Chapter Eight

It was all Whitney could do to close her eyes and not hear ticking. It got so bad some nights, she borrowed Garrett’s Benadryl and waited for her brain to get heavy. With Travis curled up beside her, she’d land somewhere hard in a dream and had an even harder time climbing out of it. Waking up was like being gut punched. Waking up was the reality check that never seemed quite fair.

She washed her face with tepid water and dragged her hair back into a ponytail. She brushed the night’s film off her teeth and swiped on a little mascara. She put on her blouse and jeans and then the heinous blue lab coat all the watch technicians wore on the floor. Her lunch already made the night before, she stacked her purse and brown lunch bag on the little table near the front door.

Remember gratitude, she scolded herself because Mondays always felt like crying. But they still had a roof over their heads—a nicer one than the trailer now—and food to make lunches. She had worked hard for her GED, and Franklin came through with his promise—a job at Timex. Only, she was the one who had snagged it.

“Morning,” she said sleepily to the body at the coffee pot. Where the father of her child—the love of her life—should have stood was her mother. Marge lifted her chin, the weight of her now heavier and more substantial, especially in her wintertime pajamas. She wore a long fleece nightdress that made her seem like a multi-colored column. She gave the impression that her bones were made of concrete, and by contrast, Whitney shivered even though the heater was on.

“Morning yourself,” Marge said, scooping the Folgers into the machine in her bare feet. Whitney sat down at the breakfast table with no intention of eating. It was funny how they had more money than they had had in a long time—the pantry filled with name brand bread and crackers—but Whitney couldn’t eat any of it. Her lunch consisted of a container of cabbage soup from the big pot she had made the night before. The house still stunk of it, Marge’s nose working overtime in the way it disapprovingly sniffed the air.

“If it smells this bad, I can’t imagine the way it tastes.”

“It tastes just fine,” Whitney lied. She was tired and hungry and knew she looked the part. It was day four of this routine, and she was certain she would have either had the sense to give up or lose weight at this point in the game, but the scale refused to budge. Nearly two years later and the baby weight lingered in her stomach and hips, but she didn’t even have a baby anymore. She had a toddler. 

She told herself it was to get healthy. She didn’t tell herself if she worked off the weight, she could gain Jamal’s interest again when he’d come back home from school. But the idea still loomed large in the foreground of her mind.

“Will it help me swallow down this travesty?” Marge said when she sat down at the kitchen table, smacking the paper that was patiently waiting for her. “That other guy, he’d know how to help us.”

Dukakis, Mother, Whitney thought but didn’t say because it would kill her to correct Marge for the hundredth time. Instead, she shrugged and filled her mug at the sink. On one side, Whitney placed her lips against the rim, and on the other, there was a depiction of Charlie Brown and Lucy who was swiping the football away right as Charlie went in for the kick. He was right there hovering mid-air between two possibilities: flying into the ether or landing hard on his backside. Whitney felt bad already knowing his fate.

“Nobody cares for the little guy anymore,” Marge said. They had both liked Dukakis’s platform. And after Whitney had read his brochure aloud—the one Jamal had sent her from school—Marge was more than onboard: 

He's invested in job training. Education. Small business. Health care. And a highly successful jobs program for welfare mothers.

As President, Mike Dukakis is committed to make these ideas and values work for the country. "I believe that every American, regardless of who you are, where you come from or what the color of your skin is, should have the opportunity to succeed."

Marge had liked the sound of that. Maybe someone like her or someone like her grandson could finally get a fair shake, she had said. 

“Just four more years. May the countdown begin.” Whitney planted her lips against the part in Marge’s hair, a wide berth that kept getting wider with each passing year. She took her coffee back into her bedroom and set it down on her side table and watched Travis sleep. He was small and peaceful in his footie pajamas. He had jammed his fist under his chin, forcing his lips to jut out in air kisses. She lightly ran her fingers across his hair, his daddy’s hair that was the source of so many comments. Some kind, others not so much.

“Whose kid?” One lady had flat out asked at the park one Saturday, her face seemingly working out the scenario before her. 

“Mine.” Whitney had said and set the word down like a high wall between them. There was no further interrogation, just that familiar look of disgust that rang as loudly as the pink smudge of lipstick on the woman’s teeth.

Marge wanted to kill people like that. “Had I been there, a head would have been busted, and your ol’ mama would have been behind bars,” she had said when Whitney got home and recounted the story. But Marge wasn’t there because she was with Garrett in the backyard, digging at piles of dirt in what they called “the garden.” As much as it hurt, and as much as it had angered her, Whitney couldn’t hate that lady, especially watching her mother slap at the earth in the hopes of getting her son’s attention. What if that lady was just mad because life hadn’t smiled on her either? 

She kissed Travis goodbye, thanking Franklin silently in her heart. He was the one who had gotten her on second shift so she’d be able to see her son in the morning and play with him in the evening. She was also thankful for her mother who—despite their substantial differences—could be trusted to keep Travis safe while she was at work. Her only sense of bitterness she forced herself to swallow like room temp cabbage soup was the fact that Jamal had left them.

“I’ll be back for holidays and the summer. And we’ll talk every day. It will hardly even feel like I’m gone.” She snorted, placed her hand over her mouth as Travis’s little body responded to the noise. What a crock, she thought. Every second was a reminder of Jamal’s empty space. She couldn’t even go to the bathroom without there being a ghostly void walking from her room to the small half bath attached to the master. He had barely lived in the house. They had moved at the end of summer when Jamal was already itching to get back in action, living the tough life of an artist in training. He had been back for previous breaks. He had been back last summer too. But love felt a lot different when it was an obligation, not a choice.

She daydreamed sometimes about running away, and she hated herself for it. She wanted to go to college, but nobody had asked her what she wanted. And besides, how could she manage that? She had a kid. And technically, so did Jamal, but Jamal had her to keep things under control and their bank account plush while he got to rub elbows with the brainy, academic sort she’d never measure up to.

“I’m sorry I’m so simple,” she had said on a miserably hot day in July before he had packed up and gone back to the university. She was at the public park again, but this time she was there with Jamal, and Travis, and her brother who, at eleven, was quickly becoming formidable with every extra inch. Being there was almost like waving her middle finger at everyone. A lot of them pretended not to notice their ragtag gang as if that were some sort of favor, but others weren’t shy about their condescension. Yup, that’s right. This one’s black and this one’s half black, and get this—he’s my son! And this one over here doesn’t even know what day it is. And don’t get me started on the teenage pregnancy! That’s right, get a good look, you dolts! Whitney had felt like her mother thinking this way, which made her queasy.

“I like simple.” They sat at a wooden picnic bench next to the swings, and Whitney dug her thigh into the rough surface as punishment. Jamal had Travis in his arms, and it was a beautiful sight if the reality of it weren’t so blinding. Her mother had put that worm of fear in her ear. “He’s black, Whitney. Things will be rough.” She hadn’t even sugar coated it. But Whitney hadn’t cared. Love could solve any problem. 

Whitney’s second alarm went off, reminding her that coffee time was now over. She looked down at Travis who was still sleeping soundly and kissed him on his cheek. 

“See you soon, little man,” she said and headed to the front door for her coat, grabbing her purse and her mildly repulsive lunch in the process. “Heading out,” she called towards the kitchen and received a “Later, gator,” from her mother who was enjoying the last few minutes of freedom before she wrangled up her son and grandson for the day. As Whitney walked out the front door, it hit her how her mother had never once told her she loved her. She had seen it though, Whitney thought, the evidence of love. But the words were never lobbed between them. 

Outside, she walked briskly to the Timex factory that was only half a mile from their house. It was November, and the heat had finally shown mercy on them. She wrapped her arms around her, although her coat was warm enough. It was a mauve, calf-length quilted jacket that was more like ankle-length on Whitney. Marge had picked it up at St. Andrew’s even though Whitney was convinced they could have splurged a little at K-Mart. “It’s talk like that that leads to the poorhouse,” Marge said. You should know, Whitney thought.

She kept walking—quicker, brisker strokes of thighs and calves and feet against the concrete sidewalk beneath her. She could feel what she’d been stuffing down the past several months bubble up in the back of her throat. She hadn’t meant to find out, and as much as she loved Stacey, the telling hadn’t felt so much like friendship. It felt more like an “I told you so.”

“Are you sure?” Whitney had asked. It was three months ago in August, and Jamal hadn’t even been back on campus three weeks yet. She sat on the step stool under the phone in the kitchen. It was a pea-green rotary phone, and sometimes she’d watch Marge stand guard as Garrett teetered on the stool, stabbing his finger at the holes in frustration. 

“I’m not blind, Whit. I saw what I saw. And honestly, I’m not that surprised.” They were both at the University of Arkansas now without her. She was angry enough with Jamal, but there was something even worse about Stacey going. Whitney had known it for months leading up to Stacey’s graduation while she was at home battling mastitis. But the reality hadn’t hardened yet.

Packing Stacey up at her trailer, Whitney felt like she was watching a bad dream. She should have been the one closing up shop in the dismal Little Rock heat and heading on towards her future. But her future was the child in her arms and the way Marge said, “I’m so glad that’s not you. No clue what I’d do without you here.” She felt a sense of panic that settled on her like the dust Stacey’s tires had disturbed as she drove away in her father’s Pinto. 

“But he loves me,” Whitney flung back over the phone line, a weak grenade. There were shades of love there, but they had somehow seemed deeper before Travis had come along.

“He can still love you and cheat on you, Whitney.” Stacey said it so softly, it came off cruel. Whitney had wanted to spring back with something about Stacey learning a thing or two from her father, but she could never go there. She figured Marge’s feistiness must have skipped a generation.

“But I don’t believe this. Of all people.”  

“You know how women can be,” Stacey said, willingly throwing their gender under the bus. But Whitney certainly knew what she meant. She remembered when she was young, her mother seemed almost like a lost little girl to her, at least when her father was still alive. She took care of her father, almost to the point that it seemed like a show she’d put on for Whitney. There was the white apron tied against her house dress, and the tray she’d load with a mug of beer, and the meatloaf she had made for dinner. It was the Barbie version of Marge, complete with pearls and short-stumped heels. It was the seventies by then, but Marge was so behind the game—taking way too long to have a kid—that the game was just going to have to grin and bear it while she set their lives up like a scene from the not-too-distant past.

But then Lenny died, and the pearls and heels died with him. There was no more money for things like that, and after she stopped working at the bakery, Marge just didn’t have the heart for that kind of stuff. Her mouth became base or maybe just honest, and she no longer bought dresses for Whitney either. So there Whitney was, used to playing one role only for the playwright to switch up the story. She imagined what it would be like to serve Jamal with a white apron around her waist, and the thought was as appalling as it was comforting.

Women, according to her mother’s performance, could be anything depending on their circumstances.

“Yeah, but still,” Whitney said lamely into the receiver. 

“Denise McGovern,” Stacey repeated, and that’s all she needed to say. Whitney had excused herself, placing the earpiece of the pea-green phone back on the wall. She felt sick. She felt like the script had been switched up on her again, and there she was playing the wrong part.

She walked and breathed in a quick burst of cold wind. It burned her lungs, the insides of her. And she stopped for a second, overwhelmed by the crying that hadn’t come in a while. She was aware of people in her vicinity, people on the edges of her bubble, so she turned her face away to a set of trees that took pity on her. She rummaged around in her purse and found a chewed-up Kleenex and wiped carefully under her eyes and around her nose to not disturb the makeup she had put on for who knew what reason. She was stuck. There was no white knight looking to save her.

Whitney took a deep breath, put the tissue back in her purse, and picked up her lunch that teetered between her feet. The soup had leaked a little, and the stench of cabbage escaped the brown bag. And Whitney realized with little to no real recognition, so had the hate in her heart.