His First Wife

“Mrs. Taylor,” Officer Cox said, “because we all saw you assault your husband, we’re going to have to take you in for domestic violence.”

“Domestic violence?” I couldn’t trust the echoes vibrating through my ears. “But he’s here with that woman cheating on me.” My spine began to twitch as the baby shifted, panicking, from side to side.

“I know. But because we saw you and our captain is with us, we have to do this. If the captain wasn’t with us, we could let you go, but we have to protect ourselves. You understand?” Her voice turned to reason for a second and she slid the cuffs on and began to read me my Miranda rights. The crowd, which had grown even larger, stood silent in fear and amazement.

“That ain’t necessary, officer,” one woman said, “She’s pregnant. Just let her go.”

“Yeah,” other people agreed. But it was too late. My hands cuffed on top of my belly, I watched them all desperately as the officer began walking me to the car. I turned again to see Jamison still standing there, looking at me helplessly. He’d done this to us, to me. I was being sent to jail fo

r hitting a man who had beaten my heart to a pulp.

“You’ll be out quickly,” the female officer said, helping me into the car. The rainbow of lights went shining again and we were off.

Inside Out

Classical piano. Ballet and tap. Etiquette. Jack and Jill. Private school for thirteen years and four years at Spelman. It seemed that my mother had spent my entire life trying to ensure that I’d never see the inside of a jail cell, yet there I was, her perfect little girl, sitting in a muggy, gray room that at once defeated all of her hard work.

I want to say the jail was like a nightmare, but really it wasn’t. It was dark, musky, cheerless, and filled with every design no-no I’d ever observed in Homes & Gardens, but really the place wasn’t anything like what I’d seen on television. Beside the fact that I was being held there against my will, it seemed like a regular office. There were computers and people on the phone. Folks eating breakfast at their desks and pictures of ugly children on the walls. Besides the “Most Wanted” signs, bars, and drunken prostitutes, you could pretend you were at a part-time job—one you never wanted to go to.

It’s funny how when you’re in a situation like that, when you feel you’ve completely lost yourself, all you can seem to do is think of who you are.

As a chubby-faced black woman with fake gold rings on every finger took my picture and fingerprints, I thought of how far I’d gone in my life, how far I thought I was from ever being booked into a jail, sitting beside prostitutes who had track marks up the insides of their starved arms, drunks who could hardly sit up, and just plain wild women who cursed and spit at their own shadows.

I was Kerry Jackson-Taylor, army brat daughter of a retired Desert Storm veteran. I’d been raised by a socialite and army wife who had old Atlanta money and a name that opened doors wherever we went. I’d had the best of everything in my life. Hadn’t ever wanted for a thing. Had been taught to play by the rules: say your prayers, obey the law, love your country, and be a good citizen, wife, and mother. When I went to college, everyone called me “Black Barbie.” Even my professors. Girls groaned in envy when I pulled up in front of the dorm freshman year in my black Corvette. They wanted to ride with me, borrow my designer clothes, study with me at the library, go with me to the hairdresser where my long black hair was perfectly pressed, do anything and everything I did, because they all thought I was so perfect. I could lie and say I didn’t feel the same way about myself. But it was hard. Things just came to me then. I’d never had a pimple in my life, had gotten straight A’s throughout prep school and college, and by the time I saw my picture plastered in Ebony magazine when I won Ms. Spelman, my head was so swollen I actually went out and bought a T-shirt that said “Black Barbie” across the front. The back, of course, read, “Perfect 10.”

Thinking about those times, it seemed as if I was nothing like the women around me. Not even like the ones whose prisoner I’d suddenly become. But like them, I was there. Still in my nightgown and a jacket one of the officers had given me, I was there and feeling completely pitiful. A pitiful Black Barbie. No corvette or Ken in sight.

Finally in my cell alone, all I could think of was how I got there. Thick tears gathered as I thought and thought about this question. I couldn’t answer it. All I could do was think it. Over and again in my mind I asked myself the same thing, but answering it just seemed so hard. Yes, Jamison was having an affair, but how did we get there? And then if we’d gotten to the place where my husband was having an affair, how did we get there? It didn’t make any sense. I didn’t make any sense. The pain of the circumstance was wearing me down and as I sat in the holding cell, searching for the courage to make my first phone call, I felt tired, and finally it seemed I was a pregnant woman who had no business being away from her bed so early in the morning.

I even grew tired of crying. I couldn’t find another tear within myself, so I just sat there on a hard bench and rehearsed what I’d say to my mother. Yeah, I’d have to call my mother to come and get me.

One of the guards said that Jamison had come up to the precinct to bail me out but that they couldn’t release me into his custody because I was being charged with hitting him. I asked how I was going to be charged for hitting someone who was trying to bail me out of jail, and she explained that Jamison didn’t have to press charges. The state pressed charges in domestic violence cases. Apparently, it was standard procedure because most victims were afraid to press charges against their mates.

I listened to this information as if I was watching Court TV and she was talking about someone else. That Savannah beauty queen, who’d shot and killed her boyfriend. Lorena Bobbitt, who’d snipped off her husband’s penis. Domestic violence? First offense? Counseling? Charges? Going before the judge? Bail? There was no way she could be talking to me. “Do you have anyone else who can come get you?” she asked. I didn’t respond. There were only two people, besides Jamison, whom I could entrust with something so low as coming to bail me out of jail. One was Marcy, and I knew she was probably already on her way to work, and the other was my mother.

I know most people wanted to get out of jail as soon as possible, so they pick up the phone to call whomever and say whatever to get them there, but my situation with Mother was quite different.

She wasn’t an overbearing or overprotective mother, like most. That would’ve been easy. My mother was a little more distant than other people. Shortly after my father came back from the Persian Gulf, he started showing signs of post-traumatic stress disorder. They tried to control it with counseling, but it just got worse, and soon my mother simply couldn’t deal with it, so they put my father in a nursing home. While I was away in prep school when it all happened, the change affected all three of us, my mother the worst. She was so angry with my father for being sick that she seemed to pretend he was dead. She immersed herself even further into her social life, throwing these expensive parties, some even on weeknights, flying to Boca Raton for long weekends and going on monthlong cruises with groups of people she claimed were her “new” friends. “I’m alive again,” she’d say when I asked what was going on. “I lived for your father and the Army for too long and now I’m alive.” I knew it was a lie. My mother was simply trying to cover up the pain she was feeling inside for losing the best of the man she loved—his mind. He couldn’t even recognize either of us anymore, had taken to calling her “the enemy” when she did find time to visit. I knew that had to hurt. It hurt me. So Mother kept burrowing within herself, pulling away from me, my dad, and even herself as she sipped overpriced wine and pretended everything would be okay in her “new life.” Now my mother was a bit of a shell, a disconnected, empty shell that I loved for who she once was and hated for who she was becoming. Nevertheless, I hated letting her down. She’d been let down enough in her life, and I never wanted to be that person who did it again. Together, we’d carefully planned my life, and I knew this would be a blow.

I wasn’t sure how she might take the call. The old Mother, before Dad went to the nursing home, would’ve run to my rescue and been mad that I’d gotten myself in such a predicament. She might drag me home and try to take care of me and my baby, saying we didn’t have to ever go home as we both swore Jamison off forever. It wasn’t what I’d wanted, but it was what most daughters expected of their mothers. We all hated it, but in the end, it was comforting to know someone could care for you like only a mother could. Yet, I expected none of that from my mother now. She simply wasn’t capable of it. I just wanted her to come bail me out and drop me off at home. But could she even handle that?

E-MAIL TRANSMISSION

TO: [email protected]

FROM: [email protected]

DATE: 3/17/07

TIME: 7:38 PM

Coreen:

I just wanted to say thanks again for finding my PalmPilot and taking time to contact me. By the way, I was shocked when you answered the door this morning. I was expecting “Duane Carter” (the name on the e-mail). But I guess you were a more pleasant surprise. Thanks again. Have a great day.

Jamison

E-MAIL TRANSMISSION