying to give him apprentices to teach them the trade. Young men too ignorant to remember what he taught them, most hadn’t stayed to finish regular school. Their minds were always filled with sex, and parties. He wasn’t going to teach them all he knew anyway. “Next thing you know, they’d be my boss.”

When he reached the place he rented, he thought as he went into his apartment, “I wonder if I should buy myself a home of my own.” He had saved a good amount of money, even though he helped James, and sent money to Jerome occasionally.

In the kitchen he prepared water for his instant coffee, thinking, “Instant coffee. Instant love. This world is full of instant everything now-a-days. None of it good. Instant unhappiness is more like it. If I buy a house, I’ll be tempted to move someone in it with me. These lonely days are sad and tiresome.

“I wonder if I should dress and go out to dinner? I should have asked Bertha or Myine, but I’d only bore them in my dark mood.”

He looked in his closet; he had three or four nice suits, several dress shirts and pairs of shoes. He liked hats, had quite a few really good ones. He sighed and closed the closet door.

“Nothing on TV, as usual. Tired of going to the movies alone,
and don’t feel like seeing the news on TV; all the wars, killings, and blood everywhere. Somebody always killing somebody. I could go out and buy a new book, or get a little piece of lovin from somebody; buy a piece anyway. I could go to church in the morning, maybe; but I’m tired of them lying too.

“I could go sit by the river’s edge, watch people and think, but I did that last Sunday. Do I want to get married again? But you need to be in love to get married. You need love to make it work.

“Maybe I should move to another town. Travel. But I don’t feel like it.” He went to a window, and looked skyward. “You know what, God? I want to be in love. Life does not count for much when there is no love in it. Help me out here, Lord. Please. I’m serious, God, dear Father. But, I know; love in Wideland, now-a-days, is pretty hard to find. Love anywhere, I guess.”

He turned back to his kitchen, opened his refrigerator, and began to prepare himself a drink. “There is plenty free nooky out there, I could go get some of that; that would relax me, make me sleep better, but only You know, God, what would be hidden inside of it.

“Is there another woman, a good woman out there in life for me, Lord? I’m tired of being alone. See, Lord? I’m in the prime of my life. Yet I spend all these lonely nights and hours knowing what it could be like; what I’m missing. I don’t have anyone to love. And You are a God of love, so I know You understand.”

Feeling a little hopeful, Herman bathed and dressed in one of his best suits, and took himself out to dinner. He didn’t go to a joint. He went to a lovely dining establishment that went with his suit. He ordered a sumptuous dinner.

People smiled at him. The waiter smiled for the tip; the owner smiled for the patronage, the bartender for his tip, and a few fine ladies of various colors smiled when their dates weren’t looking.

Herman’s thoughts were “But she isn’t here. She isn’t here.” He left thinking, “How lonely will this night be?