Put A Ring On It (18 page)

Miss Cakie finally withdrew her long, searching finger. Harlow released the breath she’d been holding.

“She’s about eight weeks,” Miss Cakie muttered. “I need the money before I do anything.”

Jody looked up at Miss Cakie with tiredness in her eyes. “Okay.” Jody already had the knot of money in her hand. She gave it to Miss Cakie. Miss Cakie counted it and then tucked the money inside a side pocket.

Then she caught a glimpse of the tools that Miss Cake had spread out on the table. There was a rubbery red tube, and a bowl filled with a thick, greyish liquid that gave off the smell of disinfectant. Next to the bowl was a funnel, the kind that Skeeter used to pour oil in his car.

Worrying about the safety of the substance in the bowl, Harlow sat up suddenly. “Jody, don’t let this lady pour nothing in me,” Harlow cried.

Openly aggravated, Miss Cakie sucked her teeth.

“Lay down, girl. Let Miss Cakie do what she gotta do.” Jodie’s voice was strained. Her eyes scanned the room anxiously, like she was looking for an escape route. She looked over at Ronica. “This is too much for me. I can’t handle it. Do me a favor and sit with Harlow. I gotta get my head right.”

“Okay, but save me something,” Ronica answered, her eyes riveted to the illegal procedure.

“Can I use your bathroom, Miss Cakie?” Jody asked, fidgeting with her purse.

“Yeah, go ahead. Turn right at the top of the stairs.”

Jody squeezed her daughter’s shoulder, a gesture meant to provide reassurance. But all Harlow felt was fear. And abandonment.

“Don’t leave me, Jody.” Harlow was on the verge of tears.

“Calm down,” Jody switched to a gentle tone that pleaded for Harlow to be cooperative. “Ronica’s gonna stay with you. Ain’t that right, Ronica?”

“Uh-huh,” Ronica said absently while trying to memorize every step of the illegal procedure to memory.

Jody patted the side of Harlow’s arm. “You’ll be alright,” she said and then padded quickly out of the dining room.

Harlow knew that once her mother got behind closed doors, she’d pull out that dirty, burned glass pipe from her purse. She wouldn’t be rejoining her daughter anytime soon. Harlow was on her own.

She didn’t want to get rid of her baby. She was young, but she was willing to learn how to take care of it. She needed Jody to take the time to teach her.

Jody had taught her how to deal with Skeeter. “When he gets on top of you, all you have to do is lie still and pretend you’re
somewhere else. Skeeter don’t take long. He’s real quick,” Jody had said encouragingly.

Jody had also gone into lengthy detail about sperm and what it produced. She was adamant when she told Skeeter, “I’ma let you get with her, but only if you promise to pull out. I’ma be in deep shit if my child gets pregnant.”

“Do I look crazy? I’m not trying to get your child or nobody else pregnant,” Skeeter had said, sounding insulted.

Harlow wished Jody would come back downstairs and save her. She wished she could hear her mother say, “It’s gonna be alright. We gon’ get through this together.” Those were the words she’d given Harlow after the first time she allowed Skeeter to have his way with her daughter.

Now she needed Jody to give her some tips on how to get through a pregnancy and care for the baby that Skeeter put in her stomach.

Maybe if her tummy was big and round, and if there were some obvious signs of pregnancy, perhaps Ms. Cakie and Jody would have second thoughts about removing it.

But the baby was invisible to Jody and the other two women. They didn’t care about it.

Miss Cakie held the long tube taut between her hands and began to insert it inside Harlow. Ronica squeezed Harlow’s hand. “It’s gon’ be alright, Harlow. Miss Cakie’s gonna get you fixed up so you can go back to school.”

Harlow tensed. This woman was not a doctor and she didn’t believe that she was in capable hands. She tried to breathe calmly, but she couldn’t help from gasping and panting. And trembling.

“You’re gonna have to keep still, now, so I can get this tube into your cervix.”

“My what?” Harlow asked, her voice shaky.

“Keep still!” Miss Cakie said with annoyance.

“Relax, honey,” Ronica said, stroking Harlow’s hair. Though Harlow was grateful for Ronica’s kindness, she would have preferred if Ronica told Miss Cakie to stop.

Agonizing seconds crept by. Unable to distract herself with her carnival fantasy, Harlow thought about being back in school. Having an abundance of school uniforms, lots of shoes and sharp boots. And a lot of cute jewelry from Claire’s at the mall. She imagined being so special that she became the teacher’s pet. But none of her imaginings were working. She was painfully aware that it was taking forever for Miss Cakie to get that red tube inside her.

“Whew, it’s hot as hell in here.” Miss Cakie mopped her brow. With the back of her hand, she wiped perspiration from her neck.

“What’s the problem?” Ronica asked.

“Tube keeps bending. Can’t get it in. Get me a hanger from inside the closet.” Miss Cakie pointed to the small living room.

Alarmed, Harlow sat up. She definitely didn’t like the direction this abortion was going in.

“What do you need a hanger for?” Ronica inquired.

Miss Cakie clucked her tongue. “I’m not sticking it inside the girl. I have to put the hanger inside the tube to keep it straight.”

“Oh!” Ronica said and went to the living room. A moment later, she returned with a wire hanger. Harlow noticed excitement dancing in Ronica’s eyes and realized that she’d lost Ronica’s compassion. Ronica had resumed being an enthused spectator. Harlow felt alone and more terrified than ever.

No longer fumbling, Miss Cakie guided the tube inside Harlow. The foreign object went well beyond the known boundaries of her vagina. It seemed to be inside her stomach. The tubing didn’t exactly hurt, but it was extremely comfortable. She wanted Miss Cakie to hurry up and take it out of her.

With slow and calm motions, Miss Cakie attached the funnel thing to the end of the tube. “Hand me that,” she mumbled to Ronica, referring to the bowl of gook.

“What’s that supposed to do?” Ronica asked. Harlow could tell that Ronica was asking to be nosey, not because she was concerned for Harlow’s safety.

“Stops the fetus from growing.”

What’s a fetus?
Harlow had no idea. She imagined that a fetus must be that wiggly-looking cord thing that she saw on the Discovery Channel when the station showed a program about giving birth.

Ronica removed her soothing hand from Harlow’s hand and moseyed next to Miss Cakie. “What is that stuff? Smells like some kind of soap.”

Miss Cakie snorted. “I don’t give out my secrets.”

Miss Cakie poured the solution into the funnel. Harlow gritted her teeth, expecting to feel a horrible sting or a burning sensation, but she didn’t feel anything.

After the bowl was emptied, Miss Cakie slowly withdrew the tube.

Harlow’s thighs were sticky with the substance from the bowl. Skeeter often left her in that exact condition when he exited her room.

“Go on upstairs to the bathroom and clean yourself up. There’s some washcloths in the bathroom cabinet,” Miss Cakie mumbled as she began to pick up the objects from the table.

Harlow sat up and looked around. “Where’s the baby you took out?” she asked, hoping she could hold the little miniature thing.

“Ain’t gon’ be no baby. You’re gon’ have some big ol’ clumps of blood. That’s about it. But it’s gon’ take a day or so for that to happen. Now, go on and clean yourself up.”

Harlow swung her legs over the side of the table and hopped down.

“Don’t forget your panties,” the woman said, nodding her head toward the chair in which the panties had fallen.

“When you get home, I want you to move some furniture around. Stay active. Jump some rope outside.” Miss Cakie turned her attention to Ronica. “Do children still jump rope?”

Ronica shrugged. “Do y’all jump rope, Harlow?”

“Sometimes,” Harlow mumbled.

“They having sex at such a young age, I can’t even imagine kids running and playing like they did back in my day.” Miss Cakie shook her head.

Harlow was an outcast at school. She didn’t get invited to jump rope very often, and therefore wasn’t very good at it. She hadn’t always been a social piranha. Back in the first and second grade, back when Jody used to comb her hair and had kept her clothes up-to-date and clean and ironed, Harlow had been treated like a normal child at school. But the past few years had been tough. As Jody’s drug habit escalated, Harlow’s social status plummeted. Harlow was often the butt of cruel jokes. She never fought back. She’d been picked on for so long and with such consistency, she had begun to believe that she was all the low down names the kids called her.

In Harlow’s mind, her life would change when she became an adult, when she could get away from Jody and her addiction.

She fantasized about being married with children. Two boys and a girl. She and her family would live in a beautiful home. Her fantasy family were happy and loving, like on TV. Her husband would wear a suit and tie, not loose clothing with pockets filled with bags of crack and weed.

A
t four in the morning, Nivea could no longer ignore her full bladder. She stumbled out of bed and flopped down on the cushioned toilet seat, releasing what seemed like an everlasting stream of urine. Her head hurt, and her heart ached.
Is tomorrow a work day?
Feeling panicked, she wondered how she could possibly perform the responsibilities of her job. Then she remembered that it was the wee hours of Christmas morning and that she’d taken a week off for the holidays. She breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Washing her hands, she peered at her reflection and saw a puffy face with smeared mascara around her eyes. She tore off the flimsy short robe and tossed it in the clothes hamper. Rather than dwell on her awful appearance, she stepped into the shower.

Blissfully, she stood under the showerhead while jets of hot water pummelled her skin. As worrisome thoughts began to creep in her mind, she began lathering. She couldn’t keep up the pretense much longer, but she couldn’t figure out how to break the news to her family that she’d called off the wedding. Though her mother would be relieved that she wouldn’t have to claim a common laborer as her son-in-law, she would still find a way to make Nivea feel inadequate for being single.

After drying off, she pulled on a fluffy robe. She was alert now and sober enough to realize that if she didn’t stop guzzling bottles of vodka, her life would soon spiral out of control. Eric had never deserved her in the first place and she’d be damned if
she’d let him and his chicken head, baby mama drive her to a state of perpetual drunkenness.

The doorbell rang and Nivea jumped out of her skin. Someone was pressing on the bell repeatedly, acting desperate to get inside.

It had to be Eric! He’d taken all his personal belongings, and there was absolutely no reason for him to be ringing her bell, harassing her. That bastard had a lot of nerve, bothering her early Christmas morning. If he thought he could buy his way back into her life with some cheap piece of jewelry, he was out of his mind.

Indignation sent her rushing toward the front door. Prepared to use maximum force, she picked up a brass candlestick from the mantle in the living room.
I’m bashing Eric upside his stupid head for putting me though this trauma.

Prepared to curse out Eric, Nivea swung the door open. And like déjà vu, there stood her sister’s fiancé…again. She stared at Knox in disbelief, recalling her lewd antics earlier that night.

“What do you want?” she asked irritably. Knox was an unpleasant reminder that her drinking was getting out control.

“Hey, Sis. I’m sorry for dropping by this hour of the morning, but I was in the area and I wanted to check up on you. You seemed kind of messed up when I left.” He peered at her questioningly.

“As you can see, I’m fine,” Nivea said sullenly. “Look, stop calling me Sis. We’re not related.” Nivea moved to close the door.

“I apologize. I’m really concerned about you. Are you alone?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“We need to talk.” His tone was serious.

She scowled. “About what?”

“About your behavior.”

This boy is letting his future foot doctor status go to his head. He’s acting like he’s about to become a damn psychiatrist or something. So what if I flashed some boobage? I was drunk. Sue me!

“Are you nuts? It’s after four in the morning. If you want to talk to somebody, you better go talk to your fiancée. Get with Courtney about her goddamn behavior.”

“You got it all wrong.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I
like
your behavior. Since I left here, I can’t get you out of my mind. The thoughts I’m having…” He paused and shook his head. “Every time I think about tonight, I feel like I’m going crazy. You’re real sexy, Nivea. I think we’re on the same wavelength.”

Should I be insulted?
She blinked at him, perplexed.

A teasing grin spread over his face. With his features in full focus, she had to admit that Knox was a good-looking young man. But he was clearly was up to no good. She looked at the candleholder in her hand, wondering if she should use it on him.

“I can’t stay long,” he added. “I just want to find out if that thing tastes as good as it looked.”

Feeling tempted, a spasm of nerves went through her. Instead of ordering her sister’s fiancé to get off her porch, Nivea pulled the door open. Oddly, his crude language was getting to her. Had her all creamy between her legs. And the idea of fucking around behind her sister’s back was extremely appealing.

Knox came inside, bringing with him a rush of cold air.

He didn’t try to smooth talk his way inside Nivea’s bedroom. He didn’t lead her over to the couch. He didn’t even take off his jacket or his knit cap. Breathing hard like he’d run a race, Knox backed Nivea into a corner. His hunger was palpable as he crouched down before her, ripping open her robe. His cold hands gripped her thighs as he pressed his face almost reverently against her crotch.