TEN

Star Light, Star Bright

I CAN’T sleep in the night. I lay in my bed with the window open. Even with Mama laying next to me, it’s like I be by myself. Out in the wilderness. Out in the night. Listening. Trying to hear my own voice out in the trees. It was carried away from me by some birds and put into they nests. Talking to the stars. Singing to my baby.

Everybody still waiting for me to have something to say. Waiting for me to say something about what I’m feeling. They all watch me from the corner of they eyes. They won’t hold me in the center of they eyes. Nam one of them. They won’t have me at the center. Look at me direct where I see myself reflected back twice. Liquid. Anchored. I know it’s because they afraid of me. Afraid for me. What I’m thinking. They know there’s more in me than what coming out my two lips. And even though they want me to open up, to spill my guts, I think they scared of what will come out from me. That is why they look at me the way they do. Even Mama. She so scared, she done made me her child again. Made me a little girl who she sleep with. She been laying in the bed with me every night for a month. She curl herself around me like I’m in her again. With my big self. With my grown self. She be in the bed with me. Waiting for me to be born back to her. Mama the one who talk. What she be talking about, I don’t always know, because sometimes I ain’t listening. She like to talk so the dark ain’t so empty and so big and we ain’t so small inside it. Curled up along its bottom. Where it touch us and cover us. Hiding us until the morning.

I don’t say nothing. I just lay with my face looking out the open window. Listening for myself in the big dark outside. Listening for my voice out in the trees. Trying to reach my baby who is dead.

I couldn’t even say the word at first. For a day. For a week. For a month. Not even to myself. It’s one of them words that was plucked from me. Pulled out my mouth and hid away by the birds. A whole season done changed in just a few weeks while I watch out my window at night. The late and cool blue of spring nights is already gone, and there be a heat burning in the early summer nights. Nights I can see already getting darker. A minute. A minute. A minute more each night. The leaves of the greening trees in the backyard opened they tiny leaves the size of baby hands and grew into the hands of mamas. They dark and shiny sides turned to the sun before I say the word. Last night I say it with my mind in the dark dark night with Mama next to me sharing with me the secret of her hands. A secret she done kept from me so long, I don’t remember her hands being so soft. Being so small and smooth. Having the power of something so gentle flowing through them that when she touch me with my face turned away from her, with my face turned out to the night. When she rub one of her hands down my arm, across my leg, I cry. Just tears. Not even a sound, and I don’t know Mama even know I be crying, and if she do know, she think it’s because Imani dead. Now and forever. But that ain’t why I be crying.

I be crying because it’s all my fault, and if any one of them knew they’d stop loving me. I want them to stop. There’s so much love for me that I can’t even stand it. I don’t want it. From Aunt Mavis. From Eboni. From Miss Lovey. From Mitch. From Peanut. Even from Mama. I can stand the heat of Mama on me. Flowing into me. Deep inside to my bones. Even now that it’s hot and the fan blow on us. From the floor. Not the window. I like the fan on the floor so the window can be open where I can see. I can stand Mama heart beating soft against my back. And her hands still. Resting. But not moving. I only think Mama be sleeping with me anyway because she don’t want to sleep in her own room. Because that’s where it happened. Where Imani was killed.

The door to it always be closed now. I heard Mama tell Aunt Mavis on the phone that she has found a place and Mitch moving in with us. Mama don’t want to stay, because Imani died here. She only go in her own room to grab some clothes and get out quick. Like she being chased. Like maybe my baby is some ghost. Which I know she ain’t.

Even though Imani dead, I can’t see her that way. I see her as a living angel up in heaven. Above the trees. Above the Earth and moon and stars. She get a free pass into heaven. Eboni told me. All babies go to heaven. Into the arms of Je-sus. He sweep them up to the sky like he they daddy. And I want to hate Jesus. To turn him into the devil. To turn him into the man who killed my baby. But I don’t hate him. I’m just jealous. Because I don’t know how he get to be with Imani every day and every night, and I don’t. He don’t need her more than me. Love her more than me. What Jesus know about singing Imani “Miss Sue from Alabama"? What he know about making her jelly bread the way she like it? Where he going to get punch and red and lemon Kool-Aid and mix them all together and make it sweet for Imani the way she like it? I know heaven supposed to be the best place there is, but when they get some Kool-Aid? And what Jesus know about a black girl hair? I know he ain’t got no Royal Crown. He ain’t got whole packs of ponytail holders and barrettes. He wasn’t here with us long enough to know what to do with a black girl. He was down in his box with his eyes turned to the dark. I think Jesus probably got my baby running around heaven looking like a wilderness angel. With her head all nappy and dry. A dark halo around her head. Like she a state kid somebody took in just for the money. Like she lost.

And she is lost, because she got to be looking for me. Wondering where I’m at in the clouds of heaven. I know she ask for me. All the time. I know she cry, even though I can’t hear her. I be listening, but I can’t hear her. I know she want for me to bring her home. Her face all ashy with dry tears and no Vaseline to grease it. She wondering why she dead. Do she know? Do she understand that, even coming from Jesus? I don’t know how Jesus fix his two lips to tell a baby she been shot to death. How he explain that. Why it had to happen. I don’t see how he make it clear to her. But maybe heaven is different from Earth. Maybe heaven is where it make some sense that a baby got shot to death. Because it ain’t clear to me down here at the bottom of the dark in the middle of the night.

Maybe all them stars hanging under heaven is answers to questions asked in heaven. All the things can’t nobody understand on Earth. That’s why there’s so many of them. Maybe God hisself hung a star up there to answer Imani. Maybe he showed his face to her. Looked at her with eyes that looked like they had love in them. Eyes that held her right in they center so he could explain why June Bug had to be at Miss Odetta house like he was. Why he had been staying there for three days when he wasn’t even living there no more. I know Mama know. Every cat and dog on the street know whoever shot Imani was gunning for June Bug. If they wasn’t, why the next day was he not only gone, but Miss Odetta too? Why, when the sun was big and bold and bright up in the sky, was there a truck backed up right to they front door?

Miss Odetta had just left our house that night. Imani was napping on the couch when she come, so I took my baby upstairs. I ain’t take her back to our room. I put her down in Mama room, right on the floor, and closed the door quiet behind her. Then I started cleaning up the kitchen. I was still in there doing the dishes when Miss Odetta left. I was looking out the window. The sky was pretty. It wasn’t all the way black. A curve of blue stretched along the top of it above the tops of the dark trees. I was all happy, because school was ending the next day. I’d finished all my exams. Mr. Toliver had even pulled me aside the day before to tell me he had looked at my exam real quick and that I’d done real good. Which meant I would probably get a C for the year. It wasn’t a grade he was just giving me. I’d earned it. While I finished the last few dishes, I was thinking all I was going to have to do the next day was turn in my books and clean out my locker. I ain’t know if I was going to take Imani with me. It was only going to be a half day.

Mama come into the kitchen then with a dirty ashtray and some glasses and I ask her if I could leave Imani home the next day. Mama say I could.

Right then I was thinking I should go check on Imani. Maybe she was woke. She couldn’t get out the room. I went to the bottom of the steps to listen. It was quiet. Nothing but quiet over me, and I should’ve gone to it. I should’ve been drawn to it like a vacuum. But I was going up in just a few minutes anyway. All I had was a little bit more dishes to do. What’s a few minutes? I was thinking. She sleeping.

And see, Jesus. Why couldn’t you look out for me? For Imani when that car turned up our street. Why you let me go back to the sink and scrape some old dried milk out the bottom of Imani bottle with a knife? And let Mama sit down at the table and drink a Pepsi? When you knew that car was coming down our street. That somebody in it had a gun. A nine millimeter. Automatic. And was coming for June Bug.

I was just going to be a few minutes. But, Jesus, why ain’t you open up your two lips to say something? Just this one time. Why couldn’t you speak to me direct? Instead of sitting back and watch everything happen like it was a movie. Just watching. When you knew my baby was fenna die.

Maybe a star might be enough for my baby. Maybe it can hold the answers to her questions, and she can look down and see it lit up, so she ain’t got to ask no more. So she ain’t got to bother nobody with her questions. Imani still young. But I got more questions than even God could answer with a whole sky filled with stars. With a whole galaxy. It’ll take God, take Jesus, all the time there ever was, there ever will be, to explain why my baby had to die like that when I’m the one to blame.

When the night’s deep. When I been at the bottom of the dark too long, I know Imani ain’t die because I put her in Mama room that night. She died because of me, because of me wishing what I did on her birthday. I wished that God would punish him. I wished him dead. And now God’s punished me.

Derrick Givens. That’s his name. Now I can say it in my mind. Taste it in my mouth without having to spit. I can lay next to Mama and cry in the night, saying his name in my mind with another wish in my mouth. Asking Jesus. Telling Jesus. I take it back.

I ain’t really want for Derrick to die. I just wanted him gone from my mind. Clean gone. Clear gone. Like my mind that of a baby. Just to not have him be part of Imani life.

I ask Jesus. I say, Jesus, I wish I could go back in time. Let me go back. Let me be the one to die. I’m the one should’ve been killed. Not my baby. Let me have just one minute to go up them steps. To go into the vacuum of silence and never come back out. Send that car back to the top of the street and let me be up in Mama room with Imani where I can see the car coming. Quiet. With the lights turned off and the music turned off. Moving like a piece of the night. Moving like a animal. A monster coming for me. I would know. I’d recognize it. See what was coming, and push Imani down. Because the police say she was probably at the window. She’d climbed up on the bed and must’ve been looking out the window. My baby always wanted to see out into this world like there was something for her to see. But, Jesus, I can see in my mind nights. With my eyes turned in, I can see me in Mama room that night. See me knock Imani down. Knock her down so hard I take the breath from her. Just for a minute. So she not hit by the bullet that come through Mama window. Or by the two that come through the living room window. The three that hit the front door. Let one of them hit me. Take me out the world. And I will go without a sound.

But Jesus act like he don’t hear me. He just leave me stuck with that night. How things really happened.

Miss Odetta house got hit first. I heard a shot that sounded like it was out the back, over round the way where Peanut live, and I looked out the dark window and thought of him real quick. Hoping he was down his basement. Then I heard another and another real quick. Pop pop. Like firecrackers. I turned to look at Mama just as our living room window was hit. Oh, God, no! Mama screamed. Get down, Tasha!

All I could think about was Imani. My feet took off running. Automatic. My feet carried me into the living room. I called out her name while Mama was screaming behind me and bullets steady hitting our house. Glass was breaking, and I called out for Imani again. Imani, answer me! She ain’t answer and my feet moved faster. Taking the steps two at a time. Three at a time. By the time I got to the top, the bullets stopped, and for a few seconds there was nothing but quiet. I ain’t pray. I should’ve started asking you, Jesus, right then. Before I run into Mama room.

The lights was off and I ain’t even see Imani down on the floor where I put her. Her blanket was there. I had to turn on the lights to see her. Face down. On the floor over by the dresser. Blood blood blood was pouring from her, so much the rug was wet under her. So much that I ain’t see at first. For a second. For a minute. I don’t know. But I didn’t see that the top of her head was gone. Just gone. Bone and brain. Just gone. There was a hole there. Pulsing with blood. Filling with blood that spilled out onto the rug. I should’ve prayed then to you, Jesus. Because I fell right to my knees. Screaming. Filling up all the air in the house. I should’ve stayed right by Imani side. Give her CPR. I remembered what Mrs. Poole taught about saving a baby life. How to cover the nose. How to breathe into the mouth. How to count. How to pump the chest. Gentle but firm. But I knew none of that wasn’t going to do no good. I knew right then. When I seen her brain. Imani was dead, and I couldn’t stay in that room. Stay in the house.

I took off running. Down them steps. Knocking Mama out the way who was on her way up. Slamming her into the wall while she tried to hold on to me. Saying, God, no! Oh, please God, no. Tasha. Mama say while I was out the door and into the night. No shoes. Just in my sweats. Running like I was crazy. Running like I was wild. My braids flying all around me. Running past Miss Odetta heading for our house in her housecoat. Running past June Bug jumping in his car. My mouth still screaming. Screaming. Screaming. Filling up all the air in the street. All the air in the world. Telling everybody all the way from here to heaven that Imani was dead. I kept on running. Out in the middle of the street. Like I was in a dream. Not even knowing where I was going. I kept running while June Bug flew past me in his car. While I was steady screaming. Telling all the birds in the wilderness. Hiding in the dark. In the trees. Calling them all to me. I kept on running to the end of the block. Thinking if I kept going, if I kept running, I could get out this nightmare. That’s what it had to be, and I was trapped inside. Maybe Mama could find me deep inside this dream, deep inside this night, and come light the way out.

Because nothing was real to me. The people on our street. Moving past me. Going the other way. Running the other way. Calling to me. Reaching out they hands to me. Like they was ghosts. Like they was shadows haunting me. It was like I ain’t know none of them. I couldn’t put a face to none of them. A name to none of them. They wasn’t at all real. I just had to keep running. Down our street that was getting darker. Long like some tunnel I was closed inside of. It stretched out longer in front of me the faster I run. But I knew as long as I kept going, Imani would be alive, laying next to me in my bed.

 

I had got to the end of the street when I passed out. I don’t remember even doing it. I was just running. Then I was in the grass of the lady yard who keep her cockeye grandson. Laying in a pile of weeds. Looking up at red and blue lights circling in the dark and faces crowded around me. Sirens was going off all over the place. Somebody say for everybody to get back so I could breathe. I could breathe. And that little boy come and threw a pot of cold water in my face. His grandma slapped him. I don’t know how long I was out for. A second. A minute.

I don’t know what happened to the time. What happen to time when you slip out of it? Where do it go? Did my Imani slip right out of the world without even knowing what happened? Without any pain?

I sat up and tried to get up. But that old lady say I shouldn’t, because one of my feet was cut bad. Cut deep. I don’t know when I cut it. How I cut it. It ain’t hurt, not one bit. I got up anyway, not sure where to go, when I seen Mama push into the crowd. Push her face right where I could see it. There wasn’t no reason for me to run no more. Mama was there, and I knew I wasn’t dreaming. I could see on her face. Kin to mine, wild like mine, that everything happening was real.

She say, Tasha, Imani going to be all right. A ambulance coming. She say that to me. Her clothes wet wet with blood. Her hands with blood on them. I could see it. Even in the dark. Wet and darker than the night. Mama had two cops with her. Real dark. Even in the night. Young like boys. But with strong hands like men. Big hands. One got me under one arm. And the other on the other. Mama was holding on to one arm too. Tight tight. She say, Imani arms and legs was moving. I seen for myself. That’s good. She can still move. You got to be strong for Imani. She need you strong. You hear me?

I ain’t say nothing. Not nam word. I guess the birds had swooped down on me when I was out, pecked my mouth clean. Mama dug her nails hard into my arm. I felt them enter me. Cut right into the flesh of me without no pain. Mama say again that I needed to be strong. It ain’t make no difference what Mama say. I could feel Imani death all up inside of me. Heavy like lead.

Latin name, Plumbum. It had been on my Latin test that morning.

Mama say, You hear me, Tasha? I heard her. Them hands dragging me along. My feet hardly touching the ground. Three police cars was in front our house. They sat me in back of one of them. Cops was everywhere. Searching all around our house and Miss Odetta house with flashlights. A whole bunch of people. Faces I couldn’t really see was gathered behind police tape. Roped behind it. Blue and red lights showing me who they was and then hiding they faces in the night. Watching me. Watching Mama. Like we was in some kind of show. Look like all the lights was on in our house and I could see heads behind the curtains of Mama room. Moving like ghosts.

Mama was trying to get inside, but they wouldn’t let her. She say, I want to see my baby. But they say she couldn’t go back in. A ambulance was coming. The biggest cop who helped me home, the darkest one, told me his name. Which went right in and out my head. He took hold of one of my hands and kept talking. I seen then he had on gloves. The kind you wear when you giving a relaxer. He was telling me everything was going to be all right. He say wasn’t no need to tell me not to worry. Because he’d worry if he was me. But he say he praying for help. He ask if I want to pray with him. I ain’t think he was supposed to even ask me that.

I should’ve prayed to you then, Jesus. I don’t know if he started praying to hisself. I started shaking. More and more. I ain’t really feel cold. But I couldn’t stop shaking, and he started looking around like my shaking was making him nervous. He kneeled down right by the open door of the car and took both my hands in his. I kept right on shaking. He ain’t let go until the ambulance come screaming up the street, and he went away.

All the attendants ran inside and a white man who I think say he was a detective come over to talk to me. I was looking up at Mama window. At all the people inside. Moving around like shadows. The detective say he just want to ask me some questions. What I seen. Who I think could’ve done the shooting and why. Did I know anybody who owned a dark Trooper. Mama was standing by the car. She had on clothes I never seen before. I guess somebody give them to her to wear. Mama looked over at the crowd. Then she wasn’t there. I heard somebody scream. Hey, hey! Stop her! I tried to get up. The detective told me to sit down.

A cop tried to grab Mama. Mama was too quick. She seen what I seen. Miss Odetta. Mama flew up in the air and landed on top of Miss Odetta. They fell in the grass, and Mama got in some punches and kicks before a cop pulled her off. Still screaming. Still kicking. I’ll kill you! Mama screamed. You goddamn bitch. It was you. Your son. Ya’ll did this.

Miss Odetta say, Ya’ll heard her threaten me. Ya’ll heard her. I ain’t done nothing. My child ain’t done nothing. I’m pressing charges. Arrest her. Arrest her! She crazy, Miss Odetta was shrieking.

The cop who had been talking to me put Mama in the back of the car with me. He say, I know you’re upset, but we can’t have this. This isn’t helping the situation. You’re upset. I don’t want to cuff you and take you in. Quiet tears was coming down Mama face.

The cop say, You’ve got to stay in control. For Imani.

Mama nodded. She say, But you just don’t understand. You don’t understand that’s my baby up there.

I reached my hand out to Mama and she held it. Tight.

The detective was still standing outside the car. Mama leaned over me and say, I already told you they was shooting for that nigger next door. June Bug. Everybody know. He stay on the west side. That bitch Odetta ain’t going to tell you. But everybody know. Listen to me, Mama say. Find him.

The detective told Mama he had already heard her. He want to know what I had to say.

I ain’t say nothing. I closed my eyes. Hoping to find that dark space again. Slip into that empty space where there wasn’t room enough even for time. When I come back, Mama was hollering my name. The detective was gone and one of them ambulance attendants come to look at my foot. It ain’t hurt. It was still bleeding, though, and the attendant say it wasn’t bad, but I needed stitches. He ask whose child Imani was, and I say mine. He say, She’s alive, and they’re preparing to bring her out any minute. He say no family was riding with her to the hospital. We could stand behind the police tape if we want to see her come out.

Mama grabbed my hand. Decided for me. I let her and that cop who’d been with me come back to my side and help me stand up. While the space of night around us lit up like the day. Not just one sun, but three rose over our heads. Lights on television cameras. Pointing right at us. I don’t know when they come. But I put my head down. Just that quick, they carried Imani past us strapped on a stretcher. She went by so fast. Surrounded by so many people, I couldn’t even see her.

Me and Mama went right behind her in a cop car. Racing to ECMC. Sirens going. Lights flashing. The big dark cop was driving, while me and Mama sat in the back. I looked over at Mama but turned my face away. I ain’t want to see the wildness of her face no more. The fear that had her rocking on the seat next to me. Folding and unfolding her hands like they was going in and out of prayer. I watched out the window. Looking past my own face at the ambulance speeding ahead of us.

They took Imani right into emergency and took me to get my foot stitched up. This young black woman did it. She gave me a shot. She smiled, but she ain’t say much to me. I don’t know if somebody told her. About Imani. So she wouldn’t be making no small talk. Asking how I cut my foot. Telling me the shot wasn’t going to hurt one bit. Letting me know how many stitches she was putting in. She just worked, and when she finished, she told me to not put pressure on my heel and to shower with it in a plastic bag for the next two days.

Then she let me go to Mama, who was sitting in the waiting room. So was Mitch. I don’t know when Mama called him. He had his work uniform on and he wiped his tears away when he seen me, rushed right up to me, and pulled me tight to him. He kept saying over and over, I’m so sorry, darling. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.

I sat down next to Mama. Mama was steady rocking. Mitch sat still. His face red red. His eyes swollen. Mama was talking soft to him. Saying, Imani going to make it. My baby going to be all right. Mitch ain’t say nothing. He was praying. Steady praying with his hands pressed together. His lips moving. While I listened to the fluorescent lights hum and watched the hands of the waiting room clock sail slow around its face.

Almost a hour went by before a nurse come and ask us to come with her. Mama jumped right straight up out her chair. How’s Imani? Mama ask.

The nurse say, The doctor will talk to you.

Mama started moaning. She knew. I think we all knew. The nurse put us in a small room with no windows. It was cold in there.

When this short, white doctor come in to talk to us with his hands balled up in his pockets and his eyes on the floor, he really ain’t have to say what he say. He sat down right next to me and say, We did all we could.

Mama moaned even louder, and tears come down her face. All of a sudden it seemed like Mama nerves took hold of her. They took over her hands. Her hands started fluttering out in front of her like they was trying to fly away from her body, and Mama fell back in her chair. Hollering. Mitch grabbed hold of her. But Mama fought against him. Her hands beating him. The doctor looked at the floor. I stared at him hard, so hard I think it made him look up. He looked like he want to leave. But he sat there until Mama calmed down. She was still moaning. Still crying. I wasn’t crying. Because I already knew. Mama was the one who was hoping. The one who had prayers in her hands, even though she has never said she did. Mitch had both of his arms wrapped around Mama. Holding her hands close to her body.

The doctor say, Imani didn’t suffer. You should know that. If you’d like to see her. To have some private time. You can. But I’ll caution you, you might not want to see her in the condition she’s in. I’ll leave it up to you. He got up and left.

Mitch say, I’ll go see Imani, and I’ll decide if you should see her.

Mama started fighting against him again. She say, I’m going to see my baby! You ain’t deciding a goddamn thing for nobody. Mitch let Mama go. She jumped up and say, I’m the one doing the deciding.

I say. Soft. Mitch can decide for me.

Mama looked at me. Like I’d slapped her. She ain’t say nothing.

Mitch say Mama could go first while he waited with me.

Mama say, No, you go on. Tasha say she want you to go for her, so, damn it, go.

Mitch just say, All right. And he left the room. Mama moved next to me and I held her hands. They was cold. Empty of prayers.

When Mitch come back, I knew I ain’t want to see Imani. I seen him shift me from the center of his eyes. Hold me off to the side. He ain’t say nothing. If he’d opened his mouth, I think he would’ve cried. Mama seen how he looked, but she went to see Imani anyway while I sat with Mitch and he put his arms around me. Like a daddy. Even though I’m past having a daddy.

Later that night when we went out to Mitch house, and I was laying on the couch, I heard Mama tell Mitch she wish she hadn’t seen Imani. They was sitting in the kitchen, talking quiet. She ain’t say why she wished it. But I knew.

I listened to the two of them crying all night. Talking all night. They voices flashing in and out. Close to me. Hanging low in the dark like fireflies. Then far far away. Like starlight. I couldn’t cry like them. Hard. Deep down to my bones. Only regular tears come from me. Soft. Tears not at all crazy. But sane, and running down my face onto my neck. Tickling my neck the way Peanut lashes do. They only come when I think about Imani being alone. Not nowhere with Jesus. Not halfway from here to heaven. But alone. All by herself in the bottom on the night.

I ain’t even think I’d slept until the next morning, when I heard Aunt Mavis nem coming in the door. I’d been in that timeless space again that ain’t seem at all like sleep. I opened my eyes, and it was bright. Aunt Mavis held on to me for too long. I had to let her go, because I could feel her heart beating all fast against me. Racing. If I had stayed pressed up against her, I ain’t know where it would’ve took me.

I went out the back and sat on the deck. Junior come right behind me. He had on sunglasses, early as it was, and he kept shaking his head. It’s messed up. The whole thing is messed up, he keep saying. He was sipping on a pop. My mouth was dry, and I ask him for a sip. He say, Ain’t hardly none left.

I snatched the bottle from him. Don’t be stingy, I say. I took a big swallow and spit it out.

Junior say, Look at you. Wasting my stuff.

I say, What is this?

He say, You know what it is.

I ain’t. It was some liquor, I knew that much.

He say, It take the edge off. I got more if you need it.

I ain’t say nothing.

He say, You might before everything is over.

Shoot, I need it now, Junior say.

Frankie come out the house. He had a pop, too. I ask for a sip. He wiped off the top on his shirt and handed it right to me. It was warm and all pop. He sat down right up under me on the next step. Where’s Imani? he ask.

Junior say, Shut up, you big head. Why you got to go ask something like that?

Frankie say, Because I want to know.

Junior say, Daddy told you don’t be asking a bunch of questions.

I say, It’s all right. She still in the hospital.

Frankie say, Mama say she in heaven. How can she be in the hospital and in heaven at the same time?

I say, I don’t know.

Frankie ask, How long do it take to get to heaven? Can you get all the way up there quick? He lay his head back in my lap and pointed up at the sky. His mouth was filling with big teeth now. Square and white, with spaces in between. Two still missing on the sides.

Junior took a drink and say, Maybe Superman took her.

Frankie say, Don’t you say that. You being stupid. Superman don’t take people to heaven. I kissed Frankie on the top of his head. I don’t know why. But I did, and he ain’t wipe it off. He say, Imani got her own wings to fly. She a angel. For real.

It was after noon before we all got showered and dressed. I ain’t have no shoes. No clothes but the sweats I wearing. They had dirt on them. Blood on them. On the pants. Brown. I don’t know if it was my blood or Imani blood. Junior let me wear some of his sweats and a pair of his sneakers. The sneakers was big on me, which was good, because my foot was hurting some. I didn’t cover it in the shower and it was throbbing pain up my leg. Every time my heart beat, I felt another pulse.

All morning long Mama nem had been making phone calls. They was all set to leave me and the boys at Mitch house, because Uncle Willis say they had to make arrangements. I say I want to go and so did the boys.

Mama ask, You sure you want to go back to the house?

I say I was, and all them looked at me. Out the corner of they eyes. But in two cars, we went. I rode with Aunt Mavis nem. Mitch with Mama.

As we drove down our street, I looked out the car window and seen heads turning. Like they was waiting for us. The little boy who’d throwed that water in my face the night before seen us and raced us to the house, still circled in police tape. And out in front of our house was something that made us all take a breath.

On the sidewalk was a memorial. People had come and put stuffed animals and flowers and cards and even some balloons tied to a light pole.

Frankie ask, What’s all this stuff for? Ain’t nobody answer him.

Seeing all them things made it easier for me to get out the car. I was thinking Imani will like this. It was so pretty. Like a party.

The little boy who was racing us come up to me. He say, Peanut looking for you. He say for me to tell you.

Frankie say, Imani my cousin. And the boy took off running again.

Mama nem was looking through all the things, and I started looking, too. All of the stuffed animals was new except this one. A teddy bear that was all nubby and dirty. It had a card tied around its neck with a ribbon. I opened it. It was a sympathy card somebody had wrote. You don’t know us or our daughter Jennifer, but this is her favorite bear. She wanted Imani to have it.

There was money in the card, and Mama took it from my hand. She started collecting all the cards and piling the toys in Frankie arms. But I ask Frankie to leave the toys there. Mama say for me to suit myself, but they might get stole.

Frankie ask, Can I put a toy here for Imani?

I told him he could and he dropped the animals and went to the car. Everybody else went in, and I waited for Frankie to come back with a plastic Superman that looked like it was flying. He got down on his knees, arranged all the animals in two neat rows, and put his Superman right in the front. So Imani can see it, he say.

We ducked under the police tape, and soon as we got in the house, the phone was ringing. Mama answered it and I went to change into my own clothes. The door to Mama room was open. I ain’t go in, but I peeked. Newspaper was down on the floor where Imani fell. Wet and dark with big brown stains and traces of orange and yellow seeping through. I felt like I’d throw up, and I wanted to leave not just our house but the whole world. I don’t know why I thought the room would be cleaned.

Frankie grabbed hold of my hand. You OK, Tasha? You want for me to get Mama? I told him no and he led me like I was some child into my room. He sat with me while I changed and maybe I should’ve been shamed in front of him, but I wasn’t. I was glad he was there. Watching over me. I even changed my drawers while he sat on the bed holding one of Imani dolls. The phone rang again, and I heard a bunch of feet on the stairs.

Junior knocked and pushed the door right open, without asking if he could come in. Peanut, Eboni, Kente, and Coco was all with him. They all hugged me tight. Crying. Frankie punched on the radio and somebody was rapping about the thug life while Junior was steady sipping. Steady taking the edge off hisself.

Uncle Willis come up and say he needed some help, and all the boys went off with him. Even Frankie. Eboni say there was plenty of food if I want to eat. Miss Lovey had cooked all night. She’d seen Imani on the news. Seen me and Mama, and they been calling and calling and calling the house. Miss Lovey couldn’t sleep, and Eboni say she stayed up with her. They made macaroni and cheese. Buffalo wings. Fried chicken. Tuna and macaroni salad. A pound cake and a jelly cake.

Eboni say her and Coco came over first thing in the morning with the food, hoping me and Mama was back, and when wasn’t nobody home, they went to Peanut house. Coco say, Peanut ain’t even know. He was on his way to school, and she and Eboni told him. He stayed home. Eboni say I should eat. Coco say I should eat. They would make me a plate. Coco say she would get it. My mouth should’ve been watering for Miss Lovey food. But it wasn’t. I ate. I could’ve even ate the plate without knowing it.

We all spent the rest of the day with the radio playing soft out in the backyard inside the shade of the trees with they hands still like babies. Eboni jumped up to turn it off the first time the news come on and they talked about Imani. I told her to leave it. They say it was a senseless tragedy and they ain’t have no leads in the drive-by shooting. It ain’t last but a few seconds no way. Then they talked about the weather.

Uncle Willis and Mitch and the boys was working hard in the house. They got a carpet cleaner. Replaced windows and screens. They even did laundry. Scrubbed the kitchen. Cleaned the bathroom. While the phone kept ringing and from time to time Frankie come to us to rest for a few minutes and tell us what was going on. There was more toys out front, and he was keeping them straight. People was bringing food and more food. They was running out of places to put it all.

He say, I had Buffalo wings and two kinds of cake. Later, he say there’s a moving truck next door pulled right up to the porch. He looked all excited in a strange kind of way when he told us the news cameras had been out front. Eboni and Coco raced to see them. But Frankie say they was gone. He say Uncle Willis told the reporters they couldn’t talk to me, and I was glad he decided. I ain’t want to be on the news. Frankie say, Daddy let them see Imani picture.

Which one? I ask.

She got on a purple dress, Frankie say.

Mama and Aunt Mavis was gone almost all day. When they got back, they come out to the backyard. They faces was pinched shut like they was holding in more than they was telling. Peanut was sitting next to me on the stoop, with Frankie sitting right up under me. I thought Frankie was going to sit in Aunt Mavis lap when she come, but he was shamed to on account of the big boys, so he sat next to her. Junior sat way off on a lawn chair almost at the side of the house. He was way past drunk, I know. Still sitting with sunglasses on and drinking from a pop bottle. Eboni and Coco fixed plates for Mama and Aunt Mavis, and they picked and talked.

Mama say they had been to the welfare. But the welfare ain’t give enough money to bury somebody in a cardboard box, let alone a casket.

Aunt Mavis say, I told you me and Willis will take care of things.

Mitch say, Me too, Earlene. Darling, don’t worry about the money. Everything is going to be taken care of.

Mama and Aunt Mavis had also been to a funeral home. Paterson Brothers. Imani not ready to be released to the funeral home for one more day. When Mama told me that, I went on upstairs.

I thought I might cry, and I ain’t want nobody to see. I was thinking about Imani. That she’d spent the day being touched by strangers who ain’t know nothing about how I loved her. How could they know? When they seen her like that. And she was going to be alone. Again. In the night. All closed up in a drawer.

But I didn’t cry none when I got upstairs. I laid across the bed with my face in a pillow. I could smell Imani in it, and I stayed there until Frankie come up. I’d fell through some hole in time, because it was dark out and it sounded like there was a party going on in the house.

The stereo was on downstairs playing some old seventies song like Uncle Willis nem like, and so many people was talking, they voices all run together in a blur.

Frankie had his arms full of toys he got from out front. Where you want them? he ask. I told him I ain’t care, and he put them in the crib. Frankie say, Junior nem say can we come in here? Them mosquitoes eating us up outside. I told him they could.

Kente was the first one through the door. He say, All them old people done took downstairs over.

Coco say, Old people? My mama only thirty-two. Talk about your own mama. She old as hell.

Eboni was going to sit next to me on the bed, but Peanut act like he was crazy. He pushed her all out the way and dove onto the bed next to me.

Eboni say, See you, big head boy, you ain’t had no home training. Up in people house tearing up they furniture.

He say, Forget you. This a place I been wanting to get to.

Eboni say, Please, you was just up in here this afternoon.

Peanut say, Not on the bed. If your Mama could see me now, Tasha.

Frankie say, If Aunt Earlene want to see you now, she can just come up here.

Junior was passing his pop bottle around, and Kente, Eboni, Peanut, and Coco took a drink. Coco passed it to me and I took a drink. It was nasty. But when Frankie ask for some, I turned the bottle up to my mouth and drank it all. Almost a half bottle, and it made my stomach all warm in one instant.

By the time I went to bed, all the edges had been rubbed off me, and I felt all smooth and light. Like I was floating. Like I was walking on water. When I laid down in the bed, with Junior and Frankie on the floor below me, I floated right out the window and off into the night.

I ain’t get a chance to be with Imani until three days later, at the wake. We got there early and parked around the back. I ain’t want to get out the car.

Mama say, It’s all right, Tasha. We all going in with you, and the casket closed. Me and Aunt Mavis seen to that.

But I couldn’t go in just then.

Mitch say, Why don’t you just wait in the car for a while? Take some time to yourself. It’s still early. Somebody will come get you.

Frankie ask, Can I stay with you, Tasha? I’ll stay with you.

Junior say, Leave Tasha alone.

I say, He all right. He can stay.

Mitch rolled the windows down.

When they left, Frankie ask me, You scared to see Imani?

I say, We ain’t going to see her.

Frankie say, in a soft voice like a baby, I know we ain’t really going to see her, but I want to talk to Imani when we go in. Junior say he was going to slap me if I do it. Mama say Imani can hear you all the time even if you talk without moving your lips, because when you get to heaven you get super power hearing.

I say, Aunt Mavis ain’t even say that.

Frankie say, Not like I say it, but I’m not telling a story. Want some Red Hots?

I told Frankie I ain’t want none, and he poured some in his mouth.

Uncle Willis come back for us soon after that. He took one hand and Frankie the other. Out front the funeral home, so many teenagers was on the sidewalk, it looked like a school had just let out right there. There was a line to go inside. I ain’t seen none of my friends, but I seen some of my teachers. Mrs. Poole was standing with Mr. Diaz, my Latin teacher, and these secretaries nem from the office. Two of my teachers from middle school and Mr. Toliver was all standing off to one side.

Mr. Toliver come right over soon as he seen me. He had on sunglasses and he hugged me real hard. I am so sorry, Tasha, he say. His voice all tight. His face all tight like he was going to cry if there was any looseness anywhere in him. Mr. Toliver ask Uncle Willis if he was my daddy. I told him who he was, and Mr. Toliver cleared his throat and went on about me. Tasha is a fine student. A fine girl. If there is anything. Anything I can do. Don’t hesitate to call. My number is in the card, he say, and handed a card to Uncle Willis. Uncle Willis thanked him, and we went inside.

Being family, we ain’t have to wait. I was surprised the funeral home was so small. There was a entry hall with a church pew full up with people. The main room was painted in this soft pink and lit dim. I counted about seven or eight rows of folding chairs. All filled. Uncle Willis say there was a row saved up front for the family. People was steady coming in around us and leaving around us.

One of the Paterson Brothers introduced hisself to me. He was a short dark man with a half-bald head. His breath smelled like Sen-Sens. He say he would take us all down front. Like we had such a long way to go. But he parted the crowd, which pulled back like a wave. It was hot in the room, like the heat was on, and it was hard for me to breathe. I pulled air into me. But it didn’t seem to come in any farther than my mouth. My feet stopped when I seen the tiny white box with Imani picture sitting on top of it.

I let Mama nem decide everything for the funeral except two things. Things I wanted to have because I knew Imani would like them. First, Miss Lovey was going to sing at the funeral. I thought it would be nice for a preacher to speak. The one from Eboni nem church. Mama ain’t want that. In a way, Mama was right. That preacher don’t know Imani. He ain’t bless her. He wouldn’t be able to say nothing personal about my baby. But I thought Miss Lovey singing would be personal. The other thing I decided was the dress Imani would wear. The purple one she’d wore for her birthday. Wasn’t nobody going to see it. The picture of her wearing it on her birthday was going to be there.

It was the picture that made me stop the night of the wake. It’s crazy how you know things and don’t know them all at the same time. I knew I was never going to see Imani again from the second I seen her on the floor in Mama bedroom, but until I seen her picture sitting on the coffin, it seem like I ain’t really know. it. The real knowing, the deep-in-my-bones knowing, took the breath from me. Stopped my feet. Uncle Willis and Frankie pulled me along, and my feet moved. Not because I wanted them to. They moved slow and my legs got a weakness in them. A baby step. A baby step. We moved right up to the coffin and passed it. I ain’t cast my eyes at it direct. I looked at the floor as we come near it.

Frankie say, Hey, Imani, we here. And Junior reached out from the front row and slapped Frankie upside his head. Uncle Willis slapped Junior on the shoulder with his free hand.

Junior say, I don’t see why you hitting me. Frankie the one said something stupid.

We all sat down while Aunt Mavis say, through her teeth, Stop acting like crazy people in public.

My friends was sitting in the second row. Eboni say, We got here early. We had two extra chairs in the front row, and I ask Peanut and her to come and sit up front with us. Frankie ain’t like it when Peanut ask him to slide down. I heard him say, Ya’ll ain’t no kin to us. But he moved.

I never been to a wake before. I ain’t really know what was going to happen. What I was supposed to do. It was two hours of people I knew and ain’t know giving me hugs. Crying. Shaking they heads. Rushing by the coffin or stopping to look at Imani picture for a long time. Some people brung toys. Pressed cards into my hands. Touched Frankie on the head when he say, Imani my cousin. Shook Uncle Willis, Junior, Mitch, and Peanut hand. Rocked Mama and Aunt Mavis in they arms. Kissed Eboni on the cheek.

When the night was just about over I heard this sound. This moan coming from the back. Low at first, but louder and louder, until it come out of the throat that held it. A wail. Like a voice long lost in the wilderness. I looked back to see who it was. It was a girl about my age. I ain’t know who she was, but she changed the night. Touched the pain right below everybody skin. I could hear more moaning. And more moaning. And cries escaping from the tiny lit room into the dark of the wilderness I could see out a single round window. Mama and Mitch was crying. I could hear them. Knew what they sounded like crying together. Near and far. I ain’t cry.

I ain’t cry at the funeral neither. Mama fell all apart. She was the one who cried so hard, she couldn’t hardly sit up. Mama was the one wailing. She was the one moaning. The one kicking. Aunt Mavis had to hold her up. Mitch had to hold her up. They pressed in close to her, and I sat on the other side of Aunt Mavis. Fanning. Lifting tiny waves of heat off her. That returned and returned.

The closest I come to crying was when Miss Lovey started singing. Miss Lovey words flowed into me. Echoed in me. Shaking me from the inside out.

She sang:

 

Why should I feel dis-cour-aged,

Why should the shad-ows come,

Why should my heart be lone-ly,

And long for heav’n and home,

When Je-sus is my por-tion,

My constant Friend is He;

His eye is on the spa-row,

And I know he watch-es me.

 

I wanted to hold them words in me. To have them fill me up. But when Miss Lovey finished with the last note, while it was still hanging in the air like a bird, them words had already gone from me. And I was empty.

 

I laid down that day while there was still blue in the sky and woke up in the dark with Mama laying next to me. Empty. Even with her hands on me. Fearing for me. Worrying for me.

Mama don’t know the power in her hands. She think her hands done failed because I don’t be talking. That’s why she let Eboni come and bring her two twins to our house. I like to hold the girls and smell the tops of they heads. They smell like Imani. Not just they grease but the inside of them I can smell. The greenness of they life. The sweetness.

Mama even let Peanut come to see me in my room. She don’t ask me a bunch of questions, neither. She let him come right up the steps. Peanut like it. Mostly me and him talk and listen to music. Maybe Mama know, maybe she don’t know. That me and him even done it. Twice. Right in this bed. While she sat downstairs watching TV. I wasn’t a woman with Peanut neither time. Just a child with my eyes wide open watching the shadows of trees blowing across the ceiling.

I ain’t really talk to Peanut when he was over. I ain’t had nothing to say to him. I don’t have nothing to say to nobody, even though I know they all still waiting for words to come out of me. But there just ain’t none. They was snatched from me the night my baby left this world. Maybe Mama nem think I can just wish them back. But they don’t know I wish every night.

With Mama hands on my back, still late in the night, I be looking outside my window at this one lone star hanging in the sky. I been watching it a long while now. How it rise in the dark and slide across the sky into the silver blue of dawn. I keep my eye on it. I hold it in the center of my eye and spend the night wishing for more than I can ever tell them. More than I’ll ever be able to say.