We Are Not Like Them(56)
I glance over at the Realtor’s exam book on the counter, its glossy cover dulled by a thin layer of dust. The test is scheduled for next week. I’ve already decided not to bother; it feels silly now. It’s not like I told anyone other than Kevin that I was taking it anyway. I was waiting until I passed—if I passed—to spring the news. Riley would be so proud of me, and maybe even a little shocked. I can still see the look on her face when I told her I was quitting my job. I didn’t imagine the judgment there. It’s not like I’m dying to be a stay-at-home mom; it’s not really a choice. We did the math, and day care costs more than my salary, so we’d essentially lose money if I continued working. But now I’ll have to find a way. I have to be prepared to support my family, whatever may come.
I drag the trash bin over to the fridge and open it, holding my nose against the spoiled food that awaits me inside. I pour the rancid milk down the sink, drop the carton in the trash. I walk over to the table, grab the dead flowers, and dump them in too, then drop the vase in the sink after pouring out the thick sludge of brown water. A sharp stab of pain in my back makes me double over and grab the counter ledge. Just a cramp, but it’s happening more and more. Everything hurts all the time. My boobs throb like they’ve been slammed in a vise; my lower back pinches; a dull ache has settled into my hip bones. At least my blood pressure is better. As soon as I left my doctor’s appointment last week, I went straight to Walgreens and bought myself a monitor. I take my blood pressure obsessively now, at least a dozen times a day.
When the pain lets up, I ease myself into a chair at the kitchen table and flip through the mail. I don’t know why I bother when I know exactly what’s inside this stack of envelopes: angry demands for money with lots of red ink. The electricity will be shut off if we don’t pay the PECO bill soon. We owe the fertility doctor about ten grand, and our credit cards are maxed out. For now, Kevin still has his health insurance, even though he’s on administrative leave, but if something happens before the baby is born and we lose our health insurance… I press my fingers to my temples, hard, to shut down the thought.
The stack of bills reminds me that we’ll never get out of debt: $36,460. The exact amount flashes in my brain like a neon sign. I lied to Riley that it was $30,000, told myself that I was just rounding down. Besides, at a certain point, it doesn’t even matter. It’s like a six-foot-deep hole; what’s another six inches when you’re trying to climb out?
I let the bills fall into the trash one by one. I’d rather set them on fire, watch all these stupid numbers go up in smoke. I settle for the garbage, without even opening them, because what the hell—they’ll just send more anyway. At the bottom of the stack of mail are two plain envelopes, hand-addressed to Kevin. At least they’re not bills. They’re probably something worse.
My index finger catches on the lip of the envelope. It tears a small gash across my skin. I put my finger in my mouth to suck away the blood and examine the paper inside. It takes me a second to register what I’m seeing—an image of a coffin, Justin Dwyer’s coffin—and to make sense of the words across the top. BABY KILLER. I toss the paper away from me like it’s on fire.
Seeing this picture is almost as wrenching as the real-life version. Attending that funeral has to be one of the most terrifying things I’ve ever done. I’m still not exactly sure why I forced myself to go—maybe to torture myself? To make amends? To prove something? But what was I proving? I have no idea. Maybe it was that I owed them, him and his mother. I owed it to them to acknowledge what happened even if I, we, couldn’t take it back—no one could. Obviously, Kevin couldn’t have gone. But no one thought I should go either.
“For God’s sake,” Cookie had said, “what good will it do?”
Nothing. It would do absolutely nothing. It wouldn’t bring the boy back. It wouldn’t return the bullets to my husband’s gun. I went anyway.
In a sea of all those people, Riley was the first person I saw, or the back of her head, really. I fixated on her sleek French twist the entire service so I could avoid making eye contact with anyone around me. The few faces I glimpsed looked wounded or angry.
When the uncle stood to speak, his eyes had been wide with fury. It was like he was speaking directly to me when he asked, “Why, why, why?” in a voice so desperate I had to look away.
The middle-aged Black woman sitting beside me in the back row moaned like she had a hurt deep in her bones. “When will they stop killing our boys?” she said. It was almost exactly what one of the LEO wives, a white woman, had said back at Jamal’s funeral.
“When’s it going to stop? When are these streets going to be safe for our boys?” Same streets, different boys.
During Justin’s funeral, each time I caught Riley glancing over at Tamara, all distressed and concerned, was like being stabbed with a dagger. I get that this is unfair, horrible of me, petty even, but sometimes it’s easier to be angry. It’s easier to let myself think, Fuck Riley.
At the end of the service, as I was walking out, emotionally exhausted, I sensed her eyes on the back of my head. I even had this pathetic hope that she’d call out to me, that maybe we could talk for a few minutes, though I know this was stupid of me—dangerous even—on a lot of levels. I’d hoped to at least see that familiar affection on my friend’s face, but there was only her blank canvas stare, her mask, as I raised my hand, a hello and a goodbye at once.