We finally find a spot, all the way at the end of the parking lot. Granddaddy parks, slow. We wait for him to turn off the car and open his door before we get out, just like Momma taught us. I start to bring my book into the mall with me, but Granddaddy gives me a quick look that says, Put it back. Then he opens the trunk and pulls out a long wooden stick.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“My cane,” Granddaddy says, placing the stick in the grip of his right hand. He leans his weight on the cane, then closes the trunk.
“What’s it for?” I ask. I’ve seen a cane before, but never in the hands of someone I know.
“Well, how you think I’m gon’ walk around that place without it?” Granddaddy jokes, pointing the tip of his cane toward the sprawling mall. Now that I think of it, Granddaddy always walks slow, kinda hobbling from one leg to the other. Not as bad as his friend Charlie, but still slow.
“Okay,” is my quiet reply. I don’t wanna make Granddaddy feel bad for his limp, so I don’t say anything else.
We walk slow through the parking lot, Granddaddy huffing and hobbling as we go. When we finally make it to the door, Granddaddy is breathing so hard I think we should just go back. But he labors on and Nia don’t even notice nothin’ wrong, so I follow.
“I’m gonna go look for some pants,” announces Granddaddy once we’re inside. “You girls go on, buy whatever you like.” He hands Nia a wad of cash, big like we ain’t ever seen. Nia’s eyes light up as she takes the money from Granddaddy’s outstretched hands. And I bet my eyes light up, too, cause I ain’t know Granddaddy had so much money. I been running around Lansing looking for bottles all this time and turns out Granddaddy got all the money I need.
“Whatever we like?” Nia asks cautiously. I can almost see the ideas circling around in her head. All I can think bout is how quick we could get back home with that much money.
“Yeah,” says Granddaddy, “just make sure to get a dress to wear to church tomorrow. And meet me right here, right inside these doors in”—Granddaddy looks at his watch, then points at the giant clock in the center of the food court cross from us—“let’s say forty-five minutes.” With that, Granddaddy hobbles off, and me and Nia are left standing there with more money than we know how to spend.
“Where you wanna go first?” I ask Nia, after we’ve been standing in one place for too long. People might start to wonder why two little girls are standing in the middle of the mall with a lot of money and no grown-up. While I wait for Nia to respond, I watch a group of teenagers stroll past, the boys in baggy pants and the girls in short shorts. Nia watches them, too, keeping her eyes trained on them as she stuffs the money in her pocket. She keeps two bills in her hands, though, which she hands to me: a twenty and a ten.
“Go wherever you want, okay?” Nia smiles at me, but the smile don’t even reach her eyes before she turns and walks away in the direction of the loud teenagers, leaving me alone in the middle of the mall. I stand there for a minute wondering why I even feel surprised. This the new Nia now, no matter how hard I try to make it different. I spot a bench up ahead and go sit down. I need a plan.
While I think, I look around at the people walking by. Most of them are in groups—friends, boyfriends and girlfriends, husbands and wives, parents and their kids. Everybody is laughing and talking and shopping, no other cares in the world. I ain’t ever seen people be so happy and so free. A family of white people with a momma and a daddy and a son and a daughter walks past. The kids hold leaning ice cream cones that they lick as they walk. The momma and daddy hold hands. I ain’t ever seen my momma and daddy hold hands in all my life. The little boy skips ahead too far, and I hear the daddy call out to him. He runs back and hops on his daddy’s back, passing his ice cream to his momma as he climbs. The momma smiles and the sister laughs and the son rides on the daddy’s back.
I feel silly to be watching these strangers so long. The lump is back in my throat. We can’t ever be happy like them kids. Not with a dead daddy and no home of our own. I stand up quick, force myself to stop thinking bout Daddy and start thinking bout where I can find books. I know I still need money for gettin’ home, and for a minute, I wrestle with the idea of using the money to try to buy a bus ticket home to Detroit. I could pop up on Momma and surprise her at the motel. Well, that is, if she’s even at the motel. She would be mad at first, if I just showed up, but I bet after a while, she would just be glad to see me. I think bout it hard, but as I’m thinking I also remember all the stuff that’s happened. Daddy dying, Momma leaving. And all the stuff in between. I run my fingers over the lump of cash in my pocket and decide that right now, I just wanna buy something that’s gon’ make me feel better.
I walk over to a big board in the middle of the mall that’s got a map of all the stores. I find words at the bottom with categories of all the stuff you can find. Clothes, shoes, music, restaurants. I keep looking til finally I spot the word books at the end. There’s only one store in this whole big mall that has books. I find a little sticker that says, you are here, all the way cross the mall from the bookstore. I start walking.
I count seven shoe stores, two jewelry stores, twelve clothing stores, and one small candle shop; then I am finally at the bookstore. I walk inside quick, but then I’m stuck frozen right away. I ain’t ever seen so many new books in one place. Usually, all my books come from the secondhand store. We don’t even get books from the library no more, cause Momma says we owe some money.
These books ain’t nothin’ like the books in the secondhand store. I run my fingertips along spines that smell like fresh trees and feel sturdy in my hands. I look around at the sections of books to choose from and find two sections that might be for me: kids and young adult. I can’t decide where I fit between the two. I look over at the kids’ section, where there’s a Black girl with braided hair, bout my age, reading a book with her momma. Then I peek at the young adults’ section, where there’s a teenager bout Nia’s age, quietly thumbing through a book on her own. I take one last look at the little girl and her momma, then wander over to young adult.
The first book I pick up is called The Secret Garden. On the cover, there is a little girl dressed in all white—white dress, white shoes, white hat—to match her pale skin. She stands in front of a strange door, looks like it’s hiding beneath a bunch of vines and trees. I turn to the back cover to read more. After some words I can’t understand but some I can, I think it’s a story bout a girl, bout my age, who loses her parents but finds a secret garden. Even though the garden is old and dying, she tries to bring it back to life again.
I don’t look at another book. I head straight to the cashier with The Secret Garden hugged close to my chest. I can’t be sure, but I bet this will be my new best book.
“That will be nine dollars and fifty cents.” The cashier gives me a look like he knows I ain’t old enough to be here in this store, buying books by myself. But I reach casually in my pocket for the money wadded at the bottom. Like I been having money and buying stuff by myself for years. The last time I had money to buy something, besides lotto tickets, was five dollars that I got from Daddy for gettin’ all A’s on my report card. But then he came back the next day after giving it to me and wanted the money back. Cept I had already spent it on a pack of pencils, two quarter bags of Hot Cheetos, and a two-liter of peach Faygo that I split with Nia.