A Knock at Midnight(32)
Genice’s body may not have worked, Sharanda said, but her brain did. She was a bright woman, full of joy, with the same soft voice and dimpled smile as Sharanda, the same pleasant way of disarming people. She adapted to the confines of her accident in the same way she’d adapted to everything else in her young life—with good humor and grace. But she was no pushover. After her first tough years of healing had passed, she ruled the roost from her bed.
Genice had been an excellent cook before the accident and had no intention of leaving her kitchen to the whims of others, even her own mother. When she had a taste for something in particular, she’d send Sharanda to the kitchen for the ingredients. Sharanda would carry everything to her mother’s bedside table, making however many trips to the kitchen were required. Genice liked everything lined up just so, and then she’d begin instructions for mixing. She eyeballed everything and taught Sharanda to do the same. “Another pinch of salt,” Genice would say. “Not that pinch. A smaller pinch. That’s right. Now black pepper…more garlic powder, too. A little handful. That’s right. No, that’s too much. Stir that in…a little more pepper…that’s it!” When the seasoning was just right, she’d send Sharanda back to the kitchen, and together they prepared the meal, Genice calling precise instructions from her bed, Sharanda asking for clarification when she needed it. Everything Sharanda knew about cooking she learned from her mom.
Money always seemed a day late and a dollar short, but somehow Genice and Pearlie made holidays magical. Genice’s friends would come over to do everybody’s hair. The girls always got new short sets—matching for Sharanda and Tina, who delighted in being the same age for three days out of each year. At Christmas Genice got on the phone with Toys for Tots to make sure everyone had something to open. All four kids had bikes—where they came from, Sharanda never knew. She and her sisters played hopscotch and held double dutch competitions with other girls in the neighborhood. In the fall they would spend time in their backyard, collecting pecans off the ground from the trees, carefully inspecting the nuts before popping the bittersweet treats into their mouths.
Pearlie did her best to give the kids a normal childhood. But by the time Sharanda was eleven, Pearlie’s new life as primary caregiver to her paralyzed daughter and four young grandchildren had taken its toll. Every day, the time for her glass of liquor got earlier and earlier, and the liquor overtook her more and more often. On those nights, Genice would call Sharanda over and explain what to do. From her bed, she taught Sharanda and her siblings how to help change her, do her hair, boil the water for her pan baths to sponge her down, feed her, administer her medicine, and tend to her bowels—an elaborate process involving two kinds of stool relaxers and manual massage.
In every way but age, Sharanda took the part of the oldest child, watching after her siblings, keeping her mom company, acting as Genice’s hands and legs. The other siblings helped, too—Sharena, nicknamed Weasel, who took so long to grow but scrappily kept up all the same; Tina, always the prissy, girly one from the beginning, their mama’s favorite, the girls always thought; and Earnest, who they called Cooter and whose gentle teasing and good nature lightened everybody’s mood.
Genice’s “friend” Mitchell moved in with them when Sharanda was in middle school. A tall, dark-skinned man, he helped the family out with his income as a construction worker. He could move Genice on and off the couch easier than anyone else, and he fell into the caretaking rotation with the rest of them. Mitchell was the closest thing to a dad they had, and his consistency counted for something.
Pearlie made sure the kids stayed on track. “Y’all have to graduate high school. Every one of y’all,” she would declare after a few drinks. “After that, I’m done!” Genice hadn’t graduated and neither had Pearlie, so to Sharanda a high school diploma seemed the ultimate educational goal. She was a solid student, but her teachers were uninspired and so was she. Every day after school she went home to tend to Genice, when she wasn’t putting in evening shifts at her job, first as a cashier at the local cleaner and then at the Walmart photo lab. Nobody ever mentioned college and the thought never crossed her mind. Still, she dreamed of a life outside of Terrell, Texas.
Terrell was a small rural town of fifteen thousand people, about thirty miles east of Dallas. Its wide, tree-lined streets, mom-and-pop shops, and railroad tracks leading to deep thickets of pine trees were perfect for growing up, but not as fun for being grown. The actor Jamie Foxx, Sharanda’s high school classmate, later spoke about the abject racism he experienced there as a young man. The tracks that were so fun to play on as a kid also separated white from Black and rich from poor—although “rich” in Terrell was relative, since the median family income was around $25,000. Sharanda wasn’t sure what she wanted to do with her life, but she was pretty sure she didn’t want to live it in Terrell. But she didn’t want to be far from her mom—couldn’t be. And Genice wasn’t going anywhere.
One, two, three, four—Genice’s children graduated, one after another, right on time, just as Pearlie planned, Sharanda in the class of 1985. For a few months afterward she worked nights at the photo lab and helped with her mom and Pearlie, whose drinking was taking a severe toll on her health. When her cousin Charlotte suggested Sharanda come stay with her in her Dallas apartment and experience the big city, she jumped at the chance.