We Are Not Like Them(93)

“You look pretty.” She reaches up to smooth the collar. This compliment is also a surprise. Momma always said being pretty was a curse. “And especially with that long straight hair of yours, girls gonna hate you just for that,” she told me in middle school, and then said that I shouldn’t ever look in a mirror in front of other girls because they’ll think I’m conceited, that I am admiring myself. To this day I feel self-conscious seeing my reflection. Which probably means I’ve been walking around with food in my teeth most of the time.

“You also look nervous,” she says to me. She can always read me. I’m laid bare in front of her no matter how much I like to think I’m my own person with my own private thoughts and smoke screen of serenity.

“I guess I am. A little. Is it that obvious?”

“Oh, please. I know you. You were me, before you were you. Don’t forget that.”

I don’t know exactly what she means, but I get it. For all the ways I want to be different from my mother, there are many more we’re alike. It’s an idea I could learn to embrace.

“I wish we’d gotten to know him better, Corey. Why’d you fall so hard for him? Your nose was wide open!”

“I don’t know, Mom, he made me feel seen. It’s hard to explain. Like I could just be my real self. I didn’t overthink with him, I just was. When he looked at me, I felt like both the person I am and wanted to be. He made me feel, I don’t know… special, confident… as dumb as that sounds.”

“Riley Wilson, you’re the most confident, exceptional human being I know. I raised you to know that. To know your worth.”

“Well, it’s not that easy sometimes.” I don’t add that she raised me to constantly be a better version of myself and that that was exhausting and that Corey loved the version of me that already existed, flawed as she may be. But we’re having such a nice moment, I’m determined not to ruin it by mining my childhood for grievances.

“But I know, Momma, I know. I appreciate you.”

“Get the blouse. You deserve it. You’ve been working so hard. Treat yo’self. Ain’t that what the kids say?”

She reaches over and digs into her pocketbook and hands me a $20. “Here, let me put something toward it. I want you to have it.”

“No, no, I got it.” I’m still getting used to the idea, and the guilt, of making more money than anyone in my family.

“Well, keep that money and use it to pay your way tonight. Girls let men pay for them and these men expect something, you know.”

There’s only one thing Corey expects from me: an explanation.

I start to take off the blouse and then remember I’m going to wear it tonight. I hand my drab sweater to my mom. It won’t fit in my tiny clutch. “Could you take this home with you?”

“Home? I’m going to take it right over there to the Salvation Army!”

We walk to the register and my mother leans in and lowers her voice like she’s prepared to divulge another secret. Is this the day I learn about her secret love child?

“So, you think Kevin’s going to take the deal?” she asks in a stage whisper that people from a mile around could hear.

Over lunch, I told my mom in confidence how Sabrina had called me to tell me about the offer. It was now clear that using Kevin as leverage had been Sabrina’s strategy all along. It was Cameron whose head she wanted on a platter—his was the more solid legal case to make. Cameron shot first and he shot someone who didn’t match the description of the suspect they were chasing. Sabrina was confident that she could get a guilty verdict and a long prison sentence. “Ten years, at least,” she told me. “That’s some justice.” So Kevin now had a lifeline, and it would be crazy for him not to take it. Except we’re already three days in and he hasn’t decided.

“I don’t know, Mom. He’d be crazy not to, though.”

“Yeah, but those cops rather go to jail than rat on each other. Even the Black ones get all caught up in that. But I guess we’ll see. You’re seeing Jenny next week, right? That’s good, that’s good.”

I’d told Momma at lunch about my talk with Jenny, how hard and infuriating it was. But how it was also a relief, to finally get out everything I’ve been thinking, even if it changes everything between us.

“But at least you’re talking,” she’d said. “Just keep going on. You can’t expect everyone to get everything. Sometimes you’ve gotta meet people where they are and bring them along. It’s not always worth it, but you love Jen through and through and vice versa and y’all will get through this.”

“We’re meeting up the week after, actually.”

The only thing I’d heard from Jenny was a cryptic text the day after Kevin’s arraignment saying she was going out of town but could we see each other when she’s back. It’s funny that I have the same feeling thinking about meeting up with Jenny after our last conversation as I do about Corey, an excited dread, like I’m preparing for something, but what?

I hand the tag to the sales clerk. “Could you ring me up with this? I’m just going to wear the blouse now.”

“It looks great on you,” she says.

“I appreciate y’all didn’t hover over us and follow us around like we were going to steal something,” Mom says to the sales clerk, nodding her head in vigorous agreement with her own thoughts.