Once the laughing stops, I ask, “What’s a crackhead?” I figure I should start there, with the easier question. Still, I don’t think she gon’ answer, but then she sits up and looks me right in the eye. Little lines of makeup are starting to run down her face.
“I’m sorry I said all that stuff in front of you,” Nia says, smoothing my hair with her hand. It’s the first time in so long Nia’s touched my hair all soft like that. “I got real upset bout some stuff, but I ain’t mean for you to hear.”
“No,” I say, “I’m happy you did. Nobody ever says anything in front of me. And they all lie to me, too. Bout Daddy and everything else.” That lump’s growing in my throat, all the questions swirling in my head.
Nia smiles. “You’re right,” she says, “we gotta stop treating you like a baby, cause you getting older and older every day.” She turns serious again when she speaks. “Crackhead means”—she pauses here to think—“it means a person who uses drugs. Drugs are something bad that we ain’t s’posed to have, but some people get ’em anyway.” I know this already, but I don’t interrupt. “And when you put drugs in your body, it makes you do bad stuff. Even to the people you love most.” Nia stops talking. Her face clouds over with memories that must be sad, cause more tears spill down her face.
“Tell me more,” I whisper, scooting closer. “What’d you mean bout Daddy? Who did he sell our house to?”
“It’s complicated—” Nia starts, but I continue.
“And when he sold it, did he know we was gon’ have to sleep in the car? Did he know it was gon’ be some days Momma had to pick between giving us breakfast or dinner, cause we ain’t have enough for both?” Nia’s crying harder now, and I’m crying, too, but I can’t stop. “Is that why you been mad all this time? Cause he did this to us, left us like this?” I pause, sniff. “Or did something else happen, something else you been keeping from me?”
Nia stops crying all at once and looks up at me.
“Is that it?” I ask, cautious. “What did he do to you, Nia?” I’m scared to know, but I been chasing secrets too long to stop now.
“He . . . he . . .” Giant tears puddle in the corners of Nia’s eyes.
“You can tell me,” I whisper, pulling Nia’s hand into my lap.
Nia half smiles, then lets out a big sigh that sounds like letting go of everything she was holding in for so long. “Before Daddy died, me and him got in a fight. I had been hearing stuff about him at school from one of the kids whose dad was a cop. He told a bunch of people about that time Daddy got arrested. He was calling Daddy a dirty druggie. He kept saying it all day—dirty druggie, dirty druggie—to me and anyone else who would listen.”
I stroke Nia’s thumb with my finger when she pauses. She shrugs her shoulders and continues.
“I guess I was mad or embarrassed . . . probably both. I came home early that day and decided I was gon’ confront Daddy. I was looking for him all over the house and couldn’t find him, then realized, of course, he was on them stairs. So, I went down there.” The discomfort of the image she remembers darkens Nia’s eyes. “I remember him like that now, when I think of him. All hunched over and frantic. It didn’t even look like him.”
Nia’s voice drags off. I try to see the image she describes, but it’s one memory of Daddy that’s only Nia’s, not mine.
“I was just so mad!” Nia starts again. “Daddy was sitting there doing the exact thing I was busy tryna defend him about. I was so”—Nia clenches her teeth—“angry.”
“So what you do?” I ask, voice shaking.
Nia’s gaze is stuck on the closed door now, like she can see Daddy sittin’ over there. “I ran down the stairs so fast I almost tripped. He was right there in the middle—not at the top or the bottom of the stairs. Right in the middle.” Nia’s eyes flutter as she speaks. “His back was to me, but he must’ve heard me coming. He must’ve . . . But he didn’t turn around. Made me run all the way down to the bottom and look up at him. He ain’t even stop . . .”
Nia pauses so long this time, I don’t know if she’s gon’ finish. I squeeze her hand to say, Keep going, and finally she does.
“I just started screaming at him. Screaming bout how he didn’t love us enough. Asking how he could choose drugs when it was killing him. Killing us.” Nia clenches her eyes shut as she talks now. “At first, I wasn’t sure he could even hear me, because he didn’t stop. I walked up the steps, got right in his face. And called him that name.”
Tears squeeze out from Nia’s still shut eyes. “What name?” I whisper.
Nia laughs, but it ain’t a real laugh. More like a cry trapped in a laugh. “I got up in Daddy’s face, waited for him to finally look at me.” Nia takes a deep breath and, as she exhales, whispers the words, “Dirty druggie.”
I lower my head quickly, before Nia can see the anger that rushes onto my face. “It’s not your fault,” I eventually say, even though I ain’t sure I mean it. “Them kids was saying that stuff and gettin’ all in your head. You ain’t mean it.”
Nia rolls her head back, lifts her face to the ceiling. I wait for her to say something, but she don’t.
“You ain’t mean it,” I repeat, “right?”
“Do you wanna know what Daddy did after I said it?” Nia asks, her voice barely a whisper now. I nod, slow. Her voice stays even, distant. “It was like he ain’t see me til right that moment. His eyes locked on mine, but they wasn’t Daddy’s eyes. They looked . . . wild. Lost.” Nia pulls her hands from my lap and hugs her shoulders, rocking back and forth, slow. “He just looked at me like that. Didn’t say nothing. And then he . . .”
Nia is rocking and rocking, but not speaking. “He what, Nia? What did Daddy do to you?”
“He ain’t mean it,” Nia whispers and rocks. “He ain’t mean it.”
“Did he hurt you?” I ask. Nia slowly starts to nod, then faster and faster. The faster she nods, the more my heart breaks.
“He hit me so hard, it knocked me down the stairs. I landed flat on my back.” Nia breathes deep, the air again escaping from her body. “He ain’t even stop. He ain’t even stop.” Tears are running down Nia’s face, past her chin. “I was just laying there, crying for him. Crying for him to help me . . .” Nia’s voice cracks, then melts into sobs.
“It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re okay.” I cradle Nia in my arms like a baby. She lays her head in my lap and I rub her hair, whispering, “Shh-shh,” into the silence. I try to think through what Nia just told me, but I ain’t even sure where to begin. All I know for now is that Nia needs me. We might not be the perfect family, but we the kind of family that’s gon’ be there when you need ’em. Just like Momma and Granddaddy, I suddenly realize. They ain’t even been talking all these years, but when Momma needed him, Granddaddy was there. That’s what family does.