“Nope,” Wayne answered. “They aren’t.”
At the same time, the big guy broke off from his conversation and squinted at Wayne.
Rhonda’s eyes widened. “What’s he saying now?”
Wayne’s jaw worked. Nonetheless, he answered, “He’s telling the other two that he recognizes me. That I used to be in the Boston Red Diamond.”
“Used to be?” Rhonda shook her head, not understanding. “Are you trying to tell me you’ve been taking money from my dad, but you’re not affiliated with the Red Diamond gang anymore?”
Before he can answer that question, the big guy rose from the booth and came over. “Wayne, man,” he said in English. “Is that you?”
4
DAWN
10 Years Later
“Wow! You’re supersmart, like Mom!” Daniella, Luca’s and Amber’s six-year-old daughter, tells me after I show her the flipbook I made of her bouncing a ball with her baby brother, Luca Jr.—or Lucky, as everybody calls him.
Technically, little Daniella is actually Amber’s niece, and Lucky is her cousin. But as Daniella told me over lunch, “None of that will matter soon because Mom and Dad told me they want to adopt me forever on the same day you came to live with us.”
After hearing her crazy adoption story, I understand why she puts extra emphasis on mom and dad whenever she speaks of her parents. She, Luca, and Amber earned their family status for sure. And I would never put myself in the same company as her seriously heroic mother.
“I wouldn’t say I’m as smart as your mom,” I hedge.
Especially not today when she’s confronting Victor about our not actually being married.
I still can’t believe I’m not really Victor’s wife.
Though, it all seems so obvious now. The lack of witnesses at our ceremony. The one judge, who seemed more than a little bit shady. Of course, it had been a trick. Yet another mind game designed to make me pay for the real May 25th wedding date that I missed fifteen years ago.
So yes, the flipbook I’d made to keep my super unemployed self from going crazy with boredom yesterday was super cute. But me? Supersmart? No, I don’t think so.
Still, there’s no reason to bring Daniella down with my foul mood.
So I suggest, “Why don’t we make another flipbook together? I’ve got a bunch of blank index cards, and if your mom or dad has another binder clip, then we pretty much have everything we need.
Daniella’s eyes go wide as saucers. “Seriously? You’d teach me how to make one?”
“Sure, why not? Spending the morning with you has been the highlight of my week.”
Daniella considers my words with a thoughtful look on her face. Then she asks, “Are all other half-black women like you? So nice?”
Daniella’s half-black herself. So is Amber. But after being raised severely isolated, she doesn’t have a whole lot of real-life experience. And bingeing Netflix shows can only teach her so much. Sincere questions like this are probably why Amber answered, “We’re working on it, but she’s not quite socially there yet,” when I asked back in May why Daniella was doing lessons with the nanny instead of attending regular school.
She reminds me of Victor in some ways. The good version of him that he used to be when we first met. Sheltered but curious and open to getting to know a visitor from outside his world.
But that version of Victor is gone now. Really, after the last ten years, he feels like somebody I might have made up.
“Hmm, I wouldn’t say that exactly. You can’t ever lump a whole group of people together.” I answer Daniella, pushing thoughts of Victor into the attic of my mind where they belong. “For example, your mom is a supersmart lawyer. And I am an artist. We’re both half-black but were nothing alike.”
Daniella nods with a considering look. “Yeah, mom is not nice. She loves me, and I love her, but she’s super strict, and you’re not super strict. You’re nice. And you’re going to teach me how to make a flipbook. How long are you going to stay? Please, can you live with us forever?”
Her words both touch and alarm me. The truth is, I’ve been so busy trying to figure out how to get this divorce, I haven’t thought about what will come next for me.
But now it turns out I don’t even need a divorce. That means my next order of business is to figure out how to actually live. My own life. On my own terms. And earn enough money to support a child Victor can never find out about.
I need to start searching for a new job. I also need health insurance since I’m not on my grad school’s plan anymore. And I’ll have to find an apartment, something I can afford now that I no longer have a magically replenishing bank account that automatically pays all my bills.
I’ll also have to start thinking about things like establishing credit, getting a drivers’ license, and obtaining daycare…
A wave of fear crashes over me, thinking about just how unprepared I am in every way to live in the real world.
Like, I’ve heard of adulting. But I’ve never actually had to do it.
Other than when I was at Mount Holyoke, someone’s been taking care of me my whole life. And my all-women’s college, with its plum work-study assignments and communal campus living, wasn’t exactly a primer on how to live in the real world. The most difficult thing that ever happened to me there was when they shut down the dining room at the bottom of our house my sophomore year, and I had to start going next door to eat.
I get the feeling raising a child on my own will be a lot harder than having to hike through a little snow for every meal.
Daniella thinks I’m so smart. But really, I’m only slightly more grown-up than her. I’m thirty-two, but I’ve been taken care of like a child for most of my adult life. Also controlled like one.
Did I even have what it took to survive in the real world? Much less raise a kid?
“Knock-knock! Coming in!” Amber calls out right before she and Luca enter through the guesthouse’s front door.
“Mom! Dad!” Daniella goes running to them and throws her arms around her parents’ waists like she hadn’t seen them in forever, even though Amber, me, and her little brother all had breakfast together before Amber left to confront Victor.
“Hey, kid! What’s what?” Luca says. He hugs her back, obviously just as happy to see her as she is him. “What are you doing over here? I thought you and Lucky were supposed to go to the park.”
“I don’t want to go to the park. The park is for babies,” Daniella answers him like Six-Year-Olds Now Too Old To Play At The Park was the headline story on this morning’s news. “And Mrs. Dawn said I could play with her until Lucky and Jenna get back. We drew lots of pictures, and she showed me her flipbook she made of Lucky and me. It’s like a little cartoon movie but with pencils!”
“Just Dawn,” I insist to the little girl. Looking at her parents, I say, “I hope it’s okay that I let her stay here.”
“It’s completely okay,” Amber answers with a wave of her hand. “Thanks for keeping her.”
“It was my pleasure,” I assure Amber. “We had a lot of fun drawing.”