Page 6

Once, I asked Mama about it and she said sometimes your grandparents show up in you more than your parents do. I thought about it and studied the pictures we had of Ken's parents and Mama's parents, but I didn't see resemblances to me in any of them.

Neither Mama's nor Ken's parents were alive. Ken's father had been killed in a car accident and his mother had died of liver damage caused by alcohol. Mama's mother died before her father. She had had a heart attack. I got to meet my grandfather, but he lived in North Carolina and he died of emphysema before I was five, so I didn't remember all that much about him except he smoked so much, I thought it came out of his ears as well as his nose and his mouth. Mama had one sister in Texas. Her name was Alana, and she had a brother named Lamar somewhere in Florida. They rarely contacted each other. I never met Lamar, but I did meet Alana one Christmas when I was seven.

Ken never talked about his older brother Curtis, who was in prison in Oklahoma for armed robbery. A man was killed so he had been given a long sentence.

Aunt Alana was supposed to have had a baby she gave away, but we didn't know any real details about it except that it was a girl. Sometimes, Beni and I would wonder aloud. We imagined she would be about our age and she probably looked a little like one of us. Occasionally, Beni would tease Roy and say things like, "Be careful 'bout the girls you sleep with, Roy. One might be your cousin."

Roy hated that. He hated it when Beth talked about sex. He was always after her to put something on lately, too. She would parade about in her panties and bra and sometimes, she would put on a robe with nothing underneath and not tie it too tightly. Roy would get so angry his eyes would nearly explode. He had Ken's temper for sure, only not for the same reasons.

He was different with me. If he caught sight of me underdressed, he looked away or walked away quickly. I always tried to be properly dressed if I was in the kitchen or the living room.

Despite his gruff manner at times, Roy was as loving and as protective a brother as Beni or I could want. He tried to be right beside us as much as he could be when we were in the streets. Now that he was taking a job at Slim's Garage after school, he was troubled about our walking home without him. He had told us both at least six times to be sure we went directly home and not stop at any of the jukebox joints to listen to hip-hop music. "The worst types hang out there," he warned.

"He just wants to keep us little girls forever," Beni complained. Two of her friends, Alicia and Nicole, were always trying to get her to go out after school. Finally, one afternoon after Roy had started working, she met me in the hallway at the end of the day and said she wanted to go with Alicia and Nicole to hang out for a while at Oh Henry's. It was a dingy luncheonette in one of the worst neighborhoods. Roy always said if all the roaches living in it were harnessed, they'd pull down the building.

"Mama will be upset," I told her.

"She won't know unless you tell.I'll be back before she gets home."

"Why do you want to go there?" I pursued. "You know what it's like."

"I don't know what it's like. I never been there, Rain. Besides ...there's someone I want to see who goes there," she added with a flirtatious smile. I knew she had been flirting with Carlton Thomas lately; he was in a gang because his cousin was a leader in it.

"If you go, I have to go," I complained.

"No, you don't. I can take care of myself," she bragged, loud enough for Nicole and Alicia to hear.

"I know you can, but Roy will kill me if I let you go by yourself."

"I don't care about Roy. He doesn't run my life," she snapped. "And I don't need you watching over me either, Rain. I'm not a baby."

She spun around and joined Alicia and Nicole. They started for the exit.

"Okay, wait up," I called. "I'll go but we're getting home before Mama," I added when I joined them.

They sauntered along, Bern looking pleased with herself, her eyes full of anticipation, and despite the brave front she put up, a little fear, too.

.

The music was loud; the room was smoky and crowded and it smelled greasy and sickly sweet, but no one seemed to mind or care. Some people were dancing. Older boys who had been out of school a while were drinking beer and passing the bottles to those who weren't old enough to buy it. I saw some drug deals being made and bad stuff being passed along. Most of it was done out in the open. The owner and the bartender and waitress acted as if the place was empty. If they saw anything, they looked right through it.

I glanced at Beni when we all entered and saw the look on her face was not much different from the look of disappointment and disgust that was on mine, but the moment she caught me staring at her, she acted as if she was still very excited to be there.

"Now that you see what's going on, you still want to stay here?" I asked.

"Of course I want to stay here. Why else would I come?"

She dove right into the crowd with Alicia and Nicole, surrounding Carlton, who was talking to members of a gang. I knew they were gang members because they wore Dickie pants with a blue belt hanging down from their pockets. They called it "flue" instead of blue, which was the color for the Crips.

I didn't see anyone I wanted to talk to so I tried to stay out of sight, more toward the door like someone who thought a fire might start at any moment and it was better to be near an exit. After a while Beni came back for me.

"If you're gonna just stand there like a statue, Rain, you should go home. They're all laughing at you. At least come listen to the music and dance or something?'

"We should go home, Beni. Look at this place. Look what's going on," I said nodding toward a couple who were kissing and petting as if they were alone in the back of a car. Across from them, some young man looked like he was in a coma, his body slumped in the chair. The music blasted so loudly around us it was hard to hear.

"Beni," Nicole shouted. "Carlton wants to ask you something."

"I'm not leaving," Beni fired at me and spun around to walk back.