What's Mine and Yours(21)

Their first date had been marred by Gee. Jade had never gone out somewhere with a man. She’d never had one show up at her house, drive her away, kiss her good night in the car. She and the college boy had only ever gone to the Cook Out drive-through after class. They’d listen to hard rock and split a joint, then drive somewhere to have sex in the backseat. There hadn’t been dates.

She had told Ray she had no one to watch Gee, but he said to bring him.

He’d taken her to a café in the next county over. It wasn’t far from the campus of the university, where she’d been accepted but couldn’t attend because of Gee. The café was a little shack in the middle of the woods, tables scattered beneath trees, stone sculptures and dirt paths winding around the hilly grounds. Inside, they didn’t ask for ID, so Ray ordered them beers, two slices of cake. They could sit wherever they wanted, so they found a stone bench underneath a string of lights. The night was breezy and the mosquitoes were biting, and Gee squirmed and cried. It was getting close to his bedtime. She stood to rock him, to get him to be quiet, so she could drink her beer, talk to Ray, but it was no help. He was ruining her dress with his drool.

Eventually, Ray asked if he could hold the boy. Gee was mesmerized by him, a new person. He put his hand on Ray’s cheek, gazed at him. Jade rushed to finish her cake, to drain her beer, until she was fuzzy-drunk and calm. The cicadas were singing. She couldn’t believe the café was less than thirty minutes from where she lived. He told her he wanted to own a café of his own one day, so he made a business of visiting them, memorizing menus, learning about flavors. The key was slowing down, he said. You had to slow down to taste.

When they were back in the car, Jade rode in the back with Gee in her lap, the seat belt over the both of them. Next time bring the car seat, Ray had said, and it surprised her that she didn’t hear it as an order. He was sweet and matter-of-fact, and she wanted to see him again, too.



New Hope sliced through the forest. It was one of the newer roads, uncracked and brilliant black, snaking through the heart of the east side. The trees formed a tunnel around them. If she turned left for the freeway, she could ride back to that café she and Ray had visited that one time.

“Mommy?”

Gee snapped her back to the car, the present. “Hmm?”

“Did Daddy have other children?”

“Who told you that?”

“Carmela was saying Daddy wasn’t really my daddy. So I wanted to know if he was really somebody else’s?”

Jade looked through the rearview at her son. He already looked dejected, although she hadn’t said anything. What could she say to dislodge the doubt her cousin had planted?

They were going forty-five on a two-lane road, the shoulder no more than dirt, but Jade pulled off quickly, slammed the car into park. She had to turn around and look at him, make sure he understood.

“Sometimes, people are your family because they’re your blood. But that doesn’t mean much on its own. The realest family are the people who stand by you. Your daddy would have stood by us every day for the rest of time, if he’d gotten the chance. He’s not your blood, but he’s your daddy. And the next time anybody tells you different, you tell them, ‘Fuck off.’ Even Carmela. That’s right—‘Fuck off.’ And if they say anything to you, don’t you worry—you tell them your mommy said it’s all right. Under this one condition, you have my permission. It’s not nice, but sometimes you have to tell people so they can hear.”

As soon as she got home, Jade called Linette. “I know you wish that I was pregnant,” she said. “But Ray already has a child. He’s already left someone behind for us.”

Then she explained about Carmela, how she wasn’t attentive to Gee, didn’t cover him with a blanket when he fell asleep on the couch. Linette seemed unmoved.

“She’s been telling him that Ray isn’t really his daddy.”

“I’ll take him,” Linette said.

Jade was so relieved she swooped down and kissed Gee on the mouth. He was startled but pleased, and he smiled back at her, stumbled off to unpack the groceries.

“But you’ve got to do something for me, Jade,” Linette said, still on the line. “You’ve got to take a test. I just have a feeling.”

“You’re getting your hopes up for nothing.”

“Please.”

“Fine, but get ready for bad news.”

Jade hung up the phone and got a beer from the fridge. It was old, flat. She took one long swallow and then another. If she were pregnant, one wouldn’t do any harm, she figured, but she wasn’t sure. She took another swig.

Gee had pulled a stool over to the sink. He was filling a big pot with water. He set it on the stove and then started fishing out the tools they’d need. He was quick around the kitchen after all the time he’d spent shadowing Ray. Even though Gee had Ray’s imprint all over him, Jade couldn’t help but be overcome with the sense that Gee was hers. It wasn’t that he looked so much like her—he didn’t—or that he had her mannerisms—he had Ray’s. It was this feeling that she wanted him to live more than she had ever wanted anyone or anything to live. This feeling that her survival was mostly about him. It would be easy to chalk that up to nothing, but no one had ever loved Ray that way; no one had ever loved her. On the day Jade left home, her mother barely looked up from her can of beer. “Bye,” she’d said, without stirring from the couch, without a wave. Her mother had slapped her, thrown her against a wall, cut off all her hair once with a pair of shears, but none of that had hurt as much as how indifferent she could be. Jade had left and hadn’t looked back, and her mother had never gone searching for her.