No Laughter Here Read online

  Somewhere between wishing down the moon and trading it in for the sun, I fell asleep.

  I woke up expecting to see the sun, but it was still dark. Not just-before-the-cock-crows dark, but dark as in the moon wasn’t going nowhere, no time soon. In fact, according to my clock, I had been asleep for only eighteen minutes. Don’t you hate that? So now I was rested and up. I would never get to sleep. I would never see the sun. I would never see Victoria.

  I got out of bed and turned on my computer to send e-mail, GirlWar to QueenV3.

  I meant to ask her if she was mad at me. If I said something wrong. I meant to write about soccer and Juwan Spenser. Shopping for school clothes. My stupid talk with Mom. I meant to ask a million questions about Nigeria. Instead all I wrote was “Glad you’re back. Let’s get together.”

  Now I could sleep. Really sleep.

  The next time I woke up, streams of light beamed through my blinds. Sure enough, the sun was grinning at me, a big old cheesy grin. I was in and out of the shower so fast I didn’t need a towel to dry off. That’s how little water actually hit me. I know I brushed my teeth and threw on my soccer outfit. I just didn’t do all of those grooming things on Mom’s “did you” list. I scooted into my chair and kept my legs under the tablecloth to hide the fact that they were lotionless. Once I got to rolling around on the soccer field, no one would know the difference.

  “Chew, Akilah. Ten times, then swallow.”

  “I am chewing.” My mouth was all full of toast.

  “Young lady! Close your mouth.”

  I’m no lady, I thought. I’m just a girl, ready to kick butt on the soccer field—after I see Victoria.

  When I ran to the Ojikes’ house, Miss Lady was out walking Gigi. The second the dog caught scent of me, Gigi started barking like mad. Miss Lady didn’t yank Gigi’s leash or quiet her down. She just let her bark.

  “I see you ain’t waste no time making it over here.” Miss Lady saw everything. “Is your mama well, child?”

  “My mama’s fine,” I said.

  “How’d she let you out the house with those ashy legs?”

  “I’m going to play soccer in the grass and mud. I’ma have to take a bath when I come home anyway.”

  “You can still fix up. Be a lady,” she said. Now Gigi was sniffing me. I didn’t care about Gigi’s wet snout as much as I cared about people insisting I be a lady. I’m a girl, not a lady.

  I went up to the Ojikes’ door and pressed the buzzer. I rocked back and forth, feeling like I could lift off and fly. The excitement of finally seeing Victoria was killing me, but I managed to keep my feet on the ground.

  Mrs. Ojike opened the door. I had to look up. Really up, because Mrs. Ojike is, as Mom says, “a woman of stature.”

  “So early, Akilah.”

  “Couldn’t wait,” I said. “I’m so glad you all are back.” I talked on and on but noticed she wasn’t letting me in, nor did she stand aside.

  “I’m sorry, Akilah, but Victoria is not feeling well.”

  “Can’t I see her for a minute? Just a minute? Please?” I dragged out the please.

  “Dear, she’s not yet awake.”

  “It’s not like I’ve never seen her pj’s before.”

  I tried to look past Mrs. Ojike, but she didn’t give me an inch in either direction. The door was cracked wide enough for her figure alone.

  “Well, I’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “Akilah, Victoria is not well. You must give her time to feel better.”

  I knew I was wearing out my welcome, but I thought she’d change her mind.

  I went to the soccer field. During the warm-ups I was minding my business, stretching with Janetta Mitchell, when Juwan came over and said, “So where’s your ugly partner hiding?”

  That was a trick to make me answer. Then he’d say, “I told you Victoria’s ugly.” I had to fall for that trick only once to know better. I said, “Juwan, you’re the only ugly person I know.” Janetta and I kept doing our warm-ups until he went away.

  Juwan has known me since Pre-K. Same amount of time he’s known Janetta Mitchell. Does he bother her? No.

  After practice I started on my way home. I took Victoria’s block, hoping I’d see her or Nelson out in the yard.

  Just as I was willing Victoria or Nelson to come outside, Mrs. Ojike opened the front door and called out to me. I raced over like a bloodhound. So much for being a lady.

  Just as I got to the porch, she said, “Wait right here,” and closed the door. I thought she was bringing Victoria to the door to say a quick hello. Instead she returned with a shopping bag that she put in my hand, closing my fingers around the handle.

  “It’s for your mother.”

  “Oh.”

  “Run along, Akilah. I will let you know when Victoria is feeling better.”

  I took the bag home and gave it to Mom. She pulled out the cloth, squealed, and said, “It’s beautiful!”

  It was just a cloth. Not like the kente Mrs. Ojike had on her wall. This one didn’t have all of those colors laced into one another. It was just brown and black, with some white stick figure drawings on it.

  Mom kept running her hands along the patterns. “It’s a mud cloth,” she said, her eyes darting from wall to wall. She was finding the perfect spot to hang it.

  I didn’t care where it went. As I slumped, sulking, on the sofa, I heard the words texture and print and glorious.

  “Hey.”

  My head stayed sunken in my hands.

  “I thought we’d have to pry you from the Ojikes.”

  “Mrs. Ojike said Victoria wasn’t feeling well. Not to come by tomorrow, either. Don’t call us. We’ll call you.”

  “She didn’t say that.”

  Mom sat down. She pulled my back braid to lift my head up out of my hands. I let my head drop back down.

  “Akilah, listen to me. You have to give Victoria time. Maybe she didn’t adapt to her country. Maybe it was too much for her.”

  I looked up. “Adapt?”

  “Sure, Victoria was born in Nigeria, but she’s lived in England and in Queens for most of her life. I’m sure the food, the water, the travel, perhaps even the climate, overwhelmed her.”

  I didn’t want to hear it, but I knew Mom was probably right.

  “Akilah.”

  I looked up.

  “Those ashy legs, young lady.”

  Cousins

  Mom and Dad did everything they could to distract me from missing Victoria. Honest to God, it would have been easier if they had given me a brother or sister six years ago when I asked for one. How many video games can you play and how much hoops can you shoot with your dad?

  Finally my parents put me out of my misery when Mom announced, “We’re going down to Silver Spring to see your cousins.”

  Silver Spring, Maryland, is six hours from Queens if we leave in the middle of the night and forever if we wait for the morning. I know the trip like I know my way to school, but I still anticipated going down to see my cousins. I love every inch of the long ride. The blue signs that point to rest stops. The green signs that subtract miles as we near Silver Spring. I love cruising neck and neck with other vacation-bound cars, and vanloads of kids fighting in backseats. I love the sing-alongs song after song. The radio stations crackling and disappearing as we cross from state to state. The car-counting game, Spot That License Plate, and the spelling games. Then a long round of remember when…? That always comes from Mom, because Dad never remembers anything correctly.

  I love being around Mom’s six sisters, who all live in Maryland. Her brother, my only blood uncle, lives in D.C., away from his sisters—Aunties Cassandra, Jackie, Lena, Lorna, Myra, and Belinda. Can you imagine that? Uncle Jason in the midst of seven girls.

  Unlike my uncle, Daddy loves the fuss my aunties make over him. He doesn’t really have a family. His mother died when he was little, and his father gave him away. When we say we’re going to visit relatives, we mean Mom’s side of the family.

>   We always stay at Aunt Cassandra’s house. She’s Mom’s oldest sister and inherited Grandma and Grandpa’s house, which has lots of room.

  Auntie Cass is funny. Not ha-ha-trying-to-make-you-laugh funny, but funny. She never has two minutes to think about what’s on her mind, so she just says whatever.

  I expected my cousins to all come running out to greet us when we drove up, but not a soul appeared from the house. Not even the dog. Dad gave Mom a glance as we got out of the car. Didn’t they know we were coming?

  We went around the back. The windows were wide open, and we could hear Auntie Cass whipping one of my cousins and saying in between each stroke, “See—if—I’m—playing—with—you.”

  Mom hollered up, “Cass! Cass!” I think she did that more to stop the whipping than to announce we were there. Mom calls whipping child abuse.

  First there was the silence of things stopping. Then footsteps. A troop of them bounding downstairs. Auntie Cass stuck her head out the window.

  “Baby? Is that you?”

  Five of my cousins and the dog all came running down to greet us.

  Auntie Cass has the biggest family of all my aunts. Her oldest daughter is married with a family of her own. The two after her are in college, and the rest of my six cousins are still at home. Since five cousins had come down all dry eyed and giddy, I knew Pearlina was upstairs nursing her sore tail, which sucked raw eggs, because she’s my age and I hang out with her the most.

  I was glad we had passed by all of those restaurants along the way without going in. We had come just in time for breakfast and were going to be fed like nobody’s business. Hot pans are always sizzling on Auntie Cass’s stove. Don’t get me wrong. My mother cooks at home, but not like Auntie Cass. Auntie starts off mornings with big, hot breakfasts, then around four o’clock she serves supper. She always puts out enough food to hurt your stomach. At eight o’clock there are leftovers, and after that there’s cake or peach cobbler if you are good.

  I didn’t think I’d eat again at four, but I couldn’t help myself. All of that good food and everybody laughing and eating! I wanted Pearlina to come downstairs and join in all the fun. Twice I stood outside her door knocking, but she wouldn’t answer me. I could hear her sniffling.

  I never took Pearlina to be the sensitive type. On that first day I gave up on her and ran around with my other cousins.

  By the eight o’clock leftovers, my other aunties had come over with their husbands and kids, so the house was loud and happy.

  Vanilla ice cream was being scooped on top of plates of peach cobbler. I dug into my mound of slurpy goodness, knowing I’d be sick that night, but I didn’t care. I just kept on eating, much to my mother’s embarrassment.

  Mom wasn’t really digging into her food. At least not like Dad, who was ready for seconds. She had stuff on her mind. It was in her stare. Mom wouldn’t let the day go by without having her say.

  I counted backward. Ten, nine, eight…

  Mom put down her spoon and said, “Cass, you know I don’t approve of physical punishment—”

  “Look, Baby,” Auntie Cass said, while washing the dishes. No one in Mom’s family calls my mother Gladys, which was also my grandmother’s name. “Wrong is wrong. You do wrong, you get what’s coming. I raised six of you girls and Jason, plus nine of my own. No one died from a whipping yet.”

  That’s what I meant by funny.

  Dad must have laughed the loudest, which didn’t please Mom at all. Auntie Cass is his favorite sister-in-law. He answered her like she was the captain and he was a lowly shipmate. In turn, Auntie Cass complained that Mom didn’t cook enough for Dad. “Look at poor Roy. He’s all bone.”

  Auntie Jackie always takes up for Mom. “Now, Roy,” she said to Dad. “How are you taking Cass’s side when she didn’t want Baby to marry you?”

  Before we knew it, my aunts were telling the story of my parents’ courtship, which Dad seemed to enjoy. Well, more than Mom did. Neither Grandpa Jack nor Grandma Gladys thought my father would know how to treat a wife and kids since he didn’t grow up in a real family himself. My mother had to prove everyone wrong and went ahead and married my father anyway.

  Mom wouldn’t let her sisters change the subject before she spoke out against whippings. Her workdays had been spent with kids who were beaten or abused. These same abused kids learned to beat up other kids and eventually turned on their own parents and children. To my mother, Auntie Cassandra said, “Baby, sounds like you need to change jobs.”

  Just like that, everyone was laughing.

  “You’ll see,” Aunt Cass promised. “One day you’ll have to crack the whip on that little tail”—she pointed to me—“and you’ll be glad you did.”

  All my aunties started to laugh and tell stories about either the worst whippings they got as children or the worst whippings they gave as parents. And then my cousins proudly told stories of how they hid under beds and did the whipping dance when the belt lashed out at their legs and feet. After a while even Mom couldn’t help herself and was laughing along with everyone else.

  Then my cousin Pearlina came downstairs. When I saw her face and how she reached out to me from across the room without saying a word, I began to miss Victoria again.

  Ready for the Fifth Grade

  Finally! First day of school. Visiting my cousins was fun, but I wanted the summer to end and for things to go back to normal. I was ready to sit next to Victoria in our new class and shoot our hands in the air to get our new teacher’s attention.

  I wasn’t the only one anxious for the summer to end. Mom decided she was well rested and ready to return to work. I think once Auntie Cass suggested she should change jobs, Mom had to prove her big sister wrong. Whatever had happened to make her leave her job now made her determined to go back to it. I was glad to see Mom in her heels and work clothes. When I was little and asked her where was she going, she used to say, “I’m going to rescue children.”

  The morning was perfect, all bright and chirpy. Mrs. Ojike couldn’t keep Victoria in the house forever. Whatever Victoria had, the flu or an earache, had to be over by now. I couldn’t wait to go over there and grab Victoria. Both of us would go running down the street, ready for fifth grade, our braids flying and us laughing. It doesn’t take much to set us off. I’ll look at her big teeth or she’ll see my big head and we’ll burst out laughing so hard we gotta cough, then slap each other on the back.

  As if my thoughts were sitting out on the table next to the jelly, Mom said, “Mrs. Ojike took Victoria to school this morning. She called to tell me.”

  Pow. Right in the gut.

  Mom offered to take me to school. But I knew she’d be late for work.

  She was feeling sorry for me, which made it worse. We’re alike, Mom and I. We can’t stand pity. We don’t want to get it and we don’t want to give it. There you are being sympathetic, waiting for the other person to snap out of it, but they’re content to ride pity like it’s the rocking horse you feed quarters into. Take Cousin Pearlina. I spent the first day pleading with her to let me inside her room. Then it was three whole days before she spoke without tears welling up in her eyes. By the time she was herself again, we had to come back to Queens.

  “It’s only a couple of blocks,” I told Mom, who was still heaping on the pity look. “I’ll walk.”

  When I got to the playground, I started looking for Victoria, searching among the clap-clap games and hopscotches. It was wild out there. Just wild. Kids who had been locked up in their homes all summer and kids who hadn’t seen one another for months were finally out—screaming, running, and having a ball. All the colors of new school clothes darted this way and that. Then the bell rang and everyone scattered, trying to figure out which line they belonged to. It was while the playground was going motion crazy that I found her, sitting still and alone against the chain-link fence, her face turned away from the playground.

  I ran over to get her.

  “Victoria! Victoria! Come on!” I grabbe
d her hand and pulled her to Ms. Saunders’s line. It didn’t matter that her feet were dragging like I was pulling her through mud. I could fly for the both of us. I squeezed her hand and ran, laughing all the way. I thought we were both laughing, but I heard mostly me. I was too excited to notice anything else. When we got on line, I kept saying, “Hi, hi, hi.”

  She said hi back, or her mouth opened to say hi. We weren’t supposed to be talking on line anyway, but I was bursting all over. Inside and out. Finally. Victoria and me. Back together again.

  I glanced over at the boys’ line just to see which boys would be in our class, and man! There was Juwan Spenser. He is like an embarrassing nickname that follows you everywhere. I can’t get rid of him. That boy followed me from Pre-K to first, second, and fourth grades, plus soccer practice. The third grade was my only break. I went to 3–1 and he went to 3–2. Well, I wasn’t going to waste my time thinking about Juwan Spenser and what misery he could cause me. I was too happy to be standing next to Victoria.

  Our new class, 5–2, marched behind our teacher, Ms. Saunders, down the hall, up the stairwell, and into our new classroom. There we found the usual rows of desks, and on each desk was a small name card made of construction paper.

  “Find your names and take your seats.”

  I panicked. The problem with a lightning-quick mind is you jump ahead. What if Ms. Saunders alphabetized our names? A for Akilah would put me on the other side of the world from V for Victoria. H for Hunter still had no hope of being close to O, Ojike. Victoria might as well still be in Nigeria.

  Breathe, girl. Breathe.

  I calmed myself and scanned the cards around me. I saw that our names had not been alphabetized and that only Jerilyn Miller kept me from sitting next to Victoria. Once again Girl Warrior rose up. I switched the name cards and took my place next to Victoria. Jerilyn didn’t care one way or the other.

  Now I was ready for the fifth grade.

  Geography Game