Small Great Things Read online

  Yes, I hated that racist father for belittling me. Yes, I hated the hospital for sticking by his side. I don't know if that bled over into my ability to care for a patient. I can't tell you that for a moment, it didn't cross my mind. That I didn't look down at that innocent baby and think of the monster he would grow up to be.

  Does that make me the villain here? Or does that just make me human?

  And Kennedy. What I said wasn't in my mind, it was in my heart. I do not regret a syllable. Every time I think about what it felt like to be the one who walked out of that room--who had that privilege, for once--I feel dizzy, like I'm flying.

  When I hear steps outside, I fly to the door and open it, but it is not my son--just my sister. Adisa stands with her arms crossed. "Figured you'd be home," she says, pushing her way into my living room. "After that, I didn't imagine you'd be sticking around the courthouse."

  She makes herself comfortable, draping her coat over a kitchen chair, sitting down on the couch, putting her feet up on the coffee table.

  "Have you seen Edison? Is he with Tabari?" I ask.

  She shakes her head. "Tabari's home babysitting."

  "I'm worried, A."

  "About Edison?"

  "Among other things."

  Adisa pats the couch beside her. I sit down, and she reaches for my hand and squeezes it. "Edison's a smart boy. He'll wind up on his feet."

  I swallow. "Will you...watch him for me? Make sure that he doesn't just, you know, give up?"

  "If you making out your will, I always liked those black leather boots of yours." She shakes her head. "Ruth, relax."

  "I can't relax. I can't sit here and think that my son is going to throw away his whole future and it's my fault."

  She looks me in the eye. "Then you're just gonna have to make sure you're here to monitor him."

  But we both know that's not in my hands. Before I know it, I am bent at the waist, punched in the gut by a truth so raw and so frightening that I can't breathe: I have lost control of my future. And it's my own damn fault.

  I didn't play by the rules. I did what Kennedy told me not to. And now I'm paying the price for using my voice.

  Adisa's arm goes around me, pressing my face against her shoulder. It isn't until she does that that I realize I'm sobbing. "I'm scared," I gasp.

  "I know. But you always got me," Adisa vows. "I will bake you a cake with a file in it."

  That makes me hiccup on a laugh. "No you won't."

  "You're right," she says, reconsidering. "I can't bake for shit." Suddenly she pushes off the couch and reaches into the pocket of her coat. "I thought you should have this."

  I know by the smell--a hint of perfume, with the sharp scent of laundry soap--what she is giving me. Adisa tosses the coil of my mother's lucky scarf into my lap, where it unfurls like a rose. "You took this? I looked everywhere for it."

  "Yeah, because I figured you'd either take it for yourself or bury Mama in it, and she didn't need luck anymore, but God knows I do." Adisa shrugs. "And so do you."

  She sits down next to me again. This week her fingernails are bright yellow. Mine are chewed down to the flesh. She takes the scarf and wraps it around my neck, tucking in the ends the way I used to for Edison, her hands coming to rest on my shoulders. "There," she says, like I am ready to be sent into the storm.

  --

  AFTER MIDNIGHT, EDISON returns. He is wild-eyed and fidgety, his clothes damp with sweat. "Where have you been?" I demand.

  "Running." But who runs carrying a knapsack?

  "We have to talk..."

  "I have nothing to say to you," he tells me, and he slams the door to his bedroom.

  I know he must be disgusted by what he saw in me today: my anger, my admission that I am a liar. I walk up to the door, press my palms to the particleboard, ball my hand into a fist to knock, to force this conversation, but I can't. There is nothing left in me.

  I don't make up my bed; instead I fall asleep fitfully on the couch. I dream about Mama's funeral, again. This time, she is sitting beside me in the church, and we are the only people present. There is a coffin on the altar. It's a shame, isn't it? Mama says.

  I look at her, and then I look at the coffin. I cannot see over the lip. So I get to my feet heavily, only to realize that they are rooted to the church floor. Vines have grown up around the ankles, and through the wooden boards on the ground. I try to move, but I am bound.

  Straining in my shoes, I manage to peer over the edge of the open coffin so that I can see the deceased.

  From the neck down, it's a skeleton, flesh melted from the bones.

  From the neck up, it has my face.

  I wake up, my heart hammering, only to realize that the pounding is coming from somewhere else. Deja vu, I think, as I swivel toward the door, shaking from the force of the knocks. I leap up and reach the knob, and the moment I do, the door flies back on its hinges, nearly throwing me down in the process. But the police that flood my home push me out of the way. They dump out drawers, they knock over chairs. "Edison Jefferson?" one of them yells, and my son steps out, sleepy and tousled.

  He is immediately grabbed, handcuffed, dragged toward the door. "You're under arrest for a Class C felony hate crime," the officer says.

  What?

  "Edison," I cry. "Wait! This is a mistake!"

  Another cop comes out of Edison's bedroom carrying his knapsack, unzipped, in one hand, and a can of red spray paint in the other. "Bingo," he says.

  Edison turns toward me as best he can. "I'm sorry, Mama, I had to," he says, and then he is yanked out the door.

  "You have the right to remain silent..." I hear, and just as quickly as the police entered, they are gone.

  The stillness paralyzes me, presses in on my temples, my throat. I am suffocating, I am being crushed. I manage to scrabble my hands over the coffee table to find my cellphone, which is charging. Yanking it out of the wall, I dial, even though it is the middle of the night. "I need your help."

  Kennedy's voice is sure and strong, as if she's been expecting me. "What's wrong?" she asks.

  IT'S JUST AFTER 2:00 A.M. when my cellphone rings, and I see Ruth's name flash. Immediately I'm awake. Micah sits up, alert the way doctors always are, and I shake my head at him. I've got this.

  Fifteen minutes later, I pull up to the East End police department.

  I walk up to the desk sergeant as if I have every right to be there. "You brought in a kid named Edison Jefferson?" I ask. "What's the charge?"

  "Who are you?"

  "The family lawyer."

  Who was fired hours ago, I think silently. The officer narrows his eyes. "Kid didn't say anything about a lawyer."

  "He's seventeen," I point out. "He's probably too terrified to remember his own name. Look, let's not make this any harder than it has to be, okay?"

  "We got him on security cameras at the hospital, spray-painting the walls."

  Edison? Vandalizing? "You sure you have the right kid? He's an honor student. College-bound."

  "Security guards ID'd him. And we tagged him driving a car with out-of-date plates registered to Ruth Jefferson. To his front door."

  Oh. Crap.

  "He was painting swastikas, and wrote 'Die Nigger.' "

  "What?" I say, stunned.

  That means it's not just vandalism. It's a hate crime. But it doesn't make any sense. I open my purse, look at how much cash I have. "Okay, listen. Can you get him a special arraignment? I'll pay for the magistrate to come, so he can get out of here tonight."

  I am taken back to the holding cell, where Edison is sitting on the floor, his back to the wall, his knees hunched up to his chin. Tears lattice his cheeks. The minute he sees me he stands up and walks toward the bars. "What were you thinking?" I demand.

  He wipes his nose on his sleeve. "I wanted to help my mama."

  "What about getting your ass thrown in jail helps your mother right now?"

  "I wanted to get Turk Bauer in trouble. If it wasn't for him, none of thi