Plenty Good Room Page 11

  With a sigh she retrieved a heavy old blanket from the worn bag, pulled her cap down hard over her eyes, and lay her head on the towel that she had rolled so carefully into a tight coil earlier. Covering herself with the blanket, she let her weariness overcome her anxieties and quickly drifted off.

  “Hey . . . hey . . . you!” the girl heard a voice say loudly, and for a long moment she thought it was part of her dream and continued to lie there unmoving.

  When she heard the voice again, she knew this time it was no dream. “Hey, you in there!” the man said, even more loudly this time.

  The girl forgot where she was when she first sat up. It seemed as if it was daylight, and she thought she was in a real home for just a moment, because everything was so bright. But then her grogginess subsided, and remembering now that she was inside her old damp pipe home, she knew immediately that something was wrong. She held up one small hand to shield her face from the light in front of her and squinted to see who was there at the end of the pipe.

  “You in there . . . come on out, right now!” said the voice demandingly. It was definitely a man speaking, and it was not a voice that she recognized from any time before. “Come on out, now! You don’t want me to come in there after you!”

  Resignedly she moved the old blanket to the side and, without attempting to stand, shimmied her way down the old pipe. At the opening the man moved back enough to allow her to get all the way out and stand up.

  A look of interest creased the older man’s face, and he said wonderingly, “Well, I be darned, boy, what are you doing there in that old dirty pipe?” Then, studying her more closely through squinted eyes, he added, “Heck, you ain’t nothin’ but a kid. Where’s your folks, anyway? I bet you’re a runaway, and somewhere, somebody is worried sick about you.”

  No one is worried about me, she thought sadly, and I can’t be a runaway really, ’cause I don’t have a home to run from . . . not really. She said nothing, though, and just stood there mutely with her head held down, hoping that if she kept quiet, he might just go away and leave her alone. But deep inside, she knew that was not going to happen.

  “Hey, boy!” the man said again, louder, and he reached out his hand in an effort to touch her shoulder and get her full attention. As his hand got close to her head, she moved back instinctively to avoid his touch. The man sensed her movement backward. Overcompensating in his attempt to tap her shoulder, he instead accidentally caught the frayed bill of her hat, flipping the old baseball cap right off her head.

  The man shielded his eyes with his hand and squinted again at her for a long moment before saying in an astonished voice, “Well, my, my, this is no boy here; this is a little girl.”

  Weary from walking all day, she just stood there staring right through him. Her small shoulders slumped gently as she just gave up. She didn’t have any energy or strength to run this time.

  Sadly she realized, she was caught!

  19.

  Popcorn and Pepsi

  “C’mon, Tamara, hurry up! Get yourself a pop! You takin’ too long!” yelled Sienna over her shoulder as she headed toward the living room to get the movies ready that they were going to watch. It had been Sienna’s idea to stop at the video store tonight, but Tamara agreed wholeheartedly that a movie night would be great way for the two of them to spend some casual time together.

  She had yet to speak with the girl about the telephone behavior that Lynnette and Jayson had brought to her attention weeks ago, and Tamara’s plan was to have that talk tonight. While Tamara was aware that she should have addressed Sienna’s uncalled-for rudeness much sooner than today, she’d been so grateful for the temporary lull after the school incident and their stormy blow up that she’d kept quiet.

  “You takin’ too long, Tamara. Can you get the popcorn or something?” asked Sienna in an annoyed tone as she grabbed bowls and napkins to carry into the front room.

  Thinking about Sienna’s rude behavior, Tamara removed the popcorn from the microwave oven and distractedly pulled the hot paper bag open before it had time to cool off, almost causing the hot steam from the buttery kernels to burn her face.

  “Ow!” she said as she sucked air in between her teeth. “Okay, Tamara,” she said aloud to herself, “this is getting serious now . . . You are constantly worrying about that girl! You must address her behavior tonight, before you seriously hurt yourself!”

  Preoccupied, she’d not heard the girl enter the kitchen again until Sienna interrupted her thoughts. “There you go again, talking to yourself.” Then with a sarcastic laugh she added, “Shoot, I still think they got me living with a crazy lady half the time.”

  Tamara glanced at Sienna without speaking, and though she maintained a calm exterior, inside she was quite distressed. She noted with a sigh that her purposefully chosen method of ignoring the girl’s behavior was not working, since the teen continued to speak to her as if she were an adult—and a rude one at that. In fact, each time Tamara ignored her disrespect, the girl seemed to grow more boldly insolent in her interactions with her. At this rate, Sienna soon would step over the boundary line that Tamara had yet to define to her clearly, and when that happened, the two of them were bound to collide hard—and it would be all Tamara’s fault.

  Abruptly breaking into her thoughts again, Sienna looked at her impatiently and said impertinently, “Tamara, can you come on?”

  This time Tamara was so aggravated by Sienna’s tone that her stomach churned at the blatant disrespect the teen was showing toward her. Highly agitated now, Tamara poured the popcorn into a plastic bowl, grabbed a hunter-green-striped kitchen towel, and threw it over her shoulder before leaving the kitchen.

  “Tonight,” she said with conviction. “I must talk to her tonight.”

  When she entered the living room, Sienna’s back was to her as she busily worked to figure out how to program the DVD player with the remote. “I bet you don’t even know how to use this thing,” Sienna commented flippantly as she pressed buttons on the control. She added derisively, “Folks like you always got a bunch of sh—stuff, and they don’t even know how to use half of it.”

  Tamara laid out the towel on the cocktail table with one hand and set the popcorn on it. Then she sat on the couch and looked at the girl before replying dryly, “For your information, Sienna, I do know how to program the DVD player.”

  “Well, Excu-u-use me—my bad,” retorted Sienna with a cynical laugh. “Maybe you smarter than I thought you was.”

  Tamara opened her Pepsi and poured it into her glass. She watched the fizzing soda for a moment before taking a couple of kernels of popcorn. Tamara put them in her mouth one at time, chewing them slowly as she watched Sienna, who, unlike her, was hungrily gobbling popcorn with one hand while looking over the movies for the umpteenth time with the other.

  Sometimes Tamara was convinced that the teenager had no understanding of just how rude she really was. She reasoned that Sienna may have been disrespectful for such a long time now that she actually thought that her way of speaking to adults was quite normal. Nevertheless, Tamara wiped her hands on the towel she had thrown over her shoulder and, after taking a deep breath, jumped headfirst into a talk that was long overdue. “Sienna . . . I don’t know if you realize it or not, but there are a lot of times when you could be perceived to be quite rude when you are interacting with adults.”

  Still chewing loudly, Sienna stared hard at Tamara and cocked her head to one side. “Huh?”

  Tamara rolled her eyes upward and inhaled again. “Sienna, the fact is, you are rude many times to adults when you talk to them. Young ladies should not behave in that way—it’s disrespectful, and frankly, it’s not very nice.”

  The girl twisted her lips after smacking them loudly. “I ain’t tryin’ to be nice,” she said as she wiped her salty hands on the sides of her jeans.

  “Well, we certainly know that to be true. You are not trying to be nice, and you are not being nice at all. Moreover, you are not even being respectful.”


  “So?”

  “So, you should try to do better. You represent yourself when you speak with people, and when you are rude, people think badly of you. This is especially true since you are still really a little girl.”

  “I’m not a little girl!”

  “Well, I’m sorry, a young teen, then. I want you to know that people at my job have said that you are quite rude when you call there for me.”

  “They just lyin’ on me!”

  “Sienna, now you stop that! First of all, stop yelling. I can hear you perfectly fine. Now, every time you get in trouble, you say that the person is lying on you, and that just cannot be true. You must learn to take responsibility for your behavior sometimes.”

  “You listenin’ to them ’cause you don’t like me no way.”

  Tamara blew out a small breath. This whole thing was taking a turn for the worse now. Reaching over, she picked up her glass and took a long drink of the soda in front of her. Her dry throat was unused to the sweet soda, though, and it caught right there in her windpipe.

  Unable to speak or catch her breath, all Tamara could do was grab the side of the couch and gasp for air. Sienna took one look at her widened eyes and sprang into action, quickly jumping from the floor and rushing behind her. Gently the girl began to rub Tamara’s mid back with a firm hand, and just like a milk-filled newborn, Tamara loudly released the pocket of gas caught there, allowing the liquid to flow freely down her throat again.

  The girl gazed at her, repeating worriedly, “Are you all right Tamara? Are you all right?”

  With a grateful look Tamara replied softly, “Thank you.”

  Sienna shrugged her small shoulders and smiled almost sheepishly before affecting her usual streetwise demeanor. “It wasn’t nothin’. I saw somebody do it on a TV show once, that’s all. I’m gonna start a movie now, okay?”

  Without waiting for an answer, Sienna turned out the lights and, after starting the DVD player, sat on the floor, crossed her legs, and leaned her back comfortably on the couch.

  Tamara turned sideways and curled her legs under her. Even though this was the first time Sienna had shown any kindness toward her, for some strange reason the teen’s caring gesture did not make Tamara feel happy.

  In fact, the entire evening had not turned out the way she had planned. She was supposed to be in control tonight, letting Sienna know her boundaries and outlining her expectations to her. But, her close call with the soda changed the agenda, and to Tamara now it seemed that Sienna was in charge of tonight’s situation and she was the one who was out of control.

  Troubled by this unexpected turn of events, Tamara laid her head back on the arm of her floral print sofa. But instead of watching the movie, Tamara’s gaze rested on the shadowy silhouette of the girl in front of her, and there it remained until her eyelids grew heavy and she fell asleep.

  20.

  Round Table

  Seated at the huge table in Central High’s conference room, Tamara stared mindlessly at the papers in front of her while trying to ignore her growing uneasiness. From the time that she had received the telephone call asking her to appear today, Tamara instinctively knew this would be no easy meeting, and while no one had been outwardly impolite since her arrival, she was certain the coolness in their greetings was an indicator of what was to come.

  “Ms. Britton, is it? I can see you’re looking over Sienna’s progress reports, and once you’re done, we can have a brief chat with you before she joins us,” said the teacher who’d done most of the talking so far.

  Tamara glanced up silently at the blonde geography teacher who obviously had been designated the spokesperson for the entire group. Counting quickly as she glanced around the table, again Tamara was dismayed to realize there were ten other adults sitting there. How was it possible that one little girl could need so many people to educate her? she wondered.

  Compounding her discomfort, all the teachers assembled were white, with the exception of Dean James, whom she’d met when Sienna got suspended. The dean had given her a quick but unreadable smile when she first arrived, and now all Tamara could see was the top of her salt-and-pepper hair as she studiously looked down at her own set of papers. No, there was no friendly face in this group to make her feel more at ease; instead, Tamara felt as though she was facing covert hostility all on her own.

  With a quick upward twist of her pink-painted lips, the blonde teacher glanced quickly at her watch before informing her, “Ms. Britton, we are waiting for one more person. Mr. Perry is Sienna’s history teacher, and he should be here momentarily. He was teaching, but the bell should be ringing in a moment.”

  Tamara returned the woman’s half smile and then looked down at the papers, willing herself to concentrate on the information. Her eyes came to rest on the Quarterly Grade Report. Where had the time gone? Tamara had not realized that the quarter was already over, and she stifled her shock once she realized that the document said Sienna was failing every class!

  That couldn’t be correct, she thought. Each time Tamara checked on Sienna in her room, the girl was busily writing or reading something. No, there had to be some sort of error, Tamara told herself, and as soon as they got started, she would make sure it all was cleared up.

  When the bell buzzed loudly announcing the end of classes, Tamara glanced up again and purposefully looked around the table at each of the individual teachers. One or two gave her a quick smile when she caught their eye, but the others simply dropped their gaze.

  Embarrassed, Tamara lowered her head again. What must these people think of me? I’m her guardian, and what if she is failing? I didn’t even know!

  Inhaling through her nostrils, Tamara sat back against the chair and, holding her back very straight, crossed her legs under the table while running her fingers through her hair. She was prepared now, calm and collected and ready for whatever this group of teachers was going to tell her about Sienna.

  Just then a stocky brown-skinned man came rushing through the door. Within moments he’d pulled out a chair, sat in it, and said in a husky voice, “I’m sorry, everybody; I’m late—got held up by a student.”

  Tamara stared at him, her almond eyes wide with surprise. Sienna had one African-American teacher, all right, and he was a good-looking one at that!

  Mr. Perry turned his wide smile toward her and, reaching over the table with his hand extended, asked, “So, you are the parent of our Miss Sienna?”

  “Y-y-yes, that’s me,” Tamara managed to say falteringly, before looking down again quickly. Her previous composure was now shattered, leaving Tamara feeling overwhelmed and ill at ease.

  The blonde teacher interrupted. “I think we should get started—some of the teachers in here have classes to teach next period. I’ve arranged for Sienna to join us during the latter half of the meeting, and there are a few things we should discuss before she does. Let’s begin by introducing ourselves to Ms. Britton.”

  All the teachers introduced themselves quickly, along with the school psychologist, social worker, and counselor.

  Mustering the courage to speak, Tamara let her eyes sweep around the table, and she commented more timidly than she would have liked, “I’ve been glancing through this information, and I’m not sure that this paperwork is correct. This report says that Sienna is failing every class. That just can’t be so. Each day when I go into her room, she’s working feverishly, and I know Sienna is an avid reader as well.”

  Brusquely the older English teacher, who had introduced herself moments ago as Mrs. Madison, broke in. “Well, I must say that Sienna has not read one book in my class. In fact, Sienna refuses to participate at all. She does no homework, and all that she really does is socialize and disrupt the classroom. I’ve had to send her out numerous times this quarter.”

  Evidently, the woman’s comment broke the ice, because one by one, each teacher began to recount the same sort of negative information about the girl’s behavior and academic progress. By the time it was Mr. Perry�
��s turn to talk, Tamara’s shoulders were drooping low, heavy with the weight of all the negative, depressing information.

  “Well, Ms. Britton, I have a few problems with Sienna’s behavior in class. But she actually participates well and does in-class assignments,” said Mr. Perry.

  Tamara shoulders relaxed a bit—she was relieved to hear something good about the girl—and she looked into his eyes hopefully.

  Mr. Perry held her dark eyes with his own and continued gently, “However, Ms. Britton, I’m sorry to have to agree with the others and tell you Sienna has done absolutely no homework this quarter, and no matter how well she participates in the class activities and quizzes, Sienna must complete the homework assignments to pass this class. Ms. Britton, we are well into the second quarter, and the fact is that Sienna will fail the semester if she does not begin to complete her assignments.”

  “I know . . . I—I—I just assumed that she was . . . doing her homework, that is. I asked her, every day . . . and she assured me she was working,” said Tamara falteringly. Then feeling self-conscious, with no idea of what else to say, she looked down and began to study the papers again silently.

  The door slammed hard then, and Tamara glanced up right into the face of Sienna, who was smiling widely as her eyes swept over the gathering around the table.

  “Dang . . . everybody up in here! Why all my teachers got to be here?” the teen asked, but her large grin clearly showed that she was basking in all the attention of the moment.

  Mr. Perry gave her a stern stare said firmly, “Sienna! Don’t you question these adults, young lady! Come over here and sit next to Ms. Britton.”

  Tamara glanced at him, grateful for his help since she was unable to speak. She felt then as though a vise were squeezing her body. The air in the room seemed stifling, and the mostly white faces around the table seemed to be pressing in closer and closer. Swallowing her discomfort, Tamara turned and awkwardly pulled out the chair next to her for Sienna.