Tayari Jones: Silver Sparrow

“My mother doesn’t even know I’m here,” I said. “And I would appreciate it if you would stop talking about her.”

“You and your sister are so much alike,” Gwen said. “I had no idea that my daughter was spending her time with you. Someone should write a book on the secret lives of girls.”

“You should know about secret lives,” I said.

Gwen turned in my direction. “Al this back talk. You and Dana real y are sisters.”

Every time she said the word sister, it felt like a tease. I shifted on the couch.

“Would you rather sit here?” Gwen said, rising. “This is your father’s chair.”

“No,” I said.

“So,” Gwen said, “what can I help you with? I’m on my way to work, but I can make time for you.”

“Don’t cal the police on my father,” I said.

She smiled, a little. “Come again?”

I took the card out of my purse. I wanted to keep my tone level, like woman to woman. “You sent this to my mother. Don’t you think my mother has suffered enough?”

Gwendolyn picked the card up and held it away from her like she didn’t want it to stain her white uniform. “Little girl,” she said, “while this card does make a good point, I did not send this.” She flipped the card over to the smiling peanut on the front. “Jimmy Carter?”

“You’re lying,” I said. “You and Dana just lie and lie and lie.”

Gwen’s mood shifted and she leaned forward. “Do not speak il of my daughter. She has done more for you than you wil ever know. Both of us have lived our entire lives in order for you to be comfortable. Nobody that lives in this house ever lied to you.”

“You’re not al that innocent.”

“You are not, either,” Gwen said. “Everything you have, you have at the expense of my daughter. Just because you were ignorant doesn’t make you innocent.”

I stood up from the raggedy couch and Gwen stood up, too. It was as though we were either going to fight or embrace. “Stay away from my mother,” I said. “And my father.”

Gwendolyn said, “Listen to me. Sit back down. You came here because you want to know something, so let me tel you something.”

I sat back down, because Gwen was right. Wasn’t whole point to find things out?

“First, what you are asking of me is unreasonable. I exist; Dana exists. You can’t ask us to pretend that we don’t. When I came to the Pink Fox that day, I did not ask Laverne to leave her husband. I did not ask you to live without your father. I just came to the shop and showed myself. You have been showing yourself to me for every day of your life. I can’t believe how arrogant you are, Chaurisse. I have been good to you your entire life, so give me some respect.”

Gwen crossed her white-stockinged legs and bounced her shoe up and down. “Don’t cry,” she said.

I wasn’t crying. I felt my face to make sure. She spoke with a grand tone, like there was someone watching. I swiveled to see the whole room, but there was no one else there except the pictures of Dana.

“Now I want to ask you something,” Gwen said. “Okay? We’re civilized here.”

“I’m not tel ing you anything,” I said.

“Oh,” Gwen said. “I know everything already. You are the one who needs to know things. I want to ask you for a smal favor.”

“A favor?”

“Yes,” Gwen said. “I want to ask you to give Dana back her grandmother’s brooch. It’s al she had.”

“Hel no,” I said.

“Why not?” Gwen wanted to know. “You have everything. My Dana has fed herself on your crumbs her whole life. Why can’t you just share this one thing?”

“Sorry,” I said standing up, feeling a bit prideful. “It’s mine. She was my grandmother. My daddy stole the brooch from her dress when she was in the casket.”

“Don’t be so selfish. My daughter has never asked for anything. I never asked for anything. You see me in this uniform? I work every day. I pay my own bil s.”

“I don’t care,” I said.

Gwen stood up. “I asked you nicely. I tried to talk to you like an adult. You have forced me to tel you this. Listen here, young lady. When you go home, look at the marriage license. Look at it careful y. Dana, your sister, the one who you think you hate so much, she changed it with a bal point pen. I didn’t marry your father one year after you were born. He married me when you were three days old, stil in the hospital, stil in the incubator.

Dana changed the date because she didn’t want to hurt your little feelings. How about that?”

“That’s not true,” I said.

She shook her head.

“You are such a liar,” I said.

“No,” Gwen said. “The devil is a lie, just like your Daddy.”

She led me to the door, as though I was just a normal guest. I squinted across the room at a photo of my mother preparing Grandma Bunny for the grave. I was stunned to see it there, as though we were part of her family. Gwen fol owed my eyes and looked into my astonished face. “It was a gift.”

SINCE I WAS the one who cal ed my father and told him to come to the house, it would have made sense for me to unlock the door and let him in.

Maybe I would have been more cooperative if he had rung the door like a guest, instead of trying to use his key like he stil lived here, like everything was okay, like my mother was his only wife and I was his only daughter. His key slid in the lock but wouldn’t turn. I stood on the other side of the door and let him try three times until it dawned on him that the locks had been changed. My mother had done it on the first day, before she turned into a sodden mess, when she was stil singing “I Wil Survive.” Before she started wishing he would come home.

When he rang the bel , I opened the wood door, undid the bolt, but I left the glass door locked. He wore his dress uniform, clutching his hat under his arm. If the outfit was red, he would have looked like an organ grinder’s monkey.

“Ch-chaurisse,” he said. “Thank you for cal ing me. Is your Mama al right?”

“How can she be al right?” I said.

“None of us is al right,” he said. “This has been hard on everybody.”

“Daddy,” I said, “how could you do this to us?”

“Open the d-d-door.”

My mother was asleep on the couch, dead from Tylenol PM. I didn’t think she would wake up, but I kept my voice low. “Explain it to me.”

“Don’t make me talk through the door.” My father was so close to the glass that I could make out his chapped lips. I took a smal step away; it wasn’t much of a move, but he saw it.

“That’s how it is, Chaurisse?” he said. “You are afraid of your father? Your mama being mad at me, I can see. What I did was a sin against her.

Look at me and see I’ve been laid low. But I never did you nothing, Chaurisse. I’m stil your daddy, nothing can change that.”

“You did do me something,” I said.

“What have I done you?” he said, like he real y wanted to know.

It was hard to explain this thing I felt. It wasn’t like daughters are supposed to expect some sort of exclusive relationship from their fathers, but what he had with Dana was an infidelity. “We didn’t even know you,” I said.

“You know me, Chaurisse. How can you say you don’t know me. When have you ever needed a daddy and I wasn’t there? Half of your friends don’t even have a daddy. Tel me if I’m lying.”

He wasn’t.

“Now open the door, Buttercup. Don’t leave me standing out here in the street. You said your mama wanted to talk to me.”

“No, I said I wanted you to talk to her. She didn’t tel me to cal you.”

“I want to talk to her, too. I’ve talked to your mama every day of my life since I was sixteen years old. Two weeks away from her liked to kil me.”