The House of Eve (27)
She declined, feigning a headache.
Nadine was painting her nails when Eleanor stormed through their door.
“How was it?”
And then she told Nadine everything. From the castle-like home, to the servants, to mistaking everyone for white only to discover they were all fair-skinned Negroes, to his mother’s questions, and then finally, Greta’s threat.
“That’s old guard D.C. for you. William’s family is the heart of the who’s who, and Rose Pride is the pulse. She sits on every board and is the mistress of ceremony for all the important events.”
Eleanor was silent. She’d known William’s family was important, but she hadn’t realized just how different they’d be.
“Don’t let them get to you. If William likes you, Ohio, then that’s all that matters.” She held up the brush and started on her toes.
Eleanor pulled on a ratty sweatshirt and took the pins from her hair not feeling so sure. She flipped open her textbook and tried to study for her eight a.m. class, but the headache she faked with William felt all of a sudden very real.
CHAPTER NINE CAUGHT UP
Ruby
The first half of tenth grade was nearing the end, and by the middle of January my mother still had not come for me. I did see her at Nene’s house for our annual Christmas dinner, but she didn’t talk to me much. She just sat sipping the special occasion corn liquor that Aunt Marie kept under the sink, while she and Leap played cards with Fatty and Fatty’s latest boyfriend. Inez hadn’t even bothered to bring me a present. Although I knew better than to expect much, I had used the allowance that Aunt Marie had given me and bought her three triangular plastic bracelets. In hindsight, I should have gifted the bracelets to myself because Inez hadn’t even tried them on.
I thought by now her anger would have subsided. Usually, Inez would show up at Aunt Marie’s a few days after dropping me off, with a peace offering of a new hairbrush, clip-on earrings or a sweater passed down from one of her employers. Then she and Aunt Marie would share a few cans of Schlitz and send me to Processed Willie’s for fried fish sandwiches and tartar sauce. After a few hands of gin rummy, she’d say, “Go on, get your things.” I’d hug Aunt Marie goodbye, and tuck my key away for the next time I was exiled.
But that didn’t happen. Now the days had turned into months, and Aunt Marie and I were settled into a weekly routine. She had rearranged her schedule at Kiki’s so she could stay with Nene on Friday nights and I could get to my Saturday enrichment classes on time. I hadn’t been marked tardy since, and as Mrs. Thomas had suggested in our last meeting, I was working like my tail was on fire.
As a requirement for We Rise, we were tested at the end of each quarter to assure that we were educationally sound to continue on. Our second-quarter exams were coming up in less than a week. There was one in English comprehension and another in mathematical equations. I had an ear for language, but math was my Achilles’ heel. Often when the numbers from my math assignments blurred into putty on the page, I found myself wishing I was less apt at art and English and better at science and math, especially if I was going to be an optometrist.
Regardless of my strengths, I needed to score a B+ or above on the exams to remain in the program, so all afternoon I sat at Aunt Marie’s kitchen table working through sample trigonometry problems while listening to the steady patter of rain against the windowpane. The fumes from the furnace made me sneeze constantly and my nose was red from blowing it.
A light rap at the front door broke my attention, but I didn’t move. Aunt Marie ran numbers out of Kiki’s and had a few neighborhood customers who’d drop by the apartment with the bets they wanted her to play. If she wasn’t home, they would wrap nickels or dimes in tissue paper and slip them under the door. I sat quietly waiting for them to leave, but nothing slid through. The knock drummed persistently.
“Who is it?” I made my voice deep.
“Ruby?”
The sound of my name got me up from my seat. I turned all three locks, removed the safety chain and opened the door. Shimmy stood in the hallway, his brown hair sopping wet against his forehead. I hesitated, and then let him in, grabbing a hand towel from the kitchen drawer and offering it to him.
“What are you doing here?”
“I’ve been looking for you for weeks. You haven’t been anywhere. I thought you moved back to your ma’s.”
I walked to the bay window and closed it before the rain wet my canvas. Being nowhere had been intentional on my part. I had avoided anywhere where I might run into Shimmy. I stopped shopping on 31st Street on the days he worked, didn’t linger on the front steps, and I purposely took the long way to and from my high school just in case he sought me out. Aunt Marie was right: no good would come from falling for a white boy—and a Jewish white boy at that. My attention needed to stay on my schoolwork so that I could go to college, and I knew Shimmy didn’t fit into my future equation.
But now that he stood in front of me, fixing me with those eyes, and shivering wet, my will went weak.
“Take that wet coat off,” I instructed, and then squeezed the towel through his hair. Our eyes locked, and even though I tried, it was hard for me to pull away. They were so green.
“Sorry for barging in on you. I just needed to know that you were all right.”