“She died,” is his eventual reply. I wait for more, but it don’t come.
“When?” I finally ask. I know he don’t wanna talk bout it, but I do.
“When your momma was ten.”
I finally have the answer, and I don’t know what to say. When Momma was ten? I think bout losing Momma now, when I’m ten, and suddenly the throat lump is even bigger. Losing Daddy wasn’t no easy thing, but losing Momma? No wonder Momma never talks bout Granny. I bet the lump in her throat is so big by now that she couldn’t even squeeze out the words if she tried. I open the photo album again and flip to my favorite picture, with Momma and the doll. It looks so different now, even though I’m looking through the same eyes. But different, somehow.
“That’s the last picture of the two of them together.” Granddaddy sits beside me again, resting his weight into mine so that we push each other straight. I look up from the photo album and into his dark eyes. Ain’t no tears, but they’re the saddest eyes I’ve ever seen.
“I bet you and Momma really had to be there for each other, once she was gone.” I offer Granddaddy a smile, but he lowers his eyes like he just remembered something he ain’t mean to remember. Then he takes a deep breath and reaches over to grab his Bible from the table.
“Your momma wanted to be on TV, did she ever tell you that?” I shake my head, just as Granddaddy pulls a picture out from between the pages of his Bible. The picture looks old, with crumbling edges and yellowed sides. Just like the old photos from the album, but for some reason, kept separate.
I take the picture from his trembling hand. Momma ain’t ever said nothin’ bout being on TV. She acts like she don’t like TV at all, since she never wants us to watch too much.
I look at the picture, and just like that, Momma is young again. Probably older than Nia, but still not quite a grown-up. She got makeup all on her face that makes her look like a life-sized doll. Her hair is curled tight on top of her head, with spiral ringlets falling into her frozen expression. I can’t tell where she’s at in the photo, cause it’s so close that only her face shows. Her eyes are soft and her smile is true. I think it’s the prettiest I’ve ever seen Momma, cept when she’s sleeping. I love watching Momma when she’s sleeping, and wild hair covers her calm face.
“That there was her headshot,” Granddaddy interrupts my thoughts. “She begged and begged for one, but I always said no.”
“What’s a headshot?” I ask quick, before he can go on.
“It’s a kind of picture that shows only your face. Just like this one.” He strokes the image gently, like he’s afraid it’ll crumble in his hands. “You need one to get jobs like a model or an actress.” I think he sees the confusion in my eyes, cause then he adds, “To be on TV.”
“Oh.” I look at the picture closer. “I bet Momma got a good job with this one.” In my mind, I see Momma on TV, smiling her ice cream cone smile at the cameras. A grin stretches cross my face as I think bout Momma this way, but Granddaddy frowns.
“No, she ain’t get no job at all.” Granddaddy rubs one hand with the thumb from his other, first in slow circles but then faster. “Like I said, she was begging for a headshot for a while. But I kept saying no, mostly cause I ain’t know nothing bout letting my little girl be on TV. And with her momma gone . . .” His voice trails off like he got lost in his thoughts.
I sit up straighter, try to look right in his eyes, but he keeps looking away. “So, if you kept saying no,” I ask, “how did she get this picture?”
Granddaddy snaps out of it and, much to my surprise, laughs. “Well, have you ever tried to tell your momma no? It’s not an easy thing to do.” Now I laugh, too, cause I know what he means. Momma is always smiling and usually nice, cept when you try to tell her no.
Granddaddy continues. “I came home from work one day and found your momma sittin’ on the couch, holding this picture in her hands. I could tell she was upset bout something before I could even tell what she was holding. She stood up, told me that she disobeyed my rules and got the headshot from some man she met at the mall.” Here, Granddaddy pauses. I bet the memory hurts, cause Granddaddy slams his eyes shut.
“I looked at the photo”—Granddaddy takes it from my hands and looks at it like it’s his first time—“and it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.” I see tears forming puddles in his deep eyes. “She looks just like her momma, always has.” I think he’s gon’ cry, but his tears are tiny soldiers, perfectly balanced on the edge of a steep hill. I need to learn his secret for keeping ’em up on that hill.
“So, what happened?” I wanna hear the rest of the story. Granddaddy silently folds his hands cross his lap and scoots over just a little bit, so we’re no longer touching. His face is still sad, maybe too sad to talk, like he got a lump blocking his voice, just like mine.
“I made a mistake,” is his quiet response.
“What did you do, Granddaddy?” I can’t imagine what could be so bad that they would stop hugging when they see each other.
“I . . .” He stops, stares at the back of his cracked hands. “I told her I ain’t even wanna hear nothing bout it.” He swallows, hard. “Then I threw the picture down on the ground and”—Granddaddy pauses—“I left. She was the most excited I had ever seen her. And I acted like I ain’t even care.”
Listening to his story reminds me of the ways Daddy tried to keep Momma from doin’ what she loved, too. Seems like her whole life has been bout doin’ stuff for other people, but not doin’ the stuff she actually wanted to do herself. Realizing this makes me sad for Momma, but I also can’t help but feel bad for Granddaddy, who is still staring at his hands. I don’t know how to respond without making Granddaddy feel worse. “Why?” I finally ask. Looking at him now I can see he does care, seems like a lot, so I can’t understand why he would pretend like he don’t.
“Sometimes, Kenyatta, parents make mistakes. I was afraid of so much back then. Having a daughter, not having a wife.” Granddaddy shakes his head. “I ain’t wanna lose my little girl, too.” Grown-ups don’t usually tell me this much, especially not quiet Granddaddy, so I consume each of his thoughtful words greedily.
“So, what did Momma say?”
Granddaddy chuckles. “She said, ‘Just tell your friends I’m a star,’ and stormed out the room before I could. We ain’t talk for a whole week after, then when we did, it was never quite the same again. She thought I ain’t believe in her. I thought she wanted to leave me. We couldn’t find our way no more, after that.” Granddaddy folds his hands cross his lap, pulling each fingertip with another as he talks.
I consider everything he said, tryna make sense of it all. “But why did she say to tell your friends she was a star, if you told her she couldn’t even try?”
“Well, she knew that, and I knew that. But that was just her way of saying she ain’t need me no more. I stopped her that time, but I ain’t ever stop her again.” Granddaddy takes one last look at the photo, so wonderful and heartbreaking, then sticks it back between the pages of his Bible. I wonder how long he’s gon’ keep it there, before he puts it back in the photo album. Or maybe it was never in the album to begin with. Maybe it always lives in his Bible, where he can look at it and regret.