Chapter 2
“I’m coming, I’m coming.” I grabbed my wallet and my own backpack, got the keys from the hook high up on the wall by the front door and let us out.
We were just in time to catch the train. I held her hand as we stood side by side in the packed car, my other hand on the rail above me while she held on to one of the seats beside her.
It was five minutes to eight when we got to Sherie’s school.
“Remember that Gramma Jo is picking you up today. I’ll come get you there after work, all right? Have a good day, listen to your teachers, and mind your Gramma.” I kissed her on the forehead, patted her little afro puffs, and gently pushed her toward the steps that led up to the front door of the building.
“I will, Daddy! Bye!” She waved and ran up the steps to join the other third grade students. I watched her until she entered the building, then turned and headed back to the station.
“Yo, Mary! What’s up, my man?” My boss Larry greeted me as I came into the office from the back room where I had stashed my stuff in a locker. I punched in at the time clock.
“You got jokes. The name is Marius—Marius Rabineaux—not Mary. Why you always gotta mess with me like that, man?” I shook my head as I grabbed an apron and pinned my nametag on the front.
“‘Cause you make it easy, dawg! Added to that, you’re gay. Ain’t one o’ you guys always the girl in the relationship? You look like a girl to me.” I did not, since I was six-foot-three and built like a linebacker, but Larry liked to play with me.
“Whatever, dude. If you’re done flirting, can I go on the floor now? I gotta check the stock.”
“You’re breaking my heart, man. What are friends for? You know you love it when I tease you.” He winked and waved me on my way.
“Some friend. Don’t forget I can still call your mother and rat your ass out. Later, man.” I headed out on the floor to check the inventory and start my day in the washing machine section of the store.
* * * *
“Momma! Where are you?” I closed the front door to my mother’s two-story home. It’d been a long-ass day and my feet were tired, but my family always made me forget all that. I left my backpack on the couch in the living room and walked down the hall to the kitchen. My mom and daughter played Scrabble at the table. From the score sheet, it looked like Sherie was ahead, as usual. My girl was smart.
“Hi, Daddy! I’m winning!” Sherie liked to gloat when she had a sure thing.
I kissed her on the cheek and said, “I see that. Momma, you lettin’ her win again?” I walked to the other side of the table and gave my mom a hug.
“Absolutely not! She’s a shark, just like you were when you were little.”
I sat in one of the chairs and waited for the inevitability of my daughter’s victory. Once they were done, I told Sherie to go get her stuff.
“Okay, Daddy!” She left the kitchen to gather her things from one of the other rooms.
Momma got up to clear the table. “You know, she’s starting to look more and more like Amber every day. Does baby girl still ask about her?”
“Not anymore. Mostly now she asks me when I’m gonna bring a guy home to be her second daddy.” We already had the “Daddy is gay” discussion a while back. “Do you believe that?”
My mom chuckled. “I believe it. You know how smart she is. I’ve wanted to ask you the same thing.” She winked at me as she put the Scrabble game on top of the refrigerator.
“Not you, too,” I said. I took a deep breath and let it out. “Girl used to ask me all the time where her momma was, when she was real little. I didn’t know how to tell her that her daddy had been a man-whore, who denied his sexuality by sleeping with any woman in a twenty-mile radius. How could I tell her that she was an accident, and Amber wasn’t ready to be a mother? Handed the baby over to me like she was groceries and out the front door. Didn’t help that she died a few months later in a car crash. All I could tell my princess was that her momma had to go away when she was little and she got hurt real bad and died. I told her that I loved her very, very much and would never leave her. Maybe I shouldn’t have made a promise like that, but I looked at that precious child and couldn’t help myself, you know?”
“I know, son, I know.” And my mom did, too. My dad had left us when I was five years old, and those had been some hard years. We made it through, though. Momma worked a lot of jobs, day and night to make sure we had what we needed to survive. When I realized as an older teenager that I liked boys instead of girls, I went into denial, screwed around with every girl I knew, as if that would change the truth. My mom knew something was wrong, and she warned me to be careful. I wouldn’t listen.