Should Have Known Better Read online

  My hand began to move in circles at my thigh.

  “No,” I whispered into the dimness, but I could hardly even hear myself. I wanted to be touched. To be given love carefully and deliberately and magically. I needed it.

  I looked at Sasha. Her beautiful blond curls spread out over my cheap cotton bedsheets.

  Sasha moaned.

  Reginald’s tongue went from her breasts to her stomach to her navel. He made these playful circles there. And he laughed and she laughed.

  “Kiss me,” she said to him inching down from the headboard. “Kiss me.”

  He went deeper and his tongue and his face disappeared between her thighs. A lover I never knew wrestled her upside-down legs around his neck, dipped his back down lower, and instigated a full and heavy and mournful cry from Sasha’s mouth.

  But he didn’t stop. He held her legs tighter.

  She reached out to me. One slender arm, snaking down the white sheet to my hand.

  I know I said “no,” but my hand moved toward hers.

  And the one that was at my thigh moved to the insides of my legs.

  Sasha locked her eyes on mine and I whimpered. My body began to soften.

  And then the ocean moved.

  She pulled me to her with those eyes.

  And this time my lips opened her mouth.

  But she got loose. And turned around on the bed.

  She pulled Reginald and I together.

  He kissed me like I was golden. Ran his tongue up my neck and bit at my chin. He kissed me like I was her.

  She pulled him back to her. He fell between her legs and with no question he entered her.

  I didn’t know where to take myself. Where to go with my ocean and my needs and screaming. My husband was having an affair in front of me and I wasn’t saying anything.

  They rocked and they moaned and Sasha held my hand so tight.

  “Oh shit,” Sasha yelled and her hand gripped mine tighter and her legs went rigid. Reginald wrapped his hand over her head and rocked faster.

  She pulled me down to the bed beside her and he came over to me.

  I wanted the same. I wanted everything the same. To have someone to laugh at my jokes and think I was marvelous and smart. To let me lead him into a meeting and cross my legs so he could see my ankles. To get him to do this to his wife.

  I pulled him into me. I shook him like he shook her. I wrapped my legs around his waist and opened my insides so far back he moaned.

  Sasha smiled like a teacher. I looked from her to Reginald and saw his eyes on my neck. On my throat. I imagined my hair was blond and my arms were slender. He went deeper inside and rocked me harder.

  I yelled then. My legs went rigid and wild. I began to kick and kick as the ocean grew and the last kick when Reginald shook, too, was swift and direct. My heel stopped at something hard.

  “Oww!”

  There was a shout.

  I looked over and Sasha was off of the bed and lying on the floor holding her foot.

  “What happened?” Reginald asked, coming up off of me with his hands in the air confused.

  “She kicked me off the bed!” Sasha cried. “She kicked me. My foot! My foot!”

  I rushed to the edge of the bed to look at her.

  Reginald turned on the light and went to her side.

  “Are you OK?” He crouched down.

  “It hurts!”

  “Well, what is it? What happened?” he asked. He reached to touch her foot, but she moved away.

  “I don’t know,” she said, now cradling the foot in her hand. “She did it!” She pointed at me. In my haze she looked like an image in a stained glass window, all colors coming together and then bursting apart.

  “I didn’t . . . I didn’t mean it. I was just having fun,” I explained. “I’m sorry.”

  Reginald went for the foot again, but Sasha was frantic now and wouldn’t let him near her.

  “I think my foot got caught on the side of the bed. I heard it snap. It’s probably broken.” She looked at me. “Did you do this on purpose? Was this supposed to be funny?”

  “No . . .” I pleaded. “Not at all. I wasn’t even . . .”

  “It can’t be broken. You’d be in way more pain,” Reginald tried. “Probably just a sprain. Let me look at it.” He reached again.

  “Look, just get me out of here. Just get me to my room and away from her,” Sasha said. “I told you she’s jealous of me. She hates me. I tried, but she hates me.”

  “What did you say?” I asked.

  Reginald helped Sasha off of the floor and she winced the whole while.

  “You told Reginald I’m jealous of you?”

  Sasha leaned on Reginald’s shoulder and stuck out her limp foot that was already swelling.

  “How am I going to work like this?” she said. “I can’t go into work like this.”

  “Why would you say that to Reginald? I’m not jealous of you!” I got up in the bed and began to inch over toward them. “You said I was your friend.”

  “You want to ruin my career,” Sasha said.

  “That’s ridiculous,” I said.

  Reginald held out his hand to stop me from coming closer to Sasha.

  “I’m gonna walk her to her room. Just stay in here.”

  “What?”

  “I want to make sure she’s OK. I’ll be back.”

  “But what about me?” I asked.

  “Dawn,” Reginald said, “you’ve had a lot to drink. You need to lie down and get some rest.”

  “But I was just trying to . . .”

  “Dawn,” Reginald called louder. “Enough. You kicked her off of the bed. I need to make sure she’s OK. Do you want me to leave her lying on our bedroom floor?”

  “But—” I tried.

  “Lie down,” Reginald demanded, turning toward the door with Sasha hanging over his shoulder.

  They began to walk out.

  “But I—” I called to Reginald.

  He turned his head to look at me.

  “I’ll be back soon,” he said before walking over our threshold.

  Sasha turned to look at me over his shoulder. There was nothing in her eyes.

  My mother was stuffing me into the empty closet under the staircase. I was still little. I know because her hands fit around my entire torso and there was nothing I could do to get her off of me.

  “I don’t want to go in here,” I cried. “It’s dark. It’s scary.”

  “It’ll just be a little while, Dawn,” she said. “He won’t find you in here. He won’t think of it.”

  “But can’t I go to my room? Be in my room by myself?” I was crying. My legs trembled in the cold draft.

  “He’s gonna come look for you there,” she said. “Look, your daddy’s been drinking; something bad got into him. Something real bad. The devil.”

  “Where ya’ll at?” my father slurred and I heard his feet nearly caving into the steps above my head.

  My mother pushed me hard, back into the wall. I hit my head and fell to the floor. I heard a click as my mother locked the closet door.

  “Edith? Where are you? Where are you with that girl? Falling asleep in church? She knows better.”

  “Herbert, she ain’t in the house,” I heard my mother say. “She gone out to play now.”

  I crawled up to the door and peeked out of the bottom where a little slit of light shined in from the lamp in the living room. I could see my mother’s black shoes right in front of me, hear my father’s shoes shuffling toward her.

  “Play? How the hell you let her out to play after what she done pulled in church this morning? Embarrassing me in front of everyone? She needs to learn how to act. Where’s she at?”

  His shoes were nearly on top of my mother’s, but she didn’t move from in front of the closet.

  “She’s gone. I told you. Told you everything. I’ll talk to her about it later. I’ll give her a whipping; don’t you worry.”

  “Spare the rod and spoil the child!” My
father stomped on the floor and turned away from her. “That’s what the Book says.”

  “That Book says a lot of other stuff, too,” she said.

  “What do you mean, woman? You talking slick to me?” He unbuckled his belt. “ ’Cause if I reckon, it does say a lot more, too. A lot about a woman obeying her husband.”

  “I ain’t trying to fight with you. I’m just saying, maybe you need to wait until that whiskey wears off before you discipline our daughter.”

  My father walked away from the closet and into the dining room, off a bit to where I could see him. He was still in his church pants.

  “What are you looking for?” My mother asked a question she knew the answer to.

  He opened the bottom door of the cherrywood china cabinet I had to clean every Friday after school.

  “I need a drink,” he said. “Where’s my whiskey?”

  “You’ve had enough. It’s all gone.”

  “Woman, it ain’t your place to tell me when I’ve had enough. Now where is it?” He tossed some half-empty glass bottles out onto the floor. One rolled out over the wood and stopped near my mother’s foot. Her hand, shaking and so pale from scrubbing other people’s dining room floors, picked up the bottle.

  “Thought you were gonna stop drinking,” she said.

  He kept rummaging through the cabinet and mumbling about a woman’s place.

  “Ain’t want to have no girl anyway,” he said.

  “You get real mean when you drink.”

  “Told you I wanted a son. Girls is trouble. All of them.”

  “It’s like you’re somebody else.”

  “Open her legs to anyone who comes by. I bet you that’s how she’ll turn out! Like a whore. Like her mama.”

  “Like the devil gets into you.”

  “What you say, woman?”

  My father sprang up off the floor and charged her so quickly it seemed like he was going to tear into the closet.

  Her heels turned into the slit and her body banged into the door. The bottle hit the floor and glass scattered everywhere. The alcohol rolled beneath the door and wet my fingertips.

  “What you say?” my father asked again.

  “I ain’t say nothing, Herbert,” she cried. “I told you I don’t want to fight with you.”

  He banged her against the wall and I watched as her heels raised high off of the ground over the slit and all I could see were the points of my father’s shoes. I could hear the faint gurgling of her choking.

  “I could kill you right now,” he said. “You’re lucky I’m with you. You’re lucky you’re alive.”

  I cried, but I knew to cover my mouth. I knew better than to let him hear me. She’d get it worse then.

  Her struggle for air lessened to silence.

  “Whore!” he yelled and all of her fell to the floor like a piece of rotten wood.

  My mother’s body covered the slit beneath the door. I sat muffling my cries in the darkness. I listened until my father found his whiskey and slammed the front door.

  “Wake up, Mama,” I cried, trying to slide my wet hand beneath the door to shake my mother. “Wake up!”

  “Wake up, Dawn.”

  Reginald was shaking me.

  I was still naked and alone in the bed, shivering in the early morning chill. My eyes were wet with tears from my dream.

  “Wake up!” Reginald was holding my arm. He was fully clothed and wearing a jacket.

  “What? Where’d you go?”

  “I didn’t go anywhere,” he said. “I’m leaving now.”

  “Leaving?”

  He let go of my arm and I sat up.

  “Leaving for what? Where’s Sasha?”

  He went to the dresser and got his watch.

  I got up and went to the bedroom door to see the door to the guest room on the other side of the end of the hallway wide open. “Did her driver come? What time is it?”

  “A little after six,” Reginald said. “Look, her foot is pretty swollen. Just a sprain, but she can’t walk. I can’t let her go home like that in a limousine. How’s she going to get around and stuff?”

  “She can call someone . . . I don’t know.” I put on my slippers and went to the bathroom for my robe.

  “She’s in the truck. Waiting for me.”

  I turned back to see him.

  “Waiting for you for what?”

  “To take her back to Atlanta.”

  “No. I’m going to talk to her.”

  “She doesn’t want to see you.”

  Reginald stood on the other side of our bed, by the dresser, looking at me with cold eyes.

  “She’s pretty upset,” he said. “And I told her maybe you two should just let things cool down a little before she—”

  “Cool down?” I grabbed the bathrobe off of the back of the closet door. “I didn’t do anything. She’s the one who came in here and tricked me into having a threesome. I didn’t want to do that.”

  “Now, she tricked you?” Reginald looked at me like I was crazy. “How did she trick you? Or was it the alcohol tricking you?”

  “You don’t believe me. Why would I try to hurt Sasha?”

  “None of that matters,” Reginald said. “I’m just going to take her home, make sure she’s OK, and come right back.”

  “But what about the kids? What about work?”

  “Just tell them I’ll be home for dinner. And I canceled all of my appointments for today.”

  “You canceled work?”

  Reginald hadn’t canceled a job since his mother’s funeral.

  I tried to tie my robe with shaking hands and tears coming from my eyes, but I couldn’t. I felt in me that something was wrong. And I couldn’t say it. Because then I didn’t know what it was. But I felt it. Something was wrong. Really wrong.

  “I have to go, too,” I cried.

  Reginald grabbed my arms with both hands.

  “How can you go with us with the kids here?” he asked slowly. “Look, Dawn, you need some rest. I didn’t want to say anything, but you’re drinking too much.”

  “I’m fine. Did she tell you to say this?” I asked. “She’s the one with the—”

  “She didn’t tell me anything,” he stopped me. “I know. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. You haven’t been right in days. And I don’t even think your mind is clear right now. Look at you.”

  He turned me to the mirror where my robe was wide open and I was still naked. My eyes were swollen. My hair was everywhere.

  “Don’t leave me,” I whispered as tears began to roll at the image. “Please don’t leave me.”

  He raked my hair down with his fingers and tucked it behind my ears.

  “I’ll be back,” he said. “I’ll be back before dinner.”

  5

  Dinner got cold. Dinner was thrown away. Cheyenne had an attitude. R. J. wouldn’t be settled down. I went to bed alone. And it was a sobering and restless night. Not a wink of sleep to be had.

  I texted Reginald a few times. Called a few more times than that. There was nothing. I thought to call a friend or a relative to ask if anyone had seen or heard from him. But then I realized we had no friends. We kept in touch with no relatives. I thought to call the police or a hospital and report my husband missing. But I knew he wasn’t missing. And that would be a lie. I knew where he was, but this silent and burning thing in my stomach wouldn’t let me say it aloud. Instead, I was busy reviewing things in my mind. Do you know how that is? When you can’t admit something to yourself, but you keep going over the facts anyway? You add it all up like a cashier at a register:

  Sasha shows up.

  My husband leaves.

  I’m alone.

  And there it is. In writing in your mind. You can’t dispute it. But then, you tell yourself that you’re crazy. That can’t be true. He’s just taking a long time. He’s mad at me. Maybe I did kick her on purpose. How can I make this better?

  I told myself I needed to relax.

  And I might have. But I c
ouldn’t stop hearing myself begging Reginald not to leave me. And thinking of how crazy that was. I begged my husband not to walk out of the door with a woman who was supposed to be my friend. My last friend.

  At four in the morning, my cell phone rattled the entire bedroom awake. I wasn’t asleep, just lying in silence, and when I turned over after hearing the vibrating, I saw the light from the phone shining bright and blue, reflecting neon colors on the ceiling above the nightstand. I reached for it like it was water in a desert.

  It was Reginald:

  Got ur texts. Need time. Call u soon.

  (That casual use of “u” would bother me for years.)

  The light over the help desk at the library was out. One long, fluorescent lightbulb blew out and we were in near darkness all day.

  “Light goes out downtown, the custodian in the building fixes it,” Sharika said, using her computer screen as a lamp to see the bar code on one of the books on her cart. “Light goes out in the ’hood, we have to wait five days until someone will come fix it. Ain’t that some racist shit?”

  “I guess so,” I said flatly, not caring to stop her cursing. “It’s how things are here. How they’ve always been.”

  “Well, they need to decide what they’re going to do. Either put the money into these libraries or shut them down. Poor people need books, but who wants to come to some beat-down, shabby library when you know they have better ones in the white folks’ neighborhoods?”

  “They have better everything in their neighborhoods. That’s just how it is.”

  “Uhm . . . humm.” Sharika shook her head disapprovingly and shot an evil eye across the floor at a boy who was folding back pages in a magazine. “Dante!” she called to him. “Stop folding those pages. I see you.”

  He looked up toward the dark help desk surprised and slid the half-folded magazine onto the table in front of him.

  “Bad-ass kids up in here,” Sharika said. “They’ll break something that’s already broken. Don’t have a clue how to treat nice things. Can’t give them anything.”

  She inched off of her stool and went to push the cart away to return the books.

  “I’ll do it,” I said.