MABEN LEFT ANNALEE ASLEEP AND SHE WALKED BACK TO THE front to talk to Brenda who was sitting behind the counter reading the newspaper. Brenda lowered the paper and asked her if she needed something.
“That café,” Maben said. “Something to do.”
“You gonna have to use sentences,” Brenda said and she folded the paper and set it aside.
“You said something about some work.”
“It ain’t glamorous,” Brenda said. “I can call down there and tell them you’re coming. You out of money?”
“No. I got twenty dollars or so.”
“Then you’re out of money.”
“Can you watch Annalee?”
Brenda turned up her nose. “Not usually. But since ain’t nobody else here I will.”
“She’s sleeping right now.”
“Fine.”
Brenda picked up the telephone and called the café and told them she was sending someone down there to do whatever they need her to do. Maben thought that the woman put it perfectly. That it had long since been a theme. The woman hung up and gave her directions. Walk back down to Main. Turn right. Go one block. Turn right on Broadway. Two or three buildings down on the right. Maben thanked her and went on her way.
She found it easily and a man named Sims met her at the door. He wore an apron and he had a towel slung over his shoulder and a pen behind his ear. The café was empty in the midafternoon except for a man in overalls who sat at the counter drinking coffee. Sims asked her if she could wash dishes and she said yes and he took her into the kitchen. She spent the afternoon washing dishes and mopping the kitchen floor and taking out the garbage. Whichever way Sims pointed her. In a few hours she said she had to go see about her kid and he opened the register and took out an envelope and handed her a twenty-dollar bill and she had doubled her wealth.
“You did good,” he said. “If you want to come back tomorrow, come on.”
She folded the twenty in her hand. “You not open tonight?” she asked.
“It’s Friday night. No reason not to be,” he said.
“Can I come back later then?”
He shrugged. “I suppose. If you want.”
She said okay and then she walked back to the shelter and she found Annalee sitting on the floor with Brenda and the teenager who had brought them the water. Each of them with coloring books. She knelt and kissed the top of Annalee’s head. She was hungry and she made a sandwich in the kitchen and she walked back to the front and sat down with them and noticed that the child had gotten better at staying between the lines.
Brenda looked at her watch. “I got to go here in a minute. New girl comes in and stays from now ’til the morning.”
“She had anything to eat?” Maben asked as she nodded at Annalee.
“About two dozen Oreos.”
Brenda and the teenager stood up and went into the office and Maben relaxed while the child colored a bear with blue fur and green eyes. Ten minutes later another woman came in the door. A young black woman with a big purse. Maben stretched her legs out straight and listened to the women trade thoughts about the day and the upcoming night. Then she slipped off her shoes and pressed her thumbs hard into the bottoms of her feet. Annalee sat with her legs crossed and Maben asked her if they hurt.
“Yes.”
“Then stretch them out for me.”
Annalee stuck her feet out straight and Maben began to massage the muscles in her small legs. She said not too hard and Maben eased up. Pressed her fingertips gently to the skin. Wanted to reach into the muscles and pull out the pain and tell her she would never have to run again because she was being chased but that would be a lie.
Brenda and the teenager walked past Maben and Annalee and said they’d see them tomorrow. The black woman stuck her head out of the office and said let me know if you need something. Got some paperwork to do.
Maben told the child she was going to get clean in the shower and Annalee followed her to the back. Sat on the cot with the coloring book.
“You still hungry?” Maben asked.
“Not really. My stomach hurts.”
“I guess so.”
Maben went into the shower and with the hot water on her neck she closed her eyes and mumbled to herself. It was a dream it was all a dream. A bad night like other bad nights and it was not real. Try and you can push it down. Way down. She nudged the hot water and made it hotter, almost scalding. And the steam rose and she begged it to be a dream. Her pleas as she sat in the backseat and he drove her into the dark and his hands in places they should not have been and the gunshots echoing across the vacant land and the harried face of the child in the motel room window. It was a dream. A nasty dream. The steam rose and the water spilled over her aching body and she felt it all and heard it all and it was not a dream but a nightmare and she felt it in the cloud of steam that shrouded her. The water so hot and her fears rising and with a quick twist she turned off the water and dropped her forehead against the slick tile of the shower wall.
She stood still. The water dripped from her body and tapped like tiny reminders. She lifted her forehead twice and let it fall both times and then she heard Annalee singing to herself and she raised her head. Half smiled. She stepped out of the shower and dried off. Dressed and sat down with Annalee.
“Got something I can color?”
The child flipped through the book. “You want ducks or dogs?”
“Ducks. Dogs bite.”
“Not good dogs.”
“No,” Maben said. “Not good dogs.”