To my niece, Violet Elizabeth Routledge, I bequeath my gelding, one gold ring with lapis stone, and cash in the amount of $750.
To my sister, Adeline Ruth Hutchinson Routledge, I bequeath all my remaining cash in the present amount of $5887, one hundred and sixty acres （and any harvests planted） in Baldwin County, Georgia, my remaining books, my house, all outbuildings, all furniture, all farm tools including my plow, one wagon, one mare, four milk cows, one bull, two calves, fourteen （and counting） chickens, one rooster, three pigs, one mule, and one goat. Further, any of my possessions not mentioned herein shall be the sole property of Adeline Ruth Hutchinson Routledge.
Witness my hand and seal at Thatcher Home, Baldwin County, Georgia, this third day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eighty.
May God have mercy upon my soul.
My Black Female Time
In early December, Scooter called me. It wasn’t a shock: he’d been calling every day, leaving messages on my machine. He’d stopped coming by without calling, though, and knocking for long minutes. The second time it had happened, Mike had told him, show up again making a fuss, and Scooter would get his ass beat. Won’t nobody playing with him.
I’d stopped going out to Shug’s for our standing coffee date. I’d gone to the grocery store to buy ground coffee. My brew was strong, though not as smooth as Miss Velma’s. But it powered me through my long nights of studying. I wasn’t as lonely as I expected to be, either. I was working so hard in my classes, I had very little time to feel sorry for myself.
On the phone, Scooter asked, could he watch the basketball game at my house? I waited for his reminder that he paid the cable bill, but it didn’t come.
“Sure, youngblood. Come on over.”
Within minutes of his arrival, he asked, could I get him a beer? I went to the refrigerator and pulled out a six-pack that had been there since October. I put the pack down on the floor, hoping he would take the hint to drink a beer and leave, but after he drank one, he still sat there.
“Can you make some wings, Ailey? I’m a little hungry.”
“No,” I said. “I’m too busy for that.”
I waited for him to broach what had happened. But he only settled on the couch and clicked the remote. He let out a small cheer when his team made a free throw or a grunt of disappointment when the ball turned over. He finished one bottle and wordlessly held out his empty bottle to me. Shaking it, but I didn’t take the bottle. I watched his face for something. A change, yet there was nothing.
I stepped in front of him, blocking his view of the television.
“Scooter, are you only my friend because of my fried chicken wings and innate sense of rhythm?”
“What?” He looked away from the screen. “Is this some sort of riddle?”
I walked to the dresser and turned the television off.
“Scooter, I didn’t appreciate what went down the last time I saw you.”
“So you really want to talk about this? I would think you would be embarrassed. You walked out on me at Shug’s—”
“After you invited me to your house, when we’ve been sleeping together—”
“Okay, here we go—”
“Here we go? You actually expected your Black mistress to eat dinner with your white, racist wife—”
“Oh man! Really, Ailey? This is you apologizing?”
“Wait. Is that what you expect? An apology?”
“Yes, I do!”
“Well, youngblood, if wishes were horses, assholes would ride.”
“See this? This is precisely why I’m not with a Black female! All you sisters want to do is yell and scream and roll your necks. You love all this unnecessary”—he waved his hands—“all this drama.”
My voice rose to a shout.
“Oh, it’s like that? I’m so damned repulsive, and yet, you fucked me for almost a year! You couldn’t get enough of this! And apparently, you still can’t, because here you are at my Black female house, taking up my Black female time, and hoping for some more of this Black female pussy!”
He put the beer bottle on the table. “Look, Ailey. I’ll see you next week for coffee. Okay? Try to calm your nerves between now and then. Maybe eat something for a change.”
I took several deep breaths. Lowered my voice, channeling the serenity of my dead father.
“Scooter, listen very carefully—”
“Ailey, I don’t want to keep fighting—”
“—wait a minute. Let me finish. I was very lonely when I came to North Carolina, and I will always thank you for being there for me. But whatever this is?” I drew a large circle with my index fingers. “This is over. I did not leave kith and kin to come to Acorn, North Carolina, to do whatever this is with you. I came here to be the first African American at this university to get a doctorate in history, and nobody is getting in the way of that. Now, you need to go, because I’ve got two essays due in seven days. And I’m not messing up my perfect grade point average.”