Something She Can Feel

She didn’t respond. She just nodded and kept her hands on the wheel. It seemed that she was afraid to let go. Afraid of what she might do herself.

“You stay here,” I said. “And I’ll go get him for you. okay?”

“Yes,” she said uneasily.

I backed away from the car and then turned to face the house repeating, “Please don’t be doing what I think you’re doing” to myself. “Please! Please! Please!”

I kept looking over my shoulder to make sure May wasn’t coming up behind me. Whatever it was, May was in no condition to confront Jr.

When I got to the door, the door of the house I grew up in, I didn’t know if I should ring the bell or just walk in. I knocked lightly, holding the screen door my father had put up one hot summer back with my foot. There was no answer, so I knocked again, almost a light tap. It had to have been after 1:30 a.m. now and all of the lights were off. I looked back to the car to see that May still hadn’t moved.

When the door finally opened, Jr was standing there looking back at me. Neither of us said anything for a second. We just stood there in the awkwardness of the situation, silent and looking at one another.

“Your wife is here,” I said.

“Honey,” a tired, feminine voice called from behind Jr. “Who’s here so late?” The woman’s head came poking out. She was a tall, light-skinned woman, who looked a lot like my mother had when she was much younger. I’d seen her at the church before.

“Kim, I told you to stay in bed.”

“Who’s this?” I looked at the woman. “Who is she?”

“I’m Kim, Journey,” the woman said defiantly. “Would you like to come into my home?”

“Kim, I just told you to go back to bed,” Jr repeated more forcefully, but she just stood there.

“I ain’t going back to bed. I’m tired of hiding. This is your family.” She stepped around Jr and came closer to me with her hands folded across her chest. “I’m his fiancée.”

“How could you do this to me?” I heard May cry out. I turned and she was right behind me, crying and shaking. “You lied to me!”

“I told you to stay home,” Jr shouted at May. “Go home. Journey, get her back in the car.” He looked at me.

“Ain’t nobody listening to you tonight, so you might as well just tell everybody what’s going on. Tell her,” Kim demanded, pointing her finger at Jr, and I swear in all my life I’d never heard anyone speak to him in that way. “Tell her now.”

I reached back and grabbed May’s hand. I hadn’t processed what all was going on—how long it had been going on and how long May had been dealing with it—but this was way out there for Jr.

He pushed Kim to the side and came charging out the door, trying to get past me so he could get to May. I stumbled back, but then I jumped and tried to get in front of him.

“No!” May started inching back. “I want to know what’s going on.”

“Leave her alone,” I said, pulling at Jr, who seemed like he was about to hit May.

“You want to know?” he shouted. “You really want to know?”

“Yes,” May cried and Jr broke away from me. He was standing right in May’s face.

“This is my girlfriend,” he said as calmly as he might have had he been ordering a cup of coffee. “You don’t make me happy anymore. You’ve put on all this weight. I’m not attracted to you. I haven’t had sex with you in months. We don’t have a life. You couldn’t even give me a son.”

Jr’s words were so cold I wasn’t sure if it was even my brother. I stood behind him, shocked and waiting for May to say something, but she just stood there. Tears started falling from her eyes and she covered her mouth with her hands.

“Enough,” I said to him. “That’s enough.”

“You wanted to know,” he said with his eyes mad and still set on May. “There it is. Everything. So now you can go and get back in your car”—he started pushing her toward the car—“and drive home and wait for me to get there when I’m done.”

“Jr,” I called, but he didn’t stop pushing her.

“No!” May shrieked, and then she just jumped on Jr, wailing and screaming, “No!”

I leaped to try to pull her off Jr and then I felt Kim on my back, trying to pull me off. We all fell to the ground, three women, piled on top of Jr, wrestling and crying.