“For what? Mr. Lincoln freed the slaves!”
I laughed, and David led me to the tiny dance floor, twirling me around slowly. When we settled into a slow drag, our hips fitting together, I remembered our summer. He whispered, I hadn’t changed one damned bit. There was a sad-sweet chord to his words. I looked up and saw that he remembered, too.
I’m Hungry
Abdul didn’t call when he arrived back in Atlanta, though that was our custom. When I rang Abdul’s rooming house, no one answered. His silence continued for the rest of the summer and when school started back, he ignored my waves in the refectory. When I’d knock on his apartment door, Steve would tell me, no, his sands wasn’t home.
It took a month into the semester for him to page me, to meet me in my dorm lobby and ask me to walk to his car. In his apartment, he locked his bedroom door. He told me, there were some things I needed to know, such as, he didn’t share his girlfriends. It was fine to share a hoe with a friend or a frat brother, but not somebody he was in a relationship with.
“Ailey, is something going on with you and that nigger?”
“Who?”
“That guy. David.”
“What? No!”
“You telling me y’all didn’t used to kick it?”
I didn’t look away when I told him David was like my brother. And I took off my clothes, as Abdul directed me. I sat down where he pointed, but when he stood in front of me, unzipping his pants, I turned my head.
“I knew it. You lied to me.”
“Abdul, no, I didn’t. I promise.”
“Open your mouth, then.” He came closer—
I am four. I need to take a bath, Gandee says. If I don’t I will stink like a nasty little girl. He pulls off the pretty dress Nana bought me and the matching panties with all the ruffles. He takes off all his clothes and his underwear and there is a red thing there. He tells me we’re going to get in the tub together in the guest bathroom. We’re going to have lots of fun and he’ll put on my other clothes after our secret. I shouldn’t tattle on him, because if I do, I will be a nasty little girl and he won’t love me more than he loves my sisters and he’ll kill everybody. I’ll die and my mama will die and Lydia will die and Coco will die and my daddy will die and none of them will go to Heaven and do I want that to happen? In the bathroom, we get in the water. I’m between his legs and that red thing is poking me in the back and his skin is white and there’s no ducky in the water. I have no friends in this water. Gandee comes at me and puts his hand down there. I start crying and I hit him on the arm and he says, be a nice little girl. Didn’t I remember what he told me? Did I want everybody to die? Did I want him to kill me? I look at the squares on the side of the tub and Miss Delores and Nana aren’t coming back but Mama is coming in a while to get me, after Gandee dresses me again. She’s coming and I don’t want her to die— Abdul tugged my hair. I couldn’t suck dick worth a damn, he told me, so he ordered me to lie on my back. He rolled on top of me, but I squirmed away, protesting, we had to use a condom.
“Like you and that nigger did?”
“I never slept with him!”
“Open your legs if you’re not lying.”
“Abdul! Quit!”
When I kicked and pushed at him, he slapped me. Again. Again. Again. I saw blue and pink sparks, but I kept kicking. He put his hands around my neck, choking off my air, until I stopped struggling. I was dry when he pushed into me, as he kissed my face, begging me, call him Shotgun, move around, do something, but I only lay there, my head turned. Through the walls, I could hear the sounds of Steve walking. He’d confided in me that he had nightmares; it frightened him to close his eyes after dark.
After Abdul was finished, he brought up the holidays, that he wanted to meet my father, like a man should. He wanted my father’s blessing for our relationship, and then Abdul began his cherished story, that his parents had never married, that his father never had been in his life. I knew how sad his story was, but I wasn’t going to comfort him. I let my breath deepen and he jabbed me with his finger. He called my name, but I didn’t answer. When I knew he was asleep, I dressed and left.
*
Every day, Abdul called the dorm for me, but I took the pink message slips from the work-study student at the desk and dropped them in my purse. In the refectory, he waved, blowing kisses. The gossips were watching, but I didn’t return his gestures. I didn’t care who was watching, ever since I’d returned from my appointment at Dr. Rice’s office, where Nurse Lansing had told me I had gonorrhea.