“This mom sounds like she’s trying her best in a difficult situation,” Dad concludes.
“I think so, too, but when I asked her if Dontrelle and Marcus took the SSAT test, which is a required piece of the application package, she looked at me like I was speaking in tongues at Sunday service.”
Dad gives me a chin raise. His childhood Christianity was peppered with hints of the devout, and he remembers what it looks like when people catch the spirit. “Do Winn and Jared know that you know about their plan?”
“Not yet. I’ve got a little time to figure out what I’m going to do with those two.” No need to bury Fitzroy under the absurd added layer of Courtney Dunn. There are only so many outrageous work antics I can lay on him at one time.
“Meanwhile, what are you going to do about these boys, boss lady?”
My heart gives my chest a fist bump. Leo calls me boss lady. Or he used too.
“I was hoping you would jump at the chance to tell me what to do when it comes to this mother and her boys. She’s doing her best with not a lot of resources and wants to do right by her family, just like you and Mom did by us.”
Dad takes off his gardening gloves and wipes his sweaty hands on his pants. He rolls off his knees with an exaggerated breath to set himself down on the ground and then pats the space next to him for me to sit. This is no small feat for a seventy-year-old man and his seven-months-pregnant daughter. “The seed of something better has been planted. We both know the current school situation is no longer going to satisfy this mother.”
“I know, Dad. So, what do I do now?” I ask, elbowing my dad to spit out his honest thoughts. Given our history of heart-to-hearts, I know Fitzroy’s patience for this topic is going to time out in about three minutes.
“Carmel’s situation is not so different than when your mother met that young man from Princeton in church all those years ago. He put a sweet taste in her mouth that she went chasing after for you and your brother. Carmel’s now expecting better for her boys, and she thinks, because of what this Winn character promised her, you’re going to deliver.” Dad nailed it. Time to reveal the final absurd fact to this convoluted story.
“Winn also promised to buy Carmel a car so she can drive the boys to and from school and make it to the Royal-Hawkins basketball games. And then there’s a toddler brother who’ll be entering kindergarten when the boys are seniors, given our sibling policy. I’m already wondering if Winn’s committed to pay for tuition and transportation for the next fifteen years on behalf of the Burns family.” I watch as Dad’s eyeballs blow out his eyelids.
“Good Lord, that man is playing games with this family.”
“For sure. So, can you please tell me what to do? You love telling me what to do, and right now I need you to point me in the right direction.”
“I do not love telling you what to do.” Fitzroy frowns, crossing his arms in disagreement.
“Really? Do we need to relive your strong-arming Leo to come home so you’d be assured another grandbaby?”
“That wasn’t me telling you what to do, that was me telling Leo what to do.” Dad winks and looks down at my stomach, his newest grandkid packed tight inside. “All I can say is yes, every parent wants the best education they can get for their child. But a parent should also want their child’s honors to be earned fair and square. If a parent is agreeable to gaming the system because they know their child can’t compete, then you don’t want that parent or their child in your school.” I nod along to what Dad has to say, but after meeting with Carmel, I don’t think she has a clue she’s gaming the system. “Your mother and I wanted you and Clive to be admitted based on the exact same criteria as all the other children. It was not the color of your skin, your athletic ability, or anything else that got you into those schools. You were as competitive, on all the measurements, as the other students applying. That’s how your mother and I did it with you and Clive, that’s how you played it with Xandra. And that’s how I think you should insist this mother plays it with her boys.”
Bless Fitzroy. His belief in Clive and me never wavers. Fact is, private schools have always needed the likes of a few Black children like me and Clive as much as we needed them. Being first-generation students offered a level of certainty to our respective schools that we would perform academically under the pressure from home to not squander the sacrifices of our immigrant parents. We were low-risk kids.
“But Dad, as chair of the board of trustees, Winn’s my boss. Not to mention he’s a massive financial contributor and a founding family member. He’s the keeper of my contract.”
“Winn going behind your back and misbehaving does not give you permission to act poorly as well. If you don’t uphold the standards of the school, then how can you expect anyone else to? Act like the leader you were chosen to be.” There’s the brutal truth I thought I wanted to hear.
“Dad, this is an easy choice for you, you’ve always followed your conscience.”
“That may be, Nina, but since when is doing what’s right easy? The simple truth is, the most difficult path is usually the right path.” And that right there is a Fitzroy Morgan mic drop.
“Shoot, these boys know what a better life looks like, they see it in magazines, on TV, in those blasted phones they stare at all day long. Royal-Hawkins has some smart kids, Nina; and I’m not sayin’ Dontrelle and Marcus aren’t smart, but Royal-Hawkins kids are academically competitive and treat the classroom like it’s their basketball court. They’re playing to win. Dropping those Burns twins into that kind of environment if they’re not well equipped is like building a house without a foundation. It sure might look pretty at first, but it won’t stay standing long enough to live in. And that is a mess you surely don’t want to have to clean up.”
I hear Dad’s point. Not accepting the Burns boys into Royal-Hawkins will be painful among the small subset of folks who know about this admissions misstep, namely Winn, Jared, Roan, Carmel, and me. But accepting Marcus and Dontrelle and then potentially having the community judge the boys’ worth in an academically competitive freshman class would be a navigation nightmare.
“Thanks, Dad, I appreciate you speaking your mind.” The issue of merit is more clear-cut for my dad as an immigrant, but having been raised in this country, I understand being Black is more complicated and that excellence is not the only factor at play. “But now I’ve got to figure out how to get up off this grass like the lady you raised me to be.”
“How about being the lady you want to be?” That lady wants teriyaki and a simple answer, even though I know my dad’s right. “I’m not quite done speaking my mind, Nina.”
“Let’s talk more about it at dinner, I need to go deal with email.”
“I’m done talking about other people’s children for today. I want to talk about my child. You think I haven’t noticed you’ve been spending more nights home than not recently? I’ve watched you walk around here for a couple of weeks wearing a brave face, but the minute the room clears, your face cracks, I know it does.”