Something She Can Feel

With Evan’s new position in the school district, our recent nuptials, the house, and the pretty red car that seemed to get attention wherever we went, Evan and I had grown into a kind of celebrity couple in Tuscaloosa. People smiled when we walked into the grocery store, sent us expensive gifts and cards during the holidays, and we were on the invite lists of every event in town. We didn’t even have to save spaces at the Alabama tailgates that season; other people held

them for us.

Evan, brimming with pride at the kind of stature he’d sought since we were young, relished in the attention—committed himself to memorizing the names of all the important people we’d cross paths with each day, meticulously answered each holiday card and gift with a quick thank-you note boasting a picture of us sitting beside the fireplace in our mansion, and extended his arm to lead me into rooms filled with people as we continued to make our “grand entrances.” While he was often over the top, this was just Evan. He was a true Southern gentleman—strong and gallant; full of honor and always wanting to exceed expectations. At times, it seemed like to him our life was a sitcom where he played the doting husband and I was the overjoyed wife. He was never angry and seldom raised his voice. One day, I pointed out that we never talked about anything that was serious, upsetting, or confrontational. I wanted to discuss what was happening in the world, who we really were, where we were going. Big stuff that I hadn’t even thought of. To challenge and be challenged. To see outside of our little world into the big world in ways that would make us love where we were from that much more. Not planning my family’s annual “Roll Tide” homecoming tailgate where we’d do our screaming duet of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Sweet Home Alabama” and what red was actually crimson and what crimson was actually red. To this, Evan grinned and, after kissing me on the forehead, said I should be happy we didn’t need to argue over stuff on the nightly news. He did that all day at work and didn’t want to come home to it. We were happy and safe from all of that. This was a good thing.

While I was just as excited by the idea of happiness and living a carefree life, sometimes it felt so unreal that I wanted to scream and just argue about something. Anything I could bring up. It felt childish, but I wanted to prove that we were alive and not just these perfect robots. But I always failed. I’d jab about the laundry piling up and Evan would smile and call for the housekeeper. I’d complain that we needed to spend more time together and he’d clear his calendar for the day. It was wonderful. Amazing. But as we neared our one-year anniversary, I started to feel like I was suffocating. Caught in a tumbling storm of happiness and contentment with my life that made me feel like I was more dead than alive. I felt the need for something again, and just as they had before, both my mother and Evan seemed to have their own ideas about what that something was ...

“When you gonna have a baby?” Opal Ivers, a student in my fourth-period chorus section asked abruptly one Friday as I waited to begin class. Opal was a petite, brown-skinned girl, who might have been pretty if she’d gotten braces when she was younger, but now her teeth were bucked and seemed to part comically with each passing week. The kids had a habit of teasing her, but that didn’t stop Opal. She loved being the center of attention and took their laughs as encouragement.

Sitting at my desk behind the shaky piano I dared not ever use, as not one key was in tune, I frowned and dismissed the bold girl’s question with my eyes, but she was reading my mind. In what had become a habit of late, Evan had hinted about a baby over breakfast just that morning. He’d pointed out that I was about to turn thirty-three that Sunday and that my own mother kept saying it was time. “My mama said a married woman got to have a baby,” Opal went on. “That’s why you get married in the first place. Your husband rich, too!”

“Opal,” I started as the room continued to fill up with faces, “not all women want to have children ... or can. And as far as my having a baby, that’s private.”

While I did want children, I just wasn’t sure if it was time for me to take that step in my life. Yes, like Opal and her mother had pointed out, I was married and had a wonderful husband and home, but I still had other things to figure out. That, and not to mention, there was a school full of other babies that needed my attention.

The bell rang and a few stragglers came rushing in without apologizing—as I would never have done when I was in high school. But a lot had changed since then.

Last to arrive as usual was Zenobia Hamilton, a mother and second-year sophomore whose child’s father—a second-year senior—was expecting another baby this summer with Patrice, another one of my students (luckily, she was in first period). Zenobia walked into the room with an air of marked carelessness; her feet were angled at a lazy ninety degrees and her lips were turned under into a nasty frown. Her short hair was undone and standing all over her head as if she’d just rolled out of the bed and onto the school bus.

“Ms. Hamilton,” I said, signaling for her to come to my desk. I unbuttoned my suit jacket and slid it onto the chair behind me.

“Ummm-hum?” She was trying her best to communicate attitude in her voice. She rolled her eyes and balanced her weight on one of her ducked feet. This kind of unnecessary and unwarranted anger so early in the day used to perplex me eight years ago when I started teaching at Black Warrior, but now I’d figured out that mistreating me and mistreating their education, which for most of the students in the poorest school in the county pretty much made up the only structure they had in their day, was simply how they dealt with the emotional minefields that had been titled their life. Zenobia knew she was wrong for most of the things she did, but being bad and stepping out of line was the only thing she thought she could control. If I was fifteen, poor, and had a child with a high school student who was now expecting another baby with my classmate, I might be duck-walking and rolling my eyes, too.

“First, it’s, ‘Yes, Mrs. DeLong—’ ”

“Yes, Mrs. DeLong,” she said under her breath, repeating my words with no trace of sincerity.

“And second, what’s wrong with your hair?”

“I ain’t felt like combing it today.”

“But you knew you had to come to school, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, but my mama took my braids out last night and then my auntie ain’t come over to braid it.”

“Personal situation aside—what’s the rule about hair grooming at the school?” I asked. The classroom grew quieter with each exchange. I didn’t want to embarrass her, but the hair was really standing up high and now that she’d mentioned that she’d just taken out braids, I noticed that it hadn’t been combed out and drifts of dandruff cradled her balding edges.

“I know the rule. We can’t come to school without our hair combed.”

“You know I have to send you to the office.”

“It ain’t my fault,” she said. “I told my mama my auntie wasn’t coming. She took my mama’s money and went to smoke it.”

It seemed every student knew what she was talking about—some had drug addictions of their own—and it was no longer a hidden Southern secret, not something these children felt they should be ashamed of. Zenobia hadn’t lowered her voice.

“Ms. Hamilton,” I whispered, leading her to the door. “I can’t allow you to sit in my classroom with your hair like that.”

“I know.” She crossed her arms and shifted her weight again.

“Then, if you know, why would you—” I stopped myself. I could hear my voice becoming frustrated. “Just go to the bathroom and comb it. Put it in a ponytail or something and—”

“My hair don’t fit in no ponytail. I ain’t got no gel ... no weave.”

“Well, just comb it down and come back.”

She sucked her teeth and flicked a red, widetoothed comb out of her back pocket. One she could’ve used hours ago.

“Fine,” she snarled. “I’ll be back.” She turned and waddled through the doorway and as she exited, I saw the promise of a firm belly imprinting the edges of her oversized T-shirt. I closed my eyes for three short seconds to say a little prayer of “no” and “God, please, no” over the pudge before turning back to the students.