The Leavers(70)

She and Leon kept the apartment stocked with the soda you loved. One night, you and Michael sat on the couch with Leon, sucking down Cokes and seeing who could burp louder.

“That’s enough, Deming,” I said. “Stop it.”

“Oh, they’re boys,” Vivian said.

As if he was proving Vivian right, Leon chimed in with a belch of his own. You burped again, and Michael stifled a giggle.

“Deming! Stop that!”

“But Auntie Vivian says it’s fine.”

“Well, I’m your mama and you have to listen to me.”

You stuck your tongue out. A fizzy rage seeped through me like a poisonous gas. I was due back at the salon in the morning, it took almost an hour to get to Harlem on the bus and subway, and I’d already worked seven hours and stopped at the bodega to get food on my way home, where the owner, a nice man from South America, gave me discounts. There were dirty dishes in the sink, laundry to do, and you and Leon were burping while Vivian was trying not to laugh. You were all trying not to laugh at me. “I said, stop it! And you—” I pointed to Leon. “You’re no better than a child.”

Vivian and Leon exchanged a look. Mortified at how you refused to obey me, I ladled out the soup Vivian and I had made. You and Michael balanced your bowls on your laps. “Thank you,” Michael said, looking at Vivian and then at me, as if he was waiting for permission to eat. His eyes were large and watery, and I realized he was afraid of me.

DIDI AND I WERE in the alley behind Hello Gorgeous, splitting a cigarette on our break. A pigeon circled the trash cans.

“I’ve been leaving hints for Quan,” she said. “The other day, I showed him a picture of an engagement ring in a magazine.”

“What did he say?”

“He just nodded.” She shook her head. “Do you think I’m wasting my time?”

I didn’t mention that Leon had suggested marriage. “If he doesn’t want to marry you, then he’s a fool,” I told her. “You could find a better man, someone who will.”

Her face relaxed. “I know. And you could, too, Polly.”

I did know that, though I didn’t tell Didi how I daydreamed about men with money and papers. I’d hear our neighbor Tommie talking about visiting family in the Dominican Republic and wished I could travel like that. Living with Leon and Vivian, I found myself slipping back into a village accent, but envied how easily they could talk to one another, how Vivian bought Michael books and DVDs when she made even less than I did, and I worried I would never get better at English and you would grow up to be a meat cutter. There were other cities out there with other opportunities. Riding the bus downtown, I’d think: I could keep riding. I could never get off.

“Ignore Vivian,” Didi said. “Ignore Leon’s nonsense. Act like a woman who likes to eat dried squid out of the bag for dinner. The world’s not made of magic.”

“I like dried squid,” I said, passing the cigarette to Didi.

“All right, squid breath.”

“And I never said the world was made of magic.”

“It’s an expression.”

“I’ve never heard that expression before.”

Didi passed the cigarette back, green eye shadow glimmering. “That’s because I made it up. Don’t worry so much, okay? Either stay with Leon or move on.”

“You, too,” I told her. “Don’t worry so much.”

I linked my arm in Didi’s. It was good to have a friend.

VIVIAN WAS THE OLDEST of Leon’s three siblings. “She was the first to come to America,” Leon said, “then she married that cocksucker who ran off on her. Had another woman on the side. Now she needs us to help pay the rent. But inside she’s a soft woman, like you.”

“I’m not a soft woman.” Then I wondered if Leon had asked me to move in with him only to help Vivian with the rent.

“Yes, you are.” He rubbed the knobs at the top of my spine. “Your boobs are soft. Your ass.” I grabbed his waist and he pushed me onto the bed, kissing my neck, my earlobes, my shoulders.

He bought me gifts, an itchy yellow sweater covered in yarn balls that resembled pimples, a stuffed unicorn, a plastic kitten to hang from the antenna of my cell phone. When he presented them to me the hopeful look on his face reminded me of you, gifting me pictures you’d drawn at school, lopsided scratches in jiggly colors. I kissed and thanked him. Leon bought gifts for you, too, a softball, a big leather mitt for catching. The three of us walked to the park on a summer Saturday, and I watched him throw you the ball. When you missed, he was encouraging. “Good try!” Then he’d toss it again. When you caught it the two of you would leap up and down, like you had won an Olympic medal. Leon let you high-five him again and again.

“Come play, Mama,” you shouted.

“Polly, join us,” Leon said.

I got up and watched, my son and my man, your comfort with one another, your laughter. All that I had once wanted, this big life, my exciting life, seeing the places in Liling’s old textbook, the promises I had made to myself when I called the lady with the mustache, were in danger of drying up. Or had they been a young girl’s fantasies? I walked with Qing and Xuan outside the factory. I stepped into the Atlantic Ocean and decided to have a baby. Maybe it wasn’t about moving to new places, but about the challenge of staying put.