Promises, Promises
Part 5
Bobby calls back at midnight. I answer before my Zoloft kicks in. I’ve been a stranger to sleep my whole life. Mama used to say I was born wide awake. I hear her voice in my head and the emptiness comes back again. “You were born so fucking nosy you had to keep awake.”
I slide my finger on the touchscreen ready for him to burn the measly bridges that keep me beholden to him.
“Imamotherfuckin’ Snow King!” Bobby yelled his street pharmacist greeting into my inner ear. My brain became plastic, but I still couldn’t wrap my head around the shit he was saying after he made me deaf. Oh My God replayed in my head. This fucking clown.
“Dem bitches suck the chrome off.” Bobby continued undeterred by my silence. “…Feed you night and day. I usually don’t fuck with hairhattedhooligans but dem beastie bitches make some good ham and grits. I got a nice one now she cleans, works, and shaves her legs, pussy, and underarms! She take care herself.”
“I been listening to you talk shit about women for fifteen minutes. I don’t want to judge but why are you being a vampire?” I said. “These are single women with children. Those children are growing up how we did.”
“Shit, either me or someone else. I’m a damn upgrade from Tyrone.”
“What happens when ‘Tyrone’ comes back?” I said.
“I only fuck with da kind who man on death row. He ain’t coming back.” Bobby said.
“Why did you call me back? Did Jesus tell you to do it?” I said the words and I already know. My family is like clockwork. He needs money, but he’s going to ask for it by using the kids. This will cushion his dignity — a veil of a concerned father. If I didn’t hear him explain the difference between black women and white women in the South for a quarter of an hour I would have believed him.
“My lil uns birthdays are coming up…” He said. I want to lose patience and speed this bullshit along but I keep quiet and nod my head during his spiel. “…. I just need a little sumthang.”
“How much Snow King?”
“Hahaha! You got jokes! You angry though. You fe-min-est now? The way you were when we were kids I thought you’d be married to another woman. You were wearing dem baggy clothes all the time.”
I am angry now. I tried so hard. “I wore those baggy clothes to hide my body from the goddamn men in our town who would corner me and feel on me.” My voice makes its way from quiet disappointment to roar, “I was a fucking little girl but I looked like a grown ass woman to them! These were men with children who knew better but decided to have a little fun with a girl with no mama or daddy trying to get to school unmolested!”
“Calm down, Sis…I was fucking around. What they say? ‘If there’s grass on the field play ball.’ Hahah — ”
“You have daughters. Fuck you!”
I hang up.
I send Suzanne, my assistant four hundred dollars on PayPal with a message that she buys a money order and send it to my brother Bobby. Sleep finds me and hits me with a hammer.
The emptiness is here. The emptiness is sonic expanding space engulfing all my emotions. A clock is ticking and it’s not in this studio. I hunt time and time again for the noise. I sweat through the paper clothes feverishly searching for something that doesn’t exist. Then I look up and there it is. It’s real…more real than real. I take it down and I break it. Slipping and falling, I smash it. Fists tighten and beat on the surface. Hands bloody as they go through the next layer for more destruction. The thing, the clock, it still exists. It exists in pieces but it exists nonetheless.
Doesn’t matter what I break it will never disappear.
The trip from the hotel to the hospital is a three-minute blur. Guy doesn’t seem to be able to shut the fuck up. There is a new guard and men and women in suits waiting outside my brother’s room. I know they are waiting for us. A nurse stops us before we get to the room. They’re cleaning up my brother. Then I find out about “impaction.” It’s when dry, hard stool fills the rectum and will not pass. They’re “unpacking” him.
I feel sick. I swallow sourness and stay calm. Guy’s hand stays on my lower back and I’m grateful. I chew some Trident from my purse. The beady-eyed fake warden comes down the hall with a carrier of coffee. He’s gunning for us. His head bobbles to alert his friends they have their prey. The Suits swarm us. Buzzards ready to peck with pens and flap sheets of liability paperwork. Guy asks the nurse to call security to clear them from the floor. She gushes and does what he asks for with no delay. They leave without an escort on their own terms. Guy and I get patted down and are allowed to enter my brother’s room. He’s awake today.
We’re there only fifteen minutes when we hear arguing outside the room. It’s my brother Bobby. I leave and Guy follows. Sitting with my brother got to be too much for him. Davey stares blankly and drools in his bed. His head moves listlessly. He moans as if to speak words. As if speaking could be the key to reversing the spell that has trapped him in this body. I look back at him and I know Davey hears Bobby too.
“What’s going on?” I ask outside the door.
“Why’d da fuck you didn’t tell me Davey was hur ?!” Bobby screams with spittle flying in all directions. His hand comes too close and Guy nearly takes it off. I step between them and Guy finds his way in front of me once again. They’re chest to chest. I squeeze in pushing them apart. “You lucky she’s here. What de fuck Sis?!” said Bobby, blaming me.
“I had to get a lawyer to find out myself.” The guard is losing patience and he tells us to leave. I ask for a moment.
“Oh, you got money for a lawyer?” asked Bobby. He sounds aroused.
“No, I don’t… What’s the problem here?” I asked.
“He isn’t on the visitor’s list the Warden sent me Ma’am. He can’t go in,” said the guard.
“He’s my brother…please.” Sweat is pouring down from under my wig. I think the fucking thing shifted. My throat is closing up.
“No. Yesterday I know y’all came late, but y’all were on the list. There are rules. I follow them, unlike some people. If you want me to end your visit go ahead. Let him in. I’m within my rights to have you all arrested. Or better yet talk to your brother on another floor or outside the hospital.
“Yes, I apologize. I’ll be right back.”
“Without him!” The guard reiterated.
I ask Guy to stay in the room. He’s seething but he listens and walks back in. I leave the floor with Bobby. We go to pediatrics. There’s someone there I want him to meet.
Our family makes you mean. Juvie fucks you up. Foster care is the icing on the mental illness cake. I can only imagine what happened to him in the military. Davey… Davey would hate it if I called him that. Davey is actually his middle name. Our mother wasn’t very good at spelling. It’s not his first name. His first name was too common in middle school. He had to go by his middle name. Then he became “David” in high school. He was tired of being called Davey. Tired of being told it was misspelled. So they called him Dave instead.
We were so close. He always found me no matter where they sent him. He ran away to find me so often Child Protective Services just had to locate me to find him. Our roles are now reversed. I had to find him. I have to take care of him.
I can barely take care of myself.
I didn’t want to talk to Bobby. If we didn’t have Davey in common I would never talk to Bobby. Davey was…is… He used to be a good person. Kind, sweet, generous, and so chivalrous. How can I convince you he was good after what he did ? Maybe we are all inherently bad?
“Where you find that pretty motherfucka?” Bobby said to me with a comical look back. He acts like he’s checking out Guy as we walk away. His hips swing and he does a double take. He makes a “Blue Steel” duck face and runs his hands through his hair. He slides his back down the nearest wall with a raised arm. Bobby fails miserably at looking seductive. I start to snicker.
“No, seriously…I ain’t gay or nuthan but Shiiiiiiiiit! I would grow a pussy for that motherfucka.” Bobby said.
I laugh out a response, “What?” I haven’t heard myself laugh for a few hours and I’m startled by the sound. He pushes off the wall and stands next to me as if he did nothing out of the ordinary.
“Fuck, Jen. You still laugh like a hyena! ‘Member when we watch National Geographic and the motherfucking TV hyena would hear your laugh. They just turn they heads and stare at you while they all the way in fucking Africa!” Laughs Bobby. He sounds like that one person in the audience laugh track who laughs too enthusiastically.
“HAHAHAHA!” His laughter chops away at the air I breathe.
“That was a coincidence. It was 20 years ago.” I said less amused. I remember why I never liked Bobby. He’s a mean bully.
Bobby and I walk into the elevators. He’s fidgeting and bouncing on his heels. He hasn’t changed much. Bobby’s always looked like a 1950’s carnival strongman. No super defined muscles, but he has a physique that is intimidating. Tall and broad-shouldered. Narrow waist and short legs. A hairy barrel chest. Bobby was always loud, brash, and bossy. Davey was quiet and always slight compared to him. I look at Bobby and he pinches his chin. He doesn’t look at me but he mumbles.
“What was that?” I asked.
“I’m sorry.” He said. Then he seems irritated when I don’t instantly forgive him. His hands go flying up again and he realizes what he’s doing. His arms come down slowly at his sides. “I’m sorry for getting up in your face… again.”
“Yeah, well you do that,” I said.
“I know, I’m working on the temper… How’s Davey doing?” Bobby asked.
“Not good….Not good at all. Who told you we were here?”
“I got friends of my girl who work here.”
“So you knew all along that Davey was here. You came — .”
“Awwww! I didn’t come here because y’all were here. I came because I love my brother.” Bobby sounded like Mama. Not like a woman mind you. Those were familiar words he spoke. They sent an icy chill into my bowels.
“HIPAA laws don’t work down here,” I mumble to myself. I’m gonna lose it at any second. Only the wall of the elevator is holding me up. Gravity wants me on the floor.
“Hippo what?”
I change the subject. “Bobby are your sleeves for the ink?” I said trying to keep it together even though my legs are rubber at the knees and the warmth and coldness I feel from my falling blood pressure and skipping heart is unnerving. I don’t feel human anymore.
“Yeah, they come in all colors now. These nude ones are the best. UV, ABC, 123 protection.” He laughs at his own joke. “Where we going?”
“Gonna see Ms. Becky.” I replied.
“Miss Who?”
The elevator doors open and Ms. Becky steps in. She comes towards us turns around and quickly presses the close door button. “No room! Bye-bye.” She wiggles her fingers at people who don’t make it when the doors are closing.
“I guess y’all remembered me after all.” She turns and smiles.
And the South will stalk again.
