Margaret Sexton - A Kind of Freedom

Winter 1987

Jackie had called in sick the last few workdays to avoid seeing her parents, but she’d had the weekend to calm down, plus she was running out of paid leave. She had decided the night before that she would head in this morning, and she woke up early, got dressed in her knee-length blue dress with lace at the top, spent some time on her makeup — etched the eyeliner over her lashes just so — let Terry drive her all the way to the front door instead of dropping her a block from the school. There were no more secrets after all.

Her mama was composed as ever, and they discussed the status of the school day with polite nods while Jackie folded her kids’ just-in-case clothes, washed the paint off their smocks, hung them to dry. It didn’t take long before Mama started really talking though and Jackie felt trapped inside what she might say.

“We didn’t want to upset you the other night, Jackie Marie.”

“No?” Jackie was far less concerned about her parents’ opinion after talking to Terry, and she could tell that came across in her plain expression; her mother looked at her as if she didn’t recognize the woman who had spoken.

“No,” she said. “Of course not. You’re not just my daughter, you’re my friend, and I would never want to cause you pain.”

That softened Jackie to her. Her mother was her friend, her best friend since Terry had gone, and Jackie had shut everyone else out. Mama walked over and stood next to her, and Jackie leaned onto her shoulder.

“I know, Mama,” she said, sighing. “But you have to let me make my own decisions.”

Mama nodded. “I’m working on it,” she said. “I’m working on it,” she repeated. Jackie looked at her hands as she spoke, noticed the veins that had started to pop, sharp tubes like the inside of a spider web. When had that happened?

“I talked to your daddy,” Mama went on, “and he’s coming around. I’m making it so that he’ll come around. I just want to ask you before we move on any further with this — are you sure this time?”

Jackie paused before she answered. The question was so antithetical to her new method of survival; the only way she had maintained her peace these last few months was by embracing the fact that she would never be sure. And who was sure about anything? Were they sure Daddy wouldn’t walk outside in a few minutes and get toppled over by an eighteen-wheeler? That Mama wouldn’t go in for her next mammogram and walk out with a death sentence? Who of them could pretend to be sure?”

“I just want to be certain,” her mama repeated. “Because it’s not just you, it’s that baby.” She clutched her heart.

“It’s been good for him to have a father,” Jackie said, trying to dodge the question.

“Now it is, but— Never mind, I didn’t even want to get into this, Jackie.” Her mother stepped back from her and Jackie’s head wobbled from the shift. “You were right to say it’s your decision, and as your parents, we just need to stand by you. I just want to be as clear as I can, are you as sure as you can be?”

Jackie didn’t speak for a while, then when the last paintbrush had been cleaned, she looked up. She nodded.

“More sure than I’ve ever been of anything in my life, Mama,” she said, and her mama grimaced as if that wasn’t the right answer.

Terry fell back in with her family after that though, as though Jackie saying she was sure had made it so. It started with him picking the baby up from Mama’s one night because Jackie had to stay late at work. When Jackie got home that evening, he still wasn’t back, and when she saw his car pull into the parking lot a few minutes later, she ran down the stairs to meet him. It had to be a good sign that he’d stayed so long, and she wanted to hear the details of the visit, unwind them, spin them out. Before all this he was just as entwined in their family unit as she was. Sometimes she’d drive up her parents’ carport, and she’d see his car out in front. She’d walk in and he’d be watching the Saints game on her mama’s sofa, clutching a bowl of gumbo in his lap. She had missed that familiarity as much as she had missed him, and she begged him to tell her it was back.

“We just talked,” he said, settling his white jacket on the arm of the sofa.

“Yes, I get that you talked,” she teased, “but talked about what? You were gone three hours.”

“Was I? Time flies when you’re having fun, I guess,” he chuckled, knowing he was leading her on, and Jackie slapped him with a pillow.

“If you don’t tell me everything they said and then everything you said back—” she threatened, smiling.

He rolled his eyes at her, sat down at the kitchen table. “You know your parents, baby. You know what they said better than I do. They drilled me at first of course. Wanting to know what my plans were for you and the baby.”

“What did you say?” She sat down next to him.

“I’m getting to that, Jackie. I said it was to make you happy, to make up for any wrongs I’ve done.’” He smiled at her then. “That was good, right?”

She nodded, trying not to laugh.

“They asked me about work, if I didn’t think it was too soon to go back, if I really thought I was in a position to handle that level of responsibility. ‘Now be honest with yourself, son’”—he was mimicking her daddy now—“‘every man has his weaknesses, but the important thing is to be honest about what they are.’”

Jackie laughed. “That sounds like my daddy.”

“He talked more than your mom did,” Terry went on. “She just listened, looking halfway like she felt bad for me.”

“And that’s my mama,” Jackie added.

“I answered them best I could.”

“That went on for three hours?”

“No, indeed. I couldn’t have handled it. After a little while, we just watched the Cosby show, laughed over that fool Cliff. Your mama wanted me to eat before I left.

“What’d she cook?”

“Red beans and rice.”

Jackie nodded. It was a Monday.

“How do you feel?” she asked finally.

He sighed, a long exhale. “Good,” he said. “Really good actually. Like all the missing pieces are back in place. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but I was worried they weren’t going to take me back.”

“They loved you. You were a son to them.”

“They loved me, but I hurt you. I wouldn’t blame them if they couldn’t get over it.”

“They’re good people.”

“They are.” He paused for a few minutes. “And I’m going to do right by them.”

She pulled him to her then. “You are,” she said. “You are,” she repeated. She kissed him for a long time the way they would kiss when all they had were ten minutes in her daddy’s Lincoln before curfew. She straddled him, and he groaned. She dipped her body down to feel him beneath her. She clutched him to her as tight as she could, and the heat of the embrace poured over her, reached through her and back out again, radiating between them both as if they were one unit. Soon their clothes were off and it felt so much like before that she let herself believe no time had passed. When they were done, he wanted to talk. He’d missed her so much, he’d needed that more than she could imagine, he never wanted to be without her a day in his life. She’d grunt here and there. Though she felt the same way he did, she just lay still, afraid to speak or move for fear she’d unsettle this new feeling.

It was more of the same after that. Jackie and Terry dropped by her mother’s as much as they could, sometimes to leave the baby so they could catch a movie at the Plaza or grab a bite at Praline Connection, but often they’d just sit on her mama’s sofa and talk about city politics, stuff their faces with jelly cake. Her parents always asked Terry about work, and he’d say it was fine and change the subject. He still ironed his white jacket and whistled on his way out the front door, usually some Prince song they’d listened to the night before while making love. Those days, she’d go to work whistling herself, feeling as if the world were organized in her favor, the way she’d grown up thinking it would be.