Hunger, page 17
“Well, if it isn’t the original big willy!” He gave Innocent the requisite black man’s handshake with an extra pound.
“From the looks of things, that title suits you.”
“I’m just a black man trying to make it—”
“And succeeding.” Innocent gestured at the stack of hard-backs in front of Marcus and the crowd of his followers who still lingered at the bookstore.
“Doing my part for the cause.” Marcus feigned modesty. “Man, you’ve been ghost. Thought you went off and married some white chick and moved to Montana or some shit. Nothing against white chicks or Montana of course.” He chuckled.
“A lot’s been going on.” Innocent bobbed his head up and down.
“I wanna hear about it, black man. But look, Lydia made me promise I’d be home to put Nile to sleep and check in on Tunisia so that she could do some sort of home spa thing and his bedtime is ten minutes from now.”
“Well, let me not hold you, then. Let’s just connect at some point soon.”
“I was going to invite you over. You can have some Brazilian cachaça or whatever you big dogs are drinking these days, while I get little man tucked in. Then we can catch up for a few and let you leave in time for your booty call.” Marcus gave his poker face.
Home was the next thing on Innocent’s agenda so he figured the detour would kill two birds with one stone. “Booty calls are out of style, so you got me all night.”
Lydia had lost all of her plumpness, replacing it with hollow cheeks and the burden of loss. Innocent gave her a hug in greeting, feeling the grief that lived in her body. “Lydia, it’s good to see you. I’m so sorry about your father’s passing.”
“Did Marcus tell you everything? He doesn’t like to talk about it anymore. But that doesn’t make it go away.”
“Not everything.” He lied. Marcus hadn’t said much of anything.
Five-year-old Nile ran into the parlor and held his arms up to Marcus. He picked him up.
Lydia didn’t miss a beat. “Dad died doing what he did best: cheating on Mom!”
“Lydia, why don’t you do that home spa you told me about?” He rubbed her shoulder with his free hand. “I’ve got things under control out here. I’ll come and look in on you later.”
She sighed and walked out of the room without another word.
Marcus gave Innocent a helpless look.
“Man, do what you gotta do, okay. I’m here.”
“Let me just get Nile to bed. And you haven’t even met Tunisia?”
“No, not yet.”
“She’s asleep, but I’ll let you peek at her in a bit.”
“Sounds good.”
Innocent sauntered around the cavernous family room looking first at the photos adorning the walls and then at the mound of old family pictures sitting loose on the coffee table. He thumbed through them one by one, studying the smiling people arrayed in hip-huggers, bell-bottoms, and the occasional leisure suit, with backdrops ranging from Disney World to l’Université Cheikh Anta Diop in Senegal. In each, Lydia’s arms encircled her father, who stood at least a head shorter than her.
“Innocent,” Marcus called from the steps. “Take off your shoes and come on up.”
They walked into Tunisia’s room where the two-year-old lay sprawled across her toddler bed, her thumb near her opened mouth.
“She’s beautiful.” Innocent felt full. Seeing her made him think of his own daughter; she was now twice the age she had been when he left Côte d’Ivoire. He could only imagine what Awura looked like now.
They returned to the family room and Marcus offered him scotch.
“That’s a little strong for a Tuesday night.”
“I thought the night was young for eligible bachelors like you. What’s the hustle these days, Innocent? You look sleep deprived but not sex deprived!” He slapped his hands in anticipation of a story.
“What?”
“I know you single Africans are still in the fucking business. Least you could do is share a story, black man.”
“Is that all I am to you?”
“Damn, man. No need to flip out and get self-righteous and shit. Things have just been tough. With Lydia and all. She’s been…not well, you know. Mentally it’s taking a toll.”
“Look, I’m sorry to hear that. But a lot’s been happening here, too.”
“Fuckin’?” He pulled his face into a smirk and waited.
“I’m a father, dammit. I became a father.”
“Oooooooh.” Marcus was a popped balloon.
Innocent stood up and rammed his hands into his pockets.
“I just thought, you know, smooth African brotha such as yourself, and all—”
“Life is serious for everybody, Marcus. Not just you. I’m not just your fucking fix!”
Marcus picked up the scotch, poured it into a shot glass, and downed it in one gulp. “Hey, I’m sorry, all right. And I suppose I should say congratulations?”
“Of course you should.” He stared down at him.
Marcus cleared his throat. “You know, life is some real bullshit. I mean, you plan for stuff and everything keeps on getting fucked up. My wife is a skinny ghost of a woman who can’t sit down to eat a full meal and who cries when I touch her, and my kids are growing up in a world where folks fly airplanes into buildings and our own president treats national security as if he were a cowboy on a cattle ranch. It just makes a man feel, well, not like a man. I guess I was trying to live vicariously through you. My bad, all right.”
Innocent nodded his acceptance of his apology. “We’re all grown up. And not everything in the real world is what you thought it would be.”
Marcus poured more scotch and raised his glass in salute. “So Innocent’s a daddy. Who’s the lucky lady? Is it Noire?” He looked suspicious.
Innocent had no intention of oversharing. “She’s a family friend from back home. Our daughter, Awura, is four months old. But she was nearly three months premature.”
“Oh wow. Damn.”
“Yeah.”
“But she’s home with her mother. I’m moving back myself. In a couple of weeks.”
Marcus stared at Innocent with new eyes, with the respect of an equal. “That’s good, Innocent. That’s real good. Pictures can’t replace being there with your daughter.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“So, let’s toast to fatherhood, then!” He poured them both shots of scotch. “And to trying to do the right thing when everything is fucked up.”
Innocent dozed in the backseat of the taxicab as it made its way downtown. The vibration on his hip nudged him back into wakefulness.
“Pokou—”
“I’m getting married!”
“Mamadou?”
“I proposed and Shema said yes. She said yes.”
“MALPT!” He reined in his thoughts. “That’s really quick, man. I barely knew you two were together.”
“Yeah, well, we are.”
“When’d you meet her exactly?” He knew the story but had never heard it from Mamadou.
“Four months, give or take. But look, I just can’t wait. Abstinence is a bitch!” He chuckled.
“Abstinence?! Since when?”
The cabdriver threw a glance at him from the front of the car.
Puzzled by the cabdriver’s consternation, Innocent noticed the mini Algerian flag dangling from the mirror. He understood French.
“Calm down, Innocent, okay. It’s just that Shema is Catholic and a very private person; she doesn’t want to share herself like that, you know, without being married.”
Innocent was speechless. He pictured her body, scarred and sad and beautiful. Shema standing naked before him on the very night they met. Lowering his voice, he chose his words carefully. “But she’s…a widow.”
“Of course I know that. But she was raped, Innocent. I wouldn’t want to force the issue and make her uncomfortable.”
“So, you’re saying she’s been celibate all this time?”
“Goddammit, Innocent. When have I ever asked you about the sexual history of any woman you’ve been serious about? How can you even ask me that?”
Innocent digested his words. He was right, of course. He had no right to ask those kinds of personal questions. But he couldn’t help knowing what he knew and seeing the image of her body in his mind. He noticed the cabdriver’s eyes trained on him through the rearview mirror and decided he should cut the cab ride short. “This is fine, let me off here.”
He screeched to the curb.
“Where are you, man?”
“Getting out of a cab. Let me just pay him.” He jostled his wallet out of his pants pocket. “And where are you?”
“I’m at a hotel in Newark. I have meetings with folks at the Newark Museum tomorrow afternoon.”
“Well, it’s only ten, so why don’t you come over and we can have coffee and talk.”
Innocent poured Mamadou’s triple espresso into a coffee mug and set it down in front of him.
“Are you trying to keep me up all night?” Mamadou narrowed his eyes at this friend.
Innocent poured a smaller version of the same for himself and sat down at the kitchen table.
“I should have asked you before. How’s Awura doing?” He sipped the bitter brew.
“Good, by all accounts. It’s hard to speak with Chi-Chi, though; I’m always calling at the wrong time, it seems. And her mother’s not much better. She thinks I’ve made her daughter un-marriageable.”
“Mmm. You know how things are at home. Even here. It’s not easy for a single mother.”
“I know.”
“So, what’s on your mind these days, Innocent?”
“Well, I’m going home. Permanently. Leaving on the twenty-first and I expect to come back to tie up loose ends by mid-May.”
“You’re selling this place?”
“Yeah. I have to. I can’t give myself an out, you know.”
Mamadou closed his eyes and frowned. “That’s good, mon reuf. See, we knew that the right thing would come to you. And it has.”
“Yes, it has.” He gulped his espresso and looked at his friend. Their relationship spanning seventeen years, they were brothers and confidants. He knew that Mamadou was a good man in all of the ways that it really counted. He had integrity and empathy and passion and faith. And he was an optimist and an artist. Innocent admired his ability to create his own way in Paris from the time he was a teenager, and his willingness to pursue the things he loved rather than getting trapped by the things others expected of him. And that’s what concerned him about Shema. He wondered how much he knew and whether he had expectations of fathering children she couldn’t have or even if he knew about her scarring. He knew that Mamadou could handle it. But what if she hadn’t told him? And why had she shown herself to Innocent so readily? What would it do to Mamadou to find out on their wedding night?
He didn’t know the right place to begin so he picked anyplace. “Would you say you know a lot about Shema?”
“Innocent, is this why you asked me over here? To quiz me on her? I don’t think I need that from you, Innocent. What happened to unconditional support?”
“Mamadou.” He let out an exasperated sigh. “You tell me that you’re marrying a woman whom you met on a trip to Washington, D.C., four months ago and you expect me to just offer unconditional support?”
“Innocent, you impregnated a woman during a three-month trip back home and when you told me about it, I didn’t pounce on you about her!”
“But you did question my choices. Around her and around Noire.” He was defensive.
“That’s because you said you didn’t love Chi-Chi and she was the one carrying your child. And that you were sleeping with the ex-girlfriend whom you did love—” He paused long enough for Innocent to correct him but no correction came. “—but couldn’t offer a real relationship. That’s why I questioned your choices. Because they were fucked up, Innocent. You knew it yourself; that’s why you called me.”
Innocent squeezed his eyes shut and counted to ten. Slowly. He turned his gaze to the other side of the room. “You remember you told me that I was jerking Noire around because she wasn’t operating on full information? Well, suppose you didn’t have full information? I mean, do you know that you do?”
“Are you trying to tell me something, Innocent, because if you are, you’re doing a very bad job of it.”
“I’m not, man. I mean, Shema seems like a wonderful woman—you know I met her through Mireille in October—but I don’t know. Maybe she’s got a complicated history. She had to leave Rwanda, you know.”
“I’m fully aware of that.”
“So, it’s just…there’s so much to know about a person before you join your life to theirs on a permanent basis.”
“I suppose you’re learning that every day with Chi-Chi.”
“Mamadou, please don’t be defensive about this. Remember, I love you, too.”
“Then be happy for me, Innocent. You know, the first time I saw Shema, I could see her story. It’s in her eyes, Innocent. And since then I’ve grown to know her heart. She’s a good woman. A great woman, Innocent. And I am willing to go on faith and to love this woman as my wife. I know that there are things I haven’t learned about her or she about me. But at some point you have to believe that there’s someone with whom you can make a life, even without complete knowledge. Because the truth is, we don’t know everything there is to know about ourselves, either. We’re growing in that knowledge every day that we live. But if we are honest, with ourselves and with those we love, then we’ve won more than half the battle.”
Innocent was awed. Honesty. Innocent wished that he had never seen Shema. He wrestled with her words—“Look at my scars and respect my history”—and with the promise he made to her to keep their interaction private. But that was when he thought Mamadou knew more than him. Now that it seemed that he didn’t—though he could not be sure—he felt that he was keeping something from his friend. And that Shema was, too, under false premises.
He changed his tactic. “Mamadou, you know that you can tell me anything. You know that. I guess I’m just surprised that you are willing to marry someone so quickly when there are so many things you haven’t experienced about her. Especially since I know you to be a sexual man. Sexually active.”
Mamadou shook his head. “You know what’s funny about close friendships like ours that play out long-distance. It’s that we think we know more about the day-to-day lives of the other person than we really do. And we used to. When we were horny university students who shared a dorm room. But that was fourteen years ago, Innocent. And we’ve become men with preferences, habits, and issues, some of which we don’t always share. And then you fall in love. And the stuff that you may not have shared with your close friend, you may share with her. Because you’re going to build a life. Together. So I may know things about Shema, and she may know things about me, that I have not and will not share with you. That’s my prerogative. I appreciate your concern, Innocent. I really do. But I appreciate your respect more. For me and for the woman I intend to marry.”
They stared at each other for a long time, Innocent ingesting Mamadou’s insights and reconciling it with his own fears. Mamadou had more faith in people than he did. He always had. If only Innocent could feel the same way…
Part Four
FAIT ACCOMPLI
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“I” STATEMENTS
Noire’s glasses rested on Dr. Branch’s coffee table. As did her mother’s. They were facing each other but sat just far enough away to blur the features in the face she used to know better than her own.
“Okay, Noire. Now I want you to repeat what your mother says exactly as you hear it. No commentary, no spin. Just the words she says. You’ll get your chance to do the same, later. Got it?”
“Yes.”
“Flora.” She nodded for her to begin.
“When you said that I didn’t need to go through the trouble of being a bride dressed in white, I felt that you were saying I didn’t deserve it.”
“That’s not what—”
“Noire, repeat what your mother said. Don’t answer it.”
Noire felt her blood pressure creeping up. “I heard you say that you didn’t like it when I said you didn’t have to go through the trouble of wearing a white dress.”
“Is that what you said, Flora?”
“I didn’t say that I didn’t like it. I said I felt that you felt I didn’t deserve it.”
“Okay, Noire. Repeat that part.”
“You felt that I felt that you didn’t deserve it.”
Dr. Branch looked at Flora for her approval. “Okay. Continue.”
“And when you acted disinterested at the dress fitting, it made me feel that you didn’t care that this was a happy experience that I wanted to share with you.”
“I heard you say that you felt like I didn’t care about your happiness because I wasn’t interested in the dress fitting.”
“Not my happiness, in general, Noire, but that this—getting married—was a happy experience for me that I wanted to share with my daughter, who’s also my maid of honor.”
“Repeat.” Dr. Branch nodded at Noire.
“You felt I didn’t care about the happy experience of you getting married and sharing it with me, your daughter and your maid of honor.”
“Is that what you said, Flora?”
“No! Noire, you’re not even listening to me.”
“What? I just repeated verbatim what you said—which happens to be dead wrong, but whatever—and I haven’t been able to even defend myself! This is crazy. And now you’re going to tell me I’m not listening. That’s all I’ve been doing is listening to your wedding plans.”
“Noire, you’re getting ahead of things. I want you to trust the process. Just try to hear why what you repeated is not what your mother said.”
“The process?! Maybe I feel like I’m not being heard, like she doesn’t give a damn about the fact that it may not all be happy for me, that she chose to share her ‘good news’ the day after my mentor, and one of the people who was closest to me in my whole life, was killed in a plane crash, not unlike the goddamn plane crash that caused my parents to decide to get married. For godsakes, Mom. Didn’t it occur to you that I could be dealing with my own stuff?!” Noire expelled air in a violent blast and crossed her arms over her chest. She couldn’t see her mother well, but she could tell that she was holding her fingers at her temples.
