Plenty Good Room Read online

  As if she’d read her mind, the woman said defensively, “And in case you wonderin’, I don’t get nothin’ for keepin’ him. The daddy had him and didn’t want him no more and dropped him off one day and never looked back.” As if challenging Tamara to do something about it, she continued, “He been here a whole year now, and we lives on my SSI—that’s how we lives.”

  Tamara sighed imperceptibly. This is not my purpose for being here, she thought. Telling herself that the boy was with family—Sissie was his grandmother—Tamara reassured herself that the woman must care for him, because if what she’d just said was true, he’d already been with her longer than her own daughters had. None of them had ever lived with her for a solid year. In fact, according to the records, Sissie Bailey’s life with her daughters had been interrupted by the state every few months, until the state finally took the girls for good.

  “Mrs. Bailey, I’m not here to discuss Dontay,” she replied. The woman was going to be even more defensive now and might even change her mind about talking with her. Tamara quickly got to the point for her visit. “Now, to answer your question about what this has to do with you, to tell the truth, I’m really not quite sure yet. I was just hoping that you wouldn’t mind taking a moment or two to answer some questions for me.”

  Glancing at Sissie again, Tamara was dismayed that the woman’s flowered housedress had fallen open and she was either oblivious or didn’t care that her undergarments were fully exposed.

  The woman calmly stretched out one plump leg before pushing back a piece of the graying hair from her eye as she looked at Tamara suspiciously. “You mean I don’t have to answer any of yo’ questions if I don’t want to?”

  Tamara was silently praying the woman would talk with her, but she knew that there was no way she could make the woman cooperate against her will. Uncomfortably she forced herself to maintain steady eye contact with the nearly nude woman and replied, “This is not an official visit.”

  Sissie Bailey looked down then and, without saying a word, pulled her robe closed tightly and gave her a brittle smile. “Oh, it’s not, huh? You sho’ you not tryin’ to gather some stuff on one of them kids of mine on the sly? Somethin’ you gone come back to me with later, are you?”

  Unwaveringly Tamara continued to look the woman in the eye and replied, “I give you my word, that is not why I am here.”

  Sissie Bailey sat with her eyes locked searchingly on Tamara’s for a long moment and then laughed harshly and said, “Okay, gal, it probably cain’t hurt nothin’ to talk to you. What the heck, you in here now. Go ’head then; ask me what you want to know.”

  Less than an hour later, Tamara was back in her car, thinking that she had not been mistaken about one thing: Sissie Bailey was an unpleasant woman. Clearly life had been rough on the woman, because she seemed steely-hard and determined not to let anything or anyone come near any soft part of her again.

  Sissie really hadn’t said too much about her own kids, either. In fact, she only knew the whereabouts of one daughter: the one whose son Sissie had living in her home. Tamara had disliked the harshness in Sissie’s voice when she’d spoken with the boy, and more than once Sissie had swatted him on the arm or behind, but the boy continued to play and laugh as if used to that type of treatment from the woman. A couple of times he’d hugged her hard around the neck and nuzzled his small head there as he giggled joyfully.

  For just that moment anyway, it looked to Tamara as though the woman’s face softened. The moment was fast and fleeting, though, and when Tamara blinked again, the hard lines and stony demeanor were back on Sissie’s face.

  Tamara started her car, and as she backed out into the street, she forced the woman’s hard countenance and raspy voice from her mind. At least she’d gotten information on one daughter—that was a start.

  “Central State County Correctional Center for Women, uh? Well, I guess I’ll be meeting Samyra Bailey soon, and I sure hope she’s nicer than you, Sissie,” she said as she pulled her Toyota onto the main street and began the long drive home.

  12.

  Troubled Waters

  Disgruntled, Tamara stared down disbelievingly at the stack of work that had accumulated on her desk. I don’t know how I can have so much to do already, she wondered. “It’s almost as if these stupid forms multiply,” she muttered to herself in frustration.

  Joan’s clipped tone, coming from behind, stunned her, “Talking to someone, Tamara?”

  Sitting straight up in her chair, she spun around quickly and found herself staring directly into her boss’s hazel eyes. It was aggravating to Tamara that the woman seemed to sneak up on Jayson and her, almost as if she was trying to catch them doing something that they should not.

  “No, Joan . . . I’m only talking to myself. Just going over what I need to do,” she added with a forced laugh.

  Without another word, Joan walked around Tamara’s cubicle and then, leaning over her shoulder, peered closely at the paperwork on her desk. “Well, it does seem like you have quite a stack of work there. How did you get so far behind, Tam?”

  I can’t believe her, thought Tamara while quickly stacking the papers into a neat pile on her desk to prevent Joan from reading them. “I’m really not too far behind,” she added through tightened lips, working hard to hide her agitation at her boss’s interference.

  Joan straightened up abruptly and patted her shoulder patronizingly. “Well, I know that you are quite competent, and you will meet any designated deadlines, I’m sure, Tam.”

  Tamara turned to glance at the woman and replied in a quiet but confident voice, “Yes, I will.”

  As soon as she heard the woman’s footfalls softly and steadily moving away from her cubicle, muffled by the indoor carpeting that covered the floor of their office, she murmured under her breath caustically, “And you can stop calling me Tam, too . . . like you really like me or something.”

  “I heard that,” said Jayson. He rolled his chair back, as he often did, and stuck his head around the partition dividing them, so that he was looking into her cubicle.

  Tamara jumped and then spun around quickly and said, “Stop doing that, Jay-Jay! You’re going to give me a stroke one day, easing around that corner like that!”

  Jayson stroked his goatee and asked, “Tam, doesn’t it make you sick when she tries to act all friendly and everything?” He pointed his finger toward their boss’s door in a dramatic gesture. “That woman don’t care about nothin’ but getting the work done and riding us black folks to do it.”

  “Oh, c’mon, Jayson, we don’t know that.” Tamara was trying hard to be fair to the woman—after all, she was in a new position, and they did not know her all that well yet. “Maybe it’s us; maybe we’re being too hard on her. Maybe we’re being racist or something. In a way it seems like she’s trying real hard to let us know she does care about us.”

  In a shocked tone, Jayson replied chidingly, “Tamara, girl, you know better than that! Racism is a tool of those in power! And that is white folks! We don’t have the power to be racist, and we’re not even being prejudiced—we did not judge her before we knew her. She is the one that treats us like we still on the plantation. She acts like she don’t know those days are long gone!”

  Tamara looked up at Jayson and said quietly, “I don’t know—well, maybe you are right, Jayson.”

  “Maybe? Maybe? Girl, you know I’m right!” Jayson looked at Tamara with concern written on his handsome face. “Tam, I know you be gettin’ mad sometimes, and you really need to start letting your anger out, or one day you are going to explode! It’s not healthy to hold in everything like you do. C’mon, you know that you are sick of Joan, too!”

  “W-w-well, kinda,” Tamara added falteringly.

  Shifting gears a little, Jayson asked, “And what about that wild girl you let come live with you when you didn’t even want to do it? She browbeat you into it!”

  Skeptically Tamara answered, “Well, it wasn’t actually like that, Jay; I could’ve s
aid no. For some reason, I just didn’t.”

  There was no stopping Jay, though; clearly he’d been waiting for this chance to voice his opinion about Sienna again, and he added, “Tam, let’s face it. You didn’t say no, because she is the boss and you were simply afraid to say no. Plus, Joan knows that you are sorta meek, and that’s why she asked you in the first place. She knew that you would not say no.”

  “I am not meek!” Tamara said more loudly than she intended.

  Jayson put one finger to his full lips “Shhh! We don’t want her back over here checkin’ up on us again, now!”

  “Sorry, but I’m not meek! I’m just a little reserved sometimes,” added Tamara firmly, with what she hoped was a stern look on her face.

  Jayson replied sarcastically, “Right, Tam, and I’m not a ladies’ man.”

  “You’re not,” said Tamara. “You only think you are!”

  Playfully Jayson pushed Tamara’s slender shoulder and said, “Well, I guess you ain’t meek, girl; in fact, you might be a little too bold, when you start questioning Jay-Jay’s prowess with the women.”

  Tamara emitted a sputtering giggle before she could stop herself.

  Jayson’s gaze turned serious then. “For real, Tamara, how is that child of yours? Is she still clownin’ and cussin’ you out and stuff?”

  “First of all, Sienna is not my child; she is a young teen staying with me temporarily, and actually she is not acting up,” said Tamara. She added a bit smugly, “Surprisingly, things are going rather well; Sienna has been minding her business, and I’ve been taking care of mine. She is usually in her room doing homework when I get home—I think her grades will be quite good.”

  Jayson was not satisfied, though. Clearly feeling that Tamara’s rosy representation of the situation was suspicious, he asked, “Does she help you around the house? Does she clean up behind herself or do dishes or anything? Have you given her chores to do every day, or are you just working your own pretty little fingers to the bone after putting in long days here?”

  Tamara ran her fingers through her hair before replying offhandedly, “She takes care of her room, and that’s all I ask.”

  Jayson sucked his lips loudly, and asked sardonically, “That’s all you ask, or that’s all she’ll do, Tamara?”

  Frowning now, Tamara chided the man. “Be quiet, Jayson! Besides, you don’t have to worry about the two of us. I think everything is going to be all right.”

  Jayson gave up then. Clearly, Tamara was intent on painting everything with a rosy brush today. “You go, girl, then; I guess you got it all together now!” He began to push his chair back around into his cubicle as he whispered, “I guess we better get to work, before she comes back. You know this time she’ll be flashin’ that ring, tryin’ to bling-bling, and if I have to see that thing one more time today, I think I might snap out and tell Ms. Joan a thing or two.”

  Before Tamara could reply, the intercom on her desk buzzed loudly. She swiveled around in her seat, picked up the receiver, and listened silently before hanging up moments later.

  Worriedly she told Jay, “I’ve gotta go now. That was the school, and Sienna evidently is really misbehaving today, and they want me over there right away.”

  Tamara’s concerned expression told Jayson to stifle himself; now was not the time to criticize her decision to allow the girl to move into her home in the first place. Instead he replied encouragingly, “Everything will be okay, Tam. Don’t worry—kids her age act up all the time.”

  The tension in Tamara’s face relaxed a little as she asked him, “Really? You think so, Jay-Jay?”

  Standing up, Jayson retrieved Tamara’s leather jacket from the coatrack and, while helping her put it on, assured her, “It’ll be just fine, Tamara; you’ll see. I’ll tell Joan where you’ve gone. You can take comfort in the fact that there’s not much she can say about you leaving early, since it was her idea that Miss Sienna-girl move with you in the first place, huh?”

  “That is right, isn’t it?” Tamara took a deep breath as she pulled her leather gloves over her slim hands. She opened her bottom drawer, got her purse out, and then turned to Jayson and said, “I’ll see you later today, hopefully.”

  “Now, don’t worry, Tam—everything will be just fine,” Jayson said again with a reassuring smile on his face. He watched her walking down the hallway toward the door, and as soon as Tamara was out of earshot, he shook his head while saying to himself, “Lord, have mercy on her! That poor girl don’t have a clue about what she’s in for. I’ve got a feeling that little Miss Sienna-girl is gonna take Tamara on the ride of her life—and it’s only just beginning!”

  13.

  Fast Getaway

  The girl stood uneasily in the dinner line, trying her best to look older than her young years. Though paranoid that someone might notice her youthfulness and call to report her as a runaway, she stayed put, realizing that in only moments the servers would begin to ladle food onto her Styrofoam tray. Tonight the girl’s usual caution took a backseat because her thoughts were consumed by her hunger; she’d not eaten since she ran away last night. In fact, it had been her overwhelming desire for food that had driven her to venture into this shelter for a meal in the first place, even though she knew that by doing so she was taking a big chance.

  Tentatively she looked up from under the bill of her cap to find herself staring right into the blue eyes of a friendly-faced, light-haired woman who was spooning out stew and hashed browns. The woman stopped what she was doing and, gazing at her curiously for a moment, said, “Well, aren’t you a pretty little thing?”

  The girl smiled quickly before instinctively becoming wary of the strange woman’s friendliness. Tucking her chin tightly into her chest, she kept it that way even though she could sense that the woman was still watching her, evidently waiting to look into her face again. With her hands out in front of her, the girl held the tray with stiff arms, praying that the woman would not bring unwanted attention to her that might cause her to have to run away without eating. She needed to eat tonight; she was so hungry.

  Impossibly long moments passed, and then finally, out of the corner of her eye she saw the feet of the person next to her move, so she sidestepped as well, without ever raising her head. Just keep moving, she thought, desperately hungry now, especially since the aroma of the food was wafting into her small nostrils, and her stomach was reacting to the smell by clenching and unclenching in anticipation of being fed.

  Ignoring her inner rumblings, the girl moved down the line, keeping her eyes straight ahead, too afraid now to look up at all. Finally, at the end of the line, she grabbed a juice from the open box sitting there, muttered a quick thank-you, and headed toward a vacant corner. Sitting on the floor, she crossed her legs and then slid on the dusty floor until her back was supported by the wall behind her.

  The curious stare of the serving lady was forgotten as the girl attacked her food; her eyes were glued on her platter while she ate ravenously. Starved, she savored each bite; the food tasted so very good to her. She contemplated her next move. First she had to recover her things—right now they were hidden in a place where she hoped that they would be safe. Her eyes darted quickly around the room. She thought, I sure couldn’t bring them here. After all, street people found out quickly that shelters had a well-deserved reputation for being places where people stole from one another—nothing was really yours for long when you were in a shelter.

  With her bread she soaked up the brown gravy of the stew. Then she took a long, quenching drink of the orange juice, and while it normally was not her favorite drink, today it tasted wonderful. She wiped at her mouth with the back of one hand and then rubbed it on the side of her already dirty coat.

  Much too soon the tray was clean and the girl sat staring at it, wishing that she felt brave enough to go back for seconds. Within moments her eyes grew heavy, and soon her long lashes rested on her cheeks, and she was nodding ever so slowly toward the tray in her lap.

  The
tired girl had no idea she was being watched with curiosity. The rotund lady sitting on the cot closest to her nudged the rasta-haired friend sitting by her and said, “Hey, look at little miss over there. She gonna fall right in her food.” She chewed a bit more as she continued to observe the girl, adding, “Poor thing is probably a runaway or something. She don’t look too old, do she?”

  Her friend looked up then and gazed around the room until she spotted the sleepy girl over in the corner. “Oh, you talkin’ ’bout that little girl over there?” she said while sucking loudly at her fingers, which were brown with gravy from the stew. Then she said knowingly, “Yep, that girl there done ran away. She probably just bad and don’t want to be at home. You know how these kids is nowadays.”

  The first woman nodded her head in agreement, adding, “Don’t I know? My kids is what got me in this situation I’m in. Tryin’ to do for them and stuff and they clownin’ and one went to jail and I puts my house up to try and help ’em and he skips off and they take MY house. Now here I am with nothin’—nothin’!”

  The rasta-haired friend, listening to show support, was thinking to herself that she’d heard this same story about a million times, it seemed. Yet she understood the woman’s need to talk. They were in a shelter after all, and it was a hard life, and everybody had a story, and sometimes they needed to tell it, just so it would seem as if somebody cared.

  Suddenly, the small girl’s head drooped even closer to her plate, and the first woman yelled, “Hey . . . hey, girl!” The woman got up from the cot, put her tray down, and walked over toward the girl, who seemed deeply asleep on the floor. Gently she touched the tired girl’s shoulder, but before she could say a word, the girl’s eyes flew open.

  Startled to see a strange face, the girl froze. For a moment she couldn’t recall where she was, but once she remembered, she jumped up so quickly that her Styrofoam tray tumbled right over on the woman’s legs.